Guten Morgen Mr. Bush - 500 Beiträge pro Seite (Seite 42)

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A heavy toll on civilians
Innocent Iraqi citizens are caught in the crossfire between U.S. troops and insurgents
http://www.newsday.com/news/nationworld/world/ny-woiraq22393…

BY RAY SÁNCHEZ
STAFF WRITER

August 22, 2004

BAGHDAD, Iraq - Rasul Hadi Hrain, 4 years old, lies nearly immobile on a hospital bed in the sprawling slum of Sadr City, his body pockmarked with a half dozen bullet and shrapnel wounds. The shattered body of his father, Hadi, was removed from a downstairs morgue for burial yesterday.

Rasul cries at the mention of his father, and his mother, Whaida Abaid Khalaf, tries to comfort him, stroking his dark hair and whispering in his ear.

"I found Rasul cradled in his father`s arms," Khalaf, 37, said through an interpreter yesterday. "He threw his body over his son to save him."

The family lived as squatters in a building the Baathist militia abandoned after the fall of Saddam Hussein. The two-story structure sits on the edge of the impoverished Baghdad district, whose 2 million Shias make up more than a third of the capital`s population.

Fierce fighting around the revered Imam Ali shrine in the southern holy city of Najaf - which has subsided amid conciliation attempts by top clerics - coincided with the boldest American offensive yet in Sadr City. There, radical Shia cleric Muqtada al-Sadr`s recurrent insurrections against the Americans have given him a formidable base.

Tuesday night, Khalaf said, armored U.S military vehicles opened fire on the old militia headquarters her family and several others called home. It was unclear whether gunmen with al-Sadr`s Mahdi Army militia in the area had fired first.

"The Americans came to liberate us, but they hurt us more," said Khalaf, a small woman in a black, billowing abaya and Islamic headscarf.



Lists of killed and wounded

In the crowded Sadr City Hospital rooms, Iraqis said the bullets and explosions that daily take civilians` lives here represent the biggest threat to the fragile new government.

"Nothing is sadder than to live through this every day," said Suhaida Arnood, 30, a nurse. She opened her hospital`s clothbound registry the size of a phone book and counted the names: 37 women and 10 children wounded in the fighting this month alone.

Between Thursday and Friday, 77 people were killed and 70 injured in fighting in Najaf, according to the Iraqi health ministry. It was unclear how many were fighters and how many civilians. Officials said at least 13 more people were killed and 112 wounded in Baghdad, where fighting was concentrated in the slum once known as Saddam City - named for al-Sadr`s late father - the ultimate Mahdi Army stronghold.

Khalaf said four members of her family and a guest were sleeping on mats in a room that opened to a courtyard when gunfire erupted. She snatched their 15-day-old son, Hussein, and ran for cover. When the shooting stopped, her severely wounded husband was on the ground, shielding Rasul with his body. The family guest was dead. Hadi, 39, died Friday.

"They killed his father," his wife said, her son watching and listening.

The U.S. military has fought a number of heavy skirmishes with the Madhi Army here, losing a tank and a helicopter in recent nights. Scores of al Sadr loyalists have been killed. Patched-up holes along the main streets are still packed with improvised explosive devices (IEDs) aimed at coalition vehicles. Yesterday morning, as five Humvees roared across a busy street, a man waved at the American machine gunner seconds before an IED exploded, barely missing the last vehicle. Later, boys danced around the crater as if in celebration.



Girl, dad hurt; mother killed

Rasul shares his hospital room with another civilian casualty of the 16-month insurgency: Anmar Khalid, 8, who has hazel eyes and wispy blond hair. She was napping beside her mother, Suzan Adnan Latif, 34, at home on Monday at 4 p.m. when, relatives say, a rocket fired from an American plane or helicopter gunship pierced the lone window. But there are so many explosions one could never be sure how it really happened.

"She doesn`t know her mother is dead," whispered Anmar`s aunt, Hadia Latif Mohammed, 48. Nor does Anmar`s father, Khalid Raheem, 36, a photographer, who was critically wounded and lost an eye.

For days, Anmar could only drink water. She had surgery to remove a length of her intestines, torn by shrapnel. "I feel better," she said yesterday, eating a piece of fruit. "I`m not afraid."

Support for the cleric al-Sadr appears to be most fervent along the narrow, dusty streets and alleyways of Sadr City, where rivers of green sewage run down the gutters and heaps of trash burn in the night.

Few residents criticize the militiamen who take up positions behind homes and on rooftops, forcing coalition troops to fire in the direction of civilians. Some people said they were growing tired of the Madhi army, whose strike-and-run tactics left them vulnerable to heavy U.S. assaults.

"What is the reason for this?" asked Hesna Sila, 70, who was wounded when she ran from the house to pull her son from crossfire the other day. "We suffered for years under Saddam. Our sons were in jails. Now they die in the streets."

Copyright © 2004, Newsday, Inc.

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Informed Comment
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Thoughts on the Middle East, History,and Religion
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Juan Cole is Professor of History at the University of Michigan

Sunday, August 22, 2004

Continued Violence in Iraq


Major violence wracked Najaf again on Saturday. Mahdi militiamen launched mortar shells at US military positions, and they fired back, starting a battle that lasted for about 45 minutes. AC-130s fired their canons at Mahdi Army positions in the sacred Valley of Peace cemetery near the holy shrine of Ali.

There did not actually seem to be much progress in the supposed turning over of the Shrine of Ali to representatives of Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani. They insisted that the Mahdi Army fighters vacate the shrine first. The latter seem to have no intention of actually leaving in greater numbers than they already have. Al-Jazeerah says that one of Muqtada`s spokesmen said that even after the "handover," the Mahdi Army fighters expected to continue to "guard" the shrine.

Comparing the al-Hayat account with the Los Angeles Times article by David Holley and Edmund Sanders (Sanders is embedded in Najaf) shows the difference in information and sensibility between what is reported in the Western press and what appears in Arabic.

Al-Hayat writes that "the fighting extended to Kufa, where American missiles struck the historic Mosque of Maytham al-Tammar, destroying part of it."
"
The LA Times story says:


` Earlier in the morning, several hundred Marines swarmed a complex of buildings in Kufa, about 500 yards west of the main Kufa Mosque, which military officials suspect that al-Sadr`s militia is using. After a heavy firefight, AC-130 warplanes bombed the buildings in a series of loud explosions heard for miles.

Later, U.S. troops raided the main Kufa police station and detained about 29 Iraqis found in a basement. Some of the men claimed they were being held prisoner by al-Sadr`s forces. `



The American report says nothing about damage to the Maytham Mosque. Najaf and Kufa are key sites of early Islam, and the religious structures in them are deeply meaningful to Shiites.

There was violence again all over Iraq, as there has been most recent days, though it has been overshadowed by the dramatic events in Najaf.

Guerrillas bombed and set afire an oil pipeline southwest of Basra. It had already been shut down because of Mahdi Army threats to target it in revenge for the assault on Muqtada`s men in Najaf.

An RPG attack on a US military vehicle killed one American soldier and wounded two others in Bahgdad. That brings the death toll of the US military in Iraq to 949.

Just outside the southern Shiite city of Hillah, guerrillas detonated a car bomb near a Polish military convoy, killing one Polish soldier and wounding six others.

The Gulf Daily lists several further incidents:

In Ramadi, guerrillas shot a senior policeman, Col. Saad Samir al-Dulaimi, to death as he left home.

Guerillas in Baquba detonated a roadside bomb, killing a peddler and wounding five garbagemen.

In Mosul, guerrillas exploded a roadside bomb, killing an Iraqi national guardsman and wounding two others, along with 3 civilians.

In Tall Afar, guerrillas fired on the home of the Mosul deputy governor, killing his nephew. The official and his son were wounded but in stable condition.

posted by Juan @ [url8/22/2004 06:26:29 AM]http://www.juancole.com/2004_08_01_juancole_archive.html#109315208590901109[/url]

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Bombed from the air, surrounded on the ground, this city still belongs to the Mehdi
By Donald Macintyre in the rebel stronghold

22 August 2004

Recovering from the loss of three fingers from his right hand, Abu Muqtada, as he called himself, was eager to get back to the fighting.

Hit by US machine-gun fire in Najaf`s large, hallowed and now badly damaged Wadi al-Salam cemetery a week ago, the 38-year-old Mehdi Army insurgent was relaxing, his hand bandaged, in the shade outside Kufa`s mosque, the second oldest in Iraq. "My hand is finished but the other is still working," he said. "We are still fighting, and we will not stop."

Kufa is no doubt a sensible place for one of Muqtada al-Sadr`s militants to convalesce. To visit this second holy city six miles to the north is to see what Najaf might be like if there were no American Abrams tanks or Bradley armoured vehicles surrounding and exchanging fire with the 1,000 or so Mehdi gunmen in the streets around the Imam Ali Shrine. Najaf is where the prophet`s son-in-law was buried; Kufa is where he lived and was stabbed in AD661 as he prayed in the mosque, martyred in the schism that created Shia Islam.

And it is totally in the control of the Mehdi Army, who patrol the streets with AK-47s, rocket launchers and light machine-guns, many of them with ammunition belts draped over their shoulders. One armed insurgent had even dragged a chair into the middle of the road to monitor the Saturday morning traffic.

There are fully manned Mehdi checkpoints inside the city, at one of which, close to the bridge over the Euphrates, another journalist and myself were briefly detained yesterday. With an armed escort of one car in front and two behind, we were taken for our press credentials to be pored over at the Kufa mosque, the Mehdi Army`s base. This is an entire town where the writ of American forces, let alone that of the Iraqi police, does not even begin to run.

But not for want of trying. Yesterday, US forces, using air bombardment as well as armoured vehicles, launched an attack on Mehdi strongholds in Kufa at what appears to be the cost of at least some US casualties. But as detention turned with welcoming smiles into interview opportunity, a local Mehdi commander, Abu Mohamed al-Hilu, told how his forces had lain in wait for the attack after seeing warplanes reconnoitring the area on Friday afternoon.

When the tanks and Humvees, which he said had been carrying heavy machine-guns, approached the Maitham Al-Tamar Mosque, "we let them come in until they were in the range of our weapons. With the shelling and bombardment they didn`t expect resistance. But suddenly we started shooting." Mr Hilu showed us the burnt-out and still-smouldering room in the empty courthouse opposite the mosque, into which he said US troops had fired a grenade before taking refuge there. In a smaller room beyond, he pointed to blood and unrecognisable gore, which he claimed was part of a brain. We were shown a captured torch, and what Mr Hilu said was one of several bloodstained and discarded US army boots. "The foot was inside," said one of his men, in a medic`s white coat. "We left it for the dogs." With only one side of the story, the Mehdi Army`s, it is hard to check out exactly what happened.

A large jagged hole in the wall of the Al-Tamar Mosque appeared to have been made by a tank shell. The buildings opposite were pockmarked with high-calibre machine-gun fire. And gaping holes in the roof and walls of the local college of economics by the Euphrates bridge, which the Mehdis say also came under aerial and ground bombardment early yesterday, showed all the signs of blast damage.

Perhaps this US advance, an attempt to broaden the front on which it is fighting to recover the region from the Mehdi Army, had been repelled. But could Mr Sadr win in Najaf against the world`s greatest military power? One of Mr Sadr`s senior political lieutenants, Sheikh Azhar al-Renani, scarcely hesitated before replying: "The Americans are fighting us with all their money and weapons. We are fighting with the power of God." And with the power of urban warfare.

While many of the guerrillas come from far across Iraq, they have extensive local knowledge, not least of the Najaf cemetery, which has been a key battleground over the past fortnight. It stretches north from the holy sites of the city - holy sites which remained firmly in the control of the Mehdi Army yesterday.

Just as on Thursday, the hundreds of pro-Sadr "human shields" in the courtyard of the shrine, its archways stunningly bedecked with blue, pink and yellow bird and flower patterns, were chanting slogans against the American-backed Prime Minister, Iyad Allawi, and telling their leader rapturously: "Your voice is like a cannon." They were chorusing yesterday for television: "We will win over Iyad Allawi and the traitors collaborating with the Americans." Some held banners that said: "Where is the bullet that will grant me martyrdom?"

It is hard, therefore, to explain Friday`s embarrassingly short-lived claim by the interim Interior Ministry that police had seized Najaf`s Imam Ali Shrine. Indeed, the instant dismissal by the Pentagon of a claim rendered absurd by the facts - "there`s not a lick of truth in it" - is a powerful illustration of who knows what is going on here militarily, and who doesn`t.

Much of the focus of the past 36 hours has been on when, and if, Mr Sadr`s forces will carry out their promise to hand over the keys of the shrine to the mainstream Shia clerics who answer to the most venerable in all Iraq, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani. But even this may be to exaggerate the importance of such a symbolic gesture. For what Kufa helps to illustrate is that even if formal control of the shrine fell into neutral hands, such an advance would hardly mean an end to the fighting. The guerrillas would still control the approaches, just as they control Najaf`s neighbour and sister city.

This doesn`t mean that civilians caught in the fighting all absolve Mr Sadr`s forces from blame. To try to thread your way to the holy sites through the densely populated, boarded-up streets of the old city is to experience for a few uncomfortable minutes what they are suffering every day. Bullets and shells make it unsafe to travel a single block.

Some see Mr Sadr as a heroic leader of resistance. But some also blame his gunmen for their suffering. Several said his Shia forces had been joined by former Baathists with little interest in the Shia cause. Whatever the truth, for the civilians of Najaf, a negotiated settlement cannot come soon enough.


22 August 2004 15:27


© 2004 Independent Digital (UK) Ltd

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Nach Meinung der FT scheint mit dem Army Report über die Foltervorwürfe in Abu Ghraib und anderswo einiges auf die Bush-Clique zuzukommen.

Army report to reignite furore over abuses in Iraq prison
By Joanna Chung in Washington
Published: August 21 2004 05:00 | Last updated: August 21 2004 05:00

http://news.ft.com/cms/s/5bb458d8-f30f-11d8-b848-00000e2511c…

The US treatment of its detainees is set to return to the centre of national political debate next week when a damaging new US army report is released to Congress. It is likely to show a level of complicity by top levels of the military in the prisoner abuse scandal at the Abu Ghraib prison near Baghdad.


The Washington Post reported yesterday that a US army investigation said abuses at the Abu Ghraib prison resulted from failures of leadership at the highest levels of US command, according to unnamed senior defence officials.

The report is expected to cast aside assertions by the White House and the Defense Department that abuses at Abu Ghraib were the fault solely of low-ranking soldiers who acted on their own initiative.

A combination of failures in leadership, lack of discipline, and absolute confusion at the prison led to the abuse, the Post reported. The report is likely to examine the role of Gen Ricardo Sanchez, who was replaced as the top commander in Iraq last month.

When the notorious photographs of US soldiers brutalising prisoners at Abu Ghraib emerged in May, they sparked public outrage and several high- profile hearings on Capitol Hill.

This investigation, led by Maj Gen George Fay, is expected to widen the scope of culpability from seven military policemen who have been charged with abuse to include nearly 20 low-ranking soldiers who could face criminal prosecution in military courts.

Four US soldiers charged with abusing Iraqi prisoners in Abu Ghraib prison are to attend pre-trial hearings at a US base in Germany on Monday.

The latest revelations are likely to be part of the discussion when Donald Rumsfeld, defence secretary, meets President George W. Bush in Crawford, Texas, on Monday.

During a heated presidential campaign Mr Bush has strived to convince an increasingly sceptical American public that invading Iraq was the right decision. But the findings, in addition to the US military commission proceedings at Guantánamo Bay which is to start next week, are likely to be a thorn in Mr Bush`s side in coming weeks.

Meanwhile, an American physician and bio-ethicist has contended, in an article published yesterday in The Lancet, a British medical journal, that doctors working in the US military in Iraq had collaborated with US interrogators in the abuse of detainees in Abu Ghraib prison. Steven Miles, a professor at the University of Minnesota, called for an official investigation into the role physicians and other medical staff may have played at the prison.

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Aug. 22, 2004. 08:41 AM

Trying to gauge the `Fox Factor`
Critics slam Fox News for toeing White House line. But do Americans expect more spin with their news?

TIM HARPER

WASHINGTON—As U.S. and Iraqi fighters surrounded Moqtada al-Sadr in Najaf last week, Fox News viewers were given three takes on what the Americans should do next.

Or, as Fox likes to put it, what the "good guys" should do about the "bad guys."

Over the afternoon, the foreign policy debate went something like this:

Retired U.S. Army Col. David Hunt told the cable network al-Sadr should be brought out "on a plate."

Bernard Kerik, a former New York City police commissioner and an adviser to the Bush campaign, said: "I think it`s time, he`s got to be taken out."

Retired Maj.-Gen. Robert Scales: "He`s simply got to go down."

Fox did bring on Michael O`Hanlon, a respected analyst at the non-partisan Brookings Institution to discuss al-Sadr and all interviewers did acknowledge that the U.S. military mustn`t storm a holy shrine.

But was it the "Fair and Balanced" coverage that the Fox slogan promises?

No, says a growing legion of critics that condemns the network for parroting Republican ideology, waving the flag and glorifying American military might.

It is a view that has gained increasing currency with the surprising popularity of Outfoxed, filmmaker Robert Greenwald`s detailed look at Fox`s slavish adherence to the White House line.

Democrats have seized on the issue, with members of Congress demanding that Rupert Murdoch, chair of the network`s parent company, abandon a campaign of "improving the president`s standing with the American people on the basis of not news, but disinformation."

The right-wing network that has learned that, as a former producer says, "there is money in the flag," is under unprecedented attack.

But with a multiplicity of news sources available during this election season, some observers suggest that more and more Americans want — even expect — their news with a spin.

Instead of the oft-cited Red (Republican) and Blue (Democrat) states, they say, the country is really breaking down into adherents to Red and Blue media.

The left in this country has author/comedians Al Franken and Bill Maher and filmmaker/ author Michael Moore of Fahrenheit 9/11 fame. The right counters with a lineup that includes the Fox mainstays, Rush Limbaugh and a stable of other radio ranters. And rarely do these two solitudes interact.

With the presidential election a mere 10 weeks away, switching the channel may be too easy because some believe there is a "Fox Factor" lurking in this campaign.

The Pew Research Centre, in a major poll released last week, found that, for the first time since the Vietnam War era, foreign affairs and national security issues have emerged as two factors that could decide the race between incumbent George W. Bush and Democratic challenger John Kerry.

However, a poll published last fall found that 33 per cent of respondents who used Fox as their prime news source believed the U.S. had found weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. Sixty-six per cent believed Saddam Hussein had ties to Al Qaeda and had a hand in the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

Of those who said their prime news source was the moderate National Public Radio network, only 11 per cent said last autumn they believed weapons of mass destruction had been found and 16 per cent believed Saddam was linked to Al Qaeda.

"You`d be amazed how many Fox viewers think Saddam was flying one of the planes that morning," says Ed Wasserman, a professor of journalistic ethics at Washington and Lee University in Lexington, Va.

"Those numbers are horrifying. The use of facts on the network is so corrupt that, on the central issues of the day, viewers are being deceived.



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`It is not that difficult for people to get
a reasonable view of the world . . .`
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Andrew Kohut, Pew Research Centre director
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"Now, if you talk to Fox journalists, they will tell you they never reported any of those things. But whatever category the Bush White House wants to put their initiatives in, that`s the way the network reports them.

"Their reports from Iraq still use the logo `War on Terror.`"

Andrew Kohut, director of the Pew Research Centre, says any argument that Americans are more or less ill-informed on electoral matters than in the past is "specious."

Says Kohut: "There is more partisanship in the media than in the past, but people still say they want objectivity and not spin.

"It is not that difficult for people to get a reasonable view of the world, because there are more sources of news."

Kohut also says the stakes are so high in this election that more Americans are making the effort to become informed.

Still, his polling also indicates that Republicans, predisposed to believe what they hear on Fox, increasingly turn to that network for their news, while Democrats increasingly turn to CNN.

(Fox has higher ratings when viewership is measured at any point during the day, but CNN has more total viewers on any given day. In the crucial Sunday talk-show arena, Fox places behind NBC, CBS and ABC. It had 1.64 million viewers last Sunday, compared with the 4.28 million who watched Tim Russert on NBC`s Meet The Press.)

A Pew study released in June found that respondents calling themselves conservatives turned to local news (66 per cent), their daily newspaper (61 per cent) and Fox (41 per cent).

Those identifying themselves as liberals got their information and analysis from daily newspapers (56 per cent), local TV news (54 per cent), network evening news (36 per cent), National Public Radio (33 per cent) and CNN (30 per cent).

In another sign that much of the media are preaching to the converted, the Pew study found that 20 per cent of conservatives get their political news from religious radio shows, compared with 7 per cent of liberals.

Twenty-one per cent of conservatives relied on combative conservative Bill O`Reilly of Fox (The O`Reilly Factor), compared with 2 per cent of liberals.

Conversely, 14 per cent of liberals sought information from the Comedy Channel`s satiric Daily Show With Jon Stewart, compared with 2 per cent of conservatives.

Last Thursday, a little slice of Fox (the network that O`Reilly says Ottawa is afraid to allow into Canada) included these highlights:

Analyzing the situation under a "So long Sadr?" logo, retired Col. Hunt told viewers that, if Iran had anything to do with the Najaf standoff, U.S. officials should fly over to Tehran, show them a little videotape of "Shock and Awe" and ask them whether they "wanted a piece of this."

However, he went on to say that he was not advocating an invasion of Iran.

Empty seats at the Athens Olympics indicated that Osama bin Laden must be smiling somewhere because he had scared tourists away from Greece, said host Neil Cavuto.

Howard Safir, another former New York City police commissioner, said he thought another terrorist attack would help Democrats because terrorists believe the Democrats would be softer on them and "I happen to agree with the terrorists."

A discussion on the FBI allegedly harassing protesters in advance of next week`s Republican convention in New York featured author Michelle Malkin (whose most recent book, In Defence Of Internment, defends the wartime rounding-up of Japanese-Americans) excoriating the "whiners on the left" from the American Civil Liberties Union and the New York Times.

No "whiners" were there to defend themselves, but host John Gibbons said he thought it would be a good idea if the FBI was tricking protesters into promising not to assemble on the New York streets, then arresting them if they showed up.

To be fair, the network`s reporting on the advertising controversy over Kerry`s Vietnam service record was largely even-handed, even though a Kerry`s spokesperson, Stephanie Cutter, told the Washington Post the campaign received calls from concerned war veterans every time one of Kerry`s critics popped up on Fox last week.

Last month, Fox News catapulted itself back into controversy with its coverage of the Democratic convention, which largely consisted commentators talking over speeches and engineering confrontations with left-wing opponents.

The network has promised "No Spin" coverage of next week`s Republican gathering.

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PORTLAND, OR (IWR News Parody) - President Bush today denied that he is connected to the controversial phony Swift Boat Veterans ads even after a member of his campaign staff was fired for being linked to t…. Bush also denied the charges that he is the [url`King of Douche Bags`.]http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/editorials/articles/2004/08/22/big_lies_for_bush

"Shoot, I`m not the King of Douche Bags that`s Karl Rove`s job. Maybe I`m the Prince or perhaps the Duke of the Douche Bags, but definitely not the king," said Mr. Bush.
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Iraq Pipeline Watch

Attacks on Iraqi pipelines, oil installations, and oil personnel:
Note: Permanent URL for this page is http://www.iags.org/iraqpipelinewatch.htm

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87. August 3 - explosion about 75 miles (120 km) west of Kirkuk at Al-Fateha on critical pipeline juncture caused a huge fire and road closure between the Beiji refineries and Kirkuk and halted exports through the northern pipeline to Ceyhan.
88. August 5 - bomb on oil pipeline in Kirkuk area found by Northern Oil Company security personnel exploded as Task Force Danger troops were investigating it. No injuries.
89. August 5 - blast on the Kirkuk to Ceyhan oil pipeline sparked a fire that was swiftly contained since oil flow was halted on the pipeline as a result of the Aug. 3 attack.
90. August 5 - attack sparked fire on gas pipeline that feeds both the Bayji power station and a propane factory in Taji 12 miles (20 km) north of Baghdad. Northern Oil Company`s gas division director, Honer Najib, said "Firefighters are trying to contain the blaze but the sabotage is going to effect the production of electricity in Iraq."
91. August 9 - attack halted oil flow on the major pipeline that feeds the southern terminals, reducing exports from 1.9 mbd to the about 1 mbd, fed through the smaller 42-inch pipeline.
92. August 14 - attack on domestic oil pipeline near the town of Mussayyib south of Baghdad sparked fire, and has caused shortages in the domestic supply of gasoline.
93. August 15 - rocket-propelled grenades were fired on an oil well 25 miles (40 km) east of the southern town of Amarah setting it ablaze.
94. August 18 - Northern Iraqi oil company security officer was killed and 2 others wounded 6 miles (10 km) from Kirkuk.
95. August 19 - attackers inflitrated the Basra headquarters of the Iraqi Southern Oil Company setting a fire that obliterated warehouses containing drilling equipment, among other items, spread to the firm`s offices, and cut electricity. "They came in droves, surrounded the building and looted it before setting it on fire," said a company official. Firefighters arriving at the compound were shot at and fled.
96. August 20 - attack apparently perpetuated by al-Sadr loyalists sparked fire on pipeline through which oil flows from the Bezergan oil field in the south to a refinery in Amarah, 180 miles (290 km) southeast of Baghdad.
97. August 20 - explosion at 8:30am on domestic pipeline through which oil flows from Kirkuk to Baiji refinery at point 19 miles (30 km) west of Kirkuk.
98. August 21 - blast near pipeline valve at Berjisiya, 20 miles (32 km) southwest of Basra, sparks fire on oil pipeline connecting the Rumeila oilfields with export storage tanks in the Faw peninsula. Another bomb was found nearby and defused. The pipeline was shut for a week due to sabotage threats. Lt. Mohammed al-Mousawi of the Iraqi National Guard explained "The aim behind attack is to damage the pipeline in case it is turned on again."

Note: Permanent URL for this page is http://www.iags.org/iraqpipelinewatch.htm

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But they turned into nigger-lovers
so I bailed and turned Republican
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Das ist die Geschichte von Karl Rove, der grauen Emminenz hinter Bush, dann auch die Geschichte über Bush und das Buch über Bush "Fortunate Son", dessen Autor, J.H. Hatfield, eine zwielichtige Figur, hi died of an alleged suicide in July 2001 mit der Behauptung kam Bush wäre wegen Kokainbesitz im Gefängnis gewesen. Interview:
http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=03/08/11/1447218
Dann noch zwei Links am Ende des Postings `Bush und Bin Laden` und noch ein Hartfield-Interview mit CBS.

George Bush`s Brain
http://sanderhicks.com/bushbrain.html
by Sander Hicks

originally published by Heads Magazine, Toronto


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Karl Rove, America`s top kingmaker is a college drop-out, a former consultant to big tobacco giant Philip Morris, a self-taught historian and George W. Bush`s brain. He doesn`t blink. He doesn`t hesitate before the kill. If not for Rove, and if not for his ruthlessness, the hapless preppie George W. Bush would not be in the White House today.

Rove is a burly, folksy character. During the primary season, he persistently took control of television discussions. When challenged by the McCain camp on his unethical campaigning, Rove turned the tables. Piece by piece, week after week, he took apart John McCain in the media, and then went on television and shifted the blame onto McCain`s staff. Soon, the public was left with an image of McCain as as hot-tempered, war-damaged veteran. McCain`s underdog groundswell for a campaign finance reform was scuttled by Karl Rove.

A HISTORY of DIRTY TRICKS

Karl Rove got his start in politics when he ran for president of the College Republicans, and met Lee Atwater in 1972. Shortly afterward Rove was investigated by the Republican National Committee for teaching political campaign "dirty tricks" to college students. Young George W. Bush worked with Atwater and Rove to create the Willie Horton scandal that scuttled Dukakis in 1988. After Atwater died of brain cancer, Rove and Bush went on to blindside the popular Democratic incumbent Ann Richards in the 1994 Texas governor`s race. Rove carried on the strategy from Atwater: scare-tactics, shocking TV ads and personal attacks. Rove minimized Bush`s public appearances and limited the spontaneous public speaking of the tongue-tied Bush, a tactic Rove reprised in the recent race for President. Rove used Governor Bush`s re-election campaign in 1998 as an opportunity to launch Bush`s White House career. Democrat Gary Mauro was a weak target, but Rove needed a landslide to create the impression of a racially-diverse, popular mandate. He and Bush campaigned hard to decimate an already weak opponent and win the support of minorities usually hostile to the right wing agenda.

Rove claimed that Bush`s popularity among Latinos was proof that a Compassionate Conservative could "erase the gender gap, open the doors of the Republican Party to new faces and new voices, and win without sacrificing principles." Bush won almost 50% of all Hispanic votes, according to his own "fuzzy math."

The Bush machine trumpeted that Bush had created "political history," with 49% of the Hispanic vote, and 27% of the black vote, citing the exit poll conducted by Voter News Service of New York. However, a co-designer of the Voter News Service survey, political scientist Bob Stein, said that the actual data on Bush`s Hispanic vote was somewhere between "the high 30s and low 40s." He said Bush`s percentage among black voters was probably in the low 20s. The Willie Velasquez Institute in San Antonio`s exit poll showed Bush got 39%, and a local El Paso poll, conducted by a professor at the University of Texas, showed Bush with 37% of Hispanic voters. When the Ft. Worth Star-Telegram called the Bush campaign with questions about this discrepancy, they were referred to the "governor`s consultant," Karl Rove. The paper glumly stated, "Attempts to reach Rove were unsuccessful."



Compassionate Communist

At what point did the Republicans change from being the starched old white men of golf courses and martinis to the merciless, tech-savvy, media manipulators? After eight years of Bill Clinton, the Republicans were eager for blood, and a change in tactics was badly needed. For Campaign 2000, Marxist-turned-Reaganite David Horowitz handed the Republicans a little book called The Art of Political War, which claimed that the Left had a monopoly on strategy, aggression and tactics. The Republican Party would not reclaim the White House until they crushed their opponent with the mercilessness of total war. Rove adopted the book as his own political Bible.

Horowitz wrote The Art of Political War to call on Republicans to create a politics that appealed to the masses: the working families, gays, unions, etc. Karl Rove praised The Art of Political War as indispensible and provided the cover blurb. ("A perfect pocket guide to winning on the political battlefield"-Karl Rove") It is recognized today as the genesis of "Compassionate Conservatism" and is used nation-wide by the Republican Party Chairs in 32 states. Horowitz took what he learned in the late sixties, and put it in the service of the same people he once referred to as "pigs." [footnote: Radical Son, pp. TK also, for legalization advocates: note that as recently as this 1997 memoir, Horowitz recalls his brief use of cannabis in the late 60`s as "the experience was seductive-but I remained skittish."] Certain fundamentals of Horowitz`s politics have remained the same througout his time: politics is war by other means, and one thing you can rely on in America is that people tend to root for the underdog. But since only 10% of the country identifies themselves as "hard Republicans," Horowitz realized that the right-wing agenda would be unpalatable to the majority, unless it was wrapped in a different package.

Compassionate Conservatism was born, a new brand indentity for the intolerance, fear and hate of the right-wing. Karl Rove became the salesman and Bush was the fun and fuzzy mascot. Rove is the perfect salesman: a ballsy top dog who swaggers like the old Texan he is. He used the language of the people to promote his candidate with maximum aggression. He understood that the agenda was to promote inclusiveness, and openness, at least until the White House is taken.

Karl Rove is known for discipline and hard-right ideological rigor. Yet, he is also known to burst spontaneously into song. Like Bush, he speaks in the common tongue. On the television discussions of the campaign, he would taunt his McCainite opponents, calling them "Man." His salty use of late 60`s youth culture slang obscures the fact that he`s a leading conservative. He shrinks at the dynamism and inclusive energy of modern thought. When asked what political writers he is most influenced by, he states Myron Magnet, Gertrude Himmelfarb, and James Q. Wilson. Over the course of the campaign, George W. Bush also made somewhat dubious claims to have read Myron Magnet. But was this just a rote answer handed him by his senior advisor?

Magnet, in his book, The Dream and the Nightmare, states that the late 60`s counterculture was a huge social disaster because it set a bad example for the underclass. The hippies encouraged indulgence and laziness instead of the virtues of hard work and competition. Yet, Bush doesn`t seem to have the same harsh memories of the 60`s. On Newshour with Jim Lehrer on April, 27th, 2000, Bush seemed to not quite understand what Magnet could have been talking about. Bush spoke about "responsible behavior" being the legacy and the political consciousness of the 60`s. As Mark Crispin Miller points out in his excellent The Bush Dyslexicon: Observations on a National Disorder (coming out this June from Norton), Bush stated, "I`m a strong candidate because I come from the baby boomer generation recognizing that we`ve got to usher in an era of responsible behavior."

Mark Crispin Miller writes "that inversion of the Myron Magnet thesis was the opposite of what Bush had meant to say-and what he did say all the time." Perhaps. Or perhaps Bush`s memories of the 60`s were a lot of pot and cocaine, so much so that a theory based on hate just didn`t compare.

for more on David Horowitz, see Sanderhicks.com`s confrontat…



FORTUNATE FELONIES

When the media stumbled upon a story regarding George W. Bush`s 1972 cocaine possession arrest, Rove had to find a way to kill the story. He did so by destroying the messenger.

Pop culture biographer J.H. Hatfield was on hand, traveling in and out of Texas at the time, interviewing Rove and other Bush aides to research the premier Bush biography "Lone Star Rising." The book that was later titled Fortunate Son: George W. Bush and the Making of an American President, a more critical title that reflects its turbulent publishing history. One of Hatfield`s acquaintances and primary sources was longtime Bush friend and schoolmate, Clay Johnson, a longtime Dallas businessman. When Hatfield was convicted of a felony in the late 80`s, it’s likely Johnson learned of it. When Hatfield approached them to research Bush, the Bush campaign already had the upper hand by knowing Hatfield’s felony record: a perfect way to discredit all stories of Bush`s drug past. In October 1999, St. Martin`s published Fortunate Son amidst a lot of buzz and hope of positive attention from major media. However, St. Martin`s was hit with a one-two punch. First, the New York Times refused to give the book the coverage St. Martin’s was counting on. So, St. Martin`s dragged Hatfield into a meeting and leaned on him to reveal the confidential Bush campaign sources that told him the cocaine story. Fearing retribution, and honoring his journalistic code, Hatfield refused. Then, St. Martin`s learned that the Dallas Morning News was about to break news about Hatfield`s felony record. The Bush Campaign began to publicly make legal threats against the book, and the media uproar about Hatfield`s felony record killed the book, and the cocaine story.

More than 70,000 copies of Fortunate Son were withdrawan. "They`re heat! Furnace fodder!" snapped the vitriolic St. Martin`s Vice President Sally J. Richardson. The media focus shifted from reporting on Hatfield`s Bush story to loud, loose talk about Hatfield`s felony. The major media tended to sing the same chorus: "How ironic, this Hatfield character who was involved in a dirty plot to kill his boss in 1987 is trying to verify these rumors about young Bush being arrested for cocaine possession in 1972. But this story couldn`t be true, of course, since Hatfield`s a criminal...right?"

I borrowed one of the rare, repossessed copies of the book from a friend and read it on a bus trip. I traveled with a pack of sticky notes and hit every page with something relevant and newsworthy and under-reported about Bush’s past. Pretty soon, the book overflowed with the edges of sticky notes poking out like the feathers of a peacock. Bush dodged the draft, was a C student at Yale, lost a lot of other people`s money in boom times in the Texas Oil market, was investigated by the S.E.C. for insider trading. What a garish life of special favors, what a clear colorful pattern of cut corners, what blurry values. I came back to New York and maneuvered my company, Soft Skull Press, Inc. to step in and acquire the rights to the book.

Meanwhile, Hatfield was in hiding. The tabloids were after him. Camera crews camped on his front lawn for two weeks. The phone rang off the hook. They all wanted to know who the confidential sources were who fed him the story, but Hatfield stuck to his journalist code. His sources were confidential. They had talked to him under condition of anonyminity. But J.H. Hatfield, our man in Arkansas, was coming to New York.

Two months after the bloody October of Hatfield’s public destruction, it was a crisp sunny winter day in New York City. Although Hatfield had the flu, he taped his portion of 60 Minutes early in the morning, and I went in later. Leslie Stahl, the elegant host of the program, had pointedly asked me on tape if I knew the sources. I said no, but that Hatfield had promised to reveal them to me.

After the taping, we walked through the Lower East Side. I had taken Hatfield and his lawyer, and my coworker to lunch at a Chinese restaurant. I needed to hold Jim Hatfield to his promise to share the sources with me; I needed to see the phone and travel records. I needed to know the whole thing wasn`t a big sick joke. I needed to be 100% sure. My gut had me already believing in Jim Hatfield. He believed in what we were doing. He stood behind all his research. He admired me for making a maverick decision, and attempting to redeem his battered book.

Hatfield stopped on the corner of Ludlow and Rivington and turned to me in the bright light. His hands were stuffed deep into the pockets of his Navy peacoat. He looked tired, but determined. He looked down the street.

"You`ve got to take this information with you to your grave. You`ve got to swear."

I swore not to repeat it to anyone. I also knew that the truth is bigger than one person. We would both choose to reveal the sources publicly when the time was right, when we had no other choice. When we no longer had anything left to lose.

"The Eufaula Connection? That was Karl Rove. The other top Bush advisor was Clay Johnson. The Bush confidante, was his minister, Mayfield. Now you know. Remember, you’ve got to swear now...."



THE RACE IS NOT TO THE SWIFT

By February 2000, McCain was gaining on Bush in terms of charisma, message and experience. His promises of campaign finance reform struck a chord nationwide, and on the first of February, 2000, he blew Bush away in the New Hampshire primary. McCain defeated the New York Republican Party establishment in the courts, and forced the Bush-loyal party bosses to put him on the ballot for the upcoming New York primary. Bush appeared at the rightwing Bob Jones University, in an attempt to get his campaign back on track by appealling to the party`s extreme right. Showing his true colors as a politician, McCain`s campaign desperately phoned Catholic voters with a recorded message that implied Bush was anti-Catholic by association with the pope-haters at Bob Jones University.

Depite his acrimony on television, Rove knew that McCain`s manueveurs were the desperate acts of a campaign in its death throes: Bush would sweep all major primaries from here on in, and take the Republican Nomination in July. By the end of February, Rove was homing in on Gore. By the end of February, New Hampshire was in the distant past. Rumors were circulating (from who knows where?) that McCain was a bit crazy and had a bad temper from being a P.O.W. in Viet Nam.

Al Gore clearly had Bush beat on experience, intelligence and gravitas. While Bush had lost $371 million of other people`s money in bad investments and bankrupt oil companies, Gore had served as a Senator and later a Vice President. While Texas had the worst air pollution of any state, Gore was a moderate interested in developing new energy alternatives. Part of Rove`s strategy was to trip the cumbersome Gore up on petty questions about Gore`s minor factual errors. Instead of attacking Bush, Gore spent time countering minor barbs about whether he had lied in statements about inventing the Internet or attending a Texas fire disaster site. Perhaps this shows that Gore didn`t have as shrewd a top strategist. While the Democrats watched polls and tried to create a likeable, casual personality for their stiff candidate, Rove kept harping on Gore`s for being "a serial exaggerator" and kept Gore in the stereotype of an uncoordinated egghead. On October 8 with both campaigns slinging mud feverishly, Rove went on NBC`s "Meet the Press," and accused Gore of being "a man who has difficulty telling the truth. He constantly exaggerates and embellishes."

Rove`s strategy of disinformation follows the pattern set by all masters of public opinion of the 20th Century. Rove is the kingmaker. He is the man behind the man. Today, he works in the White House, in a job invented just for him: the Office of Strategic Initiatives. What does that mean? It means anything Mr. Rove wants it to mean.

Copyright 2000 Burrelle`s Information Services
Posted here under provisions of fair use.

CBS News Transcripts

SHOW: 60 MINUTES (7:00 PM ET)

February 13, 2000, Sunday

http://www.sanderhicks.com/60min.html

Transcript from "The Fifth Estate"
Broadcast Wednesday October 29, 2003

BILL WHITE `LINK BETWEEN THE BUSHES ON ONE SIDE AND THE BIN LADEN’S IN SAUDI.`

Interviewed by: Bob McKeown

© CBC Canadian Broadcasting Corporation

http://sanderhicks.com/billwhite.html

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From AxisofLogic.com

Palestine
The Untermensch Syndrome
By Manuel Valenzuela
Aug 22, 2004, 00:38


The labeling as anti-Semitic of anyone critical of the state of Israel’s policies in the continued destruction of Palestinian identity and the increasing domination into American foreign policy no longer has the sting of threat or intimidation it once mastered. For too long this masquerade has been used to silence those opposing anything Israel, shouted at anyone disseminating truth and seeking justice. Like the boy who cried wolf, this charade has lost its power or hypnotic control, and today only serves to breed more anger and resentment against the apologists and smear mongers protecting the cancerous tentacles of Zionism and the crimes against humanity it spawns.



A once powerful marketing tool used to sequester valid criticism and deny truth to millions has been eroded thanks to its overlords’ continued over abuse and labeling of the term ‘anti-Semite’ to anyone even remotely critical of anything associated with Israel and the tentacles of Zionism. To criticize Christianity does not make one anti-Christian. To criticize Islam does not make one anti-Muslim or anti-Arab, just as uncovering truths about the Bush administration does not make one anti-American or unpatriotic. To speak truth about any government in the world does not make us racist or xenophobic to the people of that nation. Why then should criticism of Israeli and/or Sharon’s policies subject us to false labeling and acts of intimidation whose only purpose is to silence truth into submission and hijacking justice from ever emerging and being served?



The time has come to stop bending over to the dictates of intimidation and scare tactics used by Israel’s protectors, defenders and apologists. The time has come to say “Never Again” to such fictional libel and slander whose only purpose is the continued subjugation of truth and awakening. The labeling of “anti-Semite” does not bother us, nor does it stop us from writing truth to justice and reality to intimidation because we refuse to be frightened into submission and silenced into acquiescence by a mechanism we know to be false.



Our convictions, search for truth and want for justice supercedes the trash invented to protect the malfeasance ruining humanity and the crimes perpetrated against our fellow human beings. The time has come to stand up and be heard, refusing to believe the smears and the labels, instead living life in truth, devoid of veiled threats and intimidation tactics whose power over us continues to erode thanks to its incessant overuse and abuse. So smear if you must, defenders, appeasers and apologists of human wickedness, continue to blindly believe in the majesty of a fiction you know to be false, ensuring your daily complicity in the crimes against humanity being committed by those you protect and defend.



We are above your labels, above your intimidation and smear tactics, following the path of truth in the voice of our writings and in the convictions of humanity. If pursuing truth, fighting criminality and awakening justice makes us anti-Semites, then guilty we are. If seeing the dehumanization, exploitation and utter destruction of the Palestinian people makes the voices of reason anti-Semitic, then guilty we stand. To defend the humanity of other Semitic people is to defend humanity itself. To speak out against injustice and dehumanization makes us human, to defend it makes you complicit.







An Unbearable Likeness of Being





Here we are, living in the first decade of the 21st century, and still the violent animal in the human condition exists, thriving inside our carnal passions and still primitive mammalian brains, oozing out of humanity to release the demons of evil that only homo sapiens are capable of wielding.



Persisting in our primate selves as it has for millions of years, the greatest symptom of our disease remains uncontrolled, dominating the far reaches of man’s Earth, turning barren once fertile soil and forever despoiling the utter beauty our civilization possesses. Man killing man, erupting violence upon our fellow humans, destroying what our own hands create, decimating energy and beauty, life and opportunity, this is the story of what our species has become. Through tribal affiliation and identity, which the nation state now is, (a tribe on steroids) the potency of violence and ill-treatment against others seen as different or alien is manifested.



The human condition dictates that auras of superiority appear with every tribe. What is nationalism today but a belief that our tribe is the best in the world, that the group of humans we are attached to in unity, be it of ethnic, racial, religious or regional (nation state) parameters, is the preeminent assembly of all humanity? Beliefs of supremacy of one’s tribe and inferiority of others have marked man from the very first cluster of family clans. In order to achieve this most human psychological need, other subgroups have to be considered lower in stature, considered third-world, savages, barbarians and lesser humans, while others must be conquered and subjugated.



In the minds of those groups seeking to invade, conquer, pilfer and exploit, the invaded and conquered must be seen as sub-human, creatures not worthy of protection or life. The human mind, in order to justify the ruthlessness it will inflict on less able peoples, creates the impression that those now controlled are sub-humans and therefore not immune to the restrictions of human morality. Sub-humans are not humans, after all, and can be treated like animals or worse, like dirt.



The Nazi ideology of placing its Aryan blood above all others, believing its Germanic peoples the pinnacle of civilization, reflects a perverted mass psychosis brought on by a malevolent leader and a hypnotized tribe – namely Germany. In the delusional world of the Nazis, Jews, Gypsies and Slavs were considered inferior. These peoples were labeled ‘untermensch,’ the German word for sub-human. As such, labels became reality and reality became a holocaust, resulting in millions of deaths and untold levels of suffering. When a group of people like the Nazis begin to believe in the sub-human label they propel, the group afflicted becomes the equivalent of animals, free to be killed, tortured and dehumanized, free to be robbed of freedom, opportunity and happiness.



The Nazis, however, are not alone in exacerbating this phenomenon. On the contrary, it has been as pronounced in human history as advancements in technology. As long as there have been competing tribes the concept of untermensch has existed, released over and over through centuries and millennia. No nation or culture is immune; no epoch is innocent. With every war, invasion, occupation, domination, enslavement, oppression, exploitation, genocide and ethnic cleansing that has marked human time on Earth untermensch has been implemented, used by the powerful to justify the crimes, rapes, murders and dehumanization inflicted upon innocent fellow human beings. Untermensch is the tool used by the human brain that grants man the power to destroy humanity and all its virtues while inflicting untold levels of misery onto men, women and children without the interference or burden of human guilt, laws, theology, morality or righteousness getting in the way.



Yet our minds cannot fathom the long reaches of a history marked by incessant war, death and violence. Understanding the constructs of time and space are not talents we have evolved. Grasping the enormity of the passage of time, with the rise and fall of tribes, clans, city states and empires, the evolution of human society and spirituality from cave to metropolis, the genetic altering and evolution of diversity coming together and adding to the human spectrum, and the conquests, genocides and environmental changes created by our ancestors is not a skill endowed into our primate brains, and thus the enormous jigsaw puzzle that is human history remains a mystery. We can barely put together the pieces of our own eighty year existence on the planet, even as it is a puzzle that we experience first hand. How then are we to fathom hundreds of thousands of years of modern human existence, generation upon generation, century after century?



In an existence estimated at five million years, from primates living in trees to the dawn of living in one-hundred story skyscrapers, man has not deviated from our mammal selves. Our passions, emotions and behaviors yield to the animal inside us, and throughout our existence it has come out again and again to unleash terror on our unsuspecting species. For millions of years our species has consisted of one continuous epoch of aggression against each other, with periods of calm in between, – controlled at the individual level but becoming an unleashed monster at the tribal – destroying all we have achieved and the beauty inherent in our existence. Mammals we are, and mammals we will remain, yet the ego of our existence and the theology of our beliefs will not let us awake to our greatest truth.



Humankind’s greatest demon is also our greatest threat, condemning us to continue a long history of self-inflicted war, death, suffering and subjugation. In this quandary we find ourselves trapped in, much like every generation that has come before, and, if we fail to learn and evolve, every generation that has yet to come. The worst of humanity opens the books of history once more, and in Iraq and Palestine we find what has been, what is, and what will become. The Reign of Terror upon ourselves continues the slow erosion of our existence along the inevitable path of self-destruction we traverse.



Is it any wonder that the virus attached to us since we left the jungles of east Africa keeps reappearing again and again, stomping its seal of death, violence and misery on the face of human civilization, especially when we punish our own kind with the tools of despair, suffering and dehumanization? Can we expect the microscopic reign of modern man to purge an evil that primitive man could not exorcise in hundreds of thousands of years?



Untermensch is part of the disease we possess, or rather possesses us, attached to the constructs of fear and hatred, ignorance and superiority, emboldened by the tribe or nation state. The mega-tribes of today only serve to strengthen and release the fury of human evil onto those less fortunate. It is a syndrome that, until now, has yet to be contained. Its vicious mechanisms erode the basic foundations of humankind, birthing suffering and human destruction, both in spirit and in life, rendering all six billion of us less human every day. Into the depths we descend, living the misery of Iraqis and Palestinians, feeling the pain that the powerful inflict on the weak, losing energy with each drop of blood that is shed and cowering in shame with each act of decaying dehumanization.



The Untermensch Syndrome is alive and well, resilient as ever, surviving as long as humans exist, thriving off our own shortcomings, evolving with each passing generation and festering once more to infect yet one more amalgam of human tribes from which enlightenment seems never to arrive.





Unholy Land





In the land claimed holy and promised the madness of humankind persists, extending the perpetual violence and oppression of the weak by the powerful. Palestine today tells a story of human evils past and present, of the worst actions capable of being manifested by the human phenomenon. Lands ancient and strategic, crossroads and focal points of man’s brief history, once more seem engulfed by competing claims and boiling hatreds.



Malevolent crimes against humanity, those activities that repulse and anger, are methodically being perpetrated against peoples who have been raped of all their ancestors once possessed. Atrocities and dehumanization on an unparalleled scale are being committed, becoming the present reincarnation of the past’s dreaded evils.



In no other place on Earth is the suffering of our brothers and sisters so prevalent. In no other region is the tyranny and wickedness of humanity so present. For the lands holy and promised have been cursed by archaic fables, beliefs and myths, by fictional claims of days long extinct, condemning its native inhabitants to the bowels of Hades and the desolate realities from which loud cries go unheard.



To be Palestinian Arab in the land usurped by European Jews is to be considered untermensch in the territory your forefathers once called home. The devastation fifty-five years of invasion, occupation and state terrorism has had on both people and land has created the conditions by which Gaza and the West Bank can today be called Hell on Earth, pockets of destitute emptiness where opportunity is extinct and any relevant future is a but a hollow fantasy.



Unearthed from the colon of the planet Palestinians dwell, the squalor in the occupied territories is beyond compare, instituted and exacerbated by the state of Israel in acts of unhindered and systemic malevolence. The intent of such inflictions of emotional distress and incessant pain and suffering is the breaking point of millions of Palestinians, the realization that it is better to leave the land you know and love rather than live in perpetual imprisonment of spirit and humanity.



The desire to expand borders and territory, an addiction to greed and the aspiration to cleanse Palestine of Arabs manufactures in the Israeli government a policy of wicked objectives bursting with cold and calculated cruelty. Thus, the ill-treatment of Palestinians by Israel makes life so unbearable, so hard and depressing that it is a triumph of the human spirit that so many remain, unwavering and strong, even as the weight of utter wickedness is enforced generation to generation.



Living in the occupied territories is like living in Warsaw ghettos of the 1930’s and South African Bantustans. It is akin to dwelling in Indian reservations, those cesspools of nothingness in the lands of America from where millions rotted away their once vibrant existence. Gaza and the West Bank are squalors of humanity acting as giant prisons, where dense refugee camps are considered cities, their perimeters encircled by fences, walls, Israeli tanks and the ever watchful eyes of trigger-friendly snipers. Enormous prisons within occupied lands, preventing contiguity, freedom of movement and any semblance of a sovereign state are the true definition of the West Bank and Gaza Strip.



To live inside these vast prisons and internment camps is to struggle with the daily existence of Israeli suffocation and dehumanization that you know is purposeful as it is deliberate. It is to feel Israeli claws strangulating your esophagus, denying you of the air to breathe and the sustenance you need to survive. Life under Israel’s merciless rule means that sixty to seventy percent of your people are unemployed, unable to provide for their families, as commerce is almost non-existent and access to Israeli business almost impossible. It is to live in worlds of child undernourishment and lack of healthcare, as Israel’s policies make indigent millions of families who desperately need to feed and treat their children.



To be Palestinian is to be trapped in a vicious circle that refuses to let you escape. From birth your undernourishment outmaneuvers your development, stunting your growth, making your immune system weak and altering your ability to learn. Lack of nutrients and perpetual levels of stress make your environmental upbringing unlike anything on Earth, a constant battle being lost by both your body and mind.



Psychological behaviors associated with extreme levels of stress and dangerous levels of undernourishment affect hundreds of thousands of your fellow brothers and sisters. Feelings of imprisonment and virtual subjugation, not to mention the extreme hatred of anything Israel your environment forces upon you creates unsurpassed hatred in your mind. Education is limited, resources to tap the oasis inside you is but a dream and the talents and abilities ingrained in your being get eroded more and more with each passing year.



You see the vanishing energies of neighbors, acquaintances and family that die at the hands of the IDF and the Israeli government’s callous disregard for your people. After all, to them you are nothing but untermensch, lower to or on equal par with animals. From an early age you realize that, since you are seen as sub-human, IDF soldiers treat you with impunity, allowing themselves the pleasure of taunting your friends, shooting your cousins, demolishing your home and dehumanizing your mother, all done knowing that accountability does not exist.



Growing up Palestinian is to see with one’s eyes the hatred boiling inside the cities you live in, where the fruitless throwing of rocks towards tanks by dozens of youth is the only vent from where their bursting fumes can be released. Later on in life, these youngsters will become members of the resistance, graduating to Kalashnikovs and home-made bombs, lurking at night to defend their ever disappearing homeland. In this society, death at the hands of the Israelis is so commonplace that it is celebrated, becoming both a rallying cry and mechanism of strength. Martyrs are elevated to the skies above, becoming the role models of the very young and the heroes of the populace, their faces plastered on posters lining streets and walls.



In this society, born of occupation and seething hatred, the only way to keep living is to keep dying, and the sadness of such reality is that just as our children wish to become pilots and firemen, theirs strive for nothing more than martyrdom. It is this that Israel’s policy of untermensch has created, a mechanism where every day creates new resistance fighters and revolutionaries seeking the triumph of the human spirit and the dawn of independent freedom.



Collective punishment upon millions of Palestinians goes hand in hand with the Untermensch Syndrome, where the acts of a few result in the decimation of the many. When millions of Arabs are considered sub-human, long living in lands claimed by false divinity and thousand year old fables of peoples primitive and unenlightened, their death, destruction and prolonged suffering is inconsequential. It is state sponsored terrorism that has lasted more than eighty years in a pre-emptive attempt to ethnically cleanse by subjugation, dehumanization and cold and calculated suffering.



Breeding of fear by the intimidation of army incursions, tank deployments, sniper killings, Apache helicopter missiles and fighter jet low altitude flyovers is state sponsored terror, stressing out millions and making life under occupation an unbearable existence. Imprisoning millions and subjecting them to perpetual indigence, without ability to traverse their own lands or go one day breathing tranquil airs of calm and freedom is collective terror upon a populace. Not knowing if your home is next to be demolished by monstrous Caterpillar bulldozers, usually with a few minutes warning by the IDF is state terrorism, robbing families of their homes and their belongings, leaving thousands without the only dignity they ever possessed.



Treating Palestinians as untermensch allows young Israeli soldiers, most of whom are born hating Palestinians, to walk over innocent people only trying to survive day to day. Stinging verbal abuse, humiliating body searches, purposeful closures and damning delays at checkpoints, where the Untermensch Syndrome can be seen in full bloom, exhibits the wicked treatment of the powerful over the weak. Selected closures that can last days that in effect prevent Palestinians from getting to work, indiscriminate authority to harass and stop anyone from passing, the apartheid mechanism of different license plates for Jewish settlers – with unhindered passage through checkpoints – and Palestinians – who oftentimes wait hours in line before being allowed through – are all symptoms of the sub-human treatment and collective punishment of Palestinians.



Even ambulances, oftentimes transporting gravely injured or sick people, many of them pregnant women on the verge of giving birth, are forced to endure long hours waiting at IDF checkpoints, with the full knowledge of soldiers. Many of these people, not unexpectedly, end up dying while waiting, as precious time is squandered and criminally left to pass. If this is not terror, then what is? If this is not collective punishment and a symptom of the Untermensch Syndrome, then where has our humanity gone?



When an occupying power gives carte blanche to its military to treat the occupied as sub-human, crimes against humanity are not too far behind and the moral fabric of those imposing the will of the powerful through the barrel of a gun quickly vanishes. In Palestine, and as has become quite apparent in Iraq, indiscriminate and methodical dehumanization, without regard for human rights, has flourished through the aura of ethnic, state and cultural superiority and the invincibility of modern military might.



Pitting rock throwers against Apache helicopters and Abrams tanks is nobody’s idea of a fair fight, and in this unequal capacity to wage war we can see how the Untermensch Syndrome is furthered. One side seeks independence using only the weapons their dwindling land provides while the other is provided with the most sophisticated and lethal technology known to man. It is a battle of primitive versus modern, the Arab animals versus the Israeli westerner. And so, in order to try evening out the fight, suicide bombers, with the desperation, hate, thirst for vengeance and hopelessness ingrained in their atrocious actions, compete with the state sponsored terrorism of guided missiles raining down from the sky, artillery from tanks and incursions by an infantry trained and supplied with the best equipment American money can buy.



The equation of occupied and occupier has been the same for time immemorial, with the subjugated resorting to the creations of the human imagination and the resources at their disposal for weapons while the conqueror uses rationales of untermensch to deceive its own morality and unleash the fires of human hell with the grand weapons of war that riches provide onto the people invaded.



In Palestine, untermensch has meant the demolition of thousands of homes without regard for human life. It has meant the dehumanizing conditions by which millions live under, usually in poverty and lacking meaningful education, healthcare, infrastructure, opportunity and future. Israel’s treatment of an entire race of people has destroyed the fabric of society and the aspirations of its citizens. The Untermensch Syndrome has resulted in centuries old olive trees bulldozed for no reason other than to make miserable the lives of the farmers who owned them. It has categorized Palestinian as inferior to Jew, marginalizing millions who are expropriated of their land and homes.



Because of the Untermensch Syndrome Palestine has been carved up into dozens of enclaves, separated by walls or fences, imprisoning people in their towns and refugee camps. Traveling from town to town is virtually impossible. Children have been separated from their schools, university students from their colleges, workers from their jobs, families from each other and farmers from their fields. This has been accomplished by Israel systematically and without remorse, serving no purpose other than to dehumanize and make unlivable the daily lives of millions.



Lands with higher ground are routinely expropriated, as are those with fertile soil and abundant water aquifers. These stolen lands are then granted to the swell of settlers rushing into once Palestinian lands and farms. In other instances, Palestinian land is taken for bypass road construction that now dissects the West Bank into easily controllable blocks. Of course these roads can only be used by Israelis and Jewish settlers, while the Palestinians, whose land is now covered by asphalt, can only watch as Jewish cars circumvent the last vestiges of a land they once flourished in.



In the course of the present intifadah 3000 Palestinians have died compared to 1000 Israelis. The terrorism has been mutual, one modern and technological, the other born out of hatred and desperation. Palestinians see their native contiguously- inhabited land being gobbled up by Israel and the never-ending stream of European and American settlers. Their water is being taken, their crops destroyed, their livelihoods eviscerated. An enormous apartheid wall is being built, separating camp from camp, robbing them of still more land as it snakes deep into occupied territory, making the West Bank an amalgam of Bantustan-style reservations and internment camps. The Untermensch Syndrome has been unleashed by an Israel that is intent on ‘transferring’ out an entire race of people.





Like a Virus the Syndrome Spreads





Like an enormous wave crashing on shore, the Untermensch Syndrome is devastating everything in its path. In order to maintain a Jewish majority, which demographics tells us is impossible if Arabs remain, Israel is making the life of Palestinians a virtual dungeon of misery from where air and light are squeezed out of the dark, damp caves where Palestinians now dwell. The goal is as simple as it is macabre: the ethnic cleansing of Arabs from the ‘Promised Land’ by means of starving millions of a life worth living and through the self-exodus of Palestinians who cannot take the severe punishment and dehumanization any more. This clandestine maneuver would thus be seen as self-inflicted and as an independent move by the Palestinians, yet it is Israel pushing them off the cliff through its criminal acts against humanity.



Much is said of physical torture, yet it is the mental kind that truly kills and maims, condemning the millions of Palestinians to a life unbearable at best and cruel at worst. For many decades now Israel has waged collective war against the native inhabitants of Palestine, slowly but surely implementing the means by which it can achieve its ends. Mental torture is a crime against humanity, in direct contradiction to universal principles of humanity. It has been persistent, incessant and coldly calculated. If the treatment of the Palestinian people by the state of Israel is not terrorist in nature and evil in substance, then we have vanished underneath a rock of shamelessness and barbarity, becoming that which we most loathe.



What is occurring in Palestine today is nothing short of criminal, reminiscent of the Nazi treatment of Jews and all other untermensch during 1930’s Germany. It reminds us of the extermination and subsequent incarceration of Native Americans by a fledgling US government riding the coattails of Manifest Destiny. Reservations are today a sad reminder of the cruelty and inhumanity by which the American government methodically eliminated the indigenous peoples from the birth of a new nation. Parallels with the South African Apartheid Bantustans are being made as more truth emerges from the cages of the West Bank. The worst in humanity is now compared to the Israeli treatment of the Palestinian people, and not without merit.



The Nazi ghettos and treatment of all untermensch in 1930’s Europe during the reign of human malevolence, which caused untold levels of suffering, anguish and mental torture, lasted about a decade. The Palestinian ghettos, Bantustans, reservations, cantons, prisons, gulags or enclaves, – however you wish to call them – on the other hand, have withstood the sands of time for several decades now. Under virtual imprisonment, unable to move freely, without rights, liberties and freedoms and increasingly under a state of siege and apartheid, Palestinians find themselves struggling to survive and remain living in the lands they have continuously inhabited for thousands of years. Their very existence is being threatened; their society is being imploded. Mental torture has become their way of life, like an unrelenting leash controlling their lives, ceaseless in time and devastating in magnitude.



They are, if you will, an endangered species, considered sub-human by their occupiers and the Israeli puppets in the White House and the Congress, who, even after the International Court of Justice overwhelmingly condemned the Apartheid Wall as illegal under international law, voted overwhelmingly to support Israel and condemn the Court, also pressuring the cowardly UN to prevent the imposition of sanctions on Israel. If our elected leaders in Washington show such solidarity with the state of Israel in its inhuman acts of criminality, do they think of Palestinians as untermensch as well? The implication sure makes it seem that way, as does their treatment of the Iraqi people.



Those who were once called untermensch are today subjugating those they consider untermensch. The sub-humans of decades past have become the subjugators and exploiters, spreading the disease that once tormented their ancestors. Those who once suffered enormously are today inflicting untold levels of suffering onto an entire group of human beings. As if committing human evil on those it considers sub-humans will exorcise the demons of horrors past, Israel’s treatment of the Palestinians serves no possible purpose other than to devastate millions who are rotting away their existence in sewers of hopelessness, hoping an entire people will simply disappear or pack up and leave, thereby springing forth a final solution to the Palestinian question.



The Untermensch has become the Übermensch, the Nazi word for overlord, or supermen. The cleansed have become the ones doing the cleansing, and those upon whom human evil once enveloped are today reincarnating that same malice onto a world trying to never again repeat the errors of past generations. Yet the Untermensch Syndrome refuses to be laid to rest, living like rats among humans, forever to follow in our footsteps, feeding off our crumbs and forever destined to haunt our inner demons. If those it was once inflicted upon are today its conductors and proliferators, does there exist hope for the human race?



As long as we let it control us, the Untermensch Syndrome will linger, separating us from each other, seeing ourselves as superior and others as sub-human. The situation in Iraq is a truth to this reality, it simply repeats itself, no matter how enlightened we think we are and no matter how modern we claim to be. If the pattern persists throughout our existence, is there reason to hope for its demise?



What makes us human is not our ability to kill and destroy each other but our vast potential to bring goodness to our fellow beings. Killing, maiming and inflicting misery onto ourselves is nothing new. It is rather easy for humans to do this. Just look back at history. What is hard, and what makes us human, differentiating us from the animal world, is the ability to turn the other cheek, see each other as equals, accept our incredible diversity and stop the madness before we all end up smoldering from the fiery hell we have contained in silos and missiles. If we can create nuclear technology, enough to destroy this planet thousands of times over, can we not put our heads together and get along?



What is happening to the Palestinian people is a travesty, one more black mark on an already bruised human society. It is up to the Other Superpower to seek change, helping to bring an oasis of humanity to a suddenly barren strip of earth. Our elected leaders will not act, and neither will world organizations. It is up to us, the people of the world, to stand tall and shout with one united voice from deep within our bodies that we are in solidarity with those considered as untermensch, that if Palestinians are sub-human, then so are we, because they are human just like you and me, deserving of a life lived in happiness and opportunity, free of occupation and tyranny.



For the moral high ground cannot be usurped as easily as Israel robs Palestinian lands bearing higher ground, strategic locations, water aquifers and fertile land. The moral high ground in this battle is on the side of the occupied and subjugated, of justice and humanity, of those resisting and fighting for land they once possessed and freedom once enjoyed. It is void and non-existent in the grip of the occupiers, exploiters and criminals who produce life unbearable and dehumanizing. For this battle they cannot win because the travesty of the Palestinians is the reality billions of eyes and minds now see. Is it any wonder why the rise in anti-Semitism worldwide coincides with the escalating campaign to destroy the Palestinian people? Can we not see why Israel is considered the most hated nation on Earth, from opinions resulting in the last few years, and why its policies are endangering innocent and peace loving people of Jewish faith worldwide who only want to live free of the hatreds of the past and in full acceptance of the happiness of the years to come?





Never Again, Never Again





The time to boycott Israeli products has arrived. Let the sanctions imposed by the Other Superpower begin, unleashing the economic might of billions to punish those few who care nothing for international law or the universal declarations of human rights. May the cancer spreading dehumanization and misery on our fellow human beings stop being spread by the power and medicine of the people of the world. We succeeded once before, halting the destructive forces of apartheid South Africa, now a nation evolving forward in time, not regressing backwards in history. We will once more quash wrongness, wickedness and human evil. It is the echoes of justice and human rights emanated by the voices of truth that will tear down yet another wall of shame being built to imprison and condemn.



Let us punish American and multinational corporations that help arm the IDF, those that help bulldoze homes and lives, those that profit from human misery and those that through their instruments of death and destruction contribute to the murder and slaughter of innocents. Let us pressure our so-called representatives to stand for human rights, dignity and justice, not tyranny, misery and subjugation.



What is transpiring in the Holy Land is anathema to human civilization; it is an embarrassment to six billion people who are good, decent human beings. If our governments refuse to act, then so we must, for the sake of innocent and peaceful Palestinian and Israeli people, for the sake of human decency and for the sake of our future generations. Walls and fences that imprison and dehumanize cannot stand, for they help set mankind back in time to days dark and repressive, unenlightened and barbaric. Together, united as one we can become the massive tremor that helps bring walls and tyranny down.



“Never Again” should not just be a catchy slogan, an artifact at museums, a banner espoused but never practiced or a phrase attached to nostalgia. It should mean what it says, and, as the Other Superpower, we should interpret it literally, enforcing it upon those whose crimes against humanity make us all less human by the day.



In numbers we find strength; in conviction, reason to exist. Those seeking freedom can never be defeated; the triumph of the human spirit can never be erased. The seeds of justice have been planted, let us reap its bountiful reward. Let us once more make a beautiful oasis of a land both holy and promised, devoid of barren intentions and evil inclinations. Let olive trees grow anew, let children play and laugh, may the light of day return and once more bring forth skies of blue.





This essay is dedicated to the 3000 Palestinian and 1000 Israeli dead, who, in the last four years, have perished thanks to the sickness of human nature. This essay is also dedicated to the thousands of injured on both sides, the thousands more who have lost loved ones, and the peace-loving, tolerance-striving, justice-seeking peoples of the Holy Land, all of whom have suffered enormously for the last four years. May you have the strength to put an end to madness and the worst in the human condition. May your troubled land find the peace you and the world desperately needs.




http://www.axisoflogic.com/artman/publish/article_5199.shtml…
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© Copyright 2004 by AxisofLogic.com





Manuel Valenzuela is social critic and commentator, activist, writer and author of Echoes in the Wind, a novel to be published in mid September of 2004. A collection of essays, Beyond the Smoking Mirror: Reflections on America and Humanity, will be published in late Fall of 2004. His articles appear weekly on axisoflogic.com where he is also contributing editor. Mr. Valenzuela welcomes comments and can be reached at [e-mail]

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August 22, 2004
IDEA LAB
The Political Brain
By STEVEN JOHNSON

A few months before retiring from public office in 2002, the House majority leader Dick Armey caused a mini-scandal when he announced during a speech in Florida, ``Liberals are, in my estimation, just not bright people.`` The former economics professor went on to clarify that liberals were drawn to ``occupations of the heart,`` while conservatives favored ``occupations of the brain,`` like economics or engineering.
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The odd thing about Armey`s statement was that it displayed a fuzzy, unscientific understanding of the brain itself: our most compassionate (or cowardly) feelings are as much a product of the brain as ``rational choice`` economic theory is. They just emanate from a different part of the brain -- most notably, the amygdala, the almond-shaped body that lies below the neocortex, in an older brain region sometimes called the limbic system. Studies of stroke victims, as well as scans of normal brains, have persuasively shown that the amygdala plays a key role in the creation of emotions like fear or empathy.

If amygdala activity is a reliable indication of emotional response, a fascinating possibility opens up: turning Armey`s muddled poetry into a testable hypothesis. Do liberals ``think`` with their limbic system more than conservatives do? As it happens, some early research suggests that Armey might have been on to something after all.

As The Times reported not long ago, a team of U.C.L.A. researchers analyzed the neural activity of Republicans and Democrats as they viewed a series of images from campaign ads. And the early data suggested that the most salient predictor of a ``Democrat brain`` was amygdala activity responding to certain images of violence: either the Bush ads that featured shots of a smoldering ground zero or the famous ``Daisy`` ad from Lyndon B. Johnson`s 1964 campaign that ends with a mushroom cloud. Such brain activity indicates a kind of gut response, operating below the level of conscious control.

Could the U.C.L.A. researchers be creating the political science of the future? Consider this possibility: the scientists do an exhaustive survey and it turns out that liberal brains have, on average, more active amygdalas than conservative ones. It`s a plausible outcome that matches some of our stereotypes about liberal values: an aversion to human suffering, an unwillingness to rationalize capital punishment and military force, a fondness for candidates who like to feel our pain.

What would that kind of insight tell us that we didn`t know already? One thing is certain: evidence of a neurological difference between liberal and conservative brains would not be another instance of genetic determinism, since patterns of brain activity are shaped by experience as much as by genes. (Those who suffer from post-traumatic stress syndrome also show unusual patterns of amygdala activity, but those patterns are almost inevitably the imprint of a specific event, and not the long arm of DNA.)

Nonetheless, opening up the brain`s black box might provide new explanations for how people become Republicans or Democrats, not to mention libertarians or Maoists, in the first place. It`s pretty to think that we all decide our political affiliations by methodically studying each party`s positions on the issues. But a recent study by Paul Goren at Arizona State found that voters typically formed their party affiliations before developing specific political values. They become Democrats first and then decide that they, say, oppose capital punishment and support trade unions. But how do they make that initial decision to be a Democrat? The most likely indicator of political preference is your parents` party affiliation, but if everyone simply voted along family lines, the dominant party would simply be the one whose members had the most voting offspring. The real question is why someone would ever break from the family tradition -- without feeling strongly either way about specific issues.

Those M.R.I. scans suggest an explanation. Perhaps we form political affiliations by semiconsciously detecting commonalities with other people, commonalities that ultimately reflect a shared pattern of brain function. In the mid-1960`s, the social psychologist Donn Byrne conducted a series of experiments in which the participants were given a description of several hypothetical strangers` attitudes and beliefs. They were then asked which stranger they would most enjoy having as a co-worker. The subjects consistently preferred the company of strangers with attitudes similar to their own. Opposites repel.

Say you`re inclined to form strong emotional responses to images of violence or human suffering, and over the course of your formative years, most of the people you meet who respond to these images with comparable affect turn out to be Democrats. That`s a commonality of experience that exists beneath conscious political affiliation -- it`s closer to a gut instinct than a rational choice -- but if you meet enough Democrats who share that experience, sooner or later you start carrying the card yourself. Political identity starts with a shared temperament and only afterward deposits a layer of positions on the issues.

Seeing political identity as a reflection of common brain architecture helps explain another longstanding riddle: why do people vote against their immediate interests? Why do blue-collar Republicans and limousine liberals exist? The question becomes less puzzling if you assume that 1) people choose parties primarily because they desire the companionship of people who share their cognitive wiring, and 2) they desire that companionship so much they`re willing to pay for the privilege.

These are all hypotheses now, and indeed it may turn out that some other region of the brain plays a more important role in creating political values. But if the U.C.L.A. results hold water over time, it won`t justify the Armey theory that liberals are somehow less rational than conservatives. One of the most celebrated insights of the past 20 years of neuroscience is the discovery -- largely associated with the work of Antonio Damasio -- that the brain`s emotional systems are critical to logical decision-making. People who suffer from damaged or impaired emotional systems can score well on logic tests but often display markedly irrational behavior in everyday life. Dustin Hoffman`s autistic character in ``Rain Man`` was brilliant with numbers, but you wouldn`t necessarily want him in the White House.

Is there something intrinsically reductive or fatalistic in connecting political values to brain functioning? No more so than ascribing them to race or economic background, which we happily do without second thought. Isn`t it more dehumanizing to attribute your beliefs to economic conditions outside your control? At least your brain is inalienably yours -- it`s where the whole category ``you`` originates. No one denies that social conditions shape political values. But the link between the brain and the polis is still uncharted terrain. Prozac showed us that the slightest tinkering with brain chemistry could have transformative effects on a person`s worldview. Who is to say those effects don`t travel all the way to the voting booth?

Steven Johnson is the author most recently of ``Mind Wide Open: Your Brain and the Neuroscience of Everyday Life.``


Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company

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washingtonpost.com

Shiite Militants, U.S. Forces Clash in Najaf
Militants Say Shrine Compound Damaged

By Abdul Hussein Al-Obeidi
Associated Press Writer
Sunday, August 22, 2004; 5:30 PM

NAJAF, Iraq -- Explosions and gunfire shook Najaf`s Old City on Sunday in a fierce battle between U.S. forces and Shiite militants, as negotiations dragged on for the handover of the shrine that the fighters have used for their stronghold.

Late Sunday, U.S. warplanes and helicopters attacked positions in the Old City for the second night with bombs and gunfire, witnesses said. Militant leaders said the Imam Ali Shrine compound`s outer walls were damaged in the attacks. The U.S. military had no immediate comment, though it has been careful to avoid damaging the compound.
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Militiamen loyal to radical Shiite cleric Moqtada Sadr and pilgrims rest inside the shrine of Imam Ali in Najaf.
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Also, five U.S. troops were reported dead in separate incidents, and an American journalist held hostage for more than a week and threatened with death if U.S. forces did not leave Najaf was released by his captors.

Sunday`s clashes in Najaf appeared more intense than in recent days as U.S. forces sealed off the Old City. But Iraqi government officials counseled patience, saying they intended to resolve the crisis without raiding the shrine, one of Shia Islam`s holiest sites.

"The government will leave no stone unturned to reach a peaceful settlement," Iraqi National Security adviser Mouaffaq al-Rubaie told The Associated Press. "It has no intention or interest in killing more people or having even the most trivial damage to the shrine. We have a vested interest in a peaceful settlement."

Senior government officials said last week an Iraqi force was preparing to raid the shrine within hours to expel the militants loyal to radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, but interim Prime Minister Ayad Allawi quickly backed off that threat.

Such an operation would anger Shiites across the country and could turn them against the new government as it tries to gain legitimacy and tackle a 16-month-old insurgency.

In the Anbar province, the heart of the Sunni insurgency, four U.S. Marines with the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force were killed in separate incidents, the military announced Sunday.

One Marine was killed in action Saturday and two others died Saturday of wounds received while conducting "security and stability operations" in the province, the military said. Another Marine was killed Saturday when his Humvee flipped after running into a tank, the military said.

A roadside bomb attack Sunday targeting a U.S. military convoy outside the northern city of Mosul killed one U.S. soldier assigned to Task Force Olympia and wounded another, the military said. The injured soldier was in stable condition. Two Iraqi children also were injured in the blast, said Dr. Mohammed Ahmed of al-Jumhuri hospital.

As of Friday, 949 U.S. service members have died since the beginning of military operations in Iraq in March 2003, according to the U.S. Defense Department.

Late Sunday, U.S. journalist Micah Garen, who was kidnapped Aug. 13 in the southern city of Nasiriyah, was released along with his Iraqi translator at al-Sadr`s offices there after the cleric`s aides appealed for his freedom.

Garen and his translator, Amir Doushi, were walking through a market when two armed men in civilian clothes seized them, police said. Insurgents later released a video of Garen and threatened to kill him if U.S. troops did not leave Najaf.

In a brief interview with the pan-Arab television station Al-Jazeera after his release, Garen thanked al-Sadr`s representatives for their work, which included an appeal to the kidnappers during Friday prayers.

Sheik Aws al-Khafaji, an al-Sadr aide, said the kidnappers mistakenly had thought Garen was working for the U.S. intelligence services.

"The kidnappers listened to the call that we made during Friday prayers, and they contacted us and we asked them to bring him to (al-Sadr`s) office and promised that no one would pursue them," al-Khafaji said.

In Najaf, U.S. tanks rumbled down deserted streets Sunday, while sporadic gunfire filled the air. The roads leading to the shrine were muddied and filled with chunks of concrete ripped from the streets. Black smoke trailed from a building, as the clatter of automatic gunfire rang out.

In the afternoon a fierce battle between the military and al-Sadr`s militants broke out when insurgents launched a mortar barrage at U.S. troops, witnesses said. Calm returned to the city after about half an hour.

U.S. forces sealed off the Old City, the center of the more than two weeks of fighting here, restoring a cordon that had been loosened in recent days.

Several mortar attacks targeted police offices in the city, but no one was injured, officials said.

Early Sunday, U.S. warplanes bombed the Old City and the sounds of shelling could be heard in the streets, witnesses said. The U.S. military could not confirm the bombing.

At least three people were killed and 18 injured during overnight fighting, said Tawfiq Mohammed of Najaf General Hospital.

Fighting in the nearby city of Kufa on Saturday killed 40 militants, according to the Interior Ministry. However, Mahmoud al-Soudani, an al-Sadr aide, called the claim "government propaganda" and said only one militant had been killed.

Al-Sadr himself has not been seen in public in days, but al-Soudani said the cleric was in good health and remained in Najaf.

The crisis in Najaf, which has spread to other Shiite communities, appeared on the verge of resolution Friday, when insurgents agreed to turn over the shrine to representatives of Iraq`s top Shiite cleric, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Husseini al-Sistani.

But the transfer has bogged down amid quibbling over technicalities. Representatives from both sides said Sunday they were still working out the details.

Al-Rubaie said the government was willing to wait while the two sides worked out an agreement on the shrine, but added that al-Sadr needed to dismantle his Mahdi militia as well to end the violence.

"He has to show definite signs that he agrees, whether going on television or signing an agreement promising that he will disband the army," he said. "It`s very important. We cannot live in a peaceful, democratic country with a militia."

Also Sunday, Polish Defense Minister Jerzy Szmajdzinski paid a visit to his troops in Iraq and said the persistent attacks here would not deter Poland from fulfilling its commitments.

Attending a memorial Mass for a Polish soldier killed in a bombing Saturday, he said: "Let us make a vow that his death will not be in vain, that we will go on with our mission." Poland has about 2,400 troops in Iraq.

In other violence Sunday:

-- A suicide attacker detonated a car bomb alongside the convoy carrying a deputy provincial governor, Bassam al-Khadran, in the town of Khalis, north of Baghdad. The blast killed two people and injured 14 others, including al-Khadran, Iraqi officials said.

-- In Jur al-Nadaf, 12 miles south of Baghdad, attackers sprayed a police vehicle with machine-gun fire, killing two policemen before fleeing, said Col. Adnan Abdul-Rahman of the Interior Ministry.

-- In Mosul, 225 miles northwest of Baghdad, gunmen opened fire on a car, killing an Indonesian citizen and injuring a Filipino, hospital officials said. Two Iraqis, the car`s driver and a bodyguard, were also killed in the attack, Dr. Dhia Taha said.

-- In the southern city of Basra, an Iraqi intelligence officer kidnapped nearly a week ago and threatened with death if U.S. and Iraqi forces did not end the violence in Najaf was found dead, his body riddled with bullets, police said Sunday.

© 2004 The Associated Press

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August 23, 2004
THE VICTIMS
Weary of War, Iraqis in Najaf Blame 2 Sides
By SABRINA TAVERNISE

AJAF, Iraq, Aug. 22 - It was just about lunchtime when the sound of tank and gun fire tore through the quiet, just blocks from Amal Juad`s house.

Some of her neighbors, standing on a corner nearby, did not even stop talking. "It`s normal," one said. "Like tomatoes," Iraq`s most ubiquitous vegetable.

Twenty days after fighting erupted between American soldiers and followers of Moktada al-Sadr, a rebel Shiite cleric here, firefights are no longer a surprise. But this neighborhood, Judaada, a few blocks from the front lines, is a special case. People are weary of the fighting and blame both sides.

Ms. Juad, 49, a homemaker, watched through her living room window as an American helicopter fired at rebel fighters. On Sunday morning, an ice peddler was shot dead as he tried to cross a road that - at least on this day - divided the two sides, and artillery fire kept Ms. Juad and her children awake and on the floor all night on Saturday.

"It was like an earthquake," she said.
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Kaihla Fahem, 12, was wounded when a mortar hit her home in Najaf causing a wall to collapse.

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As the American military worries about how to control Mr. Sadr - whose impassioned calls to fight Americans have found fertile ground among this country`s impoverished Shiites - civilian casualties are another concern. Mr. Sadr`s followers are fighting from rooftops and grammar schools, drawing American troops into battles that create great danger for civilians.

Hussein Hadi, deputy director of Najaf`s main Al Hakim Hospital, says that the recent fighting has been even worse for civilians than the last time Mr. Sadr and his militia rebelled. Then, fighting lasted for more than two months, and the hospital received about 180 dead, Mr. Hadi said Sunday. In the last three weeks, the daily death toll has been about the same, but it includes more women and children than before.

"This time, it`s the average people that are dying," Mr. Hadi said. "Now the Americans are using heavier weapons. We see many children with more severe injuries."

In Judaada, many such casualties have occurred. Majid Mousa, an 11-year-old boy whose leg was blown off below the knee in an American assault on Saturday, was one. Majid`s face was freckled with shrapnel, which blinded him, doctors said. His 15-year-old brother was killed in the explosion. His father, a truck driver away on a run, does not know what happened.

"He will carry the American occupation with him for the rest of his life," Mr. Hadi said.

Kaihla Fahem, 12, was sleeping when a mortar crashed into her home, causing a wall to collapse and gouging a large gash into her leg. It is not clear who fired the shot. Still, her mother, Um-Ali, 35, blames the American military. "We`re fed up with Americans," she said. The American military often is a lightning rod for ordinary Iraqis` anger over the chaos that has befallen the country since the war. In an insurgent war and the confusion over who fired first, Americans are often blamed. Mr. Sadr, who is politically ambitious, has tapped into that anger, rallying thousands with calls of nationalism and religion.
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A militiaman loyal to the Shiite cleric Moktada al-Sadr fired yesterday toward American positions in the eastern border of the embattled old city.

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Even so, in Judaada, people have little sympathy for Mr. Sadr. Many residents follow a more moderate Shiite leader, Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, Iraq`s highest Shiite leader. He opposes Mr. Sadr`s rebellion, which has been run from the holiest shrine for Shiites in Iraq.

American forces took Judaada from Mr. Sadr`s forces just eight days ago. Though most residents say they are glad for the American presence, the neighborhood is now particularly vulnerable to mortar attacks being fired at American forces. Residents here are exhausted from being under siege for more than three weeks as Mr. Sadr`s forces fight with American troops at their doorsteps. The fighting has shut down the area around the shrine. The electricity is out. Shops are locked. Chunks of plaster lie in the street.

"We can`t sleep at night, we can`t go to work," said Haji Karim, a shopkeeper. "The Americans are useless if they can`t get rid of them."

Others expressed frustration at what they said was an unchecked bragging and inconsistency on the part of the fighters. "They shout, `God is great,` and then they shoot a mortar," said Masim Wahab, one of Mr. Karim`s neighbors. "Yesterday, they talked about how they hit a tank, but they actually hit a house."

For everyone here, much comes down to money. Eggplants have quadrupled in price. Cooking gas has more than tripled in price. Without power, Ms. Juad`s refrigerator has not worked since the fighting began. Meals have been combinations of tomatoes, okra, potatoes and onions.

Ms. Juad`s bird`s-eye view of the fighting has let her observe the fighters at close range. She has not been impressed. One looked down the barrel of a mortar launcher when it would not detonate, and it exploded in his face.

She does not understand what it is about Mr. Sadr, a neophyte cleric in his early 30`s, whose main draw is his famous father, that makes young men willing to risk their lives. Her son, who recently finished law school, provided some insight. A young man he knows said he was being offered $400 a month to fight in the Mahdi Army.

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A sniper loyal to Shiite cleric Moktada al-Sadr aimed at American positions in the cemetery in Najaf on Sunday. Sporadic clashes continued despite negotiations to end the long standoff.

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Late this afternoon, Americans and Mr. Sadr`s forces were courting residents. In dual announcements in Arabic, speakers with megaphones called for residents to rise up against the Americans, and for them to leave the area before heavy fighting later.

Hours earlier, a man in Ms. Juad`s neighborhood shouted insults at Americans and rebels.

"The ones that destroy the shrine, destroy the city," he said. "The pigs! The dogs!"

Ms. Juad raised her shoulders slightly.

"They could take care of them in one day," she said. "Why don`t they?"

Zainab Hussain, an Iraqi employee of The New York Times, contributed reporting from Najaf for this article.

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company

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August 23, 2004
Everybody Loves Obama

In a remote East African village, an old woman in a tin-roof hut spoke recently of "welo mang`eny maok ang`eyo" - that`s Luo, her tribal language, for "many strange visitors." Yes, the media have descended on the farm of Sarah Hussein Onyango Obama, the 80-something grandmother of Barack Obama, the new star of the Democratic Party, front-runner for the United States Senate seat from Illinois, the Hawaii-born, Harvard-educated son of a Kenyan and a Kansan. Will she be traveling to her grandson`s victory bash in Chicago in November? "If he invites me," she told Reuters.

Obamania is sweeping Kenya. The Kenyan press, rapturous after Mr. Obama`s keynote address at the Democratic convention, speculates on a future presidential bid. Parents are naming their newborns Obama, following a tradition to honor great Africans that produced an earlier generation of Kenyans named Lumumba and Nkrumah. Bar patrons in Nairobi reportedly ask for "Obamas" when ordering the barley beer called "Senator," while tribal elders are planning to slaughter bulls for a celebratory feast after the election.

As John F. Kennedy was to Ireland, Mr. Obama is to Kenya, living proof to a nation that its children have it within themselves to achieve great things. The melancholic note is that Kenya itself is no longer a land of opportunity. Heralded a generation ago as a model for post-colonial Africa, Kenya is today locked in a desperate struggle against poverty and corruption.

People of all nations are proud when their kin thrive elsewhere, but for many Kenyans, it must often seem as if elsewhere is the only place to thrive. That accounts in part for Obamania. Kenyans understand, perhaps better than Americans, what Mr. Obama meant when he spoke of "the audacity of hope."

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company

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GLEN G. BUTLER ist Major bei der Marine.

August 23, 2004
OP-ED CONTRIBUTOR
Over Najaf, Fighting for Des Moines
By GLEN G. BUTLER

Najaf, Iraq — I`m an average American who grew up watching "Brady Bunch" reruns, playing dodge ball and listening to Van Halen. I love the Longhorns and the Eagles. I`m you; your neighbor; the kid you used to go sledding with but who took a different career path in college. Now, I`m a Marine helicopter pilot who has spent the last two weeks heavily engaged with enemy forces here. I`m writing this between missions, without much time or care to polish, so please look to the heart of these thoughts and not their structure.

I got in country a little more than a month ago, eager to do my part here for the global war on terror and still get home in one piece. I`m a mid-grade officer, so I probably have a better-than-average understanding of the complexity of the situation, but I make no claims to see the bigger picture or offer any strategic solutions. Two years of my military training were spent in Quantico, Va., classrooms. I`ve read Sun Tzu several times; I`ve flipped through Mao`s Little Red Book and debated over Thucydides; I`ve analyzed Henry Kissinger`s "Diplomacy" and Clausewitz`s "On War"; and I`ve walked the battlefields of Antietam, Belleau Wood, Majuba and Isandlwana.

I`ve also studied a little about the culture I`m deep in the middle of, know a bit about the caliph, about the five pillars and about Allah, but know I don`t know enough. I am also a believer in our cause - I put that up front just so there isn`t any question of my motivation.

We marines are proudly apolitical, yet stereotypically right-wing conservative. I`m both. And I`d be here with my fellow devildogs, fighting just as hard, whether John Kerry or George W. Bush or Ralph Nader were our commander-in-chief, until we`re told to go home.

The other day I attended a memorial service for an old acquaintance, Lt. Col. David (Rhino) Greene. He was killed July 28 while flying his AH-1W Cobra over the eastern edge of Ramadi. His squadron was composed of reservists: "old guys" like me who had been around a little while. But unlike me, these guys had gotten out of active duty to pursue other careers and spend more time with their families. Now, they were leading the charge against the Iraqi insurgency.

The night after the service, I sat around in an impromptu gathering of $10 beach chairs in the sand, watching the sunset and smoking some of Rhino`s cigars with friends I hadn`t seen in almost a decade. I listened in awe as they told me about their Falluja April, about how they had all cheated death, been shot down, again and again. We talked about the war, pretending to know all the answers, and we traded stories about home, bragged about our wives and kids.

We also talked about the magic bullet that ended Rhino`s life. It could have been shot by a sniper who had slipped in over the Iranian border, or maybe it came from the AK-47 of a rebellious Iraqi teenager who viewed shooting at Yankee helicopters the same way mischievous American kids might view throwing rocks at cars. No matter, the single round pierced his neck, and within seconds a good man was dead, leaving his wife a widow and his two children fatherless. I won`t soon forget that day, but it was quickly overshadowed by events to come, as I was thrust into the heat of battle in my own little slice of Mesopotamia.

On Aug. 5, after a few days of building intensity, war erupted in Najaf (again). When we had first come to Iraq, we were told our mission would be to conduct so-called SASO, or Security and Stability Operations, and to train the Iraqi military and police to do their jobs so we could go home. Obviously, the security part of SASO is still the emphasis, but our unit`s area of operations had been very quiet for months, so most of us weren`t expecting a fight so soon.

That changed rapidly when marines responded to requests for assistance from the Iraqi forces in Najaf battling Moktada al-Sadr`s militia, who had attacked local police stations. Our helicopters were called on the scene to provide close air support, and soon one of them was shot down. That was when this war became real for me.

Since then my squadron has been providing continuous support for our engaged Marine brothers on the ground, by this point slugging it out hand-to-hand in the city`s ancient Muslim cemetery. The Imam Ali shrine in Najaf is the burial place of the prophet Muhammad`s son-in-law, and is one of the most revered sites in Shiite Islam. The cemetery to its north is gigantic, filled with New Orleans-style crypts and mausoleums. We had been warned it was an "exclusion zone" when we got here, that the local authorities had asked us to not go in there or fly overhead, even though we knew the bad guys were using this area to hide weapons, make improvised explosive devices, and plan against us. Being the culturally sensitive force we are, we agreed - until Aug. 5. Suddenly, I was conducting support missions over the marines` heads in the graveyard, dodging anti-aircraft artillery and rocket-propelled grenades and preparing to be shot down, too. My perspective broadened rapidly.

At first there were no news media in Najaf; now, I assume, it`s getting crowded, although the authorities have restricted access after a group of journalists "embedded" with the Mahdi Militia muddied the problem and jeopardized others` safety. I haven`t had time to catch much CNN or Fox News, and although I`ve seen a few headlines forwarded to me by friends, I don`t think the world is seeing the complete picture.

I want to emphasize that our military is using every means possible to minimize damage to historical, religious and civilian structures, and is going out of its way to protect the innocent. I have not shot one round without good cause, whether it be in response to machine gun fire aimed at me or mortars shot at soldiers and marines on the ground.

The battle has been surreal, focused largely in the cemetery, where families continue burying their dead even as I swoop in low overhead to make sure they aren`t sneaking in behind our forces` flanks, or pulling a surface-to-air missile out of the coffin. Children continue playing soccer in the dirt fields next door, and locals wave to us as we fly over their rooftops in preparation for gun runs into the enemy`s positions.

Sure, some of those people might be waving just to make sure we don`t shoot them, but I think the majority are on our side. I`ve learned that this enemy is not just a mass of angry Iraqis who want us to leave their country, as some would have you believe. The forces we`re fighting around Iraq are a conglomeration of renegade Shiites, former Baathists, Iranians, Syrians, terrorists with ties to Ansar al-Islam and Al Qaeda, petty criminals, destitute citizens looking for excitement or money, and yes, even a few frustrated Iraqis who worry about Wal-Mart culture infringing on their neighborhood.

But I see the others who are on our side, appreciate us risking our lives, and know we`re in the right. The Iraqi soldiers who are fighting alongside us are motivated to take their country back. I`ve not been deluded into thinking that we came here to free the Iraqis. That is indeed the icing on the cake, but I came here to prevent the still active "grave and gathering threat" from congealing into something we wouldn`t be able to stop.

Weapons of mass destruction or no, I`m glad that we ended the dictatorship of Saddam Hussein. My brother and other American jet pilots risked their lives for years patrolling the "no fly zone" (and occasionally making page A-12 in the newspaper if they dropped a bomb on a threatening missile battery). The former dictator`s attempt to assassinate George H. W. Bush, use of chemical weapons on his own people, and invasion of a neighboring country are just a few of the other reasons I believe we should have acted sooner. He eventually would have had the means to cause America great harm - no doubt in my mind.

The pre-emptive doctrine of the current administration will continue to be debated long after I`m gone, but one fact stands for itself: America has not been hit with another catastrophic attack since 9/11. I firmly believe that our actions in Afghanistan and Iraq are major reasons that we`ve had it so good at home. Building a "fortress America" is not only impractical, it`s impossible. Prudent homeland security measures are vital, to be sure, but attacking the source of the threat remains essential.

Now we are on the verge of victory or defeat in Iraq. Success depends not only on battlefield superiority, but also on the trust and confidence of the American people. I`ve read some articles recently that call for cutting back our military presence in Iraq and moving our troops to the peripheries of most cities. Such advice is well-intentioned but wrong - it would soon lead to a total withdrawal. Our goal needs to be a safe Iraq, free of militias and terrorists; if we simply pull back and run, then the region will pose an even greater threat than it did before the invasion. I also fear if we do not win this battle here and now, my 7-year-old son might find himself here in 10 or 11 years, fighting the same enemies and their sons.

When critics of the war say their advocacy is on behalf of those of us risking our lives here, it`s a type of false patriotism. I believe that when Americans say they "support our troops," it should include supporting our mission, not just sending us care packages. They don`t have to believe in the cause as I do; but they should not denigrate it. That only aids the enemy in defeating us strategically.

Michael Moore recently asked Bill O`Reilly if he would sacrifice his son for Falluja. A clever rhetorical device, but it`s the wrong question: this war is about Des Moines, not Falluja. This country is breeding and attracting militants who are all eager to grab box cutters, dirty bombs, suicide vests or biological weapons, and then come fight us in Chicago, Santa Monica or Long Island. Falluja, in fact, was very close to becoming a city our forces could have controlled, and then given new schools and sewers and hospitals, before we pulled back in the spring. Now, essentially ignored, it has become a Taliban-like state of Islamic extremism, a terrorist safe haven. We must not let the same fate befall Najaf or Ramadi or the rest of Iraq.

No, I would not sacrifice myself, my parents would not sacrifice me, and President Bush would not sacrifice a single marine or soldier simply for Falluja. Rather, that symbolic city is but one step toward a free and democratic Iraq, which is one step closer to a more safe and secure America.

I miss my family, my friends and my country, but right now there is nowhere else I`d rather be. I am a United States Marine.

Glen G. Butler is a major in the Marines.

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company

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Tanks close in on sacred shrine as US launches fresh assault on Najaf
By Donald Macintyre in Najaf

23 August 2004

US forces renewed their assault yesterday on Mehdi Army positions in and around Najaf`s old city with an early morning bombing raid and an advance which brought tanks at some points to within 400 metres of the shrine of Imam Ali.

The renewed fighting came amid fresh violence elsewhere in Iraq and growing fears about the welfare of three Western journalists who disappeared on the road between Baghdad and Najaf. There was a prison break-out in the southern city of Amarah, the corpse of a kidnapped Iraqi intelligence agent was found in Basra and fighting flared in and near Baghdad.

George Malbrunot of Le Figaro newspaper and Christian Chesnot of Radio France International failed to contact their editors on Thursday. Enzo Baldoni, an Italian journalist, was also reported missing on Friday. The body of his driver was found in Najaf at the weekend.

But hopes were raised yesterday when an American journalist, Micah Garen, was freed by an Iraqi group who had taken him hostage last week in the southern Iraqi city of Nasiriyah.

In Najaf, residents clustered in doorways as tank shelling and sniper fire resounded for much of the morning through the grid of narrow and otherwise empty streets bordering the south-east boundary of the old city. American Abrams tanks took up positions close to intersections and earlier an AC-130 gunship raked insurgent strongholds with cannon and howitzer fire.

The interior ministry, whose credibility was undermined by its erroneous claim on Friday that police had seized control of the Imam Ali shrine, said yesterday that 40 Iraqis had been killed in fighting in the nearby town of Kufa the previous day. The figure was dismissed as "propaganda" by the Baghdad office of the cleric Muqtada Sadr, which claimed that one insurgent had been killed. There was no immediate evidence to suggest Iraqi deaths on such a scale during a visit to the town on Saturday, which followed a fierce battle in which insurgents claimed they had damaged two tanks and killed at least one American soldier.

The health ministry said nine Iraqis had been killed and 27 others injured in clashes in Najaf in the 24 hours since Saturday morning.

US helicopters,searching for mortar positions, circled over the police headquarters and the Governor`s office as well as over the Wadi al-Salam cemetery, one of the main battlegrounds during the past 16 days.

The fresh phase of combat in Najaf was preceded by an appeal to Sadr from Hussein al-Sadr, a critic and distant relative of the militant cleric, to disarm the insurgents, pull them out of the Imam Ali shrine, and disband the Mehdi Army immediately. "We are in a race with time," he said. He urged the militants to end the standoff "to keep the sanctity of our holy sites, to ease the suffering of Najaf and to quiet the situation".

Police, meanwhile, said that Abdul Jawad, an intelligence officer kidnapped nearly a week ago by the Defence of the Holy Sites Brigade and threatened with death if US and Iraqi forces did not end the violence in Najaf, had been found dead in Basra.

Two people were killed and 14 others ­ including a deputy provincial governor ­ were injured when a car bomb exploded in Khalis, north of Baghdad.


23 August 2004 11:25

© 2004 Independent Digital (UK) Ltd

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Wounded by friendly fire

This has become one of the most nationalistic US elections in living memory - and it is all Kerry`s doing
Gary Younge
Monday August 23, 2004

The Guardian
"A true war story is never moral. It does not instruct, nor encourage virtue, nor suggest models of proper human behaviour, nor restrain men from doing the things men have always done. If at the end of a war story you feel that some small bit of rectitude has been salvaged from the larger waste, then you have been made the victim of a very old and terrible lie."
· Tim O`Brien, The Things They Carried

Vietnam war veteran and Democratic presidential hopeful John Kerry has been ambushed and, for the moment, remains caught in enemy fire. Having made his five-month stint of decorated service in Vietnam the heart of his platform, it is now emerging as his achilles heel.

A group of veterans financed by Republicans from Texas and close to President George Bush are airing ads calling him a liar for the claims he has made about his service and suggesting that he did not come by his military medals honestly. Their case is shoddy, given that none of the Swift-boat Veterans for Truth were with Kerry at the time and their claims have been refuted by those who were. Their motivation is shabby, as most of them are piqued by the fact that Kerry returned home to campaign against the war. All of which makes the fact that their attacks have had such a huge impact that much more revealing.

For since the ads began screening, Kerry`s slight lead in the polls has been shaved away. Two weeks ago, before the ads appeared, he was running even with Bush among the nation`s 26 million veterans. Now Bush has a 24-point lead. The issue dominating the news cycle is not what is happening in Najaf today but what happened in the Mekong delta 35 years ago.

There are three things we can learn from this. First, there is no level to which Republicans will not stoop to besmirch a character, belittle an issue or befuddle the electorate. Second, there is no level to which the Democrats will not stoop to attempt to neutralise these attacks. And third, that the Republicans will always win in this race to the bottom because so much less is expected of them and, when it comes to muck-slinging, they have no qualms about getting their hands dirty.

Take Vietnam. At first sight this is an issue you would think the Bush administration would want to keep away from. Thanks to family connections, the president served his war in the Texas National Guard - and even then it is debatable whether he showed up. The vice-president, Dick Cheney, managed to defer being drafted five times, until the war was over, claiming he had "other priorities". Nine months and two days after the army changed the regulations so that married men with no children were no longer exempt, Cheney had his first child, Elizabeth, bringing a whole new meaning to the term family planning.

Nobody is questioning their record in Vietnam for the simple reason that, unlike Kerry, neither them ever served there. For them to raise Kerry`s service is a mixture of chutzpah and desperation that could backfire. Bush has tried to distance himself from the ads, saying they were put out by an independent group. But since the money trail leads back to his friends in Texas, this won`t wash.

The trouble for Kerry is that, in all likelihood, none of this will matter. The Bush campaign knows the attention span of the public is short and that few will sweat the details. Their hope is that by the time the claims of the Swift-boat Veterans have been discredited, a stubborn question mark will remain hanging over Kerry`s military record. If you spread enough dung, goes the logic, then some seeds of doubt will grow.

There is nothing new in this. The Bush team employed the same strategy in 2000 against Al Gore, forcing him to refute claims he never made about inventing the internet and being the basis for Love Story. In 2002, Republicans managed to unseat senator Max Cleland of Georgia by branding him unpatriotic because he opposed the creation of the homeland security department. Cleland lost three limbs in Vietnam and is a former head of the Veterans` Administration.

But if the method of attack by Republicans is underhand, the issue they have chosen for this attack is understandable. For it was Kerry, not Bush, who placed his military service centre stage in this election campaign. The logic of doing so was clear enough. Clips of Kerry striding through the delta carrying a gun while his band of brothers (those who served with him) offered testimony of his heroics, served as a double whammy. They established Kerry in the public mind as a strong leader in wartime while providing a contrast with Bush, who stayed at home.

But by the time of the Democratic convention, the party had elevated his service 35 years ago from one aspect of his personal history to his principle selling point in his campaign for the presidency. Refusing to spell out what plans he had for the future in Iraq or the war on terror, he was forced to exploit this one moment in his past for all it was worth.

"If we do not speak of it others will surely rewrite the script," said Vietnam veteran George Swiers shortly after returning. "Each of the body bags, all of the mass graves will be reopened and their contents abracadabraed into a noble cause."

And so it was that Kerry referred to his military service alone to qualify him for the presidency. He delivered a string of nationalist non sequiturs: "As president, I will wage this war with the lessons I learned in war"; "I defended this country as a young man and I will defend it as president"; and "I learned a lot about these values on that gunboat patrolling the Mekong delta".

Then towards the end he reached for the stars and stripes. "That flag flew from the turret right behind my head. And it was shot through and through and tattered, but it never ceased to wave in the wind. It draped the caskets of men that I served with and friends I grew up with."

In so doing, Kerry may have neutralised charges that he will be weak on defence. But he also made his war record fair game and set the ground work for one of the most nationalistic elections in living memory: a campaign that offers the choice between a Republican candidate who wants America to be obeyed and a Democrat who wants it to be "looked up to" and become "once again a beacon in the world".

Kerry is not only running for president, but in flight from a history he knows only too well. When he returned from Vietnam he testified before the Senate foreign relations committee that American troops had "raped, cut off ears, cut off heads, taped wires from portable telephones to genitals and turned up the power, blown up bodies, randomly shot at civilians [and] razed villages in fashion reminiscent of Ganghis Khan." Just a few reasons why that beacon has burned so dimly for so long, and why Americans deserve a better choice.

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washingtonpost.com

Trials Set To Begin For Four at Guantanamo
Process Differs From U.S. Justice System

By Scott Higham
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, August 23, 2004; Page A01

Four suspected al Qaeda terrorists will face military trials this week at the Navy base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, in historic legal proceedings that have not been conducted by the U.S. government since World War II and are unlike anything most Americans face in the criminal justice system.

Hearsay evidence will be allowed. Conversations between defendants and lawyers can be monitored in some circumstances. Exculpatory evidence can be kept secret from suspects. And appeals will go to a panel selected by the same government official who helped establish the commissions: Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld.

Military defense lawyers and human rights activists have condemned the proceedings as "fundamentally unfair."

But Bush administration officials say they are doing the best they can to balance the nation`s security interests against due process rights. They say they have incorporated key elements of the U.S. justice system in the military commissions: Suspects are presumed innocent until proven guilty. They do not have to testify. Guilt must be established beyond a reasonable doubt. The suspects have been afforded free counsel.

"We want to get this right," said John D. Altenburg Jr., a retired Army major general who is supervising the commissions.

Initial hearings are scheduled to begin tomorrow in a tall, T-shaped yellow building that overlooks the waters encircling Guantanamo and its sprawling prison, which has become the epicenter of the administration`s war on global terror. Military officials said prosecutors and the commissioners will not discuss the cases and are requesting that their names be kept secret for security reasons. Legal analysts say few new details about the four suspects are likely to emerge, but military lawyers for the alleged terrorists are expected to attack the legitimacy of the commissions and the impartiality of the officers selected to hear the cases. They are also expected to question the rules and procedures of the commissions as well as the charges brought against their clients, according to motions filed last week.

The courtroom, framed by blue velvet curtains and flags from the armed forces, has been secured and swept by teams of bomb-sniffing dogs amid heightened security operations at Guantanamo Bay. Reporters and human rights activists permitted to attend the proceedings are not allowed to move between buildings on the base without military escorts. A courtroom sketch artist will not be permitted to portray the faces of the commission participants, including the defendants. Television cameras are not permitted in the courtroom, and videographers must clear videos of exterior shots with security officers.

Despite criticism that the commissions do not follow internationally accepted rules of law or procedures commonly used in military courts, U.S. officials pledged yesterday that the Guantanamo Bay trials will be fair. Prosecutors said they are ready as early as Sept. 28 to begin the main part of the case against one of the suspects, an Australian citizen named David Hicks.

"Each of the accused will be given full and fair trial in a manner that protects our national security," Navy Lt. Susan M. McGarvey, a spokeswoman for the commissions, told reporters at the Navy base yesterday.

Defense attorneys assigned to the cases say the composition of the commissions and their rules and procedures will make it difficult, if not impossible, for their clients to get fair trials. They also say the president, the secretary of defense and the attorney general have all proclaimed publicly that the defendants are terrorists and the "worst of the worst,`` statements possibly prejudicing the military officers who will serve as jurors.

"Most people are extremely hostile toward terrorists and I understand that, but people should worry about this," said Navy Lt. Cmdr. Philip Sundel, a military attorney assigned to defend one of the suspects. "These commissions are a lie behind the claim that all men are created equal, that we are innocent until proven guilty, that we as a society believe in the rule of law above all else."

President Bush issued an executive order Nov. 13, 2001, reviving a military justice system that has not been used in nearly 60 years. Bush said the commissions, which have been used to try the Lincoln assassination conspirators, Nazi saboteurs and Japanese war criminals, would permit the government to use a blend of secret and public hearings to try foreigners charged with committing, threatening or aiding terrorist acts.

What has emerged during the past 33 months is a military justice system that borrows heavily from commissions of the past with a few modifications, but is also a work in progress. Critics of the commissions say they are fraught with potential conflicts, such as permitting the presiding officer, who will serve as a judge of sorts, to take part in the deliberations over guilt or innocence.

"Structurally, I think there are serious questions," said Eugene R. Fidell, a Washington lawyer who specializes in military legal issues. "This is not the military justice system. . . . It`s an antique that`s being rolled out of a museum case."

The administration relied on legal experts to help craft rules and procedures, including former FBI director William S. Sessions and former White House counsel Lloyd Cutler, who served Presidents Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton. Still, the evolution of the commission process has been marked by fits and starts. With the first hearings days away, rules, procedures and the roles of the key players are still being refined, military law experts say.

"Everyone is struggling to figure out what the rules are," said Kevin Barry, a retired Coast Guard captain who now heads the National Institute of Military Justice. "These rules have been kind of made up as they go along."

Military defense lawyers assigned to the case called the commission process "confusing" and "ad hoc."

Navy Lt. Cmdr. Charles Swift, a career officer, was serving as the chief of the Navy`s legal service office near Jacksonville, Fla., in spring 2003 when he received a call requesting that he represent a suspected terrorist held at Guantanamo Bay. Swift accepted and moved to Washington. The first sign of confusion came the day he arrived for work. He said he was told to go home because "some wires got crossed" and the selection of defense attorneys was "premature." Swift said his supervisor asked him to remain in Washington while he tried to clear up the confusion.

Swift said he stayed, but instead of working as a defense lawyer, he was assigned to be a "staff attorney" for the military. Swift, Sundel and the other defense attorneys objected, saying they should not be put in the position of working for an office that would be coordinating the cases against their eventual clients. "It was an ethical conflict," Swift said.

The Pentagon eventually assigned Swift a client: Salim Ahmed Hamdan, a taxicab driver from Yemen who worked as a chauffeur for Osama bin Laden. Prosecutors allege that Hamdan ferried weapons for bin Laden`s terror network and helped the al Qaeda leader escape after several terror operations, including the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. Swift said his client was a low-level driver who cooperated fully with interrogators and had nothing to do with the planning or execution of any terrorist acts.

Swift said he and his colleagues were troubled by the commission rules that were being drafted and the indefinite detentions of their clients at Guantanamo Bay. Swift, Sundel and three other active-duty military lawyers filed a friend-of-the-court brief with the U.S. Supreme Court last January, challenging their commander in chief`s orders that suspected al Qaeda terrorists and Taliban fighters could be held without review from the federal court system. This summer the Supreme Court ruled that detainees at Guantanamo could have access to federal courts, and legal analysts say that ruling extends to those who have been designated to stand trial before the commissions.

So far, Bush has designated 15 detainees as eligible for trial before the commissions. The four who have been formally charged will have their initial hearings this week. In addition to Hamdan, they are: Ali Hamza Ahmed Sulayman al Bahlul of Yemen; Hicks of Australia; and Ibrahim Ahmed Mahmoud al Qosi of Sudan. Hamdan, al Bahlul and al Qosi are charged with conspiracy to commit war crimes. Hicks faces additional charges of attempted murder by an unprivileged belligerent and aiding the enemy.

In some cases, detainees at Guantanamo Bay have been held for more than two years. Swift hired a psychiatrist to evaluate Hamdan`s mental condition because he was being held in isolation at Camp Echo, a collection of secluded cinderblock huts off limits to most visitors on the Navy base. "The conditions of his confinement make Mr. Hamdan particularly susceptible to mental coercion and false confession," the psychiatrist wrote in a court filing.

Human rights groups argue that those conditions, in addition to interrogation techniques used to extract information from detainees, could result in coerced confessions and false statements that could be introduced during the military commissions. They also say some suspects may not be competent to understand the charges against them.

"Military commissions do not require that someone be competent to stand trial," said Avi Cover, a senior associate for Human Rights First, a New York-based advocacy group. A representative from Cover`s group will be among the advocates attending this week`s proceedings and, along with the journalists, had to agree to strict military ground rules, which include prohibitions on disclosing classified material and information that "may endanger the physical safety of participants in commission proceedings."

In June, the military lawyers complained to two U.S. Senate committees about possible coercion. "It is likely that evidence obtained from prisoners abused while in U.S. custody will be introduced as evidence in these military commissions at Guantanamo Bay, and that neither defense counsel nor the members of the commissions would ever be told about the circumstances under which such evidence was obtained," the lawyers wrote the Senate Armed Services and Judiciary committees.

Altenburg, who is supervising the commissions, said he expects that issues of coerced testimony will surface during the trials and will be addressed by the presiding officer, retired Army Col. Peter E. Brownback III, who will decide whether such statements should be admitted as evidence.

"I think that that will be an important issue in at least some of the trials," Altenburg said. "I say that because to the extent that evidence presented by the prosecution is statements made by accused persons, you know, the issue of the nature of the interrogation will be critical."

Critics of the military commissions say the combination of perceived shortcomings in the process will be seen around the world as another sign that the U.S. government believes it can operate under different legal standards. They warn that the indefinite detentions at Guantanamo Bay, coupled with the decision not to apply the Geneva Conventions to certain detainees and the abuses at the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq, could have consequences for the men and women in the U.S. armed forces.

"This process is compromising our credibility," said David P. Sheldon, a former Navy appellate defense attorney who specializes in military law in Washington. "The individuals who will suffer and pay the price are not just the people being accused of these crimes. It`s the citizens and the soldiers who will undoubtedly feel the wrath of people who will likely impose a similar type of grave judgment without regard to due process. If we don`t play by the rules of the international community and respect human rights, then why should the rights of our soldiers be respected?"

Altenburg, the supervisor of the military commissions, has heard those arguments before, but he said the defense lawyers and other critics are judging a legal process that has not yet begun. He said the public will see that fair people have been put into positions of authority in the military commissions, and fair outcomes will be the result.

"I don`t agree that we are setting a low bar," the retired general said. "I think that much of the criticism is the result of not being there yet. Once people see the professionalism of all the parties involved, I think the criticism will subside. We really do have a fair system."

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Bringing Back a Dying Baghdad Street
In Effort to Restore Normalcy, U.S. Army Attempts to Rebuild a Once-Thriving Area

By Jackie Spinner
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, August 23, 2004; Page A11

BAGHDAD -- Thamer Saadi sat on the dingy white tiled stoop of his home trying to catch a breeze. The two-story villa with chipped brick walls and broken-out windows used to have one of the most enviable and famous addresses in the capital -- Abu Nawas Street.

During its heyday two decades ago, the wide street, a main north-south traffic artery through the city that follows the gentle curves of the Tigris River, was lined with fish restaurants, nightclubs and a park with grass so lush and soft it felt like a carpet of flower petals. In the summertime when the air cooled and the day waned, families gathered for picnics along the riverbanks, and young men crowded the casinos, drinking and gambling until dawn.

But there is nothing like that now. From his steps, Saadi, 38, viewed the river past the tangles of old fencing, broken concrete, shuttered eateries and garbage collecting in the dirt. No cars passed by because the U.S. military closed a portion of the road 10 months ago to protect the towering hotels on the street that house foreign journalists and contract workers.

"It`s like a dying street," Saadi said, shaking his head. A scrawny boy in a dirty shirt, the son of the guard who protects the house, snuggled in Saadi`s lap while he talked. "I feel pain. This street was part of our history."

The story of Abu Nawas Street is in large measure the story of postwar Baghdad.

It has been 17 months since U.S.-led forces invaded Iraq pledging, among other things, a better life under democratic rule. But people who live and work on Abu Nawas Street say in many ways, life for them is worse now. They are weary of the suicide bombings, the mounds of garbage and long power outages. They say they no longer believe the promises of reconstruction, despite the signs of slow but measurable progress on Abu Nawas Street.

The street, named after a 9th-century Persian poet, is a treasured place for many Iraqis. Raad Adreeb, 28, said he and his friends used to hang out on Abu Nawas every night after work. "We`d go to the casino or the restaurants to play cards or dominoes," said Adreeb, who owns a shoe shop on Abu Nawas filled with sandals and shoes strung from the ceiling. "We`d stay out until two, three or four in the morning."

The street declined during the 1990s under economic sanctions and the often erratic rule of then-President Saddam Hussein, who closed the park to the public after deeming it a security risk to his palatial headquarters directly across the river. By the time the United States and its allies invaded last year, the park was in a sorry state. But fixing it was not a priority for the U.S.-led occupation authority, which focused on larger reconstruction challenges such as restoring electricity to the country.

Soon after the occupation authority transferred power to an interim Iraqi government on June 28, the mayor of Baghdad, Alaa Mahmood Tamimi, decided that if he were going to heal his city, he would first have to heal Abu Nawas.

At Tamimi`s request, members of the U.S. Army`s 1st Calvary Division have undertaken an ambitious $1 million project to renovate a two-mile stretch of street and park, creating a pedestrian mall with large grassy meadows, lively restaurants and fountains. Every day for the past month, soldiers have worked alongside Iraqi laborers hired for $5 a day, shoveling dirt, clearing trash and removing an outdated irrigation system.

But Saadi could see none of this from his house. When told of the plans to turn Abu Nawas into the capital`s central park, he did not change his expression. He only gathered the boy in his lap closer to him and reached for a silver pitcher of water.

"That`s just a rumor," he said, his soft blue eyes blinking against the fine dust the breeze stirred up.

Col. Ken Cox, the chief engineer for the 1st Calvary Division, said the military recognizes that Iraqis are frustrated. But he said the key to winning them over is to make their lives normal again. And that, he said, is the goal behind the restoration of Abu Nawas.

"Under the Saddam regime, Iraqis had nothing they could call their own," Cox said on a recent visit to the street. "Abu Nawas used to be a nightlife place, a place where lovers would come. I know it is only a small part of what all of the soldiers are doing here in Iraq, but if it ultimately helps a portion of Baghdad to return to a sense of normalcy, it increases security."

Cox said the 1st Calvary, which is also coordinating litter removal programs through the city and building water and waste treatment facilities, had not planned to fix Abu Nawas. But he said that when the soldiers met with the mayor last month and asked what they could do for him, Tamimi`s first response was "Abu Nawas."

The first day Tamimi toured the street with the 1st Calvary Division soldiers, he ordered that all the security barricades be taken down, opening up the street. The soldiers delicately suggested Tamimi might not want to do that, given the ongoing risks to the hotels on Abu Nawas and to the soldiers protecting them. The barriers remained.

The military said half the road will remain closed to vehicular traffic as a security measure for the hotels. But cars will be able to drive on the other side starting Nov. 1, when the mayor and his military guests plan to host a grand reopening, complete with fireworks.

"Really, Baghdad is now in the battle for peace," Tamimi said in an interview in his office.

As he walked the construction site one blazing hot afternoon, 1st Lt. Brian Mason, who is directing the restoration, pointed to stacks of tiles the soldiers and laborers had pulled up from around the statue of Abu Nawas, a tarnished likeness of the poet crouched with a jug of wine. The mayor has asked that the soldiers save the tiles for use elsewhere in the city.

Tamimi and the municipality have also ordered the soldiers to remove the old tiled moats where fresh fish were kept for people to buy.

An Iraqi worker pounded the concrete around the tanks with a jackhammer, filling the air with the rattle of his machine. "This is one of the few places in Iraq where concrete was constructed properly, and I have to tear it up," Mason said.

Four Army engineering battalions are working on the project: the 239th from Arkansas, the 458th from Pennsylvania, the 411th from Hawaii and the 980th from Texas.

Mason said the project is good for the soldiers whose National Guard and Army Reserve units specialize in construction. "For 3 1/2 months, it`s been a combat operation," he said. "Then we picked up a project like this. We`re going to leave here feeling like we`ve done something for the Iraqi people."

Mageed Jassam, 65, owns a fish restaurant along Abu Nawas that has been closed since the war. The restaurant had no lights, no food, no staff, no customers. Half the tables were broken and dirty. He said he cannot wait for the project to be finished.

"We feel comfortable now, because Saddam is not here and the Americans are protecting us," said Jassam, who wore his gray hair cropped close. "But we wish they would open the street. In the 1970s, this street was like a heaven to us. There was grass. There were children everywhere playing."

Down the street, Thamer Muhsin was dropping hunks of ice into a big blue plastic water jug outside his construction supply store. He looked up when a visitor stopped to talk.

"Oh my God, it`s like hell," said Muhsin, sweat dripping off the end of his nose as he lamented the current state of Abu Nawas Street. "Everything in Iraq is a piece of hell."

"I feel sorry when you look at it now," he said "It`s dirty. There`s trash. And you can see the blocked concrete everywhere."

He said he`d heard the Americans were going to reopen the street. But, he added, "I think it`s a rumor."

Special correspondent Luma Mousawi contributed to this report.

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Missing the Point



Monday, August 23, 2004; Page A14
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An Iraqi civilian carries a child through
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LAST FALL, DEFENSE Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld ducked the embarrassing matter of grossly offensive, anti-Islamic remarks by Lt. Gen. William G. Boykin by asking the Defense Department`s inspector general to examine his behavior. This was a ruse. The problem with Gen. Boykin`s words was never the possibility that they violated this or that department regulation -- the sort of thing inspectors general are charged with investigating. The problem was that Gen. Boykin, deputy undersecretary of defense for intelligence, was delivering himself of bigoted remarks -- generally while in uniform -- that directly undercut President Bush`s repeated insistence that America`s war is not against Islam generally and is not a clash of religious civilizations. By unloading the matter on the inspector general, Mr. Rumsfeld and Mr. Bush avoided having to condemn the remarks forthrightly while seeming to take appropriate action.

Now the inspector general`s office has issued its report. And as one would expect, it avoids the only important issues that Gen. Boykin`s remarks raised in the first place -- that is, whether the Defense Department ought to be espousing religious bigotry and whether Mr. Rumsfeld ought to take action when a senior officer does just that. We`re still waiting for Mr. Rumsfeld to answer that question.

Gen. Boykin`s words do not fall in a gray area. He said in one speech of a Somali warlord that "I knew that my god was bigger than his. I knew that my god was a real god and his was an idol"; he described the war on terrorism as a "spiritual battle," noting that "Satan wants to destroy this nation, he wants to destroy us as a nation, and he wants to destroy us as a Christian army"; and he famously described a dark section of a photograph of the Somali capital as the "evil" that is the real enemy. "It is not Osama bin Laden, it is the principalities of darkness. It is a spiritual enemy that will only be defeated if we come against them in the name of Jesus and pray for this nation and for our leaders." Such beliefs are the general`s right, but when a senior defense official utters them in public, they undermine just about every value the administration is trying to project in this war.

The report, however, finds only that Gen. Boykin failed "to clear his speeches with the proper [Pentagon] authorities," that he failed "to preface his remarks with a disclaimer" that the views were his own and that he "failed to report travel reimbursement exceeding $260" on his 2002 financial disclosure form. All of this may be true, but the findings completely miss the point. Then again, that point should have been clear to Mr. Bush and Mr. Rumsfeld from the start.

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Thoughts on the Middle East, History,and Religion
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Juan Cole is Professor of History at the University of Michigan

Monday, August 23, 2004

5 US Soldiers Killed in 24 Hours, 1 Wounded

Australian Broadcasting reports that guerrillas killed one US soldier in Mosul on Sunday with a roadside bomb. Guerrillas on Saturday killed three US Marines in separate attacks in al-Anbar province (the home of Fallujah and Ramadi). If George Will is right that the Baath is planning a big October offensive, it is being planned in al-Anbar Province and may be launched from there. Likewise, a fifth troop died in al-Anbar in a vehicle collision.

posted by Juan @ [url8/23/2004 07:05:31 AM]http://www.juancole.com/2004_08_01_juancole_archive.html#109324528438054276[/url]

Egyptian Mufti: Volcano of Anger over Najaf

The claim by Mahdi Army fighters that US bombing damaged part of a wall of the Ali shrine complex could be explosive. Wire services report:


Explosions and gunfire shook Najaf’s Old City in a fierce battle between US forces and Shiite militants, who remained in control of a revered shrine here as negotiations dragged on for its handover to religious authorities.

Late yesterday, US warplanes and helicopters attacked positions in the Old City for the second night, witnesses said. Militant leaders said the Imam Ali Shrine compound’s outer walls were damaged in the attacks.

But the US military said it had fired on sites south of the shrine, from which militants were shooting, and did not hit the compound wall.



These sorts of incidents speak to morale issues in Iraq and elsewhere. Hannah Allam of Knight Ridder explores the reluctance of Iraqi police to fight the Mahdi Army. Often they have cousins in it, and besides, they don`t like killing Iraqis on behalf of the Americans (that is how they see it).

Just how explosive the news of damage to the shrine could be is demonstrated by the reaction in Egypt to the fighting so far.

Shaikh Ali Gumaa (Jum`ah), the Mufti of Egypt, has warned of a "volcano" erupting in the Muslim world as a result of the U.S. military action in Najaf. Al-Jazeera.Net quotes him as saying,


"After the attack on the shrines of the Prophet`s noble companions, after the humiliations and the terrorizing and killing of civilians, the world cannot expect… that a volcano of anger and indignation will not explode," Gumaa said . . . Gumaa said since occupation forces claimed to have saved Iraq from dictatorship, "the Dar al-Ifta cannot accept any justification… that enables them to play this ugly role, rejected by the world`s reasonable people and lovers of peace".



Sunni Islam most resembles, it seems to me, Protestant Christianity in its authority structures. Sunni ulama or clerics are more like pastors than like priests. As in Protestantism, there is no over-arching authority. (The caliphate lapsed in 1258, and, despite occasional attempts to revive it-- most recently by the Ottoman sultans from 1880 until 1924-- Sunnism remains decentralized).

As with Protestantism, Sunnism now tends to be organized by country. Each country will have a government-appointed Mufti or jurisconsult, who issues written opinions on issues brought to him. He is not a court judge with practical cases to judge (that would be a qadi). His fatwas or rulings are for the most part advisory, and tend to address more abstract issues.

Egypt is a great center of Sunni learning because it is the seat of the prestigious al-Azhar seminary/ university, to which Muslims from all over the world come to study. The Rector of al-Azhar is probably the highest Sunni official in the country, and his voice resonates throughout the Sunni community. The Mufti of Egypt is the second highest Sunni official in Egypt.

Gumaa sees Ali ibn Abi Talib, who is buried in Najaf, as a "companion" of the Prophet Muhammad. This point of view is different than in Shiite Islam, where Ali is the Imam and wali amri`llah, the vicar of the Prophet both spiritually and temporally.

But note that Gumaa still has a highly reverential attitude toward Ali (considered the fourth Caliph by Sunnis) and toward his shrine city of Najaf. This attitude is common among pious Sunnis.

Note also that Gumaa sees the U.S. as attacking Najaf and its holy sites, not as defending it from the depredations of Muqtada al-Sadr`s Mahdi Army. This perception is very widespread in the Muslim world. Indeed, I suspect that it represents 99 percent of Muslims outside Iraq itself. American commentators often feel that they have played a trump card when they point out that it is Muqtada who has desecrated the shrines, not the U.S., which is only trying to rid them of his goons. While this argument may be convincing to some Americans, it just doesn`t fly in the Muslim world. Americans don`t get to tell Muslims which arguments Muslims find convincing. The U.S., as a foreign, Christian force, is seen as not having any business in Najaf, and as rampaging around there like an enraged elephant.

Al-Jazeerah did "person on the street" interviews on the Najaf issue in Cairo and Beirut. The Egyptians said things like, "this is an American attack on Islam." Not on Najaf, or Shiism, or on Iraq. On Islam. That`s what a lot of Muslims think, and they are absolutely furious.

Some of my readers have suggested to me that it doesn`t matter what Americans do, since Muslims hate them anyway.

This statement is silly. Most Muslims never hated the United States per se. In 2000, 75 percent of Indonesians rated the US highly favorably. The U.S. was not as popular in the Arab world, because of its backing for Israel against the Palestinians, but it still often had decent favorability ratings in polls. But all those poll numbers for the US are down dramatically since the invasion of Iraq and the mishandling of its administration afterwards. Only 2 percent of Egyptians now has a favorable view of the United States.

It doesn`t have to be this way. The US is behaving in profoundly offensive ways in Najaf. U.S. military leaders appear to have no idea what Najaf represents. I saw one retired general on CNN saying that they used to have to be careful of Buddhist temples in Vietnam, too. I almost wept. Islam is not like Buddhism. It is a far tighter civilization. And the shrine of Ali is not like some Buddhist temple in Vietnam that even most Buddhists have never heard of.

I got some predictably angry mail at my earlier statement that the Marines who provoked the current round of fighting in Najaf, apparently all on their own and without orders from Washington, were behaving like ignoramuses. Someone attempted to argue to me that the Marines were protecting me. Protecting me? The ones in Najaf are behaving in ways that are very likely to get us all blown up. The US officials who encouraged the Mujahidin against the Soviets were also trying to protect us, and they ended up inadvertently creating the Taliban and al-Qaeda. Such protection, I don`t need.

Radical Islamist terrorism is a form of vigilanteism. Angry young Muslim men see their own governments doing nothing about Israeli dispossession of the Palestinians, and bowing to US adventures like Iraq, and they grow disgusted. They have no hope of getting their governments to do anything about what they see as profound injustices. So they form small groups of engineers or other professionals and take matters into their own hands.

That is exactly the kind of phenomenon Gumaa is warning against. He is right about the volcano of anger.

posted by Juan @ 8/23/2004 06:45:28 AM

Bush`s Superficial Wounds in the Vietnam Era

The debate that a handful of Texas multi-millionnaires close to the Bush family have cleverly manufactured over John Kerry`s war record is absurd in every way. The charges that they have put some vets up to making against Kerry are false and can be demonstrated by the historical record to be false. Most of those making the charges have even flip-flopped, contradicting themselves. Or they weren`t eyewitnesses and are just lying.

But to address the substance of this Big Lie is to risk falling into its logic. The true absurdity of the entire situation is easily appreciated when we consider that George W. Bush never showed any bravery at all at any point in his life. He has never lived in a war zone. If some of John Kerry`s wounds were superficial, Bush received no wounds. (And, a piece of shrapnel in the forearm that caused only a minor wound would have killed had it hit an eye and gone into the brain; the shrapnel being in your body demonstrates you were in mortal danger and didn`t absent yourself from it. That is the logic of the medal). Kerry saved a man`s life while under fire. Bush did no such thing.

What was Bush doing with his youth? He was drinking. He was drinking like a fish, every night, into the wee hours. For decades. He gave no service to anyone, risked nothing, and did not even slack off efficiently. At what point he became addicted to cocaine, in addition to demon rum, is unclear.

The history of alcoholism and cocaine use is a key issue because it not only speaks to Bush`s character as an addictive personality, but tells us something about his erratic and alarming actions as president. His explosive temper probably provoked the disastrous siege of Fallujah last spring, killing 600 Iraqis, most of them women and children, in revenge for the deaths of 4 civilian mercenaries, one of them a South African. (Newsweek reported that Bush commanded his cabinet, "Let heads roll!") That temper is only one problem. Bush has a sadistic streak. He clearly enjoyed, as governor, watching executions. His delight in killing people became a campaign issue in 2000 when he seemed, in one debate, to enjoy the prospect of executing wrong-doers a little too much. He has clearly gone on enjoying killing people on a large scale in Iraq. Cocaine use permanently affects the ability of the person to feel deep emotions like empathy. Two decades of pickling his nervous system in various highly toxic substances have left Bush damaged goods. That he managed to get on the wagon (though with that pretzel incident, you wonder how firmly) is laudable. But he suffers the severe effects of the aftermath, and we are all suffering along with him now, since he is the most powerful man in the world.

We all know by now that Bush did not even do his full service with the Texas Air National Guard, absenting himself to work on the Alabama senate campaign of Winton "Red" Blount. Whether he was actually AWOL during this stint is unclear. But it is clear that not only did Bush slack off on his National Guard service, but he also slacked off from his campaign work.

This little-noted interview with Blount`s nephew Murph Archibald, which appeared on National Public Radio`s "All Things Considered on March 30, 2004, gives a devastating insight into what it was like to have to suffer through Bush in that period.


"All Things Considered (8:00 PM ET) - NPR

March 30, 2004 Tuesday

This campaign season, there have been questions about whether George W. Bush fulfilled his obligations to the National Guard as a young lieutenant in the early 1970s. For weeks, reporters scoured Alabama in search of pilots or anyone who might have remembered seeing Mr. Bush at the time he was serving in the National Guard there. There is one place in Alabama where Mr. Bush was present nearly every day: the headquarters in Montgomery of US Senate candidate Winton "Red" Blount. President Bush has always said that working for Blount was the reason he transferred to the Alabama Air National Guard. NPR`s Wade Goodwyn has this report about Mr. Bush`s time on that campaign.

WADE GOODWYN reporting:

In 1972, Baba Groom was a smart, funny young woman smack-dab in the middle of an exciting US Senate campaign. Groom was Republican Red Blount`s scheduler, and in that job, she was the hub in the campaign wheel. Ask her about the handsome young man from Texas, and she remembers him 32 years later like it was yesterday.

Ms. BABA GROOM (Former Campaign Worker): He would wear khaki trousers and some old jacket. He was always ready to go out on the road. On the phone, you could hear his accent. It was a Texas accent. But he just melded with everybody.

GOODWYN: The candidate Mr. Bush was working for, Red Blount, had gotten rich in Alabama in the construction business. Prominent Southern Republicans were something of a rare breed in those days. Blount`s support of the party led him to be appointed Richard Nixon`s postmaster general. In Washington, Blount became friends and tennis partners with Mr. Bush`s father, then Congressman Bush. That was how 26-year-old Lieutenant Bush came to Montgomery, at his father`s urging . . . It was Mr. Bush`s job to organize the Republican county chairpersons in the 67 Alabama counties. Back in 1972 in the Deep South, many rural counties didn`t have much in the way of official Republican Party apparatus. But throughout Alabama, there were Republicans and Democrats who wanted to help Red Blount. It was the young Texan`s job to find out what each county leader needed in the way of campaign supplies and get those supplies to them. Groom says this job helped Mr. Bush understand how even in a statewide Senate campaign, politics are local.

. . . Murph Archibald is Red Blount`s nephew by marriage, and in 1972, he was coming off a 15-month tour in Vietnam in the infantry. Archibald says that in a campaign full of dedicated workers, Mr. Bush was not one of them.

Mr. MURPH ARCHIBALD (Nephew of Red Blount): Well, I was coming in early in the morning and leaving in mid-evenings. Ordinarily, George would come in around noon; he would ordinarily leave around 5:30 or 6:00 in the evening.

GOODWYN: Archibald says that two months before the election, in September of `72, Red Blount`s campaign manager came to him and asked that he quietly take over Mr. Bush`s job because the campaign materials were not getting out to the counties.

Mr. ARCHIBALD: George certainly didn`t seem to have any concerns about my taking over this work with the campaign workers there. My overall impression was that he didn`t seem as interested in the campaign as the other people who were working at the state headquarters.

GOODWYN: Murph Archibald says that at first, he didn`t know that Mr. Bush was serving in the Air National Guard. After he found out from somebody else, Archibald attempted to talk to Mr. Bush about it. The president was a lieutenant and Archibald had been a lieutenant, too; he figured they had something to talk about.

Mr. ARCHIBALD: George didn`t have any interest at all in talking about the military. In fact, when I broached the subject with him, he simply changed the subject. He wasn`t unpleasant about it, but he just changed the subject and wouldn`t talk about it.

GOODWYN: Far from Texas and Washington, DC, Mr. Bush enjoyed his freedom. He dated a beautiful young woman working on the campaign. He went out in the evenings and had a good time. In fact, he left the house he rented in such disrepair--with damage to the walls and a chandelier destroyed--that the Montgomery family who owned it still grumble about the unpaid repair bill. Archibald says Mr. Bush would come into the office and, in a friendly way, offer up stories about the drinking he`d done the night before, kind of as a conversation starter.

Mr. ARCHIBALD: People have different ways of starting the days in any office. They`re going to talk about their kids, they`re going to talk about football, they`re going to talk about the weather. And this was simply his opening gambit; he would start talking about that he had been out late the night before drinking.

GOODWYN: Archibald says the frequency with which Mr. Bush discussed the subject was off-putting to him.

Mr. ARCHIBALD: I mean, at that time, I was 28; George would have been 25 or 26. And I thought it was really unusual that someone in their mid-20s would initiate conversations, particularly in the context of something as serious as a US senatorial campaign, by talking about their drinking the night before. I thought it unusual and, frankly, inappropriate.

GOODWYN: According to Archibald, Mr. Bush would also sometimes tell stories about his days at Yale in New Haven, and how whenever he got pulled over for erratic driving, he was let go after the officers discovered he was the grandson of a Connecticut US senator. Archibald, a middle-class Alabama boy--who, by the way, is now a registered Democrat--didn`t like that story.

Mr. ARCHIBALD: He told us whenever he was stopped, as soon as the law enforcement found out that he was the grandson of Prescott Bush, they would let him go. And he would always laugh about that. "



Goodwyn dutifully notes that Baba Groom didn`t remember George telling drunk stories. But that means nothing, since they weren`t the sort of things guys like Bush told the "girls". He was trying to buddy with Archibald and impress him.

Again, decades of this sort of behavior do not leave a person untouched. Our world is in crisis and our Republic is in danger. It should not be left in the hands of a man who spent his life like this.

posted by Juan @ 8/23/2004 06:40:13 AM

Has the Shrine been Looted?

The shrine of Ali was not only a tomb with an attached mosque. It was also a museum. Since being built in its modern form in the seventeenth century, the shrine has been the recipient of bejewelled swords, glittering gems, and other priceless gifts from Muslim monarchs and notables from all over the world. And we all know what has happened to museums in American-ruled Iraq.

The fate of the priceless treasures stored at the Shrine of Ali has proved an intractable sticking point in the negotiations between Muqtada al-Sadr and Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani, according to al-Zaman. Since 1845 or so, the shrine keeper has been in a single family. Under the Baath, he was under the authority of the state Board of Pious Endowments. Haydar al-Rufay`i al-Kalidar was viewed by the Sadr movement as a collaborator because he worked with this board. He was killed by a Sadrist mob on April 10, 2003, along with Ayatollah Abdul Majid al-Khoei, who had just flown in from exile in London. His place has been taken by Ridwan al-Rufay`i al-Kalidar, a 23 year old engineer from the U.K. For most of the period after the fall of Saddam until 1 April, 2003, the shrine of Ali came under the control of the Badr Corps, the paramilitary of the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq, now headed by Abdul Aziz al-Hakim, an ally of Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani.

Up until April 1, the treasures of the shrine were intact and accounted for. But when the ragtag Mahdi Army militiamen took over the shrine as part of their first anti-American insurgency, which responded to sudden American threats to kill or capture Muqtada al-Sadr.

Sistani appears to fear that in the past five months, the Sadrists may have looted the treasures of the shrine. (If they did, it would have made them enormously wealthy and helped to bankroll the further expansion of the movement.) He fears for his good name if he takes the keys to the shrine from the Sadrists and then later an inventory is done, and treasures are missing. It would be impossible to know at that point whether Sistani`s men had stolen them, or Sadr`s.

So apparently an inventory would have to be done first, before Sistani will take possession. One of Muqtada`s spokesmen suggested that the Shiite Board of Pious Endowments be charged with carrying out a quick inventory, so that the transfer can go forward.

Another Sadr spokesman said that the surrender of the shrine by armed militiamen has been exaggerated. He said there are still Mahdi Army volunteers in the shrine, but that they are armed only with their personal (light) weapons.

posted by Juan @ [url8/23/2004 06:26:18 AM]http://www.juancole.com/2004_08_01_juancole_archive.html#109324375824303697[/url]

Threats to Academic Freedom

This important article on the current assaults on academic freedom is a must read.

posted by Juan @ 8/23/2004 06:00:53 AM

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SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/opinion/187081_focusbush22.htm…

P-I Focus: Bush weds religion, politics to form world view

Sunday, August 22, 2004

DAVID DOMKE

American presidents beginning with George Washington have included religious language in their public addresses. Claims of the United States as a divinely chosen nation and requests for God to bless U.S. decisions and actions have been commonplace. Scholars have labeled such discourse "civil religion," in which political leaders emphasize religious symbols and transcendent principles to engender a sense of unity and shared national identity.

George W. Bush is doing something altogether different.

Since the attacks of Sept. 11, the president and his administration have converged a religious fundamentalist worldview with a political agenda -- a distinctly partisan one, wrapped in the mantle of national interest but crafted by and for only those who share their outlook. It is a modern form of political fundamentalism -- that is, the adaptation of a self-proclaimed conservative Christian rectitude, by way of strategic language choices and communication approaches designed for a mass-media culture, into political policy.

Motivated by this ideology, the Bush administration has sought to control public discourse and to engender a climate of nationalism in which the public views presidential support as a patriotic duty and Congress (and the United Nations) is compelled to rubber-stamp administration policies.

The goal is a national mood of spiritual superiority under the guise of a just sovereignty. The ultimate irony is that in combating the Islamic extremists responsible for Sept. 11, the administration has crafted, pursued and engendered its own brand of political fundamentalism -- one that, while clearly tailored to a modern democracy, nonetheless functions ideologically in a manner similar to the version offered by the terrorists.

All of this has a facade of merely politics as usual. It is not. Unfortunately, as too often occurs with matters of religion, the mainstream news media have missed the story almost entirely, and thus so has much of the U.S. public.

Bush is the most publicly religious president since at least Woodrow Wilson. Ronald Reagan had great appeal to religious conservatives, but he was far less outspoken about religion -- a point noted in a June eulogy of the late president by Ron Reagan, who said his father did not "(wear) his faith on his sleeve to gain political advantage," a comment many interpreted as a critique of the current president. Indeed, Bush speaks often about his "born-again" faith and regularly references a divine power in public statements, a practice that religion scholar Martin E. Marty has termed "God talk."

That the president -- any president -- is a person of religious faith is generally viewed by the U.S. public in favorable terms, the better to be grounded when facing momentous decisions. I share this view because I know how central the Christian faith is to my life and to many others I know and respect. Invocations of a higher power, when emphasizing inclusive and transcendent principles, seem to me to be legitimate and adroit rhetoric for a leader of 290 million people, the overwhelming majority of whom believe in God in some form. What is deeply troubling about Bush`s religiosity, however, is that he consistently evinces a certainty that he knows God`s will -- and he then acts upon this certainty in ways that affect billions of humans.

For example, in his address before Congress and a national television audience nine days after the terrorist attacks, Bush declared: "The course of this conflict is not known, yet its outcome is certain. Freedom and fear, justice and cruelty have always been at war, and we know that God is not neutral between them." Similarly, in the 2003 State of the Union address, with the conflict in Iraq imminent, he declared: "Americans are a free people, who know that freedom is the right of every person and the future of every nation. The liberty we prize is not America`s gift to the world, it is God`s gift to humanity." These are not requests for divine favor; they are declarations of divine wishes.

From this position, only short theological and rhetorical steps are required to justify U.S. actions. For instance, at a December 2003 news conference, Bush said: "I believe, firmly believe -- and you`ve heard me say this a lot, and I say it a lot because I truly believe it -- that freedom is the Almighty God`s gift to every person, every man and woman who lives in this world. That`s what I believe. And the arrest of Saddam Hussein changed the equation in Iraq. Justice was being delivered to a man who defied that gift from the Almighty to the people of Iraq."

Further, this view of divinely ordained policy infuses the public discourse of several administration leaders, irrespective of their particular religious outlook. I systematically examined hundreds of administration public communications -- by the president, John Ashcroft, Colin Powell and Donald Rumsfeld -- about the "war on terrorism" in the 20 months between Sept. 11, 2001, and the end of "major combat" in Iraq in spring 2003. This research showed that the administration`s public communications contained four characteristics simultaneously rooted in religious fundamentalism while offering political capital:

# Simplistic, black-and-white conceptions of the political landscape, most notably good vs. evil and security vs. peril.

# Calls for immediate action on administration policies as a necessary part of the nation`s "calling" and "mission" against terrorism.

# Declarations about the will of God for America and for the spread of U.S. conceptions of freedom and liberty.

# Claims that dissent from the administration is unpatriotic and a threat to the nation and globe.

In combination, these characteristics have transformed Bush`s "Either you are with us, or you are with the terrorists" policy to "Either you are with us, or you are against God." To the great misfortune of American democracy and the global public, such a view looks, sounds and feels remarkably similar to that of the terrorists it is fighting.

Indeed, one is hard-pressed to see how the perspective of Osama bin Laden, that he and his followers are delivering God`s wishes for the United States (and others who share Western customs and policies), is much different from the perspective of George W. Bush, that the United States is delivering God`s wishes to the Taliban or Iraq. Clearly, flying airplanes into buildings in order to kill innocent people is an indefensible, immoral activity. So, too, some traditional allies told the Bush administration, is an unprovoked pre-emptive invasion of a sovereign nation. In both instances, the aggression manifested in a form that was available to the leaders. Fundamentalism in the White House is a difference in degree, not kind, from fundamentalism exercised in dark, damp caves. Democracy is always the loser.

The ascendancy of the administration`s political fundamentalism after Sept. 11 was facilitated by mainstream U.S. news coverage, which substantially echoed the administration`s views. That became apparent when I analyzed how 20 leading and geographically diverse newspapers and the evening newscasts of ABC, CBS and NBC covered each of Bush`s national addresses (15 in 20 months, a remarkable pace) and the administration`s push for key "war on terrorism" policies and goals in 2001 and 2002, including passage of the USA Patriot Act, the creation of the Department of Homeland Security and congressional and U.N. resolutions regarding Iraq.

This analysis revealed that news media consistently amplified the words and ideas of the president and other administration leaders. They did that by echoing throughout their coverage similar claims made by multiple administration members, thereby having the administration`s perspectives establish the terms of public discourse. For example, only two of more than 300 editorials that I analyzed in response to the president`s national addresses criticized the administration`s description of the campaign against terrorism as an epic struggle of good vs. evil. None questioned his explicit declarations of God`s will. With so many around the globe expressing a different view during these 20 months, by echoing these fundamentalist messages within these editorials, the press failed its readers.

To be clear, the U.S. news media did not emphasize the administration`s messages to the same extent as the White House did during this time. Such an equation would imply that the commercial, independent news media merely served as mouthpieces, and that is not the case. Disagreement with the administration sometimes appeared in news stories--either as a presentation of different factual information or of divergent observations by other sources -- and in newspaper editorials. Coverage also included occasional strong criticisms of government policy, in particular in regard to the administration`s diplomatic difficulties in early 2003.

The chief failure of members of the mainstream media, though, is that they did not adequately cover the deeply religious motivations to the administration`s actions and, as a result, too rarely questioned the administration`s religious-cum-political discourses. Once these fundamentalist discourses became consistently amplified -- but not analyzed -- in leading media outlets, the administration gained the rhetorical high ground, and that went far in determining policy decisions.

While Christian conservatives and hard-line neo-conservatives may see the developments after Sept. 11 in a positive light (after all, one might say that God and the United States have been given a larger piece of the planet with which to work), all Americans should be leery of any government that merges religiosity into political ends. Noble ideals such as freedom and liberty are clearly worth pursuing, but the administration promoted those concepts with its left hand while using its right hand to treat others -- including many U.S. citizens -- in an authoritarian, dismissive manner. Unfortunately, the Bush administration appears to be the latest entry in a historical record that shows that beliefs and claims about divine leading are no guarantee that one will exercise power in a consistently liberating, egalitarian manner.

David Domke, a former journalist, is an associate professor in the Department of Communication at the University of Washington. His research focuses on the relationships among political leaders, news coverage and public opinion in the United States. He is the author of "God Willing? Political Fundamentalism in the White House, the `War on Terror,` and the Echoing Press" (Pluto Press, 2004).

© 1998-2004 Seattle Post-Intelligencer

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WASHINGTON OUTLOOK
Voters Need a Heads Up, Not a Look Back, From Bush, Kerry
Ronald Brownstein

August 23, 2004

Even with the inevitable simplifications, distortions and reciprocal charges of flip-flopping, there was something refreshing about last week`s dust-up between President Bush and Sen. John F. Kerry over the president`s plan to bring home as many as 70,000 American troops now stationed abroad.

The argument was about the future.

It`s an axiom in political circles that campaigns are always about the future. But this year`s presidential election is in danger of being hijacked by the past.

Each side has contributed to this backward-looking environment. Kerry has developed an extensive and detailed agenda on everything from domestic security to healthcare. But the Democrats, at their national convention last month, focused much more on his service in Vietnam 35 years ago than his plans for the next four.

Bush`s campaign has been even heavier into retrospective. On the campaign trail, the president has devoted almost all of his time to defending his decisions of the last four years and attacking Kerry`s voting record in the Senate. His television ads have struck the same notes. Until recently, the missing piece has been almost any hint of what Bush might do if reelected.

This shift into reverse has now been accelerated by the group of anti-Kerry Vietnam War veterans called Swift Boat Veterans for Truth. Amplified by talk radio and heavy coverage on cable television, their ad accusing Kerry of misrepresenting his service in Vietnam is consuming the campaign. Suddenly, on the evening news, debates about the Mekong Delta are elbowing aside reports about Najaf; if you closed your eyes, you might wonder if you were listening to Walter Cronkite instead of Dan Rather.

Investigative reports in several major newspapers over the last week have opened gaping holes in the credibility of the first Swift boat ad. Reporters showed that several of the veterans criticizing Kerry`s wartime record in the ads had earlier praised his performance in interviews and formal evaluations.

The group suffered the most serious damage on its most serious charges. The group has challenged Kerry`s account of the firefight in which he won a Silver Star, but on Saturday another swift boat commander on the scene, William Rood, now a Chicago Tribune editor, confirmed the key elements of Kerry`s version.

Likewise, Navy records offer no support for the group`s allegation that Kerry won his Bronze Star by falsely claiming to have faced enemy fire when he rescued Special Forces Lt. Jim Rassmann during an engagement in the Bay Hap River in March 1969. Rassmann has always said he was under fire when Kerry fished him out of the river; the Washington Post found that one of Kerry`s critics, Larry Thurlow, also won a Bronze Star that day — and his citation likewise referred to enemy fire. Damage reports showed bullet holes in Thurlow`s boat.

The group is on more factually defensible ground in its second ad, which focuses on testimony Kerry delivered to the Senate in 1971 after he returned from Vietnam. In that testimony, Kerry repeated allegations from antiwar veterans that they had committed atrocities in Vietnam — charges that many veterans, then and now, felt slandered them all. Compared with the flimsy accusations about Kerry`s service under fire, this is a much more legitimate political dispute.

Yet by exhuming this argument from more than three decades ago, the Swift boat veterans are virtually compelling Democrats to amplify their attacks on Bush`s choices during the same period. The more the right accuses Kerry of serving dishonorably, the more the left will stamp Bush as dishonorable for avoiding combat service altogether.

The last few months have demonstrated that these are volatile materials for either side to handle. At their convention, Democrats allowed speakers such as former President Clinton and former Georgia Sen. Max Cleland, a disabled Vietnam War veteran, to jab at Bush`s National Guard record.

Democrats can`t like the result now that the Swift boat veterans have so aggressively escalated the combat over the Vietnam War era. But if the Swift boat veterans` offensive inspires a full-scale Democratic counterattack on Bush`s record in the National Guard, and his decision not to enlist for Vietnam, the president`s campaign probably won`t be very happy either.

Obviously, politicians should have to account for their choices in life, and even more so, their records in office; presidential elections involving an incumbent always turn heavily on the public`s evaluation of his record. But campaigns must also make room for the question that most directly affects the voters` lives: what the candidates hope to achieve over the next four years.

That question has been oddly peripheral to this election. Now it risks being swamped entirely in the wake of the controversy over the Swift boat charges. For all the detail in his proposals, Kerry has never found a way to force Bush into a sustained debate on the next four years.

And although White House aides insist that Bush will provide more specifics about a second-term agenda — and that he will break ground in his convention acceptance speech — much of what he`s discussed lately have been familiar ideas blocked in Congress.

The coming week offers an excellent opportunity to rescue the campaign from these musty arguments about the distant past. On Thursday, the Census Bureau is scheduled to release its annual reports on median family income, the poverty level and the number of Americans without health insurance.

This is the most important yearly report card on how the economy is performing for average families. It`s likely to show that far too many of them are struggling. If the two sides and the media can tear away from a war that ended almost 30 years ago, maybe the contenders could explain how they would help hardworking families fighting to stay above water today.

Ronald Brownstein`s column appears every Monday. See current and past Brownstein columns at latimes.com/brownstein.


Copyright 2004 Los Angeles Times

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THE ROVING EYE
Martyrdom or victory for Muqtada
By Pepe Escobar
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/FH24Ak02.html
As another inevitable result of the "smoke them out" diplomacy of the Bush administration and Iraqi Premier Riyadh Malawi, untold damage is being done in the Muslim world: US Apache helicopters and AC-130 gunships bombing the vast holy grounds of the Wadi al-Salam cemetery, while the main shopping street leading to the Imam Ali Shrine - as well as most of Najaf`s old city - lies in ruins. And in an overlapping graphic display, US forces now also occupy much of the 2-million-strong Sadr City, the vast Shi`ite slum in Baghdad.

The Iyad Allawi government has warned Muqtada al-Sadr, who heads the resistance in Najaf, at least three times: surrender, or else. Muqtada`s answer, faithful to centuries of Shi`ite martyrdom, cannot be anything but "martyrdom or victory". Muqtada`s spokesman in Najaf, Shaikh Ahmad al-Shaibani, still insists he wants a peace agreement - "not an ultimatum". But "peace" is something the former US Central Intelligence Agency asset Allawi simply cannot deliver, because its precondition, for Muqtada, is the US Army leaving Najaf.

Muqtada knows that the longevity of the standoff (the most recent one began on August 5) is directly proportional to his enhanced status as a resistance icon, and Allawi`s loss of face. And if the Imam Ali Shrine is stormed, as his Baghdad spokesman Abdel Hadi al-Darraji puts it, there will be "a revolution all over Iraq".

Fighting continued on Monday around the shrine, with militia loyal to Muqtada in control of the mosque. US tanks pulled back slightly from positions they held on Sunday as close as 800 meters from the compound of the shrine, but earlier promises by Muqtada to vacate the shrine appear, once again, to be ringing false.

Muqtada`s agenda has been spelled out in fine detail for 16 months now: one just has to grab a batch of video compact discs of his sermons, selling for US$1 apiece in Baghdad and the Shi`ite south. While Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani had chosen to "collaborate" - as Muqtada calls it - with the occupiers and their now-defunct Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA), Muqtada, already in the autumn of 2003, was actively engaged in sabotaging the dream of the neo-conservatives: the fire sale of Iraqi assets enshrined in the interim constitution to be adopted by the transitional - Allawi`s - government.

Former US proconsul L Paul Bremer - who thought he could take Muqtada out with military muscle, and failed - had let down disfranchised Shi`ite Iraqi masses in the first place. Muqtada, on the other hand, not only dressed them in black, gave them cranky Kalashnikovs and a place in his swelling Mehdi Army: he gave them a role as participants in a sort of shadow rebuilding of Iraq - the real thing, not US-inspired rhetoric coupled with disappearing funds. From Baghdad to Basra, Sadr centers were and still are heavily involved in setting up emergency generators, collecting garbage, fixing power and phone lines and directing traffic, making everyday life for Iraqis less miserable.

Chalmers Johnson, the author of Blowback and The Sorrows of Empire, would qualify the whole process as - what else - blowback: if Bremer and the CPA had not been so obsessed in transforming Iraq into a paradise for corporate looting and had provided security, job opportunities and functioning services to most Iraqis, Muqtada and his Mehdi Army would not even qualify as an historic footnote.

Muqtada`s Iraq
What Muqtada wants Bremer could not possibly deliver, and much less Allawi. Muqtada refuses any "collaboration" with Allawi`s government, which is regarded by himself and many Iraqis as a US-appointed puppet regime. The class-struggle angle is also inescapable: rich, exiled, businessman with dodgy espionage links (Allawi) calls a foreign-occupier army to smash a disfranchised urban proletariat (the Mehdi Army) offered a social role by a charismatic cleric.

Unlike Sistani and the Shi`ite political parties, Muqtada insists the precondition for any serious political process is the end of the occupation - and that`s the main reason for his popularity. Muqtada would only admit foreign troops in Iraq if they were controlled by the United Nations.

What is the shape of a future Iraq in Muqtada`s mind? Muqtada is above all an Iraqi nationalist - another reason for his popularity, even among Sunni Muslims. He wants no federalism, but a strong central government with a strong military (but with no Ba`athist officers: that`s a tough call). This would be an Iraq ruled by a Shi`ite majority, but independent from Iran, and with none of its shades of Islamic revolution. Well, not that many, because Muqtada is in favor of velayat-e-faqih, or the predominance of theological power over secular power. So Iraq`s democracy a la Muqtada would be relatively similar to Iran`s, with an Iraqi equivalent of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei ruling over an equivalent of an elected President Mohammad Khatami and a parliament also elected by universal suffrage.

Allawi simply cannot swallow any of this because his brief - as a US-appointed prime minister without a parliament - is to implement what Bremer could not, and Muqtada is in the way. The administration of US President George W Bush badly needs sprawling military bases in Iraq and a model corporate heaven in the Middle East. Bush is even usurping the amazing progress of the Iraqi soccer team in the Athens Olympics for his campaign-trail speeches - they are into the semifinals. But not even a miracle - an Iraqi soccer Olympic medal - would likely prevent what could go down in history as the 2004 Najaf tragedy.

(Copyright 2004 Asia Times Online Ltd. All rights reserved. Please contact [e-mail] for information on our sales and syndication policies.)

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Monday, August 23, 2004
War News for August 23, 2004 draft

http://dailywarnews.blogspot.com/

Bring ‘em on: One US soldier wounded in Najaf fighting.

Bring ‘em on: Four US Marines killed in separate incidents in al-Anbar province.

Bring ‘em on: One US soldier killed, one wounded by roadside bomb near Mosul.

Bring ‘em on: Indonesian contractor, two Iraqis killed in ambush near Mosul.

Bring ‘em on: Japanese troops under mortar fire near Samawah.

Bring ‘em on: One Turkish contractor, three Iraqis killed in ambush near Tikrit.

Bring ‘em on: Forty Iraqis killed in fighting in Kufa.

Bring ‘em on: Iraqi truck driver killed in convoy ambush near Kirkuk.

Bring ‘em on: Iraqi policeman killed by insurgents in Basra.

Bring ‘em on: Heavy fighting continues in Najaf.

Lieutenant AWOL, the Great Uniter. Nearly 100 prominent Muslims yesterday called on followers around the world to support resistance to American forces in Iraq and the government installed in June. In an appeal released by the offices of Egypt`s Muslim Brotherhood, the 93 figures from nearly 30 nations, from Germany to Indonesia, said the aim should be to ‘purify the land of Islam from the filth of occupation.’ The signatories included senior members of the brotherhood, Youssef al Qaradawi, a leading Qatari-based moderate; Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah of Lebanon, Hizbollah leader; Khaled Mashal, of the Palestinian group Hamas; two Egyptian opposition party leaders; Sheikh Abdeslam Yassine of Morocco`s Justice and Charity Group; and Sheikh Abdullah al Ahmar, Yemeni speaker of parliament. Others came from Afghanistan, Algeria, Bahrain, Bosnia, the Comoros, Germany, India, Iran, Iraq, Jordan, Libya, Malaysia, Mauritania, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Somalia, South Africa, Sri Lanka, Sudan, Syria, Tajikistan and Tunisia.”

Fighting in Kufa. “In pre-dawn darkness, American tanks and Humvees also staged a raid on Kufa, trundling down the high street and past the library. Commander Hilu and his men were waiting. ‘The Americans went as far as the mosque then got out,` the commander said, having escorted me back to the scene of what, he suggested, was a heroic victory.”

Reconstruction. “Ordinary Iraqis and U.S. officials have expressed growing concern that although the U.S. aid is finally arriving, it may have come too late to win the sympathy of the people, who have endured more than a year of haphazard electricity, water and other essential services. A program that was supposed to convince the Iraqi people that U.S. money and know-how would improve their lives has instead left many bitter and no better off materially than they were under Saddam Hussein.”

Fallujah. “Blackwater Security Consulting violated its own standards in March by sending four contractors on an undermanned mission in Fallujah, Iraq, where they were ambushed, mutilated, burned and dragged through the streets, the company`s contract for the job shows.”

Mission accomplished. “A USA TODAY database, which analyzed unclassified U.S. government security reports, shows attacks against U.S. and allied forces have averaged 49 a day since the hand-over of sovereignty June 28, compared with 52 a day in the four weeks leading up to the transfer. Iraqi guerrillas are relying heavily on weapons that allow them to attack and then slip away, such as roadside bombs and mortars. In June and July, U.S. and Iraq forces were attacked with 759 roadside bombs and uncovered at least 400 others before they exploded.” The upbeat tone of this article is entirely inconsistent with the facts it contains.

Déjà vu, all over again. “As many as 30,000 members of Iraq’s new police force are to lose their jobs in a radical shake-up aimed at weeding out troublemakers and officers considered unsuitable for employment. A $60 million (£33 million) fund has been set aside by the interim government in Iraq to pay off the sacked police officers, with the axe due to fall at the end of this month. They will receive an average pay-off of $2,000 (£1,100). But critics of the plan in Iraq say that it risks repeating the mistakes made when the Iraqi army was disbanded after the end of the war in 2003, when 400,000 disaffected soldiers were turned on to the streets with no source of income. Many joined the insurgency against the coalition forces.”

Commentary

Editorial: “The Abu Ghraib scandal above all was a failure of leadership, and although the inquiries multiply, the top brass have escaped direct discipline. At the time of last year`s prison abuse, which included torture, sexual humiliation and suspicious deaths, U.S. forces in Iraq faced a deadly insurgency. U.S. commanders sought ‘actionable’ intelligence from Iraqi detainees. Despite Red Cross protests, U.S. intelligence officers seemed to have had a clear hand at Abu Ghraib to extract information as they pleased. The original, limited inquiry by Maj. Gen. Antonio Taguba found soldiers had committed ‘sadistic’ criminal acts. Last week, it was reported that Army reservist Joseph Darby, who tipped off investigators about prisoner abuse, received death threats and has been put in protective military custody.”

Editorial: “Last fall, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld ducked the embarrassing matter of grossly offensive, anti-Islamic remarks by Lt. Gen. William G. Boykin by asking the Defense Department`s inspector general to examine his behavior. This was a ruse. The problem with Gen. Boykin`s words was never the possibility that they violated this or that department regulation -- the sort of thing inspectors general are charged with investigating. The problem was that Gen. Boykin, deputy undersecretary of defense for intelligence, was delivering himself of bigoted remarks -- generally while in uniform -- that directly undercut President Bush`s repeated insistence that America`s war is not against Islam generally and is not a clash of religious civilizations. By unloading the matter on the inspector general, Mr. Rumsfeld and Mr. Bush avoided having to condemn the remarks forthrightly while seeming to take appropriate action.”

Opinion: “It`s interesting how we choose whether to root for a team or not. A dozen years ago in Barcelona, few people rooted for Iraq and many rooted against it. A dozen years ago almost everyone rooted for the U.S. basketball team and few rooted against it. Now it`s just the opposite.”

Casualty Reports

Local story: Washington State soldier wounded in Iraq.

Awards and Decorations

Local story: Kansas soldier decorated for valor.



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http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Global_Economy/FH24Dj01.html
Aug 24, 2004

THE ROVING EYE
Oil`s slippery slope
By Pepe Escobar

BRUSSELS and DUBAI - As the neo-conservative dream of a "liberated" Iraq came true in April 2003, who would have predicted that 16 months later oil would become the ultimate time bomb for the Bush administration?

And the Saudi royal/oil family cavalry is not exactly coming to the rescue.
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Many factors explain the current rise in the price of oil toward US$50 a barrel - and counting: incapacity - or unwillingness - of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) to respond to growing global demand; maximum terrorist risk in Saudi Arabia; the Yukos saga in Russia; the recent referendum in Venezuela; ethnic trouble in Nigeria; China`s unquenchable oil thirst; widespread speculation frenzy propelled by pension funds; and serial pipeline bombing in Iraq.

Average prices for last week stood at $47.02 a barrel in the United States, $44.44 a barrel for North Sea Brent and $41.64 a barrel for the OPEC basket - a more than 4% overall rise on the previous week. Crude futures for October were trading at $46.87 a barrel on Monday.

OPEC, in its latest report, insists the world economy is coping: "On current trends OPEC production will be more than adequate to meet demand in the remainder of 2004 and 2005." A survey by WSJ.com with 55 economists concluded that oil would have to top $60 a barrel to compromise the US economy seriously. But in the real world, the fact is that high oil prices are already set to shave as much as 1% off Asia`s gross domestic product in 2004, according to the United Nations` Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific.

Cheap oil is the Holy Grail of the Bush administration`s global strategy. According to the sanitized version of US Vice President Dick Cheney`s secret energy report published in May 2001 - the work sessions and the people involved remain classified information - the US in 2020 will be importing 66% of its oil, against 55% in 2001. So, the report says, oil is "the priority of America`s foreign and trade policy", and "Russia, Central Asia, the Caspian, the Gulf countries and Western Africa" need "special attention".

This, in the long term, represents one of the explanations for the invasion of Iraq. In the short term, the administration of President George W Bush is in for a lot of trouble when oil-guzzling SUV (sport-utility vehicle) armadas of voters start making the connection between the unmitigated disaster in Iraq and oil at $50 a barrel and beyond. Analysts in Dubai estimate that the Iraqi premium - fueling uncertainty and speculation - adds at least $10 to each barrel of oil.

Welcome to peak oil
According to HSBC, oil is now 136% - and counting - more expensive than before September 11, 2001. The United States - with 5% of the world`s population - gobbles up no less than 26% of the world`s oil production.

The world currently consumes 81.2 million barrels of oil a day (1 barrel = 159 liters), according to the International Energy Agency (IEA), the energy forum for 26 industrialized consumer nations. But the really alarming figure is 84 million barrels of oil a day: according to the IEA, this will be the global demand by 2005.

A few months ago, the same IEA was saying that demand in 2005 would be of only 82.6 million barrels a day. And more than a year ago, the IEA said we would reach 84 million barrels a day only by 2007 or 2008. This is leading analysts in Dubai to predict that demand - on a very optimistic scenario - will reach 120 million barrels a day in 2020. Additionally, this should mean that if demand continues to grow at the current frenetic level, all proven oil reserves in the world - at the best-estimate level - will be extinguished by 2054.

Way before that happens, of course, we will reach what experts define as "peak oil". The oil-supply bell curve inexorably will be going down - with no return in sight - while the price curve will be going up, toward $100 a barrel and beyond.

Colin Campbell makes no bones about it: for him, peak oil is already here, or around the corner in 2005. For years, Campbell - a PhD in geology at Oxford University in England and former chief executive for BP, Texaco, Amoco and Fina - has been a lonely voice contradicting the supremely powerful oil lobby, according to whom high technology and the invisible hand of the market must guarantee discovery and exploitation of reserves virtually forever.

Already in 2000, Campbell was charging that "oil giants are fooling the planet" and that everybody was myopic - especially producing countries. He was saying that "we only find a new barrel of oil for each four we produce". He is sure that the world has already consumed half of its proven oil reserves, and he is sure that the Middle East will again manipulate oil prices. It turns out that Campbell might have been wrong by a margin of only a few months: he was betting on a new oil shock by 2005, "when production will start to fall and reserves will begin to dwindle at a rate of 3% a year".

In Europe, experts from the IEA, echoed by diplomats, acknowledge that the market is tense and production facilities are extended to the limit, but they insist the current hysteria is a question of "irrational exuberance". One expert says that "there is plenty of oil in the market, and offer is superior to demand". The consensus is to blame traders and speculators who are pushing the price of the barrel higher and higher by brandishing the specter of scarcity.

But things are not so clear cut. Especially because of China, global demand this year will increase by a staggering 2.5 million barrels a day compared with 2003. In terms of offer, analysts in Dubai say that OPEC as of July had an excess production capacity of a maximum 1.2 million barrels a day. OPEC is currently producing 29.1 million barrels a day. This means non-OPEC members such as Russia or Norway must also increase their production to push prices down. But North Sea oilfields have already peaked; and Yukos in Russia, pumping 2% of the daily global demand for oil - 1.7 million barrels - even as it`s about to go bankrupt, is also stretched to the limit.

The Chavez factor
They certainly prefer neo-liberalism to Hugo Chavez` "Bolivarian Revolution". But the 50 multinationals involved in the oil-and-gas business in Venezuela - including US majors ExxonMobil, ChevronTexaco and ConocoPhillips - as well as world markets, all badly wanted a Chavez victory in the latest referendum in that country. Chavez could not possibly beat the markets` bete noire: uncertainty. Venezuela is the fifth-largest oil exporter and eighth-largest oil producer, the only Latin American member of OPEC and the supplier of 15% of the United States` oil needs. Chavez played like a master his role of guaranteeing Venezuela`s constitutional stability. And markets - when it suits them - do have memory: everybody remembered the December 2002-February 2003 general strike provoked by Chavez` opposition, which led to production falling to 150,000 barrels a day (against 2.5 million to 2.6 million nowadays) and exports to the US being interrupted for the first time in 80 years.

So Venezuela as part of the fear factor may be out of the equation - at least for now. As well as global oil majors and major oil producers, Venezuela is profiting handsomely from high oil prices: the country is scheduled to grow no less than 10% in 2004.

Saudi trouble
Ali al-Naimi, the Saudi energy minister, is the Alan Greenspan of black gold. In early July, Naimi said on the record that oil at about $35 a barrel was a "fair" price. That was the formal burial of the old OPEC selling price range of $22-$28 a barrel. This extremely important statement in fact meant two things. The first is that there will be no October surprise - or the Saudis coming to President George Bush`s rescue. The second is that Saudi Arabia is not able to increase oil production (although they have promised an increase to almost 10 million barrels a day in September: not many in the industry are counting on it). The whole thing leads us back - once again - to peak oil.

When oil reached $45 a barrel, Naimi said again on the record that Saudi Arabia would be ready "immediately" to increase its production by 1.3 million barrels a day. Once again, not many in the industry took him seriously.

Besides, there`s the all-important bickering over Saudi oil reserves. According to Saudi Aramco, the kingdom`s proven reserves are estimated at 257.5 billion barrels. But analysts in Dubai prefer to cling to Aramco`s former executive vice president Sadad al-Hussayni who, in articles appearing in the Oil & Gas Journal, insists proven reserves amount to only 130 billion barrels.

In Dubai, it is estimated that the recent al-Qaeda activities inside Saudi Arabia - via attacks on expats working in the oil business - have increased the geopolitical risk of a barrel of oil by something from $8-$12. Analysts comment that crucial Saudi installations such as Ras Tanura and Abqaiq - the world`s largest oil-processing complex - can be extremely vulnerable to an al-Qaeda attack. The ultimate nightmare scenario doing the rounds in the oil business is of Osama bin Laden as a new caliph in a non-Saudi Arabia - before the Americans decide to invade and take over the oilfields. "Five hundred dollars for a barrel of oil, anyone?" scoffs a Dubai analyst.

Investing in Iraq, anyone?
It`s fascinating to compare the current situation with the situation in the Middle East prior to the invasion of Iraq.

Back in February 2003, people in Dubai were saying an oil shock was inevitable: the price of a barrel would climb to as much as $50, and in the event of a civil war in Iraq, it would reach $100. They agreed that in the short term this would be a windfall for the Saudis, the Kuwaitis and the United Arab Emirates. Dubai at the time was confident that Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and the UAE - with a combined spare capacity of an alleged 5 million barrels a day - would be able to cover Iraq`s production and Venezuela`s shortfall caused by the general strike.

Now there`s not so much optimism as far as spare capacity is concerned - although oil experts in the Persian Gulf region keep saying that production costs in Iraq are a blessing: only $1.50 per barrel, compared to $2.50 for Saudi Arabia and $4 for the US or North Sea oil. Iraqi oil could be extracted for as little as 97 cents a barrel. But Iraqi equipment is more than 20 years old. Sanctions have devastated the economy and nothing has been upgraded. Water is getting into the pipelines. And 16 months after the Americans took over, the oil industry is still rusting.

Walid Khadduri, editor-in-chief of the Middle East Economic Survey (MEES), believes at least $3 billion is needed to raise Iraqi oil exports to the pre-sanctions level of 3.5 million barrels a day. In his view, this would take at least two or three years of investment after peace has been established - and Iraq is still at war. Others in Dubai believe it would take $10 billion and no less than six years to get to 5 million barrels a day. And to realize Iraq`s potential fully, an investment of up to $50 billion in more than a decade will be necessary. This leads the MEES to conclude that Iraq`s oil sector will not produce large returns in the next 10 years.

Ahmed el-Sayed el-Naggar, of the al-Ahram Center for Political and Strategic Studies in Cairo, remembers how "Iraq had always been among the hawks in OPEC. As a matter of historical record, Iraq has always presented an obstacle to the US`s oil-market strategy. This explains why the US administration`s behavior towards that country was so implacably vindictive, and why, in the process of occupying Iraq to drive oil prices down to the cheapest possible levels, it wanted to drive a lesson home to all nations opposed to the US and use the fate of Iraq as an example to intimidate all developing nations."

Whatever the spin from the White House and the Pentagon, the fact is one of the key objectives in the whole Iraqi adventure - completely in line with Dick Cheney`s 2001 energy report - was to take over the world`s second-largest oil reserves, extirpate Iraq from the much-hated OPEC and maybe kill the cartel for good. Last May in Houston, Asia Times Online confirmed that even the oil business didn`t think this was a good idea.

The crumbling Iraq oil infrastructure - on the most optimistic of days - currently cannot produce more than 1.8 million barrels, and much less export it. The Iraqi resistance knows how formidable a weapon is the regular bombing of either the northern pipeline from Kirkuk to Ceyhan, Turkey, or the southern pipeline from Basra. Whenever there is a bombing - or an interruption in pumping because of workers condemning the offensive against Shi`ite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr in Najaf - production in Basra falls to less than 1 million barrels a day. It`s always important to remember that even under United Nations sanctions, Iraq exported at least 2.5 million barrels a day.

Petro-dependency
Officially, not many in the oil business seem prepared to admit that the real big problem today is unprecedented demand by the US, China and India - which production simply cannot match. But if people in the oil business know that consumption is growing at its fastest in more than 20 years, they also know that OPEC - controlling about half of the world`s oil export supply - is already pumping at the highest levels since 1979.

China - the second-largest oil consumer in the world, way behind the US - grew 9.7% in the first semester of 2004, and is importing 40% more oil this year than in 2003. Its own production grows very slowly: for example, as its consumption rises feverishly, the production of its main oilfield, Daqing, is declining, according to official Chinese data, by 7% a year (it may be more). Daqing used to be responsible for 50% of China`s oil. This leaves China scrambling for all sorts of deals with Gulf countries, Central Asia (especially Kazakhstan), Russia and Africa. China`s ultimate nightmare is its "petro-dependency". Energy-saving is now part of the official language, the nuclear program is back, and research for alternative forms of energy is definitely on.

China devoured 6 million bpd in 2003, of which it imported 2.6 million bpd. Oil imports in India, which consumed 2.4 million bpd last year, 1.6 million of which were imported, will increase 11% this year, the state-owned Indian Oil Corp reported.

Some diplomats in Brussels admit that the whole system may face a major structural problem. Huge oilfields are on their way down; there`s been no major oil discovery for the past 18 months - despite huge technological progress; and producer countries are operating at their limits.

The key indication of a crisis has been the now famous line by Indonesian Oil Minister and current OPEC president Purnomo Yusgiantoro. "We cannot increase the supply." And this only a few weeks after OPEC guaranteed supply was not a problem. In June, Indonesia admitted it was in the unenviable position of being the first OPEC country to actually become a net importer of oil. Russia has already announced its production will fall in 2005.

In euros, please
From an American perspective, the need to control Iraq`s oil is deeply intertwined with the defense of the dollar. The strength of the dollar is guaranteed above all by a secret agreement signed between the US and Saudi Arabia in the 1970s that all OPEC oil sales be denominated in dollars. Saddam Hussein started selling Iraqi oil in euros (and making a handsome profit) in November 2000 - and that`s another crucial reason for the Iraqi invasion. Many OPEC countries, not to mention Russia (President Vladimir Putin already referred to it on the record), flirt with the idea of trading their oil in euros. (OPEC is made up of Algeria, Indonesia, Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, Libya, Nigeria, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and Venezuela.)

A recent analysis published by Goldmoney states that OPEC has already switched, in fact, to trading oil in euros - as oil-exporting countries fight to offset the weak dollar, "It seems clear that OPEC and the other oil exporters are already pricing crude oil in terms of euros, at least tacitly. Whether they start invoicing their crude oil sales in terms of euros remains to be seen."

So what is Cheney doing in the middle of this crisis? He`s blaming the Democrats. The failure of Cheney`s Russia strategy will be examined in a separate article. But as far as Iraq is concerned, the blowback is obvious. The neo-cons dreamed of exporting "democracy". Instead, they imported geopolitical instability - reflected in the rising price of oil. The Bush administration has not been rewarded with cheap oil: it is now facing a new, slow, mutating oil shock.

The oil business knows that with its oil infrastructure repaired, Iraq could rival or might even surpass Saudi Arabia as the world`s largest oil producer. But the neo-con dream of a US military protectorate with US oil companies running the oil business is a more distant prospect by the day. There`s no credible evidence that Iraq may become, sooner or even later, a source of spare capacity to world oil production, or be able to stop the migration of OPEC and non-OPEC countries from the petro-dollar to the petro-euro.

Oil at $50 a barrel, and on its way to $60, is an absolute disaster for oil-importing countries (and this means most of the world). Business costs are automatically higher - leading in many cases to job cuts, which means higher unemployment. The days of cheap oil may be over - as most analysts agree. But beyond the current hysteria over oil at $50 and the failure of Cheney`s US energy policy, the world seems to be failing to address at least four extremely important questions on which the common future depends: how much oil - proven reserves - is left in the Middle East? How much oil does Russia have? What is the real amount of proven reserves in the Caspian Sea? How long will all this oil last?

NEXT: The Russia-US energy relationship

(Copyright 2004 Asia Times Online Ltd. All rights reserved. Please contact [e-mail] for information on our sales and syndication policies.)

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http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2004/08/23/ohio/index.html

The Bull`s-eye state
Susan Sarandon, Bruce Springsteen and an army of lesser-known door-knockers converge on Ohio to swing it Democratic blue.

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By Lisa Chamberlain

Aug. 23, 2004 | CLEVELAND -- "You probably haven`t been romanced quite so much before," Susan Sarandon told a crowd of about 300 Cleveland-area liberals at a fundraiser in Ohio last weekend. "Don`t be let down if you`re forgotten. It happens to the best of us."

Indeed, it`s doubtful Ohio has ever been so romanced by celebrities, musicians, artists and activists. The state`s motto, "Ohio: The Heart of It All," finally has a ring of truth to it, at least until Nov. 2, when American voters will decide what has been touted as the most important presidential election in our lifetime. Ohio is a critical swing state with 20 electoral votes that are up for grabs. The state narrowly voted for Clinton in 1992 and more decisively in 1996. Bush won Ohio in 2000 by 3.5 points with Nader taking almost 2.5 percent of the vote, a much closer election than Al Gore`s campaign anticipated, considering he essentially pulled out of the state a month beforehand.

The Aug. 14 fundraiser -- attended by Sarandon, as well as Martin Sheen, Julianna Margulies, Chad Lowe (brother of Rob Lowe), Fisher Stevens and CNN humorist Andy Borowitz -- was organized by Bring Ohio Back, one of more than 33 different PACs and 527s (nonprofit groups whose tax status lets them engage in partisan campaigning, as long as they don`t officially consult or coordinate with a candidate) working hard in Ohio to educate and register voters in hopes of unseating President Bush. But BOB, as it`s affectionately known, is the only organization that is locally grown and is focusing almost exclusively on the Cleveland-Youngstown area. About half of the Democratic vote must come from this corner of the state in order for Kerry to win.

"Al Gore received 140,000 fewer votes in Northeast Ohio than Bill Clinton did," says Jeff Rusnak, a founder of Bring Ohio Back and a veteran political operative with the consulting firm Burges and Burges. "Gore lost the whole state by only 165,000 votes. So, while it`s incredibly important what the big organizations like America Coming Together and MoveOn are doing throughout Ohio, the Cleveland-Youngstown corner of the state is critical. The way we put it is, Ohio is the most important state in this election, and Cleveland is the most important media market in Ohio. Therefore, Cleveland is the most important media market in this election."

Rusnak isn`t the only one who seems to have reached this conclusion. In fact, the very same weekend BOB brought in celebrities to a leafy-liberal suburb of Cleveland, America Coming Together held its national convention in downtown Cleveland, and featured Howard Dean and the stellar Democratic candidate for the U.S. Senate in Illinois, Barack Obama. According to the Center for Public Integrity, ACT -- funded in large part by billionaire George Soros and progressive insurance millionaire Peter B. Lewis -- has spent more on field operations in Ohio than in any other state, an estimated $1 million so far.

Still, eking out a victory here will be no easy task. Despite 270,000 lost jobs in the last three years, the Republican-controlled state has focused on culture-war, wedge issues, such as a year-long debate to allow "intelligent design" to be taught in Ohio`s public schools as an alternative to evolution; enacting one of the most far-reaching gay marriage bans in the country (which also prevents unmarried heterosexual state employees from extending benefits to their domestic partners); making it legal to carry a concealed weapon; and introducing a resolution to declare the Ten Commandments the moral foundation of Ohio`s government. As one Cleveland city councilman told Cleveland Scene, an alternative weekly paper, "The Dukes of Hazzard have taken over Columbus. Next thing you know, we`ll be installing outhouses."

Ohio Democrats wring their hands about how this state -- which once had two solidly Democratic senators, John Glenn and Howard Metzenbaum, and a majority in the statehouse -- came to be controlled by Republicans. Aside from Ohio`s Supreme Court, there isn`t a single Democrat elected statewide in Ohio and there hasn`t been for years. For all the same reasons that Ohio is a microcosm of the country, it swung Republican in the early 1990s just as Newt Gingrich took over Congress. The Ohio Democratic Party was lackluster, there was no effort to build a farm team, and Ohio was allowed to Balkanize into urban, suburban and rural districts, with the latter two going largely Republican. But now with corruption investigations rocking top Republicans and Gov. Bob Taft`s approval rating around 40 percent, Ohio Democrats are cautiously optimistic that the party will be able to revive itself by piggybacking onto all the activity here during the presidential election and making an issue of the state`s horrendous economic performance.

"This is the largest and most sophisticated voter mobilization effort in history," says Sarah Leonard, who`s with the national ACT organization in Washington. "We are sending canvassers to doors with Palm Pilots in hand. Throughout the conversation, data is logged into the Palm, and at the end of the night, when the canvasser is finished, they`ll sync that info into a database. So if `Judy Smith` is interested in education issues, that information is used to target messages to her and continue the dialogue. We`ll send her information on a flier or through a phone call about education issues."

One suburban Cleveland woman, for example, was highly impressed when a young, earnest ACT canvasser not only seemed to have a handle on the issues affecting her neighborhood, but showed her a 30-second advertisement from her Palm Pilot. "We`re marrying technology with grass-roots organizing. It`s never been done at this level before," says Leonard.

Jess Goode, communications director for ACT-Ohio, says that over the past year, 250 canvassers have knocked on a million doors in Ohio and the goal is to knock on a million more by Election Day. "We`re not just dropping off literature and never talking to people. We`re returning two and three times to people`s doors and engaging them in conversation about the issues that concern them. This is the seventh largest state in the country. It should be prosperous and it`s not."

Not to be outdone, MoveOn and Bruce Springsteen recently announced they are teaming up to put on a dizzying number of concerts in Ohio on Oct. 2, the day before registration closes. Bands affiliated with Springsteen`s Vote for Change will be playing all over the state that night, including the Dave Matthews Band, Pearl Jam, the Dixie Chicks, John Mellencamp, Bonnie Raitt and others.

MoveOn`s PAC has also launched a major grass-roots organizing effort called Leave No Voter Behind. According to Josiette White, MoveOn PAC`s Northeast Ohio field organizer, $5 million will be spent in swing states to bring out volunteers and register new voters. She doesn`t know exactly how much of that will be spent in Ohio, but it`s safe to say it`ll be a good portion.

"We had an initial organizing meeting here in Cleveland," says White. "I was expecting about 100 people; 250 people showed up. There`s this amazing synergy and energy. We`re ready to take back our democracy in a true and literal way. People are constantly saying they`ve never been involved in politics before. I`m not willing to let Ohio come up red. Ohio is coming up blue this time, and everyone`s going to be a part of it. Once the election is over, in a perfect world, there will be a whole new group of future progressive leaders that will emerge."

Among the projects concentrating on Ohio is a youthful arts-affiliated PAC called Downtown for Democracy, formed in New York City, which will be loading up buses full of volunteers in their 20s (many of whom have never voted before) to help rally the under-30 crowd in the Buckeye State. Everyone from designer Marc Jacobs to filmmaker Richard Linklater, along with seemingly every new bar, club and restaurant in New York City, is showering the organization with donations, time, space and cachet. This new group has teamed up with 21st Century Democrats/VoteMob in Ohio, which will do more traditional get-out-the-vote while D4D will entice kids to register by throwing DJ parties in Columbus, Cleveland and Cincinnati. In exchange for free beer and politically provocative T-shirts, e-mail addresses will be collected so potential voters can be informed about issues and reminded about where and when to vote.

Will this whirlwind of activity in Ohio give the Kerry-Edwards campaign an edge? A CNN/USA Today/Gallup poll of 761 registered Ohio voters, conducted between Aug. 13 and Aug. 15, showed Kerry at 50 percent, followed by Bush at 41 percent and Ralph Nader at 5 percent. When only likely voters are included, Kerry`s advantage dropped to 47 percent to Bush`s 45 percent with 4 percent for Nader. But MoveOn`s Northeast Ohio field organizer doesn`t think polls are terribly reliable at this point, as newly registered voters aren`t included.

Economic trends, at least, do seem to herald bad news for Bush. Not only has Ohio hemorrhaged jobs, it`s also losing more people with college degrees than any other state in the country, according to the New York Times. While other states worry about a housing bubble, real estate prices here are depressed. The Corporation for Enterprise Development gave Ohio`s economic performance a D grade in its annual report card. A ballot initiative to provide seed money for economic development failed while the sales tax has been increased. Education funding has been drastically cut.

None of this, however, seemed to be on the minds of three Republican-leaning men sitting at the bar where Susan Sarandon and company had just, with impressive sincerity, beseeched people about the need to educate Ohio`s voters. They said they were at the bar independently of the event, adding that they would be voting for Bush in November because of the war in Iraq. It wasn`t necessarily a good thing to have gone to war, they agreed, but now that we`re there, only Bush could bring this to a good conclusion. They view Kerry as a wishy-washy politician who would do more harm than good. One even claimed to have voted for Gore.

Another unsuspecting bar patron, however, offered one of the exhausted celebs a bit of encouragement. After Julianna Margulies emphasized women`s issues in her halting but heartfelt speech, a young woman approached her and said she wasn`t there for the fundraiser and in fact is a Republican. But she told Margulies she gets it now, and will be voting for Kerry.

In Ohio, it`s one voter at a time.

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About the writer
Lisa Chamberlain is a writer and editor in New York City.

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Published on Monday, August 23, 2004 by CommonDreams.org
The Clash Thesis: A Failing Ideology?
by M. Shahid Alam


"They hate us because we don`t know why they hate us."
- Bill Maher

Instantly, instinctively, and unrelentingly, the American establishment has framed the attacks of September 11, 2001, in the language of a clash of civilizations. The Islamic terrorists attacked America because they hate our highest values, our freedoms, our way of life, our civilization.

President Bush wasted no time in defining the language of this discourse in his first speech on September 11, 2001. "Today," he opened his speech, "our fellow citizens, our way of life, our very freedom came under attack in a series of deliberate and deadly terrorist acts." This thesis was hammered home again. "America was targeted for attack because we`re the brightest beacon for freedom and opportunity in the world."

On September 20, 2001, the President returned to this question in his speech to a joint session of the Congress. Indeed, it was the centerpiece of his speech. "Americans are asking," he told us, "who attacked our country?" His answer: the attackers are "a collection of loosely affiliated terrorist organizations known as al-Qaeda." Their goal is "is remaking the world - and imposing its radical beliefs on people everywhere."

Americans are also asking, the President informs us, "why do they hate us?" His answer is clearly stated. "They hate what we see right here in this chamber - a democratically elected government. Their leaders are self-appointed. They hate our freedoms - our freedom of religion, our freedom of speech, our freedom to vote and assemble and disagree with each other." It is not clear anymore if `they` points to al-Qaida, the Arabs or all Muslims.

A month after the September 11 attacks, President Bush made the connection more explicit. "How do I respond," he asks, "when I see that in some Islamic countries there is vitriolic hatred for America?" Of course, the President is "amazed that there`s such misunderstanding of what our country is about that people would hate us. I am - like most Americans, I just can`t believe it because I know how good we are."

This then is the ideology of America`s establishment as it wages its "war against terror." The Muslims attacked America because they hate who we are. They want to destroy us because they hate our freedom, our opportunities, our democratic institutions, our way of life, our Judeo-Christian heritage. It is a hatred that is civilizational. It is rooted in the illiberal, intolerant, misogynist, anti-modernist, and anti-scientific culture of Muslims and their religion. This thesis is now spun a thousand times every day by America`s politicians, press and pundits.

This ideology of the clash of civilizations is multi-layered. First, it seeks to explain to Americans and the rest of the world why the United States and the rest of the world must wage this war against terror. Secondly, the clash thesis - long championed by Zionist ideologues inside and outside Israel - is a device for Americanizing the war Israel has waged against the Palestinians and Arabs. Thirdly, the war against terror is itself a cover which the United States is using to establish a more muscular control over the world.

This ideology is problematic. First, there is its flimsiness. It uses an inane concoction to deflect the blame for the September 11 attacks from US policies in the Middle East: our craven pandering to Israeli aggression, our vital support for corrupt and dictatorial regimes in the Middle East, and the war and deadly sanctions against Iraq since 1990. It is flimsy because it contradicts our understanding of human nature. As Charles Reese put it, "It is absurd to suppose that a human being sitting around suddenly stands up and says: "You know, I hate freedom. I think I`ll go blow myself up." [1] Despite the incessant brainwashing, most Americans can see that.

The ideology fails for at least four additional reasons. If it is their hatred of freedoms that motivated Muslims to attack America, why did they wait for some 200 years to begin their attacks against America - if we start the clock with the bombing of American marines in Beirut? The clash thesis raises another question: why America only? Surely, freedoms are not unique to America. The Arabs could have found several easier targets, and nearer their home bases too, in Europe. Third, if the Islamic world so hated freedoms, why did young men from all corners of the Islamic world descend upon Afghanistan to fight the totalitarian Soviets? Fourth, if the attackers are such freedom-haters why can`t they get along with their own anti-democratic regimes, in Saudi Arabia, Syria, Egypt, Algeria and Jordan?

The clash thesis resoundingly fails another crucial test. Will the Islamists who attacked the United States, and prepare for additional at-tacks, scrap their terrorist campaign if the United States turns into a fascist state or - try to imagine this - if America`s elites convert to Islam but continue their present policies towards the Islamic world? One might pose a similar question for the Zionists who accuse the Palestinians of anti-Semitism. Would the course of Palestinian resistance be any different if we could replace the colonial-settler Jews with colonial-settler Germans, colonial-settler Chinese or even colonial-settler Pakistanis? The Islamist resistance does not stem from differences of race or religion that divide Muslims from Americans or Jews. It is a response to US-Israeli violence, systematic and longstanding, that seeks to divide, undermine, control and humiliate Islamic societies.

Despite its intense propaganda, the American establishment has failed to dupe most Americans on the Clash thesis. In a CBS/NYT poll done in September 2002, 21 percent Americans place "a lot of blame" on "US policies in the Middle East over the years, while another 54 percent place "some blame" on these policies. According to a Pew Research Center survey in August 2002, 53 percent Americans said that the attacks of September 11 were "mostly because" of the "political beliefs" of the terrorists; only 25 percent believed that the terrorists were motivated by "religious beliefs." [2] Finally, a Los Angeles Times poll in September 2002 shows that 58 percent Americans think that the attacks were "a direct result of United States` policy in the Middle East." [3]

The Clash thesis and the associated war on terrorism carry little or no credibility outside the United States. This was first demonstrated in massive world wide protests against the planned US invasion of Iraq. Outside of the United States and Israel, the overwhelming majority of world opinion regarded this war to be illegal and immoral. Now, more than a year after a failed occupation of Iraq; after the revelations of systematic torture by Americans in Iraq, Afghanistan and Guantanamo Bay; after the erosion of liberties inside the United States; after the establishment of an American Gulag whose geographic expanse exceeds anything established by the Soviet Union; American prestige in the world has sunk to the lowest point in its history. In a poll conducted by the European Union in October 2003, 53 percent of EU citizens marked the United States as the second greatest threat to world peace. It`s chief ally, Israel, bagged the first prize. [4]

The bogey of America`s `global` and `unending war` on terrorism will soon face another test. While the United States and its neocolonial allies have incarcerated thousands in Gulags spread across the world - without charges and without recourse to law - the `war against terrorism` has produced very few convictions for terrorist crimes against the United States. If the al-Qaida is indeed a formidable adversary, with a global reach, and with sleeper cells in the United States itself, trained in the manufacture and use of WMDs, its failure to launch even a single operation against the United States since September 11, 2001, poses a problem for the credibility of the `war against terrorism.`

It is of course all too easy for the United States to take credit for this failure. `Look how good we have been against this formidable foe. Our intelligence failed utterly before 9-11, but we have since fixed all the problems.` Alternatively, they might argue that they are fighting these terrorists in Baghdad and Najaf instead of Boston and New York. But this rhetoric will wear out over time.

If indeed al-Qaida fails to launch another attack against American interests, on American soil or elsewhere, Americans too will begin to ask: Did the United States overreact. Worse, they might question if this war was a phony, a cover to curtail liberties, to launch preventive wars, to line the pockets of corporate executives with tens of billions stolen from American tax-payers. Have so many Americans died in vain - for a phony war? Have Americans died for Israel - to fulfill its strategic objective of balkanizing, pulverizing the larger Arab states? Once Americans begin to ask these questions, the consequences could be unpredictable for Israel and for the exercise of American power in the world.

It is unlikely, however, that the US-Israeli axis will allow this kind of questioning to ever take place. The strategists in Washington and Tel Aviv understand very well how Newton`s third law of motion operates in the realm of history. If the `war on terrorism` is a phony, it can in time - once the preventive wars are extended to Iran, Syria and Pakistan - be made to produce the causes that will make it look more credible, even more compelling. Great powers have never lacked the ability or willing-ness to produce the wars their elites think are profitable. If the people do not get behind their wars - or, in our case, start falling back after getting in line - that is not a problem. Great democracies know how to manufacture consent. In the present circumstances, when history appears to be balanced on a knife-edge, that trick looks easier than ever.

Let no one underestimate the power of great countries - and we are undoubtedly the greatest the world has ever seen - to convert phony wars into real ones. Although false, the clash thesis can become self-fulfilling.

M. Shahid Alam is professor of economics at Northeastern University in Boston, and author of Is There An Islamic Problem (forthcoming). He may be reached at [e-mail]. Visit his website at http://msalam.net.

References:

[1] Charles Reese, "Baghdad George," November 7, 2003. http:// reese.king-online.com/Reese_20031107/index.php

[2] War on terrorism. http://www.pollingreport.com/terror4.htm

[3] Americans and the World, Israel and the Palestinians, August 15, 2002. http://www.americans-world.org/digest/regional_issues/ Is-raelPalestinians/summary_ME.cfm

[4] EU polls name Israel greatest threat to world peace, Deutsche Welle, November 4, 2003. http://www.dw-world.de/English/ 0,3367,1430_A_1022127_1_A,00.html

© M. Shahid Alam.

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August 23, 2004
Bush Urges End to Attack Ads by Outside Groups on All Sides
By MARIA NEWMAN

President Bush, who has refused for weeks to condemn a veterans` group`s television commercials attacking John Kerry`s military service in Vietnam, today said the group and others running independent advertisements should stop running them.

But Mr. Bush, speaking at his ranch in Crawford, Tex., stopped short of condemning the contents of the ad, as the Kerry camp has called for. He also did not address an assertion made in a new Kerry television ad that the veteran`s group is a "front group" for the Bush campaign.

In response to reporters` questions, the president once again condemned the so-called 527 groups, which can raise unlimited donations and run attack ads, but cannot directly coordinate their efforts with the campaigns. One of them, called Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, has been running an anti-Kerry ad that has accused Mr. Kerry, the Democratic nominee, of lying about activities in Vietnam that won him four medals. But this time Mr. Bush, by alluding to the Swift Boat group`s ad, appeared to go a bit farther than his previous call that all ads run by such groups should be stopped.

"All of them," the president said, when asked whether he specifically meant that the veteran`s group`s ad against Mr. Kerry should be stopped. "That means that ad, every other ad. Absolutely. I don`t think we ought to have 527`s. I can`t be more plain about it, and I wish — I hope my opponent joins me in saying — condemning these activities of the 527`s. It`s — I think they`re bad for the system."

Mr. Bush was asked whether he agreed with the charges made in the ads by the anti-Kerry group that the Democratic nominee had portrayed his war record inaccurately.

"I think Senator Kerry served admirably, and he ought to be proud of his record," Mr. Bush said. "But the question is who`s best to lead the country in the war on terror, who can handle the responsibilities of the commander in chief, who`s got a clear vision of the risks that the country faces."

"I think we ought to be looking forward, not backward," he said.

The issue of Mr. Kerry`s war record continued to dominate the campaign just before the Republican convention to renominate Mr. Bush convenes in New York City next week. The Kerry side said the president had not gone far enough to condemn the ad.

"The moment of truth came and went, and the President still couldn`t bring himself to do the right thing," Mr. Kerry`s vice presidential nominee, John Edwards, said in a statement released this afternoon by the Democrats. "We need a president with the strength and integrity to say when something is wrong. Instead of hiding behind a front group, George Bush needs to take responsibility and demand that the ad come off the air. Its funded by his own supporters."

At a briefing with reporters in Crawford after the president spoke, the White House spokesman, Scott McClellan, said the president was saying what he has said all along — that Mr. Kerry should join him in putting an end to all 527 ads.

"He`s calling for a stop to all of these ads," he said, when asked whether the president was specifically condemning the message in the Swift Boat ad. "He`s renewed his call today to Senator Kerry: Join us in calling for a stop to all of these ads."

The Bush campaign has said it is not affiliated with the Swift Boat group, and has sent a letter to television managers saying the new ad by the Kerry campaign is libelous.

Mr. Kerry and his campaign launched an offensive last week against the Swift Boat group`s ads that reached its zenith in an advertisement released Sunday that accuses the Bush campaign of "smears" and "lies" against his Democratic opponent.

In the new ad, a narrator says that four years ago, Mr. Bush smeared Senator John McCain of Arizona, a former Vietnam prisoner of war who was then seeking the Republican nomination for president, and "now, he`s doing it to John Kerry."

Mr. McCain lost the South Carolina Republican primary in 2000 after Mr. Bush supporters accused him of opposing legislation to help military veterans. Mr. McCain never recovered from that primary loss.

Today the Kerry campaign arranged for a conference call with several Vietnam veterans who defended Mr. Kerry`s war record, including the three Purple Hearts he was awarded.

"John Kerry is lucky to be alive today," former lieutenant Rich Baker said in the conference call. "The fourth Purple Heart could have been an AK-47 through the heart."

And in a speech that he will make in New York tomorrow, Mr. Kerry is expected to continue to talk about the history of dirty tricks that Republicans have waged against political opponents of Mr. Bush and his father for several years.

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company

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U.S. Steps Up Pressure on Insurgents in Najaf
Freed American Journalist Says He Wants to Stay in Iraq

By Abdul Hussein al-Obeidi
Associated Press Writer
Monday, August 23, 2004; 5:20 PM

NAJAF, Iraq -- U.S. tanks and snipers took up positions near the revered Imam Ali Shrine and engaged in fierce battles with militants Monday as the U.S. military stepped up pressure on the insurgents to leave the holy site and end their uprising.
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Supporters of radical Shiite cleric Moqtada Sadr inside the shrine of Imam Ali in Najaf, Monday.
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Late Monday night, U.S. warplanes bombed the area of the Old City, and shrapnel from the attack hit the shrine`s golden dome, one of its minarets and the compound`s outer wall, said Ahmed al-Shaibany, an aide to militant cleric Moqtada Sadr, who is leading the uprising. A fire near the area lit up the night sky.

The U.S. military had no immediate comment, and there was no independent confirmation of damage to the shrine.

Violence earlier Monday ripped a chunk out of the outer wall of the shrine compound. Explosions throughout the day shook the Old City -- a mix of streets and narrow, maze-like alleys that is the heart of much of the fighting -- sending up clouds of black smoke.

With the U.S. advance Monday, fewer militant fighters were visible in the streets of Najaf and some were seen leaving the city. Militant medical officials said at least two insurgents were killed and four others injured.

Al-Hakim Hospital reported two dead civilians and two others injured, but many more casualties were reported in the Old City and could not be reached by emergency workers, said Hussein Hadi, a hospital employee.

Sadr has not been seen in public for many days, and police drove around Najaf with loudspeakers declaring that he had fled and was headed to the northern city of Sulaymaniyah. Sadr`s aides denied that.

"Moqtada Sadr is still in Najaf and is still supervising the operations," Sheik Aws Khafaji, the head of Sadr`s office in the southern city of Nasiriyah, told the pan-Arab television station Al-Jazeera.

Worries that the violence could spread have fueled calls by Iraq`s neighbors and other Islamic countries for international intervention to end the fighting in Najaf.

In Baghdad`s heavily Shiite Sadr City neighborhood, which has been wracked by violence since the Najaf uprising, an explosion Monday killed four people and injured nine others, said Dr. Qasim Saddam, director of Sadr Hospital. The cause of the blast was unclear, and the U.S. military said it was unaware of the incident.

The Najaf fighting, which began Aug. 5, has killed at least 40 Iraqi policemen, eight U.S. troops and scores of civilian bystanders. The U.S. military says it has killed hundreds of militants, though the militants say their casualties have been far lower.

The crisis has posed a severe challenge to the interim government of Prime Minister Ayad Allawi, who has tried to take a hard-line toward insurgents causing chaos throughout the country.

Government officials have sent mixed messages in recent days, first threatening to raid the shrine -- which would infuriate the nation`s Shiite majority -- then backing down and saying they were willing to wait for a peaceful solution.

Sadr`s aides said Friday they would turn over the shrine to Shiite religious authorities, but the militants had still not withdrawn by Monday amid squabbling with the religious leaders over the details of the pullout.

Interior Minister Falah Hassan Naqib said the government would not wait indefinitely.

"Certainly there`s a limit, and I think the period has started to narrow," he told Al-Arabiya television Monday. "It could be days or it could be hours. Such decisions are taken at the time, depending on the developments."

The violence has already damaged the outer walls of the shrine compound in several places, though the damage inflicted late Sunday was among the most severe. An outer wall on the Western side of the compound, near one of the compound`s four entrances, had a chunk about 12 inches by 30 inches ripped out of it.

The militants blamed the damage on U.S. bombing; U.S. military officials said they were careful not to launch attacks near the shrine.

Maj. Jay Antonelli, a U.S. military spokesman in Baghdad, said that in response to sniper fire and rocket-propelled grenade attacks, U.S. forces fired artillery Monday at a parking garage about 400 yards west of the shrine compound and fired mortars at other sniper nests.

"No shots were fired into the mosque," he said.

Tanks approached within 250 yards of the shrine, the closest they have come to the compound in recent days. U.S. snipers took positions on rooftops around the shrine, witnesses said. Clashes broke out throughout the day, planes flew overhead as explosions shook the city.

Antonelli said militants within the shrine compound fired 120 mm mortars at the governor`s office in Najaf. There were no immediate reports of casualties in the attack.

In a separate attack, two mortar shells landed in a garden outside al-Hakim Hospital, but caused no damage or casualties.

Antonelli said U.S. troops were trying to secure the city, but were being fired at from the shrine compound and other areas. "We`re not doing any offensive operations. This is all in response to them," he said.

The militants see U.S. troops as unwanted occupiers and view their very presence in the streets of Najaf as a provocation for attack, even if the troops do not attack them first.

The violence has hammered the residents of Najaf`s Old City, which has had no electricity since the fighting began and only spotty water service.

Many stores in the neighborhood have been shut down, others have been destroyed. The streets are often deserted as many residents have fled their homes to stay with relatives or friends in other parts of the city.

Worries over the fallout from the violence have fueled calls for international action. Syrian Prime Minister Naji Otari, in talks with his Jordanian counterpart Monday, warned that instability in Iraq "is about to backfire on neighboring countries" and called for Arabs and Iraq`s neighbors to "help it get out of its current ordeal."

Iran has called for an urgent meeting of Muslim nations to deal with Iraq. Iranian President Mohammad Khatami repeated denials of claims by some Iraqi officials that his country supports Sadr.

"We have never taken sides in favor or against any group or faction in Iraq," Khatami told reporters when asked if Iran was supporting Sadr, the official Islamic Republic News Agency reported.

The chairman of the world`s largest grouping of Muslim countries suggested the United Nations take a role in ending the violence. "If the confrontation in Najaf is not defused, it will inflame emotions and may create unpredictable conditions," said Malaysian Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, who heads the 57-member Organization of the Islamic Conference.

In other violence:

-- Assailants in Tikrit, 80 miles north of Baghdad, killed one Turkish citizen and two Iraqis along a road as they headed to the northern city of Kirkuk late Sunday, Maj. Neal O`Brien, a spokesman for the U.S. Army`s 1st Infantry Division, said Monday.

-- In Kirkuk, Sharzad Hassan, 31, an official with the pro-U.S. Patriotic Union of Kurdistan was gunned down by unknown attackers late Sunday in a drive-by shooting, police officer Sarhat Qadir said Monday.

© 2004 The Associated Press

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KERRY DENIES PERFORMING GAY WEDDINGS ON SWIFT BOAT

One Million Anti-Kerry Boatmates March on Washington

Democratic nominee John Kerry today blasted a just-released attack ad in which a new group of swift boat veterans accuse him of performing hundreds of gay weddings on the boat he commanded during that conflict.

The ad, financed by a group calling itself Swift Boat Veterans For Truth About Gay Weddings On Swift Boats, accuses Sen. Kerry of using his status as commanding officer on his boat to perform gay weddings on an almost non-stop basis.

According to one veteran who appears in the ad, Mr. Kerry stunned his boatmates by announcing, “I hereby declare this swift boat ‘The Love Boat.’”

The veteran goes on to accuse Mr. Kerry of performing hundreds of gay weddings “whether the sailors wanted to marry each other or not.”

The latest charges come at a critical juncture for the Kerry campaign, as over one million anti-Kerry boatmates marched on Washington this weekend to express their unbridled hatred of the Democratic nominee.

But Sen. Kerry came out swinging against the ads today, telling a Michigan audience, “It would have been impossible for me to declare my swift boat ‘The Love Boat’ because ‘The Love Boat’ did not come on TV until 1977.”

Moments after Mr. Kerry’s comment, the airwaves were blanketed with a new ad financed by a group calling themselves Swift Boat Veterans For Truth About What John Kerry Claims Did Or Did Not Happen On His Swift Boat.

In the ad, a veteran states: “Okay, so maybe John Kerry didn’t perform any gay weddings, but it’s a lot like something he would have done if given half a chance.”

**** BOROWITZ LIVE IN NEW YORK CONVENTION WEEK ****

Aug. 29: Symphony Space, 8 PM www.symphonyspace.org
Aug. 30: The Bitter End, 7:30 PM www.themoth.org

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August 24, 2004
DETAINEES
Defense Leaders Faulted by Panel in Prison Abuse
By ERIC SCHMITT

WASHINGTON, Aug. 23 - A high-level outside panel reviewing American military detention operations has concluded that leadership failures at the highest levels of the Pentagon, Joint Chiefs of Staff and military command in Iraq contributed to an environment in which detainees were abused at Abu Ghraib prison and other facilities, Defense officials said Monday.

The report, set to be released Tuesday, does not explicitly blame Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld for the misconduct or for ordering policies that condoned or encouraged it. But the panel implicitly faults Mr. Rumsfeld, as well as his top civilian and military aides, for not exercising sufficient oversight over a confusing array of policies and interrogation practices at detention centers in Cuba, Afghanistan and Iraq, officials said.

The military`s Joint Staff, which is responsible for allocating military resources among the various combatant commanders, is criticized for not recognizing that military police officers at Abu Ghraib were overwhelmed by an influx of detainees, while the ratio of prisoners to guards was much lower at the detention center at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba. The report also criticizes the top commander in Iraq at the time, Lt. Gen. Ricardo S. Sanchez, for not paying close enough attention to worsening conditions at Abu Ghraib, delegating oversight of prison operations to subordinates.

The highest-ranking Army reservist charged in the Abu Ghraib case, Staff Sgt. Ivan L. Frederick II, said Monday that he would plead guilty to at least some charges. [Page A6.]

In contrast to the half dozen military inquiries into aspects of the Abu Ghraib scandal, including the roles of the military police and military intelligence officials, the four-member panel led by James R. Schlesinger, a former defense secretary, was appointed by Mr. Rumsfeld to identify gaps in the reviews and offer a critique of senior officials` roles that uniformed military officers might be reluctant to level against superiors.

The Schlesinger panel`s report and a high-level Army investigation into the role of military intelligence officials in the misconduct, which is also set to be released this week, are expected to offer important new details and context that may help explain the causes of a scandal that came to the military`s attention last January, but only became public in April with the disclosure of photographs of prisoner abuse. The panel said in a statement that it would brief Mr. Rumsfeld, who is traveling this week, by video-teleconference on Tuesday, and then present its findings at a news conference at the Pentagon. The Army is expected to release the findings of its own review this week, probably on Wednesday.

The broad outlines of the Schlesinger panel`s work were described by two Defense officials who had portions of it summarized for them by associates. They spoke on condition of anonymity because the full report has not been made public.

In addition to Mr. Schlesinger, the panel members are Harold Brown, another former defense secretary; Tillie K. Fowler, a former Republican congresswoman from Florida and chairwoman of the investigation last year into sexual misconduct at the United States Air Force Academy; and Gen. Charles A. Horner, a retired four-star Air Force officer who led the air campaign in the Persian Gulf war in 1991.

All of the panel members, who also sit on the Defense Policy Board, an advisory panel to Mr. Rumsfeld, have reputations for independent thinking. Some Congressional officials warned, however, that they had not yet seen the report`s precise language, so it was difficult to gauge just how critical it would be of Mr. Rumsfeld and other officials.

The Senate Armed Services Committee has scheduled two hearings for Sept. 9 to review the findings of the Schlesinger panel and the Army investigation, which was opened by Maj. Gen. George R. Fay. The committee has held hearings into the scandal, but none since May 19, as many Republicans in the House and some in the Senate have voiced fears that keeping the issue alive on Capitol Hill could hurt President Bush`s re-election prospects in November.

"The Schlesinger panel has the power to look up the civilian chain of command, and is not limited," a Senate Republican aide said Monday. "It is a key report."

The Schlesinger panel interviewed only about two dozen people, but it focused on senior policy makers and commanders. The panel is the only inquiry to interview Mr. Rumsfeld (twice); Deputy Defense Secretary Paul D. Wolfowitz; Gen. Richard B. Myers, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff; and Gen. John P. Abizaid, the top American commander in the Middle East. "It is very comprehensive," one senior defense official said of the report.

The report`s executive summary ticks off problems in organization, detention policies, command structures and the training of active-duty personnel and reservists, all issues that Mr. Rumsfeld asked the panel to examine in a May 12 memorandum.

"It would be helpful to me to have your independent, professional advice on the issues that you consider most pertinent related to the various allegations, based on your review of completed and pending investigative reports and other materials and information," he said in the memo. "I am especially interested in your views on the cause of the problems and what should be done to fix them."

Defense officials said Monday that there was overlap in the conclusions of the panel and some other inquiries, which officials said was to be expected, given the panel`s mandate.

The panel, for instance, recommends revamping training and policy for military police operations in counterinsurgencies like those in Iraq and Afghanistan. A report by the Army inspector general last month identified the same issue.

The panel also criticized the leadership of Brig. Gen. Janis Karpinski, commander of the 800th Military Police Brigade at Abu Ghraib, just as Maj. Gen. Antonio M. Taguba did in his inquiry, the first investigation into the prisoner abuse.

Marine Is Tried in Iraqi`s Death

CAMP PENDLETON, Calif., Aug. 23 (AP) - A marine went on trial on Monday on charges that he kicked the chest of an Iraqi prisoner who authorities say later suffocated from a crushed windpipe.

The assault case against the marine, Reserve Sgt. Gary Pittman, is the first court-martial known to be connected to the death of a prisoner in Iraq.

The prisoner, Nagem Hatab, had been rumored to be an official of the Baath Party of Saddam Hussein and a participant in the ambush of a United States Army convoy that left 11 soldiers dead and led to the capture of Pfc. Jessica Lynch and five others.

A fellow marine who has been granted immunity said Sergeant Pittman kicked Mr. Hatab in the chest so hard that he flew three feet.

Defense lawyers say that Mr. Hatab died of natural causes, perhaps from an asthma attack.

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company

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August 24, 2004
COMBAT
Overwhelming Militiamen, Troops Push Closer to Shrine
By ALEX BERENSON and SABRINA TAVERNISE

NAJAF, Iraq, Tuesday, Aug. 24 - American forces sharply intensified fighting here early on Tuesday morning, as troops attacked rebels loyal to Moktada al-Sadr from three sides and pressed into the inner ring of Najaf`s Old City for the first time.

Inside the Old City, Mr. Sadr`s loyalists appeared to be on the verge of collapse as American forces overwhelmed the poorly armed rebels with tanks, attack helicopters and AC-130 gunships. Many members of his militia have fled Najaf since early Sunday, when American forces began intensifying their assault, residents said.

Both the Army and the Marines took part in the latest attack, a coordinated series of assaults that began before midnight and did not cease until almost 3 a.m. The insurgents put up little resistance in the north and west, and even in the south of the city, the scene of heavy fighting during the past week, American forces seemed to take control.
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Sadr supporters wheeled the body of a man killed during the fighting to a hospital.
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After offering to negotiate last week, the interim Iraqi government appears to have lost patience with Mr. Sadr, the Shiite cleric who has fiercely opposed the government as well as the American presence in Iraq.

On Monday, the interim prime minister, Ayad Allawi, again demanded that Mr. Sadr disband his militia, a step Mr. Sadr has refused. The American attacks here have been approved by Dr. Allawi.

Even though his insurgents lost ground, Mr. Sadr may be hoping to gain support from Muslim anger at the fact that American troops are fighting so near the shrine of Imam Ali, one of Shiite Islam`s holiest sites.

On Monday, American tanks closed to within 250 yards of the shrine, which Mr. Sadr`s forces in Najaf have been using as a base. By early Tuesday morning the shrine was shrouded in smoke from a large fire on the northern edge of the Old City.

The attack did not appear to have damaged the dome of the mosque. But an attack on Sunday night punched a deep hole in the west wall of the shrine and scattered shrapnel and twisted pieces of metal across the area.

Mr. Sadr has rallied from military defeats before. But American commanders said on Tuesday morning that they had been surprised by the lack of resistance to the attack and that they believed that Mr. Sadr`s forces were becoming discouraged.

"We want to destroy the enemy, destroy his will, make him fight on our terms," said Lt. Col. Myles Miyamasu, commander of the First Battalion of the Fifth Cavalry, which attacked from the north. "Slowly but surely, we`re achieving that."

Spokesmen for Mr. Sadr said Monday that his forces would continue to resist. But many of the Shiite men who answered his call to come to Najaf and join his militia are leaving the city, residents said Monday. Small groups of men could be seen trudging away from the shrine on Monday afternoon.

"They`re running like deer," said Haidar Abdul-Hussein, a baker from the area. "We know them because they`re strangers, not from Najaf. Some even ask directions."
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Militiamen loyal to the rebel cleric Moktada al-Sadr took cover yesterday as American shells hit a building in Najaf.
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Mr. Abdul-Hussein, who lives on the western edge of the Old City, said he first began seeing fighters leave about three or four days ago. Minivan drivers at Najaf`s bus station for travel to and from southern cities said Monday that the number of men leaving had steadily increased.

Mr. Sadr himself has not been seen for more than a week, and aides refused to disclose his whereabouts again on Monday.

Inside the shrine, a dwindling band of men napped and chatted on carpets in the shade of the mosque`s high walls. Many of the militiamen there were from other cities, including Baghdad`s Shiite slum area, and badgered reporters for the use of satellite phones to call home.

The insurgents, who fought fiercely against marines when the battle of Najaf began in early August, appear to have no answer to the tanks and helicopter gunships that American forces are now using against them. On Monday night, soldiers moved freely through the huge cemetery north of the Old City , facing only light resistance: a half-dozen rocket-propelled grenades and occasional sniper fire. The mortar attacks that killed several American troops and wounded dozens more in the cemetery were absent.

In an attack that began just before midnight, American tanks and Bradley fighting vehicles pushed south through the cemetery and into the northern edge of the innermost part of Najaf`s Old City, just 250 yards from the shrine.

The tanks then unleashed dozens of shells on buildings north of the shrine, while the Bradleys followed up with heavy machine-gun fire, setting several buildings ablaze. Explosions filled the night, and smoke poured north from the Old City into the cemetery. Later, an AC-130 gunship, a plane armed with rapid-fire cannons and a howitzer, poured shells into the area, causing fires to burn out of control and the northern edge of the city to glow red.

Colonel Miyamasu said American forces could have pressed even closer to the shrine but had chosen to keep their distance.
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An attack on Sunday night punched a deep hole in the west wall of the shrine of Imam Ali and scattered shrapnel and twisted pieces of metal across the area.
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Meanwhile, marines swept around the western edge of the city before striking at a large parking garage just west of the mosque. There, too, resistance was relatively light.

South of the shrine, American tanks lined streets at the edge of the Old City on Monday afternoon. Overnight they rolled into a building complex on the southeastern edge of the area, which could be seen burning near midnight.

With the battle intensifying, Dr. Allawi showed no signs of compromise.

In a speech on Monday, he blamed Mr. Sadr for failing to meet with a delegation of mediators sent by a national conference last week. Mr. Sadr`s aides said they believed that his safety could not be guaranteed if he met the delegation, which had traveled from Baghdad to see him.

The rejection appears to have rekindled old doubts about Mr. Sadr held by many Iraqis. While he has become a hero to some Shiites for standing up to the United States, others believe that his religious knowledge is weak and that his militia is little more than a group of thugs. By shrugging off the delegation, Mr. Sadr fanned those concerns.

In a statement on Monday, Dr. Allawi again called on Mr. Sadr`s militia to leave the shrine and disband.

"We will guarantee safety to all who drop their weapons," he said.

Sabrina Tavernese contributed reporting from Najaf for this article.

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August 23, 2004
Q&A: What`s at stake in Afghanistan`s upcoming presidential election?

From the [urlCouncil on Foreign Relations,]http://www.cfr.org/background/afghanistan_karzai.php[/url] August 23, 2004

What`s at stake in Afghanistan`s upcoming presidential election?

Many experts say the October 9 vote, the first direct presidential election in Afghanistan`s history, is the latest round of an ongoing power struggle between interim president Hamid Karzai and the regional strongmen known as warlords who control most of the country. Karzai`s appointed government rules Kabul, the capital, but "the warlords are the main power-holders in most of Afghanistan," says Barnett R. Rubin, director of studies at the Center on International Cooperation at New York University. Efforts to disarm the militias controlled by the warlords have been largely ineffective.

Do warlords participate in the current government?

Yes. Some have hold--or continue to hold--significant posts, including first vice president, defense minister, education minister, and as governors of several important provinces. This arrangement is part of a power-sharing agreement worked out at a Bonn conference after the U.S.-led invasion toppled the Taliban in 2001 and later at a nationwide loya jirga, or grand council, in June 2002.

Why were warlords given government posts?

Karzai and the international organizers of Afghanistan`s political transition hoped that including the warlords would spur them to support the establishment of a strong central government. But that plan hasn`t succeeded, experts say. Instead, the warlords have largely used their official positions to cement their own authority in the regions they control and have resisted attempts to disarm their personal militias or meld them into the national army.

What has Karzai done recently to exert control over the warlords?

In July, he dropped a powerful warlord who also serves as first vice president and defense minister, Mohammed Qasim Fahim, from his presidential ticket. Many Afghans saw Karzai`s snub of Fahim as a rebuke to the warlords and a sign of Karzai`s willingness to challenge them. "It was a very courageous move," says Kathy Gannon, Associated Press bureau chief for Pakistan and Afghanistan and the 2003-04 Edward R. Murrow press fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations. Karzai has also stepped up his anti-warlord rhetoric. In a July 12 interview with The New York Times, he called warlords the greatest threat to Afghanistan`s security--more dangerous than the remnants of the Taliban regime.

Are the main warlords supporting Karzai in the presidential election?

No. Instead, they are either running for office themselves or supporting other candidates. Abdul Rashid Dostum, a general with Uzbek roots, is running for president. Fahim is supporting fellow Tajik Yunus Qanuni, who resigned as education minister to run against Karzai. Voters will elect a president and two vice presidents.

Who is expected to win?

Karzai is heavily favored, and no warlord appears to have national appeal. However, in an 18-candidate field, Karzai may fail to muster a majority. Under those circumstances, a runoff election between the two leading candidates will occur within two weeks.

Where does the presidential election fit in Afghanistan`s democratic transition?

It is a midway point. The June 2002 loya jirga chose Karzai to head the Transitional Islamic State of Afghanistan. The group also drafted a constitution that was ratified by a constitutional loya jirga on January 4, 2004. Under the terms of this constitution, presidential and parliamentary elections were due to be held by June 2004.

Why didn`t they occur on schedule?

The presidential election was delayed twice because of security fears and organizational difficulties caused by attacks on election monitors and workers trying to register voters. Efforts to take a new census have also been disrupted by violence, experts say. The parliamentary vote has been put off until April 2005.

What is the current level of violence?

Dozens of Afghans and foreigners have been killed in recent attacks, which have targeted election workers and international aid workers. A busload of female election workers traveling to register voters was bombed June 26, killing two and injuring 12, including three children. A U.N. voter registration office in western Afghanistan was hit by a series of bombs August 20, injuring six policemen. Officials blame members of the Taliban, which has regained strength in the country`s south and east, for trying to prevent Afghans from participation in the election process.

Why are warlords contesting the election?

They are running to "flex their political muscle," says Sam Zarifi, deputy director of the Asia Division of Human Rights Watch. If they win enough votes, experts say, the warlords will be in a better position to bargain for powerful posts in a new Karzai government. Some experts say the warlords, like good businessmen, are keeping their options open. "There`s a high degree of uncertainty [in the country], and they`re trying to diversify their portfolios," Rubin says. "They know a transformation is in the works."

If Karzai wins, is he expected to take additional measures against the warlords?

It depends on his margin of victory. "He could take 60 percent of the vote or more," Zarifi says; if he does, Karzai would likely take it as a mandate to rein in the warlords. A landslide, Karzai hopes, would give his government political legitimacy in the eyes of Afghans and the world. This, in turn, may help him get more international support to extend the rule of law outside Kabul; he has been asking for additional contributions of troops and money for months. "Karzai`s done all he can," Zarifi says. "The ball`s in the court of the U.S. and NATO now."

How many warlords are there?

There are a handful of very powerful warlords with regional and national reach. In addition, each province in the country also has hundreds, possibly thousands, of smaller-scale leaders, Zarifi says. "It ranges from leaders who have thousands of men under arms to the guy on the corner who has 20 guys with guns."

Are the warlords leaders of ethnic tribes?

Not necessarily, although most of them have strong support from their ethnic communities. Zarifi says the warlords are men from across Afghanistan "whose political authority derives solely from their military capabilities." Many served as mujahedeen fighters against the Soviets in the 1980s.

Who are the major warlords?

* Mohammed Qasim Fahim, vice president and defense minister. Fahim is an ethnic Tajik and commands a large militia that controls both parts of Kabul and sections of the northern Pansjir Valley. A former deputy of the late Northern Alliance leader Massoud, Fahim stepped into Massoud`s leadership role "by default" after his death, Zarifi says.
* Abdul Rashid Dostum, the ethnic Uzbek general, is a former Northern Alliance commander with a stronghold in the city of Shebergan, in the northern Jozjan province. A former adviser to Karzai, he resigned his post in July to run for president. He is expected to draw support from the country`s Uzbek and Turkmen minority groups, as well as from the northern Shar-e-pul province just south of Mazar-i-Sharif. Dostum opposes a centralized state in Afghanistan and has refused to disarm his militia. He reportedly has thousands of men under arms.
* Attah Mohammed, the Tajik governor of the northern Balkh province, is another of the powerful Northern Alliance commanders. Karzai appointed him governor of the province--whose capital Mazar-i-Sharif is the country`s second-largest city--in July. Mohammed, a longtime enemy of Dostum, is loyal to Fahim. Gannon says Mohammed is in clear command of his province; he recently put Mazar-i-Sharif`s police chief under house arrest for stopping a military vehicle that was carrying drugs. "All the police are loyal to me," he told Gannon.
* Ismail Khan, a former mujahedeen leader and now the governor of the western Herat province, which borders Iran. Khan is a member of the Farsiwan tribe, which has close ties to Iran. He is "the most independent of the warlords," Zarifi says, and owes allegiance to few. Khan is a totalitarian, Zarifi says, "which means [Herat is] the only part of the country where security and services are good."
* Hazrat Ali, a mujahedeen leader from Jalalabad, the capital of Nangarhar province. His troops have helped U.S. forces hunt Qaeda members. He serves as the military adviser to Karzai for the country`s eastern region.
* Abdul Rabb al-Rasul Sayyaf, a powerful former mujahedeen leader who was born near Kabul. A member of the Kharruti tribe, he studied in Egypt and Saudi Arabia and practices Wahhabism, the form of Sunni Islam dominant in Saudi Arabia. He has strong support from Wahhabi factions in Saudi Arabia, but has no significant support base in Afghanistan. "He`s by far the most fundamental and radical" of the warlords, Zarifi says.

How far has disarmament of the warlords` militias progressed?

"The disarmament has been negligible," Gannon says. "None of the commanders has demobilized to any extent." The New York Times reported July 12 that only 10,000 of the country`s estimated 60,000 to 100,000 militiamen have been demobilized thus far. Anyone who wields power in the country is armed, experts say. Gannon says tribal leaders in the provinces have told her, "Afghanistan today is ruled by the gun. If you don`t have one, you`re nobody."

How much control do the warlords have over Afghanistan`s drug trade?

Experts say the warlords take a cut of the money made from the country`s drug trade, estimated at $2.3 billion last year, half the country`s legitimate gross domestic product. "The military commanders who control the country are personally profiting from the drug trade," Gannon says. Rubin says the warlords profit at every level: they tax the opium grown locally, they charge tolls on the roads used to transport the opium to wholesale markets, and they take a share of the profits from the centers where the opium is processed. In addition, many warlords help get the drugs to international markets using their existing networks for moving men, money, and arms, he says.

Experts say the warlords are using drug money to arm their private militias and to fund their political campaigns. But Zarifi adds that the biggest warlords have plenty of other ways to make money: they charge import duties on trade through their provinces, smuggle antiquities and lumber, and skim reconstruction funds. "The major warlords tax the poppy trade, but they don`t depend on it," he says.

-- by Esther Pan, staff writer, cfr.org

Copyright 2004

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Zu der Geschichte Idema siehe auch:

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Central_Asia/FH21Ag02.html

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August 24, 2004
Afghan trial casts light on murky warfare
By Victoria Burnett

He is perfectly cast in a murky tale of foiled assassinations and vigilante antics. With his convincing patter and combat garb, Jonathan Keith Idema blended easily into the circle of spooks, bearded US special forces and burly private security contractors who form part of the cast of America`s war in Afghanistan.

The drama of the American known in Kabul simply as "Jack" could soon end in an Afghan jail. It has thrown a stark light on a war fought in the shadows, where the lines between official and unofficial security agents are often blurred. Mr Idema and his co-defendants two Americans and four Afghans face up to 20 years imprisonment for allegedly torturing detainees as part of a freelance counter-terrorism mission that he insists had official backing.

At the weekend, in his first interview since Afghan intelligence officials arrested him on July 5, Mr Idema denied torturing the 15 men he had rounded up in June in connection with what he said was a complex bomb plot aimed at Afghan and American targets.

"Nobody was beaten, nobody was tortured, nobody had boiling water poured on them," said the former special forces soldier, who spent three years in jail for wire fraud. "Did we interrogate people? Absolutely. Did we keep them up with sleep deprivation? Absolutely."

Mr Idema, who wore dark glasses and chain-smoked throughout a 75-minute meeting at the Afghan intelligence headquarters, insisted that senior Afghan and US security officials had supported his efforts.

"I have e-mails between me and DoD, Isaf, the Pentagon," he said, referring to the US Department of Defense and the Nato-led International Security Assistance Force based in Kabul. "Documents, tape-recorded conversations, video-taped conversations I`ve got everything."

Some of Mr Idema`s claims were borne out on Monday in a session at a packed Kabul courthouse, where the defendants struggled to make their case to a trio of judges through a muddled, inaudible translator.

A lawyer for Edward Caraballo, a New York-based journalist and co-defendant of Mr Idema, who had been filming his exploits for a documentary, played a tape showing Yunus Qanooni, former education minister and one of the alleged targets of the bomb plot, offering Mr Idema help from some of his security guards. Mr Qanooni is running for president in October`s election.

Another taped excerpt showed Mr Idema and his team raiding a compound alongside Afghan intelligence officials and police. In another, Mr Idema talked to Isaf officials in a compound he had raided. Mr Idema said in the interview that he had handed Isaf about 2kg of an explosive called Alpha 1X2.

The US military denies any formal relationship with Mr Idema but admitted last month to taking a suspect from the vigilante and holding him for more than a month. Isaf officials acknowledged sending explosives experts on three occasions in June to check compounds raided by Mr Idema.

Mr Idema said he had the support of Marshal Mohammad Fahim, the Afghan defence minister, and of Masood Khalili, Afghanistan`s ambassador to India, both of whom are former commanders of the Northern Alliance resistance movement. A photo circulating in Kabul shows Mr Khalili standing with Mr Idema and his team in Kabul. An official close to Mr Fahim, one of the targets of the terror plot, confirmed Mr Fahim had met Mr Idema.

Mr Idema forged bonds with the Northern Alliance during the war against the Taliban, when he dressed wounded soldiers on the front lines and offered security advice without payment, he says. His exploits featured in the book The Hunt for bin Laden.

He said the US government, in particular the Federal Bureau of Investigations, had disowned him and orchestrated his arrest because they were alarmed by the torture charges. "This was driven solely by the American FBI. Because they didn`t want to be embarrassed," he said.

Armed with Afghanistan`s criminal code, Mr Idema quarrelled with a judge on Monday, objecting he had yet to receive a duly translated indictment and lacked legal representation. The trial was suspended to give Brent Bennet, one of the two co-defendants, time to get a lawyer.

It is unlikely the truth will emerge from the trial as to whether Mr Idema is a deluded mercenary who drew officials into his web, or a misled crusader hung out to dry. In the interview, he said: "This is too unbelievable for me to make up."

© Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2004.

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Das Wichtigste ist die Sensation: Facts, half-truths and passionately tendentious opinions get tumbled together on screen like laundry in an industrial dryer - without the softeners of fact-checking or reflection. Das betrifft nicht nur diesen Fall und auch nicht nur die USA.


August 24, 2004
TV WATCH
On Cable, a Fog of Words About Kerry`s War Record
By ALESSANDRA STANLEY

There is the fog of war and then there is the fog of cable.

Over the last few weeks, 24-hour news networks have done little to find out what John Kerry did in Vietnam, but they have provided a different kind of public service: their examination of his war record in Vietnam illustrates once again just how perfunctory and confusing cable news coverage can be. Facts, half-truths and passionately tendentious opinions get tumbled together on screen like laundry in an industrial dryer - without the softeners of fact-checking or reflection.

Somehow, on all-cable news stations - CNN as well as Fox News - a story that rises or falls on basic and mostly verifiable facts blurs into just another developing news sensation alongside the latest Utah kidnapping or the Scott Peterson murder trial. (It is particularly confusing on Fox News, where so many of its blond female anchors look like Amber Frey.)

Fox News, which delivers its news with "Fight Club" ferocity, has relished the controversy the most, seizing hungrily on charges that Mr. Kerry lied to gain his medals. Those accusations, which have not been substantiated, were made in the book "Unfit for Command," co-written by a former Swift boat commander and longtime Kerry critic, John O`Neill. Fox News has pushed the story early, often, and sometimes even late.

Yesterday, President Bush denounced all third-party campaign ads, including the ads by a group called Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, and called his opponent`s war record admirable. Fox anchors made note of that development, then raced back to the disparaging remarks former Senator Bob Dole made to CNN on Sunday about Mr. Kerry`s Purple Heart medals. ("Never bled that I know of," said Mr. Dole, who was badly wounded in World War II.)

Fox News showed, again, a clip of Mr. Dole complaining that it was hypocritical of Kerry, a former opponent of the war, to run now as a proud Vietnam veteran. The Fox anchor Laurie Dhue then turned to her liberal guest, Elaine Kamarck, a former Gore campaign adviser.

"I mean, this does make it sound like he speaks from both sides of his mouth on this," Ms. Dhue said. "Could this hurt the Kerry campaign?"

Ms. Kamarck disagreed.

Fred Barnes, the executive editor of The Weekly Standard and a regular Fox commentator, ardently defended the Swift boat critics of Mr. Kerry, saying on Fox that a majority of the senator`s Vietnam brethren believed that Mr. Kerry "fabricated or exaggerated his record." Mr. Barnes added that "the entire chain of command above Kerry have said the same thing." He did not mention any notable exceptions in that chain of command, including Senator John W. Warner, Republican of Virginia, a former secretary of the Navy who said Mr. Kerry fully merited the Silver Star. Mr. Barnes`s hyperbole went unchecked.

CNN showed less relish over the Swift boat clash, but it was not much more helpful in separating fact from friction. Wolf Blitzer`s interview with the tart-tongued Mr. Dole made a lot of news on Sunday, but CNN allowed him to make misleading assertions without pointing out where he was in error. Mr. Dole suggested that Mr. Kerry was in a rush to obtain his Purple Hearts to meet a regulation that allowed soldiers to leave the war zone after winning three. "I mean, the first one, whether he ought to have a Purple Heart - he got two in one day, I think. And he was out of there in less than four months, because three Purple Hearts and you`re out." ( Mr. Kerry did not receive two Purple Hearts for events of the same day. He received them for the events of Dec. 2, 1968; Feb. 20, 1969; and March 13, 1969.)

Finally, yesterday afternoon, Mr. Blitzer spoke to Mr. Dole by telephone and asked him if he regretted any of his statements. Mr. Dole said he did not.

"I wasn`t trying to be mean-spirited," Mr. Dole said. "I was just trying to say all these guys on the other side just can`t be Republican liars."

That kind of air-kiss coverage is typical of cable news, where the premium is on speed and spirited banter rather than painstaking accuracy. But it has grown into a lazy habit: anchors do not referee - they act as if their reportage is fair and accurate as long as they have two opposing spokesmen on any issue.

Fox commentators like Bill O`Reilly and Sean Hannity are famous for their informal, intemperate manner of speech. But the debate on programs like "Crossfire," on CNN, is often as heated - and as full of hot air. On an Aug. 12 edition about the Swift boat debate, a program regular, Robert Novak, the conservative columnist, called Mr. O`Neill and his fellow anti-Kerry veterans "the real patriots to rise to the surface this election year."

James Carville, Mr. Novak`s liberal counterpart, challenged Mr. O`Neill`s co-author, Jerome Corsi, charging that Mr. Corsi`s blog is "scabrous." When Mr. O`Neill tried to change the subject, Mr. Carville shrieked at him.

At best, cable news programs swing into action when a crisis or major news development occurs, marshaling their resources to give viewers instant, live access. At their worst, they amplify the loudest voices and blur complexities. People can blame the confusion of combat for some of the discrepancies over Mr. Kerry`s war record, but cable has done little to clear the air.

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company

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August 24, 2004
OP-ED COLUMNIST
The Rambo Coalition
By PAUL KRUGMAN

Almost a year ago, on the second anniversary of 9/11, I predicted "an ugly, bitter campaign - probably the nastiest of modern American history." The reasons I gave then still apply. President Bush has no positive achievements to run on. Yet his inner circle cannot afford to see him lose: if he does, the shroud of secrecy will be lifted, and the public will learn the truth about cooked intelligence, profiteering, politicization of homeland security and more.

But recent attacks on John Kerry have surpassed even my expectations. There`s no mystery why. Mr. Kerry isn`t just a Democrat who might win: his life story challenges Mr. Bush`s attempts to confuse tough-guy poses with heroism, and bombast with patriotism.

One of the wonders of recent American politics has been the ability of Mr. Bush and his supporters to wrap their partisanship in the flag. Through innuendo and direct attacks by surrogates, men who assiduously avoided service in Vietnam, like Dick Cheney (five deferments), John Ashcroft (seven deferments) and George Bush (a comfy spot in the National Guard, and a mysterious gap in his records), have questioned the patriotism of men who risked their lives and suffered for their country: John McCain, Max Cleland and now John Kerry.

How have they been able to get away with it? The answer is that we have been living in what Roger Ebert calls "an age of Rambo patriotism." As the carnage and moral ambiguities of Vietnam faded from memory, many started to believe in the comforting clichés of action movies, in which the tough-talking hero is always virtuous and the hand-wringing types who see complexities and urge the hero to think before acting are always wrong, if not villains.

After 9/11, Mr. Bush had a choice: he could deal with real threats, or he could play Rambo. He chose Rambo. Not for him the difficult, frustrating task of tracking down elusive terrorists, or the unglamorous work of protecting ports and chemical plants from possible attack: he wanted a dramatic shootout with the bad guy. And if you asked why we were going after this particular bad guy, who hadn`t attacked America and wasn`t building nuclear weapons - or if you warned that real wars involve costs you never see in the movies - you were being unpatriotic.

As a domestic political strategy, Mr. Bush`s posturing worked brilliantly. As a strategy against terrorism, it has played right into Al Qaeda`s hands. Thirty years after Vietnam, American soldiers are again dying in a war that was sold on false pretenses and creates more enemies than it kills.

It should come as no surprise, then, that Mr. Bush - who must defend the indefensible - has turned to those who still refuse to face the truth about Vietnam.

All the credible evidence, from military records to the testimony of those who served with Mr. Kerry, confirms his wartime heroism. Why, then, are some veterans willing to join the smear campaign? Because they are angry about his later statements against the war. Yet making those statements was itself a heroic act - and what he said then rings truer than ever.

The young John Kerry spoke of leaders who sent others to their deaths because they wanted to seem tough, then "left all the casualties and retreated behind a pious shield of public rectitude." Fifteen months after George Bush strutted around in his flight suit, more and more Americans are echoing Gen. Anthony Zinni, who received a standing ovation from an audience of Marine and Navy officers when he talked about the debacle in Iraq and said of those who served in Vietnam: "We heard the garbage and the lies, and we saw the sacrifice. I ask you, is it happening again?"

Mr. Kerry also spoke of the moral cost of an ill-conceived war - of the atrocities soldiers find themselves committing when they can`t tell friend from foe. Two words: Abu Ghraib.

Let`s hope that this latest campaign of garbage and lies - initially financed by a Texas Republican close to Karl Rove, and running an ad featuring an "independent" veteran who turns out to have served on a Bush campaign committee - leads to a backlash against Mr. Bush. If it doesn`t, here`s the message we`ll be sending to Americans who serve their country: If you tell the truth, your courage and sacrifice count for nothing.

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company

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Iraqi Teens Abused at Abu Ghraib, Report Finds
Officials Say Inquiry Also Confirms Prisoners Were Hidden From Aid Groups

By Josh White and Thomas E. Ricks
Washington Post Staff Writers
Tuesday, August 24, 2004; Page A01

An Army investigation into the Abu Ghraib prison scandal has found that military police dogs were used to frighten detained Iraqi teenagers as part of a sadistic game, one of many details in the forthcoming report that were provoking expressions of concern and disgust among Army officers briefed on the findings.

Earlier reports and photographs from the prison have indicated that unmuzzled military police dogs were used to intimidate detainees at Abu Ghraib, something the dog handlers have told investigators was sanctioned by top military intelligence officers there. But the new report, according to Pentagon sources, will show that MPs were using their animals to make juveniles -- as young as 15 years old -- urinate on themselves as part of a competition.

"There were two MP dog handlers who did use dogs to threaten kids detained at Abu Ghraib," said an Army officer familiar with the report, one of two investigations on detainee abuse scheduled for release this week. "It has nothing to do with interrogation. It was just them on their own being weird."

Speaking on the condition of anonymity because the report has not been released, other officials at the Pentagon said the investigation also acknowledges that military intelligence soldiers kept multiple detainees off the record books and hid them from international humanitarian organizations. The report also mentions substantiated claims that at least one male detainee was sodomized by one of his captors at Abu Ghraib, sources said.

"The report will show that these actions were bad, illegal, unauthorized, and some of it was sadistic," said one Defense Department official. "But it will show that they were the actions of a few, actions that went unnoticed because of leadership failures."

The investigative report by Maj. Gen. George R. Fay focuses on the role of military intelligence soldiers in the prison abuse. It will expand the circle of soldiers considered responsible for abuse beyond the seven military police soldiers already facing charges, officials said, to include more than a dozen others -- low-ranking soldiers, civilian contractors and medics. Sources have said that the report also criticizes military leadership, from the prison and up through the highest levels of the U.S. chain of command in Iraq at the time.

One Pentagon official said yesterday that Lt. Gen. Ricardo S. Sanchez, then the top U.S. commander in Iraq, is named in the report for leadership deficiencies and failing to deal with rising problems at the prison as he tried to manage 150,000 troops countering an unexpected insurgency. Sanchez, however, will not be recommended for any punitive action or even a letter of reprimand, the source said. About 300 pages of the 9,000-page report will be released publicly, according to Army officials.

Another report regarding the prison abuse, commissioned by Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, is expected to be released this afternoon. That independent commission, chaired by James R. Schlesinger, a former defense secretary, will be critical of the guidance and policies set by top Pentagon and military officials as they worked to get more useful intelligence from detainees in Iraq, said a source familiar with the commission`s work.

The Schlesinger report is not expected to implicate high-level officials by name, but it would be the first report to link the abuse at Abu Ghraib to policies set by top officials in Washington. The Fay report, by contrast, does not point a finger at the Pentagon and instead assigns most of the blame to military intelligence and military police who worked on the chaotic grounds of the overcrowded and austere Abu Ghraib.

Rumsfeld had not been briefed on the commission`s findings as of yesterday, a Defense Department source said, and the commission likewise has not briefed members of Congress, who have been anticipating the reports for months. Initially, the Schlesinger commission was slated to take 45 days, and Rumsfeld suggested that it consider limiting itself to reviewing the work of other investigations. But the commission hired a staff of more than 20 people and conducted dozens of interviews, taking more than two months to complete its work.

The reports are part of several investigations into U.S. detainee operations around the world, and so far they have expanded the scope of culpability beyond the seven MPs charged in connection with the most notorious incidents of abuse, such as stacking naked detainees in a pyramid, posing them in mock sexual positions and beating them. Pentagon officials said yesterday that the abuse came not as the result of direct orders but rather as "off-the-clock mischief" that arose from vague instructions and a general lack of oversight.

The core conclusion of the Fay report, said one general who is familiar with it, is that there was a leadership failure in the Army in Iraq that extended well beyond a handful of MPs. "There`s a vacuum there," he said. "Either people knew it and turned a blind eye, or they weren`t paying attention."

In particular, top leaders failed to give proper attention to reports from the International Committee of the Red Cross that decried conditions at Abu Ghraib, reported allegations of abuse and raised warning flags about detainees being hidden from them. Top Pentagon officials have denied keeping detainees from the ICRC, but the Fay report will concur with an earlier Army investigation that cited the prison for keeping "ghost detainees."

"This report will address the ghost-detainee problem, and it was an outright policy violation," said one Pentagon official familiar with the report. "It did happen, and accordingly it is still being investigated."

Another officer at the Pentagon said he felt that the latest revelations, including the use of dogs to frighten juveniles, were some of the most worrisome of the scandal. He said one particular worry at the Pentagon is how the use of dogs against Arab juveniles will be viewed in the Middle East.

"People know that in war, you know, you have to break eggs," he said. "But this crosses the line."

Staff writer Bradley Graham contributed to this report.

© 2004 The Washington Post Company

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Ein sehr einseitiger Krieg
von Uri Avnery
uri-avnery.de / ZNet Deutschland 21.08.2004
„Von meinetwegen, können sie alle verhungern.!“ verkündete Zachi Hanegbi, nachdem die palästinensischen Gefangenen einen zeitlich unbegrenzten Hungerstreik wegen der Gefängnis-bedingungen erklärt hatten. Auf diese Weise fügte der Minister für Innere Sicherheit dem Lexikon über den israelisch-palästinensischen Konflikt einen weiteren denkwürdigen Satz hinzu. Hanegbi wurde das erste Mal berühmt (oder berüchtigt) als von ihm als Student ein Photo aufgenommen wurde, während er mit seinen Freunden arabische Studenten mit Fahrradketten jagte. Damals veröffentlichte ich ein Photo von ihm, das in den 30er Jahren deutsche und polnische Studenten nicht beschämt hätte. Es gibt nur einen kleinen Unterschied: in den Dreißigern waren die Juden die Verfolgten – jetzt sind sie die Verfolger.

Mittlerweile hat sich Hanegbi wie viele junge Radikale verändert – er wurde ein rücksichtloser Karrierist. Er ist ein Minister geworden, der selbst an heißen Sommertagen elegante Anzüge trägt und der mit der typischen, wichtigtuerischen Gangart eines Kabinettsministers daherkommt. Jetzt unterstützt er sogar Ariel Sharons Abzugsplan – sehr zum Missfallen seiner Mutter Geula Cohen, einer extrem rechten Militanten, die sich nicht verändert hat. Doch abgesehen vom Ministeranzug und der Toga des Staatsmannes, ist Zachi Zachi geblieben, was durch die totale Unmenschlichkeit seines Statements über die Gefangenen deutlich wird, für deren Wohlergehen er offiziell verantwortlich ist. Sein Einfluss beschränkt sich nicht auf Worte: die augenblickliche Gefängniskrise wurde durch seine Ernennung eines neuen Direktors der Gefängnisse ausgelöst, der sofort daran ging, für die palästinensischen Gefangenen härtere Bedingungen zu schaffen.

Doch wollen wir nicht zu viele Gedanken über den ehrenwerten Minister verschwenden. Viel wichtiger ist es, sich Gedanken über den Streik selbst zu machen.

Das Grundübel liegt in einer israelischen Erfindung: der einseitige Krieg. Die Generäle der israelischen Armee erklären immer wieder, wir befänden uns in einem Krieg.. Der Kriegszustand erlaubt ihnen, Akte wie „gezielte Tötungen“ zu verüben, die man sonst Mord nennen würde. Aber in einem Krieg tötet man den Feind ohne Gerichtsverfahren. Und im Allgemeinen sind das Töten und Verletzen von Menschen, das Zerstören von Häusern und Plantagen und all die anderen Akte der Besatzung zu alltäglichen Vorfällen geworden, die durch den Kriegszustand gerechtfertigt werden. Aber dies ist ein sehr spezieller Krieg, weil er nur den Kämpfern der einen Seite Rechte zugesteht. Auf der anderen Seite ist kein Krieg, gibt es keine Kämpfer, kein Recht der Kämpfer – sondern nur Verbrecher, Terroristen und Mörder.

Warum? In früheren Zeiten machte man einen klaren Unterschied: man war Soldat, wenn man eine Uniform trug; wenn man keine Uniform trug, war man ein Verbrecher. Soldaten einer angreifenden Armee war es erlaubt, lokale Bewohner, die auf sie schossen, an Ort und Stelle zu exekutieren. Aber in der Mitte des 20. Jahrhunderts änderte sich dies. Weltweit wurde man sich darin einig, dass die Mitglieder des französischen Widerstandes, die russischen, jugoslawischen u.a. Partisanen Kämpfer waren und deshalb als legitime Kämpfer unter internationalem Schutz standen. Internationale Konventionen und Kriegsregeln wurden entsprechend abgeändert. Was ist also der Unterschied zwischen Soldaten und Terroristen? Nun, die Besatzer sagen, da bestehe ein riesiger Unterschied: Soldaten bekämpfen Soldaten, Terroristen verletzen unschuldige Zivilisten. Wirklich? Der Pilot, der über Hiroshima die Atombombe warf, tötete Zehntausende von unschuldigen Zivilisten – war er ein Soldat oder ein Krimineller, ein Terrorist? Und was waren die Piloten, die ganze Städte wie Hamburg und Dresden zerstörten, als es dafür keine triftige militärische Notwendigkeit mehr gab? Das erklärte Ziel war, den Willen der deutschen Zivilbevölkerung zu brechen und sie zur Kapitulation zu zwingen. Waren die Kommandeure der britischen und amerikanischen Luftwaffe Terroristen ( wie die Nazis sie damals tatsächlich nannten und so das Wort „Terrorflieger“ erfanden)? Was ist der Unterschied zwischen einem amerikanischen Piloten, der eine Bombe auf einen Bagdader Markt fallen lässt und einem irakischen Terroristen, der eine Bombe auf demselben Markt explodieren lässt? Die Tatsache, dass der Pilot eine Uniform trägt? Oder dass er seine Bombe aus größerer Entfernung fallen lässt und so die Kinder natürlich nicht sieht, die er tötet?

Ich sage dies nicht, um das Töten von Zivilisten zu rechtfertigen, Gott bewahre! Im Gegenteil – ich verurteile dies absolut, egal, wer das tut: ob Soldaten, Guerillas, Piloten hoch oben oder Terroristen hier unten. Für alle gilt ein und dasselbe Gesetz. Soldaten, die vom Feind gefangen genommen werden, werden Kriegsgefangene, denen Rechte zustehen, die von internationalen Konventionen garantiert werden. Eine spezielle internationale Organisation – das Rote Kreuz – überwacht dies. Kriegsgefangene werden nicht wegen Strafe oder aus Rache festgehalten, sondern nur, um sie daran zu hindern, zum Schlachtfeld zurückzukehren. Sie werden entlassen, sobald der Frieden einkehrt. Von ihren Feinden gefangene Untergrundkämpfer werden oft wie Verbrecher vor Gericht gestellt.. Ihnen werden in Israel nicht nur die Rechte der Kriegsgefangenen (POW) entzogen, ihre Gefängnisbedingungen sind schlimmer als die unmenschlichen Bedingungen, die israelischen Kriminellen auferlegt werden. Die Amerikaner haben von uns gelernt und Präsident George W. Bush hat afghanische Kämpfer in ein extra für sie errichtetes, berüchtigtes Gefängnis in Guatanamo geschickt, wo sie aller menschlichen Rechte beraubt sind, der Rechte der Kriegsgefangenen und der Rechte gewöhnlicher kriminellen Gefangenen.

Als vor sechzig Jahren die jüdischen Untergrundorganisationen gegen das britische Besatzungs- und Kolonialregime in Palästina kämpften, forderten wir, dass unseren Gefangenen die Rechte der Kriegsgefangenen gewährt werden. Die Briten waren nicht damit einverstanden; in der Praxis aber wurden die Gefangenen so behandelt, als wären sie POWs. Die gefangenen Untergrundkämpfer konnten sich an einem Fernstudium beteiligen. Viele von ihnen konnten ihr Jura- oder andere Studien in britischen Gefängnislagern abschließen.

Eine der damaligen Gefangenen war Geula Cohen, Zachi Hanegbis Mutter. Man würde wohl gerne wissen wollen, wie sie und ihre Kameraden der Stern-Untergrundgruppe reagiert hätten, wenn ein britischer Polizeikommandeur erklärt hätte: „Es kümmerte mich einen Dreck, wenn sie im Gefängnis gestorben wäre.“ Wahrscheinlich hätten sie versucht, ihn zu ermorden. Glücklicherweise handelten die Briten anders. Sie brachten sie sogar zur Behandlung in ein Krankenhaus, ( aus dem sie mit Hilfe von arabischen Dorfbewohnern fliehen konnte). Gegenüber den irischen Untergrundkämpfern verfolgten die Briten eine andere Linie. Als diese einen Hungerstreik erklärten, ließ Margaret Thatcher sie Hungers sterben. Diese Episode brachte ihr zusätzlich zu ihrer Haltung gegenüber Arbeitern und Bedürftigen den Ruf als unmenschliche Person ein. Menschliche Behandlung von politischen Gefangenen ist auch aus rein pragmatischen Gründen richtig. Ex-Gefangene besetzen nun die oberen Ränge der palästinensischen Behörde. Männer, die 10, 15 oder gar 20 Jahre in israelischen Gefängnissen saßen, sind politische Führer, Minister, Bürgermeister geworden. Sie sprechen fließend hebräisch und kennen die Israelis gut. Fast alle von ihnen gehören jetzt dem gemäßigten Lager an und stimmen für Koexistenz zwischen Israel und einem palästinensischen Staat. Sie sind es auch, die die Gruppierungen leiten, die Demokratie und Reformen in der palästinensischen Behörde fordern. Die faire Behandlung, die sie damals vom Gefängnispersonal erhielten, muss wohl dazu beigetragen haben. Die Hauptsache für mich aber ist, der Staat Israel sollte nicht wie Zachi Hanegbi und seinesgleichen aussehen. Wichtig für mich ist, dass Menschen – Palästinenser genau so wie Israelis – in Israels Gefängnissen nicht vor Hunger sterben sollten. Wichtig für mich ist auch, dass Gefangenen – egal ob Israelis oder Palästinensern – menschliche Bedingungen gewährt werden sollen.

Wenn Zachi Hanegbi im Gefängnis einsäße, würde ich auch für ihn genau dies fordern.

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For the grief-stricken of Iraq, burying the dead is a dangerous business
By Donald Macintyre in Najaf

24 August 2004

When the thunderous explosion threw up its tall plume of smoke and dust a mere 600 yards away from where Radhi Salman and his two children were being buried, his grief-stricken family were barely distracted from the Koranic verses for the dead a relative was reciting over the plain wooden coffins they had brought from their local mosque outside Baghdad.

As one of the gravediggers worked, a colleague waved a white cloth at the US warplane droning overhead in the hope that this might somehow stop a bomb or a missile falling directly on the little band of mourners. Such are the hazards of holding a funeral in a battlefield.

But for the Salman family, poor farmers, religious and traditionally Shia, burying their dead anywhere but the Wadi al-Salam cemetery in Najaf was simply not an option.

Less than 10 hours earlier, Radhi, his 11-year-old son Razzaq and his two-year-old daughter Najwa had been sleeping in the garden of their house in a hamlet on the edge of al-Amin, to the south-east of the capital, when a US convoy had been ambushed on the road outside at about 4.30am. According to Alawi Latif, 59, a cousin, the convoy responded by shooting "randomly" through the darkness; Radhi, 25, and his children were caught in the firing. Two others in the family, including Radhi`s mother, had been injured.

So the family set out at 9.30am yesterday in a convoy of two rented minibuses, each with a coffin strapped to the top, one carrying the 11-year-old boy, the other the father and his infant daughter, on the 100-mile journey from Baghdad, across the Euphrates and past the insurgent checkpoints in Kufa to bury the three in Wadi al-Salam, one of the biggest cemeteries in the world. Everyone interred there, Imam Ali, the prophet Mohammed`s martyred son-in-law, had said, would go to paradise.

But this is a cemetery which for the past two and a half weeks has also been one of the main theatres of the battle the US Marines and Cavalry have been waging with Muqtada Sadr`s Army of Mehdi for control of Najaf.

First the bodies had to be ritually washed. The dark gold of the contested Imam Ali shrine - the outer wall of whose courtyard was damaged by overnight shelling - dominated the skyline from about a kilometre away.

And Mr Latif spoke of why it had been necessary to bring the bodies to this place, where tombstones have been damaged by conflict. "The soil of Najaf is very holy," he said, "because Imam Ali is buried here. That is what is important. This is our tradition. Normally we would take the bodies to the shrine first but we knew we couldn`t do this because of the war. Of course we were worried about coming here but we had no choice."

Another cousin and close neighbour of the Salman family, Abdul Khadim, was angrier at what had happened in the early hours. "The Americans are beasts. We tried to get into the house because we could hear people screaming. But we couldn`t because of the shooting. They are human beings and we don`t care if they are Christian or Muslims. They should treat us as human beings."

As if on cue, three US Cavalry Humvees drove into the car park of the block of washing rooms and offices where the cemetery is currently run by a tiny staff. They did not behave like beasts, but it was evident they had not been here before; two of the soldiers, finding a door locked, kicked it open to check for any hostile presence, while their dismounted comrades watched the scene warily and the children`s grandmother continued to cry out imprecations to her own dead mother. But when the family asked us through our translator to tell the troops the mourners wanted to drive to the graves, they waved us through.

In the loneliness of the chosen burial place in the huge expanse of this cemetery of a million souls, you could see a row of Humvees on the near horizon patrolling in the hunt for insurgents, as the warplanes flew above and the explosions continued to resound, one alarmingly close. The grandmother, beside herself with grief, covered her face with sand and at one point sought to climb into her son`s grave, while her daughter cried out for her dead brother from one of the minibuses. Before they finally laid his son, wrapped in cloth, in the freshly dug grave, the children`s grandfather, half out of his mind at his bereavement, wailed: "Tonight I will prepare a dinner for him. What can I do?"

When we returned to the washing rooms, the US Cavalry had set up a checkpoint to search all vehicles, including the coffins themselves, for weapons. Specialist Brian Phillips stood on the roof of a minivan as an Iraqi carried out orders to open the coffin and show what lay inside; as the Iraqi uncovered the corpse of a man who may have been a Mehdi fighter, the side of its face blown through by a bullet, the American soldier exclaimed: "Oh my Jesus Christ, it`s a young boy." He stood for a moment examining the body and then jumped from the minibus and ran some 20 yards before vomiting on to the ground. Nobody laughed at him. It wasn`t a young boy, as he acknowledged a few minutes later, but a man of between 35 or 40. "I guess I hadn`t seen a dead body like that so close before."

Another tall, fair-haired US Cavalryman, Staff Sergeant James Staden, eight months in Iraq, said: "There are good days and bad days." Normally based in Baghdad, "where you can get around, get to the shops and help people", he added: "Here it`s more of a war zone."

And how long, we asked another Staff Sergeant, Brandon George, did he think the battle had to run? "That`s what we all keep asking."

Asked how long his unit, here to support the US Marines, had been in Najaf, another soldier replied: "About three weeks. Three weeks too long."

On this at least, these soldiers from Texas and elsewhere across the US, aching to get home, or at least to Baghdad, from this cemetery which seems to encapsulate all the torments of Iraq, would agree with the extended family of the three Salmans, innocent victims of a continuing war. "I do not know who is controlling Iraq," said Mr Latif. "We call on Allah to provide security and stability."


24 August 2004 12:23


© 2004 Independent Digital (UK) Ltd

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The beginning of history

Fahrenheit 9/11 has touched millions of viewers across the world. But could it actually change the course of civilisation?
John Berger
Tuesday August 24, 2004

The Guardian
Fahrenheit 9/11 is astounding. Not so much as a film - although it is cunning and moving - but as an event. Most commentators try to dismiss the event and disparage the film. We will see why later.

The artists on the Cannes film festival jury apparently voted unanimously to award Michael Moore`s film the Palme d`Or. Since then it has touched many millions across the world. In the US, its box-office takings for the first six weeks amounted to more than $100m, which is, astoundingly, about half of what Harry Potter made during a comparable period. Only the so-called opinion-makers in the media appear to have been put out by it.

The film, considered as a political act, may be a historical landmark. Yet to have a sense of this, a certain perspective for the future is required. Living only close-up to the latest news, as most opinion-makers do, reduces one`s perspectives. The film is trying to make a small contribution towards the changing of world history. It is a work inspired by hope.

What makes it an event is the fact that it is an effective and independent intervention into immediate world politics. Today it is rare for an artist to succeed in making such an intervention, and in interrupting the prepared, prevaricating statements of politicians. Its immediate aim is to make it less likely that President Bush will be re-elected next November.

To denigrate this as propaganda is either naive or perverse, forgetting (deliberately?) what the last century taught us. Propaganda requires a permanent network of communication so that it can systematically stifle reflection with emotive or utopian slogans. Its pace is usually fast. Propaganda invariably serves the long-term interests of some elite.

This single maverick movie is often reflectively slow and is not afraid of silence. It appeals to people to think for themselves and make connections. And it identifies with, and pleads for, those who are normally unlistened to. Making a strong case is not the same thing as saturating with propaganda. Fox TV does the latter; Michael Moore the former.

Ever since the Greek tragedies, artists have, from time to time, asked themselves how they might influence ongoing political events. It`s a tricky question because two very different types of power are involved. Many theories of aesthetics and ethics revolve round this question. For those living under political tyrannies, art has frequently been a form of hidden resistance, and tyrants habitually look for ways to control art. All this, however, is in general terms and over a large terrain. Fahrenheit 9/11 is something different. It has succeeded in intervening in a political programme on the programme`s own ground.

For this to happen a convergence of factors were needed. The Cannes award and the misjudged attempt to prevent the film being distributed played a significant part in creating the event.

To point this out in no way implies that the film as such doesn`t deserve the attention it is receiving. It`s simply to remind ourselves that within the realm of the mass media, a breakthrough (a smashing down of the daily wall of lies and half-truths) is bound to be rare. And it is this rarity which has made the film exemplary. It is setting an example to millions - as if they`d been waiting for it.

The film proposes that the White House and Pentagon were taken over in the first year of the millennium by a gang of thugs so that US power should henceforth serve the global interests of the corporations: a stark scenario which is closer to the truth than most nuanced editorials. Yet more important than the scenario is the way the movie speaks out. It demonstrates that - despite all the manipulative power of communications experts, lying presidential speeches and vapid press conferences - a single independent voice, pointing out certain home truths which countless Americans are already discovering for themselves, can break through the conspiracy of silence, the atmosphere of fear and the solitude of feeling politically impotent.

It`s a movie that speaks of obstinate faraway desires in a period of disillusion. A movie that tells jokes while the band plays the apocalypse. A movie in which millions of Americans recognise themselves and the precise ways in which they are being cheated. A movie about surprises, mostly bad but some good, being discussed together. Fahrenheit 9/11 reminds the spectator that when courage is shared one can fight against the odds.

In more than a thousand cinemas across the country, Michael Moore becomes with this film a people`s tribune. And what do we see? Bush is visibly a political cretin, as ignorant of the world as he is indifferent to it; while the tribune, informed by popular experience, acquires political credibility, not as a politician himself, but as the voice of the anger of a multitude and its will to resist.

There is something else which is astounding. The aim of Fahrenheit 9/11 is to stop Bush fixing the next election as he fixed the last. Its focus is on the totally unjustified war in Iraq. Yet its conclusion is larger than either of these issues. It declares that a political economy which creates colossally increasing wealth surrounded by disastrously increasing poverty, needs - in order to survive - a continual war with some invented foreign enemy to maintain its own internal order and security. It requires ceaseless war.

Thus, 15 years after the fall of communism, a decade after the declared end of history, one of the main theses of Marx`s interpretation of history again becomes a debating point and a possible explanation of the catastrophes being lived.

It is always the poor who make the most sacrifices, Fahrenheit 9/11 announces quietly during its last minutes. For how much longer?

There is no future for any civilisation anywhere in the world today which ignores this question. And this is why the film was made and became what it became. It`s a film that deeply wants America to survive.

· John Berger is a novelist and critic
Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2004

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There`s more to Sadr than meets the eye

The Iraqi cleric has an illustrious family background of resistance
Sami Ramadani
Tuesday August 24, 2004

The Guardian
Secular as well as Islamic anti-occupation forces in Iraq are now beginning to drop their caution about Moqtada al-Sadr and are openly siding with his resistance forces in Najaf. The National Foundation Congress, the influential umbrella organisation that represents most religious, nationalist and other secular forces opposed to the US-led occupation, on Saturday issued an eight-point proposal, already approved by Sadr, to peacefully end the crisis in Najaf. This proposal strengthens Sadr`s hand and is in essence a call to end the US-led forces` carnage in Najaf and Baghdad and all other areas of Iraq.

But as intense fighting continues around the Imam Ali shrine, where Sadr`s fighters have resisted more than two weeks of US bombardment, it`s worth taking a closer look at the man himself. There is much more to Sadr than meets the eye.

His full title is Hujjat il-Isalm al-Sayyid Moqtada Muhammad Sadeq al-Sadr, and he is 31 years old. Al-Sayyid literally translates to mister, but when conferred by clerics, as in this case, it is public recognition that the man concerned can authentically trace his lineage to the Prophet Muhammad.

Muhammad Sadeq is his father`s name. Grand Ayatollah Muhammad Sadeq al-Sadr was murdered in 1999 by Saddam, because he was building bridges with Sunni clerics and becoming influential among the poor, particularly in the 2-million strong poorest district of Baghdad now known as Sadr City. His uncle Ayatollah Muhammad Baqir al-Sadr was an even more politically significant figure: he and his sister Bint-ul-Huda were tortured to death by Saddam`s thugs in 1980. The pair had founded a powerful militant movement that was at the forefront of the Islamic wing of the opposition to Saddam`s regime. It is reported that Saddam himself shot both of them after their torture.

Sadr often reminds his listeners of this illustrious heritage, including active involvement in the 1920 revolution against British occupation. Like his father, he often wears a white robe on top of his religious garb to indicate that he too is ready to be "a martyr in the cause of liberation and independence". When the US-led occupation forces sought to capture him "dead or alive" in April, he chose to resist rather than surrender.

No matter how young and politically inexperienced they were told that he was, the militant patriots of Sadr City, Najaf, Basra and beyond began to trust him and saw in him the rightful custodian of the traditions handed down by the rebellious Islamic leaders who chose martyrdom rather than obeying tyranny. Indeed, Saddam`s regime finally began to totter, despite the murderous US-led 13 years of sanctions that strengthened him and hurt the people, precisely because this uncompromising will to be free and resist subjugation runs very deep in Iraq.

It is said that Iraq`s Shia strictly follow their most senior religious leaders. This might be true of practising Shia in calmer times. But in times of crises this readiness to listen to "wiser" councils evaporates. Grand Ayatollah Sistani was being listened to attentively after the invasion. The number of his portraits on display was rising with every defiant statement. During the past few weeks, however, those portraits were fast disappearing to be replaced by Sadr`s, and those of his father, his uncle, Ayatollah Khomeini, and those of another very potent and very popular junior, Nasrallah, leader of Hizbullah in Lebanon.

There are now signs that, like Nasrallah in Lebanon, Sadr is learning that he needs to build bridges and links with Iraq`s varied sects, religions, nationalities and secular political trends. After Iraq`s proconsul Paul Bremer appointed the now defunct Iraqi Governing Council last year, Sadr uni laterally declared the appointment of an alternative government composed solely of his supporters. It went down like a lead balloon. However, when asked last week about the political and social programme of al-Tayyar al-Sadri`s (the Sadri current), one of Sadr`s main spokesmen said that Sadr opposed the publication of such a detailed programme because it had to evolve from and be agreed at a conference of all Iraq`s political forces. Indeed, if the Sadri current is to last the distance, he has to also take on board that the Kurds in Iraqi Kurdistan and Iraqi women, particularly in the cities, will want a major input.

Most of the parents and grandparents of the young Sadri patriots were probably supporters of the once powerful Iraqi Communist party, now in Ayad Allawi`s interim government which is being widely compared in Iraq`s streets to Saddam`s regime.Bush and Blair are only now beginning to approach the Iraqi volcano. Nothing short of a full, speedy and planned withdrawal of the US-led occupation would stop the Iraqi, and wider Middle Eastern, volcano from erupting.

· Sami Ramadani was a political refugee from Saddam`s regime and is a senior lecturer in sociology at London Metropolitan University

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Four days in California

US sociologists are finally challenging the intellectual stranglehold of economists
Jonathan Steele in San Francisco
Tuesday August 24, 2004

The Guardian
In the ocean-fed air and mild August sunshine of America`s most beautiful city, optimism flows easy. But the real mood-lift these past few days was in the windowless conference rooms of two downtown mega-hotels. More than 5,000 American sociologists, plus a few foreign scholars, held their largest and, many said, most vibrant annual convention for years.

Bush and Kerry were campaigning through nearby states. Their soundbites were rarely mentioned, but the lack of serious debate is one reason for US sociology`s new political engagement after decades of quiet since the 60s.

The profession`s centre of gravity is moving left. There is a drive to inject ethical standards into the analysis of what most agree is a US society becoming increasingly polarised beneath its veneer of shared consumerism.

Above all, sociologists are starting to challenge the intellectual stranglehold of American economists who have managed to get the neo-liberal model of competitive individualism and corporate globalisation to dominate public discourse and policy-making for the past 20 years.

Words like "empire" and "inequality" popped up frequently at this conference after their post-Vietnam war dormancy. New phrases like "the corporate state" and "global apartheid" appeared.

Half the world`s PhDs in sociology are taken at American universities. The US has 13,000 career sociologists, a potential for extraordinary intellectual hegemony. They flexed their muscles last year, becoming the only US professional association to oppose the invasion of Iraq. A few unions denounced the war and even the normally conservative trade union federation, the AFL-CIO, passed a mildly worded vote of criticism. But with the exception of the sociologists, America`s professions were coy about raising their collective voice.

It was no accident that this year`s conference theme was "public sociologies". It was chosen by the American Sociological Association`s president, Michael Burawoy, a modest Mancunian ethnographer and sociologist who emigrated in the 70s. He distinguishes public sociology from professional sociology, which he describes as work aimed primarily for academic journals and peer review - "solving puzzles". It also differs from policy sociology, which is "solving problems" for mainly government or business.

Public sociology, by contrast, is a conversation with society about values. Burawoy is careful to argue that it does not have a single orientation since a third of the sociologists who voted rejected the anti-war motion. He also insists that the three types - professional, policy and public - are inter-dependent. Without rigorous scholarly standards no public sociology will be taken seriously.

Most controversially, Burawoy wants to "provincialise" American sociology. This may sound odd since US intellectual life has long been scarred by insularity. Burawoy means his slogan provocatively. The famous "end of history" claim that US liberal democracy and market capitalism were the only models left was a sign, in his view, that many Americans were trying to universalise the particular. They should realise their culture is not always preferred else where. To make the point, he invited high-profile foreigners like Arundhati Roy, the anti-globalisation campaigner, and Mary Robinson, a former UN human rights commissioner.

Sociologists` relations with the state vary in time and place. The South Africans and east Europeans present were ex-dissidents who described how the advent of democratic and legitimate governments in their countries had brought new problems. Debate narrowed, intellectuals were less in demand and disappointment with rising social inequality and the new governments` economic policies was leading to public apathy.

Jacklyn Cock, author of a path-breaking exposure of the plight of domestic workers in South Africa, called on sociologists to stand in solidarity with the new social movements. But she warned against romanticising civil society in the struggle against globalisation`s injustices. "The real issue of our time is how to reinvent the state," she said.

Her point applies with greatest force in the US. Behind the rhetoric of small government, the US has created a monster state where political, economic and media power is dominated by corporations. America`s political scientists ought to be taking the leading role in analysing this distortion of democracy but, according to their sociology rivals, their profession is in a conservative phase. It churns out graduates for the foreign service rather than critics who want to reform the system. Sociologists have to move alone.

Four days in California are not going to change the world. But it was hard not to feel that something big is stirring in US academic life. The dominance of Reaganomics is under serious intellectual challenge. Clinton`s third way is rejected as neoliberalism in a different guise - welfare-cutting, support for the out-sourcing of US jobs and unfair "free" trade.

The foreign subjects of America`s global empire have been restless for years. Now some of the sharpest minds are raising questions. Even if John Kerry wins control of the White House, the rebellion is unlikely to stop.

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August 24, 2004
Iraqi Guardsman Ring Najaf Shrine
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

Filed at 6:23 a.m. ET

NAJAF, Iraq (AP) -- U.S. and Iraqi forces battled militants in Najaf on Tuesday and Iraqi National Guardsmen surrounded the holy city`s Imam Ali Shrine, where insurgents loyal to radical cleric Muqtada al-Sadr have been holed up for weeks.

However, a raid into the shrine was not imminent, Iraqi Defense Minister Hazem Shaalan told Al-Arabiya television.
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U.S. Army soldiers aim from an abandoned hotel during a gun battle with insurgents in Najaf. American troops have been fighting a stop-and-go battle with the Mahdi Army militia while the Iraqi government tries to negotiate a truce.
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Witnesses in Najaf said the Iraqi forces accompanied U.S. troops into the Old City for the first time in recent days on Tuesday and were stationed about 200 yards from the shrine. Clashes between militants and the combined U.S. and Iraqi forces rang out and plumes of black smoke rose above the city.

``Today, they complete the operation of encircling the shrine compound,`` Shaalan said.

Iraqi officials have said that any raid on the shrine would be conducted by Iraqi forces. The presence of U.S. troops at the holy site would infuriate the nation`s Shiite majority.

The Iraqi troops will use loudspeakers to urge the militants loyal to radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr to evacuate the shrine. These calls will continue ``for a long time to give another humanitarian chance for them to surrender,`` he said.

``If they don`t ... listen to reason, then certainly there will be a very simple operation, a very simple raid,`` he said. ``The decisive hours are near.``

In Baghdad, assailants targeted the convoys of the interim government`s ministers of environment and education in two separate bombings Tuesday, officials said. Neither of the ministers was hurt, but at least five people were reported killed.

In one attack, a car bomb exploded in the southern Baghdad neighborhood of Kadisea as Environment Minister Miskhat Moumin was passing through in a convoy, ministry spokesman Dalal Ali said. Moumin escaped unharmed, Ali said.

Four people were killed and two others were injured in that blast, police and hospital officials said.

In a second attack around the same time in the western district of al-Khadra, a roadside bomb exploded as a convoy of vehicles was headed to pick up Education Minister Sami Mudhafar, the police said.

The education minister was not in the convoy at the time, the police brigadier said. The blast killed one of Mudhafar`s bodyguards and wounded two others, he said.

Late Monday, U.S. warplanes bombed the area of the Old City, and fires lit up the night sky, witnesses said. Ahmed al-Shaibany, an aide to al-Sadr, said shrapnel from the attack hit the shrine`s golden dome, one of its minarets and the compound`s outer wall.

The U.S. military denied damaging the shrine and said an air crew saw militants in the compound fire a rocket that clipped one of the walls and explode 10 yards outside.

``We are not doing anything that could have caused damage to the shrine,`` Marine Capt. Carrie Batson said.

There was no independent confirmation of damage to the shrine, but violence earlier Monday ripped a chunk out of the outer wall of the compound. Explosions throughout the day shook the Old City, which is a mix of streets and narrow, maze-like alleys at the heart of much of the fighting. streets and some were seen leaving Najaf. Militant medical officials said at least two insurgents were killed and four wounded.

Al-Hakim Hospital said two civilians were killed and two others injured, but more casualties were reported in the Old City and could not be reached by emergency workers, said hospital employee Hussein Hadi.

Al-Sadr, whose Mahdi Army fighters are behind the uprising, has not been seen in public for many days, and police drove around Najaf with loudspeakers declaring he had fled toward Sulaymaniyah in northern Iraq. Al-Sadr`s aides denied that.

``Muqtada al-Sadr is still in Najaf and is still supervising the operations,`` Sheik Aws al-Khafaji, the head of al-Sadr`s office in the southern city of Nasiriyah, told Al-Jazeera television.

U.S. warplanes reportedly struck the volatile city of Fallujah early Tuesday. Witnesses said it was unclear what the target was, but they reported flames and smoke in southern neighborhoods.

The U.S. military, which routinely bombs what it describes as insurgent strongholds in the city 40 miles west of Baghdad, had no immediate comment.

In Baghdad, assailants fired a rocket-propelled grenade at a U.S. patrol on Monday night, killing one soldier and wounding two others, the military said. The troops were evacuated to a U.S. military hospital, where one of the soldiers succumbed to his wounds. As of Monday, 958 U.S. service members have died since the beginning of military operations in Iraq in March 2003, according to the U.S. Defense Department.

The Najaf fighting, which began Aug. 5, has killed at least 40 Iraqi policemen, eight U.S. soldiers and dozens of civilian bystanders. The U.S. military says it has killed hundreds of al-Sadr fighters, though the militia says its casualties have been far lower.

In Washington, U.S. State Department spokesman Adam Ereli said, ``The government of Iraq and Prime Minister Allawi have said that the Mahdi militia should accept their terms for engaging in the political process and vacating the shrine.``

He added that the Bush administration has made clear that U.S. forces will not be involved in a move against the holy sites.

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Die Preise sind immer noch moderat, wenn ich vergleiche, was ich in 2000 in Kalifornien bezahlt habe. Da kostete regular in den Städten auch an die 2 $ bei um 1/3 niedrigeren Rohölpreisen. Frage wird da als Wahlkampfhilfe nachgeholfen? K. ist immer etwas teurer.

Gasoline Prices Go Against the Flow
As oil soared, higher refinery output gave California drivers relief at the pump. Will it last?
By James F. Peltz
Times Staff Writer

August 24, 2004

A funny thing happened on the way to $2.50-a-gallon gas this summer. It didn`t get there.

The average price for regular self-serve gasoline in California has now fallen for nearly three months, to just above $2 a gallon, the Energy Department reported Monday. That comes despite the busy summer driving season and a spurt in crude oil prices to record highs of nearly $50 a barrel.
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The average price in California is a nickel a gallon cheaper than a year ago, a survey finds.
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Experts disagree over whether the price break may be ending for California, as it already has for other parts of the country. Some say that with crude so expensive, it`s only a matter of time before pump prices start climbing too. Others maintain that with the summer driving season winding down, the decrease in demand should help prices drift even lower.

But what everybody seems to agree on is that the last few months have been mighty strange at the gas station.

As Californians celebrated Memorial Day, the average price of regular gasoline in the state hit a record-high $2.327 a gallon. With supplies tight and motorists just starting to hit the road for the summer, it seemed plausible that gasoline might reach $2.50 or more a gallon. Crude oil at the time sold for about $40 a barrel.

Responding to the sharp rise in pump prices, state lawmakers vowed to investigate whether oil companies were manipulating the market. The state Senate launched an investigation of the industry`s tactics, creating a select committee headed by Sen. Joe Dunn (D-Santa Ana). That probe continues.

Yet ever since then, pump prices have steadily fallen.

In the week ended Monday, the average price for regular in California slipped an additional 0.4 cent to $2.051 a gallon, its 12th consecutive weekly decline, the U.S. Energy Department`s Energy Information Administration said in its weekly survey.

The average price in California is a nickel a gallon cheaper than a year ago, the agency said. And regular gasoline is selling below $1.90 a gallon at some service stations in Los Angeles and Orange counties.

Crude oil, meanwhile, continues to hover near record levels, even though it fell 67 cents, to $46.05 a barrel, on Monday on the New York Mercantile Exchange.
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So, why did pump prices turn south even as crude oil prices have kept heading north?

The overriding reason, analysts say, is supply, supply, supply.

Last spring, oil refiners saw a perfect opportunity to boost their production. Demand for gasoline had risen sharply in the spring, yet gasoline supplies were constrained. Refiners realized they could capture hefty profits by opening up the spigots and producing as much gasoline as possible.

"At that point, people were concerned about having adequate supplies," said Steve Enger, an energy analyst at investment firm Petrie Parkman & Co. in Denver. "The U.S. refining system was going to have to run all out for a couple of months to be in decent shape, and that`s basically what happened."

Indeed, refiners operated nearly flat-out to produce gasoline, running at about 97% of their capacity at times. They also enjoyed a stretch of good luck, avoiding the kinds of major disruptions, such as a fire, that often knock refineries off line and cause a temporary spike in gasoline prices.

At the same time, gasoline imports to the U.S. increased sharply. In July, the nation imported 1.07 million barrels of gasoline per day, the third-highest monthly import figure ever, according to the American Petroleum Institute, an oil industry trade group.

The result: Gasoline inventories gradually kept building through the summer. There were enough supplies to satisfy motorists` demand for fuel and then some, enabling prices to fall back.

The refiners also captured the gains they had sought. Valero Energy Corp., for instance, earned more money in this year`s second quarter — $633 million — than it did in all of 2003.

Motorists did their part too. The record-high gas prices around Memorial Day prompted some drivers to conserve, further helping supplies to swell this summer.

Demand "has not been as high as anticipated," said Carol Thorp, a spokeswoman for the Automobile Club of Southern California. The club suspects the decline is coming from commuters who are finding other ways to get to work, including public transit or carpooling.

The latest run-up in crude oil prices, which began two months ago, finally showed up in retail gas prices during the last week in most states outside of California. The average U.S. price had fallen in nine of the last 12 weeks.

In its survey Monday, the Energy Information Administration said the nationwide average gasoline price edged up nearly a penny, to $1.884 a gallon, and it remains 13.7 cents higher than a year ago. Several East Coast cities are paying 15 cents to 20 cents a gallon more than a year earlier.

Gasoline prices typically move up ahead of Labor Day as service station owners take advantage of the summer`s last official vacation weekend. Then, as schools reopen and motorists` demand for gasoline tapers off, prices tend to sag.

What will happen this time, though, is far from clear.

As high prices for crude oil work their way to the retail market, some believe, it could offset the normal pattern and prevent further declines at the pump.

"It`s anybody`s guess, but with the market so tight, and with crude going up, I cannot believe that prices will continue to drop," said Will Woods, executive director of the Automotive Trade Organizations of California, a Tustin-based trade group for independent station owners.

Valero Energy, which has two major refineries in California, has noticed wholesale gasoline prices moving up in the last two weeks. Given that, "we would expect street prices to increase some over the near term, but not necessarily to the peak we saw in May," said Mary Rose Brown, a spokeswoman for the San Antonio, Texas-based company.

Others aren`t so sure, pointing to continued high refinery output and gasoline imports.

"If supplies remain steady," said the Auto Club`s Thorp, "we could see a continued price decrease through Labor Day and beyond."



Copyright 2004 Los Angeles Times

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THE CONFLICT IN IRAQ
Iraq Olympians Say Bush Is Not on Their Team
Some soccer players angrily object to being cited in the president`s reelection drive. White House says the message is freedom, not politics.
By Tracy Wilkinson
Times Staff Writer

August 24, 2004

ATHENS — They`re the darlings of the Summer Games and just one win away from a medal. But now Iraq`s Olympic soccer players, and many of their fans, are complaining that their team has become a political football in President Bush`s reelection campaign.

The problem began when Bush decided to share in the good fortunes of the Iraqi club, which is competing in its first Olympics in more than a decade. After enduring torture under the regime of Saddam Hussein and overcoming hardships such as the loss of their German coach — who fled when militants began abducting Westerners — the team has advanced to tonight`s semifinal game with Paraguay.

As the team racked up victories in its first-round matches, Bush began to mention the club in his stump speeches, holding it up as an example of his success in the U.S.-declared war on terrorism. His campaign produced an Olympic-themed TV commercial showing a swimmer and the flags of Iraq and Afghanistan.

"In 1972, there were 40 democracies in the world. Today, 120," the ad says. "And this Olympics there will be two more free nations. And two fewer terrorist regimes."

But some of Iraq`s players say they resent the use of the team as a prop in the presidential campaign. Especially among other Arab states, the Iraqi team has struggled to be recognized on its own merit and not as a creation of American occupiers.

"Iraq as a team does not want Mr. Bush to use us for the presidential campaign," soccer player Salih Sadir told the website of Sports Illustrated magazine over the weekend, after demanding that U.S. troops get out of Iraq. "He can find another way to advertise himself."

His teammate Ahmed Manajid was equally forceful: "How will [Bush] face his god after having slaughtered so many men and women?" he asked. "He has committed so many crimes."

And after Iraq`s defeat of Australia on Saturday, coach Adnan Hamad Majeed criticized Bush for "helping to destroy our country." He said that "we will never believe that Bush is with us."

Iraqi fans, too, are angry.

"A lot of people are very upset," Iraqi businessman Samir Ganni, who has been organizing caravans of fans to Iraq`s games, said Monday. "These victories are not because of Bush but because of our efforts and hard work. Some of the players are very unhappy with this and said if they weren`t in sports they would be fighting the Americans, like their relatives."

The U.S. Olympic Committee has also raised concerns about the campaign ad, saying it may have violated copyright laws restricting general use of the name "Olympics" as well as rules against using the Games to promote a political candidate.

Bush`s campaign is defending the ad.

"We`re very proud of that ad," campaign director Ken Mehlman said Sunday on NBC`s "Meet the Press." The creation of what he called two new democracies, Iraq and Afghanistan, is "something all Americans should be proud of. It`s not about politics. It`s about the fact that our nation has been successful in helping spread freedom all around the world."

By Monday, Iraqi athletes apparently had been ordered to keep quiet about the controversy. At a news conference with Iraq`s soccer coach in Thessaloniki, where the Paraguay match will take place, a FIFA official instructed reporters not to pose political questions.

Afterward, the leader of the Iraqi Olympic team, Tiras Odisho Anwaya, issued a plea to keep politics out of his game. "We don`t want to bother with these things now," he said. "We are trying to concentrate on the championship."

But Majeed, asked at the news conference about the Bush campaign ad and accompanying furor, said: "We cannot separate politics and sports."

Indeed, keeping the two things separate is not a simple matter. The U.S. Olympic Committee, U.S. State Department and other international donors have paid to train, outfit and transport the Iraqi competitors. And Iraqi athletes have expressed gratitude to the United States for removing Hussein and his son Uday, who ran the nation`s Olympic committee and ordered players beaten or imprisoned if their performances disappointed him. Uday was killed last year by U.S. forces.

But anti-American sentiment among many Iraqis remains high as violence convulses the country, more than 140,000 U.S. troops remain there and reconstruction efforts make slow progress in improving people`s lives.

Anger among Iraqis grew when rumors circulated that Bush would attend the championship game this week if Iraq made it to the finals. (The presidents of the countries in soccer finals traditionally attend the event.) Then an official with the Iraqi Olympic Committee told the Los Angeles Times that the soccer team had been asked to display Afghanistan`s flag along with its own banner at Iraq`s final game but refused.

A State Department official said she had no knowledge of a request about Afghanistan`s flag. Bush`s campaign officials said the president was not planning to attend the Olympics, although Secretary of State Colin L. Powell is expected to travel to Athens this weekend.

As the soccer semifinal approaches, fans in Iraq are keeping close tabs on their team and hoping the political controversy blows over soon.

"The soccer team should not be used for an election campaign," said Mohammed Huthaifa, a 23-year-old engineer in Baghdad who has been watching the soccer games on TV. "I think it is better to keep politics far from sports. The team went there representing Iraq, not President Bush."

Mohammed Arrawi of The Times` Baghdad Bureau contributed to this report.



Copyright 2004 Los Angeles Times

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ROBERT SCHEER
Iraqi Olympic Soccer Players Kick the Stuffing Out of Bush`s Fantasy
Robert Scheer

August 24, 2004

With just 70 days until election day, the race for the presidency has gone from bitter to outright poisonous: John Kerry is faulted in television ads by President Bush`s moneyed allies for winning combat medals in a war that Bush avoided, then slammed by the same hypocrites for having the courage to criticize that war after his return as a wounded vet.

Meanwhile, Bush pretends to be above the fray, all the while parading as a war commander and boasting, bizarrely, about his mythical achievements in the invasion of Iraq. That war, like Vietnam, has been a costly disaster since its inception. In an eerie echo of previous presidents who knowingly lied us into the Vietnam horror, always affirming that victory was "just around the corner," Bush`s latest campaign ads prematurely declare Afghanistan and Iraq as the world`s newest democracies. According to the implicit logic of one ad, the proof can be found in the fact that they both sent teams to the Olympics.

Never mind that both countries are racked by insurgencies and warlordism and dependent on U.S. troops for what passes for security. Forget that both countries are under martial law and their leaders are unelected U.S. appointees. Cover your eyes to the fact that both countries are squalid economic basket cases, with the vast majority of the populace unemployed — or, in the case of Afghanistan, cultivating opium poppies. Ignore the facts. They`re democracies because George W. Bush says so.

But members of the very successful Iraqi Olympic soccer team beg to differ, blasting Bush`s attempt to use their participation in the Games as justification for the U.S. occupation of their country. "My problems are not with the American people," Iraq`s soccer coach, Adnan Hamad Majeed, told the Associated Press. "They are with what America has done in Iraq: destroy everything. The American Army has killed so many people in Iraq." His star midfielder, Salih Sadir, agreed: "Iraq as a team doesn`t want Mr. Bush to use us [in an ad] for the presidential campaign…. We don`t wish for the presence of the Americans in our country. We want them to go away."

These are not anonymous bomb throwers sending notes to the media. These are Iraq`s favorite sons, stars of the national sport. Yet they all seem to be saying the same thing: America`s military is not wanted on our land. Another team member, Ahmed Manajid, demanded to know: "How will [Bush] meet his God having slaughtered so many men and women? He has committed so many crimes." The athlete added that were he not playing for his country he would "for sure" be fighting in the Iraqi resistance. "I want to defend my home. If a stranger invades America and the people resist, does that mean they are terrorists?" Manajid asked.

That is a legitimate question that no one in the Bush administration and few in Congress want to grapple with. And yet we wonder why, 15 months after the United States "liberated" Iraq, are there so many people there who hate us?

The honest answer would be similar to the one once offered by Vietnam vet and now-Secretary of State Colin L. Powell to explain the failure of the U.S. occupation of South Vietnam: "We had been sent to pursue a policy that had become bankrupt," Powell wrote in his autobiography. "Our political leaders had led us into a war for the one-size-fits-all rationale of anti-communism, which was only a partial fit in Vietnam, where the war had its own historical roots in nationalism, anti-colonialism and civil strife beyond the East-West conflict."

The only essential difference between Powell`s remarks and the 1971 remarks by Kerry that Bush supporters cite in their ugly smear campaign is that Powell`s dissent came 20 years too late to stop the carnage. Those who attack Kerry for speaking out in 1971 against the Vietnam War don`t understand that it was an enormous public service for returning American veterans to expose the cynicism of their leaders, as Kerry did in testifying before the U.S. Senate.

The young Kerry was speaking truth to power, facing a reality that presidents Richard Nixon and Lyndon B. Johnson had admitted in private, as records made public later revealed. In private White House tapes, Johnson made it clear he could never justify the death of a single U.S. soldier in Vietnam.

His successor, knowing the war was unwinnable, nevertheless carpet-bombed the region in order to fend off an inevitable defeat until after his reelection campaign.

In the end, who better than veterans to speak out when our commander in chief has betrayed the trust of U.S. troops, sending them to kill and be killed in an unnecessary war?



Copyright 2004 Los Angeles Times

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SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/opinion/187543_overtime24.html

Overtime cut undermines workers

Tuesday, August 24, 2004

JOHN SWEENEY
GUEST COLUMNIST

Yesterday, the biggest pay cut in American history took effect: The Bush administration`s overtime pay cut became official. It`s a new federal rule that could strip up to 6 million workers of overtime pay protection, forcing them to work longer hours without fair compensation.

Nurses, police lieutenants, chefs, team leaders, working supervisors, assistant managers and financial services workers are just some of the millions of workers who used to earn overtime pay when they worked more than 40 hours a week -- and who will now lose that eligibility.

Not only will these employees no longer get overtime pay -- they`ll be working extra hours for free, earning only their base salary. That means a huge pay cut. Currently, time-and-a-half premium pay for overtime work accounts for 25 percent of the income of those who work overtime. That averages out to about $161 every week.

And what incentive will employers have to keep workers` hours reasonable if they don`t have to pay extra for extra work? Workers without overtime pay rights are twice as likely to work more than 40 hours per week, three times as likely to work more than 50 hours and three times as likely to work more than 60 hours. The fact is that workers will have less time with our families, thanks to President Bush`s new overtime rule.

These overtime rules are also bad news for our economy -- at a time when we can least afford it. Our nation is already in a deep jobs hole; we have 1.6 million fewer jobs than when Bush took office.

Last month, experts were disappointed when the economy created only 32,000 jobs as opposed to the 200,000 expected. Under the new rule, employers will tend to work their current workers longer hours rather than creating new jobs, making the underlying problems in our economy even worse. At a time when workers` paychecks are down, joblessness is up and Americans are working more hours than workers in any other industrialized nation, Bush has made the wrong decision in implementing his new rule.

Even three former Department of Labor officials -- three of the highest-ranking DOL officials under Presidents Reagan, Bush and Clinton -- agree that these new overtime rules hurt workers. They have issued an analysis that concludes that with one exception, every one of the administration`s changes to the overtime rules will weaken the eligibility requirement and increase the number of workers who will lose their overtime rights.

This new rule was sold as "modernization." But the truth is these are changes in the law that giant corporations have fought for years to win.

A number of low-income workers will gain overtime pay rights under the new rule, and we applaud this long-overdue change. But this gain does not justify the Bush administration`s decision to take overtime pay rights away from millions of other workers, a move bipartisan majorities of Congress tried to block.

Last May, the Senate voted not once but twice to guarantee that no worker will lose his or her overtime rights. The two amendments passed by the Senate, we believe, would repeal large portions of the Bush regulation that restrict overtime eligibility. This marks the fourth time in the past year that Congress has voted to prohibit overtime pay cuts.

But the overtime guarantee passed by the Senate is unlikely to become law unless approved by the House. This explains why the House Republican leadership has blocked any debate or votes on protecting workers` overtime rights -- because they know that an overtime guarantee would likely pass in the House and would repeal major portions of the Bush overtime regulation. U.S. workers deserve an up-or-down vote in the House on this issue when Congress returns in September.

An overtime guarantee would give workers the peace of mind of knowing they will not be losing their right to overtime pay, and it would calm the intense political passions that have been stirred by the Bush plan. Anything less is simply a massive pay cut for America`s workers.

John Sweeney is president of the AFL-CIO, which represents 13 union members.

© 1998-2004 Seattle Post-Intelligencer

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NEWS ANALYSIS
Observers see eerie parallels in attacks on Kerry, McCain
As in 2000 campaign, Bush attempts to distance himself from hits against rival
- Zachary Coile, Marc Sandalow, Chronicle Washington Bureau
Tuesday, August 24, 2004

Washington -- Four years ago, as George Bush struggled in the polls, supporters of his bid for the Republican presidential nomination unleashed a ferocious attack on rival John McCain, questioning his commitment to veterans and his fitness to serve.

After the charges took root, Bush distanced himself from the veterans group that made the attacks, called the Arizona senator`s service "noble`` and cruised to a nomination-saving victory in the South Carolina primary.

Monday, in a series of events that some observers say are eerily familiar, Bush distanced himself from a veterans group running fierce attacks on John Kerry`s military record and called his rival`s service in Vietnam "admirable. `` Rather than focus on the Democratic nominee`s Vietnam record, a matter that has engulfed the presidential contest for the past week, Bush said "we ought to be debating who (is) best to be leading this country in the war against terror.``

Bush passed up an opportunity to denounce the content of the group`s television commercial, in which veterans accuse Kerry of lying in order to win combat medals. In a carefully worded statement, Bush called on all independent groups -- those supporting him and those supporting Kerry -- to pull their television commercials relating to the 2004 presidential campaign off the air, a request that strategists on both sides appeared to not take seriously.

Bush`s comments from his ranch in Crawford, Texas, were his most extensive yet on Kerry`s military record. They seemed to fit a pattern that dates back to Bush`s early run for office as well as campaigns run by Karl Rove, his chief political adviser.

"It`s amazing how similar this type of attack is to the pattern of attacks I have seen over two decades -- in some cases involving Bush`s campaigns, in other cases they involved campaigns in which Karl Rove was a participant,`` said Wayne Slater, senior political writer at the Dallas Morning News, who has covered Bush since his early days in Texas politics and is author of the book "Bush`s Brain,`` about Rove.

"In every case, the approach is the same: You have a surrogate group of allies, independent of the Bush campaign, raising questions not about the opponent`s weakness but directly about the opponent`s strength,`` Slater said. "In every case, it works."

In 1994, when Bush ran against Democratic Gov. Ann Richards in Texas, a whisper campaign began in East Texas that Richards had appointed gays and lesbians to state positions, which was true. The issue got little notice until Bush`s East Texas campaign chairman accused the governor of naming "avowed and activist homosexuals" to high offices.

Bush tried to distance himself from the remarks, but the story garnered major media attention and turned one of Richards` greatest strengths -- the inclusiveness of her administration -- into a political liability, particularly in socially conservative East Texas.

In the 2000 South Carolina Republican primary, Bush attended a rally during which the chairman of a Vietnam and Gulf War veterans group accused McCain, a prisoner of war for six years, of betraying veterans on health issues such as Agent Orange and Gulf War syndrome.

"I don`t know if you can understand this, George, but that really hurts. You should be ashamed," McCain told Bush at a televised debate.

Bush replied: "I believe you served our country nobly. I`ve said it over and over again. That man wasn`t speaking for me."

Slater said in each case Bush "was able to basically take the high road and give the same answer: `I`m not associated with these attacks, and I don`t condone these attacks. I`m engaged in a high-road campaign,` while at the same time, his allies are basically doing the dirty work."

Even many Republicans acknowledge the hardball tactic but say there is nothing different about Bush`s responsibility for the ads by the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth and Kerry`s responsibility for hard-hitting anti-Bush ads produced by left-leaning groups such as the Media Fund and Move-On.org.

"This is a political tactic that too many campaigns in both parties use, `` said Dan Schnur, a California Republican strategist who worked on McCain`s 2000 campaign.

White House press secretary Scott McClellan said that Bush has been on the receiving end of $63 million worth of negative advertising by such groups, which are known as 527s for their title in the tax code that allows them to collect unregulated money for use in political ads so long as there is no coordination with political parties or presidential campaigns.

"I don`t think we ought to have 527s,`` Bush said Monday. "I can`t be more plain about it, and I wish -- I hope -- my opponent joins me in ... condemning these activities of the 527s. It`s -- I think they`re bad for the system.``

The effect of the latest anti-Kerry ads, which have run in only three states, remains unclear. Opinion polls show Kerry`s small lead over Bush has slipped slightly in the weeks since the Democratic convention. Other polls show that Kerry`s support among veterans has dropped more markedly.

Though the Bush campaign has denied any direct connection, some of Bush`s donors and allies have been heavily involved in Swift Boat Veterans for Truth. Houston homebuilder Bob Perry, a friend of Rove who donated $46,000 to Bush`s campaigns for governor, is the group`s largest contributor, giving $200,000. Public relations executive Merrie Spaeth, who has helped coordinate the swift boat group`s efforts, has ties to Bush and served as spokeswoman in 2000 for a group that ran $2 million in TV ads attacking McCain`s environmental record. That group, Republicans for Clean Air, was also funded by a major Bush donor, Texas businessman Sam Wyly.

Similar connections can be found between some of the anti-Bush organizations and the Kerry campaign. Jim Jordan, who was Kerry`s campaign manager until last fall, is involved in both the Media Fund, which has produced at least 17 anti-Bush ads, and America Coming Together, an independent grassroots organization. Billionaire financier George Soros, a Kerry donor, has pledged $5 million to MoveOn.org to defeat Bush.

Schnur said there was an "absolute moral equivalency`` between the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth ads and ads produced by the Democratic groups.

"Anyone who lashes out on the swift boat ads without calling MoveOn and the other groups into account is the worst kind of hypocrite,`` Schnur said.

The Kerry campaign, like McCain four years ago, accused Bush of hiding behind a group of attack-dog surrogates.

"The moment of truth came and went, and the president still couldn`t bring himself to do the right thing,`` said Kerry`s running mate, Sen. John Edwards. "We need a president with the strength and integrity to say when something is wrong. Instead of hiding behind a front group, George Bush needs to take responsibility and demand that the ad come off the air.``

The Kerry campaign produced three more veterans Monday who had served with Kerry, each of whom supported his version of events along the rivers of the Mekong Delta 35 years ago and disputed the charges made in the television commercials.

"None of you would have wanted to be up those rivers four minutes ... let alone four months,`` said Navy Lt. Rich Baker, who served with Kerry in 1969 and bristled at the notion that Kerry had collected his three Purple Hearts, Bronze Star and Silver Star in order to win early release from Vietnam or to advance his political career.

"John Kerry is lucky to be alive today. The fourth Purple Heart could have been an AK47 through the heart,`` Baker said.

Swift Boat Veterans for Truth issued a statement after the president`s comments that showed no willingness to disarm.

"We have our own message and our combat experience that occurred right alongside of John Kerry earned us the right to be heard in the public debate, `` the statement said. "It was John Kerry who decided to make his military service the centerpiece of his presidential campaign and Swift Boat Veterans for Truth will continue to take its message directly to the American people.``

Meanwhile, MoveOn.org will host a star-studded gala tonight in New York to kick off a drive billed as "10 Weeks: Don`t Get Mad, Get Even!`` which will air a dozen television commercials featuring high-profile directors and actors, including Matt Damon, Rob Reiner, Woody Harrelson, Kevin Bacon and Al Franken.

E-mail the writers at [e-mail] and [e-mail].

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Thoughts on the Middle East, History,and Religion
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Juan Cole is Professor of History at the University of Michigan

Tuesday, August 24, 2004

The Fighting in Iraq

Reuters is reporting that guerrillas detonated a car bomb early on Tuesday, killing 2 persons and wounding 3 others. They were trying to assassinate Education Minister Sami al-Mudhaffar, but he escaped unscathed.

Knight Ridder`s Hannah Allam was trapped in the Imam Ali Shrine on Monday when fighting suddenly intensified, and she filed via her satellite phone. She reports numerous strikes against the Mahdi Army in the sacred cemetery of the Valley of Peace, and elsewhere in the city. The US military "squeeze" of the militia continued, with what look like increasing success (from a purely military point of view). She writes:

`At nightfall, U.S. attacks increased. The buzz of an AC130 gunship could be heard. Nine or 10 times by midnight, aircraft could be heard circling overhead, then a whistling sound and the explosion of a bomb. Shrapnel flew into the shrine`s courtyard.

Members of the Madhi`s Army -- as al-Sadr`s militia is known -- kept their spirits up with chants of "We`re with you, Muqtada. We`ll die for you, Muqtada." They staged an impromptu rally at midnight, marching through the courtyard.

Wounded militia members were brought in throughout the evening to a makeshift trauma center in the shrine. A little girl hit by shrapnel was carried in.

Outside the shrine, militiamen and U.S. troops continued their mutual hunt for the enemy throughout the day. `



Meanwhile, the violence in Najaf provoked a demonstrationof about 200 persons in Multan, Pakistan (where the Shiites have some demographic weight. The Malaysian government condemned the fighting in Najaf.

Al-Hayat reports that PM Iyad Allawi has forbidden Defense Minister Hazem Shaalan and Interior Minister Falah al-Naquib from speaking publicly about the Sadr movement.

posted by Juan @ [url8/24/2004 06:24:22 AM]http://www.juancole.com/2004_08_01_juancole_archive.html#109332974289502256[/url]

Bush and Iraqi Soccer

From Bush press conference on Tuesday



` QUESTION: You’re not going to Athens this week, are you?

BUSH: Athens, Texas?

(LAUGHTER)

QUESTION: The Olympics in Greece.

BUSH: Oh, the Olympics. No, I’m not.

QUESTION: Have you been watching?

BUSH: Yes. It’s been exciting.

QUESTION: Did a particular moment stand out?

BUSH: A particular moment?

I liked the -- let’s see -- Iraqi soccer. I liked seeing the Afghan woman carrying the flag coming in.

I loved our gymnasts. I have been watching the swimming. I have seen a lot. `



He had earlier said,

BUSH: . . . You know, we’ve got a great record when you think about it. Led the world in the war on terror. The world is safer as a result of the actions we’ve taken. Afghanistan is no longer run by the Taliban. Saddam Hussein sits in a prison cell. Moammar Gadhafi has gotten rid of his weapons. Pakistan is an ally in the war on terror.

There’s more work to be done in fighting off these terrorists. I clearly see that. I understand that we’ve got to use all resources at our disposal to find and bring these people to justice.



Bush in these remarks continued to try to exploit the presence of Afghanistan and Iraq at the Olympics for his presidential campaign. The problem is, he has a different definition of "freedom" than do the people of whom he is speaking.

The Bush campaign is defining freedom as the absence of indigenous tyranny. Thus, they claim to have liberated 50 million persons (25 each in Afghanistan and Iraq) since September 11, insofar as they overthrew the Taliban and Saddam Hussein.

But to date, no one in either country has been freely and openly elected by the popular electorate. The US has more or less appointed the governments of both countries (in consultation with other international actors). Even one Iraqi cabinet minister admitted last spring that the then Interim Governing Council was no more representative than had been the Baath government.

The Western press often confuses a government that reflects the composition of the country with a "representative" one. Thus, the Interim Governing Council had and the new national advisory council has representatives from all over Iraq, and some journalists have said the council is the most representative body Iraq has had since 1958. But this allegation ignores the undemocratic way in which it was chosen.

As for Afghanistan, the Bush administration simply turned it back over to the pre-Taliban warlords who had fought the Soviets in alliance with the US and then had fallen to squabbling when the US walked away, reducing much of the country to rubble. Herat province is ruled by Ismail Khan, Mazar by Abdul Rashid Dostam, etc., etc. Even really bad guys like Abu Sayyaf have their fiefdoms in the Pushtun areas (although he broke with the Taliban, it would be hard to distinguish his ideas and style of ruling from theirs). This is not to mention the revival of the poppy trade, which fuels heroin smuggling to the tune of $2 billion a year, nearly half Afghanistan`s gross national product.

The parliamentary elections scheduled for summer, 2004, in Afghanistan have been postponed until at least spring, 2005. Presidential elections are to be held this fall, but American-installed Hamid Karzai has enormous advantages of incumbency. These advantages recently spurred his 23 rivals to call for his resignation, threatening a boycott of the elections if he declines. There is widespread voter registration fraud.

The human rights situation is infinitely better now than under the Taliban, but the Bush administration has reneged on its pledge of a new Marshall Plan and massive reconstruction in Afghanistan. What little economic progress there has been has mostly derived from individual entrepreneurs, and some of it derives from smuggling and drugs (which have a way of backfiring as economic engines of growth because they cause so many other problems.) Getting rid of the Taliban is not the same as bringing democracy to Afghanistan. We have yet to see if that is even feasible.

Most Iraqis would define liberation as the end of the American military occupation and their ability to choose a government of their liking. It seems highly likely that the Iraqi elections scheduled for January 2005 will be postponed for a good long time, allowing caretaker Prime Minister Iyad Allawi to consolidate his power (though whether the ongoing resistance to the occupation will allow him to do so is in doubt).

Liberation as self-determination is not in evidence in either Afghanistan or Iraq. That is why the Iraqi soccer team spoke out against Bush. Samples:


` Talking to Sports Illustrated, Iraqi midfielder Salih Sadir expressed dismay at being used in Bush`s re-election propaganda: "Iraq as a team does not want Mr. Bush to use us for the presidential campaign. He can find another way to advertise for himself."

"My problems are not with the American people; they are with what America has done in Iraq: destroy everything," Coach Adnan Hamad added. "The American Army has killed so many people in Iraq. What is freedom when I go to the [national] stadium and there are shootings on the road?"

Ahmed Manajid, whose cousin was an insurgent killed by US soldiers, went even further, saying he would "for sure" be fighting the occupation as a member of the Iraqi resistance were he not playing soccer. `



and

` One of the team`s midfield players, Ahmad Manajid, accused Mr Bush of "slaughtering" Iraqi men and women. "How will he meet his God having slaughtered so many? I want to defend my home. If a stranger invades America and the people resist, does that make them a terrorist?" he said. `



and

` Hamad said: "One cannot separate politics and sport because of the situation in the country right now."

He said the violence which continues to afflict Iraq, more than a year after Bush declared major combat there was over, meant the team could not fully enjoy its success.

"To be honest with you, even our happiness at winning is not happiness because we are worried about the problems in Iraq, all the daily problems that our people face back home, so to tell you the truth, we are not really happy," he said. `



So, the Bush definition of "liberated" and the Iraqi definition are two entirely different things.

Given that the Bush administration has turned Iraq into a failed state and a country in flames, the condition of which is far worse than the US public is allowed to know, it is quite outrageous that Bush should be trumpeting Iraq as an achievement. That he is doing so in connection with the Olympics is just tacky and probably illegal.

Will any of the Iraqi soccer players get interviewed on US television?

posted by Juan @
[url8/24/2004 06:00:51 AM]http://www.juancole.com/2004_08_01_juancole_archive.html#109332778950374679[/url]

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Tuesday, August 24, 2004
War News for August 24, 2004 draft

http://dailywarnews.blogspot.com/

Bring ‘em on: Heavy fighting continues in Najaf.

Bring ‘em on: One US soldier killed, two wounded in Baghdad RPG ambush.

Bring ‘em on: More air strikes reported in Fallujah.

Bring ‘em on: Iraqi education and environment ministers targeted in two separate attacks.

Bring ‘em on: Insurgents establish roadblocks near Basra, attack oil company offices.

Al-Anbar. “Echo Company has lost 22 of its 185 men, more than any other Marine or Army company. It`s had more than 40 wounded. U.S. soldiers and Marines have stopped patrolling large swaths of Anbar. After losing dozens of men to a ‘voiceless, faceless mass of people’ with no clear leadership or political aim other than killing Americans, the U.S. military had to re-evaluate the situation in and around Ramadi, said Maj. Thomas Neemeyer, the head intelligence officer for the 1st Brigade of the Army`s 1st Infantry Division, the main military force in the area.”

Latifaya. “This small farming town, en route from Baghdad to the holy cities of Najaf and Karbala, has become Iraq`s capital of kidnapping and murder, a place where police live in constant fear of brutal death. ‘The area is very dangerous for us and we don`t go out in our uniforms. We don`t even want to eat in a restaurant for fear of being shot down at every street corner,’ said a senior police officer in Latifiya. Refusing to give his first name and jumping back in horror when asked if he could be photographed, he went to great lengths to explain that the daily attacks carried out in the area were the work of unknown ‘Arab fundamentalists’, not Iraqis.”

Commentary

Opinion: “Printing as many names and as often as possible is a gloomy task. These are the deaths that the president and his people try to sneak past the country. The dead were brave men. The president is craven. He buries the war, and the news reporters, indolent and in fear of authority, follow like cattle going into pens. For so long, the public believed the news it was given. Saddam Hussein was going to blow us up with an atom bomb! The Muslims of Iraq love us!”

Analysis: “Little did the Iraqis know that the reality was quite the opposite: by August, the UN mission had grown very distant from the Americans. The intense early relationship that Sergio, the world`s most brilliant negotiator of post-conflict crises, had fashioned with Paul Bremer, the US proconsul, had already fractured. Contact was intermittent once Bremer`s coalition provisional authority (CPA) could deal directly with the Iraqis whom it had appointed, with Sergio`s help, to the governing council. General dismay over occupation tactics aside, Sergio had already parted company with Bremer over key issues such as the need for electoral affirmation of a new constitution, and the arrests and conditions of detention of the thousands imprisoned at Abu Ghraib prison. The low point came at the end of July last year, when, astonishingly, the US blocked the creation of a fully fledged UN mission in Iraq. Sergio believed that this mission was vital and had thought the CPA also supported it. Clearly, the Bush administration had eagerly sought a UN presence in occupied Iraq as a legitimizing factor, rather than as a partner that could mediate the occupation`s early end, which we knew was essential to averting a major conflagration.”

Casualty Reports

Local story: Ohio Guardsman killed in Iraq.

Local story: Texas Marine killed in Iraq.

Local story: Washington State Marine killed in Iraq.

Local story: Mississippi Guardsman killed in Iraq.

Local story: Illinois Marine killed in Iraq.

Local story: New York soldier killed in Iraq.

Local story: Oklahoma Marine killed in Iraq.

Local story: Florida Marine killed in Iraq.

Local story: Ohio soldier wounded in Iraq.

Local story: New York Guardsman wounded in Iraq.

Local story: Pennsylvania soldier wounded in Iraq.

Pop Quiz

In May, the White House announced that George W. Bush would deliver five weekly speeches intended to shore up support for his Iraq policies. How many of the five did he deliver before abandoning the effort?

(a) One.
(b) Two
(c) Three
(d) Four

(Answer [urlhere]http://www.newyorker.com/shouts/content/?040830sh_shouts[/url].)



# posted by yankeedoodle : 4:49 AM
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The Thirteenth Hundred Days
by Paul Slansky
Issue of 2004-08-30
Posted 2004-08-23

Das ganze Quiz von #470 und einige Links zu weiteren von Bushs Anormalitäten aus dem New Yorker:
und auch die Lösungen.

http://www.newyorker.com/shouts/content/?040830sh_shouts

1. Three of these statements were made by George W. Bush. Which one was made by Senator Rick Santorum (R-Pa.)?

(a) “Our enemies are innovative and resourceful, and so are we. They never stop thinking about new ways to harm our country and our people, and neither do we.”

(b) “Tribal sovereignty means that it’s sovereign. You’re a—you’ve been given sovereignty and you’re viewed as a sovereign entity.”

(c) “Iraqis are sick of foreign people coming in their country and trying to destabilize their country, and we will help them rid Iraq of these killers.”

(d) “Isn’t that the ultimate homeland security—standing up and defending marriage?”



Who’s who?

2. Alberto Gonzales.

3. Tony Robinson.

4. Steven Galson.

5. Thomas B. Griffith.

6. Devon Largio.

7. Terry Holt.



(a) The Bush federal-appeals-court nominee who practiced law in Utah for four years without a state license.

(b) The college student whose honors thesis found that the Bush Administration offered twenty-three different rationales for the Iraq war.

(c) The federal drug official who rejected the 23-4 recommendation of an advisory panel and refused to allow a morning-after birth-control pill to be sold over the counter.

(d) The former Army interrogation instructor who said of the Abu Ghraib prison photographs, “Frat hazing is worse than this.”

(e) The author of the 2002 memo to George W. Bush which said that the war on terrorism “renders quaint” certain provisions of the Geneva Conventions.

(f) The Bush campaign official who referred to stem-cell researchers who oppose restrictions on their work as “mad scientists out of control.”

8. Complete George W. Bush’s statement: “The reason ______________.”

(a) I can’t stop saying ‘the American people are safer’ [is] because the American people are safer

(b) I keep insisting that there was a relationship between Iraq and Saddam and Al Qaeda [is] because there was a relationship between Iraq and Al Qaeda

(c) people all over the world think the United States government authorized torture [is] because the United States government did authorize torture

(d) Jenna stuck her tongue out at those reporters [is] those reporters deserved to have their tongues stuck out at



9. What caused Dick Cheney to say to Senator Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.), “Fuck yourself”?

(a) Leahy had said, “So, Dick, you didn’t think you needed to check with the boss before ordering planes full of civilians to be shot down?”

(b) Leahy had made a comment comparing Cheney’s “quintuple-deferment war record” with John Kerry’s heroics.

(c) Leahy had pointed out how many no-bid contracts had gone to Halliburton.

(d) Leahy had said, “Cheney’s turned into a James Bond villain.”



10. Three of these statements describe Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz. Which one describes his boss, Donald Rumsfeld?

(a) He publicly understated the number of deaths of United States soldiers in Iraq by more than two hundred at a congressional hearing.

(b) He scoffed at the notion that prisoners’“quality of life” was compromised at Abu Ghraib, saying, “Whether they have a PX or a good restaurant is not the issue.”

(c) He told a House committee hearing that so many negative stories are coming out of Iraq because reporters are “afraid to travel very much, so they sit in Baghdad and they publish rumors.”

(d) He conceded, after a good deal of questioning by a Senate committee, that putting a bag over someone’s head for seventy-two hours was “not humane.”



11. In May, the White House announced that George W. Bush would deliver five weekly speeches intended to shore up support for his Iraq policies. How many of the five did he deliver before abandoning the effort?

(a) One. (c) Three.

(b) Two. (d) Four.



12. Which statement did Ron Reagan not make?

(a) “Dad . . . never made the fatal mistake of so many politicians: wearing his faith on his sleeve to gain political advantage.”

(b) “My father didn’t know George W. Bush from Adam.”

(c) “Cheney brought my mother up to the casket . . . she has glaucoma and has trouble seeing. There were steps, and he left her there. He just stood there, letting her flounder. I don’t think he’s a mindful human being.”

(d) “My father wouldn’t have had to prove how macho he was by waving around Saddam’s gun.”



13. Where was the Cheney rally at which people were refused admission unless they signed this statement: “I, (full name) . . . do herby [sic] endorse George W. Bush for re-election of the United States”?

(a) Missouri. (c) Nevada.

(b) Michigan. (d) New Mexico.



14. How did George W. Bush pronounce the name of Abu Ghraib prison, the site of the abuses that he claimed to have been “disgusted of” and “disgraced about”?

(a) “Abugah-rayp.”

(b) “Abu-gareff.”

(c) “Abu-garon” and “Abu-garah.”

(d) All of the above.

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Sen. Robert C. Byrd: `Defending liberty`
Date: Tuesday, August 24 @ 10:03:38 EDT
Topic: The Constitution & Civil Liberties

By Robert C. Byrd, Baltimore Sun

WASHINGTON -- The Constitution of the United States of America is sheer genius captured on parchment. The delicate balance of authority -- the system of checks and balances and separation of powers -- has served as the foundation for our liberties, providing for the flexibility needed to accommodate two centuries of change and growth while also inspiring people around the world to strive for liberty.

The Constitution is designed, as Chief Justice John Marshall observed, "to endure for ages to come." But our national charter is being threatened as never before by reckless disregard for its wisdom.

Especially since Sept. 11, 2001, I have viewed with increasing alarm the erosion of the people`s liberties at the hand of an overreaching executive and a less than vigilant Congress. This White House wraps itself in the garb of patriotism while running roughshod over the very ideals for which the first American patriots sacrificed. A concentrated, manipulative and ruthless grasp for power by an arrogant executive which eschews the need to answer questions, seek counsel or build consensus is a dangerous phenomenon, especially in these troubled times.



This Bush administration preys on fear, twists the truth and relies on extreme secrecy in an unprecedented display of contempt for the American people.

Let President Bush speak for himself. "I`m the commander," he told journalist Bob Woodward for the book, Bush at War. "See, I don`t need to explain -- I do not need to explain why I say things. That`s the interesting thing about being the president. Maybe somebody needs to explain to me why they say something, but I don`t feel like I owe anybody an explanation."

In this country, the people are sovereign. The first three words of the preamble to the Constitution are "We the people." The people are always owed an explanation by those who serve them. For any public servant to believe otherwise is arrogant in the extreme and can be costly at home and abroad.

Consider the cornerstone of Mr. Bush`s foreign policy -- the doctrine of pre-emption, the first-strike war. This doctrine is unconstitutional. It cuts the people`s representatives -- the Congress -- completely out of decisions to send Americans to fight and die.

Look to Iraq, the first testing ground for this radical doctrine. America is not safer because of Mr. Bush`s war.

Instead, we have forged a cauldron of contempt for America, a dangerous brew that may have poisoned efforts at peace throughout the Middle East and, indeed, the world, while giving rise to generations of young people who now hate America for its aggression and for shameful debacles like the horrors at Abu Ghraib. We have squandered the goodwill of the world. Such has been the price of the Bush doctrine of pre-emption.

A weak Congress buckled in its vote to authorize force in Iraq. The country was misled by an administration that waved the bloody shirt of 9/11 then subtly shifted the blame to Saddam Hussein, despite the fact that there exists no demonstrable link between the two.

The White House propaganda machine convinced the country and Congress that it was unpatriotic to question the president; that it was damaging to our troops to question the war; and that it now serves no purpose to rehash the events that took us to war. But we must learn from an examination of the sad mistakes that have been made. Nearly 1,000 Americans have died in Iraq. No president must ever again be granted such license with our troops and our treasure.

Each generation of Americans has the responsibility to renew the framer`s legacy, and to make this nation shine as a lasting beacon of hope for the world. "Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty." We must reacquaint ourselves with the Constitution and forge new links with our history. Congress must reinvigorate its defense of the people`s liberties. Amid the sound and fury of election-year politics, all of us must take a long, hard look at the kind of country we want to leave to our children.

Robert C. Byrd, the senior Democratic senator from West Virginia, is the author of Losing America: Confronting a Reckless and Arrogant Presidency (W.W. Norton & Co.)

Copyright © 2004, The Baltimore Sun

Reprinted from The Baltimore Sun:
http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/opinion/
oped/bal-op.byrd24aug24,1,1225858.story

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Chris Floyd`s new book, "Empire Burlesque: The Secret History of the Bush Regime,"

Chris Floyd: `Deep background: The Bush family tradition of war profiteering`
Date: Tuesday, August 24 @ 09:56:09 EDT
Topic: The First Family

By Chris Floyd, Moscow Times

Transcript, Rush Limbo Hour, NBC Radio, Jan. 17, 1943.

Announcer: Good evening, America! Welcome to the Rush Limbo Hour – brought to you by Bush-Walker! OK girls, take it away!

Chorus: Who put the armor on Hitler`s Panzer tanks? Bush-Walker! Bush-Walker! Who helped the Nazis hide their assets in our banks? Bush-Walker! Bush-Walker! And who kept helping Hitler while he was killing Yanks? Bush-Walker! Bush-Walker!

Announcer: Yes, folks, that`s Bush-Walker – purveyors of the finest international investments. Now here`s our host, a man who always talks out of the Right side of his mouth: Rush Limbo!



Rush: Ha ha, thanks, Johnny! Hello out there in radioland! My friends, we`ve got a really special show for you tonight. We`re honored to welcome one of our very own sponsors: a great man, a great American – Prescott Bush! Come on out, Press, and say howdy to the folks!

Bush: Howdy, folks.

Rush: Har har! You know, Press, that advertising jingle that always leads our show – it really says it all, doesn`t it?"

Bush: You`re so right, Rush. We at Brown Brothers Harriman – that`s the chief vehicle for the Bush-Walker fortunes – we`re just gosh-darn proud of the way we`ve always stood up to the "political correctness" crowd, those silly-billies bleating about `ethical investments` and what have you. Gosh darn it, Rush, there`s only one kind of ethical investment – one that makes money for you and your business partners. Everything else is just, well, flapdoodle, if I can say that on the radio.

Rush: Hee hee, sure you can! I said it just yesterday, talking about this war profiteering witch hunt in Congress. I said it was pure flapdoodle, the way Senator Harry Truman and his gang are blackening the name of good American tycoons just trying to make a buck or two in wartime.

Bush: It`s a darn shame, Rush. Look at our situation. Now, it just so happens that some of our German business partners are major backers of Hitler and major players in arming his war machine. So what? We were operating in Germany long before Herr Hitler came onto the scene. We`ll be operating there after he`s gone. That`s what we do: we operate. The nature of the regime doesn`t matter. King, Communist, Nazi, sheikh, warlord, poobah, it all comes down to this: are they open for business? If they are, then we have a duty – yes, a moral duty – to ourselves and to our stockholders to maximize our profits anywhere we can, in any way we can.

Some nervous nellies said we should have divested ourselves of our German interests after the Nazis took power. And let someone else make all that money? No way, Jose! That would be a betrayal of everything we stand for. You know, I always look to the example of my good friend William Farish at Standard Oil. He signed a deal with the Nazis on secret patents for synthesizing rubber. Hitler couldn`t have gone to war without it. And after Roosevelt and his pinko cabal led us into this war, good old Bill stood by his Nazi partners and refused to share these precious trade secrets with the U.S. government, despite the American military`s dire need for rubber. Now that`s honor and integrity for you, Rush! And that`s the ethos that we in the Bush family try to pass on to our children. It`s just a gosh-darn doodley-doo shame that Bill had his knuckles rapped with those conspiracy charges after that little haberdasher Truman put the heat on.

Thank goodness we pulled enough strings to keep my name out of the papers when they seized our Nazi assets under the Trading With the Enemy Act last year! But things have reached a sorry pass in this country when decent businessmen are forced to give up profits and betray their foreign partners just because of some ridiculous law. I mean, come on! The law is for regulating the behavior of the lower orders; it was never meant to apply to people like us!

You know, I`m starting to think that government is just too darn important to be left to the whims of the so-called electorate and their childish notions about law and justice and morality. I might have to get into politics one day and straighten things out. Because I have a dream, Rush.

Rush: Say on, brother!

Bush: I dream of a world where no tycoon need ever lose a dime of profit just because it came from the blood of innocent people. I dream of a world where the rabble keep their mouths shut and the well-born can exercise their God-given privileges in any way they see fit. I see a world where votes go uncounted and judges take orders, where bribes flow and kickbacks abound, where public service and private enrichment are joined in one great, golden revolving door. I see a world where war, corruption and deceit are exalted, where stupidity is rewarded and arrogance enthroned in power.

And if I can`t get us there, if I fall along the way, then maybe my son or my grandson will pick up the banner and lead us to that promised land. But I believe we`ll make it there somehow, Rush. We`ll leave this rickety old constitutional republic behind and see our great country submit at last to the natural order, ordained by God and confirmed by history: the rule of elites, backed by brute power, gorging on the toil and blood of others.

Rush: Amen, Pres! My friends, you can forget about Comrade Roosevelt`s "freedom from want, freedom from fear" jazz -- this is the true voice of American leadership. All hail the Natural Order!

Chris Floyd`s new book, "Empire Burlesque: The Secret History of the Bush Regime," is now available at www.globaleyefloyd.com.

Reprinted from The Moscow Times:
http://www.moscowtimes.ru/stories/2004/08/20/120.html

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Rumsfeld, Military Leaders Faulted in Prison Abuse
Tue Aug 24, 2004 02:44 PM ET

By Charles Aldinger and Will Dunham

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Top Pentagon officials and the military command in Iraq contributed to an environment in which prisoners were abused at Abu Ghraib prison, according to a report released on Tuesday by high-level panel investigating the military detentions.

The outside four-member panel headed by former Defense Secretary James Schlesinger found that Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and the Joint Chiefs of Staff failed to exercise proper oversight over confusing detention policies at U.S. prisons in Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as at the U.S. naval base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

"Command failures were compounded by poor advice provided by staff officers with responsibility for overseeing battlefield functions related to detention and interrogation operations," the report said. "Military and civilian leaders at the Pentagon share this burden of responsibility."

The panel did not find that Rumsfeld or military leaders directly ordered abuse such as stripping prisoners naked and sexually humiliating them. It said, however, that the abuses were not carried out by just a few individuals, as the Bush administration has consistently maintained.

Schlesinger said there were 300 cases of abuses being investigated, many beyond Abu Ghraib. "So the abuses were not limited to a few individuals." He said there was "sadism" by some Americans at Abu Ghraib.

"It was a kind of animal house on the night shift" at the jail, he added.

The report said prisoner interrogation policies in Iraq were inadequate and deficient, and changes made by Rumsfeld between December 2002 and April 2003 in what interrogation techniques were permitted contributed to uncertainties in the field as to what actions were allowed and what were forbidden.

The report said an expanded list of more coercive techniques that Rumsfeld allowed for Guantanamo "migrated to Afghanistan and Iraq, where they were neither limited nor safeguarded."

The Schlesinger panel, named by Rumsfeld in May to look into the abuse and how effectively the Pentagon addressed it, also includes former Defense Secretary Harold Brown, former Florida Republican Rep. Tillie Fowler and retired Air Force Gen. Charles Horner, who led the allied air campaign in the 1991 Gulf War.

Echoing an earlier investigation headed by Army Maj. Gen. Antonio Taguba, the Schlesinger panel said the "weak and ineffectual leadership" of Army Brig. Gen. Janis Karpinski, commander of the 800th Military Police Brigade at Abu Ghraib, "allowed the abuses at Abu Ghraib."

In a statement released by the Pentagon, Rumsfeld said the panel provided "important information and recommendations that will be of assistance in our ongoing efforts to improve detention operations."

In addition, a separate Army investigation headed by Maj. Gen. George Fay faulted Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez, at the time the top U.S. commander in Iraq, for leadership failures for not addressing troubles at Abu Ghraib, a senior Army official said. The Schlesinger panel, too, faulted Sanchez.

The Fay report, to be released on Wednesday, found Sanchez and his staff were preoccupied with combating an escalating insurgency and did not focus on the festering problems at Abu Ghraib, the Army official said.

The report also found that Army military intelligence soldiers kept a number of prisoners, dubbed "ghost detainees," off the books and hidden from the International Committee of the Red Cross, the official added. It also found a small number of military police used dogs to menace teen-age Abu Ghraib detainees.

Seven Army reservists from the 372nd Military Police Company already have been charged with abusing prisoners at Abu Ghraib. The Fay report implicates about two dozen more low-ranking soldiers, medics and civilian contractors in the Abu Ghraib abuse, and about half of them will be recommended for criminal proceedings, the Army official said.

"These are illegal, unauthorized, mischievous, sadistic activities happening outside the purview of interrogations," the Army official said.

But the Fay report maintains that the abuse was perpetrated by a few soldiers, but went unchecked as a result of military leadership deficiencies, the Army official said.

White House spokesman Scott McClellan told reporters in Crawford, Texas, "Remember, we said early on that it`s important that those who were responsible for the appalling acts at Abu Ghraib are held accountable. And it`s also important to take a broad look and make sure that there are no systemic problems."

In Mannheim, Germany, a U.S. military judge ruled that Rumsfeld could not be forced to testify in the court martial of a sergeant charged in the abuse.

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Outside Panel Faults Leaders of Pentagon for Prisoner Abuse
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

Published: August 24, 2004


Der Report als PDF-Datei:

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ZOGBY
8/23/2004

ARKANSAS
48.2 - 45.6 Kerry by 2.6

FLORIDA
49.6 - 49.0 Kerry by 0.6

IOWA
52.2 - 45.2 Kerry by 7.0

MICHIGAN
50.5 - 45.3 Kerry by 5.2

MINNESOTA
50.3 - 44.6 Kerry by 5.7

MISSOURI
49.3 - 48.8 Kerry by 0.5

NEVADA
47.7 - 46.0 Kerry by 1.7

NEW HAMPSHIRE
50.5 - 43.3 Kerry by 7.2

NEW MEXICO
49.7 - 44.1 Kerry by 5.6

OHIO
45.8 - 51.4 Bush by 5.6

OREGON
53.9 - 42.6 Kerry by 11.3

PENNSYLVANIA
52.3 - 44.0 Kerry by 8.3

TENNESSEE
49.6 - 47.7 Kerry by 1.9

WASHINGTON
53.1 - 44.7 Kerry by 8.4

WEST VIRGINIA
41.5 - 49.3 Bush by 7.8

WISCONSIN
50.8 - 46.4 Kerry by 4.4
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ugust 25, 2004
NEWS ANALYSIS
A Trail of `Major Failures` Leads to Defense Secretary`s Office
By DOUGLAS JEHL

WASHINGTON, Aug. 24 - For Donald H. Rumsfeld to resign over the prison abuses at Abu Ghraib would be a mistake, the four-member panel headed by James M. Schlesinger asserted Tuesday. But in tracing responsibility for what went wrong at Abu Ghraib, it drew a line that extended to the defense secretary`s office.

The panel cited what it called major failures on the part of Mr. Rumsfeld and his aides in not anticipating and responding swiftly to the post-invasion insurgency in Iraq. On the eve of the Republican convention, that verdict could not have been welcome at the White House, where postwar problems in Iraq represent perhaps President Bush`s greatest political liability.

The report rarely mentions Mr. Rumsfeld by name, referring most often instead to the "office of the secretary of defense.`` But as a sharp criticism of postwar planning for Iraq, it represents the most explicit official indictment to date of an operation that was very much the province of Mr. Rumsfeld and his top deputies.

"Any defense establishment should adapt quickly to new conditions as they arise, and in this case, we were slow, at least in the judgment of the members of this panel, to adapt accordingly after the insurgency started in the summer of 2003,`` Mr. Schlesinger, a former defense secretary himself, said in presenting the panel`s findings at the Pentagon on Tuesday.

Beginning in late 2002, the panel said, Mr. Rumsfeld and his staff set the stage for an environment in which abuses later became widespread. They did this first by sowing confusion about what kinds of interrogation techniques would be permitted, then by failing to plan for the intensity of the post-invasion insurgency, and finally by delaying for months in dispatching reinforcements to help the American guards at Abu Ghraib contend with the swelling number of prisoners.

The panel sidestepped the broader, even more contentious, question of whether Mr. Rumsfeld had sent enough troops to Iraq. It focused instead on what it described as short staffing among the military police, who were outnumbered by prisoners by a ratio of 75 to 1 at Abu Ghraib, and at the headquarters of Lt. Gen. Ricardo S. Sanchez, whose 495-member staff numbered only about one-third of the authorized total.

In the four months since the abuses at Abu Ghraib first came to light, some of Mr. Rumsfeld`s critics have demanded his resignation, as a gesture of the accountability that the defense secretary himself has promised. But while the panel chronicled failures all the way up the civilian as well as the military command, all four members said that Mr. Rumsfeld`s errors were less severe than those made by uniformed officers, and that he should not be forced from office for what they described as primarily failures of omission.

"If the head of a department had to resign every time someone below him did something wrong, it`d be a very empty cabinet table,`` said Harold Brown, defense secretary under President Jimmy Carter and a panel member. Indeed, members of the panel went out of their way to praise Mr. Rumsfeld for having tried to avert abuses by directing his staff beginning in late 2002 to draw up rules for interrogation at the American detention facility in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba.

But they said confusion about those rules, which were rewritten several times as part of a fierce Pentagon debate, ultimately added to problems in Afghanistan and Iraq as the procedures were put into force there, without adequate supervision, by military intelligence units that were moved from Cuba to the Middle East.

Mr. Rumsfeld, who was briefed on the findings by video conference on Tuesday morning, responded later in the day only with a brief statement, saying that the panel had provided "important information and recommendations.``

"We have said from the beginning that we would see that these incidents were fully investigated, make findings, make the appropriate corrections, and make them public,`` Mr. Rumsfeld said.

As described by Tillie K. Fowler, another member of the group and a former Republican congresswoman from Florida, the panel`s mission was to find out "how this happened and who let it happen,`` a reference to the abuses that came to public attention in April with the publication of what have now become infamous photographs.

The abuses depicted in those photographs themselves were primarily the work of a small group of wayward soldiers, including the seven members of a military police unit who have already been charged with the crime, the panel members said Tuesday. But the panel took issue with the idea, voiced publicly by senior officials including Mr. Bush, that the full array of misconduct at the prison was limited to no more than "a few`` soldiers.

"We found a string of failures that go well beyond an isolated cellblock in Iraq,`` Ms. Fowler said at the Pentagon.

"We found fundamental failures throughout all levels of command, from the soldiers on the ground to the Central Command and to the Pentagon," she said. "These failures of leadership helped to set the conditions which allowed for the abusive practice to take place.``

In addressing the role played by Mr. Rumsfeld in particular, the panel`s report emphasized the defense secretary`s decisions beginning on Dec. 2, 2002, to authorize for use at Guantánamo Bay 16 additional interrogation procedures more aggressive than the 17 methods long approved as part of standard military practice. The next month, in response to criticisms from the Navy, Mr. Rumsfeld rescinded a majority of the approved measures, and directed that the remaining aggressive techniques could be used only with his approval.

But it was not until April 16, 2003, the report said, that a final list of approved techniques for use at Guantánamo was issued. It said that those changes "were an element contributing to uncertainties in the field as to which techniques were authorized,`` and that ultimately "the augmented techniques for Guantánamo migrated to Afghanistan and Iraq where they were neither limited nor safeguarded.``

"Had the secretary of defense had a wider range of legal opinions and a more robust debate regarding detainee policies and operations, his policy of April 16, 2003, might well have been developed and issued in early December 2002,`` the report said. "This would have avoided the policy changes which characterized the Dec. 2, 2002, to April 16, 2003, period.``

In terms of postwar planning, members of the panel faulted the Pentagon for assuming that the problems encountered in Iraq after a full-scale American invasion in 2003 would be limited to the refugee issues that followed the limited incursion of the Persian Gulf war of 1991.

By last summer, as it became clear "that there was a major insurgency growing in Iraq,`` the report said, senior leaders within the uniformed military and the Pentagon "should have moved to meet the need for additional military police forces`` to help guard prisoners at Abu Ghraib in particular, whose population had begun to overwhelm the members of the 800th Military Police Brigade, who ultimately became the primary agents in the acts of abuse.

Here in particular, the panel made clear its view that by October or November at least, the void should have been filled by Mr. Rumsfeld and his aides.

Using an acronym that refers to the Office of the Secretary of Defense, the report said, "It is the judgment of this panel that in the future, considering the sensitivity of this kind of mission, the OSD should assure itself that serious limitations in detention/interrogation missions do not occur.``

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company

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August 25, 2004
THE INSURGENTS
Rebel Iraqi Cleric Is Told to Give Up or Face Attack
By ALEX BERENSON and DEXTER FILKINS

NAJAF, Iraq, Wednesday, Aug. 25 - As American forces pressed new attacks on guerrillas loyal to Moktada al-Sadr, the interim Iraqi government ordered Mr. Sadr to surrender immediately or face an attack on his headquarters at the shrine of Imam Ali.

In an overnight assault, marines attacked a building in the inner ring of Najaf`s Old City, less than 400 yards west of the shrine. The assault was the first time that American forces had tried to take and hold ground inside the inner ring, instead of simply attacking and leaving.

Iraqi soldiers took a tentative step into the battle on Tuesday, beginning mop-up operations in the Judaada neighborhood south of the shrine, which had already been cleared of insurgents by American soldiers. Among the Iraqis deployed were soldiers from the 36th National Guard Battalion, an 800-man unit drawn from the best militia fighters among the major Iraqi political parties. Although the Americans are still doing almost all the fighting here, the interim Iraqi government has said repeatedly that only Iraqi forces will be allowed to attack the shrine.

In Baghdad, two government ministers were the targets of bombings less than an hour apart on Tuesday morning that killed at least five bodyguards and wounded several bystanders. The officials, Education Minister Sami al-Mudhaffar and Environment Minister Mishkat Moumin, were not hurt.
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An Iraqi militiaman inside a dust-filled room in Najaf yesterday as the building was hit by American shells.
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In the first attack, an explosives-packed car slammed into Mr. Moumin`s convoy as it left a government compound. In addition to the driver of the car, the explosion killed four bodyguards and wounded at least two bystanders.

Soon after, a roadside bomb exploded in the western district of Al Khudra as Mr. Mudhaffar`s convoy passed. One bodyguard was killed and two others were wounded, but the minister was not in any of the vehicles at the time of the attack.

In a statement posted on an Islamic Web site, a group linked to Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, a militant who is accused of being an organizer for Al Qaeda and who is believed to be hiding in Iraq, took credit for the car bomb attack on the environment minister, The Associated Press reported. On Tuesday, Defense Minister Hazim al-Shalaan again called on the insurgents in the Mahdi Army, Mr. Sadr`s militia, to give up the shrine and surrender their weapons or face an imminent attack. "They have a few hours to surrender," Mr. Shalaan told Al Arabiya, an Arabic-language news channel.

Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari echoed that resolve, saying, "We will not waver," and adding that the credibility of the government was at stake. But he reiterated the recent promise by Prime Minister Ayad Allawi that Mr. Sadr could join in the country`s fledgling democratic process if he were to disarm his militia.

As the pressure mounted, the mood of Mr. Sadr`s supporters in Najaf was grim.

In a news conference on Tuesday, Ali Smeisim, an aide to Mr. Sadr, said Mr. Sadr`s good intentions had been thwarted. In the lobby of the Sea of Najaf Hotel, a building several hundred yards behind the American lines that has been home to Western and Arabic-language journalists, Mr. Smeisim recited a litany of what he called deliberate efforts by Dr. Allawi`s government to block Mr. Sadr`s peace efforts. Reading from his list, Mr. Smeisim seemed like an unhappy man, one who feared that Mr. Sadr and his militia may not survive.

"This government wants to fool us by killing or arresting Moktada al-Sadr, and they want to insult Sadr`s movement," he said. "Now, we are saying it very clearly, that we are ready for negotiations." With that, he stood up, waved away questions and disappeared into Najaf`s streets.

Just a week ago, Mr. Sadr felt confident enough to turn away a delegation that had traveled from Baghdad to Najaf to meet him and mediate an end to the standoff.

Since then, Dr. Allawi has authorized steadily increasing attacks by American troops, drawing the ring tighter around Mr. Sadr`s insurgents and pushing closer to the shrine.

Now the insurgents appear weary and overmatched by American tanks, artillery and air power. Some guerrillas have fled, and American commanders here say they believe that they are close to breaking the will of the remaining insurgents.
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Some Iraqi men leaving the Imam Ali shrine in Najaf ducked yesterday to avoid fire from American snipers.
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In the past 10 days, the Army battalion fighting in southern Najaf has reported killing several hundred of Mr. Sadr`s forces while having only two soldiers seriously wounded and no one killed, said Maj. Tim Karcher, the battalion`s operations officer.

"They know we`re coming, and they have to feel relatively incapable of stopping us," Major Karcher said. "They see us coming every day."

Around the shrine, Mr. Sadr`s guerrillas seemed to be preparing for a final battle. Overnight, supporters had erected a makeshift barricade of shelves, metal carts used by tea peddlers and oil barrels to protect themselves against American snipers a few hundred feet away. Guerrillas ducked sniper fire as they ran to the shrine`s entrance. And a steady flow of wounded men entered the shrine`s makeshift hospital on long flatbed vegetable carts. Two others were killed, their bodies wrapped in light-colored sheets in preparation for burial.

But Ahmed al-Shaibani, a senior aide to Mr. Sadr, insisted that the rebels were winning. "The war has developed and changed and the Americans know that," he said. "We have full control."

Iraq Rejects Iranian Summit Idea

By The New York Times

BAGHDAD, Iraq, Aug. 24 - Mr. Zebari, the Iraqi foreign minister, on Tuesday rejected Iran`s call last week for a regional summit meeting over the fighting in Najaf.

"We regard this as an internal affair between the Iraqi state and outlaws," he said at a news conference. "We will not welcome any effort to internationalize or regionalize it."

While ruling out any outside mediation or interference, Mr. Zebari sought to convey a conciliatory message to the government of Iran. "We are reaching out to Iran, trying to engage them positively," he said.

The government has decided to send a delegation to Iran soon, he said, "to explain our position and to encourage them to play a constructive role."

Erik Eckholm contributed reporting from Baghdad for this article, and Sabrina Tavernise from Najaf.

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company

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August 25, 2004
ALLIES
A New Sight in a District of Najaf: Iraqi Troops
By SABRINA TAVERNISE

NAJAF, Iraq, Aug. 24 - Dressed in army fatigues, flak jackets and carrying machine guns, a small unit of new Iraqi Army soldiers ducked and weaved through dusty streets, just south of where Iraqi Shiite rebels are fighting American forces near a holy shrine.

The soldiers arrived here on Tuesday morning with a mission - to fight alongside American forces for control of the shrine, which has been occupied by the Shiite militia for three weeks. But their patrol on Tuesday night in the Judaada neighborhood at times had more the air of a public relations stunt than the start of a siege.

Curious residents crowded on street corners, staring and pointing as the soldiers peered around the corners of buildings and sprinted across intersections, guns drawn. The neighborhood is just south of where the rebel fighters are holed up, but has been mostly under American control for days. So many residents had other concerns.

"It`s safe here," one man yelled. Another cried out, "What about the electricity?"

Still, in this neighborhood, parts of which have been caught in heavy fighting, most people were happy to see them.

"They`re heroes," said Muhammad Kadim, a small boy running alongside the soldiers. Riab Abdul Hussein, 47, came out of his mud-walled house smiling broadly.

American officials have said that Iraqi forces will lead any charge against the rebels, who are loosely organized around the cleric Moktada al-Sadr, and this brigade is one of the first trained by Americans for that purpose. Even so, it seemed unlikely - at least in the near future - that they would actually lead the battle.

Soldiers interviewed in the unit, which they called the First Brigade, said that they were from cities all across Iraq and that they had arrived from the southern city of Diwaniya on Tuesday morning. In all, there are about 300 Iraqi Army personnel in Najaf, said one soldier, Ahmed Hassen, 23.

Though they were expected to be working directly with Americans, the patrol on Tuesday night was solo. An American tank patrol that rolled by seemed almost surprised to see the Iraqis.

"We knew you were in the area, but we didn`t know we`d come out here and find you," said Maj. Tim Karcher of the Second Battalion, Seventh Cavalry, to an Iraqi soldier, through a reporter`s translator. "Is there anything we can help you with?" There was not, and the 30 Iraqi soldiers ducked into a side street, with a small group of onlookers following on foot and bicycle.

Residents here have not seen Iraqi Army soldiers since the American occupation began, and they were more than a little surprised to see the brigade on Tuesday night.

"Who are you?" one man shouted.

"I`m an Iraqi, a son of an Iraqi," one of the soldiers replied.

Iraqi troops, like the Iraqi police, have a difficult role in the new Iraq. Many Iraqis are angry at the American occupation, and the police and army are seen as an extension of it.

The soldiers dismissed the potential difficulties in Iraqi-on-Iraqi warfare. One soldier said Mr. Sadr`s fighters were "our brothers." He said he hoped they would simply leave.

But for the most dedicated of Mr. Sadr`s fighters, known as the Mahdi Army, leaving did not seem likely. Less than half a mile north, in the afternoon, seven Mahdi fighters, after finishing meals of rice with lentils and tomato, discussed the standoff.

"I have learned to be patient with my enemies," said a Mahdi leader who identified himself as Abu-Amir. "Gerry Adams fought for so many years before things went his way. Fighting is politics."

Abu-Amir, who is educated, described the Mahdi forces as a "public army," that included educated Shiites, not just poor ones, and said it was financed by wealthy donors.

Back in Judaada, the Iraqi soldiers who had been sent to oppose him were still trying to find their bearings. A small boy walked up to the troops and offered them water. A large group of children followed.

"What can I say," said Kasim Tarash, a 24-year-old soldier from the northern Iraqi city of Mosul. "It`s been one day. We`re new here."

Zainab Hussain, an Iraqi employee of The New York Times, contributed reporting for this article.

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company

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August 25, 2004
Spokesman: Top Cleric Returning to Iraq
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

Filed at 4:00 a.m. ET

BEIRUT, Lebanon (AP) -- Iraq`s powerful top Shiite cleric was returning home Wednesday from medical treatment abroad and called on followers to join him in a march to reclaim the violence-torn holy city of Najaf, his spokesman said.

Ali al-Husseini al-Sistani, 73, underwent an angioplasty, a procedure to unblock a coronary artery, Aug. 13 in London. He had left Iraq Aug. 6, shortly after fighting broke out in Najaf, where he lives.

U.S. and Iraqi forces have battled militia loyal to radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr for more than two weeks there.

``His eminence Grand Ayatollah al-Sistani will arrive in beloved Iraq in a few hours and he will return to the holy city of Najaf to rescue it from its ordeal,`` Hamed al-Khafaf said in an e-mail sent to The Associated Press in Beirut.

Al-Khafaf, who had accompanied al-Sistani to London, was not answering his mobile telephone.

Another al-Sistani spokesman Al-Sayyid Murtadha Al-Kashmiri told The AP by telephone from London, that the senior cleric ``is in good health and left the hospital three or four days ago.``

He said al-Sistani planned to return to Iraq, but refused to say when or whether he already had left.

Al-Khafaf told the Dubai-based Arab satellite television station Al-Arabiya that al-Sistani ``will lead thousands of followers on a march to holy Najaf.``

``We call upon all devout Iraqis who follow him`` from all over the country to be ``on alert to head to holy Najaf under his leadership,`` al-Khafaf told the station. He said an announcement on the next steps will be made later.

Al-Sistani`s return could play a crucial role in stabilizing the situation, with Iraqi Shiites looking to his leadership amid violence that has engulfed the city.

Al-Sadr`s supporters, who oppose the U.S. military presence in Iraq, have taken over the Imam Ali Mosque, the tomb of Ali, who is the most revered Shiite figure. They have been battling Iraqi government forces. At one point, al-Sadr agreed to hand over the keys to the shrine to al-Sistani`s representatives as a way to end the conflict, but those negotiations have bogged down amid renewed fighting.

Copyright 2004 The Associated Press

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August 25, 2004
Swift Boats and the Texas Nexus

President Bush should stop evading responsibility and unequivocally condemn the attacks on Senator John Kerry`s Vietnam War service that are being orchestrated by negative-campaign specialists deep in the heart of the Texas Republican machine. Mr. Bush says that Mr. Kerry`s record is admirable and something to be proud of. Yet he allows these politically useful ads to continue spreading unfounded charges that Mr. Kerry fabricated his medal-winning experience as a Swift boat commander.

The attempt to contradict the federal government`s own records about Mr. Kerry`s record is the work of a transparently partisan group led by a longtime Kerry antagonist, John O`Neill, a Swift boat veteran recruited by the Nixon White House to counter Mr. Kerry`s denunciations of the war when he returned from Vietnam. The operation`s start-up money came from big-money Texas donors long supportive of Bush political causes; some principals have ties to the "independent" attack ads that blindsided another Vietnam veteran, Senator John McCain, in his 2000 primary contest with Mr. Bush.

Rather than single out the Swift boat group, Mr. Bush condemned all such stealth-party activities, Democratic and Republican, which have sprung up to evade legal restrictions on the flood of "soft money`` into political races. Mr. Bush called on Mr. Kerry to join in renouncing these specialists in low-blow politicking - an idea we applaud. This page has long criticized the Democrats` pioneering soft-money evasions, and the Federal Election Commission`s refusal to control these rogue operations.

But the president had hardly finished speaking when the White House began sidestepping, insisting that Mr. Bush had not intended to single out the anti-Kerry ads as something that should be stopped. This is unfortunate. Senator McCain has called on the administration to "specifically condemn" the ads.

Senator Kerry invited debate on his war service by making it a keystone of his campaign. But that means fair debate. Some of the veterans in the ads criticizing Mr. Kerry have praised his courage in the past. No one has offered evidence to contradict the record. By failing to condemn the ads, Mr. Bush leaves the impression that he condones this effort to turn the historical record into a partisan blur.

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August 25, 2004
OP-ED CONTRIBUTOR
When Truth Dies in Battle
By KAREN SPEARS ZACHARIAS

Hermiston, Ore. — Amid the confusing debate over John Kerry`s Vietnam record, one thing is clear: war - particularly the trauma of war - corrodes memory.

My father was killed in Vietnam in 1966, when I was 9. There were two official Army reports regarding his death. One said he was killed by friendly fire. The other claimed he was struck down by enemy fire. Newspaper accounts in the local newspapers (we were living in Tennessee) said my father, a career soldier, a staff sergeant with nearly 20 years of experience, was operating the howitzer that killed him. Then there was a nasty rumor that he had been decapitated.

Several years ago, I set out to see if I could figure out what really happened. I traveled all over the United States and to Vietnam. I gathered documents and conducted interviews. In a remote Kentucky town, I met my father`s commanding officer. In Nebraska, I found his gunner. In New Jersey, I discovered the man who had issued the radio call for medical evacuation. In Georgia, I found a private who had been awakened by my father`s screams as he bled to death. "It sounded like a wildcat," he recalled. And just when I`d given up on tracking him, the medic who had identified my father`s body called me.

Each of these men remembers the events of July 24, 1966 differently. They all agree that not long after 5 a.m. a mortar round exploded in a muddy spot, nobody remembers exactly where, in the Ia Drang Valley of Vietnam`s Central Highlands. My father, his commanding officer and a medic were asleep in the same tent; their cots only a few feet apart. All three sustained injuries. The commanding officer was hit with hot shrapnel. "It looked like I`d run through a briarpatch," he said. The medic took a round in his buttocks. The daily log lists the last victim, my father, as "third man down." Bad weather delayed his evacuation. He died long before the chopper arrived.

From then on, though, the stories get convoluted. The commanding officer insisted the mortar round was incoming; so did the sergeant who was outside operating the howitzer for their battery that morning and said he heard the round come in.

But my father`s gunner has always insisted that the round came from friendly fire. According to him, the sergeant was conducting routine harassing and interdictory fire that morning. One of the shells misfired and exploded in camp, near my father`s tent. This version is supported by several of the men who were in the battery that day.

Rather than clarify matters, the autopsy report created more confusion. It stated that my father had a "possible GSW from back to abdomen." In others words, one former Army mortician explained, "Your father was shot in the back with an M-16." A small wound like that, the mortician insisted, could not have been mistaken for mortar shrapnel. It had to have come from a gunshot at close range. The commanding officer, however, maintained that the wound was the result of flying shrapnel.

I`m not sure I understand the events that led up to my father`s death any better today than I did when the young lieutenant in the Army jeep pulled up in front of our home at Slaughter`s Trailer Court in Rogersville, Tenn. and started my mother crying. Still, my search wasn`t in vain. I learned that my father was a good soldier, well-loved and respected by those who fought alongside him.

"There`s nobody I`d have rather have gone to war with," said Gary Catlett, my father`s driver, whom I tracked down in California. "He was so confident. He had experience. He was the kind of guy that could walk through a minefield and have mines exploding all around him and he`d still be calm. He knew how to keep morale up. We respected him."

So, then, what about John Kerry and the Swift boat crew? Enough already. There are some things we`ll never know. But there are also some things that are beyond dispute - even in the chaos of war. Mr. Kerry went. He served. Lucky for him, he got to come home and raise his daughters.

Karen Spears Zacharias is the author of the forthcoming "Hero Mama."

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company

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A degree in bullying and self-interest? No thanks

The decline of American studies reveals our increasing dislike of the US
Polly Toynbee
Wednesday August 25, 2004

The Guardian
Turn to the Guardian`s university clearing pages and there are many vacancies for a subject that was once hugely popular. Until recently, American studies departments sprang up everywhere. But no longer.

Now 28 universities still have American studies places unfilled, and they include many at well-regarded institutions - Essex, Keele, Kent and Swansea among them. Due to lack of demand, five universities have closed American studies departments while others have cut staff. Keele, traditionally the top-ranking American studies department, with a maximum, grade five ranking for research for the past few years, has had to fire half its staff. Professor Ian Bell at Keele says: "Students don`t want to be branded by doing American studies. They still want to do American modules as part of English or history but, after Bush, they shy away from being labelled as pro-American - not after the obscenity of Iraq."

It`s only a straw in the wind: student choices are notoriously fickle. But it fits the picture of a groundswell of anti-American feeling. Where in the world could you walk down the street and not collect overwhelmingly negative vox pops on Bush`s America and its global impact? Last year`s BBC/ICM poll, taken in a string of countries across the continents, found only Israel in support of Bush - with Canada, Australia and Korea least unfavourable, but still with a majority against.

That is not necessarily the same as anti-Americanism. The Bushites in their daily, foul-mouthed email assaults on Guardian writers try to portray current anti-American sentiment as racist, akin to anti-semitic. They try to pretend "old" Europe is just effetely snobbish about the Ugly Americans. They dismiss anti-Bush disgust in developing countries as envy and as ignorant support for terror.

But opinion polls make it clear that people are well able to separate their feelings about Americans from the politicians and policies now occupying the White House: 81% of the British say, "I like the Americans as people", according to Mori, but only 19% admire American society. They overwhelmingly reject the proposition "We would be better off if we were more like the Americans in many respects" - the view of the right and of younger Tories infatuated with US neo-conservatism.

How much wider the Atlantic has grown under Bush. A Mori poll for the German Marshall Fund examined European attitudes towards America. It found massive condemnation of US Middle East policy (among the British just as strongly) and equally strong opprobrium for US policies on global warming and nuclear proliferation. Most Europeans - the British too - want the European Union to become a superpower to match the US, with a strong leadership in world affairs. (Americans said they wanted to be the only superpower.) Yet there was also surprisingly strong support among two-thirds of Europeans for strengthening Nato - even in France.

However, President Bush`s election pledge this week to withdraw 70,000 troops from Germany and Korea may bring an abrupt end to Europe`s old doublethink on Nato. If the troops go, it may force Europe to confront the hypocrisy of detesting America while relying on it to provide the defence European nations refuse to pay for. The Bushite emailers are justified in sneering, "We pulled your sorry asses out of two world wars" (the printable version), and it`s just as well Fox News hasn`t covered celebrations in Paris this week that pretend France liberated itself, with never a mention of Europe`s American saviours.

If a Bush victory brings a major withdrawal from Europe, it should prod the EU into coordinating its defence capability, without having to beg the US for a transport plane to mount every tiny border peacekeeping operation in Macedonia. If the EU starts to put its still considerable defence spending to better collective use, Bush won`t like it: his ministers protested when Blair and Chirac began the task.

If Bush wins it may galvanise Europe into a stronger sense of what it must do in response. Forget Blair`s phantom "bridge" across the Atlantic, and start building across the Channel. (Sadly there has been no growth in university applications to read European studies or languages.)

The world waits on the US elections with particular trepidation this time. The fall of the Berlin wall was a great opportunity missed for America the victor to become the global force for good it thinks it is. The fall of the twin towers was a chance to reclaim that lost global respect, but in every action Bush has swelled the ranks of those who cheered in the streets when it happened.

ICM`s poll reveals a world that thinks America arrogant, less cultured, a worse place to live than their own countries and a threat to world peace. Is that hatred now irreversibly hardwired?

A Kerry win might still do much to heal the rift, just by showing America publicly renouncing Bush and all his works. Peering into Kerry`s muddy campaign messages, it is unclear whether the man can be far-sighted, brave and decisive. On Nato troops, for example, he first said he would consider withdrawing them, then said it was a mistake, then that it should be done but more slowly.

The insane necessities of a presidential campaign make it impossible to know what manner of president will emerge at the end, but if Kerry does indeed make it his mission to repair America`s global standing, he will have a brief window of global goodwill in which to try his best.

The underlying picture of attitudes towards America suggests a miasma of confusion and deep emotion: the idea of America is woven deep into the universal imagination. When prompted, the world can also admit to seeing the US as that beacon of liberty and opportunity that Americans dream themselves to be.

Hardly a child born can avoid drinking in the great American myth from those Disney realms where the simple, humble and virtuous win through every time against the rich, corrupt and greedy. How is that self-image squared with the monster the world perceives? The old Hollywood morality tales from Shane and It`s a Wonderful Life still spin out into Spiderman or I, Robot, celebrating the little guy who beats the monster corporation. Homespun American goodness warring with the cruelties of raw capitalism is the dominant Hollywood theme, yet little of this culture enters the US political bloodstream.

Between the American ideal and the American reality falls the longest shadow. Discuss. It`s well worth more study. If John Kerry wins and sets about repairing the damage Bush has done, it may get American studies flourishing again - and stem the global tide of anti-Americanism.

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A Push for More Power at Iraqi Plant
Residents Grow Impatient as Engineers Struggle With Failing Equipment

By Jackie Spinner
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, August 25, 2004; Page A10

BAIJI, Iraq -- Plumes of thick black smoke billowed from the Baiji power station, where a contingent of U.S. soldiers craned their necks and tried to count the long columns of soot shooting into the sky. Three? Four? No, five, there were definitely five. Dirty-faced and sweating in the mid-afternoon heat, the soldiers bobbed their helmets in agreement and beamed.

Five spewing smokestacks meant all but one of the steam-powered units at the power station were operational. And that meant Baghdad, 125 miles to the south, was having a good power day because the Baiji station supplies more than one third of the capital`s electricity.

"Back in February, we`d come over this bend just hoping to see some smoke," said Capt. David Unger, the electricity adviser for the Army`s 1st Infantry Division.
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Bechtel National Group, of California, is working under a $172 million contract with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to repair the massive steam-generated power plant outside of Baiji in northern Iraq.
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U.S. reconstruction authorities have poured more than $200 million into the power station in a race to bring more electricity to Iraq.

Both the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) and the Army Corps of Engineers have huge restoration projects underway within the complex, which is a self-contained compound located between miles of blowing sand and ragtag farmland on the banks of the Euphrates River.

The Baiji power station can produce more electricity than any plant in the country, but even here, progress is measured one megawatt at a time. The steam-powered units should be producing up to 1,300 megawatts, which is enough power for about 4 million households. Instead, the plant ekes out 510 megawatts a day. That, however, is 50 megawatts more than the plant produced before the beginning of the war last year.

"This number is going up, but it`s very small," said Basem Janabi, a senior manager at the plant "The main goal is not to increase capacity. The main thing is to keep up the load until next year, when we will have more stability."

The story of Baiji helps explain why power generation remains one of the most vexing reconstruction challenges in Iraq.

U.S. engineers who arrived to repair the plant found it was barely holding together, the result of 13 years of economic sanctions against Iraq. Because many parts of the plant were in disrepair, the engineers have had to focus on keeping things from falling further apart instead of adding crucial generation machinery. But security threats have made it difficult to bring in parts. Fuel shortages have hampered production. Iraqi engineers have been reluctant to take equipment off-line for repairs because the plant isn`t producing enough power as it is.

"It is not for the lack of determination under some very austere conditions," said Lt. Col. Jeff Ogden, director of the Army Corps` electrical restoration program. "This is a combat zone, and there is still considerable insurgent activity. It has been difficult to obtain all the materials required where and when you need them. This obviously has a great impact on your construction schedule."

Though Iraq has more power than it did before the war, Baghdad has suffered. The capital had a steady and sufficient flow of electricity under President Saddam Hussein, who supplied the capital at the expense of the rest of the country. National levels currently hover around 5,300 megawatts a day, far short of the 6,000 megawatt goal that U.S. authorities wanted by June and not nearly enough to supply all of Iraq.

Many Baghdad residents blame the now-defunct U.S. occupation authority for the shortage.

"What do the Americans do for us? Nothing," said Sanaa Addallatif, 49, a resident of the wealthy Monsour neighborhood of Baghdad. "If they give the Iraqi people electricity and water, all the Iraqi people will love America."

Addallatif said her daughters, college students, had been unable to prepare for their exams because there was no power at night to provide light for them to study. Her emergency generator has broken three times, requiring the family to spend $700 to fix it.

"Every time it breaks, I have to go to the market to sell some of my gold," she said, growing agitated while sitting in her neighbor`s home, where she had come to visit. "They spend the money to buy tanks, on body guards for our ministries, on new cars. But it`s hot at night. I can`t sleep. I want to send a message to George Bush. Where is the power? This is my question. We don`t need to have a good president of Iraq. We don`t need this new political process. We just need to have power."

Iraqi engineers at Baiji echoed her frustration at the pace of progress.

"It is going so slow," said Tahseen Zeki, the manager of a new mobile power station built by the Army Corps. "All the Iraqis, they just want to have electricity. The roads are open. The skies are open."

Zeki said he blamed the former occupation government. "It came down to this," he said, rubbing his fingers together as if they held cash.

In Baiji, USAID, through its contractor, California-based Bechtel National Group, is focusing on repairing six giant generators powered by steam turbines. Electricity is sent from the generators to a switchyard, where it is then passed on to the power grid. About 60 percent of Baiji`s electricity is distributed outside of the region.

In the main control room one afternoon, Ahmed Taqi, a technical operator, monitored power distribution to neighboring provinces by observing a large panel of dials and blipping lights. Before the war, distribution was monitored by computer. Now Taqi does it by hand. Asked why the computer hadn`t been fixed, Taqi simply shrugged.

Iraqi laborers are finishing up a brick wall that will surround the Baiji station, which comprises three separate power plants: the thermal plant, eight mobile generators and a gas turbine plant.

The Army Corps is responsible for the mobile generation and gas turbine plants, projects that will add 440 megawatts of power when they are completed. Florida-based Odebrecht Construction Inc., the contractor for the gas turbine project, has hired more than 1,000 local workers through seven major subcontractors and their various subcontractors.

Dan Spencer, a senior manager for Odebrecht, said the project should be completed by November, three to four months quicker than it would typically take to build a power station in the United States, he said.

"We were called to get power on the grid as quickly as possible," Spencer said last week, while workers in light blue coveralls moved beams and stitched together long cable wires. One worker had spread out his prayer mat and was bent in silence.

As a security measure, the U.S. contractors live in guarded compounds at the power station, which is near the village of Hanshe, a farming community that protected the plant from looting immediately after the war.

Washington Group International, of Idaho, the prime Army Corps contractor responsible for power generation in northern Iraq, built a new school for the village. The facility replaced a 26-year-old, crumbling school that villagers had built by hand.

A sign in front of the school reads in English and Arabic: "This school is built and funded by Washington Group International, a [p]rivate American company. It is dedicated to the children of Al-Hanshe. Peace on Earth. Good will toward men."

Hasan Ali Abraham, the school`s headmaster, stood in the middle of a group of smiling, clapping children, who had dressed in their finest clothes to meet American soldiers stopping by for a visit.

The children played with the soldiers` radios, clamored to check out their weapons and eagerly posed for pictures.

Abraham said he was grateful to the contractors for building the school and to the 1st Infantry Division soldiers who patrol the area. The school "even has two air-conditioners," he said proudly.

There has been only one problem.

"There`s not enough power for them to function," Abraham said. "In fact, all this village has very poor power. Think about it: We are neighbors with the power station."

Special correspondent Luma Mousawi contributed to this report.

© 2004 The Washington Post Company

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Da scheint ein Katz und Maus Spiel abzulaufen. Da die US-Truppen sich nicht trauen ihre Panzer zu verlassen, sehen sie auch nicht, wen sie erschießen. Das gleiche gilt für die Hubschrauber und Flugzeuge. Zwischenzeitlich haben die meisten Leute der Mahdi Armee schon Natjaf verlassen und bauen anderswo neue Kampfstellungen auf. Die US-Truppen beschießen und bomben derweilen Häuser mit Zivilisten, töten Frauen und Kinder und erwerben weitere Sympatien. Die gleiche Taktik wie in Falluja. Die Irak Truppen in Natjaf sollen 300-450 Mann sterk sein. Heute wurde in der WAPost nur noch von 300 Mann berichtet. Dabei sind viele Kurden oder andere, die auf jedem Fall nicht mit der Region verbunden sind. Nach anderen Berichten haben bis zu 80% der von der USA ausgebildeten irakischen Armee vor bevorstehenden Kampfhandlungen den Dienst quittiert oder sind desertiert, wobei sie oftmals die Waffen mitgenommen haben.

Mahdi army flees shrine as US steps up offensive

Luke Harding in Najaf
Wednesday August 25, 2004

The Guardian
Mahdi army fighters loyal to the Shia cleric Moqtada al-Sadr had largely abandoned Najaf`s Imam Ali shrine yesterday before American forces launched a massive offensive, which was under way last night.

Sources inside the resistance movement said the majority of the militiamen slipped out of the complex after a secret order by Mr Sadr five days ago.

The cleric was no longer in the area immediately around the shrine, which was encircled by American tanks, they said.

"He is 100% not there," one source said. "We are cleverer than the Americans think. Anybody who stays behind is likely to be killed." He added: "We need these people."

Mr Sadr`s aides insisted the cleric was still in Najaf, but many of his fighters appeared to be regrouping in the neighbouring town of Kufa, having been told that the battle for the shrine has effectively been lost.

Their withdrawal preceded a ferocious bombardment by US forces of both Najaf and Kufa last night - and the largely symbolic arrival of a handful of Iraqi government troops near, but not in, the battle zone for the first time.

American tanks were only a few hundred metres from the shrine, and had blocked off a strategic boulevard immediately to the south.

A major American military operation appeared to be underway last night after a day of intense fighting.

The streets of Najaf`s old city echoed to the "pop pop" of machine gunfire. Overhead US warplanes circled continuously. Two Apache helicopter gunships flew over the vast cemetery.

They also attacked targets in Kufa, where the crump of tank shells could be heard. Seconds later thick black smoke billowed above the old city.

Yesterday Iraq`s defence minister, Hazim al-Shalan, predicted that the battle in Najaf, which has severely dented the authority of the US-backed interim government, was entering its final, and possibly most bloody, stage.

"We are in the last hours," he told a news conference at a US base outside the city. "This evening Iraqi forces will reach the doors of the shrine and control it, and appeal to the Mahdi army to throw down their weapons. If they do not, we will wipe them out."

But Mr Shalan has made the same claim before, and last week Iraq`s interior ministry announced prematurely that police were already inside the shrine.

Meanwhile, in Baghdad yesterday insurgents tried to assassinate Iraq`s environment and education ministers in separate bombings that killed five of their bodyguards and wounded more than a dozen people, officials said.

The environment minister, Mishkat Moumin, said she had survived a suicide car bomb attack on her convoy. "I have been working on sending aid to Najaf and before that distributing water in Sadr City. Serving the Iraqi people is not a crime that deserves this," Ms Moumin told Reuters.

The education minister, Sami al-Mudhaffar, was unhurt after a roadside bomb hit his convoy.

The attacks were the latest attempts to kill government officials, seen as traitors by Iraq`s resistance. The uprising in Najaf has plunged the prime minister, Ayad Allawi, into his gravest crisis so far.

Yesterday a spokesman for Mr Sadr, Ali Semesin, told journalists the cleric still wanted a peaceful solution. "We are still ready to negotiate to end this suffering," he said.

Another of Mr Sadr`s aides said shrapnel from an American attack on Monday night had hit the shrine`s golden dome, one of its minarets and the compound`s outer wall. The US said the Mahdi army caused the damage after firing a rocket that clipped one of the shrine`s walls and exploded.

Yesterday an official at Najaf`s al-Hakim Hospital said at least two fighters had been killed and four wounded. Two civilians also died and two others were injured. More casualties were reported in the old city, where emergency workers could not reach.

Mr Sadr has not been seen in public for many days, and police drove around Najaf with loudspeakers yesterday declaring that he had fled towards Sulaimaniya in northern Iraq. His aides denied that.

"Moqtada al-Sadr is still in Najaf and is still supervising the operations," Aws al-Khafaji, the head of Mr Sadr`s office in the southern city of Nassiriya, told al-Jazeera television.

US warplanes reportedly also struck the volatile city of Falluja early yesterday. Witnesses said it was unclear what the target was, but they reported flames and smoke in southern parts of the town.
Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2004

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Wednesday, August 25, 2004
War News for August 25, 2004 draft

http://dailywarnews.blogspot.com/

Bring ‘em on: Four former Iraqi policemen killed in ambush near Baghdad.

Bring ‘em on: Three Iraqis killed in fighting with British troops near Amarah.

Bring ‘em on: Four Iraqis killed in fighting and air strikes near Fallujah.

Bring ‘em on: Aid convoy ambushed near Latifiya; two Iraqis killed.

Bring ‘em on: Italian journalist kidnapped by insurgents near Najaf.

Bring ‘em on: British troops fighting insurgents near Basra.

Bring ‘em on: Japanese troops under mortar fire near Samawah.

Bring ‘em on: Fighting reported in Kufa.

One US soldier dies in road accident near Fallujah.

Indonesia urges citizens to leave Iraq.

Sistani returns, calls for march on Najaf.

Najaf police chief says crisis will end today or tomorrow. “US-backed Iraqi forces have approached to the Imam Ali shrine and will end Najaf standoff ‘today or tomorrow,’ police chief of Najaf said Wednesday. ‘Our forces are very close to the revered shrine, and the Najaf crisis will end within today or tomorrow,’ police chief Brigadier Amer Hamza told reporters in a news conference in Najaf. US tanks and armored vehicles came closer to the shrine early in the morning as artillery and machine gunfire resonated throughout the area, Xinhua correspondent in Najaf Aziz al-Shammary said.”

Commentary

Editorial: “The comments would be bad enough from a buck private. From a three-star general whose job includes gathering information for the campaign against Islamic radicals, they are unforgivable. Let Boykin retire and speak out as much as he wants. But do not give others the chance to assume that the general speaks for the Pentagon, the administration and the nation. Two months ago, Bush told the graduating class at the U.S. Air Force Academy that a clash of ideologies should not be viewed as a fight between civilizations or religions. He called Islam a religion that ‘teaches moral responsibility that ennobles men and women.’ Fine words, those, and incompatible with letting one of his generals get away with preaching bigotry.”

Opinion: “Thirty-eight years ago this very month, a young congressman told his colleagues that something was seriously amiss about huge wartime contracts awarded to a company with a big friend in a high place. ‘The potential for waste and profiteering under such a contract is substantial,’ he warned. It is ‘beyond me,’ he went on, why the contract ‘has not been and is not now being adequately audited.’ The war was Vietnam. The company was Brown & Root, a subsidiary of Halliburton that is now known as KBR. The big friend in a high place was Democratic President Lyndon B. Johnson. And the impassioned young congressman was Donald Rumsfeld.”

Casualty Reports

Local story: Arizona Marine dies in Iraq.

Local story: New York Guardsman wounded in Iraq.

Local story: California Guardsman wounded in Iraq.



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DER SPIEGEL 35/2004 - 23. August 2004
URL: http://www.spiegel.de/spiegel/0,1518,314808,00.html

SPIEGEL-GESPRÄCH

"Verwirrte geben Verwirrung weiter"

Der Philosoph Peter Sloterdijk über die Herrschaft der Politiker aus der 68er-Generation, die Jammerwut der wohlstandsverwöhnten Deutschen, den Traum von einer europäischen "Komfortgesellschaft" und sein neues Buch "Sphären III"

SPIEGEL: Herr Sloterdijk, der Schlussessay Ihres neuen Buchs, mit dem Sie Ihr dreibändiges Hauptwerk "Sphären" abschließen, provoziert mit der These, unsere Gesellschaft befinde sich "jenseits der Not". Fürchten Sie angesichts der neuen Armutsdiskussion nicht, dafür Prügel zu beziehen?

Sloterdijk: Allenfalls von Seiten übereifriger Verbandssprecher. In Wahrheit mache ich dem Publikum einen therapeutischen Vorschlag: Lasst uns die Mechanismen untersuchen, derentwegen eine der materiell und mental reichsten Nationen aller Zeiten einer permanenten verdrießlichen Selbstagitation zum Opfer fällt. Nutzen wir die Verwöhnungspause, die mit der aktuellen Rezession kommt, für eine Untersuchung über Bewusstseinsverzerrungen in der entlasteten Zivilisation.

SPIEGEL: Zurzeit geben sich viele Intellektuelle als Wirtschaftsfachleute und debattieren über Wohlstandssicherung und Renditen. Halten Sie diesen Primat des Ökonomischen für falsch?

Sloterdijk: Sich um Materielles zu kümmern ist nicht unter dem Niveau menschenwürdiger Sorgen. Wir leben in einem politökonomischen System, das mit einiger Plausibilität ein Wohlstandsversprechen an vier Fünftel der Bevölkerung abgibt.

SPIEGEL: Was es nie zuvor in der menschlichen Geschichte gab.

Sloterdijk: Die aktuelle Verwöhnkultur betrifft nicht mehr eine winzige Adelsgruppe, sondern den größten Teil der Population. Anthropologisch gesehen ist das eine Weltneuheit. Zu deren Betriebsgeheimnissen scheint aber zu gehören, dass von dem beispiellosen kollektiven Luxus nicht gesprochen wird. Stattdessen müssen ständig neue Mangelfiktionen publiziert werden. Im Übrigen war Mangelalarm bisher eine Sache von Intellektuellen, doch jetzt haben die Verbandsfunktionäre diesen den Rang abgelaufen.

SPIEGEL: Systemkritik äußert sich trotz der aktuellen Demonstrationen neuerdings meist von oben nach unten - viele Unternehmer, die mit Volk, Gesellschaft und Politikern nicht einverstanden sind, sitzen in der Talkshow von Sabine Christiansen und jammern.

Sloterdijk: Das Mediensystem - auch darüber finden Sie in "Sphären III" Auskünfte- beutet in der Komfortsphäre den Unterhaltungswert des Jammerns aus.

SPIEGEL: Sie selbst haben einst mit Ihren Büchern oder einem Essayvortrag über das Klonen die Feuilletons auf die Palme gebracht und spielen heute den Moderator der ZDF-Sendung "Das philosophische Quartett", als "Nationalmoderator", wie Sie mal gesagt haben. Wo sehen Sie Ihre Rolle in der gegenwärtigen Diskussion?

Sloterdijk: Zwei Jahrzehnte lang stand ich auf ziemlich verlorenem Posten, seit ich in meinem ersten Buch gesagt habe, dass Aufklärung über Aufheiterung läuft. Man wollte mich als den Narren hinstellen, der den Ernst der Lage nicht erkennt. Inzwischen haben viele eingesehen, dass man bei allem mit den atmosphärischen Tatsachen beginnen muss. Einseitiger Negativismus ist auf die Dauer nicht lebbar. In diesem Punkt wäre ein wenig Emissionsschutz für das intellektuelle Klima nützlich.

SPIEGEL: Der Philosoph als Fachmann fürs Positive?

Sloterdijk: Solange der Medienbetrieb vom Gejammere und Meta-Gejammere lebt, besteht keine Gefahr, das Positive könnte mächtig werden.

SPIEGEL: Kritiker sind vom Wesen her Schlechtmacher, das ist Teil ihrer Profession.

Sloterdijk: Man darf aber nie vergessen, dass die deutsche Kritik eine Spätform des deutschen Idealismus darstellt. Nach diesem gehört die Seele zur Basis, die Wirtschaft hingegen zum Überbau. Folgerichtig sieht man sich hier zu Lande von edlen Schlechtmachern umzingelt, die davon überzeugt sind, dass man sich an die lahmende Basis wenden muss. Man macht schlecht, weil man einer von den Guten ist. Ein deutscher Kritiker sein heißt: aus dem Stand eine Mahnpredigt halten können.

SPIEGEL: Finden Sie es nicht beunruhigend, dass der Wirtschaftsriese Deutschland stolpert und die europäischen Nachbarn mit einer Mischung aus Sorge und Schadenfreude zuschauen?

Sloterdijk: Eher bin ich beruhigt, dass man uns jetzt mit ganz normaler Häme behandelt. Das beweist, ringsum hat man sich an den vormals unheimlichen Nachbarn gewöhnt. Vorher, während der deutschen Resozialisierungsphase, beleidigte man den ehemaligen Delinquenten besser nicht. Da beobachtete man mehr oder weniger nervös, was aus dem Tunichtgut in der Völkerfamilie noch werden kann. Jetzt endlich sind wir, die notorischen Ausreißer der Geschichte, vom Hauptfeld eingeholt worden.

SPIEGEL: Also findet das Land in der Krise zu seiner Normalität?

Sloterdijk: Jedenfalls haben die Deutschen durch ihr Zurückfallen von der Spitze aufgehört, Sonderschüler der Demokratie zu sein, bei denen man dauernd den Schulpsychologen bestellt. Sogar die wachsamen Mahner, die den Deutschen Rückfallneigungen und Mördergene andichten wollten, haben es jetzt um vieles schwerer. Kein Volk kann gewöhnlicher sein, als die Deutschen es heute sind.

SPIEGEL: In den achtziger Jahren haben Sie die herrschenden Verhältnisse als "unglücklich aufgeklärt" beschrieben - und dagegen den heiteren, subversiven Einspruch gesetzt. Heute herrscht auf der Linken Flaute. Wo ist der große Drang nach Veränderung geblieben?

Sloterdijk: Man sollte im Rückblick nicht übertreiben. Als meine "Kritik der zynischen Vernunft" erschien, 1983, hatte sich die radikale Linke hauptsächlich mit tragikomischen Wiederholungsszenarien aus den dreißiger Jahren beschäftigt. Wir haben von 1967 bis zur Baader-Meinhof-Krise 1977 Volksfront gespielt und tapfer Hitlers Aufstieg verhindert. Doch immerhin, man hatte ein Drehbuch, auch wenn es um ein halbes Jahrhundert verrutscht war. Heute hingegen fehlt ein Spielplan für die Linke, ob gemäßigt oder radikal. Die Altersgruppe, die jetzt in Stellung ist, bildet die verwirrteste Generation der deutschen Geistesgeschichte.

SPIEGEL: Die 68er sind an der Spitze der Gesellschaft angekommen. Ist das ein beklagenswerter Zustand?

Sloterdijk: Die verwirrte Generation kann nur Verwirrung weitergeben. Das tut sie erfolgreich.

SPIEGEL: Bringt nicht Schröder jetzt jene Reformen auf den Weg, die eigentlich die CDU in den achtziger Jahren hätte betreiben müssen?

Sloterdijk: Man sollte vielleicht begreifen, dass das deutsche Parteiensystem seit bald 25 Jahren den Wählern die Auswahl zwischen vier Spielarten von Sozialdemokratie anbietet: Die Einheitspartei des Wohlstands verteilt sich über das ganze so genannte politische Spektrum.

SPIEGEL: Das hat der ehemalige Bundeskanzler Helmut Kohl als Erster verstanden, indem er seine Politik sozialdemokratisierte. Seine Ära wurde geprägt durch den Glücksfall Deutsche Einheit - und all das, was liegen blieb.

Sloterdijk: Kohl ist und bleibt der unbestrittene Herr der deutschen Lethargie. Er hat die Deutschen ans Ende der Geschichte geführt. Das Versprechen der Nachgeschichte, allgemeine Lethargie bei hohem Wohlstand, hat er mit sichtbarem Erfolg somatisiert. Seit schlankere Männer an der Regierung sind, wird es entschieden ungemütlicher. Man droht uns sogar den Wiederbeginn der Geschichte an.

SPIEGEL: Auch die neuen Männer werden wieder dicker.

Sloterdijk: Keiner kann Kohl auf der Waage schlagen. Nun aber kommen die neuen Ungemütlichen und möchten die deutsche Lethargokratie in den Wettbewerb mit den Besten der Welt zurückführen. Kein Wunder, dass die große Mehrheit, wie zu erwarten, sagt: Moment mal, das war nicht ausgemacht! Für Spitzenleistung haben wir nicht trainiert! Darum nehmen so viele Journalisten und Soziologen den deutschen Fußball als Orakel der Nation ernst. Auch auf dem Rasen zeigt sich, dass man mit Selbstlob allein nicht immer durchkommt.

SPIEGEL: Es scheint, dass in Deutschland zum ersten Mal Armut ganz offiziell geduldet wird - das ist doch bisher unerhört gewesen in der deutschen Mitte- und Konsensgesellschaft.

Sloterdijk: Die Agenda 2010 enthält nichts, was nicht schon Kohl vor 20 Jahren hätte auf den Weg bringen müssen. Jetzt muss eben sein Nachfolger die Operationen der anderen Seite übernehmen. Die übliche SPD-Tragik, nebenbei. Was die neue Sichtbarkeit der Armut angeht, so hat das auch mit dem Verschwinden des deutschen Sonderklimas nach 1945 zu tun: Damals, als das ganze Land aus Verlierern bestand, war die sozialpsychologische Klammer ums Ganze viel dichter als heute. Der Wiederaufbau war eine kollektive Anstrengung. Inzwischen wird das Verlierersein wieder mehr als eine Sache Einzelner gedeutet.


SPIEGEL: Stimmt die These vom abgeschlossenen Wiederaufbau eigentlich? Berlin zum Beispiel ist längst nicht wiederhergestellt und eine Stadt, die aus Baustellen, Unkrautnarben, Brachen besteht, was die Lokalpolitiker auch noch als tolle Chance verkaufen.

Sloterdijk: Es ist immer verheerend, wenn sich Politiker wie Galeristen äußern. Im Sonderbiotop Berlin hat man ein halbes Jahrhundert lang geübt, die Einkesselung als Attraktion zu erleben. Nach der Öffnung kam dann, neben all den neuen Repräsentationsbauten, der permanente Wettbewerb um die Gedenkstätten hinzu, die auch die historische Erinnerung repräsentativ machen sollten.

SPIEGEL: Reue, made in Germany.

Sloterdijk: Deutsche Reue war ein Markenartikel auf den Moralmärkten der Welt. Inzwischen ist er nur noch wenig gefragt.

SPIEGEL: Sichtbar wird vielmehr ein neues deutsches Selbstbewusstsein, zumindest in der Außenpolitik, die sich sogar den Widerstand gegen den amerikanischen Messianismus erlaubt hat.

Sloterdijk: Ich habe mir eine Menge Feindschaften eingehandelt, als ich vor Ausbruch des Irak-Kriegs davon sprach, dass Schröder mit seinem Votum gegen die amerikanisch-britische Politik die Stimme des freien und vernünftigen Europa vertrat - gegen die Opportunisten im Süden, im Osten und im Bundestag.

SPIEGEL: Liegt da die neue deutsche Rolle, vielleicht sogar eine deutsche Identität: Europa voranzutreiben als eine Art Selbstabschaffung im europäischen Projekt?

Sloterdijk: Europas Nationalstaaten, Deutschland inbegriffen, müssen sich nicht selbst liquidieren. Sie sollen sich aber an ihr großes und gemeinsames Drehbuch erinnern: Hier ist das antimiserabilistische Programm zu Hause, nach dem die Menschheit im Ganzen, oder doch ein großer Teil von ihr, in eine weltweite Komfortgemeinschaft einbezogen werden soll. Hinter den Menschenrechten, wohlgemerkt, stehen ja immer die Komfortrechte, die man zu Unrecht bloß als "materielle Interessen" bezeichnet.

SPIEGEL: Ist das nicht eine ziemlich harte Demystifikation der hehren Menschenrechte?

Sloterdijk: Keineswegs. Menschenrechte beginnen als Rechte auf einen Anwalt; sie schützen zunächst jene, die noch nicht für sich selber reden können. Kann man erst für sich selber sprechen, erhebt man sofort materielle Forderungen. Diese Sequenz ist unvermeidlich. Unvorstellbar wäre eine Menschheit, die bis unter die Haarwurzeln voller Menschenrechte steckt, aber bettelarm bliebe. Wer Menschenrechte sagt und meint, bejaht auch die Tendenz, den Zugang zum Wohlstandsraum zu öffnen.

SPIEGEL: Also weist der neue Bundespräsident den richtigen Weg, wenn er ruft: "Die Nation braucht Mut zur Veränderung"?

Sloterdijk: Er stimmt die richtige Erkennungsmelodie an. Allerdings haben auch die schönsten Mut-und-Ruck-Reden einen prinzipiellen Baufehler. Wenn unser neuer Präsident ein gutes Verhältnis zum Mut hat, dann muss er was Mutiges tun. Vielleicht jemanden begnadigen, bei dem man es nicht erwartet, oder ein verfemtes Land besuchen. Mut nur zu fordern wäre wieder zu deutsch.

SPIEGEL: Was könnte ein Bundespräsident in diesem Sinne tun?

Sloterdijk: Er muss die eingeschlagene Linie einhalten. Es ist de facto so, dass Menschen im Wohlstandsraum nur die Veränderungen hinnehmen, die ihnen die Gewissheit geben, dass die Dinge alles in allem bleiben, wie sie waren. Komfortsysteme werden über Tautologien gesteuert. Wenn zum Beispiel Günter Netzer nach einem schlechten Fußballspiel sagt: "Wir haben ein schlechtes Spiel gesehen", dann geht ein Leuchten durch das Land, weil alle dasselbe gesehen haben. Wahrscheinlich sagt er "ein bedenklich schlechtes Spiel", um seinen intellektuellen Rang zu verteidigen.

SPIEGEL: Er sagt, was alle hören wollen.

Sloterdijk: Er sagt, was jeder gesehen hat. Er hat zurzeit das höchste informelle Staatsamt inne - das des Chef-Tautologen. Nur der kann ein schlechtes Spiel ex cathedra ein wirklich schlechtes Spiel nennen. Zurzeit ist das höchste Amt geteilt, die eine Hälfte besetzt Günter Netzer, die andere der Bundespräsident. Letzterer hat das Vorrecht zu sagen, dass wir es dennoch schaffen können.

SPIEGEL: Herr Sloterdijk, wir danken Ihnen für dieses Gespräch.



Das Gespräch führte der Redakteur Matthias Matussek.



© DER SPIEGEL 35/2004

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[urlKerry Calls for Rumsfeld`s Resignation]http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=694&ncid=696&e=2&u=/ap/20040825/ap_on_el_pr/kerry

AP -- 8-25-04

Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry called Wednesday for Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld to resign and urged President Bush to appoint an independent investigation to provide reforms after a report faulted all levels of the military for abuse at Abu Ghraib prison.[/url]
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Das kommt mir vor wie eine Inzinierung. Sistani als der große Retter aus der Not. Wie schon mal passiert.

washingtonpost.com
Sistani Returns to Iraq, Calls for End to Fighting
U.S. Gains Footholds in Sadr`s Defenses in Najaf

By Karl Vick
Washington Post Foreign Service
Wednesday, August 25, 2004; 5:27 PM

NAJAF, Iraq, Aug. 25 -- Iraq`s most senior Shiite cleric returned to the country Wednesday following medical treatment in London and aides said the cleric was urging "all believers" to join him in the holy city of Najaf to bring an end to three weeks of fighting between U.S. forces and rebel Shiite militiamen.

Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani entered southern Iraq from Kuwait in a convoy guarded by Iraqi police and national guardsmen, according to the Associated Press, and reached Basra, where he was spending the night before heading to his home city on Thursday.
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Shiite faithful gather to answer the call of Iraq`s most powerful Shiite cleric Grand Ayatollah Sistani to march to Najaf.
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On the ground in Najaf, U.S. forces pushing from two directions breached a ring road and gained footholds in the core of the defenses of rebel cleric Moqtada Sadr`s Mahdi Army, a dramatic push that one commander said may signal "the beginning of the end."

Mohammed Musawi, a Sistani aide, said the purpose of the summons to believers was to save the holy city and the Shrine of Imam Ali, which has been at the center of fighting that began Aug. 5.

"Americans interfering in this will not help the situation at all," he told the BBC in an interview broadcast Wednesday morning. "We always say that the Americans should be very far from the holy places. They should not involve themselves in this problem."

Another aide, Hamed Khafaf, was quoted by AP as saying: "Najaf is burning. Ayatollah Sistani is on his way back and calls on Iraqis from all provinces to join him in the holy city."

U.S. commanders immersed in planning and executing a sharp escalation of the battle did not immediately react to the prospect of tens of thousands of Iraqis descending on a war zone. Field officers, who operate in a news vacuum, said they had no instructions to divert from operations and planning already underway.

But Sistani, the most powerful Shiite cleric in Iraq, has been given great deference in the past by the U.S. commanders and officials, who have credited him with exercising a calming influence on Iraq`s Shiite Muslim majority.

A Sadr spokesman said the Mahdi militia would observe a cease-fire along Sistani`s route to Najaf. "We announce stopping all the operations and fighting in the south and all the provinces which Sistani will pass through, for his sake," said Qais Khafaji, the Sadr spokesman in the southern city of Nasiriyah, in an interview with the al-Jazeera satellite television network.

If Sistani continues on to Najaf, he will return to a city barely recognizable. Tank, mortar and air bombardment have shattered whole streets and reduced to rubble sections of the neighborhoods adjoining the immediate vicinity of the mosque.

The overnight military developments in Najaf marked a sharp escalation. At about 10 p.m. Tuesday night, elements of the 7th Regiment of the Army`s 1st Cavalry Division crossed the road that encircles the oldest part of Najaf and contains the shrine. Tanks and armored vehicles approached from the southeast, facing sometimes fierce resistance in taking a complex of four- and five-story buildings overlooking a major intersection.

At about the same time, a Marine-led assault force with armor support from the Army Cavalry`s Fifth Regiment took a high-rise building at the western edge of the ring road, on the northwest of a mall-like plaza flanking a huge split-level parking garage. One Marine was reported killed in the fighting.

During the Marine assault, an air strike hit a split-level parking garage that forms a large plaza that is lined by hotels, finished and unfinished, extending behind the shrine. The strike apparently hit an arms cache or ammo dump, according to a Marine officer, who said ammunition was still exploding 12 hours later.

The twin assaults breached the island of winding alleys and narrow streets that encircle the Shrine of Ali, where Sadr`s Mahdi Army has operated freely.

"It`s extremely important," said Lt. Col. Jim Rainey, commander of the 7th Regiment`s 2nd Battalion. "The enemy is defending a circle, which up until now has provided some freedom of maneuver." U.S. forces "have established a penetration inside the circle.

"We now have the ability to insert more force through these penetrations. So it`s the beginning of the end, I think."

The advance came at a cost, however. At midday the intersection with the multistory buildings was a horrific site, a tangle of broken buildings, downed power lines, standing water and jumpy soldiers, pivoting one way while tank turrets scanned the other.

"It looks like Sarajevo down there," said Rainey, who added a qualifier that takes in the keen attention to precision that gunners and pilots have been required to exercise with special care around the shrine. "Or rather, the stuff that`s supposed to look like Sarajevo looks like Sarajevo. The minarets still look like minarets."

Rainey said, "We`ve been fighting non-stop" since encircling the "old city" south and east of the shrine nearly two weeks ago. "This fight is high intensity urban battle," he added, "which we`ve trained for and built equipment for and written doctrine for. But it doesn`t happen a lot."

Describing the conditions for troops, he said: "I`m dealing with a sense of frustration every day. It`s a slit trench latrine quality of life."

The spectacular gold dome stands at the center of the combat area, resplendent thanks to generator power in a section of the city without electricity for more than a week. The warren of streets and alleys around it hold a thousand folds and obliques, which militiamen have routinely used for cover.

"It`s designed for exactly what it`s doing now: Defending itself," said Capt. Calvin Powell, an air controller attached to the Cavalry`s 1st Battalion, Fifth Regiment.

Meanwhile, the militia showed signs of returning arms to the shrine itself, which they claimed had been voluntarily cleared of weapons during the weekend. At least one pilot and an unmanned Predator drone equipped with video saw militiamen carrying stretchers laden with unidentified objects into the shrine. The stretchers were heavy enough to require four men to carry them, but the load "wasn`t people," said one Air Force officer.

Najaf Police Chief Ghalib Hashim Jazaeri said some militia leaders had been taken into custody for stealing treasures from the shrine. "We arrested leaders of the Mahdi Army carrying jewels and some of the precious things from the holy shrine which . . . were stolen by them. They are arrested and under our control inside the city hall," Jazaeri said.

In late afternoon about 300 demonstrators marched in a neighborhood about 1.3 miles from the shrine. Saying they aimed to break the U.S. cordon on the Mahdi Army, the group chanted "Long live Sadr" and "Allawi and American are blasphemers." Clashes erupted with Iraqi police officers who tried to stop the group, and the conflict spread to a second neighborhood.

Wire services reported that two demonstrators were killed on Wednesday.

Special correspondent Naseer Nouri contributed to this report.

© 2004 The Washington Post Company

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August 25, 2004
The Neocon Civil War
Besieged on every front, the neoconservatives are now fighting among themselves
by Justin Raimondo

It was all too delicious for words. Francis Fukuyama, the boy wonder of the neocons who had famously pronounced the End of History, sat listening to a lecture by War Party stalwart and neocon comrade Charles Krauthammer, and wondered if the former psychiatrist had become unhinged:

"As he was listening to his friend Krauthammer deliver a recent speech on the theme of the United States as a unipolar power, Fukuyama said, he grew increasingly agitated. Krauthammer`s speech `is strangely disconnected from reality,` Fukuyama said in his article.

"`One gets the impression that the Iraq war,` Fukuyama continued, `has been an unqualified success, with all of the assumptions and expectations on which the war had been based vindicated.`"

What`s this? A break in the ranks? A neocon civil war? Are the crusaders for global democracy – or, at least, some of them – losing their revolutionary zeal? Will we soon be treated to the publication of a volume entitled Neoconservatism: The God That Failed? Well, that would be good news, but I`m afraid not. As the New York Times goes on to report:

"Fukuyama said he retained his neoconservative principles – a belief in the universal aspiration for democracy and the use of American power to spread democracy in the world. He said he was acknowledging the mistakes to preserve the credibility of the neoconservative movement."

Good luck with that one, but it seems a hopeless cause. How does one rescue the credibility of a fanatic and secretivecult that lied us into a quagmire and is even now agitating for us to get in deeper?

Now that growing numbers of people on the right as well as the left are on to their machinations, and are especially enraged by the brazen manipulation of "intelligence" engineered by their cadres in government, the question arises: credibility in whose eyes?

Since the neoconservative movement is not at all a mass phenomenon, and is entirely oriented to the elites in government, the media, and academia, the answer is clearly: credibility in the view of opinion- and- policy-makers in the centers of power, New York and Washington. But it may be too late for that.

Rumor has it that there is a break in the Plame case, in which one prominent neocon in government service has turned state`s evidence and is "singing like a canary." In questioning a plethora of prominent journalists, special counsel Patrick J. Fitzgerald is said to be especially interested in their contacts with one Lewis I. "Scooter" Libby. As multiple investigations – not only the "outing" of CIA agent Valerie Plame, but also Chalabi`s shenanigans and the Niger uraniumforgery case – zero in on the neocons clustered in and around the Office of the Vice President, Fukuyama`s apostasy is the least of their problems.

The neocons are down, but they are far from out. Anyone who believes they`ll be driven from power by the outcome of the 2004 election is unfamiliar with their modus operandi. As Tim Carney, a reporter for the Evans-Novak Political Report, has pointed out:

"A year after the Iraq war and after [David] Frum`s attempted purge, the New York Times went to William Kristol to ask him his thoughts on Iraq now that things weren`t moving as smoothly as he had hoped.

"Kristol told the Times that John Kerry had the real answer to the problems there: we need to send more troops. Kristol explained that this agreement between the neocons and the Democrats should surprise no one:

"`I will take Bush over Kerry, but Kerry over Buchanan or any of the lesser Buchananites on the right. If you read the last few issues of The Weekly Standard, it has as much or more in common with the liberal hawks than with traditional conservatives.`

"Kristol continued, `If we have to make common cause with the more hawkish liberals and fight the conservatives, that is fine with me, too.`"

Some, like Pat Buchanan, believe – or hope – that Bush is on his way out of Iraq, and is even now in the process of handing the country off to Iyad Allawi, the aspiring Iraqi strongman. In the end, it seems, the "liberation" will have amounted to the victory of a kinder, gentler Ba`athism. This the neocons will never countenance, just as they won`t give up their dreams of future conquests: Iran, Syria, Saudi Arabia, Lebanon, the central Asian republics – so many targets, so little time. And, as Carney says, "if we balk as the battle moves to fronts we never imagined, they will have no trouble finding a new movement, and even a new president, to march beneath their flag."

If the architects of this disastrous war in Iraq are to be held accountable – not only for the costs incurred, in lives and treasure, but for the crimes they committed on the road to war – I wouldn`t count on the occupant of the White House to administer justice. For that we must look, not to any politician or elected official, but to special counsel Fitzgerald and the Justice Department.

The neocons seem to be unraveling, but I wouldn`t count them out just yet. They`ve endured disgrace before, and lived to fight another day. It will take far more than a Democratic administration to entirely dislodge their hands from the levers of power. Nothing short of a political bunker-buster will eliminate their influence, no matter who wins in November.

–Justin Raimondo



Find this article at:
http://www.antiwar.com/justin/?articleid=3444

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Text: The Fay Report

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August 26, 2004
THE M.P.`S
Perilous Conditions Led Up to Abuses at Baghdad Prison
By ANDREA ELLIOTT

WASHINGTON, Aug. 25 - The prisoner, from Syria, had come to Iraq to kill coalition troops. Inside Abu Ghraib jail last November, he took aim at American soldiers, using a handgun smuggled in by an Iraqi police officer. The Americans quickly shot him and started searching cells for weapons, rounding up 11 Iraqi police officers. Then, the abuses began.

According to the Army investigation released Wednesday, the men were strip-searched by military officers in a hallway and were humiliated as women soldiers looked on. They were interrogated for hours, some of them still naked or barely dressed. As they were questioned, military dogs harassed them.

Presiding over events that night was Lt. Col. Steven L. Jordan, a top commander at the prison, who is blamed by military investigators for allowing those abuses to occur - and others to follow.

"The tone and the environment that occurred that night, with the tacit approval of Lt. Col. Jordan, can be pointed to as the causative factor that set the stage for the abuses that followed for days afterward," according to a report released Wednesday by military officials. The report offers the most detailed look yet at the series of systemic failures that plagued the prison. And in expanding the list of those responsible, the re-port provided a harsh indictment of Colonel Jordan, who ran the Joint Interrogation and Debriefing Center at the prison, and of Col. Thomas M. Pappas, of the 205th Military Intelligence Brigade, to whom Colonel Jordan reported.

According to the investigation, Colonel Pappas presided over the intelligence-gathering mission at the prison, which was besieged with problems including a staffing shortage, dismal communication between section leaders and inadequate training of reservists and other soldiers who were assigned to interrogate prisoners. The report, directed by Maj. Gen. George R. Fay, offers at turns a sympathetic and critical view of Colonel Pappas.

With an excellent reputation as a military intelligence officer, he took command of the 205th Brigade on July 1, 2003, after the unit had been deployed to Iraq. Before the prison-abuse scandal, his performance as commander had been rated "outstanding" by a supervisor.

The same month Colonel Pappas took over the brigade, which is based in Weisbaden, Germany, coalition forces came under heavy assault by the insurgency and the demand for intelligence grew. Nightly roundups of Iraqis became routine, overwhelming soldiers at the prison as the detainee population swelled. To augment Colonel Pappas`s intelligence operation, reservists and soldier from units all over the world - Japan, Germany and the United States - were dispatched to Abu Ghraib. Civilian interrogators and linguists were also brought in. In a very short time, a unit was cobbled together. But, it lacked cohesion, the report said, and that would become a "fatal flaw."

Colonel Pappas had to contend with "disparate elements of units and individuals, including civilians, that had never trained together but now were going to have to fight together," the report said.

In September, Colonel Pappas requested an officer to supervise the prison`s interrogation center and Colonel Jordan was given the job, four days after he arrived in Iraq.

Symptomatic of the confusion at the prison, the two men offered very different accounts about Colonel Jordan`s responsibilities at the prison, according to the report. Colonel Pappas and another officer said Colonel Jordan was sent to the prison to run the interrogation center; Colonel Jordan said he was supposed to be a "liaison" between the center and another unit at the prison.

"People made up their own titles as things went along. Some people thought Col. Pappas was the director; some thought Lt. Col. Jordan was the director," read the report. "It is clear that both had their own ideas as to roles and responsibilities."

Soldiers were also unclear about the rules regarding detainees. A chart in the prison outlining interrogation tactics was confusing, according to the report: "Nowhere on the chart did it mention a number of techniques that were in use at the time: removal of clothing, forced grooming, hooding, and yelling, loud music and light control."

Forced nudity was common, apparently stemming from interrogation techniques imported to Abu Ghraib by military personnel who worked in prisons in Afghanistan and Guantánamo Bay, Cuba. "The lines of authority and the prior legal opinions blurred. They simply carried forward the use of nudity into the Iraqi theater of operations," said the report. The prison`s leaders are criticized for not stopping the activity: Colonel Pappas should have taken "sterner action" against an interrogator who forced a detainee to strip and then paraded him across part of the prison, the report said. The interrogator was demoted.

By the second week of October, it had become apparent that Colonel Jordan was ill-suited for the job and Colonel Pappas committed a "critical error" by failing to remove him, the report said. While Colonel Jordan was considered hard-working and brave - he had survived a mortar attack that killed two other soldiers at the prison in September - he was a "poor choice" to run the interrogation center, the investigation found. He was a military intelligence officer early in his career, but had no experience in interrogation operations and had been a civil affairs officer since 1993.

At Abu Ghraib, Colonel Jordan seemed interested in aspects of the prison that fell outside his jurisdiction. According to the report, he became the "go-to guy" when soldiers wanted to improve living conditions at the prison or complained of a lack of exercise equipment. All the while, Colonel Jordan left the management and leadership of the interrogation center to Maj. Michael D. Thompson and Capt. Carolyn A. Wood, who were overwhelmed with organizing, staffing and training the interrogation center, the report found.

What would come to be known as the Iraqi police shakedown, or "IP shakedown" began on Nov. 24, when an Iraqi insurgent posing as a police officer smuggled a gun into the prison, according to interviews with military intelligence soldiers who worked at the prison.

Iraqi police officers were a common sight at the prison, where they assisted American soldiers with security checks at the entrance and duties. The Syrian prisoner wounded one soldier and fired at others. A prison guard shot back and wounded the man, who was sent to a hospital.

The night of the shooting, Colonel Jordan recruited soldiers to line up Iraqi police officers to determine if any were insurgents.

The men were forced to strip and do jumping jacks, a military intelligence analyst said, separate from the report. He said he had witnessed one Iraqi police officer being forced to stand under a cold shower for hours. The analyst, who was interviewed by a New York Times reporter several months ago s conditions become known at Abu Ghraib, asked to remain anonymous to protect his job.

When the Syrian prisoner returned from the hospital, he was subjected to abuse, he later claimed, including being hung by handcuffs outside his door for several hours, smacked on the head, forced to eat pork and curse his religion, urinated on and having a hot substance put in his nose, according to the report.

While the report acknowledges that "these claims are from a detainee who attempted to kill U.S. service members," a sergeant, Theresa Adams, checked in on the man in early December, when she heard he was back from the hospital. She found him bleeding in his cell, naked, with a catheter hanging from his body and no bag attached, the report said. She asked a doctor at the prison to remove the catheter and he said it was not his responsibility, according to the report. The doctor, a colonel, is not identified in the report.

Sergeant Adams asked the colonel if he had ever heard of the Geneva Conventions. According to the report, the colonel responded: "Fine, sergeant. Do what you have to do but I am going back to bed."

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company

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August 26, 2004
ABU GHRAIB REPORT
Abuses at Prison Tied to Officers in Intelligence
By ERIC SCHMITT

WASHINGTON, Aug. 25 - A high-level Army investigation has found that military intelligence soldiers played a major role in directing and carrying out the abuses of Iraqi prisoners at Abu Ghraib prison. The report undercut earlier contentions by military officials and the Bush administration that a handful of renegade military police guards were largely to blame.

The report, released at the Pentagon on Wednesday, cited for punishment the top two military intelligence officers at the prison, Col. Thomas M. Pappas and Lt. Col. Steven L. Jordan, and three other intelligence officers involved in the interrogations at the jail, near Baghdad, saying they bore responsibility for what happened even though they were not directly involved in abusing prisoners.

The inquiry, by Maj. Gen. George R. Fay and Lt. Gen. Anthony R. Jones, also implicated 29 other military intelligence soldiers in at least 44 cases of abuse between July 2003 and February 2004. These soldiers could face disciplinary action ranging from criminal charges to administrative punishments, like reductions in pay and rank. Even lesser penalties can effectively end a military career.

While the involvement of intelligence soldiers, as well as civilian contractors, was reportedly significantly greater than previously disclosed, many of the allegations had been described before, sometimes in less detail.

The 171-page report chronicled a gruesome range of abuses, including one death, an alleged rape, numerous beatings and instances where prisoners were stripped naked and left for hours in dark, poorly ventilated cells that were stifling hot or freezing cold. Gen. Paul J. Kern, who supervised the work of General Fay and General Jones, spoke with disgust of a "game" in which dog handlers terrorized adolescent prisoners. [Excerpts, Page A10.]

"There were a few instances when torture was being used," General Fay told reporters at Pentagon news conference, in perhaps the harshest characterization of the abuses so far by military authorities.

While investigators said the mistreatment captured in the horrific photographs that first brought the abuses to light did not in most cases involve interrogations, the panel said it had uncovered other abuses that did occur during questioning, or were carried out by military police on orders from interrogators with the aim of extracting information.

The report blamed the abuses on a combination of factors, including a small group of "morally corrupt" soldiers and civilian contractors, poor leadership by commanding officers and a failure by military headquarters in Baghdad to recognize the looming disaster.

Coupled with the findings released on Tuesday by a four-member independent panel headed by James R. Schlesinger, a former defense secretary, the Army report reaffirms the suspicion of many critics that culpability extended far beyond a handful of low-level military police personnel, to include military intelligence soldiers in Iraq and up the chain of command in the Persian Gulf to the highest levels in Washington.

"When you put these reports together, the clear message is that the system failed in a widespread manner," said Senator Lindsey Graham, a South Carolina Republican on the Armed Services Committee.

Moreover, the reports offer revealing new details on the military`s failure to prepare adequately for the postwar environment in Iraq, in this case underestimating the ferocity of an Iraqi insurgency that led to violence at Abu Ghraib.

"One of the consequences of not addressing the postwar challenges is that there were not enough troops in Iraq, and many of those were untrained," said Senator John McCain, an Arizona Republican. The reports have renewed calls by some senior Democrats, including Senator John Kerry, for Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld to resign. The Schlesinger panel implicitly blamed Mr. Rumsfeld for contributing to a confusing set of interrogation polices, but its members said he should not resign.

On Wednesday, Mr. Kerry called on Mr. Rumsfeld to step down and urged President Bush to appoint an independent investigation to provide reforms. "It`s not just the little person at the bottom who ought to pay the price of responsibility," Mr. Kerry said at a campaign appearance in a Philadelphia union hall.

Representative Martin Meehan, a Massachusetts Democrat who sits on the House Armed Services Committee, said: "The Fay-Jones report has further widened the circle of accountability. What is still missing is any sort of accountability in Washington for the policies and incompetence that gave rise to the abuses."

But senior Republicans have rushed to defend Mr. Rumsfeld and said his resignation would hand a victory to America`s enemies.

"I do not find any evidence that Secretary Rumsfeld had actual knowledge of these horrific incidents in the prison system that were the direct result of lack of training, lack of supervision by the immediate command," Senator John W. Warner, a Virginia Republican who heads the Armed Services Committee, told reporters on Wednesday.

The report also chastised the top commander in Iraq at the time, Lt. Gen. Ricardo S. Sanchez, and his deputy, Maj. Gen. Walter Wojdakowski, for not having provided adequate oversight for the detention and interrogation operations at the prison.

"We did not find General Sanchez culpable but we found him responsible for the things that did or did not happen," Gen. Paul J. Kern, the senior officer responsible for issuing the report, told reporters.

In addition to the 29 military intelligence soldiers who are alleged either to have committed abuses themselves, ordered military police officers to mistreat detainees or witnessed misconduct but failed to report it, the inquiry found six civilian contractors were involved in abuse or failed to report it.

The report also stated that 11 military police soldiers - seven of whom have already been charged - were involved in abuses, and that two Army medics in Iraq failed to report misconduct they had witnessed. The report also states that military intelligence soldiers conspired to keep at least eight Iraqis detained by American forces hidden from the International Committee of the Red Cross, a violation of Geneva Conventions.

The report goes beyond any of the other military inquiries into the Abu Ghraib scandal released so far by concluding that military intelligence officers at the prison had a significant involvement in abusing prisoners. Some of the seven military police soldiers who have been charged with abuse have said they were acting at the direction of military intelligence personnel.

"It is clear from the reports that abuse occurred at Abu Ghraib and that abuse, in some cases, was directed, condoned or solicited by members of the 205th M.I. Brigade," the report said.

What General Kern called one of the most egregious abuses involved two Army dog handlers who used unmuzzled dogs in a sadistic game to frighten detained Iraqi teenagers to force the youths to urinate or defecate on themselves.

The report said abuses largely fell into two categories: intentional abuses of a violent or sexual nature, and those that occurred through the misinterpretation or misapplication of shifting procedures. By mid-October last year, interrogation policy in Iraq had changed three times in less than 30 days, the report found.

"Some soldiers behaved improperly because they were confused by their experiences and direction," said General Kern, noting that many interrogators, overwhelmed by their workload, "were feeling a lot of pressure to produce intelligence."

The report, which relied on some 9,000 documents and 170 interviews, is divided into two parts. General Fay examined the role of the 205th Military Intelligence Brigade, which oversaw interrogations at the prison in Tier 1A and 1B, where the security detainees were held.

This portion of the report examined in detail the 44 cases of prisoner abuse at Abu Ghraib that investigators found. In 16 of the cases, the report found that military intelligence soldiers solicited military police to carry out abuses, while in 11 cases the military intelligence soldiers were directly involved in the misconduct. Some soldiers were involved in more than one more case.

In some instances the two groups colluded, General Fay said, with one interrogator threatening to turn a prisoner over to a military police officer infamous for his beatings if the prisoner did not cooperate.

In his section, General Jones examined the role of senior intelligence officers and commanders above the brigade level, including General Sanchez. Together, the investigators found that 54 military police officers, military intelligence soldiers, medics and civilian contractors bore some degree of responsibility.

The report found that there was a blurring of interrogation techniques used at Guantánamo Bay and in Afghanistan that were applied improperly in Iraq; confusion with Central Intelligence Agency interrogators using different procedures; poorly trained civilian contractors, and a dire shortages of military police, interrogators and linguists.

Abusing detainees with dogs started almost immediately after the animals arrived at Abu Ghraib on Nov. 20, 2003. By then, the report said, prisoner abuse was in full swing, and dogs became just another device, the report said. The dogs were brought to Iraq on recommendation of Maj. Gen. Geoffrey Miller, then head of detention operations at Guantánamo, who said they could be helpful to maintain order. But interrogators at Abu Ghraib said Colonel Pappas approved the use of dogs to exploit prisoners` fears.

Many interrogators and their superiors were poorly trained, the investigation found. "Most interrogator training that occurred at Abu Ghraib was on-the-job training," the report said.

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company

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August 26, 2004
INTERROGATION TACTICS
Some Abu Ghraib Abuses Are Traced to Afghanistan
By DOUGLAS JEHL

WASHINGTON, Aug. 25 - Some of the aggressive tactics used by American military interrogators at Abu Ghraib prison now appear to have had their origins in shadowy corners of the campaign against terrorism, following interrogation techniques developed by Special Operations forces and the Central Intelligence Agency.

Both of the Pentagon investigations made public this week found that the practices of elite secretive forces contributed to the abuses at Abu Ghraib. The belief that "other governmental agencies were conducting interrogations using harsher techniques than allowed`` under Army rules fostered "the belief that such methods were condoned,`` according to the report released on Tuesday by the panel headed by James R. Schlesinger.

The report released on Wednesday by Maj. Gen. George R. Fay said a flouting of military procedures by C.I.A. officers who had conducted interrogations inside the prison had "eroded the necessity in the minds of soldiers and civilians for them to follow Army rules.``

The suggestion that the agency`s practices were in part responsible for what went wrong at Abu Ghraib has reinforced a clash of cultures between the by-the-books Army and the C.I.A, which is known to operate by its own rules. A C.I.A. spokesman, Mark Mansfield, complained Wednesday that the "broad allegations`` against the agency were "not supported`` by the material in the Fay Report.

General Fay and other senior officers said the C.I.A. had not shared all of the information they had requested as part of their investigation, but Mr. Mansfield said the C.I.A. was conducting its own "thorough`` inquiry into the conduct of the agency`s employees at Abu Ghraib and elsewhere in Iraq.

More broadly, the Fay and Schlesinger reports have provided the clearest assertion to date that the origins of some of the harsh interrogation procedures used at Abu Ghraib rested in those drawn up for use in Afghanistan, most specifically in a document prepared by Special Operations forces in February 2003 that allowed interrogators much more latitude than the rules later put into effect in Iraq.

That document became the template, the reports said, for the unauthorized practices of interrogators at Abu Ghraib from a unit of 519th Military Intelligence Battalion, which had worked closely with paramilitary forces in Afghanistan and was assigned to the 205th Military Intelligence Brigade in Iraq.

But the reports provided no indication of exactly what was contained in that document, and sections of the Fay Report that appeared to describe those practices in further detail were deleted from the version made public on Wednesday.

The details of C.I.A. interrogation practices at Abu Ghraib and elsewhere also remain secret, and were not spelled out in either of the Pentagon reports this week. But government officials have acknowledged that those the agency has used at times in the past on a small number of Qaeda prisoners held at secret detention centers around the world are harsher than those permitted by the military, and have in some cases included techniques like "water boarding,`` in which a prisoner is made to believe that he will drown.

But the Fay Report does describe a case in which a C.I.A. officer working at Abu Ghraib brandished a loaded weapon in an interrogation room, in violation of military rules.

It says Lt. Col. Steven L. Jordan, the head of the military interrogation center at the prison, became "fascinated with the `other government agencies,` a term used mostly to mean the Central Intelligence Agency, who were operating at the prison,`` and waived a rule that should have required military officers to monitor C.I.A. interrogations there.

In the future, the report urged, all government agencies operating in Iraq should have to follow a uniform set of interrogation practices.

The report also describes sharp tensions between the military and the C.I.A. at Abu Ghraib, particularly over the agency`s use of the prison to hide so-called ghost detainees, in violation of military rules.

Among the episodes described in the report were eight cases in which C.I.A. officers persuaded military personnel to house Iraqi prisoners at Abu Ghraib without accounting for them, including a case in which it took appeals from Secretary of State Colin L. Powell and the Saudi government to track down three Saudis whom the C.I.A. had installed at the prison under assumed names. The Saudis were later released.

Intelligence officials have said they suspended that practice last January, but defended it as sometimes appropriate temporarily, to prevent news from circulating about the capture of individuals with particular intelligence value.

Mr. Mansfield of the C.I.A said: "We don`t take issue with the report`s conclusion that military personnel were confused regarding the role and authorities of different government entities. Better prior consultations, including memorandums of understanding and clearer guidance, would have provided a better guide to the military personnel on duty.``

Intelligence officials said the C.I.A.`s inspector general was already carrying out a series of investigations of the agency`s involvement in alleged abuses in Iraq, including the handling of the "ghost detainees."

Among the cases under investigation is a previously disclosed episode in November 2003 involving the death of an Iraqi detainee who was taken to Abu Ghraib by C.I.A. officers and whose body was wrapped in plastic and packed in ice before being removed. The prisoner, identified in the report only as Detainee-28, had been captured by a Navy Seal team and had been injured when struck on the head with the butt of the rifle by a Seal, the Fay Report said.

Intelligence officials have long said they believed that members of the military, not the C.I.A. employees, bore responsibility for the prisoner`s death, and the Fay Report said an autopsy conducted later had concluded that the prisoner had "died of a blood clot in the head, likely as a result of injuries he sustained during apprehension.``

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August 26, 2004
Holding the Pentagon Accountable: For Religious Bigotry

The first reports sounded like an over-the-top satire of the Bush Pentagon: the deputy secretary of defense for intelligence - the ranking general charged with the hunt for Osama bin Laden - was parading in uniform to Christian pulpits, preaching that God had put George Bush in the White House and that Islamic terrorists will only be defeated "if we come at them in the name of Jesus." But now a Pentagon inquiry has concluded that Lt. Gen. William Boykin did indeed preach his grossly offensive gospel at 23 churches, pronouncing Satan the mastermind of the terrorists because "he wants to destroy us as a Christian army."

It was stunning last fall, after the general`s lapse into brimstone bigotry became public, when Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, far from disturbed, praised General Boykin for an "outstanding record" and kept him at the highly sensitive intelligence post during the inquiry. Now it is simply mind-boggling that Pentagon reports suggest the general may survive with only a reprimand for having failed to clear his remarks in advance.

General Boykin has to be removed from his current job. He has become a national embarrassment, not to mention a walking contradiction of President Bush`s own policy statement that the fight against terror is bias-free and not a crusade against Islam. (General Boykin preached of a 1993 fight against a Muslim warlord in Somalia: "I knew that my God was bigger than his. I knew that my God was a real God, and his was an idol.")

The sense of offense among Islamic Americans is already deep. Removal of the preacher-general should be a no-brainer, however much the president`s campaign generals might fear offending the Christian right voting bloc.

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company

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August 26, 2004
Holding the Pentagon Accountable: For Abu Ghraib

For anyone with the time to wade through 400-plus pages and the resources to decode them, the two reports issued this week on the Abu Ghraib prison are an indictment of the way the Bush administration set the stage for Iraqi prisoners to be brutalized by American prison guards, military intelligence officers and private contractors.

The Army`s internal investigation, released yesterday, showed that the torture of prisoners at Abu Ghraib went far beyond the actions of a few sadistic military police officers - the administration`s chosen culprits. It said that 27 military intelligence soldiers and civilian contractors committed criminal offenses, and that military officials hid prisoners from the Red Cross. Another report, from a civilian panel picked by Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, offers the dedicated reader a dotted line from President Bush`s decision to declare Iraq a front in the war against terror, to government lawyers finding ways to circumvent the Geneva Conventions, to Mr. Rumsfeld`s bungled planning of the occupation and understaffing of the ground forces in Iraq, to the hideous events at Abu Ghraib prison.

That was a service to the public, but the civilian panel did an enormous disservice by not connecting those dots and walking away from any real exercise in accountability. Instead, Pentagon officials who are never named get muted criticism for issuing confusing memos and not monitoring things closely enough. This is all cast as "leadership failure" - the 21st-century version of the Nixonian "mistakes were made" evasion - that does not require even the mildest reprimand for Mr. Rumsfeld, who should have resigned over this disaster months ago. Direct condemnation is reserved for the men and women in the field, from the military police officers sent to guard prisoners without training to the three-star general in Iraq.

Still, the dots are there, making it clear that the road to Abu Ghraib began well before the invasion of Iraq, when the administration created the category of "unlawful combatants" for suspected members of Al Qaeda and the Taliban who were captured in Afghanistan and imprisoned in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba. Interrogators wanted to force these prisoners to talk in ways that are barred by American law and the Geneva Conventions, and on Aug. 1, 2002, Justice Department lawyers produced the infamous treatise on how to construe torture as being legal.

In December 2002, Mr. Rumsfeld authorized things like hooding prisoners, using dogs to terrify them, forcing them into "stress positions" for long periods, stripping them, shaving them and isolating them. All this was prohibited by the Geneva Conventions, but President Bush had already declared on Feb. 7, 2002, that the Geneva Conventions did not apply to Al Qaeda.

In January, the general counsel of the Navy objected, and Mr. Rumsfeld rescinded some of the extreme techniques. Then another legal review further narrowed the list, and Mr. Rumsfeld issued yet another memo on April 16, 2003. The Schlesinger panel said the memos confused field commanders, who thought that harsh interrogations were allowed, and that things could have been made clearer if Mr. Rumsfeld had allowed a real legal debate in the first place. Yet the panel places no fault on Mr. Rumsfeld for the cascade of disastrous events that followed.

According to the report, American forces began mistreating prisoners at the outset of the war in Afghanistan. Interrogators and members of military intelligence were sent from Afghanistan to Iraq, and the harsh interrogations "migrated" with them, the report said. But one of the panel`s oddest failures is how it deals with this issue. It notes that Maj. Gen. Geoffrey Miller, who had been running the prison in Guantánamo Bay, went to Iraq in August 2003, bringing the harsh interrogation rules with him. The report said Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez, the commander in Iraq, used his advice to approve a dozen "aggressive interrogation techniques," and that General Sanchez was "using reasoning" from the president`s own memo. But in the strange logic of this report, that was not the fault of those who made the policies. The report assigns no responsibility to General Miller, nor does it say that he was sent to Iraq by Mr. Rumsfeld`s staff.

All these decisions were happening in a chaotic context. The Schlesinger reports said the military failed to anticipate the insurgency in Iraq or react to it properly and was unprepared for the number of prisoners it had. Insufficient numbers of military police units were sent to Iraq in a disorganized fashion, many of them untrained reservists.

The panel was right in criticizing General Sanchez for not appreciating the scope of the disaster, but it made only the most glancing reference to the bigger problem: the Iraqi occupation force was too small. And that was a policy approved by Mr. Bush and designed by Mr. Rumsfeld, who wanted a lightning invasion by the sparest force possible, based on the ludicrous notion that Iraqis would not resist.

Still, the civilian panel said the politicians had only indirect responsibility for this mess, and Mr. Schlesinger made the absurd argument that firing Mr. Rumsfeld would aid "the enemy." That is reminiscent of the comment Mr. Bush made last spring when he visited the Pentagon to view images of American soldiers torturing Iraqi prisoners and then announced that Mr. Rumsfeld was doing a "superb job." It may not be all that surprising from a commission appointed by the secretary of defense and run by two former secretaries of defense (Mr. Schlesinger and Harold Brown). But it seems less a rational assessment than an attempt to cut off any further criticism of the men at the top.

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company

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August 26, 2004
GUEST COLUMNIST
No Smoking Gun
By DAHLIA LITHWICK

It has been four months since the photos from Abu Ghraib came to light, and America still can`t decide what to make of them. Yes, they`re appalling. But who`s to blame? With the release of two new reports this week, we still can`t quite connect the torture and abuse to the commander in chief or his defense secretary; we still can`t quite find that smoking gun.

Because there`s never going to be a smoking gun.

If you`re waiting around for evidence of the phone call from Donald Rumsfeld to Pfc. Lynndie England - the one where he orders the "code red," instructing her to pile up a bunch of naked, hooded men and strike a queen-of-the-mountain pose - you`ll wait forever. That`s not how armies function. Armies depend on the realities of the chain of command and the cha-cha of plausible deniability.

This week`s report by the James Schlesinger panel offers the closest thing we`ll get to a smoking gun. Connect the dots and it`s all there: the sadism at Abu Ghraib stemmed from "confusion." Confusion sounds accidental - like maybe it just blew in off the Atlantic - but the report is clear that this confusion resulted from systemic failures at the highest levels. The report faults ambiguous interrogation mandates, an inadequate postwar plan, poor training and a lack of oversight. It notes that much of this confusion stemmed from the Bush administration`s posture that the Geneva Conventions applied only where the president saw fit, and that the definition of "interrogation" was up for grabs at Guantánamo Bay, thus possibly at Abu Ghraib.

Or you can put your ear right up to the horse`s mouth, where - even before the Schlesinger report - Mr. Rumsfeld owned the blame. "These events occurred on my watch. As secretary of defense, I am accountable for them and I take full responsibility," he told the Senate Armed Services Committee last May. But we live in an era when such words are intended to signify simultaneous culpability and absolution.

Mr. Schlesinger`s insistence that Mr. Rumsfeld not leave office - because his departure would "be a boon to all of America`s enemies" - is a pragmatic argument. It doesn`t even pretend to be a just one.

You can choose to connect these dots, or cast your vote in November based on whether Colonel Mustard was in a Swift boat with a lead pipe. But Abu Ghraib can`t be blamed solely on bad apples anymore. It was the direct consequence of an administration ready to bargain away the rule of law. That started with the suspension of basic prisoner protections, because this was a "new kind of war." It led to the creation of a legal sinkhole on Guantánamo Bay. And it reached its zenith when high officials opined that torture isn`t torture unless there`s some attendant organ failure.

There is a sad, familiar echo behind the Abu Ghraib prosecutions. This is precisely the approach the administration has used throughout the so-called terror trials here at home. Behind virtually every prosecution of an Al Qaeda member since Sept. 11, there has been an overhyped, overcharged foot soldier taking the fall for his invisible superiors. From the losers making up the so-called Portland Seven to the Virginia "jihad network," all we`ve achieved in our courts is a lot of pretrial chest thumping by the Justice Department, followed by relatively short sentences for a handful of malcontents who watched training videos or played paintball.

The ranking terrorists we do catch? They disappear into yet more law-free zones for further interrogation. The same intelligence-at-any-price culture that led us to Abu Ghraib keeps the real terrorists from ever being held to account.

Such is the beauty of an army: the little guy can always get tagged as a proxy for the big guy. Does any of this suffice as justice? In the terror trials it must: we convict low-level Al Qaeda members as ringleaders because we can`t catch (or won`t prosecute) their bosses. It`s not just, but it`s satisfying. Convicting low-level American soldiers as ringleaders to protect their bosses is neither just nor satisfying. It`s just easy.
•

Correction: In an Aug. 22 column, I accidentally placed Horry County in North Carolina, whereas it is actually in South Carolina. Apologies to both Carolinas for the mistake.

Dahlia Lithwick, a senior editor at Slate, is a guest columnist during August. Thomas L. Friedman is on leave until October, writing a book. Maureen Dowd is on vacation.

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company

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A ruinous trap of their own making

Iraq is now more dangerous to the US than when they went to war
Sidney Blumenthal
Thursday August 26, 2004

The Guardian
There was no "imminent threat" to the United States from Iraq. Then there was no strategy for building a new Iraq."Hubris and ideology" ruled. Now, "Iraq is more dangerous to the US potentially than it was at the moment we went to war".

These are the reluctant judgments of one of the key US officials who participated in the highest levels of decision-making of the Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA). Both interviewed by me and in a forthcoming article in Foreign Affairs journal, Larry Diamond offers from the heart of the Green Zone an unvarnished first-hand account of the unfolding strategic catastrophe.

Diamond, a scholar at the Hoover Institution, a conservative thinktank located on the Stanford University campus, was personally recruited to serve as a senior adviser to the CPA by national security adviser Condoleezza Rice, once provost of Stanford.

When he arrived in Baghdad, Diamond observed "a highly centralised decision-making process. There were weighty Americans with decades of experience in the region who were not consulted or integrated into decision-making, foreign service officers up to the level of ambassadors." The neoconservatives in the Pentagon were in charge, and CPA head Paul Bremer "was the agent more of the Pentagon than the state department". The Pentagon cut out state because the neocons viewed it as "not on board" ideologically.

The British were regarded as warily as was the state department. British ambassador to the United Nations Jeremy Greenstock was systematically shut out. "In terms of the final decision-making on key issues I never saw much evidence that [the British] had the opportunity to weigh in." When British officials in Basra urged conducting local elections there "they were vetoed", Diamond told me. "It would have helped. If the British had been listened to it might have been better. They had a history with this country."

The UN was considered only useful as a rubber stamp to approve the flawed decisions. After the August 19 bombing that killed 22 UN personnel, "the organisation felt that they suffered this trauma and for what? They were so ignored, they felt used. The combination of the risk and the trauma with the lack of impact and consultation left the organisation feeling wounded." But when UN representative Lakhdar Brahimi appeared this February, he negotiated the standoff between Shia leader Ayatollah Sistani and the US.

"The reasons there are six women in the cabinet, corrupt members were jettisoned, why the ministers are regarded as able and serious, has a lot to do with the UN team," said Diamond. "It`s indicative of what we could have accomplished.

"There are so many bungled elements. We haven`t had a strategy for the beginning for dealing with Moqtada al-Sadr. We were flying blind from the start. The result was we didn`t neutralise him early on."

In Falluja, after the murder of four American contractors, the US military pounded the city and withdrew. "We now have a terrorist base in Falluja. The Bush administration looked at the political cost, at what would have been necessary to destroy this terrorist haven. A country not an imminent threat to the security of the US is now in some areas a haven of the most murderous, dedicated enemies of the US, including al-Qaida."

In Iraq, the US cannot escape from its own trap without even more ruinous consequences. "If we walk away the place falls apart disastrously. Americans are not only a bulwark against civil war. They are a stimulus for nationalist and Islamic fundamentalist mobilisation. We need to reduce that stimulus and provocation without robbing the new Iraqi state of the bulwark it needs.

"We have been dealt a bad hand by mistaken decisions, going to war, in prewar planning and in the first few months after the war ended. A lot of negative things are difficult to alter because of mistakes that were not inevitable. There are really no good options."

Fallujah remains under terrorist control; insurgents run rampant even beyond the Sunni triangle; the number of US soldiers killed spirals towards 1,000; the Iraqi army, disastrously disbanded by the CPA, is being reassembled and trained. The American campaign is consumed with false charges made by a Republican front group about the medals that John Kerry earned in a war more than 30 years ago. The arrogant and incompetent blunders of the Bush administration in Iraq are not debated. On the eve of the Republican convention, Bush burnishes his image as a prudent and reassuring leader. The lethal realities of his "hubris and ideology" are for the moment off the screen. Mission accomplished.

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Sistani mobilises his `believers` to march on Najaf in peace bid
By Donald Macintyre in Najaf

26 August 2004

The most venerated Shia cleric in Iraq made a sudden intervention in the Najaf crisis yesterday by returning to the country and calling on his supporters to march to the embattled holy city.

Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani was expected in Najaf today after arriving yesterday in Basra from Kuwait as his lieutenants suggested that he had proposals for ending three weeks of fighting in the city.

Ayatollah Sistani`s return came amid intense fighting around the streets leading to the compound of the Imam Ali shrine. US and Iraqi forces sought to tighten their narrowing cordon round the insurgent forces loyal to the militant Shia cleric Muqtada Sadr.

In Basra, Hayder al-Safi, a Sistani aide, read out a statement said to have been issued by the ayatollah. It said: "We ask all believers to volunteer to go with us to Najaf. I have come for the sake of Najaf and I will stay in Najaf until the crisis ends." Members of the ayatollah`s team said he intended to depart for Najaf at 7am today. Aides to Sadr also called on their supporters to march to Najaf.

Two people were killed yesterday and five wounded as demonstrators set out to march to Najaf from Kufa.

Witnesses said the demonstrators had been chanting pro-Sadr slogans, but were also carrying pictures of the Ayatollah Sistani, and that Iraqi security forces had been responsible for the shootings.

The ayatollah, whose influence was underlined earlier this year when he pressed for an accelerated timetable for national elections, is sometimes seen as a moderating force in the Shia political scene.

He left Iraq the day after the present fighting erupted for heart treatment in London.

Earlier, police sealed off Najaf`s old city, preventing cars from entering the grid of streets to its south-east and fired warning shots in the direction of civilian residents and reporters who attempted to pass them.

Meanwhile, armed police ordered about 50 journalists - including The Independent`s correspondent - to leave their hotel at gunpoint and herded them into trucks and pick-ups to be driven at high speed to the police headquarters.

Police, some masked, shouted threats and abuse at the reporters, along with their Iraqi drivers and translators, and fired about a dozen shots inside and outside the hotel before taking them before the police chief, Major-General Ghaleb al-Jazaari, to hear his emotional complaints about media coverage and the sufferings of police officers during the present crisis. There were no injuries. One policeman declared: "You are responsible for many deaths", while another repeated earlier threats to blow up the hotel.

Maj-Gen Jazaari appeared especially exercised about a report on the Dubai-based al-Arabiya network - five of whose team in Najaf were briefly detained yesterday - which he said had claimed that the Ayatollah Sistani was already in Najaf. Al-Arabiya had taken its information from a "man of sedition" who was "used by Muqtada al-Sadr and people from al-Qa`ida".

He told the reporters that he had not been responsible for the way they had been summoned and added: "You are not arrested. We just brought you here to let you know what you are doing and what you have done. Of course, I want to speak with sensitivity with other countries."

The police chief brandished pictures of officers beaten by the Mehdi Army militiamen and added that his nephew, a police officer, had been beheaded. He added: "What can I do? Believe me I will listen to any suggestions. These are our people. They are killing us. We just represent the law. We want to live and we want our people to live." He said that police had not fired first in the incident at Kufa.


26 August 2004 11:34

© 2004 Independent Digital (UK) Ltd

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Sharif Hikmat Nashashibi: What is so radical about Iraq`s rebel cleric?
Misrepresenting Sadr`s policies is an insult to all who oppose foreign occupation

24 August 2004

The standoff in Najaf has cast the spotlight on the rebel Shia cleric Muqtada Sadr. While the Western media cannot resist calling him "radical", it is in fact very difficult to find any basis for this description.

He has been consistent in his staunch opposition to the occupation of Iraq. "There can be no politics under occupation, no freedom under occupation, no democracy under occupation," he said this month. What is so radical about that? If his Mehdi Army were patrolling and bombing London or New York, I would be astonished to find media descriptions of US and British resistance as "radical".

His opposition to foreign occupation cannot be explained away as support for Saddam Hussein, who persecuted the Shias so ruthlessly. Sadr and his family were vehemently opposed to the dictator and his regime, and for this they paid a heavy price - Sadr`s uncle was executed in 1980, and his father and two brothers were shot dead in February 1999.

Although Sadr`s opposition to occupation has been consistent, he only turned to armed resistance more than a year after the invasion. His sermons previously called for non-violent resistance.

While death and insecurity reigned after Baghdad fell, Sadr supporters took control of many aspects of life in the Shia sectors, appointing clerics to mosques, guarding hospitals, collecting garbage, operating orphanages, and supplying food to Iraqis hit by the hardships of war. I cannot imagine anything less "radical" than collecting garbage especially since the occupation authorities failed in their responsibility under international law to provide such basic and vital services.

When Paul Bremer, the head of the Coalition Provisional Authority, formed the Iraqi Governing Council, Sadr did not turn to violence, but instead announced the formation of an alternative administration to those he saw as handpicked by occupiers. When coalition forces closed his Al Hawza newspaper in March, Sadr`s supporters staged peaceful protests. And peaceful protests followed the arrest in April of his senior aide Mustafa al-Yaqubi, and threats to arrest Sadr himself.

The response from the occupation forces was armed and fatal for numerous Iraqi civilians, after which the protests turned violent. Sadr proclaimed his peaceful means had become "a losing card" and "we should seek other ways... terrorise your enemy, as we cannot remain silent over its violations". Bremer, whose administration undertook an illegal war against Iraq, started calling him an "outlaw".

Even through armed resistance to occupation, Sadr has stuck to well-defined limits. He has denied involvement in car bombings and assassinations; he denounced the attack on the UN headquarters in Baghdad. Until their current involvement in US onslaughts followers were urged not to attack Iraqi security forces; he is opposed to the taking of journalists as hostages, and last month he condemned the beheading of foreign workers: "There is no religion or religious law that punishes by beheading. True, they are your enemies and occupiers, but this does not justify cutting off their heads."

Sadr`s eventual use of armed resistance has certainly not been viewed as "radical" by his compatriots. In a poll conducted by the CPA in June, 81 per cent of Iraqis said their opinion of the cleric was "much better" or "better" after his first uprising than before.

Sadr`s condemnation of the interim Prime Minster Iyad Allawi and his dismissal of the June "handover of power" as a farce is justified. Nor has Allawi`s heavy-handed, compliant rule gone down well with most of the Iraqi population - a recent poll showed his approval rating at just 2 per cent, tied with Saddam Hussein.

Nor can he be accused of being a tool for outside forces. Frequent accusations of ties with the regime in Iran have fallen flat, with both the US administration and the Iraqi interim government admitting there is no evidence of such a link.

But the adjective "radical" still sticks, defying the widespread popularity he has gained nationally and regionally. With the allegiance of the followers of his late father, Grand Ayatollah Mohammed Sadiq Sadr, he can mobilise the Shia masses. But his armed resistance has drawn support from Sunnis and Shias throughout Iraq and the Middle East. Yet he has still sought diplomacy. He agreed to a truce in June and during the current fighting he has invited mediation from the Vatican. Contrast this with Allawi`s uncompromising stance that there can be "no negotiation" with militias.

Sadr is also prepared to disband his army and form a political party to contest next January`s elections. The fact that some Iraqi leaders are ignoring a decree passed by Allawi`s government and have invited Sadr into the political process reflects the recognition that, like him or not, he is too powerful and popular a figure to marginalise.

Calling Sadr "radical" is not only a misrepresentation of his policies, it is an insult to all those who oppose foreign occupation and domination, religious in-fighting and regional instability. One does not have to be Shia, Iraqi, Arab or "radical" to see that.

The writer is chairman of Arab Media Watch


26 August 2004 11:43


© 2004 Independent Digital (UK) Ltd

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Iraq Mortar Attack Kills 25, Sistani Heads to Najaf


Reuters
Thursday, August 26, 2004; 5:47 AM

By Michael Georgy

NAJAF, Iraq (Reuters) - A mortar attack on a packed mosque in the town of Kufa on Thursday killed at least 25 people as Iraq`s most influential Shi`ite cleric headed to the nearby holy city of Najaf to try to end a bloody three-week uprising.

The Interior Ministry said 60 people had been wounded in Kufa, where hundreds of supporters of rebel cleric Moqtada al-Sadr -- the firebrand leader behind the Najaf rebellion -- were in the town`s main mosque when the mortar bomb hit.

Television pictures showed dozens of wounded men on the ground amid pools of blood or being ferried to Kufa`s hospital.

Shi`ite cleric Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani was heading for Najaf to try to persuade Sadr`s Mehdi Army militia to leave a sacred shrine where they are holed up and end fighting with U.S. marines that has killed hundreds of people.

Both Sistani and Sadr called on their supporters to converge on Najaf.

Supporters of Iraq`s top Shi`ite cleric were fired upon in the town of Kufa and 20 people were killed, a Reuters witness said. It was unclear who opened fire.

Sadr supporters marching to Najaf from Kufa were also attacked and several were wounded, witnesses scene.

A senior aide traveling with Sistani on the lengthy journey from the southern city of Basra said the 73-year-old Iranian-born cleric would not delay his trip despite the Kufa bloodshed, which could ignite passions among Sadr`s supporters.

"We are making our way. The crowds surrounding us are huge," aide Hamed al-Khafaf told Reuters.

Kufa is a key Sadr powerbase and lies adjacent to Najaf. The mosque is where Sadr often gives sermons during Friday prayers.

His followers had gathered there and had planned to march on Najaf. His supporters blamed U.S.-led forces for the mosque attack. Najaf`s governor said the attack was not carried out by U.S. or Iraqi forces.

HUGE CONVOY

Sistani left Basra in a convoy of some 50 police cars and 10 British military vehicles on Thursday morning. Hundreds of cars driven by his supporters joined the trip.

He will unveil a plan in Najaf to get the Mehdi militia out of the Imam Ali mosque and call on U.S. marines encircling Iraq`s holiest Shi`ite shrine to leave the city, his aides said.

"On his arrival, a (peace) initiative will be launched," Khafaf said earlier.

Sistani will be helped by a government cease-fire the governor of Najaf said Iraqi forces would observe a cease-fire once Sistani arrived in the holy city.

But fighting still raged in the area on Thursday.

The three weeks of clashes have driven oil prices higher and undermined interim Prime Minister Iyad Allawi.

Heavy shooting and mortar bomb attacks erupted near the Najaf shrine on Thursday, a Reuters witness said. Gunfire later broke out away from the mosque, indicating fighting was taking place elsewhere in the besieged city.

Overnight, U.S. warplanes unleashed a fierce attack on rebel targets in Najaf. The strikes came just after U.S. artillery fire rattled the city which has a peacetime population of 500,000, about 100 miles south of Baghdad.

Sistani left Iraq for medical treatment in London just as the Najaf uprising began three weeks ago. Dressed in a black robe and turban, with a flowing white beard and dark rings around his eyes, Sistani made a dramatic return on Wednesday, arriving from Kuwait and spending the night in Basra.

His followers say the cleric`s intervention could break the deadlock in Najaf and ensure a peaceful resolution.

UPSTART CHALLENGE

Thousands of Iraqis began gathering in Shi`ite areas overnight to begin the journey to Najaf. Witnesses said two Shi`ite marchers were killed west of the city on Wednesday evening when police opened fire on a crowd.

Sadr has challenged the collegiate leadership of the Najaf clergy headed by Sistani and styled himself as the face of anti-U.S. Shi`ite resistance. Aged only about 30, Sadr has proven a stubborn foe of Iraq`s U.S.-backed government.

U.S. firepower has failed to get his rebels out of the mosque. So have threats and peace offerings from Allawi, who has faced multiple challenges barely two months since he took over from U.S.-led occupiers.

That leaves Sistani, the most powerful voice of moderation in the tormented country.

Sadr`s spokesmen were quick to make conciliatory statements when Sistani returned on Wednesday. The whereabouts of the upstart cleric himself, however, remain a mystery.

Sistani also played in role in ending a similar uprising from the Mehdi militia in April and May.

The other points of Sistani`s initiative will be for the city to be free of weapons and for police to take charge of security, aides said.

(With reporting by Waleed Ibrahim, Khaled Yacoub Oweis, Tom Perry and Andrew Marshall in Baghdad)

© 2004 Reuters

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Saboteurs Attack About 20 Iraq Pipelines

By ABBAS FAYADH
The Associated Press
Thursday, August 26, 2004; 5:26 AM

BASRA, Iraq - Saboteurs have attacked about 20 oil pipelines in southern Iraq, reducing exports from the key oil producing region by at least one third, a top oil official said Thursday.

The cluster of pipelines was attacked late Wednesday in Berjasiya, 20 miles southwest of the southern city of Basra, an official with the state-run South Oil Co. said on condition of anonymity. The pipelines, which connect the Rumeila oilfields to Berjasiya, were still ablaze Thursday.

Associated Press Television News footage showed huge plumes of black smoke and flames leaping from the Zubayr 1 pumping station, south of Basra.

Oil exports out of southern Iraq average about 1.85 million barrels a day. The oil official said Wednesday`s sabotage cut exports to 1.2 million barrels.

Squadron leader Spike Wilson, a spokesman for British troops helping maintain security in the area, said he was only aware of one pipeline breach 12 miles west of Zubayr.

He said it was not clear if that pipeline had been attacked, however.

"It`s a minor pipeline, it hasn`t impeded the export of oil at all," Wilson said. "Because the infrastructure of the pipelines are so old, they frequently just give way."

Insurgents have repeatedly sabotaged Iraq`s crucial oil industry, its main source of income, in an effort to hamper reconstruction efforts here. The threats to the oil infrastructure have increased in recent weeks amid a violent uprising by Shiite militants in southern Iraq, where much of the oil industry is located.

© 2004 The Associated Press

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http://www.metrotimes.com/editorial/story.asp?id=6647
The blog of war

Ann Arbor professor Juan Cole covers Iraq with his computer

by Curt Guyette
8/25/2004

"I began getting the reputation of being remarkably prescient."
Like the history that he teaches, Juan Cole’s emergence as a 21st century media phenomenon is the product of convergence. Geopolitics and technology and professional pursuits have combined to transform a once-obscure university professor into an analyst hundreds of thousands of people are turning to as an alternative source of information regarding the war in Iraq.
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There was a time not long ago when the opinion pieces Cole submitted to magazines and newspapers would go unpublished. No one had much interest in the insights being offered by this University of Michigan history professor who made study of the Middle East and its religions his specialty.

The terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, America’s subsequent invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq, and the evolution of the Internet have changed all that. Now, instead of specialized journals and books little noticed outside the margins of academia, Cole’s writings can be found on the pages of The Guardian, San Jose Mercury News, and The Nation, and in Web publications such as Salon. He’s featured frequently in the electronic media, appearing on CNN, “The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer” and National Public Radio.

His Web log, or blog, Informed Comment (juancole.com), has received as many as 250,000 hits a month; last week, the online journal Slate cited it as “a must-read for those interested in the Middle East.” The phone at his Ann Arbor home rings constantly with journalists seeking his expertise. And in April, he testified before the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations.

Juan Cole and his opinions on Iraq have become a hot commodity. On his blog, he draws information daily from a variety of sources, collecting disparate pieces of a complicated puzzle and placing them together to form a coherent picture.

A 51-year-old specialist in Islamic studies who has “lived all over the Muslim world,” Cole began getting peppered with questions from colleagues on various e-mail lists he subscribed to following Sept. 11. As the author of more than a half-dozen books about Middle Eastern religious sects and the region’s social and political movements, he brought a perspective few Westerners could match.

“Because I was familiar with the terrain from which al Qaeda developed,” he says, “people would ask questions about what was going on and I would try to answer them. My answers were thought well of by my colleagues. My responses would get forwarded very widely. Frankly, I began getting fan mail from places like Denmark. Obviously, there was a lot of interest in what I had to say. People were trying to make sense of the situation.”

Cole relates his trajectory in a matter-of-fact way, with no trace of a braggart in his tone.

As Cole points out, e-mails, by nature, are “ephemeral. You send them and they are gone.” And they have a relatively narrow audience.

By the winter of 2001-02, however, blogging as a phenomenon was beginning to take off, and Cole, who describes himself as “very wired,” was there at the start, ready to ride that technological wave as it began to form.

It was, at that point, a “relatively minor sort of thing,” he explains, nothing more than a hobby. The Iraq war came in the spring of 2003, and he began focusing attention on that. Still, his blog remained relatively obscure. That all changed the following year when, following the capture of Saddam, a “huge pilgrimage from Baghdad to the holy city of Karbala took place. There were thousands and thousands of people flagellating themselves and chanting, and the American media and the American public suddenly said, ‘Who are these people?’”

With one of his specialties being the modern history of Shiite Islam, Cole could answer those questions. Because of his presence on the Internet, journalists, for the first time, began to take notice and turned to him and his Web page as a resource.

A flurry of media appearances occurred, and his blog began gaining wider notice. The site, which would get just a few hundred hits each month when first begun, steadily attracted more readers.

Early on in the war, when optimism ran rampant, Cole saw much reason for concern. Able to read several Middle Eastern languages, he was able to monitor news accounts and opinion pieces from the region online, which, along with his previous studies, provided a depth and breadth of insight few others could match.

“This was something I could not have been able to do in 1990, or even 1995,” says Cole about the availability of Middle Eastern news reports on the Internet. “I could get a level of texture and detail that you could never get from the Western press.”

In fact, he contends, from his desk in Ann Arbor he can obtain a “more thorough review of what is going on in Iraq than most observers on the ground.”

By the summer of 2003, Cole had gained a reputation as a “dark pessimist” at a time when many observers were still expecting victorious troops to be greeted with nothing more dangerous than flower bouquets being lobbed at them.

“As time went on, though, I began getting the reputation of being remarkably prescient,” he says.

Other Web blogs were taking notice and posting links to Informed Comment. And suddenly, instead of having submissions rejected, editors were calling, asking him to write opinion pieces.

“I found out that it is much better when they ask you to write something,” he laughs.

By the spring of this year, with the uprising led by cleric Muqtada al-Sadr and the siege of Faluja — a time when, says Cole, “all hell broke loose” — his site began receiving upward of 250,000 hits a month.

Although that has tapered off some since then, interest remains fervent. Those who log onto his blog receive a mixture of news summary and opinion — something that a person trained to be an “objective” historian doesn’t offer lightly. He worries that offering pointed commentary could damage his academic credibility, but at this point he feels a moral obligation to point out “the very bad foreign policy mistakes” the United States continues to commit.

“The fate of my country is in the balance,” says Cole. “That is more important than objectivity.”

Cole gives the American media mixed marks for its coverage of the war.

“Some are more on the ball than others,” he observes.” I learn a lot from the mainstream media, and I admire the courage of the reporters in Iraq, because anybody who is there is risking their life.”

But coverage is inhibited by a number of factors, not the least of which is a sort of parochialism. Regions of the country where American troops aren’t deployed are routinely ignored, despite the importance of events. Also, Cole sees a tendency on the part of reporters to place undue importance on the official pronouncements coming from the Bush administration — “even though our current president is a profoundly ignorant man who doesn’t have the slightest idea of what’s going on in Iraq.”

Cole sees this tendency to rely so heavily on official sources as a sort of “gullibility.”

As far as television, if the broadcast and cable networks don’t have footage, then stories don’t get covered. As an example, he pointed to a recent incident in the town of Kut, where coalition troops fighting militia received close air support from American planes, which bombed residential neighborhoods. Iraqi officials reported 83 people killed. Except for wire reports, the story went virtually uncovered in the United States.

“Eighty-three people killed,” says Cole. “I think that is significant.”

Asked what he sees as the way out at this point, Cole is at a loss to offer an opinion on how America extricates itself from the quagmire we’ve waded into.

His sense of pessimism remains strong. There is, opines Cole, “a 50-50 chance that, in the next few years,” the Iraqis will rise up and throw us out the way the Iranians did in the late 1970s. If that happens, he fears, chaos could spread throughout the region, with U.S.-friendly regimes such as the one in Saudi Arabia being overthrown in popular uprisings.

That, he says, is a chilling scenario.

“If unrest spreads to Saudi Arabia, if our war spreads to Iran, we could see gasoline prices hit $20 a gallon. That would lead to the de-industrialization of much of the world.”

“We have no idea what we are playing with,” he says. “Things could be very, very bad.”

There is, however, still hope.

“We could also muddle through,” says Cole.

That history remains to be written. When it is, Cole will be among those refining its first draft.

Curt Guyette is the news editor of Metro Times. Contact him at 313-202-8004 or [e-mail].

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THE TIMES POLL
Bush Edges Ahead of Kerry for the 1st Time
The president gains in several measurements but remains in a statistical tie. Ads on the senator`s war record seem to have an effect.
By Ronald Brownstein
Times Staff Writer

Alle Daten PDF Datei:

http://www.latimes.com/news/custom/timespoll/la-082604poll-e…

Interactive Map:

http://www.latimes.com/news/politics/la-polldatapage,1,19065…

August 26, 2004

WASHINGTON — President Bush heads into next week`s Republican National Convention with voters moving slightly in his direction since July amid signs that Sen. John F. Kerry has been nicked by attacks on his service in Vietnam, a Times poll has found.

For the first time this year in a Times survey, Bush led Kerry in the presidential race, drawing 49% among registered voters, compared with 46% for the Democrat. In a Times poll just before the Democratic convention last month, Kerry held a 2-percentage-point advantage over Bush.

That small shift from July was within the poll`s margin of error. But it fit with other findings in the Times poll showing the electorate edging toward Bush over the past month on a broad range of measures, from support for his handling of Iraq to confidence in his leadership and honesty.

Although a solid majority of Americans say they believe Kerry served honorably in Vietnam, the poll showed that the attacks on the senator from a group of Vietnam veterans criticizing his performance in combat and his antiwar protests at home have left some marks: Kerry suffered small but consistent erosion compared with July on questions relating to his Vietnam experience, his honesty and his fitness to serve as commander in chief.

The Times Poll, supervised by polling director Susan Pinkus, interviewed 1,597 adults, including 1,352 registered voters nationwide, from Saturday through Tuesday. It has a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 3 percentage points.

With independent voters splitting evenly in the survey between the two men, one key to Bush`s tentative new advantage was his greater success at consolidating his base. While 3% of voters who called themselves Republicans said they would vote for Kerry, Bush drew 15% of all Democrats, and 20% of Democrats who consider themselves moderate or conservative, the poll found.

Bush`s advantage remained 3 percentage points when independent candidate Ralph Nader was added to the mix. In a three-way race, Bush drew 47%, compared with 44% for Kerry and 3% for Nader, whose access to the ballot in many key states remains uncertain.

For all the promising signs for Bush, the poll found the president still threatened by a current of uneasiness about the nation`s direction. In the survey, a slight majority of voters said they believed the country was on the wrong track. A majority also said the country was not better off because of his policies and needed to set a new course. And 45% said they believed his policies had hurt rather than helped the economy.

Those results suggested that a substantial part of the electorate remained open to change. But amid the firefight over Kerry`s Vietnam service and uncertainty about his policy plans, the Democrat still has not built a constituency for his candidacy as large as the audience for change in general, the poll suggested. Nearly 1 in 5 voters who say the country needs to change policy direction is not supporting Kerry, according to the poll.

Pamela Sundberg, a disabled paralegal from Moorhead, Minn., who responded to the survey, crystallized the conflicting emotions among those drawn toward change but still resisting Kerry.

Sundberg voted for Bush in 2000, but now feels "we got ourselves in a mess in Iraq," where her son has been serving. She is dubious about Kerry, saying that "he`s so back-and-forth about things."

But while leaning toward Bush now, she can envision switching to Kerry by November. "Maybe just for a change, he should be elected," she said.

Swift Boat Divide

The country divides mostly along predictable partisan lines on the exchanges between Kerry and the group that has attacked his Vietnam record over the past month, Swift Boat Veterans for Truth. But by several measures, the struggle appears to be drawing some blood from Kerry.

The Swift boat group, which has received funding from several of Bush`s supporters and advice from some veteran Republican operatives, has made only relatively small purchases of television time in a few battleground states for its two ads, the first charging that Kerry did not deserve some of the five medals he won in Vietnam and the second criticizing his antiwar testimony before the Senate in 1971.

But with the controversy attracting intense media attention, especially on talk radio and cable television, the ads have achieved extraordinary visibility among voters. Fully 48% of those polled said they had seen the ad accusing Kerry of lying to win his medals; an additional 20% said they had heard about it. Similarly, 44% said they had seen the ad criticizing Kerry`s Senate testimony; another 17% said they had heard about it.

At the same time, 18% of those surveyed said they "believe that Kerry misrepresented his war record and does not deserve his war medals," while 58% said Kerry "fought honorably and does deserve" the medals.

Attitudes on that question divided along party lines. As many Republicans said they believed Kerry was lying as believed he fought honorably. By nearly 10 to 1, Democrats said Kerry served honorably.

Independents sided with Kerry in the dispute by more than 5 to 1. Among them was Monika Schiel, a retiree in Gardena, Calif. "You have all the people that were on Kerry`s boat—not somewhere downstream or upstream—confirming what he said," said Schiel. "This is some typical smear stuff; it seems mostly done by Republicans."

When voters were asked whether Kerry`s protest against the war when he returned from Vietnam would influence their vote, 20% said it made them more likely to support him, while 26% said it reduced the chance they would back him, and 52% said it made no difference.

But if Kerry showed relatively few bruises on these questions directly measuring reactions to the veterans` charges against him, indirect measures suggested he had suffered more damage.

Asked how Kerry`s overall military experience would affect their vote, 23% said it made them more likely to vote for him, while 21% said it made them less likely; the remaining 53% said it would make no difference. That has to be a disappointment for the Kerry camp after a Democratic convention last month that placed Kerry`s Vietnam service at the top of the marquee.

Two other key questions produced even more troubling results for Kerry.

In the July Times poll, 53% of voters said Kerry had demonstrated in his Vietnam combat missions the "qualities America needs in a president," while 32% said that by "protesting the war in Vietnam, John Kerry demonstrated a judgment and belief that is inappropriate in a president."

In the August survey, that balance nudged away from Kerry, with 48% saying he had demonstrated the right qualities and 37% saying he had exhibited poor judgment.

Likewise, the share of voters saying they lacked confidence in Kerry as a potential commander in chief edged up from 39% in July to 43% now; the percentage that said they were confident in him slipped from 57% to 55%. Both changes were within the poll`s margin of error, yet both tracked with the poll`s general pattern of slight Kerry slippage.

Similar trends were evident on voters` assessments of the two men`s personal qualities. Compared with July, Bush slightly widened his advantage over Kerry when voters were asked which was a strong leader and which had the honesty and integrity to serve as president.

Following the poll`s general trend, the percentage of voters who said they viewed Kerry favorably slipped from 58% in July to 53% in August, while the percentage who viewed him unfavorably ticked up from 36% to 41%. Bush`s ratings were virtually unchanged from last month in this poll, with 53% viewing him favorably and 46% unfavorably.

The poll spotlighted another challenge for Kerry. After a Democratic convention that focused much more on Kerry`s biography than his agenda, 58% said they knew even a fair amount about the policies he would pursue as president; nearly 4 in 10 said they knew not much or nothing at all.

By comparison, although Bush has put forward few specifics about his second-term priorities, 70% said they had a good idea of the policies he would pursue.

Bush Holding His Own

Compared with the trend of modest erosion for Kerry in the poll, Bush either slightly gained ground or stabilized his position on several measures.

Bush`s overall approval rating, which many analysts consider the best single gauge of his prospects in November, stood at 52%, with 47% disapproving; the numbers last month were 51% to 48%.

Bush`s approval rating on the economy, at 46%, hardly budged from July. But the percentage of voters who gave him positive marks on Iraq did bump up from 44% in July to 48% now, with 50% disapproving.

Asked if the situation in Iraq was worth launching the war over, 46% said yes and 49% said no; last month the numbers were 44% and 51%.

"We should have done it a long time ago, eight to 10 years ago, and we probably wouldn`t have had 9/11," said Gene Cox, a small-business owner and veteran from Crestview, Fla., who is supporting Bush.

Yet warning signs continue to blink at Bush. Fully 54% of voters said the country was not better off because of Bush`s policies and that it should move in a new direction — although that represented an improvement for Bush from the 59% who felt that way last month.

Asked if Bush deserved reelection, 47% of voters said yes and 49% said no. By contrast, Bill Clinton and Ronald Reagan, the last two presidents who won a second term, polled 56% and 57% on that question, respectively, in other polls at roughly this time in their campaigns.

While 45% of those polled said Bush`s economic policies had left the country worse off, 27% believed they had improved conditions. Independents fell on the negative side of that ledger by nearly 3 to 1. And 52% of all voters said the country was heading down the wrong track.

Voters were far more likely to identify Bush than Kerry as inflexible and unwilling to admit his mistakes. Pluralities picked Kerry over Bush when asked which man had better ideas for strengthening the economy and which was more likely "to build respect for the United States around the world."

"While America has had an image problem for decades, it`s never been this low," said Grace Russo Bullaro, an independent and college professor from Syosset, N.Y., who did not vote in 2000 but planned to support Kerry this fall. "The world is now afraid that Bush is going to blow us up."

Since last month`s poll, Bush has gained in the race against Kerry across a broad range of groups.

But Bush`s greatest strides have come among groups that tend to hold more culturally conservative views, among them: voters earning less than $40,000 a year, those without college educations, married women, and voters living in small towns or rural communities. By contrast, since July, Bush has made almost no progress, or has lost ground, among constituencies that typically hold more socially moderate views: college graduates, more affluent families and suburbanites.

The Democrats picking Bush over Kerry in the poll tended to fit that profile as well, with Kerry suffering his greatest defections among Democrats without college degrees, those who own guns, and those who call themselves conservative, live in rural areas or are married.

All of this may offer more indirect evidence that the Vietnam-era charges are hurting Kerry with socially conservative constituencies that both sides covet.

One potential bright spot for Kerry: The 5% of voters who said they were undecided were overwhelmingly negative on the direction of the country, the impact of Bush`s policies and the decision to invade Iraq.

Those voters were also much more likely than the electorate overall to say Kerry`s service in Vietnam "demonstrated qualities America needs in a president." And they were less likely to see Kerry`s protests when he returned as a sign of flawed judgment.

That could make them a receptive audience as Kerry fights to regain his balance from the Swift boat veterans` offensive, even as Bush approaches the stage for his convention.

Times staff writer Kathleen Hennessey contributed to this report.

Voices

`You have all the people that were on [John F.] Kerry`s boat—not somewhere downstream or upstream— confirming what he said.

This is some typical smear stuff; it seems mostly done by Republicans.`

Monika Schiel, a Gardena, Calif., retiree and independent voter, when asked about Kerry`s war service.

*

`We should have done it a long time ago, eight to 10 years ago, and we probably wouldn`t have had 9/11.`

Gene Cox, a small-business owner and Bush supporter in Crestview, Fla., when asked if the situation in Iraq was worth launching the war.

*

Presidential race

Registered voters were asked whom they would vote for if the election were held today.

In a two-way contest
Now July
Bush/Cheney 49% 46%
Kerry/Edwards 46% 48%
Don`t know 5% 6%
Source: Times Poll

*

Presidential matchup nationwide

Q: Whom would you vote for if the election were held today?

In a three-way contest
Now July
Bush/Cheney 47% Bush/Cheney 44%
Kerry/Edwards 44% Kerry/Edwards 46%
Nader/Camejo 3% Nader/Camejo 3%
Don`t know 6% Don`t know 7%
Q: Have you seen, heard or read about a television ad that disputes whether Sen. John F. Kerry deserves the medals he received during the Vietnam War? ... How do you plan to vote?

--

Have seen ad (48%)

Those planning to vote for: George W. Bush -- 45%

Those planning to vote for: John F. Kerry -- 51%

--

Have heard about ad (20%)

Those planning to vote for: George W. Bush -- 52%

Those planning to vote for: John F. Kerry -- 41%

--

Haven`t seen/heard about ad (31%)

Those planning to vote for: George W. Bush -- 54%

Those planning to vote for: John F. Kerry -- 39%

Q: Have you seen, heard or read about a television ad about John F. Kerry`s role protesting the war in Vietnam? ... How do you plan to vote?

--

Have seen ad (44%)

Those planning to vote for: George W. Bush -- 50%

Those planning to vote for: John F. Kerry -- 46%

-—

Have heard about ad (17%)

Those planning to vote for: George W. Bush -- 50%

Those planning to vote for: John F. Kerry -- 45%

--

Haven`t seen/heard about ad (37%)

Those planning to vote for: George W. Bush -- 49%

Those planning to vote for: John F. Kerry -- 44%

Q: Do you believe that John F. Kerry misrepresented his war record and does not deserve his war medals, or that he fought honorably and does deserve his war medals?
Reg. voters Dems. Ind. Reps.
Misrepresented 18% 8% 10% 34%
Fought honorably 58% 77% 55% 36%
Not aware 5% 4% 5% 7%
Don`t know 19% 11% 30% 23%
Q: Which statement comes closer to your view: `In his combat missions in Vietnam, John F. Kerry demonstrated qualities America needs in a president`; or `By protesting the war in Vietnam, John F. Kerry demonstrated a judgment and belief that is inappropriate in a president`?
Now July
Combat mission demonstrated
qualities America needs 48% 53%
Protesting war demonstrated
inappropriate judgment 37% 32%
Both 4% 4%
Don`t know 11% 11%
Q: Do you think the president deserves to be reelected?
Question asked about: Deserves Doesn`t deserve
reelection reelection
George W. Bush (August 2004) 47% 49%
Bill Clinton (August 1996*) 56% 42%
George H.W. Bush (July 1992**) 41% 55%
Ronald Reagan (August 1984***) 57% 37%
*ABC/Washington Post poll **Gallup poll ***NBC poll

Q: Generally speaking, do you think the country is better off because of George W. Bush`s policies and should proceed in the direction he set out, or do you think the country is not better off and needs to move in a new direction?
Now July
Continue policies 43% 38%
Needs a new direction 54% 59%
Q: Does this apply more to George W. Bush or to John F. Kerry?
Now July
Bush Kerry Bush Kerry
Cares about people like me 39% 43% 34% 44%
Will be a strong leader 47% 42% 44% 42%
Has honesty/integrity
to be president 46% 39% 42% 42%
Flip-flops on the issues 29% 49% 31% 43%
Will keep country safe
from terrorism 49% 33% 49% 31%
Has better ideas
for the economy 39% 46% 35% 48%
Will build respect
for the U.S. 40% 48% 38% 44%
Shares my moral values 46% 37% 44% 38%
Does not admit
mistakes/is inflexible 53% 23% 55% 20%
More likely to achieve
success in Iraq 46% 40% 46% 37%
More committed to
recommendations in the
9/11 commission report 39% 40% Not asked
Will be a more effective
commander in chief 46% 43% Not asked
Has a more detailed
plan of policies 40% 32% Not asked
Notes: All results are among registered voters nationwide. Some answers may not add up to 100% where some some answer categories are not shown.

How the poll was conducted

The Times Poll contacted 1,597 adults nationwide, including 1,352 registered voters. Interviews were conducted by telephone Saturday through Tuesday. Telephone numbers were chosen from a list of all exchanges in the nation and random-digit dialing techniques were used to allow listed and unlisted numbers to be contacted. Adults were weighted slightly to conform with their respective census figures for sex, race, age and education. The margin of sampling error for all registered voters in the nation is plus or minus 3 percentage points in either direction. For certain subgroups, the error margin may be somewhat higher. Poll results may also be affected by factors such as question wording and the order in which questions are presented.

Source: Los Angeles Times Poll Los Angeles Times



Copyright 2004 Los Angeles Times

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EDITORIAL
Kerry`s Testimony

August 26, 2004

It turns out that the attack on John Kerry`s war record was just Act 1. Now the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth (and, miraculously, all the right-wing media) have turned to Kerry`s antiwar record. After returning from Vietnam, Kerry became a spokesman for the Vietnam Veterans Against the War, a major force in the antiwar movement. In 1971, he testified before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. This famous testimony launched Kerry`s political career and the talk of him as a future president. Richard Nixon and Henry Kissinger can be heard fretting about it on the Watergate tapes.

This at least is a real issue, unlike the manufactured nonsense about his war medals. Does what Kerry said back in 1971 disqualify him for the presidency 33 years later?

There is some ambiguity, or purposeful confusion, about the precise objection to Kerry`s ancient testimony. Is it something in particular that he said? Or is it the very fact that Kerry opposed the Vietnam War and worked to end it?

Many of those who condemn Kerry for opposing the Vietnam War are too young to have been politically aware during that period. The rest are fighting very old battles. But the fact is that the argument over Vietnam was settled long ago, and a majority of Americans decided that Kerry was right.

Members of the Swift boat group and like-minded Americans are free to try to re-litigate the basic Vietnam question. They say, from the comfortable perspective of 2004, that the antiwar movement emboldened the enemy and thus lengthened the war. That`s their premise: We could have won the war by 1971 if not for Kerry and his ilk. Of course, after continuing the war for three more years, we still didn`t win it. So even accepting the dubious premises of these Hindsight Hawks, blame for the lives lost after Kerry`s testimony goes primarily to the leaders in Washington who kept the war going needlessly.

But most Americans came to accept Kerry`s view that the war was ill advised and unwinnable at any reasonable cost. Only when that happened did the war end, and the antiwar movement made it happen sooner. If that historical judgment is correct, which we think it clearly is, then Kerry saved the lives of many more Americans in his antiwar role than he did as a Navy officer.

Kerry`s testimony in April 1971 was eloquent, persuasive and damning. Consistent with his cautious instincts, Kerry never joined the extremist America-haters who hoped for a North Vietnamese victory, but instead he patiently explained to senators why the war was a disaster.

Undoubtedly, Kerry was overwrought when he declared that atrocities by American soldiers were ubiquitous. They weren`t. But it is ignorant fantasy to suppose that the United States emerged from Vietnam unblemished by horrible misdeeds. What about the free-fire zones and the dumping of more munitions than during World War II? What about the Phoenix program of mass assassinations? In his new memoir, retired Gen. Tommy Franks recounts how he was tempted to kill inhabitants of a Vietnamese village because he feared they were communist sympathizers. Sometimes, temptation was not resisted.

But Kerry`s anger was not directed at soldiers in the field. On the contrary, in his testimony, he blamed the Washington establishment. He lashed out at former Defense Secretary Robert S. McNamara and former national security advisor McGeorge Bundy: "Where are they now that we, the men whom they sent off to war, have returned?" Kerry asked. "These are commanders who have deserted their troops, and there is no more serious crime in the law of war."

None of what Kerry said was particularly novel or shocking. But his status as a decorated sailor sent the Nixon administration into overdrive to depict him as providing aid and comfort to the enemy, just as his current detractors seek to depict him as a traitor unfit to lead the war against terror.

The late 1960s were a moral obstacle course for young Americans, especially young men. Kerry is one of the few who got it right. He served, and served bravely as even President Bush now concedes. Then he came back home and worked to stop the killing and the dying.

George W. Bush, by the way, dodged the second part too.


Copyright 2004 Los Angeles Times

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Iraq`s Sistani Arrives in Najaf; 45 Killed in Attacks
Thu Aug 26, 2004 07:56 AM ET

By Michael Georgy

NAJAF, Iraq (Reuters) - Iraq`s top Shi`ite cleric arrived in Najaf Thursday to try to end a bloody three-week uprising as tensions rose sharply following attacks in a nearby town that killed 45 people and wounded 170.

Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani drove into the battered holy city of Najaf in a huge convoy, guarded by dozens of police pickups with their sirens wailing. Scores of police brandished AK-47 rifles as they drove past thousands lining the streets.

The violence in nearby Kufa came as Sistani`s efforts to try to persuade fighters loyal to rebel cleric Moqtada al-Sadr to leave Najaf`s holiest shrine appeared to be gaining momentum. Sistani would soon unveil a peace plan, his aides said.

Tens of thousands of Iraqis in cars and on foot, many appearing to respond to Sistani`s call to rescue the holy city, were converging on Najaf from several regions, witnesses said.

A mortar attack on Kufa`s main mosque killed at least 25 Sadr supporters as hundreds of his men gathered inside, officials said. Shi`ite marchers were fired on in Kufa around the same time and 20 were killed, a Reuters photographer said.

The photographer said he had seen 20 bodies under blankets. It was unclear who opened fire or who launched the mortar.

Mohammed Abed al-Kadhem, a doctor at a hospital in the area, said 25 dead and 100 wounded had been brought in from the mosque attack, and at least 10 dead and 70 wounded from the shooting. Other victims were taken to another hospital in the area.

Television pictures showed dozens of wounded men lying in pools of blood around the mosque.

TEST FOR ALLAWI

Both the moderate Sistani and the radical Sadr have called on their supporters to converge on Najaf, where Mehdi Army militiamen loyal to Sadr are holed up in the Imam Ali mosque.

Hundreds have been killed in the past three weeks in fighting between the militia and U.S. and Iraqi government forces. The clashes have driven oil prices to record highs and undermined interim Prime Minister Iyad Allawi.

An aide with Sistani on the journey from the southern city of Basra said the 73-year-old Iranian-born cleric would unveil a plan to resolve the Najaf crisis. Sistani arrived back from London Wednesday after heart treatment.

"On his arrival, a (peace) initiative will be launched," aide Hamed al-Khafaf told Reuters from Sistani`s convoy.

Allawi said he had ordered his forces to observe a 24-hour cease-fire in Najaf from 3 p.m. (1100 GMT) to help the talks.

In a statement, he said representatives of the rebel cleric Sadr -- who has appeared to be ready to accept peace proposals in the past only to back away -- had indicated they would accept the plan from Sistani.

Allawi said Mehdi fighters would be offered an amnesty if they gave up their weapons and left the Imam Ali shrine, and Sadr would also be given safe passage if he ended the uprising.

Military operations would resume 24 hours later if no agreement was reached, Najaf`s governor said.

Sistani`s peace plan will include getting the Mehdi militia out of the Imam Ali mosque and calling on U.S. marines encircling the shrine to leave, aides said.

OVERNIGHT CLASHES

Overnight, U.S. warplanes unleashed a fierce attack on rebel targets in Najaf. The strikes came just after U.S. artillery fire rattled the city which has a peacetime population of 500,000, about 160 km (100 miles) south of Baghdad.

Sistani left Najaf for medical treatment in London just as the Najaf uprising began three weeks ago. Dressed in a black robe and turban, with a flowing white beard and dark rings around his eyes, he made a dramatic return to Iraq Wednesday.

His followers say the cleric`s intervention could break the deadlock in Najaf and ensure a peaceful resolution.

Sistani played a role in ending a similar uprising from the Mehdi militia in April and May.

Sadr has challenged the collegiate leadership of the Najaf clergy headed by Sistani and styled himself as the face of anti-U.S. Shi`ite resistance. Aged only about 30, Sadr has proven a stubborn foe of Iraq`s U.S.-backed government.

U.S. firepower has failed to get his rebels out of the mosque as have threats and peace offerings from Allawi.

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Thursday, August 26, 2004
War News for August 26, 2004

http://dailywarnews.blogspot.com/

Local story: Florida Marine killed in Iraq. "Three Marines went to a house in Hollywood to tell the father and stepmother of Lance Cpl. Alexander Arredondo that their 20-year-old son had died Tuesday in Najaf, family members said. The father, Carlos Arredondo, 44, then walked into the garage, picked up a propane tank, a lighting device and a can of gasoline he used to douse the van, police Capt. Tony Rode said. He smashed the van’s window, got inside and set the vehicle ablaze, despite attempts by the Marines to stop him, Rode said. When the couple saw the Marines walking toward the front door, `My husband immediately knew that his firstborn son had been killed — and my husband did not take the news well,` Melida Arredondo told reporters before police escorted her to the hospital." (Via Daily Kos.)

Bring `em on: Multiple atacks reported on oil pipelines near Berjasiya.

Bring `em on: Twenty-seven Iraqis killed, 63 wounded by mortar fire in Kufa.

Commentary

Editorial: "The Army`s internal investigation, released yesterday, showed that the torture of prisoners at Abu Ghraib went far beyond the actions of a few sadistic military police officers - the administration`s chosen culprits. It said that 27 military intelligence soldiers and civilian contractors committed criminal offenses, and that military officials hid prisoners from the Red Cross. Another report, from a civilian panel picked by Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, offers the dedicated reader a dotted line from President Bush`s decision to declare Iraq a front in the war against terror, to government lawyers finding ways to circumvent the Geneva Conventions, to Mr. Rumsfeld`s bungled planning of the occupation and understaffing of the ground forces in Iraq, to the hideous events at Abu Ghraib prison."

Editorial: "General Boykin has to be removed from his current job. He has become a national embarrassment, not to mention a walking contradiction of President Bush`s own policy statement that the fight against terror is bias-free and not a crusade against Islam. (General Boykin preached of a 1993 fight against a Muslim warlord in Somalia: `I knew that my God was bigger than his. I knew that my God was a real God, and his was an idol.`)"

Opinion: "You can choose to connect these dots, or cast your vote in November based on whether Colonel Mustard was in a Swift boat with a lead pipe. But Abu Ghraib can`t be blamed solely on bad apples anymore. It was the direct consequence of an administration ready to bargain away the rule of law. That started with the suspension of basic prisoner protections, because this was a `new kind of war.` It led to the creation of a legal sinkhole on Guantánamo Bay. And it reached its zenith when high officials opined that torture isn`t torture unless there`s some attendant organ failure."



86-43-04. Pass it on.



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Informed Comment
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Thoughts on the Middle East, History,and Religion
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Juan Cole is Professor of History at the University of Michigan

Thursday, August 26, 2004

Sistani Arrives in Najaf
Dozens Dead in Kufa Mosque Mortar attack

[urlAbdul Hussein al-Obeidi of AP]http://www.boston.com/dailynews/239/world/Iraq_s_top_cleric_arrives_in_N:.shtml[/url] reports that Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani has arrived in Najaf and gone to a house about a mile from the besieged shrine of Ali. He has asked the thousands of marchers with him to wait outside the city.

Caretaker Prime Minister announced a 24-hour truce in Najaf. American-appointed Najaf Governor Ali al-Zurfi threatened that if the mosque crisis is not resolved in 24 hours, he will begin military operations again (the clip was shown on al-Jazeerah).

Iraqis in Kufa who went to a mosque to pray before walking to Najaf came under mortar fire, which killed dozens and wounded a large number. The Sadrists blamed the US military, which denied having mortar emplacements anywhere near the shrine. The US military suggested that the Mahdi Army has engaged in wild, undisciplined mortar fire. (This is true, but unless a clear target is identified near the mosque that they might have actually been aiming at, it seems a little unlikely that they would hit their own mosque with hundreds of worshippers inside.) The main source of violence in Kufa in the past 24 hours has been Iraqi police or national guards, who have fired on unarmed demonstrators.

Before Sistani`s arrival,protesters from Diwaniyyah to Najaf`s east who arrived at that side of the holy city had received fire from Iraqi police, and there were an unknown number of casualties.

Iraqi police also fired on peaceful demonstrators in Hilla who were heading for Najaf, killing at least two and wounding 23, according to [urlAustralian Broadcasting.]http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200408/s1186067.htm[/url]

Al-Jazeerah is quoting ccasualties during the previous 24 hours from Iraqi health officials as 74 dead, 300 wounded.

[urlTony Karon]http://www.time.com/time/columnist/karon/article/0,9565,688151,00.html[/url] at the Time Magazine weblog, has a fine overview of the situation which does an excellent job of explaining Sistani`s political dilemma and the way he is trying to resolve it.

posted by Juan @
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William Pfaff: Neocons have Iran in their sights
William Pfaff IHT/TMSI
Wednesday, August 25, 2004

An `October Surprise`?

PARIS An American presidential election campaign is an invitation to adventure. The candidates themselves - especially when they`re sitting presidents - are tempted to produce October surprises to scare or stampede the electorate.

There has been much speculation about an October surprise this year. The American public, however, has grown cynical about terrorist scares and would need a pretty convincing one to overcome the skepticism provoked by the Bush administration`s past exploitations of the terrorism risk, notably around the Democratic National Convention.

What about something that increases the violence in the Middle East? It is hard to imagine that the administration wants more trouble in the region since it is far from mastering the Iraq insurrection.

But one theory says that making the war bigger would make it better for U.S. forces, since what is going on now is "the wrong kind of war."

The U.S. has troops and tools for "real" wars, the kinds it wins, and should move on from today`s disastrous affair of suicide bombers and kids with rocket-launchers.

The temperature has been rising between Washington and Iran over the latter`s alleged efforts to develop nuclear weapons. Some former U.S. officials concerned with Middle Eastern policy suggest that when President George W. Bush must eventually explain what has gone wrong in Iraq, it might be convenient to blame Iran.

Bush could accuse Iran of fostering the Islamic extremism responsible for U.S. frustration in Najaf and elsewhere, and of encouraging Shiite resistance to the occupation force and the new Iraq government the United States is trying to install. Blaming Iran would be a step up the escalation ladder.

This scenario includes the possibility that escalation could get out of hand.

Pressure has already increased for "pre-emption" of Iran`s nuclear-power program. The extent of Tehran`s project has yet to be fully exposed to international inspection, but Iran`s enemies insist it includes a covert nuclear military program.

And once again, this is a prominent theme of neoconservative publicists and organizations in Washington. The neoconservative godfather Norman Podhoretz put it suggestively in an interview last week: "I am not advocating the invasion of Iran at this moment, although. ..." Another moment will undoubtedly be along soon.

Israel has an interest in promoting, if not exaggerating, Iran`s supposed strategic threat to the United States. Iran already threatens Israel`s interest in remaining the unchallenged military power of the region.

The attack on Iraq had exactly the opposite result of what Israel expected. America`s invasion of what was once considered the most powerful state in the Arab world, generally believed to possess weapons of mass destruction, turned into a fiasco.

Powerful Iraq is no more. But there is no sign of the peaceful and pro-American Iraq that was supposed to emerge from the invasion. That new Iraq was supposed to provide permanent military bases for the United States, recognize Israel and become a friend to Jerusalem, as well as to Washington. The invasion`s advocates promised that the road to Israeli-Palestinian settlement ran through Baghdad.

Instead, what has come out of the Iraq invasion could strengthen Iran. Saddam Hussein`s Iraq, after all, was Iran`s enemy. It is now gone. The new Iraq could easily fall under the control of its Shiite majority and become Iran`s ally, or possibly even an Iranian client-state. That is not what Israel wanted.

What can be done now?

Israel reportedly contemplates a unilateral attack on Iran`s nuclear installations. It would want America`s permission, so it needs to get it while it is sure Bush is president.

The recent decision in Israel to distribute antiradiation kits to people living in areas that might be contaminated by "an accident" at its own nuclear weapons facility is aimed at American opinion. The indirect message is that Israel is preparing for an Iranian attack on Israel`s nuclear weapons manufacturing installations; hence, pre-emption is necessary.

Israel`s basic position is forthright and simple to understand. Iran, like Iraq before it, is a major - and hostile - neighboring Islamic state. If the danger it potentially presents can be removed without disproportionate political or military costs, Israel - under Ariel Sharon - will probably do it.

The American case against Iran is entirely different. Its rests on the neoconservative notion that every society instinctively yearns to become an American-style democracy, and would do so if its despotic leaders were removed, by force if necessary. As the world`s leading democracy, the United States has an obligation to propagate democracy. Overturning despots is therefore a duty, and the result will be a better world. The argument, of course, is familiar: It is why the United States invaded Iraq.

Tribune Media Services International


Copyright © 2004 The International Herald Tribune | www.iht.com

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CRAWFORD, TX (IWR News Parody) - President Bush today said that recently disclosed connections between his campaign and the Texas sleaze balls behind the slanderous Swift Boat Veterans for Truth are a coincidence.

"It`s a only a coincidence that I am connected to those Texas sleaze balls. I mean sleaze balls and scum bags, like Kenny Boy and Karl Rove, are the only people I know in Texas or anywhere else for Christ sakes. You think I would hang around with [urlthose nice guy bastards,]http://www.snopes.com/politics/bush/rugby.asp who always finish last? Hell no," said Mr. Bush.[/url]
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John Emerson: `Soros vs. Scaife`
Date: Thursday, August 26 @ 10:06:54 EDT

http://seetheforest.blogspot.com/2004_08_01_seetheforest_
archive.html#109340451498604290" target="_blank" rel="nofollow ugc noopener">http://seetheforest.blogspot.com/2004_08_01_seetheforest_
archive.html#109340451498604290

By John Emerson, Seeing The Forest

The Bush team has very deftly redefined the debate over his discredited Swift Boat Liars as a debate about soft money and 527s, and the media seem to be buying his line of bullshit. One name that comes up a lot in the debate is the sinister billionaire George Soros, who (as fully disclosed) has given a lot of money to Move On, an independent group which supports Kerry the way the Swiftboat Liars support Bush (albeit more honestly).

Republicans seem to think that Soros is a villain, and they use his name that way in speeches, but Soros is actually a good guy in a very big way. Like the Republican sugar-daddy Richard Mellon Scaife, he`s a billionaire, but the comparison ends there. Soros earned his money, whereas Scaife inherited his, and Soros, unlike Scaife, is mentally stable.

So let`s compare the two. Scaife`s one accomplishment in life has been the Clinton impeachment. He gave millions of dollars to various slanderers and to investigators who ultimately came up with very little that was solid, but his investments in publicity and propaganda succeeded in keeping the fake scandals alive and almost succeeded in toppling Clinton. He apparently (according to David Brock) had an unhealthy interest in Hillary Clinton`s supposed lesbian relationships, and one of the few reporters ever to succeed in talking to him left hurriedly after he called her a "Communist cunt" and threatened her.



But for all his looniness, Scaife has been a powerful force in American politics for well over a decade. A high proportion of America`s most noxious right-wing disinformation is produced on his dime, and most of the important contemporary conservatives of our time are deeply in Scaife`s debt.

Salon Scaife links / Washington Post on Scaife / Scaife foundations / Scaife bio

George Soros grew up very precariously in WWII Hungary, and escaped from Communist Hungary in 1947 to live in London. He studied there under Karl Popper, his hero, but was not able to continue his studies and went into finance. He has been very successful, turning a few hundred thousand dollars into billions.

Over the last two decades, starting well before the Berlin Wall fell, he has spent hundreds of millions of dollars on the Open Society Foundation, the purpose of which was to help the ex-Communist world to develop democratic institutions. Soros is anti-Communist, anti-Fascist, and pro-democracy, but he also fears the Christian nationalist free-market fanaticism which dominates the Republican Party.

Soros bio / Soros Bio / Soros in Fascist Hungary (search "Soros")

So his new project is to get George W. Bush out of office. The Republicans think that we should be ashamed of Soros` involvement, but we should be proud instead.

Soros is a billionaire, but how can the Republicans possibly complain about that? When he compare the present moment to proto-Fascist Hungary, he isn`t just blowing smoke -- he`s talking about something he remembers and was lucky to survive. We`re in very good companty with Soros at our side, and (as you can see below) Soros` Republican critics are in very bad company indeed.

Soros` political activities / Soros` Open Society efforts / Open Society Institute site / Defence of Soros (Eric Alterman, The Nation) / Defence of Soros (Matt Welch, Reason)

Soros` Enemies:

Soros has enemies to be proud of: post-Communist dictators, neo-fascist nationalists, anti-Semites, Likudniks, LaRouchies, and miscellaneous wackos. Here are a few of the dozens of links I have seen.

Especially creepy guest attacks Soros on O`Reilly / Long, creepy American attack on Soros / Uzbek attack / Soviet attack and defence /Ukrainian attack / Macedonian attack / Serbian attack / Muslim anti-Semitic attack (Mahathir) / Likudnik attack I /Likudnik attack II -- weird accusations /Wacko attack I / Wacko attack II / Wacko attack III / Freeper / Ukrainian attack / Anti-semitic attack I / Anti-semitic attack II

Reprinted from Seeing the Forest:
http://seetheforest.blogspot.com/2004_08_01_seetheforest_
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IRAQ:
Learning New Lessons, And Some Old Ones

Peyman Pejman As almost six million Iraqi children prepare to start their second year at school away from the shadow of Saddam Hussein`s regime, officials see major challenges ahead.

At this time last y ear Iraq was still fresh from the war that toppled Saddam. U.S.-led occupation forces had been on the ground less than six months. Many schools had been damaged by the war or in the looting that followed.

Families fearing for the safety of their children were not sure if they should be sent to school at all. Those who went did not always have books because the caretaker U.S. government had not managed to print enough books free of Saddam`s picture.

Children were often asked to use old books after ripping out the picture of Saddam Hussein. A few books re-printed with UN help deleted references to Saddam.

This year officials are promising all students new books, which would mean about 180 million in all.

"We are printing new books for everyone," Saad Ibrahim who is in charge of the printing project told IPS. "We have received a grant from the World Bank and other donor countries for 40 million dollars, and signed many contracts with printing houses in Iraq and countries such as Jordan and United Arab Emirates."

Ministry officials have to deal also with school buildings. Eighty percent of about 18,000 school buildings in Iraq need some kind of repair, says Hassanein Mualla, deputy education minister.

About 40 percent need "partial" repair and 30 percent "comprehensive" repair. More than 1,000 need to be rebuilt.

The ministry additionally plans to build 4,500 new schools by 2007. Some buildings at present hold morning, afternoon, and evening schools.

It is not clear how much the repair and new construction will cost, and whether the ministry will have the budget for it. The U.S.-led administration said last year it had spent 70 million dollars repairing and refurbishing buildings.

The education ministry says all work on schools will have to be approved by the government first. "That is for two reasons," Mualla told IPS. "First, we do not want various parties doing their own work. Second, we want Iraqi construction designers to be involved so the work is done properly from the start."

In an obvious jab at the U.S. administration, he said that "instead of putting some paint here and changing some windows there, it is better to do the job right."

But the biggest task lies beyond repairing buildings and reprinting books. "Nowadays the biggest challenge before the ministry is how to change the curriculum," says Ibrahim. "A national committee was formed last year (but) I think it will take many years. The education philosophy now has to be changed."

What some people in Iraq mean by "changing the philosophy" is cleansing the textbooks of any reference to Saddam and the Baath Party which Saddam used for more than three decades to stay in power.

This is a touchy subject. Some Iraqi parties that campaigned for decades to topple Saddam argue that Baath ideology must be eradicated from the memory of the country. Others say this history must be recorded for future generations.

"Until many of these issues are decided by the Iraqis themselves, it would be hard to see how they can start re-writing the textbooks," says a Western official here who asked not be named. "So, until then, they`ll just be re-printing the old books."

Some education experts say the philosophy issue goes deeper than de-Baathification of text books, and is about encouraging students to think and deduct, not just memorise facts and figures.

Education officials are looking also at re-distribution of resources. Under Saddam most schools, teachers, and money went to Baghdad and the biggest cities. Officials say they now have a programme to spread resources more evenly.

Whatever the state of the books and the buildings, teachers seem a happier lot. Their salaries have been raised threefold. (END/2004)



Copyright © 2004 IPS-Inter Press Service. All rights reserved.

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Ich kann mir nicht helfen, für mich war das alles eine Inzenierung der Shiiten. Da kommt ein Mann zurück aus London, wie ein Deus ex Machina, und es entwirren sich alle Fäden. Da wird ein machtloser Präsident vorgeführt, der alles, was die beiden Kleriker aushandeln, abnickt. Und was bleibt den USA übrig, entweder ziehen sie sich zurück in ihre Stellungen, oder der ganze irakische Süden geht in Flammen auf. Da hat ein 30jähriger angeblich ungebildeter Wirrkopf einige Wochen lang die Besatzer vorgeführt und hat gleichsam auf dem Tablett die Macht an den Ayatollah Sistani weitergereicht. Da hat die USA erst die Kontrolle in Falluja verloren und nun auch noch diese im Süden. Die USA können nur noch eins machen, die Macht schnellstmöglichst abzugeben durch Wahlen oder wie es auch immer genannt wird, denn eine Demokratie westlichen Zuschnitts will keiner der schiitischen Ayatollahs und dann einen geordneten Rückzug anzutreten. Die andere Möglichkeit wäre brutale Gewalt und die Ausweitung des Krieges.

washingtonpost.com
Sistani Reports Peace Agreement With Sadr
Iraqi Officials Accept Terms to End Armed Confrontation

By Karl Vick, Rajiv Chandrasekaran and Fred Barbash
Washington Post Staff Writers
Thursday, August 26, 2004; 5:07 PM

NAJAF, Iraq, Aug. 26 -- Iraq`s most revered Shiite cleric, Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani, who arrived here on a peace mission Thursday, brokered a tentative agreement late in the day with the rebel cleric Moqtada Sadr and the Iraqi government to end the uprising in this holy city.

"Mr. Moqtada al Sadr has agreed to the proposals from his eminence Ayatollah Ali Sistani," said a top Sistani`s representative, Hamed Khafaf. "You will soon hear very good news from the Iraqi people and from Moqtada al Sadr himself."

Shortly afterward, Iraq`s minister of state, Qasim Dawood, told reporters at a news conference that the government accepted the terms of the deal arranged by Sistani, which would allow Sadr and his militia to leave the city if they put down their arms.

"Sadr is free to go anywhere he would like," Dawood said. "He is as free as any Iraqi citizen to do whatever he would like in Iraq."

He expressed confidence that this deal, unlike others that were set and then dissipated in recent days, will stop the combat here. "No more fights," Dawood said. "Najaf and [the nearby suburb of] Kufa will be peaceful cities, free from arms, free from militias."

According to Khafaf, Sadr agreed to a peace initiative that calls for his Mahdi Army militia to vacate its positions in and near the Imam Ali Shrine, a site in the old city section of Najaf that is revered by Shiite Muslims around the world but has been used as a refuge by Sadr`s forces. In addition, however, the plan calls for the withdrawal of U.S. forces from Najaf and for turning control of the city over to Iraqi police units. The initiative would also prohibit weapons in Najaf and Kufa, an effort to keep militias and army forces from congregating there.

Sistani is also calling on the Iraqi government to compensate residents whose homes have been damaged in the fighting and demanding that local elections be held in Najaf.

Under Sistani`s proposal, thousands of his supporters, who were waiting outside the old city of Najaf following the cleric`s call for them to come to the shrine Thursday, would be allowed in. In return, Sistani said they would promise to leave by 10 a.m. Friday morning, a move that is expected to provide cover for Sadr`s militiamen as they return to their homes.

Dawood said Iraqi and U.S. troops would pull back "as soon as the prime minister instructs." But there was no immediate response to the plan from U.S. military officials.

The return of Sistani earlier in the day was marked by considerable violence and numerous deaths.

Even before Sistani arrived, more than two dozen Iraqis waiting for him were killed in two separate assaults in the nearby suburb of Kufa. They had been preparing to march in a demonstration organized by Sistani in an effort to bring an end to the three weeks of furious fighting between U.S. troops and Sadr`s militia.

In the first assault, mortar rounds were fired into a crowd gathered at the main mosque in Kufa. Early reports said 27 people died while more than 60 people were wounded. No group claimed responsibility.

In the second attack, gunmen opened fire on a group already on the road from Kufa to Najaf. Reports from that attack remained sketchy but wire services said three were dead and many more wounded.

Kufa is a key Sadr power base and lies adjacent to Najaf. The mosque there is where Sadr often gives sermons during Friday prayers.

After Sistani reached the city, an exchange of gunfire between police and people in a surging crowd near the house where the cleric is staying resulted in 10 more deaths and at least 20 injuries. There were varying accounts of how that violence started. But wire service reports from the scene and officials agreed that armed civilians were in the crowd, some of them marching around with signs bearing Sadr`s image.

Iraq`s Health Ministry put the death toll for the day at 74, with 315 wounded. It was unclear how officials arrived at that total.

Fighting in Najaf also claimed the life earlier in the day of a U.S. Marine, the second to be killed in two days, bringing to 11 the number of American service personnel lost here since the latest conflict began here Aug. 5.

Television footage showed Sistani, 73, entering Najaf in a massive convoy guarded by police vehicles with sirens wailing. A surging, swaying crowd of thousands enveloped the convoy as it made its entrance. Many more were converging on Najaf on foot from several regions. He returned to Iraq Wednesday from London where he was receiving medical treatment.

"We have been waiting for a long time for the arrival of Sayyid Sistani and we hope he`ll solve the problem," said Hasan Athari, 34, a trader from Najaf dressed in a dirty white ankle-length tunic as he stood in the street. "Our city, my family, our business, our house have all been destroyed."

His family, he said, is staying in a refugee camp outside Najaf. "I used to have a small shop. I never needed to ask people for help. Now my family is living on what people give then. If I have lunch today, I`ll not have dinner. I hope Sistani will be able to get my life and dignity back."

On the other hand, Ali Abdul Ameer, 41, laborer from Najaf said: "I don`t believe this coward will be able to do anything. He ran away from Najaf and threw himself in their hands in London, so I don`t think he`ll be able to do anything.

"Even if Sadr leaves the city, who will govern it? We need a strong government able to control the city and keep it from destruction."

Both U.S. and Iraqi officials, while worried about aspects of Sistani`s plan for peace, have expressed the hope that he can succeed. While the day brought talk of cease-fires and of potential negotiations between Sadr`s followers, the violence seemed to escalate as civilians took to the streets to join in Sistani`s march.

There appeared to be no clear coordination between the Iraqi authorities and U.S. commanders over how to handle the pilgrims, who will be trying to move through the tight cordon established by troops around the area.

As night fell, the U.S. military announced that it has suspended offensive operations in Najaf. "At the request of the local and national Iraqi government, Iraqi security forces and the Multi-National Force . . . have temporarily suspended offensive military operations to facilitate the return of Grand Ayatollah al-Sistani to the holy city of Najaf," the military`s statement said.

Officers for units fighting in the city`s badly battered center said that they had no guidance from senior commanders on how to deal with the arrival of peaceful demonstrators.

"We`re going to send some trucks [Humvees] out to stop people from going farther for their own safety," said Capt. Jeff Gardner of the 1st Cavalry Division`s 5th Regiment, 1st Battalion. Another cavalry battalion, the 2nd of the 7th Regiment, planned to "do some crowd control" from the position it was holding at the main approach to the shrine.

Another American officer said the troops would only search those approaching the city and would allow those without weapons to proceed. "My orders are, if they`re civilians, if they`re unarmed, let them through," said Maj. Jeff Cushman, a senior adviser to the 4th Battalion of the Iraqi Intervention Force. "If they`re armed, pretty much the Iraqi police will take care of them."

Cushman, speaking in the hot sand where 123 Iraqi troops were climbing into trucks for the short trip to a permanent police checkpoint, said: "These people have a right, if they`re going to do it peacefully, to do what they want to do. . . . Hopefully these people can help end this on a peaceful note, because that`s what everybody wants."

Fighting continued through midday as the city center rang with sniper fire, the roar of rocket-propelled grenades, mortars and, around noon, the thunderous impact of at least two 500-pound bombs U.S. warplanes dropped on the south end of the parking garage behind the shrine.

Although Sistani has quietly disagreed with Sadr`s militant tactics, it is not clear what he wants to accomplish through his march.

Iraqi political leaders expressed concern that the march could be co-opted by Sadr`s supporters and that an injection of thousands of noncombatants into the war-torn city could interfere with ongoing military operations and allow the militiamen to escape.

U.S. commanders say they are certain that Sadr used a public march toward the shrine during a previous cease-fire as an opportunity to re-supply and reinforce his militia.

But, the political leaders said, it also could reduce tensions by pressuring Sadr to relinquish control of the shrine to more senior Shiite leaders, perhaps leading some fighters to lay down their arms.

Chandrasekaran reported from Baghdad. Barbash reported from Washington.

© 2004 The Washington Post Company

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Poll: Presidential race remains dead heat
Kerry convention gains blunted
CNN/USA Today/Gallup poll:

http://www.cnn.com/interactive/allpolitics/0408/gallup.poll.…

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The November presidential race between President Bush and Massachusetts Sen. John Kerry remains a statistical tie, with Kerry holding a single-point edge among registered voters, according to a new CNN/USA Today/Gallup poll.

The survey of 876 registered voters found Kerry leading Bush 48 percent to 47 percent. The margin of error in that poll, conducted August 23-25, was plus or minus 3.5 percentage points.

Among the 709 people determined to be likely voters, Bush held a three-point lead over Kerry, 50 to 47 percent -- a figure unchanged since the last poll, three weeks ago. The margin of error among likely voters was 4 percentage points.

Asked what they thought of how Bush was handling his job as president, 49 percent of the total survey said they approved; 47 said they disapproved.

When independent Ralph Nader was added into the mix, Bush led Kerry by a 48-46 margin among likely voters, with 4 percent supporting Nader. The major-party candidates were tied at 46 percent among registered voters, with Nader drawing 4 percent again.

The poll was taken as Kerry attempted to fend off attacks on his Vietnam war record by a group calling itself Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, which has accused Kerry of lying to win combat decorations during the conflict and criticized his role in the antiwar movement after he returned home.

The survey indicates the ads and the controversy surrounding them may have helped Bush blunt any boost Kerry received since the Democratic National Convention, particularly on national security issues.

But they appear to have had little impact on the overall horse race, and the poll found that half of all adults hold Bush responsible for the anti-Kerry veterans` campaign.

Before the convention, when Kerry accepted the party`s presidential nomination, Bush led Kerry by an 8 percentage-point margin -- 51 to 43 -- on the question of who would be a better commander-in-chief. After the convention, Bush and Kerry were tied at 48 percent apiece, but in the latest poll, the numbers returned to the same pre-convention margin.

Similar patterns emerged when voters were asked about which candidate would better handle the war in Iraq, where respondents preferred Bush 49 percent to 43 percent, and the global antiterror campaign, where Bush led Kerry 54-37.

Only 22 percent said Kerry`s military service made them more likely to vote for him in November -- more evidence that the Swift Boat ads have neutralized the Massachusetts senator`s military record as an asset. But 63 percent said Kerry is telling the truth about his military record, suggesting that most of those polled discount the charges raised by Swift Boat Veterans for Truth.

The group is an independent "527" committee funded largely by Republican contributors from President Bush`s home state of Texas. Its claims about Kerry`s military record are contradicted by official Navy records, other veterans and, in some cases, by past statements from group members themselves.

Kerry accuses the group of being a front for the Bush campaign, an allegation Bush aides have strongly denied. The Democrat has called on Bush to disavow the ads, but Bush -- who has been the target of millions of dollars in advertising by Democratic-backed 527s -- has called instead for an end to all independent attack ads.

Among those surveyed in the latest poll, 56 percent said Bush should denounce the ads, and 50 percent said they consider him responsible for them. Forty-eight percent said they think Kerry has been the victim of unfair Republican attacks, while 43 percent say Democrats have attacked Bush unfairly.

The favorable ratings for Kerry and his running mate, Sen. John Edwards, have dropped since August 1, with 52 percent saying they view both Kerry and Edwards favorably now. Bush`s favorable rating was at 54 percent, while only 44 percent said they viewed Vice President Dick Cheney favorably.

But the Swift Boat Veterans ad campaign may have dampened public enthusiasm for voting this year as well: In the August 23-25 poll, only 60 percent said they were enthusiastic about voting compared with 69 percent who said they were enthusiastic about casting their vote in surveys after the Democratic convention.



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Census: More Americans living in poverty
Number of uninsured also rises


WASHINGTON (AP) -- The number of Americans living in poverty increased by 1.3 million last year, while the ranks of the uninsured swelled by 1.4 million, the Census Bureau reported Thursday.

It was the third straight annual increase for both categories. While not unexpected, it was a double dose of bad economic news during a tight re-election campaign for President Bush.

Approximately 35.8 million people lived below the poverty line in 2003, or about 12.5 percent of the population, according to the bureau. That was up from 34.5 million, or 12.1 percent in 2002.

The rise was more dramatic for children. There were 12.9 million living in poverty last year, or 17.6 percent of the under-18 population. That was an increase of about 800,000 from 2002, when 16.7 percent of all children were in poverty.

The Census Bureau`s definition of poverty varies by the size of the household. For instance, the threshold for a family of four was $18,810, while for two people it was $12,015.

Nearly 45 million people lacked health insurance, or 15.6 percent of the population. That was up from 43.5 million in 2002, or 15.2 percent, but was a smaller increase than in the two previous years.

Meanwhile, the median household income, when adjusted for inflation, remained basically flat last year at $43,318. Whites, blacks and Asians saw no noticeable change, but income fell 2.6 percent for Hispanics to $32,997. Whites had the highest income at $47,777.

Census Bureau analyst Dan Weinberg said the results were typical of a post-recession period. He said the increase in the number of people without insurance was due to the uncertain job picture.

"Certainly the long-term trend is firms offering less generous [benefit] plans, and as people lose jobs they tend to lose health insurance coverage," he said.

Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry seized on the numbers as evidence the Bush administration`s economic policies have failed. During the years Bush has been in office, 5.2 million people have lost health insurance and 4.3 million have fallen into poverty, he said.

"Under George Bush`s watch, America`s families are falling further behind," Kerry said.

House Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Joe Barton, R-Texas, noted that while more people lost insurance, there also were about 1 million more Americans with coverage in 2003. Overall, 243 million people had insurance last year.

"The bottom line is this: More people in America have health coverage today than at any time in our nation`s history and I think that`s a fact worth noting, but we can always do more," he said.

Even before release of the data, some Democrats claimed the Bush administration was trying to play down bad news by releasing the reports about a month earlier than usual. They normally are released separately in late September -- one report on poverty and income, the other on insurance.

Putting out the numbers at the same time and not so close to Election Day "invite charges of spinning the data for political purposes," said Rep. Carolyn Maloney, D-New York.

Census Director Louis Kincannon -- a Bush appointee -- denied politics played any role in moving up the release date. The move, announced earlier this year, was done to coordinate the numbers with the release of other data.

"There has been no influence or pressure from the [Bush] campaign," Kincannon said Wednesday.

Official national poverty estimates, as well as most government data on income and health insurance, come from the bureau`s Current Population Survey.

This year the bureau is simultaneously releasing data from the broader American Community Survey, which also includes income and poverty numbers but cannot be statistically compared with the other survey.

William O`Hare, a researcher with the Annie E. Casey Foundation, a private children`s advocacy group, expected increases in the number of kids in poverty and without health insurance. He called the changes in the way data was released "bothersome."

"It makes me wonder whether this statistical agency is being politicized in some way," said O`Hare, who has studied the poverty and health insurance data for over two decades.

Copyright 2004 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.



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August 26, 2004
Kidnapped Italian Journalist Said Killed
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

Filed at 6:16 p.m. ET

BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) -- An Arab television station said Friday it received a video showing the killing of Italian journalist Enzo Baldoni, who was kidnapped by militants who threatened to execute him if Italy did not withdraw troops from Iraq.

The video received by Al-Jazeera appeared to show Baldoni`s killing, but the station declined to broadcast the footage out of sensitivity to its viewers, said station spokesman Jihad Ballout.

``To the best of our knowledge, it indicates that the hostage-takers carried out their threat,`` Ballout said.

The Italian Foreign Ministry said it was checking into the report.

The ministry had reported Baldoni missing Friday and said he was believed to be in Najaf, the holy city south of Baghdad where fighters loyal to a radical cleric have been battling U.S. and Iraqi forces for nearly three weeks.

In a video broadcast on Al-Jazeera on Tuesday, a militant group calling itself ``The Islamic Army in Iraq`` said in a statement it could not guarantee Baldoni`s safety unless Italy announced within 48 hours that it would pull out its 3,000 soldiers.

Italy had insisted it would keep its troops in Iraq, and Italian Premier Silvio Berlusconi`s office said in a statement his government would work to win Baldoni`s freedom.

Copyright 2004 The Associated Press

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August 27, 2004
THE INSURGENTS
Tentative Accord Reached in Najaf to Halt Fighting
By DEXTER FILKINS and JOHN F. BURNS

NAJAF, Iraq, Friday, Aug. 27 - Aides to the country`s most powerful Shiite leader said they had reached a tentative agreement on Thursday to end the three-week siege in this Shiite holy city, after a day of chaos and bloodshed here that left at least 74 Iraqis dead and more than 300 wounded.

Hamed al-Khaffaf, an aide to Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, said that Moktada al-Sadr, the rebel cleric whose fighters have held the Imam Ali Shrine since early August, had agreed to the conditions set forth by Ayatollah Sistani to end the siege.
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The proposal, which the interim Iraqi government quickly accepted, calls for the withdrawal of Mr. Sadr`s fighters from Najaf and the neighboring city of Kufa, as well as a pullout of American forces and the introduction of Iraqi police officers into Najaf. The agreement would allow Mr. Sadr and his fighters to keep their guns and go free.

In celebration of the accord, thousands of Shiites marched to the shrine through the battle-scarred city on Friday morning.

"We pray today that Najaf will recover,`` Kassem Hameed, a 52-year-old oil worker who came from Basra on Thursday to support Ayatollah Sistani, told Reuters. "The military operations have only brought destruction."

In a statement broadcast Friday morning over the shrine`s loudspeakers, Mr. Sadr told his men inside the mosque to lay down their weapons and join the pilgrims outside, Reuters reported. It was not immediately clear if the militia intended to leave the mosque for good.

The deal was struck during a face-to-face meeting between the two men after the momentous homecoming of the 73-year-old Ayatollah Sistani to the city earlier in the day. The ayatollah had left the country just after the fighting began to receive treatment in London for a heart ailment. His return was well timed, coming just after Mr. Sadr`s forces had been decimated by a series of blistering American attacks.
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Iraqis tended the wounded Thursday after a mortar attack on the main mosque in Kufa. The attack killed or wounded dozens of people.
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The Americans halted combat operations on Thursday, but made clear they were prepared to resume and assault the shrine if Mr. Sadr did not quickly sign on to the pact.

The deal announced Thursday followed a day of horrific violence, underscored by the execution of an Italian journalist, Enzo Baldoni, who disappeared last week while traveling to Najaf.

In the neighboring city of Kufa, a mortar attack on a mosque where thousands of Iraqis were gathering left dozens dead and wounded. At least 35 Iraqi civilians were killed in two other incidents, when the Iraqi police fired into crowds of civilians who were trying to move toward the Shrine of Ali.

One of those incidents occurred in the late afternoon, as thousands of Iraqis had gathered at the gates of Najaf`s old city to heed Ayatollah Sistani`s call to march on the holy shrine. But as the crowd pushed forward, a line of police officers appeared to panic, first firing into the air and then directly on the crowd.

The police officers fired dozens of rounds, setting off a stampede of terrified people who ran, fell and tripped over one another as they tried to flee. At least 15 Iraqis were killed and 65 more wounded. Some of the injured said the police had fired on the crowd after they had been fired on themselves, but the claim could not be verified.

But for this day, at least, the greater emphasis was on peace. If Mr. Sadr sticks to the deal, it will end one of the bloodiest episodes since the United States invaded the country, a grinding urban battle that has left hundreds of Iraqis dead and much of Najaf in ruins.

The crisis, touched off when Mr. Sadr`s men attacked an Iraqi police station earlier this month, has posed a difficult challenge to the interim Iraqi government, led by Prime Minister Ayad Allawi, which took office less than two months ago.
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Shiites headed for Najaf Thursday in response to a call by Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, who brokered an accord to end fighting.
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"Mr. Moktada al-Sadr agreed to the initiative of his eminence al-Sistani," Mr. Khaffaf told reporters at a news conference outside the house where the grand ayatollah was staying. "You will hear good news soon from the government and Mr. Moktada al-Sadr."

But deals with Mr. Sadr have crumbled before, and there were signs that this one could prove just as ephemeral as the others. Several times this month, and during the uprising called by Mr. Sadr last spring, American and Iraqi negotiators believed they had reached agreements with Mr. Sadr, only to learn that they had been mistaken.

Mr. Sadr did not participate in the news conference called by Ayatollah Sistani`s aides on Thursday night. He was spied slipping out to the street just as it got under way. Later, Mr. Sadr`s promised public statement failed to materialize.

As to highlight the extremely tenuous nature of the deal, Ayatollah Sistani`s aides declined to discuss crucial aspects of the agreement, like how and when Mr. Sadr`s fighters, the Mahdi Army, might actually pull out of the shrine.

"It`s too early to talk about details," Mr. Khaffaf said.

By not insisting that Mr. Sadr appear publicly to announce the pact, Ayatollah Sistani`s men seemed to be trying to offer the young cleric a face-saving way out of the crisis.

"There will be a mechanism that will preserve the dignity of everyone in getting out of the holy shrine," Mr. Khaffaf told Al Jazeera television.

The agreement does not require the surrender of Mr. Sadr, who is under indictment for murdering a rival cleric in Najaf last year, or any of his fighters. That seemed to raise the prospect of a repeat of the peace agreement reached in May, when Mr. Sadr was allowed to retreat gracefully with his army intact, only to return again.

In a statement earlier in the day, Dr. Allawi seemed willing to forgive Mr. Sadr. "We`d like to stress again that we would provide Moktada a safe passage if he chooses to stop the armed conflict," the prime minister said in a statement.

Mr. Khaffaf said the first step in implementing the agreement would be to allow the tens of thousands of Iraqis who heeded Ayatollah Sistani`s call to march on the shrine to do so. As with much else in the agreement announced Thursday night, Mr. Khaffaf spoke vaguely about how the march would proceed but said the demonstrators had to be out of the city by Friday at 10 a.m.

Senior American and Iraqi officials in Baghdad said the 24-hour cease-fire was agreed to in discussions in the southern city of Basra on Wednesday night between Ayatollah Sistani and two officials of the Allawi government. They said the Iraqis had returned to the capital saying they had Ayatollah Sistani`s commitment that he would make a public demand that the last of the militiamen disarm and leave the shrine, and that if Mr. Sadr defied the demand they had the ayatollah`s assurance that he would support an assault on the shrine by Iraqi commandos.

The officials said American military pressures had eliminated virtually all resistance by the Mahdi Army outside the shrine itself. Intelligence reports indicated there were weapons hidden in the shrine, the officials said. Planning for an assault was based on the assumption that these would be used by some of the hundreds of Sadr supporters remaining in the shrine, who have told reporters in recent days that most of the fighters had left.

Without an order from Mr. Sadr for these remaining fighters to leave, one American official said, "There will be a fight."

Either way, the officials said, the Allawi government and American commanders believed the three weeks of fighting in Najaf would end quickly, either with a last-minute Sadr capitulation or with Iraqi forces storming the shrine. They said that a battalion of 500 Iraqi troops was ready for the assault, and that Iraqi and American commanders were confident the Iraqi troops would not fail.

"We`re close to being in a position to finish this," an American official said.

Still, some officials at the American command complex in Saddam Hussein`s former Republican Palace in Baghdad acknowledged that things could go still go awry.
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Iraqi men carried a wounded demonstrator in Najaf Thursday while others ran for cover when marchers were fired upon, apparently by Iraqi forces, on the road from Kufa.
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Since American troops toppled the Hussein government 16 months ago, Ayatollah Sistani has been careful to maintain an equivocal position on American military actions, usually condemning any use of force, by the Americans or the rebels. That left open the possibility that in Najaf, he could distance himself from the Americans by condemning the damage inflicted on the Old City by American bombs and tanks, and even leave Mr. Sadr free to claim that he acted all along to defend the shrine against American attacks.

One of the last American actions before the cease-fire went into effect involved the use of a 2,000-pound, laser-guided bomb to strike a hotel about 130 yards from the shrine`s southwest wall, in an area known to American commanders as "motel row."

Dexter Filkins reported from Najaf for this article and John F. Burnsfrom Baghdad.

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company

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August 27, 2004
Thousands March to Holy Shrine in Najaf
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

Filed at 2:09 a.m. ET

NAJAF, Iraq (AP) -- Guns were largely silent in Najaf for the first time in weeks and thousands of Iraqis thronged the revered Imam Ali shrine Friday after Iraq`s top Shiite cleric made a dramatic return to this holy city and won agreement from a rebel cleric and the government to end the fighting between his militia and U.S.-Iraqi forces.

The renegade Muqtada al-Sadr accepted the proposal in a face-to-face meeting Thursday night with the 75-year-old Grand Ayatollah Ali Husseini al-Sistani. Hours afterward, Iraq`s interim government also agreed to the deal.

Early Friday, thousands of people marched through the streets and thronged the Imam Ali shrine, one of Shia Islam`s holiest, which has served as a base for al-Sadr`s fighters and been at the center of much of the three-week crisis. Though they pulled their arms out of it last week, the militiamen themselves remained there Friday.

Police frisked those entering the shrine for weapons, while revelers held hands together in the air and chanted ``Thanks be to God!`` Many kissed shrine doors as they entered.

U.S. soldiers looked on as people passed by in streets leading to the shrine compound. Army 1st Lt. Chris Kent said the agreement ``appears to be a final resolution. That`s what it looks like right now.``

Police briefly exchanged fire with militants in one part of town, however, and some U.S. troops were still receiving occasional sniper-fire. Nevertheless, the fierce clashes of previous days had ended and most parts of the city were calm.

Al-Sistani`s highly publicized, 11th-hour peace mission would almost certainly boost his already high prestige in Iraq and cloak him in a statesman`s mantle, showing that only he had the ability to force an accord between two sides that loathe each other.

The influential cleric returned to Iraq after heart treatment in London to intervene for the first time in the bloody conflict, drawing thousands of followers who marched on Najaf and massed on its outskirts.

In the 24 hours before al-Sistani entered the holy city, more than 90 Iraqis were killed in fighting -- including 27 killed when mortars barraged a mosque in neighboring Kufa, where thousands had gathered to march into Najaf in support of al-Sistani`s mission.

Meanwhile, an Arab television station said Friday that it received a video showing the killing of kidnapped Italian journalist Enzo Baldoni, whom militants had threatened to execute if Italy did not withdraw troops from Iraq. Al-Jazeera said the video was too graphic to broadcast but appeared to show Baldoni being slain.

Italian Premier Silvio Berlusconi, a staunch supporter of the U.S.-led war to topple Saddam Hussein`s regime, condemned the reported slaying and repeated his statement of Tuesday that Italy`s 3,000 soldiers would not abandon the U.S.-led coalition and Iraq`s government.

Fighting eased in Najaf after al-Sistani arrived, and the U.S. military and the Iraqi government called a 24-hour ceasefire.

The acceptance by the young, firebrand preacher al-Sadr -- whose militia has been battling U.S. and Iraqi forces since Aug. 5 -- didn`t necessarily mean an end to the crisis. He has agreed to peace proposals before, and they have quickly fallen apart.

But State Minister Qassim Dawoud, announcing the administration`s acceptance, was optimistic. ``Brothers, we have entered the door to peace,`` he said. He added that the government would not try to arrest al-Sadr, who is sought in the slaying of a rival cleric last year.

The five-point plan calls for Najaf and Kufa to be declared weapons-free cities, for all foreign forces to withdraw from Najaf, for police to be in charge of security, for the government to compensate those harmed by the fighting, and for a census to be taken to prepare for elections expected in the country by January.

There was no immediate word if the U.S. military would accept the provisions on the agreement calling on its forces to leave Najaf. In Washington, a senior Bush administration official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said only: ``We`ve seen the developments. We`re watching them very closely.``

Dawoud said U.S. and coalition forces would pull out of Najaf as soon as interim Prime Minister Ayad Allawi ordered them to.

Al-Sistani aide Hamed al-Khafaf announced al-Sadr`s acceptance and suggested fighters from his Mahdi Army militia would leave the Imam Ali Shrine, the holy site they have used as a stronghold and refuge throughout the fighting.

``There will be a mechanism that will preserve the dignity of everyone in getting out of the holy shrine, and you`ll see this in the coming hours,`` al-Khafaf told Al-Jazeera television.

The shrine, in Najaf`s Old City, has been the center of fighting, but U.S. troops have tried to avoid damaging it, fearing it would anger Shiites.

After the cease-fire was called, one platoon of U.S. soldiers was holed up in a multistoried office-building, poking weapons out of broken windows and scanning devastated streets for any signs of militants. A handful took advantage of the quiet to sleep -- a relative luxury after days of fierce clashes, according to Associated Press photographer Jim MacMillan, who is embedded with the soldiers.

Al-Sistani`s immense moral authority brings more hope for the new peace plan than previous ones.

As the most senior of four clerics in Iraq holding the rank of grand ayatollah, al-Sistani is one of the most respected men in the country, esteemed by Iraqis of all religious factions. He is more popular among Iraqi Shiites than al-Sadr, who is in his early 30s and of a far lower clerical rank.

Al-Sadr`s fiery anti-U.S. message has drawn many poorer, disillusioned Shiites but he is seen by the Shiite mainstream as impulsive and too radical. Al-Sadr`s followers have set up their own religious courts and arrested hundreds of people on charges including selling alcohol and music deemed immoral.

The elder cleric has consistently opposed violence as a way to end the U.S.-led occupation. He has also bucked the authority of the United States in the past, giving him credibility in the eyes of Shiites who consider the current Iraqi government beholden to the United States.

Thousands of Iraqis had flocked to Najaf on Thursday after al-Sistani called for a peace march but were blocked from entering by Iraqi police.

Al-Sistani asked the government to allow the demonstrators to visit the Imam Ali Shrine compound provided they leave by 10 a.m. Friday, al-Khafaf said.

Al-Sistani`s 30-vehicle convoy drove 220 miles from the southern city of Basra to Najaf, joined by at least a thousand cars from towns along the way, where supporters on the street cheered the ayatollah.

From Wednesday morning until Thursday morning, 55 people were killed and 376 injured during clashes in Najaf, the Health Ministry said. At least 40 people were killed in Kufa over the same period, including the victims in the mosque.

The military said Thursday that a U.S. soldier in Baghdad was killed by a mortar attack the night before. As of Wednesday, 964 U.S. service members have died since the beginning of military operations in Iraq in March 2003, according to the U.S. Defense Department.

Copyright 2004 The Associated Press

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August 27, 2004
ABU GHRAIB SCANDAL
Army`s Report Faults General in Prison Abuse
By DOUGLAS JEHL and ERIC SCHMITT

WASHINGTON, Aug. 26 - Classified parts of the report by three Army generals on the abuses at Abu Ghraib prison say Lt. Gen. Ricardo S. Sanchez, the former top commander in Iraq, approved the use in Iraq of some severe interrogation practices intended to be limited to captives held in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, and Afghanistan.

Moreover, the report contends, by issuing and revising the rules for interrogations in Iraq three times in 30 days, General Sanchez and his legal staff sowed such confusion that interrogators acted in ways that violated the Geneva Conventions, which they understood poorly anyway.

Military officials and others in the Bush administration have repeatedly said the Geneva Conventions applied to all prisoners in Iraq, even though members of Al Qaeda and the Taliban held in Afghanistan and Guantánamo did not, in their estimation, fall under the conventions.

But classified passages of the Army report say the procedures approved by General Sanchez on Sept. 14, 2003, and the revisions made when the Central Command found fault with the initial policy, exceeded the Geneva guidelines as well as standard Army doctrines.

General Sanchez and his aides have previously described the series of orders he issued, although not in as much detail as the latest report, which was released Wednesday with a few classified sections omitted. They have described his order of Oct. 12 as rescinding his order of Sept. 14.

But the Army`s latest review instead finds that the later order "confused doctrine and policy even further,`` a classified part of the report says. It says the memorandum, while not authorizing abuse, effectively opened the way at Abu Ghraib last fall for interrogation techniques that Pentagon investigators have characterized as abusive, in dozens of cases involving dozens of soldiers at the prison in Iraq.

The techniques approved by General Sanchez exceeded those advocated in a standard Army field manual that provided the basic guidelines for interrogation procedures. But they were among those previously approved by the Pentagon for use in Afghanistan and Cuba, and were recommended to General Sanchez and his staff in the summer of 2003 in memorandums sent by a team headed by Maj. Gen. Geoffrey Miller, a commander at Guantánamo who had been sent to Iraq by senior Pentagon officials, and by a military intelligence unit that had served in Afghanistan and was taking charge of interrogations at Abu Ghraib.

The report says the abusive techniques not sufficiently prohibited by General Sanchez included isolation and the use of dogs in interrogation. It says military police and military intelligence soldiers who used those practices believed they had been authorized by senior commanders.

"At Abu Ghraib, isolation conditions sometimes included being kept naked in very hot or very cold, small rooms, and/or completely darkened rooms, clearly in violation of the Geneva Conventions,`` a classified part of the report said.

The passages involving General Sanchez`s orders were among several deleted from the version of the report by Maj. Gen. George R. Fay that was made public by the Pentagon on Wednesday.

Classified parts of the 171-page report were provided to The New York Times by a senior Defense Department official who said fuller disclosure of the findings would help public understanding of the causes of the prisoner abuse scandal.

Army officials said Thursday that some sections of the report had been marked secret because they referred to policy memorandums that were still classified.

But the report`s discussion of the September and October orders, while critical of General Sanchez and his staff, do not disclose many new details of the orders and do not appear to contain sensitive material about interrogations or other intelligence-gathering methods.

They do show in much clearer detail than ever before how interrogation practices from Afghanistan and Guantánamo were brought to Abu Ghraib, and how poorly the nuances of what was acceptable in Iraq were understood by military intelligence officials in Iraq.

The classified sections of the Fay report reinforce criticisms made in another report, by the independent panel headed by James R. Schlesinger, the former defense secretary.

That panel argued that General Sanchez`s actions effectively amounted to an unauthorized suspension of the Geneva Conventions in Iraq by categorizing prisoners there as unlawful combatants.

The Schlesinger panel described that reasoning as "understandable,`` but said General Sanchez and his staff should have recognized that they were "lacking specific authorization to operate beyond the confines of the Geneva Convention.``

In an interview on Thursday with reporters and editors of The Times, Gen. Paul J. Kern, the senior officer who supervised General Fay`s work, said the Fay inquiry had not addressed whether General Sanchez was authorized to designate detainees in Iraq as unlawful combatants, as the administration has treated prisoners in Afghanistan.

A secret passage in the report, though, says that with General Sanchez`s first order, on Sept. 14, national policies and those of his command "collided, introducing ambiguities and inconsistencies in policy and practice,`` adding, "Policies and practices developed and approved for use on Al Qaeda and Taliban detainees who were not afforded the protection of the Geneva Conventions now applied to detainees who did fall under the Geneva Conventions` protections." It goes on to cite several further problems with the order.

Asked whether General Sanchez`s actions opened the door to use of interrogation techniques from Afghanistan, General Kern said, "He didn`t close the door, and he should have."

Together, the Schlesinger and Fay reports spell out the sharpest criticism of missteps by American commanders in Iraq involving what they described as a crucial question of making clear to soldiers what was permitted and what was not in interrogation of Iraqi prisoners at Abu Ghraib.

General Sanchez and his deputies have always maintained that the only approaches they authorized for use in Iraq were consistent with the Geneva Conventions, which spell out rules for the treatment of prisoners of war and other combatants. They have said the directive issued by General Sanchez in October had made it clear that the use of dogs and isolation could be used in interrogations only with the general`s approval.

"Interrogators at Abu Ghraib used both dogs and isolation as interrogation practices," a classified part of the report said. "The manner in which they were used on some occasions clearly violated the Geneva Conventions."

The classified section of the Fay report also sheds new light on the role played by a secretive Special Operations Forces/Central Intelligence Agency task force that operated in Iraq and Afghanistan as a source of interrogation procedures that were put into effect at Abu Ghraib. It says that a July 15, 2003, "Battlefield Interrogation Team and Facility Policy,`` drafted by use by Joint Task Force 121, which was given the task of locating former government members in Iraq, was adopted "almost verbatim`` by the 519th Military Intelligence Battalion, which played a leading role in interrogations at Abu Ghraib.

That task force policy endorsed the use of stress positions during harsh interrogation procedures, the use of dogs, yelling, loud music, light control, isolation and other procedures used previously in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Those measures were initially authorized by General Sanchez for use in Iraq in his September memorandum, then revoked in the policy he issued a month later, but not in a way understood by interrogators at Abu Ghraib to have banned those practices, the classified version of the Fay report said.

Among those who believed, incorrectly, that the use of dogs in interrogations could be approved without General Sanchez`s approval was Col. Thomas M. Pappas, the commander of the 205th Military Intelligence Brigade, the report said.

"Dogs as an interrogation tool should have been specifically excluded,`` a classified section of the report said. It criticized General Sanchez for not having fully considered "the implications for interrogation policy,`` and said the manner in which interrogators at Abu Ghraib used both dogs and isolations as interrogation practices "on some occasions clearly violated the Geneva Conventions.``

The role played by members of the 519th Military Intelligence Battalion, from Fort Bragg, N.C., some of whom were identified as having taken part in the abuses, is given particular attention in the classified parts of the report.

Members of the unit had earlier served in Afghanistan, where some were implicated in the deaths of two detainees that are still under investigation, and the report says commanders should have heeded more carefully the danger that members of the unit might again be involved in abusive behavior.

The unit had worked closely with Special Operations Forces in Afghanistan, and "at same point`` it "came to possess the JTF-121 interrogation policy`` used by the joint Special Operations/C.I.A. teams, the classified section of the report says.

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company

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August 27, 2004
Abu Ghraib, the Next Step

For months, John Warner, the chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, has been gamely resisting pressure from Republican leaders to call off his hearings on the Abu Ghraib prison disaster - the only real sign of life on Capitol Hill on this important issue. Mr. Warner was patiently awaiting the outcome of a set of Pentagon investigations, including one by the Army and one by a civilian panel set up by Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld. Both issued reports this week, and it`s clear that Mr. Warner still has work to do.

The Army report did a painfully professional job of criticizing its own enlisted men and officers, including the three-star general who commanded American forces in Iraq at the time of the prison brutality and his two-star deputy. But it was not up to the Army to review the actions of the policy makers in Washington. It was also pretty obvious that Mr. Rumsfeld`s panel - two former secretaries of defense, a retired general and a former Republican congresswoman - was not going to produce a clear-eyed assessment of responsibility.

The two new reports do make it starkly evident that President Bush`s political decision to declare the war over far too prematurely and Mr. Rumsfeld`s subsequent bungling of the occupation set the stage for the prison abuses. But the panel announced that it did not see any need to hold the secretary accountable, or even to subject him to any real direct criticism - even though its members thought the events warranted criminal charges against dozens of uniformed men and women.

At a news conference on Wednesday, Mr. Warner was careful to leave open the possibility that his committee would disagree with the panel`s conclusions and that Congress would need to investigate Abu Ghraib on its own. He even pointedly reminded Mr. Rumsfeld that the secretary of defense is "captain of the ship," and "ultimately has to take responsibility." But Mr. Warner has set a schedule for further action that does not promise to lead to a real investigation, or to produce any satisfying answers for the public about Abu Ghraib, before the election.

Mr. Warner scheduled a hearing on the civilian panel`s report for Sept. 9, when the committee`s 25 members will get about eight minutes each for questions and comments. After that hearing, and after the Defense Department reacts to the report, and after the Pentagon finishes the investigations still under way, Mr. Warner said it would be time to decide what to do next. It`s understandable that the courtly and loyal Mr. Warner would not want to push his party`s leaders too far this close to an election. But the public has waited for months while Mr. Rumsfeld`s team withheld documents from Congress and stonewalled senators` questions.

The Senate Armed Services Committee should call upon the Congressional leadership of both parties to form an investigative committee, with subpoena powers, to review this disaster, which has damaged the reputation of the American military and the United States around the world.

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company

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August 27, 2004
OP-ED CONTRIBUTOR
When Actions Speak Louder Than Medals
By LARRY HEINEMANN

Chicago — When I came back from Vietnam, I always thought that the next argument was going to be between those who went overseas and those who stayed at home. But it turns out that the big argument now is between those veterans who thought the war was right and those who didn`t. And further, it is amazing to me that the argument should revolve around medals and Purple Hearts and honorable service.

The plain fact is that in Vietnam medals were handed out like popcorn, right down to the Good Conduct Medal and the Rifle Sharpshooter Badge, particularly among career-minded officers and NCO`s. Ticket-punching lifers, we called them with all the derision that the phrase implies; they seemed more interested in tending their precious careers than anything else.

I know officers who were given the Bronze Star for simply being in country (the ultimate in merit badges). An Air Force pilot told me that his commanding officer suggested that he write himself up for a Distinguished Flying Cross on no particular account, and that he, the commander, would sign it. To his credit, my friend did not do so. By the same token, a writer friend of mine keeps his Bronze Star to prove to his children and grandchildren that despite what they may hear about Vietnam, he acted the way an adult is supposed to act, with compassion and grit, and that if he is not especially proud of his service in Vietnam, he`s not ashamed of it, either.

Regardless of career ambitions, there were officers and NCO`s who understood the unvarnished reality of the war, and made no bones about it. When I left Fort Knox, Ky., for Vietnam in 1967, the sergeant (a full-blood Navajo Indian) called me into his office and told me flat out, "Remember, Heinemann, this is not a white man`s war." After I`d been in country seven or eight months, a lieutenant with a degree in history took over our platoon. He gathered us young sergeants around him and said that our job was to make sure that everyone got home in one piece. We told him that his was a very good plan and how could we help.

The awards for Purple Hearts were mostly initiated by the medical staff. A wound is hard to fake, and you didn`t put in for a Purple Heart, it was given to you whether you wanted one or not, or deserved it. And anyone who went looking for a Purple Heart was called "John Wayne," and avoided like the plague.

The veterans who seem eager to go after John Kerry remind me of the guys who thought, and perhaps still think, that the war was a right and righteous undertaking, and ultimately winnable. But to say that we could have won the war is the same as saying that we didn`t fill our hearts with enough hate. Remember: we were not pleasant people, down where the rubber met the road, so to speak, and the war was not a pleasant business. John Kerry wasn`t the only veteran to come back from the war spiritually exhausted and morally outraged - ready, willing and able to denounce his own government for its conduct of the war. Well before the end of my tour in March 1968, most everyone around me knew the war to be a fool`s errand, but if there was any antiwar sentiment it didn`t get much more sophisticated than the vast and colorful repertoire of curses you cannot repeat in a family newspaper.

But we knew what we saw, we knew what we did, and we knew what we had become. Soldiering, the downward path to wisdom to be sure. In 1971, when John Kerry sat before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, the essence of his message was exact: many a mean thing was done, sir, from the Oval Office on down, and in the spirit of meanness. We love our nation dearly, but oppose this terrible war. Our country seems to have forfeited its moral authority, and that makes our hearts sore.

And all these years later - the name-calling and nitpicking about wounds suffered and medals earned and honorable service aside - the important matter is that, when push came to shove, Lieutenant Kerry turned his boat around and drove back into a firefight to fetch an Army Green Beret out of the river. I know that if it had been me in the water, I would surely remember the man`s name, the look on his face, and the reach of his arm for the rest of my life; I would be sure to tell my grandchildren about him.

Larry Heinemann is the author of "Paco`s Story," which received the National Book Award, and a forthcoming memoir about his experiences in Vietnam.

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company

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August 27, 2004
OP-ED CONTRIBUTOR
The View From the Boat
By JUDITH DROZ KEYES

San Francisco — On Feb. 28, 1969, my husband was the commander of one of three Swift boats traveling the Dong Cung in Vietnam to carry troops and supplies upriver. The events of that day, and what happened almost two weeks later on another Swift boat patrol, have become a source of controversy in the presidential campaign, with a group of veterans saying that John Kerry did not deserve the medals he won for what he did then. I know my husband thought otherwise.

The other two commanders - John Kerry and William Rood, an editor at The Chicago Tribune - have written of the courage they witnessed on Feb. 28. My husband, Lt. j.g. Donald Droz, who grew up in a small Missouri town and was a 1966 graduate of the United States Naval Academy, wrote to me about it in a letter dated March 6, 1969:

"I had quite a morning... Admiral [Elmo] Zumwalt, Commander Naval Forces Vietnam, flew to An Thoi from Saigon ... for a special awards presentation. To make a somewhat long story short, PCF`s 23, 94 and 43 conducted an operation February 28th which we pulled off rather spectacularly. Anyway, for my part, I was awarded the Bronze Star Medal with Combat `V.` I don`t mean to blow my own horn, but I really am pleased with the award, and it is a rather significant medal. I`ll bring the citation with me to Hawaii."

Don did bring the citation to Hawaii a few weeks later, and I traveled from our home in Pennsylvania with our infant daughter, Tracy, to meet him for his R&R. But before that meeting, Don and John Kerry and others were involved in another battle, on March 13. Don did not write to me about that battle. But he did tell me about it during our five days together in Hawaii - when he met our daughter for the first time, and held her for what turned out to be the last time.

In Hawaii, Don mostly talked about the future: how he wanted to come home, go to graduate school and then become involved in public service. But he also talked about Vietnam: about how much respect all the "Swifties" had for one another. I remember him saying that John Kerry was heading home, deservedly so, and that he admired his bravery and planned to see him that summer.

Don also talked about how hard it was to be in a situation where no one knew what was around the next bend or what the "rules" were or who was friend and who was foe. He told me he was convinced that what the United States was doing in Vietnam was pointless or worse and that, when he got home, he intended to speak out against it. But he was clear - and I have always understood - that he was criticizing the war itself and those who were deciding how to wage it, not those who were putting their lives on the line to do their duty honestly and bravely.

Those who had the courage to fight in Vietnam and, when they returned home, to tell of the reality of what they saw deserve our admiration. I am certain my husband would have been as appalled as I am at the spectacle of some veterans questioning others` service.

Don died on April 12, 1969, just two weeks after we said goodbye in Hawaii and two months before he would have come home. Ever since, I have felt a special obligation to speak the truth as I know he would have done.

Judith Droz Keyes, a lawyer, was a delegate to the 2004 Democratic convention.

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company

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Wer sich für die Zusammenhänge näher interessiert, der siehe #20372 u. #20437. Die Berichte über die Vorgänge von der WaPost und NYTimes.
Noch eine Bemerkung, Bush hat sich entgegen anderslautenden Meldungen der Presse nie von der Kampagne gegen Kerry distanziert.
August 27, 2004
OP-ED CONTRIBUTOR
A War Without End
By NEIL SHEEHAN

Washington — Thirteen years after the 41st president, George Herbert Walker Bush, announced that America had "kicked the Vietnam syndrome`` with his crushing expulsion of Saddam Hussein`s forces from Kuwait, the war in Vietnam is back. Its memories and divisions are reverberating as forcefully as ever in the campaign between his son, George Walker Bush, the 43rd president, and Senator John Kerry.

Seeking to convince voters that he would make a better commander-in-chief in the war on terror than Mr. Bush has been, Mr. Kerry placed his status as a Vietnam War hero front and center, only to find his reputation under assault by a group calling itself the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth. As well as can be determined, the accusations are unfounded and Mr. Kerry deserved his medals.

Mr. Bush has his own problem with Vietnam; he did not serve there. In the spring of 1968, when he was a senior at Yale, casualties in Vietnam were averaging 414 killed and 1,160 seriously wounded a week. Draft calls were running commensurately high to replace the fallen. In contrast to the present, when the National Guard and the Reserves are ransacked for replacements for Iraq, both institutions were safe havens during the Vietnam era. Mr. Bush used his father`s political influence to leapfrog the waiting list into the Texas Air National Guard.

One must be careful in pointing a finger at those who avoided service in Vietnam. Many, like President Clinton, had moral objections to the war. The gimmicks they used to stay out of it were tawdry, but they acted from motives of conscience. Mr. Bush - like his father`s vice president, Dan Quayle, who sheltered in the Indiana National Guard, and his own vice president, Dick Cheney, who obtained five draft deferments - are in a different category. From what can be discerned, none of them opposed the Vietnam War. Had the younger Mr. Bush not stood aside from the central, transforming event of his youthful years, his performance as president might have been closer to that of the wise and capable commander-in-chief he claims to be but has not been. He might have learned a lesson from Vietnam - do not become involved in an unnecessary war.

Unnoticed in the controversy over the Swift Boat group`s accusations is an undercurrent that lingers from the war. The men who fought in Vietnam and survived came back as divided as the public at home. Most suffered in silence, then picked up their lives and went on. But some, like John Kerry, were so disillusioned that they felt they had to do something to stop the war. Another minority persisted in their faith that the war could be won, that America is an exception to history and can do no wrong.

The nation has yet to come to grips with what really happened in Vietnam, and Mr. Kerry`s accusers are among those who simply cannot and never will. They are driven by more than a political desire to further the fortunes of George Bush. Their remarks make clear that what they really hold against Mr. Kerry are his antiwar activities after his return and his testimony then that atrocities were being committed in Vietnam. They regard these as undermining the war effort and casting aspersions on their service. "We won the battle,`` one of Mr. Kerry`s accusers, former Navy commander Adrian Lonsdale, said. "Kerry went home and lost the war for us.`` The group`s second television commercial focuses on this issue, running bits of old news film of Mr. Kerry`s testimony in a 1971 Senate hearing, excerpting his remarks to twist their meaning.

The truth is that atrocities were committed in Vietnam. The worst and most horrendous atrocity was officially sanctioned. The American command coldbloodedly set about to deprive the Communists of the recruits and other assistance the peasantry could provide by emptying the countryside. Peasant hamlets in Communist-dominated areas were deliberately and relentlessly bombed and shelled. Free Fire Zones - anything that moved, human or animal, could be killed - were redlined on military maps.

By 1968, civilian deaths, the great majority from air strikes and artillery, were estimated at about 40,000 a year and seriously wounded at 85,000. The wholesale killing cheapened the value of Vietnamese life in American eyes. It created an atmosphere that fostered the massacre at My Lai hamlet on March 16, 1968, when 347 Vietnamese old men, women, boys, girls and babies were butchered. That same morning another 90 unarmed Vietnamese were slaughtered at a nearby hamlet by a second army unit.

In Vietnam, America the exceptional joined the rest of the human race and demonstrated that it could do evil as easily as it could do good. Mr. Kerry undoubtedly said some intemperate things in 1971. That is the way of youth. But he also showed the moral courage to try to persuade his fellow citizens to halt actions that were disgracing their nation.

There is a way to honestly confront the reality of Vietnam and yet still honor the men who fought there. One must learn to distinguish between the war and the warrior. It always galls me when I hear the generation of World War II referred to as the "greatest generation.`` They were a great generation, but so were the men who served in Vietnam. The soldiers and Marines, sailors and airmen who fought there did so with just as much courage as anyone who fought in World War II. The generation of Vietnam had the ill luck to draw a bad war, an unnecessary and unwinnable war, a tragic, terrible mistake. But valor has a worth of its own, and theirs deserves to be honored and remembered.

Neil Sheehan, a correspondent in Vietnamfor the United Press International and The Times, won the 1989 Pulitzer Prize in general nonfiction for "A Bright Shining Lie: John Paul Vann and America in Vietnam.``

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company

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Es scheint so, dass nach anfänglichen Erfolge der Kampagne gegen Kerry, die Aktion gegen die Verursacher zurückschlägt.
Siehe CNN Poll von gestern abend. #20654

August 27, 2004
OP-ED COLUMNIST
Where Is The Shame?
By BOB HERBERT

Max Cleland, minus the three limbs he lost in Vietnam, showed up in his wheelchair outside President Bush`s ranch in Crawford, Tex., on Wednesday to suggest that the president take the simple and decent step of condemning the slime that is being spread by Bush supporters against the war record of John Kerry.

He didn`t get very far. The president was busy vacationing and had neither the time nor the inclination to meet with Mr. Cleland, a former U.S. senator who was himself the target of vicious, unconscionable attacks by the G.O.P. slime machine when he ran for re-election in Georgia in 2002.

Later, at a press conference under the hot Crawford sun, Mr. Cleland told reporters: "The question is, where is George Bush`s honor? Where is his shame?"

Mr. Cleland reminded reporters of the scurrilous attacks by Bush forces against Senator John McCain in the Republican presidential primary in 2000 and said: "Keep in mind, this president has gone after three Vietnam veterans in four years. That`s got to stop."

In what is surely the most important election of the last half-century, we seem trapped in the politics of the madhouse. What is incredible is that these attacks on men who served not just honorably, but heroically, are coming from a hawkish party that is controlled by an astonishing number of men who sprinted as far from the front lines as they could when they were of fighting age and their country was at war.

Among them:

Mr. Bush himself, the nation`s commander in chief and the biggest hawk of all. He revels in the accouterments of combat. The story was somewhat different when he was 22 years old and eligible for combat himself. He managed to get into the cushy confines of the Texas Air National Guard at the height of the Vietnam War in 1968 - a year in which more than a half-million American troops were in the war zone and more than 14,000 were killed.

The story gets murky after that. We know the future president breezed off at some point to work on a political campaign in Alabama, skipped a required flight physical in 1972 and was suspended from flying. He supported the war in Vietnam but was never in any danger of being sent there.

Vice President Dick Cheney, another fierce administration hawk. Mr. Cheney asked for and received five deferments when he was eligible for the draft. He told senators at a confirmation hearing in 1989, "I had other priorities in the 60`s than military service." Many draft-age Americans had similar priorities - getting an education, getting married and starting a family.

Attorney General John Ashcroft. He is reported to have said, "I would have served, if asked." But with the war raging in Vietnam, he received six student deferments and an "occupational deferment" based on the essential nature of a civilian job at Southwest Missouri State University - teaching business law to undergraduates.

Paul Wolfowitz, the deputy defense secretary and a fanatical hawk on Iraq. He was not fanatical about Vietnam and escaped the draft with student deferments.

There are many others.

I would like to see at least some of these men, in keeping with their positions as leaders of a great nation, stand up and say it is wrong - just wrong - to try and reap a cheap political gain by defacing the sacrifices of individuals like John Kerry, John McCain and Max Cleland, who put themselves in mortal danger in the service of their country.

It`s one thing to decline to serve. It`s quite another to throw mud at those who did serve - or to remain silent as allies hurl the mud.

I`ve interviewed several soldiers and marines who have suffered grave wounds in Iraq, including the loss of limbs. A permanent place of honor should be reserved for them in the pantheon of American heroes. The idea that someone some years from now may trash their service for political gain is beyond disgusting.

George W. Bush ought to call off his dogs. The one thing we ought to be able to do in this hyperpoliticized era is rally in a bipartisan way behind those who have been willing to fight our wars.

The privileged classes no longer feel an obligation to put their lives - or their children`s lives - on the line in defense of the nation. The very least they could do is insist that those who have put themselves in harm`s way be treated with respect.

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company

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August 27, 2004
OP-ED COLUMNIST
America`s Failing Health
By PAUL KRUGMAN

Working Americans have two great concerns: the growing difficulty of getting health insurance, and the continuing difficulty they have in finding jobs. These concerns may have a common cause: soaring insurance premiums.

In most advanced countries, the government provides everyone with health insurance. In America, however, the government offers insurance only if you`re elderly (Medicare) or poor (Medicaid). Otherwise, you`re expected to get private health insurance, usually through your job. But insurance premiums are exploding, and the system of employment-linked insurance is falling apart.

Some employers have dropped their health plans. Others have maintained benefits for current workers, but are finding ways to avoid paying benefits to new hires - for example, by using temporary workers. And some businesses, while continuing to provide health benefits, are refusing to hire more workers.

In other words, rising health care costs aren`t just causing a rapid rise in the ranks of the uninsured (confirmed by yesterday`s Census Bureau report); they`re also, because of their link to employment, a major reason why this economic recovery has generated fewer jobs than any previous economic expansion.

Clearly, health care reform is an urgent social and economic issue. But who has the right answer?

The 2004 Economic Report of the President told us what George Bush`s economists think, though we`re unlikely to hear anything as blunt at next week`s convention. According to the report, health costs are too high because people have too much insurance and purchase too much medical care. What we need, then, are policies, like tax-advantaged health savings accounts tied to plans with high deductibles, that induce people to pay more of their medical expenses out of pocket. (Cynics would say that this is just a rationale for yet another tax shelter for the wealthy, but the economists who wrote the report are probably sincere.)

John Kerry`s economic advisers have a very different analysis: they believe that health costs are too high because private insurance companies have excessive overhead, mainly because they are trying to avoid covering high-risk patients. What we need, according to this view, is for the government to assume more of the risk, for example by picking up catastrophic health costs, thereby reducing the incentive for socially wasteful spending, and making employment-based insurance easier to get.

A smart economist can come up with theoretical justifications for either argument. The evidence suggests, however, that the Kerry position is much closer to the truth.

The fact is that the mainly private U.S. health care system spends far more than the mainly public health care systems of other advanced countries, but gets worse results. In 2001, we spent $4,887 on health care per capita, compared with $2,792 in Canada and $2,561 in France. Yet the U.S. does worse than either country by any measure of health care success you care to name - life expectancy, infant mortality, whatever. (At its best, U.S. health care is the best in the world. But the ranks of Americans who can`t afford the best, and may have no insurance at all, are large and growing.)

And the U.S. system does have very high overhead: private insurers and H.M.O.`s spend much more on administrative expenses, as opposed to actual medical treatment, than public agencies at home or abroad.

Does this mean that the American way is wrong, and that we should switch to a Canadian-style single-payer system? Well, yes. Put it this way: in Canada, respectable business executives are ardent defenders of "socialized medicine." Two years ago the Conference Board of Canada - a who`s who of the nation`s corporate elite - issued a report urging fellow Canadians to bear in mind not just the "symbolic value" of universal health care, but its "economic contribution to the competitiveness of Canadian businesses."

My health-economist friends say that it`s unrealistic to call for a single-payer system here: the interest groups are too powerful, and the antigovernment propaganda of the right has become too well established in public opinion. All that we can hope for right now is a modest step in the right direction, like the one Mr. Kerry is proposing. I bow to their political wisdom. But let`s not ignore the growing evidence that our dysfunctional medical system is bad not just for our health, but for our economy.

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company

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It`s time to bring Najaf back home

Americans have one last chance to show their opposition to this war
Naomi Klein in New York
Friday August 27, 2004

The Guardian
I`ve been here a week now, watching the city prepare for the Republican national convention and the accompanying protests. Much is predictable: tabloid hysteria about an anarchist siege; cops showing off their new crowd-control toys; fierce debates about whether the demonstrations will hurt the Republicans or inadvertently help them.

What surprises me is what isn`t here: Najaf. It`s nowhere to be found. Every day, US bombs and tanks move closer to the sacred Imam Ali shrine, reportedly damaging outer walls and sending shrapnel flying into the courtyard; every day children are killed in their homes as US soldiers inflict collective punishment on the holy city; every day, more bodies are disturbed as US marines stomp through the Valley of Peace cemetery, their boots slipping into graves as they use tombstones for cover.

Sure, the fighting in Najaf makes the news, but not in any way connected to the election. Instead it`s relegated to the status of a faraway intractable ethnic conflict, like Afghanistan, Sudan or Palestine. Even within the antiwar movement, the events in Najaf are barely visible. The "handover" has worked: Iraq is becoming somebody else`s problem. It`s true that war is at the centre of the election campaign - just not the one in Iraq. The talk is all of what happened on Swift boats 35 years ago, not what is being dropped out of US AC-130 gunships this week.

But while Vietnam has taken up far too much space in this campaign already, I find myself thinking about the words of Vietnam veteran and novelist Tim O`Brien. In an interview for the 1980 documentary Vietnam: The 10,000 Day War, he said: "My time in Vietnam is a memory of ignorance and I mean utter ignorance. I didn`t know the language. I couldn`t communicate with the Vietnamese except in pidgin English. I knew nothing about the culture of Vietnam. I knew nothing about the religions. I knew nothing about the village community. I knew nothing about the aims of the people, whether they were for the war or against the war ... No knowledge of what the enemy was after ... and I compensated for that ignorance in a whole bunch of ways, some evil ways. Blowing things up, burning huts as a frustration of being ignorant and not knowing where the enemy was."

He could have been talking about Iraq today. When a foreign army invades a country about which it knows virtually nothing, there is plenty of deliberate brutality, but there is also the unintended barbarism of blind ignorance. It starts with cultural and religious slights: soldiers storming into a home without giving women a chance to cover their heads; army boots traipsing through mosques that have never been touched by the soles of shoes; a misunderstood hand signal at a checkpoint with deadly consequences.

And now Najaf. It`s not just that sacred burial sites are being desecrated with fresh blood; it`s that Americans appear unaware of the depths of this offence, and the repercussions it will have for decades to come. The Imam Ali shrine is not a run-of-the-mill holy site; it`s the Shia equivalent of the Sistine Chapel. Najaf is not just another Iraqi city, it is the city of the dead, where the cemeteries go on for ever, a place so sacred that every devout Shia dreams of being buried there. And Moqtada al-Sadr and his followers are not just another group of generic terrorists out to kill Americans: their opposition to the occupation represents the overwhelmingly mainstream sentiment in Iraq. Yes, if elected, Sadr would try to turn Iraq into a theocracy like Iran, but for now his demands are for direct elections and an end to foreign occupation.

Compare O`Brien`s humility with the cockiness of Glen Butler, a major in the marines whose August 23 New York Times article reads as if it were ghostwritten by Karl Rove. Butler brags that though he has been in Iraq for a month, he "know a bit about the caliph, about the five pillars and about Allah". He explains that by swooping low over Najaf`s cemeteries, he is not inflaming anti-US hatred but "attacking the source of the threat". He dismisses his enemies as foreign fighters and ex-Ba`athists and "a few frustrated Iraqis who worry about Wal-Mart culture infringing on their neighbourhood".

It`s hard to know where to begin. The Mahdi army that Butler is attacking is made up of Iraqi citizens, not foreigners. They are not Ba`athists: they were the most oppressed under Saddam`s regime and cheered his overthrow. And they aren`t worried that Wal-Mart is taking over their neighbourhood: they are enraged that they still lack electricity and sewage treatment, despite the billions pledged for reconstruction.

Before Sadr`s supporters began their uprising, they made their demands for elections and an end to occupation through sermons, peaceful protests and newspaper articles. US forces responded by shutting down their newspapers, firing on their demonstrations and bombing their neighbourhoods. It was only then that Mr Sadr went to war against the occupation. And every round fired out of Butler`s helicopter doesn`t make Des Moines and Santa Monica safer, as he claims. It makes the Mahdi army stronger.

As I write, the plan for the convention demonstration seems to be to express general outrage about Iraq, to say "no to war" and "no to the Bush agenda". This is an important message, but it`s not enough. We also need to hear specific demands to end the disastrous siege on Najaf, and unequivocal support for Iraqis who are desperate for democracy and an end to occupation.

The US antiwar coalition, United for Peace and Justice states that "there are two key moments this year when people throughout the United States will have the opportunity to send a resounding message of opposition to the Bush agenda: November 2, election day; and August 29, in New York City". Sadly, this isn`t the case: there is no chance for Bush`s war agenda to be clearly rejected on election day because John Kerry is promising to continue, and even strengthen, the military occupation of Iraq. That means there is only one chance for Americans to express their wholehearted rejection of the ongoing war on Iraq: in the streets outside the Republican national convention. It`s time to bring Najaf to New York.

This column was first published in The Nation www.thenation.com
Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2004

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Für die Zerstörungen in Natjaf ist von US-Seite das 7. Kavallerie Regiment verantwortlich.
Das ist das Regiment, dass unter General Custer die Schlacht bei Big Horn gegen die Indianer verloren hat und dort vernichtet wurde.
Custer wird öfter in Kommentaren mit Bush verglichen, weil sie beide das gleiche Verhältnis zur Realität haben und auch beide beratungsresitent sein sollen bzw gewesen sein sollen.


washingtonpost.com
Iraqi Holy City Left Broken by Urban Warfare

By Karl Vick
Washington Post Foreign Service
Friday, August 27, 2004; Page A01

NAJAF, Iraq, Aug. 26 -- Lt. Col. Jim Rainey describes the battle here as "tackle football in the hallway, with no roof on the hallway." It`s an apt analogy for urban warfare in sometimes extremely close quarters.

But after 21 days of merciless battering by U.S. weapons, parts of Najaf have very nearly no hallway at all. Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani, the most influential Shiite cleric in Iraq, negotiated a cease-fire Thursday, but not before parts of Najaf had been devastated.

Pinpoint fire and tight restrictions on munitions ensure that the gold-domed Imam Ali shrine remained all but unscathed. But the core of the city around it, a destination of longing for millions of Shiite Muslims, is so mauled that American commanders debate which famously ruined wartime cityscape Najaf now resembles most.

"It`s like Stalingrad," a senior 5th Cavalry officer said.

"Sarajevo," Rainey maintained.

"Beirut," a Marine commander said.

"Not Dresden," an Army field officer said while standing watch at a panorama of blackened, half-destroyed buildings a few dozen yards north of the glittering shrine. "Not enough fire."
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The damage to Najaf is the consequence of an urban setting for battle, a woefully overmatched enemy and an American military doctrine that unites terrifying firepower with almost zero tolerance for casualties in its own ranks.

"If we take fire from it, we destroy the whole building," an Army commander said Thursday, after he ordered junior officers in his headquarters to do just that, once they received clearance, against a structure the Mahdi Army militia, the enemy here, was using as a firebase.

The staff had a broad assortment of weapons available at the other end of their radio handsets: the Marines` 155mm howitzers just behind the headquarters, Apache helicopter gunships on alert or swooping menacingly over the battlefield and a fighter-bomber on station at 10,000 feet.

At one point this week, soldiers from a 1st Cavalry Division battalion led by M1-A1 Abrams tanks and heavily armored Bradley Fighting Vehicles watched in bemused wonder as their opponent sent a donkey with a rocket-propelled grenade strapped to its side onto the field of battle. The remote triggering device was a string running toward the building corner from which the animal had emerged.

"We actually had reports of `engage and destroy the donkey,` " said Maj. Tim Karcher of the 7th Cavalry Regiment. The animal appears to have died as another enemy casualty.

The 7th Cav, once led by Gen. George Custer at Little Big Horn, has fared better in Najaf. Since arriving from north of Baghdad and setting up a cordon around a large section of the city south of the shrine, the unit`s 2nd Battalion has fought almost nonstop for two weeks without losing a single soldier.

Perhaps the closest call came this week, when a grenade exploded in a basement room where Sgt. Varitogi Taetulli was wrestling an insurgent. The fight was a miniature version of the larger battle: Taetulli, from American Samoa, weighs 230 pounds. The militiaman weighed perhaps half as much.

But the crucial advantage was that Taetulli was wearing an armored vest. He escaped the grenade explosion alive and hollering to get back in the fight. The militiaman died immediately.

"It`s the best feeling in the world," Karcher said of the armor, technology and munitions that safeguard the U.S. force. "We`ve been given the best tools in the world for waging war."

The battle for Najaf has been a study in the urban warfare that conventional wisdom says can only cause high American casualties. That is what U.S. invasion planners feared -- and subordinates of deposed president Saddam Hussein promised -- would occur last year in a protracted fight for Baghdad that never came.

Officers of the 7th Cavalry said their experience over the past two weeks found such fears exaggerated. So far, 11 Americans have died in the fighting; Iraqi health officials say that hundreds of militiamen and other people have lost their lives.

The 2nd Battalion was told to tighten the armored cordon around Najaf`s old city, moving more than a mile through dense residential neighborhoods where Mahdi Army irregulars had enjoyed free rein.

But there was little house-to-house fighting, officers said. Maj. Scott Jackson, the 2nd Battalion`s executive officer, described U.S. forces advancing using a kind of citified version of the island-hopping strategy used in World War II in the Pacific, attacking the militia at its strong points and establishing strong points of its own, then dominating the surrounding terrain. Tanks were very useful.

One strong point was tall buildings, which offered platforms for scores of American snipers. Precision fire was a must, given the bar imposed on firing heavy guns toward the shrine.

The other strong point was schools. Militiamen found them convenient places to store arms and mount defenses. The 7th Cavalry took four on their march toward the shrine complex, in some cases shelling schoolhouses that other U.S. forces had boasted of rehabilitating as part of Iraq`s reconstruction.

One recent day, at the forward-most school the U.S. soldiers had occupied, a heavy machine gun was mounted on a child`s desk and an orange banner hung from a second-story window to warn pilots against bombing the school by mistake.

At the same time, the 7th Cavalry made efforts to show goodwill to residents who stuck it out through the fighting. More than once, medics set up a mobile clinic to treat Najafis, while soldiers handed out food -- pre-packaged chicken and beef dishes labeled in Arabic as halal, or approved for the Muslim diet.

"The way you defeat an insurgency is by co-opting the population," Jackson said. "You don`t end an insurgency by leveling the city."

And yet, when the 7th Cavalry arrived at the road that rings the shrine`s immediate neighborhood like a moat, it let loose a furious barrage. Multi-story buildings at the main intersection of the ring road crumbled under the Americans` combined-weapons warfare -- bombs and missiles from the skies, shells from distant artillery, direct fire from the 25mm chain guns of Bradley Fighting Vehicles and the 120mm cannons of tanks.

The intersection that pilgrims approach immediately before sighting the splendid shrine is now a hellish landscape of standing water, Swiss cheese walls and ruined hotels.

Less than a mile away, the northern approach to the shrine is battle-savaged as well, framed by a bent metal banner proclaiming that in the end only God will be alive.

"We are destroying this city," a Marine officer said with a sigh at one point in the battle, described by some locals as a siege.

How the Arab world sees the damage is a question that field commanders said they had little time to ask themselves as they constantly changed battle plans. Several noted it was Sadr who brought the fight to the holy city, not them.

Field commanders add that key decisions on what to attack in the city, and how strongly, were made by senior officials in the U.S. command and Iraq`s interim government. The Iraqis, who saw the militia takeover of Najaf as the most severe test to date of its new authority, had the ultimate say, the Americans say.

But it would not hurt, one officer said, to announce reconstruction plans right away. If the destruction "is the price of shoring up the Iraqi government, then okay," one U.S. commander said while standing in the ruins. "But it probably wouldn`t hurt if we found a way to make things right here."

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washingtonpost.com
Love or Ideology? Heart or Strategy?

By E. J. Dionne Jr.

Friday, August 27, 2004; Page A21

Vice President Cheney has a lesbian daughter who matters more to him than ideology. So on Tuesday he said that people "ought to be free to enter into any kind of relationship they want to" and that states ought to make their own decisions on marriage laws.

Cheney made his pro-gay statement on the same day that the Republican platform committee contradicted him, endorsing President Bush`s call for a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage.

"Attempts to redefine marriage in a single city or state could have serious consequences throughout the country," the platform plank read, "and anything less than a constitutional amendment, passed by Congress and ratified by the states, is vulnerable to being overturned by activist judges."

That was pretty strong language. But social conservatives were so outraged by Cheney`s statement that on Wednesday they hardened the platform to be even more anti-gay, insisting not only on the amendment but that same-sex couples not receive the legal benefits set aside for married couples. The platform writers urged that federal courts be stripped of any authority to overturn state laws banning gay marriage.

Please forgive me for a certain skepticism. Cheney`s comments made the front pages, burying the news of the hard-line platform. In light of the Republicans` strategy at their convention next week -- to put up one moderate speaker after another by way of pretending that their party is far less right-wing than it is -- Cheney`s comments would seem to be perfectly on message. Distracting attention from this administration`s commitments to the right is essential to Bush, who has been performing rather badly among independents and moderates in the polls.

So, no, I won`t swoon over Cheney`s dissent from Republican orthodoxy on gay marriage. But there is a more benign explanation of what Cheney did, and I offer an example from my own family to suggest that if you know and care deeply about someone who is gay or lesbian, you simply have to reject anti-gay bigotry, just as Cheney did.

My late mother was a devout Catholic and as committed to old-fashioned family values as anyone I have ever known. She also had a gay godson, my cousin, who was (and remains) as warm and generous a person as you would ever want to know. He loved my mom and was very devoted to her all her life, and my mother loved him back just as much.

When my mother discovered my cousin was gay -- she was, I think, early among the relatives to know this -- she not only accepted the fact, she embraced him and his partner. And she became a committed supporter of gay rights simply because she believed that any attack on gays constituted an attack on her godson.

I am certain that Dick Cheney feels the same kind of love for his daughter, and thank God he did not let politics get in the way.

As Steve Gunderson, a former Republican congressman from Wisconsin who is gay, says: "When you personalize these things and talk from the heart, you`re 10 times more powerful because the heart always trumps ideology."

Moreover, even if Cheney`s statement was primarily a politically shrewd tilt toward the center, the vice president thereby demonstrated that the gay marriage issue is not the sure-fire winner in this election that many social conservatives think it is. Gunderson is happy with Cheney`s statement, no matter what the motivation was: "I`m trying to find out if this is from the heart, which I commend, or if it is strategic, which I also commend."

I write all this without any hostility toward opponents of gay marriage. On the contrary, I have been slow to embrace the cause myself. I`ve thought that the country has moved so far, so fast toward a proper openness toward people who are gay and lesbian that it may be too much to ask for a quick acceptance of homosexual matrimony. To this straight guy, civil unions seemed a reasonable compromise.

Then I called my cousin Donald, who lives in Massachusetts, to ask if he would mind if I recounted the story of his relationship with my mom. He was not only happy to have the story told, he was moved because he never knew how much my mother`s love for him had affected her view of the gay rights question. And he told me that he and his partner of 31 years had married on May 27. I have a feeling that my late mom, who believed in love and fidelity, is somewhere smiling about this.

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Sentient Non-Idiots For Kerry
Repubs pick a fight about Vietnam while Bush ruins America right now? Is the nation drunk?
- By Mark Morford, SF Gate Columnist
Friday, August 27, 2004

And isn`t it funny how at least 13 members of Congress have actually requested that the United Nations monitor this year`s U.S. presidential election, just because, just in case, just to ensure there`s no voter rolling and election rigging and chad hanging and outright shameless Florida reaming like last time?

And isn`t it even more funny how, when firebrand U.S. Rep. Corrine Brown, from Florida, brought the issue up on the floor of Congress, she was actually shouted down by the Republicans, scolded that she was out of order and told her comments should be stricken from the record?

And they all screamed and stomped and huffed and puffed and said no way should there be any oversight of this year`s election, even though there is indeed a gross pile of mounting evidence that there`s nothing stopping BushCo from simply stealing the election all over again. Isn`t that funny?

It`s enough to make you laugh `til you gag. And choke. And move to Canada.

And isn`t it hilarious how the absolute worst thing the Right has been able to dredge up about John Kerry is that he might sort of maybe have exaggerated some facts about his various Vietnam medals and acts of and valor and deeds of astounding heroism, which is sort of like saying well sure you saved 10 babies from that burning building, but jeez, you were wearing special shoes at the time and by the way couldn`t you have saved 11? Traitor!

And how hard should we guffaw while we note that, as Kerry was volunteering in Vietnam and earning his medals and risking his life in the most volatile and ugly and pointless and lethal and hideous war in American history unless you count Iraq, which you really really should, Dubya was "serving" in the Air National Guard, which we all know translates to mean "hangin` down in Tijuana slamming tequila shooters and annoying the waitresses, all while praising Jesus that he had a daddy who could keep him away from scary complicated violent stuff."

Whoa. Let me take that back. That was totally out of line and inappropriate and disrespectful of our fine incoherent president, and I have absolutely no proof that Dubya was such an embarrassment, such an incompetent AWOL serviceman. Very sorry.

After all, as I`ve mentioned in this column before, no one really knows what Bush was doing all those blurry, gin-soaked years in the National Guard. No one knows, because all of Dubya`s military-service records just recently disappeared from Pentagon archives. Poof! Just like that! And then some of the missing payroll records were magically "found" again, though they still don`t answer any questions regarding Bush`s whereabouts that year. Imagine! Isn`t it funny? What a thing.

So, let`s see: Bona-fide war hero turned incredibly articulate, educated, gifted Vietnam War protester and respected senator on one side, alcoholic AWOL failed-businessman born-again pampered daddy`s boy evangelical Christian on the other. Is this really the contest? Bush slugs gin and tonics like Evian while Kerry is accused of ... what again? Not being incredibly heroic enough? Wow.

This is not, apparently, a hallucination. Kerry really is being forced to defend his well-documented war record, despite how all the proofs are there, in public view, on the candidate`s own Web site, with nothing to hide and for all to see, whereas Dubya was (and still is) a famously inept embarrassment to the military, and is being forced to defend nothing about his own spoiled spoon-fed life, as he humiliates the nation at every utterance and attacks Kerry (and, by extension, John McCain) via GOP-sponsored henchmen while large chunks of his own embarrassing records have just, um, "disappeared."

What, too bitter? Resentful? Too much like I advocate stringing Karl Rove up by his large intestine and slapping him with a rainbow flag until he cries? All apologies.

Hey, it happens. Sometimes you just gotta purge. Vent. Let it all out. Because, really, it all makes you ask: Is everyone on drugs? Mass delusional? Are we just blind? Or is the vicious GOP spin machine really that powerful? Why, yes, yes, it is. And isn`t it just the funniest thing?

But, wait, there`s more. The GOP is also accusing Kerry of a nasty bout of "flip flopping" on a handful of issues. Griping that he`s changed his mind on a few key pieces of legislation, not the least of which is his support for war on Iraq. And the USA Patriot Act. Which is, you know, sort of true.

But, then again, not really, not considering how nearly every single congressperson was equally duped by the vicious GOP war machine, the outright WMD lies and BushCo`s post-9/11 propaganda and the invidious USA Patriot Act midnight ream-through. Hell, Kerry was just as misled as the rest of us.

Is Kerry culpable for his own choices and for making errors in judgment and for not always being absolutely flawlessly progressive in his decisions? Hell, yes. But does his record of such errors pale in comparison to Bush`s mile-high ream of lies and flip-flops and outright slaps in the face of your humanity? Oh my God yes, yes, it does.

But lo, let us not hold back any longer. Let us now laugh out loud, hold our sides in pain, gasp for air as we look at the BushCo "flip flop" record, in sum. Let us observe the short list of issues about which BushCo has either completely reversed his position, or has simply openly lied to the nation about to further his administration`s shockingly small-minded, self-serving corporate agenda:

The creation of the 9/11 commission. The Iraq WMD investigation. The Israeli/Palestine conflict. Nation building. Same-sex marriage. Veterans` benefits. The value of Osama bin Laden. The Saddam/al Qaeda link. North Korea. The U.N. vote on Iraq. "Mission accomplished." Ahmed Chalabi. Steel tariffs. The Department of Homeland Security. Campaign-finance reform. Energy policy. Hybrid cars. The deficit. Assault weapons. Abortion. Science. Global warming. The environment.

And the list, as they say, goes on. And on. And on.

It`s a masterful deflection by the GOP spin doctors, really, away from Bush`s truly appalling record of flagrant deceit and his title as the hands-down worse environmental president in the history of the United States, toward Kerry`s much more highly respected record, wherein he has, among other accomplishments, earned the highest possible rating from various international environmental groups.

And, finally, isn`t it funny -- in a nauseating, soul-mauling sort of way -- that 52 American soldiers have died in BushCo`s completely useless little Iraq war just this month alone. How very touching, their noble sacrifice. Too bad Bush doesn`t care.

Let us just laugh and laugh at how the media barely covers these pedestrian, boring deaths anymore, instead allowing the GOP to turn the debate into one about a miserable, lost war that happened nearly 30 years ago, all while U.S. soldiers continue to die every day, right now, for no justifiable reason whatsoever.

Yes, let us laugh until we cry. Let us note how the Bush-induced death toll is now up to 964 U.S. soldiers -- a staggering 855 above the total since the infamous, insulting "Mission accomplished" quip -- which is, if the GOP plays it just so, right on track to reach 1,000 U.S. dead by the time the Republican convention kicks into high gear. What fun!

And that 1,000th soldier will fall in abject pain, his or her life utterly wasted for a cause that never really existed, that no one actually believes in, that was all built on a lie to begin with. And he or she will die just as all the war hawks and all the right-wing homophobes and all the cigar-chompin` corporate CEOs gather in New York and pop their champagne and cheer the true triumvirate o` GOP happiness: God, guns and money.



Mark Morford`s Notes & Errata column appears every Wednesday and Friday on SF Gate, unless it appears on Tuesdays and Thursdays, which it never does. Subscribe to this column at sfgate.com/newsletters.


URL: http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/gate/archive/200…

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Friday, August 27, 2004

Thousands Stream into Shrine of Ali
Muqtada orders Followers to Disarm

[urlCNN`s Kianne Sadeq]http://edition.cnn.com/2004/WORLD/meast/08/27/iraq.main/[/url] continues her excellent reportage from Najaf. She and her team report that supporters of Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani streamed into the shrine of Ali in Najaf. After reaching an agreement with Sistani, Muqtada pledge to ask his men to leave the shrine. Sistani wants Najaf and Kufa to be demilitarized. Muqtada al-Sadr`s men used the microphones ordinarily employed for the call to prayer to relay his message that the Mahdi Army should lay down its arms. Wire reports suggest that some were obeying the order. With all those pilgrims now in the shrine, it will be easy for the Mahdi Army fighters to slip away if they so choose.

Sadeq also says that Qasim Dawoud, the Minister of State for Military Affairs, has pledged that Muqtada al-Sadr would be a free man as a result of the agreement he reached with Sistani. Dawoud said,

"Muqtada al-Sadr is free to go anywhere he likes. ... He is as free as any Iraqi citizen."



Meanwhile, the full extent of the destruction inflicted on Najaf by the US military may never be fully appreciated in the U.S. itself. How many civilians did our troops kill in their campaign in a densely populated urban area against the Sadrist street gangs? I find chilling the words ofJohn Burns and Dexter Filkin of the New York Times


` One of the last American actions before the cease-fire went into effect involved the use of a 2,000-pound, laser-guided bomb to strike a hotel about 130 yards from the shrine`s southwest wall, in an area known to American commanders as "motel row." `



Al-Hayat reports that while he was in London, a delegation of Iranians came to see Sistani and to request that he support a bigger role for Iran in Iraq. He is said to have rejected this overture vehemently, and to have decided in the aftermath to return to Iraq without coordinating that step with the British, American or Iraqi governments.

Winners and losers:

I think the big losers from the Najaf episode (part deux) are the Americans. They have become, if it is possible, even more unpopular in Iraq than they were last spring after Abu Ghuraib, Fallujah and Najaf Part 1. The US is perceived as culturally insensitive for its actions in the holy city of Najaf.

The Allawi government is also a big loser. Instead of looking decisive, as they had hoped, they ended up looking like the lackeys of neo-imperialists.

The big winner is Sistani, whose religious charisma has now been enhanced by solid nationalist credentials. He is a national hero for saving Najaf.

For Muqtada, it is a wash. He did not have Najaf until April, anyway, and cn easily survive not having it. His movement in the slums of the southern cities is intact, even if its paramilitary has been weakened.

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Thoughts on the Middle East, History,and Religion
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#20685 stammt natürlich von Prof.Cole Home Page.

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Das was aus Sadr geworden ist, haben die USA aus ihm gemacht. Die Ungeschicklichkeit persönlich, Bremer, hat Sadr immer wieder in den Mittelpunkt gerückt. Auch die Beschuldigungen gegen ihn stammen aus den gleichen Quellen. Es bestehen nach Aussage vieler keinerlei Beweise, dass Sadr hinter den Taten steht, die ihm zur Last gelegt werden.
Aber sowas ist bei den USA wohl üblich, dass sie ihre Popanze je nach Bedarf aufbauen oder wieder in der Versenkung verschwinden lassen.
Im Irak sind sie bis jetzt mit der Taktik auf den Bauch gefallen.

SPIEGEL ONLINE - 27. August 2004, 12:54
URL: http://www.spiegel.de/politik/ausland/0,1518,315346,00.html

Analyse zum Nadschaf-Plan

Sistanis Triumph

Von Alexander Schwabe

Sieg und Niederlage liegen nahe beieinander - manchmal sind sie deckungsgleich. Schiitenführer Muktada al-Sadr muss zwar die Imam-Ali-Moschee räumen, doch dadurch zieht er zugleich seinen Kopf aus der Schlinge. Der von Großajatollah Sistani an Autorität weit übertroffene Sadr wird die USA auch weiterhin piesacken.

Gegen den Mann liegt ein Haftbefehl vor. Schon vor Monaten war er von einem irakischen Richter ausgestellt worden. Er wird schwerer Verbrechen beschuldigt. Er soll mehrere hohe schiitische Geistliche aus dem Weg geräumt haben und für den Tod von nahezu hundert Pilgern verantwortlich sein. Und nun das: Muktada al-Sadr kommt erneut ungeschoren davon.

Bereits im April, als es in Nadschaf zu schweren Kämpfen kam, war es erklärtes Ziel der amerikanischen Besatzungsmacht im Irak, den Haftbefehl zu vollstrecken. Der einstige amerikanische Zivilverwalter im Irak, Paul Bremer, hatte ihn bereits zum Geächteten erklärt. Mehrere Ultimaten gegen ihn verstrichen.

Spätestens seit dem Frühjahr sind die Amerikaner Sadr auf den Fersen. Nun hatten sie ihn und seine rund 400 Kämpfer in der Altstadt von Nadschaf in die Enge getrieben. Nie waren sie seiner Kapitulation näher. Zwar wäre es nicht angeraten gewesen, die Imam-Ali-Moschee zu bombardieren, eines der wichtigsten Heiligtümer der Schiiten, in dem der Cousin und Schwiegersohn des Propheten Mohammed und Gründer der schiitischen Glaubensrichtung begraben sein soll. Doch den fülligen Prediger und seine Gefolgsleute auszuhungern und so zum Aufgeben zu zwingen hätte gelingen müssen.


Die Amerikaner aber ließen ihre Chance während der Abwesenheit von Großajatollah Ali al-Sistani verstreichen. Als dieser aus London zurückkam, wo er am Herzen behandelt wurde, und wieder irakischen Boden betrat, war es zu spät. Der Geistliche rief die Schiiten auf, nach Nadschaf zu strömen und zog in einem riesigen Konvoi - wie er eigentlich nur in einem klamaukartigen Action-Streifen vorstellbar ist - selbst in die Stadt ein.

Sistani steht nun als Mann der Stunde da. Er hat demonstriert, dass er die derzeit einzige Machtinstanz im Süden des Irak ist - und sein Gegner Sadr hat ihn dank seiner Rebellion gegen die Besatzungsmacht inthronisiert. So spielt der greise Sistani seinem jungen Rivalen Sadr zu, indem er ihm einen Ausweg aus der verfahrenen Lage beschert, und dieser jenem, indem er ihm den Auftritt als Friedensapostel ermöglicht. Für die Übergangsregierung mit ihrer folgenlosen Politik der Ultimaten ist das eine Demütigung.

Die Schiiten scheinen ihre Probleme selbst zu lösen - Bagdad spielt in Nadschaf keine Rolle. Das Pokerspiel um die Macht am heiligen Schrein hat die Schiiten politisch gestärkt. Von einem Zentralirak reden nur noch Illusionisten; mehr als eine Föderation mit Sunniten und Kurden kann man sich an Euphrat und Tigris nach den Ereignissen der vergangenen Tage kaum mehr vorstellen.

Der 74-jährige Sistani erweist sich einmal mehr als geschickter Taktiker und Machtpolitiker. Bereits als die USA im vergangenen Jahr versuchten, eine Nachkriegsordnung zu schaffen, und Sistani dafür gewinnen wollten, ihren Plan von Regionalversammlungen zu unterstützen, die zu einer Verfassung gebenden Übergangsregierung führen sollten, weigerte er sich, US-Gesandte zu empfangen, und demonstrierte, dass weder Bagdad noch Washington im Süden etwas zu melden haben.

Sistani diktierte den Besatzern und dem Ministerpräsident Ijad Alawi von ihren Gnaden nicht nur den - vorläufigen - Frieden von Nadschaf, sondern nebenbei gleich eine seiner alten Forderungen: Die irakische Übergangsregierung soll schnellstmöglich freie Wahlen abhalten. Diese kommen Sistani gelegener denn je: Seine Popularität ist auf dem Höhepunkt - und 60 Prozent der rund 23 Millionen Iraker gehören den Schiiten an.

Zugleich gibt es freilich keinen Grund, anzunehmen, Sadr würde künftig Ruhe geben. Die Liste der ihm zur Last gelegten Verbrechen ist lang. Viele Gläubige sind überzeugt, dass er nach dem Sturz Saddams systematisch hohe schiitische Geistliche aus dem Weg geräumt hat, um selbst Macht anzuhäufen, die ihm angesichts seiner geringen theologischen Kompetenz nicht zugetragen wird. Allein sein Name verschafft ihm Ansehen, denn sein vor fünf Jahren von Saddams Killern umgebrachte Vater Mohammed Sadek al-Sadr, ein alter Rivale Sistanis, war eine theologische Autorität.

So soll er hinter einem verheerenden Anschlag stecken, dem vor genau einem Jahr auf dem Vorplatz der Grabmoschee von Nadschaf fast hundert Menschen zum Opfer fielen, als sie nach dem Freitagsgebet aus dem Gotteshaus kamen. Das Attentat, ausgeführt durch eine Autobombe, galt Ajatollah Mohammed Bakir al-Hakim, dem Führer des "Obersten Rates der Islamischen Revolution im Irak", der dabei auch getötet wurde. Ebenfalls vor einem Jahr wurde der aus dem Londoner Exil zurückkehrende, Amerika-freundliche Schiitenführer Abd al-Madschid al-Chui nahe der Goldenen Moschee in einen Hinterhalt gelockt und erstochen - auch dafür sollen Sadr und seine Schergen verantwortlich sein.

Spätestens wenn Sistani das Zeitliche segnen wird, oder wenn Sadr ihm als Zündler gegen die USA wieder gelegen kommt, wird es zur alten Konfrontation kommen. Das Problem Sadr ist nur vertagt.

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Eine Bananenrepublik wählt!

SPIEGEL ONLINE - 27. August 2004, 19:08
URL: http://www.spiegel.de/politik/ausland/0,1518,315527,00.html

US-Wahlpannen

Bush und Kerry bringen Juristen-Truppen in Stellung

Von Marc Pitzke, New York

Schwarze Listen, verunsicherte Wähler, mysteriöse Computerdefekte: Wenige Wochen vor dem Stichtag mehren sich in den USA die Vorzeichen eines neuen Wahldebakels. Schon bringen beide Seiten ihre Anwälte in Stellung, um das Wahlergebnis notfalls anzufechten.

New York - Geht es nach den Behörden in Florida, kann Sam Heyward am Tag der US-Präsidentschaftswahlen eigentlich zu Hause bleiben. Die Landesregierung hat dem 45-jährigen invaliden Schwarzen nämlich das Wahlrecht aberkannt. Er selbst wusste davon allerdings bis vor kurzem nichts. Seit Jahrzehnten gibt er ahnungslos seine Stimme ab. Kein einziges Mal ist sie gezählt worden.

"Ich frage mich", seufzt der beinamputierte Ex-Soldat, der heute für eine Kirche in Tallahassee arbeitet, "wie vielen anderen es ähnlich geht."

Die Antwort: 47.763. So viele Namen finden sich auf einer internen "schwarzen Liste", die das Wahlamt von Florida jetzt auf richterliche Anordnung veröffentlichen musste. Die Personen, so die Behörde, seien "mögliche Kriminelle", die ihr Wahlrecht verwirkt hätten. Ihre Stimmen würden automatisch annulliert.

Doch die "Säuberungsliste", wie sie im Behördenjargon heißt, hat noch eine andere Auffälligkeit: Weniger als 20 Prozent der Betroffenen sind registrierte Republikaner. 60 Prozent dagegen sind Demokraten und die meisten davon Schwarze - und Tausende, so stellt sich nun heraus, ganz harmlose Bürger.

Eingeschüchterte Wähler

Zum Beispiel Heyward. Der saß 1981 zwar wegen Hehlerei ein Jahr in Haft. Nach seiner Freilassung erhielt er aber eine rosa Wahlkarte und ein Gnadenschreiben, das sein Wahlrecht wiederherstellte. Dachte er jedenfalls.

"Dies ist kein Einzelfall", sagt Ralph Neas, Präsident der Bürgerrechtsgruppe People for the American Way (PFAW). Ein Bericht über Zweifel am Wahlablauf, den PFAW gemeinsam mit der nationalen US-Schwarzenvereinigung NAACP jetzt vorgelegt hat, liest sich wie ein Orwell-Roman. Titel: "Einschüchterung und Unterdrückung von Wählern in Amerika".

Demnach war der Wahlskandal von 2000 - bei dem es neben dem Auszähl-Malheur ja noch viele weitere Ungereimtheiten gab - nur ein Vorgeschmack auf das, was im November landesweit drohen könnte: schwarze Listen, parteiliche Wahlhelfer (auf beiden Seiten), Stimmen-Manipulation. "Die Legitimität der Wahl 2004", sagt Neas, "steht in Frage."

Das sind dramatische Vorwürfe, doch sie werden längst nicht mehr nur von Demokraten erhoben, den Verlierern von 2000. Auf beiden Seiten florieren wilde Verschwörungstheorien. Es sei mit "substanziellen Gelegenheiten für Wahlbetrug" zu rechnen, warnt John Fraser, Wahlexperte der republikanischen Anwaltsvereinigung RNLA. Sowohl Präsident George W. Bush als auch sein Herausforderer John Kerry haben deshalb bereits jetzt ganze Armadas von Juristen angeheuert - einzig um das Wahlergebnis im November beim kleinsten Fehler der Gegenseite sofort anzufechten.

Vorbestraft fürs Jahr 2007

In der Tat mehren sich in vielen US-Staaten schon heute die Vorzeichen für ein neues Wahldebakel - ob durch Inkompetenz der Verantwortlichen, technische Macken oder womöglich düstere Manöver. "Es besteht die ernsthafte Möglichkeit", schreibt der Ökonom Paul Krugman in der "New York Times", "dass das Ergebnis der Wahlen suspekt sein wird."

Ein Brennpunkt ist wieder mal Florida, der Staat des Desasters von 2000, regiert vom Präsidentenbruder Jeb Bush. Als der "Miami Herald" nach der Wahl recherchierte, entpuppten sich 2119 auf der Blacklist vermerkte Personen als unbescholtene Bürger. Bei einigen ist die "Vorstrafe" plump auf die Zukunft datiert, etwa aufs Jahr 2007.

Die Behörde sagt, all das seien Versehen. Bürgerrechtler verweisen hingegen darauf, dass nur ein Bruchteil der Betroffenen weiße Republikaner seien. "Dies ist ein kalkulierter Versuch des Gouverneurs, die Wahl für seinen Bruder zu entscheiden", sagt Randy Berg, Chef der Rechtshilfegruppe Florida Justice Institute.

Mit Waffen zu Seniorenwählern

Ähnliche Listen gibt es nach Informationen der US-Bürgerrechtskommission aber auch in mindestens 14 anderen Bundesstaaten. Überprüft wurde davon bisher noch keine.

Andere Wahlturbulenzen werden aus Orlando gemeldet. Dort steht der Sieger der jüngsten Bürgermeisterwahl - ein Demokrat - im Verdacht, sich von schwarzen Senioren Stimmen erkauft zu haben. Er gewann mit nur 234 Stimmen Vorsprung. Im Zuge der Ermittlungen statteten bewaffnete Polizisten des Department of Law Enforcement, das Bush unterstellt ist, den Betroffenen Hausbesuche ab. "Die wollten uns einschüchtern", schimpfte Eugene Poole, der schwarze Präsident der Florida Voting League, daraufhin. "Die wollen, dass wir der nächsten Wahl fern bleiben."

Glaubt man den Republikanern, sind aber eben auch die Demokraten nicht ohne. Auf einer Tagung befasste sich die republikanische Anwaltsvereinigung RNLA neulich fast ausschließlich damit, was die Gegner "alles anstellen, um Wahlbetrug zu begehen und so um jeden Preis zu gewinnen". Zum Beispiel: Wahllokale in demokratischen Bezirken länger als erlaubt offen halten; telefonische Beeinflussung von Wählern am Wahltag; Manipulation der Wählerlisten. "Shocking!", schimpft RNLA-Vizepräsidentin Deanna Mool.

Stimmen abgezogen statt addiert

Dann sind da die neuen Wahlcomputer. Nach dem Debakel von 2000 erließ der Kongress ein Gesetz zur Modernisierung der Wahltechnik. Fast ein Drittel aller US-Wahlbezirke hat seither von den antiquierten Stanzautomaten auf elektronische Maschinen umgestellt. Doch auch bei denen geht es nicht mit rechten Dingen zu. Eine Studie der New York University fand erhebliche Sicherheitsmängel: Computer-Hacker schafften es, die Geräte zu manipulieren; Hard- und Software seien "verwundbar für Attacken". In Maryland sabotierte die Landesregierung in einem Test ihre eigenen Wahlapparate. Aktivisten tragen seitdem T-Shirts mit dem Aufdruck: "Der Computer hat meine Stimme gefressen."

Nicht nur Labortests gingen in die Hose. In vielen Bundesstaaten hat die neue Technologie bei Kommunal- und Landeswahlen bereits elend versagt. Da gingen Stimmen "verloren", "verschwanden", wurden "nicht registriert", "abgezogen statt addiert" oder kategorisch "für immer denselben Kandidaten verbucht".

Wahlhilfe vom Computerhersteller

Ein Großteil der beanstandeten Maschinen stammt vom Elektronikkonzern Diebold aus Ohio. Dessen CEO Walden O`Dell - der seit 1991 fast 350.000 Dollar an die Republikaner gespendet hat - machte kürzlich mit einem Brief an seine Parteifreunde von sich reden, in dem er schwor, "mitzuhelfen, dass Ohio seine Wahlmännerstimmen an den Präsidenten abliefert". Dazu gibt O`Dell Fundraiser-Feten auf seinem Anwesen Cotswold Manor und war auch schon mal zu Gast auf Bushs Privatranch.

Aber auch Diebolds Konkurrenten Sequoia und ES&S sind nicht viel besser. Sequoia ist für jüngste Wahlprobleme in Palm Beach in Florida verantwortlich. EB&B, das von prominenten Republikanern mitfinanziert wird, kam ins Gerede, als es ungeprüfte Software auslieferte.

Anwälte in jedem Wahlbezirk

John Kerry hat in Erwartung derlei Unbotsamkeiten in allen Bundesstaaten Task Forces aus insgesamt 2000 Anwälten in Stellung gebracht, davon allein 100 in Florida. Ziel: die Wahlergebnisse in mindestens fünf Staaten gleichzeitig anfechten zu können. In Tallahassee, dem Regierungssitz von Florida, haben die Kerry-Truppen bereits jetzt massenweise Büroraum angemietet oder sich bei freundlich gesinnten Kanzleien einquartiert.

Auch die Republikaner verlieren keine Zeit. Bush hat in jedem Wahlbezirk Anwälte unter Vertrag. Die Anwaltslobby RNLA veranstaltet Wahl-Trainingsseminare für ihre Mitglieder.

Sam Heyward in Tallahassee weiß derweil immer noch nicht, ob er im November wählen darf. Zwar hat Floridas Regierung die schwarze Liste nach all den Protesten jetzt offiziell wieder zurückgezogen. Stattdessen dürfen die Kommunalämter nun aber ihre eigenen Verbotslisten erarbeiten. Denn, so beharrt die republikanische Innenministerin Glenda Hood: "Kriminelle müssen ausgeschlossen bleiben."

© SPIEGEL ONLINE 2004

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WASHINGTON, DC (IWR News Parody) - The New Yorker today released a poster from the Abu Gharib prison that bore the image of Donald Rumsfeld with a modified the seal of the DOD, which replaced the bald eagle with a spread eagle. The magazine said it received the poster from sources inside State Department.

Mr. Rumsfeld was unavailable for comment, but President Bush had the following to say on the subject: "At least now I know what happened to my dirty sock bag. Anyway, I thought Rush Limbaugh cleared all this up last Spring. It`s only a little harmless college prank. Heck, it`s just our way of hazing those uppity Arabs so they`ll be ready for democracy.
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08/26/04 Poll: Presidential Race Tied Going Into GOP Convention

Thursday, August 26, 2004

By Dana Blanton

President George W. Bush (search) is seen as the candidate who would do a better job handling the war against terrorism and a national crisis, while voters see Democrat John Kerry (search) as the candidate better able to create jobs and handle domestic issues like prescription drug benefits. The president has made gains this month in his job performance rating, but the race for the White House remains extremely tight in the week before the Republican National Convention in New York. These are some of the findings of the latest FOX News national poll of likely voters.

The presidential race is tied with Kerry holding a one-point advantage over Bush among likely voters, down from a five-point edge immediately following the Democratic National Convention. When independent candidate Ralph Nader (search) is included, he receives three percent, Kerry 44 percent and Bush 43 percent.

More Bush voters say they back their candidate strongly. Fully 77 percent of Bush supporters say they back him "strongly" compared to 64 percent of Kerry voters.

Both candidates receive equally strong backing from their party faithful; Bush is supported by 88 percent of Republicans and Kerry by 85 percent of Democrats. Kerry has a small six-point edge over Bush among independent voters. By a four-point margin, women are more likely to pick Kerry over Bush, while men are evenly divided.

Among veterans, Bush tops Kerry by 51 percent to 42 percent in the two-way matchup. It should be noted that these results are based on a small number of veterans.

Bush receives his highest support among conservatives, whites, high-income families, those who frequently attend religious services and voters living in the South. Kerry’s strongest backers are young people, non-whites, liberals and those living in the Northeast and West.

Opinion Dynamics Corporation conducted the national telephone poll of 1,000 likely voters for FOX News on August 24-25. "Likely voters" are defined as respondents who are considered more likely to vote in the November presidential election. All FOX News polls between now and Election Day will focus on these voters to get a more accurate estimate of the election outcome.

A 43 percent plurality believes President Bush will win in November while just over a third (35 percent) believe Kerry will win. Republicans are more confident, with 72 percent saying Bush will be re-elected compared to 62 percent of Democrats who believe Kerry will prevail.

Just under half of voters (48 percent) say they would rather have Laura Bush than Teresa Heinz Kerry (33 percent) as first lady of the United States.

Job Ratings

The president’s approval rating has moved back to positive ground this week as 51 percent approve and 43 percent disapprove of his job performance. This is up markedly from three weeks ago, when 45 percent of likely voters approved and 47 percent disapproved of the job Bush was doing as president.

Not surprisingly, Bush voters overwhelmingly approve of the president’s job performance (94 percent), and Kerry voters largely disapprove (85 percent). Among the small number of undecided voters, 39 percent approve and 34 percent disapprove of the job Bush is doing.

The poll asked voters which candidate would do a better job handling various issues. Bush has the edge on the war on terrorism (+16), a national crisis (+13), improving U.S. intelligence operations (+8), Iraq (+5), and appointing justices to the United States Supreme Court (+1).

Kerry is seen as the candidate better able to handle the issue of prescription drug benefits (+19), protecting and creating jobs in the U.S. (+15), Social Security (+13), gas prices (+11), the economy (+6), and gay marriage (+6).

Bush has the advantage over Kerry, 47 percent to 40 percent, as the candidate having "the character to lead the United States through difficult times."

The economy is the issue voters say is most important for the government to address right now, with the war in Iraq, health care, terrorism and national security rounding out the top five spots.

"The fact is that the race hasn`t moved more than a few points off dead even for months. The candidates have spent millions of dollars, interest groups have spent millions more, and nothing has changed," comments Opinion Dynamics President John Gorman. "One reason is that people are increasingly listening only to those with whom they already agree. Many Americans pick their news, their books, and even their singers and comedians based on political orientation."

Economy

A 53 percent majority of voters feels optimistic about the nation’s economy right now, including 27 percent that feel "strongly" optimistic. Four in 10 feel pessimistic about the economy today (21 percent "strongly" pessimistic). Most Republicans are optimistic (80 percent) about the nation’s economy while among Democrats that drops to 33 percent.

Almost six in 10 voters (58 percent) rate their personal financial situation positively, up from 44 percent around this time last year (early September 2003).

Iraq

The public is divided on whether the United States made the right decision in taking military action in Iraq. When asked if taking action was the right decision, based on the intelligence available at the time, 47 percent say it was the right decision and 45 percent think it was the wrong decision. There are large partisan differences here, as 80 percent of Republicans think it was the right decision and almost as many Democrats (73 percent) think it was wrong.

Opinion is also divided on whether the war in Iraq will have been worth it five years from now — 40 percent say yes and 43 percent say no. Even so, half of voters believe the war in Iraq has played an important part in fighting the war against terrorism.

Kerry’s Vietnam Service Record

A group called Swift Boat Veterans for Truth (search) has been running advertisements in battleground states questioning John Kerry’s military record, and the ads have received considerable national media attention. Voters are somewhat split on whether the veterans have been fair in their criticism, but a 45 percent plurality believes the veterans have been unfair.

Over a third (36 percent) believe Kerry has been honest in his portrayal of his Vietnam combat record, 35 percent say he has exaggerated but not lied, 13 percent think he has lied and 16 percent are unsure.

More than twice as many people believe Kerry deserved his Purple Hearts as say his wounds were too minor to deserve that award.

[url• Pdf: Click here for full poll results.]http://www.foxnews.com/projects/pdf/082604_poll.pdf[/url]

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[colr bgcolor=#dddddd]Das Entscheidende bei der Präsidentenwahl sind die Wahlmänner, die jeder Kandidat in den einzelnen Staaten erhält. Da gibt Staaten, die sicher Bush Wählen (Blue states) und die sicher Kerry wählen (red states). Dann gibt es noch die Staaten, in denen die Mehrheit öfter wechselt. Die sogenannten Swing oder Battleground States.
Dies ist eine Aufstellung vom Rasmussen Reports. Solche Wählerbefragungen veröffentlichen alle größeren Zeitungen und auch Fernsehanstalten. Fast jedes große Meinungsforschungsinstitut veröffentlicht Umfragen aus den einzelnen Staaten.
Noch drei Begriffe, tie, toss-up und leans.
Tie: beide Kandidaten sind bei der allgemeinen Umfrage gleich.
Toss-up: In dem Staat liegt die Umfrage innerhalb der Toleranzwerte.
Leans Bush oder Leans Kerry: Die Werte liegen noch immer eng beieinander, aber nicht mehr innerhalb der Toleranz.
Z.B ist es eine große Überraschung, dass Nevada und auch Colorado auf der `Toss-up` Liste stehen. Beim letzten Mal gab es da klare Bush Siege.
So gibt es für jeden Staat eine Bewertung und da hat augenblicklich Kerry einen Vorsprung denn er führt in vielen Staaten, in denen beim letzten Mal Bush gewonnen hat. Und das wäre wahlentscheidend.
Mehr auf der Seite des Reports.
Die Mehrheit sind 270 Wahlmänner.
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Electoral College Projections

http://www.rasmussenreports.com/Electoral%20College%20Projec…

August 22, 2004--As Election 2004 draws closer to its conclusion, the number of Electoral Votes in the Toss-Up category continues to grow. As of today, Rasmussen Reports projections show 152 Electoral Votes in the Toss-Up column.

Prior to this update, the number of Toss-Up Electoral Votes has ranged from 98 to 134 in our projections. Beginning Friday at 3:00 p.m. Eastern, we will update our state-by-state projections to provide a final pre-Convention look at the Electoral College.

At this moment, neither candidate can count on the 270 Electoral Votes needed for victory in November. Senator John Kerry leads in states with 203 Electoral Votes while President George W. Bush is ahead in states with 183 Electoral Votes.

For Kerry, the 203 Electoral Vote projection is his lowest of the year. For Bush, the 183 Electoral Vote projection is just above his lowest total of 177.

The growing number of Toss-Up states was highlighted last week by Colorado, Nevada and New Mexico. Earlier, Nevada and Colorado had been projected as "Leans Bush" and New Mexico as "Leans Kerry."

Also, we are now moving Michigan and Wisconsin moving from "Leans Kerry" to the Toss-Up category. Our last publicly released polls in those states placed them in the "Leans Kerry" category. However, we have just provided new polling updates for 25 states to our Premium Members. Those results are based upon our Tracking Data through August 15 and show the race tightening in a number of states.

That data does show one exception to the growing number of Toss-Up states. Iowa is moving from Toss-Up to "Leans Kerry."

Our state polls will be updated on the public site during the first week in September. Also, after Labor Day, we will provide more frequent updates of state polling data.

Our current projections include August state election polls for Washington, Maine, Ohio, Florida, Oregon, New Jersey, Arkansas, New Mexico, California, Missouri, North Carolina, Virginia, Georgia, Illinois, and Minnesota. Overall, there was little movement in those states relative to the prior month.

At Rasmussen Reports, we consider any state where polls show a candidate leading by less than five percentage points to be a toss-up. Feel free to review our state-by-state listing and share your comments.

Additional state polling data will be released later this week.

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Joe Bageant: `Karaoke night in George Bush`s America`
Posted on Friday, August 27 @ 09:52:45 EDT Another visit to Burt`s Tavern
http://www.smirkingchimp.com/article.php?sid=17584&mode=nest…
By Joe Bageant

73 virgens in arab heaven and not a dam one in this bar!
-- Men`s room wall, Burt`s Westside Tavern

I know it makes me a dinosaur, but I still think there is much to be learned in America`s small neighborhood taverns. I call it my "learning through drinking" program. Here are some things I have learned at Burt`s Westside Tavern:

1: Never shack up with a divorced woman who is two house payments behind and swears you are the best sex she ever had.

2: Never eat cocktail weenies out of the urinal, no matter how big the bet gets.

Learning through drinking was never dull. But when karaoke came to American bars it got even more entertaining, especially at Burt`s where some participants get gussied up for their three weekly minutes of stardom.



One of them is Dink, a stubble-faced 56-year-old guy presently dressed like Waylon Jennings. However, Dink`s undying claim to fame in here in Winchester is not his Waylon imitation, which sucks. It is that he beat up the boxing chimpanzee at the carnival in 1963. This is a damned hard thing to do because chimpanzees are several times stronger than a human and capable of enough rage that the pugilistic primate wore a steel muzzle. Every good old boy in this place swears Dink pounded that chimpanzee so hard it climbed up the cage bars and refused to come back down and that Dink won the hundred dollars. I don`t know. I wasn`t there to see it because my good Christian family did not approve of attending such spectacles. One thing for sure, though. Dink is tough enough to have done it. (By the way, a note to readers who email me asking if names like Dink and Pootie are fictional devices. Hell no! Not only do we have a Dink and a Pootie here, we also have folks named Gator, Fido and Tumbug---who we simply call Bug.)

Anyway, with this older crowd of karaoksters from America`s busted-up laboring lumpen, you can count on least one version of "Good Hearted Woman" or a rendition of "Coal Miner`s Daughter," performed with little skill but a lot of beery heart and feeling. And when it comes to heart and feeling, the best in town is a woman named Dottie. Dot is 59 years old, weighs almost 300 pounds and sings Patsy Cline nearly as well as Patsy sang Patsy. Dot can sing "Crazy" and any other Patsy song ever recorded and a few that went unrecorded. Dot knows Patsy`s unrecorded songs because she knew Patsy personally, as did lots of other people still living in Winchester. We know things such as the way she was treated by the town`s establishment, called a drunken whore and worse, and snubbed and reviled during her life at every opportunity, and is still today sniffed at by the town`s business and political class. But Patsy, who took shit off no one, knew cuss words that would make a Comanche blush, and well, she was one of us. Tough and profane. (As you may have noticed, cussing is a from of punctuation to us.) Patsy grew up on our side of the tracks and suffered all the insults life still inflicts upon working people here. Hers was a hard life.

The fat lady sings, then drops dead. Dot`s life has been every bit as hard as Patsy`s. Harder because she has lived twice as long as Patsy Cline managed to. By the time my people hit 60 they look like a bunch of hypertensive red faced toads in a phlegm coughing contest. Fact is, we are even unhealthier than we look. Doctors tell us that we have blood in our cholesterol and the cops tell us there is alcohol in that blood. True to our class, Dottie is disabled by heart trouble, diabetes and several other diseases. Her blood pressure is so high the doctor at first thought the pressure device was broken. Insurance costs her as much as rent. Her old man makes $8.00 an hour washing cars at a dealership, and if everything goes just right they have about $55 a week for groceries, gas and everything else. But if an extra expense as small as $30 comes in, they compensate by not filling one of Dot`s prescriptions---or two or three of them---in which case she gets sicker and sicker until they can afford the copay to refill the prescriptions again. At 59, these repeated lapses into vessel popping high blood pressure and diabetic surges pretty much guarantee that she won`t collect Social Security for long after she reaches 63. If she reaches 63. One of these days it will truly be over when the fat lady sings.

Dot started working at 13. Married at 15. (Which is no big deal. Throw in "learned to pick a guitar at age six" and you would be describing half the Southerners in my social class and generation.) She has cleaned houses and waited tables and paid into Social Security all her life. But for the last three years Dottie has been unable to work because of her health. (Did I mention that she is slowly going blind to boot?) Dot`s congestive heart problems are such she will barely get through two songs tonight before nearly passing out.

Yet the local Social Security administrators, cold Southern Calvinist hardasses who treat federal dollars as if they were entirely their own---being responsible with the taxpayers` money---have said repeatedly that Dot is capable of fulltime work. To which Dot once replied, "Work? Lady, I cain`t walk nor half see. I cain`t even get enough breath to sing a song. What the hell kinda work you think I can do? Be a tire stop in a parkin` lot?" Not one to be cowed by mere human misery, the administrator had Dot bawling her eyes out before she left that office. In fact, Dottie cries all the time now. Even so, she will sing one, maybe two songs tonight. Then she will get down off the stage with the aid of her cane and be helped into a car and be driven home.

Although my people seem to step on their own dicks (I couldn`t think of a female metaphor) every time they get near polling place, it is not entirely because we are drunken inbreds, although it is a contributing factor. The truth is that Dottie would vote for any candidate, black, white, crippled blind or crazy, that she thought would actually help her. I know because I have asked her if she would vote for a president who wanted a nationalized health care program?" "Vote for him? I`d go down on him!" Voter approval doesn`t get much stronger than that.

But no candidate, Republican or Democrat, is going to offer nationalized health care, not the genuine article. Of course we expect the Republicans to be pricks, but the Democrats are no better. Guys like John Kerry think they can stay in Washington and BUY progress with the money they take from health care industry lobbyists buying off both parties with campaign contributions. John Kerry does not know anybody in Dottie`s class. John Edwards claims to, but he`s not very convincing to these people. As Dink puts it, "Neither one of `em gets me hard." If Dot is lucky, a Democratic pollster might call her, take her political temperature over the phone to be fed into some computer. But that is about as much contact as our system is willing to have with a 300 pound diabetic woman with a small bird and a husband too depressed to get out of his TV chair other than to piss or stumble off to his car washing job.

Get sick, get well, Congress says to go to hell. Americans are supposed to be so disgustingly healthy, rich and happy. But I have seen half-naked Indians in Latin America eating grubs and scrubbing their penis sheathes on river rocks who were a whole lot happier. And in some cases, more cared for by their governments. Once in Sonora, Mexico I got very sick among the Sari Indians and needed a doctor. Every damned Sari Indian had nationalized health care, but the American crapping his guts out behind their shacks, a man who made a hundred times their annual income, couldn`t even afford health insurance in his own country. I wish I could say they also had a native cure for dysentery, but they didn`t.

Actually, I can think of one politician who stands up for people like Dot and programs like nationalized health care. But he is busy right now being president of Venezuela. Show me a political party willing to put the people on the streets door to door, which is what it will take to mobilize the votes of the working poor, and I will show you one that can begin to kick a hole in that wall between Capitol Hill and the people it is supposed to be serving. But we both know that is not about to happen. Parties do not lead revolutions. They follow them. And then only if things get entirely too hot for them. The Democrats began to support the civil rights movement only after the bombings and lynchings and fire hoses and marchers caused enough public outrage indicated there were probably some votes to be wrung out of the whole sorry goddam spectacle playing out on American TV screens. That was back when a Watts type city burn-down, a good old fashioned revolt could still get Washington`s attention. I suspect nowadays it would be one of those national emergencies that Homeland Security would handle.

But Dink and Dot are the least likely Americans to ever rise up in revolt. Dissent doesn`t seep deeply enough into America to reach places like Winchester, Virginia. Never has. (Even most blacks here are still pretty much sir-ing and maaming the white folks and staying in their own part of town.) Yet, unlikely candidates that Dot and Dink are for revolution, they have nonetheless helped fuel the right wing revolution with their votes, the right-wing revolution that is said to be rooted in the culture wars neither one of them has ever heard of. I often think the culture wars are just more educated liberal silliness, cocktail chat that never touches the heart of the problem---which is that gutless soft liberals refuse to cross class lines and meet their suffering brothers and sisters face to face right here on this earth. The Republicans did a great job of this in grassroots organizing, and they were selling bullshit and a screwjob. Imagine what an honest populist effort might do.

In the old days class warfare was between the rich and poor, and that`s the kind of class war I can sink my teeth into. These days it is clearly between the educated and the uneducated, which of course, does make it a culture war, if that`s the way you choose to describe it. But the truth is that nobody is going to reach Dink and Dot or anyone else on this side of town with some elitist sounding jabber about culture wars. It`s hard enough reaching them with the plain old fact that the Republicans are the party of the dumb rich. As far as they are concerned, dumb people like themselves have been known to become very rich. Take Ronnie Fulk, the realtor we all grew up with. He`s dumber than owl shit but now worth a few million. And he still drinks Bud Lite and comes into Burt`s once in a while. Besides, any one of us here at Burt`s could very well win the Powerball lottery and become just like Ronnie Fulk.

"It ain`t all Boosh`s fault." It`s gonna be a tough fight for progressives. We are going to have to pick up this piece of road kill with our bare hands. We are going to have to explain everything about liberalism to the people at Burt`s because their working poor lives have always been successfully contained in cultural ghettoes such as Winchester by a combination of God rhetoric, money, cronyism, and the capitalist state. It will take a true effort, because they understand being poor and in some respects even accept it as their lot. Right down to getting sneered at by the Social Security lady. But if we talk about their "exploitation by the corporate state," they are going to say "Git ta fuck outta here!" And the revolution which never seems to get started will be again cancelled due to lack of interest on the part of the oppressed. Naturally it is tempting, even for me, to say, "Fuck`em. Let them lie in the bed they made for themselves by voting for people like Bush." Then I remember that it was the worst in our collective national character that made their bed for them long ago. Like Dink says: "Except for when I was in the Army, I never had health insurance in my life. That ain`t George Boosh`s fault." It`s not anybody`s fault that there are 44 million people like Dink and Dot. That`s the free market system---the weak ones die early and hard. And besides, who cares about a fat lady who sings like some dead hillbilly?

It`s one hour before closing time, and if there is one classy thing I do in this life, it is never to be the last customer out of a bar. It only took 40 years to learn that. So I pay up and head for the door and Carol the bartender calls out "GET A CAB BAGEANT." You`re damned straight I`ll get a cab. This town has public drunkenness laws and born-again Christian cops who take smug pride in enforcing them....humble public servants who will throw you against a police car and make your joints scream if you so much as giggle. Then next day you WILL make the local paper under police notes. No thanks.

Fortunately, the local cab company---which we call "dial a derelict" because of its halfway house resident drivers---is next to Burt`s. So you lean out the door and wave at the drivers watching for a fare. Usually we know the driver, or went to school with one of his or her relatives. And always we can tell by the last name on the cab registration sheet on the visor that the driver is one of us---a fellow link of flesh and blood in the chain of common laborers stretching back over two centuries. It feels familiar and good. Sometimes this symbiosis between the wet drunks at Burt`s and the dry drunks at the cabstand seems to be the last superbly functioning human thing in this town. Meanwhile, Dottie`s voice can be heard faintly leaking out onto the street:

I`m crazeeeeeeeeeeee, crazy for feeling so lonely Crazy, crazy for feelin so bluuuuuuuue...

And those last notes just slide away like a silk scarf dropped onto some stairway in the heart. It is so utterly human how all of us ---me, the cabby, Dot---get what we need from each other in that moment round midnight when we share the common ghosts of this old town.

Copyright 2004 by Joe Bageant.

Joe Bageant is a magazine editor and essayist living in Winchester, Virginia. He may be contacted at [e-mail]

[Joerver]

Ein Wort zu dem Autor von #20695. Ist mir schon öfter aufgefallen.

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BIOGRAPHY

Born 1946 in Winchester VA, USA

US Navy Vietnam era veteran

After Navy became anti-war hippie, ran off to the West Coast…. lived in communes, hippie school buses… started writing about holy men, countercultural figures, rock stars and the American scene in 1971…. lived in Boulder Colorado until mid 1980s…. 14 years in all… became a Marxist and a half-assed Buddhist… Traveled to Central America to write about third World issues…

Moved to the Coeur d’Alene Indian reservation in Idaho, built a cabin, lived without electricity, farmed with horses for seven years…. tended reservation bar (The Bald eagle Bar), wrote for regional newspapers… generally festered on life in America… Moved to Moscow Idaho, worked on newspaper there…

Then moved to Eugene Oregon, worked for an international magazine corp…

Then back to hometown of Winchester VA to settle some scores with the bigoted, murderous redneck town I grew up in. I love’em but they need a good ass kicking.

Died in 2000 when George Bush got elected, along with 275 million other Americans… Plan to rise again from the dead when he is tossed out…maybe reincarnate as a Commie terrorist on Wall Street…. maybe as a sex worker in Amsterdam…. can’t decide… both have their advantages.

Contact email: [e-mail]

Hier einige Artikel von ihm, sonst mehr über Google.
http://www.smirkingchimp.com/search.php
# Joe Bageant: `Karaoke night in George Bush`s America` by Smirky Chimpster on Friday, August 27 @ 09:52:45 EDT (6)
# Joe Bageant: `Cranky reflections on the Fourth of July` by Smirky Chimpster on Tuesday, July 06 @ 09:48:15 EDT (10)
# Joe Bageant: `Is our president a wackjob?` by Smirky Chimpster on Thursday, July 01 @ 10:11:52 EDT (32)
# Joe Bageant: `Sons of a laboring God` by Smirky Chimpster on Wednesday, June 30 @ 10:34:44 EDT (22)
# Joe Bageant: `Thy will be done, on Earth as it is in Texas` by Smirky Chimpster on Sunday, June 27 @ 09:59:29 EDT (39)
# Joe Bageant: `Mash note for the `girl with the leash`` by Smirky Chimpster on Sunday, June 13 @ 09:42:53 EDT (37)
# Joe Bageant: `Staring down the jackals` by Smirky Chimpster on Monday, May 24 @ 09:47:00 EDT (9)
# Joe Bageant: `John Ashcroft, keep your mouth off my wife!` by Smirky Chimpster on Wednesday, May 05 @ 10:09:46 EDT (3)
# Joseph Bageant: `Sleepwalking to Fallujah` by Smirky Chimpster on Friday, April 30 @ 09:53:12 EDT (3)

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Friday, August 27, 2004, 01:16 P.M. Pacific

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/editorialsopinion/2002…

Editorial
Kerry for President


Four years ago, this page endorsed George W. Bush for president. We cannot do so again — because of an ill-conceived war and its aftermath, undisciplined spending, a shrinkage of constitutional rights and an intrusive social agenda.

The Bush presidency is not what we had in mind. Our endorsement of John Kerry is not without reservations, but he is head and shoulders above the incumbent.

The first issue is the war. When the Bush administration began beating the drums for war on Iraq, this page said repeatedly that he had not justified it. When war came, this page closed ranks, wanting to support our troops and give the president the benefit of the doubt. The troops deserved it. In hindsight, their commander in chief did not.

The first priority of a new president must be to end the military occupation of Iraq. This will be no easy task, but Kerry is more likely to do it — and with some understanding of Middle Eastern realities — than is Bush.

The election of Kerry would sweep away neoconservative war intellectuals who drive policy at the White House and Pentagon. It would end the back-door draft of American reservists and the use of American soldiers as imperial police. It would also provide a chance to repair America`s overseas relationships, both with governments and people, particularly in the world of Islam.

A less-belligerent, more-intelligent foreign policy should cause less anger to be directed at the United States. A political change should allow Americans to examine the powers they have given the federal government under the Patriot Act, and the powers the president has claimed by executive order.

This page had high hopes for President Bush regarding taxing and spending. We endorsed his cut in income taxes, expecting that it would help business and discipline new public spending. In the end, there was no discipline in it. In control of the Senate, the House and the presidency for the first time in half a century, the Republicans have had a celebration of spending.

Kerry has made many promises, and might spend as much as Bush if given a Congress under the control of Democrats. He is more likely to get a divided government, which may be a good thing.

Bush was also supposed to be the candidate who understood business. In some ways he has, but he has been too often the candidate of big business only. He has sided with pharmaceutical companies against drug imports from Canada.

In our own industry, the Bush appointees on the Federal Communications Commission have pushed to relax restrictions on how many TV stations, radio stations and newspapers one company may own. In an industry that is the steward of the public`s right to speak, this is a threat to democracy itself — and Kerry has stood up against it.

Bush talked like the candidate of free trade, a policy the Pacific Northwest relies upon. He turned protectionist on steel and Canadian lumber. Admittedly, Kerry`s campaign rhetoric is even worse on trade. But for the previous 20 years, Kerry had a strong record in support of trade, and we have learned that the best guide to what politicians do is what they have done in the past, not what they say.

On some matters, we always had to hold our noses to endorse Bush. We noted four years ago that he was too willing to toss aside wild nature, and to drill in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. We still disagree. On clean air, forests and fish, we generally side with Kerry.

We also agree with Sen. Kerry that Social Security should not offer private accounts.

Four years ago, we stated our profound disagreement with Bush on abortion, and then in one of his first acts as president, he moved to reinstate a ban on federal money for organizations that provide information about abortions overseas. We disagree also with Bush`s ban on federal money for research using any new lines of stem cells.

There is in these positions a presidential blending of politics and religion that is wrong for the government of a diverse republic.

Our largest doubt about Kerry is his idea that the federal debt may be stabilized, and dozens of new programs added, merely by raising taxes on the top 2 percent of Americans. Class warfare is a false promise, and we hope he forgets it.

Certainly, the man now in office forgot some of the things he said so fetchingly four years ago.

Copyright © 2004 The Seattle Times Company

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Published on Friday, August 27, 2004 by the Seattle Times
Vietnam-Era `Chickenhawks` Deserve a Swift Kick
by Gordon Livingston


Among the human attributes that excite the most contempt, hypocrisy occupies a special place. Those who say one thing and do another or who criticize others for moral deficiencies they themselves exhibit are deservedly the objects of public derision.

So it is with the "chickenhawks" of the Vietnam War generation currently providing what passes for leadership in this administration. They include Vice President Dick Cheney, who discovered he had "other priorities" during Vietnam, and Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz, who graduated from Cornell University in 1965 but decided to forgo military service during the war.

We recently have had a renewed opportunity to observe hypocrisy in action in President Bush`s reluctance to disavow the contemptible attacks by a group calling itself Swift Boat Veterans for Truth.

This collection of veterans, angry at John Kerry`s antiwar activism after he returned home from Vietnam, continues to run TV ads attacking Kerry`s war record. One of the group`s leaders, John O`Neill, has published a book, "Unfit for Command: Swift Boat Veterans Speak Out Against John Kerry."

The New York Times reports that "some people behind the ads had connections to the Bush family, to prominent Texas politicians and to President Bush`s chief political aide, Karl Rove."

The Times also says that "the accounts of Swift Boat Veterans for Truth prove to be riddled with inconsistencies. In many cases, material offered as proof by these veterans is undercut by official Navy records and the men`s own statements."

Whether this strategy will work is still a question. Redirecting public attention to the Vietnam War may prove unwise, considering the facts of Bush`s own choice to avoid service in a war he purported to support.

According to The Washington Post, "A review of Bush`s military records shows that Bush enjoyed preferential treatment as the son of a then-congressman, when he walked into a Texas Guard unit in Houston two weeks before his 1968 graduation from Yale and was moved to the top of a long waiting list."

Safely spared the prospect of combat service, he then virtually disappeared between May 1972 and May 1973. There are few records to indicate his whereabouts during that time.

The Associated Press noted that a full release of Bush`s records would clarify "allegations that potentially embarrassing material was removed in 1997 from Bush`s military file when he was running for re-election as Texas governor."

Perhaps it`s not important who chose to serve and who did not in that misbegotten war. After all, Bush and prominent members of his administration simply made the same decision to find some way to avoid service that was made by many of the privileged young men of his generation, including Bill Clinton.

What smacks of hypocrisy, however, is to attack the service of Kerry, who lived an equally advantaged life yet made the choice to expose himself to the considerable risks of combat.

That he was intelligent enough to learn something from this experience and came home to oppose the war appears to be the real sin in the minds of many Republican hawks. They still argue that Vietnam was, in the words of Ronald Reagan, "a noble cause." To change one`s mind as the result of experience is, of course, to "flip-flop."

The issue here, in a presidential campaign, is not courage vs. cowardice. People go to war for many reasons. For young men of my generation, the system created a situation in which the largest proportion of those engaged in combat were those who lacked the education or connections to avoid it. It was a war fought largely by working-class and poor kids. (The majority of our soldiers in Iraq, despite an all-volunteer military, come from similar backgrounds.) Little sacrifice was asked of the society at large, particularly its most-fortunate members.

This is what makes Kerry`s decision to go to war all the more remarkable, whatever the complicated motives behind it. Whether he deserved his medals, whether he bled enough to justify three Purple Hearts, is irrelevant. That he went, in contrast to our current bellicose commander in chief, is enough, one would think, to earn the respect of those who chose not to. We have all, especially veterans, had enough of this contrived issue.

My Bronze Star citation contains some exaggerations written into it by the officer in my unit who submitted it. It was apparently felt that the award reflected well on my regiment and the Army and helped fill a national need for heroism in a decidedly unheroic conflict.

I, too, opposed the war when I got home, based on what I had seen there. I am prouder of that than anything I did with a rifle in my hands. Like Kerry, I believed I had earned the right to speak out. I would prefer not to be criticized by those who didn`t go at all.

Gordon Livingston, a West Point graduate who served with the 11th Armored Cavalry in Vietnam, is a psychiatrist who lives in Columbia, Md.

Copyright © 2004 The Seattle Times Company

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RAMBO WAS A CHUMP

Fri Aug 27, 2:44 AM ET

By UNIVERSAL PRESS SYNDICATE/TED RALL

John Kerry Should Be Ashamed of Vietnam Service


Ted Rall


NEW YORK--John Kerry has made a career out of trying to have things both ways. Now it`s catching up with him.

"Let me be clear," he said at the time, "the vote I will give to the President is for one reason and one reason only: to disarm Iraq of weapons of mass destruction, if we cannot accomplish that objective through new, tough weapons inspections in joint concert with our allies." That was an exact summary of the position that most Americans supported at the time. Sixty-three percent told the October 7, 2002 CBS News-New York Times poll that they favored giving the UN inspectors as much time as they needed to get the job done. But while just 30 percent favored war, Kerry knew that the Bushies were just beginning to unleash a blizzard of pro-war propaganda. Banking that the percentage of hawks would soon increase, he voted with the winning team.

Indeed, by March 2003 72 percent of the U.S. public supported attacking Iraq. Kerry`s cynical calculus, it seemed, had paid off.

Five months after the fall of Baghdad, Bush asked Congress for $87 billion to finance the occupation of Iraq. But with 130,000 troops bogged down by a resistance movement that was killing at least one soldier a day, the war had already become unpopular. Only 41 percent of Americans--the number kept sliding--remained sweet on regime change. Again wanting to be on the winning side of the polls, Kerry voted against the appropriation.

Republicans have had a field day with his hawk-to-dove act. "[Kerry] tried to explain his vote by saying: I actually did vote for the $87 billion before I voted against it. End quote," Bush told his chortling audiences. "He`s got a different explanation now. One time he said he was proud he voted against the funding; then he said that the whole thing was a complicated matter. There is nothing complicated about supporting our troops in combat."

Kerry has a reasonable explanation for voting against the money to pay for the war he voted in favor of: he preferred that the $87 billion come from a partial repeal of Bush`s tax cuts, whereas Bush tacked it onto the deficit. The elephant in the room, however, is this: he never should have voted for the Iraq incursion in the first place.

The debate about Kerry`s Vietnam War record similarly revolves around the Democratic candidate`s penchant for flipfloppery.

Kerry returned from the war in Vietnam in 1971. An early supporter of the conflict, what he saw there changed his mind--prompting him to help found Vietnam Veterans Against the War.

"I committed the same kind of atrocities as thousands of other soldiers have committed in that I took part in shootings in free fire zones," he told "Meet the Press." "I conducted harassment and interdiction fire. I used fifty calibre machine guns...I took part in search and destroy missions, in the burning of villages. All of this is contrary to the laws of warfare, all of this is contrary to the Geneva Conventions and all of this is ordered as a matter of written established policy by the government of the United States from the top down. And I believe that the men who designed these, the men who designed the free fire zone, the men who ordered us, the men who signed off the air raid strike areas, I think these men, by the letter of the law, the same letter of the law that tried Lieutenant Calley [found guilty in the My Lai massacre], are war criminals."

By 1971, American public opinion had turned against the war in Vietnam. Kerry`s views were widely accepted. But it has now been three decades since we fled Saigon. Hollywood movies have portrayed Vietnam vets as noble warriors hampered by simpering politicians. We`ve forgotten the million-plus people we killed to prop up a right-wing puppet dictatorship. And militarism is in the air. Vietnam has been rehabilitated, and no one has done more to rewrite this history than John Kerry.

When Kerry reappeared on "Meet the Press" in 2001, the new rightist paradigm prompted him to back down from his original comments: "I don`t stand by the genocide. I think those were the words of an angry young man. We did not try to do that. But I do stand by the description--I don`t even believe there is a purpose served in the word `war criminal.` I really don`t."

The Kerry campaign has played both sides of the Vietnam equation. He scores points both as a pacifist hippie and as a Silver Star-winning war hero! Choose whichever Kerry you prefer--1969 or 1971 or 2004--and vote for whichever version you like best.

Serious people and historians know that Kerry was right the first time around. Like Iraq, Vietnam was an ill-conceived, doomed war that wasted countless lives for no good reason, launched by a president who lied about a Cold War threat (the absurd "domino theory") that simply didn`t exist. As U.S. troops are doing now in Iraq, we committed horrific atrocities in Vietnam.

Not only did the guys in black pajamas beat us fair and square, we deserved it. We were wrong. We deserved to lose. Service in the wars against Vietnam and Iraq are nothing to be proud of. If John Kerry can`t admit now what he knew in 1971, at least he can stop bragging about his medals.

That, of course, would require that he pay more attention to his heart than the polls.




Copyright © 2004 Yahoo! Inc. All rights reserved.

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washingtonpost.com
Peace Deal Ends 3 Weeks of Fighting in Najaf
Militiamen Put Aside Arms as Thousands of Iraqis Stream into Holy Shrine

By Rajiv Chandrasekaran and Karl Vick
Washington Post Foreign Service
Friday, August 27, 2004; 3:00 PM

BAGHDAD, Aug. 27 -- Scores of militiamen loyal to rebellious cleric Moqtada Sadr put down their weapons in Najaf Friday while thousands of Iraqis streamed into the once-besieged shrine of Imam Ali following an agreement brokered overnight by the top Shiite Muslim religious figure in Iraq.

U.S. forces, in turn, pulled out of positions they have occupied since early August in the center of the city and moved to less conspicuous positions elsewhere in the city. In their place, a long convoy of Iraqi army and national guard forces was moving into the holy city Najaf.

Meanwhile, men in surgical masks went down streets reeking with the stench of death and collected the bodies of militiamen killed in the fighting with Americans over the past few weeks.

And the city, one of the most lethal battlegrounds of the war in Iraq, appeared calm for the first time in a month, having avoided, at least for now, a confrontation at the shrine that threatened to enflame the entire Muslim world.

The agreement was arranged Thursday by Iraq`s most revered cleric, Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani. Under it, rebellious cleric Moqtada Sadr pledged to withdraw his militia from the contested shrine and other parts of the city of Najaf after three weeks of fighting against U.S. and Iraqi forces.

In exchange for Sadr`s compliance, the government pledged to pull U.S. military forces out of Najaf and to allow Sadr, who had been wanted by the former U.S. occupation authority on murder charges, to participate in politics.
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Iraqi police were the first to arrive at the outer doors of the shrine this afternoon since negotiations ended the stand-off.

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"He is as free as any Iraqi citizen to do whatever he would like in Iraq," said Qasim Dawood, a minister of state, after announcing the government`s acceptance of the peace plan arranged by Sistani.

At 6:30 a.m. Friday, authorities in Najaf permitted the pilgrims to enter the city and walk toward the shrine. The crowd, estimated at more than 10,000 people, was searched for weapons by Iraqi police officers at the edge of Najaf`s Old City district, where the shrine is located.

Two hours later, a message conveyed from Sadr was broadcast from the shrine`s loudspeakers instructing militiamen to depart with the crowd. "Drop your weapons and leave Najaf and Kufa," the announcement said. "You have done a great job."

Scores of Sadr`s militiamen were seen dropping off their weapons at Sadr`s office near the shrine. People were observed pushing wooden carts through the city to collect weapons from militiamen. Many of them changed out of their fighting uniforms, black shirts and trousers, changed into normal clothes and joined the throng of people.

Later in the day, the shrine was emptied and the doors locked.
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Iraqi police officers, backed by American soldiers and armor, converged on the area around the shrine, with the Americans moving to within 75 yards and then dropping back.
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Despite the activity, it remained unclear how thoroughly the Mahdi Army was complying with the orders to hand in weapons.

Ahmed Shaibani, a Sadr spokesman, pledged that the city would soon be free of militants. He said that members of Sadr`s Mahdi Army would return to their homes and that leaders of the movement would go back to the religious schools that they had been attending.

If that happens -- Sadr does not have a good track record when it comes to peace agreements -- it would end a conflict that has claimed hundreds of lives and roiled Iraq`s Shiite majority, who have been concerned that using force to resolve the standoff could damage the gold-domed edifice.

"Iraq has achieved a victory today," Dawood said at a Thursday night news conference. "No more fights. Najaf and Kufa will be peaceful cities, free from arms, free from militias."

The accord was reached on a day when more than 45 people died in a mortar attack and other violence in Najaf and the neighboring town of Kufa, which are about 90 miles south of Baghdad.

Under its terms, members of the Mahdi Army -- a well-armed militia that numbers in the low thousands, will be allowed to leave Najaf and return to their homes without any sanction, despite having fought against U.S. and Iraqi security forces for three weeks.
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Civilians returned to the streets after three weeks of conflict in Najaf.
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Sadr, who has reneged on peace deals in the past, did not issue a statement of acceptance, but senior government officials and a top aide to Sistani expressed optimism that Sadr would comply with the terms of this agreement, which was reached during a meeting between Sistani and Sadr. "Mr. Moqtada Sadr has agreed to the proposals from his eminence, Ayatollah Ali Sistani," said Sistani`s top aide, Hamed Khafaf.

The U.S. military, which ceased offensive operations on Thursday because of the peace talks, did not withdraw from positions inside Najaf after the deal was announced. Dawood said U.S. forces would be instructed to "draw back" by the interim prime minister, Ayad Allawi, once Sadr`s militia departs.

The arrangement was a vivid indication of the enormous clout Sistani wields among Iraq`s Shiites. His objections to American plans for Iraq`s political transition forced the U.S. occupation authority to make substantial changes on two occasions. But in recent months, some political and religious leaders wondered whether Sistani, a reclusive 73-year-old who believes in the separation of religion and government, was losing followers to Sadr, a mercurial man in his early thirties who lacks Sistani`s clerical credentials but plays a more activist form of street politics.

Last week, Sistani`s aides demanded that Sadr hand over the keys to the shrine, but Sadr`s aides refused, insisting that a transfer had to be done on their terms. The exchange seemed to suggest that Sistani lacked the power to rein in Sadr.


But Thursday`s compromise indicated Sistani was still the most influential cleric in Iraq, a man who can force both Sadr and the interim government to yield to his middle-ground approach. When Sistani arrived in the southern port city of Basra on Wednesday after a trip to Britain for treatment of a heart condition, Dawood and another cabinet minister flew to meet him and discuss his peace plan. Shortly after Sistani`s police-escorted convoy reached Najaf Thursday afternoon, Sadr came calling.
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Marines patrolled the streets of Najaf today, near the entrance of the Imam Ali Shrine, as Iraqi police prepared to move up to its doors.
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"Sayyid Ali Sistani has played a very important role in bringing about peace," said Dawood, using the honorific reserved for descendants of the prophet Muhammad.

The deal also revealed the limits of the power of Iraq`s interim government. Allawi and other senior officials had sought to avoid any resolution that would allow Sadr`s militia to reconstitute itself, favoring the use of force to kill or capture as many militiamen as possible. But because the government could not rely on its security forces alone to deal with the threat, it was forced to seek assistance from the U.S. military. That put the government in an untenable position: If U.S. forces stormed the shrine, Shiites would be outraged, but if they didn`t, Sadr`s men could drag out the confrontation for weeks.

A senior Iraqi official, speaking on condition of anonymity, acknowledged that Sistani`s deal will allow the militiamen to return unchallenged to their homes in Baghdad and other Iraqi cities. "We`re going to let most of them get away," the official said.

But the official expressed hope that by ending the standoff and allowing Sadr`s supporters to participate in politics, the plan would cause the militia to be weakened and eventually demobilized. "If the shrine is clear, it will help us pursue our main objective of dismantling his militia," the official said.

Other Iraqi officials and Western diplomats in Iraq contend that any deal that allows Sadr and many of his most loyal followers to escape will pose an continuing threat to the interim government. The militia does not have a formal roster of members who can be offered jobs or cash incentives to lay down their weapons. And as long as Sadr, who has been charged with murder in the death of a fellow cleric, remains free to preach and rally his loyalists, he will have the power to reconstitute a militia, the officials and diplomats said.

Under the terms of the agreement, Najaf and Kufa would become "demilitarized zones" that are off-limits to militias and foreign military forces; only Iraqi police and National Guard units would be permitted to patrol the areas. Sistani also demanded that the interim government compensate residents whose homes were destroyed in the fighting.

The senior government official said a date has not been set for the withdrawal of U.S. forces from Najaf. "It is contingent upon Najaf becoming a safe place, free of militants," the official said. "If the standoff is resolved and the militants leave Najaf, then the presence of foreign forces in Najaf will not be necessary."

U.S. commanders in the city said Thursday night that they had not received orders to withdraw.

The peace deal was forged after one of the most violent and chaotic days in the three-week confrontation.

On Thursday morning, before Sistani`s return to Najaf, three mortar shells slammed into the grounds of the main mosque in Kufa, killing at least 27 people and wounding 63. The marble courtyard was covered with pools of blood and torn clothing as survivors frantically dragged the wounded to a makeshift first-aid station. Overwhelmed ambulance drivers ferried the wounded to the overflowing local hospital, where relatives wailed next to gurneys carrying bloodied young men.
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Marines watched the shrine as they continued to recieve sniper fire Thursday evening.
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People at the mosque blamed the U.S. military for the attack, but U.S. military officials denied responsibility. A military spokesman said no operations were being conducted near the shrine.

A short while later, unidentified gunmen fired into a group walking on the main road from Kufa to Najaf. At least 15 people were killed, according to hospital officials.

The shooting caused the marchers to disperse as they sought cover. When a small contingent reassembled, they began shouting: "Where are the religious leaders? Where is the government? They let the Iraqis kill each other."

After Sistani`s arrival, there was a shooting in Najaf, as hundreds of his supporters, as well as many Sadr loyalists, tried to converge on the house where Sistani had decamped. Police officials said gunmen in the crowd began firing, prompting the police to return fire. At least 10 people were killed and 38 wounded, hospital officials said.

At Najaf`s hospital, an employee told the Reuters news agency: "Go look at the morgue. It`s full."

Iraq`s Health Ministry put the death toll for the day at 74, with 315 wounded, but that count included militiamen killed in clashes with security forces.

The fighting in Najaf also claimed the life of a U.S. Marine on Thursday, the second to be killed in two days, bringing to 11 the number of American military personnel lost in Najaf since the conflict began on Aug. 5.

Meanwhile, militants who kidnapped two relatives of Iraqi Defense Minister Hazim Shalaan have released one of them, al-Jazeera television reported Friday, according to Reuters.

Al-Jazeera said the group calling itself the "Brigades of God`s Anger" freed Salah Hassan Zeidan Lamie, a relative of Shalaan by marriage, after Iraqi police met its demand to release Ali Smeisim, an aide to rebel Shi`ite cleric Moqtada Sadr.

There was no word on the other kidnapped man -- a blood relative of Shalaan -- captured by the group.

Special correspondent Naseer Nouri contributed to this report from Najaf.

© 2004 The Washington Post Company

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US-Iranian tug and pull over Iraq
By Ehsan Ahrari
Aug 28, 2004
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/FH28Ak01.html

The deal struck between the old guard, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, and the young guard, Muqtada al-Sadr, on Thursday over the custodianship of the Imam Ali Shrine is also a continuation of the struggle for the future of Iraq.

The old guard is unwittingly giving the US occupation a little space to maneuver, with an understanding that the young guard will not be harmed. Muqtada has apparently agreed to hand over the custodianship of the shrine with a more than tacit understanding that he will be allowed to participate in the Iraqi elections down the road. A five-point plan calls for foreign troops to leave the city and for the Iraqi government to compensate victims of the unrest. What the US may not have realized is that the real struggle about the future of Iraq has just entered another phase.

Through Muqtada, Iran is emerging as a potent power in the political maneuvering with the US over whether Iraq will become some sort of a secular or semi-secular democracy, or an Islamic democracy. Through this, the chances of Iran`s preference for the emergence of an Islam-based Iraqi government seem to have perceptibly improved.

The shock and awe aspects of the Bush doctrine in Iraq suffered a serious setback because of the deteriorating security situation, but US aspirations to transform the shape of the political map of Iraq and the larger Middle East remain undeterred. That is one reason why Washington made a very crucial tactical shift from an overall preference for unilateralism to selective application of multilateralism in Iraq, and allowed the United Nations to play a limited role in the formation of the interim government. However, a potent competition between the US and Iran is currently taking place, not only to maintain control over the shape of events in Iraq, but also to determine whether the future elected government there will have a heavy presence and influence of the Islamic or secular elements.

The Bush administration invaded Iraq with a whole slew of shifting strategies and rationales. Ultimately, it settled on the grounds of implanting democracy in that country, and then using that as a "shining" example for the rest of the Middle East. Another explanation was that the road to settlement of the Palestine Liberation Organization-Israeli conflict passed through Baghdad. Once Saddam Hussein was toppled, argued President George W Bush and his national security officials, violence and suicide acts in the occupied Palestine were going to subside. Iran affected all these rationales one way or another, albeit in some instances, its influence was somewhat indirect.

Even the US outlook of implantation of democracy in Iraq went through several versions. First, there was the Pentagon`s version of it, whereby the coronation of exile Ahmad Chalabi was to take place as president, right after the cessation of hostilities. Since Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, his deputy, Paul Wolfowitz - the official part of the Pentagon - and Richard Perle (aka "Prince of Darkness") - the unofficial player, who then served as chairman of the powerful Defense Advisory Board that counsels the Pentagon on defense matters - got most of their first-hand knowledge and a substantial part of their intelligence on Iraq from Chalabi, they bought lock-stock-and-barrel his description of the outcome of the US invasion. According to that portrayal, the invasion of Iraq would be a cakewalk, that the Iraqi troops would lay down their arms and would not fight, and that the American troops would be given a welcome reception of sweets and rosewater.

But when the US invasion was met with stiff resistance - whose intensity kept only escalating with the passage of time - other haphazard measures were introduced. The option of implanting Chalabi was quickly abandoned, and discussions of secular democracy and elections surfaced within the Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) of Iraq. Then the Iraqi Governing Council was packed with expatriate Iraqis, with the clear intention of using them as leading proponents for secular democracy for their country. Finally, a sort of "exit strategy" was settled on in Washington, whereby a handpicked interim Iraqi government was to take charge leading up to general elections in early 2005. Throughout that course, the American purpose was implantation of a secular democracy, one of whose raison detre was to allow the presence of US forces for an unlimited period. Iraq, under this vision, was to emerge ultimately as a friendly state, even legitimizing the current regional dominance of Israel. Considering that Iraq was a major Arab state, such a cowing of post-Saddam Iraq was to be envisioned as an unstated, but a capstone, achievement of the Bush administration.

Iran, the Iraqi Shi`ite clergy and the Shi`ite populace had entirely different agendas. The Iraqi Shi`ites were in favor of having a democratic setup, since such an arrangement promised to give them an unprecedented opportunity of becoming a dominant ruling group, as they are the dominant group, ahead of Sunni Muslims. However, their own perspectives of democracy were marked by a lack of clarity from the very beginning. They did not seem to know whether they preferred a secular democracy or a government based on Islam. Second, and more important, the reason for their bewilderment on the issue is that even the Shi`ite clerics are led by proponents of two schools of thought: the Islamists and the quietists.

The Islamist groups - now led by Muqtada - want an Iran-style Islamic government in Iraq. Whether it would be another vilayat-e-faqih (rule of the learned cleric) a la Iran, or a pale resemblance of it, is not quite clear. But this perspective is very much present, and is likely to become a visible player during the elections of 2005. The chief weakness of this school in today`s Iraq is that it is led by a young cleric, Muqtada, who doesn`t carry impeccable religious credentials (compared to Sistani), but makes up for it many times over in charisma. Considering that charismatic leaders in the Middle East - indeed in the Muslim politics at large - usually carry a larger sway than sedate moderates, no one should rule out a major voice for the Muqtada brand of religiously alluring leaders in the post-Saddam Iraq.

The quietist school - which advocates keeping politics and religion separate - is led by Sistani, an ardent promoter of Islam-based democracy in Iraq. In his vision, Iraq is to be governed by a Shi`ite-dominated democracy, where moderate Islam will play an important role. It was Sistani`s insistence on holding elections in the near future, and his deeply rooted suspicion of the former CPA, that forced the Bush administration to abandon its obsession with unilateralism in Iraq, and allow the participation of the UN. The participation of the world body also initiated a highly desirable phase of multilateralism governing the US presence in Iraq. The continued insurgency and terrorism inside that country also played a vital role in forcing the US`s hand in that direction.

Sistani`s prestigious and powerful presence has ensured that elections will be held in Iraq within the next six months. At the same time, he serves as an equally potent source of the participation of Islamic candidates in the Iraqi elections.

Iran`s role in the Shi`ite side of the power equation in Iraq is extremely calculating and multidimensional. Iran has strong theological ties with Iraq; it served as an important source of anti-regime protest even during the heyday of Saddam`s rule; and continues to play a similar role regarding the presence of US forces in its neighboring state. Iran`s influence on Iraq`s underground economy has remained substantial. As such, it is expected to influence the future course of that country`s politics. One can be assured that Iran will - to the chagrin of the US - handpick many candidates in the forthcoming Iraqi elections.

It should be pointed out, however, that the chief obstacle that Iran faces in Iraq is the uncertainty of Iraq`s Shi`ites about the future course of their democratically elected government: whether it should be modeled after the Islamic Republic of Iran or a moderate Islamic democracy, with a limited role for the clergy? The chief reason for this uncertainty is that the Iraqi Shi`ites are not at all impressed with the ostensibly sustained inertia inside Iran as a result of the enduring struggle between the hardliners (led by the Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei) and the pragmatists (led by President Mohammad Khatami). In all probability, the Iraqi Shi`ites don`t want to implant that inertia in their own polity by adopting the Iranian model. Sistani will play a crucial role in resolving the dilemma of the Iraqi Shi`ites, by promoting a sui generis Iraqi democracy based on moderate Islam. Regardless of the outcome, Iran`s influence on Iraqi politics is not likely to dissipate in its neighboring state. This reality continues to frustrate the Bush administration.

Muqtada envisions an Islamic Iraq, with no influence or presence of the US. Sistani would prefer a moderate Islamic democracy dominated by Shi`ites. He has no use for the US either, once Iraq becomes a Shi`ite-dominated Islamic democracy. Actually, these two visions may not be that much apart, if they are not to get entangled in the personality differences between these two individuals.

However, from Muqtada`s side, it is well nigh impossible to minimize the element of personal aspirations. Muqtada is very much interested in seeing the creation of some sort of vilayat-e-faqih. In principle, such a concept emphasizes the exercise of power by a high-powered ayatollah, like Sistani. In reality, since Sistani belongs to the quietist school, he is not interested in such a role, as was adopted by the late Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, leader of the Islamic Revolution in Iran in 1979. Muqtada, on the contrary, despite his lesser religious credentials, definitely aspires to such a role. In the past three months or so his popularity among poor Shi`ites and even among hardline anti-American Sunni Iraqis has gone way up. Whether or not he can translate that popularity into votes will be determined during the next elections.

If Iraq were to become an Islam-based democracy, Washington would envision it as a setback for its own larger vision of democracy in the Middle East. If Bush were to be reelected, the tug-and-pull between the US and Iran over the future political course of Iraq would only intensify. Iran will play its hand to the hilt; that includes exploiting its theological connections, and utilizing its economic power in order to make its presence felt in Iraq.

At least for now, Iran does not seem to be overly apprehensive about America`s larger designs to democratize the Middle East, especially if there is a second Bush administration. Bush has created so much ill will through his invasion of Iraq and through his perceptibly overly one-sided policies on the PLO-Israeli conflict that his credibility in the Middle East - indeed, in the entire world of Islam - will not be reestablished any time soon. So Iran does not feel compelled about responding to America`s mega-designs toward the Middle East. It knows if it can maintain its sway in the future course of power politics inside Iraq that would be a major achievement for now. Iran appears convinced of the powerful linkages between the creation of Islam-based democracy in Iraq and the failure of the US in its larger designs to implant secular democracy in the Muslim Middle East. Fortunately for Iran, a number of Middle Eastern states have a jaundiced perception of Washington`s democracy-related activities and vision for their region.

Ehsan Ahrari, PhD, is an Alexandria, Virginia, US-based independent strategic analyst.

(Copyright 2004 Asia Times Online Ltd. All rights reserved. Please contact [e-mail] for information on our sales and syndication policies.)

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Der Kampf gegen Yukos nichts anderes als Putings Versuch die USA aus dem asiatischen Ölgeschäft rauszuhalten?

Putin`s hands on the oil pumps
By John Helmer

MOSCOW - For a decade Washington has backed the Turkish and Azerbaijan governments to steer the export of Caspian region crude oil away from Russia. Russia`s newest riposte has been to ally the Russian and Iranian oil industries, and open up the shortest, cheapest and most lucrative oil route of all, southwards out of the Caspian to Iran.

The economics of the southward route are the latest blow for the Bush administration as it tries to redraw the geography of the Caucasus on an anti-Russian map. But for oil exporters and shippers in the Caspian, President George W Bush`s jawboning looks to be as futile as King Canute telling the sea to roll backwards.

Early oil from Azerbaijan`s newest offshore oilfields has been piped northwestwards through the Russian pipeline system to Novorossiysk port, on the Black Sea, along with crude from the Caspian shoreline of Kazakhstan. But there have been frequent arguments with the Azeris over volumes and transit fees, and these have led to frequent oil stoppages. Azeri oil for transit across Georgia to Supsa port is a costly trickle, by comparison.

Bosphorus chokepoint, Bosphorus bypass
In parallel, Turkey has been steadily tightening restrictions on tanker movements out of the Black Sea, through the Bosphorus Straits. The latest rules ban lengthy and large-capacity tankers - those which are most cost-effective for charterers and cargo-owners - from moving through the straits at night. The delay adds to the transport charges, creating an expensive chokepoint that has multiplied the costs of routing oil through the Black Sea for US allies, and Russia, alike.
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As new Caspian oilfields come onstream, and the volumes of crude lifted grow beyond the capacities of the Russian pipeline system to absorb, the American strategy has been to press hard to redirect these exports across land towards Turkey. The pipeline route chosen is known by its origin and destination as Baku-Ceyhan (Azerbaijan-Turkey). It passes through Tbilisi in Georgia and is known as the BTC project.

The Russian government has always understood that the this pipeline was part of the broader US strategy to cut all links with Moscow of the former Soviet states in the Caucasus, building a new economic infrastructure that would dissuade the Caucasus group from ever renewing these ties. These efforts have proved to be a costly boomerang.

To thwart those in Turkey who view the Bosphorus logjam as leverage to promote the Ceyhan route, Russia`s state-controlled pipeline agency Transneft has found a Turkish partner, and proposes building a relatively low-cost, short-distance pipeline to avoid the straits - and avoid the Ceyhan pipeline too.

Transneft disclosed its Bosphorus bypass plan in February, when chief executive officer Semyon Vainshtok said his company was interested in constructing a 193 kilometer pipeline on the territory of Turkey, with the local contractor Anadolu. Last year, he noted, Russian companies shipped 62 million tonnes of oil through the straits, or over 30% of all Russian export volumes. Compared with the Ceyhan`s project cost of more than $5 billion, the bypass reportedly would cost about $900 million, with capacity estimated in the range of 50-60 million tonnes per year.

This is roughly equal to Russian shipments by tanker through the straits. Vainshtok also claimed that two major Russian oil producers, Tatneft and Tyumen Oil Company - now controlled by British Petroleum - have offered their guarantees to supply the bypass with crude. This was another slap at the Ceyhan project, whose backers admit it lacks guarantees of enough crude to justify its cost. According to the latest news reported in Moscow, the potential starting point for the Bosphorus bypass route could be Kiyikei on the Black Sea, and the end-point at an offloading terminal at Ibrikhaba on the Aegean Sea.

In June, while North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) heads of state were holding their annual meeting on the shores of the Bosphorus at Istanbul, the Russian government despatched a warning that the security measures Turkey had implemented in the straits violated 68-year-old treaty provisions that still bind both the NATO states and the Russians. In an unusual statement, the federal Ministry of Transport in Moscow issued a warning to the Turkish government, accusing its ban on tanker traffic through the Bosphorus of being a violation of the Montreux Treaty.

According to the ministry, "unilateral actions undertaken by Turkey contradict Article 2 of the treaty of Montreux of 1936". The statement, drafted by the foreign relations department at the Transport Ministry, referred to the ban, in effect from June 27 to 29, on vessels carrying hazardous cargoes, notably oil and gas. The Montreux Treaty was the most recent in a series of last-century international pacts declaring the straits to be international waters, and prohibiting Turkey from taking unilateral action to interfere with innocent passage of vessels.
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Ukrainian reversal, Croatian opening
The American effort at the north end of the Black Sea, on the Ukrainian shore, has had even less success.

A Ukrainian pipeline, designed to attract Caspian oil into Odessa port, on the Black Sea, and then pump it northwards to Brody, and thence into Poland and other central European destinations, has lain empty for almost a year. Despite US government prodding, even the major US oil companies in the Caspian cannot quite absorb the commercial disadvantages of the route. Nor can US allies in the Polish government overrule their colleagues with demands to buy this anti-Russian, but higher-priced oil.

The Russian government, together with Russian oil exporters, has countered with a proposal for the Ukrainian government to reverse the oil flow in the pipeline, and pipe Russian crude southwards to Odessa, for tankering out of the Black Sea. At first, the Ukrainians rejected the offer. But as port shipments of oil from Odessa dwindled, and the economics of the Brody direction began to talk louder than politics, a deal was done to accept the Russian oil, and reverse the pipeline direction.
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The conflict in Kiev over the strategic pros and cons of these alternative oil routes has damaged another US ally in the region. Late last year, the Ukrainian parliament voted to block the Adria pipeline reversal project. This is aimed at delivering Russian crude to the deep-water port of Omishalj in Croatia, on the Adriatic Sea. The Ukrainian veto was retaliation by the anti-Russian oil lobby in Kiev for the failure of its Odessa-Brody project.

The irony of this outcome is that the Omishalj project was first proposed in 2002, and agreed upon by Russia, Belarus, Ukraine, Slovakia, Hungary and Croatia as a way of despatching Russian crude in large tankers to Bush constituents who own the refineries on the Texas coast of the United States.

Initial capacity, according to the Omishalj plan, was 5 million tonnes per year, rising eventually to 15 million tonnes. The Ukrainian deputies justified their no-vote because, they said, it would be the final blow to the proposed Odessa-Brody pipeline, should the Druzhba line be filled up west of Ukraine. "This is true," says Adam Landes, an oil analyst in Moscow. "But Odessa-Brody is doomed regardless. It offers no competitive advantage to potential Caspian shippers, or buyers of crude, and this is why it has been idle for two years now, since it was essentially completed. The longer Ukraine takes to face up to these rather obvious facts, the longer that this ill-fated pipeline will lie dormant." The Croatians, too, have now bowed to the realities of the oil marketplace, and Omishalj will soon start regular dispatches of Russian oil cargoes.

Embargo for Latvia
Another US ally to be caught in the cross-fire has been Latvia. As the anti-Russian pressure has mounted against Russian oil shipments in the south, Moscow accelerated the completion of a new oil outlet on the Gulf of Finland and Baltic Sea. This is Primorsk, which opened two years ago, and is being expanded by Transneft to become Russia`s largest oil port.

Controlled by Transneft, Primorsk receives its crude from the Baltic Pipeline System - a network of pipelines linking Russia`s new Arctic oilwells and expanding northwest Siberian fields to the sea lanes to Western Europe`s markets. Once the Primorsk outlet was established, the Russian government ordered Transneft to turn off the supply of oil to Ventspils in Latvia. At one time the Soviet Union`s northern gateway for oil exports, in 1990 Ventspils almost matched Novorossiysk in capacity and throughput. But no longer. The Latvians have appealed to Washington for help, but Moscow will not listen. The opening of Primorsk was the deathknell for Ventspils.

Checkmate for the Yukos-Houston alliance
The Americans responded in 2003 by pressing the Russian government to end Transneft`s monopoly over pipelines, and allow the Russian oil majors to build a pipeline of their own to Murmansk. That, Washington energy officials claimed, would open a new, commercially effective route for crude deliveries to US East Coast refineries. Transneft has responded by accelerating the expansion of the Baltic Pipeline System, while the Kremlin has started prosecutions of Yukos, the oil company which was closest to Washington. The speed of this pipeline expansion effort will overtake the growth of Russian export volumes by 2005, Transneft officials have said. The Murmansk project will wither, they believe, for lack of oil to ship.

Beginning in May 2002, Russian and US energy officials appeared to endorse public announcements from the two leading Russian producers and exporters, Yukos and LUKoil, that they were prepared to start strategic shipment of oil to the US. Russian tanker operators were skeptical from the start. Yukos led with a shipment of about 250,000 tonnes of oil which was despatched to Houston in June of 2002 on three 80,000-tonne tankers, which transferred the cargo to a VLCC (Very large crude carrier) in the Mediterranean.

LUKoil followed with an announcement it was preparing a shipment at Malta. Dmitri Skarga, chief executive of Sovcomflot, Russia`s leading tanker company, told Asia Times Online at the time that he thought the Yukos project "may be effective, but that depends on the level of prices and the tariff rates". He said that adjusting deliveries to refinery needs was a time-consuming and costly business. Yukos chief executive Mikhail Khodorkovsky then announced that the trade would not be profitable unless oil were above $25 per barrel.

Mikhail Perfilov, a leading Moscow analyst, noted skeptically, "LUKoil has been speaking of plans to start supplies to the US for years now, and I won`t be surprised if they still continue this talk a few years from now."

By August, Russian oil industry sources were conceding that two years of publicity and political talks by the two governments had failed to produce a viable Russian supply line for crude deliveries to the US.

Sergei Grigoriev, vice president of Transneft and the company spokesman, told Asia Times Online that the Murmansk project - also known by the Russians as the North Project - is still under study, and no decisions have been made. "The pipeline direction starts from Surgut and goes towards to the Barents Sea, but we don`t know where it will finish. We have two variants - a port in the Indigo area, in the Nenets region, or at an undeveloped site called Svyatoy Nos [Saint Nose], also in the Nenets region." In the ongoing feasibility studies, Grigoriev said the throughput target is "approximately 50-60 million tonnes".

But is this route a realistic option for Russia to supply the US? "I wouldn`t talk about US shipments now," Grigroiev replies, "because currently there is no direct shipment of oil from Russia to the US. The numbers are insignificantly small - something less than 300,000 tonnes a year in 2002, and I don`t know the later numbers. Maybe the US buys some Russian oil in Rotterdam. The only direct shipment project I know was the Yukos experiment, but it failed."

Two years ago, LUKoil, Russia`s largest oil producer and second exporter after Yukos, waxed enthusiastic on the Murmansk project, but no longer. Spokesman Mikhail Mikhailov says now "it`s too early to speak about the project. While it`s at the feasibility study stage we aren`t ready to announce how we will use it because a lot of necessary information is unknown." He claimed that LUKoil had earlier announced that it would contribute 20 million tonnes to the line, "but now the situation has changed, and the terms and extraction volumes are different".

Does LUKoil have a view of the projected capacity of Russia to supply the US with crude oil? "We are speaking about non-existent facts. Maybe some oil was shipped through Rotterdam, but its volume was very small." The commercial viability of Russian oil shipments to the US, LUKoil now concedes, depends not on the US, but on the Russian government. "[This] depends on the terms of the project, terms which Transneft will create." TNK-BP - the new British-controlled form of Tyumen Oil - is also no longer the talkative US booster it once was. A spokesman, claiming anonymity, would say only that the Murmansk project was "currently at such a preliminary stage we are not ready to discuss its details or its opportunities".

The data on Russian crude exports to the US confirm that the Yukos experiment has failed. Petroleum Argus reports that in the first half of this year, direct Russian exports to the US were "close to zero". Indirect shipments, through Rotterdam and other markets, were "approximately 250 to 270,000 tonnes per month". A Russian Energy Ministry official told Asia Times Online he lacked a precise number for total Russian exports to the US, but he acknowledged that there is no direct shipment, and the aggregate is "too small to report".

Yukos sources now say they believe Yukos, now close to insolvency after being held liable for billions of dollars in unpaid taxes from 2000, and former chief executive officer Mikhail Khodorkovsky - now on trial in Moscow on multiple charges relating to his share dealings - never intended that Russia should assist the US as a strategic oil supply partner. Rather, the sources believe that Khorokovsky and his shareholding allies in the company believed the oil shipments to Houston could generate favorable publicity as they sought to sell their shares on the New York Stock Exchange, or find a major US oil producer to buy up to 40% of the stock. "It was a case of what the US could do for the Yukos shareholders," one source said, "not what Russian oil could for the US." The arrest of Khodorkovsky in October 2003 exposed how far apart these two ambitious plans were.

Putin`s hand on the oil pump - the eastern option
Until Vladimir Putin became president in 2000, Russian oil policy was dictated by a corrupt alliance of Russian oil producers and the US government. Putin`s campaign against Yukos has put a stop to that. Even during the Boris Yeltsin period, however, Russian public policy was not to attack the Baku-Ceyhan pipeline on strategic grounds. Rather, Russian tactics were to play for time, and wait for the economics of oil transportation to tell against the US plan. So long as crude oil prices remained low, time encouraged delay in starting Baku-Ceyhan. The US war against Iraq threatened the pipeline plan too, by raising the prospect of a gusher of Iraqi crude on the market, cutting prices.

But now that Bush is proving that he cannot lift Iraqi oil, and oil has begun to substitute for the US dollar in international financial speculation, further counters to Baku-Ceyhan are being created by Moscow to retain the upper hand.

One new export route for Russian oil goes southwards by tanker through the Caspian to Iran. Russian oil producers and shippers say they are expecting the volume of crude oil and petroleum products shipped from the Russian Caspian port of Astrakhan to Iran to more than double this year. A spokesman for Volgotanker, the leading tanker operator in the Caspian, said it is expecting growth of its oil volume to jump 150% over the 2003 level of 800,000 tonnes.

Russian industry sources claim the expansion of the Iranian port of Neka, and the construction of a 120,000-barrels/day pipeline from Neka to Rey, is one of the new options for oil movement southwards. The Russian shipments of Caspian oil are paid for by swap arrangements with Iranian oil shipped out of Persian Gulf ports. Enzeli, the only Iranian Caspian port able to receive deep-draught vessels, is also being considered for receiving oil aboard railcars shipped by ferry from Astrakhan. LUKoil`s new oil terminal at Ilyinka, on the Astrakhan shore, will reach transshipment capacity of 3 million tonnes annual capacity (60,000 barrels per day) next year; this year capacity is 1 million tonnes (20,000 bd).

Russian use of its oil exports in strategic policy has been frustrating to China, an erstwhile ally in the Far East. So far, despite years of negotiations, the government in Beijing has failed in its bid to get access to the pipeline flow of Russian oil exports. A non-binding agreement signed last year between the Chinese and Russian governments envisages that China will receive 700 million tonnes of Russian crude through the pipeline over 25 years at a current cost of about $150 billion. The price formula Russia and China would use for the oil has not been disclosed, and is apparently not settled. The strategic objective for Beijing is obvious: it wants to reduce its growing dependence on oil shipped from the Middle East, Africa and Southeast Asia, and lower both oil and delivery premiums Beijing is currently obliged to pay.

The target for this Chinese strategy has been the construction of a pipeline from the southeastern Russian refinery town of Angarsk to the northwestern Chinese terminal center of Daqing. The Chinese section of the pipeline is already under way. The Russian section is stalled on the drawing-board. An increase in rail deliveries across the border makes up only a fraction of the planned pipeline deliveries.

Statements to Asia Times Online by Transneft executives have backed the Russian and Chinese government decision of last year to build the Angarsk-Daqing line at a cost of less than $3 billion, in preference to the $7 billion line to Nakhodka. But Putin`s campaign since last July against shareholders of Yukos has complicated the China project; that is because Yukos had been the intended oil supplier to China.

Japanese offers to finance the heavy cost of the Nakhodka line have been treated skeptically by the Kremlin, which wants to avoid single-market oil commitments - to repay Japanese loans, as much as to commit to Chinese supply terms. A Nakhodka oil shipping hub is, however, viewed in Moscow as potentially more open to spot-market pricing of oil than Daqing would be.

Transneft sources, along with oil industry executives in Moscow, agree on one thing about the eastern option for shipping Russian oil. The principal market for this crude will be Asia, and not the US West Coast. But think for a moment what might have happened if the Yukos owners had managed to sell control of their company last July to Chevron-Texaco or Mobil, as Khodorkovsky intended - Russia as an independent oil exporter would have been on its way to a level of independence that is less than Aramco, the Saudi oil company. It is unsurprising that the US media have failed to report the Yukos affair in this light, let alone to have noticed that the US, the world`s largest oil consumer, has tried, but so far failed, to compel Russia, the world`s second or first-largest oil exporter, to ship and market oil in the way Washington, or Houston, wants.

(Copyright 2004 Asia Times Online Ltd. All rights reserved. Please contact [e-mail] for information on our sales and syndication policies.)



Aug 26, 2004

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Houston, we have a Yukos problem
By Pepe Escobar

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Central_Asia/FH26Ag03.html

BRUSSELS - The crucial consequence of Moscow`s campaign to nail Yukos, the country`s leading oil producer, is the end of any possible energy alliance between Russia and the US, according to European Union diplomats and officials.

Yukos` former golden boy, chief executive Mikhail Khodorkovsky, languishing in jail since October 2003, was President George W Bush`s and Vice President Dick Cheney`s man. But way beyond his personal fate, it is the symbol of the fall of Yukos - no hope of cheap Russian oil for America and extra profits for ExxonMobil, ChevronTexaco and ConocoPhillips - that is really rattling markets and driving oil prices higher.

Soon after September 11, when the Bush administration seriously started looking for major oil sources other than the Saudis, a deal with Russian oligarchs might have seemed the ideal solution. In May 2002, at a summit in Moscow, Bush and Russian President Vladimir Putin forged what looked like an alliance, further developed in an "energy summit" held in a Houston steel-and-glass tower in October of that year. The deal was straightforward: Washington/Houston injects tons of dollars into the Russian oil sector, and Russia up to 2010 becomes America`s number one supplier. The key Russian partner in this deal was to be Khodorkovsky - the son of a Moscow worker turned king of business and head of Yukos, producer of 1.7 million barrels of oil a day and the largest Russian oil company ahead of LUKoil.

Khodorkovsky could not but be a Western darling. His hero was Standard Oil`s founder John Rockefeller. He installed five Americans on the Yukos board. The company`s public relations was handled by an American firm. He created a charity, Open Russia, which boasted Henry Kissinger and Lord Rothschild as chairmen. Wall Street loved him, because he guaranteed fortunes to Yukos` shareholders, especially himself (he owns 44% of the shares).

In April 2003, as the US was taking over Iraq, Yukos was about to take over one of its rivals, Sibneft. This would have created a US$35 billion company, the fourth-largest private company in the world and the first in Russia, with oil production similar to Kuwait`s (2.3 million barrels a day). But just as Khodorkovsky was entertaining the idea of selling control of Yukos to ChevronTexaco, Putin struck. In October, Yukos was billed $3.4 billion for back taxes for 2000, its assets frozen and Khodorkovsky was in jail and on trial on separate charges of tax evasion and fraud.

Russia`s shock and awe
Last month, a surrealist spectacle took place during the short Siberian summer. In the midst of its battle with the Kremlin, Yukos inaugurated an electrical plant in the Tomsk region. American Steven Theede, 30-plus years in the oil business, appointed as Yukos director-general by the end of June to try to save the company, made the trip from Moscow on a chartered jet full of journalists, trying to put the best face on it all.

European Union (EU) diplomats in Brussels say that at the time Theede was explaining oil shipments to China were at risk because there was no money to pay the Russian railways, and the company would have to stop paying salaries by the first half of August. The time has now come.

Depending on the observer`s angle in the political spectrum, the campaign to get Yukos is interpreted either as a hostile corporate takeover masterminded by Putin`s FSB - former KGB - friends running the Kremlin, or a well-deserved punishment to the Russian oligarchs who profited from the wild privatization of the 1990s. The consensus in the EU is that Yukos is essentially being "de-privatized" and re-nationalized because of a huge amount of unpaid taxes, which the company could easily take care of if the Kremlin had not frozen all of its assets.

The most probable endgame of the Yukos saga, according to analysts in Moscow and around the EU, is the Kremlin forcing the company to sell its main assets - Yuganskneftegaz, Tomskneft and Samaraneftegas - to one or a few oil majors with close ties to the Kremlin, like Gazprom, Rosneft or Surgutneftegaz. Rosneft - the seventh-largest Russian oil company - seems to be very well positioned: Igor Sechin, a close Putin adviser, and considered to be one of the main figures behind the attack on Yukos, is now Rosneft`s chief executive officer. This leaves many, behind closed doors in Brussels, London and Frankfurt, talking about what amounts to "Putification" of Russian oil: drive down the price of Yukos and then sell it to the Kremlin`s friends.

The jewel in the crown
Nefteiougansk, which rose from the ashes in the 1960s on the margins of the Ob river, is literally in the middle of nowhere. The most important building in the city of 100,000 is the headquarters of Yuganskneftegaz - the jewel of the Yukos crown. Yugansk pumps 60% of Yukos` oil, has reserves worth more than $50 billion and nowadays produces more oil than Iraq. There`s a plaque in the building - signed by Khodorkovsky - stating that the city is, indeed, "Yukos` capital".

But the shining light of Yuganskneftegaz itself is the immense Priobskoie oilfield in western Siberia - which brings tears to Yukos managers` eyes as it is said to be able to keep producing oil "for 50 years". This oilfield has been doubling its production for the past few years and is now responsible for at least half of Yukos` output of 1.7 million barrels a day.

Russian bailiffs are adamant: Yuganskneftegaz will be sold off for a fraction of its real value to compensate for Yukos` unpaid taxes. Yukos, in a statement, insists this would be the end of the company. "If Yuganskneftegaz is sold, the management of the company would be compelled to announce the bankruptcy of Russia`s largest oil company."

Yukos insists Yuganskneftegaz is worth at least $30.4 billion, according to leading consulting firm DeGolyer and MacNaughton. Other independent analysts talk about $16 billion. But everybody seems to agree on one point: it could be sold for as little as $1.75 billion.

Follow the money
Yukos has already sent 11 letters to the Kremlin, to Prime Minister Mikhail Fradkov and to Finance Minister Alexei Kudrin, pleading for some kind of settlement. Khodorkovsky has repeatedly offered to give up his 44% stake. But the Kremlin could not possibly take this offer: it would have to lift a freeze on the Menatep holding`s majority stake in Yukos - a very risky move.

So the Kremlin`s answer has been thunderous silence. It hasn`t escaped anybody`s attention that if the Kremlin made its position clear, Yukos would be able to borrow money on the global financial markets. But the justice minister even blocked a proposition for parts of Yukos being bought by a British consortium, including a collection of Dubai princes.

Yukos could go bankrupt at any moment. It needs $1.7 billion every single month just to maintain its operations - like paying fees to the state-owned Transneft pipeline network and a huge amount of taxes. There`s not much it can do with its accounts frozen. Yukos has until August 30 to pay the hefty $3.4 billion bill for taxes and penalties unpaid in 2000. This could skyrocket to at least $10 billion if the Russian authorities decide to apply similar charges for 2001 through 2003.

So the war is now between the Kremlin and Yukos` majority shareholder, the Menatep Group, an offshore holding based in Gibraltar and so immune to the Kremlin`s attacks. While Yukos is still active, Menatep is trying to get maximum liquidity: there will be maybe those $10 billion in back taxes to pay, plus some kind of satisfaction to minor shareholders - most of them Americans - who still control 25% of Yukos` capital (the major American shareholders bailed out two months ago). Washington is obviously applying some pressure over the Kremlin to protect their interests - but to no avail.

Eric Kraus, chief equity strategist at Sovlink, tries to sum it all up: "It looks like Menatep is trying to bring down everything with it, while the government appears to be willing to inflict as much damage as need be. The only innocent victims are going to be international investors." Earlier this week, Yukos cut its output forecast for 2004. The company as we know it may no longer exist after August 30.

I want my own pipeline
Pipelines in Russia are a state monopoly. They have belonged to the state company Transneft since Soviet times. Russia produces anything around 8.5 million barrels of oil a day - and up. The antiquated Transneft network allows for only 3.5 million export barrels a day, on three different pipelines: one to Eastern Europe; one to a new terminal in the Baltic which gets frozen in winter; and one to the Black Sea port of Novorossiysk. Some of the daily non-export production is for the national market, a few hundred thousand barrels is exported by rail to minor ports, but the bulk is stocked up - to the despair of Russian oil majors whose profits could skyrocket even more with the barrel flirting with the $50 mark.

But Transneft does not care about profits. Its business - under direct control of the Kremlin - is strategic. This situation ended up forcing the four Russian oil majors - Yukos, LUKoil, Sibneft and TNK - to open a new front in their private war against Transneft.

Enter Murmansk. The perfect spot: 200 kilometers north of the Arctic Circle, very close to the Norwegian border, hit by the warm waters of the Gulf Stream, the only Russian port allowing supertankers. And crucially it is only 9,300 kilometers from refineries in Texas, against 20,500 kilometers for tankers leaving from the Persian Gulf.

In November 2002, after that famous energy summit in Houston, the four Russian oil majors committed themselves to build an immense, $4 billion private pipeline from Western Siberia to a private terminal in the Barents sea - so as much oil as necessary could be exported to the US with no hassle. Murmansk, halfway between Moscow and the North Pole, where the sun simply does not shine for two whole months in winter, was supposed to be the place where the US, in 2007, would quench its thirst for oil.

Or will it? As the chess game stands, it looks like Siberian oil will most likely go to China. Yukos itself, before the crisis, was betting heavily on China. Yukos` managers were dreaming of China`s consumption of 160 million tons by 2010 - four times what it imports today. So it invested in a 2,400 kilometer pipeline from Angarsk, very close to Irkutsk , to Daqing in Manchuria, with oil coming from fields in Eastern Siberia, north of the Baikal lake. The only thing missing for the deal - after four long years of negotiations - was an imprimatur from the Kremlin. It came on April 2003 - before Putin made his move.

There is an alternative route: it favors Japan, and is proposed by the state-owned Transneft, meaning it has an attentive audience in the Kremlin. It`s longer, and much more expensive, than the Chinese route, going all the way to the Pacific near Vladivostok. Russia is very much tempted to strike a strategic, energy alliance with Japan. But the Kremlin decided, also in April 2003: the priority is the Chinese pipeline.

The Angarsk-Vladivostok route makes no sense - industry experts argue. Better to sell Russian oil from the Sakhalin islands - where a congregation of oil majors is investing $20 billion in offshore projects. Yukos, for its part, still bets heavily on Murmansk - dreaming of selling Russian oil for the same price as Arab oil.

Splendid independence
The Kremlin essentially is on the verge of making decisions that will influence its foreign policy for decades to come. An energy alliance with the US - via Murmansk? A pipeline to China? A pipeline to Japan? And what about the strategic alliance with the European Union?

After Putin`s extremely friendly response to America`s grief on September 11, the Russians were expecting at least more technological transfer on the oil front. It didn`t happen. So Bush`s unilateralism in fact was in part responsible for Putin`s change - from his 2001 pro-Americanism to the 2003 Paris-Berlin-Moscow axis prior to the invasion of Iraq.

Putin is in a splendid position of independence - of sorts. With high oil and gas prices, Russia has been growing at about 7% a year since 2001. But it needs a massive injection of foreign capital in its derelict oil and gas industry - so it may be able to export not 4.6 million barrels a day, but maybe 8 or 9 million. Russia needs the American and British oil majors: it`s more cost-effective than depending on bank loans or the financial markets.

The key question being debated in the European Union - and of course in Moscow and Washington - is which alliance will prevail: with the US or with Western Europe? With China, it`s not really an alliance: it`s a question of making money because, as any visit to the region reveals, Russia remains terribly afraid of Chinese demographic and economic pressure over the Siberian border.

So Russia may gain a lot by getting close to Japan. Japan - like America - also needs to get rid of its dependence on Saudi oil, and it is increasingly buying more and more Russian oil and gas. EU diplomats are betting that Russia, although not neglecting the US, wants above all an economic partnership with Japan, a strategic partnership with India, and a strategic energy partnership with the EU. It helps that Putin loves and understands German culture and speaks fluent German, and that French President Jacques Chirac loves Russian culture and speaks Russian. It`s up to the EU to get its political act together.

The way Putin re-engineered the whole game suggests that the Russia-US energy alliance may not have resisted the Iraq disaster. The key lesson from the Yukos saga is that Russian oil will continue to flood world markets: but this will happen under Putin`s state capitalism strategic rules. And one thing is certain: they are not exactly Dick Cheney`s.

(Copyright 2004 Asia Times Online Ltd. All rights reserved. Please contact [e-mail] for information on our sales and syndication policies.)

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Caspian capers
By Sergei Blagov

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Central_Asia/FH26Ag02.html

MOSCOW - As attempts to solve differences on how to divide the Caspian Sea riches between Russia, Azerbaijan, Iran, Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan go nowhere, the five littoral states remain divided in decade-long negotiations. Meanwhile, some evidence suggests that positions in the great Caspian could be shifting.

Senior diplomats of the littoral states are due to meet in Moscow next month to discuss sharing the region`s immense oil and gas resources. Last week, Azerbaijanii Foreign Minister Yelmar Mamediarov traveled to Moscow and told his Russian hosts that "diplomatic efforts could yield a result like the one we succeeded in achieving in the north of the Caspian". He was referring to a deal among Russia, Kazakhstan and Azerbaijan to share the resources of the north and center of the Caspian Sea.

Moscow believes that in the absence of an overall agreement, bilateral agreements on the Caspian are needed. In the wake of the flawed Caspian Sea summit in April 2002, Moscow pushed for a series of bilateral deals instead of an overall agreement among all five littoral states. Kazakhstan quickly agreed and clinched a separate deal with Russia, while Azerbaijan eventually followed suit by signing a similar agreement.

However, Iran has said it will not recognize any bilateral or trilateral deals on the Caspian division before an overall Caspian convention is signed by all five states. Seeking a larger share of the Caspian Sea, Turkmenistan and Iran have disagreed with Russia`s plan for splitting the Caspian bottom along a "modified median line" while keeping the waters in common. Turkmenistan has declined to take part in any bilateral deals on the Caspian.

In April, the littoral states` chief diplomats met in Moscow, and Russia had expected to give ongoing negotiations on the Caspian division a much-needed boost. Yet the meeting`s outcome proved well below these expectations.

The Caspian Convention has been under discussion since 1991, and respective special Caspian envoys have been meeting since 1996. The convention was expected to be signed this year, but these plans are still far from maturity. Prospects of the Caspian summit, which was to have be convened in the second half of this year in Tehran, also remain far from certain.

Moreover, the Kremlin has just fired its special Caspian envoy - Viktor Kalyuzhny, who used to be largely anti-American and fiercely critical of the US-backed projects in the region. He was replaced by former energy minister Igor Yusufov, a less outspoken official who has been supporting closer energy ties with the United States.

Kalyuzhny, who had served as Russia`s special Caspian envoy for the past four years, had become notorious for his anti-US rhetoric. He lashed out at the United States` perceived meddling and insisted regional security issues should be tackled by the littoral states only, a position close to Tehran`s stance. Kalyuzhny also quoted the presence of US bases in Central Asia as an argument against demilitarization of the Caspian region.

As far as the Kremlin`s goals in the region were concerned, Russia`s special Caspian envoy sounded uncharacteristically blunt. "We have the Russian president`s instructions to ensure the maximum volume of Caspian energy transit through Russia," Kalyuzhny stated.

On the other hand, Russia`s new special Caspian envoy, Yusufov, in his previous capacity, has repeatedly reiterated Russian readiness to supply oil and gas to the United States, stating that Russia prioritizes energy ties with the US. It remains to be seen whether Kalyuzhny`s replacement by Yusufov could indicate changes in Moscow`s position in the Caspian debate, a step closer toward Washington.

Incidentally, Yusufov`s status was downgraded from presidential special envoy and deputy foreign minister to the Foreign Ministry`s special envoy. Hence the move could also reflect Moscow`s disillusionment with prospects of working out a viable Caspian solution in the foreseeable future.

In the meantime, Tehran has been on its diplomatic offensive to secure its Caspian interests. A recent visit by Iranian President Mohammad Khatami to Azerbaijan seems to have put bilateral relations on a better footing. However, the Iranian leader`s trip failed to resolve differences over the Caspian division.

Until recently, the two countries were divided by a variety of disagreements. Since the early 1990s, Azerbaijani and Iranian presidents did not exchange visits because of bilateral tensions. Yet the late president Heydar Aliyev`s trip to Iran in May 2002 served to improve bilateral ties.

Khatami paid the first official visit to Azerbaijan this August 5-7. Both presidents hailed bilateral ties, although no political declaration or agreement on the legal status of the Caspian Sea was signed, as had been initially expected. Besides the Caspian question, issues of geopolitics also surfaced: Azerbaijan has been wary about Iran`s strong economic and political ties with Azerbaijan`s erstwhile rival, Armenia, while Tehran has been suspicious of Baku`s close relationship with the US.

Iran and Azerbaijan have long been unable to agree on a formula to divide the sea. During his Baku visit, Khatami tried to improve prospects for a near-term breakthrough. Yet no participants in the stalemated Caspian Sea talks have given any indication of making a significant concession.

With Russia, Kazakhstan and Azerbaijan supporting the median-line division principle, this would leave Iran with the smallest part of the Caspian. According to treaties in 1921, 1940 and 1970, Iran controls just 13% of the Caspian sea and is poised to benefit greatly from equal division. After 1991, Iran suggested that the Caspian should be divided equally, with the five littoral states each receiving 20% of the sea.

Kazakhstan is set to become a major beneficiary of the median principle, which would leave it with the largest part of the Caspian. Iran and Turkmenistan would be the losers. No big wonder that Iran and Turkmenistan insist that each of the five states bordering the Caspian Sea should own one-fifth of its oil and gas reserves, estimated to be the third-largest in the world.

In terms of the great Caspian energy game, Moscow also seeks a pipeline ban as part of a future convention on the Caspian Sea`s status. Such a ban would be detrimental to a US-backed project to send Caspian oil to the Turkish port of Ceyhan. Russian officials cited environmental reasons as the main argument for banning pipelines.

Moscow has been insisting that the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan (BTC) pipeline is not economically viable, indicating that Russia remains wary of the US-backed project. Last February, Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev came to Moscow to reassure Russia that the BTC was not intended to damage Russia`s economic interests.

Coincidence or not, Kalyuzhny happened to be the BTC`s most zealous critic. He threatened to undermine Kazakh crude oil supplies to the BTC, accusing Washington of sponsoring the BTC pipeline in order to bypass Russia. Following Kalyuzhny`s removal, it remains to be seen whether Russia can remain opposed to the BTC, as well as the US pursuit of the Caspian`s hydrocarbon riches.

Sergei Blagov covers Russia and post-Soviet states, with special attention to Asia-related issues. He has contributed to Asia Times Online since 1996. Between 1983 and 1997, he was based in Southeast Asia. In 2001 and 2002, Nova Science Publishers, NY, published two of his books on Vietnamese history.

(Copyright 2004 Asia Times Online Ltd. All rights reserved. Please contact [e-mail] for information on our sales and syndication policies.)



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August 28, 2004
THE AFTERMATH
After the Siege, a City of Ruins, Its Dead Rotting
By ALEX BERENSON

NAJAF, Iraq, Aug. 27 - The wild dogs of Najaf ate well this week.

In this holy city, in lightless basements, in empty crypts, in the shadow of the golden dome of the shrine of Imam Ali, thousands of men have tried desperately and often successfully to kill one another. They have fought with knives and guns, grenades and mortars, tanks and mines and roadside bombs, and sometimes even their bare hands.

Now, as a cease-fire halts the three-week fight between American forces and Iraqi insurgents, the toll from the battle is only too clear. On Friday afternoon, the decomposed bodies of insurgent fighters lay in houses in and around the Old City, which surrounds the shrine.

One house at the western edge of the city held four blasted corpses, missing arms and legs, their stench heavy in the hot midday sun. Dogs had been at the bodies overnight, marines said. Indeed a dog skulked nearby as Iraqi medics carried the remains to an ambulance for transport to the shrine, where they are washed before burial.

As many as 1,000 guerrillas may have been killed since early August, American commanders say, along with 11 American marines and soldiers. More than 100 have been wounded, including dozens of serious injuries.

About 3,000 American soldiers and marines took part in the fight, battling somewhere between 1,000 and 2,000 guerrillas, a number that varied as Iraqis joined or quit the battle.

For every shot they took, American troops returned scores or hundreds. For every mortar round the guerrillas lobbed, the gunners at the Marine base here responded with a 100-pound artillery shell. The insurgents had donkey carts loaded with rocket-propelled grenades, the Americans 70-ton tanks that can survive direct hits from mortars and grenades. The American advantage was especially large at night, when night-vision goggles allowed troops to see in the dark.

The two sides have caused uncounted civilian casualties and inflicted tremendous damage on Najaf`s Old City. The area stinks of sewage and soot, and its streets are filled with rubble from bombed-out buildings. Even the mosque has been slightly damaged.

Civilians walked freely around the shrine on Friday, and the area was nominally peaceful, but passions are running high just below the surface. Just before the noon prayer call, this reporter was accused of being a spy and set on by a crowd just west of the shrine, then briefly taken captive by Moktada al-Sadr`s guerrillas, blindfolded and tied up, and threatened with death before being released unharmed after senior Sadr officials intervened.

Overwhelming American firepower has caused nearly all of the structural damage, although it is unclear whether guerrillas or American troops are responsible for more civilian casualties.

Unlike the guerrillas, American troops generally appeared to make an effort not to fire at random, but when fired upon they responded with overwhelming force. They joke that they are living bait, luring guerrillas out of their holes to be killed.

"When we take fire, we just usually light it up," said Pfc. Anthony Johnson, a soldier in the Second Battalion, Seventh Cavalry, which fought in the southern part of the city.

For three weeks, the fighting was fierce and nearly nonstop, moving from a sprawling cemetery just north of the Old City to the blocks in the southern part of the Old City and then nearly to the gates of the shrine itself.

Armed mainly with rocket-propelled grenades, mortars and light machine guns, the insurgents tried to counter American troops equipped with tanks and supported by artillery and air power.

The resulting battle was intense but lopsided, especially after the first few days of fighting, when the American military brought in two heavy Army battalions to take over the fighting in the cemetery and south of the Old City while the marines raided strongholds elsewhere in Najaf and Kufa.

Still, American soldiers and commanders say they have been surprised by the tenacity and toughness of the guerrillas, fighters loyal to Mr. Sadr, the rebel Shiite cleric.

"They`re brave," said Specialist Mark Siapco, a soldier in the First Battalion, Fifth Cavalry, which has fought north of the shrine. "They`re crazy."

In the most brazen attack, a guerrilla jumped onto an American tank in the cemetery two weeks ago and killed two soldiers before fleeing.

"You have to be careful about underestimating your enemy," said Lt. Col. Myles Miyamasu, commander of the battalion. "Their tenacity, though not equal to our own, probably surprised us a little."

Besides the deaths and wounds, many more men have stories of close calls, dud mortar shells that failed to explode or bullets that smashed into body armor instead of skin and bone. On the front lines, soldiers no longer blink at mortars that explode 50 feet from their armored vehicles or rocket-propelled grenades trailing sparks by their heads, instead methodically trying to figure out the location of the guerrillas in order to destroy them.

"A close call would be getting hit in your Kevlar," the chest and back armor that every soldier and marine wears, Specialist Siapco said. "A bullet whizzing by, that doesn`t count. You don`t have to worry about that."

American forces advanced daily so that by Thursday the rebels had no ground left to give. Early that morning, American tanks reached the gates of the shrine and fought in its shadow. On a bombed-out street illuminated only by the stars and the glow from the lights attached to the mosque`s walls and minarets, the tanks and Bradley fighting vehicles turned their turrets left and right, searching for targets.

Guerrillas fired rocket-propelled grenades from buildings nearby, but even direct hits did not seriously damage the American armor. The Bradleys returned fire, pouring bursts of 25-millimeter high-explosive shells, essentially miniature grenades, into the buildings.

The shells glowed red, setting fires that burned orange in the night. With the shrine`s golden dome as a backdrop, the street had a surreal beauty, and soldiers said they were astonished to be fighting so close to one of the holiest sites in Islam.

But the Mahdi Army did not stop fighting. Snipers took aim at Maj. Doug Ollivant, an American commander directing the battle from about 100 yards away, and a hidden mortar position rained shells around Major Ollivant`s armored Humvee. The mortar was so close to the Americans that soldiers could hear shells being fired 30 seconds before they landed, because they essentially were traveling straight up and down.

"It`s going to kill you, you know," Major Ollivant said, as one soldier lighted a cigarette not long after a mortar crashed down nearby.

By Friday afternoon, with a cease-fire in place, the scene in the Old City was very different. Men walked through the streets, surveying the damage and walking past American troops who would soon be pulled back from their positions.

"You never know if some of these guys were the guys fighting us," one soldier said to another, watching the men walk by.

"I guarantee you some were," the second responded.

But First Sgt. Justin Lehew of the Marines, whose men killed the fighters whose bodies the medics were gathering Friday afternoon, said his troops were not unhappy that the fight had ended without a climactic battle.

"They just want to go home," Sergeant Lehew said. "Like everybody else."

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company

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Wahlen in einer Bananenrepublik!

August 28, 2004
In Palm Beach, Results of 2000 Still Stir a Fight
By ABBY GOODNOUGH

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. - Brushing away tears as she sat for an interview on a hectic morning in the Palm Beach County elections office, Theresa LePore wanted to be clear: her contact lens was bothering her, nothing more.

"I`m not crying, you know," she said with a faint smile.

Ms. LePore is clearly intent on showing that she is holding things together. Four years after her county became the red-hot center of the 2000 presidential election standoff, she is under just about as much stress and scrutiny as she was back then, when camera crews from as far away as Japan camped at her office and she surrendered to emotional exhaustion and teared up in public. She designed the infamous "butterfly ballot," and so in this county that bears the most scar tissue from 2000, her name figures prominently in the rallying cries leading up to Tuesday`s state primary and the far bigger test in November.

"She is the problem, my dear," said Donald Kronfeld, a retiree in Lake Worth who said he, like thousands of other county residents, accidentally voted for Patrick J. Buchanan in 2000 instead of Al Gore because of the confusing ballot design. Other votes were invalidated because paper tabs called chads did not properly detach from ballot cards. In all, about 29,000 ballots in Palm Beach County were thrown out because they included votes for more than one presidential candidate or appeared to have no names punched.

"She is exactly what everyone wants in a civil servant," said Sid Dinerstein, chairman of the Palm Beach County Republican Party, which has practically granted Ms. LePore folk-hero status.

Ms. LePore, 49, is determined to prove herself not just stoic but also nonpartisan (she changed her voter registration to unaffiliated from Democrat after 2000) and run a smooth-to-the-point-of-boring election this time. But as the aftershocks of 2000 shudder on here, the leadup to November is anything but dull.

Everyone in Palm Beach County wants redemption: the Democrats, many of whom remain haunted by the knowledge that they voted for the wrong candidate back then; the Republicans, tired of accusations that they stole the election; and Ms. LePore, who wants to escape her Madam Butterfly label and accusations that she caused everything from President Bush`s victory in 2000 to the 2001 terrorist attacks and the war in Iraq.

She is up for re-election herself on Tuesday and is facing competition, for the first time since she won the office in 1996, from an opponent who paints her as incompetent. On the eve of the primary, which includes local candidates and nominees to replace a retiring senator, Bob Graham, Ms. LePore is again facing accusations of bad ballot design, this time with the county`s absentee ballot. It asks voters to connect an arrow to their preferred candidate`s name instead of filling in a bubble beside it. Ms. LePore said she chose the arrow design, which is used elsewhere in Florida and nationally, because studies suggested it was easier for voters to understand.

Ms. LePore`s opponent, Arthur Anderson, an education professor and former county school board member, has sharply criticized the ballot design and the fact that Ms. LePore`s office mailed about 25,000 absentee ballots with old instructions (they asked for a witness`s signature, which state law no longer requires). Though virtually unknown, Mr. Anderson is getting high-profile help: former Gov. Howard Dean of Vermont campaigned with him on Monday, and Senator Joseph I. Lieberman of Connecticut, a popular figure in South Florida, is to campaign with him on Sunday.

Although Democrats hold a solid majority here, Palm Beach County is so big that even a small shift among its 700,000 voters could make a difference in the statewide result in November. Both parties are investing heavily here in television advertisements and get-out-the-vote efforts.

But Ms. LePore and the jagged memories of 2000 are likely to draw even more attention here.

"There is a high level of sensitivity, a high level of awareness about not letting this happen again in Palm Beach County," said Ron Klein, a Delray Beach Democrat who is the State Senate`s minority leader. "We need to make sure we get it right this time."

Of course, how to get it right depends on whom you ask. To the Democrats, it means securing an even larger margin of victory than in 2000, when Mr. Gore won almost two-thirds of the Palm Beach County vote despite widespread voter error.

To the Republicans, it means capturing just enough traditionally Democratic voters - maybe a few thousand, Mr. Dinerstein said - to give Mr. Bush a leg up in a state expected to be extremely competitive. They are focusing on Haitian immigrants and Jews, some of whom might switch allegiances because Mr. Lieberman is no longer on the Democratic ticket and because Mr. Bush has staunchly supported Israel, Mr. Dinerstein said.

First, though, both parties have to turn voters out at the polls, where Election Day operations will be a lot different from 2000. Punch-card ballots have been outlawed statewide and Palm Beach County sold many of its chad-producing Votomatic machines on eBay, replacing them with touch-screen machines made by Sequoia Voting Systems of Oakland, Calif.

So far, Palm Beach County has experienced more success under the new system than Miami-Dade and Broward Counties, which chose touch-screen machines manufactured by Elections Systems and Software Inc. of Omaha. Ms. LePore said she picked Sequoia because its machines had a promising track record in Riverside County, Calif., which has a voter population roughly the same as Palm Beach County.

But suspicion about the machinery, stoked by Democratic lawmakers who paint dark scenarios about its potential liabilities, runs deep. Representative Robert Wexler, a Boca Raton Democrat, has sued Ms. LePore and other officials - unsuccessfully so far - because the touch-screen machines do not provide a paper record of every vote. Ms. LePore said she was not against paper voting receipts, but thought they were unnecessary and would use them only if the state authorized them.

Mr. Klein, meanwhile, asked Gov. Jeb Bush to require the 15 counties now using touch-screen machines to also offer paper ballots as an alternative for worried voters. But the governor refused, and the usually impassive Ms. LePore accused Mr. Klein of fear-mongering.

"That is just totally absurd," she said, adding that it was too late to acquire the necessary equipment and teach poll workers and voters how to use it. "Every step forward we`re taking, we end up getting bumped back two steps because of elected officials that are going out and predicting doom and gloom."

Besides overhauling election machinery, Ms. LePore has increased the number of poll workers and, because of a new state requirement, given them more training. She has acquired laptop computers and cell phones for all 696 precincts so that, unlike in 2000, poll workers can have voter registration records at their fingertips and keep in touch with headquarters. In another change, two phone banks will operate out of Ms. LePore`s office on Election Day to take calls from poll workers and the public.

Yet there are signs that these changes have brought voters little comfort, the foremost being the high number of absentee ballots requested so far this year. Palm Beach County received 35,577 requests for next week`s primary, more than three times the 11,472 ballots requested before the 2000 primary.

Ms. LePore said she expected as many as 120,000 absentee ballot requests for the general election, up from just 54,570 in 2000. She bought two extra scanners to read absentee ballots, she said, so there should be no backlog.

Her opponent, Mr. Anderson, has raised more money than Ms. LePore, but has suffered from revelations that the Internal Revenue Service filed liens against him and that he was behind on child-support payments.

Mr. Anderson does not hesitate to blame Ms. LePore for the travails of 2000; his Web site says that she "singlehandedly changed the outcome of the presidential election." She has attributed the problems of that year to voter error and said that she would "probably" not use a butterfly ballot again, "knowing what I know now."

As they march toward November, Democrats think they have a potent strategy in rehashing the chaos of 2000, but admit their approach is unorganized. The county party has been weakened by internal battles, and its leadership is fragmented among about 30 Democratic clubs, most based in condominium complexes for retirees.

Republicans here say they are much more organized than in 2000, with more money, ground troops and determination. Mr. Dinerstein said Jeb Bush`s popularity here in the 2002 gubernatorial race - he won 43 percent of the county vote - gave his party new momentum in the Democratic stronghold.

Mr. Dinerstein said that the local chapter of the Republican Jewish Coalition, a Washington-based group, has helped by lobbying Jewish voters to support Mr. Bush. It brought Vice President Dick Cheney to Palm Beach County in May, riling stalwart Jewish Democrats who are painting defections as betrayal.

Similar tensions were on display one recent afternoon at Valencia Shores, an upscale retirement community in Lake Worth, when Shellie Kronfeld, 64, admitted that she was an undecided voter, making her husband gasp. "I wish Kerry did really move me, but he doesn`t," Mrs. Kronfeld, a retired assistant principal from Brooklyn, said. "I don`t think either party has been terrific."

Yet she is haunted by her belief that she accidentally voted for Mr. Buchanan in 2000, a victim of the butterfly ballot.

"I let it go until I see all those kids dying in Iraq and think, `Could we have made a difference?` " she said.

Mr. and Mrs. Kronfeld said they would vote absentee this year, mostly to avoid long lines. Though Ms. LePore said the wait would be shorter this time because the new machines were faster, she also expressed concern about a potential circus atmosphere outside the polls. What if Michael Moore, who has vowed to bring his cameras to Florida on Election Day, joined the throngs of volunteer lawyers and poll watchers whom Ms. LePore expects to pour into Palm Beach County in search of foul play?

Some poll workers quit after they heard Mr. Moore might come, she said.

"These poor voters may actually have to walk a gantlet just to get in to vote," she said, "and get discouraged and leave because they just don`t want to deal with it."

But conversations with people like Barbara Katz of Boynton Beach, who said she voted correctly in 2000 only because friends warned her in advance about the confusing ballot, suggest that many voters here would walk on broken glass to get it right this time.

"You can`t redo that election, even though many of us do it in our dreams," Ms. Katz, 67, said. "They look at this one as their chance to start sleeping nights again."

Ban on Recounts Struck Down

By The New York Times

MIAMI, Aug. 27 - An administrative law judge in Tallahassee struck down a new state rule that bans manual recounts in counties that use touch-screen voting machines, handing a preliminary victory to voting-rights groups.

The American Civil Liberties Union sued to overturn the rule in July, saying it violated a state law that requires recounts in extremely close elections. State officials say they made the rule because under state law the only reason for a manual recount is to determine "voter intent" in close races.

A spokeswoman for Secretary of State Glenda E. Hood said the state might appeal.

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August 27, 2004
Al-Qaeda outsmarts sanctions, says UN
By Stephen Fidler in London

International measures aimed at curbing al-Qaeda`s access to finance have achieved less than hoped, as terrorists have successfully evaded sanctions and parts of the sanctions regime have lost credibility, a new United Nations report concludes.

While the UN Security Council has largely reacted to events, the report says "al-Qaeda has shown great flexibility and adaptability in staying ahead of them".

The report, by a UN monitoring panel established in January to look at the effectiveness of UN sanctions against al-Qaeda and the Taliban fundamentalists of Afghanistan, also concludes that a recent mutation of al-Qaeda into a looser network of affiliated underground groups has made sanctions more difficult.

Heraldo Muñoz, Chile`s ambassador to the UN and chairman of the security council committee that commissioned the report, said: "We have to get into the more sophisticated ways in which they have financed terrorist operations and channelled their funds."

These included using alternative methods of transfering funds outside the formal banking system, and bogus trade operations. Cash was being moved in large amounts by courier including packages of $100,000 and $30,000 from the southern Philippines to Indonesia to finance attacks in Bali and Jakarta, he said.

It appears al-Qaeda favours countries where financial controls are weakest. "We suspect that al-Qaeda has exploited the counterfeit currency trade in Somalia," Mr Muñoz said.

Al-Qaeda has also changed to make its financing harder to tackle; the group has less need for money and operations have decentralised.

Operations since September 11 2001 have been smaller. The Madrid bombings in March used mining dynamite and mobile phones and are thought to have cost only $10,000.

There are fewer people in al-Qaeda training camps. It no longer pays $10m-$20m a year to its hosts in Afghanistan, the Taliban. The only payments by al-Qaeda found by Afghan authorities were $200 a month to families of those in Guantánamo Bay.

"Only the sophisticated attacks of September 11 2001 required significant funding of over six figures," the report concluded.

It costed the Bali bombings in October 2002 at less than $50,000 and the November 2003 attacks in Istanbul at less than $40,000. Decentralisation of the group reduced need for funds transfers.

The report, to be published next week, says the UN list of designated individuals, groups and entities "has begun to lose credibility and operational value . . . ".

Only 21 countries have submitted names for the list, which includes 174 individuals and 111 entities associated with al-Qaeda.

Millions of dollars of assets have been frozen worldwide--Azerbaijan has frozen only $40 of suspected terrorist finance, the report says but no state reports stopping anyone under the travel ban.

Mr Muñoz said the report would go to the Security Council, from which he hoped would emerge measures to tighten finance sanctions.

© Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2004.

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August 28, 2004
Economic Reality Bites

If anyone required further evidence that President Bush`s fiscal policies have not worked the way he says they have, this week`s report from the Census Bureau provided it. In brief, from 2001 through 2003, poverty increased, income stagnated and the ranks of the uninsured grew, while the United States spent some $400 billion on tax cuts, which mainly benefited wealthy families. The Bush administration seemed intent on minimizing the political impact of the report, releasing the data on Thursday, instead of the usual date in late September, to get it done before the convention. But the numbers spoke for themselves. Since Mr. Bush came to power, 4.3 million people have fallen below the poverty line, set at $18,660 for a family of four in 2003, bringing the total number of people living in poverty in 2003 to 35.9 million, or 12.5 percent of the American population.

The poor will always suffer most from recession and job losses. But one sure way to stem the slide into poverty is by bolstering state programs that directly benefit the poor, like job training, health care and child care. The administration devoted only 3 percent of its stimulus spending to aid for state governments. Congress and the administration have also done nothing to enhance the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program. As a result, while the number of children living in poverty increased by 11 percent over the past three years, the number of children receiving welfare declined by 10 percent over the same period. Adding to the gloom, median family income - $44,853 in 2000 - fell by $1,535 during the administration`s first three years, while the number of Americans without health insurance, according to the Census Bureau, grew by 5.2 million, to 45 million in 2003. The president and Congress have largely ignored this problem, while leaving little room to address it later by ballooning the deficit with tax cuts.

A Bush campaign official suggested that the census report was misleading because it did not reflect the economic growth of the past 11 months. In fact, the report covers all of 2003. And in three of the seven months of 2004 for which data is available, job growth has not been strong enough to even keep up with population growth. Moreover, a Commerce Department report released yesterday showed that economic momentum slowed in the spring, with the economy expanding at a rate of only 2.8 percent, the slowest advance in more than a year, versus 3.0 percent as originally reported. The downward revision reflects June`s record trade deficit of $55.8 billion.

It remains to be seen whether this week`s bad economic news turns out to be bad political news for Mr. Bush. But for tens of millions of Americans, it is already old news.

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company

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Allawi ist nur noch ein Bettvorleger.

August 28, 2004
Lessons of Najaf

Iraq`s interim government did well to avoid a bloody fight to the finish with Moktada al-Sadr over the Imam Ali Mosque, the country`s most sacred Shiite site. It could have suffered incalculable political damage even if it had won. Instead, Prime Minister Ayad Allawi accepted a face-saving compromise worked out by the country`s leading Shiite cleric, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, thus ending a siege that had occupied center stage in the war in Iraq for three weeks.

The main winners are Ayatollah Sistani and Mr. Sadr, a fiery but low-ranking cleric who is a hero to millions of poor, young and unemployed Iraqi Shiites. Baghdad and Washington, once eager to escalate this confrontation, exit from it somewhat diminished. Najaf, meanwhile, lies shattered, and hundreds of Iraqis, including many of Mr. Sadr`s armed followers, have been killed.

Significantly, it was with Ayatollah Sistani, not Dr. Allawi, whom Mr. Sadr worked out the withdrawal deal. The battered remnants of his Mahdi Army were allowed to leave the mosque without having to surrender or give up their weapons. They are now supposed to stay out of Najaf and the city of Kufa nearby, but similar agreements with the Mahdi Army have broken down in the past. And with Mr. Sadr now seen as a hero in the Shiite slums, he will have no trouble replacing his fallen fighters and building an even more powerful militia to advance his towering political ambitions and militant religious agenda.

The agreement also calls for all American and other foreign military forces to be withdrawn from Najaf and Kufa, to be replaced by Iraqi police, whose readiness and reliability remain untested.

Mr. Sadr is widely disliked - by the Allawi government, by senior clerics and by the main Shiite religious parties. His growing influence threatens orderly constitutional development and secular rule. Yet again, he has demonstrated that he excels at turning military confrontations to his own advantage. In this he was assisted by Mr. Allawi, who tough-talked himself into a corner from which the more subtle Ayatollah Sistani extracted him. Mr. Allawi needs to digest important lessons about the limits of bluster and firepower in his volatile country, and move quickly, with American help, to find jobs for the angry unemployed men Mr. Sadr has been using as cannon fodder.

For its part, Washington now faces the prospect of seeing American forces banned from the Shiite strongholds of Najaf and Kufa, as well as the Sunni redoubt of Falluja. It therefore needs to make major adjustments in military and political strategy if it is to retain any hope of rebuilding Iraq and preparing for credible elections in five months.

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company

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Was braucht Israel Spione im Pentagon, wenn dort Wolfowitz, Feith und andere Neocons dort in führenden Positionen sind.

FBI Probes Pentagon Spy Case
Aug. 27, 2004
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/08/27/eveningnews/printa…

CBS News has learned that the FBI has a full-fledged espionage investigation under way and is about to -- in FBI terminology -- "roll up" someone agents believe has been spying not for an enemy, but for Israel from within the office of the Secretary of Defense at the Pentagon.

60 Minutes Correspondent Lesley Stahl reports the FBI believes it has "solid" evidence that the suspected mole supplied Israel with classified materials that include secret White House policy deliberations on Iran.

At the heart of the investigation are two people who work at The American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), a powerful pro-Israel lobby in Washington.

The FBI investigation, headed up by Dave Szady, has involved wiretaps, undercover surveillance and photography that CBS News was told document the passing of classified information from the mole, to the men at AIPAC, and on to the Israelis.

CBS sources say that last year the suspected spy, described as a trusted analyst at the Pentagon, turned over a presidential directive on U.S. policy toward Iran while it was, "in the draft phase when U.S. policy-makers were still debating the policy."

This put the Israelis, according to one source, "inside the decision-making loop" so they could "try to influence the outcome."

The case raises another concern among investigators: Did Israel also use the analyst to try to influence U.S. policy on the war in Iraq?

With ties to top Pentagon officials Paul Wolfowitz and Douglas Feith, the analyst was assigned to a unit within the Defense Department tasked with helping develop the Pentagon`s Iraq policy.

Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld has been made aware of the case. The government notified AIPAC today that it wants information about the two employees and their contacts with a person at the Pentagon.

AIPAC told CBS News it is cooperating with the government and has hired outside counsel. It denies any wrongdoing by the organization or any of its employees.

An Israeli spokesman said, "We categorically deny these allegations. They are completely false and outrageous." The suspected spy has not returned repeated phone calls from CBS News.



©MMIV, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.

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Die irakische Regierung sollte sich der Dienste von Baghdad-Bob sichern, damit bei den nächsten Kämpfen ihre Verlautbarungen besser rüberkommen. Man erinnert sich noch an Mohammed Saeed al-Sahaf, Iraqi Minister of Information.

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Voice of power

Leader
Saturday August 28, 2004

The Guardian
What the Americans failed to achieve in Najaf with their tanks, the Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani achieved with a motorcade. Having arrived in the Iraqi holy city on Thursday accompanied by thousands of ordinary Shia Muslims, he calmly took possession of the Imam Ali shrine where fighters loyal to Moqtada al-Sadr had been under siege from US and Iraqi government forces for three weeks. Yesterday, Mr al-Sadr`s militiamen in Najaf began laying down their arms under a deal brokered by Mr al-Sistani. We can only hope it will last; if it does not, the future in Iraq scarcely bears thinking about.

This outcome may be portrayed in some quarters as a defeat for Mr al-Sadr; in reality it is only a tactical withdrawal. His militia is being allowed to melt away, no doubt to reappear somewhere else later on. Despite previous threats to arrest him, Mr al-Sadr is, in the words of one government minister, "as free as any Iraqi citizen to do whatever he likes". Since the overthrow of Saddam Hussein, Mr al-Sadr has risen from minor rabble-rouser to significant if troublesome player with nationalist as well as religious appeal. His constituency is the marginalised and disaffected youth, and his rise is mainly the result of US mistakes and misjudgments plus, latterly, those of the interim government too.

In Najaf, Mr al-Sistani has in effect come to Mr al-Sadr`s rescue, providing him with a relatively face-saving way out of a bloody impasse. The more junior cleric has, for the time being at least, submitted to the superior authority of the grand ayatollah. Whether this will allow Mr al-Sistani to exercise much control over him is another matter. Mr al-Sadr, in his early 30s, can play a long game; the grand ayatollah, at 73, can not.

Earlier this month, as the fighting started, Mr al-Sistani left Najaf for medical treatment in London - to return as the city`s saviour. He has been criticised for his absence, though there was probably little he could have done until the warring forces exhausted themselves. As the highest Shia cleric in Iraq, he tends to stay out of day-to-day politics, keeping religion and state separate. He favours democracy (with good reason, since the Shia account for 60% or more of Iraqis). His caution exasperates many activists, but when he speaks - usually at a critical moment - everyone listens. In effect, Mr al-Sistani has proved he has a veto over significant change in Iraq.

If it holds, the Najaf agreement will relieve the interim government of an immediate headache. It may also improve the prospects for bringing peace to other cities and for holding elections successfully next year. But the problem for prime minister Ayad Allawi is that it leaves his unelected and increasingly unpopular government further weakened. His huffing and puffing over Najaf, backed by American military might, brought only more bloodshed - until Mr al-Sistani came along and upstaged him. The deal that was brokered this week was essentially the same one the government had tried and failed to broker earlier, which certainly raises questions about its effectiveness. More than ever, Mr Allawi will now have to keep his mind on the grey-bearded figure over his shoulder.

Mr al-Sistani`s influence comes from his religious authority. In Najaf he has exercised that to good effect. When he chooses to use it, the ayatollah has a voice that speaks louder than gunfire. The Middle East could certainly do with more voices like that. But Iraqis might also consider whether religious authority is what a modern Iraqi state ought to rely on. Perhaps a better omen here were the thousands of Iraqis who accompanied the grand ayatollah on his mission to bring peace to the Najaf. If Iraq is ever to become more peaceful, it is from citizens like them rather than ayatollahs that supreme authority must come.
Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2004

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Ich möchte auf den Artikel aus der NYTimes von heute hinweisen #20712
THE AFTERMATH After the Siege, a City of Ruins, Its Dead Rotting By ALEX BERENSON Berenson war wohl als Embedded wärend der Aktion in Nadjaf dabei.

It`s peace but the dead are everywhere

Luke Harding in Najaf
Saturday August 28, 2004

The Guardian
In an alleyway next to Najaf`s Imam Ali shrine, Commander Sayed Haider rested yesterday.

For more than three weeks he and his fellow fighters from the Mahdi army had battled against the vast firepower of the US military. Now was a time to reflect.

"We believe that we are right. This is our country. This is our city. We will not accept that people come and occupy our land," he said.

Nearby, fighters were lugging the corpse of a dead comrade out from the shattered ruins of a hotel; others were brewing tea.

Thousands of pilgrims, meanwhile, had begun flowing past the sandbags and metal barricades which until recently had blocked the path of American tanks.

"We didn`t give in for one reason," Mr Haider explained, as his platoon posed for photos, still holding their rocket-propelled grenade launchers. "Our beliefs," he said.

In the end, the battle for Najaf that had plunged Iraq`s interim government into crisis ended, to everyone`s surprise and relief, peacefully yesterday.

On Thursday evening Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, Iraq`s most important Shia leader, and Mr Haider`s boss Moqtada al-Sadr, had agreed a deal under which Mr Sadr`s Shia militia would vacate the Imam Ali shrine and go home. To some surprise, they did.

Initially not everyone was on message: as the pilgrims filed through into a narrow alleyway of bullet-ridden camera shops and colonnades, a sniper started firing. But by mid-morning, the mood had turned jolly.

"I`ve been here for five months. I`ve only seen my wife once a month during that time. I`m going back to Baghdad as soon as I`ve finished my breakfast," Abu al-Musawi said, waving a victory kebab. "It`s peace," he added. Inside the shrine, dozens of Sadr supporters were dancing in a circle, waving placards of their leader; outside in the street a man was pushing a cart, carrying a mortar ineptly hidden under a blanket.

Asked whether he had now handed in his Kalashnikov to the Iraqi authorities, Abu Gaffar, a 25-year-old Mahdi army fighter, looked baffled. "It`s my personal weapon. I can`t give it to the police or the army. I`ll keep it in a safe place," he promised.

Until yesterday, the market square leading to the shrine and the alleys around it had been the centre of vicious fighting between US marines and the Mahdi. Yesterday, across what was the frontline, the full scale of the devastation became clear. Tank rounds littered the road; the al-Dawha hotel had been blown apart; several of the tombs in Najaf`s old cemetery had been pulverised. The souk was a tangle of metal debris; on the floor, unnoticed, lay a ripped poster of David Beckham.

Over in the old city it was the same story. In among the piles of rubbish lay a dead dog; from the seemingly empty houses came the smell of rotting flesh.

But what had it all meant?

Yesterday Abu Hussein Muhammad, a Najaf local, said he did not support Mr Sadr and was sceptical that peace would now descend on Iraq.

"We support Bush and the coalition forces. They allowed us to get rid of this monster," he said.

Mr Hussein said that the Mahdi army had slit the throat of one of his neighbours, a police officer. "These people are savages," he said.

There was stark evidence for his claim: in a building that served as Mr Sadr`s Sharia court, just behind the shrine, police stumbled upon some of his army`s apparent victims.

The Guardian counted 20 corpses - stinking, blackened and disfigured, on the floor beneath a judicial clock. It appeared they had been tortured. Given the state of the bodies, nobody could be sure. But other survivors were unequivocal in their praise for Mr Sadr. "Moqtada is the son of Iraq," Abu Ahmed, 28, said on his way to the shrine, his two-year-old son Ahmed perched on his shoulders clutching a multicoloured plastic Kalashnikov.

What kind of future did he envisage for Ahmed? "He`ll join the Mahdi army," Mr Ahmed said. "I`ll teach him to fight Americans."

By late morning the human shields who had spent days sleeping inside the Imam Ali shrine had left. The cleaners had arrived and were rolling up the carpets. A few golden tiles had fallen off one of the minarets, but otherwise the building appeared remarkably undamaged.

In an air-conditioned audience room, Mr Sadr`s spokesman Sheikh Ahmed Shaibani explained the five-point peace plan signed by Mr Sadr and Mr Sistani.

Under the agreement the Mahdi army would leave Najaf and Kufa; the Iraqi police would take over security in both towns; and the Iraqi government would compensate those whose property was destroyed in the fighting.

The Americans would also pull out of both cities - something that yesterday had not happened.

Asked what the uprising had achieved, Mr Shaibani said it had proved that the al-Marjia`ya - the committee of Shia scholars headed by Mr Sistani - was the ultimate authority in Iraq.

He added: "The Mahdi army will never be disarmed. We have proved it is a religious army."

Tantalisingly, Mr Shaibani hinted that Mr Sadr might take up a post in Iraq`s next government - provided next year`s elections were "honest" and the Americans did not try to manipulate them.

The political parties would also create a "suitable environment" for a proper census to be carried out to facilitate elections and the "return of full sovereignty" to Iraq, he announced.

By late afternoon Iraqi troops were patrolling the old city for the first time; American soldiers were loafing some distance away on a traffic roundabout. Three tanks were sitting in a dusty car park.

Earlier, before going home, the Mahdi army fighters had been recounting their tales of martyrdom.

"In the last couple of hours before the ceasefire one of my friends died while he was firing his Kalashnikov at a helicopter," Jawad Abdul Khadi, 24, said. "Fortunately our brothers shot it down over the cemetery."

Mr Khadi claimed that during the entire battle only 61 of his "brothers" were killed - with only "one or two fighters" dying each day.

And what would happen now he was asked?

"There are still a lot of us left," he said.
Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2004

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#20722 von Joerver
Was braucht Israel Spione im Pentagon, wenn dort Wolfowitz, Feith und andere Neocons dort in führenden Positionen sind.

Noch will keiner Namen nennen, aber es wird bereits darüber gemunkelt, dass der israelische "Maulwurf" im Pentagon für Douglas Feith, die offizielle Nr.3 im Pentagon, gearbeitet hat. Die besagte Person soll ein altgedienter Mitarbeiter des Militär-Geheimdienstes sein, die kurz vor der Pensionierung stand.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A40004-2004Aug…

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Deserter`s Delight
By Michael Moore, AlterNet
Posted on August 28, 2004, Printed on August 28, 2004
http://www.alternet.org/story/19702/

Dear Mr. Bush,

I know you and I have had our differences in the past, and I realize I am the one who started this whole mess about "who did what" during Vietnam when I brought up that "deserter" nonsense back in January. But I have to hand it to you on what you have uncovered about John Kerry and his record in Vietnam. Kerry has tried to pass himself off as a war hero, but thanks to you and your friends, we now know the truth.

First of all, thank you for pointing out to all of us that Mr. Kerry was never struck by a BULLET. It was only SHRAPNEL that entered his body! I did not know that! Hell, what`s the big deal about a bunch of large, sharp, metal shards ripping open your flesh? That happens to all of us! In my opinion, if you want a purple heart, you`d better be hit by a bullet – with your name on it!

Secondly, thank you for sending Bob Dole out there and letting us know that Mr. Kerry, though wounded three times, actually "never spilled blood." When you are in the debates with Kerry, turn to him and say, "Dammit, Mr. Kerry, next time you want a purple heart, you better spill some American red blood! And I don`t mean a few specks like those on O.J.`s socks – we want to see a good pint or two of blood for each medal. In fact, I would have preferred that you had bled profusely, a big geyser of blood spewing out of your neck or something!" Then throw this one at him: "Senator Kerry, over 58,000 brave Americans gave their lives in Vietnam – but YOU didn`t. You only got WOUNDED! What do you have to say for yourself???" Lay that one on him and he won`t know what to do.

And thanks, also, Mr. Bush, for exposing the fact that Mr. Kerry might have actually WOUNDED HIMSELF in order to get those shiny medals. Of course he did! How could the Viet Cong have hit him – he was on a SWIFT boat! He was going too fast to be hit by enemy fire. He tried to blow himself up three different times just so he could go home and run for president someday. It`s all so easy to see, now, what he was up to.

What would we do without you, Mr. Bush? Criticize you as we might, when it comes to pointing out other men`s military records, there is no one who can touch your prowess. In 2000, you let out the rumor that your opponent John McCain might be "nuts" from the 5 years he spent in a POW camp. Then, in the 2002 elections, your team compared triple-amputee Sen. Max Cleland to Osama bin Laden, and that cost him the election. And now you are having the same impact on war hero John Kerry. Since you (oops, I mean "The Swift Boat Veterans for Truth!") started running those ads, Kerry`s poll numbers have dropped (with veterans, he has lost 18 points in the last few weeks).

Some people have said "Who are you, Mr. Bush, to attack these brave men considering you yourself have never seen combat – in fact, you actively sought to avoid it." What your critics fail to understand is that even though your dad got you into a unit that would never be sent to Vietnam – and even though you didn`t show up for Guard duty for at least a year – at least you were still IN FAVOR of the Vietnam War! Cowards like Clinton felt it was more important to be consistent (he opposed the war, thus he refused to go) than to be patriotic and two-faced.

The reason that I think you know so much about other men`s war wounds is because, during your time in the Texas Air National Guard, you suffered so many of them yourself. Consider the paper cut you received on September 22, 1972, while stationed in Alabama, working on a Senate campaign for your dad`s friend (when you were supposed to be on the Guard base). A campaign brochure appeared from nowhere, ambushing your right index finger, and blood trickled out onto your brand new argyle sweater.

Then there was the incident with the Crazy Glue when your fraternity brothers visited you one weekend at the base and glued your lips together while you were "passed out." Though initially considered "friendly fire," it was later ruled that you suffered severe post traumatic stress disorder from the assault and required certain medicinal attention – which, it seems, was provided by those same fraternity brethren.

But nothing matched your heroism when, on July 2, 1969, you sustained a massive head injury when enemy combatants from another Guard unit dropped a keg of Coors on your head during a reconnaissance mission at a nearby all-girls college. Fortunately, the cool, smooth fluids that poured out of the keg were exactly what was needed to revive you.

That you never got a purple heart for any of these incidents is a shame. I can fully appreciate your anger at Senator Kerry for the three he received. I mean, Kerry was a man of privilege, he could have gotten out just like you. Instead, he thinks he`s going to gain points with the American people bragging about how he was getting shot at every day in the Mekong Delta. Ha! Is that the best he can do? Hell, I hear gunfire every night outside my apartment window! If he thinks he is going to impress anyone with the fact that he volunteered to go when he could have spent the Vietnam years on the family yacht, he should think again. That only shows how stupid he was! True-blue Americans want a president who knows how to pull strings and work the system and get away with doing as little work as possible!

So, to make it up to you, I have written some new ads you can use on TV. People will soon tire of the swift boat veterans and you are going to need some fresh, punchier material. Feel free to use any of these:

ANNOUNCER: "When the bullets were flying all around him in Vietnam, what did John Kerry do? He said he leaned over the boat and `pulled a man out of the river.` But, as we all know, men don`t live in the river – fish do. John Kerry knows how to tell a big fish tale. What he won`t tell you is that when the enemy was shooting at him, he ducked. Do you want a president who will duck? Vote Bush."

ANNOUNCER: "Mr. Kerry`s biggest supporter, Sen. Max Cleland, claims to have lost two legs and an arm in Vietnam. But he still has one arm! How did that happen? One word: Cowardice. When duty called, he was unwilling to give his last limb. Is that the type of selfishness you want hanging out in the White House? We think not. Vote for the man who would be willing to give America his right frontal lobe. Vote Bush."

Hope these help, Mr. Bush. And remember, when the American death toll in Iraq hits 1,000 during the Republican convention, be sure to question whether those who died really did indeed "die" – or were they just trying to get their faces on CNN`s nightly tribute to fallen heroes? The sixteen who`ve died so far this week were probably working hand in hand with the Kerry campaign to ruin your good time in New York. Stay consistent, sir, and always, ALWAYS question the veracity of anyone who risks their life for this country. It`s the least they deserve.

Yours,

Michael Moore

P.S. George, I know you said you don`t read the newspaper, but USA Today has given me credentials to the Republican convention to write a guest column each day next week (Tues.-Fri.). If you don`t want to read it, you and I will be in the same building so maybe I could come by and read it to you? Lemme know...
© 2004 Independent Media Institute. All rights reserved.
View this story online at: http://www.alternet.org/story/19702/

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Saturday, August 28, 2004
War News for August 27 and 28, 2004

http://dailywarnews.blogspot.com/

Bring ‘em on: Heavy fighting reported in Sadr City.

Bring ‘em on: Two Iraqis killed, six wounded in Baghdad mortar attack.

Bring ‘em on: Ten Iraqis, one US soldier wounded by Mosul car bomb ambush.

Bring ‘em on: Twelve US soldiers wounded in three Baghdad grenade attacks.

Bring ‘em on: Five Iraqis killed, 32 wounded in US air strikes near Fallujah.

Bring ‘em on: Oil pipeline ablaze near Baghdad.

Bring ‘em on: Insurgents execute Italian journalist.

Bring ‘em on: University lecturer assassinated in Mosul.

Bring ‘em on: Insurgents execute two Turkish hostages near Beiji.

Bring ‘em on: Oil pipeline attacked near Basra.

Bring ‘em on: Oil pipeline attacked near North Rumalia oilfield.

Bring ‘em on: Municipal councilman assassinated near Hilla.

Insurgents evacuate ruined Najaf, fail to disarm. “They stood in a scene of devastation. Hotels had crumbled into the street. Cars lay blackened and twisted where they had been hit. Goats and donkeys lay dead on the sidewalks. Pilgrims from out of town and locals coming from home walked the streets agape, shaking their heads, stunned by the devastation before them. As the Mahdi Army fighters did not surrender themselves, neither did they give up their guns. Instead, they took the assault rifles and rocket launchers with which they had commandeered the shrine and loaded them onto donkey carts, covering them with blankets, grain sacks and television sets, and sending them away. Hours later, Mahdi fighters, some still dressed in their signature black uniforms, could be seen stashing rocket launchers in crates and pushing them into roadside shops.”

One US soldier killed, one injured in vehicle accident near Fallujah.

Kuwaiti trucking company suspends operations in Iraq.

Allawi vs. Chalabi. “US-backed Iraqi police forces on Friday raided the Baghdad office of the Iraqi National Congress of disgraced Pentagon favorite Ahmed Chalabi and expelled party members, an INC official said.”

US congresscritters get the Wolfowitz Welcome in Baghdad. “A congressional delegation led by U.S. Rep. Jeff Miller got a close-up look at combat in Iraq when two mortar shells exploded about 500 yards from where the lawmakers were waiting to board a helicopter.”

Lying Rummy. “In his first comments on the two major investigative reports issued this week at the Pentagon, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld on Thursday mischaracterized one of their central findings about the American military`s treatment of Iraqi prisoners by saying there was no evidence that prisoners had been abused during interrogations.”

Commentary

Editorial: “Failures in U.S. occupation policy have increased anti-American feelings among the Iraqi people, making it even more difficult to initiate a process of national reconciliation. Al-Sadr`s stubborn uprising against the interim government and U.S. forces is a stark reminder of how Iraqi and U.S. authorities have bungled the postwar management of Iraqi affairs. The flip-flop pattern of U.S. military operations also seems to have worsened the situation. In April, U.S. troops launched a major offensive against the Mahdi Army to bring al-Sadr, a staunch opponent of the occupation, to his knees. The operation appeared to have succeeded as the two sides agreed to a ceasefire. But, in early August, fighting erupted again between U.S. forces and Mahdi militiamen who had taken positions inside the Ali Imam shrine, one of the most sacred sites in the Islamic world. The gold-domed mausoleum is dedicated to Ali Muhammad, the cousin of the prophet Mohammed and the first imam (leader) of the Shiite branch of Islam. The Najaf standoff poses a major challenge for the Bush administration as well. Although how it is going to deal with the situation is unclear at the moment, there is no denying that a failure to resolve the crisis will affect not only the administration`s policy in Iraq but also Mr. Bush`s re-election campaign.”

Editorial: “The poisoned seeds that flowered so darkly in Abu Ghraib were planted much earlier in the flawed, postwar planning of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and his minions. Stubbornly insisting on the surreal premise that Iraqis would greet invading coalition forces with flowers and candy after the defeat of Saddam Hussein, there were insufficient troops to handle the homegrown insurgency that followed. Overwhelmed, undertrained and inadequately supervised, those assigned to Abu Ghraib were left to their own devices with predictably shameful results. It is also impossible to untangle the Abu Ghraib scandal from an earlier decision by the Bush administration to circumvent Geneva Convention protections for ‘enemy combatants’ being held by U.S. forces in Afghanistan and at the Guantanamo Bay naval base in Cuba. The tortured legal arguments concocted by White House lawyers to sidestep the international treaty were not specifically intended to be applied to Iraqi prisoners. However, some of the personnel who were transferred from Camp X-Ray in Guantanamo to Abu Ghraib brought the same atmosphere of lawlessness along with them.”

Analysis: "Najaf is hardly the only problem area facing U.S. commanders in Iraq. Less noticed during the Najaf battles have been ongoing clashes in several areas closer to the capital. U.S. warplanes have repeatedly hit Fallujah, where the Marines pulled back after another brokered settlement in the spring. North of Baghdad, the Army has all but withdrawn from Samarra, another Sunni Triangle hot spot. Fighting also continues in Baqubah. ‘Currently, the insurgents are in charge of both Fallujah and Samarra,’ said a senior Army commander in Iraq. ‘The status quo in Samarra is unacceptable, and the final outcome is still in question.’”

Casualty Reports

Local story: Michigan soldier dies in Iraq.

Local story: Alabama soldier killed in Iraq.

Local story: Pennsylvania Marine killed in Iraq.

Local story: Illinois soldier dies in Iraq.

Local story: Texas Marine killed in Iraq.

Local story: Tennessee soldier killed in Iraq.

Local story: Oregon soldier wounded in Iraq.

Local story: California sailor wounded in Iraq.

Local story: Idaho soldier and Marine wounded in Iraq.


Rant of the Day

This WaPo editorial represents the art of journalistic turd polishing at its best. Since it severely frosted my ass, I’ve decided to provide some commentary.

"AT BEST, PROGRESS in Iraq during the coming months will be uneven, and the options facing U.S. forces will range from unappealing to unthinkable. In that context, a brokered truce that yesterday appeared to have ended, at least for now, the weeks-long battle of Najaf represents as bright an outcome as could have been realized."



WaPo got this part right. Thanks to consistent bungling, first by Bremer’s CPA and now by Nergoponte and Allawi, there are no good policy options left for the United States occupation of Iraq.

"The difficulties are well-known. The Iraqi government led by Prime Minister Ayad Allawi has performed relatively well since it took over in June, and it has at least one major factor on its side: Most Iraqis still seem to share the overall goal of shaping a coherent, multi-ethnic democratic state. Mr. Allawi`s commitment to hold elections by early next year while seeking to restore as much security as possible is in sync with that goal. But he does not have a strong enough army or police force to deliver as much security as Iraqis expect, and the U.S. and allied troops he must therefore rely upon are deeply unpopular. Meanwhile the enemies of democratic transition, including foreign terrorists, Islamic militants and Saddam Hussein-trained Baathists, may comprise a small minority of the population, but they are ruthless and capable of terrible mayhem and intimidation. Mr. Allawi must navigate these currents while Iraqi forces continue to be trained."


Since June 28th, Allawi’s government has performed as well as the CPA did before June 28th – they have screwed up everything except their effort to bamboozle the US media. Like the CPA, the Negroponte/Allawi gang has chosen to pursue a military solution to the insurgency while deliberately offering the insurgents unacceptable political solutions, except that Allawi provides more belligerent rhetoric than Bremer. As with the CPA, military solutions have failed miserably and served only to stiffen opposition. Worse, each failure reveals the weakness of the military option and encourages further insurgent violence. Allawi’s battleship mouth has only succeeded in revealing the weakness of his rowboat ass.

The WaPo editorial board makes a tremendous leap of logic by assuming that because “most Iraqis still seem to share the overall goal of shaping a coherent, multi-ethnic democratic state,” most Iraqis support the Allawi regime. It appears that a growing majority of Iraqis do not support Allawi for the same reasons they gradually grew to resent and despise the former Iraqi Governing Council: Allawi is an outsider without any significant political base in Iraq, he has no intention of holding anything but a rigged election and his government is propped up only by the use of foreign troops who regularly bomb Iraqis at his direction.

Allawi’s only success in navigating Iraqi "currents" has been his perversion of the Iraqi judicial system and his use of the few trustworthy police he controls in isolating and prosecuting his political enemy, Ahmed Chalabi’s exile faction.

"Moqtada Sadr, the firebrand young Shiite cleric whose militia had seized control of Najaf`s revered mosque, sought to derail the process. He led an uprising that at one time seemed to be gaining strength through much of Iraq`s southern Shiite heartland, and his goals, while never entirely clear, certainly did not include multi-ethnic democracy or a U.S. presence in Iraq. U.S. Marines and soldiers, fighting alongside a small and untested Iraqi force, performed bravely for the past several weeks, inflicting substantial losses on the Sadr forces while taking care not to damage the mosque. If the respected Shiite Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani had not intervened, U.S. forces were prepared in the next few days to force a final battle, with Iraqi troops assigned to reclaim the mosque itself. Instead, Mr. Sadr was permitted to go free in exchange for vacating the mosque and ordering his militia to lay down their arms."


Again, the WaPo editorial board draws a false conclusion from the events in Najaf. Aside from the notion that Sadr has never made his goals clear – he has, and those goals include an immediate end to both the US presence and the Allawi government – Sadr’s militia did not lay down their arms. They left the shrine and dispersed with their weapons. We will see them again.

"Is this a defeat for the government? Mr. Sadr is a murderous outlaw, and Iraq would be better off without him. But it`s not certain that Iraqi forces could have prevailed in a final battle, at least not without harming the sacred shrine in a way that would have redounded against U.S. forces and the Iraqi government. Now the shrine has been reopened, thanks to the intervention of Mr. Sistani, who worked in cooperation with the Allawi government and who supports the same democratization schedule as Mr. Allawi and the international coalition. Mr. Sadr cannot be trusted to honor any agreement, but he has failed for a second time to derail the process."


In one day, Sistani accomplished what the US military and the Allawi government have failed to do since April, and this should be a clear indication of the weakness of the Allawi government in general and military solutions in particular. Sistani has shown no support of the Allawi government. In fact, he pointedly refused to deal with the CPA, and only his implied threat to use his tremendous influence coerced Bremer to abandon the CPA’s plan to impose a Chalabi exile government through regional caucuses rather than direct elections. Sistani’s intervention in Najaf only shows that he wants Sadr and Allawi to go fight someplace else.

"Mr. Allawi should take credit for the reopening of the mosque and thank Mr. Sistani for his role. He and his U.S. allies should avoid any future threats they cannot back up, but they must move to regain control of Sunni cities as they moved in Najaf. They also must accelerate the dispensing of U.S. and allied aid in places such as Baghdad`s Sadr City slum, which is named for Mr. Sadr`s late -- and far more respected -- father, but where the young cleric remains popular. No one should think that yesterday`s truce is a turning point toward stability in Iraq. But it has given the allied effort another bit of breathing room."


While Allawi might thank Sistani for his role in saving the mosque, he can take credit for nothing but failure. Turd polishing, a speciality of the WaPo editorial board, is a phenomenon unique to American politics and while the WaPo board might think their efforts to shine up the debacle in Najaf, it`s still a turd.


86-43-04. Pass it on.



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CONVENTION PROTESTERS PLOTTING TO SPEAK, ASSEMBLE

Prepare for the Worst, Ashcroft Says

Attorney General John Ashcroft today revealed that the Justice Department has credible intelligence that protesters at next week’s Republican National Convention are actively plotting to speak and assemble.

“These evildoers may speak or assemble without warning,” Mr. Ashcroft told reporters. “We are preparing for the worst.”

To foil the protesters’ plot to speak and assemble, the Attorney General said that the Justice Department has established a special Anti-Speech and Assembly Task Force in New York City.

“This task force has its ears to the ground on a twenty-four-hour basis,” Mr. Ashcroft said. “If they get wind of a plot to speak or assemble, they will pounce.”

The Attorney General said that New York’s Central Park would be off-limits to protesters for the duration of the Convention, but said that space for the protesters to speak and assemble was being reserved in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

The Gitmo location was chosen, Mr. Ashcroft said, to facilitate military tribunals for the protesters immediately after they are done speaking and assembling.

Elsewhere, White House spokesman Scott McClellan said Vice President Dick Cheney was entitled to receive overtime pay as an emergency worker, explaining, “Everything Dick Cheney touches turns into an emergency sooner or later.”

On the campaign trail, Mr. Cheney did not address the overtime issue but reiterated his opposition to gay marriage, saying, “I’m sure as hell not paying for one.”

Finally, President Bush’s daughters Barbara and Jenna cancelled their convention speech scheduled for next Wednesday, citing a conflict with Ladies’ Night.

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Man kann die Vorwürfe für Spionage für Israqel nur für einen Witz halten. Die gleichen Leute, die im Pentagon sitzen und dort teilweise in führenden Positionen, haben auch beste Verbindungen zu Israel und sitzen dort auch in wichtigen Ausschüßen. Auf jeden Fall ist das keine Spionage, möglicherweise könnten für diese Neocons Intressenskonflikte bestehen. Aber Geld heilt alle Wunden und das schon seit langem. Oder sollte ein Sinneswandel in der Bushregierung vor sich gehen und die Neocons ausrangiert werden. Nachdem Cheney ein Bekenntnis zu seiner lesbischen Tochter und zu deren freier Entscheidung, wie sie leben will, abgegeben hat, und Bush eingeräumt hat, dass er unter Umständen im Zusammenhang mit dem Irakkrieg irgendeinen Fehler gemacht haben könnte und weiter einen Bericht hat publiziert lassen, in dem steht, dass die Klimaerwärmung mit den Treibhausgasen zusammenhängt, nachdem er noch 2001 erklärt hat, dass dies ein "put out by the bureaucracy" sei, ist es vielleicht möglich, dass Bush einen Politikwechsel anstrebt, jedenfalls bis er die Wahlen gewonnen hat.

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Informed Comment
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Thoughts on the Middle East, History,and Religion
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Juan Cole is Professor of History at the University of Michigan

Saturday, August 28, 2004

Israeli Spy in Pentagon Linked to AIPAC

CBS is reporting that a Defense Intelligence Agency analyst detailed to Undersecretary of Defense for Planning Douglas Feith`s Office of Special Plans is under FBI investigation for spying for Israel. The person passed to the American Israel Political Action Committee confidential documents, including those detailing Bush administration policy toward Iran, and AIPAC then passed them to Israel. There are wiretaps and photographs backing up the FBI case (the FBI agents involved are extremely brave to take this on).

But this espionage case is too narrow. Consider what journalist Jim Lobe wrote about Feith`s Office of Special Plans and the Pentagon Near East and South Asia office:


` key personnel who worked in both NESA and OSP were part of a broader network of neo-conservative ideologues and activists who worked with other Bush political appointees scattered around the national-security bureaucracy to move the country to war, according to retired Lt. Col. Karen Kwiatkowski, who was assigned to NESA from May 2002 through February 2003. The heads of NESA and OSP were Deputy Undersecretary William Luti and Abram Shulsky, respectively. Other appointees who worked with them in both offices included Michael Rubin, a Middle East specialist previously with the neo-conservative American Enterprise Institute (AEI); David Schenker, previously with the Washington Institute for Near East Policy (WINEP); and Michael Makovsky; an expert on neo-con icon Winston Churchill and the younger brother of David Makovsky, a senior WINEP fellow and former executive editor of pro-Likud Jerusalem Post. Along with Feith, all of the political appointees have in common a close identification with the views of the right-wing Likud Party in Israel. `



Karen Kwiatkowski was an eyewitness in NESA, and Lobe reports:

` she recounts one incident in which she helped escort a group of half a dozen Israelis, including several generals, from the first floor reception area to Feith`s office. "We just followed them, because they knew exactly where they were going and moving fast." When the group arrived, she noted the book which all visitors are required to sign under special regulations that took effect after the Sep. 11, 2001 attacks. "I asked his secretary, `Do you want these guys to sign in?` She said, `No, these guys don`t have to sign in.`" It occurred to her, she said, that the office may have deliberately not wanted to maintain a record of the meeting. `



The American Israel Political Action Committee is a lobbying group that used to support whatever government was in power in Israel, and used to give money even-handedly inside the US. My perception is that during the past decade AIPAC has increasingly tilted to the Likud in Israel, and to the political Right in the United States. In the 1980s, AIPAC set up the Washington Institute for Near East Policy as a pro-Israeli alternative to the Brookings Institution, which it perceived to be insufficiently supportive of Israel. WINEP has largely followed AIPAC into pro-Likud positions, even though its director, Dennis Ross, is more moderate. He is a figurehead, however, serving to disguise the far right character of most of the position papers produced by long-term WINEP staff and by extremist visitors and "associates" (Daniel Pipes and Martin Kramer are among the latter).

WINEP, being a wing of AIPAC, is enormously influential in Washington. State Department and military personnel are actually detailed there to "learn" about "the Middle East"! They would get a far more balanced "education" about the region in any Israeli university, since most Israeli academics are professionals, whereas WINEP is a "think tank" that hires by ideology.

I did some consulting with one US company that had a government contract, and they asked me about WINEP position papers (many of them are just propaganda). When I said I would take them with a grain of salt, the guy said his company had "received direction" to pay a lot of attention to the WINEP material! So Discipline is being imposed even on the private sector.

Note that over 80% of American Jews vote Democrat, that the majority of American Jews opposed the Iraq war (more were against it than in the general population), and that American Jews have been enormously important in securing civil liberties for all Americans. Moreover, Israel has been a faithful ally of the US and deserves our support in ensuring its security. The Likudniks like to pretend that they represent American Jewry, but they do not. And they like to suggest that objecting to their policies is tantamount to anti-Semitism, which is sort of like suggesting that if you don`t like Chile`s former dictator Pinochet, you are bigotted against Latinos.

As can be seen by Lobe`s list, WINEP supplies rightwing intellectuals to Republican administrations, who employ their positions to support Likud policies from within the US government. They have the advantage over long-time civil servants in units like the State Department`s Intelligence and Research division, insofar as they are politically connected and so have the ear of the top officials.

So, passing a few confidential documents over is a minor affair. Pro-Likud intellectuals established networks linking Defense and the national security advisers of Vice President Dick Cheney, gaining enormous influence over policy by cherry-picking and distorting intelligence so as to make a case for war on Saddam Hussein. And their ulterior motive was to remove the most powerful Arab military from the scene, not because it was an active threat to Israel (it wasn`t) but because it was a possible deterrent to Likud plans for aggressive expansion (at the least, they want half of the West Bank, permanently).

It should be admitted that the American Likud could not make US policy on its own. Its members had to make convincing arguments to Rumsfeld, Cheney and Bush himself. But they were able to make those arguments, by distorting intelligence, channeling Ahmad Chalabi junk, and presenting Big Ideas to men above them that signally lacked such ideas. (Like the idea that the road to peace in Jerusalem ran through Baghdad. Ha!)

It was these WINEP and AIPAC-linked US Likud backers in the Defense Department who had the Iraqi army dissolved as soon as Saddam was overthrown. This step threw Iraq into chaos and led to the deaths of nearly a thousand US servicemen so far, since an Iraq without an army would inevitably depend on the US military. But with the Iraqi army gone, and with Egypt and Jordan neutralized, Syria was left the only country anywhere near Israel that could make active trouble for Sharon if he completely screwed over the Palestinians. And Syria was now weak and isolated. So Sharon has had a free hand in his expansionist aggression. And, because the US public has been preoccupied with Iraq, the Likud could pursue its annexation of West Bank land and its expropriation of even more Palestinians without anyone over here even noticing. It is the best of all possible worlds for the heirs of Ze`ev Jabotinsky.

The Likud policies of reversing Oslo and stealing people`s land and making their lives hell has produced enormous amounts of terrorism against Israel, and the Likudniks have cleverly turned that to their political advantage. Aggression and annexation is necessary, they argue, because there is terrorism. Some of them now openly speak of ethnically cleansing the Palestinians, using the same argument. But when the Oslo peace process looked like it would go somewhere, terrorism tapered off (it did not end, but then peace had not been achieved).

The drawback for the US in all this is that US government backing for Sharon`s odious policies makes it hated in the Muslim world. (Note that Muslims who oppose Israeli aggression are often tagged as "terrorists" by the US government, but rightwing Jews who go to Palestine to colonize it, walking around with Uzi machine guns and sometimes shooting down civilians, are not "terrorists.") This lack of balance is one big reason that Bin Laden and al-Zawahiri hit the US on September 11. In fact, Bin Laden wanted to move up the operation to punish the US for supporting Sharon`s crackdown on the Second Intifada.

Likud apologists have carefully planted the false story that al-Qaeda did not care about Palestine, but that is absurd. Bin Laden always complained about the occupation of the three holy cities (Mecca, Medina and Jerusalem, the first two because of US troops in Saudi Arabia, and the third under Israeli occupation). When Bin Laden came back from Afghanistan to Jidda in 1989 his first sermon at the local mosque was about the Israeli repression of Palestinians during the first Infifada.

Now US occupation of Iraq is making it even more hated in the Muslim world. It is a policy hatched in part by AIPAC, WINEP, and their associated "thinkers." The cynical might suggest that they actively want the US involved in a violent struggle with Muslims, to make sure that the US remains anti-Palestinian and so will permit Israeli expansion.

All this can happen because there is a vacuum in US political discourse. A handful of special interests in the United States virtually dictate congressional policy on some issues. With regard to the Arab-Israeli conflict, the American Israel Political Action Committee and a few allies have succeeded in imposing complete censorship on both houses of Congress. No senator or congress member dares make a speech on the floor of his or her institution critical of Israeli policy, even though the Israeli government often violates international law and UN Security Council resolutions (it would violate more such resolutions, except that the resolutions never got passed because only one NSC member, the US, routinely vetoes them on behalf of Tel Aviv.) As the Labor Party in Israel has been eclipsed by the Likud coalition, which includes many proto-fascist groups, this subservience has yoked Washington to foreign politicians who privately favor ethnic cleansing and/or agressive warfare for the purpose of annexing the territory of neighbors.

On the rare occasion when a brave member of congress dares stand up to this unrelenting AIPAC tyranny, that person is targeted for unelection in the next congressional campaign, with big money directed by AIPAC and/or its analogues into the coffers of the senator or congressman`s opponent. Over and over again, AIPAC has shaped the US congress in this way, so successfully that no one even dares speak out any more.

AIPAC is not all that rich or powerful, but politics in the US is often evenly divided between Democrats and Republicans. Because many races are very close, any little extra support can help change the outcome. AIPAC can provide that little bit. Moreover, most Americans couldn`t care less about the Middle East or its intractable problems, whereas the staffers at AIPAC are fanatics. If some congressman from southern Indiana knows he can pick up even a few thousand dollars and some good will from AIPAC, he may as well, since his constituents don`t care anyway. That there is no countervailing force to AIPAC allows it to be effective. (That is one reason that pro-Likud American activists often express concern about the rise of the Muslim-American community and the possibility that it may develop an effective lobby.) Moreover, AIPAC leverages its power by an alliance with the Christian Right, which has adopted a bizarre ideology of "Christian Zionism." It holds that the sooner the Palestinians are ethnically cleansed, the sooner Christ will come back. Without millions of these Christian Zionist allies, AIPAC would be much less influential and effective.

The Founding Fathers of the United States deeply feared that a foreign government might gain this level of control over a branch United States government, and their fears have been vindicated.

The situation has reached comedic proportions. Congress is always drafting letters to the president, based on AIPAC templates, demanding that lopsided US policy in favor of Israel be revised to be even more in favor of Israel. US policy recently changed to endorse the expansion of Israeli colonies in Palestinian, West Bank territory.

Where Israel is in the right, this situation obviously is innocuous. The United States should protect Israel from aggressive attack, if necessary. United Nations members are pledged to collective security, i.e. to protecting any member nation from aggression at the hands of another. But given that Israel is a nuclear power with a vast arsenal of weapons of mass destruction; given that Egypt and Jordan have long-lived peace treaties with Israel; and given that Syria and Lebanon are small weak powers, there is not in fact any serious military threat to Israel in its immediate neighborhood. In contrast, Israel launched wars against neighbors in 1956, 1967, and 1982 (all of which it won so easily as to bring into question the necessity for the wars in the first place if they were defensive), and has since 1967 been assiduously colonizing Palestinian land that it militarily occupied--all the while attempting to avoid becoming responsible for the Palestinian populations on that land. This latter policy has poisoned the entire world.

AIPAC currently has a project to shut up academics such as myself, the same way it has shut up Congress, through congressional legislation mandating "balance" (i.e. pro-Likud stances) in Middle East programs at American Universities. How long the US public will allow itself to be spied on and pushed around like this is a big question. And, with the rise of international terrorism targeting the US in part over these issues, the fate of the country hangs in the balance.

If al-Qaeda succeeds in another big attack, it could well tip the country over into military rule, as Gen. Tommy Franks has suggested. That is, the fate of the Republic is in danger. And the danger comes from two directions, not just one. It comes from radical extremists in the Muslim world, who must be fought. But it also comes from radical extremists in Israel, who have key allies in the US and whom the US government actively supports and against whom influential Americans are afraid to speak out.

If I had been in power on September 11, I`d have called up Sharon and told him he was just going to have to withdraw to 1967 borders, ore face the full fury of the United States. Israel would be much better off inside those borders, anyway. It can`t absorb 3 million Palestinians and retain its character, and it can`t continue to hold 3 million Palestinians as stateless hostages without making itself inhumane and therefore un-Jewish. And then I`d have thrown everything the US had at al-Qaeda in Afghanistan, and frog-marched Bin Laden off to justice, and rebuilt Afghanistan to ensure that al-Qaeda was permanently denied a base there. Iraq, well, Iraq was contained.

posted by Juan @ [url8/28/2004 06:52:59 AM]http://www.juancole.com/2004_08_01_juancole_archive.html#109368172121878771[/url]

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SECRETARY RUMSFELD BRIEFS AMERICA`S FREEDOM®-CRUSADERS ON KINDER, GENTLER NEW GUIDELINES FOR INTERROGATING MAYBE-TERRORIST ISLAMIAC TRASH
Policy Statement by the Secretary of Defense
Abu Ghraib Prison, Iraq
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SECRETARY RUMSFELD: Good afternoon, troops. I`d like to say I`m pleased to be back here at Abu Ghraib, but I`m not. As you know, a handful of rogue soldiers at this facility, led by a nefarious Lou Diamond Phillips impersonator, demonstrated appalling indiscretion by photographing a highly sophisticated and effective system for sexual humiliation – which they obviously dreamt up entirely on their own, with zero knowledge of or tacit approval by anyone important enough to not be cannon fodder. And so today, with the entire world whipped into a frenzy of righteous indignation, President Bush has personally directed yours truly to fly here to this godforsaken desert armpit to hand-deliver all-new, kinder, gentler guidelines for the non-torture of maybe-probably-terrorist trash. You all stand hereby directed to learn it, live it, and love it. Thank you.

REVISED ARAB INTERROGATION GUIDELINES Effective May, 2004

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This article can be found on the web at
http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i=20040913&s=pollitt

subject to debate by Katha Pollitt
Bush Bashers & the Bashers Who Bash Them

[from the September 13, 2004 issue]

For well over a decade now, right-wingers and Republicans have heaped insult, lies and slander on liberals and Democrats, who responded for the most part by becoming starchy, self-doubting and depressed. To complain was to be labeled elitist and fuddy-duddy: Rush and Ann and Bill and Sean say liberals are traitors and hate America? They`re populist entertainers! Jerry Falwell hawked a video accusing Bill Clinton of murder? Shut up and finish your latte. It took ages, not to mention a suspect election and a suspect war, but suddenly everywhere you look Democrats and liberals are fighting back.

The prissy and thin-lipped are cracking jokes, policy wonks are gabbing on Air America, voters once proud of being as unherdable as cats leap aboard the projects of MoveOn.org and write checks to long-shot red-state candidates because Howard Dean says it`s a good idea. Do some of these newborn activists feel an intense personal dislike of Bush and all his works? Think he`s a blithering idiot? Quiver with rage and loathing when they watch him flash that arrogant sneer and speak in that weird lurching way, as if he`s on the edge of blanking out totally? Sure. Probably some of them even enjoy seeing his features merged with an ape`s on smirkingchimp.com. But so what? This is America, where pundits have for years reassured us politics is a down-and-dirty contact sport with no room for girly men.

Bush hatred wasn`t supposed to happen. Liberals were supposed to be lofty and wistful and clueless, even as their enemies slimed them into irrelevance; they were supposed to say things like "Have you no sense of decency, sir?"--not cram into movie theaters to laugh hysterically at the President sitting in that classroom reading "The Pet Goat." Something must be wrong with these Bush-haters, with their No More Years bumper stickers and their obsessional blogs--could they be insane? "Monomaniacal," as Tucker Carlson put it on Crossfire: "Their hatred has become the focus of their lives. It`s actually a clinical description."

In The New York Times Book Review, Leon Wieseltier uses his review of Nicholson Baker`s thin, sensationalistic novella Checkpoint, about a man holed up in a hotel with fantasies of assassinating the President, to deliver a long, sanctimonious lecture to the anti-Bush crowd: "The virulence that calls itself critical thinking, the merry diabolization of other opinions and the other people who hold them, the confusion of rightness with righteousness, the preference for aspersion to argument, the view that the strongest statement is the truest statement--these deformations of political discourse now thrive in the houses of liberalism too. The radicalism of the right has hectored into being a radicalism of the left. The Bush-loving mob is being met with a Bush-hating mob.... American liberalism, in sum, may be losing its head." Wieseltier sees "signs of the degradation...everywhere": Janet Malcolm wrote a letter to the Times in which she claimed the present moment is "as fearful as the period after Munich"; an anti-Bush anthology is decorated with anagrams like "The Republicans: Plan butcheries?"; MoveOn publishes an ad--a "huge" ad--that reads "The communists had Pravda. Republicans have Fox." Liberalism, it would seem, is supposed to consist of constantly reminding ourselves that we do not live in a murderous totalitarian regime. Things could be worse! This too shall pass!

Actually, I too bridle when people start talking about Hitler. It sounds naïve and overwrought. If the Republicans really were Nazis, you wouldn`t be holding this magazine in your hands. And I don`t like the endless theme of Bush`s stupidity, either--it`s mostly a way for the marginalized to feel culturally superior. I don`t even believe that Bush is so dumb--he seems to have plenty of political cunning and skill, and that`s a kind of intelligence, albeit not the kind that has much relation to making good policy decisions in a complex and dangerous world. On the Times op-ed page, Dahlia Lithwick made some good points about the impulse to portray Bush as a child: It insults people who voted for him in 2000 and whom we hope are persuadable this time, and it lets him off the hook, since children aren`t responsible for the damage they cause.

And yet there is a schoolmasterish quality to all this finger-wagging. What are we talking about here? Some over-the-top e-mails? Whoopi Goldberg`s off-color jokes? Nicholson Baker`s novel has the obsessive-compulsive look-at-me creepiness of all his fiction, but surely it`s LA Times book reviewer P.J. O`Rourke who has the problem when he compares its characters` dismay at suburban sprawl to the hatred of humanity that fuels Robespierre and Pol Pot. Is it anti-humanity to wish for more trees? Imagining characters named "Ann Coulter" and "Bill O`Reilly" up in that hotel room, he writes, "Hmmm, they don`t appear to be discussing whether to kill Bill Clinton." Well, maybe not in the novel in O`Rourke`s head--but in real life, Nicholson Baker`s would-be assassin doesn`t exist, while Ann Coulter has called for the murder of Islamic heads of state, the invasion of their countries, the forced conversion of their citizens to Christianity, the execution of liberals and a terrorist attack on the New York Times. Hilarious, I know.

It`s really a stretch to suggest that the newly awakened anti-Bush advocates are just the lefty equivalent of the hard-right disinformation machine. Al Franken is no Bill O`Reilly. The New York Times editorial page equates MoveOn PAC`s ads with those of the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, and it`s true both are funded through gaps in campaign-finance laws, and both attack the enemy candidate on his war record. But the Swift Boat vets` charges are a mess of smears and lies with Karl Rove`s fingerprints all over them, while MoveOn`s ads raise genuine questions about Bush`s service record that have never been answered.

One group protesting at the Republican convention is planning to hand out 3,000 fortune cookies with messages like "Do not change horses midstream unless horse lies to you and stream is on fire," and lists of ways Bush has mispronounced "Abu Ghraib." You can be sure the Republicans will portray these mild jabs as demonic howls of rage and fury.

Where`s their sense of humor?

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Wie will die USA unbeschadet aus dem Chaos herauskommen ohne ein Blutbad anzurichten? Und das Schlimmste ist, man kann keiner Meldung aus dem Irak wirklich trauen, wenn man die Quelle nicht kennt. Hier dieser Artikel stimmt im Großen und Ganzen mit dem überein, was ich anderswo auch gelesen habe. Die Reporter vor Ort haben ein großes Problem, sie können aus manchen Teilen des Iraks nicht berichten. So sind sie entweder mit den Truppen embedded unterwegs oder stehen unter dem Schutz irgendwelcher Stammesführer oder sitzen nur in Baghdad in Ihrem Hotel und erhalten ihre Informationen von der Army, der US-Botschaft oder der sogenannten Regierung des Iraks. Dementsprechend sind die Berichte. Bei der Berichterstattung über die Kämpfe in Nadjaf hatte man manchmal den Eindruck das Baghdad Bob wieder im Dienst sei, besonders bei den Verlautbarungen der Irak-Regierung. Das ist von einigen Reportern bemerkt worden, aber von vielen auch nicht, deshalb gab es so viele widersprüchliche Meldungen aus der Region. Eine Geschichte ist für mich äußerst zweifelhaft, das ist die Zarqawi Posse. Ein kleiner Sraßenschläger und Räuber, der eine Karriere wie Bush gemacht hat. Jemand der sich nächtelang rumgetrieben hat, meist gesoffen und sich geprügelt hat und dann während eines Gefängnisaufenthalts auf einmal die Erleuchtung bekommen hat und ab da im Auftrag des Herren unterwegs war. Jemand ohne Schulbildung, der kaum schreiben können soll, ist auf einmal das zweite große Mastermind neben Bin Laden und soll eine Organiston aufgebaut haben, die für fast alle Gräueltaten der letzten Zeit im Irak verantwortlich sein soll. Seine Kontakte zu Bin Laden sind auch auf jeden Fall nicht nachgewiesen, er soll ihn in Afghanistan einmal getroffen haben, aber sonst wollten beide nichts miteinander zu tun haben. Und noch eine Unstimmigkeit, vor nicht langer Zeit wurde Zarqawi von den USA noch als Tod gemeldet, denn sie hätten ihn in die Luft gespregt, dann sollte er auf jeden Fall ein Bein verloren haben und nun soll er der Superterrorist im Iraks sein. Gesehen haben soll ihn aber noch keiner.

August 29, 2004
INSURGENCY
In Western Iraq, Fundamentalists Hold U.S. Forces at Bay
By JOHN F. BURNS and ERIK ECKHOLM

BAGHDAD, Iraq, Aug. 28 - While American troops have been battling Islamic militants to an uncertain outcome in Najaf, the Shiite holy city, events in two Sunni Muslim cities that stand astride the crucial western approaches to Baghdad have moved significantly against American plans to build a secular democracy in Iraq.

Both of the cities, Falluja and Ramadi, and much of Anbar Province, are now controlled by fundamentalist militias, with American troops confined mainly to heavily protected forts on the desert`s edge. What little influence the Americans have is asserted through wary forays in armored vehicles, and by laser-guided bombs that obliterate enemy safe houses identified by scouts who penetrate militant ranks. Even bombing raids appear to strengthen the fundamentalists, who blame the Americans for scores of civilian deaths.

American efforts to build a government structure around former Baath Party stalwarts - officials of Saddam Hussein`s army, police force and bureaucracy who were willing to work with the United States - have collapsed. Instead, the former Hussein loyalists, under threat of beheadings, kidnappings and humiliation, have mostly resigned or defected to the fundamentalists, or been killed. Enforcers for the old government, including former Republican Guard officers, have put themselves in the service of fundamentalist clerics they once tortured at Abu Ghraib.

In the last three weeks, three former Hussein loyalists appointed to important posts in Falluja and Ramadi have been eliminated by the militants and their Baathist allies. The chief of a battalion of the American-trained Iraqi National Guard in Falluja was beheaded by the militants, prompting the disintegration of guard forces in the city. The Anbar governor was forced to resign after his three sons were kidnapped. The third official, the provincial police chief in Ramadi, was lured to his arrest by American marines after three assassination attempts led him to secretly defect to the rebel cause.

The national guard commander and the governor were both forced into humiliating confessions, denouncing themselves as "traitors" on videotapes that sell in the Falluja marketplace for 50 cents. The tapes show masked men ending the guard commander`s halting monologue, toppling him to the ground, and sawing off his head, to the accompaniment of recorded Koranic chants ordaining death for those who "make war upon Allah." The governor is shown with a photograph of himself with an American officer, sobbing as he repents working with the "infidel Americans," then being rewarded with a weeping reunion with his sons.

In another taped sequence available in the Falluja market, a mustached man identifying himself as an Egyptian is shown kneeling in a flowered shirt, confessing that he "worked as a spy for the Americans," planting electronic "chips" used for setting targets in American bombing raids. The man says he was paid $150 for each chip laid, then he, too, is tackled to the ground by masked guards while a third masked man, a burly figure who proclaims himself a dispenser of Islamic justice, pulls a 12-inch knife from a scabbard on his chest, grabs the Egyptian by the scalp, and severs his head.

The situation across Anbar represents the latest reversal for the Marines` First Expeditionary Force, which sought to assert control with a spring offensive in Falluja and Ramadi that incurred some of the heaviest American casualties of the war, and a far heavier toll, in the hundreds, among Falluja`s resistance fighters and civilians. The offensive ended, mortifyingly for the marines, in a decision to pull back from both cities and entrust American hopes to the former Baathists. The American rationale was that military victory would come only by flattening the two cities, and that the better course lay in handing important government positions to former loyalists of the ousted government, who would work, over time, to wrest control from the Islamic militants who had emerged from the shadows to build strongholds there. The culmination of this approach came with the recruitment of the so-called Falluja Brigade, led by a former Army general under Mr. Hussein, and composed of a motley assembly of former Iraqi soldiers and insurgents, who marched into the city in early May, wearing old Iraqi military uniforms, backed with American-supplied weapons and money.

But the Falluja Brigade is in tatters now, reduced to sharing tented checkpoints on roads into the city with the militants, its headquarters in Falluja abandoned, like the buildings assigned to the national guard. Men assigned to the brigade, and to the two guard battalions, have mostly fled, Iraqis in Falluja say, taking their families with them, and handing their weapons to the militants.

The militants` principal power center is a mosque in Falluja led by an Iraqi cleric, Abdullah al-Janabi, who has instituted a Taliban-like rule in the city, rounding up people suspected of theft and rape and sentencing them to publicly administered lashes, and, in some cases, beheading. But Mr. Janabi appears to have been working in alliance with an Islamic militant group, Unity and Holy War, that American intelligence has identified as the vehicle of Abu Musaab al-Zarqawi, the Jordanian-born terrorist with links to Al Qaeda whom the Americans have blamed for many of the suicide bombings in Baghdad, which is just 35 miles from Falluja, and in other Iraqi cities.

The videotapes showing the killing of the guard commander, the humiliation of the governor, and the beheading of the Egyptian all display the black-and-yellow flag of the Zarqawi group as a backdrop, and the passages of the Koran chanted as an accompaniment to the killings are drawn from passages of the Muslim holy book that have accompanied some of the videotaped pronouncements by Qaeda leaders, including Osama bin Laden. Iraqis who have watched the Falluja tapes say the Egyptian`s executioner speaks in a cultured Arabic that is foreign, possibly Jordanian or Palestinian.

A Severe Blow in Falluja

Perhaps the harshest blow to the American position in Falluja came with the Aug. 13 execution of the national guard commander, Suleiman Mar`awi, a former officer in Mr. Hussein`s army with family roots in Falluja. In the tape of his killing, he is seen in his camouflaged national guard uniform, with an Iraqi flag at his shoulder, confessing to his leadership of a plot to stage an uprising in the city on Aug. 20 that was to have been coordinated with an American offensive. For that purpose, he says, he recruited defectors among the militants` ranks and met frequently with Marine commanders outside the city to settle details of the attack.

American commanders in Baghdad acknowledged ruefully that Mr. Mar`awi had been killed, but they denied that there was any plan for an offensive. Still, Marine commanders at Camp Falluja, a sprawling base less than five miles east of the city, have been telling reporters for weeks that the city has become little more than a terrorist camp, providing a haven for Iraqi militants and for scores of non-Iraqi Arabs, many of them with ties to Al Qaeda, who have homed in on Falluja as the ideal base to conduct a holy war against the United States. Eventually, the Marine officers have said, American hopes of creating stability in Iraq will necessitate a new attack on the city, this time one that will not be halted before it can succeed.

Some of these officers have also acknowledged that Iraqi "scouts" working for the Americans, some disguised as militants, others working for the national guard and police, have been a source of intelligence on militant activities in Falluja, and on the location of bombing targets. The American command says it has carried out many bombing raids since the Marine pullback from the city in May, killing scores of militants. One such raid that was reported this week in a popular Baghdad newspaper, Al-Adala, said that 13 Yemenis had been killed in an air raid in Falluja as they prepared to carry out suicide bombing attacks in Baghdad, and that the Yemeni government was negotiating to bring the bodies home.

Among militants in Falluja, there has been one point of agreement with the Americans - that many of the bombing raids have hit militant safe houses, and with pinpoint accuracy. A clue as to how this has been possible is given in the tapes of the beheadings of Mr. Mar`awi, the national guard commander, and of the Egyptian, a man in his mid-30`s who identifies himself on the tape as Mohammed Fawazi. Both men confess to having planted electronic homing "chips" for the Americans. As they speak, the tapes show a man wearing a red-checkered kaffiyeh headdress holding a rectangular device, colored green and encased in clear plastic, about the size of a matchbox.

The tape of Mr. Fawazi`s execution breaks from the scene of the Egyptian kneeling in confession to a combat-camera film from a bombing raid on Falluja that has been posted on numerous Internet Web sites in recent weeks. The black-and-white tape, giving the pilot`s eye view, shows a district of Falluja on a moonlit night, with the targeting crosshairs fixed on a large, low building across the street from a mosque, whose minaret throws a moon shadow onto the street. The sound of the pilot breathing into his mask can be clearly heard, with an exchange with a controller that speaks for the nonchalance of modern warfare.

"I have numerous individuals on the road, do you want me to take them out?" the pilot asks as the tape shows a stream of about 40 men coming out of the building and heading down the street away from the mosque, toward what some Web site accounts said was a firefight between militants and American troops.

After a pause, the controller replies, saying, "Take them out."

The pilot, having fired his weapon, begins the countdown. "Ten seconds," he says.

"Roger," the controller replies. The combat camera swings suddenly, picturing the scene from behind the men below. A huge blast of smoke and flame erupts on the road, enveloping the men, as the pilot cries "Impact!"

The controller then closes the exchange. "Oh dude!" he says, with what appears to be a chuckle.

The execution tape then shifts to scenes of devastation after an air attack on Falluja. It shows a crater, rubble, people piling up belongings, injured being carried into a hospital, and distraught-looking groups of civilians, including children. Shifting back to Mr. Fawazi, it shows him with his hands tied behind his back, looking downcast at the ground, then nervously toward the camera, as the heavyset man towering over him quotes passages from the Koran ordaining death. "He who will abide by the Koran will prosper, he who offends against it will get the sword", he says, his right forefinger pumping in the air, pointing first to heaven, then down to Mr. Fawazi.

"The only reward for those who make war on Allah and on Muhammad, his messenger, and plunge into corruption, will be to be killed or crucified, or have their hands and feet severed on alternate sides, or be expelled from the land," the man says. With that, the two gunmen flanking the executioner shout "Allahu akbar!" God is Great, drop their Kalashnikovs and tumble Mr. Fawazi face down on the ground. The killer pulls his knife from behind a magazine belt on his chest, grabs Mr. Fawazi by the hair, severs his head, holds it up briefly to the camera, then places it between his rope-tied hands on his back. On Aug. 21, the Marine headquarters issued a brief news release. The police chief of Anbar, Ja`adan Mohammed Alwan, had been arrested that day in Ramadi on suspicion of "corruption and involvement in criminal activities to include accepting bribes, extortion, embezzling funds, as well as possible connections with kidnapping and murder." A Marine spokesman, Lt. Eric Knapp, declined to offer more details of Mr. Alwan`s charges, beyond saying, "everyone knew he was corrupt."

In the Hussein years, Mr. Alwan was a senior police officer but also a high-ranking Baathist, people who knew him at the time say. But unlike many Iraqis who prospered under Mr. Hussein, these Ramadi residents said, he had never been known as a thug. When the Americans arrived, leaders of a local clan that had secretly cooperated with the invaders vouched for him. But soon, the Ramadi residents said, " People started to hate him because he was too cooperative with the Americans." Repeated death threats followed, and the three assassination attempts. The third, in May, especially shook him, acquaintances said, because he survived a rocket attack on his car, but his eldest son lost a leg.

Soon after, the verdict on the streets of Ramadi about the police chief began to change. Although he may have raked in illegal profits, Ramadi people say, he also began cooperating with Islamic militants, even passing American military plans to them. Although such claims are unverifiable, the assassination attempts stopped. But so too, last week, did Mr. Alwan`s tenure as police chief. The Marines say his arrest followed a three-to-five month investigation, that "countless government officials were afraid of him" and that the provincial chief "contributed to crime and instability."

Asked whether Mr. Anbar was also charged with aiding the insurrection, Lt. Knapp, the spokesman, said tersely by e-mail, "We are investigating suspected ties to the insurgency." Lt. Knapp described how the police chief was lured to captivity. "To avoid bloodshed and to make the arrest as clean as possible," he wrote, a Marine officer who had been working with the police invited him to a meeting in an American camp. On his arrival at the gate he climbed into a car where he was advised of his arrest. The e-mail message concluded, "He was then removed from the vehicle, handcuffed, and blackout goggles were put on him for security reasons."

Sabotage by Humiliation

In the case of the provincial governor, Abdulkarim Berjes, Mr. Zarqawi`s group, Unity and Holy War, appears to have decided that it could achieve its ends, nullifying American efforts to build governing institutions in the province, by humiliating him - a punishment many Iraqi men regard as worse than death. They then passed the videotape to the Arab satellite news channel Al Jazeera, the most-watched channel in Iraq. "He cried like a woman," one of the Iraqis who watched the tape said, after viewing the governor`s reunion with his kidnapped sons in a militant safe house,

At the end of June, Mr. Berjes, a former Anbar police chief under Mr. Hussein, complained in a discussion at Camp Falluja, the Marine base, that his government was riddled with agents of the resistance. "I can no longer trust anybody" Mr. Berjes said in a farewell meeting with L. Paul Bremer III, the departing leader of the American occupation authority. "I don`t know if people are working for me, or for the resistance." Mr. Berjes was visibly shaken, having survived an insurgent ambush on his motorcade as he drove in his old American limousine to the Marine base from Ramadi.

In fact, Iraqis in Anbar say, the governor had become a despised figure, for the same reason as Mr. Alwan, the Anbar police chief - because he too enthusiastically embraced the Americans and took to calling the resistance fighters "terrorists." Following a common ritual among the resistance, militants sent him a note of formal warning, paraphrased by those who say they had been told about it as saying: "We are watching you. Remember that we consider anybody who cooperates with the Americans a traitor, to be killed under Islamic law."

On July 28, assailants entered the governor`s residence in Ramadi, snatching his three grown sons and setting fire to the house. The governor got his final warning: repent and resign, or your sons die. His capitulation was broadcast on Aug. 6, in the video now circulating in Anbar markets. Standing under the Zarqawi group`s flag, he glumly recites: "I announce my repentance before God and you for any deeds I have committed against the holy warriors or in aid of the infidel Americans. I announce my resignation at this moment. All governors and employees who work with infidel Americans should quit because these jobs are against Islam and Iraqis."

As the governor is reunited with his sons, a voice on the tape recites the Zarqawi group`s attacks on public officials in the last three months. "We killed the president of the Iraqi Governing Council, and then the deputy minister of the interior," the voice says. "The minister of justice survived our attack, but we killed the governor of Mosul. And now we have captured the governor of Anbar. The list is just beginning, and is far from finished.`` More than three weeks after Mr. Berjes resigned, the Allawi government, seemingly hard put to find anyone to take the job, has yet to name a successor.

No Answers in Anbar

American commanders confess they have no answers in Anbar, and say their strategy is to curb the militants` ability to project their violence farther afield, especially in Baghdad, only 35 miles east of Falluja. A recent meeting between Iraq`s interim prime minister, Mr. Allawi, and a delegation of tribal sheiks from Falluja who have pledged fealty to Mr. Janabi is said to have reached a standstill accord, with Mr. Allawi promising not to sanction large-scale American attacks on the Anbar cities, and the sheikhs conveying Mr. Janabi`s pledge to halt militant attacks on the Americans,

But leaving the militants in control could pose a disabling threat to American political plans, which may already have been shaken more than American officials will admit by events in Najaf. Top American officials say that events there, with Moktada al-Sadr`s militiamen finally driven from the Imam Ali shrine, have set the stage for a turn in American fortunes across the Shiite heartland of Iraq. But even there the prospects seem deeply clouded by the failure to effectively disarm Mr. Sadr`s surviving fighters as they left the shrine with shouldered rifles and donkey carts loaded with rockets,

Mr. Sadr has signed a new pledge to join the democratic political process that will be the final measure of American success here. But he has abrogated similar undertakings, and many of his fighters vowed to take up arms again. Coupled with the militants` control in Anbar, this could unsettle plans for elections scheduled across Iraq by the end of January - the next crucial step toward a fully elected government by January 2006, an event American officials see as a way station on the path to a draw down or withdrawal of the 140,000 American troops here,

These Americans say a rapid buildup of the new Iraqi Army, the national guard and police, coupled with gathering momentum in "turning dirt" on the thousands of reconstruction projects financed by $18-billion in American money, should eventually improve security across Iraq. But the Americans acknowledge that a full, nationwide election in January may not be possible. For now, they have identified 15 cities across the Arab parts of Iraq that they contend can be stabilized to make voting in January possible. For the moment, they say, Falluja and Ramadi are not among them.

Iraqi staff members of The New York Timesin Baghdad contributed reporting for this article.

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company

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DER SPIEGEL 36/2004 - 30. August 2004
URL: http://www.spiegel.de/spiegel/0,1518,315585,00.html

USA

"Fundamentaler Bruch"

US-Diplomat Richard Holbrooke über die außenpolitischen Konzepte der Präsidentschaftsrivalen Bush und Kerry, die Lage der Amerikaner im Irak und das Vietnam-Syndrom

SPIEGEL: Herr Botschafter, wenn die Deutschen am 2. November wählen dürften, würden sie vermutlich mit übergroßer Mehrheit John Kerry dem amtierenden Präsidenten vorziehen. Aber ist es nicht eine Illusion, wenn wir uns von einem Präsidenten Kerry größere Veränderungen in der Außenpolitik erhoffen?

Holbrooke: Zwischen beiden Kandidaten gibt es grundlegende Unterschiede, was die internationalen Beziehungen anbelangt. Man muss sich doch nur ihren Hintergrund, ihre Biografien, ihre Haltung und ihre Stellungnahmen anschauen, um zu wissen, wie sehr sich George W. Bush und John Kerry unterscheiden.

SPIEGEL: Bush zieht amerikanische Alleingänge vor, während Kerry internationale Koalitionen anstrebt, wie er sagt. Was bedeutet sein Multilateralismus in der Praxis?

Holbrooke: Multilateralismus ist die entscheidende Grundlage für die Vereinigten Staaten gewesen, zumindest von Franklin D. Roosevelt bis Bill Clinton. Jeder Präsident, Ronald Reagan inbegriffen, arbeitete mit unseren Freunden und Verbündeten zusammen und übte so die Führungsrolle Amerikas aus. Sobald die nationale Sicherheit der USA auf dem Spiel stand, war jeder Präsident bereit, allein vorzugehen, doch war das in den meisten Fällen weder wünschenswert noch wirksam - denken Sie an Vietnam. Wenn die transatlantischen Beziehungen stark sind, können wir Probleme am wirkungsvollsten bewältigen.

Die Regierung Bush bildet Koalitionen, wenn sie es kann, aber sie hat kein Interesse daran, dauerhafte Allianzen zu stärken. Sie hat etwa, meiner Ansicht nach, die zentrale Bedeutung der Nato gering geachtet. Und wenn sie Meinungsverschiedenheiten mit engen Verbündeten hatte, wie mit Deutschland wegen Irak, hat sie die Streitigkeiten vertieft, bis daraus ein fundamentaler Bruch entstand, anstatt das Problem einzugrenzen. Das sind grundlegende Fehler.

SPIEGEL: Noch ehe Gerhard Schröder und Joschka Fischer 1998 ihren Amtseid abgelegt hatten, fuhren sie nach Washington, wo ihnen der damalige Präsident Clinton eröffnete, dass ein Krieg im Kosovo geführt werden müsse. Er informierte sie, er konsultierte sie nicht. Ein Vorbild für künftige Beziehungen?

Holbrooke: Präsident Clinton hat 1998 nicht mitgeteilt, dass im Kosovo ein Krieg bevorstehe. Ich war Chefunterhändler, wir sind im Kosovo erst vorgegangen, als wir sämtliche Nato-Verbündeten auf unserer Seite wussten. Der Uno-Sicherheitsrat konnte keine Zustimmung erteilen, weil Russen und Chinesen Widerstand angekündigt hatten. Erst im März 1999 begann der Krieg, erst als alle Nato-Mitglieder einstimmig dem Nato-Oberbefehlshaber den Einsatzbefehl erteilt hatten.

SPIEGEL: Wie wichtig ist Deutschland für einen amerikanischen Präsidenten?

Holbrooke: Na ja, das hängt davon ab, wer Präsident ist.

SPIEGEL: Lassen Sie uns annehmen: John Kerry.

Richard Holbrooke, 63, zählt seit vielen Jahren zu den herausragenden Außenpolitikern der Demokratischen Partei, er machte sich vor allem 1995 um den Friedensschluss im Bosnien-Konflikt verdient. Der ehemalige Uno-Botschafter von Präsident Bill Clinton berät derzeit Bush-Herausforderer John Kerry, für den er das State Department übernehmen könnte. Mit dem Parteitag der Republikaner in New York tritt der amerikanische Wahlkampf diese Woche in eine neue Phase.

Holbrooke: Deutschland bleibt Amerikas wichtigster Verbündeter in Europa. Haben wir Schwierigkeiten mit den Deutschen, wie im Fall Irak, sollten wir daran arbeiten. Wir dürfen nicht zulassen, dass die Grundlage unserer Beziehungen strapaziert wird. So haben wir in der Vergangenheit Differenzen behandelt, sei es wegen der Raketenaufstellung in Europa, sei es wegen Vietnam oder ähnlicher Probleme.

SPIEGEL: Vor einigen Jahren waren Sie Uno-Botschafter Amerikas, jetzt beraten Sie John Kerry. Würden Sie den Anspruch Deutschlands unterstützen, ständiges Mitglied des Sicherheitsrates zu werden?

Holbrooke: Ich glaube, Deutschland sollte ein ständiges Mitglied werden, aber ich muss etwas klarstellen: Es ist nicht Amerikas Versäumnis, dass Deutschland dem Sicherheitsrat nicht angehört. Dafür sind erstens vor allem Deutschlands europäische Verbündete England und Frankreich verantwortlich, die ihren eigenen Status im Sicherheitsrat nicht schmälern wollen, und zweitens andere große EU-Länder wie Italien und Spanien, die der Auffassung sind, Deutschland sollte erst in den Sicherheitsrat aufgenommen werden, wenn ihnen das auch ermöglicht wird.

Unsere Einstellung ist bekannt, und ich habe sie mit Nachdruck vertreten, als ich in der Uno war.

SPIEGEL: Vor kurzem kündigte Präsident Bush den Rückzug größerer Truppenverbände aus Deutschland an. John Kerry kritisierte ihn dafür: Es sei nicht die richtige Zeit, nicht die richtige Methode. Warum? Der Kalte Krieg ist seit mehr als einem Jahrzehnt vorbei.

Holbrooke: Truppenverlegungen gibt es seit der Wiedervereinigung. Drei Viertel der US-Truppen, die im Kalten Krieg in Deutschland standen, sind abgezogen worden. Die restlichen Soldaten sind auf deutschen Wunsch hin im Land, Deutschland zahlt eine Milliarde Dollar pro Jahr für ihren Unterhalt. Sie dienen nicht mehr der Verteidigung Ihres Landes, sondern festigen die gemeinsame deutsch-amerikanische Haltung, falls es um den Einsatz der Nato östlich und südlich von Deutschland geht. Amerika hätte keine Einwände, falls Deutschland eine Truppenreduzierung wünschen würde. Aber die Bush-Regierung hat den Abzug ohne langes Nachdenken über die Konsequenzen für die deutschamerikanischen Beziehungen und für Amerikas Engagement in Zentraleuropa verkündet. Und der Präsident hätte das besser nicht als nachträglichen Einfall in einer politischen Rede tun sollen, die von der Parteiführung der Republikaner und nicht etwa vom Weißen Haus initiiert wurde.

SPIEGEL: Ist der Truppenabzug nicht auch ein Zeichen für die militärische Überbeanspruchung der US-Streitkräfte?

Holbrooke: Es ist wahr, unsere Streitkräfte sind ausgedünnt.

SPIEGEL: Ein Grund dafür ist der Irak-Krieg. Worin liegt für Sie die Hauptkritik - dass Saddam Hussein für Amerika keineswegs die beschworene Gefahr darstellte oder dass die Misere im Irak den Hass auf Amerika weiter anfacht?

Holbrooke: Ich glaube, dass die Mehrheit der Amerikaner die Entmachtung Saddam Husseins für ein legitimes Ziel hält. Aber die Terminierung des Krieges beruhte auf weit gehend falschen Geheimdienst-Einschätzungen - wonach Saddam Massenvernichtungswaffen besaß, die binnen 45 Minuten einsatzbereit gewesen wären, wie Tony Blair sagte. In der ersten militärischen Phase des Krieges ging es schnell und effektiv voran. Doch die zweite Phase nach dem Einmarsch der Truppen in Bagdad war ein Desaster. Fast tausend Amerikaner sind bisher im Irak ums Leben gekommen. Die Kämpfe in Nadschaf und im sunnitischen Dreieck forderten viele irakische Opfer. Und das verursacht die zunehmende Flut an Anti-Amerikanismus in anderen Teilen der muslimischen Welt. Darauf gründet sich unsere Kritik, und die Regierung Bush gibt keine angemessene Antwort.

SPIEGEL: Ist der Abzug der Truppen eine Option für eine Kerry-Regierung?

Holbrooke: Wir haben jetzt erst August, und da lässt sich unmöglich vorhersehen, wie die Lage im Januar sein wird.

SPIEGEL: Stellt es für Senator Kerry nicht ein größeres Problem dar, dass er im Jahr 2002 dem Irak-Krieg zugestimmt hat?

Holbrooke: Nein. Er bedauert es heute nicht, dass auch er Präsident Bush die Vollmacht zum Vorgehen gegen Saddam gegeben hat. Er bedauert aber zutiefst, wie die Regierung die Vollmacht des Kongresses missbraucht hat. Sein "Ja" macht Kerry nicht verantwortlich für den falschen Lauf der Dinge.

SPIEGEL: Der amerikanische Wahlkampf dreht sich in diesen Tagen mindestens genauso sehr um Vietnam wie um Irak. Sie kamen 1962 als junger Diplomat nach Vietnam, Sie lernten sogar die Landessprache. Warum peinigt dieses Thema noch immer Ihre Generation?

Holbrooke: Jeder aus unserer Generation hat seine eigene Biografie und seine eigenen Erinnerungen. Wer wie ich oder John Kerry gedient hat oder wer nicht gedient hat, wer gegen den Krieg war oder sich dem Einsatz entzogen hat - für uns alle, die wir heute in den Fünfzigern oder Sechzigern sind, war Vietnam ein einschneidendes Erlebnis.

Ich glaube aber nicht, dass dieser Krieg meine Generation nach wie vor wie ein Gespenst verfolgt. Allerdings spukt Vietnam durch den Präsidentschaftswahlkampf. Vergangene Woche zum Beispiel drehte sich die gesamte Berichterstattung um diesen Krieg, der schon vor 30 Jahren zu Ende gegangen ist - und das an einem Tag, als im Irak sechs Amerikaner getötet wurden. Das ist schon sehr merkwürdig. Und dabei wird John Kerry, ein dreimal verwundeter und fünfmal ausgezeichneter Kriegsheld, von Leuten angegriffen, die einen Präsidenten unterstützen, der Vietnam zu meiden verstand und nicht einmal den Nachweis antreten kann, dass er seinen Dienst in der Nationalgarde in Alabama ableistete. Und sein Vizepräsident sagt öffentlich, er sei nicht nach Vietnam gegangen, weil er andere Prioritäten hatte.

Ich finde das seltsam, ich finde das bedauerlich. Denn Vietnam ist heute kein Problem, Irak aber ist eines.

SPIEGEL: Wem hilft die Vietnam-Obsession mehr - Kerry oder Bush?
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Holbrooke: John Kerry hat Kriegserfahrung, George Bush und Dick Cheney haben sie nicht. Darüber werden die Wähler ihr Urteil fällen. Die Fakten sind bekannt, doch Senator Kerry wird momentan von einigen früheren Vietnam-Veteranen heftig attackiert, die ein angeblich unabhängiges politisches Komitee gegründet haben. In Wahrheit finanzieren texanische Republikaner dieses Komitee. Ihr juristischer Ratgeber war der Justiziar der Bush-Kampagne, weshalb er zurücktreten musste.

SPIEGEL: Wann beginnt die heiße Phase des Wahlkampfes?

Holbrooke: Das nächste Großereignis wird die erste Debatte zwischen Kerry und Bush Ende September sein, glaube ich.

SPIEGEL: Sie waren 1993/94 Botschafter in Deutschland und reisen regelmäßig dorthin ...

Holbrooke: Das nächste Mal bin ich am 9. September in Berlin, um den Jahrestag der Gründung der American Academy zu feiern. Vor zehn Jahren haben Henry Kissinger, Richard von Weizsäcker und ich mit anderen diese Akademie gegründet. Kanzler Schröder wird erstmals dabei sein.

SPIEGEL: Eine gute Gelegenheit, ihm die Außenpolitik Kerrys nahe zu bringen.

Holbrooke: Es ist mir immer eine Ehre, den Kanzler zu treffen.

SPIEGEL: Herr Botschafter, wir danken Ihnen für dieses Gespräch.

Das Gespräch führte Redakteur Gerhard Spörl.



© DER SPIEGEL 36/2004

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August 29, 2004
After 3 Weeks of Fighting in Najaf, 1 Riddle: Who Won?
By DEXTER FILKINS

NAJAF, Iraq — In a single moment last week, all the mystery and contradiction surrounding Moktada al-Sadr, Iraq`s rebel cleric, came into focus.

It was near midnight Thursday, and the 50-odd reporters following the fighting here were hustled from their hotel by the local police and gathered for a press conference in the courtyard of a home where the Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, the country most powerful Shiite leader, was staying.

Just as one of Ayatollah Sistani`s aides stood to announce that a peace deal had been struck, Mr. Sadr, the man most responsible for the bloodshed, scurried out the front door, across the lawn and into the street.

And then he was gone.

The moment seemed to encapsulate the conflicting currents that have made Mr. Sadr, and his relationship to the Iraqi and American governments, so hard to fathom.

It was Mr. Sadr, after all, whose Mahdi Army began the current round of bloodletting by attacking a police station earlier this month after the Iraqi police arrested one of his aides. It was Mr. Sadr who had turned the Imam Ali Shrine, one of the holiest sites in Shiite Islam, into a fortress from which he dared the government and the Americans to expel him. And it was Mr. Sadr, facing an indictment for the murder of a rival cleric, who had mocked the Iraqi government`s efforts to arrest him.

Yet for all of that, the burden of announcing the tentative peace accord had fallen to Ayatollah Sistani, the country`s most revered religious figure. Mr. Sadr was allowed to dash out the front door.

The kid-glove treatment of Mr. Sadr here, after days of fighting that left hundreds of Iraqis dead, points up the dilemma faced by American commanders and Iraq`s new leaders. As much as both groups would like to capture or kill Mr. Sadr - and there is no doubt that they would - neither the American military nor Iraq`s American-appointed government feels politically strong enough to get away with it.

It is for that reason, too, that Mr. Sadr and his Mahdi Army will almost certainly be back.

"No one can defeat the Mahdi Army," said Arkan Rahim, a 30-year-old Iraqi who fought the entire three week-long battle. "The Mahdi Army is all Iraqis, the whole Iraqi nation."

Mr. Rahim was one of hundreds of Mahdi Army fighters who streamed out of the warrens and narrow alleyways of Najaf`s old city Friday morning as the peace deal took hold. Mr. Rahim and the other Mahdi fighters lucky enough to have survived the American military onslaught were already holding up Mr. Sadr as a mythic leader who had done a great deed for Iraq`s Shiites by protecting one of their most sacred sites.

In such moments, it would be easy to overestimate the strength and popularity of Mr. Sadr, a 30-year-old rabble rouser whose following is still largely limited to Iraq`s Shiite poor. He is powerful, it often seems, because the others around him are so weak. In the political vacuum that is Iraq, Mr. Sadr looms large.

To view the limits of Mr. Sadr`s power, one need travel no further than the neighborhoods of Najaf itself. Many Iraqis there blame Mr. Sadr for the nonstop shooting and bombing that decimated the central part of the city and damaged the holy shrine itself.

"Moktada al-Sadr is the enemy," said Saleh Allawi Jasem, a 48-year-old Najaf businessman who spent most of August huddled in his home, as the American military and the Mahdi Army fought for control of his neighborhood. "I am happy that the Americans pushed him out of my neighborhood."

Indeed, the relentless military assault that unfolded here last week could not possibly have been carried out if Mr. Sadr were as large and popular a figure as he sometimes seems to be. In all likelihood, the American operation to expel the Mahdi Army from the shrine could never have gone forward without the sanction of some very powerful Iraqi leaders - including Ayatollah Sistani himself.

The destruction caused by the fighting certainly approached the level of damage wrought during the American assault on Falluja last April, when the Marines began a huge operation after four American contract employees were killed and their bodies mutilated. In Falluja, amid reports that hundreds of Iraqis had been killed, an outcry among Iraqi political leaders caused the Americans to halt. But here in Najaf, where dozens and perhaps hundreds of Mahdi Army fighters were killed and much of the old city was reduced to ruins, no similar outcry came forth.

Falluja, of course, is a city dominated by Sunni Arabs, who have resisted the American-backed project here more vigorously than any other group, while Najaf is an almost entirely Shiite city.

But just as important is leadership: The Sunni Arabs do not have a cleric capable of rallying the majority of his community who has decided, at least for now, to tolerate the American presence here. In Ayatollah Sistani, the Shiites do.

With Ayatollah Sistani`s men now in control of the shrine, it seems clear that he played a central role in getting Mr. Sadr`s men out. The timing of Ayatollah Sistani`s comings and goings are fascinating on their own. On Aug. 6, the day after the fighting started in Najaf, he departed for London, with the expressed purpose of getting heart surgery. On Thursday, nearly three weeks later and after receiving coronary care, he returned at the decisive moment: after the Americans had done the hard fighting, and just as Mr. Sadr`s fighters had begun to falter.

On the same day, Ayatollah Sistani met with representatives of Prime Minister Ayad Allawi, and agreed with them to seek a 24-hour cease-fire, according to senior American military officials. Then came the crucial decision: If Mr. Sadr did not back down, American officials said, Ayatollah Sistani assured them that he would support a storming of the shrine by Iraqi troops.

"There was a lot of thought that he had left the country originally to give us a chance to take control of the situation," an American military officer said of Ayatollah Sistani. "Now he is coming back to help us find a solution, possibly a peaceful result. But the end result is, he wants us to help disband the Mahdi Army."

With his dramatic return to Iraq and the lightning-fast capitulation of Mr. Sadr, Ayatollah Sistani proved again that the most powerful political leader in Iraq is someone who professes to have no political aspirations at all. Even the most zealous of Mr. Sadr`s recruits, told of the ayatollah`s wishes, marched out of the old city like the obedient troops that they were.

While it appeared likely that Mr. Sadr, even after his public surrender, would rise again, that prospect seemed, amid the ruins of Najaf, beside the point. The political vacuum that opened the way for the events of the past month here fell hardest not on people like Mr. Sadr, or even the Mahdi fighters who picked up their guns, but on the ordinary Iraqis who had been caught between two armies.

"Can`t you see?" an Iraqi man in Najaf called to American reporter. The man stood over his dead animal and ice cart. "Can`t you see? My donkey was shot by a sniper."

And with that, the Iraqi man began to tug and pull on his cart and his dead animal under the noonday sun.

About an hour later, when the reporter returned to the spot, a man - possibly the same one, possibly not - lay face down in the road, near the donkey, shot by a sniper.

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company

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A member of Moktada al-Sadr`s militia who was killed in the standoff between the militia and American forces was buried on Saturday in Najaf.
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August 29, 2004
Residents of a Shattered City Begin to Pick Up Its Pieces
By DEXTER FILKINS

NAJAF, Iraq, Aug. 28 - In a corner of this ravaged city, the dead are marked by slips of paper, tucked into tiny bottles that mark the graves.

"Hamid Qadim Murtada," read one piece of crumpled paper. "Medina Street, Moktada al-Sadr Brigade, martyred."

"Old woman," read another slip that marked a tomb. "Medium height, black dress, dark skin."

"Haider Abdul Zahra, Najaf, martyred," read a third.

"He was a friend," said Walid Haadi, standing over Mr. Zahra`s dusty grave and holding the piece of paper bearing his name. "He wasn`t a fighter. He stepped out of his house, it was Friday, and he was killed by a sniper."

Mr. Haadi was one of dozens of Iraqis who came Saturday to this makeshift cemetery built on the edge of town. At the height of the fighting, which pitted Mr. Sadr`s militia against American soldiers, it was too dangerous to take the bodies to the city`s main cemetery, which had become a battleground. So the people buried their dead here, in this small outcropping of rocky soil at the end of the road.

There are perhaps 50 graves in all, most of them holding fighters of the Mahdi Army, including at least one from Iran. But civilians were buried here, too, like the old woman of medium height and black dress. By late afternoon, three of the graves were empty, their bodies carried away by families and friends.

The people of Najaf began their journey back to normal life on Saturday, the first truly calm day here in almost a month. After 23 days of unrelenting combat, the fighting came to a halt Thursday, when the country`s most powerful Shiite leader, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, returned from abroad and secured Mr. Sadr`s surrender. On Friday, Mr. Sadr`s men vacated the Imam Ali Shrine, which they had turned into a fortress, for the first time in four months.

So when the sun rose Saturday, the people of Najaf went into the streets, looking over the damage, picking through the ruins, burying and digging up their dead. With the Mahdi Army fighters gone and the Americans pulled back, even the mundane rituals began to reassert themselves. One man sold cold Pepsi from the trunk of his car; another sold cigarettes.

But even as people got back to work, they paused, of course, to survey the breathtaking destruction that the battle had wrought: whole city blocks decimated, streets littered with shrapnel and shell casings, buildings reduced to dust. One man took his young son by the hand as they walked, pointing out the wreckage and trying to explain.

"You have to let me into my store, please let me into store," said a confused elderly man, Shakir Abdul Hussein, as he pleaded with the police. One of his shops, Mr. Hussein said, had already been looted of its carpets and bedding; he wanted to save the other before the looters got to it, too.

"Sorry, but there are too many unexploded bombs," an Iraqi police officer told him. "Give us two days."

After weeks of fighting, the streets of Najaf were left littered with unexploded shells, some tucked under buildings, some hidden in piles of rubble. One unexploded shell sat on the ground beneath a pupil`s chair in the middle of the street. Another was stuck deep into the sidewalk, buried halfway, as if it had been planted like a knife.

The smell of death, too, was everywhere. Men walking down one of the Old City`s narrow streets would suddenly catch a putrid drift, stop and begin to dig. Sometimes they found a dead animal, like a pigeon or a goat, sometimes a human form.

No one knows how many people died in the fighting here, some of the heaviest since the Americans toppled Saddam Hussein`s government 16 months ago. American officers said they had killed hundreds of Mahdi Army fighters, but there was no way to be sure. Mr. Sadr`s office said the militia lost 110 fighters and suffered another 300 wounded. But with ready-made graves like the one at the end of the Rasool Street, it seemed that many more had met their end here.

The departure of the Mahdi Army appeared to free people to speak their minds for the first time in months. Since April, when the militia first took control of the shrine, people here have seemed to muffle their comments about Mr. Sadr and his men. On Saturday, people spoke openly about Mr. Sadr, even if some of the old fear remained.

"Moktada and those people around him, they know nothing," said an Iraqi cleric who had studied under Mr. Sadr`s father, Ayatollah Muhammad Sadiq al-Sadr, a cleric who was widely respected by the mainstream Shiite establishment.

"Moktada, he just sat on his father`s computer," the cleric said. "He is not an educated man."

With that, the cleric began to tell of the threats delivered to men like himself by Mr. Sadr`s men. He pulled out a small handwritten letter from his pocket, delivered to him by the Mahdi Army. "Some clerics sell their consciences to Jews and foreigners," the letter said. "If you are not careful, you will be killed."

"Tell the truth about Moktada," the cleric said, and he walked away.

After they spent weeks pushing deeper into the city, the Americans, too, were hard to find on Saturday. One group of soldiers was helping to direct the flow of traffic, a much less strenuous duty than the Americans had grown used to lately.

One solider who seemed to be taking particular pleasure in his work was Sgt. First Class Willie Marshall, 33, of Hot Springs, Ark. On Thursday, while he was directing his armored personnel carrier in a firefight with the Mahdi Army, a sniper fired a bullet directly into his chest.

The bullet struck the armored plate that Sergeant Marshall was wearing, cracking it, and knocked him backward. But the plate did its job: he had a hole in his jacket and a shallow wound in his chest. He was back on duty the same day.

"The guy was a good shot," Sergeant Marshall said. "He aimed straight at my heart."

Insurgent Attack Kills 5 Iraqis

BAQUBA, Iraq, Aug. 28 (Reuters) - Five Iraqi policemen were killed and six were wounded Saturday in an attack by guerrillas here.

Baquba, with a mixed population of Sunni and Shiite Muslims, has been a center of insurgency in the so-called Sunni Triangle, where loyalists to Saddam Hussein`s administration still operate.

Group Issues Demand to France

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates, Aug. 28 (Reuters) - An Iraqi militant group that is holding two Frenchmen has given the French government 48 hours to end a ban on Muslim headscarves, the Arabic television station Al Jazeera said on Saturday.

Al Jazeera identified the men as Georges Malbrunot and Christian Chesnot. Last week, French officials said two journalists with those names were missing in Iraq.

The channel showed a brief video showing two men standing in front of a black banner bearing the name of the Islamic Army in Iraq.

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company |

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Die US-Erfolge im Irak gehen weiter, wozu auch vornehmlich das Abwerfen von lasergelenkten 500kg Bomben auf vermutete Stellungen von Aufständigen gehört. Leider werden dann in die Leichenschauhäuser oder Krankenhäuser meist tote oder verletzte Frauen und Kinder eingeliefert. Aufständige werden selten dabei erwischt. Diese Taktik wendet die Army schon seit der Zeit vor dem Krieg an, als sie noch Jagd auf Saddam machten und Lokale bombadierten, wobei in einem Fall 20-30 Zivilisten daran glauben mußten. Diese Vorfälle mit den schlauen Bomben ziehen sich durch den gesamten `Krieg gegen den Terror`, ob im Irak oder in Afghanistan. God help the rest of the world, if Bush is reelected. schreibt ein Poster in der NYTimes

August 29, 2004
GIs Kill 2 North of Mosul After Attack
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

Filed at 6:25 a.m. ET

MOSUL, Iraq (AP) -- U.S. troops battled insurgents in northern Iraq early Sunday in clashes that left two dead and 32 wounded, officials said.

U.S. forces were attacked twice before dawn near Tal Afar, about 30 miles west of Mosul, said Army Capt. Angela Bowman. Soldiers returned fire during both assaults, killing two of the attackers, she said. No U.S. casualties were reported.

Provincial health chief Rabie Yasin al-Khalil said 32 people were injured in the clashes.

The attack comes a day after Shiite militants and U.S. forces battled throughout the Baghdad slum of Sadr City, and a mortar barrage slammed into a busy neighborhood in the capital, killing at least 12 people and wounding more than 100 others.

U.S. warplanes and tanks later bombarded targets in Sunni stronghold of Fallujah, and U.S. forces exchanged gunfire with insurgents along the city`s eastern outskirts and the main highway running to neighboring Jordan, witnesses said. The fighting left at least 14 people injured, hospital officials said.

The new violence came as residents of Najaf began digging out of the rubble and debris left by three weeks of fierce fighting between militants and U.S. forces in the holy city. The crisis ended Friday when the militants withdrew under a peace deal brokered by Iraq`s most senior Shiite cleric, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani.

Iraqi police spread out across Najaf`s devastated Old City on Saturday, patrolling in vehicles and on foot and taking over checkpoints that until recently were manned by followers of rebel Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr. U.S. forces pulled back from the neighborhood, the site of much of the fighting.

``It`s a joyful thing, the armed men have left Najaf and (neighboring) Kufa,`` interim Prime Minister Ayad Allawi told al-Iraqiyah television Saturday.

Around the Imam Ali Shrine -- which al-Sadr fighters surrendered Friday after weeks of using it as a stronghold -- street cleaners in orange uniforms swept up debris, trash and rubble, loading it onto trucks. Shards of glass littered the streets, and burnt cars could be seen on the roads, cratered by bomb blasts. Some buildings were blackened by blasts. Others had big holes in them.

A delegation of five government ministers visited al-Sistani to thank him for his peace efforts. They also visited the shrine.

``The shrine inside is cleaned up,`` Minister of State Qassim Dawoud said. ``We hope to open the mosque to the public within 10 days.``

Though Najaf remained calm, fighting flared in Sadr City, an al-Sadr stronghold in Baghdad named for the cleric`s slain father, as militants armed with rifles and mortars fought with U.S. forces.

Sadr City has been the scene of repeated clashes in the 16 months since the fall of Saddam Hussein, but the violence intensified in recent weeks as the Najaf fighting spread to Shiite communities across the country.

Allawi blamed the continuing violence on renegade al-Sadr followers who do not want to honor the peace deal.

``I believe there are some people who are disobeying Muqtada al-Sadr`s orders`` to stop fighting, he told Al-Iraqiyah television.

U.S. soldiers in Humvees drove through the neighborhood with loudspeakers, telling people to stay inside because coalition forces were ``cleaning the area of armed men,`` according to an Associated Press reporter at the scene.

Gunfire crackled in the streets as U.S. tanks rolled by and helicopters patrolled the sky. Militants stood in the streets calmly launching round after round of mortars at U.S. forces. Black smoke rose over the neighborhood. A blue sedan was peppered with dozens of bullet holes.

Saad al-Amili, a Health Ministry official, said 10 people were killed and 126 wounded in the skirmishes over the last 24 hours. A young boy was receiving an intravenous drip at the hospital, while a little girl in a pink dress grimaced at the large, bleeding wound in her leg.

Militants fired eight mortars at U.S. troops, but all of them missed and instead hit an electricity substation, cutting power to five or six blocks of Sadr City, U.S. Capt. Brian O`Malley of the 1st Brigade Combat Team, said. U.S. forces suffered no casualties.

Insurgents also fired a round of mortars into a crowded eastern Baghdad neighborhood, killing two boys washing cars in a street, said Interior Ministry spokesman Col. Adnan Abdul-Rahman. At least four mortar rounds landed within an hour in the same area, sending panicked pedestrians scrambling for safety, witnesses said.

The dead teenagers were taken to a nearby morgue, where tearful relatives pounded their chests in grief and others hugged and kissed the boy`s bodies. At least six other people were injured, said Bashir Mohammed of Baghdad`s al-Kindi hospital.

Another mortar round hit a fuel tank at the Golden Beach hotel, starting a fire that enveloped much of the building in flames. Yet another round fell near the Palestine Hotel, where foreign journalists and contractors stay, but did not explode.

Meanwhile, Iraqi militants kidnapped two Frenchmen to protest France`s ban on students wearing Islamic head coverings in public schools, which goes into effect on Wednesday.

Al-Jazeera television said it had received a tape from a group calling itself the Islamic Army in Iraq showing several seconds of videotape with the two hostages. One of them said in poor Arabic, ``We are being held by the Islamic Army in Iraq.`` The second hostage spoke French.

The kidnapping could not be independently confirmed. The French Foreign Ministry said it had no information.

The station`s newsreader said the group described the French law banning religious apparel in public schools as ``an aggression on the Islamic religion and personal freedoms`` and gave the French government 48 hours to overturn the law, without mentioning any ultimatum.

The latest U.S. strikes in Fallujah, a hotbed of Sunni Muslim insurgents, struck the Askari neighborhood and an industrial area in the eastern section of the city. At least 14 people were injured, including eight children, said Dr. Ali Khamis of Fallujah General Hospital.

Witnesses said the air raids began at 7 p.m. and clashes continued for several hours. Smoke billowed into the air, and fire blazed in the night sky after the strikes.

Lt. Col. Thomas V. Johnson, a Marine spokesman, said U.S. troops were responding with tank and artillery after coming under fire. A blaze in the city was sparked by a strike that apparently hit a ``significant weapons cache,`` he said.

On Friday, U.S. airstrikes targeted the same neighborhoods, killing three people, medical officials said. U.S. forces have repeatedly carried out airstrikes in Fallujah, 40 miles west of Baghdad, since Marines pulled back following a three-week siege in April aimed at rooting out Sunni Muslim insurgents.

In other violence:

-- Gunmen killed five policemen and injured two others in the center of the city of Baqouba, a hotbed of violence 35 miles northeast of Baghdad, said police Lt. Col. Salman Saadoon.

-- Police found the bodies of a slain Turkish truck driver and an Iraqi man on a highway near Beiji, 155 miles north of Baghdad, a Turkish diplomat said Saturday on condition of anonymity. It was not known who killed the men.

-- A civilian was killed and two other people were wounded, including an Iraqi police officer, when rebels fired a mortar round in Beiji on Friday, the U.S. military said.

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Der CIA muß sich fragen, wieviel Wert die Aussagen der Gefangenen, Al Kaida oder nicht, überhaupt haben, wenn die Umstände betrachtet werden, unter denen diese Aussagen zu Stande gekommen sind.

August 29, 2004
C.I.A. Expands Its Inquiry Into Interrogation Tactics
By DOUGLAS JEHL and DAVID JOHNSTON

WASHINGTON, Aug. 28 - A Central Intelligence Agency review that grew out of the furor over abuses at Abu Ghraib prison now includes scrutiny of the agency`s interrogation and detention practices at military-run facilities and other sites across Iraq, government officials say.

The reassessment, which is more far-reaching than previously known, could have implications for the agency`s conduct elsewhere, including interrogations of high-level Al Qaeda suspects like Khalid Shaikh Mohammed who are being held by the C.I.A. in secret facilities around the world.

Former intelligence officials say that lawyers from the C.I.A. and the Justice Department have been involved in intensive discussions in recent months to review the legal basis for some extreme tactics used at those secret centers, including "waterboarding," in which a detainee is strapped down, dunked under water and made to believe that he might be drowned.

"Policies and procedures on detention interrogation in Iraq and elsewhere have been the focus of intense oversight and scrutiny, and very close attention has been paid to making them lawful," a senior intelligence official said Friday.

Over all, the review by the intelligence agency, along with the investigations and corrective steps already undertaken by the military, reflect how the government has retreated from an aggressive posture adopted in the months after the Sept. 11 attacks on how far interrogators could go in questioning detainees.

Within the military in particular, some of the harsh procedures authorized until this spring were quickly suspended or abandoned after the extent of the abuses at Abu Ghraib surfaced in April. This week, reviews completed by two investigative panels have called for even clearer rules to be drafted for the military and intelligence agencies to require humane treatment during interrogation.

Among the questions raised by the Pentagon reviews is whether intelligence agencies should be required to heed the same guidelines for interrogation as the military, or whether they should be permitted more latitude. A report by Maj. Gen. George R. Fay about the abuses at Abu Ghraib said the conduct of C.I.A. personnel at the prison was perceived by military officials there as more aggressive than that allowed by the military. The report said the C.I.A.`s conduct had a corrupting influence on military interrogators and contributed to a view among them that it was permissible to exceed strict guidelines for interrogations.

Mark Mansfield, a C.I.A. spokesman, would say only that the agency`s inspector general is conducting "several" reviews of the agency`s conduct in Iraq. Mr. Mansfield said it had not yet been determined when the inquiries would be completed or whether the results of the probes would be made public.

Among the reviews, intelligence officials say, are an examination of what a military investigation described as eight "ghost" detainees who were incarcerated at Abu Ghraib, but who were kept off the prison`s roster at the C.I.A.`s request. In one of those cases, in November 2003, a detainee brought to the prison by C.I.A. employees but never formally registered with military guards died at the site, and his body was removed after being wrapped in plastic and packed in ice.

The man had been detained by Navy Seals, who had hit him in the head with a rifle butt during his arrest, and the military investigation said that blow apparently led to his death. But the investigation suggested that the detainee might have survived if he had been screened by doctors, as would have been required had he been properly registered with the military.

The reviews have stirred concern in intelligence and military circles by officials who fear that decisions to forbid all coercive interrogation techniques could cost the United States valuable intelligence. A senior Army official, discussing new rules adopted by the military in a briefing for reporters on Wednesday, said the restrictions had damaged efforts to obtain information.

"Interrogators and detainees both know what the limits are," the official said. "They know that if the United States captures them, they will get a medical exam. They`ll get their teeth fixed. They will get essentially a free physical and they will be released if they don`t talk after a certain amount of time."

In interviews in recent days, some current and former intelligence officials have warned of the danger of showing too much deference to detainees who espouse extreme anti-American views.

"Let`s keep in mind what the objective is - to get information that will save American lives," said a senior intelligence official. "And there is an absolute necessity to use effective interrogation to gain insights on plans to kill Americans."

Interrogations of suspected Qaeda figures including Mr. Mohammed, regarded as the mastermind of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, have been described by the independent commission that investigated those attacks as having provided rich and important information about terrorist operations. Intelligence officials have not spelled out in any detail the kinds of interrogation tactics used on Mr. Mohammed, but they have expressed concern that he has successfully resisted their efforts to extract information.

An April 2003 C.I.A. report on Mr. Mohammed that is cited in a footnote to the Sept. 11 commission`s report refers in its title to Mr. Mohammed`s "Threat Reporting - Precious Truths, Surrounded by a Bodyguard of Lies.``

In recent weeks, current and former officials say, the debate about interrogations and about Mr. Mohammed in particular has been conducted against the real and urgent backdrop of concern about a potential new terrorist attack.

Mr. Mohammed`s knowledge of Qaeda personnel has become significant again because of his association with the suspected Qaeda figure known as Issa al-Hindi, or Dhiren Barot, who was among eight men arrested early this month in Britain and later charged with terrorist related offenses. The authorities believe that Mr. Hindi traveled to New York in 2000 and 2001 to conduct surveillance operations at five financial institutions in New York, New Jersey and Washington.

In the Sept. 11 commission`s final report, Mr. Mohammed is said to have told his interrogators that he dispatched Mr. Hindi, under the name Issa al-Britani, to case potential economic targets in New York.

It is not clear whether Mr. Mohammed was talking about the same reconnaissance described in surveillance reports that the authorities found in Pakistan last month. But those surveillance operations are important because they were behind the Bush administration`s decision, announced on Aug. 1, to elevate the threat level in the three parts of the United States.

It remains unclear whether intelligence officials have adopted newly aggressive methods in their interviews of Mr. Mohammed.

It has been known that, after the abuses at Abu Ghraib were disclosed, the Justice Department abandoned some legal opinions written in the months after the Sept. 11 attacks that had been used as the basis for the broad latitude allowed interrogators in using extreme procedures against suspected Qaeda detainees. In recent months, government lawyers said the legal opinions were too broad and were being rewritten to restrict the harshest interrogation measures.

The broader inspector general investigation into the agency`s involvement in detention and intelligence in Iraq since May 2003 was ordered in May by George J. Tenet, who was then director of central intelligence. But additional questions about the C.I.A.`s practices center on a small number of high-level suspected Qaeda detainees being held by the agency outside Iraq in undisclosed locations around the world.

The C.I.A. has already scaled back some coercive methods used against detainees, although officials would not discuss specific techniques. Agency officials have demanded advance Justice Department approval for each tactic used against detainees and a new legal analysis of federal laws on the subject, including a statute that makes it a felony for American officials, including C.I.A. employees, to engage in torture.

One seminal document repudiated by the government was an August 2002 memo by the Justice Department. It concluded that interrogators could use extreme techniques on detainees in the effort to prevent terrorism.

The memo suggested that the president could authorize a wide array of coercive interrogation methods in the campaign against terrorism without violating international treaties or the federal torture law. It did not specify any particular procedures but suggested that there were few limits short of causing the death of a prisoner.

While the memo appeared to give the C.I.A. wide latitude in adopting tactics to interrogate high-level suspected Qaeda detainees, it is still unclear exactly what procedures were used or the extent to which the memo influenced the government`s overall thinking about interrogations of other terror detainees captured in Afghanistan and elsewhere.

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Die Ungerechtigkeiten des US-Wahlsystems.
August 29, 2004
Abolish the Electoral College

When Republican delegates nominate their presidential candidate this week, they will be doing it in a city where residents who support George Bush have, for all practical purposes, already been disenfranchised. Barring a tsunami of a sweep, heavily Democratic New York will send its electoral votes to John Kerry and both parties have already written New York off as a surefire blue state. The Electoral College makes Republicans in New York, and Democrats in Utah, superfluous. It also makes members of the majority party in those states feel less than crucial. It`s hard to tell New York City children that every vote is equally important - it`s winner take all here, and whether Senator Kerry beats the president by one New York vote or one million, he will still walk away with all 31 of the state`s electoral votes.

The Electoral College got a brief spate of attention in 2000, when George Bush became president even though he lost the popular vote to Al Gore by more than 500,000 votes. Many people realized then for the first time that we have a system in which the president is chosen not by the voters themselves, but by 538 electors. It`s a ridiculous setup, which thwarts the will of the majority, distorts presidential campaigning and has the potential to produce a true constitutional crisis. There should be a bipartisan movement for direct election of the president.

The main problem with the Electoral College is that it builds into every election the possibility, which has been a reality three times since the Civil War, that the president will be a candidate who lost the popular vote. This shocks people in other nations who have been taught to look upon the United States as the world`s oldest democracy. The Electoral College also heavily favors small states. The fact that every one gets three automatic electors - one for each senator and a House member - means states that by population might be entitled to only one or two electoral votes wind up with three, four or five.

The majority does not rule and every vote is not equal - those are reasons enough for scrapping the system. But there are other consequences as well. This election has been making clear how the Electoral College distorts presidential campaigns. A few swing states take on oversized importance, leading the candidates to focus their attention, money and promises on a small slice of the electorate. We are hearing far more this year about the issue of storing hazardous waste at Yucca Mountain, an important one for Nevada`s 2.2 million residents, than about securing ports against terrorism, a vital concern for 19.2 million New Yorkers. The political concerns of Cuban-Americans, who are concentrated in the swing state of Florida, are of enormous interest to the candidates. The interests of people from Puerto Rico scarcely come up at all, since they are mainly settled in areas already conceded as Kerry territory. The emphasis on swing states removes the incentive for a large part of the population to follow the campaign, or even to vote.

Those are the problems we have already experienced. The arcane rules governing the Electoral College have the potential to create havoc if things go wrong. Electors are not required to vote for the candidates they are pledged to, and if the vote is close in the Electoral College, a losing candidate might well be able to persuade a small number of electors to switch sides. Because there are an even number of electors - one for every senator and House member of the states, and three for the District of Columbia - the Electoral College vote can end in a tie. There are several plausible situations in which a 269-269 tie could occur this year. In the case of a tie, the election goes to the House of Representatives, where each state delegation gets one vote - one for Wyoming`s 500,000 residents and one for California`s 35.5 million.

The Electoral College`s supporters argue that it plays an important role in balancing relations among the states, and protecting the interests of small states. A few years ago, this page was moved by these concerns to support the Electoral College. But we were wrong. The small states are already significantly overrepresented in the Senate, which more than looks out for their interests. And there is no interest higher than making every vote count.

Making Votes Count: Editorials in this series remain online at nytimes.com/makingvotescount.

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company

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Für mich bleibt die Geschichte ein Witz.
Aber vielleicht muß man sich fragen, was wird mit dieser Geschichte beabsichtigt?

washingtonpost.com
Analyst Who Is Target of Probe Went to Israel

By Thomas E. Ricks and Robin Wright
Washington Post Staff Writers
Sunday, August 29, 2004; Page A01

The FBI investigation into whether classified information was passed to the Israeli government is focused on a Pentagon analyst who has served as an Air Force reservist in Israel, and the probe has been broadened in recent days to include interviews at the State and Defense departments and with Middle Eastern affairs specialists outside government, officials and others familiar with the inquiry said yesterday.

At the center of the investigation, sources said, is Lawrence A. Franklin, a career analyst at the Defense Intelligence Agency who specializes in Iran and has served in the Air Force Reserve, rising to colonel. Early in the Bush administration, Franklin moved from the DIA to the Pentagon`s policy branch headed by Undersecretary Douglas J. Feith, where he continued his work on Iranian affairs.

Officials and colleagues said yesterday that Franklin had traveled to Israel, including during duty in the Air Force Reserve, where he served as a specialist in foreign political-military affairs. He may have been based at the U.S. Embassy in Tel Aviv on those tours, said a former co-worker at the DIA, but was never permanently assigned there.

Messages left at Franklin`s Pentagon office were not returned yesterday, and nobody answered the door at his house in West Virginia. No one has been charged in the case.

FBI officials have been quietly investigating for months whether Franklin gave classified information -- which officials said included a draft of a presidential directive on U.S. policies toward Iran -- to two Israeli lobbyists here who are alleged to have passed it on to the Israeli government. Officials said it was not yet clear whether the probe would become an espionage case or perhaps would result in lesser charges such as improper release of classified information or mishandling of government documents.

On Friday, Pentagon officials said Franklin was not in a position to have significant influence over U.S. policy. "The Defense Department has been cooperating with the Department of Justice for an extended period of time," a Pentagon statement said. "It is the DOD`s understanding that the investigation within DOD is very limited in its scope."

At the Pentagon and elsewhere in Washington yesterday, people touched by the case said they were baffled by aspects of it.

Colleagues said they were stunned to hear Franklin was suspected of giving secret information to a foreign government. And foreign policy specialists said they were skeptical that the pro-Israel group under FBI scrutiny, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, would jeopardize its work with classified documents from a midlevel bureaucrat when it could find out almost anything it wanted to by calling top officials in the Bush administration.

"The whole thing makes no sense to me," said Dennis Ross, special envoy on the Arab-Israeli peace process in the first Bush administration and the Clinton presidency. "The Israelis have access to all sorts of people. They have access in Congress and in the administration. They have people who talk about these things," said Ross, now a senior fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.

Prime Minister Ariel Sharon`s office issued a statement yesterday saying Israel was not involved in the matter and conducts no espionage in the United States. AIPAC has strongly denied any wrongdoing and said it is "cooperating fully" with the probe.

The FBI investigation was touched off months ago when a series of e-mails was brought to investigators` attention, said a U.S. official familiar with the case. The investigation moved into high gear in recent days, another official said. On Friday, Justice Department officials briefed some Pentagon officials about the state of the inquiry.

"I think they are at the end of their investigation and beginning to brief people in the chain of command, partly to make sure that the acts weren`t authorized," one official said.

Pentagon co-workers expressed shock at the news. "It`s totally astonishing to all of us who knew him," said a Defense Department co-worker who asked not to be identified because of the investigation. "He is a career guy, a mild-mannered professional. No one would think of him as evil or devious."

Franklin works in the office of William J. Luti, deputy undersecretary of defense for Near Eastern and South Asian affairs. For years a bureaucratic backwater, the office has been in the thick of the action since 2001 because it formulates Pentagon policy on Iraq. It played a central role as the U.S. military prepared for the spring 2003 invasion and since then as the Pentagon has overseen the occupation.

Luti`s office is part of the policy operation under Feith.

Feith has been a controversial figure in U.S.-Israeli affairs since the mid-1990s, when he was part of a study group of American conservatives, then out of government, who urged Israel`s then prime minister, Binyamin Netanyahu, to abandon the Oslo peace accords and reject the basis for them -- that Israel should give up land in exchange for peace.

More recently, Feith has been a target of criticism from Democrats who claim that two offices in his branch -- the Office of Special Plans, headed by Luti, and the Counterterrorism Evaluation Group -- sought to manipulate intelligence to improve the Bush administration`s case for war against Iraq. House and Senate intelligence committee investigators found no evidence for allegations that the Pentagon offices tried to bypass the CIA or had a major impact on the prewar debate. But in the Senate panel`s report on prewar intelligence, three Democratic senators -- John D. Rockefeller IV (W.Va.), Carl M. Levin (Mich.), and Richard J. Durbin (Ill.) -- specifically criticized Feith`s operation.

In Kearneysville, W.Va., about 80 miles from the Pentagon, neighbors of the Franklins interviewed yesterday said they did not know the family well. Though nobody answered the door, voices were heard in the house, which had a "God Bless Our Troops" sticker and an American flag in the window.

People who know Franklin from different phases of his life offered contrasting accounts of his political views.

A U.S. government official familiar with the investigation said Franklin was very outwardly supportive of Israel, for example. But a former co-worker at the DIA disputed that characterization, saying that he did not recall in years of working with him any strong political statements about Israel or anything else. Franklin, he said, was a solid, competent analyst specializing in Iranian political affairs, especially the views of top leaders and the course of opposition movements.

In February 2000, Franklin wrote an op-ed piece for the Wall Street Journal`s European edition that was sharply critical of Iranian President Mohammad Khatami, arguing that the leader was launching a "charm offensive" that was simply a "ruse" to make the Iranian government look better to Westerners while it continued to abuse human rights.

Details of Franklin`s Air Force service, and especially his time in Israel, could not be learned yesterday. A spokesman for the U.S. Embassy in Tel Aviv declined to comment.

In Israel yesterday, Sharon`s office issued a statement. "Israel does not engage in intelligence activities in the U.S. We deny all these reports," the statement said, according to the Associated Press. That followed a strong statement Friday by the Israeli Embassy in Washington denying any wrongdoing.

One Israeli official familiar with the situation said yesterday that his government had checked "every organ here" to make sure that no part of government was involved. "We checked everything possible, and there`s absolutely nothing. It`s a non-event, from the Israeli point of view. Someone leaked this to [hurt] . . . the president, AIPAC and the Jews on the eve of the Republican convention," he speculated.

He added that Israel would not have been involved in such activities, "because we have a trauma here in Israel. It`s called Pollard."

That was a reference to the case in which a U.S. Navy intelligence analyst, Jonathan J. Pollard, admitted in 1987 to selling state secrets to Israel. Pollard was sentenced to life in prison, and Israeli officials have said since then they do not conduct espionage against the United States.

At AIPAC, spokesman Josh Block said the organization had no comment yesterday beyond its Friday statement that the organization and its employees denied any wrongdoing and were cooperating with the government. A former AIPAC employee also said he was baffled by the news of the FBI investigation. "I have a hard time figuring out what this is about," he said. If the Israelis or their supporters want to know about deliberations in the Bush administration, he said, "all they have to do is take people to lunch."

Others in Washington, however, maintained that Israel does present a problem for the United States in certain aspects of intelligence, such as sensitive defense technologies and Iran policy.

Israel sees Iran as the single biggest threat to its existence, and so closely monitors all possible moves in Washington`s Iranian policy -- especially as the Bush administration presses Tehran to disclose more about the state of its nuclear program.

One former State Department officer recalled being told that U.S. government experts considered the countries whose spying most threatened the United States were Russia, South Korea and Israel. "I also know from my time in Jerusalem that official U.S. visitors to Israel were warned about the counterintelligence threat from Israel," he said.

Taking a slightly different view, others speculated that the very closeness of the relationship between the United States and Israeli governments -- and especially the tight connections between the Israelis and Feith`s policy office -- may have led officials to become sloppy about rules barring release of sensitive information.

Staff writers John Ward Anderson in Jerusalem, Dan Eggen, Amit R. Paley, Steven Ginsberg and Jerry Markon in Washington and staff researcher Madonna Lebling contributed to this report.

© 2004 The Washington Post Company

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washingtonpost.com
Series of Misjudgments Cost President His Lead

By John F. Harris and Mike Allen
Washington Post Staff Writers
Sunday, August 29, 2004; Page A01

No gloating, President Bush warned his White House staff in November 2002. It was an order he strained to follow himself.

Flush with his success at leading Republicans to victory in congressional midterm elections, Bush claimed the results as a mandate for his policies on terrorism, Iraq and tax cuts, and for his brand of trust-my-gut conservatism. "I think the way to look at this election is to say that people want something done," he told reporters. To skeptics at home and abroad, he declared: "I don`t spend a lot of time taking polls . . . to tell me what I think is the right way to act; I just got to know how I feel."

As Bush heads to the Republican National Convention in New York this week, the man who stood astride the political world at that news conference in 2002 is a distinctly more life-size figure. With the election just 65 days away, there is a puzzle: How did a leader who was so formidable become so vulnerable?

In small ways, the answer is an accumulation of miscalculations and missed opportunities that have marred the president`s political operation this year, in the view of some Republicans inside that operation and others beyond it. In a large way, however, Bush`s predicament is less a reversal of his 2002 success than a natural progression of it -- the consequence of two confrontations he sought that autumn.

To the dismay of Democrats, who suspected he was manipulating national security for political advantage, he invited the electorate two years ago to judge him over the then-looming confrontation with Iraq. To the delight of Democrats, it is precisely such judgments that polls say are shadowing his reelection campaign.

By the same token, his decision to confront Democrats directly and immerse himself in partisan electioneering ensured that he would face reelection with little of the rally-behind-the-leader sentiment that flowed to him after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.

To the contrary, Bush`s decisions and political style have virtually eliminated the political center -- sending all but a small percentage of Americans into fevered pro- and anti- camps -- and dictated a general election strategy organized around exciting core supporters and increasing turnout. This approach upends conventional reelection strategy, which holds that a president should mostly finish his base-tending the year before voting, and spend the general election softening his rhetoric and showering blandishments on independent voters in the ideological middle.

Matthew Dowd, the Bush-Cheney campaign`s senior strategist, said the conventional strategy is obsolete in an election dominated by national security: "The same thing that appeals to our partisans appeals to those folks in the middle, which is: What are you going to do about terror?"

Drawing a contrast with President Bill Clinton, Dowd added that both groups admire a president willing to take controversial actions to meet problems, rather than expending political capital on small-but-popular initiatives: "This is a president who decided to play big ball instead of small ball."

There are indications that, in the homestretch, Bush is planning to return to the milder brand of "compassionate conservatism" on which he ran in 2000. This week`s GOP convention will feature such speakers as California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and former New York mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani, who hold clear appeal to moderates, even though they have views on abortion and other social topics that are anathema to the party`s conservative base. Democratic strategists say they are surprised that Bush is making this pivot so late, and only this week planning to lay out more details of a proposed second-term agenda.

Without question, it is real-world facts -- events in Iraq, the economy at home -- that are shaping Bush`s reelection prospects more than any decision about strategy, in the view of campaign operatives with the president and the Democratic nominee, Sen. John F. Kerry (Mass.).

Even so, a variety of critical Democrats and anxious Republicans outside Bush`s campaign believe that the long and mostly downward arc of Bush`s political strength over the past year is also the result of some specific misjudgments. Two stand out as most important:

• The enactment of a prescription drug benefit under Medicare in December. The expectation was that by delivering on this promise, which is the most expensive expansion of government social benefits in 40 years, Bush would take away an issue that historically had belonged to Democrats. As it happened, by passing a bill with mostly GOP support Bush did not reap much political gain. Polls show voters still strongly trust Democrats and Kerry more than Bush to protect senior citizens` health care, and many are wary of a benefit that is more complicated and slower to arrive than they wanted.

• The missed opportunity of the State of the Union address in January. Bush spoke to a large national television audience, but polls showed little movement upward in his support. Critics said that in content and tone, much of his rhetoric seemed aimed at existing supporters of his Iraq and tax-cut policies rather than presenting new arguments to doubters. He foreshadowed his support for a constitutional amendment to block gay marriage, which polls say is the most important issue for social conservatives, at the risk of alienating more tolerant independents who think the issue should be decided by states.

These large events were reinforced by several smaller ones, including what even some Bush political aides acknowledge were middling performances in a high-profile "Meet the Press" interview on NBC last winter and a news conference in the spring in which he professed himself stumped when asked whether he could think of any mistakes he had made.

In its own way, that answer was of a piece with the values Bush has followed at every major juncture of his presidency. It is a brand of politics that believes the assertion of power can create the reality of power -- and that it is preferable to act boldly and make other politicians accommodate Bush`s agenda rather than try to accommodate their doubts. Bush did not offer coalition government after winning the contested 2000 election with a minority of the vote, nor did he offer to split the difference when Democrats complained that his tax cuts were too large. Instead, he corralled Republicans and a handful of Democrats and enacted the tax cuts into law.

A top official from a former Republican White House said Bush`s governing operation created critical problems for his political arm by deciding to "divide and conquer rather than unite and win." This official, who refused to be identified because he works with Bush`s inner circle, said that largely because of Vice President Cheney`s influence, the White House adopted a confrontational style with Capitol Hill and with the Democratic Party that is endangering Bush`s chance of reelection. "There`s nobody over there saying `No,` " the official said. "It`s all the same Kool-Aid. Instead of the art of governing, it`s been, `Are you for me or against me?` "

Steven Schier, a Carleton College political scientist, has edited a book on Bush`s political style called "High Risk and Big Ambition." In pursuit of large goals, Schier believes, Bush and his political team are willing to take "audacious risks" with voters in the middle so long as the GOP base is secure; 2002 showed the rewards of this style, while 2004 has so far highlighted the perils.

"When you take risks, if your premises are wrong, you pay a price," said Schier, who noted that Bush might well be coasting to victory had he been proved right that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction or that tax cuts would have an unambiguous stimulative effect on the economy. As it is, Schier said, Bush has spent the year stroking his partisan base and pursuing an electoral strategy that amounts to "reaching the top of a low ceiling."
The Clinton Comparison

In 2000, Bush campaigned expressly inviting a comparison of his leadership style and Clinton`s. "They have not led; we will," he declared at his first nominating convention. What has been striking about the past two years is the extent to which Bush has been a mirror opposite of Clinton.

The comparison worked to his advantage in the fall of 2002. Clinton`s first midterm elections resulted in a massive repudiation of his party and majority control that Republicans have yet to surrender. The GOP gains after two years of Bush contradicted long history dictating that a new president`s party loses seats in midterm elections.

Clinton`s humiliation forced him to transform his strategy for reelection. He adapted a governing style in which he cast himself as unconcerned with partisan politics and relentlessly embraced policy positions that had been extensively polled and proved popular with large majorities. After the State of the Union address in 1996, when Clinton angered liberals in his party but captured the center with his declaration that "the era of big government is over," he never trailed in the race for reelection. By August, after Republican Robert J. Dole`s convention but before his own -- exactly the point where Bush is now -- Clinton was leading by 10 points in the polls. Bush started the month a couple of points behind Kerry but has nudged slightly ahead in several recent polls.

In contrast to Clinton`s "near-death experience," Bush`s experience apparently has emboldened him to believe that he can win by playing down independents and "making Republicans come out of the woodwork," said Bruce Reed, a former Clinton administration official. The Clinton comparison is revealing of Bush`s election strategy in other ways. Clinton`s brand of campaigning involved regular policy pronouncements and proposals, sometimes several a week. Some, such as cell phones for neighborhood watch groups, were criticized as piddling, but collectively they presented a vision of a smaller-but-still-activist government that proved popular with voters.

The president is focused on large questions of national security and the changing economy, and has no interest in such minutiae, even if popular, said Ken Mehlman, Bush`s campaign manager.

But critics say Bush has not filled out his policy agenda for a second term in ways big or small. White House communications director Dan Bartlett said the president made a decision to save many details about his vision for his acceptance speech.

Mark Penn, a Clinton pollster, believes the shortcomings of Bush`s political strategy on both domestic policy and Iraq were on vivid display in the State of the Union address. While no rhetorical formulation could offset bad news, such as the Abu Ghraib prison scandal or mounting U.S. casualties in Iraq, the political costs of these would have been lessened if Bush had presented "more of a flow of information and an explanation to state the case," Penn said. Bush has later made such acknowledgments, but his initial posture of refusing to admit error or surprise apparently caused many people to stop listening to him, Penn said.
Keeping Up Appearances

There were few indications that Bush hit panic buttons last January. This was the same month that one of the White House`s 2003 assumptions about the campaign -- the president would be running against the antiwar Howard Dean -- was overturned by Kerry`s comeback success in Iowa and New Hampshire. Even then, the assumption was that Bush`s then-formidable financial lead could be used to fund advertising that would leave Kerry irrecoverably behind in polls by the time of his convention. This did not happen, although Bush aides say they are pleased at polls showing that ads depicting Kerry as weak-willed and a flip-flopper have influenced public opinion.

The public posture of unyielding optimism about Bush`s prospects and insistence that his strategy has worked creates a dissonance. Top Bush operatives such as Mehlman say they have been surprised that Kerry has not offered more policy substance to date, and other Bush aides are more blunt in bad-mouthing the Democrat as a weak candidate. In the next breath, they say the campaign is happy with the president`s posture -- even though he is running even, with job approval ratings under 50 percent in most polls.

Surely, though, it would have come as a rude surprise if Bush strategists had been told a year ago that two months before the election the president would be running even with a man they regard as a clumsy opponent. In fact, the numbers illuminate a steady decline. Bush`s job approval in a Washington Post-ABC News poll this month was 47 percent, 11 points lower than a year ago. Even his core asset -- the public`s confidence in how he is handling terrorism -- has dropped more than 20 points from the spring of 2003 to this summer, and stands in the mid-50s.

Some White House officials acknowledge they have not had a major success since the capture of Saddam Hussein in December, which provided a fleeting bump in polls. Some of these officials have begun what is the rare process of second-guessing themselves. For instance, some of Bush`s senior aides believe they would be better off if they had preserved Medicare prescription drugs to use as a campaign issue.

But Dowd said no strategy was going to prevent the election from being a narrowly fought and highly polarized contest. "The dominant parties occupy 90 to 92 percent of the landscape. There are very few people that swing in the middle anymore," he said. "We`re playing within the 45- or 47-yard lines, so nobody`s going to break away in this thing." Bartlett predicted that Bush`s aggressive posture will pay dividends this fall, as even people who disagree with him on particulars appreciate that "there`s no ambiguity where he stands." Paraphrasing a hypothetical voter, Bartlett said, "Do I agree with everything Bush is doing? No. But on the big things, I feel pretty good about him, or reassured about him. If things go wrong again, I feel good about him being there."

© 2004 The Washington Post Company

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Waren das noch schöne Zeiten, als eine willige Praktikantin die Schlagzeilen beherrschte.

washingtonpost.com
A Failure of Accountability



Sunday, August 29, 2004; Page B06

ONLY A FEW years ago, it seemed the slightest suggestion of malfea- sance by a presidential administration -- allegations of tampering with a minor administrative office, say, or indications that a cabinet secretary might have understated the amount of money given to a former girlfriend -- could trigger a formidable response from the other two branches of government: grand juries, special prosecutors, endless congressional hearings, even impeachment proceedings. Some of that auditing, especially during the Clinton administration, went too far. Yet now the country faces a frightening inversion of the problem. Though there is strong evidence of faulty and even criminal behavior by senior military commanders and members of President Bush`s cabinet in the handling of foreign detainees, neither Congress nor the justice system is taking adequate steps to hold those officials accountable.

Investigations by the Army, including one completed last week, could result in prosecution or disciplinary action for up to 50 persons involved in the abuse of Iraqi prisoners. But almost all are low-ranking soldiers; the most senior officer to be targeted is a female reserve brigadier general, who plausibly argues she has been scapegoated by higher-ranking officers. The military investigations and a separate probe by a panel picked by Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld have issued reports making it clear that senior commanders in Iraq and the civilian leadership at the Pentagon also bear specific responsibility for an affair that has gravely damaged the U.S. mission in Iraq and American prestige around the world. But no court, prosecutor or disciplinary panel is even considering action against these top officials. Only one more congressional hearing, by the Senate Armed Services Committee, is planned.

What`s particularly troubling about this breakdown of checks and balances is that some of the most disturbing behavior by senior officials has yet to be thoroughly investigated. For example, Mr. Rumsfeld is now known to have approved, in December 2002, the use of dogs to frighten detainees under interrogation. That technique, which was immediately adopted in Afghanistan and later in Iraq, was described by Army Maj. Gen. George R. Fay as "a clear violation of applicable laws and regulations." Mr. Rumsfeld has also publicly acknowledged that he ordered that some prisoners in Iraq not be registered with the International Red Cross, an unambiguous violation of Army regulations and the Geneva Conventions. Yet Mr. Rumsfeld has never been called upon to explain these actions to legal investigators or to Congress.

The former commander in Iraq, Lt. Gen. Ricardo S. Sanchez, also issued an interrogation policy allowing the illegal use of dogs. Subsequently, he testified under oath to Congress that he had never approved this or other illegal measures listed above his signature. No formal criminal or administrative action against him is under consideration. Former CIA director George J. Tenet, according to Mr. Rumsfeld, requested that detainees in Iraq be concealed from the Red Cross. According to Gen. Fay`s investigation, CIA operatives abused detainees, introduced improper interrogation methods to the theater and contributed substantially to the breakdown of discipline at Abu Ghraib. Yet the only investigation of the agency and its leaders is being conducted by its own inspector general.

When the prisoner abuse allegations first became public in May, many members of Congress, including several senior Republicans, vowed to pursue the evidence up the chain of command and not to allow low-ranking reservists to be prosecuted while more senior officials escaped sanction. Yet, as matters now stand, Mr. Rumsfeld, Gen. Sanchez and other senior officials are poised to execute just such an escape. When the scandal began, these leaders told Congress they were prepared to accept responsibility for the wrongdoing. As it turns out, they didn`t mean that in any substantive respect. Their dodge shames not only them but the legal and legislative bodies charged with enforcing accountability.

© 2004 The Washington Post Company

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Das war zu erwarten, dass die Veteranen von Bush `National Guard` jetzt auch einen Verein gründen für die Wahrheit, was damals wirklich geschah bei den Trinkgelagen in Texas:
"Stiff Drink Veterans for Kerry, Whoops We Mean for Brewsky, Whoops We Mean for Truth."

washingtonpost.com
George Bush`s Secret War

By Michael Kinsley

Sunday, August 29, 2004; Page B07

LOS ANGELES -- Veterans of George W. Bush`s National Guard unit charged today that the president has misrepresented his military service during the Vietnam War. The veterans allege that during a period when the future president was supposed to be serving in the Texas Air National Guard, he was actually fighting in Vietnam.

"For more than 30 years we have remained silent," said the head of the group, which calls itself "Stiff Drink Veterans for Kerry, Whoops We Mean for Brewsky, Whoops We Mean for Truth." But, he added, "We want to be on Larry King just as much as those Swift Vote guys."

Two members of the group claim to be eyewitnesses. "It was a typical night at the Guard offices," one of them recalled at a press conference yesterday. "Okay, I`d had a few. But I personally saw George parachute down from a B-52, kill a dozen Cong with his bare hands, leap into one of those Swift boat thingies and stick his tongue out at John Kerry."

The White House yesterday strongly denied the Stiff Drink version of events. "As has been his policy throughout his entire life," a spokesman said, "the president never left the continental United States during the entire Vietnam era -- well, except for a few weekends in Tijuana. These Stiff Drink fellows are nothing more than a front for the Kerry campaign, which would like to convince the American people that George W. Bush is responsible for the Vietnam War."

The Stiff Drink story is not easy to confirm or refute. On one side, claiming that Bush has been lying, are two obscure drunks with close ties to the Democratic Party and longstanding grudges against the Bush family, which they claim cooperated with space aliens who kidnapped them to Crawford, Tex., or possibly Mars ("Who can tell?") and examined their genital areas. On the other side, confirming Bush`s version of events, are 143 fellow reservists who have signed affidavits attesting that they saw the future president popping a Bud in the Guard offices at a time when the Stiff Drink group alleges he was on a secret mission to Hanoi, where he personally arm-wrestled Ho Chi Minh.

There is no documentary evidence supporting the view that Bush was in Vietnam. However, there is an extensive collection of speeding tickets from several Southern states, issued throughout the period in question to someone whose description resembles that of George W. Bush. This person, whose identity cannot be firmly established, called himself George W. Bush. He was driving a car registered to Bush and was carrying Bush`s driver`s license. In addition, there are photographs of Bush at the time in Texas papers, accompanying stories such as "Bush Son Seeks Own Way" (Houston Chronicle, March 28, 1969) and "Bush Son Still Seeking Own Way" (Dallas Morning News, Dec. 12, 1972).

Bush also kept a diary throughout this period. Supplied to reporters yesterday by the Bush-Cheney campaign, the diary contains multiple entries along the lines of, "Woke up. Terrible hangover. But at least I`m not in Vietnam. Thanks, Dad!"

Bush signed up for the Texas Air National Guard in 1968, to defend the state of Texas against the Viet Cong. In 1972 -- having decided, sources say, that Texas was now secure from communist infiltration -- he transferred his allegiance to a Guard unit in Alabama.

There has long been mystery and controversy about what exactly Bush did in Alabama and whether he fulfilled his reservist`s obligation to show up and sharpen pencils for 45 minutes every other weekend. This is different from today`s National Guard and Army Reserve policy, under which a recruiting officer leads young people to believe they are signing up for pencil-sharpening duty and then, as soon as they`ve signed, shouts "Aha! Gotcha!" and ships them off to a distant war.

"Look, Larry," the president told Barbara Walters in a recent interview, "just because I got away with it is no reason they should get away with it." Although Bush has never said what he was doing when he was supposed to be sharpening pencils for his country, he has not denied published hypothesizes that he spent the period drinking, sleeping and watching sports on TV. "It sounds easy," said one Bush friend from that era, "but keep in mind that in those days there might be only one game on the tube at any given time."

The Stiff Drink group, however, insists that Bush was actually flying sorties over Hanoi. And doing it without a plane. In the end, it is their word against his. The truth probably lies somewhere in between. And the full story of George Bush`s secret war in Vietnam will never be known.

The writer is editorial and opinion editor of the Los Angeles Times.

© 2004 The Washington Post Company

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Die Geschichte könnte Auswirkungen auf die Beziehungen zu Israel haben. Es sieht so aus als ob Israels Likud die Kriegsplanungen für den Pentagon gemacht hat.
Die Beziehungen zwischen den Neocons im Pentagon und Israel sind kein Geheimnis, deshalb wundert es mich, dass diese Geschichte so hoch gehenkt wird.
Ist das die Rache des CIAs gegenüber den Falken, die die CIA vorgeführt haben.

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Thoughts on the Middle East, History,and Religion
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Juan Cole is Professor of History at the University of Michigan

Sunday, August 29, 2004

Pentagon/Israel Spying Case Expands:
Fomenting a War on Iran

Here is my take on the Lawrence Franklin espionage scandal in the Pentagon.

It is an echo of the one-two punch secretly planned by the pro-Likud faction in the Department of Defense. First, Iraq would be taken out by the United States, and then Iran. David Wurmser, a key member of the group, also wanted Syria included. These pro-Likud intellectuals concluded that 9/11 would give them carte blanche to use the Pentagon as Israel`s Gurkha regiment, fighting elective wars on behalf of Tel Aviv (not wars that really needed to be fought, but wars that the Likud coalition thought it would be nice to see fought so as to increase Israel`s ability to annex land and act aggressively, especially if someone else`s boys did the dying).

Franklin is a reserve Air Force colonel and former Defense Intelligence Agency analyst. He was an attache at the US embassy in Tel Aviv at one point, which some might now see as suspicious. After the Cold War ended, Franklin became concerned with Iran as a threat to Israel and the US, and learned a little Persian (not very much--I met him once at a conference and he could only manage a few halting phrases of Persian). Franklin has a strong Brooklyn accent and says he is "from the projects." I was told by someone at the Pentagon that he is not Jewish, despite his strong association with the predominantly Jewish neoconservatives. I know that he is very close to Paul Wolfowitz. He seems a canny man and a political operator, and if he gave documents to AIPAC it was not an act of simple stupidity, as some observers have suggested. It was part of some clever scheme that became too clever by half.

Franklin moved over to the Pentagon from DIA, where he became the Iran expert, working for Bill Luti and Undersecretary of Defense for Planning, Douglas Feith. He was the "go to" person on Iran for Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz, and for Feith. This situation is pretty tragic, since Franklin is not a real Iranist. His main brief appears to have been to find ways to push a policy of overthrowing its government (apparently once Iraq had been taken care of). This project has been pushed by the shadowy eminence grise, Michael Ledeen, for many years, and Franklin coordinated with Ledeen in some way. Franklin was also close to Harold Rhode, a long-time Middle East specialist in the Defense Department who has cultivated far right pro-Likud cronies for many years, more or less establishing a cell within the Department of Defense.

UPI via Dawn reports,

` An UPI report said another under-investigation official Mr Rhode "practically lived out of (Ahmad) Chalabi`s office". Intelligence sources said that CIA operatives observed Mr Rhode as being constantly on his cell phone to Israel, discussing US plans, military deployments, political projects and a discussion of Iraq assets. `



Josh Marshall et al. have just published a piece in the Washington Monthly that details Franklin`s meetings with corrupt Iranian arms dealer and con man Manuchehr Ghorbanifar, who had in the 1980s played a key role in the Iran-contra scandal. It is absolutely key that the meetings were attended also by Rhode, Ledeen and the head of Italy`s military intelligence agency, SISMI, Nicolo Pollari, as well as Rome`s Minister of Defense, Antonio Martino.

The rightwing government of corrupt billionnaire Silvio Berlusconi, including Martino, was a big supporter of an Iraq war. Moreover, we know that the forged documents falsely purporting to show Iraqi uranium purchases from Niger originated with a former SISMI agent. Watch the reporting of Josh Marshall for more on this SISMI/Ledeen/Rhode connection.

But journalist Matthew Yglesias has already tipped us to a key piece of information. The Niger forgeries also try to implicate Iran. Indeed, the idea of a joint Iraq/Iran nuclear plot was so far-fetched that it is what initially made the Intelligence and Research division of the US State Department suspicious of the forgeries, even before the discrepancies of dates and officials in Niger were noticed. Yglesisas quotes from the Senate report on the alleged Iraqi attempt to buy uranium from Niger:



` The INR [that`s State Department intelligence] nuclear analyst told the Committee staff that the thing that stood out immediately about the [forged] documents was that a companion document -- a document included with the Niger documents that did not relate to uranium -- mentioned some type of military campaign against major world powers. The members of the alleged military campaign included both Iraq and Iran and was, according to the documents, being orchestrated through the Nigerien [note: that`s not the same as Nigerian] Embassy in Rome, which all struck the analyst as "completely implausible." Because the stamp on this document matched the stamp on the uranium document [the stamp was supposed to establish the documents bona fides], the analyst thought that all of the documents were likely suspect. The analyst was unaware at the time of any formatting problems with the documents or inconsistencies with the names or dates. `



Journalist Eric Margolis notes of SISMI:


SISMI has long been notorious for far right, even neo-fascist, leanings. According to Italian judicial investigators, SISMI was deeply involved in numerous plots against Italy’s democratic government, including the 1980 Bologna train station terrorist bombing that left 85 dead and 200 injured. Senior SISMI officers were in cahoots with celebrated swindler Roberto Calvi, the neo-fascist P2 Masonic Lodge, other extreme rightist groups trying to destabilize Italy, the Washington neocon operative, Michael Ledeen, and the Iran-Contra conspirators. SISMI works hand in glove with US, British and Israeli intelligence. In the 1960’s and 70’s, SISMI reportedly carried out numerous operations for CIA, including bugging the Vatican, the Italian president’s palace, and foreign embassies. Italy’s civilian intelligence service, SISDE, associated with Italy’s political center-left, has long been a bitter rival of SISMI. After CIA rejected the Niger file, it was eagerly snapped up by VP Dick Cheney and his chief of staff, Lewis Libby, who were urgently seeking any reason, no matter how specious, to invade Iraq. Cheney passed the phony data to Bush, who used it in his January, 2003 address to the nation in spite of warnings from CIA . . .



So Franklin, Ledeen, and Rhode, all of them pro-Likud operatives, just happen to be meeting with SISMI (the proto-fascist purveyor of the false Niger uranium story about Iraq and the alleged Iran-Iraq plot against the rest of the world) and corrupt Iranian businessman and would-be revolutionary, Ghorbanifar, in Europe. The most reasonable conclusion is that they were conspiring together about the Next Campaign after Iraq, which they had already begun setting in train, which is to get Iran.

But now The Jerusalem Post reveals that at least one of the meetings was quite specific with regard to an attempt to torpedo better US/Iran relations:


The purpose of the meeting with Ghorbanifar was to undermine a pending deal that the White House had been negotiating with the Iranian government. At the time, Iran had considered turning over five al-Qaida operatives in exchange for Washington dropping its support for Mujahadeen Khalq, an Iraq-based rebel Iranian group listed as a terrorist organization by the State Department.



The Neoconservatives have some sort of shadowy relationship with the Mojahedin-e Khalq Organization or MEK. Presumably its leaders have secretly promised to recognize Israel if they ever succeed in overthrowing the ayatollahs in Iran. When the US recently categorized the MEK as a terrorist organization, there were howls of outrage from scholars associated with the Washington Institute for Near East Policy (a wing of AIPAC), such as Patrick Clawson and Daniel Pipes. MEK is a terrorist organization by any definition of the term, having blown up innocent people in the course of its struggle against the Khomeini government. (MEK is a cult-like mixture of Marx and Islam). The MEK had allied with Saddam, who gave them bases in Iraq from which to hit Iran. When the US overthrew Saddam, it raised the question of what to do with the MEK. The pro-Likud faction in the Pentagon wanted to go on developing their relationship with the MEK and using it against Tehran.

So it transpires that the Iranians were willing to give up 5 key al-Qaeda operatives, whom they had captured, in return for MEK members.

Franklin, Rhode and Ledeen conspired with Ghorbanifar and SISMI to stop that trade. It would have led to better US-Iran relations, which they wanted to forestall, and it would have damaged their proteges, the MEK.

Since high al-Qaeda operatives like Saif al-Adil and possibly even Saad Bin Laden might know about future operations, or the whereabouts of Bin Laden, for Franklin and Rhode to stop the trade grossly endangered the United States.

The FBI has evidence that Franklin passed a draft presidential directive on Iran to AIPAC, which then passed it to the Israelis. The FBI is construing these actions as espionage or something close to it. But that is like getting Al Capone on tax evasion. Franklin was not giving the directive to AIPAC in order to provide them with information. He was almost certainly seeking feedback from them on elements of it. He was asking, "Do you like this? Should it be changed in any way?" And, he might also have been prepping AIPAC for the lobbying campaign scheduled for early in 2005, when Congress will have to be convinced to authorize military action, or at least covert special operations, against Iran. AIPAC probably passed the directive over to Israel for the same reason--not to inform, but to seek input. That is, AIPAC and Israel were helping write US policy toward Iran, just as they had played a key role in fomenting the Iraq war.

With both Iraq and Iran in flames, the Likud Party could do as it pleased in the Middle East without fear of reprisal. This means it could expel the Palestinians from the West Bank to Jordan, and perhaps just give Gaza back to Egypt to keep Cairo quiet. Annexing southern Lebanon up to the Litani River, the waters of which Israel has long coveted, could also be undertaken with no consequences, they probably think, once Hizbullah in Lebanon could no longer count on Iranian support. The closed character of the economies of Iraq and Iran, moreover, would end, allowing American, Italian and British companies to make a killing after the wars (so they thought).

Franklin`s movements reveal the contours of a rightwing conspiracy of warmongering and aggression, an orgy of destruction, for the benefit of the Likud Party, of Silvio Berlusconi`s business in the Middle East, and of the Neoconservative Right in the United States. It isn`t about spying. It is about conspiring to conscript the US government on behalf of a foreign power or powers.

posted by Juan @ 8/29/2004 06:38:08 AM[url8/29/2004 06:38:08 AM]http://www.juancole.com/2004_08_01_juancole_archive.html#109376785516786360[/url]

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In meinen Vorbemerkungen zu #760 habe ich die Rechtschreiberegeln etwas sehr großzügig ausgelegt. Normalerweise werden Regeln zu hoch gehängt. Zum Henker, da muß bei mir irgendein Reflex durch diese Geschichte ausgelöst worden sein.

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Sunday, August 29, 2004
War News for August 29, 2004

http://dailywarnews.blogspot.com/

Bring ‘em on: Six Iraqi policemen killed by insurgents at checkpoint near Baquba.

Bring ‘em on: Seven Iraqis killed in continued fighting in Sadr City.

Bring ‘em on: One Iraqi killed, two wounded in Beiji mortar attack.

Bring ‘em on: Two Iraqi policemen wounded in friendly-fire incident near Kirkuk.

Bring ‘em on: Two insurgents killed, 32 Iraqis wounded in two US convoy ambushes near Tall Afar.

Bring ‘em on: Two insurgents wounded in attack on US observation post near Kirkuk.

Bring ‘em on: More air strikes, ground fighting reported near Fallujah.

Bring ‘em on: Two French journalists taken hostage in Iraq.

Bring ‘em on: Oil pipeline ablaze near Basra.

Meanwhile, back in Al-Anbar province. “Both of the cities, Falluja and Ramadi, and much of Anbar Province, are now controlled by fundamentalist militias, with American troops confined mainly to heavily protected forts on the desert`s edge. What little influence the Americans have is asserted through wary forays in armored vehicles, and by laser-guided bombs that obliterate enemy safe houses identified by scouts who penetrate militant ranks. Even bombing raids appear to strengthen the fundamentalists, who blame the Americans for scores of civilian deaths. American efforts to build a government structure around former Baath Party stalwarts - officials of Saddam Hussein`s army, police force and bureaucracy who were willing to work with the United States - have collapsed. Instead, the former Hussein loyalists, under threat of beheadings, kidnappings and humiliation, have mostly resigned or defected to the fundamentalists, or been killed. Enforcers for the old government, including former Republican Guard officers, have put themselves in the service of fundamentalist clerics they once tortured at Abu Ghraib.”

Supply lines. “Recently, Halliburton`s convoys have been taking hits every day on some routes. The truckers endure sniper fire, car bombs, roadside explosions and rocket-propelled grenades. Iraqi insurgents mount ambushes to pick off trucks from behind. They throw bricks and drop 8-foot-long steel pipes from overpasses into the cabs. In the most horrific incident, in April, insurgents blocked a convoy near the Abu Ghraib prison. Four Halliburton truckers were killed, two remain missing, and another, Thomas Hamill, escaped from his captors. For an insurgency vastly outmatched by the U.S. military in firepower, shutting down supply lines has become an efficient alternative to direct confrontation.”

Chickenhawks.

More blowback. “Michael Howard issued a blistering rebuff to George W Bush yesterday after the President barred the Tory leader from the White House as punishment for his attacks on Tony Blair over the Iraq War. In a furious phone call earlier this year, Karl Rove, Mr Bush`s closest adviser, told Mr Howard`s aides: ‘You can forget about meeting the President. Don`t bother coming. You are not meeting him.’”

How do you measure this kind of loss? “The most difficult miles of Rosanna Powers` life are bringing her from Florida to the small Washington state farming community of Mansfield, Douglas County, for her brother`s funeral tomorrow. Then she will fly back across the country to help bury her fiancé the next day. Both were U.S. Marines killed last week — one day apart — in Iraq.”

Commentary

Editorial: “President Bush could have avoided walking into the unfamiliar terrain by not going to war against a much smaller and weaker nation, in the first place. It`s not known whether he will ever realise this simple point, but what he should be able to discern without any difficulty is that his war on terrorism has been far from successful. He may have diagnosed the disease, or even rightly worked out the remedy, but he applied it on the wrong target. Honestly speaking, he miscalculated everything right from the impact of the war on terrorism to the prolonged and stubborn resistance that his troops are facing. The war has done very little to dampen the enthusiasm of terrorists. Rather, it has worked as a stimulant to the elements that are vehemently opposed to the US presence in the Middle East and its rather one-sided drubbing of a nation that was never known as a breeding ground for terrorism.”

Opinion: “We were to believe that young reservists from trailer parks, with minimal education and little military training, developed techniques of torture on their own and even turned them into games. It was a few renegades who decided to turn attack dogs loose on Iraqi teenagers to see how fast they would lose control of their bowels. There were plenty of pictures of fall guys who were unsympathetic characters with unappealing biographies. It would have been the perfect casting call for blame, if it wasn`t quite so perfect. Last week, two investigative reports on the prison came out — one from a panel chaired by former Defense Secretary James Schlesinger and another from three Army generals — and both reached the conclusion that the fault for the abuses goes much higher into the chain of command. The Schlesinger report traces it all the way to Washington.”

Casualty Reports

Local story: Indiana soldier killed in Iraq.

Local story: Oregon Guardsman wounded in Iraq.


Rant of the Day

I ain’t believin’ this item appeared on today’s WaPo editorial page.

“ONLY A FEW years ago, it seemed the slightest suggestion of malfeasance by a presidential administration -- allegations of tampering with a minor administrative office, say, or indications that a cabinet secretary might have understated the amount of money given to a former girlfriend -- could trigger a formidable response from the other two branches of government: grand juries, special prosecutors, endless congressional hearings, even impeachment proceedings. Some of that auditing, especially during the Clinton administration, went too far. Yet now the country faces a frightening inversion of the problem. Though there is strong evidence of faulty and even criminal behavior by senior military commanders and members of President Bush`s cabinet in the handling of foreign detainees, neither Congress nor the justice system is taking adequate steps to hold those officials accountable.”


I ain’t believing it because WaPo should have run it in the goddam obituaries, announcing WaPo’s demise as a functioning member of the Fourth Estate. I’ve got a couple of hot news flashes for you folks on the editorial board. First, Dewey took Manila. I figured you hadn’t heard about it since you damn sure haven’t heard Republicans control Congress, Republicans control the Executive branch, Republicans control the Federal judiciary, and Republicans control the Justice Department. Do you think Republicans are going to hold other Republicans accountable for criminal behavior? Did the Reichstag hold Werner von Blomberg and Heinrich Himmler accountable for the murders of Ernst Roehm and Gregor Strasser? We’re living in a one-Party state, and you’re acting like you’re the editorial board of the Volkischer Beobachter.

You people had no problem printing every rumor, calumny and innuendo generated by the fabled GOP slime machine during the Clinton administration and dutifully transcribed by your stenographer pool, and now you’re going to come whining to me that the country faces a lack of government accountability? Do your jobs, and put pressure on these assholes. You want to see some accountability? Stop serving as a GOP mouthpiece and start printing some criticism outside the “he said/he said” context.


86-43-04. Pass it on.



# posted by yankeedoodle : 5:04 AM
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THE CONFLICT IN IRAQ
In Iraq, `Road Warriors` Deliver the Goods
The lure of a big payday keeps civilian truckers going despite bombs, bullets and ambushes.
By T. Christian Miller
Times Staff Writer

August 29, 2004

BALAD, Iraq — It is 9 p.m. on a Wednesday, and Melvin Winter is going to war.

The 44-year-old truck driver from Greenville, Texas, turns the key of his white Mercedes flatbed truck, revs the engine and rolls up to a chain-link fence topped with barbed wire. On this side is Camp Anaconda, a U.S. supply base. On the other is Iraq.

"Put your game face on," he says, strapping on a helmet and bulletproof vest as the call to roll out crackles across the radio. "It`s time to put on the gloves."

Over the next three hours, Winter and the other truck drivers in his convoy will rumble through a landscape of violence and fear. They will take fire from Iraqi insurgents. They will pass through blinding black smoke from roadside fires. They will be stuck for tense moments on a stretch of highway famous for its ambushes.

It will, in sum, be a normal day for the truck drivers of KBR, a subsidiary of Halliburton Co. that finds itself on the front lines of the deadliest war the United States has fought since Vietnam.

Halliburton allowed a reporter to accompany a convoy on a typical run, providing the first glimpse of the hazards faced by its drivers, many of them blue-collar workers seeking to get ahead. Certain security measures were not allowed to be disclosed.

As the Defense Department has contracted out more and more jobs traditionally done by military personnel in order to focus its mission and save money, private companies increasingly have been plunged into the war.

None is more prominent than Halliburton, an oil services company once run by Vice President Dick Cheney. In 2001, the company won a multibillion-dollar contract to supply all the logistical needs of the U.S. military in Iraq.

As a result, it is difficult to overstate Halliburton`s importance to the war effort. Halliburton delivers soldiers` mail and washes their clothes. It provides them with food, toilets and bunks. It ships fuel for tanks and builds conference rooms for generals.

The company and its workers have benefited, but at a cost. In Congress and the presidential campaign, Halliburton has come under attack because of its links to Cheney and Pentagon audit findings that it has overcharged the government hundreds of millions of dollars.

Workers have paid with their lives. Of Halliburton`s 30,000 employees in Iraq — including more than 7,000 U.S. citizens and thousands of subcontractors from other countries — 45 have been killed since the company established operations in March 2003.

No job is more dangerous than driving a truck. Of the 18 U.S. citizens killed in Iraq while working for Halliburton, 11 were truckers.

The drivers` existence here is a real-life version of "The Road Warrior," the Mel Gibson film in which a group of settlers in post-nuclear-war Australia tries to steer a truck through a desert filled with bad guys.

Recently, Halliburton`s convoys have been taking hits every day on some routes. The truckers endure sniper fire, car bombs, roadside explosions and rocket-propelled grenades. Iraqi insurgents mount ambushes to pick off trucks from behind. They throw bricks and drop 8-foot-long steel pipes from overpasses into the cabs.

In the most horrific incident, in April, insurgents blocked a convoy near the Abu Ghraib prison. Four Halliburton truckers were killed, two remain missing, and another, Thomas Hamill, escaped from his captors.

For an insurgency vastly outmatched by the U.S. military in firepower, shutting down supply lines has become an efficient alternative to direct confrontation.

"The front lines are no longer what we think of," says Capt. Catherine Wilkinson, a spokeswoman for the Army`s 13th Corps Support Command, which oversees Iraq`s main logistics center. "The front lines are the convoys."

There is not much the drivers can do. The Army provides security escorts, but the insurgents plant bombs along the relatively few cross-country routes the trucks must travel. Then they simply wait for a convoy, which sometimes pass as frequently as every half-hour on well-traveled routes.

Not all of Halliburton`s trucks are bulletproofed. Their windshields shatter. Bullets pierce the cab.

Mostly, the drivers punch the gas, and hope for the best.

"Sometimes it`s so calm and peaceful out there. Other times, you roll out the gate and think: I hope I make it, I hope I make it," says Lou Hadley, who has been driving trucks here for nearly a year.

On this run, the convoy is carrying a load of tires, engine parts and other supplies into Baghdad from Camp Anaconda, a sprawling base about 60 miles to the north.

The drivers are typical: experienced truckers from the U.S. Military security prevents Halliburton from hiring Iraqis to deliver supplies to American troops.

As they wait for orders in the camp`s dusty parking lot, they stand out from the camouflaged soldiers, a motley crew from heartland America in the midst of the Iraqi desert. They wear tattoos and cowboy hats, big brass belt buckles and Bowie knives, blue jeans and sweat-soaked shirts.

Nearly all the drivers went to work for Halliburton for the money. Halliburton won`t disclose sums, but drivers have boasted of salaries of as much as $100,000 with bonuses — with $80,000 of it tax free, as long as they stay in Iraq for a year.

It`s a long haul. The truckers work 84 hours a week — that`s 12 hours a day, seven days a week. Home is a tent with 20 other cots and 5-foot-high divider walls in between. Meals are cafeteria style. Mortar attacks are constant.

Edie Hair, a 34-year-old from Ft. Hood, Texas, is a rarity here, a female driver. Her husband served 15 months in Iraq with the Army. When he got home, she went to work for Halliburton, leaving him to take his turn caring for their three daughters.

"I gotta put braces on my kids," says Hair, a solidly built woman with thin blond hair, to explain her choice. "But I`m also supporting our troops."

Clay Henderson, 34, is the convoy commander and the veteran of the group, with nearly a year in Iraq. A big man with a beard and long hair, he dreams of owning his own ranch one day in the Louisiana countryside where he now has nine horses.

"I want to mess around and do something fun instead of getting up at 3 a.m. and working until midnight and have nothing to show for it at the end of the year," he says.

It`s an irony not lost on the drivers: They have come all the way to Iraq to make enough money to realize the American dream.

"I`d say 90% of the people over here are in it for the money," says Winter, who is saving to trade up from a double-wide trailer to the 3,500-square-foot home he hopes to build one day. "One year over here, it`s equal to two to three years working in the U.S. You can advance considerably."

If you make it a year. Turnover is high, the drivers say. One says he came to Iraq with about 20 friends. Of those, only three remain a year later. Halliburton said it could not provide statistics for the truckers` turnover rate. But company policy is to send anyone home who wants out of their one-year contract, no questions asked — but no tax benefits, either.

"If you don`t get nervous, you`re stupid. If you don`t get nervous, it`s time to go home," says Billy Lee Tripp, 44, a La Vernia, Texas, native who is as wiry as a stray cat.

Nervousness rises as night begins to fall. With an orange sun flaring in the west, the truckers and their military escorts gather in a circle to plan the night.

The route will take them right through the middle of "IED Alley," named for the roadside bombs that the military calls improvised explosive devices.

In addition, locals have recently taken to lining the highways and bridges, dropping rocks to smash the windshields. Hair, the woman from Texas, had five windshields replaced in a month.

Sgt. Hosea Lark, the military commander for the run, orders his soldiers to pass out chemical light sticks to the truckers. He tells the truckers to activate the sticks and toss them out the window to alert their escorts if they get hit by rocks.

"If you see a rock thrower, blast [him] away," Lark tells his men from the Army National Guard`s 1171st Transportation Company. "The risk is extremely high."

After the briefing, truckers and soldiers huddle in prayer. Then all scramble into their vehicles, forming a long convoy of military security escorts and Halliburton trucks.

Winter goes over final preparations in his cab, pockmarked by a single round from an AK-47 that he calls his "lucky bullet hole."

Near at hand, he places bottles of water and lemon-flavored Gatorade, three packs of cigarettes and a handful of tampons — which can be used to stanch bleeding.

Then the convoy rolls out. In minutes, the landscape changes from the bustle of the base to a wide open plane of scrub and blacktop lighted by the moon.

Soon, the trucks turn onto the main highway leading toward Baghdad.

"From this point on, it`s not safe," says Winter, a round-faced man with metal glasses, a tan shirt and blue jeans.

The road quickly becomes a place of lurking danger. Iraqis motor alongside the convoy in both directions. The endless piles of rocks and trash by the side of the road are potential hiding places for bombs.

"If you roll out thinking that everybody is trying to kill you, you`re better off," says Winter, a veteran of the 1991 Persian Gulf War, shrugging off a question about the danger.

Thirty minutes down the road, fires burning in clumps by the side of the road become visible. Huge clouds of acrid black smoke roll across the road, maybe from trash burning, maybe from recent combat. The cab becomes hot, smoky. The drivers run with the windows down, to keep the cab`s windows from being shattered by explosive concussions.

"Mash the gas. Drive it like it`s stolen," Henderson`s voice comes across the radio.

The convoy bolts up onto an elevated highway that runs across marshland, providing a hellish view of fires, billowing smoke and haze. After a while, they descend and make a slow turn to join another highway. Suddenly, the radio crackles.

"AK-47. Right side. It`s hitting your truck," a KBR driver calls out to the military escort in front of him.

Ahead, perhaps a thousand yards, red tracers light up the sky as the military escort returns fire. Radio calls report fire from the left and the right.

"It`s pretty bad," one driver calls out. "You got bullets flying from both sides."

And then, just as suddenly as it began, the shooting stops. Henderson calls on the radio for injuries. The radio stays quiet.

"It didn`t hit nobody. Keep rolling," Henderson says. "Keep rolling."

The trucks speed up briefly, but then slow again. Ahead, brake lights from another convoy fill the road, a major highway with four lanes in both directions.

The truckers get nervous. The highway that had been filled with Iraqi cars is empty. The stretch of road had seen both sniper fire and bombs in the past.

"There`s not enough traffic. Be advised of it," one trucker calls out.

"Let`s go, let`s go," Winter says under his breath. "This is not a nice neighborhood."

The convoy comes to a halt. Gunners in the military escorts train their weapons on the moonlit fields and low, two-story homes around them.

The truckers don`t know what is happening. Neither does the military. The radio is filled with unanswered questions. The convoy has stopped in the middle of one of the most dangerous places in Iraq. Their best defense, speed, has been stripped away.

The convoy ahead begins to move. The truckers who have hopped out of their trucks to take shelter jump back into the cabs.

Half an hour later, the convoy hits the exit for the Baghdad airport, where the truckers are dropping off their load at a military base.

The trucks pull into a dusty parking lot. The drivers climb down, drop their trailers and talk quickly among themselves.

"It was a good run," Winter says. "It was only small-arms fire. That`s a good run."

Then they get back to work. It is 12:30 a.m. The moon is high. Time to make the run back to the logistics base, through the same gantlet of gunfire and smoke.

The road awaits.



Copyright 2004 Los Angeles Times

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The Road to Resolve
A Sober View: He partied hard, then dried out and found a fierce determination. How George Bush was saved—and never looked back
By Evan Thomas, Tamara Lipper and Rebecca Sinderbrand
Newsweek

Sept. 6 issue - It is an article of faith with the president and his advisers, repeated like a mantra, that George W. Bush is "comfortable in his own skin." President Bush himself thinks so: "I know who I am," he told a pair of NEWSWEEK reporters recently. "If you`re the president, you don`t have time to figure out who you are. I think it`s unfair to the American people to sit in that Oval Office and try to find your inner soul." As he sat in a captain`s chair in his office on Air Force One, ruminating about leadership and cracking the occasional joke, he betrayed no inner doubts. Stumping through the small towns of northern Wisconsin later that day, he appeared confident, winning and charming crowds with a self-effacing, plain-spoken but resolute manner.

And yet, at other times, he can seem not so self-assured. There is the deer-in-the-headlights look that still pops up at press conferences, and that annoying smirk, possibly meant to convey an air of disdain or superiority, but showing the defensiveness of a teenager.

The country is evenly—and hotly—divided over the real George Bush. Some, predominantly those who live in the conservative Red States, proudly see a confident, self-knowing Bush, the steady commander in chief. Others, mostly liberal Blue Staters, cringe at a cocksure (but insecure) bully boy who seems to strut about the world. How to reconcile the two? One way is to examine how George Bush has dealt with an old curse.

A week after his father, George H.W., was elected president in 1988, George W. turned to a friend and adviser, Doug Wead, and said with a sigh, "What`s going to happen to me?" Wead took it to mean that Bush wanted to know how his father`s election might change his life. He asked Bush if he wanted some research on the lives of the progeny of earlier presidents, and, as Wead recalled the story to NEWSWEEK, Bush answered yes. The result was a 44-page memo, titled "All the President`s Children." It`s a discouraging read.

Burdened with high expectations, presidential children seem to sense that people are just waiting (and sometimes hoping) for them to fail. And by and large, their lives have been messy. The fate of many presidential sons, Wead found, was alcoholism, divorce and premature death. A few did have some political success, Wead reported. Franklin Roosevelt`s son, FDR Jr., became a congressman and ran for governor of New York. Did he win? asked Bush. No, replied Wead. Bush just "groaned."

But running for governor in Texas, Bush did win—twice, in 1994 and 1998. If he triumphs again this November, he will become the only presidential son ever to be re-elected president. (John Quincy Adams, like his father, John Adams, was defeated after one term.) Just as important on a personal level, perhaps, he will surpass his father, another one-termer. President Bush has shown great sureness of purpose, even courage, rallying his country from its worst day ever. He has faced down fear, disciplined what he once jokingly described to his sister Doro as his "inner fat boy," and emerged resolute in his life and manner.

But not without struggle and, almost surely, at a cost. Behind his calm and outward patience there is an edginess that can seem prickly, resentful. At times, he appears so determined to stay the course and stick to his convictions that he seems too rigid, fixed in his ways, unable to adjust. One cannot help but wonder: At some level, is he afraid that the slightest wavering might fatally crack his whole hard-earned, painfully constructed persona? Is admitting a mistake for Bush like an ex-drunk`s taking just one drink? Bush can be empathetic, emotional and even (dread word) sensitive. But he can also be surly and impatient with weakness. At these moments, he seems more dogged than enlightened, his life more a triumph of will than of understanding.

It is easy to mark the turning point in George Bush`s life. It was the morning of July 28, 1986, when he woke up, wretchedly hung over after a night of celebrating his 40th birthday at the Broadmoor, a resort in Colorado, and decided to quit drinking. He did not seek therapy or join Alcoholics Anonymous. He just quit, and joined a regular Bible group. Before Bush gave up the bottle, his life was more feckless than accomplished. After that day, he moved from success to success. Bush has been sober for 18 years (less time than John Kerry has spent in the U.S. Senate); for 12 of those years, he has been running for office or governing. His mature life, then, has been a public one, mastering, despite his occasional inarticulateness, the art of politics. And his relatively brief adulthood may also help explain the roots of the self-confident side of his nature. If a man starts focusing only when he`s 40 and finds himself president of the United States at 54, what can`t he do if he sticks to the script that got him from the Broadmoor to the White House?
Bush`s presidency has followed the same pattern of moving from chaos to resolution. In his first eight months in office, he had to struggle against the perception that he was an accidental president, elected on a fluke, not quite sure whether he really belonged in the Oval Office. Then came 9/11. After hearing the news of the attacks, he may have looked addled, even frightened, while he was reading "My Pet Goat" to Florida fourth graders in that endless seven minutes captured by Michael Moore in his biting film "Fahrenheit 9/11." But three days later he was standing on the rubble of the World Trade Center, waving his bullhorn and speaking with a conviction that gave heart to his countrymen.

George and Laura Bush do not hide or make light of Bush`s transformation. In an interview with NEWSWEEK, the First Lady acknowledged, with her usual smile but also a tone of seriousness, that "it`s taken a long time" for her husband to find himself. "I wasn`t always disciplined," agreed President Bush. He dated his own turnaround to 1972, when he began jogging regularly. Charlie Younger, a Houston friend, recalls his running flat-out to win in 117-degree heat, whether he had been drinking the night before or not. Terry Johnson, an old Texas and Yale friend, recalls a memorable golf game with Bush shortly before the `88 election. Before they teed up, Bush told Johnson, "Guess what? I decided to quit smoking. Chewing tobacco, too." Johnson asked, "When did you decide this?" Bush answered, "This morning."

"About halfway through," Johnson remembered, "he just starts shaking. It was pretty clear he was going through some bad withdrawal symptoms. He was spraying the balls all over the place. I told him, `Maybe we should stop.` He wouldn`t hear it. `No, we`re gonna keep moving, we`re going to finish`." Johnson said: "I`ve never seen anything like that, ever."

Bush "did not announce his decision to quit drinking," recalls Roland Betts, who befriended Bush at Yale and remains very close to the president. "It even took me a few months to figure out he quit." Bush did tell stories about his days as the family black sheep—funny stories, but also tinged with regret, and sometimes disgust. "He`d say things like, `I was at some dinner, and I was a little potted, and I was spitting chewing tobacco on the floor, and at the end of dinner, I realized I`d been spitting chewing tobacco on a woman`s purse`," recalls Jim Pinkerton, who worked closely with Bush on his father`s `88 campaign.

Bush told another friend that his marriage was in trouble, and he blamed himself for risking the loss of Laura and his twin girls. Laura had been after him to quit drinking and go to church more. A lapsed Episcopalian, Bush had been attending a Methodist church with Laura, but he was deeply affected when evangelist Billy Graham asked him in 1985 if he was "right with God." After he quit drinking, Bush began attending a men`s Bible-study group with Don Evans and some other Texas businessmen. Bush`s religious turn—his decision to "serve the Lord"—was in a sense liberating. As Evans, a fellow born-again Christian, puts it, faith "provides comfort to make decisions because decisions are not about me."

Faith, his wife and shame helped Bush quit alcohol. But it is iron discipline and a fierce competitive edge that keep Bush going. When Bush jogs, he wears a heart monitor, not for his health, but as a way of keeping score. Discipline has always been a hallmark of Bush political campaigns, ever since he upset the colorful but somewhat loose-around-the-edges Ann Richards in the 1994 Texas governor`s race. She made fun of him as "Shrub," but he beat her by giving the same short speech, over and over again.

Today, Bush`s discipline permeates the White House decision-making process. Unlike the free-floating college-bull-session atmosphere of the Clinton administration, the Bush White House is on time, if not five minutes early. Bush`s occasional nickname for his chief of staff, Andy Card, is "Tangent Man"—Bush`s way of putting Card on notice that he doesn`t appreciate digressions. "He pays very close attention to his schedule," says Card, "and if I`m not doing my job of monitoring his schedule, he disciplines me."

"I believe people need to be on time and punctual," says Bush. "It puts a discipline in the system." Bush finds bureaucratic foot-dragging and hand-wringing to be "unbelievably frustrating," he says. He told NEWSWEEK: "I`m the kind of person who says, `You told me this was going to happen. How come it hasn`t happened?` "

Bush is not shy about making his feelings known. At an early meeting with congressional leaders, Bush stood impatiently waiting as the lawmakers arrived, as is often the case, a little late. Three or four minutes after the meeting`s scheduled hour, as the congressmen were still straggling in, Bush turned to congressional liaison Nick Calio and said, "Let`s go. We`re going now. You let everyone know that from now on meetings start on time with or without them."
Bush will jump into a debate. "I`m a questioner; I know how to cut to the chase pretty quickly," he says. But he rarely explains his decisions to his own aides, much less the American people. Bush can become exasperated when his aides engage in circular wrangling. Calio recalls a tendentious debate in the Roosevelt Room over steel tariffs. Bush interrupted. "He just basically said, `Enough. I can make this decision. Here`s my decision`." (Bush raised tariffs, just in time to boost the steel industry in swing states like Pennsylvania before the 2002 election; the tariffs were later rolled back when they hurt the economies of other swing states, like Ohio. Aides say that Bush disdains polls and decides by instinct, but his instincts can be pretty political.)

Bush is not insensitive to the criticism that he shoots from the hip. "I`ve learned to be more patient," he says. "It`s really important to let the process work," he adds, as if repeating a lesson to himself. But Bush cannot abide second-guessing. He is more intuitive than cerebral; he is the opposite of John Kerry, who likes to rethink and reconsider and analyze from all angles, and who sometimes reverses himself. Bush is following his own "inner moral code," says Betts. "He has no patience at all with people who want to rehash the past," says Betts. "None."

Bush`s convictions can make him dogmatic and too unyielding. In Bob Woodward`s "Plan of Attack," the best inside account so far of the Bush administration`s lead-up to the Iraq war, it is striking how little Bush talks to his top advisers about whether to go to war. He meets constantly with Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and his top military commander, Gen. Tommy Franks, to go over war plans. But there is almost no debate over whether invading and occupying Iraq is a good idea to begin with.

On another important issue—stem-cell research—Bush`s advisers can go into great detail describing all the steps Bush took to make his compromise decision, the hefty briefing books, the long consultations with religious and scientific leaders. But when it comes to describing the process Bush took on Iraq, they are suspiciously vague. The clear impression is that Bush made a quick gut decision. The debate, says one knowledgeable former administration official, was "pro forma."

Bush likes other leaders who "mean what they say and say what they mean," as national-security adviser Condoleezza Rice puts it. But if he deems them untrustworthy—like PLO leader Yasir Arafat or German Chancellor Gerhard Schroder—then Bush has little use for them. He had long described Saddam Hussein as "evil" (and noted that the Iraqi despot tried to kill his father in an assassination plot in 1993). Bush does not dispute that he is a visceral judge of people, though in his NEWSWEEK interview, the president insisted, "I don`t necessarily send troops into combat because I don`t like a person."

Judging from "Plan of Attack" and the accounts of some former administration officials, particularly from the State Department, Bush paid little attention to shaping a plan for reconstructing Iraq. When Bush is faced with a high-stakes complex problem, he believes in delegating, says a senior adviser, and in the case of post-war Iraq, Bush trusted the Pentagon, the government agency that can actually put troops on the ground and build things. (The State Department, with diplomatic expertise but low budgets, was largely cut out.) Don Rumsfeld, dubbed "Matinee Idol" by Bush, was riding high at the time, but the Defense secretary had little interest in nation-building, and his subordinates made a hash of the job. Bush rarely, if ever, admits a mistake. But last fall he quietly allowed the national-security staff to push Defense aside and draw in other agencies, like State and the U.S. Agency for International Development, to work on Iraqi reconstruction. Critics say that the damage was already done, but this was one case in which Bush was able to change course.

Many of Bush`s friends, as well as his critics, wonder why Bush failed to consult one particularly experienced and able expert in the field of foreign affairs: his father. "41" often calls "43," but usually to say, "I love you, son," President Bush told NEWSWEEK. "My dad understands that I am so better informed on many issues than he could possibly be that his advice is minimal." That is a pity, say some old advisers to 41, because 43 badly needed to be rescued from the clutches of the neocons, the Defense Department ideologues who, in the view of the moderate internationalists who served in 41`s administration, have hijacked American foreign policy.

But the fact is that President Bush did not want to be rescued. To say he has a complicated relationship with his father is an understatement. Bush clearly admires, even worships, his father, says a friend who notes that Bush wept when his father lost political races. But he doesn`t want his father`s help. To some degree, he is following a Bush family code. According to family lore, Bush`s grandfather Prescott refused an inheritance from his father, while W`s dad refused Prescott`s plea to put off joining the Navy in World War II before going to college. "No, sir, I`m going in," said the 19-year-old George H.W. Bush. In the Bushes` world, real men are supposed to make it on their own, without Dad`s looking over their shoulders. After the 1988 presidential campaign, W was eager to shed the nickname "Junior."

© 2004 Newsweek, Inc.

But George W. hasn`t just been independent, he`s been defiant. The degree to which Bush defines himself in opposition to his father is striking. While 41 raised taxes, 43 cut them, twice. Forty-one is a multilateralist; 43 is a unilateralist. Forty-one "didn`t finish the job" in Iraq, so 43 finished it for him. Much was made of 43`s religiosity when he told Bob Woodward that "when it comes to strength," he turns not to 41, but rather to "a higher father." But what was the president saying about his own father?

According to some of the president`s advisers, 43`s role model as president is not his father, but rather Ronald Reagan. When Bush`s former spokesman Ari Fleischer told the president that he was uncomfortable with Bush`s "Bring it on" rhetoric against Al Qaeda, Bush replied, "When Ronald Reagan went to Berlin, Ronald Reagan didn`t say, `Mr. Gorbachev, put a gate in this wall; Mr. Gorbachev, remove some bricks," Fleischer recalled. But Reagan, it should be noted, was not afraid to compromise, and, unlike 43, he seemed almost eerily serene.

Several of Bush`s friends and advisers commented that Bush is really more like his mother than his father. Barbara Bush, they say, can be more judgmental, more black and white, and more caustic than her husband. Andy Card, who has spent considerable time around the Bushes, observed that he has never seen President Bush argue with his father. The father won`t engage or argue back, says Card. Not because Bush Sr. agrees with his son`s policies, says an old friend of 41`s. "It`s an agony for him" to watch 43 make policy on Iraq. "It`s doubly frustrating to him because that`s not the way he`d run it if he was still in charge."

Bush is comfortable arguing with his mother, who does not hesitate to make her own views known. In her memoir, Barbara Bush writes frankly of the resentment she felt when she was stuck carpooling kids in the dusty town of Midland, Texas, while her husband gallivanted about the country and the world making oil deals and laying the groundwork for his political career. Young George no doubt picked up on his mother`s distress.

The death of Bush`s 3-year-old sister Robin when he was 7 tightened the bond between mother and son. WASPs are not supposed to show too much emotion, and young Bush was not even told his sister was sick with leukemia until after she died. Robin`s death "crushed" young George, says his cousin Elsie Walker, "but he dealt with it. His mom really leaned on him after Robin died. That`s when he got to be so outrageous, in terms of his sense of humor, I think," says Walker, who is close to her cousin. "He was always trying to make her laugh."

You don`t have to be Freud or Sophocles to conjure up some rivalrous or rebellious feelings of the son toward the father. George W. spend much of his early years, and a good deal of his adulthood, trying and failing to catch up to his father as a student, athlete, aviator, businessman and politician. When Bush, in a drunken rage at the age of 26, challenged his father to go "mano a mano" with him, all his father could say was how "disappointed" he was. What could be more wounding?

But that was many years ago. Bush without question bears scars, possibly serious ones, that affect his behavior today. But unlike so many other sons of the powerful, he pulled his life together and made some kind of peace, or at least truce, with his demons. He was not desperate to become president. "He would have been happy to stay governor of Texas, maybe even happier," says his cousin Elsie. And while it may well be true, as one old family friend put it, that Bush sees "his presidency as a chance to best his dad," it is an interesting question whether he would really be crushed if the voters send him back to his ranch in November. He would surely think that he had been unhorsed while riding on a great and sacred mission. But he might also be relieved to have the burden of expectation finally lifted from his shoulders.

Whatever anger Bush felt toward his father has long been softened (or suppressed) by affection, success and self-discipline. Asked by NEWSWEEK, "Who`s the better adviser, your mother or your father?" Bush started to answer, then stopped. "Let me start over," he said with a twinkle in his eye. "I advise them not to pay attention to editorial policy." Bush has said that he does not read the papers, but his parents do, and fret when Bush comes under fire from the mainstream press. "I`m advising them a lot, about don`t worry about me," says Bush. The president says he calls his mother or father about once a week. "I`ll call them in the mornings when I get to the Oval early and say, `How are you doing? Turn off this show`." (He does not refer to a specific show, but he could mean almost any morning news program.) "I want them to stop watching it." Bush was chuckling to himself. He seemed, as he sat back in his president`s chair on Air Force One, comfortable enough.

URL: http://msnbc.msn.com/id/5853701/site/newsweek/

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August 29, 2004
Marchers Denounce Bush as They Pass G.O.P. Convention Hall
By CHRISTINE HAUSER

On bicycles, on foot, and some with their children in tow, hundreds of thousands of people moved through areas of Manhattan today in rallies or mass demonstrations, carrying messages against war and the Bush administration.

In the largest demonstration ever at a political convention, people swarmed through the midtown area of Manhattan in a march organized by United for Peace and Justice, passing by Madison Square Garden, where this week`s Republican National Convention starts on Monday. At the height of the march, it took more than an hour to move one block.
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Tens of thousands of people moved through areas of Manhattan today in rallies or mass demonstrations, carrying messages against war and the Bush administration.
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Groups of bicyclists were detained by police officers on scooters in other parts of the city.

The police cordoned off an area along Seventh Avenue near the Garden when a papier-mache likeness of a green dragon went up in flames. The fire was quickly extinguished. It was not immediately clear who set the fire.

By midafternoon, at least 53 people were arrested on charges of disorderly conduct for blocking traffic near 37th Street and Seventh Avenue on Manhattan`s West Side, the police said.

Witnesses said a group of cyclists was arrested at Park Avenue South between 27th and 26th Streets. The police handcuffed the cyclists, photographed them and searched their bags, which they then placed in clear plastic sacks. Those who were detained called out that they had been riding lawfully when pulled over.

Much of the activity was focused on the Garden, where President Bush will accept his party`s nomination this week. But even as the demonstrators were marching, Republican delegates were enjoying other aspects of the city, including theaters and restaurants.

As delegates lined up on West 44th Street, waiting to be admitted to the Majestic Theater for a matinee performance of "Phantom of the Opera," a couple of dozen picketers chanted "Get out of New York!"

Some delegates responded, "Four more years!"

The protesters retorted, "Four more months!"

When a drummer and a man in an elephant costume — "Elephants Against Republicans" — filed by, Flora Rohrs, a delegate from Colorado, burst into song. "This is my country," she sang, with bits of "God Bless America" thrown in.

"What is going on here is we are going to get George Bush re-elected," she said, adding that the day`s demonstrations did not faze her.

Outside Madison Square Garden, about 100 people from a group called Young Koreans United stood banging drums for about 20 minutes chanting that it is time for Bush to go.

Imbo Sim, 40, said he was from Los Angeles and that most of the group were from out of town. "We`re against Bush`s war policy," he said. "We`re against any escalation of tension with North Korea."
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Protesters organized by the group United for Peace and Justice marched by Madison Square Garden, the site of this week`s Republican National Convention.
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A group of older women calling themselves the Raging Grannies from Rochester, N.Y., sang to the tune of the "Battle Hymn of the Republic":

"No more lies from Dick and Georgie, we deplore their wartime orgy."

On 41st Street and Sixth Avenue, six other bicyclists were arrested for disorderly conduct, obstructing traffic and parading without a permit.

One man, Kevin O`Connell, a 37-year-old graphic designer, was among those arrested. He said there were "all these small scooters, about 12 of them, with officers in civilian clothes."

"They blocked off the road and caught us," he said.

Mr. O`Connell said he had stepped onto the sidewalk from the street to try to make sure that people were getting through and "was knocked off his bike by officers" and sprayed with tear gas.

Authorities braced for protests by hundreds of thousands of people, including the largest rally, that planned by United for Peace and Justice, which had expected about 250,000 people to take part.
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Protesters of the spoof group "Billionaires for Bush."
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The huge demonstration wound its way north through steamy streets just around noon, when temperatures climbed to about 88 degrees Fahrenheit, starting in the Chelsea neighborhood of Manhattan. The route took them past Madison Square Garden before turning south again to finish in Union Square.

Among the marchers were war veterans, parents with their children, and the elderly, as well as familiar faces, like the Rev. Jesse Jackson and the filmmaker Michael Moore. Many marchers commuted into the city.

"The march is going great," said Faith Strongheart, a 31-year-old film production coordinator, who drove in from her home in New Jersey to attend the rally.

As she spoke, she struggled to be heard over the chants of a raucous crowd. "There are tons of people, the energy is really high," she said. "There are people with homemade signs. The main message is to get Bush out of office."

She said the heat was beating down on the marchers but "people are very peaceful, everybody is singing, the cops are being very cooperative."

Uniformed police patrols were thick on the ground in the midtown area and other parts of Manhattan and along the planned protest routes near Madison Square Garden. Officers strode through the tunnels of New York City`s elaborate subway network, watchful of passers-by.

Even before the convention started, as of Saturday night more than 300 people had been arrested on charges related to the event, according to the police.

A large group of bicyclists on Friday were among those held. The police said 264 individuals were arrested on charges of obstructing governmental administration, unlawful assembly and disorderly conduct at various locations throughout Manhattan.
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Protesters stood with part of a group of mock coffins that signified American soldiers who have died in Iraq and Afghanistan.
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Thousands of protesters gathered today in Union Square Park on the edge of the city`s Greenwich Village neighborhood, holding up placards opposing the policies of President Bush.

Paintings showed scenes depicting Mr. Bush in a war crimes setting. One old woman in a wheelchair held up a placard saying, "I`m 98 and I`m outraged."

One organizer of the protest shouted through a megaphone to the crowd that the police were "closing down" a table with pamphlets and booklets espousing the anti-Bush views.

"Save a Tree — Plant a Bush Back in Texas," read one placard.

"Bush — You`re Fired!" read another, using a motto that has infused popular culture borrowed from the reality television show "The Apprentice," set in New York City.

Streets around the convention center were sealed off. After the march, thousands of demonstrators gathered in Central Park, despite court decisions last week that denied some groups, including United for Peace and Justice, permission to hold rallies.

Earlier in the day, police vehicles and officers on patrol circulated among the joggers, bicyclists and dog-walkers. Helicopters thudded overhead in the Upper West Side neighborhood. But by late afternoon, thousands of protesters, many still carrying placards, had converged on the Great Lawn. Some sat on the ground, their signs at their sides, others milled around as the police watched and answered questions for those who needed directions.

Mari Elena Granger, 57, a self-employed New Yorker, carried a sign that said, "Bush lies. Who dies. Bring the troops home now."
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Thousands of protesters gathered near Union Square Park holding up placards opposing the policies of President Bush.
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Asked whether most of the people in the park had come from the march organized by United for Peace and Justice, she said: "I am assuming most of them are, particularly because they told us we couldn`t go. It was a very poor excuse."

The police have been training on mock demonstrations for the convention, which starts on Monday and continues through Sept. 2.

On Saturday, a small circle of demonstrators used Central Park`s Great Lawn for a protest, lying in the grass covered by plastic garbage bags.

"Come join us!!" they shouted to people strolling around the oval of grass. Bemused couples with babies lying on picnic blankets looked on but did not budge. One man, throwing a Frisbee with a friend nearby, shouted, "Shut up!"

"If they get out of control we`re going to shut it down," a park security guard said, standing in the shade nearby with her arms folded.

Randal C. Archibold, Natalie Layzell, Jennifer Medina, Colin Moynihan and Marc Santora contributed reporting for this article.
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Da es eine der größten Demonstrationen in der US-Geschichte war, hier noch ein paar Bilder mit Text.

August 30, 2004
Vast Anti-Bush Rally Greets Republicans in New York
By ROBERT D. McFADDEN

A roaring two-mile river of demonstrators surged through the canyons of Manhattan yesterday in the city`s largest political protest in decades, a raucous but peaceful spectacle that pilloried George W. Bush and demanded regime change in Washington.

On a sweltering August Sunday, the huge throng of protesters marched past Madison Square Garden, the site of the Republican National Convention opening today, and denounced President Bush as a misfit who had plunged America into war and runaway debt, undermined civil and constitutional rights, lied to the people, despoiled the environment and used the presidency to benefit corporations and millionaires.

The protest organizer, United for Peace and Justice, estimated the crowd at 500,000, rivaling a 1982 antinuclear rally in Central Park, and double the number it had predicted. It was, at best, a rough estimate. The Police Department, as is customary, offered no official estimate, but one officer in touch with the police command center at Madison Square Garden agreed that the crowd appeared to be close to a half-million.
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Thousands of people protesting the war in Iraq and the Bush presidency marched in Manhattan on the eve of the Republican convention. One police estimate put the crowd at a half-million
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The march, which took nearly six hours to complete, was a tense, shrill, largely choreographed trek from Chelsea to Midtown and back to Union Square, where it ended, as planned, without a rally. And while there were a couple of hundred arrests, the event went off without major violence, despite fears of explosive clashes with the biggest security force ever assembled in New York.

After the march, hundreds of protesters in a more belligerent mood made their way to Times Square and blocked the entrances of two Midtown hotels, while another group harassed Republican guests at a party at the Boathouse restaurant in Central Park. But a post-march gathering on the Great Lawn of the park was peaceful.

At a news conference last night, Police Commissioner Raymond W. Kelly said there had been about 200 arrests, mostly for disorderly conduct, though nine people were charged with felony assaults on officers who were seizing a 10th suspect for setting a small fire outside the Garden, and 15 members of an anarchist group called Black Block were arrested after they knocked down police barriers and hurled bottles at police lines at 34th Street and Avenue of the Americas.

It was unclear how many protesters were injured. Mr. Kelly said three officers suffered minor injuries in the Black Block arrests, and a deputy inspector suffered a hyperextended elbow in another incident. Another officer sustained a wrenched shoulder as he went to the aid of a colleague outside the Marriott Marquis Hotel, and another suffered a knee injury chasing a disorderly protester at Union Square.

"Organizers for United for Peace and Justice should be commended for keeping their word," Mr. Kelly said. "They pledged that their demonstrators would follow the march route and that`s exactly what happened. It proceeded as expected and by and large was peaceful and orderly." He also praised officers for "commendable restraint," adding that "they are consummate professionals and it showed today."

The relatively peaceful outcome of the enormous march seemed the result of various factors - a determined restraint by the marchers and the police, weeks of planning by organizers and city officials, and, perhaps not least, the subduing effects of an exhaustingly hot day, with 90-degree temperatures and humidity that soaked shirts and wilted all but the most aggressive spirits.
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Coffins representing soldiers who have died in the Iraq war were part of the protests on Sunday along Broadway near 23rd Street.
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As the march unfolded, the 5,000 Republican convention delegates, their families and entourages began sampling the delights of New York, attending parties and Broadway matinees, dining in homes and elegant restaurants and taking in the Gotham sights. Vice President Dick Cheney, Gov. George E. Pataki and former Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani gave speeches on Ellis Island, but took no note of the march. President Bush campaigned in Ohio, working toward an arrival in New York on Thursday.

The Republicans, some of whom regard protesters as little more than wild-eyed liberal wastrels, largely ignored yesterday`s demonstration, but there were occasional encounters between delegates and demonstrators, like one outside a theater on 44th Street.

"Four more years," the delegates chanted.

"Four more months," the protesters responded.

Several hours after the march stepped off at noon, chaos erupted outside the Garden at Seventh Avenue and 33rd Street when a papier mâché dragon float was set on fire, scattering demonstrators. But the police quickly extinguished the flames before firefighters arrived and seized 15 people said to be carrying smoke bombs, and the march resumed as order was restored.

More than 50 bicyclists who were not participants in the march were seized for obstructing traffic at several locations in Midtown. Bystanders said that officers on motor scooters had rammed some bikes, knocking riders to the ground before handcuffing them. But the police took photographs and insisted that the officers had acted properly.

More than 50 people were also arrested for blocking the entrances to the Marriott Marquis Hotel in Times Square, where delegates from Ohio and California were staying, and the Milford Plaza Hotel on Eighth Avenue.

Most of those arrested were taken in buses to a detention center at Pier 57, at West 14th Street, an aging, dingy three-story warehouse of the Department of Marine and Aviation. Mateo Taussig, speaking for the National Lawyers Guild, said many had been denied access to lawyers, and he called the building an inappropriate detention facility.
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Thousands of protesters gathered on Seventh Avenue near Madison Square Garden holding up placards opposing the policies of President Bush.

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After the march, thousands of protesters, apparently following suggestions by the demonstration`s leaders, regrouped in Central Park, where organizers had been denied permission to rally in order to forestall damage to the Great Lawn - an affront to many who insisted it was free speech and not the grass being trampled. Trouble had been widely expected.

But the protesters gathered on the Great Lawn in what appeared to be a mellow mood, mostly young people scattered in small groups, Some held up peace signs or anti-Bush placards, others twirled sign poles like batons. Some practiced yoga, others smoked cigarettes and talked quietly. A few drums could be heard in the distance, but there were no bull horns or sound amplification equipment.

Police officers were also scattered around the Great Lawn, talking in small groups. Norman Siegel, a former executive director of the New York Civil Liberties Union who was acting as a legal observer, said the police told him they would not enforce a rule that gatherings of more than 20 required a permit. The police and the protesters appeared to be just hanging out, looking to avoid trouble.

"I see a very mellow scene," said Leslie Cagan, a leader of United for Peace and Justice, who had urged protesters to go to the park after the march. "The police are being very laid back and very mellow and that`s great."

Underlying yesterday`s events was wide concern over a possible terrorist attack - premonitions of a catastrophe aimed at disrupting the Republican convention, the national elections and the American psyche three years after Sept. 11. Such fears were expected to be the subtext of events throughout the convention, which runs through Thursday.

In response, the city and federal governments have mounted a $65 million security operation, with warplanes enforcing a no-fly zone over Manhattan, an armada of Coast Guard cutters and police launches patrolling waterways and tens of thousands of police officers and military personnel guarding landmarks, the convention site and other potential targets, as well as overseeing the week`s almost nonstop protests.

But there was no sign that a terrorist attack was imminent, and the focus of the day was on the protest march as a tide of chanting, placard-waving, lustily shouting demonstrators from across the region and around the nation converged on New York`s sun-drenched streets in a boisterous, almost carnival mood that belied the serious intent of the demonstration.

The multitudes were packed as dense as broccoli florets, and they filled the entire two-mile route - so the head of the march reached Union Square even before the last of the marchers stepped off at 14th Street and Seventh Avenue.

After months of mounting anger at the president and frustrations over plans for a rally that finally was scrapped after a court upheld city objections to the use of Central Park for fear of damage to the Great Lawn, the day was an emotional crescendo for the participants, for organizers and for city officials.

For Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg and other city officials, who had spent days calling for a peaceful demonstration, the nonviolent outcome was gratifying, a testament to months of planning and training and an insistence on common-sense restraint by officers and marchers alike, and on carefully drawn rules to avoid needless confrontations.

For organizers who had also urged nonviolence, the outcome was gratifying and something of a relief. The leadership had voiced concern that any violence would play into the hands of Republicans, allowing them to caricature the protesters as anarchists, provocateurs and chronic malcontents.

The organizers said they were also pleased by the size and diversity of the turnout. The faces appeared to be a cross-section of the American experience. There were individuals, families and groups from many states and across the region and the city. There were young people and older citizens, families with small children, students and representatives of the middle and working classes and many organizations, including advocates of gay and women`s rights, antiwar groups, immigrants, veterans, artists, professionals, religious organizations and proponents of education, health and other causes.

For many participants, there was also pride, and a kind of amazement, in being part of an event so large and diverse, and yet so pacific.

And there was a satisfying sense for many of having played a role in larger political processes, of doing something beyond voting to affect the outcome of an election widely seen as crucial to America`s future on issues as varied as the war in Iraq, the huge national deficit, abortion, same-sex marriage, the environment and the nation`s role in the world.
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Anti-Bush marchers faced some opposition from supporters of the president.
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Gathering on the avenues and leafy residential side streets of Chelsea between 14th and 23rd Streets, the marchers stepped off shortly before noon, a cumbersome army led by the Rev. Jesse Jackson, the actor Danny Glover, the filmmaker Michael Moore and other celebrities.

Shorts and T-shirts, many branding Mr. Bush a liar, a criminal or a warmonger, were the uniforms of the day. Anti-Bush accessories went beyond banners, placards and buttons. There were fly swatters bearing Mr. Bush`s face. Pallbearers carried a thousand mock coffins of cardboard draped in black or in American flags, representing the war dead in Iraq. And moving along the line of march was a papier-mâché tank with President Bush`s head, wearing a cowboy hat, poking out the hatch.

On either side, the marchers were flanked by blue and camouflage-green lines of helmeted, flak-jacketed police officers and National Guardsmen, mostly watching quietly as the marchers moved north on Seventh Avenue toward the deckle-edged skyline of Midtown.

Overhead, police helicopters thwacked and a relentless sun beat down on the protesters and pavements.

Still, the protesters were exuberant. Shouting insults and obscenities at Mr. Bush, raising placards proclaiming "Drop Bush, Not Bombs" and "Eradicate Mad Cowboy Disease," they marched past the Garden hour after hour in masses that poured out barrages of abuse. But inside the Garden, no one was home to hear it. Aside from workers making final preparations, the arena was a decorous empty shell hung with patriots` bunting a day before the delegates` arrival. That hardly mattered to the protesters, whose outpourings were aimed mainly at news media, anyway.

Reporting for this article was contributed by Michael Wilson, Randal C. Archibold, Diane Cardwell, Ann Farmer, Colin Moynihan, John Holl and Judy Tong.

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August 30, 2004
INSURGENTS
G.I.`s in Talks With Rebels of Sadr Stronghold in Baghdad
By ERIK ECKHOLM

BAGHDAD, Iraq, Aug. 29 - The American military met for five hours on Sunday with representatives of the rebellious cleric Moktada al-Sadr in the volatile Baghdad Shiite neighborhood of Sadr City, searching for peace in a zone where the cleric`s ragged militia remains well armed, entrenched and defiant.

For the Americans and the interim Iraqi government, the goal is the disarmament of the militia, known as the Mahdi Army. That is the thorniest issue left unresolved by a settlement on Friday in the southern city of Najaf after three weeks of intense combat there.

Ending the Najaf battle, in which hundreds of his followers may have died, Mr. Sadr agreed that fighters would leave Najaf and nearby Kufa and hand in their weapons. Those cities have since been returned to government control, but many of the fighters left the city with their weapons.

The Najaf peace plan, which was proposed by the relatively moderate and most powerful Shiite cleric in Iraq, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, did not require nationwide dissolution of the armed militia, and many experts here predict a renewal of combat in several Shiite dominated regions.
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Workers cleaned up debris in the streets of Najaf on Sunday after three weeks of fighting between American troops and insurgents ended.
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The confrontation with Mr. Sadr`s forces here in Sadr City, one of his strongholds, continues. The Americans, seeking to root out militants here, sent aggressive patrols into the heart of the sprawling, impoverished neighborhood on Saturday. As is usual, they met resistance, and 10 Iraqis died in firefights, Iraqi health officials said.

On Sunday, an informal cease-fire seem to exist as American officers met in a Sadr City police station with representatives of Mr. Sadr and other local leaders. As the meeting ended, Lt. Col. Gary Volesky of the United States First Cavalry Division shook hands with Mr. Sadr`s chief Baghdad representative, who said he was scheduled to hold more talks Sunday night with officials of the Iraqi government.

But the Americans later said adamantly that no agreements had been reached. "There was no agreement or understanding of any kind,`` said Lt. Col. James Hutton, a spokesman for the First Calvary, the American unit with responsibility for the Baghdad area. "We are not pulling out of Sadr City, and we will make no change in the way we operate there. Our troops will go in and out as always."

Negotiators for Mr. Sadr said they were searching for common ground for a truce, promising to cease attacks if American troops would stay out of the neighborhood. They also demanded the release of militia fighters in jail and protection of their militants against legal prosecution. But they said they would not lay down weapons wholesale, and it was unclear how the impasse could be peacefully resolved.

"There is no disarming or dissolving the Mahdi Army," the cleric`s chief agent in the talks, Sheik Yousef al-Nasir, said in a telephone interview Sunday evening.

The representatives of Mr. Sadr said that the Mahdi Army was not an organized military that could be disbanded but a spiritual movement and that weapons were individually owned by volunteer fighters, some of whom had even sold furniture to buy them so they could resist the Americans.

Their counterproposal, which is unlikely to satisfy the Americans or the interim government, was a voluntary program in which people could turn in guns for cash.

"We are authorized to say that if they accept this gun purchase proposal, we would not oppose anyone who wants to turn in his weapon," said Sheik Naim al-Kaaby, another Sadr representative who took part in the talks.

The previous night, Prime Minister Ayad Allawi said armed militias would be crushed with force if they refused to give up weapons.
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South Oil Company workers tried Sunday to control a fire caused by sabotage to the pipeline connecting the oil fields of Rumaila and Zubair.
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"The government will not permit armed groups to operate outside Najaf," Dr. Allawi said on Iraqi television. "The government will not back down."

The representatives of Mr. Sadr said they expected further talks, but the American Army spokesman said none were scheduled.

Also on Sunday, Iraq`s deputy prime minister, Barham Salih, flew to Iran, a neighboring, mainly Shiite Muslim nation, saying, "I am carrying a message of friendship." Iraqi and American officials have accused Iran of aiding Shiite insurgents in Iraq, but Iraqi officials say they now hope to reach an understanding with Iran - often an enemy in the past - that will prevent its meddling in Iraqi politics.

Early Sunday near the northern city of Mosul, two American patrols were attacked with rocket-propelled grenades and small arms, the United States Army announced. The announcement said that the Americans had killed two of the insurgents and that the insurgents caused 34 injuries among civilians by firing weapons and spreading debris and broken glass. No American troops were wounded and no vehicles were lost, the Army said.

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Germany 10 Points!

August 30, 2004
U.S. and Russia Still Dominate Arms Market, but World Total Falls
By THOM SHANKER

WASHINGTON, Aug. 29 - The United States and Russia continued to dominate the global arms market last year, especially when measured in weapons deals to developing nations, although the total value of arms sales worldwide tumbled for the third consecutive year, according to a new Congressional study.

The United States maintained its lead in worldwide weapons sales in 2003, signing deals worth more than $14.5 billion, or 56.7 percent of all arms agreements, up from $13.6 billion in 2002, the study showed.

Russia ranked second, signing agreements worth $4.3 billion, or 16.8 percent of all global arms sales deals in 2003. That figure was down from nearly $6 billion in 2002.

Germany was the third largest merchant in the global arms market for 2003, signing deals worth $1.4 billion.

The report, "Conventional Arms Transfers to Developing Nations," is published each year by the Congressional Research Service, part of the Library of Congress. The unclassified study is considered the most authoritative compilation of statistics on global sales of conventional weapons that is available to the public.

The study, nearly 90 pages of statistics and analysis, offers glimpses into the speculative and secret world of missile proliferation by North Korea.

Between 1996 and 1999, no surface-to-surface missiles were delivered to developing nations by the United States, Russia, China or European arms manufacturers. But 30 such missiles were delivered during that period by a state classified by the report as "Other," a category that includes North Korea, Israel and South Africa. Between 2000 and 2003, 20 more surface-to-surface missiles were delivered by the nations in that category, according to the study.

Although the report does not identify the country that manufactured and delivered the weapons, Pentagon analysts say the missile proliferation statistics almost certainly refer to North Korea.

Of those 50 missiles, 10 were delivered in Asia, and 40 to the Middle East. The report does not identify the recipients of the missiles.

According to the study, the value of all weapons transfer agreements worldwide was more than $25.6 billion in 2003, the third consecutive year that the dollar total for global arms deals declined. When measured in dollars adjusted for inflation to give an accurate comparison to the $25.6 billion figure, the value of global arms agreements has steadily fallen, from $41 billion in 2000.

"Nonetheless, the developing world continues to be the primary focus of foreign arms sales activity by conventional weapons suppliers," Richard F. Grimmett, a specialist in national defense at the research service, wrote in his introduction to the study.

In 2003, arms transfer agreements to developing countries topped $13.7 billion, or 53.6 percent of all weapons deals worldwide. This was a notable decrease from the $17.4 billion total in 2002.

Of those arms deals with developing countries, the United States signed deals for more than $6.2 billion, or about 45.4 percent, while Russia signed for $3.9 billion, or 23.4 percent of the sales in 2003.

Mr. Grimmett`s research found that "numerous developing nations have reduced their weapons purchases primarily due to their lack of sufficient funds to pay for such weaponry," according to the study. "Even those prospective arms purchasers in the developing world with significant financial assets have exercised restraint and caution before embarking upon new and costly weapons procurement endeavors," he wrote.

What Mr. Grimmett termed "the unsettled state of the global economy" prompted a number of developing nations to focus on upgrading their existing arsenals rather than signing deals to purchase new weapons systems.

Fewer large-scale arms purchases were being made by the wealthier oil nations in the Middle East, whose earlier buying sprees contributed to a bull market in weapons when Iraq under Saddam Hussein was a regional threat. The report said it remained uncertain whether the Persian Gulf states would now perceive a potentially hostile Iran as a new motivation to improve their arsenals.

Some relatively large arms purchases were made by developing nations in Asia, according to the report.

Between 2000 and 2003, China signed arms deals to acquire $9.3 billion in weapons. After China, the nations that signed the highest-value weapons deals during that period were, in order, the United Arab Emirates, Egypt, India, Israel, South Korea, Saudi Arabia, Malaysia, Singapore and Kuwait, according to the report.

Evidence of the missile trade outlined in the study came into public view in December 2002, when a North Korean cargo ship was halted and boarded off the Horn of Africa by crews from two Spanish warships. Fifteen Scud missiles were found hidden in the hold. But the ship and its cargo were allowed to sail on to Yemen when officials determined that no treaties had been violated.

North Korea has a long record of aiding both Iran and Pakistan with their missile programs, according to American government officials.

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company

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August 30, 2004
OP-ED COLUMNIST
Four Connected Elections
By WILLIAM SAFIRE

George W. Bush comes to the G.O.P. convention on the heels of victory in the Najaf primary.

As a young, anti-American cleric turned a revered house of worship into a fortress, thereby to seize leadership of Iraq`s Shiites, the grand ayatollah slipped out of the country for medical treatment. This left the dirty work of reducing the firebrand`s "Mahdi Army" to American firepower. Then, lest the final closing-in give rise to an Iraqi Alamo legend, the ayatollah neatly timed his return to lead thousands in a peaceful march into the shrine and the remnants of the occupying rebels vanished.

Not quite an electoral "primary" - the al-Sadr forces prefer bullets to ballots - but the result was political. Nobody now doubts who is the most powerful Shiite leader. And though he cannot publicly express his gratitude to the foreign soldiers who made possible his victory over the abusers of sanctuary in Najaf, the ayatollah is on the side of a general election soon.

Two other elections will affect that expression of nascent democracy in a land once known for Saddam`s tyranny and sponsorship of terror.

One is in October in Afghanistan. On a recent visit to D.C., President Harmid Karzai told me he expected that seven million out of the nine million eligible Afghan voters would register to vote. That seemed a vain hope, since nobody had the habit and with opium growers and warlords roaming the precincts, voting would be risky.

What happened? So far, 9.9 million Afghans have registered, which is a little embarrassing, but the lust to get more than one registration card is only human to a populace that hid its oppressed womenfolk until the U.S. and its allies overthrew the Taliban. The Afghans don`t take the right to vote for granted, as half of us do.

The other election that will influence the scheduled vote in Iraq is the one that seems to have caught the attention of the citizens of New York City. (As I write this, I can see a demonstration by a group of Chinese representing a sect oppressed by the Communist rulers in Beijing. Dressed in yellow and red costumes, they exercise gently, dance gracefully and politely hand out fliers. New Yorkers never saw such a peaceful demonstration. Other marchers bearing coffins are depressing, but for now - Go, Falun Gong!)

This is an election essentially about the political will to carry the war on terror to the sources of terror and to maintain that will despite the costs.

That is not the only issue to affect the voting decision we make. This week, President Bush is expected to rise above the dog-eat-dog days of August to present plans for medical and retirement incentives on the domestic front. (In proposed tax-free accounts, the word "private" is out; the word "personal" is in.) And the supporting stars of the G.O.P. firmament - McCain, Giuliani, Franks and Schwarzenegger - will try to get swing voters into the swing of not changing horses in mid-war.

But Bush`s September song must deal with the paramount issue of the national will to carry the fight to the enemy. Though there have always been many to whom taking the offensive gives offense, a majority of Americans will be willing to "stay the course" if a persuasive leader can ennoble the cause.

In "World War IV," a brilliant, long, sweeping review of our foreign policy in the past century in the current Commentary magazine, the neoconservative Norman Podhoretz makes the historical case for optimistic assertiveness over "realistic" accommodation. He sees the roots of the Bush Doctrine in the successful Truman Doctrine, and reminds us that the sustained resolve that won the three global wars of the past century can prevail in the present generation`s rendezvous with terror.

I`m more of a new libercon than an old neocon, but such a determined mindset on our time`s paramount issue - of global safety in freedom - attracts me to the crowd in New York that points with pride at what we`re doing rather than the bunch in Boston that viewed with alarm all we`ve done.

Look ahead, you guys. No culture-warring, no back-pedaling, no pouting at celebrity Bush-bashing, no poll-bounce fixation, no Kerrymandering. "In war, resolution"; in campaigning, uplift.

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company

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washingtonpost.com
Iraqi Premier Meets Militants, Pushes Amnesty
Allawi Has Held Talks in Private

By Rajiv Chandrasekaran
Washington Post Foreign Service
Monday, August 30, 2004; Page A18

BAGHDAD, Aug. 29 -- Iraq`s interim prime minister, Ayad Allawi, said Sunday that he had held private meetings with representatives of insurgent groups from the restive cities of Fallujah, Ramadi and Samarra to persuade them to accept a government amnesty offer.

Allawi said the meetings, which began shortly after he assumed office in late June, have been intended to split the insurgency by luring lower-ranking members away from harder-core elements. Although he said he has not reached agreement with any of the groups, he insisted that some of the representatives are "changing horses . . . and taking the amnesty seriously."

The meetings, some of which have occurred at Allawi`s private home outside the highly fortified zone that houses the Iraqi government, are a risky and unconventional form of back-channel diplomacy. But they represent the most significant effort yet to address the insurgency through political rather than military means.

"I am meeting with them. Fallujah. Ramadi. I am talking to the people there, and we are reaching out to them, to tribes, to guys who were in military and security [services]," Allawi said in an interview with a half-dozen foreign newspaper correspondents. " `There is an amnesty,` I`m telling them. `Make use of it.` "

For all of his feisty promises to crush the insurgency with military force, Allawi appears to have concluded that forging peace deals with enemies may be better for him -- and his country.

A three-week confrontation with rebellious Shiite Muslim cleric Moqtada Sadr in the holy city of Najaf was resolved on Friday after Allawi halted a U.S. military offensive and permitted the country`s top Shiite leader to meet with Sadr. In a one-hour meeting, Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani persuaded Sadr to order his militia to vacate a Shiite shrine and accept a set of conditions that mirrored the government`s demands.

There were signs on Sunday that a peace agreement was within reach in the Baghdad slum known as Sadr City, a stronghold of Moqtada Sadr`s that has been wracked by violence for the past month and was not covered by Friday`s deal in Najaf. After 10 people died in fighting in Sadr City on Saturday, a group of tribal sheiks allied with Sadr met with a U.S. military officer and an Iraqi police commander to hammer out a cease-fire deal.

An official with Sadr`s political office, Ali Yassiri, said the talks were productive and would continue on Monday. "All the indications are that we will reach a positive step," he said.

Sadr`s representatives are pushing for an arrangement similar to the one implemented in Najaf: Armed militiamen would leave the streets in exchange for a pullout of U.S. forces, leaving Iraqi police to maintain order.

But Yassiri said a disagreement remained over what would become of the weapons used by Sadr`s militiamen. Sadr officials insist the firearms used by the militiamen are personal items that should be returned to their homes, while the U.S. military and the Iraqi police want all the weapons to be surrendered.

Near the northern city of Mosul, 37 civilians were injured on Sunday when insurgents attacked a military convoy with rocket-propelled grenades and small arms, the U.S. military command said in a statement.

In southern Iraq, saboteurs blew up a cluster of oil pipelines in the third major attack on the oil infrastructure in four days, reducing the country`s crude exports to 500,000 barrels a day, less than a third of the average production volume, an official with the state-run South Oil Co. told the Associated Press.

The nihilistic nature of the oil sabotage appeared to baffle Allawi. "They don`t have any reason for this," he said with a sigh. Unlike the insurgents, the prime minister does not view the 150,000 U.S. troops in Iraq as occupiers, but as the invited guests of his government. He said he found it difficult to comprehend what the insurgents wanted to achieve.

"They are not knowing how to express themselves but through violence and through violent behavior," he said. "We are trying to talk to them face-to-face and assure them that we are not here as Saddam [Hussein] to stay in power. There is a mandate for a short time. We are trying to get the country back on its feet, on the road to recovery."

In the latest attempt to get his message across to his enemies, Allawi said he met on Saturday with a delegation of 11 senior representatives from Samarra, a city about 65 miles north of Baghdad that has been roiled by insurgent attacks.

He said he posed "a really simple question" to the men from Samarra. "Tell us what you want, tell us exactly," he said he told the group. "If you need money, wait and you will have your jobs and start earning your money. The economic cycle will start. If you want to be rulers of this country, wait for the elections. . . . If you want to get the Americans out, fine. Do so, but have the consensus of the people in a proper way, not by forcing them."

Allawi did not identify the people with whom he met. He described them as not "the hard-core criminals" but as "people on the fringes who are disillusioned."

He insisted the meetings were not negotiations but opportunities for him to make a pitch to skeptics. "I am meeting them and telling them there is one thing to do: It is the respect of law, the rule of law," he said. "If you want to use violence, we will face you violently and suppress you -- and we will bring you to justice."

It is not clear how many people -- if any -- have taken up the government`s amnesty offer. The offer is limited to people who have not directly participated in fatal attacks, limiting the number of eligible insurgents. Some Iraqi leaders had sought a broader amnesty, but U.S. officials, particularly the new American ambassador, John D. Negroponte, insisted that insurgents who killed Americans should not be pardoned.

Even if he has not been able to persuade insurgents to switch sides, Allawi said he believed he had made headway. In his meeting with the group from Samarra, "I said to them, and to [delegations from] Ramadi and Fallujah, `Okay, for the sake of argument, let me assume that the multinational forces will leave. What do you think will happen?` You know what they answered? I swear to God, they said: `Catastrophe. Iraq will be dismembered.` "

He paused for moment and then offered a bit of analysis. "When you squeeze them, then you put them to the corner," he said, "these are the answers."

© 2004 The Washington Post Company

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Kerrys Problem er will es allen Recht machen.

washingtonpost.com
Is `Not George Bush` Enough?

By William Raspberry

Monday, August 30, 2004; Page A23

John Kerry is not George W. Bush -- and for a lot of us, that`s reason enough to vote for Kerry come November. But reason enough for a majority of voters? I doubt it.

The problems with Bush are (for those who would vote for virtually anyone else) obvious and important. He has tilted the economy toward the rich and away from the middle class. He is heavily influenced by "neocons" whose foreign-policy ideas are well outside the American mainstream -- and, because he came to office innocent of foreign-policy experience or interest, he has no personal core to which to return.

Most of all, though, is the fact that he led America into a quite unnecessary war in Iraq -- and into the resultant bloody mess there now. In the name of fighting terrorism, he has greatly increased its appeal in the Arab world. He seems, moreover, likely -- through misstep and inadvertence -- to play into the Holy War hopes of certain Islamic fanatics, including Osama bin Laden.

But if Bush is frightening -- in part because he so dogmatically believes what he believes -- Kerry is frustrating and infuriating because he seems not to believe much of anything worth risking offense.

The Republican charge against Kerry is that he flip-flops -- voting, for instance, to authorize the president to go to war against Iraq, then criticizing him for doing so. That charge is easily answered: To stay with your old conclusion long after the basis for it has been exploded is not consistency but madness.

No, what infuriates about Kerry is his wish to be all things to all people -- or, at any rate, not to give them any basis for attacking him. He has, as far as I can tell, staked out a single position that might be called controversial: He would repeal the tax cuts for the rich.

But nearly everything else he says or does seems calculated to avoid clear-cut disagreement with people on either side of any issue. Thus he "voted for [the $87 billion supplemental military budget] before I voted against it." Thus he differs with the president on what he would do to extricate us from Iraq, but has offered no discernible policy. Thus he parses every statement to the point where even he must wonder what he said. Thus he (to return to his Vietnam War protest days) didn`t return his "medals," but only the "ribbons" that represent them.

And I don`t know what to make of the controversy over his wartime heroism and the Swift boat incident, except to say that the details of his indisputably valiant war service more than 30 years ago shouldn`t be a matter of significance in this election.

But little things become big issues for Kerry because he refuses to stake out positions on the big things. Maybe, with the polls showing him in a virtual dead heat with Bush, he doesn`t want to frighten the "undecideds." Well, if I were undecided (and, frankly, I would be if Kerry were pitted against Bush I instead of his scary son) I`d find Kerry`s super-carefulness off-putting.

Is Kerry acting on advice of his political advisers, or does he really have no important and articulable policy differences with the man he would replace? If the former, it strikes me as questionable advice; if the latter, it suggests a president who would be weak on leadership.

A lot of us will vote for him because he`s not W. But, as I say, it may not be enough.

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Irgendjemand versucht mit dieser Spionagegeschichte querzuschießen.

washingtonpost.com
Israel, Iran Trade Threats As FBI Investigates Spying
U.S. Ally Said to Have Received Documents on Tehran

By Molly Moore and John Ward Anderson
Washington Post Foreign Service
Monday, August 30, 2004; Page A18

JERUSALEM, Aug. 29 -- Israel and Iran traded significantly escalated threats of military attacks in recent months as the FBI investigated allegations that a Pentagon official passed secret U.S. policy information about Iran to Israeli authorities.

Israel has warned that it could launch strikes against Iranian nuclear facilities to thwart the country`s advancing weapons program. In response, Iranian Gen. Yahya Rahim Safavi, commander of the Revolutionary Guards, said earlier this month: "If Israel should dare to attack our nuclear installations, we will come down on its head like a heavy hammer crushing its skull."

Since the U.S. invasion of Iraq, Israeli officials have expressed more concern about the danger Iran poses and have been more emboldened in their threats to quash it. But the espionage allegations, which surfaced Friday, prompted a wave of vehement denials, political angst and disbelief among Israeli officials, intelligence experts, diplomats and other political analysts.

"It`s hard to see this as such an issue of controversy or disagreement that Israel would say, `Break all the rules because we have to find out what they`re doing,` " said Yossi Alpher, a former official in the Mossad, Israel`s intelligence agency.

The FBI is investigating whether Lawrence A. Franklin, a career analyst at the Defense Intelligence Agency who specializes in Iran, gave classified information to two lobbyists for the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, known as AIPAC, according to sources. U.S. officials said the information, which included the draft of a presidential directive on U.S. policies toward Iran, was then given to Israeli officials. AIPAC has denied any wrongdoing and said its employees were cooperating with the inquiry.

Newsweek magazine reported on its Web site Sunday that FBI agents had monitored a conversation between an Israeli Embassy official and an AIPAC lobbyist at lunch nearly 18 months ago. Another American, later identified as Franklin, "walked in" during the session, according to the report. At the time the FBI was looking into possible Israeli espionage, Newsweek said.

The investigation is the second in recent months involving allegations of Israeli espionage against an ally. In July, a New Zealand court found two Israeli men, accused of being agents for the Mossad, guilty of attempting to forge New Zealand passports. Israeli officials denied that the men were members of the Mossad, but New Zealand`s prime minister announced diplomatic sanctions against Israel and demanded an apology.

Michael Oren, an Israeli historian, said Israel would have very little to gain by spying on the United States "because the relationship is so open and giving."

"Israel and the United States see very much eye to eye on the Iran threat, and the intelligence cooperation is extremely close -- it`s on an unprecedented level," Oren said. "Both countries perceive Iran`s future acquisition of nuclear weapons as a grave threat to the region and the world, and both are committed to trying to prevent Iran from going nuclear."

For months, Israeli officials, including Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz, have warned Iran that Israel was prepared to take what Mofaz called "the necessary steps" to eliminate its nuclear capability. In 1981, Israeli bombers destroyed Iraq`s Osirak nuclear reactor in an effort to curtail then-President Saddam Hussein`s nuclear weapons program.

In recent weeks, Israel and Iran have stepped up their rhetoric. Iranian Defense Minister Ali Shamkhani told al-Jazeera Arab television network this month that "Iran is not Iraq -- we will not sit by idly if our nuclear reactor`s installations are attacked."

Israeli defense and intelligence officials have said Iran`s nuclear weapons development program, coupled with its Shihab-3 missile, which is capable of striking Israel, represent the most significant threat to Israel.

In a simulated test last Friday off the Californian coast, Israel`s Arrow anti-ballistic missile system, which is designed to destroy or intercept short- and medium-range missiles, failed to stop a Shihab-3 and a Syrian Scud D, according to Israeli defense officials.

Analysts also said that because of AIPAC`s alleged involvement, the Franklin case, if proved, could have a more damaging impact on U.S.-Israeli relations than the case of Jonathan J. Pollard, a U.S. Navy intelligence analyst who admitted to spying for Israel in 1987. Analysts said the case could also have a major impact on AIPAC. The group has 65,000 members "at the forefront of the most vexing issues facing Israel today: stopping Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons, fighting terrorism and achieving peace," according to its Web site.

"The insinuation that AIPAC, an American Jewish lobby, is engaged in espionage is in some ways worse than Pollard, who as a single individual could be described as off-balance," said Alpher, the former Mossad official.

Equally damaging could be the perception that Israeli and American Jews are wielding disproportionate influence on U.S. foreign policy, said Oren, the historian.

"There`s a convention going on in New York," he said, referring to the Republican National Convention, "and the canard has been out there for a long time that Israel and Israel`s supporters and the neo-conservatives in the Defense Department have manipulated U.S. foreign policy, especially on Iraq, to serve Israeli purposes, and this would tend to substantiate that canard."

© 2004 The Washington Post Company

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RONALD BROWNSTEIN WASHINGTON OUTLOOK
Bush Strives to Join Fraternity of Frustrated Two-Termers
Ronald Brownstein

August 30, 2004

WASHINGTON — Like second marriages, second presidential terms represent the triumph of hope over experience. Every incumbent since Herbert Hoover has sought four more years. And yet, after the experience of their predecessors, it is easy to wonder why they bother.

Bill Clinton was impeached in his second term. Richard Nixon would have been if he hadn`t quit first. Ronald Reagan was wounded by the Iran-Contra scandal. Lyndon B. Johnson sank into the swamp of Vietnam.

Dwight D. Eisenhower had health problems and Sputnik. The high point of Harry Truman`s second term was the day he won it in a stunning upset. After that, it was war, scandal and legislative gridlock. Woodrow Wilson suffered through World War I, the rejection of the League of Nations and a stroke. Even Franklin D. Roosevelt reached his lowest point during his second term, when Congress blocked his plan to stack the Supreme Court.

This is the fraternity George W. Bush is desperately fighting to join as the Republicans gather for their national convention this week in New York. It`s human nature to seek validation for your work. But (re)election day is often the best day for a two-term president.

Most reelected presidents achieve at least some goals. Clinton built a budget surplus and reduced the national debt. Reagan simplified the tax code and pursued a rapprochement with Mikhail S. Gorbachev.

Johnson accomplished plenty with his Great Society domestic and civil rights programs. But his experience was more like the conventional first-term honeymoon. Almost all his triumphs came within months of his 1964 landslide victory less than a year after the assassination of President Kennedy. After Johnson`s initial legislative successes, Congress balked.

Notwithstanding these occasional breaks in the clouds, historians agree that almost all two-term presidents enjoyed their second much less than their first. James Madison was burned out of the White House by the British. Even the sainted George Washington faced criticism in his final months that, he wrote, "could scarcely be applied to a Nero, a notorious defaulter, or even to a common pickpocket."

Why have so many second terms come to grief? Presidents become arrogant and overconfident (Wilson, Roosevelt). Or they wear down and run out of ideas (Eisenhower, Reagan). Many of the believers who helped send them to Washington and launch their first term leave for cushier pursuits or demand grander positions in government. One day the president looks around the Oval Office and doesn`t recognize a single face in the room.

Mostly, the odds catch up with reelected presidents. 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. is a dangerous neighborhood: Bad things almost always happen to anyone who stays there long enough. The economy slows. International tensions rise. Appointees misbehave (see Truman). The president misbehaves (Nixon, Clinton). Embarrassing memoirs appear. Policies launched during the first term with all the fanfare of a newly christened ship inevitably spout leaks and become tempting targets. Voters begin grumbling for change.

There`s no secret map for avoiding these rocks. Experience and common sense suggest that second-term presidents, like second-time spouses, have a better chance of success with clear goals and expectations. Ambition, of course, can be stretched too far — overreaching has disrupted several second terms. But the more common problem has been drift.

As Bush unveils more of his second-term plans, he seems oddly vulnerable to both of these dangers. Most of the priorities he has presented — modest tax credits for those without health insurance, more tax incentives for saving — are the orphans that couldn`t generate enough momentum to win passage in his first term.

In truth, the huge budget deficits produced largely by Bush`s repeated tax cuts leave little room for new initiatives. The most important domestic proposal Bush has endorsed so far is to make his tax cuts permanent. "This is a fairly shallow pool of ideas Republicans have right now," says Stephen Moore, president of the conservative Club for Growth.

The exceptions are the ideas so big they could expose Bush to the opposite risk of overreaching. In his acceptance speech Thursday, Bush plans to center his domestic agenda on the theme of reform. He`s likely to call again for allowing workers to invest part of their Social Security taxes in the stock market and to set as a second-term priority fundamental tax reform that would move the nation toward a flatter income tax or, less likely, a national sales tax.

All of these ideas can be structured to minimize short-term costs. And all would excite Bush`s base.

But there`s a reason Republicans are still talking about these changes so long after conservatives first proposed them. Whatever their merits, they face political obstacles so formidable that no one has seriously sought to implement them. As the foundation of a policy agenda, they always may be more attractive in prospect than in practice. They recall the arch observation by former Sen. Sam Nunn, a Georgia Democrat, that Bill Clinton was a promising young man in three different decades.

Bush has made more of a mark in foreign policy, anyway. But here, too, he faces constraints. With so many troops committed to Iraq and public opinion so seared by the war, he couldn`t easily apply his preemption doctrine again. His greater opportunity might be to rebuild frayed ties with allies, but he could find the bruises difficult to salve.

Like every president seeking reelection, Bush this week will tell the country that he`s just getting started. But he`s already redirected policy at home and abroad more forcefully than seemed possible after his narrow victory in 2000.

If Bush wins again, a long line of frustrated predecessors suggests his reward will be more headaches than triumphs.

Ronald Brownstein`s column appears every Monday. See his current and past columns at The Times` website at latimes.com/brownstein.


Copyright 2004 Los Angeles Time

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COMMENTARY
All Work and No Play Is the U.S. Way
By Joan Williams and Ariane Hegewisch

August 30, 2004

Politicians and CEOs like to boast about the productivity of American workers. But here`s the dirty little secret: U.S. productivity is No. 1 in the world when productivity is measured as gross domestic product per worker, but our lead vanishes when productivity is measured as GDP per hour worked, according to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, whose members are the world`s 30 most developed nations.

Productivity per hour is higher in France, with the U.S. at about the same level as other advanced European economies. As it turns out, the U.S. "productivity advantage" is just another way of saying that we work more hours than workers in any other industrialized country except South Korea. Is that something to brag about?

Europeans take an average of six to seven weeks of paid annual leave, compared with just 12 days in the United States. Twice as many American as European workers put in more than 48 hours per week. Particularly sobering is the fact that in two out of three American families with small children in which both parents work, the couples work more than 80 total hours per week, also more than double the European rate.

Confusing productivity with long work hours precludes a much-needed public debate about the costs and benefits of workaholism.

Conventional economic theory argues that Americans prefer the higher income gained from working extra hours, while Europeans prefer more family time and leisure. This truth may hold supreme among economists (and business reporters), but study after sociological study contradicts it. Sociologists have long documented that many Americans (men especially) want more family or leisure time and would be willing to sacrifice up to a quarter of their salaries in return. But they are prevented from working the hours they prefer for two different kinds of reasons.

Some Americans just need the money, given that the U.S. has the most unequal income distribution in the developed world. The average CEO of a major U.S. company, according to Business Week, is paid more than 400 times what the average worker is paid in the same company. In Britain — the European economy with the most inequality — that ratio is 45 to 1. Because the profits from Europe`s productivity increases are shared more equitably through shorter working hours and investment in education and healthcare, European workers can work fewer hours without worrying about creating a domino effect in which they first lose their jobs and then healthcare.

Other Americans who would gladly trade time for money cannot do so because the widespread demand for more family (and life-friendly) hours has not translated into good, reduced-hours jobs. In most workplaces, a shift to family-friendly hours is the kiss of death professionally, and a refusal to work overtime is reason for dismissal.

This leaves too many Americans with only two choices: a good job with health insurance at 50-plus hours a week or a dead-end job at 20 to 25 hours a week with depressed wages and no health insurance. The American economy, compared with Europe`s, has fewer jobs that are between 30 to 35 hours a week.

As a result, many families who would prefer both parents to be employed end up with Dad working 50 to 60 hours a week because Mom cannot find a quality, reduced-hours job. So many mothers drop out. One in four mothers are out of the labor force during the key career-building years, including many with professional or on-the-job training. This is a squandering of human capital that is typically overlooked in discussions of productivity and GDP.

A new and more promising way to fuel economic growth would be to offer good jobs with working hours that enable fathers as well as mothers to maintain an active involvement with family life as well as an active career.

*

Joan Williams is a professor and director and Ariane Hegewisch is a faculty fellow at the Program on WorkLife Law at American University Washington College of Law.






Copyright 2004 Los Angeles Times

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Can Bush win?
NO: The inability to quiet Iraq and to deliver broad-based prosperity has damaged Bush among swing voters
- Mark Hertsgaard
Sunday, August 29, 2004

At the height of his power, Joseph McCarthy appeared to be invincible. Beginning in 1950, the senator from Wisconsin made a name for himself by waving around documents supposedly listing hundreds of communists employed by the U.S. government.

For the next four years, no one in official Washington dared stand up to McCarthy for fear of being called communist. But in 1954, drunk with power, McCarthy went too far: He attacked the U.S. Army. The Washington establishment soon turned against him as an unsteady extremist, and within months, the Senate had censured him, ending his career.

Fifty years later, George W. Bush is about to suffer a similar fate.

Bush, too, looked invincible after the Sept. 11 attacks and the war in Afghanistan. With help from his advisers, Bush, too, intimidated critics into silence by challenging their patriotism. And he, too, eventually over-reached, insisting on a war in Iraq that has now blown up in his face.

Think back to January: Nearly everyone expected him to be re-elected, even people who opposed him. After all, Saddam Hussein had just been captured and Iraq seemed under control.

But the eruption of U.S. casualties that followed in April, plus the weakening of the U.S. economy, changed all that. By mid-July, Americans were evenly split on whether Bush would win.

Worse for him, a Time-CNN poll found that only 43 percent of likely voters wanted him to win a second term.

No U.S. president in the last 50 years who suffered such low approval ratings so close to election day has recovered to win a second term. Of course, Bush may prove an exception. Polls now show him running close to Democrat John Kerry in a head-to-head contest, and the Republican convention this week may give the president a boost.

But the loss of Bush`s previous aura of invincibility is ominous news for his campaign in two ways.

First, it emboldens opponents both inside and outside the Kerry campaign to greater confidence and efforts. (Would Bruce Springsteen be playing rally- the-vote concerts for Kerry in October if he looked like a loser?)

Second, like a game-tying grand slam in the seventh inning, Bush`s sinking poll numbers alert the public that this game isn`t over after all, and they should pay attention and get involved.

Together, these two factors could lead to greater turnout than expected among anti-Bush voters on Nov. 2. Unions, civil rights groups and environmental groups are mounting unprecedented get-out-the-vote efforts, and the race`s tightness may help their recruiting.

Because the 50 percent of the electorate that usually doesn`t vote tends to be less affluent, they presumably will favor Democrats over Republicans. If their turnout increases by even a few percentage points, Bush and the Republican ticket are in real trouble.

Middle class opposition

The fundamental problems facing Bush, however, go beyond whatever voter mobilization feats his opponents may pull off.

No president can get elected without the support of the great American middle. Bush`s failure to quiet Iraq and to deliver broad-based prosperity has turned that middle increasingly against him in recent months.

Bush is extremely unlikely to get more than 25 percent of the undecided vote, predicts the respected nonpartisan analyst Charlie Cook, who adds that the fundamental dynamics of the race "favor a challenger over an incumbent."

For all the talk of 50-50 polarization, the American electorate actually divides into thirds.

The third on the right are Bush`s base, which he will never lose. The third on the left he will never win. The final third identify themselves as neither left nor right but independent, and they are the de facto kingmakers of American politics.

As with most presidents` re-election hopes, Bush`s fate rests with how this middle third views two issues that historically have most shaped voters` decisions: war and the economy.

The middle third rallied behind Bush after Sept. 11, and they stayed with him through the initial combat in Iraq. But as the war unraveled this spring, many independents began to rethink their support of the president who launched it.

Some 45 percent of independents now view Bush negatively. Iraq is much of the reason why. Soaring casualties and Abu Ghraib photos turned the war`s image at home from proud success into troubling failure.

Americans tend to punish presidents for failed wars. The number of combat deaths in Iraq, which is likely to exceed the psychologically powerful level of 1,000 by November, is bad enough for Bush. Worse is how the continuing violence feeds doubts that this war can ever be won.

Analysis of past wars shows Americans will accept relatively high casualty numbers if they believe a war is being won. But if they conclude that the war cannot be won, even limited casualties become unacceptable. This dynamic not only explains Bush`s loss of support since April but also suggests his approval ratings may fall further if casualties continue.

And casualties, alas, will continue. No amount of White House spin can disguise the fact that 140,000 U.S. troops will remain in Iraq through election day.

Insurgents will surely keep targeting them and the thousands of U.S. private contractors in Iraq. The rising death toll will keep Iraq in the news and persuade yet more Americans that Bush was wrong to invade in the first place.

News coverage will be relatively skeptical because the center has also turned against Bush inside Washington. Most Washington journalists base their stories on what official sources say.

Thus the Washington press corps ends up reflecting the opinions expressed by leading factions inside official Washington.

This tendency helped Bush after Sept. 11, when Democrats and Republicans alike kept criticisms to themselves for the sake of national unity. But over the last year, more and more Washington insiders, including prominent Republicans, diplomats and military officers, have spoken out against Bush`s foreign policy.

This official dissent in itself generates news stories, but it also colors the tone of overall coverage. The same news outlets that cheered Bush through the initial combat phase in Iraq are now running stories highlighting the problems for the U.S. occupation.

Publicly embarrassed by how uncritically they transmitted the administration`s now-discredited rationales for war, some of these news outlets have been trying to make up for it, and they have lots of official sources to draw on.

The result has been more critical news coverage, which in turn shapes public opinion.

It`s a rule of thumb in politics: When in trouble, change the topic. But while hot-button issues like gay marriage are welcomed by Bush`s right-wing base, they are unlikely to distract voters in the middle third who are anguished by the latest beheading in Iraq.

And the unsubstantiated attacks on Kerry`s war record only highlight an issue -- military service in Vietnam -- where Bush is weak.

Nor is the economy likely to help Bush, given the anemic numbers for jobs and growth being reported. Contrary to some Democrats` fears, even another terrorist attack might not save Bush, for many Americans would ask why he had not better prepared the nation`s defenses over the past three years.

Of course, it`s possible that Bush could, as in 2000, lose the popular vote but still win the Electoral College. But the swing states he needs to carry contain lots of centrist voters. His weak standing with them makes this scenario doubtful, as even Republicans have warned.

Undecided voters in swing states are "poised to break away from President Bush and to John Kerry," concluded a recent survey by the Republican polling firm Fabrizio, McLaughlin & Associates, "which would hand Kerry a lion`s share of these states."

Referendum on Bush

The election, in short, is Kerry`s to lose. No one should put that outcome past the cautious Democrat, but this election is not primarily about Kerry.

One last lesson from U.S. presidential history: When an incumbent runs for re-election, the vote is more a referendum on him than a judgment on his challenger. Do voters want to give him another four years or not?

Bush is, in effect, running against himself on Nov. 2. And he is running against history, for he is on the wrong side of the two issues that have always mattered most in past elections -- war and the economy.

Some commentators have suggested that such historical patterns are irrelevant in the post-Sept. 11 era. In a dangerous world, an apprehensive public will surely stand by a leader who stands tough against terrorism.

This argument may appeal to Bush`s right-wing base, but non-ideological voters in the middle third are pragmatists who make decisions based on results. The results Bush has delivered on the economy and in Iraq have not been good.

As with Joe McCarthy, the dawn was slow in coming. But over the past eight months, the American middle has at last woken up to what a seemingly invincible leader has been doing to their country. And George W. Bush is going down.

Mark Hertsgaard`s most recent book is "The Eagle`s Shadow: Why America Fascinates and Infuriates the World."

URL: http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archiv…
©2004 San Francisco Chronicle

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Can Bush win?
YES: Bush deserves a second term for helping us find the resolve to recover from the terrorist attacks on American soil
- Bill Whalen
Sunday, August 29, 2004

The Republican wartime president sensed his days in office were numbered. His leadership and competency had been questioned; he stood accused of lying about his reasons for going to war.

Party insiders talked openly about shaking up the GOP ticket. And there was that pesky Democratic challenger, whose main celebrity was his military resume.

So gloomy, in fact, was this president`s outlook that he wrote the following after a particularly lousy Cabinet meeting on Aug. 23 of that election year: "This morning, as for some days past, it seems exceedingly probable that this administration will not be re-elected."

Before all you "Fahrenheit 9/11" fans overheat, I have bad news: the aforementioned Republican was Abraham Lincoln, not George W. Bush. He was angling for a second term, campaigning in a time when there were "two Americas" divided by the Civil War, not John Edwards` imagination. And he went on to win 55 percent of the popular vote against his Democratic rival, former Union Gen. George McClellan.

How did Lincoln pull it off? Try fortunate timing. On Sept. 2 -- 10 days after Lincoln penned his dour forecast -- Atlanta was occupied by Union troops. Now convinced the Confederacy`s defeat was inevitable, the electorate broke late to Lincoln and the GOP.

Remember that date: Sept. 2. In this election year, it just happens to be the night that Bush gives his acceptance speech at the Republican National Convention in New York City. And, as in 1864 and with the same luck, it could go down as the pivotal moment when undecided voters gave Bush`s wartime presidency a second act.

Bush haters, of course, hate Lincoln analogies. But the point is not to compare the two presidents but, rather, their presidencies.

Lincoln, like Bush, was a polarizing figure. In his inaugural address, he had vowed not "interfere with slavery where it exists." Once in office he flip- flopped by issuing the Emancipation Proclamation.

To pay for his war, Lincoln signed into law the first federal income tax, an inheritance tax and a corporation tax, plus a Bureau of Internal Revenue to oversee collection. Try that today, with our pro-war, anti-tax electorate. Lincoln never signed a Patriot Act, but he did suspend the U.S. Constitution`s writ of habeas corpus.

All of which made Republicans nervous come re-election time in 1864. Only the talk then wasn`t of changing vice presidents. Back then, Republicans wanted to dump the president -- hawks and meddling newspapers shopping for a war hero liked Ulysses S. Grant or Benjamin Butler; abolitionists and radicals favored a more seasoned infighter like Treasury Secretary Salmon P. Chase.

Yet Honest Abe somehow persevered, and so, too, will Dubya.

But, like Lincoln, it won`t be solely because of the power of ideas. Lincoln`s platform in 1864 was straightforward: the Confederacy`s unconditional surrender; aid to disabled Union soldiers; pro-immigration; construction of an intercontinental railroad.

Yet to see new agenda

At this point in the 2004 campaign, we`ve yet to see all of Bush`s second- term agenda, but by the time his convention`s over it will look something like this: internationally, the war on terrorism; domestically, improving high school education, greater health care access, expanding home ownership and increasing individuals` control over their retirement savings.

As Bush has stated on the campaign trail, it`s a meat-and-potatoes Republican philosophy that Lincoln too would endorse: "Government should never try to control or dominate the lives of our citizens. Yet government can and should help citizens gain the tools to make their own choices and to improve their own lives."

Elections, of course, often boil down to slogans and marketing -- whatever it takes to grab the public`s ever-shrinking attention span. For the Democrats, this year, the choice is obvious: steal Ronald Reagan`s "are you better off?" question. And for Republicans: once again, the road leads back to the election of 1864 and the GOP`s rallying cry that year: "Don`t change horses in the middle of the stream."

It`s the best rationale for a second Bush term: switching midstream makes little sense for a nation hardly in need of a sea change. This is not 1932 with America in the midst of a Great Depression. Nor is it 1976 with a hunger for political integrity, or 1980 amid a cry for a new direction at home and abroad. We are a nation with a growing economy that, over the past three years, has found the resolve to recover from an attack on our soil that strained our markets and weakened our confidence.

Bush deserves a second term for getting America through that crisis.

After all, Kerry`s claim to military leadership is based on four months served in Vietnam, which is one-sixtieth of the time that the junior senator from Massachusetts has spent in Washington. Where are the highlights of that Senate record -- aside from dating Morgan Fairchild?

You won`t find Kerry glossing over his Senate record for the simple reason that it`s a study of time wasted on the wrong side of history. He voted against ousting Saddam Hussein from Kuwait, thought the Nicaraguan Sandinistas were good clean peace-loving folks, and supported the nuclear freeze movement when it was the Reagan defense build-up that was accelerating the downfall of the Soviet Union. This is a man who deserves a promotion?

Kerry`s bad instincts could make for four painful years of failure and floundering.

An analysis of the Kerry-Edwards spending plan shows that the Democratic ticket is proposing a little over $1.9 trillion in campaign promises. That runs the gamut from big-tickets items like near-universal health care coverage ($895 billion) and Kerry`s "real deal" education plan ($200 billion), to smaller items like $15 million for tribal colleges and courts. Just how a Kerry administration would pay for this is something of a mystery. The Democratic ticket calls for $658 billion in new taxes over the next decade, leaving a $1.25 trillion tax.

That means two certainties. First, Kerry will discover what it took Bill Clinton a full term to realize: "The era of big government is over." Kerry will propose; a conservative GOP will dispose. Bush`s domestic agenda may end up being less ambitious than Kerry`s, but it likely will be more practical -- standing a better chance of seeing the light of day.

Second, if Kerry insists on an aggressive domestic agenda, then the nation is in for a repeat of a guns-and-butter debate the likes of which we haven`t seen since Vietnam and another Democratic president, Lyndon B. Johnson. Only, as Kerry is a liberal Democrat, which do you think would get top priority: $80 billion for 40,000 more active-duty troops, as he`s promised, or $58 billion to fully fund Head Start and $20 billion to create an energy trust, which are two other Kerry guarantees? If recent history is any indicator, bet on the latter: Even under a more moderate Democrat like Clinton, defense spending fell to its lowest level since 1948 as a percentage of the nation`s gross domestic product.

But the domestic gridlock might seem like a welcome relief compared with the muddle that would be Kerry`s foreign policy. Bush has changed history in two respects: For the first time, America staged a pre-emptive war to defend its homeland; with a democratic Iraq, the rest of the Middle East will be held to higher American standards of freedom of speech and worship, and racial and gender equality. There is little to suggest that Kerry would pre-emptively take action against a foreign threat. There is even less to suggest that he places those American standards higher than phony adulation from the French government.

Iran going nuclear

One can hope some smart debate panelist will pose this question to the two candidates: We know that Iran is going nuclear before the 2008 presidential election. The options appear to be to wait for a revolution from within (not likely anytime soon), build new diplomatic inroads (which did us little good in North Korea), or take some form of military action (not easy, given that Iran has a large standing army and we`re already spread thin in Iraq and around the globe).

Bush`s record in Afghanistan and Iraq suggests that military action -- perhaps a raid by U.S or Israeli aircraft -- is a possibility, if that`s the only way to prevent Iran from joining the league on nuclear nations. Would Kerry be as hawkish? So far, all the Kerry campaign has offered is working through the international legal framework on arms control and cracking down on nuclear proliferation. Loosely translated, that means sending Jimmy Carter or Madeleine Albright to Tehran -- and getting suckered, as we were by the North Koreans.

There`s one other reason to support Bush in November and, while, it`s juvenile, it`s also very satisfying. A second Bush term will utterly annoy some very annoying people. Teresa Heinz Kerry will have to endure another "four years of hell" (well, as hellish as her life must be, commuting on her Gulfstream between Martha`s Vineyard and Sun Valley). As they did in 2000, some Hollywood blowhards will threaten to move to France. Still others, like Ben Affleck, will go back to making (bad) movies.

Bill Whalen, a former speechwriter for Gov. Pete Wilson, is a fellow at the Hoover Institution.

URL: http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archiv…
©2004 San Francisco Chronicle

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Kerry`s Real Heroism Came After The War
VIEW FROM THE LEFT
- Harley Sorensen, Special to SF Gate
Monday, August 30, 2004

To be fair about it, George W. Bush did what many of us would have done given the chance. He ducked the war in Vietnam and got free flying lessons in the deal.

That he stopped attending Air National Guard meetings is really no big deal. Those meetings are boring and unproductive.

What is troublesome is Bush`s hypocrisy. He has no qualms about sending others into battle, but he himself did a sophisticated cut and run when the shooting started.

That is one reason, when it comes to waging a war, John Kerry might make a better president than Bush.

Kerry`s record in combat seems to be mixed. It is apparently true that he took a risk in rescuing a crew member, but what else could he do? If he`d left his buddy behind, he`d never be able to look his crew in the eye again.

Putting Kerry`s heroism in perspective, any infantryman who goes out on patrol takes at least a big a risk as Kerry did the day he won his Bronze Star.

As for Kerry`s wounds, he apparently did what any sane man would have done in his situation: He worked his wounds for all they were worth. Three Purple Hearts and you`re out of `Nam. Any scratch counts. Kerry apparently got a couple of scratches that could have been overlooked, but he used them as his ticket back to the States.

Who can blame him?

But his real heroism revealed itself when he became a front man for Vietnam Veterans Against the War. We Americans don`t like to admit it, but we live in a culture that adores war. Our World War II veterans were long ago promoted to sainthood, and our younger men deliriously want the same kind of respect. The nation as a whole sees our success in WWII as "the good old days."

So in our national psyche, war is good. By logical extension, people who oppose war are bad.

It seems there are two kinds of war veterans: those who make their war experience the cornerstone of their existence, and those who come home, try to forget, and get on with their lives.

In the case of Vietnam veterans, the first kind, the "professional veterans," are angry and bitter because they never got the kind of respect accorded to WWII vets.

The "forgetters," on the other hand, don`t care. They`ve gotten on with their lives. That was then; this is now.

In any event, it took a remarkable amount of courage for John Kerry, and others like him, to take an active public stand against the war they had just helped fight.

They knew that in a pro-war culture they would be looked down upon as traitors. They knew they`d be linked with Jane Fonda and the myths surrounding her anti-war efforts.

They knew all that, but they also knew what was right. They knew the war was wrong. The bogus "domino theory" (if Vietnam falls, the entire region becomes communist) was such a shallow lie it could have been something today`s so-called neo-com advisers would have whispered into President Bush`s ear.

The vets who dared speak against the war knew there was nothing about Vietnam that justified the deaths of tens of thousands of American boys and an estimated 1 million Vietnamese.

They`d been there. They knew it was wrong. And they had the courage to say so in a country that thrives on war.

The Vietnam vets who despise Kerry do so because he has helped rob them of the glory they feel they deserve. Most of them, like most of the WWII vets, were dragged into battle through the Selective Service System. They were drafted. They didn`t want to be in a war. But once there they did what was expected of them, which was no more nor less than the WWII vets did.

They crave the same respect.

The war in Iraq is, in a way, a continuum of World War II, the Korean War, and the Vietnam War. So America in my lifetime went from its most noble war, to its forgotten war, to its unjustified war, to the hopeless quagmire we`re in now in Iraq.

Does John Kerry still have the courage he exhibited after returning from Vietnam? If he does, and if he`s elected, our troops will be out of Iraq by next February.

Courageous or not, Kerry is a peace-loving American`s only hope. The incumbent president (Mr. Bring It On) has signaled he`ll be sending others off to fight for as long as he holds the office.

Harley Sorensen is a longtime journalist. His column appears Mondays. E-mail him at [e-mail].


URL: http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/gate/archive/200…
©2004 SF Gate

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Neocon vs. neocon
It`s every ideologue for himself as even the most hardcore Republicans try to distance themselves from the disaster in Iraq.
http://www.salon.com/
- - - - - - - - - - - -
By Martin Sieff

Aug. 30, 2004 | The Grand Old Party`s "big tent" on foreign policy is flapping in tatters. Behind the Republicans` predictable show of Rambo bravado as they gather in Madison Square Garden Monday, they are reeling. The libertarians and isolationists have left in disgust. The respectable traditional internationalists of the James Baker-Brent Scowcroft school are holding their noses and saying nothing, but behind closed doors they are seething. President Bush and his fundamentalist evangelicals have left only the neoconservatives who plunged them into the nightmarish swamps of Iraq. And now even that notoriously disciplined group has gone rogue and is rioting wildly: The neocons have turned upon one another -- and on Bush himself.

The neoconservatives who dominate the civilian echelon in the Pentagon and on the National Security Council understandably remain silent. With their every prediction and assurance about Iraq discredited, there is little more they can do but hope for another war, this time with Iran, that will miraculously sweep away all their problems. It is like betting the second mortgage on red when you have already lost your shirt and the roulette wheel is rigged to turn up black.

Senior neocon administration officials like Lewis "Scooter" Libby and John Hannah at Vice President Cheney`s right hand; Harold Rhode, the Islamic affairs advisor to Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld; and the Pentagon coteries led by Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz and Undersecretary of Defense for Policy Douglas Feith are lying low in public, as well they might.

They would prefer that their longtime favorite, Ahmed Chalabi, the veteran head of the Iraqi National Congress who is now under indictment in Iraq for various crimes, were forgotten by the usually compliant mainstream media. But it is their own sympathizers and fellow conspirators on behalf of Chalabi in the media, led by the likes of Washington Post columnist James Hoagland and neocons Michael Ledeen and Michael Rubin in National Review Online, who will not let Chalabi`s embarrassments die.

On Aug. 19, Rubin, formerly a midlevel advisor to the Coalition Provisional Authority in Baghdad and now at the American Enterprise Institute, blasted Bush, noting that the president cannot escape the tainted legacy of his father. "There is little goodwill left in Iraq," he opined. "The United States government has managed to squander it. Bush may be sincere about his desire for democracy, but to Iraqis, family matters. Iraqis associate the president with his father, who is notorious among Iraqi Shia for his failure to support their March 1991 uprising."

Rubin went on to attack administration policy as incompetent. "The recent siege of Najaf reinforces the Shia belief that the U.S. government is anti-Shia. In recent days, I`ve spoken to a number of Iraqis from Najaf, Samawa, and Diwaniya. They are disgusted."

Bush`s right hand in foreign policy, National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice, who sided with the neocons against Secretary of State Colin Powell on almost every major Middle East issue, doesn`t get any kinder treatment. On the contrary, Rubin lays the Iraq debacle firmly at her door. "In October 2003, the White House launched a major reorganization of its Iraq-policy team ... Rice became titular head of the Iraq Stabilization Group, but her deputy (and former mentor) Robert Blackwill, who is well known for his slash-and-burn management style, became chief for political transition. His influence on Iraq policy was quickly felt in both Baghdad and in Washington."

Chalabi`s disinformation shaped the decision and planning to invade Iraq, including the assumption that Iraqi masses would embrace their American liberators in gratitude indefinitely. Today, these masses are openly calling for U.S. forces to be swept out of the country, and no one in the administration dares to say a word in defense of Chalabi. Yet Chalabi`s hardcore defenders are still at it, slandering the U.S. intelligence community in defense of the convicted bank embezzler.

But as the death toll of U.S. troops in Iraq relentlessly climbs toward 1,000, the leading intellectual neoconservatives outside the administration have turned to feud viciously among themselves.

Francis Fukuyama, whose famous, absurd, but at the time eagerly acclaimed thesis of "The End of History" was a defining neocon text after the collapse of Soviet communism, has published an article in the summer 2004 issue of the conservative National Interest, energetically taking on columnist Charles Krauthammer for his idea of a "unipolar" American moment that, Krauthammer argued, would last for generations, or even a century.

"Krauthammerian unipolarity has increased hatred for the United States in the broader fight for hearts and minds," Fukuyama wrote. He took issue with Krauthammer`s contention in a speech delivered to the American Enterprise Institute in February 2004, in which he described the United States as being in the midst of a long, grim war with an implacable enemy out to destroy Western civilization. "That kind of language is appropriate as a description of Israel`s strategic situation since the outbreak of the second intifada," Fukuyama pointedly noted. "The question is whether this accurately describes the position of the United States as well ... I believe that there are real problems in transposing one situation to the other ... The United States faces a much more complex situation."

Fukuyama also has harsh words to say about the Bush administration`s now-infamous September 2002 "National Security Strategy" report that asserted the policy of preemptive war. "Even talking about such a strategy, as we did in the National Security Strategy document, will tend to promote opposing coalitions and resistance to U.S. policies ... It is hard to see why we would want to put ourselves in this position. It is hardly an advantageous position from which to launch an idealistic Wilsonian crusade to reshape the Middle East."

Meanwhile, Krauthammer is preparing a counterblast at Fukuyama -- "breathtakingly incoherent," he has called him --for the next issue of the National Interest.

This neocon food fight is embarrassing enough for Bush, Cheney and Wolfowitz. After all, their every other source of intellectual talent on foreign policy has been alienated or thrown overboard. After four years of leaks, humiliations and endless media criticism by leading neocon columnists, Powell and his deputy, Richard Armitage, plan to step down, even if Bush is reelected. The last remnants of the proud, moderate and bipartisan internationalists -- stretching from the time of Dwight Eisenhower and Thomas Dewey to Baker and Scowcroft -- will go with them. The neocons, both inside and outside the administration, are all Bush has left. But they are now openly turning on their greatest patron, trying to blame Bush for the bungles in Iraq.

The neocons are acting as though they smell the sweet, sickly scent of defeat wafting over the Bush campaign. Indeed, they have already prepared what they imagine will be their lifeboat to escape its wreck and reclaim their political respectability. They recently thawed out, with the support of honorary chairmen Sen. Joe Lieberman, D-Conn., and Sen. Jon Kyl, R-Ariz., the old Committee for the Present Danger. Nothing better reflects the Jurassic antiquity of their conceptions. What worked to make them respectable and influential 30 or 40 years ago, in the last cycles of the Cold War, will now, they believe, make them the leaders of a united America against the global challenge of extreme, militant Islam.

The members of the new committee are the same hoary folks who were so eager to charge into Iraq in pursuit of those famous weapons of mass destruction that were never there in the first place: former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, a close buddy of former Pentagon advisor Richard Perle and Wolfowitz who sits on the Defense Policy Board; Jeane Kirkpatrick of -- where else? -- the American Enterprise Institute; and former CIA Director James Woolsey, who did so little to anticipate the rise of al-Qaida and drew payments as the lawyer for Chalabi`s Iraqi National Congress.

The committee`s real purpose is obvious: to restore to the neocons a fig leaf of respectability and a claim to the bipartisanship they never practiced for a second when they were in power. One can guarantee that Wolfowitz, Feith, Libby and the rest of them will eagerly join the committee`s board to suitable hosannas in press releases the day after Bush takes his one-way flight back to Crawford, Texas.

What is the reaction of the president, his national security advisor and his political master strategist, Karl Rove, to the necons` open and flagrant rebellion and the palpable contempt with which they are now treating their benefactors? It is, as usual, to bury their ostrich heads ever deeper in the sand. Bush, with the curious passivity that betrays his macho self-image, has not fired a single defense or national security official during his nearly four years in power despite the unprecedented catastrophes they have led him into. They know they can rely on Bush`s predictable timidity to let their own closest associates in the media run wild with their tacit approval, even though this behavior only serves to further humiliate him.

For where else can Bush go? He has isolated himself with his own simplistic vision of the world and his pathological anti-intellectualism. Bush truly believes that by embracing the neoconservatives, he freed himself from the chattering classes. He does not realize that he thereby made himself the hapless and helpless puppet of the most irresponsible, incompetent and pretentious intellectual clique of all: the neocons themselves. And now he is stuck with them, even while they openly spit upon him and prepare to flee.

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`We Were Supposed to Humiliate Them`

By Caroline Emcke

08/30/04 "Der Spiegel" -- Interview with US Staff Sergeant Ivan Frederick on torture at Baghdad`s Abu Ghraib prison.

SPIEGEL: Since the images of torture at Abu Ghraib became public, you have had a lot of time, while detained in Baghdad, to think about your actions. Today, how do you view what you did - as a disgrace for America?

Frederick: I am very upset and depressed about what happened. I`m not a sadist. My family and my friends will attest to that. I was always proud to be defending America. In doing so, I made a lot of sacrifices in the past twenty years, especially since the attacks of September 11. I have always served my country well, even in Iraq - until we were transferred to Abu Ghraib and things got out of control.

SPIEGEL: What was the prison like when you arrived there in October 2003?

Frederick: As soon as I walked into that place the first time, I knew it was a nightmare. There was dirt everywhere, the toilets didn`t work, and it stank. The food was terrible. The chicken wasn`t cooked properly. It was still raw. We worked twelve hours a day, seven days a week. And we only had five soldiers for 1,000 prisoners. We had no place to unload our stress. Morale was generally miserable.

SPIEGEL: What kinds of guidelines applied to your job during the night shift? Who gave you your commands and instructions?

Frederick: I didn`t even know who was really in charge. I knew that Captain Donald Reese was theoretically the company commander and that Brigadier General Janis Karpinski was in charge of all operations at Abu Ghraib. But in reality, the battalion wanted you to do one thing, while the company wanted you to do something completely different, and the intelligence services had their own ideas altogether. It was total chaos.

SPIEGEL: That`s not an excuse for abusing prisoners.

Frederick: You`re right, but on my very first tour, when they showed me cell block 1-A, I saw naked prisoners with their hands tied to the door. Sleep deprivation, withholding food, humiliating prisoners - those things were already routine at Abu Ghraib before I was transferred there.

SPIEGEL: You are also a prison guard in your civilian life, so that you`re someone who should know about the proper treatment of prisoners. Why didn`t you talk to your superiors about these practices?

Frederick: On the very first day, I asked a sergeant in military police company 372 why the prisoners were being treated that way. His answer was: That`s the way the intelligence services do it. I heard a number of people say: "We don`t waste a lot of time with them here. If they don`t cooperate, we deal with them."

SPIEGEL: You keep talking about everyone else, but you did play along, after all. Who started the torture? Were you following orders, or did the situation simply escalate?

Frederick: Both. They would say: "Let the dogs loose on these prisoners! Try to get more information out of them. Take away their food, their clothing. Humiliate them!"

SPIEGEL: You stacked naked prisoners into a pyramid and abused them. Was that your idea, or were you also just following orders?

Frederick: There was a riot uprising at Abu Ghraib. A prisoner had injured a female American soldier in the face with a rock. They brought him and the other ones who were involved to our section, the "tough section," as a punishment. First we searched them. Then we made them undress and forced them to build that pyramid - and then everything got out of hand. One of the methods was to humiliate them, so that they would break down and talk, and I...I just wanted (he begins to cry) to humiliate them. And so I made them masturbate. I didn`t want to commit a crime, I just wanted to humiliate them. But I am guilty of that.

SPIEGEL: Didn`t you realize, at that moment, that what you were doing was wrong?

Frederick: I had mixed feelings at the time. Today I know I was wrong. On the one hand, I was filled with rage for this prisoner who had injured a female soldier. And they had told me to "humiliate them!" On the other hand, no one explained to us exactly how we were supposed to do that.

SPIEGEL: Why didn`t you object? Didn`t you have clear guidelines?

Frederick: I had guidelines at the prison in Buckingham, Virginia, where I worked as a civilian. But there were no guidelines at Abu Ghraib. No one gave me any instructions on the military principles for treatment of prisoners.

SPIEGEL: You could have invoked the Geneva Conventions.

Frederick: I didn`t know anything about the Geneva Conventions. No one told me about them when I was in training. I just recently tried to find out about the Conventions on the internet. In addition, the intelligence people were constantly praising us. They would just say: "Keep up the good work."

SPIEGEL: Was that in reference to the abuse?

Frederick: The intelligence service simply imposed no limits. They wanted concrete results, and they didn`t care how they were achieved.

SPIEGEL: What do expect from your trial?

Frederick: First of all, I want to apologize to the victims and their families. And I will take responsibility for my actions during the trial. But I also hope that others will follow my example and assume their share of the responsibility. It`s clear that more people are responsible for what happened in Abu Ghraib, and many of them haven`t even been charged yet.


Translated from the German by Christopher Sultan

Copyright: New York Times

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From AxisofLogic.com

Iraq
The Cradle of Devastation
By Manuel Valenzuela
Aug 30, 2004, 23:53

"How do you ask a man to be the last man to die in Vietnam [Iraq]?..How do you ask a man to be the last man to die for a mistake?�

- John Kerry, 1971

"How will he [Bush] meet his god having slaughtered so many men and women? He has committed so many crimes� I want to defend my home. If a stranger invades America and the people resist, does that mean they are terrorists?...Everyone [in Falluja] has been labeled a terrorist. These are all lies.

---- Ahmad Manajid, Iraqi Olympic Soccer Team Member

"My problems are not with the American people�They are with what America has done in Iraq: destroy everything. The American army has killed so many people in Iraq. What is freedom when I go to the [national] stadium and there are shootings on the road?"

---- Adnan Hamad, Iraqi Olympic Soccer Team Member

"We don`t wish for the presence of Americans in our country. We want them to go away."

Salih Sadir, Iraqi Olympic Soccer Team Member and team leader

"You cannot speak about a team that represents freedom. We do not have freedom in Iraq, we have an occupying force. This is one of our most miserable times�.Freedom is just a word for the media. We are living in hard times, under occupation."

---- Head coach Adnan Hamad, critical of George Bush�s exploitation of the Iraqi Olympic team in recent re-election advertisements



Gunboat soldiers of wars past and brutal, bitter at the truths spoken thirty years ago, have taken us back to bloody deltas and haunting demons, purposefully smearing one man and making an entire nation relive memories still too fragile to exorcise from the collective mind of the American people. Traversing waters of painful history so that we ignore the now toxic waterways of the Tigris and Euphrates, tools of proxy and pawns of convenience have only succeeded in reminding us of the putrid morality and dishonor residing in mansions old and white that have and continue to stain the once bright American beacon of light.



Taking us back to the jungles of Vietnam so that we can forget the present debacle in the deserts of Iraq, gunboat soldiers and their puppeteers wish to deviate an amnesia-riddled populace from the lands of the once Fertile Crescent, manipulating our short-attention span away from a foreign policy blunder more and more resembling a cocktail offering equal opportunity to an amalgam of failure, including a massive debacle, quagmire, catastrophe and collapse rolled into one.



Iraq is on the verge of implosion, a pussing scab never to heal, forever to pain America through the salts of bitterness and the unyielding defeat of failure. The inevitability of failure cannot be denied nor can it be questioned. It is only a matter of when, not if, as alien lands and divergent peoples resist and revolt imperial armies and crusading delusions. How can the sinister intentions of the few, nothing more than a malignant cluster of miscreants at the top, bring down a nation of so much splendor and potential, belonging to the total spectrum of humanity, not just the sewers of the elite?



Trapped in the sand dunes of Mesopotamia the American dream has awoken to, unable to extricate one soldier from an occupation besmirched by the leadership of George W. Bush and his neocon vultures. Condemned soldiers of misfortune find themselves in, their caste of indigence and lack of opportunity helping seal their fates, fighting and dying for mistakes, furthering the power trips of the elite, suffering through the indifference of their anointed leaders and sacrificing for the welfare of another nation. How many more will have to die or have their extremities ripped apart for a mistake and a fight sought by few to the detriment of the many? How many more sons and daughters will we have to bury, when the world entire smells the decaying smell of failure and sees the maggots prospering in our carcass?



Something has gone terribly wrong when the same people you are claiming to have liberated, showering them with the mirages of American freedom and democracy, exhibit nothing but animosity and hostility toward you. Such is the situation in Iraq, vividly exhibited by members of the Iraqi Olympic Soccer Team, who echo the sentiments of the vast majority of their countrymen. To understand the comments emanated, with the strong emotions and powerful words used, Americans must see themselves through the eyes of Iraqis. We must empathize with and place ourselves inside their lands and cities and homes. Only then will we understand why members of Iraq�s soccer team, like so many of their fellow citizens, feel the way they do, spouting bitterness and animosity towards the devastation enveloping their nation, and why the debacle that George W. Bush and the neocons have created will inevitably be doomed to fail.



The question thus becomes how many more American soldiers and Iraqi citizens need to die for a mistake? How much more suffering, death, destruction and human evil, both here and in Iraq, needs to arise from the rotting flesh of a minute cabal of lunatics that took two nations to war and hundreds of millions of people towards division, hatred and perpetual conflict? Who will be the last person to die for the mistake of an inept and ignoramus leader? How much more human energy need be extinguished until the people of America have their insatiable hunger for conflict, revenge and blood satisfied?



Yet statements such as those made by members of the Iraqi Olympic soccer team will never be disseminated to the American people who continue to be trapped in the quicksand of propaganda and mass manipulation delivered by a complicit corporate media loyal only to its parent companies and the government they own. Once more, it seems, the truth of what the Iraq debacle is will be sequestered, never to see the light of day and forever to be altered so the masses remain clueless to the implosion about to befall the American occupation of Iraq.



Iraq has become a phantom that is not seen, lingering in our midst yet invisible to the conscious. The intensity of guerilla war and the devastating attacks by Iraqi freedom fighters and the resistance routinely go unnoticed, instead only making a ten second sound bite proclaiming the death of dozens of dead-enders, thugs, Baathist remnants and foreign fighters. It seems the reality of who it is American troops are fighting cannot be blurted out since it was our forefathers who waged the same kind of war for Independence more than 225 years ago. We would not want to call the Founding Fathers and their army of patriots �terrorists,� would we?



The fact is we have become the occupiers, the Red Coats exploiting and subjugating the Iraqi people, and today their George Washington�s, their patriots and minutemen are waging battles to rid their lands of us. And so the nonsense about bringing �freedom and democracy� to Iraq fails to disappear as straight-faced journalists and anchors who know better continue disseminating lies that mask a truth that can never be uncovered. Because if we are today�s Red Coats, and Iraqi freedom fighters are yesterday�s American Revolution, wouldn�t that make us the bad guys, nothing more than imperial thugs seeking out world conquest for natural resources and human exploitation? Would not invaders and occupiers lose all altitude in the moral high ground, waging war and destroying an entire society so that the thirst for black blood can be quenched and the geo-strategic goal of empire building satisfied?



The Bush administration would rather distort the success of the soccer team in its favor, politicizing and spinning its triumph of the human spirit, like it does everything else, airing an advertisement exploiting those that despise what it has unleashed, even while team members openly condemn what the occupation has done. The administration, with its legions of spinmeisters, professional liars, propagandists, manipulators and marketers is also doing everything in its power to muzzle the truth from ever escaping the deserts of Mesopotamia. Iraq is such a mess, such a cesspool of chaos that any news coming out of there inevitably damages a president whose sole preoccupation is how best to politicize, spin, connive, lie and corrupt himself and his pack of wolves back into office.



With an occupation that resembles the very real and frightening nightmares we desperately seek to wake from and never experience again, with every decision made only succeeding to make volatile an already highly flammable situation, the question must be asked if American foreign policy knows what it is doing, both to the present populace and the future to come. Every action leads to reaction, every cause has its effect, and just as butterflies flap their wings, typhoons of rampage can we expect. What is our purpose in the lands of the Tigris and Euphrates? Who is the greatest beneficiary in this failed experiment? Why did we invade, based on lies and deceptions? For what reason must so many, on both sides, keep dying and getting injured, forever to be maimed, if not in body then in soul?



The need to preserve in the American mind the illusion of American grandeur and the façade of the occupation�s noble intentions prevents the corporate media and its minions from reporting the gravity of the situation. The very idea of America the Beautiful must remain intact; the illusion of bringing freedom and democracy to �barbarians� must be made to persevere. For if the truth of what America and its military have done to Iraq and its people is ever made known, mirages of grandeur and virtue would vanish like a morning fog, and the dream of America as the enabler of liberty, human rights and worldwide peace and harmony would come crashing down with the force of ten thousand Tomahawk missiles raining from the sky above.



The American people would see that our government is not what it portends to be. We would finally see the devastation upon land and man that the greatest military machine unleashes in the name of freedom and democracy. We would see our soldiers winning the battles but losing the war, losing their humanity amidst the growing hatred of the Iraqi people. One step forward and one-hundred back, the United States� only success is in exporting death and importing shame, in bringing misery and returning bodies devoid of energy. It has only achieved the monumental rage now boiling in Iraq and the Middle East that only grows and that will last entire generations, forever condemning our presence in their lands and infiltration into their affairs.



If allowed to see truth, we would finally be privy to the images denied us for decades, of third-world countries decimated and poisoned, their people slaughtered and laid to waste, rotting among cesspools of misery and mechanisms of slavery. Destroyed homes, cratered cities, unending cemeteries and children playing in raw sewage would only begin to erode the blinders that have for too long hidden us from a world devastated by our government�s foreign policies and military interventions. What our eyes have never been allowed to see would finally blind us in shame.



Hospitals lacking medicines, the infirm dying, doctors who can no longer use their ability to save condemned �collateral damage� and a healthcare system in shambles might finally open our minds to the evils our government does in our name. Malnourished children, bloated babies, all with lower immune systems and all with severe mental deficiencies that have and continue to foster stunted intelligence thanks to a decade of economic genocide imposed by the US continue to suffer. Those sanctions, you may recall, left over one million Iraqis dead, over half of them children.



Genocide by clandestine economic depravity is still genocide, under the name of sanctions or under the rubric of containment of one man. One man for one million deaths plus the destruction and impoverishment of a once flourishing society is a formula created by sinister men and only understood by the malevolent that walk among us. All in a day�s work for a government we trust and military we cherish, both of which unleashed the fires of hell on a nation that had nothing to do with 9/11 or the so-called fiction labeled the �war on terror�. And we wonder why they hate us?



In this present imperial exercise in futility for natural resources, strategic base construction and war by proxy, anywhere from 10,000 to 40,000 innocent Iraqi deaths and hundreds of thousands of severe injuries have been estimated thanks to America�s invasion and subsequent occupation. Given that the population of the nation is 25 million, this is an alarming number, signifying a huge percentage of the population. The United States, on the other hand, lost 3000 energies on 9/11, out of a population of 285 million. What we have done to Iraq pales in comparison to the World Trade Center, in essence superceding 9/11 on a magnitude 1000 times worse, reaching titanic proportions of death, destruction and incredible and ongoing suffering. So much suffering for a nation 9/11-innocent and WMD free, so many monstrosities created to enrich the military industrial complex and the Corporate Leviathan.



Crimes against humanity have been omnipresent, thanks to the human evil festering in Washington and a complicit media whose failures betray its motives. The warmonger junta and its minions belong at The Hague, or better, Texas� death row. For the Iraqis, unlike America, their 9/11 still festers, never healing or dissipating, continuing to murder, contaminate and decimate on a daily basis, each day becoming greater in scale as the terrorist invasion and occupation upon their nation continues to send them further down the sewer of eternal damnation. Their nation and society will take generations to recover; their hatred of America may never erode.



The devastation has been so severe, and the destruction of an entire society so systemic, that to awaken the fiction-living, bubble-inhabiting, fantasy-aspiring, chemically-altered, stupor-existing, pill-popping American mind from its catatonically endemic state with the unfiltered truth of the wasteland created in Iraq would send shockwaves through our brainwashed and acquiescent society. We have been led to believe in victory, in altruism and the exportation of the American way of life abroad. Deceived we have been conditioned to think all is well in Iraq, that the occupation is only temporary, just as long as is needed to �stay the course�, and that only a few bumps in the road are in the way of instilling freedom and democracy on a people ever-thankful for their liberty.



Through the manipulations of both the media and the Bush administration the charade that is the Prime Minister and the Interim government breathes life, gorging on our naïve belief that sovereignty has been passed. Never mind that 140,000 American troops remain, going from holy city to holy city to unearth the seeds of Armageddon from the embittered population. Never mind that the Iraqi economy has been privatized to serve American corporate interests, that democracy is another term for crony capitalism and that �advisers� sit at every ministry, becoming the overlords of the Iraqi government. Never mind that oil revenues are being pilfered, that it is being usurped by American oil conglomerates and that much needed profits are going not to the people of Iraq but to Bush cronies, contributors and profiteers.



The biggest scam in the history of the world is taking place, with Iraqi oil that should belong to Iraqis disappearing, its revenues enriching American interests, while only two percent of $18 billion in reconstruction money has been spent. Where, then, is all this remaining money? Where is the much marketed reconstruction of Iraq, meant to alleviate the painful life of the average Iraqi citizen? Where are the schools, the medicines and the improved infrastructure? Where are the electricity and the security once promised but yet to be delivered? The trail of sorrow, the trail of corruption and of highway robbery begins with Halliburton and others like it, nothing but fronts to the greatest misappropriation of American taxpayer funds and Iraqi oil revenues ever devised. The criminals in office, through their abuse of power, are orchestrating the complete looting of the American treasury, giving our hard earned wages to the American and Israeli military industrial complexes and the Corporate Leviathan.



Getting rich has never been this easy, and, with an unquestioning and indifferent American public who refuses to ask for transparency or accountability, the pilferage of their taxes will likely persist and the evisceration of education, healthcare and social services gutted.



Officially, the one-thousandth soldier has now died, his �transfer tube� clandestinely sneaked back under cover of warm darkness and cold indifference, surpassing a barrier few ever thought reachable. Thanks to Kevlar vests, 6,500 can claim to be alive, though forever destined to live with the demons of missing appendages, seared bodies and tortured souls. Unofficially, however, the tally of dead and injured is much higher, easily pro-rated by the day or week through the macabre accounting schemes of the same criminals sponsored by Enron and at the helm of Halliburton. The American public, after all, naively believes every distortion and propaganda spewed by the Department of War, even when the first casualty of war is the truth and when deception is part of and indeed a major tool of war. Can we possibly imagine the same administration that lied to us into war, concocting bogus and sexed up intelligence, that has not once told the American people the truth about anything it has ever done and whose president can be psychoanalyzed as a compulsive liar would ever tell us the truth about deaths and injuries? Hiding bodies under cover of sky lit night and sneaking the maimed and burned under the radar should be proof enough that our men and women are getting slaughtered and torn to shreds in Iraq.



When there has been a pattern of incessant lies coming from the Pentagon and White House, at the same time that a barrage of propaganda streams into our conscious, it seems unbelievable American citizens take the word of their government as if descended from the heavens above. Perhaps ingrained in each of us is the belief that governments are altruistic entities with our best interests as their main focus. Maybe it is denial that leads us to trust what cannot be trusted, a refusal to acknowledge that we are being used and taken advantage of.



In the end, it is possible that we do not want to learn the truth for fear of what it might divulge, awakening us to the failure and chaos, the unrelenting guerilla war that will never subside and whose tenacity will only escalate, the incessant war crimes being committed in our name and the proposition that America will lose yet again to a �third-world, rag-tag, decrepit waste of a nation.� It is pride that bites the most, and it could help explain why the vast majority of us would rather dwell in the fields grazing like sheep, seeking to be led by our shepherds in government, wanting no part in escaping the fiction we have been living for so long.



History, for those who heed its lessons, is against the occupying forces who invade another people�s land. When history repeats itself, as it is now, it is because those who sought what could never be achieved failed to learn or understand the codes of human mistakes littered within the verses of man�s short recorded time. The sands of time were not consulted, and the price of ignorance are we today suffering. Man does not change over short periods of time; indeed, mentally our brains and bodies haven�t for hundreds of thousands of years. We are prevented from rapid leaps of change by the inertia of evolution, both mental and physical. The same creature of violence, territorial competition, instinct of survival (selfishness), hierarchy, sexual drive, and animal passions and emotions resides inside us. Is it any wonder war, death, violence and destruction are endemic in our collective history and civilization, regardless of which corner of the globe we reside from, as common in humanity as the television and movies we watch, saturated to the brim with images and plots mirroring the symptoms of our disease?



The devastation of the Cradle of Civilization is but the latest resurrection of the virus we cannot purge from our human nature. And it will not be the last, for it will continue as long as we fail to realize the reality of who and what we truly are.



Lingering in the sands and air of Iraq are remnants of the malevolence of human evil. The nation whose rivers Tigris and Euphrates helped spawn human civilization has been poisoned by toxins so deadly and disease-ridden that it will take billions of years to once more be cleansed. Thousands of tons of Depleted Uranium (DU) munitions have been used by the US military in the invasion and occupation of Iraq, not to mention in Gulf War I also. The equivalent of thousands of Hiroshimas has been unleashed upon the peoples of Mesopotamia, not to mention the hundreds of thousands of US soldiers as well. Depleted Uranium is radiation, overwhelmingly dangerous, and enormous amounts of it now taint the environs of Iraq. As a result, cancers, leukemia and pandemics of disease have increased exponentially, only to grow more pronounced in the coming years and decades. Child deformities that have never been witnessed are now commonplace, so grotesque are the babies born to send chills down one�s spine. The genetic code and DNA sequence of Iraqis is being destroyed, mutating due to the radiation in the air, the ground, the water and the food. The United States has unleashed nuclear war onto millions of innocent people.



This devastation cannot be seen on television or read in newspapers, it will never be mentioned by a government intent on covering up the greatest mass genocide in history. Hundreds of thousands, perhaps even millions, are dead men, women and children walking, waiting for America�s radiation, the ultimate WMD, to strike them down with one disease or another. Entire generations of children will be born deformed or with mutated genetic codes. Deformities in newborns will continue to rise, becoming prevalent with the passage of time. Iraqis have been poisoned, just as Vietnamese once were (toxic defoliating chemicals) and continue to be. They have been sentenced to death and perpetual misery thanks to the murderers in Washington, the Pentagon and the military-industrial complex.



And if you think they do not know what they have unleashed or what is transpiring, think again. Once more, our government covers up what it does not want the masses to know. One of the most devastating implications of DU is the fact that hundreds of thousands of American soldiers have been exposed to the radiation emanating from the same bombs, munitions, bullets and artillery they have fired. What is happening to Iraqi civilians can also be seen in the men and women of Gulf Wars I and II. Already, 11,000 veterans of Gulf War I have died, most of them in the prime of their lives, and over half of those who served, about 325,000 out of 580,400, suffer various medical ailments related to their time in the Middle East. The same symptoms are starting to be seen with military personnel returning home from Iraq. Child deformities, cancers, disease, premature death and ceaseless pain and suffering are the sacrifice America�s soldiers and new veterans must endure to do the dirty work of the elite in government and those who run the vast military-industrial complex.



Once again, however, the corporate media refuses to do its job. It refuses to inform the American public or to report the truth of the devastation that our government and military have condemned Iraq and its people with. It fails yet again to report the betrayal of American soldiers by their government, many of whom have been sentenced to death by their exposure to DU. Our corporate media serves no truth telling purpose. On the contrary, its only role is to disseminate propaganda and lies, manipulations and brainwashing material. It hides a reality we are not supposed to see, distracting us with brainless fiction and purposefully guiding us down the wrong path so that lost we remain inside forests of disinformation and ignorance. The system is at work, and its great accomplishment can be seen in the total control of the dumbed-down, worker-bee, short-term memory, amnesia-laden, ignorant-conditioned and apathetically-subservient creature called the average American citizen.



In worlds once teeming with happiness and vibrancy disease now prospers. In rivers that once birthed life only sewage and toxins now flow. The Cradle of Civilization is now the Cradle of Devastation; its deserts glow with radiation, not human warmth; its cities crawling with trash, not commerce; its oil is disappearing into the pockets of westerners, not transferred to the purses of breadwinners; its economy has been neo-liberalized and privatized, assuring market colonization and economic strangulation; untold thousands have died and many more have yet to perish, their children now born mutants and deformed creatures fated by human evil; occupation will last years, if not decades, tormenting Iraqi society every second of every day; guerilla war has been reincarnated, sure to outlast the invading army.



The inevitable failure continues and the futility of persisting will only exacerbate the loss of life, limb and mind. The defeat of military might is already assured while winning battles yet losing the war. History does not lie, nor does the strength of the human spirit. Freedom fighters, the resistance and Iraqi patriots will not relent, they will not stop fighting until the last group of American combat boots leaves the sand-filled ground they love. Their land has been invaded, exploited, occupied and robbed. Their people have been humiliated, carpet bombed, raped and dehumanized. Their holy cities have been destroyed through the sacrilege of bombs and bullets. Entire neighborhoods have been made to vanish, tens of thousands now lie buried.



Human history and nature does not deceive, it does not manipulate and it certainly does not lie. The path has been forged for millennia, leading to constant battles for freedom and wars for sovereignty. Those invaded and occupied never stop against those thinking themselves overlords of alien lands, peoples and resources. The human spirit never alters, from the dawn of time, it refuses to be conquered. Iraq is no different, and is why through the study of history we can see the inevitable failure and defeat of the United States.



It is already happening, and it will only continue, snowballing until ego-driven leaders see the fallacy of their power trip and the corrosiveness of their mistakes. Until then, the prolonged march of death down the road of perdition will go on, killing, maiming and destroying minds, forever scarring lives and futures.



Who will be the last man or woman to die for a mistake? Who will be the last to die for the ineptitude of leadership and the corruption of morality of those at the top? We can stay the course and thousands more can be killed, thousands more can be maimed in body and mind, and thousands more mothers, fathers, sons, daughters, wives and husbands can forever mourn the death of their loved ones. Or we can learn from history, learn from our mistakes, see the writing on the wall and get the hell out of the debacle that Bush and the neocons have manufactured.



The cause is lost, the war has been determined and the inevitability that is American defeat now lingers in the air we breathe, becoming the foul odor penetrating our lungs. We can get out, saving thousands of lives on both sides, moving on with our lives, preventing the blowback that is sure to come, or we can remain, thinking in our omnipotence and our pride, thinking of fake freedom and democracy, in our macho chest-thumping that victory is near, and slowly but surely becoming entangled in a battle extending its cruel tentacles outside the borders of Iraq from which our world may never return. Thousands more will die, thousands more will suffer and the great American Empire will come tumbling down.



The choice is up to us. It is up to America. Remember history and its many lessons, for in it can the mistakes and errors of man be deciphered. Remember the lasting images of the last days of Vietnam, and the 58,000 Americans and millions of native inhabitants who lost their energies in a war of madness. Watch The Battle of Algiers (1965), a great and educational movie about the colonization of Algeria by the French and the urban guerilla warfare that followed. Focus your attention to Chechnya and Palestine, for that is what Iraq is to become if America stays. Gaze upon human nature, and realize the inevitable war of attrition that is to come by freedom fighters against American soldiers who are trapped in an unending vicious circle of devastation not of their own making.



Only the people can act, for those in government will not, for they care not an ounce for you or I or the hundreds of thousands of cannon fodder soldiers now risking life and limb that call urban and rural communities home. They are but pawns in the game of power and control, mere expendable grunts doing the military-industrial complex�s dirty work. Those sitting pretty in houses old and white and in the bordello called Congress would rather your son or daughter die than declare that a mistake has been made and a debacle is taking place. Those that represent and those that we elect are cowards, some of the most immoral and dishonorable people to walk the green grasses of Earth. They will do nothing, and so we must.



Upon the radiation-filled deserts of Babylon can the ruins of invaders past be seen. In the streets and faces of Iraq the truth is hidden. Like a giant maze that must be traversed and understood reality awaits. From the mouths of soccer players can the writing on the wall be seen. Who will be the last person to die for a mistake? The cradle of devastation eagerly awaits our reply.



For further reading on the government`s treatment of soldiers:



The Exploitation of the American Soldier: Part I of II: Of Caste Drafts and Society`s Complicity, Manuel Valenzuela



The Exploitation of the American Soldier, Part II of II: Of The Vietnam Example, Guinea Pigs and Systemic Abuse



Further Reading on Depleted Uranium:



http://bellaciao.org/en/article.php3?id_article=2887

© Copyright 2004 by AxisofLogic.com





Manuel Valenzuela is social critic and commentator, activist, writer and author of Echoes in the Wind, a novel to be published in mid September of 2004. A collection of essays, Beyond the Smoking Mirror: Reflections on America and Humanity, will be published in late Fall of 2004. His articles appear weekly on axisoflogic.com where he is also contributing editor. Mr. Valenzuela welcomes comments and can be reached at [e-mail]

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Published on Sunday, August 29, 2004 by the Toronto Star
An Attack on the US Economy
by Eric Margolis


Wherever he is, Osama bin Laden will be beaming as he watches my beloved hometown, New York City, turned into an armed camp and a victim of municipal nervous breakdown.

Sheik Osama has repeatedly warned America will never know peace until it withdraws from the Mideast and ceases supporting Israel. He ordered followers to attack the heart of America`s power, its economy.

He has been horrifyingly successful. The 9/11 attacks cost America $98 billion US, and billions more annually for heightened internal security. The Bush administration`s constant, politically-timed warnings of imminent al-Qaida attacks -- none of which materialized -- and attendant media hysteria, have left Americans frightened and emotionally exhausted.

The Republican National Convention here is being guarded by the city`s 37,000 cops -- a force twice as large as Canada`s entire army. Ten thousand police will guard the convention centre at Madison Square Garden, backed by thousands more FBI, ATF, Secret Service, and other "federales." Still, rumours abound al-Qaida will attack the convention.

Roadblocks, checkpoints, flashing red lights, heavily armed paramilitaries, and armoured vehicles will turn New York into a traffic nightmare, disrupt commerce, and make the world`s most important city look like Damascus during a military coup, or a remake of the film Escape From New York.

As this strange spectacle unfolds, the Bush and Kerry campaigns are arguing furiously about the 30-year-old Vietnam War -- at a time when the U.S. is losing the wars it is now waging in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Neither candidate has advanced any cogent or realistic plan for dealing with these military-political quagmires. Bush keep intoning meaningless platitudes like "we`ve got to stay the course." But at least he has been consistent about Iraq, even though consistently and disastrously wrong. Kerry keeps shifting his position, and has seriously damaged his credibility by trying to be both pro-war and anti-war at the same time.

The sordid smear campaign launched against Kerry`s war record by an apparently Republican-funded hit squad called "Swift Boat Veterans for Truth" has besmirched both candidates` reputations and further damaged America`s already battered image around the globe. Kerry`s feeble reaction to the shameful attacks seems further evidence of weakness and indecision.

How the Kerry campaign can get away with letting a draft-dodging president attack his war record escapes me. Maybe Kerry`s too much of a gentleman. How can decent Americans and veterans` organizations, like the American Legion, to which I belong, accept this disgraceful business and not roar disapproval at the president? This is not politics, it`s pure filth.

As a U.S. Army veteran, I know that military citations are often awarded too freely and overblown to promote careers. Kerry may not be quite the Democratic Rambo he contends, but at least he was there, in combat -- while Bush was making sporadic guest appearances at the Texas and Alabama National Guards.

Mind you, the Bush administration didn`t flinch from concocting a cascade of lies about the Iraqi threat -- including Saddam`s nukes and Iraqi drones about to spray poison on sleeping America. So why would it discourage fabrications against a genuine threat -- at least to the current presidency -- namely, John Kerry?

Bush and Kerry ought to be debating how to pull 150,000 U.S. troops out of two stalemated wars costing $6.5 billion US a month. A recent Spanish congressional report estimates that had Bush not invaded Iraq, oil would now be around $30 a barrel, instead of $43. Americans have yet to understand the full cost of the president`s foreign misadventures.

Neither candidate is telling Americans the truth about Iraq, Afghanistan or the misnamed "war on terrorism." Sadly, many Americans don`t want to hear awkward facts, as Gov. Howard Dean found to his chagrin.

The hard truth is that the U.S. is stuck in two no-win colonial wars, precisely what bin Laden wanted. The U.S. is increasingly under attack by Islamic militants who hate America --not, as Bush fatuously claims, because of its freedoms and democracy, but because of what the U.S. has been doing in the Muslim world.

Americans need to debate that, not rehash Vietnam.

Copyright © 2004, CANOE

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Published on Monday, August 30, 2004 by CommonDreams.org
Madame Butterfly Flies Off with Ballots
Florida Fixed Again? Absentee Ballots Go Absent
by Greg Palast


On Friday, Theresa LePore, Supervisor of Elections in Palm Beach, candidate for re-election as Supervisor of Elections, chose to supervise her own election, no one allowed. This Tuesday, Florida votes for these nominally non-partisan posts.

You remember Theresa, "Madame Butterfly," the one whose ballots brought in the big vote for Pat Buchanan in the Jewish precincts in November 2000. Then she failed to do the hand count that would have changed the White House from Blue to Red.

This time, Theresa`s in a hurry to get to the counting. She began tallying absentee ballots on Friday in her own re-election race. Not to worry: the law requires the Supervisor of Elections in each county to certify poll-watchers to observe the count.

But Theresa has a better idea. She refused to certify a single poll-watcher from opponents` organizations despite the legal requirement she do so by last week. She`ll count her own votes herself, thank you very much!

And so far, she`s doing quite well. Although 37,000 citizens have requested absentee ballots, she says she`d only received 22,000 when she began the count. Where are the others? Don`t ask: though she posts the names of requesters, she won`t release the list of those who have voted, an eyebrow-raising deviation from standard procedure.

And she has no intention of counting all the ballots received. She has reserved for herself the right to determine which ballots have acceptable signatures. Her opponent, Democrat Art Anderson, had asked Theresa to use certified hand-writing experts, instead of her hand-picked hacks, to check the signatures.

Unfortunately, while Federal law requires Theresa to allow a voter to correct a signature rejection when registering, the Feds don`t require her to permit challenges to absentee ballot rejections.

I know what you`re thinking. How could Madame Butterfly know how people are voting? Well, she`s printed PARTY AFFILIATION on the OUTSIDE of each return envelope. That certainly makes it easier to figure out which ballot is valid, don`t it?

And dear Reader, please take note of the implications of this story for the big vote in November. Millions have sought refuge in absentee ballots as a method to avoid the dangers of the digitizing of democracy. Florida and other states are reporting 400%-plus increases in absentee ballot requests due to fear of the new computer voting machinery. Some refuge. LePore is giving us an early taste of how the Bush Leaguers intend to care for your absentee ballot.

If there`s no safety in the absentee ballot, how about the computerized machines? The LePores of America have that one figured out too.

On Friday, the day on which Theresa began her Kremlim-style vote count, the New York Times ran a puff piece on Jeb`s Palm Beach political pet. Cub reporter Amy Goodnough derided fears of Democrats who painted "dark scenarios" about the computer voting machines Madame Butterfly installed over the objections of the state`s official voting technology task force.

If you`re wondering why the experts told her not to use the machines, I`ll tell you -- because the New York Times won`t. It`s not because the voting specialists are anti-technology Luddites. The fact is that Florida counties using touch-screens have reported a known error rate 600% greater than the alternative, paper ballots read by optical scanners. And those errors have occurred -- surprise! -- overwhelmingly in African-American precincts.

First Brother Jeb has teamed with LePore to keep the vote clean and white. Together they have refused the Democrats request for the more-reliable paper ballots as an option for voters.

In Leon County, by contrast, Elections Supervisor Ion Sancho insisted on paper ballots and did not lose a single vote to error in the March presidential primary. Sancho told me it`s a slam-dunk certainty that the computer screens will snatch away several thousand Palm Beach votes.

Theresa and the Jebster have been quite close since LePore came out of the closet. The Republican-turned-Democrat, nominally independent, this year accepted the sticky embrace of the Republican Party. One really has to wonder if she ever truly left the Blues in the first place.

It`s a shame that Supervisor LePore was too busy counting her votes and rejecting ballots to respond to my phone calls. I wanted to be the first to congratulate her on her election victory -- two days before the election. Or maybe she fears I might be the early birddog who catches the butterfly as she turns back into a worm.

Greg Palast is the author of the New York Times bestseller, The Best Democracy Money Can Buy. His article on vote manipulation in Florida for Harper`s Magazine, was nominated for a 2002 National Magazine Award.

On September 28, Disinfo/Ryko will release on DVD his film, "Bush Family Fortunes," based on Palast`s investigative reports for BBC Television -- described as "courageous reporting." (Michael Moore) and "twisted and maniacal" (Katherine Harris). View a 2-minute preview at http://www.gregpalast.com/bff-dvd.htm

Sign up for Greg Palast`s elections investigation reports at http://www.gregpalast.com/contact.cfm

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washingtonpost.com
Bush, Kerry Locked in Dead Heat, Poll Shows
President Holds Clear Advantages on Security, Leadership, but Falls Short on Economy

By Richard Morin and Christopher Muste
Washington Post Staff Writers
Monday, August 30, 2004; 5:22 PM

President Bush holds clear advantages over John F. Kerry on national security issues and leadership in the war on terror, largely erasing the broad gains Kerry made at his Boston convention last month, but voters continue to give the president negative marks on the economy and his handling of Iraq, according to a new Washington Post-ABC News Poll.

At the opening of the Republican National Convention, Bush and Kerry remained deadlocked in the race for the White House, with each claiming 48 percent of likely voters, with 2 percent supporting independent Ralph Nader, virtually unchanged from a survey taken immediately after the Democratic convention. Among all registered voters, the poll found Bush at 48 percent, Kerry at 47 percent, a shift in the president`s direction since the previous survey.

The survey offered conflicting evidence of the impact of the controversy over Kerry`s Vietnam record and television ads attacking his character aired by a group called Swift Boat Veterans for Truth. A solid majority of voters said they believed Kerry deserved the medals he won in Vietnam and most voters see the issue of Vietnam as irrelevant to their choice in November. But in the past month, Kerry`s personal image has deteriorated, with almost as many voters viewing him unfavorably as favorably.

The new poll confirms other recent surveys that suggest that, despite clear dissatisfaction about the direction of the country, Bush had regained ground lost to Kerry on national security issues. Republicans will now attempt to build on those shifts during their four-day convention that opened in New York today. Bush advisers see the convention as an opportunity to highlight the president`s leadership in the war on terror and also to attack Kerry`s record in the Senate in an effort to portray him as inconsistent and unreliable.

The new poll found that a slight majority of registered voters -- 53 percent -- say Bush is more qualified than Kerry to be commander-in-chief, while 43 percent say they prefer the Democratic nominee. At the end of the Democratic convention, Kerry enjoyed an 8-point advantage over Bush on that question. Taken together, the results of the poll suggest Bush`s recent gains have come from eroding perceptions of Kerry and not as a consequence of improved views of Bush`s performance as president.

"I like the way has handled [Iraq] -- he just did what he had to do, didn`t pussy-foot around," said Joy L. Crockett, 52, a manicurist in Hammond, La. She worries that Iraq and the war on terrorism makes it a bad time to change presidents and believes Bush offers the best hope of "get the country back to better than it was."

But others worried that Bush`s go-it-alone leadership style has isolated the United States from the rest of the world at a time when the United States needs help from allies to stabilize Iraq and fight the international war on terrorism.

"He`s alienated the U.N.," said William Thomas, 66, a retired electrician who lives in the Cleveland suburbs. "If anyone in government thinks they`re going to get any countries like France to pay for some to this, I want some of what they`re smoking. They`ll be laughing up their sleeves."

A total of 1,207 randomly selected adults were interviewed August 26-29, including 945 registered voters and 775 likely voters. Margin of sampling error for the subsample of likely voters is plus or minus 3 percentage points and slightly smaller for all voters.

Bush`s job approval rating stands at 50 percent, where it has largely been for the past six months. Fewer than half of all Americans -- 45 percent -- approve of the job Bush is doing on the economy, unchanged from recent Post-ABC News polls. Fewer than half also approve of the way he is dealing with the situation in Iraq, also unchanged.

On other issues, such as education and health care, public sentiments remain unchanged from a month or two ago. Six in 10 give Bush high marks for the way he has handled the war on terrorism, up slightly from last month but still below where it was as recently as April.

Overall, a majority of Americans -- 54 percent -- said they are dissatisfied with the way things are going in the country, unchanged from July and a sign that Bush remains vulnerable despite his recent gains.

"It sort of like we`re stuck-- Iraq is a quagmire-type deal; myself I`m concerned with keeping a job; I work two jobs," said Karen Barnes, 50, of Indianapolis. "Trade is a big issue -- I know we have to have free trade, but jobs are going overseas."

But when matched against Kerry on issues and character, Bush either has closed the gap or surged ahead on virtually every measure. One reason is that candidates often lose some of the bounce up in support they gained from their convention. But the erosion in Kerry`s standing also may be attributable to the attacks on his Vietnam service and continued criticism from Bush and his campaign on the Democrat`s record and reliability.

Bush is viewed as more honest and trustworthy than Kerry by a 47 percent to 41 percent ratio -- exactly reversing the results of the Post-ABC News poll taken immediately after the Democratic convention.

Bush also is seen by a growing majority as the stronger leader and has narrowed Kerry`s lead from 14 percentage points to six points as the candidate who best understands the problems of people like them. He has tied Kerry as the candidate who best shares their values and drawn nearly even with the Democrat as the candidate who has a vision for the future, two areas where Kerry led immediately after his party`s convention.

On key issues as well as character Bush has improved his position since the Democratic convention. Kerry is no longer viewed as the candidate best able to deal with the economy -- an issue of growing importance to Americans this year, according to the survey. Voters now evenly divide over which candidate would do a better job with economic issues.

By 52 percent to 44 percent, voters now judge Bush superior to Kerry as the candidate who would best able to deal with the situation in Iraq. After the Democratic convention, the two were essentially tied.

In barely a month, Bush has surged to an 18-point advantage over Kerry as the candidate voters prefer to lead the war on terrorism. Immediately after the Democratic convention, Bush held a narrow 3-point lead over Kerry on this key measure.

The Post-ABC News survey also found that Vietnam haunts both Kerry and Bush. In recent weeks, the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth have said Kerry did not deserve the medals he won for service during Vietnam and may have exaggerated other details of his service during the war.

By nearly 3 to 1, voters reject those claims and say Kerry does deserve his Vietnam medals. And two-thirds disapprove of the commercials critical of Kerry, though voters remain divided whether the Bush campaign was behind the ads.

More broadly, most voters dismissed the issue of each candidate`s military service during the Vietnam era. Six in 10 said Kerry`s war record does not affect their decision to vote for him while seven in 10 said Bush`s service in the Texas Air National Guard during Vietnam is not an issue. In addition, half say Kerry`s opposition to the Vietnam war after he left the military was not relevant to them, though one in four said it made them less to vote for Kerry while a slightly smaller proportion said his actions made them more inclined to support him.

"It`s all a sideshow," said Melissa Mathias, 24, a first grade teacher who lives in Chrisman, Ill. "There are lot more important issues. They just pick at each other`s faults -- like first graders."

© 2004 The Washington Post Company

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washingtonpost.com
Sadr Calls for Followers to Lay Down Arms
Insurgent Attacks Halt Iraqi Oil Exports

By Todd Pitman
The Associated Press
Monday, August 30, 2004; 4:33 PM

BAGHDAD, Iraq -- Rebel Shiite cleric Moqtada Sadr called for his followers across Iraq to end fighting against U.S. and Iraqi forces and is planning to join the political process in the coming days, an Sadr aide said Monday.

Meanwhile, Iraqi oil exports came to a halt after a rash of insurgent attacks on the country`s petroleum infrastructure, the country`s main source of income, senior oil company officials and the governor of the southern province of Basra said.

Oil prices edged higher in advance of the opening of trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. October contracts for light crude were up 26 cents at $43.44 a barrel. But that was well below peaks of over $48 a barrel in mid-August.

The announcement by Sadr came as his aides were trying to negotiate an end to fighting in the Baghdad slum of Sadr City and in the southern city of Basra, where clashes have continued even after a peace deal was reached in Najaf, the holy city where Sadr militiamen battled U.S. and Iraqi forces for three weeks.

Sadr also called for U.S. and Iraqi forces to withdraw from the center of Iraqi cities, Sheik Ali Smeisim told The Associated Press. However, that did not appear to be a condition for the unilateral ceasefire.

"I call on the interim Iraqi government to have patience ... and to pull back the American and Iraqi forces from the center of Iraqi cities," Smeisim said, speaking on behalf of Sadr. "At the same time I call on the forces of the Mahdi Army (militia) to ... stop firing until the announcement of the political program adopted by the Sadrist movement."

When asked if the cease fire would take effect immediately, he said: "I hope so."

The announcement could provide a major boost to the government of interim Prime Minister Ayad Allawi. Sadr has fiercely opposed the continued U.S. presence in Iraq and has denounced Allawi`s government as dependent on the Americans -- but if he decides to join politics, it would suggest Sadr`s acceptance of the U.S.-backed political process due to lead to elections in January.

Allawi has also demanded Sadr disband his Mahdi Army militia, but the aides did not say the cleric was considering doing so. The militia has emerged intact from the weeks of fighting with U.S. forces, and Sadr has gained popularity among some sectors of Shiites, particularly the poor.

"This latest initiative shows that we want stability and security in this country by ending all confrontation in all parts of Iraq," said Sheik Raed al-Khadami, Sadr`s spokesman in Baghdad. "Sadr`s office in Najaf will call within the next two days to join the political process."

Sadr visited the Imam Ali Shrine in the city of Najaf for the first time since his militia left the holy site of Friday after weeks of using as a stronghold and refuge during the fighting with the Americans.

Sadr asked religious authorities for permission to enter the shrine and made a brief visit on Monday, according to the office of Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, Iraq`s top Shiite cleric.

Uprisings by Sadr`s fighters this month and in April increased the security problems faced by Allawi`s government, on top of the Sunni Muslim-led insurgency that has plagued Iraq since the fall of Saddam Hussein more than a year ago.

Oil exports, which have been falling for days because of a string of insurgent attacks, came to a complete stop from southern pipelines, which account for 90 percent of Iraq`s exports, after an explosion Sunday.

Two senior officials of the South Oil Co., speaking Monday on condition of anonymity, said the southern lines were not likely to resume operations for at least a week. Iraq`s other export avenue, a northern pipeline to the Turkish Mediterranean port of Ceyhan, also carried no oil Monday, according to an oil official in Ceyhan.

Basra Gov. Hassan al-Rashid confirmed that oil exports in the south were halted completely Monday. "Yes, they are stopped," he told The Associated Press.

Al-Rashid said the country was losing $70 million a day because of the attacks on pipelines and oil fields.

"A number of saboteurs and terrorists who are spread across Iraq are behind these operations, and they are taking advantage of the lack of security in order to destroy the country`s economy," he said.

Allawi condemned the pipeline attacks, saying they were making ordinary Iraqis suffer.

"This is causing a great loss for the Iraqi people in terms of revenues, which could be used in the reconstruction of the country and to pay the people and get the economy back on track again," Allawi said in an interview with CNN aired Monday.

The latest strikes, which hit five pipelines linked to the southern Rumeila oil fields on Sunday, immediately shut down the Zubayr 1 pumping station, forcing officials to use reserves from storage tanks to keep exports flowing for several hours. The reserves ran out late Sunday, the South Oil Co. official said.

Saboteurs last brought southern oil exports to a halt in June.

The job of guarding oil pipelines primarily falls to the U.S.-trained Iraqi infrastructure protection service, although some U.S. soldiers continue to be to be involved. But with about 4,350 miles of pipelines crisscrossing the country, officials concede there are many places for saboteurs to strike.

"Those pipelines are very long and very vulnerable," a U.S. diplomat in Baghdad said on condition of anonymity. The official said it wasn`t immediately clear who was responsible for the latest wave of pipeline bombings. "There are many insurgent and terrorist groups active in Iraq," the official said.

In Baghdad, insurgents fired three mortar rounds into an eastern neighborhood early Monday but there were no immediate reports of casualties, Interior Ministry spokesman Col. Adnan Abdul-Rahman.

South of the capital, gunmen fired on the motorcade of the government`s top official in charge of Shiite religious affairs, Sheik Hassan Baraka al-Shami, wounding two of his bodyguards, his spokesman said Monday.

© 2004 The Associated Press

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August 31, 2004
OP-ED COLUMNIST
A No-Win Situation
By PAUL KRUGMAN

Everyone wants to go to Baghdad; real men want to go to Tehran." That was the attitude in Washington two years ago, when Ahmad Chalabi was assuring everyone that Iraqis would greet us with flowers. More recently, some of us had a different slogan: "Everyone worries about Najaf; people who are really paying attention worry about Ramadi."

Ever since the uprising in April, the Iraqi town of Falluja has in effect been a small, nasty Islamic republic. But what about the rest of the Sunni triangle?

Last month a Knight-Ridder report suggested that U.S. forces were effectively ceding many urban areas to insurgents. Last Sunday The Times confirmed that while the world`s attention was focused on Najaf, western Iraq fell firmly under rebel control. Representatives of the U.S.-installed government have been intimidated, assassinated or executed.

Other towns, like Samarra, have also fallen to insurgents. Attacks on oil pipelines are proliferating. And we`re still playing whack-a-mole with Moktada al-Sadr: his Mahdi Army has left Najaf, but remains in control of Sadr City, with its two million people. The Christian Science Monitor reports that "interviews in Baghdad suggest that Sadr is walking away from the standoff with a widening base and supporters who are more militant than before."

For a long time, anyone suggesting analogies with Vietnam was ridiculed. But Iraq optimists have, by my count, already declared victory three times. First there was "Mission Accomplished" - followed by an escalating insurgency. Then there was the capture of Saddam - followed by April`s bloody uprising. Finally there was the furtive transfer of formal sovereignty to Ayad Allawi, with implausible claims that this showed progress - a fantasy exploded by the guns of August.

Now, serious security analysts have begun to admit that the goal of a democratic, pro-American Iraq has receded out of reach. Anthony Cordesman of the Center for Strategic and International Studies - no peacenik - writes that "there is little prospect for peace and stability in Iraq before late 2005, if then."

Mr. Cordesman still thinks (or thought a few weeks ago) that the odds of success in Iraq are "at least even," but by success he means the creation of a government that "is almost certain to be more inclusive of Ba`ath, hard-line religious, and divisive ethnic/sectarian movements than the West would like." And just in case, he urges the U.S. to prepare "a contingency plan for failure."

Fred Kaplan of Slate is even more pessimistic. "This is a terribly grim thing to say," he wrote recently, "but there might be no solution to the problem of Iraq" - no way to produce "a stable, secure, let alone democratic regime. And there`s no way we can just pull out without plunging the country, the region, and possibly beyond into still deeper disaster." Deeper disaster? Yes: people who worried about Ramadi are now worrying about Pakistan.

So what`s the answer? Here`s one thought: much of U.S. policy in Iraq - delaying elections, trying to come up with a formula that blocks simple majority rule, trying to install first Mr. Chalabi, then Mr. Allawi, as strongman - can be seen as a persistent effort to avoid giving Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani his natural dominant role. But recent events in Najaf have demonstrated both the cleric`s awesome influence and the limits of American power. Isn`t it time to realize that we could do a lot worse than Mr. Sistani, and give him pretty much whatever he wants?

Here`s another thought. President Bush says that the troubles in Iraq are the result of unanticipated "catastrophic success." But that catastrophe was predicted by many experts. Mr. Cordesman says their warnings were ignored because we have "the weakest and most ineffective National Security Council in post-war American history," giving control to "a small group of neoconservative ideologues" who "shaped a war without any realistic understanding or plans for shaping a peace."

Yesterday Mr. Bush, who took a "winning the war on terror" bus tour just a few months ago, conceded that "I don`t think you can win" the war on terror. But he hasn`t changed the national security adviser, nor has he dismissed even one of the ideologues who got us into this no-win situation. Rather than concede that he made mistakes, he`s sticking with people who will, if they get the chance, lead us into two, three, many quagmires.

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company

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August 31, 2004
DEVELOPMENTS
U.S. Envoy to Iraq Urges Shift of Money to Security
By STEVEN R. WEISMAN

WASHINGTON, Aug. 30 - The new American ambassador in Iraq, concerned about the problems of unemployed Iraqis and by attacks on the country`s oil fields, has urged the Bush administration to shift money away from infrastructure improvements and use it to improve security and job opportunities, Bush administration officials said Monday.

The officials said that under a proposal submitted last week by the ambassador, John D. Negroponte, more than $3.3 billion in aid that had been set aside for improvements in Iraq`s utilities, electricity, water and sewage needed to be spent for other purposes to show quickly results that could be seen by discontented Iraqis.

The recommended policy shift, first reported by The Wall Street Journal, is to be discussed at an interagency meeting as early as this week. Administration officials said that Mr. Negroponte`s suggestions also would have to be discussed with budget officials in Congress, which appropriated $18 billion for Iraq`s reconstruction last year.

The Negroponte recommendation was seen in the administration as a sign of the State Department moving to take control of the nonmilitary agenda in Iraq. During the occupation, which ended June 28, officials at the State Department were incensed over being sidelined by Defense Department officials then in charge of reconstruction.

"The recommendations are the result of a review that Negroponte began even before he arrived in Baghdad," a State Department official said. "He`s reached the conclusion that a lot of the infrastructure improvements that Iraq needs simply cannot go forward unless the security situation is improved."

Of the money proposed to be shifted, $1.8 billion is to help pay for 45,000 new Iraqi police officers, 16,000 new border patrol officers, 99 new border outposts and an additional 20 Iraqi National Guard battalions. A battalion is about 1,000 people. On top of these expenditures, money is proposed for training and equipment.

Another $140 million would be used to provide assistance for elections that are to be held at the end of this year or the beginning of the next. The United Nations is supposed to be in charge of arranging for the elections, but an administration official said there was a growing feeling the United Nations may not have the resources to do the job.

At the time of the American transfer of power to a newly sovereign government in Iraq in late June, American officials said one of their greatest disappointments during the occupation after the ouster of Saddam Hussein was the failure to be able to spend reconstruction funds rapidly enough.

Of the $18 billion appropriated by Congress following the end of major combat, only about $600 million had actually been spent on contracts with companies hired to rebuild Iraq`s infrastructure.

As a result, just before the transfer of power, the occupation shifted $2.5 billion in Iraqi oil revenues, which were nominally under control of the Iraqi oil and finance ministries, to construction projects that would provide a quick payoff to Iraqis increasingly skeptical about American intentions.

On a visit to Baghdad during the summer, Secretary of State Colin L. Powell told Americans at the new embassy that he wanted a thorough review of procedures on spending. Aides to Mr. Powell said that more specifically, he wanted to know why there had been so many delays.

Administration officials say the delays were a result of many factors, including cumbersome contracting regulations imposed by the Congress and a heightened sensitivity over the fact that early in the occupation several contracts were awarded without competitive bidding to the Halliburton Company, once headed by Vice President Dick Cheney.

When they went into Iraq, many administration development experts approached the aid programs in a traditional way. The idea was that improvements to power generation capacity, electricity lines, water and sewage would be "precursors for larger economic investments" down the road, an administration official said.

But that view did not take into account the problems arising from the spread of the anti-American insurgency. Rebels were also attacking oil fields, making it clear that without security it made little sense to keep spending money to improve oil production equipment.

In Baghdad, a senior military commander said Monday that some of the newly shifted money could be spent in unstable parts of the country, such as the section of Baghdad known as Sadr City, where supporters of Moktada al-Sadr are able to keep their insurgency going because of local anger at the failures of the American presence.

The commander said that while it would be "wonderful" to clean up the banks of the Tigris River, as originally envisioned by some American planners, it was much more urgent to clean up local sewers and get jobs for the people firing rocket-propelled grenades at American troops.

"Right now it`s not long-term projects that matter,`` the commander said. "What matters is cleaning up Ahmed`s sewer.``

The American effort is to be supervised in coming weeks by William B. Taylor Jr., a State Department diplomat who until recently oversaw the reconstruction and plans for elections in Afghanistan. In the 1990`s, Mr. Taylor was involved in similar projects in the Balkans.

American officials in Washington and Baghdad say their priority now is to stabilize as much of the country as possible in order to clear the way for the elections. Elections for a constitutional convention are to take place in December or January.

John F. Burns contributed reporting from Baghdad for this article.

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company

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Sistani most popular Iraqi leader, US pollsters find
By Donald Macintyre in Baghdad

31 August 2004

Ayatollah Ali-al Sistani, who halted the three weeks of fighting in Najaf, is the most popular public figure in Iraq, says a poll which shows a deep undercurrent of respect for religious parties ahead of campaigning for elections planned for January.

Even before the three-week battle for control of Najaf, Iraq`s most venerated Shia cleric came just ahead of leading figures in the interim Iraqi government and well ahead of Muqtada al-Sadr, the man he ordered to lay down his arms last Thursday night.

But Sadr, a leading figure in agitation for a US pullout from Iraq, was high the league table of public figures, with 57.19 percent of Iraqis viewing him positively before his gunmen fought coalition and Iraqi forces in the holy city.

The confidential poll, for the International Republican Institute, an offshoot of the US Republican Party and chaired by Senator John McCain, is one of the most comprehensive surveys of Iraqi public opinion since the fall of Saddam Hussein 16 months ago. It shows that most Iraqis see the restoration of a full electricity supply as their primary concern in reconstruction of the country; The biggest group regard crime as the issue most affecting them, and the ability to maintain "order and stability" is the key factor by which they will judge the political parties.

The survey, seen by The Independent after being shown to several Iraqi political parties, was done at the end of July and is a snapshot of opinion a month after the handover of sovereignty. But at its heart are complex and sometimes contradictory attitudes on the role of religion in the future of the country.

The Islamic parties Dawa, SCIRI, and the IIP are viewed most positively by potential electors and 29 per cent - the biggest single group - believes religious figures will make the best candidates in the elections, ahead of university academics (24 per cent), party leaders(16 per cent) and dissidents against the former regime (5.25 per cent) Almost 70 per cent of those polled agree with the proposition that Islam and sharia should be the "sole basis" of all laws, and 70 per cent say they would prefer a "religious" state. Only 23 per cent would opt for a secular one.

But only 4.74 per cent regard a party`s religious ties as a key factor by which it will judge whether to vote for a political party. compared with nearly 20 per cent who regard stability and order as the key criterion. Even fewer, 4.52 per cent and 4.28 per cent, respectively say they will judge a party according to whether it is from their own religious or ethnic group.

The latter finding on ethnicity suggests sectarian rivalries between groups, including Sunnis, Shias and Kurds, may be a less potent electoral factor than has sometimes been assumed.

But despite the reflexive emphasis on the importance of sharia, a total of 68 per cent say that they would prefer politicians to be "pragmatic" compared with only 26 per cent who value "principled" politicians most. And 63 per cent would prefer them "modern", to 18 per cent "traditional." Some analysts will see this as strong evidence that Iraqi public opinion does not favour a fundamentalist religious state on the model of Iran.

That is supported by the huge popularity of Ayatollah al-Sistani who even before his authority was enhanced by his role in ending the battle for Najaf had 73.98 per cent approval ratings, and who is widely believed not to favour a strict Islamic state in which clerics play a leading political role.

One of the most striking figures in the survey is that 80 per cent of potential electors have not yet identified with a particular political party, a finding which suggests a continuing and potentially dangerous vacuum, but also that parties which do not yet have a profile among the nascent Iraqi electorate may have everything to play for. Dawa, and to a lesser extent SCIRI, (who both have "very positive" ratings of more than 23 per cent) have a high profile and are seen to have borne the most savage impact of their long-standing opposition to the Saddam regime.

Sadr`s rating was notably high - at least before the events of the past month - the biggest single group of voters (44 per cent) are less likely to vote a party because it has a militia compared with a mere 7 per cent who say they would be more likely to vote for such a party.

Another striking finding is that 84 per cent value highest in politicians the characteristic of "mature and experienced", compared with only 11 per cent who want them "dynamic and youthful". Seventy per cent would rather see their politicians as "deliberative" than "decisive", which got 26 per cent.

The personal ratings show that Ghazi Al Yawer, the country`s President, is strongly or "somewhat" approved by 72 per cent of electors, which may suggest Iraqis are not yet used to the idea that the Presidency is a much more honorific post than others. Iyad Allawi, the Prime Minister, is at 72 per cent while the figures also show a striking popularity for Ibrahim Jaffari, the moderate Islamist vice president who publicly criticised the government`s handling of the Najaf crisis.

Abdel Aziz al Hakim, the leader of SCIRI and brother of the Shia leader Mohammed al-Bakr Hakim, murdered a year ago, is at 61.53 per cent, and Adnan Pachachi, whose Iraqi Independent Democrats has yet to acquire a high profile, has personal approval ratings of 46.5 per cent.


31 August 2004 10:25


© 2004 Independent Digital (UK) Ltd

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The angry editor

As the slick editor of Vanity Fair, America`s celebrity bible, Graydon Carter has never shown much interest in politics. But now he has written a passionate diatribe against George Bush. Here he explains why
Emma Brockes
Tuesday August 31, 2004

The Guardian
Perhaps it is his long, girly eyelashes or Tintin hair, but Graydon Carter has the air of someone not altogether serious. He edits Vanity Fair, the magazine of lush exteriors, a position he has held for 12 years and which confers on him an almost aristocratic status in American journalism. When we meet in a London hotel, Carter practically glides into the room, propelled by the sail-power in his billowing white shirt. He once founded a satirical magazine and has kept the habit of sardonic delivery. "Oh, completely, always," he says drily, when asked if he gets unfairly categorised as a fluffy celebrity-worshipper; he smiles and looks away with a distant, more-in-sorrow-than-in-anger sort of look. "But that`s natural."

Carter fights his reputation as a lightweight, but even he admits that he is surprised by the book he has just written. During his editorship of Vanity Fair, the 55-year-old has made a point of neither voting nor buying shares, a position of lofty disinterest from which he descends with a 340-page polemic attacking Bush and comparing Donald Rumsfeld to Hermann Goering.

What We`ve Lost: How the Bush Administration Has Curtailed Freedoms, Ravaged the Environment and Damaged America and the World is a book that has been assembled rather more than written. With great recourse to lists and bullet-point breakdowns, it audits Bush`s shortcomings across every department of government, opening each chapter with one of the president`s goofy quotes ("It`s clearly a budget. It`s got lots of numbers in it") then slamming home wave after wave of damning facts and anecdotes: that Bush tried to reclassify "manufacturing" jobs to include people who worked in fast-food joints; that teachers in Missouri were ordered to remove every third light bulb from schools to save money; that parents of soldiers in Iraq were in some cases forced to buy their children`s own body-armour vests ("$1,500 retail"), plus hundreds of statistics attesting to Bush`s failure to help America`s poor, sick and discriminated against. The result is so overwhelming that it reads a little as if someone has fed "Bush, presidency, fuck up" into a search engine on the internet and loosely organised the results. Carter says he intended to write a short handbook, but that the more he and his researchers looked into it, the longer the book got.

"We had meetings on the research every couple of days; we went through 30,000 reports - it was daunting, what the Bush administration had done," he says. "I went into this thinking I knew maybe a 10th of it; I didn`t know the 1,000th of it. I`m really crummy at deadlines - which is strange, `cos I`m a very punctual person usually for lunches - and a really slow writer, but I had to do this in four months and worked till 2am every morning. I was saying to my kids, the one thing this book did was use my brain cells, `cos I`ve been an editor so long. An editor rarely uses his brain; he uses his gut more than his brain. My brain was worn out, the tips of my fingers were worn out."

With this book and the Vanity Fair editorials in which he rehearsed its outraged tone, Carter joins what might be regarded as the cultural opposition to Bush, a loose alliance that numbers among its members Michael Moore, the comic Al Franken, and the shock-jock Howard Stern - and which some suggest has done more to help dislodge Bush from the White House than full- time politicians like the anaemic John Kerry. Carter downplays his own influence. "I`m sort of flattered to be included with those guys," he says. "They are more vocal than I am, but I try to stay independent. The fact is that their greatest influence is in the Democratic states; when the cultural elite endorses a candidate anywhere else, people tend to run for the hills." Is the fact that people like Moore and Carter put so much energy into trashing Bush an indication of John Kerry`s failure to do so? "No. I`m not in the least disappointed with Kerry. I think he`s a perfect candidate; honest, forthright and he plays fairly. He is a very brave man. The thing people forget is that the only reason Bush looks presidential, is because he is president. You could stick Michael Moore on Air Force One and he`d look presidential, too."

Carter`s Vanity Fair editorials, formerly chatty introductions to the articles in that issue, now bolts of hellfire, can sit a little strangely with the Annie Leibowitz celebrity love-ins, although this, he says, is the magazine`s magic: soft on the outside, hard on the inside. Carter has been angry before, of course; he characterises himself as a "very angry young man" in the years when he set up and edited Spy, the satirical magazine, with Kurt Anderson, which mocked the very world Vanity Fair now celebrates. But, says Carter, you can`t carry on being furious like that and as he got older, got married and had four children (he is divorced now and engaged to Anna Scott, a British PR), he found he was quite content, not a good stance for a satirist. "But this got me up again," he says, "in the way I haven`t felt since my early 30s. It was a sense of outrage as you went along." The thing that most shocked him was the discovery that "the Bush administration is doing everything in its power to cut back the benefits for veterans, both of past wars and of the troops in Iraq now".

Does he at least think Bush believes he is doing the right thing? "I don`t know. I don`t know how you think you are doing the right thing by having a tax system that barely affects the middle class, and makes life so much easier for so many wealthy people. America has almost too many wealthy people and the tax cuts were designed for them."

Some of Carter`s friends warned him off doing the book - "You gotta be crazy," he recalls them saying, "they`ll come after you" - but in fact, if anyone is going to come after Carter, it is more likely to be his cohorts in the media. Already, bitchy remarks are circulating about the number of researchers Carter used (nine), which he responds to with a sigh and says: "The fact is I have a full-time job and four kids and I`m not much of a researcher myself. The fact is, unlike a lot of writers, I credit the people who help me. A lot of writers out there have a ton of researchers and they don`t get credited in the book. So."

Earlier this year Carter found himself attacked simultaneously in the New York Times and LA Times, with stories about a payment he received, some $100,000, for recommending the novel A Beautiful Mind as a film project to the producer, Brian Grazer, and the director, Ron Howard. It is not unusual for film ideas to come from magazines - another Russell Crowe flick, Proof of Life, came from a long Vanity Fair article about the kidnap and ransom industry - but there were whispers about the propriety of the magazine`s editor having a stake in a film which, through his magazine, he was in such a good position to promote. The surrounding furore took oxygen from a certain dislike of Carter`s style, in the same way that his predecessor at Vanity Fair, Tina Brown, was so eagerly mocked for her failure at Talk magazine. But there was also a genuine unease at the relationship of journalists such as Carter to the people they report on; Howard and Grazer appeared in the Vanity Fair top powerbrokers list and the film, which won an Oscar, was obviously well covered in the magazine.

"Confused, not bruised," he says of the episode. "I had no idea where it was coming from. It was just a ... I was being criticised for being successful. I do documentary films on the side, one of which is called 9/11 and is about these two documentary film-makers and the twin towers, and one called the Kid Stays in the Picture, about the life of Bob Evans. I loved doing them, they`re really fun and they did well. And I think that in some circles it`s going to cause some envy and I think this came from envy more than anything else, and envy is a characteristic I literally can`t understand."

This is the kind of defence to get Carter detractors howling, proof of how far he has come since his days at Spy, an egomaniac who, by his own admission, oversees every caption and headline in the magazine, having tried delegation and found it "didn`t work". Against the weight of his new book, Carter enemies might posit a daffy exchange he once had with Nicole Kidman, who interviewed him for another magazine.

NK: What keeps you curious? Isn`t that a lovely word? What`s your favourite word?

GC: My favourite word? It`s canoe. I love the word canoe and all that it implies and the history of the canoe and all the rest of it. The canoe is a big part of Canadian culture.

NK: That`s very strange. Canooooo, canooooo . . . It is a nice word.

GC: What`s your favourite word?

NK: Bliss.

Carter rolls his eyes at this and in his best sardonic drawl says: "Canoe is still one of my favourite words." He insists he isn`t grand - "Grand in what way?" he says, looking bemused - that he always eats "in the same crummy restaurant" in his neighbourhood in New York, that he doesn`t go to black-tie events, that at the Vanity Fair Oscars party he doesn`t work the room. Jesus, he`s not even American, he`s Canadian, from a modest upbringing outside Ottawa.

Nevertheless, I suggest that there is a problem with the power exerted by the Hollywood PR machine over magazines such as Vanity Fair: don`t they have to suck-up to succeed?

"I think that`s absolutely non-existent. I think it`s the most oversold story in the world. Because I`ve never found any kind of obstruction, pressure, anything, ever."

This isn`t what I`ve heard; Lynn Barber, for example, had to leave Vanity Fair after offending one of Hollywood`s most powerful PRs and being told, in not so many words, that she would never work in this town again.

"Well, the trouble is for Lynn to work, you`ve got to get the other person to sit down. Well, you can`t put a gun to someone`s head and say you have to sit down in this chair opposite Lynn. If Lynn could do her job without co-operation, she`d still be on staff. But it only works if you get a willing subject, and we ran out of willing subjects in the US."

But surely that`s an example of the power of the PR handlers? "No, I don`t know if it was that or not. I think she did a story on Michael Caine that he wasn`t thrilled with. But it`s not about that. That is the single most oversold, erroneous story in journalism."

Whenever he can, says Carter, he tries to get a non-film star on the cover - "even a musician is better" - while trying to keep "the utterly loathsome" off the front page. It is getting harder; "the level of celebrity in America now is so low," he says, "so unbelievably low."

Meanwhile, the staff at the magazine are proud he has added its voice to the political debate; if the book sells just one copy, he says, he`ll "have felt I have done my part". There is a point in What We`ve Lost wherein the two sides of Carter meet, a classic, Vanity Fair moment in which he quotes from a phone-in that took place last year on the political TV channel, C-Span. Half way through the conversation, it becomes clear that the caller complaining about Bush is an entertainer of some sort; after pressing for her identity, to no avail, the presenter eventually says in amazement: "Is this Cher ?" It is.

The lesson is clear: when even the celebrities are getting mad with Bush, we had jolly well better sit up and listen. This year, Graydon Carter will be voting.
Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2004

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Bush and Blair: four more years may bring wide rifts on the Middle East and Cuba

Simon Tisdall
Tuesday August 31, 2004

The Guardian
The crowd at the campaign rally in Annandale, Virginia, knew exactly what it wanted. As President George Bush mounted the podium, the cry went up: "Four more years! Four more years!"

It is a cry that will be heard again and again this week at the Republican party`s national convention in New York City. But while four more years of Mr Bush seems a terrific idea to the party faithful, the prospect arouses mixed feelings beyond America`s shores.

For Britain, in particular, Mr Bush`s term in office has proved divisive and occasionally humiliating, especially in respect of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, but also over issues ranging from climate change and the international criminal court to protectionist American steel tariffs.

There can be no doubt that Britain has been a good friend to the US in recent years. Whether the Bush administration has been a good friend to Britain is a different matter altogether.

So would four more years of Mr Bush follow the same pattern? The authors Ivo Daalder and James Lindsay, in their new book on the neo-conservative hegemonistic tendency, America Unbound, believe that the president has wrought a permanent foreign policy revolution.

They cite, in particular, his doctrine of pre-emptive war and regime change, his disdain for the "international community", and his unabashed unilateralism. It is what Robert Hunter, a former US ambassador to Nato, diplomatically calls a "major experiment in foreign policy".

But another body of US opinion, typified by Joseph Nye of Harvard, holds that recent experience - not least the chastening lessons of Iraq - are already pushing Mr Bush back toward a more traditional, consensus-based approach.

Professor Nye suggests that a second term would see greater US emphasis on allies and institutions and a search for negotiated, rather than military, solutions in places like North Korea.

Significantly, perhaps, a senior Republican senator, Chuck Hagel, recently called on the administration to "help strengthen global institutions... Winning the war on terrorism will require a seamless network of relationships", he said.

The UN, Mr Hagel said, "is more relevant today than it has ever been... [it] has an essential role to play in post-conflict transitions".

Britain`s former foreign secretary Robin Cook also believes Mr Bush`s actions since 2001 have demonstrated the limitations rather than the attractions of unilateralism. Rather than test this theory further, Mr Cook and others like him would plainly prefer to deal in future with a President John Kerry.

But whether or not Mr Bush has learned his lessons, Britain and Mr Blair must anticipate more sharp-edged problems with US policy if a second Bush term comes to pass.

One simmering area of disagreement concerns the Palestine-Israel conflict. Mr Blair has repeatedly personally championed the "road map" peace process; reports from Washington suggest that Mr Bush has effectively abandoned it. This is a row just waiting to happen.

Iran remains a big worry. While the potential for a transatlantic rift can be exaggerated, given London`s disappointment at Tehran`s perceived recent backward steps, US sabre-rattling echoes jarringly down Whitehall`s corridors.

Syria and Cuba reveal clearer differences in approach. Mr Bush`s controversial Latin America special envoy, Otto Reich, has been quietly cooking up a "transition strategy" for a post-Castro Cuba, ignoring the fact that President Castro is still very much around.

Threatening behaviour towards Damascus and Havana may be an unsavoury feature of a second Bush term. Meanwhile, further American "war on terror" excesses and its abuses of human rights and judicial processes could prove politically explosive in London.

Mr Bush`s refusal to support multilateral arms control and counter-proliferation treaties, particularly dismaying to Britain, would be another ongoing source of friction. There is a high embarrassment factor, too, in his insistence on pursuing "son of Star Wars" missile defences, including upgraded British facilities.

Given the enduring importance to the US of cheap foreign oil, as highlighted by the presidential campaign, Mr Blair`s efforts to resuscitate the Kyoto pact may continue to struggle. Nor is another British priority - meeting the UN`s millennium development goals and raising overall foreign aid - likely to receive much bottom-line encouragement.

It may be that a second-term Bush will be a changed man. Failing that admittedly optimistic scenario, it may be that Mr Blair will be able to paper over any difficulties and disappointments, as hitherto, and so maintain his White House best-buddy routine.

That assumes, of course, that Mr Blair will also be granted the favour of four more years.
Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2004

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Days of plunder

Coalition forces are doing little to prevent the widespread looting and destruction of Iraq`s world-famous historical sites
Zainab Bahrani
Tuesday August 31, 2004

The Guardian
The destruction of the Bamiyan Buddhas by the Taliban was met with an outcry in the United States, Britain and the countries that form the coalition in Iraq. Yet the coalition forces can now claim, among other things, the destruction of the legendary city of Babylon.

Ironically, the bombing campaign of 2003 had not damaged archeological sites. It was only in the aftermath, during the occupation, that the most extensive cultural destruction took place. At first there was the looting of the museums under the watch of coalition troops, but that was to be followed by more extensive and active destruction.

Active damage of the historical record is ongoing at several archeological sites occupied as military camps. At Babylon, I have seen the continuing construction projects, the removal of and digging into the ancient mounds over the past three months, despite a coalition press release early in June stating that work would halt, and the camp would be removed.

A helicopter landing zone, built in the heart of the ancient city, removed layers of archeological earth from the site. The daily flights of the helicopters rattle the ancient walls and the winds created by their rotors blast sand against the fragile bricks. When my colleague at the site, Maryam Moussa, and I asked military personnel in charge that the helipad be shut down, the response was that it had to remain open for security reasons, for the safety of the troops.

Between May and August, the wall of the Temple of Nabu and the roof of the Temple of Ninmah, both sixth century BC, collapsed as a result of the movement of helicopters. Nearby, heavy machines and vehicles stand parked on the remains of a Greek theatre from the era of Alexander of Macedon. The minister of culture has asked for the removal of military bases from all archeological sites, but none has yet been relocated.

Iraq is ancient Mesopotamia, otherwise called the "cradle of civilisation". It has more than 10,000 listed archeological sites, as well as hundreds of medieval and Ottoman Muslim, Christian and Jewish monuments. The coalition did not establish a means of guarding the sites, though they would be protected in any other country rich in antiquities. As a result, archeological sites are being looted to an extent previously unimagined.

The looting supplies the appetites of an international illicit trade in antiquities, and many objects end up in places like Geneva, London, Tokyo and New York. The lack of border controls has only added to the ease with which the illegal trade in Mesopotamian artefacts functions. The looting leaves the sites bulldozed and pitted with robber holes. Ancient walls, artefacts, scientific data are all destroyed in the process.

But it is not only the stolen artefacts that are lost. The loss of this data is the loss of the ancient history of this land. Many important Sumerian and Babylonian cities have been irreversibly damaged in this way already. Passive destruction of this kind has been widespread under the occupation, but antiquity is not the only area of concern.

In Baghdad, the National Library and State Archives building is a burned-out shell in which the employees work in the most horrendous conditions. The Ottoman archive that records the history of the country, spanning the 16th to the early 20th centuries, is in the gravest danger. Having been soaked by flooding last year, the archive began to mould. Upon the advice of conservators, the entire archive was removed to freezers to stop the mould.

Because of the lack of electricity and equipment, the only place that could be found with large freezers, and where power could be maintained, was an abandoned and bombed building that had previously been a Ba`athist officers` club. In Iraq, where it is not unusual for temperatures to soar up to 60C (140F) in summer, and where the Coalition Provisional Authority never managed to restore the electrical power to the country, this was no small feat.

The power in Baghdad (outside the US-occupied presidential palace and embassy buildings) is available, sporadically, about nine hours a day. If the archives should thaw, the documents will be destroyed. The conservation process needs to be done in a time- and climate-controlled manner if the archive is to be saved. But the Coalition Provisional Authority reassigned ownership of this building to the ministry of justice. There is now still no place to move this archive to, the loss of which would be the loss of the modern historical records of Iraq, much of which has not been studied or published.

In the midst of the disasters of Iraq under occupation, the condition of its cultural heritage may seem a trivial matter. But, as a historian of antiquity, I am painfully aware that there is no parallel for the amount of historical destruction that has taken place over the past 15 months in Iraq. The Geneva and Hague conventions make the protection of heritage the responsibility of the foreign powers during occupation. Instead, what we have seen under the occupation is a general policy of neglect and even an active destruction of the historical and archeological record of the land.

· Zainab Bahrani is professor of ancient near eastern art history and archaeology, Columbia University

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Bush Cites Doubt America Can Win War on Terror
By ELISABETH BUMILLER

The New York Times

August 31, 2004

NASHUA, N.H., Aug. 30 - President Bush, in an interview broadcast on Monday, said that he did not think America could win the war on terror but that it could make terrorism less acceptable around the world, a departure from his previous optimistic statements that the United States would eventually prevail.

In the interview with Matt Lauer of the NBC program "Today," conducted on Saturday but shown on the opening day of the Republican National Convention, Mr. Bush was asked if the United States could win the war against terrorism, which he has made the focus of his administration and the central thrust of his re-election campaign.

"I don`t think you can win it," Mr. Bush replied. "But I think you can create conditions so that those who use terror as a tool are less acceptable in parts of the world."

As recently as July 19, Mr. Bush had drawn a far sunnier picture. "I have a clear vision and a strategy to win the war on terror," he said.

At a prime-time news conference in the East Room of the White House on April 13, Mr. Bush said: "One of the interesting things people ask me, now that we are asking questions, is, `Can you ever win the war on terror?` Of course you can."

It was unclear if Mr. Bush had meant to make the remark to Mr. Lauer, or if he misspoke. But White House officials said the president was not signaling a change in policy, and they sought to explain his statement by saying he was emphasizing the longterm nature of the struggle.

Taken at face value, however, Mr. Bush`s words would put him closer to the positions of the United States` European allies, who have considered Mr. Bush`s talk of victory as simplistic and unhelpful.

Scott McClellan, the White House press secretary, told reporters on Air Force One that Mr. Bush was speaking about winning the war "in the conventional sense" and that his comments underscored the reality that ridding the world of terrorists would take decades.

"I don`t think you can expect that there will ever be a formal surrender or a treaty signed like we have in wars past," Mr. McClellan said. "That`s what he was talking about. It requires a generational commitment to win this war on terrorism."

Mr. Bush`s comment came only a few days after an interview with The New York Times in which he acknowledged a "miscalculation`` about the evolution of the insurgency in Iraq, saying that no one could have anticipated that a swift military victory would allow forces loyal to Saddam Hussein and others to melt into the cities and launch attacks on American forces.

But Democrats clearly saw those comments, and the one broadcast Monday, as missteps they could exploit, much as Mr. Bush has attacked Mr. Kerry`s remark that he would have authorized the president to invade Iraq if he had known then what he knows now about Iraq`s weapons.

"After months of listening to the Republicans base their campaign on their singular ability to win the war on terror, the president now says we can`t win the war on terrorism," Senator John Edwards, Mr. Kerry`s running mate, said in a statement. "This is no time to declare defeat - it won`t be easy and it won`t be quick, but we have a comprehensive longterm plan to make America safer. And that`s a difference."

Mr. Edwards elaborated on his criticism in an interview Monday with the ABC program "Nightline.`` Mr. Edwards said the battle against terrorism was "absolutely winnable" with the right leadership. "Now, in order to win it," Mr. Edwards said, "we have to do the right thing, which includes some of the things that I spoke about today: reform our intelligence operations, more human intelligence inside these terrorist cells, being more aggressive about the developing nuclear threats in North Korea and Iran, and different plans - a more effective plan in Iraq, a more effective plan in Afghanistan.``

Mr. Kerry, who has limited his campaigning this week, was asked at his vacation home in Nantucket whether the war on terror could be won. He replied, "Absolutely."

Analysts said Mr. Bush`s comment reflected both foreign policy and political realities, and appeared intended in part to emphasize that even a striking breakthrough, like the capture of Osama bin Laden, would not by itself assure the nation`s security.

"From the start it`s been clear that we`re dealing with an ideological struggle that affects a region, and not just a single movement or group," said Anthony Cordesman, a fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

With Mr. Kerry having trouble getting across how his approach would have been different from Mr. Bush`s approach to Iraq, Mr. Bush can show some flexibility in his thinking, Mr. Cordesman said. "Bush can afford to move to a more nuanced ground precisely because Kerry has been unable to occupy it," he said.

Former Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani of New York sounded more optimistic about overcoming terrorism when he addressed the convention Monday evening. "We will see an end to global terrorism,`` Mr. Giuliani said. "I know it will happen. It may seem a long way off. It may even seem idealistic. But it may not be as far away and idealistic as it seems.``

Mr. Bush`s comment was broadcast as he campaigned in Michigan and New Hampshire on his record on fighting terrorism, part of a leadup to his acceptance speech at the Republican convention in New York on Thursday night. In a part of the NBC interview that was broadcast during the weekend, he also commented on his National Guard service during the Vietnam War and that of Mr. Kerry, a decorated combat veteran. "I think him going to Vietnam was more heroic than my flying fighter jets,`` Mr. Bush said. "On the other hand, I served my country. Had my unit been called up I would have gone.``

In New Hampshire, Mr. Bush got an unusually tough question at an "Ask President Bush" event at Nashua High School North, forcing him to detour from his message of the day and defend Prime Minister Ariel Sharon of Israel.

"How can Ariel Sharon be a man of peace, as you`ve said, if he causes death and torture among innocent Palestinians?" demanded a young woman who said she had recently spent two weeks in Libya.

"That`s a great question," Mr. Bush responded. "First of all, Ariel Sharon is defending his country against terrorist attacks, just like we will." Mr. Bush then blamed the Palestinians for holding up progress in the Middle East. "Ariel Sharon is a duly elected official in a democracy," the president said. "We would hope that the Palestinians would have that same kind of democracy."

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Franken wants us to `fuggedaboutdit`

By SAM DOLNICK
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

NEW YORK - Al Franken wants you to get up out of your chairs, open your windows, stick your heads out and yell... fuggedaboutdit?

Well, yes.

In the spirit of Paddy Chayefsky`s classic movie monologue from "Network," the liberal comedian urged New Yorkers - and other Americans - to simultaneously scream the all-purpose local wisecrack at the moment that President Bush accepts the nomination.

"This is a form of protest that is very non-disruptive," Franken said at a press conference in the Park Avenue office of Air America radio network, where he hosts a talk show.

Franken said the Sept. 2 protest, called the "Great American Shout-Out," will not "tax our public safety system at all."

"This is our way of venting," Franken added. "It will be a catharsis."

Franken said he expected the shouts to last less than five minutes. Out of "respect for the office of the presidency," he asked that participants quiet down once Bush begins speaking so "people can hear him give a bad speech."

Franken said he expects 100 million people nationwide to participate, adding: "Anything less would be a horrific failure."

Unlike the movie version - "I`m as mad as hell, and I`m not going to take this anymore!" - this protest has been tailor-made for regional dialects, Franken said.

In his native Minnesota, people are to yell "Oh no ya don`t!" in an exaggerated accent.

In California, the suggested shout is: "No way, dude!"

Air America has created a Web site, www.thegreatamericanshoutout.org, where participants can plan "shout parties" or let their solo shout be counted.

Air America began on five stations around the country on March 31 as a left-leaning political alternative to conservative talk radio. It now airs on 23 stations nationwide.



© 2004 The Sun Herald and wire service sources. All Rights Reserved.
http://www.sunherald.com

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washingtonpost.com
Michael Moore Joins the Press -- And Gets Some
[urlMcCain Criticizes Moore in Speech:]http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/mmedia/politics/083004-18v.htm[/url] Sen. John McCain (R - Ariz.) called Michael Moore a "disingenuous film maker."


By Mark Leibovich and Paul Farhi
Washington Post Staff Writers
Tuesday, August 31, 2004; Page C01

NEW YORK, Aug. 30 -- Michael Moore -- filmmaker, rabble-rouser, citizen -- wandered into a dangerous neighborhood on Monday. As a guest columnist for USA Today at the Republican National Convention, he only wanted to take some notes, he said, to observe.

But from the moment he entered Madison Square Garden, Moore was the one being observed.

For more than two hours, he created a comet`s tail of commotion. Holding a rolling news conference as he dragged a clot of some 70 reporters past a growing wave of security officials and hostile conventioneers, Moore came close to disrupting the entire convention.

"Moore, you loser! Get out!" shouted Dan Willard, an alternate Maryland delegate from Rockville.

Others merely scowled -- if not at Moore, then at the traffic jam he created.
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Director Michael Moore signals to the crowd on the convention floor after Sen. John McCain denounced him during his opening-night speech.
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Moore, whose anti-Bush film "Fahrenheit 9/11" is a $100 million-plus polemical blockbuster, seemed delighted by the ruckus. It gave him another platform to sound off on a variety of themes: the war in Iraq, the economy, the national debt.

When Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) called him "a disingenuous filmmaker" during his speech, Moore said, "Thank you, John McCain."

No offense taken. Only dollar signs.

"Hey, the film`s doing $120 million right now," Moore said. "When McCain mentions it, I have a chance to do $150 million. It just creates more interest, more excitement."

It sure did. At the senator`s gibe, delegates near Moore started pointing and booing, and the crowd roared, "Four more years! Four more years!" McCain said, "That line was so good, I`ll use it again," and the crowd booed Moore some more. In his faded burgundy baseball cap, the filmmaker just smiled and sort of waved.

Moore first attracted attention about 8:45 p.m. as he walked slowly over the temporary bridge that connects the media spillover building to Madison Square Garden. Stopped by a handful of reporters, Moore began to hold court. Video camera lights quickly popped on, and the knot around Moore grew.

It quickly became a crowd-control issue, and officials began trying to corral the unruly scribes. "You were told to stop," shouted one police officer as reporters tried to break through his hallway cordon. "If you don`t, I can arrest you."

This set off grumbling in the mob, with several reporters asserting their sacred First Amendment right to chase a celebrity through the corridors of a sports arena.

"This is my big rugby scrum," Moore said, explaining the scene around him to a security guard. "It`s a dangerous situation here," yelled a plainclothes NYPD officer. "Please make a lane. Please make a lane."

A delegate from Missouri called Moore a "disgrace," a few seconds after asking for his autograph.

"I could kick his [rear]," said Steven R. Schirripa, an actor on "The Sopranos" who is here as a "correspondent" for NBC`s "Tonight" show. "We need to get this Moore guy on `The Sopranos` in case we need to whack someone."

"I think that guy`s the most disgusting human being I`ve ever seen," said Jimmy Gilbert, a 66-year-old alternate from Lenoir, N.C.

Another passerby got in an anti-Moore plug: "Log into Moorewatch.com and Moorelies.com," he shouted, mentioning two conservative Web sites.

Officials began checking and rechecking Moore`s press credential as well as those of his private security detail. He just shrugged and leaned against a white cinderblock wall outside Gate 75. "It`s easier to go to a Knicks game, that`s for sure," he quipped.

At one point a photographer asked Moore to hold up his credential. He obliged, and the photographer snapped a picture of Moore with a pass that read "Media Messenger."

Finally, after starts and stops lasting almost a half-hour, Moore sat down in the press section inside the arena, where the convention was in progress. But working reporters fumed at those who had collected around Moore.

"I`m Dave Espo and I work for the Associated Press," a veteran reporter thundered to the police. "This is our work space and we need to get our work done. Please get these people out of here!"

The episode left Owen Ullman, deputy managing editor of USA Today`s editorial page, red-faced and a bit shaken. Ullman was, in effect, Moore`s sponsor, and thus was left to plead on his behalf with waves of security personnel.

"We invited Mr. Moore to write a column for us, and he asked if he could unobtrusively observe the convention," said Ullman, recognizing with hindsight the absurdity of that proposition. "We did not anticipate that many would consider him the story and that it would create such commotion."

Did he think Moore`s convention theatrics were planned? Ullman smiled and ducked: "I`ll have to talk to him about the experience."

© 2004 The Washington Post Company

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The GOP doesn`t reflect America
Michael Moore, Filmmaker
NEW YORK — Welcome, Republicans. You`re proud Americans who love your country. In your own way, you want to make this country a better place. Whatever our differences, you should be commended for that.

But what`s all this talk about New York being enemy territory? Nothing could be further from the truth. We New Yorkers love Republicans. We have a Republican mayor and governor, a death penalty and two nuclear plants within 30 miles of the city.

New York is home to Fox News Channel. The top right-wing talk shows emanate from here — Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Bill O`Reilly among them. The Wall Street Journal is based here, which means your favorite street is here. Not to mention more Fortune 500 executives than anywhere else.

You may think you`re surrounded by a bunch of latte-drinking effete liberals, but the truth is, you`re right where you belong, smack in the seat of corporate America and conservative media.

Let me also say I admire your resolve. You`re true believers. Even though only a third of the country defines itself as "Republican," you control the White House, Congress, Supreme Court and most state governments.

You`re in charge because you never back down. Your people are up before dawn figuring out which minority group shouldn`t be allowed to marry today.

Our side is full of wimps who`d rather compromise than fight. Not you guys.

Hanging out around the convention, I`ve encountered a number of the Republican faithful who aren`t delegates. They warm up to me when they don`t find horns or a tail. Talking to them, I discover they`re like many people who call themselves Republicans but aren`t really Republicans. At least not in the radical-right way that George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, John Ashcroft and Co. have defined Republicans.

I asked one man who told me he was a "proud Republican," "Do you think we need strong laws to protect our air and water?"

"Well, sure," he said. "Who doesn`t?"

I asked whether women should have equal rights, including the same pay as men.

"Absolutely," he replied.

"Would you discriminate against someone because he or she is gay?"

"Um, no." The pause — I get that a lot when I ask this question — is usually because the average good-hearted person instantly thinks about a gay family member or friend.

I`ve often found that if I go down the list of "liberal" issues with people who say they`re Republican, they are quite liberal and not in sync with the Republicans who run the country. Most don`t want America to be the world`s police officer and prefer peace to war. They applaud civil rights, believe all Americans should have health insurance and think assault weapons should be banned. Though they may personally oppose abortion, they usually don`t think the government has the right to tell a women what to do with her body.

There`s a name for these Republicans: RINOs or Republican In Name Only. They possess a liberal, open mind and don`t believe in creating a worse life for anyone else.

So why do they use the same label as those who back a status quo of women earning 75 cents to every dollar a man earns, 45 million people without health coverage and a president who has two more countries left on his axis-of-evil-regime-change list?

I asked my friend on the street. He said what I hear from all RINOs: "I don`t want the government taking my hard-earned money and taxing me to death. That`s what the Democrats do."

Money. That`s what it comes down to for the RINOs. They do work hard and have been squeezed even harder to make ends meet. They blame Democrats for wanting to take their money. Never mind that it`s Republican tax cuts for the rich and billions spent on the Iraq war that have created the largest deficits in history and will put all of us in hock for years to come.

The Republican Party`s leadership knows America is not only filled with RINOs, but most Americans are much more liberal than the delegates gathered in New York.

The Republicans know it. That`s why this week we`re seeing gay-loving Rudy Giuliani, gun-hating Michael Bloomberg and abortion-rights advocate Arnold Schwarzenegger.

As tough of a pill as it is to swallow, Republicans know that the only way to hold onto power is to pass themselves off as, well, as most Americans. It`s a good show.

So have a good time, Republicans. It could be your last happy party for awhile if all the RINOs and liberal majority figure it out on Nov. 2.

Political conventions have become predictable rituals, four-day cheerleading sessions for both parties. So USA TODAY is offering readers an alternative perspective. Liberal filmmaker Michael Moore, director of Fahrenheit 9/11, is writing daily from the Republican convention in New York. A month ago, conservative National Review columnist Jonah Goldberg weighed in from the Democratic convention.



Find this article at:
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Outing in USA. Das ist nun ein weiteres Opfer einer Outing Kampagne. Vor ein paar Wochen hat der Gouverneur von New Jersey ein Demokrat wegen einer schwulen Affäre das Handtuch geschmissen und nun ein republikanischer Kongressmann.
Eine Gruppe im Web versucht augenblicklich Politiker besonders gerne Republikaner wegen Homosexualität zu outen. Das ist die Antwort auf die GOP Kampagne gegen die Schwulenehe. Man hat noch mehr Kandidaten in der Mangel.

washingtonpost.com
Va. Legislator Ends Bid for 3rd Term
Schrock Cites Unspecified Allegations Questioning His Ability to Serve

By Michael D. Shear and Chris L. Jenkins
Washington Post Staff Writers
Tuesday, August 31, 2004; Page A02

Rep. Edward L. Schrock (R-Va.) abruptly dropped out of his race for a third term yesterday, citing unspecified "allegations" that he said called into question his ability to represent his Virginia Beach district.

In a statement, Schrock, 63, did not address the nature of the allegations, but he said they "will not allow my campaign to focus on the real issues facing our nation and region." His chief of staff, Tom Gordy, refused any further comment last night.

Schrock`s announcement came after a gay activist claimed on a Web site on Aug. 19 that Schrock is secretly gay.

Michael Rogers said his claims about Schrock were motivated by anger over what he said was the hypocrisy of the congressman`s opposition to gay rights while leading a gay life. He said the purpose of his Web site is to make public the names of lawmakers and other politicians who engage in such hypocrisy.

"Why should my community protect him?" Rogers asked. "He`s the enemy."

Rogers said on his Web site that Schrock had been recorded several years ago using a telephone service on which men place ads to arrange liaisons with other men. Rogers posted an audio link of an unidentified man placing an ad. Rogers said the man is Schrock, who is married and has a child.

The accusation by Rogers had circulated widely among Republicans in the state during the past 10 days and spurred rounds of talks among members of Congress, House leaders and local party leaders.

"We were unable to get any facts. It was all rumors and conjecture," said one Republican familiar with the talks who spoke on condition of anonymity. "No one wanted to believe the rumors. Everyone wanted to stand with Ed."

Last week, Gordy called Rogers`s accusations "unsubstantiated rumors" and insisted that Schrock would stand for reelection as planned.

But party leaders in the district began planning a meeting in case they needed to review their nomination. The 2nd District Republican Party is scheduled to meet tonight to select a new nominee.

Mark L. McKinney, chairman of the Virginia Beach Republican Committee, said he had not talked directly to Schrock. "It`s a shame that he had to resign because of a Web site that is trying to push a point of view . . . but . . . I have to believe that this was the reason why he stepped down."

Schrock`s announcement came on the first night of the Republican National Convention in New York.

Virginia`s top Republicans publicly ignored the sexual allegations and offered kind words about Schrock`s service in Congress. Schrock, a Navy veteran of the Vietnam War, was elected in 2000 to represent Virginia`s 2nd District, a conservative part of the state that includes Virginia Beach, parts of Norfolk and Hampton and Virginia`s Eastern Shore.

The area is home to many military bases and a large number of active-duty service people and veterans.

Schrock retired from the Navy in 1988 and later became an investment broker, resigning in 1995 to run successfully for the Virginia Senate.

In Congress, Schrock has served on the House Armed Services Committee. In 2001, he was elected president of the Republican House freshman class.

In 2000, the Virginian-Pilot said of Schrock that he favored ending the Clinton administration`s "Don`t ask, don`t tell" policy on gays in the military. He supported asking enlistees whether they have had homosexual experiences in an effort to try to keep gays from serving.

"You`re in the showers with them, you`re in the bunk room with them, you`re in staterooms with them," Schrock told the Virginian-Pilot. "You just hope no harm would come by folks who are of that persuasion. It`s a discipline thing."

Sen. George Allen (Va.), speaking from the Republican convention in New York, said through a spokesman: "I have enjoyed working with Ed Schrock for many years as governor and as senator. I respect his service to Virginia as well as the personal decision he made today."

Attorney General Jerry W. Kilgore, the Republican Party`s presumptive nominee for governor next year, said in a statement, "I think we should all thank Rep. Schrock for his tireless and devoted efforts on behalf of the Commonwealth."

The congressman`s decision has prompted what the state`s top elections official called "a scramble" to nominate a new candidate. Democrats have nominated David B. Ashe, an Iraq war veteran, as their candidate.

Politicians considered the seat a safe one for the Republican incumbent.

Jean Jensen, secretary of the Virginia State Board of Elections, said Republicans have until 5 p.m. Friday to replace Schrock.

Several state Republican lawmakers said they are considering seeking Schrock`s seat.

The leading candidates are state Sen. Kenneth W. Stolle (Virginia Beach) and Del. Thelma Drake (Norfolk), according to several Republican sources who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the events surrounding Schrock`s sudden decision. Del. John J. Welch III (Virginia Beach) also said he is considering a bid.

A clash between Stolle and Drake could exacerbate a philosophical split that erupted earlier this year over taxes. Stolle supported higher taxes; Drake fervently opposed them.

Republican Party Chairman Kate Obenshain Griffin, who presides over a state organization that has been rocked by one scandal after another in the past several years, said she hoped that her party would come together quickly to move on.

"It is now important for Virginia Republicans to unite behind our nominee and work hard to ensure the 2nd District continues to be represented by a Republican," she said.

Staff writer Spencer S. Hsu contributed to this report.

© 2004 The Washington Post Company

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For Openers, Recalling The Past to Win the Present

By John F. Harris
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, August 31, 2004; Page A01

NEW YORK, Aug. 30 -- One month after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, a poll showed that 92 percent of Americans approved of how President Bush was handling terrorism. Almost two years later, after the surrender of Baghdad, that number still stood at 79 percent.

The speakers who opened the Republican National Convention on Monday night -- led by Sen. John McCain (Ariz.) and former New York mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani -- launched a concerted effort to convince Americans that what they thought of Bush then remains the way they should think of him now.

The evening was replete with unabashed efforts to invoke the emotional trauma of New York`s Sept. 11 catastrophe on behalf of the Republican campaign. The aim was to restore the luster of Bush`s credentials on national security despite the scuffs these have taken from the problems of the Iraq occupation and handover. It was the political equivalent of reintroducing a famous consumer brand after a season of controversies. In Bush`s case, this meant trying to revive public appreciation for what had been his core assets: a reputation for strength and steadfastness against adversaries, even in the face of setbacks.

Convention stagers put little stock in subtlety. In addition to Giuliani, the partisans heard from the city`s former police chief, two widows of people who died on Sept. 11, as well as all manner of tributes to the firefighters, doomed airline passengers and other heroes of the terrorist attacks. The message, sometimes unstated and sometimes explicit, was that Bush`s presidency has itself been a story of rising to meet the demands of a terrible moment.

About 60 percent of Americans in a new Washington Post/ABC poll approved of Bush`s handling of terrorism, and in recent months that number has dipped as low as 50 percent -- potentially providing an opening to Democrat John F. Kerry on what both candidates say is the preeminent issue in this year`s race. The anomaly confronting Bush this year is that he is seen as comparatively effective on terrorism, but he has been dragged down by events in Iraq. The message from the podium here was to limit the Iraq damage by demonstrating Bush has been equally vigilant toward both problems.

Combined with Giuliani`s mockery of Kerry as an inveterate flip-flopper, the evening`s larger argument was that the country is safer with a president who may err through forceful action than with one who allows threats to build through timidity.

"We must learn from our mistakes, improve on our successes, and vanquish this unpardonable enemy," McCain said in a prime-time speech.

The message came wrapped in emotion-laden recollections of Bush`s performance after the airborne assault that leveled the twin towers, which once stood just a few miles from the Madison Square Garden convention hall. There were numerous efforts to link -- at least rhetorically -- Osama bin Laden`s al Qaeda terror network and deposed Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein as like-minded enemies in what McCain called "a big thing, this war . . . a fight between right and wrong, good and evil."

Although some Republican strategists said the party needs to be alert to the dangers of seeming to exploit Sept. 11 for political purposes, this risk plainly did not weigh heavily on the city`s former mayor.

He recalled grabbing the arm of then-police commissioner Bernard Kerik in the days after the attacks, when Bush visited the stricken city, and exclaiming, "Thank God George Bush is our president."

To a roar of applause from the assembled partisans, he added, "I say it again tonight. . . . Thank God George Bush is our president." Turning expressly partisan, Giuliani said the terrorism threat is a reason to vote Republican.

"I don`t believe that we`re right about everything and Democrats are wrong," he said. "Neither party has a monopoly on virtue. . . . But I do believe there are times in our history when our ideas are more necessary and more important and critical, and this is one of those times when we are facing war and danger."

If Sept. 11 and its aftermath remain the strongest political card in Bush`s security record, both polling and the opening-night speeches were a reminder that the Iraq invasion and its troubled aftermath are the opposite.

McCain devoted a substantial part of his address to defending the decision to dislodge Hussein through force. Two pillars of Bush`s case for war -- that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction and that there were important links between Hussein`s government and al Qaeda -- have not been supported by evidence since the war`s end.

But, McCain said, "Those who criticize that decision would have us believe that the choice was between a status quo that was well enough left alone and war.

"But there was no status quo to be left alone," he said. A 12-year-old containment policy was failing, and many nations "had decided the time had come again to do business with Saddam," McCain argued. He added that if Hussein remained in power indefinitely the dictator would have had time to gain weapons of mass destruction.

Bush`s choice, he said, "was between war and a graver threat. Don`t let anyone tell you otherwise -- not our critics abroad, not our political opponents."

Nonetheless, several Republicans have said the political baggage Bush is carrying from Iraq has affected his popularity enough that he has little choice but to portray Kerry as an unacceptable alternative. Among those who argued that was Sen. Lindsey O. Graham (R-S.C.) , who introduced McCain.

"These are just the times that you live in. I could say he`s going to be on Mount Rushmore, I mean he might be in his second term, but you`d have to be crazy and not know that some of the problems in the war are affecting us in South Carolina," Graham told Washington Post reporters and editors earlier in the day. "I`ve got some Republicans who are uneasy about the war."

Bush, he said, needs to convince voters that Kerry is not qualified by ideology or leadership traits to be commander in chief during an age of terrorism.

Monday evening, it was Giuliani who made this case, with obvious relish.

"President Bush sees world terrorism for the evil that it is," he said. "John Kerry has no such clear, precise and consistent vision."

Giuliani said he intended no personal criticism of Kerry, but he hurled his invective with the sting of a native New Yorker. He noted that Kerry had voted against the Persian Gulf War in 1991 but claimed he later said he supported the action. And he noted that Kerry voted to authorize force against Iraq in 2002, but this year voted against Bush`s $87 billion funding request to support the occupation.

"He even at one point declared himself an antiwar candidate. Now he says he`s a pro-war candidate," Giuliani said. "At this rate, with 64 days left, he still has time to change his position at least four or five more times."

Like Bush, Giuliani`s reputation soared after the Sept. 11 attacks. Were it not for his association with that event, Giuliani would hardly be a welcome figure to be addressing a Republican convention. He supports abortion rights and gay rights, both positions anathema to the culturally conservative delegates who dominate this convention.

Sen. Chuck Hagel (R-Neb.), who supports Bush even though he has been critical of the administration on Iraq and other issues, said he thinks the convention can cite Sept. 11 without inappropriately politicizing national tragedy. "The president`s leadership and how he has handled the responsibilities as president since that time are a big part of this campaign," he told Post reporters and editors.

"You can question whether he is using that event as a political prop, and that`s a fair question, but at the same time, I think it is fair and accurate to say that it is part of the last four years and a dramatic part -- and I think that reason itself is probably as good as an argument as any as to why they came here."

Alert listeners heard McCain seem to answer former president Bill Clinton, who at the Democratic convention in Boston chided Bush by saying, "Strength and wisdom are not opposing values." Arguing that there was no avoiding the war on terrorism, McCain said, "We tried that once and our reluctance cost us dearly."

Conventioneers leapt to their feet to applaud that apparent reference to Clinton`s record on terrorism. McCain said it made no sense to value smooth diplomacy over security, adding: "That`s not just an expression of our strength. It`s a measure of our wisdom."

© 2004 The Washington Post Company

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Poverty and Health



Tuesday, August 31, 2004; Page A20

THE CENSUS BUREAU reported last week that the poverty rate rose in 2003 for the third consecutive year and that the percentage of people without health insurance climbed for a third straight year as well. But what`s really revealing about the trends in poverty and health coverage is not the similarity, which reflects the downturn in the business cycle, but rather the contrast. Put simply, the long-term trend in health coverage is negative: The percentage of Americans without insurance is up from about 13 percent in the late 1980s to nearly 16 percent today. But the long-term trend in poverty is positive: The rate ranged between 13 percent and 15 percent in the 1980s, but it has hovered at about 12 percent in the past half-decade. Moreover, the real decline in poverty is bigger than suggested by these numbers.

What policy prescriptions follow? The health insurance figures are a call to action: Economic growth over the past 15 years has failed to improve coverage, so some kind of policy response is essential. Indeed, this conclusion is only reinforced if you dig into the data. The percentage of uninsured has gone up despite expanded government activism: Since 1987, the first year for which the Census Bureau has data, government has gone from covering 23.3 percent of the population to covering 26.6 percent, a rise that primarily reflects the extension of Medicaid to a wider circle of low-income people. But the trend in company-provided health insurance has been negative, except during the extraordinary bubble of the late 1990s. The soaring cost of health insurance is driving companies to withdraw coverage, and there`s little reason to expect this trend to reverse itself. More government activism -- possibly in the form of incentives to companies to keep offering insurance, such as those proposed by Sen. John F. Kerry -- seems unavoidable.

Interpreting the poverty data is harder. Economic growth has been a powerful antidote to poverty, and the long-term reduction in the poverty rate is all the more impressive because it defies powerful head winds. High immigration in the past two decades might have been expected to increase poverty; the same goes for the rise of single-parent families, which are four to five times as likely to be poor than two-parent ones. Yet economic growth, while powerful, is not a magic bullet. For one thing, the surprisingly small increase in the poverty rate during the recent economic downturn owes something to the policies of the 1990s, which provided financial incentives, training, child care and other services to people trying to escape poverty via work. For another, the positive news on the number of people in poverty masks an alarming trend. The number of people in extreme poverty -- that is, subsisting on less than half the income defined as the poverty line -- stands at 15.3 million, higher than at any time since the Census Bureau began collecting data 28 years ago.

This fact deserves more attention than it has received. The policies of the 1990s may have successfully pushed former welfare recipients into work, but those who have not found work, or who have found it and then lost it, appear to be worse off than before. A bit oddly, the congressional debate on reauthorizing the welfare law has dwelt minutely on the details of the design of work incentives rather than on the program`s function as a safety net; it is not often noted, for example, that fewer than half the families eligible for money and job training actually receive any, a shocking contrast with the participation rate of 80 percent that prevailed in the mid-1990s. A combination of deft government incentives and a strong economy may have reduced overall poverty. But the people at the very bottom are being forgotten.

© 2004 The Washington Post Company

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Questions For a Wartime President

By David Ignatius

Tuesday, August 31, 2004; Page A21

In the military gym in Baghdad`s Green Zone, where U.S. troops relax during their free time, there were three posters behind the front desk last month. One was Time magazine`s "Person of the Year," showing the proud faces of three American soldiers; the second was an iconic photograph of Muhammad Ali looming over a defeated opponent; the third, and the largest, was a photograph of the twin towers of the World Trade Center.

In the dining hall of the Republican Palace, where the soldiers eat, a painted image of the twin towers forms the background of a large mural. The emblems of the four military services are displayed around the towers and, to reinforce the link between Sept. 11 and Iraq, the mural includes the emblems of the New York police and fire departments. Below the towers are the words, "Thank God for the Coalition Forces and Freedom Fighters at Home and Abroad."

I suspect that if you polled U.S. soldiers in Iraq, this is what they would say they were fighting for: to avenge Sept. 11 and defeat the terrorists who were responsible for it. The characterization of Iraq as a battleground in the war against terrorism has been repeated frequently by President Bush -- so often, in fact, that it has assumed a life and logic of its own.

Most of the soldiers who lift weights and eat breakfast in the shadow of Sept. 11 wouldn`t question statements by the president and vice president about prewar links between al Qaeda and Saddam Hussein. Yet the Sept. 11 commission, after a careful review, concluded last month that it could find no evidence to support those claims. But nobody has told the soldiers.

The Republican convention this week in New York will reinforce the nation`s bond with the events of Sept. 11. Three years after that terrible day, we are surrounded by reminders of the war against Islamic extremism -- in Iraq, in Afghanistan, in our airports, on our streets. Drive to Washington these days and you`ll be greeted by huge electronic messages on the interstates ominously warning drivers: "Report Suspicious Behavior."

Bush, who has defined himself through his role as a "wartime president," has a special responsibility this week to explain how that war is going -- and what strategy he will pursue if he wins a second term. Bush`s rival, John Kerry, owes the country the same clarity.

America`s dilemma in Iraq now, so obvious that people rarely state it, is that a war meant to contain terrorism has had the effect of creating more of it. Most of the new terrorism is in Iraq itself, which was to be a platform in combating terrorism but has instead become a magnet for it.

The Iraqi cauldron was dramatically captured in an article Sunday in the New York Times about the Taliban-like Sunni fundamentalists who now control western Iraq. When decent Iraqis try to work with the Americans to fight these insurgents, they can meet the fate of the local commander of the Iraqi National Guard, who had his head sawed off.

The administration is sensibly seeking Iraqi solutions, which, unfortunately, don`t provide crisp answers. As is so often the case in the Arab world, there is never a final resolution -- only the postponement of a decision to a later day. The three-week battle of Najaf is the latest example. This looked to be a decisive showdown between the insurgent militia of Moqtada Sadr and the U.S.-backed interim government. But just as U.S. and Iraqi forces were near a decisive victory last week that would have powerfully reinforced the interim government, an Iraqi solution emerged. Shiite Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani brokered a deal that avoids clear winners or losers.

Facing such reversals in Iraq, what does the Bush administration plan to do in a second term? Will the United States double its bets in Iraq and fight a bloody new war to pacify the country, or will it tolerate more murky but pragmatic Iraqi solutions? Will it expand the war against Islamic militants by threatening Iran and Syria, or will it seek to enlist those nations as allies in maintaining regional stability? Will it accept a broad (and sometimes anti-American) coalition for change in Iraq and the Arab world -- broad enough to include even a Moqtada Sadr -- or will it hunker down with a narrower group of allies?

The truth is that we don`t know the Bush administration`s plans. We see the twin towers looming in the background, as a powerful symbol of unity and resolve. But to what end? This week Bush should level with the nation about what`s ahead. That`s an obligation, surely, for a wartime president.

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Sovereign Iraq Just as Deadly to U.S. Forces
With attacks more frequent, the hand-over of power has not mollified insurgents.
By Patrick J. McDonnell
Times Staff Writer

August 31, 2004

BAGHDAD — Two months after the U.S. handed sovereignty back to Iraq amid hopes of reduced violence, more than 110 U.S. troops have been killed and much of the country remains hostile territory. The toll of U.S. dead since the war began last year is fast approaching 1,000.

Although attention in recent weeks has focused on Najaf, where U.S. forces battled Shiite Muslim militiamen, most of the deadly confrontations for American troops in newly independent Iraq have occurred in the Baghdad area and the so-called Sunni Triangle to the north and west.

The concentration of attacks in those areas is a reminder that the fiercest and most organized opposition to U.S. forces and the U.S.-backed interim government continues to be in Sunni-dominated cities, such as Fallouja. Nationwide, U.S. forces are being attacked 60 times per day on average, up 20% from the three-month period before the hand-over.
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The occupation of Iraq has technically ended, but a U.S.-commanded multinational force of more than 150,000 is still there, tasked with providing security to the fledgling government. Ubiquitous graffiti denouncing the continued occupation indicate that insurgents see little change in their enemy — U.S. troops and their Iraqi allies.

With Iraqi security forces still largely in training, U.S. forces continue to run raids and conduct patrols in many areas, maintaining a very visible presence, especially on the roads. Pulling back to the garrisons now, commanders agree, would open the door to even more chaos and violence.

Although U.S. authorities did not expect casualties to plummet immediately after the transfer of power June 28, American, Iraqi and international officials expressed optimism that restoring sovereignty and officially ending the U.S. occupation would curb the violence.

"We hope that this is going to be a true beginning, and those who are opposing occupation will now consider that opposing occupation is not necessary anymore," Lakhdar Brahimi, the U.N. envoy who helped select Iraq`s interim government, said on the day of the transfer.

But many of the underlying grievances that have stoked the insurgency, such as the presence of U.S. troops and the slow pace of reconstruction, remain. The number of fighters — including loyalists of former President Saddam Hussein, religious militants and others dissatisfied enough to take up a gun or plant a bomb — shows no sign of decreasing.

"There was a government in South Vietnam all those years ago, and we lost a lot of people back there," noted U.S. Army Col. Dana Pittard of the 1st Infantry Division in Baqubah, a zone of conflict northeast of the capital.

In August so far, 63 U.S. troops have died, and 54 died in July, the first complete month after the hand-over of power. In June, 42 American troops died, according to Associated Press and the Pentagon.

Neither July nor August come close to the death tolls of April and May — 135 and 80 troops, respectively. Still, July and August rank among the deadliest months for U.S. forces in Iraq this year.

Overall, 974 U.S. troops had died in Iraq as of Monday, the vast majority — 836 — since President Bush declared an end to major combat May 1 of last year, the Pentagon said. About 6,500 have been wounded. Since January, the majority of attacks on U.S. forces have come in the form of "indirect fire" — such as mortar and rocket strikes — along with homemade roadside bombs.

There is no reliable accounting of Iraqi civilian deaths, but some rough calculations top 10,000. The number of Iraqi military dead is in the 5,000 to 6,000 range, according to think-tank estimates cited by Reuters.

"There are munitions all over this country, remnants of the Saddam era," said Air Force Brig. Gen. Erv Lessel, deputy director of operations for the multinational forces. "So you can`t expect to rid the country of all its weapons in a month or two."

Although daily attacks are up, debate continues over whether the armed insurgency is growing. U.S. officials have stuck with an estimate from last year that the number of hard-core insurgents remains between 4,000 and 6,000, a calculation others call low. The military has arrested more than 40,000 suspected insurgents, most of whom have been released.

"We`re losing more people because the resistance is just firing more shots at us," said Michael O`Hanlon, a military analyst at the Brookings Institution in Washington who supported the decision to go to war. "They are just hitting us hard and everywhere. The reason they are effective is because they just have more people shooting at us."

Pittard in Baqubah, like many field commanders, is openly skeptical of official U.S. estimates of the insurgency`s size. He puts the hard-core support at about one half of 1% of the Iraqi population of 24 million — or about 120,000.

The fighting in Iraq has unfolded in stages, as insurgents have turned to different and often bolder techniques. The sovereignty era has seen a wave of takings of foreign hostages and attempted assassinations.

Efforts to kill government officials are so frequent that interim Prime Minister Iyad Allawi remarked last week on the menacing messages he receives daily. "Every day there is a threat," he said. "One of them may succeed, I don`t know."

Government ministers must travel with bodyguards and vary their daily routes. The government itself meets inside the heavily fortified Green Zone in central Baghdad, protected by U.S. tanks and machine-gun nests.

Iraqi civilians have suffered tragically from the violence, with scores dying in bombings and other attacks directed at officials and police outposts.

Contributing to the U.S. death toll in August and the rise in daily attacks was the three weeks of intermittent combat in Najaf with Shiite militants that killed at least 10 U.S. troops.

"Not to be callous, but this is war. People get hurt," said Maj. Douglas Ollivant, operations officer of the Army`s 1st Battalion, 5th Cavalry Regiment, in Najaf. "Once you start a war, you don`t know where it`s going to end. The enemy has a vote."

The fact that the Najaf battles didn`t spark fierce uprisings in other areas of the country — as happened during the fighting in Fallouja and elsewhere in April — is viewed by some as a hopeful sign. "The people in Najaf, the people around the country, have grown more and more tired of the insurgency and the killing," Lessel said.

Muqtada Sadr, the militant Shiite cleric whose forces were battling U.S. troops in Najaf, ordered his militia last week to leave the city and has asked all of his armed supporters to cease fighting while his group makes plans to join Iraq`s emerging political process. Still, much of the goodwill once enjoyed by U.S. forces among Iraq`s Shiite majority — which was repressed during the rule of Hussein, a Sunni — has evaporated.

Efforts by Allawi to offer amnesty to former combatants and otherwise reach out to fighters have been less well received among Sunni insurgents.

The Sunni Triangle — more accurately a vast half-moon stretching from Baghdad to the west and north — remains a bastion of armed opposition to the U.S.-led coalition. The city of Samarra, north of Baghdad, has joined Fallouja as basically a no-go zone for U.S. troops and a sanctuary for insurgents.

Periodic violence continues to rack Ramadi, Baqubah and other Sunni-dominated areas. In the northern city of Mosul — a longtime stronghold of Hussein`s Baath Party once heralded as an occupation success story — there are almost daily attacks and frequent bombings.

Iraqi security forces, though numerous — totaling about 240,000 — are still largely in the training stage, and there is no word on when their presence may result in a drawdown of U.S. forces.

U.S. commanders are hopeful that much of the country will be at "local control" — meaning that Iraqi forces will shoulder much of the security burden — by January, when elections are scheduled.

"Of course, the hope is to put the Iraqis out front — we`re just not there yet," a senior Army official in Washington said. "This is going to take a really long time."

Times staff writers Edmund Sanders in Najaf and Mark Mazzetti and Esther Schrader in Washington contributed to this report.


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NEWS ANALYSIS
GOP Resolved to Portray President as Unwavering
By Ronald Brownstein
Times Staff Writer

August 31, 2004

NEW YORK — When former New York Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani and Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) were named to headline the Republican National Convention`s opening night, most analysts in both parties took it as evidence that President Bush`s campaign wanted the gathering to project a message of moderation.

But in their speeches Monday night, Giuliani and McCain signaled that the real mission for the Bush campaign this week was to send a message of strength.

In their emphasis on Bush`s determination and resolve, they dramatized how heavily the GOP was betting that many voters uneasy about the president`s policy direction would support him for reelection if they believed he could set a steadier course in a turbulent time than his rival, Democrat John F. Kerry.

In one of the evening`s most revealing passages, Giuliani argued that voters should assess the two contenders not through an ideological or partisan prism, but above all on their personal qualities of leadership.

"In choosing a president, we don`t really choose just a Republican or Democrat, a conservative or a liberal," Giuliani said. "We choose a leader. And in times of danger and war, as we are now in, Americans should put leadership at the core of their decision."

The portrayal of leadership as a value that transcends and trumps ideology represented an effort from the Bush campaign to shift the election debate toward more favorable ground. Polls continue to show the public deeply divided over Bush`s key policy decisions, especially the invasion of Iraq.
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But surveys also show that more Americans pick Bush than Kerry when asked which one is a strong and determined leader. Bush`s fate could turn heavily on whether swing voters place more weight on their doubts about his choices or on their confidence in his tenacity.

"That`s the question of the election," said Andrew Kohut, president of the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press, an independent polling organization. "Even though he faces significant disapproval for his handling of the economy and Iraq, he continues to hang in there in the race, or even lead, because people have faith in him as a leader at a time when the country prizes leadership."

The emphasis on resolve is not risk-free. Although polls show voters consider Bush more steadfast than Kerry, far more Americans also rate him as more stubborn and inflexible than his rival.

And by defending so emphatically the decision to invade Iraq, Republicans risk suggesting to voters that if Bush is reelected, nothing will change in a conflict that about half of the public believes was not worth the cost, according to polls.

Indeed, a principal Democratic argument against Bush is that he is so unwavering that he refuses to change course even when conditions seemingly demand it. At the Democratic National Convention last month, former President Clinton summarized that case when he pointedly declared, "Strength and wisdom are not opposing values."

With Giuliani`s emotional re-creation of the chaotic first hours after the Sept. 11 attacks and McCain`s spirited defense of the Iraq war, the evening`s principal speeches struck a martial tone so persistent that it sometimes left the session sounding as much like a recruiting drive as a political rally. Giuliani and McCain presented the struggle against terrorism as the defining challenge of American life, possibly for as long as the next generation.

That`s the way it is The GOP has allotted a media skybox in Madison Square Garden to Al Jazeera, the Qatar-based satellite channel — as did Democrats during their convention. But although Democrats made the Arabic news outlet remove their banner, Republicans have let the Al Jazeera logo stay.

With its heavy emphasis on leadership, the GOP convention`s first night represented a direct response to the Democrats` strategy at their convention. Almost to the exclusion of all other goals, Kerry built his convention message around an effort to convince voters he would be a strong leader in the war on terrorism, primarily by emphasizing his experience under fire in Vietnam.

Polls immediately after the Democratic convention showed Kerry narrowing — but notably not eliminating — the gap with Bush when voters were asked which man would provide strong leadership for the country. But in the month since, Kerry`s position on that critical variable has eroded under the attacks on his Vietnam-era record from a group of veterans opposing him, Swift Boat Veterans for Truth.

An ABC/Washington Post survey released Monday night showed that voters preferred Bush over Kerry 54% to 39% when asked which man was a strong leader; in early August, Bush`s advantage on that question was 4 percentage points.

Likewise, Bush led Kerry by 13 percentage points in the survey when voters were asked which man could keep the country safer; Bush`s advantage had dwindled to 3 percentage points earlier in August.

One senior GOP strategist familiar with campaign strategy said Giuliani and McCain were chosen as opening speakers not because of their reputations as moderates, but because of their capacity to reinforce a message of strength.

"These are people who are held in high esteem because of their leadership qualities and public character, vouching for President Bush on those same qualities," the strategist said.

Both men were emphatic in their praise of Bush. "He has not wavered," McCain said. "He has not flinched from the hard choices. He will not yield." Giuliani compared Bush as a steadfast leader not only to President Reagan, a familiar touchstone for Republicans, but to Winston Churchill.

Both evoked the unity Americans felt after the Sept. 11 attacks, as if to remind many voters that they once saw Bush, now a bitterly polarizing figure, as a leader beyond politics.

McCain offered no criticism of Kerry, a fellow Vietnam veteran with whom he had worked closely on the normalization of relations with Vietnam.

More broadly, in a speech whose language sometimes drifted toward the oblique, McCain sought to counter the Democratic argument that Kerry would pursue a fundamentally different strategy in the war on terrorism.

McCain insisted that Bush was just as willing to build alliances as his critics. He suggested the key difference between the two sides was that Bush had a more realistic view of when America had to act alone in its own defense. "That is not just an expression of our strength," McCain said in a subtle rejoinder to Clinton`s remarks. "It`s a measure of our wisdom."

In a speech that wandered like a cabbie trying to drive up a fare, Giuliani was more confrontational toward Kerry. Although praising Kerry for "his service to our nation," he presented the Massachusetts senator as a man who had "made it the rule to change his position, rather than the exception."

Bush may have complicated the evening`s message when he told Matt Lauer of the NBC program "Today" in an interview aired Monday morning that he did not believe America could eradicate the threat of terrorism.

The Kerry campaign immediately jumped on the statement to question Bush`s resolve, the very attribute the convention`s first night intended to burnish.

It is unclear if the Kerry campaign can generate sustained controversy over Bush`s remarks. The president`s comments voiced the conviction of many foreign policy analysts that the war on terrorism, like the war on poverty or the war on drugs, represented an open-ended struggle against a problem that could be controlled or ameliorated but never eliminated.

Still, Bush`s comment created at least some short-term dissonance with the evening`s message, particularly since Giuliani posited a future in which "terrorist attacks throughout the world decrease and then end."

Likely, the bigger question over time is whether undecided voters, hearing so many testimonials to Bush as a man who never backs down, will see the president as decisive or dogmatic. The Republican convention`s first night underscored the president`s commitment to his course. It remains for the president to convince a majority of Americans that his course is one they want to follow.


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COMMENTARY
Military Must Squarely Face New `My Lai`
Abu Ghraib scandal is a test of values for the U.S. officer corps.
By Andrew J. Bacevich

August 31, 2004

For the present generation of American soldiers, Abu Ghraib is fast becoming what the My Lai massacre was to the generation that fought in Vietnam — an episode of horrific misconduct transformed through subsequent mishandling into a full-fledged moral crisis.

The similarities between the two episodes are instructive. So too are the differences. For those differences suggest what must be done to prevent the current situation from further eroding the integrity of the armed services.

The similarities between My Lai and Abu Ghraib begin with the incidents themselves. In each, units — not wayward individuals but groups of American soldiers — not only broke the law but violated the most basic standards of human decency. At My Lai in 1968, GIs murdered hundreds of Vietnamese civilians. In 2003 at Abu Ghraib (and perhaps elsewhere), soldiers systematically humiliated, abused and even tortured detainees in U.S. custody.

For a time, each episode remained hidden, as seasoned officers averted their eyes, lied or actively sought to suppress all knowledge of what had occurred. In the case of My Lai, conscience eventually moved a young draftee to blow the whistle. In the case of Abu Ghraib, a junior-ranking enlisted soldier refused to be complicit in wrongdoing.

As each incident erupted in public, it evoked a similar response from the upper echelons of the Pentagon. First came denial and then damage control. In passing off Abu Ghraib as the work of a few bad apples, Defense Department officials in 2004 behaved very much as had their predecessors in 1969. Then as now the hunt for expendable scapegoats began almost immediately, with Lt. William Calley the precursor of today`s Pfc. Lynndie England.

But in one crucial respect, the two episodes differ. The numerous official inquiries that Abu Ghraib has spawned have amounted to a well-choreographed exercise in evasion. Thus far at least, these investigations have produced much hand-wringing, but on the central question of who shall be answerable, reticence has been the order of the day. Although the word "responsibility" is much bandied about in connection with the prisoner abuse scandal, it appears to have no address — at least none that links directly to the names of regular Army colonels and generals.

Much as the College of Cardinals embodies the Catholic Church, these high-ranking officers embody the military profession. As long as they evade direct accountability, the crisis brought on by Abu Ghraib will continue to fester.

Rather than speaking blunt truths, investigators fall back on weasel words. Former Defense Secretary James R. Schlesinger, who headed one inquiry, ascribed Abu Ghraib to what he dismissively called "the night shift." Gen. Paul Kern, who directed the Pentagon inquiry that released a report last week, allowed that certain unnamed high-ranking officers might bear some responsibility for the prison abuse scandal, but he resisted the notion that any might be "culpable."

In contrast, the My Lai massacre produced an investigative report that had no difficulty in calling a spade a spade.

That report, issued in March 1970, was the work of Lt. Gen. William Peers. A crusty soldier of the old school, Peers refused to let the several echelons above Calley off the hook. Senior leaders — colonels and generals — had made My Lai possible and then had conspired to cover it up. Only by confronting their malfeasance, dishonesty and corruption could the officer corps as a whole begin to rehabilitate itself. So the Peers report bluntly called the chain of command to account and did not hesitate to name names. Peers wanted heads to roll.

The upshot was a far cry from perfect justice. In the end, only Calley was convicted of a crime. But due in large measure to the Peers report, Calley`s division commander, Maj. Gen. Samuel W. Koster, was reduced in rank and retired in disgrace. Other senior officers, including Calley`s brigade commander, endured the humiliation of court-martial, and their careers were destroyed.

More important, at a time rife with moral confusion, Peers had reminded the officer corps of something fundamental: If lapses from professional standards have no consequences, then "responsibility" becomes empty of meaning. For an army, that way lie indiscipline, dishonor and defeat.

Today as in the days that followed My Lai, moral confusion is eating away at the American military, with Abu Ghraib the most troubling but by no means only symptom to appear. In a war that is ultimately about values, as the war on terror surely is, the erosion of soldierly standards in the U.S. armed forces, if left unchecked, could well mean the difference between our victory and defeat.

The remedy to this disease is clear. Reaffirm the core values of the military professional ethic. Insist that leaders uphold those values. Hold accountable those who don`t — by naming names and forcing lofty heads to roll.

"We are better than this" — that was the message that Gen. Peers communicated to his fellow soldiers. In the bleak aftermath of Abu Ghraib, we need his like again.

Andrew J. Bacevich, a Vietnam War veteran, is professor of international relations at Boston University and author of "The New American Militarism," forthcoming from Oxford University Press.


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With friends like these, Israel doesn`t need enemies. Ich hoffe nicht, dass diese Politik eines Tages auf Israel zurückschlägt. Wenn sich Dinge miserable entwickeln, wird meist ein Sündenbock gesucht. Und da die Entwicklung in Nahost nicht so läuft wie von den Verantwortlichen vorhergesagt, sondern immer mehr zu einem Fass ohne Boden für die USA wird, werden auch die Lösungsmöglichkeiten immer schwieriger. Die Lösungen nach einer Wiederwahl Bushs wären, Ausweitung des Kriegsgebiets auf Syrien und Iran und die Lösung des Irakproblems mit brutaler Gewalt. Nur ob diese Taktik Erfolg haben wird, ist zweifelhaft. Dann wäre ein schmählicher Rückzug wie in Vietnam zu erwarten mit der Aufgabe der Verbündeten. Ich glaube kaum, dass das im Sinne Israels seien könnte, wenn es dann als Sündenbock herhalten müßte. Alle die durch den Überfall auf den Irak meinten, die Position Israels zu stärken, macht diese Aussicht so unnachgiebig, gegenüber allen Argumenten der Vernuft.

ROBERT SCHEER
Israel`s Albatross: U.S. Neocons
Robert Scheer

August 31, 2004

With friends like these, Israel doesn`t need enemies. The purported Israeli "spy caper" is another sign that the neoconservatives in the Bush administration, who claim to be big supporters of Israel, on the contrary, have increased the risks for the Mideast`s only functioning democracy.

As the developing story goes, a neocon Pentagon official allegedly gave classified documents to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, the pro-Israel lobby, which then passed them on to the Israeli Embassy.



So far, these are only unproved accusations. It is disturbing that some well-placed officials in the Bush administration have leaked to the media allegations of spying against the Pentagon official and a respected ally. As demonstrated in the phony, Clinton-era China spy case, in which Los Alamos nuclear weapons scientist Wen Ho Lee was smeared, such lurid charges may not stick. But the charges now circulating do call attention to the regime-change ideologues in the Pentagon, whose antics have left Israel more vulnerable than at any time in recent memory.

First, the Bush administration abandoned the Israel-Palestinian peace process and the United States` historical role as a good-faith broker between the two sides. Then, after 9/11, the tight band of so-called neoconservatives who had championed the invasion of Iraq for years, both in Israel and in the U.S., successfully completed their hijacking of U.S. foreign policy by landing us in the Iraq quagmire.

This has only served to inflame passions across the region, increasing the threat to Israel. Many Israelis concerned for their country are alarmed by President Bush`s substitution of militarism for diplomacy, which they believe only benefits those who profit from fear and hate — such as arms brokers and political and religious extremists.

In addition, moderates across the Muslim world have seen their position eroded by popular anger over the U.S. occupation and Washington`s uncritical support for Ariel Sharon. Al Qaeda and allied terror groups have seized on the chaos and fury to recruit a new generation of fighters. Extremists are now in control of crucial parts of Iraq and disrupting the rest, while rogue Iran is more politically influential among their co-religionists in the Shiite majority in Iraq than is the U.S. with its 120,000 troops on the ground.

Now, after the missing weapons of mass destruction and Abu Ghraib, comes the latest embarrassing blow to America`s image — which polls show has been in free fall since the decision to invade Iraq. It centers on neocon Larry Franklin, the Pentagon`s chief Iran analyst, who, according to unnamed officials, is under investigation for allegedly supplying the American Israel committee with a secret draft presidential directive on U.S.-Iran policy that was allegedly passed on to Israel.

Franklin is an ideological comrade of his bosses, Douglas J. Feith, undersecretary of Defense for policy, and Deputy Defense Secretary Paul D. Wolfowitz, the two strongest promoters inside the administration of preemptively invading Iraq. He also was part of the unit that funneled intelligence chum up the food chain and into Bush`s now-discredited speeches claiming Saddam Hussein`s regime posed an imminent danger.

These are the folks who bought the disinformation pumped out by Iraqi exile Ahmad Chalabi, whom they promoted as the George Washington of the new Iraq state. Now the neocons distance themselves from Chalabi, who has been accused of spying for Iran and harangues radical Iraqi Shiite crowds with anti-American rhetoric. That can`t be good for Israel, which is threatened by Iran`s nuclear program.



The neocons are unstable ideologues, more in love with their own radical dream of breaking the world to remake it in their image than they are with protecting Israel or the U.S. Such unbounded arrogance, embraced by Bush, has greatly amplified the voices of those persistent anti-Semitic conspiracy theorists in the Muslim world and beyond who are now seizing upon the latest Israeli spy rumors.

"It revives the old charge that Israel is not an ally but a treacherous country," Nathan Guttman wrote Monday in the Israeli newspaper Haaretz.

That charge is false. What is true is that not every Bush administration hawk who claims to support Israel is actually a reliable friend.


Copyright 2004 Los Angeles Times

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http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/opinion/188550_thomas31.html

Hand Rumsfeld his walking papers

Tuesday, August 31, 2004

By HELEN THOMAS
HEARST NEWSPAPERS

WASHINGTON --The time has come for Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld to leave his Pentagon post, either by dismissal or resignation.

Two separate reports last week make it clear that Rumsfeld and other top Pentagon officials were ultimately responsible for the sadistic abuse of prisoners in Iraq`s infamous Abu Ghraib.

A report by a four-member panel headed by former Defense Secretary James Schlesinger traced the mistreatment of prisoners in Iraq to failures that went all the way up the chain of command in the Pentagon.

Another military report Wednesday said 27 people attached to intelligence agencies as well as four private contractors participated in abuses, some tantamount to torture, of prisoners.

"We discovered serious misconduct and a loss of moral values," said Army Gen. Paul Kern, head of the investigation. This gives the lie to early Pentagon efforts to paint the prison abuses as the work of a handful of low-level MPs, acting out their frustrations.

The Kern report also noted that eight "ghost detainees" were concealed from the International Committee of the Red Cross. One of them died in custody.

The origin of the scandal traces back to Feb. 2, 2002, when President Bush abrogated the Geneva Conventions requiring humanitarian treatment of prisoners. Bush declared that those rules didn`t apply to the U.S. war against terrorism. Bush has been scrapping our international agreements since he came into office, but for this one he has paid dearly in terms of just plain decency.

When he canceled the Geneva accords, the U.S. focus was in Afghanistan where American forces were rounding up al-Qaida and Taliban suspects.

Later that year, in December, Rumsfeld authorized ruthless interrogation practices against detainees rounded up in Afghanistan and held at the U.S. Navy base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Those approved practices included the use of dogs to terrify prisoners, forcing prisoners into prolonged painful stress positions, stripping them naked, solitary confinement, shaving them, hooding them.

The train then completely left the tracks after the U.S. invasion of Iraq where U.S. military personnel at the Abu Ghraib prison adopted the same interrogation tactics used in Afghanistan and at Guantanamo Bay.

The photos provided the shocking evidence earlier this year and the investigations, courts-martial and congressional hearings began.

Top military officials ignored the mistreatment of prisoners until the graphic photographs of naked prisoners piled in a pyramid at Abu Ghraib horrified the public.

Red Cross reports about prison abuses fell on deaf ears at the Pentagon until the administration was faced with exposure.

Several reviews of the military mistreatment of prisoners have been under way but the Schlesinger panel was the first to assign any responsibility to the highest levels of the Pentagon.

"There is both institutional and personal responsibility at higher levels," the Schlesinger report said.

Schlesinger said the prison problems were "well known" and corrective actions "could have been taken and should have been taken."

Despite all of this, the report concluded that Rumsfeld and other senior leaders, including Air Force Gen. Richard Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, should not be forced to resign.

Since he is a Washington "establishment" figure who headed the Pentagon in the Nixon era, Schlesinger was not about to go any higher than a brigade commander to parcel out responsibility.

Schlesinger said Rumsfeld`s resignation would be "a boon to all of America`s enemies and consequently, I think that it would be a misfortune if it were to take place."

Wrong. It would show the world that Americans are not afraid to topple leaders when the country is dishonored on their watch. For those who have lived under totalitarian rule, a challenge to the leadership could have dire consequences. But that`s not our system. In a democracy, public servants must be held accountable.

Rumsfeld should have thrown in the towel months ago for this scandal.

In the run-up to the invasion of Iraq, the Rumsfeld coterie bragged about the "shock and awe" of the planned U.S. invasion. The secretary has since lost some of his swagger and is no longer a TV rock star. As the gravity of the scandal gradually sunk in around the world, Rumsfeld has become virtually invisible to the public.

Rumsfeld stands indicted by the very panel that he appointed to assess responsibility. The fact that the Schlesinger panel veered sharply at the last curve and said Rumsfeld should keep his job can`t bury the reality that they traced the footprints right to Rumsfeld`s office.

It`s time for him to take responsibility for this scandal. It`s time for him to leave office.

Helen Thomas is a columnist for Hearst Newspapers. E-mail: [e-mail]. Copyright 2004 Hearst Newspapers.

© 1998-2004 Seattle Post-Intelligencer

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Juan Cole is Professor of History at the University of Michigan

Tuesday, August 31, 2004

Republican Convention "We did not seek this War"

The Republican National Convention in New York was All 9/11 All the Time. As one would expect, Senator John McCain and former New York Mayor Rudolph Guiuliani gave strong speeches (though Rudi came off as petty toward John Kerry in a way no one but Al Sharpton at the Democratic Convention came off toward George W. Bush). Unfortunately, these moderate Republicans don`t run the party. Tom Delay and Dick Cheney and George Bush do.

Just two Middle-East related observations.

The speech-makers kept saying "we did not seek this war," and that it was imposed on us, and by God we were going to keep hitting back. That is, the rhetoric was that of righteous anger, of the avenging victim. While this argument works with regard to Afghanistan (which the US did not invade, only providing air cover to an indigenous group. the Northern Alliance), it is hollow with regard to Iraq. Only by confusing the "war on terror" with the war on Iraq could this rhetoric be even somewhat meaningful, and it is not a valid conflation.

No American president has more desperately sought out a war with any country than George W. Bush sought out this war with Iraq. Only William Polk`s war on Mexico, also based on false pretexts, even comes close to the degree of crafty manipulation employed by Bush and Cheney to get up the Iraq war. Intelligence about weapons of mass destruction was deliberately and vastly exaggerated, producing a "nuclear threat" where there wasn`t even so much as a single gamma ray to be registered. Innuendo and repetition were cleverly used to tie Saddam to Usama Bin Laden operationally, a link that all serious intelligence professionals deny.

So, I agree that the war in Afghanistan was imposed on the US. But the war on Iraq was not. And pretending that the US had no choice but to attack Iraq and reduce it to a pitiful failed state is flatly dishonest.

The Republicans also had an Iraqi woman speak. Apparently they could not find an eloquent Iraqi with good English who still would come and support them. This woman at one point alleged that there have been recent free municipal elections in Iraq. I doubt that very much. Or, if any municipal elections have been held, they wouldn`t be considered free or fair if done in the same way in Topeka, Kansas.

I also objected to the use of 9/11 and the US military for partisan purposes. 9/11 happened to all of us, Republican and Democrat. Is it really plausible that all those firefighters from Queens are Republicans? But that was the impression they tried to give. As for singing all the service songs, not all servicemen support Bush. One person with direct knowledge of the incident told me that a US officer in Iraq had had to threaten his tired, dusty, frightened men with being disciplined if they did not stop referring to Bush as "the Deserter."

I am frankly not impressed by the Bush administration response to al-Qaeda. Bin Laden and al-Zawahiri are at large, as are a large number of other high al-Qaeda operatives. The Bush administration missed a chance to get a number of important al-Qaeda figures from Iran, which wanted some Mojahedin-e Khalq terrorists in return, because the Neocons in the Pentagon have some sort of weird alliance with the MEK mad bombers. Most of the really big al-Qaeda fish have been caught by Pakistan, to which the Bush administration has just farmed out some of the most important counter-insurgency work against al-Qaeda. Is this wise?

Bush is characterizing the Iraq war as a "catastrophic success". This is the line that the US military succeeded so well so fast against Saddam`s army that chaos naturally ensued.

Democrats are having a lot of fun with the phrase, but the real problem is that that analysis of what went wrong is incorrect. The Bush administration simply mismanaged Iraq. It dissolved the Iraqi army, throwing the country into chaos. That army was not gone and would have gladly showed up at the barracks for a paycheck. It pursued a highly punitive policy of firing and excluding members of the Baath Party, which was not done in so thorough-going a manner even to Nazis in post-war Germany. It canceled planned municipal elections, denying people any stake in their new "government," which was more or less appointed by the US. It put all its efforts into destroying Arab socialism in Iraq and creating a sudden free market, rather than paying attention to the preconditions for entrepreneurial activity, like security and services. It kept changing its policies-- early on it was going to turn the country over to Ahmad Chalabi in 6 months. Then that plan was scotched and Paul Bremer was brought in to play MacArthur in Tokyo for a projected two or three years. Then that didn`t work and there would be council-based elections. Then those wouldn`t work and there would be a "transfer of sovereignty." All this is not to mention the brutal and punitive sieges of Fallujah and Najaf and the Abu Ghuraib torture scandal, etc., etc.

So it wasn`t a catastrophic success that caused the problem. It was that Iraq was being run at the upper levels by a handful of screw-ups who had all sorts of ulterior motives, and at least sometimes did not have the best interests of the country at heart. And Bush is the one who put them in charge.

posted by Juan @ [url8/31/2004 06:51:47 AM]http://www.juancole.com/2004_08_01_juancole_archive.html#109393674537048049[/url]

Muqtada Plans Political Party

AP reports that the young Shiite leader Muqtada al-Sadr has called on his followers to cease fighting American and Coaltion troops and Iraqi police. He plans, his aides say, to have the Sadr movement contest the forthcoming elections to parliament.

Al-Hayat argues that Muqtada`s decision was a compromise between hawks and doves within the Sadr movement. The hawks want continued anti-American action, whereas the doves want to seek political power at the ballot box. Muqtada decided to favor the doves at this juncture, in part, it says, because the Najaf debacle demonstrated to him that other significant Shiite political forces might well attempt to cut him out of political power.

That is, if I understand the argument, the al-Dawa Party and the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq could jointly dominate parliament if the Sadrists boycott the elections, and could then use their governmental power to harm the Sadrists (as Allawi had done in Najaf, in alliance with local Najaf notables and with SCIRI). Unlike Fallujah, where the whole town rallied against the Marines, Muqtada`s men were largely deserted and despised by the Najafis, and so could be massacred by the US, unlike the Fallujah guerrillas. Muqtada saw that he could be effectively and devastatingly isolated, and decided that participation in parliamentary politics would actually strengthen his position.

On the other hand, he had to appease the hawks, and so is arguing that they should not have to disarm, and should be allowed to keep their weapons.

The NYT`s Eric Eckholm is very good on these developments, as well, today. He says that the Sadrists want to keep their guns, arguing that they are private property and that most America families have guns at home. He says that the Allawi government might allow the Mahdi Army men to keep their rifles, but wanted rocket-propelled grenades turned in. Eckholm writes:


` Sheik Bakhabi declined to describe the two sides` positions but said, "If we gave our rocket-propelled grenades to the government, but then they broke their promises, we couldn`t get them back again."

In Sadr City on Monday, armed fighters were seldom visible on the streets, but there was little doubt who was in control. When a stranger shows up, a neighborhood captain of the Sadr organization quickly offers a challenge. A signed note from a militia official or a local tribal leader is usually enough to pass muster. Posters everywhere depict Mr. Sadr. `


posted by Juan @ 8/31/2004 06:45:57 AM

Franklin Met with Naor Gilon

The Israeli foreign ministry has confirmed that Lawrence Franklin, the Pentagon`s top Iran desk officer, met repeatedly in Washington with "Naor Gilon, head of the political department at the Israeli Embassy in Washington, and a specialist on Iran`s nuclear weapons program."

Gilon appears already to have been under surveillance by the FBI. At one point Franklin is said to have offered him a document, which he declined to take, but asked what it said and got an oral report. Gilon was unaware that he was being monitored and clearly thought he would be safe as long as he did not have any incriminating paper in his possession (conversations can be denied or spun, as long as they aren`t taped).

Franklin did succeed in giving a confidential draft presidential directive on Iran to AIPAC officials, who then passed it to someone at the Israeli Embassy, perhaps Gilon. It is telling that the official took hard copy from AIPAC, presumably because he trusted them implicitly, whereas Gilon had rejected it from Franklin.

That Gilon is a specialist in Iran`s nuclear weapons program suggests that Franklin wanted to consult with him about what the US should do about that issue. Gilon was "Director of the Division for Strategic and Military Affairs in the Center for Policy Research in Ministry of Foreign Affairs, from 2000-2002." Franklin harbors feelings of profound hatred for the regime in Tehran and wanted to see it destroyed.

Israeli government officials and people like Dennis Ross at the AIPAC-funded "Washington Institute for Near East Policy" keep saying that this case makes no sense, since if Israel wanted to know something about US policy toward Iran, they could just make a call. This line of defense doesn`t really help, though, since it suggests that there are no US government secrets to which Israel would be denied access on a simple request. That is an impossible proposition, and if it were true then it really would be the case that AIPAC runs the US government.

I continue to believe that Franklin was not seeking to give Israel information so much as he was soliciting input on the wording of the presidential directive on Iran. We have seen over and over again in the Bush administration how crucial it is to control key policy documents. Because Bush frankly is not a detail man, and cannot get his head around nuanced policy (he makes fun of the word), the ability of his smarter subordinates to control what paper is put in front of him is key to making things happen. Thus, the Neocons managed to put the false Niger uranium purchase story into the State of the Union address in 2003 despite the opposition of CIA director George Tenet, who knew by then that it was junk. Stephen Hadley, then the Neocon chief mole in the National Security Council, signed off on the insertion.

So, if you could work up a presidential directive on Iran that, e.g., threatened military action against the Iranian nuclear facilities at Bushehr, and could put it about the Pentagon that AIPAC and the Israelis had signed off on it, you might be able to make a US air attack on Bushehr happen. When the final draft was presented to Bush for his signature, Karl Rove (Bush`s campaign chief) could be assured that Bush would get brownie points (big money and votes) from AIPAC if he signed. That is, in my view, why Franklin was willing to risk sharing confidential Pentagon policy documents with AIPAC and the Israelis. He was cultivating them as a key constituency for the aggressive policies he was formulating. Having them on board before the directive had been finalized would allow him to argue that it had to be shaped in a particular way in order to please AIPAC and the Israelis. If he could privately assure his superiors that Gilon approved, that would help him get his way in a Neocon-dominated part of the Pentagon.

The Mojahedin-e Khalq Organization (MEK or MKO) has a front organization, the "National Council of Resistance" or NCR. The NCR has been a significant source of charges about the Iranian nuclear program, and probably spies on Iran for both the Pentagon and Israel. (I am reasoning back from AIPAC`s WINEP-associated "scholars" supporting the MEK, which is very odd unless there is a big quid pro quo). They probably exaggerate, playing a game similar to that of Ahmad Chalabi in Iraq. That would be another reason for which Franklin would try to stop its Iraq commanders being turned over to Iran by the US in return for top al-Qaeda leaders that Tehran holds.

posted by Juan @ 8/31/2004 06:30:35 AM

Brown`s "Public Diplomacy Press Review

A really useful compendium of news items related to public diplomacy and Middle East policy is sent out by email by John Brown, a former Foreign Service officer, in conjunction with the University of Southern California Center on Public Diplomacy. It deals with "issues pertaining to foreign public opinion, anti-Americanism, propaganda, cultural diplomacy, U.S. international broadcasting, and the reception of American popular culture abroad." Mr. Brown says, "To receive the PDPR, please request it by e-mail at johnhbrown30 at hotmail d o t com."

posted by Juan @ 8/31/2004 06:10:59 AM

Hollings on AIPAC

I saw this in the press at the time, but a reader reminded me of it. Senator Hollings is retiring and speaking his mind. In my experience, this sentiment is very widespread on Capitol Hill, but politicians who are not retiring soon do not complain in public about it. Hollings said,


` But in any event [the Neocons say,], the better way to do it is go right in and establish our predominance in Iraq and then, as they say, and I have different articles here I could refer to, next is Iran and then Syria. And it is the domino theory, and they genuinely believe it. I differ. I think, frankly, we have caused more terrorism than we have gotten rid of. That is my Israel policy. You can`t have an Israel policy other than what AIPAC gives you around here. I have followed them mostly in the main, but I have also resisted signing certain letters from time to time, to give the poor President a chance.

I can tell you no President takes office--I don`t care whether it is a Republican or a Democrat--that all of a sudden AIPAC will tell him exactly what the policy is, and Senators and members of Congress ought to sign letters. I read those carefully and I have joined in most of them. On some I have held back. I have my own idea and my own policy. I have stated it categorically.

The way to really get peace is not militarily. You cannot kill an idea militarily. `

posted by Juan @ [url8/31/2004 06:05:42 AM]http://www.juancole.com/2004_08_01_juancole_archive.html#109392552278422787[/url]

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Tuesday, August 31, 2004
War News for August 30 and 31, 2004 draft

http://dailywarnews.blogspot.com/

Bring ‘em on: One US soldier killed, two wounded by roadside bomb near Mosul.

Bring ‘em on: Iraqi education official assassinated in Kirkuk.

Bring ‘em on: US Army convoy ambushed near Balad.

Bring ‘em on: Four Iraqis killed, seven wounded in mortar attack near Samarra.

Bring ‘em on: Three Iraqi policemen wounded in ambush near Kirkuk.

Bring ‘em on: Four Iraqis killed, five wounded in US airstrike near Samarra.

Bring ‘em on: Fighting reported near Fallujah.

Bring ‘em on: US troops under heavy mortar attack near Baquba.

Bring `em on: Insurgent attacks near Basra stop oil exports.

British troops cease patrols in Basra. "After three deaths in as many weeks the British Army has stopped patrolling the streets of Basra, choosing instead to remain in barracks under daily bombardment despite pleas from residents to take on the Iraqi insurgents. With troops now moving only in Warrior armoured vehicles on patrols not more than 100 yards from base, forces loyal to the rebel cleric Moqtada al-Sadr have stepped into the power vacuum, roaming the streets with rocket-propelled grenades and AK47s. Vital reconstruction has been halted and the citizens are suffering deprivations daily."

Let freedom reign. "For journalists working in Iraq, it sometimes feels like trying to operate between a rock and a hard place. Last week around 60 of us covering the battle in Najaf were sitting in our hotel when the Iraqi police burst in. A man we later nicknamed `the evil smurf` stormed into the lobby and fired a shot into the wall. Other policemen, some of them wearing balaclavas, then ran upstairs and went from room to room, yelling `Yalla, Yalla `- `Go, go.` It is hard to argue with someone who is pointing a Kalashnikov at you, and so we went - waiting outside the Sea of Najaf hotel while the police fired a live volley over our heads. They then herded us on to a truck. From there, I managed to phone London on my satellite phone and say: `We`ve been arrested ... `; unfortunately, the evil smurf then grabbed it. The incident last Wednesday confirms an unwelcome truth: that despite the talk of democracy, Iraq`s interim government shares many of the same authoritarian traits as its predecessor. The new police force is very like the old one. The same Ba`athist instincts – to threaten and intimidate people who cause you embarrassment - appear to be alive and well. Many of the rank-and-file police officers who served under Saddam Hussein are now back in uniform. The only organisation that inspires any confidence is the Iraqi National Guard (ING) - the new Iraqi army that started patrolling the streets of Najaf last Friday. So far Iraq`s US-backed interim prime minister, Ayad Allawi, himself a former Ba`athist, has offered no explanation or apology for last week`s mass arrest, despite complaints from the Guardian, the BBC and other media organisations."

Why should I believe this? "The meetings, some of which have occurred at Allawi`s private home outside the highly fortified zone that houses the Iraqi government, are a risky and unconventional form of back-channel diplomacy. But they represent the most significant effort yet to address the insurgency through political rather than military means…Allawi did not identify the people with whom he met. He described them as not `the hard-core criminals` but as `people on the fringes who are disillusioned.` He insisted the meetings were not negotiations but opportunities for him to make a pitch to skeptics. `I am meeting them and telling them there is one thing to do: It is the respect of law, the rule of law,` he said. `If you want to use violence, we will face you violently and suppress you -- and we will
bring you to justice.`" Allawi made this claim before. If he`s not meeting with the leadership of the resistance with the aim of negotiating a political settlement, he`s wasting his time.

Informal cease-fire reported in Sadr City. "For the Americans and the interim Iraqi government, the goal is the disarmament of the militia, known as the Mahdi Army. That is the thorniest issue left unresolved by a settlement on Friday in the southern city of Najaf after three weeks of intense combat there."

100. “An Army fuel supply specialist has become the 100th soldier from Fort Hood to die in Iraq since the U.S.-led invasion began last year.”

Foreclosure. “When she returned home on 10-day emergency leave in May, she found a life in disarray -- her husband had left her, family members were taking care of her four children, ages 10-16, and a mortgage company was foreclosing on her home. During leave, Curry filed for divorce, called the mortgage company and made arrangements for her kids. Then she traveled back to her station 30 miles north of Baghdad, where her unit tries to keep wounded soldiers alive long enough to get them to a hospital. But Curry is now back on another emergency leave, after the mortgage company, ABN Amro Mortgage Group, continued its foreclosure proceedings.”

Planning failure. “About a dozen Oregon National Guard soldiers say they have languished for months here because the Army lacked a protocol to allow them to return to Oregon to convalesce…The problem arose from an oversight in the Army`s war planning, which failed to anticipate the large number of wounded soldiers returning from wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, said Col. Douglas Eliason, chief medical officer with the Oregon Guard.”

Commentary

Opinion: “Facing such reversals in Iraq, what does the Bush administration plan to do in a second term? Will the United States double its bets in Iraq and fight a bloody new war to pacify the country, or will it tolerate more murky but pragmatic Iraqi solutions? Will it expand the war against Islamic militants by threatening Iran and Syria, or will it seek to enlist those nations as allies in maintaining regional stability? Will it accept a broad (and sometimes anti-American) coalition for change in Iraq and the Arab world -- broad enough to include even a Moqtada Sadr -- or will it hunker down with a narrower group of allies? The truth is that we don`t know the Bush administration`s plans. We see the twin towers looming in the background, as a powerful symbol of unity and resolve. But to what end? This week Bush should level with the nation about what`s ahead. That`s an obligation, surely, for a wartime president.”

Opinion: “So what`s the answer? Here`s one thought: much of U.S. policy in Iraq - delaying elections, trying to come up with a formula that blocks simple majority rule, trying to install first Mr. Chalabi, then Mr. Allawi, as strongman - can be seen as a persistent effort to avoid giving Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani his natural dominant role. But recent events in Najaf have demonstrated both the cleric`s awesome influence and the limits of American power. Isn`t it time to realize that we could do a lot worse than Mr. Sistani, and give him pretty much whatever he wants?”

Analysis: “The concentration of attacks in those areas is a reminder that the fiercest and most organized opposition to U.S. forces and the U.S.-backed interim government continues to be in Sunni-dominated cities, such as Fallouja. Nationwide, U.S. forces are being attacked 60 times per day on average, up 20% from the three-month period before the hand-over.”

Analysis: “Rather than speaking blunt truths, investigators fall back on weasel words. Former Defense Secretary James R. Schlesinger, who headed one inquiry, ascribed Abu Ghraib to what he dismissively called "the night shift." Gen. Paul Kern, who directed the Pentagon inquiry that released a report last week, allowed that certain unnamed high-ranking officers might bear some responsibility for the prison abuse scandal, but he resisted the notion that any might be ‘culpable.’ In contrast, the My Lai massacre produced an investigative report that had no difficulty in calling a spade a spade. That report, issued in March 1970, was the work of Lt. Gen. William Peers. A crusty soldier of the old school, Peers refused to let the several echelons above Calley off the hook. Senior leaders — colonels and generals — had made My Lai possible and then had conspired to cover it up. Only by confronting their malfeasance, dishonesty and corruption could the officer corps as a whole begin to rehabilitate itself. So the Peers report bluntly called the chain of command to account and did not hesitate to name names. Peers wanted heads to roll…More important, at a time rife with moral confusion, Peers had reminded the officer corps of something fundamental: If lapses from professional standards have no consequences, then ‘responsibility’ becomes empty of meaning. For an army, that way lie indiscipline, dishonor and defeat.”

Casualty Reports

Local story: New York soldier killed in Iraq.

Local story: Iowa Marine killed in Iraq.



# posted by yankeedoodle : 4:00 AM
Comment (1) | Trackback (0)
Monday, August 30, 2004
Note to Readers

I am very busy this morning, so I won`t post an update until around 0900 PST.

YD


86-43-04. Pass it on.



# posted by yankeedoodle : 6:11 AM
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No space for the dead in Sadr City
Reuters
Monday 30 August 2004 12:51 PM GMT

Hospital staff cannot keep pace with the dead bodies
The elderly man who runs a hospital mortuary in Sadr City says he does not have space for the bodies of those killed in fighting in the Baghdad neighbourhood.
"I`m tired of this," grumbles 74-year-old Bidu Abbass. "This morgue is old. There`s not enough room," he said, pointing at a refrigerated metal room by the hospital gate.

"Sometimes they bring 15 bodies, sometimes 20, sometimes 30," he said, grimacing as he remembers occasions when the morgue`s refrigeration units have been knocked out by power cuts. "The smell kills."
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The Imam Ali general hospital in Sadr City has become a field clinic for fighters and others wounded in clashes between US occupation forces and fighters loyal to Shia leader Muqtada al-Sadr.

Yearning

Clashes broke out at the weekend in Sadr City, which was not included in a peace deal last week ending fighting between al-Sadr loyalists and US and Iraqi forces in Najaf.

The hospital`s young staff is yearning for peace.

The stink in the morgue is killing

They struggle against supply shortages and risk death to treat both the wounded and the many suffering from disease in the slum, where pools of sewage fill potholes and dead animals decay in the streets.

"It`s like we`re going to the frontline," said Dr Ghazwan Ghalyan, who was shot in the neck on his way to work last week.

"The streets were blocked, they were filled with tanks. So we got out of the car and started walking, then a bullet struck me and I fell unconscious," the 25-year-old said.
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Blood-soaked bandages

"The bullet entered here and left here," he said, pointing at blood-soaked bandages on either side of his neck. "One centimetre further forward and it would have shattered my spinal column."

There is severe shortage of
basic equipment

Like Ghalyan, many of those wounded in fighting were shot either in the chest or above, the hospital doctors said. "That`s where the Americans aim," Dr Samir Saaid said. "We can`t treat them. They die in transit to another hospital," he said.

The doctors struggle against shortages of basic equipment including blood transfusion kits. Fighting, which first erupted in Sadr City in early April, has even cut the hospital`s supplies of clean water, which is delivered by tankers.

Frantic relatives

"One time we couldn`t find drinking water for eight hours," said surgeon Sarmad Adnan, who was previously an Iraqi army doctor. "I now see things I never saw in the army."
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There is severe shortage of
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"One time we couldn`t find drinking water for eight hours"
Sarmad Adnan,doctor

When clashes erupt, the hospital is filled with the frantic relatives of the wounded, who block corridors and make it difficult for doctors to treat the casualties, 27-year-old doctor Laith Ghazi said.

Relatives often threaten doctors who they think are not doing enough for the wounded.

"Many times my colleagues have been struck. Sometimes those relatives are even carrying machine guns," Ghazi said.

Ghazi says his work, which pays $140 per month, gives him anxiety. "But I have to do my duty," he said.

The doctors who say disease is rife in Sadr City hope the fighting will end soon. "We have a lot of work anyway," Saaid said. "The water is dirty. The sewage system is exhausted."

Reuters


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THE ROVING EYE
In God, and terror, we trust
By Pepe Escobar
Sep 1, 2004
"This battle will take time and resolve. But make no mistake about it: we will win."
- George W Bush, September 12, 2001

"Can we win the war on terror? I don`t think you can win it." - Bush, August 31, 2004

The war in Iraq is part of the "war on terra". You`re either with us, Republicans, or with the terrorists. Be afraid. Be very afraid. And count on us to deliver you from fear - somewhat. Fear not what you can do to support us, fear for the world if you don`t.

This, in essence, is the Republican platform for "four more years" of the president of permanent war. A slightly milder, softer version is being sold by the Republican National Convention (RNC) in New York this week via party moderates such as Senator John McCain, former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani and the California Gubernator. Warning: what you see is not what you get. These party moderates will vanish as soon as the convention is over, because as much as KBR is a subsidiary of Halliburton, the real Grand Old Party (GOP) nowadays is a subsidiary of Bush-Cheney `04, its platform micro-managed by an ultra-authoritarian White House and the Republican campaign "war room" in Virginia.

Pre-packaged, sanitized, make-believe, Wizard of Oz America is now being enacted inside Madison Square Garden at the RNC just after another part of America - in the form of half a million New Yorkers - roared in the streets this Sunday to express their yearning for regime change in Washington. This was probably the largest political - and peaceful - demonstration in New York for decades, and all but preempted any message emanating from the convention. And just like in February 15, 2003 - when more than 10 million people around the world marched against the war on Iraq - civil society fell victim once again to a double whammy: the criminalization of protest and dissent in the US coupled with vast disinformation by US corporate media. According to this twisted logic, any reasoned criticism of the Bush administration is labeled as "Bush bashing", without the thrust of the argument even being considered.

Najaf doesn`t make it to New York
The Bush administration badly needed a Najaf "victory" to spin at the RNC. At the first siege of Najaf, in April, General Mark Kimmitt was emphatic, "[Muqtada] al-Sadr must be killed or captured." He was not - as he was not, again, last week. Winning "hearts and minds" in Iraq was never part of the Bush administration`s plan. The sieges of both Fallujah and Najaf suggest neo-colonial repression to any form of indigenous resistance.

Once again, like clockwork, the Bush administration was defeated in Najaf. No amount of spinning will raise the US profile in Iraq and the Arab world after Najaf`s old city and sacred burial grounds were practically reduced to rubble. The US-imposed Iyad Allawi government`s credibility is in shambles. Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani reasserted his moral authority big-time - adding impeccable Iraqi nationalist credentials to his profile as a moderate who wants the end of the occupation. And Muqtada - who has already humiliated former proconsul L Paul Bremer, not to mention Allawi - is free to continue his own brand of resistance: his Mahdi Army of urban, disfranchised, Shi`ite lumpenproletariat remains ready to roll.

The 1,000th US soldier will die very soon in Iraq. For the Bush administration these poor Americans fighting a dubious war to pay for their college tuition simply don`t exist: no wonder New Yorkers told Asia Times Online contributor Tom Engelhardt (Voices from the march to nowhere, August 31) the most powerful message on Sunday`s march was the 1,000-coffin protest, the carefully assembled cardboard copies carried by volunteers and solemnly draped with the US flag.

On the internal front, the enormous Republican advantage in fundraising disappeared as the campaign of Democratic rival John Kerry is also awash in donations. The economic recovery is a myth. Jobs are disappearing by the hundreds of thousands. Bush is in serious danger in the crucial swing states. Ohio - 250,000 lost jobs - is swinging pro-Kerry by 9%. Florida is swinging pro-Kerry by 6%. Pennsylvania, with its huge Boeing plant in the Ridley Park suburb of Philadelphia, is also swinging pro-Kerry. Analysts point to 2.6 million undecided voters nationwide - which both parties may have identified almost to a man and woman. But as Ruy Teixeira of the Emerging Democratic Majority suggests, the recent surge in Bush`s numbers may have more to do with more undecideds than with increased support for the president.

How Bush gets away with it
Who are these people in New York? Sixty-three percent declare themselves conservative (compared with 57% of Republicans on a national basis). Two-thirds are Protestant (compared with 54% nationally). Thirty-three percent are evangelicals (compared with 27% at the 2000 convention). Forty-five percent are gun owners. The convention is not preaching to this pretty regressive bunch of converts, for most of whom New York is worse than Sodom. By using entertainment to market - and soften - the really regressive Bush-Cheney `04 agenda, it is trying, as corporate media insist, to "reach out" to many Republicans - and even some Democrats - who simply can`t swallow the whole platform.

Three cinemas in New York are currently showing Bush`s Brain, a documentary based on the homonymous book by James Moore and Wayne Slater, head of the Dallas Morning News office in Austin, Texas. The thesis of both book and film is that Karl Rove, the Republican Machiavelli-in-charge, is the co-president of the US: trade policy, fiscal policy, social policies, environment, education, foreign policy and war, everything is dictated by the ultimate Rovian imperative - to win the next election.

So the question switches to how to counteract Rove`s dirty tricks. Rove`s consummate tactic is always to find and place surrogates to lie for him and for Bush - a lie often related to a divisive cultural issue. As in the Swift Boat smear campaign against John Kerry`s record in Vietnam, if the lie gets to Bush, the president can always get away with it, by "comforting" Kerry for example, but without ever explicitly condemning the smear. If the Democrats decided to pull a Rove and start applying the same mechanism to Bush - attacking his perceived strength (the tough, anti-terror guy) and not his many weaknesses - the effects could be devastating.

The real Bush-Cheney `04 campaign strategy is not, and could never be, on show in New York. Its main "themes" are fear and character assassination: fear in the form of perennially evoking the "war on terra", and character assassination like the Swift Boat smear campaign. The strategy aims to brainwash and polarize voters relentlessly with a barrage of lies and caricature. And it involves never, ever talking about the Iraq quagmire (best slogan in the New York march: "Quagmire Accomplished"), unless to tie it up with the "war on terra". Many Americans are smart enough not to fall into this trap: according to the latest Gallup poll, Kerry is now more trusted to handle Iraq (48%) than Bush (47%) - even considering the fact that still nobody knows exactly what Kerry would do.

As much as corporate media insist New York "is not America", the Sunday mass protest once again underlined the total failure of the twin pillars of Bush`s record - the economy and especially the "war on terra".

The Sunni Iraqi resistance controls the major cities in the Sunni triangle and is able to sabotage pipelines at will. Nobody is even dreaming of investing in Iraq. Unemployment is close to 70%. Muqtada is a nationalist leader with popular legitimacy who can cause endless trouble to the illegitimate US-appointed government.

The Taliban control at least 40% of Afghanistan - and warlords control the rest. As a New Yorker puts it: "The Taliban are killing people in Afghanistan? Again? That`s soooooo 2001 ..." US-installed Hamid Karzai may win October`s presidential election, but he will control little else apart from his own chair, as the joke in Kabul goes. Osama bin Laden, Ayman al-Zawahiri, Mullah Omar, these figures were not "smoked out" as promised, so they were completely erased from the Bush administration spinning machine - as Iraq is being erased by complicit corporate media. Opium-poppy cultivation is the rage in Afghanistan - its heroin back with a vengeance in Western Europe. Both Iraq and Afghanistan are under martial law. Their governments can only survive because they are protected by US troops - and mercenaries. "Democracy", anyone?

Who cares? In God - and terror - we trust to keep us indefinitely in power.

(Copyright 2004 Asia Times Online Ltd. All rights reserved. Please contact [e-mail] for information on our sales and syndication policies.)

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Don`t look closely, just swallow
By Ian Williams
Sep 1, 2004
NEW YORK - Part of the press kit for the Republican National Convention (RNC) is a packet of "Republican Macaroni Cheese Dinner", provided by Kraft, which has a "Republican IQ test" on the back. Actually the real test, as with the convention itself, is to read the ingredients in the small print on the side. It contains as many chemicals as the chemistry set I used to have as a schoolboy, and was certainly not digestible for the discerning reader.

The old saying has it that you can`t fool all of the people all of the time. But as the convention opens in New York, that is not the challenge facing President George W Bush and his eminence grise Karl Rove. At worst, they only need to fool 50% plus one of the population for the next two months. And if Governor Jeb Bush, the president`s brother, controls Florida with his accustomed strong hand, maybe not even that.

In fact, the target victims are the 20% or so swing voters, since the partisan spirit is such that each side takes its core voters for granted, assuming that they can take almost any degree of abuse for the cause of victory. And they can take it for granted that few, if any, of the voters, committed or undecided, will look at the actual ingredients but will act on their perception of the packaging.

In the old days, the conventions were where the parties actually chose their presidential candidates and argued about their policies. Nowadays, the primaries and the party bosses have already made that choice, so the convention is more like a coronation ceremony, much glitter and little substance. The actual nomination of the candidate has all the tension of a North Korean general election, and nobody apart from the party faithful reads, let alone cares, about the party platforms, the policies on which the party nominally goes to election.

The conventions are hugely expensive events, but the media time they buy is without price. In a country where the media do not cover national politics to the same degree, or even in the same sense, as in many others, the conventions give a chance for the contenders to hit the media markets in a big way, to craft their messages. It is assumed that there will be a "bounce" in support for each candidate, one reason for which is that most voters did not really know who they were or what they claimed to stand for until after they had had saturation media exposure.

Especially in recent years, both parties` platforms are a sop to the activists: but while the Democratic contenders will cast them aside in their rush to the center, the Republicans have a basic honesty. They will apply theirs while hoping none of the swing voters actually reads or refers to it.

The Democratic leadership will betray its diehard followers by pursuing a much more centrist position once elected. But the Bush administration, in this convention as with the last one, will be flying totally false colors. It has a pact with its followers: it will pretend to be moderate for the swing voters, but has convinced its core conservative supporters that once elected it will deliver what they wanted, which is probably even more than is in its platform.

Consider: the twin themes of the RNC are the "war on terror" and compassionate conservatism. The keynote speakers of the convention are Senator John McCain, ex-New York mayor Rudy Giuliani, New York Governor George Pataki, California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, and the retiring Georgia Senator Zell Miller, who once nominated Bill Clinton at a Democratic National Convention.

Except for Miller, who as a southern Democrat was far to the right of most northeastern Republicans, they all won their elections by explicitly repudiating the Republican line on social issues. McCain, whom Bush`s supporters slimed in the primary, and who has called (unavailingly) on the president to disavow the similar sliming of Democratic candidate John Kerry, is widely known to hate Bush and is acting out of extreme party loyalty, or because he has been promised a top job in the next administration.

But the party platform repudiates everything they stand for. Giuliani, Pataki in New York, and Schwarzenegger in California, would never have been elected in their home states if they had hewed to the pro-gun, anti-abortion and implicitly anti-gay planks that will quietly and without public notice be included in the Republican platform this week.

It does not matter that New York hosted possibly the biggest protest march ever at a party convention. This convention is not intended to win over New York. It is intended to evoke the memory of September 11, 2001, and the World Trade Center for the heartland of America.

But watching carefully inside the convention will be the disciplined ranks of the hardline Christian conservatives, who expect that in return for the silence and lack of dissent while all these liberal speakers hold forth, their fundamentalist vision will be implemented in the next term. One extra reason for their good discipline is that they made exactly the same bargain for the last election, and most of them think the president delivered. He owes them and he knows it, but also, he actually seems sincerely to believe much of their agenda.

Indeed, having dodged one disastrous war in Vietnam and having started another in Iraq, passing himself off as the assured commander-in-chief in the "war on terror" should, on the face of it, be a hard task. But we only have to remember that his campaigners` genius, backed by the media`s lazy inattention or outright complicity, had persuaded 70% of Americans that Saddam Hussein was behind September 11, which this convention is intended to commemorate.

Any campaign that can slime the reputation of a combat veteran like Kerry to the advantage of a candidate who actually dodged the war, like Bush, has a lot going for it.

This convention, like that Macaroni cheese, will go a long way to divert people`s attention from the small print on the outside of the package and the lack of substantial nourishment inside. Kerry has two months to come out fighting.

(Copyright 2004 Asia Times Online Ltd. All rights reserved. Please contact [e-mail] for information on our sales and syndication policies.)

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Bush Reissues Kerry New Purple Heart

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`The Republican convention goes on all week, but of course the highlight will be toward the end of the week when George Bush will show up for one day, you know, just like he did in the National Guard.``
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"If you`re planning to go to the convention, even if you`re a delegate, you`re going to get frisked, you`re going to get patted down, you`re going to get groped, and that`s just by Arnold Schwarzenegger."
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"You folks excited about the Republican convention? Well here`s good news. Homeland Security chief Tom Ridge has declared New York City is safe, New York City is safe. Of course, that`s based on 4-year-old intelligence."
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After Muqtada, the militias ...
By Syed Saleem Shahzad
Sep 1, 2004
KARACHI - With the United States preoccupied first with the Sunni resistance in Fallujah and then with the Shi`ite opposition in Najaf, led by cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, another, equally significant development has taken place in the Shi`ite-dominated south of Iraq.

According to Asia Times Online contacts in the south, the Lebanese Shi`ite militia Hezbollah has deeply infiltrated Basra and surrounding areas, so much so that it virtually runs the province, with the help of Shi`ite militias, and is committed to establishing vilayat-e-faqih (rule by the religious clergy according to the Shi`ite faith).

Most of Iraq`s eligible males received military training under the Ba`ath rule of Saddam Hussein, and now the Shi`ite militias have equipped them with arms and ammunition. According to the contacts, much of this activity is being bankrolled through "welfare funds" ostensibly given to mosques and shrines by Iranian intelligence. Also, Iranian Shi`ites are said to be flooding across the porous border in their thousands, including Iranian revolutionary guards, who have already established pockets, especially in Ammarah and Basra.

The former residence of the governor of Basra, situated in Mohallah (locality) Manawi Basha (popularly known as Corneesh) near the Sheraton Hotel is now being used by Iranian intelligence under the cover of the Sayyed al-Shohada political party. The party is like many Shi`ite militias and calls itself a branch of the al-Majlis al-Alla (Supreme Council of Islamic Revolution in Iraq - SCIR) led by Ayatollah Abdul Aziz al-Hakim. However, the office bearers of the organization are not known to local Iraqis, and are generally believed to be Iranian.

However, it is often difficult to distinguish between Iranians and native Iraqis in southern Iraq as many Shi`ites, notably from the Dawa Party, the SCIR and members of Muqtada`s Mehdi Army spent many years in exile in Iran during Saddam`s rule.

Given the troubles of the US-led occupation forces elsewhere, militias in the south have flourished. This started immediately after the fall of Saddam`s regime last year, when Hezbollah sent hundreds of volunteers to take over the control of holy shrines in southern Iraq. Later, Hezbollah leaders helped Iraqi Shi`ites establish the Iraqi Hezbollah to fight against foreign forces, with the ultimate goal of establishing vilayat-e-faqih , in line with Iran`s desires.

The Iraqi Hezbollah now has its headquarters right in the middle of Basra, in the old police headquarters. The police have offices in a new building in front of the Shatul Arab waterway. The Iraqi Hezbollah has also established a powerful branch in Ammarah.

This combination of Shi`ite militias (reinforced with Iranians) and Iranian intelligence in Basra and Ammarah is taking place under the watchful eyes of the British, who are responsible for security in the south, but they are reluctant to precipitate a major clash, so have kept their distance.

These Iranian supported-militias are one part of the Shi`ite political puzzle. There are, of course, other key pieces, notably Muqtada, who if nothing else has earned himself a reputation for opportunism and unpredictability.

After vowing to fight to the "last drop of my blood" in Najaf, Muqtada has called on his militia to put down their arms and leave the Imam Ali Shine in Najaf, where their resistance was centered. This at the behest of the powerful Shi`ite leader Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, who favors a more moderate secular-leaning Iraq to Muqtada`s vision of a country more in line with vilayat-i-faqih.

The American-backed Iraqi government and Muqtada`s representatives continued talks on the future of his militia late into Monday night. The focus was a peace plan for the volatile Baghdad neighborhood of Sadr City, which has a majority Shi`ite population. At the same time, a spokesman for Muqtada said that the cleric was developing a "political program".

Getting Muqtada off the battlefield and into the political process is only a part of the problem in Iraq. Still sidelined are many Arab nationalists (former Ba`ath Party members), tribal chiefs, former Iraqi army top brass, and last but not least many of the clergy and prayer leaders at mosques, whether Shi`ite or Sunni. These people formed the pillars of power under Saddam, now they have been excluded - the Ba`ath Party was banned, the army disbanded, etc.

Inevitably a power vacuum formed, into which stepped people like Muqtada and Sunni leaders in Fallujah. Interim Prime Minister Iyad Allawi, who was himself a former Ba`athist and once a jail mate of Saddam in the 1960s, is acutely aware of this, and he is known to oppose the ban on the Ba`ath Party, which has been partly relaxed.
But whether he will have a free hand over his US backers in "rehabilitating" the former pillars of power is another matter. The alternative is anarchy in the form of militias. This is the dilemma the US now faces.

Syed Saleem Shahzad, Pakistan Bureau Chief, Asia Times Online. He can be reached at [e-mail]

(Copyright 2004 Asia Times Online Ltd. All rights reserved. Please contact [e-mail] for information on our sales and syndication policies.)

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Published on Tuesday, August 31, 2004 by the San Francisco Chronicle
Najaf Peace Deal Shows Why US Troops Must Leave Iraq
by Aaron Glantz


Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani`s triumphant return to the Iraqi holy city of Najaf last week should clearly illustrate one point: 135,000 American soldiers are not needed to keep the peace. In fact, it is their continued presence that makes Iraq so dangerous.

Under a peace agreement reached between al-Sistani and Muqtada al-Sadr, an arrest warrant on the young cleric was lifted as al-Sadr`s forces withdrew from the Imam Ali Shrine. Najaf and neighboring Kufa will become weapons-free cities, and in time legitimate elections will be held to determine the future government of Iraq.

Throughout its long-running fight with al-Sadr, the Bush administration has said it was battling a "radical cleric" linked to terrorist Abu Musab al- Zarkawi, but most Iraqis saw the situation differently. Moderates have always opposed al-Sadr`s confrontational stance, but for months they have demanded the Bush administration meet al-Sadr`s basic demands. In Baghdad this spring, Shiite political leaders often echoed al-Sadr`s public pronouncements, noting his willingness to agree to stop killing foreign troops if the U.S. Army withdrew from Najaf and agreed to leave the cleric`s fate up to a future, elected Iraq government (exactly the terms al-Sistani negotiated).

"The Mahdi Army has no problem with the people, it has a problem with the Americans," Hassen al-Sari told me in May. Al-Sari is an officer in the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq, a moderate organization that was appointed by President Bush to the now-defunct Iraqi Governing Council. "There are religious leaders and political powers in Iraq that can be used to solve this problem. The Mahdi`s problem is with the occupation army. It has problems with no other sides. If the U.S. troops decide to get out of Najaf, there won`t be any problem there anymore."

Sometimes U.S. officials even admit that they started this fight. Take this April remark from General Richard Myers, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, shortly after al-Sadr`s followers took up arms. Then-U.S. administrator Paul Bremer had just closed al-Sadr`s newspaper and arrested his chief adviser.

"What contributed to this was our offensive action," Myers told reporters at a press conference. "(We) shut down his newspaper. Went after one of his lieutenants (adviser Mustafa) Yakoubi, and it was not unanticipated or unexpected that we would find some resistance to that. They think they can stop progress for 25 million Iraqis. That`s not going to happen."

But is it possible that it was precisely the progress al-Sadr`s forces were making that made his presence so annoying to the United States?

Before the U.S. military branded al-Sadr a criminal, his followers had organized elections in many of Iraq`s poor Shiite slums and in smaller cities such as Najaf, forcing out local governments appointed by the North Carolina contractor, Research Triangle International. While big U.S. firms (Halliburton, Bechtel et al.) have failed to fix Iraq`s electricity grid and telephone system, al-Sadr`s organization has done its best to build a functioning society.

In a report issued in September last year, the International Crisis Group (headquartered in Brussels) credited al-Sadr`s organization for keeping the peace in primarily poor, Shiite sections of Baghdad after the fall of Saddam Hussein.

"Within weeks of the regime`s collapse," the report reads, "al-Sadr`s representatives claimed to have employed 50,000 volunteers in East Baghdad to provide refuse collection, hospital meals and traffic control. Religious seminaries run by al-Sadr`s followers have proliferated. In the absence of a functioning public judicial system, Mohammed Fartousi, al-Sadr`s agent in (the Baghdad neighborhood) al-Sadr city, used his Hikma mosque to establish rudimentary personal status courts. Al-Sadr`s wakils, or agents, distributed vests to traffic wardens emblazoned with the words `hawza police.` "

Now that al-Sistani has stepped in to stop the fight between al-Sadr and the U.S. Army, we can only hope that the cleric has the wisdom to put down his guns. But even if he doesn`t, the U.S. military should leave Iraq before it causes any more problems. The Iraqi people can take care of themselves.

Aaron Glantz is a reporter for Pacifica Radio who spent much of the last year in Iraq. His radio documentary, "Iraq: One Year of Occupation and Resistance," can be accessed online at www.fsrn.org.

©2004 San Francisco Chronicle

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Ich habe heute in einer Agenturmeldung gelesen, dass ein Offizier im Irak seine Leute dafür bestrafen, dass sie Bush nur noch als `the deserter` bezeichnen.
One person with direct knowledge of the incident told me that a US officer in Iraq had had to threaten his tired, dusty, frightened men with being disciplined if they did not stop referring to Bush as "the Deserter." Aus dem Cole Website.


How the Pentagon has failed U.S troops
Paul Rieckhoff and Dafna Hochman IHT
Tuesday, August 31, 2004

Policies that hurt

NEW YORK In the 16 months since President George W. Bush landed on the U.S. aircraft carrier Abraham Lincoln and declared major combat activities in Iraq complete, the nearly 400,000 U.S. service men and women deployed in active duty around the globe have faced unprecedented difficulties.

By now, the litany of strategic miscalculations in Iraq by civilian leaders at the Pentagon is well known. What the public and news media often neglect, however, are the less publicized policies that have quietly but insidiously undermined American troops, making it increasingly challenging to fight under the U.S. flag.

Four major Pentagon policies in the past year have undermined the morale of U.S. troops and their families - and are likely to leave a negative long-term impact on the ability of the armed services to recruit and retain service members in the long term.

First, in the dog days of August 2003, while Congress recessed, the Pentagon quietly cut payments for imminent danger and family separation. Earlier that summer, Congress had given the nearly 150,000 U.S. troops serving in Iraq and the 9,000 serving in Afghanistan a $75 a month imminent danger pay increase and a $150 monthly allowance to fund rent and child care for their families at home. The administration cited budgetary concerns for this pay cut. Yet the two payments totaled approximately $450 million - a meager amount next to the $400 billion 2003 defense budget or the $166 billion spent in 2003 on supplemental spending bills for Iraq and Afghanistan.

The White House reluctantly agreed to reinstate the bonuses after outrage in the press and Congress, but had already sent a damaging, demoralizing message to troops in the field: compensating service members would be among the last priorities in war time.

Second, by autumn 2003 it had become apparent that the U.S. troops on the front lines in Iraq were inadequately equipped. Their Humvee vehicles were not designed to withstand front-line combat and soon became the target of choice for insurgents. And by October 2003, although Congress had allocated funds for all U.S. troops to wear 16-pound, ceramic-plated Interceptor body armor, as many as 51,000 American soldiers and civilian administrators in Iraq still had not been equipped with the gear.

Family members of the service men and women serving in Iraq recognized the equipment shortage. Throughout America, worried parents and spouses bought expensive flak jackets and other critical gear and sent it to their loved ones by FedEx. For almost a year, until new flak jackets and heavily armored Humvees arrived, U.S. troops confronted the dangers in Iraq with inadequate equipment and protection.

Third, though the Pentagon had not planned sufficiently to protect and equip U.S. troops, in early September 2003 it decided to lengthen the deployment of nearly 20,000 National Guard and Reservists serving in Iraq. Over the following 11 months, more than 50,000 National Guard and Reservists would be deployed abroad; they now make up 40 percent of the 140,000 U.S. troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. These "citizen-soldiers," who had expected to serve one weekend a month, were now being sent for unknown and ever extended durations to the front lines, leaving behind families and full time jobs. These National Guard and Reservists are often the sole family breadwinners, and many work in local police and fire departments, so their absence weakens already insufficient local and state first-response capabilities.

Fourth, the Pentagon has grown increasingly unreliable in the eyes of the troops as it changes the rules of the game when the going gets tough. Faced with desperate troop shortages, particularly in the army, the administration has begun to disregard its agreements with service members. In June 2003, the Pentagon announced a Stop Loss policy to keep more than 10,000 service members in the field beyond their enlistment period. In other words, troops stationed in Kandahar or Najaf or about to be deployed Iraq or Afghanistan who were nearing the end of their service contracts are now being forced to remain in combat - involuntarily drafted for at least 90 days or until their unit is redeployed home. This back-door draft targets already battle-weary troops who have sacrificed the most and fought the hardest.

These four policies, the result of poor military and strategic planning at the Pentagon, are hurting Americans who have volunteered to serve during wartime. This week in New York, the president and the Republican Party will proudly celebrate their security accomplishments. Yet the baseline test of a government`s national security credibility during wartime should be its authentic compassion for its soldiers, marines, sailors, and airmen and women and their families.

Paul Rieckhoff recently returned from Iraq, where he led a platoon in the 3rd Infantry Division for 10 months. He is founder and executive director of Operation Truth, an advocacy and educational organization created to support American troops in Iraq. Dafna Hochman, a doctoral student in political science at Columbia University, was a foreign policy and defense adviser in the U.S. Senate.


Copyright © 2004 The International Herald Tribune | www.iht.com

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Perle wurde im letzen Jahr schon von Seymour Hersh vom New Yorker wegen anderen finanziellen Unregelmäßigkeiten abgeschoßen und mußte als US defence adviser zurücktreten. Dafür hat er dann Hersh als Terroristen bezeichnet, denselben Hersh, der die Sauereien von My Lai im Vietnam Krieg aufgedeckt hat und auch die Foltervorgänge in Abu Ghreib einer breiten Öffentlichkeit nahegebracht hat. Diesmal ist Perle wohl wieder mal mit der Hand in der Keksdose erwischt worden. Sowas ist ein Idol unserer Neocons.

August 31, 2004
Black Queried Perle`s Accounts
By FT.COM

http://www.nytimes.com/financialtimes/business/FT20040831_26…
http://www.nytimes.com/financialtimes/business/FT20040831_26…
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/08/31/business/media/31CND-CONR.…
Conrad Black was not a man who quibbled about the personal use of Hollinger International`s corporate expense account.

But on February 1, 2002, Lord Black seemed to have had enough of Richard Perle (pictured), the former US defence adviser who played a key role at Hollinger and Hollinger Digital, its now-defunct venture capital arm.

"I have been consulted about your American Express account which has been sent to us for settlement. It varies from $1,000 to $6,000 per month and there is no substantiation of any of the items which include a great many restaurants, groceries and other matters," Lord Black wrote in a letter to Mr Perle.

Apart from Hollinger`s most senior executives, the report into spending at the newspaper company is most critical of Mr Perle, a man whose "head-in-the-sand" behaviour, the report concluded, could make him liable for damages under Delaware law.

As one of three members of Hollinger`s executive committee, Mr Perle approved a series of transactions that directly benefited Lord Black "without any thought, comprehension or analysis".

"Perle`s own descriptionof his performance on the executive committee was stunning. In fact, he admitted that he generally did not even read [consents and resolutions he signed] or understand the transactions to which they applied," the special committee found.

Mr Perle also personally benefited from his role as chairman of Digital. Trireme Partners, Mr Perle`s private company, received a $2.5m investment from Hollinger and was paid more than $3m in bonuses connected to Digital in 2000 and 2001 despite the fact the group racked up losses of $67.8m on failed investments.

The influence of Mr Perle was not always welcomed by Hollinger executives and, eventually, Lord Black began to question the motives of the man who now stands accused of enabling executives to skim hundreds of millions of dollars from Hollinger.

"As I suspected there is a good deal of nest-feathering being conducted by Richard which I don`t object to other than that there was some attempt to disguise it behind a good deal of dissembling and obfuscation," Lord Black wrote in an e-mail to a colleague.

"My instinct told me that [Perle and a partner at Trireme] were trying to smoke one past us." Mr Perle did not return calls and e-mails.

© Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2004.

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September 1, 2004
BOOKS OF THE TIMES | `THE EUROPEAN DREAM`
Casting Europe as a Virtuous Upstart
By RICHARD BERNSTEIN

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THE EUROPEAN DREAM
How Europe’s Vision of the Future Is Quietly Eclipsing the American Dream
By Jeremy Rifkin
435 pages. Jeremy P. Tarcher/Penguin $25.95
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It would be foolish, especially after the recent report of an increase in poverty in the United States, for even the most committed proponent of the American way not to admire much in Europe these days: its reduction of grinding poverty almost to a vestige, its low levels of violent crime, the quality of its culture. And then there is the European Union, now 25 countries strong and, in fits and starts, becoming a peaceful global superpower, a breathtaking development given the blood-soaked history of Europe.

Jeremy Rifkin, the president of the Foundation on Economic Trends in Washington, rightfully calls these achievements to attention in "The European Dream," a book in which he unabashedly proclaims the superiority of the European model over the American one as a guide for the future. But Mr. Rifkin`s book, ponderous in style and pretentiously theoretical, is unpersuasive, flawed as it is by two mirror-image exaggerations: one of the European virtue, the other the American fault.

Here is the overall idea: "While the American Spirit is tiring and languishing in the past, a new European Dream is being born,`` he writes. That dream "emphasizes community relationships over individual autonomy, cultural diversity over assimilation, quality of life over the accumulation of wealth, sustainable development over unlimited material growth, deep play over unrelenting toil, universal human rights and the rights of nature over property rights, and global cooperation over the unilateral exercise of power."

That would seem to be quite a place, Mr. Rifkin`s Europe, and some aspects are real enough, at least in some of the many variable countries that make up what Mr. Rifkin calls Europe. But this imputation of a unified and homogeneous Europe is an initial conceptual problem. The European Union includes Poland and Portugal, Britain and Greece, which are as different from each other as each is from the United States. Those differences call into sharp question many of Mr. Rifkin`s assertions, like this one: "The U.S. foreign policy is light-years away from the foreign policy orientation of the 25 member states that make up the European Union."

Surely, there are some ways in which the international orientation of a collection of small and medium-sized countries will be substantially different from that of a superpower. But that phrase "light-years away" is a typical Rifkinian overstatement, even when applied to countries like France and Germany, which vigorously opposed the United States on Iraq. These same countries, after all, cooperated with Washington during the last decade or so in Kuwait, Bosnia, Kosovo and Afghanistan, including regarding the use of force in every instance. Beyond that, a solid majority of the 25 members of the European Union supported the United States on Iraq and contributed troops, wisely or not, to the coalition.

Some of what Mr. Rifkin describes as important European-American differences have been shrinking even in recent weeks. Powerful German labor unions have agreed to work longer hours without additional pay, a recognition that Germany, Europe`s economic engine, may be in for more "unrelenting toil" and less "deep play" (what Mr. Rifkin means by that profound-sounding concept remains vague) if it is to restore its damaged competitiveness. German unemployment has been more than 10 percent for several years, even as unemployment benefits have been shrinking; that country`s budget deficits have exceeded the levels allowed by the European Union for three consecutive years; and its leftist government has been cutting back on social welfare.

Meanwhile, Germany, like the rest of Europe, has an aging population and a low birth rate, which, unless something is done, mean, as Mr. Rifkin puts it, that "the European project will die." And, as Mr. Rifkin notes, the remedy for the looming demographic crisis, namely large-scale immigration from non-European countries, is powerfully opposed by majorities in Europe and by important minorities whose members have grouped themselves into numerous right-wing political formations with racist and nationalist appeal.

Mr. Rifkin by no means conceals these facts. He writes accurately about anti-immigrant sentiment in Europe even as he describes recent gestures, like the French banning of Muslim head scarves in school, a product, Mr. Rifkin says, of "the French assimilationist ideal." What is strange is that in one breath Mr. Rifkin can identify an assimilationist ideal in France even while characterizing the United States as assimilationist and Europe as culturally diverse. Europeans, he writes, "seek to establish a politics based on inclusivity - that is, honoring everyone`s individual dream equally." A nice sentiment, but there is nothing indicating that Europe is doing better in this area of life than the United States and a good deal to suggest that it is doing worse.

Mr. Rifkin`s reply is, essentially, that, yes, there is always a difference between dream and reality; what is important is the evolution of attitudes, values and the conscious formation of ideals to live by, and European values, attitudes and ideals are more suited for the interdependent world of the future than the American ones. Here Mr. Rifkin devotes several chapters to describing the formation of those attitudes and values on the two sides of the Atlantic. He demonstrates a great deal of reading and thought on these subjects, invoking an astonishing array of people and things, from the contribution of Descartes to the invention of bourgeois rationality to the role of clocks in altering the human consciousness.

But here too there is a dreamy, abstract quality to his book, which is replete with highly arguable assertions founded, it would seem, mostly on Mr. Rifkin`s authority. "Europeans tend to be less expedient and driven in their personal relationships than Americans," he writes in one of many examples of this tendency. Or, "More and more emigrants are choosing Europe over America than ever before," a notion he advances to support his claim that, actually, there is more opportunity and upward mobility in Europe than in the United States.

Having seen the visa lines in places like Beijing and Karachi, I don`t believe that Europe has replaced the United States as the first choice of emigrants. Moreover, Mr. Rifkin`s arguments on the mobility front are a long way from definitive. As frequently happens in this book, Mr. Rifkin sticks to his thesis even when the cold facts, including many that he himself adduces, seem powerfully to undermine his argument.

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company

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Höchstwahrscheinlich hat Al Kaida auch 600% in Baghdad an der Börse gemacht!

August 31, 2004
U.N. Seeks Tighter Sanctions as Qaeda Skirts Money Controls
By WARREN HOGE

UNITED NATIONS, Aug. 30 - Al Qaeda no longer needs large sums of money to mount terror attacks and is consequently able to finance its actions in less detectable ways, the chairman of a United Nations sanctions-monitoring committee said Monday.

"We either strengthen the sanctions regime that the Security Council has implemented or we risk those sanctions falling into irrelevancy," said Ambassador Heraldo Muñoz of Chile, the chairman of a panel examining the effectiveness of arms and travel embargoes against people and organizations tied to the terror group.

"We have passed the easy stage," Mr. Muñoz said in reporting the diminishing effects of United Nations sanctions. "The easy stage was the first few years, when freezing bank accounts of individuals and organizations linked to Al Qaeda was a relatively easy task. Now they have become more flexible, they are staying ahead of the sanctions, and we need obviously to be better at combating them because they have become better at defending themselves."

The committee`s report said that Al Qaeda had spent less than $50,000 on each of its attacks since Sept. 11, 2001, and no longer had to seek large cross-border transfers to help pay the estimated $10 million to $20 million a year that it once owed its Taliban hosts in Afghanistan.

As examples, the report said that the attacks in March on commuter trains in Madrid in which 191 people died cost only $10,000, while suicide truck bombings in Istanbul in November that left 62 people dead cost less than $40,000.

According to the 9/11 commission, the Sept. 11 plot cost $400,000 to $500,000, not including the hijackers` training in Afghanistan.

Among the difficult-to-scrutinize financing sources for Al Qaeda that the report listed were crime proceeds, diverted charitable donations, counterfeit currency trading in Somalia, credit card fraud in Western Europe and Asia, the drug trade in Afghanistan and Northern Africa, and an ancient financial system where money brokers in the Middle East, Pakistan, India and Southern Asia can move cash from one office to another based on trust.

The Security Council sanctions, established in October 1999, were intended to undermine the ability of organizations to gain access to, raise or move money, to purchase arms and to cross borders.

"They were relevant to the circumstances at the time, but the circumstances have changed," said Richard Barrett, the monitoring team`s coordinator. He said the panel would send recommendations to the Security Council on how to sharpen the sanctions.

Noting that whatever success the sanctions have had in freezing money has been offset by Al Qaeda`s adaptability, the report said, "As a result of national and international action, Al Qaeda`s funding has decreased significantly, but so, too, has its need for money."

Al Qaeda, the report said, has decentralized into a loose network of affiliated groups with the capacity to inspire terror attacks around the world through its use of the Internet, cellphones and weapons and equipment that are not proscribed.

The report said the committee`s effort to compile a list of individuals linked to Al Qaeda, now at 429 names, had been compromised by entries that were inaccurate or not sufficiently detailed to be useful.

"This is not a U.S. problem, it is not a European problem, it is global,`` Mr. Muñoz said, implying that the panel expected greater cooperation from United Nations member states.

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company

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Moore in New York beim Parteitag der GOP.
2.Tag

http://www.usatoday.com/news/politicselections/nation/presid…" target="_blank" rel="nofollow ugc noopener">http://www.usatoday.com/news/politicselections/nation/presid…


The Ebert and McCain show
By Michael Moore
NEW YORK — Poor John McCain.

Here`s a guy I`ve always sort of liked, a courageous war hero reduced to carrying water for the Bush campaign. (Related stories: Moore index page)

So it was Monday night, as I sat in the press section — unbeknownst to Sen. McCain — when he switched from pro-war convention speaker to film critic. Out of nowhere, he began to attack my movie, Fahrenheit 9/11, calling me a "disingenuous filmmaker." The problem is, he hasn`t seen the movie, a fact he later admitted to Chris Matthews on MSNBC.

I know Republicans are mad that my film may have convinced just enough people to tip the balance in this election. Yet with all the serious issues facing our country, and right smack in the middle of an important speech about the need to catch the terrorists and continue the war in Iraq, McCain decided to turn the convention into the Ebert and McCain Show. He claimed that I portrayed Saddam`s Iraq as an "oasis of peace."

Some of the 20 million who have seen the film must have wondered, "Did I miss that scene? I knew I shouldn`t have gone out for those Goobers." All I can imagine McCain was referring to was a brief cutaway just as President Bush announces the commencement of the bombing of Baghdad on March 19, 2003.

Human-rights groups say thousands of civilians were killed because of our bombing. I thought it would be worthwhile to show some of the faces of Iraqi people who might soon meet their death.

I felt really bad for McCain standing there on the stage. The man wanted to be president. That dream was snuffed out during the 2000 primaries, when George W. Bush`s supporters spread nasty rumors about what five and a half years in a North Vietnamese POW camp might have done to McCain`s sanity.

Then there were the calls to potential white voters in South Carolina to inform them that McCain had a "black baby." (He and his wife adopted a child from Bangladesh.) The Bush supporters also spread other rumors that questioned McCain`s patriotism, even though the man was a decorated war hero while W. chose to oh, let`s not get into that again.

Still, McCain has offered to soldier on for Bush. So how does Bush`s campaign treat him? It doesn`t tell him I might be in the press section, officially credentialed.

It has him say some gibberish about my movie. Everyone then sees me, I start laughing my ball cap off, the crowd goes bananas, and poor McCain must think he said something funny or cool, so he says, "That line was so good, I`ll use it again."

Agghh!

Thousands of Republicans turned to me chanting "Four more years." I thought, "That`s strange, Republicans are usually good at math, but they`re off by a few dozen months. Bush only has two months left." So I held up two fingers to correct their miscalculation. But that just drove them into more of a frenzy.

If you have never had this happen to you, I insist you try it at least once in your life. It is better than an angry mosh pit at a Slayer concert. As a quiet salute to Beavis and Butthead, I held up my index finger and thumb in an "L" — the international sign for loser — which is what I hope their candidate is about to become.

As for McCain, he had to beg the mob to be silent and listen to the rest of his speech. He must have wondered why a party that promises to protect us from terrorists booed my name more loudly than Saddam`s or Osama`s. Actually, no one mentioned the "O" name Monday night because, well, that would acknowledge that they have failed to find him.

Perhaps that is why Bush told Today anchor Matt Lauer that we can`t win the war against terrorism. Perhaps that is why they were more mad at me than the bad guys. I`m much easier to remove.

Maybe I`ll call up McCain and treat him to a movie down the block, one I know he will enjoy, considering he agreed that I was right when Chris Matthews said a main point of my movie is that "war is often fought by people without power."

If he will join me at the movies, he`ll see brave soldiers like himself face the camera and tell the truth to the American people about what is going on in a place called Iraq.



Find this article at:
http://www.usatoday.com/news/opinion/editorials/2004-08-31-m…

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merci für deine klasse arbeit u. info`s !

heute musste ich mal kurz zu einigen passagen zugreifen,
u. rüberkopieren in meinen thread- sie passten einfach zu gut...

cu
rightnow

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September 1, 2004
DEMONSTRATIONS
At Least 900 Arrested in City as Protesters Clash With Police
By DIANE CARDWELL and MARC SANTORA

A series of demonstrations rippled across Manhattan last night when protesters tried to converge on the Republican National Convention, as a day of planned civil disobedience erupted into clashes with police officers and led to the arrest of more than 900 people.
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On Tuesday, protesters wearing masks and snouts demonstrated against Halliburton, which held a breakfast at the Hilton New York for the Texas delegation. A series of demonstrations rippled across Manhattan when protesters tried to converge on the Republican National Convention, as a day of planned civil disobedience eventually erupted into clashes with police officers and led to the arrest of more than 900 people.
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The wave of confrontations - which included a brawl with the police at the New York Public Library, marauding crowds cursing at delegates in Midtown and the detention of hundreds of protesters near ground zero - created a day of disorder in a convention week already marked by sustained protests against the Bush administration and the war in Iraq.

Yesterday`s incidents stood in contrast to the enormous, mostly orderly antiwar march that drew hundreds of thousands of people to Manhattan on Sunday. Many of those protesting yesterday had purposefully avoided seeking permits for their rallies but had publicized their plans well in advance, leading hordes of police officers in cars, bikes, scooters and vans to flood various parts of the city primed to pre-empt disorder before it could occur. The day`s arrests brought the convention-related total to more than 1,460.
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A 17-year-old anti-war protester was interviewed by the media as he was arrested at ground zero. The protesters gathered at various locations, many with the goal of descending on the convention site at Madison Square Garden.
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The protesters gathered at various locations, many with the goal of descending on the convention site at Madison Square Garden. But at the various staging areas - near ground zero, in Union Square, in Herald Square near Macy`s, and outside the New York Public Library - the police began making arrests, sending the crowds into a frenzy. These confrontations followed several other events, some of which went off without incident, and the police said their aggressive actions prevented even more widespread disruptions.

"Today a number of anti-R.N.C. activities failed to materialize, including a takeover of the lobby of the Warwick Hotel, perhaps because of the police presence there," Police Commissioner Raymond W. Kelly told reporters at an early evening news conference.
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The police arrived early at meeting places for protests and began making arrests, angering crowds
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Protesters and civil liberties lawyers expressed concerns over what they said had been unfair and overzealous tactics in dealing with demonstrators who may not have had permits but were not violent.

"It`s an example of the police suckering the protesters," said Donna Lieberman, executive director of the New York Civil Liberties Union, referring to the arrest of some 200 protesters who said they thought they were abiding by an agreement they had negotiated with the police as they marched from ground zero on Fulton Street.

"It was a bait-and-switch tactic," she added, "where they approved a demonstration and the protesters kept up their end of the bargain. They undermined people`s confidence in the police, and that`s a serious problem as we go forward."
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Ozier Muhammad/The New York Times
Protesters were arrested after trying to hang a banner at the New York Public Library.
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The day, loosely organized by an anarchist collective called the A31 Action Coalition, began slowly, with highly anticipated events proving less than fractious. Indeed, the cat-and-mouse between the protesters and the police started early.

Responding to word that anarchists planned to somehow disrupt the morning`s trading, hundreds of police officers flooded the blocks surrounding the New York Stock Exchange before 8 a.m.

Roughly an hour later, dozens of officers responded to an obscure corner near the exchange at South William Street and Mill Lane, where protesters had stretched a ball of yarn across the street.
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Members of the War Resisters League lay in the street for a "die-in" at 28th Street and Broadway.

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Within minutes, 14 young people sat handcuffed and seated with their backs to a wall near the short pedestrian mall, surrounded by three or four times as many police officers. Several balls of red and yellow yarn were strewn about the street, and a boom box sat nearby with a sign on a bedsheet reading "Celebrate the Power of Money." One of the protesters wore a pinstriped suit and a beret.

Paul J. Browne, a police spokesman, said of the protesters, "A lot of them are from out of town, and I think it was reflected in the choice of intersections."

But the protests gained intensity throughout the day, and by late afternoon, the tenor had clearly changed as the police appeared to adjust their tactics to deal with the spontaneous eruptions throughout the city and the crowds of demonstrators grew increasingly volatile as the arrests mounted.

Indeed, the turning point appeared to come as several hundred protesters with the War Resisters League tried to begin a march up Fulton Street that organizers had negotiated with police, although they did not have a permit.
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A protester at the "die-in" was photographed by the police.
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Ed Hedemann, one of the organizers, said their understanding was that if they stayed on the sidewalk and did not block foot traffic or vehicles, they could proceed toward Madison Square Garden.

But within minutes, the protesters were confronted by a line of police officers who told demonstrators they were blocking the sidewalk and would be arrested, although they did not appear to be blocking pedestrian traffic at that point.

A commanding officer, telling the crowd of about 200 "you`re all under arrest," ordered other officers to bring the "prison van" and the "orange netting" with which to enmesh the protesters.

"We don`t know why we are being arrested, we were just crossing the street," said Lambert Rochfort, who was among the protesters. "We were told if we don`t do anything illegal we would be allowed to march on the sidewalk and we did just that. Then they arrested us for no apparent reason."

Later in the afternoon, a clash erupted on the steps of the New York Public Library after two women tried to hang a protest banner over one of the lions atop the library steps. After the police pinned the women to the ground, a crowd of protesters struggled with police, answering requests to move with chants of "Oink, oink, oink."
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As protesters converged on Herald Square in the evening, the police tried to contain the increasingly raucous crowds.

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People coming off the subways were thrown to the ground and the steps of the library were left littered with chairs and debris.

As protesters converged on Herald Square in the evening, the police tried to contain the increasingly raucous crowds. Hundreds of protesters seemed to get too close to the buses of delegates and the crowd became unruly as the police moved in metal barricades and used scooters to try to push the crowd back.

Those who would not move were arrested, and each time the police moved in to make an arrest, they were swarmed by protesters.

The demonstrators at Herald Square, frustrated by their lack of ability to move closer to Madison Square Garden, began breaking off in clusters of hundreds or so and storming the streets and avenues in Midtown, throwing cones and other objects at cars and windows as they ran.

As police drew close, they tried to scatter. Police tackled them in streets, corners and in front of stores. Innocent bystanders were also caught up in the maelstrom.
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Police tackled protesters in streets, corners and in front of stores. Innocent bystanders were also caught up in the maelstrom.
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In one instance, about 200 people broke away from the larger group in a chase that went all the way from 33rd Street and Broadway to 27th Street and Park Avenue, before being tackled by police. At 27th Street and Madison Avenue, protesters set fire to a large pile of trash near the Carlton Hotel as delegates and other guests made their way to the convention.

Reporting for this article was contributed by Randal C. Archibold , Michael Wilson, Mary Spicuzza, William K. Rashbaum and Colin Moynihan.

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company

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September 1, 2004
INSURGENTS
Talks to Disarm Shiites Collapse
By DEXTER FILKINS and ERIK ECKHOLM

BAGHDAD, Iraq, Aug. 31 - Talks to disarm hundreds of insurgents in the roiling Sadr City ghetto in Baghdad collapsed Tuesday, after a tentative peace pact was abruptly canceled by Prime Minister Ayad Allawi.

Leaders of the Mahdi Army, the rebel force led by the Shiite cleric Moktada al-Sadr, and two well-placed Iraqi sources said an agreement had been reached late Monday that called for the disarming of the rebel force and a halt in American military operations in Sadr City.

Mahdi Army commanders and other Iraqi sources said Tuesday that Dr. Allawi backed out of the agreement on Tuesday morning.

The failure of negotiations raised the prospect of more violence from Mr. Sadr`s Shiite insurgency, meaning the Iraqi government may not be able to direct its full political and military resources to quelling the continuing Sunni insurgency in other parts of the country.

Also on Tuesday, a militant Islamic group announced a mass killing in Iraq, showing pictures of 12 dead Nepalese laborers for a Jordanian company. [Page A9.]

The agreement on Monday on Sadr City, reached after several days of negotiations, had come on the heels of the withdrawal of Mr. Sadr`s forces from Najaf last week after the intervention of Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, the country`s most powerful religious leader.

"Last night there was a deal," said Yusef al-Nasiri, the leader of the Mahdi Army in Sadr City. "This morning there was supposed to be a press conference. But then Allawi surprised us, and he has taken us back to zero."

Simultaneous news conferences scheduled by Dr. Allawi and the Mahdi Army to announce their earlier deal were called off.

Mr. Nasiri said he had been told by one of the government`s negotiators, Qassim Daoud, the minister of state, that Dr. Allawi had objected to the restrictions placed on Americans soldiers operating in the area. Under the agreement, the Americans would be limited to performing reconstruction work; anything more aggressive than that would require the permission of the Iraqi government.

Aides to Mr. Sadr acknowledged that the agreement to disarm the militia forces had been left vague, which may also have given Dr. Allawi pause. He could not be reached for comment.

An American diplomat, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said American officials were unaware of such an agreement between the Iraqi government and Mr. Sadr.

But an Iraqi source said Dr. Allawi had decided to take a harsher approach toward Mr. Sadr and the Mahdi Army, possibly including the use of military force. The source said Dr. Allawi appeared to be motivated by disappointment with the agreement in Najaf, which ended the bloodshed there but left the Mahdi Army intact and made Mr. Sadr stronger than ever, in the eyes of many Iraqis.

In addition, the Iraqi source said, Dr. Allawi had recently come under intense pressure from Shiite political parties that fear that the entry of Mr. Sadr into the political mainstream could diminish their own potential success at the polls.

The groups include the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, which was long based in Iran and which has close ties to Ayatollah Sistani, and Dawa, a prominent religious movement. Such established organizations tend to see Mr. Sadr as an upstart.

The Iraqi source said it was possible that Dr. Allawi`s intention was to kill or capture Mr. Sadr, in hopes of striking a death blow to his increasingly popular movement, which has the support of many poor Shiites and of 150 imams around the country. He wants to humiliate Moktada," the source said of Dr. Allawi. "He needs a victory."

Another Iraqi political leader echoed those remarks, saying that the prime minister appeared to be reverting to his roots as a former member of Saddam Hussein`s Baath Party, where political dissent was often silenced with the gun.

"Allawi is a Baathist at heart, and he inherited all of his thoughts and behavior from them," said a senior leader of an Iraqi political party. "He is like Saddam; he has a smile on his face, but a gun in his hand to shoot you with - and he will use it."

It was the second time this month that Dr. Allawi had backed out of a tentative peace deal struck by his negotiators, who are led by his national security adviser, Mowaffak al-Rubaie, a Shiite political leader who is close to Ayatollah Sistani. Earlier this month, with the fighting raging in Najaf, Dr. Rubaie announced that he had struck a deal with Mr. Sadr, only to see Dr. Allawi renounce it.

Indeed, the abrupt cancellation of the agreement seemed to reveal a split within Iraq`s Shiite political leadership, and even inside Dr. Allawi`s government, over how to deal with the threat posed by Mr. Sadr and his legions of armed men. Several Iraqi newspapers reported this week that Dr. Rubaie intends to resign over differences with Dr. Allawi, who is a Shiite as well. Both Dr. Rubaie and Dr. Allawi have denied the strains.

The differences between the two are reflected in the larger Shiite community, which has been divided on the issue of dealing with the challenge posed by the Mahdi Army. Mr. Sadr, a 30-year-old street cleric, is disliked by Iraq`s Shiite religious establishment, which has felt increasingly threatened by his growing popularity.

Some Iraqi leaders, especially the Shiite ones, have quietly raised the prospect of killing or arresting Mr. Sadr as a way of eliminating him as a threat.

Other Shiite leaders advocate a more diplomatic approach to Mr. Sadr, based on the notion that aggressive action would only inflame his large following.

"Were someone to try to kill Moktada, it would disturb the peace," said Adnan Ali, a leader of the Dawa Party, one of the largest Shiite parties. "Moktada has a lot of sympathizers in Iraq, and it would be incorrect to ignore them."

Some Shiite leaders say a debate has been raging inside Mr. Sadr`s movement in recent weeks about the possibility of ending the armed struggle and entering democratic politics. Mr. Nasiri, the Mahdi Army leader, echoed that Tuesday.

"We have a clear political plan," Mr. Nasiri said, "for a new Iraq, for democracy, for human rights."

In the past, though, such declarations by Mr. Sadr and his lieutenants have proved empty. Mr. Sadr has promised repeatedly to lay down his weapons and stop fighting, but he has repeatedly broken that promise.

One of the unanswered questions in the negotiations has been the role of the American government, which has provided most of the armed forces deployed against Mr. Sadr. American diplomats have said that in confrontations like the one in Najaf, they would follow Dr. Allawi`s lead.

A Western diplomat expressed skepticism about Mr. Sadr`s latest promises to renounce violence, suggesting that they were no more sincere than those that came before. "He has given no indication that he would give up his weapons," the diplomat said, speaking of Mr. Sadr.

The diplomat suggested that Mr. Sadr, who has not taken part in the negotiations himself, is probably trying to buy time as he replenishes his ranks. The appropriate response, the diplomat suggested, was to keep up the pressure.

"We have seen no evidence that Moktada is prepared to forswear violence and enter the political process," the diplomat said. "The movement has suffered damage and wants a timeout. We can`t figure out why that is in our interest."

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company

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Das hatte er sich redlich verdient!

September 1, 2004
Chalabi Escapes an Attempt on His Life
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

Filed at 2:54 a.m. ET

BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) -- Gunmen opened fire Wednesday on a convoy carrying former Iraqi Governing Council member Ahmad Chalabi in an apparent assassination attempt that wounded two of his bodyguards, Chalabi`s spokesman said.

Chalabi`s convoy was attacked in southern Baghdad at about 7:30 a.m. as he returned from the holy city of Najaf, said spokesman Mithal al-Alusi.

``The doctor (Chalabi) is in good health. He is safe but two of his bodyguards were injured, `` al-Alusi said.

Chalabi, a one-time Pentagon favorite who fell out of favor with the United States, returned to Iraq from Iran earlier this month to face counterfeiting charges.

A warrant issued by an Iraqi court accused him of counterfeiting old Iraqi dinars, which were removed from circulation after the ouster of Saddam Hussein last year. Chalabi denies the allegations, saying he collected the fake currency in his role as chairman of the Governing Council`s finance committee.

Despite the warrant, the Iraqi Interior Ministry has said it won`t arrest Chalabi until unspecified legal issues are cleared up, leaving him free to move around the country.

Chalabi`s nephew, Salem Chalabi -- who heads the special tribunal in charge of trying ousted Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein -- faces separate murder charges.

Copyright 2004 The Associated Press |

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German Army Attacks Poland; Cities Bombed, Port Blockaded; Danzig Is Accepted Into Reich
Hitler Gives Word In a Proclamation He Accuses Warsaw of Appeal to Arms Foreigners Are Warned They Remain in Poland at Own Risk--Nazis to Shoot at Any Planes Gdynia Blockaded By German Fleet
By OTTO D. TOLISCHUS
Special Cable to THE NEW YORK TIMES

RELATED HEADLINES British Mobilizing: Navy Raised to Its Full Strength, Army and Air Reserves Called Up: Parliament Is Convoked: Midnight Meeting Is Held by Ministers--Negotiations Admitted Failure Daladier Summons Cabinet To Confer: News of Attack on Poland spurs Prompt Action--Military Move Thought Likely British Children Taken From Cities: 3,000,000 Persons Are in First Evacuation Group, Which Is to Be Moved Today Soviet Ratifies Reich Non-Aggression Pact; Gibes at British and French Amuse Deputies Hostilities Begun: Warsaw Reports German Offensive Moving on Three Objectives: Roosevelt Warns Navy: Also Notifies Army Leaders of Warfare--Envoys Tell of Bombing of 4 Cities Free City Is Seized: Forster Notifies Hitler of Order Putting Danzig Into the Reich: Accepted By Chancellor: Poles Ready, Made Their Preparations After Hostilities Appeared Inevitable

Hitler Acts Against Poland

Hitler Tells the Reichstag `Bomb Will Be Met by Bomb`: Chancellor Vows `Fight Until Resolution` Against Poland--Gives Order of Succession As Goering, Hess, Then Senate to Choose

Berlin, Friday, Sept. 1--Charging that Germany had been attacked, Chancellor Hitler at 5:11 o`clock this morning issued a proclamation to the army declaring that from now on force will be met with force and calling on the armed forces "to fulfill their duty to the end."

The text of the proclamation reads:

To the defense forces:

The Polish nation refused my efforts for a peaceful regulation of neighborly relations; instead it has appealed to weapons.

Germans in Poland are persecuted with a bloody terror and are driven from their homes. The series of border violations, which are unbearable to a great power, prove that the Poles no longer are willing to respect the German frontier. In order to put an end to this frantic activity no other means is left to me now than to meet force with force.

"Battle for Honor"

German defense forces will carry on the battle for the honor of the living rights of the re- awakened German people with firm determination.

I expect every German soldier, in view of the great tradition of eternal German soldiery, to do his duty until the end.

Remember always in all situations you are the representatives of National Socialist Greater Germany!

Long live our people and our Reich!

Berlin, Sept. 1, 1939.
Adolf Hitler

The commander-in-chief of the air force issued a decree effective immediately prohibiting the passage of any airplanes over German territory excepting those of the Reich air force or the government.

This morning the naval authorities ordered all German mercantile ships in the Baltic Sea not to run to Danzig or Polish ports.

Anti-air raid defenses were mobilized throughout the country early this morning.

A formal declaration of war against Poland had not yet been declared up to 8 o`clock [3 A.M. New York time] this morning and the question of whether the two countries are in a state of active belligerency is still open.

Reichstag Will Meet Today

Foreign correspondents at an official conference at the Reich Press Ministry at 8:30 o`clock [3:30 A.M. New York time] were told that they would receive every opportunity to facilitate the transmission of dispatches. Wireless stations have been instructed to speed up communications and the Ministry is installing additional batteries of telephones.

The Reichstag has been summoned to meet at 10 o`clock [5 A.M. New York time] to receive a more formal declaration from Herr Hitler.

The Hitler army order is interpreted as providing, for the time being, armed defense of the German frontiers against aggression. The action is also suspected of forcing international diplomatic action.

The Germans announced that foreigners remain in Polish territory at their own risk.

Flying over Polish territory as well as the maritime areas is forbidden by the German authorities and any violators will be shot down.

When Herr Hitler made his announcement Berlin`s streets were still deserted except for the conventional early traffic, and there were no outward signs that the nation was finding itself in the first stages of war.

The government area was completely deserted, and the two guards doing sentry duty in front of the Chancellery remained their usual mute symbol of authority. It was only when official placards containing the orders to the populace began to appear on the billboards that early workers became aware of the situation.

Border Clashes Increase

Wireless to The New York Times

Berlin, Friday, Sept. 1--An increasing number of border incidents involving shooting and mutual Polish-German casualties are reported by the German press and radio. The most serious is reported from Gleiwitz, a German city on the line where the southwestern portion of Poland meets the Reich.

At 8 P.M., according to the semi-official news agency, a group of Polish insurrectionists forced an entrance into the Gleiwitz radio station, overpowering the watchmen and beating and generally mishandling the attendants. The Gleiwitz station was relaying a Breslau station`s program, which was broken off by the Poles.

They proceeded to broadcast a prepared proclamation, partly in Polish and partly in German, announcing themselves as "the Polish Volunteer Corps of Upper Silesia speaking from the Polish station in Gleiwitz." The city, they alleged, was in Polish hands.

Gleiwitz`s surprised radio listeners notified the police, who halted the broadcast and exchanged fire with the insurrectionists, killing one and capturing the rest. The police are said to have discovered that the attackers were assisted by regular Polish troops. The Gleiwitz incident is alleged here to have been the signal "for a general attack by Polish franctireurs on German territory."

Two other points--Pitsachen, near Kreuzburg, and Hochlinden, northeast of Ratibor, both in the same vicinity as Gleiwitz, were the scenes of violations of the German boundary, it is claimed, with fighting at both places still under way.

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September 1, 2004
OP-ED COLUMNIST
Crowning Prince George
By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF

ASHLAND, Ore. — The most common literary allusion to President Bush is Shakespeare`s Prince Hal, the hard-drinking, wild-living young man who sobers up, reforms and emerges as the great English warrior King Henry V.

So, as the Republicans once again crown Mr. Bush as their nominee, I decided to seek lessons from an expert on King Henry who is also one of the shrewdest analysts of current American politics and international affairs. That`s right: Shakespeare. I went to Ashland for my annual pilgrimage to the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, then started thinking about what Shakespeare might say if he were speaking at the Republican convention this week.

The paramount lesson in Shakespeare`s plays is that the world is full of nuances and uncertainties, and that leaders self-destruct when they are too rigid, too sure of themselves or - Mr. President, lend me your ears - too intoxicated by moral clarity.

You see Shakespeare`s passion for nuance in the way he portrays Henry V himself (you also see his prurience, for "Henry V" is Shakespeare`s most obscene play, laced with X-rated double-entendres that make it an attractive introduction to the Bard for teenagers).

Shakespeare admires Henry, who, like Mr. Bush, is strong, decisive and funny to be around, as well as a victor in overseas battles that help soothe doubts about his legitimacy. Thus for several hundred years, the play "Henry V" was regarded as a celebration of Henry`s invasions of France, and for that reason George Bernard Shaw and other liberal critics recoiled from it.

Yet beginning in the 20th century, critics began to see another subtext in "Henry V": an unblinking examination of the brutality and inevitable excesses of war, even depicting the Abu Ghraib scandal of the 15th century: Henry`s order to murder French prisoners at Agincourt. Shakespeare`s play can be seen as scorning the empty-headed jingoism that inflicts so much suffering as the ruler wraps himself in the flag. As Shakespeare writes in "Henry V" about wars of choice:

"But if the cause be not good, the king himself hath a heavy reckoning to make when all those legs and arms and heads chopped off in a battle shall join together at the latter day and cry all `We died at such and such a place,` some swearing, some crying for a surgeon, some upon their wives left poor behind them, some upon the debts they owe, some upon their children rawly left. I am afeared there are few die well that die in a battle."

A related lesson for Mr. Bush, if he has time to read Shakespeare, is the inevitability of intelligence failures. In just about every play, characters put their faith in information that turns out to be catastrophically untrue. Lear believes his elder daughters; Romeo believes that Juliet is dead; Othello believes Iago`s lies.

Shakespeare begins "Henry IV, Part 2," with the character of Rumor (who could today be played by Ahmad Chalabi), and he shows how kings get in trouble by relying on partial truths or flattery spun by sycophants like Goneril Tenet and Regan Wolfowitz.

"All these figures in Shakespeare suffer from hubris, and that`s what W. is suffering from," says Kenneth Albers, a veteran Shakespearean actor who is playing Lear in Ashland.

Indeed, the only person who seems to provide Shakespeare`s kings with sound advice is the court fool, who cannot be punished for saying unpalatable truths because jesting is his job. I urge Mr. Bush to appoint a White House fool.

Shakespeare is warning us against rash actions on the basis of flawed intelligence. Hamlet is sometimes seen as an indictment of indecision, but his "to be or not to be" soliloquy is a careful examination of the pros and cons of immediate action - a measured approach that Mr. Bush might have emulated before the Iraq war.

Instead, Mr. Bush emulates Coriolanus, a well-meaning Roman general and aristocrat whose war against barbarians leads to an early victory but who then proves so inflexible and intemperate that tragedy befalls him and his people.

Unless Mr. Bush learns to see nuance and act less rashly, he will be the Coriolanus of our age: a strong and decisive leader, imbued with great talent and initially celebrated for his leadership in a crisis, who ultimately fails himself and his nation because of his rigidity, superficiality and arrogance.

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company

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In einer englischen Zeitung stand vor ein paar Tagen, man findet nicht mehr genügend Studenten in GB, die in den USA studieren wollen. Sonst hatten die Plätze nie ausgereicht.
Auch sonst wird immer wieder berichtet, dass weniger Akademiker aus dem Ausland sich in den USA bewerben.

September 1, 2004
OP-ED CONTRIBUTOR
Too Scary for the Classroom?
By TARIQ RAMADAN

Geneva — Right now, I am supposed to be in South Bend, Ind., beginning my term as a professor of Islamic studies at the University of Notre Dame. After all, my petition for a work/residence visa in the United States was granted in May, after meticulous clearance procedures. But nine days before I was to move, I received an urgent message from the American Embassy: my visa had been revoked. If I wished to reapply, I was told, I was welcome to do so; but no reasons for the revocation were given. Classes have now begun at Notre Dame, while my wife and children and I wait here in a barren apartment.

The State Department`s reasoning remains a mystery. For some time I have been considered a controversial figure in France; but this was well known by the American government when I received the visa in the spring. I have been accused of engaging in "double talk" - that is, of delivering a gentle message in French and English, and a radical, violent one in Arabic.

My detractors have tried to demonstrate that I have links with extremists, that I am an anti-Semite and that I despise women. Repeatedly I have denied these assertions, and asked my critics to show evidence from my writings and public comments. Their failure to do so has had little effect: I am repeatedly confronted with magazine articles and Web postings repeating these accusations as facts and fabricating new ones.

And now the web of lies has spread across the Atlantic Ocean. The most damaging accusations were in an article in Vanity Fair claiming that I had written the preface to a volume of essays that endorsed the stoning of women caught in adultery. Actually, the book condemned the practice as un-Islamic.

I admit that my intellectual project is inherently controversial. My goal is to foster communities within the Islamic world that are seeking a path between their often bitter experience with some American and European policies on the one hand, and the unacceptable violence of Islamic extremists on the other. I understand, share and publicly discuss many of the Muslim criticisms of "Western" governments, including the deleterious worldwide effects of unregulated American consumerism.

I find current American policies toward the Middle East misguided and counterproductive, a position I believe I share with millions of Americans and Europeans. Yet I have also criticized many so-called Islamic governments, including that of Saudi Arabia, for their human rights violations and offenses against human dignity, personal freedom and pluralism.

My more specific stances have also raised hackles in France. For example, I strongly oppose France`s new law banning female students from wearing head scarves, although on general human rights grounds rather than because I am a Muslim. (I condemn the kidnapping of two French journalists in Iraq and think the French government should not submit to the blackmail of the kidnappers, who say they will kill the captives unless the ban is overturned.)

I was also accused of anti-Semitism after I criticized some leading French intellectuals - including Bernard-Henri Lévy and Alain Finkielkraut - for abandoning France`s noble traditions of universalism and personal freedom because of their anxiety over Muslim immigration and their support for Israel.

The fact is, in the more than 20 books, 700 articles and 170 audio tapes I have produced, one will find no double talk, but a consistent set of themes, and an insistence that my fellow Muslims unequivocally condemn radical views and acts of extremism.

Just days after 9/11, I gave an interview calling on Muslims to condemn the attacks and to acknowledge that the terrorists betrayed the Islamic message. I have denounced anti-Semitism, criticizing Muslims who do not differentiate between the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as a political issue and the unacceptable rejection of individual Jews because of their religion and heritage. I have called for a spiritual reformation that will lead to an Islamic feminism. I reject every kind of mistreatment of women, including domestic violence, forced marriage and female circumcision.

My opponents also accuse me of being the grandson of Hassan al-Banna, the founder of the radical Muslim Brotherhood movement in Egypt. I plead guilty to this charge. My response is: am I to be judged by the words and deeds of an ancestor?

Those critics obsessed with my genealogy ought to examine my intellectual pedigree, which includes advanced study of Descartes, Kant and Nietzsche, among others. They should examine the time I have spent working in poverty-stricken areas with the Dalai Lama, Mother Teresa and the Brazilian human-rights leader Dom Helder Camara, as well as with countless other Christians and Jews, agnostics and atheists.

For 20 years, I have dedicated myself to studying Islamic scripture, Western and Eastern philosophies and societies, and built an identity that is truly Western and truly Muslim. I make no apologies for taking a critical look at both Islam and the West; in doing so I am being true to my faith and to the ethics of my Swiss citizenship. I believe Muslims can remain faithful to their religion and be able, from within pluralistic and democratic societies, to oppose all injustices.

I also feel it is vital that Muslims stop blaming others and indulging in victimization. We are responsible for reforming our societies. On the other hand, blindly supporting American or European policies should not be the only acceptable political stance for Muslims who seek to be considered progressive and moderate.

In the Arab and Islamic world, one hears a great deal of legitimate criticism of American foreign policy. This is not to be confused with a rejection of American values. Rather, the misgivings are rooted in five specific grievances: the feeling that the United States role in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is unbalanced; the longstanding American support of authoritarian regimes in Islamic states and indifference to genuine democratic movements (particularly those that have a religious bent); the belief that Washington`s policies are driven by short-term economic and geostrategic interests; the willingness of some prominent Americans to tolerate Islam-bashing at home; and the use of military force as the primary means of establishing democracy.

Instead of war, the Arab and Muslim worlds seek evidence of a lasting and substantive commitment by the United States to policies that would advance public education, equitable trade and mutually profitable economic and cultural partnerships. For this to occur, America first has to trust Muslims, genuinely listen to their hopes and grievances, and allow them to develop their own models of pluralism and democracy.

Simply sponsoring a few Arabic TV and radio channels will not lead to real changes in Muslims` perceptions. Instead, America`s only chance of making peace with the Islamic world depends on consistency between words and actions, and the development of cross-cultural trust over time.

I believe Western Muslims can make a critical difference in the Muslim majority world. To do this, we must become full, independent Western citizens, working with others to address social, economic and political problems. However, we can succeed only if Westerners do not cast doubt on our loyalty every time we criticize Western governments. Not only do our independent voices enrich Western societies, they are the only way for Western Muslims to be credible in Arab and Islamic countries so that we can help bring about freedom and democracy. That is the message I advocate. I do not understand how it can be judged as a threat to America.

Tariq Ramadan is the author, most recently, of "Western Muslims and the Future of Islam."

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company

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Greueltaten im Irak
“Ich habe für unsere Regierung unschuldige Menschen umgebracht”
von Paul Rockwell
ZNet 19.05.2004
Paul Rockwell interviewt von Chris Hedges.

„Wir vergessen, worum es bei Krieg geht, was er denen antut, die ihn führen, und denen, die unter ihm leiden. Ich habe oft gefunden, dass diejenigen, die den Krieg am meisten hassen, Veteranen sind, die ihn kennen.“

- Chris Hedges, Reporter der New York Times und Autor von „War is a force that gives us meaning“ [Krieg ist eine Kraft, die uns Bedeutung verleiht]

Fast zwölf Jahre lang war Feldwebel Jimmy Massey ein hart gesottener und, wie manche sagen, besonders enthusiastischer Marineinfanterist. Drei Jahre lang trainierte er andere Marineinfanteristen in Marineinfanterieausbildungslagern, einem der härtesten Indoktrinationsräume des Militärlebens.

Der Irakkrieg hat Massey verändert. Die Brutalität, das reine Gemetzel der US-Invasion berührte sein Gewissen und änderte ihn für immer. Er wurde am vergangenen 31.12. ehrenvoll und bei voller Abfindung entlassen und ist nun zurück in seinem Heimatort Waynsville, N.C.

Als ich letzte Woche mit Massey sprach, drückte er seine Reue über die zivilen Verluste bei Vorfällen aus, in die er selbst verwickelt war.

Sie verbrachten zwölf Jahre bei der Marineinfanterie. Wann wurden Sie in den Irak geschickt?

Ich bin um den 17. Januar nach Kuwait gegangen und war vom ersten Marschbefehl an dabei. Und ich habe an der ursprünglichen Invasion teilgenommen.

Was sollte die Öffentlichkeit über ihre Erfahrungen als Marineinfanterist wissen?

Den Grund für die irakische Revolte gegen die amerikanische Besatzung. Was sie wissen müssen ist, dass wir viele unschuldige Menschen getötet haben. Ich denke, am Anfang hatten die Iraker das Verständnis, dass Opfer Teil des Krieges sind. Aber mit der Zeit begann die Besatzung den Irakern wehzutun. Und ich habe nichts von humanitärer Unterstützung gesehen.

Welche Erfahrung hat Sie gegen den Krieg gestimmt und die Marineinfanterie verlassen lassen?

Ich hatte das Kommando über einen Zug aus Maschinengewehrschützen und Raketenschützen. Es war unsere Aufgabe, uns in bestimmte Gegenden von Städten zu begeben und Straßen zu sichern. Da ereignete sich dieser bestimmte Zwischenfall – und es gab viele mehr – derjenige, der mir wirklich den Rest gab. Darin war ein Auto mit irakischen Zivilisten verwickelt. Nach allen Geheimdienstberichten, die wir bekamen, waren die Autos voll beladen mit Selbstmordbomben oder Material dafür. Das waren die Phrasen, die wir vom Geheimdienst bekamen. Sie kamen an unseren Kontrollpunkt heran. Wir feuerten einige Warnschüsse. Sie verlangsamten nicht. Also steckten wir sie an.

Ihr habt sie angesteckt? Sie meinen, ihr feuertet mit Maschinengewehren?

Richtig. Bei jedem Auto, das wir ansteckten, erwarteten wir, dass Munition hochgehen würde. Doch wir hörten nie welche. Nun, dieses spezielle Auto zerstörten wir nicht völlig, und ein Herr guckte zu mir hoch und sagte: „Warum hast du meinen Bruder getötet? Wir haben nichts Falsches getan.“ Das traf mich wie eine Tonne Pflastersteine.

Er sprach Englisch?

Oh ja.

Bagdad war unter Bombardement. Die Zivilisten versuchten herauszukommen, richtig?

Ja. Sie bekamen Broschüren, Propaganda, das wir ihnen zukommen ließen. Darin stand: „Nehmt nur eure Hände hoch und legt die Waffen nieder.“ Das taten sie, aber immer noch beleuchteten wir sie. Sie waren nicht uniformiert. Wir fanden nie irgendwelche Waffen.

Sie haben die Leichen und Opfer gesehen?

Ja, aus erster Hand. Ich half, sie in einen Graben zu schmeißen.

Während welcher Zeitperiode fand das alles statt?

Während der Invasion Bagdads.

„Wir steckten ihn ziemlich gut an“
Wie oft waren Sie in das „Anstecken“ an Kontrollpunkten beteiligt?

Fünfmal. Da war [die Stadt] Rekha. Der Mann fuhr einen gestohlenen Mehrzwecktransporter. Er hielt nicht an. Da unsere Finger am Abzug ziemlich locker saßen, gaben wir ihm eigentlich keine richtige Chance. Wir steckten ihn ziemlich gut an. Dann inspizierten wir das Hintere des Kleinbusses. Wir fanden nichts. Keine Sprengstoffe.

Die Berichte sagten, die Autos wären voll mit Sprengstoffen beladen gewesen. Stellten Sie bei all den Vorfällen auch einmal fest, dass das zutraf?

Nie. Nicht einmal. Es gab keine Folgeexplosionen. Es war sogar so, dass wir eine Kundgebung ansteckten, nachdem wir ein paar verirrte Schüsse hörten.

Eine Demonstration? Wo?

In den Randbezirken von Bagdad. Nahe einer Militäranlage. Da waren Demonstranten am Ende der Straße. Sie waren jung und sie hatten keine Waffen. Und als wir auf der Szene eintrafen, war schon ein Panzer da, der am Straßenrand parkte. Wenn die Iraker etwas hätten machen wollen, so hätten sie den Panzer hochjagen können. Aber sie taten ’s nicht. Sie hielten nur eine Demonstration ab. Am anderen Ende der Straße sahen wir einige RPGs (Raketengetriebene Granaten) gegen eine Mauer aufgebaut. Das beruhigte uns, denn wir dachten: „Wow, wenn die vorgehabt hätten, uns hochzujagen, hätten sie’s schon getan.“

Waren die Protestplakate auf Englisch oder Arabisch?

Beides.

Wer gab den Befehl, die Demonstration auszulöschen?

Befehl von oben. Uns wurde mitgeteilt, vor Zivilisten auf der Hut zu sein, da viele Fedajin und republikanische Gardisten ihre Uniformen weggeschmissen und Zivilkleidung angezogen hätten und Terrorattacken auf amerikanische Soldaten durchführen würden. Die Geheimdienstberichte, die uns mitgeteilt wurden, waren im Wesentlichen jedem Glied der Befehlskette bekannt. Die Militärhierarchie, die im Irak errichtet worden war, war jedem Marineinfanteristen im Irak bekannt. Der Befehl, die Demonstranten abzuschießen, kam, glaube ich, von höheren Regierungsbeamten, einschließlich Geheimdienstgruppierungen innerhalb des US-Militärs und US-Regierung.

Was für Feuerwaffen wurden angewandt?

M-16er, fünfziger Kaliber Maschinengewehre.

Sie feuerten auf sechs oder zehn Jugendliche? Wurden sie alle eliminiert?

Oh ja. Nun, ich hatte „Mitleid“ mit dem einen Burschen. Als wir anrollten, versteckte er sich hinter einer Betonsäule. Ich sah ihn und erhob mein Gewehr, und er hob die Hände hoch. Er rannte weg. Ich sagte allen: „Schießt nicht!” Die Hälfte seines Fußes schleifte hinter ihm her. So rannte er also mit einem halben Fuß abgetrennt.

Nachdem Sie die Demonstration angsteckt hatten, wie lange dauerte es bis zum nächsten Vorfall?

Vermutlich ein oder zwei Stunden. Das ist auch so eine Sache. Ich bin froh, dass ich mit ihnen darüber spreche, denn ich habe all das unterdrückt.

Nun, ich schätze es sehr hoch, dass Sie mir die Informationen geben, so hart es auch sein mag, sich die schmerzhaften Details in Erinnerung zu rufen.

Das geht schon in Ordnung. Es ist eine Art Therapie für mich. Da es etwas ist, dass ich lange unterdrückt habe.

Und der Vorfall?

Es war ein Vorfall mit einem der Autos. Wir erschossen ein Individuum mit erhobenen Händen. Er stieg aus dem Auto aus. Er war verletzt. Wir steckten ihn an. Ich weiß nicht, wer mit dem Feuern begann. Einer der Marineinfanteristen kam zu uns rüber gerannt und sagte: „Ihr habt gerade einen Burschen erschossen, der seine Hände erhoben hatte.“ Mann, ich hatte das ganz vergessen.

Abgereichertes Uran und Clusterbomben
„Sie erwähnen Maschinengewehre. Was können Sie mir über Clusterbomben oder abgereichertes Uran sagen?

Abgereichertes Uran. Ich weiß, was es anrichtet. Es ist grundsätzlich so etwas wie Plutoniumstäbe herumliegen zu lassen. Ich bin zweiunddreißig Jahre alt. Ich habe achtzig Prozent meiner Lungenkapazität. Ich habe ständig Schmerzen. Ich fühle mich nicht wie ein gesunder Zweiunddreißigjähriger.

Befandest du dich in unmittelbarer Nähe zu abgereichertem Uran?

Oh ja. Es ist überall. AU ist überall auf dem Schlachtfeld. Wenn du einen Panzer triffst, gibt es Staub.

Hast du Staub eingeatmet?

Ja.

Und wenn AU dich oder deine Leute trifft, trifft es auch irakische Zivilisten.

Oh ja. Sie haben ein großes Problem mit verödetem Land.

Treffen Marineinfanteristen irgendwelche Vorkehrungen beim Umgang mit AU?

Nicht, dass ich wüsste. Nun, wenn ein Panzer getroffen wird, kommt die Besatzung für ein Weilchen unter Aufsicht um sicherzustellen, dass keine Symptome auftreten. Amerikanische Panzer haben an der Seite abgereichertes Uran, und die Geschosse haben AU in sich. Wenn ein Feindfahrzeug getroffen wird, wird die Gegend kontaminiert. Verbrauchte Munition ist im Boden. Die Zivilbevölkerung fängt gerade an, davon zu erfahren. Verdammt, ich hatte bis vor zwei Jahren nicht einmal etwas von AU gehört. Wissen Sie, wie ich davon erfahren habe? Ich las einen Artikel im Rolling-Stones-Magazin. Ich fing gerade erst damit an, mich darüber zu erkundigen, und ich sagte „Verdammte Sch...!“

Clusterbomben sind auch kontrovers. UN-Kommissionen fordern ein Verbot. Sind Sie mit Clusterbomben vertraut?

Ich hatte einen Marineinfanteristen in meinem Bataillon, der ein Bein durch eine ICBM verloren hat.

Was ist eine ICBM?

Eine Mehrzweckclusterbombe.

Was ist passiert?

Er trat auf sie drauf. Wir haben bis vor einem Monat, bevor ich ausstieg, überhaupt keine Unterweisungen über Clusterbomben bekommen.

Was für Unterweisungen?

Sie sagten uns, wie sie aussehen, und das wir nicht drauf treten sollen.

Warst du in den Gegenden, wo sie abgeworfen worden waren?

Oh ja. Sie waren überall.

Aus der Luft abgeworfen?

Aus der Luft und gleichwohl von Artillerie.

Sind sie weit weg von den Städten abgeworfen worden, oder in den Städten?

Sie werden überall verwendet. Nun, wenn Sie mit einem Artillerieoffizier der Marinesoldaten sprechen würden, würde er ausweichend und abschwächend reagieren, die politisch korrekte Antwort. Aber für einen durchschnittlichen Soldaten sind sie überall.

Auch innerhalb der Siedlungen und Städte?

Jepp, wenn du in eine Stadt gingest, wüsstest du, dass da ICBMs sein würden.

Clusterbomben sind Antipersonenwaffen. Sie sind nicht präzise. Sie schaden keinen Gebäuden, oder Panzern. Nur Menschen und Lebewesen. Es gibt eine Menge undetonierter Blindgänger, die hochgehen, nachdem die Schlachten vorbei sind.

Sobald das Geschoss das Rohr verlässt, hat die Clusterbombe ein eigenes Bewusstsein. Menschliches Versagen tritt immer auf. Ich will ihnen sagen: Die Streitkräfte da drüben sind in einer Zwickmühle. Es sickert durch, dass Zivilistenopfer stattfinden. Das wissen die Iraker. Ich höre weiter Berichte von meinen Marinekumpels im Inneren, dass 200 Zivilisten in Fallujah getötet wurden. Das Militär tut alles, dass solche Nachrichten nicht laut werden. Ich verstehe das so, dass Fallujah mit zivilen Körpern übersät ist.

Eingebettete Reporter
Wie reagieren die eingebetteten Reporter?

Ich hatte eingebettete Reporter in meiner Einheit, nicht mein Zug. Einer, den wir hatten, war ein südafrikanischer Reporter. Er hatte die Hosen total voll. Wir hatten einen Zwischenfall, auf den hin einer von ihnen nach Hause gehen wollte.

Warum?

Es war, als wir in Bagdad einmarschierten. Als er die Zivilistenopfer sah, fing er an etwas auszuflippen. Es begann erst, als wir zu den Randbezirken Bagdads kamen und anfingen zivile Opfer verursachen.

Ich würde gerne zu dem ersten Zwischenfall zurückkommen, als der Überlebende fragte, warum Sie seinen Bruder getötet haben. War das der Zwischenfall, der dir den Rest gab, wie du es sagtest?

Oh ja. Später fand ich heraus, dass das ein typischer Tag war. Ich redete nach dem Zwischenfall mit meinem befehlshabenden Offizier. Er kam zu mir und sagte: „Bist du in Ordnung?” Ich sagte: „Nein, heute ist kein guter Tag. Wir haben eine Menge Zivilisten getötet.“ Er sagte: „ Nein, heute war ein guter Tag.“ Und als er das sagte, sagte ich „Oh meine Güte, wo zur Hölle bin ich hier gelandet?“

Ihre Gefühle änderten sich während der Invasion. Wie war ihre Einstellung vor der Invasion?

Ich war wie jeder andere Soldat. Mein Präsident sagte mir, dass sie Massenvernichtungswaffen haben, dass Saddam die freie Welt bedrohte, dass er all diese Macht hatte und uns überall angreifen kann. Ich kaufte ihm die ganze Sache ab.

Was änderte Sie?

Die Zivilistenopfer, die es gab. Das war es, was den Unterschied machte. Das war es, was mich änderte.

Haben die Enthüllungen, dass die Regierung die Beweise für den Krieg erfand, die Soldaten beeinflusst?

Ja. Ich tötete unschuldige Leute für unsere Regierung. Wofür? Was tat ich? Was ist das Gute, das dabei heraus kam? Ich fühle mich, als ob ich unserer Regierung bei einer Art bösen Lüge geholfen hätte. Es ist mir nur peinlich, ich schäme mich dafür. Kraftprobe mit Vorgesetzten

Ich verstehe, dass all die Zwischenfälle - Töten von Zivilisten an den Kontrollpunkten, nervöse Finger bei Massenzusammenkünften - auf ihnen lasten. Was passierte mit ihren befehlshabenden Offizieren? Wie gingen Sie mit ihnen um?

Da gab es einen Zwischenfall. Es war genau nach dem Einfall in Bagdad, als wir zurück runter in den Süden gingen. In den Randbezirken von Karbala hatten wir ein morgendliches Treffen auf dem Schlachtplan. Ich war nicht in einer guten geistigen Verfassung. All diese Sachen gingen mir durch den Kopf - darüber, was wir hier taten. Nach manchen dieser Sachen fragten meine Leute. Ich behielt alles in meinem Inneren. Mein Leutnant und ich kamen ins Gespräch. Das Gespräch erwischte mich auf dem falschen Fuß. Und ich äußerte heftige Kritik. Ich sah ihn an und sagte ihm: „ Du weißt, ich fühle wirklich, dass das, was wir machen, falsch ist. Wir begehen Völkermord.“
Er fragte mich etwas und ich sagte, dass wir uns angesichts unseres Tötens von Zivilisten und des abgereicherten Urans, dass wir hier rumliegen lassen,, über Terroristen keine Sorgen machen müssten. Er mochte das nicht. Er stand auf und stürmte davon. Und ich wusste jetzt und hier genau, dass meine Karriere vorbei war. Ich habe mit meinem befehlshabenden Offizier geredet.

Was passierte dann?

Nachdem ich mit dem obersten Kommandanten geredet hatte, wurde ich irgendwie schnell aus dem Verkehr gezogen. Ich war im Wesentlichen unter Hausarrest gestellt. Ich redete nicht mit anderen Soldaten. Ich wollte sie nicht verletzen. Ich wollte sie nicht in Gefahr bringen.
Ich möchte Menschen helfen. Es war mir wichtig. Ich musste etwas sagen. Als ich zurück in die Staaten geschickt wurde, ging ich zum Hauptfeldwebel. Er ist verantwortlich für 3500 Marineinfantristen. „ Sir“, sagte ich ihm, “Ich möchte nicht Ihr Geld. Ich möchte nicht Ihre Vorteile. Was Sie taten, war falsch.”
Es war meine persönliche Überzeugung. Ich hatte eine makellose Karriere. Ich entschied auszusteigen. Und wissen Sie, wem ich die Schuld gab? Ich gab dem U.S.-Präsidenten die Schuld. Es geht mir nicht um die Degradierung. Ich gebe dem Präsidenten die Schuld, weil er sagte, dass sie Massenzerstörungswaffen hatten. Es war eine Lüge.

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Siehe auch #20869

Daring to dream

Europe is no utopia but, using Britain as a bridge, it can share its global vision with the US
Jeremy Rifkin
Wednesday September 1, 2004

The Guardian
In a deeply polarised America, where virtually every value has become fair game for criticism, there is one that remains sacrosanct: the American dream - the idea that anyone, regardless of the circumstances to which they`re born, can make of their lives as they choose, by dint of diligence, determination, and hard work. The problem is that one-third of all Americans, according to a recent national survey, no longer even believe in it. Some have lost faith because they worked hard all their lives only to find hardship and despair. Others question the very dream itself, arguing that its underlying tenets have become less relevant in an increasingly interconnected and interdependent world. For the first time, the American dream no longer serves as the rallying point for everyone in America.

Meanwhile, a new European dream is beginning to capture the world`s imagination. That dream has now been codified in the form of a draft constitution and Europeans are currently debating whether or not to ratify its contents and accept its underlying values as the core of a new Europe.

Twenty-five nations, representing 455 million people, have joined together to create a "United States" of Europe. Like the United States of America, this vast political entity has its own empowering myth. Although still in its adolescence, the European dream is the first transnational vision, one far better suited to the next stage in the human journey. Europeans are beginning to adopt a new global consciousness that extends beyond, and below, the borders of their nation-states, deeply embedding them in an increasingly interconnected world.

Americans are used to thinking of their country as the most successful on earth. That`s no longer the case: the EU has grown to become the third largest governing institution in the world. Though its land mass is half the size of the continental US, its $10.5 trillion GDP now eclipses the US GDP, making it the world`s largest economy. The EU is already the world`s leading exporter and largest internal trading market. The comparisons are even more revealing when it comes to the quality of life. For example, in the EU, there are approximately 322 physicians per 100,000 people; in the US there are only 279 physicians per 100,000 people. The US ranks 26th among the industrial nations in infant mortality, well below the EU average. The average life-span in the 15 most developed EU countries is now 78.2 years compared to 76.9 years in the US. When it comes to wealth distribution - a crucial measure of a country`s ability to deliver on the promise of prosperity - the US ranks 24th among the industrial nations. All 18 of the most developed European countries have less income inequality between rich and poor.

Europeans often remark that Americans "live to work", while they "work to live". The average paid vacation time in Europe is now six weeks a year. By contrast, Americans, on average, receive only two weeks. When one considers what makes a people great and what constitutes a better way of life, Europe is beginning to surpass America.

Nowhere is the contrast between the European dream and the American dream sharper than when it comes to the definition of personal freedom. For Americans, freedom has long been associated with autonomy; the more wealth one amasses, the more independent one is in the world. One is free by becoming self-reliant and an island unto oneself. With wealth comes exclusivity and with exclusivity comes security. For Europeans, freedom is not found in autonomy but in community. It`s about belonging, not belongings.

Americans are more willing to employ military force to protect perceived vital self-interests. Europeans favour diplomacy, economic aid and peacekeeping operations to maintain order. The American dream is deeply personal and little concerned with the rest of humanity. The European dream is more systemic, bound to the welfare of the planet.

That isn`t to say that Europe is a utopia. Europeans have become increasingly hostile towards asylum seekers. Anti-semitism is on the rise, as is discrimination against Muslims and other religious minorities. While Europeans berate America for having a trigger-happy foreign policy, they are willing, on occasion, to let the US armed forces safeguard European security interests. And even its supporters say that the EU`s governing machinery, based in Brussels, is aloof from the citizens it supposedly serves.

The point, however, is not whether the Europeans are living up to their dream. We Americans have never fully lived up to our own dream. What`s important is that a new generation of Europeans is creating a radical new vision for the future.

The UK is uniquely positioned to play a bridge role between the older American dream and the newly emerging European dream. Were it to cast its fate with the EU, while maintaining its special relationship with America, the UK could help create an ideological synergy between the two great superpowers of the 21st century. The UK could champion the entrepreneurial sensibilities and sense of individualism that is so characteristic of the US way of life, within the corridors of Europe. At the same time, the UK could help Americans better understand the need to expand their dream beyond individual self-interests to include the general welfare of the larger community and a global consciousness more befitting a globalising world.

But the UK will never fully enjoy the advantages that come with being part of a shared political space if it continues to straddle the fence. The US and the EU are going to increasingly realise that their own prosperity and security depends on their cooperation, if for no other reason than the fact that they each represent the two largest markets in the world. What can the UK offer either of these megapowers that they can`t better secure by dealing directly with each other?

Instead of seeing full membership in the European Union in purely negative terms, as something being forced on them by the flow of global events, the UK ought to consider Europeanisation as a historic opportunity, with vast potential benefits for the British people. By being a critical part of a larger European agenda, the UK can play a leadership role in helping shape the European dream and laying the groundwork for a truly global consciousness in the coming century. Equally importantly, the UK`s ability to draw America and Europe closer together depends on it being squarely in the EU fold.

The human race is becoming connected. Nation-state boundaries, once a source of security in an unpredictable world, are increasingly seen as too restrictive to accommodate the many new identities, affiliations and loyalties that make up a network way of life. The question for the British people, and peoples everywhere, is whether to be constrained inside old political containers, or to reach out and establish new political arrangements more suitable to an era of ever greater interdependence.

The real lesson in a globally connected world is that no people can any longer exist as an island unto themselves. The UK, too, will have to choose to be part of a larger political affiliation. The only question is whether it will make its home with America or Europe.

·This is an edited extract from Jeremy Rifkin`s new book, The European Dream: How Europe`s Vision of the Future is Quietly Eclipsing the American Dream, published by Polity Press.
Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2004

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washingtonpost.com
The GOP`s Challenge: Softening the Edges

By Dan Balz
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, September 1, 2004; Page A01

NEW YORK, Aug. 31 -- When President Bush described himself as a "compassionate conservative" in his first run for the White House, his political objective was to put an appealing face on a Republican Party whose image had suffered from the hard-edged conservatism of its rambunctious congressional wing.

On Tuesday night, as the Republican National Convention focused on themes of compassion without ever straying far from the president`s leadership in the war on terrorism, Bush`s advisers had another goal in mind: to put a more human face on a wartime president portrayed by opponents, including challenger John F. Kerry, as stubborn, reckless and insensitive.

That shift speaks volumes about what has happened to Bush during his first four years in office, as both he and his presidency have been redefined by two wars, a sluggish economy, and economic and domestic policies that have left many Americans wondering whether he is the man he claimed to be when elected in 2000.

On Monday night, former New York mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani and Sen. John McCain (Ariz.) offered testimony to the president`s toughness and resolve. Bush`s advisers believe his leadership on fighting terrorism since the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, holds the key to his reelection. But they also know his often grim wartime persona has obscured what they consider one of his most attractive characteristics: a generally buoyant, wisecracking personality that helped soften the edges of his conservative policy proposals.

There may be no going all the way back to the George W. Bush of 2000, given what has happened on his watch. Tuesday`s major speeches -- those aired by the major broadcast networks -- barely reprised the "compassionate conservative" agenda that was at the heart of that campaign but has been largely subsumed by a focus on terrorism.

War, terrorism and national security now form the core priorities of Bush`s presidency, and it was first lady Laura Bush`s role to tell the country that although her husband may be tough and resolute, he is neither indifferent nor uncaring as he has led the country into war. If war has transformed his presidency, she was there to offer testimony that it has not fundamentally changed Bush. He is, she said, the same man she met many years ago at a backyard barbecue in Midland, Tex.

The first lady spoke of quiet nights at the dinner table on the road to war, of overheard conversations with foreign leaders and of watching her husband from a White House window as he walked across the White House lawn, agonizing. "He`s a loving man with a big heart," the first lady said in remarks prepared for delivery. "I`ve seen tears as he has hugged families who`ve lost loved ones. I`ve seen him return the salute of soldiers wounded in battle."

The president has regularly turned to his wife in this campaign to soften the edges of his presidency. She appeared in the first ad of the campaign. She has crisscrossed the country on his behalf, and when the campaign put up a new ad recently about the war on terrorism, she was once again at his side on the screen as he talked about the anguish of parents worrying about their children on the day America was attacked almost three years ago. She has helped to provide what he often cannot.

California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger provided affirmation of a different sort for a president who has relentlessly courted his party`s conservative base. The party`s newest star is at odds with the president and that conservative base on social issues such as abortion and gay rights, but he vouched for Bush as the leader who has helped make the party open to those who don`t always agree with its dominant wing.

"Maybe, just maybe, you don`t agree with this party on every single issue," he said, reaching out to Americans who may have qualms about some of the GOP`s positions. "I say to you tonight, I believe that`s not only okay, that`s what`s great about this country. Here we can respectfully disagree and still be patriotic, still be American and still be good Republicans."

Before Tuesday`s evening session, Bush advisers explained why they had made compassion the theme of the second night of the convention, rather than the economy, which they and Kerry strategists both say is an issue at least as important than terrorism and Iraq in the election. They said they believed it was important to highlight some character traits and domestic policies of the president that had been forgotten.

"Obviously, the attacks of September 11 changed the nature of this presidency overnight," said Republican National Committee Chairman Ed Gillespie. "I`ve said before the president is seen often in settings that don`t remind us of [that] he`s not just a good president, he`s a good guy, and it helps to remind people of that sometimes. . . . I think it is important to reinforce that element of his personality and also that aspect of his agenda."

Bush campaign communications director Nicolle Devenish said the president feels compelled to talk about the war in Iraq and the war on terrorism, on the campaign trail and elsewhere -- and as a result Americans may have lost sight of what else he has tried to do.

"They might not have fresh in their minds some of the elements of the compassion agenda," she said. "It`s been crowded and probably eclipsed. . . . It [war] has made the compassionate agenda, the domestic agenda, something that people have not focused on."

Bush`s critics suggest that Iraq and the war on terrorism are only part of the reason Bush`s image as a compassionate conservatism may need a remake. They argue, in the words of Bruce Reed, president of the centrist Democratic Leadership Council, that "conservatism dwarfed compassion."

Reed contended that Bush used compassionate conservatism in 2000 to suggest he was no disciple of former House speaker Newt Gingrich`s brand of Republicanism but that once in office he showed his true colors -- and is paying the price in his reelection campaign. "It`s no surprise that they`re bringing `compassionate` out of its undisclosed secure location for the convention," he said, "but it`s not clear what it means anymore."

The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have also taken their toll on that compassionate-conservative agenda, but so, too, have some of Bush`s domestic priorities. Bush`s compassion agenda included education accountability, and the No Child Left Behind legislation was approved early in his first term. But that has become embroiled in debate over funding and regulations.

Education Secretary Roderick R. Paige said Tuesday that Bush "always had a compassionate vision for education," but the president has talked far less about that subject in this campaign than last and has barely outlined the next chapter in his education agenda.

His tax cuts, which have been generous to the wealthiest Americans, have caused many to question whether his compassion extends to those closer to the bottom of the economic ladder, according to Andrew Kohut of the Pew Research Center. "They look at many policies, especially his tax cut, as something that really isn`t designed for them," he said.

Public impressions of Bush`s compassion in his approach to governing have ebbed and flowed throughout his four years in office, reaching their peak in early 2002 as he remained in the glow of support after the Sept. 11 attacks. Now, only four in 10 Americans say they believe he has governed compassionately, according to a NBC News-Wall Street Journal poll. If the public began with optimism, if not certainty, about his compassionate conservatism, much of that seems to have dissipated.

Tuesday`s convention program reinforced the reality that Bush`s political future is tethered significantly to terrorism, Iraq and national security. But if his compassionate-conservative agenda occupies a less prominent role in his governing agenda, his advisers know the political benefits, particularly among swing voters, of reminding people of what they found appealing about his candidacy four years ago.

Advisers believe that the more Bush is on the campaign trail, the more that will shine through, but whether this wartime president can do that -- even with the kind of familial and political support he received from his wife, his daughters and others on Tuesday -- is an unanswered question.

© 2004 The Washington Post Company

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[rightnow]

# `87

einfach wahnsinnig u. erschütternd !

es überrascht mich aber nicht wirklich:
es bestätigt leider, was jeder interessierte schon lange weiss.


cu
rightnow

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Rightnow
ich weiß nicht, ob Du diesen Link kennst.
Hier findest Du an sich alles über DU-Munition, Cluster-Bomben usw.

http://informationclearinghouse.info/index.html

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Ein Problem, dass noch nicht gelöst ist. Die Kurden verteilt auf vier Staaten. Da wird in der Zukunft noch einiges auf uns zukommen. Dazu kommen zwei kurdische Organisationen, die normalerweise spinnefeind sind und auch irgendwann ihre Entscheidungsschlacht schlagen werden. Dann von Saddam im Kurdengebiet angesiedelte Araber und andere Minderheiten, denen noch einige Progrome bevorstehen werden. Ab und zu hat es schon mal gekracht in den letzten Wochen. Vor ein paar Tagen haben der Iran und die Türkei einen Vertrag über die Kurdenfrage abgschloßen. Etwas Gutes wird dort für die Kurden nicht drin stehen. `Four more wars`, wie sie auf dem Parteitag in New York gröhlen, wenn ich es richtig verstanden habe.

Turkish Commandos Kill 11 Kurdish Rebels


Tuesday August 31, 2004 7:01 PM

By SELCAN HACAOGLU

Associated Press Writer

ANKARA, Turkey (AP) - Turkish commandos killed 11 Kurds in three days of battles in the mountains bordering Iraq, one of the biggest offensives against the autonomy-seeking rebels in five years, authorities said Tuesday. The government didn`t rule out bolstering its forces in northern Iraq.

Two Turkish soldiers have also been killed in the fighting in southeastern Hakkari province, officials said. The offensive comes amid mounting rebel violence in overwhelmingly Kurdish southeastern Turkey.

Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul reiterated a call for the United States to take action against Turkish Kurdish rebel bases across the border in Iraq.

``Of course, we expect international cooperation in this issue,`` Gul told private NTV television. ``But we know how to deal with our enemy.``

Asked whether Turkey would consider boosting forces in northern Iraq to fight Kurdish rebels, Gul said: ``We would do whatever is necessary for our security.``

Turkey already has 1,500 troops backed by tanks and other armor in northern Iraq to monitor rebel actions and prevent cross-border infiltrations.

Gov. Erdogan Gurbuz of Hakkari province said two soldiers and 11 rebels of the Kurdistan Workers Party or PKK, now known as KONGRA-GEL, were killed in the clashes that began Saturday.

An official speaking on condition of anonymity said over 1,000 Turkish troops have participated in the offensive. The troops, backed by U.S. made helicopters, were chasing the guerrillas near the city of Hakkari, where the borders of Iraq, Iran and Turkey meet.

Turkey is home to an estimated 12 million Kurds. Half of them live in the southeast.

Kurdish rebels had waged a 15-year war for autonomy, in which some 37,000 people were killed. They declared a unilateral cease-fire in 1999 after the capture of their leader, Abdullah Ocalan, but ended it after five years on June 1, saying Turkey had not responded in kind.

Rebels intensified attacks in the southeast after calling off the cease-fire, killing more than 20 Turkish soldiers or police. Turkish troops have killed more than 60 rebels in the same period.

Turkish authorities blamed the rebels for bombings earlier this month of two small hotels and a liquefied petroleum gas plant in Istanbul that killed two people and wounded 11 others.

Turkey has ruled out any dialogue with the rebel group, considered a terrorist organization by the U.S. State Department and the European Union, and vowed to maintain its military drive until all rebels surrendered or are killed.




Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2004

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Am lustigsten finde ich immer die Zahl der Arbeitslosen in den USA. Glaube keiner Statistik, die du nicht selbst manipuliert hast. Dabei stehen die Zahlen allen in der monatlichen Statistik. Man muß sie nur zusammenzählen.

washingtonpost.com
Bush`s Jobs Albatross

By Robert J. Samuelson

Wednesday, September 1, 2004; Page A19

With Republicans gathered in New York, the lackluster job market must dishearten President Bush. He had hoped that a strong economic recovery would favor his reelection, and in some ways, he`s gotten his wish. Gross domestic product (the economy`s output) is almost 9 percent higher than at the peak of the 1990s boom, and business investment -- which had dropped sharply -- is up 14 percent from its low point. Jobs remain an obstinate exception. Monthly increases in payroll employment improved earlier this year, averaging 242,000 from February to May, but have since slowed. They were 78,000 in June and 32,000 in July.

Soft job markets in some swing states must especially worry Bush. The unemployment rate is 5.5 percent nationally but 5.9 percent in Ohio and 6.8 percent in Michigan. Beyond that, weak job growth casts a broader pall. Consumer confidence, though well above recession levels, has retreated from recent peaks. Ditto for stocks; the Dow (as of Aug. 27) was off 5 percent from its 2004 high. Wage gains have been modest, in part because there`s surplus labor. For hourly workers, wages -- after inflation -- fell about 1 percent from July 2003 to July 2004, says Jared Bernstein of the liberal Economic Policy Institute.

Explaining the slow job growth isn`t easy, particularly now. Everything is politicized. John Kerry slams Bush`s policies -- and Bush boasts that they`re working. Where they agree is in the presumption that presidents can deliver prosperity. Politicians, the media and the public embrace this notion. Unfortunately, it isn`t even a half-truth. More like a sixteenth. A president`s policies do affect the economy. But they`re one of many influences. The others (including the business cycle, technology and the Federal Reserve) usually dominate.

Let`s start with two popular theories of slow job growth: Bush`s tax cuts and global outsourcing.

Over the long term, budgets should be balanced. But in an economic downturn, they should move toward deficit to stimulate private spending. Well, you can`t fault Bush there. In fiscal 2000, the surplus was $236 billion; for fiscal 2004 the Congressional Budget Office projects a $422 billion deficit. It`s possible to condemn (as many Democrats do) Bush`s pro-rich tax cuts. A more middle-class tilt might have translated into more consumer spending. It`s also possible to retort (as many Republicans do) that Democrats would have moved more slowly toward providing a stimulus. Regardless, the tax cuts bolstered private spending. But the resulting economic growth produced fewer jobs than expected. Why?

Although outsourcing could be the reason, it probably isn`t. The stories about software jobs and call centers moving to India aren`t make-believe. But the numbers are small. Charles Schultze of the Brookings Institution concludes that perhaps 155,000 to 215,000 business-service jobs shifted abroad between late 2000 and 2003. Similarly, Schultze reports that government surveys attribute only about 4 percent of mass layoffs in the past two years to "import competition" and "relocation overseas." Even if these estimates are too low, they suggest that the impact of job loss abroad is exaggerated, Schultze writes.

The bigger cause of slow job growth, he contends, is higher productivity. Companies and workers became more efficient. That`s ultimately good; it raises living standards. But higher productivity can temporarily lower employment. Fewer people are needed to do the same work, and new jobs don`t instantly materialize. From late 1995 to late 2000, productivity (output per hour worked) grew 2.6 percent annually. During the next three years, annual growth averaged 4.1 percent. If it had stayed at the lower level, there`d be 2 million more jobs, Schultze estimates. Unemployment would be about 5 percent.

No one knows what caused faster productivity growth. It may be technology. Or it could be cautious corporate managers. "Business confidence remains fragile," says Mark Zandi of Economy.com. Companies try to make better use of existing workers; they`ll hire only when they`re convinced that higher sales justify it, he says. That could explain the recent slowdown. Consumer spending -- possibly hurt by higher gasoline prices and the fading effects of tax cuts -- weakened in the spring; job growth soon subsided. Whatever is happening, presidents can`t control either productivity or job creation. These are the amalgams of actions by countless firms and workers.

The actual jobs story and the campaign`s stories are barely connected. The first is complicated and uncertain. Indeed, government employment surveys disagree on the extent of job creation. By contrast, the stories told by both campaigns are simplistic. Kerry and Bush both pledge policies that will produce more jobs. Their promises sound reassuring even if they aren`t particularly plausible. But they do represent the agreed-on terms of debate. The Labor Department releases its next employment report on Friday. Whatever the numbers say, they will entitle one -- or maybe both -- of the candidates to claim vindication.

© 2004 The Washington Post Company

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Giuliani soll mit Reden nach 9/11 8 Mio$ an Honorar gemacht haben.

washingtonpost.com
False Grit

By Harold Meyerson

Wednesday, September 1, 2004; Page A19

NEW YORK -- There is apparently not much to George W. Bush`s presidency except his resolve.

Judging by the speeches of Sen. John McCain and former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani on the Republican convention`s opening night, the president has no record whatever on matters economic, nor -- remarkably for a wartime president -- much of one when it comes to conducting the war in Iraq since the fall of Saddam Hussein.

What the president does have is leadership -- pure, undiluted determination, a virtue that transcends such considerations as where exactly he is leading us. At other periods in our history, issues might matter, Giuliani noted, but "in times of danger, as we are now in, Americans should put leadership at the core of their decision."

Of course, the Bush campaign is fully aware that on a range of issues, Americans aren`t wildly enthusiastic about where the president`s resolve has taken us. By a narrow plurality, Americans would now prefer that he not have led us into Iraq. And nowhere has the president been more unwavering than in his disastrous commitment to tax cuts, which has held firm through surplus and deficits, peace and war, a weak economy and -- well, a weak economy.

Consistency may be the hobgoblin of small minds, but George Bush got it and John Kerry don`t -- or so Giuliani and a host of other Republican speakers would have us believe. Kerry, said hizzoner, lacks the "clear, precise and consistent vision" that the president has already demonstrated.

In the happiest of sheer coincidences, the convention`s coordinated attacks on Kerry`s alleged lack of grit follows hard on the Swift boat veterans` assault -- both base and baseless -- on Kerry`s record in Vietnam. Though Kerry`s crews still swear by his leadership, the Swifties contended that John Kerry was unfit for command then and remains so.

One test of Bush`s putative leadership skills, you`d think, would be his ability to rally his countrymen around a shared national purpose. Both McCain and Giuliani strove manfully to recall the moment when the nation did indeed come together, in the wake of the Sept. 11 mass murders. "We were not two countries," McCain said, "we were Americans."

But this spirit of national unity didn`t mysteriously slip away, nor was it sundered by the plots of fractious Democrats. Though most Democrats and liberals backed the war in Afghanistan, Bush decided to lead in a divisive manner for narrowly partisan ends. The president made no move to bring Democrats into his Cabinet to fight what some supporters have termed a new world war. On the contrary, in a spirit of downwardly shared sacrifice, Bush pushed for further tax cuts for large-scale investors; his war in Iraq would be fought by the working class and funded by its children. By forcing Congress to vote to give him a blank check to make war in Iraq before the November elections, Bush sought to use his war as a weapon against the Democrats. This was leadership all right, to exquisitely sectarian ends. And for Giuliani to have waxed nostalgic about the post-Sept. 11 period of national unity in a speech extolling George W. Bush`s leadership was industrial-strength chutzpah.

The mayor`s speech was plainly crafted to appeal to a number of swing voter groups, among them blue-collar white males who have borne the brunt of Bushonomics but who just might stick with the president out of some pathetic sense of tough-guy kinship. Giuliani lovingly recalled the bond between Bush and New York construction workers at Ground Zero three days after the Sept. 11 attacks, and earlier in the evening, in a film broadcast at the convention, the leader of a dissident Wisconsin firefighters local told the president, "We are willing to walk into a burning building with you." Of course, nothing in Bush`s service record, or his cosseted careers in business and politics, suggests that he`d be willing to walk into a burning building with them, but that merely testifies to how effective the marketing of the president`s macho-mindedness may prove to be.

The Wisconsin firefighters are precisely the demographic that the Bush campaign is wooing with its emphasis on the president`s "leadership" and its avoidance of any discussion of his record. For Bush to win, he needs downscale, white, Midwestern males to bond with him nearly as strongly as downscale, white Southern males. There`s a lot these guys will have to overlook to vote for Bush -- the exporting of their jobs, and the loss of their health coverage, to name just two -- but the decimation of industrial unions in the Midwest has Bush strategists hoping that white guys in Ohio will vote increasingly like their Mississippi counterparts.

It`s not that Bush is resolved to help them better their lives; it`s just that he`s resolved.

[e-mail]

© 2004 The Washington Post Company

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EDITORIAL
Remember Afghanistan?

September 1, 2004

Chapter one of President Bush`s war on terror, before Iraq, was the U.S. invasion of Afghanistan, where the governing Taliban was in cahoots with Al Qaeda. In June, Bush called Afghanistan "the first victory in the war on terror." And during the Republican convention this week, Bush supporters are playing up Afghanistan to draw attention away from the mess in Iraq. But last weekend`s bombing in Kabul, the Afghan capital, provided the latest reminder that the victory is nowhere near complete.

The death toll — at least six — was bad enough. More stunning was the bomb`s target: a building used by the company that provides security for Afghan President Hamid Karzai and is training a national police force. Somehow the remotely detonated bomb escaped the notice of security guards.

There has been progress in Afghanistan since the post-Sept. 11 ouster of the Taliban. Many schools have opened, and millions of Afghans have registered to vote in the presidential elections scheduled for October. Kabul has been largely peaceful, a tribute to the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force stationed there.

But the country`s setbacks are many. The Taliban is far from destroyed, and its leader, Mullah Mohammed Omar, is still at large. So is Osama bin Laden, and Al Qaeda remnants still fight U.S. troops.

Foreigners and international organizations have been special targets in the last year. Two United Nations workers registering voters in southeast Afghanistan were among six killed in a bomb blast in July. That month, the Nobel Prize-winning group Doctors Without Borders announced it was withdrawing from the country. Officials with the nonprofit group said the security situation was so bad, and the investigation of the June killing of five of its staffers so poor, that it could no longer put its members at risk. At least two dozen additional Afghan and foreign workers for international aid groups have been killed this year.

Karzai has had trouble extending his writ much beyond Kabul. Too much of the country remains the fiefdom of warlords. Some of these men helped U.S. forces in the months after the invasion, but they must be disarmed now before the country can collect taxes, build more schools or stamp out the opium poppy crop — which is estimated to have increased 36-fold since the days of Taliban rule.

Washington shortchanged Afghanistan to launch the Iraq war and seems to remember the early battleground of the war on terror only when political advantage accrues. If the U.S. clears the cobwebs and remembers Kabul again, it will have to stay focused to produce long-term progress. That must include pushing European nations to supply more troops and speed up the timetable for reconstructing the country.



Copyright 2004 Los Angeles Times

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Al-Jazeera TV brings GOP to the Arab world
LIVE FROM N.Y.: Influential network covers convention
- Anna Badkhen, Chronicle Staff Writer
Wednesday, September 1, 2004

New York -- Out of a busy basement office across the street from the Republican National Convention center, an Arabic-language news channel helps shape the views of millions of people in the region that plays a key role in the presidential race: the volatile Middle East.

For 40 million viewers in the Arab world, Al-Jazeera, a Qatar-based satellite television channel, provides a window into the intricate world of American politics. This week, its 16 reporters and staff will air 13 hours of broadcasts from the convention -- more time than the combined coverage of America`s major television networks, ABC, CBS and NBC.

Al-Jazeera`s coverage includes live broadcasts from the channel`s skybox above the convention floor in Madison Square Garden, interviews with Republican delegates, dispatches from outside the midtown Manhattan convention center and two talk shows, one of them modeled loosely on CNN`s "Crossfire" and featuring Arab American Democratic and Republican commentators.
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Al-Jazeera, the Arabic-language news station, is broadcasting 13 hours
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For many of Al-Jazeera`s viewers in the Middle East, these insights into the American political system are more than an excursion into foreign politics, said Hafez al-Mirazi, the Al-Jazeera Washington bureau chief.

"American politics for them is almost domestic politics," said al-Mirazi. "The Arabic society wants to know how serious are the statements they hear about America`s commitment to democracy."

Washington has well over 100,000 forces on the ground in Afghanistan and Iraq; its warships dominate the Persian Gulf; and it is a major influence in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. All of this makes the U.S. "a Middle East power," said Gary Sick, a senior research scholar at the Middle East Institute of Columbia University.

"The decisions that are being made in Washington literally determine life and death for many people in the Middle East," Sick said.

Al-Jazeera`s coverage of the U.S. political process may be equally important for Washington, analysts say. The success of the U.S.-led war against international terrorism and the course of its occupation of Iraq -- two issues that dominate the presidential campaign -- ultimately will be affected by the Arab world`s perception of America`s intentions.

"We failed to conduct our diplomacy with the Middle East, which led to resentment toward U.S. policies" there, said Najib Ghadbian, a professor of Middle East Studies at the University of Arkansas.

"If a credible channel such as Al-Jazeera covers the U.S. extensively, I think the educated and more sophisticated audiences may see that, yes, there is something to what the U.S. is saying, and maybe they are really interested in bringing democracy to the region," Ghadbian said.

Al-Mirazi agreed.

"The U.S. cares a lot about explaining America to the world. We`re telling the American story without any cost to taxpayer money," al-Mirazi said in a playful stab at Al-Hurra, the U.S.-funded Arabic-language network unpopular in the Arab world, where many perceive it as a White House mouthpiece.

Al-Jazeera, which airs news and public affairs programs round-the-clock, also struggles to shake the image of a channel biased against America and Israel. Its broadcasts of unedited videos of Osama bin Laden, its often provocative talk shows and its gruesome coverage of the war in Iraq have earned it nicknames such as "Taliban TV."

A U.S. bomb hit Al-Jazeera`s Baghdad headquarters last year, killing one reporter and contributing to the channel`s strained relationship with the White House. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld has called Al-Jazeera`s coverage of the Iraq war "violently anti-coalition," and last month Iraq`s pro-American interim government shut down the network`s Baghdad offices for "inciting violence."

"It`s important to change our image from `Al-Jazeera, comma, Osama bin Laden`s mouthpiece, comma,` " said Stephanie Thomas, the Washington bureau manager for the channel. "We have no agenda, no spin. We want senior American policy-makers to go on the air and talk to our viewers."

Thomas feels the channel wasn`t treated fairly during the Democratic National Convention in Boston in July. Convention organizers unexpectedly took down the pre-approved banner emblazoned with Al-Jazeera`s name and logo from the channel`s skybox, replacing it with a johnkerry.com sign. The media relations workers at the Democratic convention did not help the channel get any interviews with delegates, Thomas said.

That did not stop Al-Jazeera from airing 13 hours of news and talk shows from Boston, al-Mirazi said.

"Our coverage of the Democratic convention ... carried more than clichés, " he said.

Thomas said the channel had had no problems with access to Republican delegates so far. On Tuesday, Al-Jazeera broadcast interviews with Dan Senor, senior adviser to the former administrator of the Coalition Provisional Authority in Iraq, and Rep. David Dreier, R-San Dimas (Los Angeles County).

"I think they understand that speaking to us is better than the consequences of not speaking to us," Thomas said.

Al-Mirazi, who has been host since January for a weekly hour-long talk show on the U.S. election campaign, said access to delegates during the political conventions allowed for an in-depth analysis of American thinking.

"Covering the convention is important because in addition to policy- makers you also get to listen to the rank-and-file voters," he said. "You get to know what America thinks."

Despite the extensive coverage, al-Mirazi said, few of the channel`s viewers in the Middle East will be able to tell the difference between President Bush and his Democratic rival, Sen. John Kerry.

"There isn`t much difference in foreign policy between Kerry and Bush," he said.

But the Al-Jazeera coverage might help America`s 500,000 Arab-speaking voters, who get the channel through the Dish Network, al-Mirazi said.

In 2000, nearly 70 percent of Arab Americans voted for Bush because they "could identify with Republicans on conservative issues," Ghadbian said.

But since then, the Bush administration has "done so many things they cannot accept -- the Patriot Act, the way Muslims are being treated, the war in Iraq," he said.

E-mail Anna Badkhen at [e-mail].


URL: http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2004/09/01/M…
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[rightnow]

aus: # `94
"...Vor ein paar Tagen haben der Iran und die Türkei einen Vertrag über die Kurdenfrage abgschloßen..."

----

joerver,
ich denke, du liegst da goldrichtig mit deiner einschätzung.

1. zwischen türkei u. kurden waren spannungen, u. werden
spannungen bleiben (konflikte mgl.)

2. zwischen türkei u. israel herrschen spannungen, u.
bleiben spannungen.
(hoher türkischer politiker, nannte in einer
offiziellen zeitung vor wochen, israel einen
unrechtsstaat).

3. vor wenigen tagen wurde in 3 - sat bestätigt, dass die
israelis im nordirak tätig sind (diplomatisch
formuliert)

4. im letzten geht es allen parteien, um die zukünftigen
ölpositionierungen, wobei israel&amerika hand in hand
arbeiten. (in dem punkt ist die türkei zwischen israel
u. amerika "gespalten", denn von usa "erhoffen" sie
genügend dollars, die sie immer brauchen können -wenn
auch widerwillig.)

5. iran`s vertrag macht sinn, da es ihnen unangenehm sein
wird, wenn die usa (evtl. noch israelis) waffen-
strotzend vor "der haustür sitzen". gleichzeitig
sie mit der irakischen shiitenmehrheit, mehr "einfluss"
im irak nehmen, u. die kurden als randgruppe belassen

6. wie du weisst habe ich einmal hier von einer angeblich
vorhandenen ölpipeline im nordirak (auf der damaligen
karte mit k1, k2 , k3... beschrieben -aus den
britischen 48 ern- geschrieben. sie führt an der
jordanischen grenze (teilweise durch) richtung haifa.

7. ich bleibe bei meiner vermutung , dass dies
stimmen kann (nicht muss!) -denn es kann kein zufall
sein, dass israel damals in ihrer eigenen presse vom
"new rotterdam" für israel geschrieben hat.

8. jedoch gehe ich davon aus, dass die spezialeinheiten
dort, solange vom "medienradar" verschwiegen werden;
bis man den grossteil des irak an "die auserwählten&
us - gekauften u. gefügigen regierungsstrohmänner ver-
delegiert ! hat. um sich dann der eigentlichen aufgabe
widmen zu können.
(so die evtl. us - vorstellung; wie`s wirklich kommt,
steht auf einem ganz anderen blatt)


cu
rightnow

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Dick Cheney Gets His Gay On
In which the hunky veep comes out and confesses that homosexuals are "like, totally yummy"
- By Mark Morford, SF Gate Columnist
Wednesday, September 1, 2004

Bunny-curdling screams were heard throughout the Beltway last week and Laura Bush herself got all flustered and confused as vice president and noted hunk of rabid warmongering neoconservatism Dick Cheney broke ranks with his party of other hunks of rabid warmongering neoconservatives and admitted, in public, that he thinks gay people are, you know, mostly OK.

Sort of. A little. In small doses.

"With respect to the question of relationships, my general view is that freedom means freedom for everyone. People ought to be able to free -- ought to be free to enter into any kind of relationship they want to." This is what Cheney actually said.

Reporters gasped. Bystanders were stunned. Small flowers burst into flames. Shockingly, the GOP`s lightning bolts of homophobic self-righteousness did not strike Mr. Cheney dead on the spot. And his head, contrary to reports, did not actually spin all the way around, twice.

Lest anyone think Cheney`s comment means the veep is reversing his position on all issues of morality and sex and conservatism and turning into some sort of liberal namby-pamby bleeding-heart progressive tofu-loving Pottery Barn-shopping metrosexual hippie, he quickly added, "Man, I`d sure love to blow the living crap out of some cute little deer in the Alaska Wildlife Refuge and then maybe smash some rusty Halliburton-brand oil barrels over the heads of some baby seals and make an enormous undeserved profit from it. Now, who wants to bomb Iran? I sure as hell do!"

But, alas, the din following the gay comment drowned out Dick`s follow-up disclaimer, and the damage had already been done.

The Family Research Council, an ultraconservative anti-everything faction with close White House ties that is packed with sad sexless parents whose own deeply unhappy therapy-bound kids will themselves be coming out of the closet very, very soon as they discover polyamory and vibrators and yoga and Buddhism and get their first taste of freedom from their lost and misguided parents, called Cheney`s remarks disappointing, if not downright "grody."

"Unfortunately, protection of our values is made more difficult when mixed messages emanate from the White House," oozed FRC prez Tony Perkins as he fondled a small porcelain statuette of a young Greek boy and cooed quietly.

"We support President Bush`s commitment to a constitutional amendment on marriage, but we are left to wonder why the vice president is allowed to depart from this position when the top of the ticket is unified on all other issues," Perkins continued. "Issues like, you know, killin` stuff, and repressing the hell out of those scary women, and masturbating furiously to reruns of `Will & Grace` with a deep sense of shame," he did not add, but should have.

However, many Democrats and skeptics, not to mention a whole slew of increasingly accurate conspiracy theorists, are not convinced of Cheney`s stance, and merely see it as part of a larger plot designed by top Bush strategist and noted slice of poisonous bile Karl Rove to give BushCo an excuse to toss Cheney from the ticket and replace him with someone slightly more palatable. Like Colin Powell. Or John McCain. Or a small slab of rancid tree fungus.

Far from being a semi-humane stance that tacitly supports gays, and far from being something Cheney felt morally obligated to utter in deference to his openly gay and very weird daughter Mary, many saw Cheney`s little speech as a surefire sign of the apocalypse, something to be openly feared rather than carefully embraced. Sort of like McDonald`s salads. Or hybrid SUVs. Or "Princess Diaries" sequels. Or Jenna Bush.

U.S. Sen. Rick Santorum, the neoconservative Right`s airbrushed poster boy for rabid homophobia and source of adorable small-minded quotes about people having sex with dogs, and whose very name has penetrated the American slang lexicon and become somewhat of a global phenomenon as well, was reputedly "wildly excited" by Cheney`s statement.

"Finally, an excuse to parade around the Senate floor in my full-length taffeta ball gown and gyrate to Paul Oakenfold remixed while flagellating myself with a Children`s Illustrated Bible!" Santorum exclaimed excitedly before being quickly shot by Justice Antonin Scalia. "Damn gay pheasants," Scalia muttered satisfactorily, after which he consumed a positively enormous plate of baby-seal meat.

"Stop this silliness right now!" Lynne Cheney reportedly shouted in response to all the hoopla and outcry and really bad jokes in this very column.

"As anyone who read my cheesy soft-core-porn book `Sisters` back in 1981 can attest, I love lesbians. Adore them. Fantasize about them. Especially tough-as-nails lesbians in long flowy frontier dresses who wear their long flowy chestnut hair pulled back in tight knots tied with long flowy ribbons, women whose piercing blue eyes can penetrate the coldest of feminine hearts and whose beautiful callused hands know how to handle both a rifle and all those tiny hooks on a snug corset," Lynne said with a sigh, dreamily.

As no one knew quite what the hell she was getting at, everyone pretty much ignored her and moved on.

Meanwhile, the nation watched in nauseated horror as many of the speakers at the Republican National Convention pretended to be all open minded and moderate, when every even slightly attuned, articulate, progressive, open-hearted person you know in the world understands that this is the most war-happy, secretive, deceptive, censoring, neoconservative, gay-hating, human rights-destroying, happily repressive administration in the last 100 years.

"That is such an unfair and hateful exaggeration!" deeply flustered U.S. Senator Trent Lott muttered as he adjusted his enormous pink wig and smudged his thick eyeliner and stroked his beloved Dick Cheney bobblehead doll like it was a hairless cat. Or a vodka bottle. Or a constitutional amendment outlawing same-sex marriage forever.

"Besides, it hasn`t been 100 years," he corrected. "It`s only been, like, 75." At which point Dick Cheney laughed demonically and the GOP agenda continued on its happily intolerant homophobic steamrollin` ways and all this silly dreaming of a glimmer of hope came to a quick and fitting end.

Mark Morford`s Notes & Errata column appears every Wednesday and Friday on SF Gate, unless it appears on Tuesdays and Thursdays, which it never does. Subscribe to this column at sfgate.com/newsletters.


URL: http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/gate/archive/200…
©2004 SF Gate

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Thoughts on the Middle East, History,and Religion
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Juan Cole is Professor of History at the University of Michigan

Wednesday, September 01, 2004

Spy Scandal`s Roots are Deep

Jim Lobe argues that the FBI investigation that caught up Pentagon Iran expert Lawrence Franklin is much wider than initially thought, and focuses on the unauthorized transfer to Israel of highly sophisticated military software and designs. Since many Israeli arms merchants connected to the government in Tel Aviv sell to the black market, some of this military technology has ended up in the hands of countries that have poor relations with the US, and some may have ultimately been resold to al-Qaeda.

Lobe writes,


According to knowledgeable sources, who asked to not be identified, the FBI (Federal Bureau of Investigation) has been intensively reviewing a series of past counter-intelligence probes that were started against several high-profile neo-cons but never followed up with prosecutions, to the great frustration of counter-intelligence officers, in some cases.

Some of these past investigations involve top current officials, including Deputy Secretary of Defence Paul Wolfowitz; Undersecretary of Defence for Policy Douglas Feith, whose office appears to be the focus of the most recently disclosed inquiry; and Richard Perle, who resigned as Defence Policy Board (DPB) chairman last year.

All three were the subject of a lengthy investigative story by Stephen Green published by Counterpunch in February. Green is the author of two books on U.S.-Israeli relations, including Taking Sides: America`s Secret Relations with a Militant Israel, which relies heavily on interviews with former Pentagon and counter-intelligence officials.



Meanwhile, The Jerusalem Post reports that the FBI raided the offices of Steve Rosen, the director of foreign policy issues for the American Israel Public Affairs Committe, an enormously influential lobby.

Earlier, rumors swirled of an FBI investigation of how the Pentagon Office of Special Plans, set up by Doug Feith, Undersecretary of Defense for Policy, skewed intelligence on Iraq and may have illegally engaged in intelligence-gathering. In fact, that investigation was being conducted by the Senate Intelligence and House Judiciary Committee staffs, not by the FBI. They are also looking at the possibility that Pentagon employees pursued unauthorized contacts aimed at preparing the way for overthrowing the governments of Iran and Syria. This according to the Boston Globe:


` Senate Intelligence and House Judiciary Committee staff members say inquiries into the Near East and South Asia Affairs division have found preliminary evidence that some officials gathered questionable information on weapons of mass destruction from Iraqi exiles such as Ahmed Chalabi without proper authorization, which helped build President Bush`s case for an invasion last year.

The investigators are also looking into a more serious concern: whether the office engaged in illegal activity by holding unauthorized meetings with foreign nationals to destablize Syria and Iran without the presidential approval required for covert operations, said one senior congressional investigator who has longtime experience in intelligence oversight. `



A pattern of illegal payments for such information is also at issue. Laura Rozen says she
has evidence that Pentagon officials paid Manuchehr Ghorbanifar for documents he provided.

By the way, I personally do not expect any dramatic developments from all these investigations. AIPAC has powerful protectors on Capitol Hill, and past charges that it was involved in espionage for Israel have always been buried. As for the Neocon cult in the Pentagon, even if they did something illegal, they will not suffer much because of it. Look at where the Iran-Contra criminals are, who subverted the US Constitution and stole arms from the Pentagon to sell illegally to Khomeini. One Iran-Contra figure, who lied to Congress, now serves in the National Security Council as the person in charge of the Israeli-Palestine issue. That is Elliot Abrams, who was pardoned by Bush the elder and now sets White House policy on among the more important issues affecting US relations with the Muslim world. Bush may as well have just appointed Ariel Sharon to advise him on how to deal with Ariel Sharon (though to be fair, Sharon is probably more pragmatic than and to the left of Abrams).

Moreover, if Sharon and AIPAC decide that they need to US government to take military action against Iran, it is likely that the US government will do so. They can mobilize the US evangelicals in favor of this step, putting enormous pressure on Congress and the executive. Many Iranian expatriates are extremely wealthy and well connected, and they want such military action. And, firms like Halliburton, which find work-arounds allowing them to make money in Iran (and did so when Dick Cheney was CEO), would love to get rid of the mullas so they could make the big bucks, and more straightforwardly. So it isn`t that AIPAC can snap its fingers and make something happen in Washington. But it can put together powerful coalitions and leverage its influence through policy allies, which does tend to make things happen.

I don`t personally believe that the Iraq war has been good for Israel in reality, since there is now a great deal of instability on Israel`s front porch, and the Fallujans have already declared solidarity with Hamas. I don`t think US military action against Iran would be good for anyone, since it would further destabilize the Persian Gulf (the high oil prices, by the way, can`t be good for the Israeli economy).

But American politics has become so dominated by single-issue lobbies that they far outweigh the concerns of a mere voter.

posted by Juan @ [url9/1/2004 06:50:28 AM]http://www.juancole.com/2004_09_01_juancole_archive.html#109402382850329928[/url]

Charles Smith on Bush and Sharon

Guest Editorial By Charles Smith:

"Bait and Switch: Ariel Sharon, the Bush Administration, and the West Bank"


Much attention has focused recently on Ariel Sharon’s travails in Israel where a majority of his Likud Party oppose his intent to withdraw all Israeli settlements from the Gaza Strip as part of his Disengagement Plan. At the same time, though less noticed, President Bush has declared that Israeli realities on the ground in the West Bank, in the form of large settlement complexes, should remain in any future peace arrangement between Israel and the Palestinians.

Bush’s stance and tacit support for expansion of Israeli settlements, not merely their retention, contradict the Road Map to which he proclaims his ongoing commitment as the basis of the peace process What is occurring is a bait and switch. Most commentators, and the Palestinian leadership, have seen the Gaza withdrawal plan as the first step in a broader reduction of settlements that will eventually include most of the West Bank, setting the stage for a negotiated Palestinian state. In fact Sharon and his allies in the White House and Defense Department envision Sharon consolidating Israel’s ongoing control of the West Bank, thwarting any possibility of a future Palestine, a development ignored by commentators who concentrate on Sharon’s domestic political troubles over opposition to the Gaza withdrawal.

The roots of Sharon’s confrontation with Likud lie in his own actions in April, 1982 when Israel handed back the final sector of the Sinai Peninsula to Egypt to fulfill the 1979 Israel-Egypt peace treaty. This sector included the Israeli settlement town of Yamit. As defense minister in the Menachem Begin government, Sharon oversaw this withdrawal in the face of militant settler complaints that no land settled by Jews should be given up. Having removed the Yamit inhabitants, he facilitated occupation of the deserted town by settlers from the West Bank in order to stage a confrontation between them and the troops he sent in to oust them. He then declared that this simulated clash between settlers and soldiers, which he had arranged, was designed to send a message: any future proposed withdrawal from land considered truly Israeli, including Gaza as well as the West Bank at that time, would be met with legitimate armed resistance by settlers.

In short, defense minister Sharon threatened civil war. Now his own Likud Party attacks prime minister Sharon for proposing such a withdrawal from Gaza. Although Likud Party platforms have always stressed the need for permanent control of Judea and Samaria (the West Bank) and blocking of a Palestinian state, Gaza settlements are mentioned as inviolable. Sharon appears to be gambling that he can abandon Gaza, but retain the West Bank and block creation of a Palestinian state, his major goal, while paying obeisance to Bush’s Road Map; his Likud opponents insist on realization of all platform objectives.

Evidence of Bush’s collusion with Sharon can be found in the fact that Bush’s statement accepting Israeli retention of West Bank settlements came after Sharon had given him his Disengagement Plan. In addition to the full dismantling of Gaza settlements, Sharon’s plan envisages Israeli withdrawal from four settlements in the northern West Bank (Samaria); all other settlements will remain. Palestinians would have territorial contiguity only in this northernmost sector with Israel promising to “improve the transportation infrastructure” elsewhere; this means that Palestinians would have contact with each other by bridges and tunnels. Although Israel would remove its “permanent military presence” from the northern area, it would retain that presence elsewhere, including checkpoints and barriers. Significantly, the words “Palestinian state” appear in the first version of Sharon’s plan, submitted in April, but a second version, issued after Bush’s public acceptance of Israeli retention of settlements, omits that reference and alludes to the West Bank as part of Israel.

The point person for the Bush people is Elliott Abrams, head of Middle East issues on the National Security Council. He like Douglas Feith, number three in the Defense Department, is an ardent backer of Likud expansion. Reports from Israel indicate that the Bush administration will permit settlement construction and expansion to continue, as is now happening in Maale Adumim but deplores any publicity given to the venture; with that in mind, Israel can act as it wishes with Washington issuing a “standard protest” from time to time which can be easily ignored. This cynicism is matched by Washington’s acceptance of Sharon’s assurances that the security barrier/fence now being built is only “temporary.” Items that cost over $1 billion are rarely temporary and Sharon clearly intends to keep the vast majority of settlements on the eastern side of the barrier, not just those adjacent to the 1967 border.

In sum, the Bush administration is quietly abandoning the Road Map and the possibility of a Palestinian state despite denials to the contrary. It is doing so to fulfill Likud Revisionist goals of an Israeli state extending from the Mediterranean to the Jordan River, goals shared by Christian evangelicals who are a key part of Bush’s reelection strategy. The U.S. press has ignored the implications of these developments which the administration has sought to obfuscate, proclaiming its adherence to the Road Map while referring to ongoing Israeli settlement expansion as “unhelpful.”

As this process unfolds, Palestinian protests will be ignored and continuing attention paid to Likud opposition to withdrawal from Gaza, not a threat to Sharon’s plans for the West Bank, but a definite and apparently unexpected challenge to the stability of his government. Indeed, the major threat to Sharon’s gamble to get all of the West Bank will likely not be the U.S., but Sharon’s own party whose ambitions for Gaza may finally focus attention on what is at stake.

As a State Department spokesperson told a reporter in Tel Aviv recently, “We don’t think that it serves any purpose to lay this out to the public.” One can see why!

Charles D. Smith
University of Arizona


Professor Smith is the author of Palestine and the Arab-Israeli Conflict, now in its fifth edition. He was living in Israel in April 1982 when Israel handed over Yamit to Egypt.

posted by Juan @ 9/1/2004 06:23:16 AM

US Warplanes Hit Samarra
Kirkuk Official Assassinated

Al-Sharq al-Awsat reports that US war planes bombed two civilian vehicles in Samarra on Tuesday, killing two women and a child in the process. The US military in Fallujah fired tanks on guerrillas that attacked them. A high official of Turkmen extraction in the department of education in Kirkuk was assassinated. There have been growing and worrying tensions between Turkmen and Kurds in this major oil city of about 1 million inhabitants. Two Kurdish security men were assassinated outside their party headquarters in Mosul. As Paul Krugman correctly argues, the US is not really in control of Iraq, and may never be. Unfortunately, even if the US did turn over Iraq to Grand Ayatollah Sistani, as he suggests, the situation would not necessarily improve. Sunnis in al-Anbar province would not submit to him, and probably a lot of the angry youth around Muqtada al-Sadr would not, either.

The New York Times says that talks aimed at getting the Mahdi militia to dissolve in East Baghdad have collapsed.

There are major terrorist incidents on Tuesday in Moscow, Beersheba, Jidda and Iraq, and others recently in Spain (the Basques this time). Bush was being honest when he said the war on terror can`t be won. That it because terror is a tactic, and you can`t wage a war on a tactic, much less win one. And hardline policies don`t make terror go away. Hamas took credit for the Beersheba bombing and said it was in retaliation for the assassinations of Sheikh Yasin and Rantisi. As Gandhi said, an eye for an eye makes the whole world blind.

posted by Juan @ 9/1/2004 06:20:32 AM

Harold Rhode and Bernard Lewis

The classic expose of Pentagon operator Harold Rhode was written by Bob Dreyfuss and Jason Vest last January, and aptly entitled "The Lie Factory." It has long been known that Rhode has a close relationship with former School of Oriental and African Studies and Princeton historian Bernard Lewis. I received a tip from someone who knew the story of how Rhode, a Middle East expert, became ensconced in the Pentagon. She writes:


` Harold Rhode was completing his PhD [in the 1970s] at Columbia University . . . Although his PhD adviser was Tibor Halasi-Kun, Harold regularly visited Bernard Lewis at Princeton. He considered Lewis his real mentor. Later, [I was told by someone in the know that] that Lewis helped him get a job in Richard Perle`s office at the Pentagon. The rest is history....

Some writers are asking about what the connections are between various individuals and groups in the Iraq/Iran/Israel/etc. mess. Were there ever to be a serious investigation of the Israeli infiltration of the Pentagon (unlikely, of course), one would certainly have to examine Bernard Lewis`s role here.

Even though Edward Said raised the issue 25 years ago, in view of recent events, it seems high time that a scholarly society promote a frank and more balanced discussion of the political agenda driving Lewis`s scholarship as well as his advice to leaders as a supposed senior scholar on the Islamic world. (On the other hand, I am not aware of any reputable treatment of his non-academic side; a Google search only reveals some rather unsavory publications that question his non-academic affiliations.) `



Rhode participated in the meetings in Europe with the proto-fascist Italian military intelligence organization, SISMI, and the rightwing Italian Defense Minister, along with fraudster Manuchehr Ghorbanifar, at which suspected spy Lawrence Franklin also was present.

posted by Juan @ [url9/1/2004 06:00:49 AM]http://www.juancole.com/2004_09_01_juancole_archive.html#109401628914300067[/url]

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Wednesday, September 01, 2004
War News for September 1, 2004

http://dailywarnews.blogspot.com/

Bring ‘em on: Three Iraqi women working for US forces killed in Mosul ambush.

Bring ‘em on: Opening of Iraqi national assembly mortared in Baghdad.

Bring ‘em on: Chalabi survives assassination attempt near Latifiyah.

The schools. “As Iraq`s universities prepare for a new school year more than 16 months after Saddam Hussein`s ouster, they are still coping with the damage caused by looters who stole or destroyed more than 80 percent of the universities` infrastructure.”

Negotiations with al-Sadr collapse. “Leaders of the Mahdi Army, the rebel force led by the Shiite cleric Moktada al-Sadr, and two well-placed Iraqi sources said an agreement had been reached late Monday that called for the disarming of the rebel force and a halt in American military operations in Sadr City. Mahdi Army commanders and other Iraqi sources said Tuesday that Dr. Allawi backed out of the agreement on Tuesday morning. The failure of negotiations raised the prospect of more violence from Mr. Sadr`s Shiite insurgency, meaning the Iraqi government may not be able to direct its full political and military resources to quelling the continuing Sunni insurgency in other parts of the country.”

Wounded in Iraq. “The number of American troops wounded in Iraq since the U.S.-led invasion in March 2003 is approaching 7,000, according to figures published Tuesday by the Pentagon. The death toll for U.S. military personnel is 975, plus three Defense Department civilians. The wounded total has approximately doubled since mid-April, when casualties and deaths mounted rapidly as the insurgency intensified. The death toll over that period has grown by about 300.” Emphasis added.

Compassionate conservatism in action. “The family of a soldier killed in Iraq last week is hoping to raise money to bring his body from New York to his hometown of East Chicago for a funeral service and burial. The Army is paying for the transport of Pfc. Luis A. Perez`s body to northern New York, where his wife, Molly, lives. A memorial service for the 19-year-old Perez will be held there, and then his family will accompany his body on a flight to Indiana. Because the military only will pay to transport the body to one location, East Chicago community leaders and local businesses are working with Perez`s family to set up a trust fund and organize a fund-raiser.”

Commentary

Editorial: “A band of wounded Oregon National Guard soldiers stuck at Fort Lewis offers a small yet outrageous measure of the Bush administration`s insufficient preparation for the war in Iraq. Among the 49 Oregon guardsmen at Fort Lewis are a few who need specialized care for severe injuries, but many of them are stuck there, unable to return to their homes, for no better reason than bureaucratic snafu.”

Opinion: “A world where thousands of Minnesota citizen soldiers who once worried about spring floods or tornadoes now worry about rocket-propelled grenades and improvised explosive devices. Thousands of Guard troops have been deployed over the past few years and another 500 were ordered to duty this week. In a time like this, no 18-year-old can be expected to have all the answers about a war that even seems to leave President Bush puzzled some days. Bush went on Rush Limbaugh on Tuesday to explain that despite his earlier comments, which are inoperative, he believes this war on terror can be won. If he didn`t think so, he would have some explaining to do.”

Analysis: “Given the troubles of the US-led occupation forces elsewhere, militias in the south have flourished. This started immediately after the fall of Saddam`s regime last year, when Hezbollah sent hundreds of volunteers to take over the control of holy shrines in southern Iraq. Later, Hezbollah leaders helped Iraqi Shi`ites establish the Iraqi Hezbollah to fight against foreign forces, with the ultimate goal of establishing vilayat-e-faqih , in line with Iran`s desires. The Iraqi Hezbollah now has its headquarters right in the middle of Basra, in the old police headquarters. The police have offices in a new building in front of the Shatul Arab waterway. The Iraqi Hezbollah has also established a powerful branch in Ammarah.”

Opinion: “But this spirit of national unity didn`t mysteriously slip away, nor was it sundered by the plots of fractious Democrats. Though most Democrats and liberals backed the war in Afghanistan, Bush decided to lead in a divisive manner for narrowly partisan ends. The president made no move to bring Democrats into his Cabinet to fight what some supporters have termed a new world war. On the contrary, in a spirit of downwardly shared sacrifice, Bush pushed for further tax cuts for large-scale investors; his war in Iraq would be fought by the working class and funded by its children. By forcing Congress to vote to give him a blank check to make war in Iraq before the November elections, Bush sought to use his war as a weapon against the Democrats. This was leadership all right, to exquisitely sectarian ends. And for Giuliani to have waxed nostalgic about the post-Sept. 11 period of national unity in a speech extolling George W. Bush`s leadership was industrial-strength chutzpah.”

Opinion: “How wrong this was. Bush`s obvious lack of interest in policy issues makes him more dogmatic, not less so. Intellectual laziness stiffens the backbone as much as ideological fervor does. Hand him his position on an issue, and he can cross it off his list. Bush`s intellectual defenders compare him to Ronald Reagan, who was simpleminded (they say) in the best sense. Reagan whittled down the world`s complexities into a few simple truths. But Reagan pondered those complexities on his way to simplicity. He stopped thinking only after a fair amount of thought. Bush`s advisers deliver ideas to him like a pizza. His stove has never been lit. And four years have not illuminated the meaning of compassionate conservatism. It remains an insult to conservatives and a mystery to everybody else. On every big social issue that has arisen during his term (gay marriage, for example, and stem-cell research), Bush has been steadfast in taking the hard-conservative line.”

Analysis: “Same goes for Bush`s Iraq policy. It`s a betrayal of everything Republicans claim to stand for—fiscal prudence, the reservation of U.S. military resources for the protection of the national interest, and skepticism of government`s ability to shape society. The weapons of mass destruction that Bush touted as the reason for spending our blood and treasure in Iraq are simply not there. We were not greeted with sweets and flowers as the administration suggested. We have lost nearly 1,000 soldiers. We have sunk about $200 billion into this mistake, and there is no end in sight. It`s a complete failure. Unable to defend the policy, Schwarzenegger defends Bush as ‘a man of inner strength. He is a leader who doesn`t flinch, who doesn`t waver, who does not back down.’ But ‘inner strength’ is exactly the kind of New Age pap no hard-headed Republican should fall for. Accountability means judging a president by visible results. Schwarzenegger says leadership is ‘about making decisions you think are right and then standing behind those decisions.’ Fine. But standing behind your decisions means taking responsibility at election time. This is election time, and Bush`s decisions have turned out to be disastrously wrong.”

Casualty Reports

Local story: Montana soldier killed in Iraq.

Local story: California Marine killed in Iraq.

Local story: South Carolina airman killed in Iraq.

Local story: Texas Marine killed in Iraq.

Local story: Iowa Marine killed in Iraq.

Local story: Oregon Guardsman wounded in Iraq.

Local story: Pennsylvania soldier wounded in Iraq.

Local story: Hawaii soldier wounded in Iraq.


86-43-04. Pass it on.



# posted by yankeedoodle : 4:13 AM
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[Joerver]

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NEW YORK CITY (IWR News Parody) - Filmmaker and USA Today reporter Michael Moore last night pulled a prank on the Republican delegates by switching out their signs which were supposed to say "4 More Years" to signs that read "No More Years".
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[Joerver]

Siehe auch die Newsweek Titelgeschichte von dieser Woche #20767. Auf jeden Fall lesenswert.
Aber hier steht mehr drin, auch Geschichten, die sich Newsweek nicht zu schreiben traut, wie die Abtreibungsgeschichte und die Geschichte mit dem Koks.

August 31, 2004
High Plains Grifter
The Life and Crimes of George W. Bush
http://www.counterpunch.org/
By JEFFREY ST. CLAIR

Part One: The Ties That Blind

The mad cowboys are on the loose. Pack only what you can carry. Liberate the animals. Leave the rest behind. The looters are hot on the trail. Only ruin stands in their wake. Not even women and children are safe. Especially not them. Run for the hills and don`t look back. Don`t ever look back.

So the story goes, anyway.

We find ourselves living out a scene in a bad Western. A movie filmed long after all the old plot lines have been exhausted, the grizzled character actors put out to pasture, the Indians slaughtered and confined to desert prisons, the cattle slotted into stinking feed lots, the scenic montane backdrops pulverized by strip mines. All that remains are the guns, bulked up beyond all comprehension, and the hangman and his gibbet. We`ve seen it all before. But there`s no escape now. Someone`s locked the exits. The film rolls on to the bitter end. Cue music: Toby Keith.

Perhaps only the Pasolini of Salo: 120 Days of Sodom could have done this celluloid scenario justice. Or the impish Mel Brooks, who gave us Blazing Saddles (one of the greatest films on the true nature of American politics), if you understand the narrative as comedy, which is probably the most emetic way to embrace it. Both Pasolini and Brooks are masters of scatological cinema. And there`s mounds of bullshit to dig through to get at the core of George W. Bush.

Because it`s all an act, of course, a put on, a dress game. And not a very convincing one at that. Start from the beginning. George W. Bush wasn`t born a cowboy. He entered the world in New Haven, Connecticut, hallowed hamlet of Yale. His bloodlines include two presidents and a US senator. The cowboy act came later, when he was famously re-birthed, with spurs on his boots, tea in his cup and the philosophical tracts of Jesus of Nazareth on his night table. Bush is a pure-blooded WASP, sired by a man who would later become the nation`s chief spook, a man frequently called upon to clean up the messes left by apex crooks in his own political party, including his own entanglements (and those of his sons) with the more noirish aspects of life. His grandfather was a US senator and Wall Street lawyer, who shamelessly represented American corporations as they did business with the Nazi death machine. Old Prescott narrowly escaped charges of treason. But those were different times, when trading with the enemy was viewed as, at the very least, unseemly.

His mother, Barbara, is a bitter and grouchy gorgon, who must have frightened her own offspring as they first focused their filmy eyes onto her stern visage. She is a Pierce, a descendent of Franklin, the famously incompetent president, patron of Nathaniel Hawthorne and avowed racist, who joined in a bizarre cabal to overthrow Abraham Lincoln. (For more on this long neglected episode in American history check out Charles Higham`s excellent new book Murdering Mr. Lincoln.)

Understandably, George Sr. spent much of his time far away from Barbara Bush`s icy boudoir, indulging in a discreet fling or two while earning his stripes as a master of the empire, leaving juvenile George to cower under the unstinting commands of his cruel mother, who his younger brother Jeb dubbed "the Enforcer." This woman`s veins pulse with glacial melt. According to Neil Bush, his mother was devoted to corporal punishment and would "slap around" the Bush children. She was known in the family as "the one who instills fear." She still does...with a global reach.

How wicked is Barbara Bush? Well, she refused to attend her own mother`s funeral. And the day after her five-year old daughter Robin died of leukemia Barbara Bush was in a jolly enough mood to spend the afternoon on the golf course. Revealingly, Mrs. Bush kept Robin`s terminal illness a secret from young George, a stupid and cruel move which provided one of the early warps to his psyche.

Her loathsome demeanor hasn`t lightened much over the years. Refresh you memory with this quote on Good Morning America, dismissing the escalating body count of American soldiers in Iraq. "Why should we hear about body bags and deaths and how many," the Presidential Mother snapped. "It`s not relevant. So why should I waste my beautiful mind on something like that?"

Even Freud might have struggled with this case study. Imagine young George the Hysteric on Siggy`s couch in the curtained room on Berggasse 19. The analysand doesn`t enunciate; he mumbles and sputters in non-sequential sentence fragments. His quavering voice a whiny singsong. The fantasy has to be teased out. It`s grueling work. But finally Freud puts it all together. This lad doesn`t want to fuck his mother. Not this harridan. Not this boy. He wants to kill her and chuckle in triumph over the corpse. Oh, dear. This doesn`t fit the Oedipal Complex, per se. But it explains so much of George the Younger`s subsequent behavior. (See his cold-blooded chuckling over the state murder of Karla Faye Tucker.)

Perhaps, Freud isn`t the right shrink for Bush, after all. Maybe the president`s pathology is better understood through the lens of Freud`s most gifted and troubled protégé, Wilhelm Reich. (I commend to your attention Dr. Reich`s neglected masterpiece Listen, Little Man.) Sadly, we cannot avail ourselves of psychological exegises of either Freud or Reich. So Justin Frank, the disciple of Melanie Klein, will have to substitute. In the spirit of his mentor, Frank, author of Bush on the Couch, zeroes in on the crucial first five years of W`s existence, where three factors loom over all others: an early trauma, an absent father and an abusive mother. It is a recipe for the making of a dissociated megalomaniac. Add in a learning disability (dyslexia) and a brain bruised by booze and coke and you have a pretty vivid portrait of the Bush psyche.

With this stern upbringing, is it really surprising that Bush evidenced early signs of sadism? As a teenager he jammed firecrackers in the orifices of frogs and snickered as he blew them to bits. A few years later, as president of the DKE frathouse at Yale, Bush instituted a branding on the ass-crack as an initiation ritual. Young pledges were seared with a red-hot wire clothes hanger. One victim complained to the New Haven police, who raided the frathouse. The story was covered-up for several decades until it surfaced in Bush`s first run for governor of Texas. He laughed at the allegations, writing the torture off as little more than "a cigarette burn." From Andover to Abu Ghraib.

In his teens, this man child was shoved into a distant boarding school. It must have been a relief for him. The squirrely adolescent with the pointy ears did just enough to get by. At Andover they called him "Bushtail." Ambition wasn`t his thing. And he didn`t have the athletic talent or thespian skills to do much more than play the role of class goof. So he went on to an undistinguished academic career, highlighted only by his ebullient performances as a cheerleader and a reputation for selling fake IDs. Even in his youth he was adept at forgery.

George the Younger snuck into Yale on a legacy admission, a courtesy to his father and grandfather. He was a remedial student at best, awarded a bevy of Cs, the lowest score possible for the legacy cohort. Repositories like Andover and Yale know what to do with the dim children of the elite. George nestled in his niche. No demands were made of him. He spent much his time acquainting himself with a menu of designer inebrients. He was arrested twice. Once for petty theft. Once for public drunkenness. No one cared.

When Vietnam loomed, Lil` George fled to New Haven for Houston and the safe harbor of the Texas Air National Guard, then jokingly known as Air Canada--a domestic safe-haven for the combat-averse children of the political elite. It was a deftly executed dodge. His father pulled some strings. Escape hatches opened. The scions of the ruling class, even the half-wits, weren`t meant to be eviscerated in the rice paddies of the Mekong--that`s why they freed the slaves.

But soon George grew bored of the weekend warrior routine. And who among us wouldn`t? He slunk off to Alabama, and promptly went AWOL for a year and a half. Nobody seemed to miss him. He wasn`t a crucial cog in anyone`s machine. George? George Bush??

How did the president-in-training fritter away those idle days? Supposedly he was lending his expertise to the congressional campaign of Winton "Red" Blount. But he apparently soon went AWOL from this assignment as well. Other campaign staffers recall young George ambling into the campaign office in the late afternoon, propping his cowboy booted heals on a desk and recounting his nocturnal revels in the bars, strip joints and waterbeds of Montgomery. The other staffers took to calling him the "Texas Soufflé.". As one recalled, "Bush was all puffed up and full of hot air."

Precisely, how did he wile away those humid nights on the Gulf Coast? According to the intrepid Larry Flynt, he spent part of his time impregnating his girlfriend and, like a true southern gentleman, then escorting her to an abortion clinic. Checkbook birth control, the tried and true method of the ruling classes. A year later, according to Bush biographer J.H. Hatfield, George W. got popped in Texas on cocaine possession charges. The old man intervened once again; George diverted for six months of community service a Project PULL in a black area of Houston and the incident was scrubbed from the police blotter and court records. Today, Bush denies all knowledge of those squalid indiscretions. Just two more lost weekends in George`s blurry book of days.

Speaking of cocaine, Bush, by many accounts, had more than a passing familiarity with the powder. Several acquaintances from his days at Yale tell us that Bush not only snorted cocaine, but sold it. Not by the spoonful, but by the ounce bag, a quantity that would land any black or Latino dealer in the pen for at least a decade. Young Bushtail had become the Snow Bird of New Haven.

Even the Bush family, so smugly self-conscious of its public image, didn`t seem to care much. Jr wasn`t the star child. They just wanted him alive and out of jail. (The habitual drunk driving was already a nagging problem. On a December night in 1973, George came up from Houston to visit his family in DC. He took his younger brother Marvin out drinking in the bars of Georgetown. Returning home after midnight, Bush, drunk at the wheel, careened down the road, toppling garbage cans. When he pulled into the driveway, he was confronted by his father. Young Bush threatened to pummel his old man, mano-a-mano. Jeb intervened before young George could be humilated by his father. A couple of years later, the drunk driving would later land him in the drunk tank of a Maine jail-his fourth arrest.) No need to plump up his resumé with medals or valedictory speeches. Anyway back then, the inside money was riding on Neil, who they said had a head for figures, or perhaps young Jeb, whose gregarious looks hid a real mean streak. (Neil, of course, came to ruin in the looting of the Silvarado Savings and Loan (though he deftly avoided jail time), while Jeb proved his utility in Florida and amplified his presidential ambitions.)

By all accounts, the family elders saw George as a pathetic case, as goofy as a black lab. They got him out of the National Guard eight months early (or 20 months, if you insist on counting the Lost Year) and sent him off to Harvard Business School. He didn`t have the grades to merit admission, but bloodlines are so much more important than GPA when it comes to prowling the halls at the Ivy League. The original affirmative action, immune from any judicial meddling. In Cambridge, he strutted around in his flight jacket and chewed tobacco in class. The sound of Bushtail spitting the sour juice into a cup punctuated many a lecture on the surplus value theory. At Harvard, one colleague quipped that Bush majored in advanced party planning and the arcana of money laundering. George met every expectation.

Then came the dark years. Booze, drugs, cavorting and bankruptcy in dreary west Texas. There he also met Laura Welch, the steamy librarian who had slain her own ex-boyfriend, by speeding through a stop sign and plowing broadside into his car with a lethal fury. (Rep. Bill Janklow got 100 days in the pen for a similar crime; Laura wasn`t even charged.) They mated, married, raised fun-loving twins. In 1978, George decided to run for congress. His opponent cast him as carpetbagger with an Ivy League education. It worked. And it didn`t help his chances much that Bush apparently was drunk much of time. After one drunken stump speech, Laura gave him a tongue lashing on the ride home. Bush got so irate that he drove the car through the garage door. He lost big.

Eventually, Laura got George to quit the booze--though the librarian never got him to read. It wasn`t a moral thing for her. Laura still imbibes herself, even around her husband. She smokes, too. Refreshingly, so do the Bush Twins, who have both been popped for underage drinking.

George was Laura`s ticket out of the dusty doldrums of west Texas. She sobered him up and rode him hard all the way to Dallas, Austin and beyond. "Oh, that Welch girl," recalled a retired librarian in Midland. "She got around." Wink, wink.

If the son of a millionaire political powerbroker can`t make it in Midland, Texas, he can`t make it anywhere. George was set up in his own oil company in the heart of the Permian Basin. His two starter companies, Bush Exploration and Arbusto, promptly went bust, hemorraghing millions of dollars. His father`s cronies in a group called Spectrum 7 picked up the pieces. It flatlined too. A new group of savoirs in the form of Harken Oil swooped in. Ditto. Yet in the end, George walked away from the wreckage of Harkin Oil with a few million in his pocket. One of the investors in Harken was George Soros, who explained the bail out of Bush in frank terms. "We were buying political influence. That was it. Bush wasn`t much of a businessman."

Among the retinue of rescuers in his hours of crisis was a Saudi construction conglomerate, headed by Mohammad bin Laden, sire of Osama. The ties that blind.

Flush with unearned cash, George and Laura hightailed it to Arlington, the Dallas suburb, soon to be the new home of the Texas Rangers, perennial also rans in the American League. Bush served as front man for a flotilla of investors, backed by the Bass brothers and other oil and real estate luminaries, who bought the Rangers and then bullied the city of Arlington into building a posh new stadium for the team with $200 million in public money, raised through a tax hike, for which Bush, the apostle of tax-cuts for the rich, sedulously lobbied. Here`s a lesson in the art of political larceny. The super-rich always get their way. When taxes are raised, public money is sluiced upward to the politically connected. When taxes are cut, the money ends up in the same accounts. As William Burrough`s hero Jack Black (the hobo writer, not the rotund actor) prophesied, you can`t win.

The Rangers deal was never about building a competitive baseball team for the people of Dallas/Ft. Worth. No. The Bush group seduced the city into building a stadium with nearly all the proceeds going straight into their pockets. It was a high level grifter`s game, right out of a novel by Jim Thompson, the grand master of Texas noir. Bush played his bit part as affable con man ably enough. Even though he only plunked down $600,000 of his own cash, he walked away from the deal with $14.7 million-a staggering swindle that made Hillary Clintons`s windfalls in the cattle future`s market look like chump change.

As team president, Bush printed up baseball cards with his photo on them in Ranger attire, endulging his life-long fetish for dress-up fantasies. He would hand out the Bush cards during home game. Invariably, the cards would be found littering the floors of the latrines, soaked in beer and piss.

Part Two: Mark His Words

Sex and politics often seem to conflate in George W. Bush`s mind. In 1975, young George, fresh out of Harvard Business School, followed his father to China, where he was keen testing the receptiveness of the Chinese to infusions of Texas capital. Soon bored by detailed discussions of international finance, Bush began hitting on his translators and other Chinese women. One Yale coed who came into Bush`s orbit recalled: "He was always one of the fastest guys on campus in trying to get his hands in your pants." This friskiness didn`t set will the decorous crowd then running China and he was discreetly directed to evacuate the country in order to save his father, the new ambassador to Peking, further embarrassment.

During the 1988 Republican convention, David Fink, a reporter with the Hartford Courant, asked Bush what he talked about with his father when they weren`t jawing about politics. "Pussy," George W. quipped. Take that mom.

In 1992, W. famously offered his services to his father`s moribund re-election campaign. The younger Bush counseled the president to hire private investigators to rummage through the bedtrails of Clinton`s sex life, hoping to ignite "bimbo eruptions." This advice coming from a man who, according to one of his friends, spent the 1970s "sleeping with every bimbo in West Texas, married or not." George Sr. (who was himself desperately trying to suppress talk of an affair with a State Department employee) demurred, patted Jr. on the head and followed the more tactful advice of Robert Teeter, with fatal results.

George W. vowed not to make the same political miscalculations as his father in his own 1994 run for governor of Texas. With the sepulchural Karl Rove as his political Svengali, Bush set his sights on Ann Richards, the gruff Democrat who ridiculed Bush`s sense of privilege, "Little George was born on third base and thinks he hit a triple." It was a campaign marked by unbridled viciousness, backroom slanders and outright lies. Bush didn`t attack frontally; he sent surrogates to hurl the mud for him. Naturally, he won in a romp.

Bush`s six-year tenure as governor of Texas was unremarkable by almost any standard. He was kept on a short leash by his handlers, Rove and Karen Hughes, and generally turned over policy-making to the yahoos in the Texas legislature. His resume of those days is familiar by now: he slashed taxes for the rich, injected religion into public schools and social welfare programs, signed a law permitting the carrying of concealed weapons in public buildings and churches, privatized public parks, turned Texas into the nation`s most toxic state, sent children to adult prisons and supervised the execution of 152 death row inmates. During an interview with Larry King, Bush chortled about sending Karla Faye Tucker to her fatal encounter with death`s needle, saying he had no regrets. Later he joked about the execution with his CNN doppleganger Tucker Carlson. Bush mimiced Karla Faye`s pleas for mercy, whining in a shrill falsetto: "Oh please don`t kill me." Somebody give Bushtail a shot of Jack Daniels before he kills again.

The big change in Bush was his dramatic conversion to a messianic form of Christian fundamentalism. The happy-go-lucky cad of the 60s and 70s had withered away, replaced by a doltish and vindictive votary. His rebirth as a Christian zealot was famously midwifed by Billy Graham, who considered young George "almost like a son." According to Bush during a walk on the beach at Kinnebunkport, "Billy planted a mustard seed in my soul." The man has a felicity with metaphor.

The seed sprouted a few months later. In the notorious scene in the bathroom of a Colorado resort, Bush, head pounding from a night of drinking in celebration of his 40th birthday, plunged to his knees before the mirror and pleaded with the Almighty for a heavenly intervention. Lightning struck that morning. Bush, so the family legend goes, kicked the bottle and emerged as a fanatical believer in what he called "the intercessory power of prayer."

A few years later Bush, by then governor of Texas, offered readers of the Houston Chronicle a peek into the stern nature of his faith. "Only those who have accepted Jesus as their personal savoir will be permitted entry into heaven," Bush prophesied. Ten years down the road, Bush would do his best to send thousands of heathens to eternal damnation. Of course, Bush, having been granted the moral amnesty of being born-again, rarely attends formal church services.

* * *

Bush wasn`t the early favorite of the Texas king makers to retake the presidency for the Republicans. That role fell to the newt-faced senator Phil Gramm, who had amassed a majestic campaign warchest. But no amount of money could soften Gramm`s grotesque image and foul tongue. He was the hissing personification of the Republican ultras, an unrepentant whore for industry who seemed to take delight in savaging the poor, blacks and gays. Here`s a taste of the Gramm technique: "Has anyone ever noticed that we live in a country where all of the poor people are fat?"

Gramm`s dismal showing in 1996 told the Republican powerbrokers that they needed an image makeover, a candidate with Christian sex appeal coating a hard core philosophy. John McCain was too grouchy, carried the whiff of scandal and might prove uncontrollable. Jack Kemp was perceived as soft on blacks and perhaps even was a real libertarian at heart. So they settled on Bush, the smirking governor with the lofty Q-rating among white middle-aged women who`d been devoted watchers of Dallas and Knots Landing.

As for Bush, he didn`t recall being coaxed to run by the RNC power elite. Instead, the green light fell upon him from a celestial source. "I feel like God wants me to run for president," Bush confided to James Robison, the Texas evangelist. "I can`t explain it, but I sense my country is going to need me. I know it won`t be easy on me or my family, but God wants me to do it."

In a flashy feat of political transvestitism, Bush marketed himself as a "compassionate conservative," a feathery reprise of his father`s kinder and gentler Reaganism. It was a ploy to distance himself from the foamy rhetoric of the Republican pit bulls who had nearly self-destructed in their manic pursuit of Clinton. Bush was tight with Tom DeLay, Trent Lott and Phil Gramm, but he didn`t want to be tarred with their radioactive baggage while he courted soccer moms. During the 2000 campaign, this grand hoax was rivaled only by Al Gore`s outlandish masquerade as an economic populist.

Still Bush, under the lash of Karl Rove, didn`t shirk from playing mean, particularly in the bruising inter-squad battle for the Republican nomination. During the crucial South Carolina primary, Bush`s campaign goons intimated that his chief rival, John McCain, had fathered an illegitimate child with a black woman. Of course, a more dexterous politician than McCain could have turned this slur to his advantage. After all, Strom Thurmond ruled the Palmetto State for decades and he was widely known to have sired at least one child with his black mistress. The Bush attack dogs also made ungentlemanly whispers about McCain`s wife, Cindy, suggesting that she might be a neurotic and a drug addict. Of course, it was McCain himself who was slightly unhinged and he wilted under the fire of the Bush sniper teams, which also included an attack on McCain`s war record by the same by claque of mad dog vets who would later fling mud at Max Cleland and John Kerry.

The 2000 campaign itself was unremittingly dull until the final debate, when Gore sealed his fate as he stalked Bush across the stage like he had overdosed on testosterone. As Gore glowered over the governor badgering him with the names of obscure pieces of legislation, Bush merely turned his head to the camera and shrugged his shoulders, as if to say, "What`s this guy`s problem?" It was the first real moment of the campaign and probably kept Bush close enough so that the Supremes could hand him the presidency.

Bush`s 534-vote triumph in Florida is an old and tiresome story by now, but it`s worth recalling some of the low points. The stolen election was an inside job, although greatly abetted by Gore`s incompetence. The state may very well have been secured before a single vote was cast. That`s because Jeb, the Bush who always wanted to be president, ordered Katherine Harris to purge the voter rolls of more than 90,000 registered voters, mostly in Democratic precincts.

Then, with the recount underway, the Bush junta sprang into action. Using $13.8 million in campaign funds, they recuited an A-list of Republican fixers, tough guys and lawyers. Roger Stone, the former Republican fixer and body builder of Reagan time who fled to Florida following a DC sex scandal, was summoned to orchestrate gangs of rightwing Cubans to harass election officials in Dade and Palm Beach counties. Marc Racicot, later to be elevated by Bush to chair of the RNC, staged similar white-collar riots, all designed to impede the counting of ballots. Jeb and the haughty Harris did their parts as institutional monkeywrenchers.

Meanwhile, the legal strategy designed by Theodore Olson to fast track the case to the Supreme Court. When Scalia and Thomas refused to recuse themselves from the case despite glaring conflicts of interest (family members worked for the Bush campaign), the electoral theft was legitimized.

The ringmaster of this affair was Bush Sr.`s old hand, James Baker. Baker later boasted to a group of Russian tycoons mustered in London, "I fixed the election in Florida for George Bush." And Gore laid down and took it like a dazed Sonny Liston. He didn`t raise a peep about the disenfranchisement of thousands of black voters, as if to say, "If have to be elected by blacks, I don`t want the job."

Bush, the Selected One, was anxious to consolidate his power. "If this were a dictatorship, it would be a heck of a lot easier-- just so long as I`m the dictator," Bush snickered on December 18, 2000, as the Supreme Court prepared to deliver the presidency to his sweaty hands.

Mark those words.

* * *

The contours of the Bush agenda were established by his transition team. This shadowy group picked the cabinet, outlined the budget, sketched the foreign policy, dreamed up the size of the tax cuts and scouted across the sprawl of the bureaucracy for opportunities for self-dealing contracts.

None had a sharper nose for scenting opportunities to cash in on federal contracts than Dick Cheney, the man who recruited himself as Bush`s running mate. Although Cheney flunked out of Yale (he was a working class kid without the academic passes afforded the legacy admittees), he shares several other traits with Bush. Twice Cheney has been arrested for drunk driving. And, although he fervantly supported the war, he had no desire to actually go to Vietnam and do battle. Saying he "had other priorities," Cheney sought and received five draft deferments. See Dick run. And so it came to pass: others died so that he might prosper. Don`t tell Cheney he doesn`t understand the meaning of sacrifice.

As a congressman from Wyoming, Cheney established himself as a hardcore rightwinger, gnashing away at everything from abortion to Head Start. Bush Sr. picked this top-flight chickenhawk as Defense Secretary in 1989. He managed the first Gulf War, amassing through bribery and bullying international support like a CEO on a consolidation binge, and later rationalized the decision not to depose Saddam or support uprisings by Iraqi and Kurdish rebels, predicting that the fall of the Ba`athists would destabilize the entire region. How right you were, Dick.

After Clinton steamrolled Bush, Cheney cashed in, landing a top executive position at Halliburton, the Houston-based oil services and military construction giant. Cheney knew all about Halliburton and they knew Dick. In fact, as Defense Secretary, Cheney had devised the privatization scheme which turned over much of the Pentagon`s logistical programs (base construction, food and fuel services, infrastructure, mortuaries) to corporations. He also steered some of the biggest early contracts to Halliburton, including lucrative deals for reconstructing Kuwait`s oil fields and logistical support for the doomed venture into Somalia.

At Halliburton, Cheney exploited his government and international contacts to boost Halliburton`s government-guaranteed loans from $100 million to $1.5 billion in less than five years. He also created 35 off-shore tax free subsidiaries, a feat of accounting prestitigidation that would soon be aped by Kenny Boy Lay and the corporate highwaymen at Enron. The grateful board of Halliburton soon rewarded Cheney by making him CEO and compensating him to the tune of $25 million a year in salary and lavish stock options. By the time he left Halliburton for the White House, he owned $45 million in the company`s stock.

Of course, the question presents itself as to whether Cheney ever really left Halliburton. The company had been bruised a bit in Clinton. In 1997, it lost a multi-billion dollar logistics contract with the Army. Yet, soon after Cheney ascended to the Veep`s office Halliburton seized the contract back and stood poised to become the prime provisioner for the Pentagon as it embarked on operations in Afghanistan, Iraq, Uzbekistan, Qatar, Korea, and the Philippines. Within two short years under Cheney, Halliburton cashed in on $1.7 billion in Pentagon contracts. Then, naturally, Halliburton decided to gouge the government, overcharging for everything from gas deliveries to food services.

Then came the big reward: a two-year contract worth $7 billion for rebulding Iraq`s oil infrastructure, bombed to smithereens by the Pentagon. The no bid contract was awarded by the Army Corps of Engineers, who apparently never even considered another company. No surprise here. Halliburton had drafted the Corps` reconstruction plan for Iraq. "They were the company best positioned to execute the oil field work because of their involvement in the planning," explained Lt. Col. Gene Pawlick, a PR flack for the Army.

All the while, Cheney continues to personally benefit from Halliburton`s government contracts. He still holds options for 400,000 shares of Halliburton stock and continues to receive $150,000 a year in deferred compensation from his former company.

* * *

Cheney was not a lone emissary from crude cartel. Of the 41 members of that Bush transition team, 34 came from the oil industry. The mask had slipped off the beast. Not since the days of Warren Harding has big oil enjoyed a firmer stranglehold on the controls of the federal government. Bush`s inner circle is dominated by oil men, starting with Bush and Cheney and including 6 cabinet members and 28 top political appointees. Recall that Condoleezza Rice has an oil tanker named after her and that Stephen Griles, the number two man at the Interior Department, was the oil industry`s top lobbyist and continued to be paid $285,000 a year by his former firm as he handed out oil leases to his former clients. Griles is the Albert Fall of our time. Fall, the architect of the Teapot Dome scandal, where his crony`s oil company was quitely handed the rights to drill in on federal lands in Wyoming, pronounced: "All natural resources should be made as easy of access as possible to the present generation . Man cannot exhaust the resources of nature and never will." More than 80 years later, this wreckless nonsense could serve as a motto for the Bush administration. But see how times have change. Fall went to jail for his self-dealing; Griles got a bonus.

Then came the neo-cons: Paul Wolfowitz, Richard Perle, Scooter Libby, Douglas Feith, Donald Wurmser, Stephen Cambone and John Bolton. This coterie of hawks, many of them veterans of Reagan/Bush I, were deeply marinated in the writings of the darkly iconic Leo Strauss and schooled in the art of political terror by Henry "Scoop" Jackson, the Democratic senator from Boeing. After eight years on the outside, they came in febrile for war from the get-go and charged with an implacable loyalty to Israel, nation of the apartheid wall and the 82 nukes. The neo-cons`s devotion to Israel was so profound that several of them hired themselves out as consultants to the Israeli government. At the close of Bush`s first term, this same nest of neo-cons finds itself under investigation for leaking top secret documents to Israel.

To complete the starting lineup, Bush and Cheney also dredged up from the obscurity of far right think tanks some of the most malodorous scoundrels of the Iran/contra era: Eliot Abrams, John Poindexter, Otto Reich and John Negroponte. Soon enough this merry band of brigands were up to their old tricks. Poindexter, from his den at DARPA, devised a big brother program under the name Total Information Awareness, branded with an Illuminati logo, which sought to keep track of the movements and credit card purchases of all Americans. Later Poindexter, convicted of lying to congress in the 1980s, opened up a futures market for terrorist attacks, where traders would be financially rewarded by the Pentagon for accurately predicting suicide bombings. Meanwhile, Abrams, another Iran/contra felon, was put in charge of human rights in the Middle East-a curious brief for the man who backed the butchers of Guatemala and El Salvador. Even Hunter S. Thompson blazing away on blotter acid couldn`t dream this stuff up.

Tomorrow: Jesus Told Me Who to Bomb

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Bruce S. Ticker: `GOP crackers: Give Michael Moore a good whipping`
Date: Wednesday, September 01 @ 09:12:52 EDT
Topic: Republicans

By Bruce S. Ticker

Memo to Republican rednecks: If you had real imaginations, you would have suggested wrapping a strip of "Fahrenheit 911" film around Michael Moore`s throat, strip him naked and drag him around the floor at Madison Square Garden the first night of the convention.

That would have brought the house down.

Alas, you expect creativity from these crackers? However, at least three Republican delegates to the GOP convention specifically told Lloyd Grove of The New York Daily News that Moore could face the beating of his life should he show up at the convention in his role as a convention columnist for USA Today. Other delegates had some punishing ideas in mind, too, but none quite so violent.



Scary. What follows depicts the mindset of some of those who are selecting a major candidate - the incumbent, no less - for the highest office in the land.

Alabama`s Terry Butts: "I`m from South Alabama, and we`re used to dealing with jackasses, and so I look forward to making his acquaintance. In Alabama, there are probably a few good ol` boys who would know how to put a good knot on his head."

Carey Holliday of Louisiana: "I would be delighted if he slapped me. Because then I could defend myself. And it would all be on camera. He`d be hit from so many angles - he`d never even catch me. Four hundred-pounders move very slowly and with no wind at all. I`m 53 and in good shape."

South Dakota`s John Teupel: "If he`s going to show up at the GOP convention, hopefully he has has the sense and tact to act like a civilized human being. If he wants to get in my face, I`m plenty capable of getting back in his."

Contrast these attitudes with the actions of their leaders. Colin Powell cancelled a visit to Athens after protesters conducted raucous demonstrations.

George W. Bush will deliver his acceptance speech for renomination at the Republican convention in a specially made blast- and bullet-proof stage, The Daily News reported earlier. The News quoted a source who said it will be far different stage from the stage used during the other hours of the convention.

So much for Bush`s challenge, "Bring `em on." That is, bring `em on to someone else.

Needless to say, this is frightening that delegates of any party convention would advocate violence in responding to criticism. It reflects the arrogance of the administration they are supporting. They can`t respond in a rational manner.

It so happens that I finally saw Moore`s film just a week ago. I can understand why Republicans are so frightened: Moore simply tells the truth and they cannot possibly defend the indefensible.

To characterize the movie, let`s put it this way: Moore owes a great debt to the news media in general. They were not performing their job adequately, so he did their job for him and as a result he had a good movie with information that was new to a lot of people.

But the news was not new. Much of it was old news that many of us picked up in small bits, which include the news media and the Internet. In the past, the media downplayed most of what they did not ignore altogether and refused to keep after it.

All Moore did was piece it altogether and present it in a neat package, thus shocking a sizeable chunk of the public: As in, my God, did the Bush administration do all that?

"Fahrenheit 911" should not be exception to what passes for cinematic fare. It should be the minimal standard.

Bush supporters were quick to pick up on any misrepresentations, but what really bothered them was what is true. Or as Bush himself declared on David Letterman`s Top Ten List, he was peeved that only 95 percent of Moore`s movie is true.

Interestingly, the news media swiftly picked apart Moore`s film, but rarely did they pick apart Bush`s policies and actions the same way. There were no front-page stories raising questions as to why Bush blew seven minutes reading a story to schoolchildren while New York City burned. I don`t recall footage of maimed and deceased Iraqis on American news programs; presumably, Moore obtained that film from Al Jazeera and other foreign sources.

Terry Butts, Carey Holliday and John Teupel - the Republican delegates quoted by Lloyd Grove - may not get the chance to pounce on Moore, but they had an opportunity to show thousands of Moore-think-alikes what-for on Sunday. As depicted live on C-SPAN, thousands of people who are actually dissenting Americans marched passed Madison Square Garden speaking truth to power.

As I watched, I came to wish that I could have joined the marchers. Then again, maybe the Butts-Holliday-Teupel mob would have done to me what they recommended for Moore. By staying in Philly, I avoided a Sunday night hospital stay in Manhattan.

Bruce S. Ticker is publisher of CRISIS: ISRAEL at www.crisisisrael.com.

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Being There
What does 9/11 tell us about Bush? Nothing.
By William Saletan
Posted Tuesday, Aug. 31, 2004, at 11:19 AM PT

For the past month, a group of veterans funded by a Bush campaign contributor and advised by a Bush campaign lawyer has attacked the story of John Kerry`s heroism in Vietnam. They have argued, contrary to all known contemporaneous records, that Kerry was too brutal in a counterattack that earned him the Silver Star, and that he survived only mines, not bullets, when he rescued a fellow serviceman from a river. President Bush, who joined the National Guard as a young man to avoid Vietnam, has been challenged to denounce the group`s charges. He has refused.

Now the Republican National Convention is showcasing Bush`s own heroic moment. As John McCain put it last night: "I knew my confidence was well placed when I watched him stand on the rubble of the World Trade Center with his arm around a hero of September 11 and, in our moment of mourning and anger, strengthen our unity and our resolve by promising to right this terrible wrong and to stand up and fight for the values we hold dear."

Pardon me for asking, but where exactly is the heroism in this story? Where, indeed, is the heroism in anything Bush has done before 9/11 or since?

Two days ago at an Ellis Island rally, Dick Cheney described Bush`s 9/11 leadership this way: "In the weeks following the terrorist attacks on America, people in every part of the country, regardless of party, took great comfort and pride in the conduct and the character of our president. They saw a man calm in a crisis, comfortable with responsibility, and determined to do everything necessary to protect our people."

Calm and comfortable. I appreciate that. This was a major selling point of Bush`s 2000 campaign: He would allow us to "look at the White House with pride." But isn`t a president supposed to, um, do things? Isn`t it a bit strange to praise a man`s leadership not for doing something, but for maintaining a certain appearance?

Bush partisans point out that he did do things in the 9/11 aftermath. In his convention address last night, former New York Police Commissioner Bernard Kerik recalled Bush`s famous visit to New York, "inspiring a nation as he stood on hallowed ground, supporting the first responders."

OK, so Bush stood there. He "supported," in a Clintonesque sense, the people who were doing something. He touched the mayor. As Rudy Giuliani told the New York Times over the weekend, "When he got off the helicopter, he put his arm around the back of my neck and said, `What can I do for you?` It was a personal thing: `I know what you`ve been through, and what I can do to support you?` "

Amid all this touching, did Bush put himself in any peril? He certainly did. As Giuliani explained to the convention audience:

When President Bush came here on September 14, 2001, the Secret Service was not really happy about his remaining in the area so long. With buildings still unstable, with fires raging below ground of 2,000 degrees or more, there was good reason for their concern. Well, the president remained there. And talked to everyone. ... [A construction worker] grabbed the president of the United States in this massive bear hug, and he started squeezing him. And the Secret Service agent standing next to me, who wasn`t happy about any of this, instead of running over and getting the president out of this grip, puts his finger in my face and he says to me, "If this guy hurts the president, Giuliani, you`re finished."

This is Bush`s heroism? Showing up three days later, "remaining in the area," and enduring a hug?

The only moment of physical bravery any of last night`s speakers could find in Bush`s life was his secret trip to Iraq. "As I think about his leadership," Kerik recalled, "I think of the courage it took for our commander in chief to land on an airstrip in the dark of night, a world away, to be with our troops on Thanksgiving."

Thanksgiving? You mean, six months after we captured the airport and Bush declared victory?

And isn`t "the dark of night" normally a term we use to describe the preferred arrival and departure time of people who aren`t exactly overflowing with courage?

Or is Kerik pointing out the difficulty of landing a plane in the dark? Is he unaware, perhaps, that Bush wasn`t flying the plane? That once again, as in Vietnam, somebody else was doing the hard part and Bush was along for the ride? That Air Force One has more security systems than any other vehicle on Earth? That Bush went to Baghdad to "be with" the troops in the same way he went to New York to "be with" the firefighters? That waiting for a safe time and place to "be with" people who have braved unsafe places at unsafe times is the difference between heroism and a photo op?

Maybe Bush`s courage is moral rather than physical. Maybe it lies in the conviction Giuliani extolled last night: "President Bush sees world terrorism for the evil that it is."

Calling terrorism evil? Answering a deed with a word? This is courage?

Not fair, says the Bush camp. Bush has answered terrorism with far more than words. "He worked effectively to secure the cooperation of Pakistan," McCain pointed out last night. "He encouraged other friends to recognize the peril that terrorism posed for them and won their help in apprehending many of those who would attack us again and in helping to freeze the assets they used to fund their bloody work."

Ah, diplomacy. Now, that`s courage.

The ultimate testament to Bush`s manhood, supposedly, is the two wars he launched. As McCain put it, "He ordered American forces to Afghanistan" and "made the difficult decision to liberate Iraq." But the salient word in each of those boasts is the verb. Bush gives orders and makes decisions. He doesn`t take personal risks. He never has.

I don`t mean to be unfair to Bush. Vietnam was a lousy war. He wanted a way out, and he found it. But isn`t it odd to see Republicans belittle the physical risks Kerry took in battle while exalting Bush`s armchair wars and post-9/11 photo ops? Isn`t it embarrassing to see Bob Dole, the GOP`s previous presidential nominee, praise Bush`s heroism while suggesting that Kerry`s three combat wounds weren`t bad enough to justify sending him home from Vietnam?

Watching the attacks on Kerry and the glorification of Bush reminds me of something Dole said in his speech to the Republican convention eight years ago. It was "demeaning to the nation," Dole argued, to be governed by people "who never grew up, never did anything real, never sacrificed, never suffered and never learned."

You tell me which of this year`s presidential candidates that statement best describes.
William Saletan is Slate`s chief political correspondent and author of Bearing Right: How Conservatives Won the Abortion War.

Article URL: http://slate.msn.com/id/2105914/

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Noch mal etwas zu den Spionagevorwürfen gegen Israel. Den Artikel von Green, den ich gefunden habe, ist nicht der hier im Text erwähnte.
http://www.counterpunch.org/green02242003.html

Ich habe den Artikel über Google doch noch gefunden:
http://www.counterpunch.org/green02282004.html

POLITICS-U.S.:
Spy Probe Scans Neo Con-Israel Ties

Jim Lobe



The burgeoning scandal over claims that a Pentagon official passed higly classified secrets to a Zionist lobby group appears to be part of a much broader set of FBI and Pentagon investigations of close collaboration between prominent U.S. neo-conservatives and Israel dating back some 30 years.

SEATTLE, Aug 31 (IPS) - According to knowledgeable sources, who asked to not be identified, the FBI (Federal Bureau of Investigation) has been intensively reviewing a series of past counter-intelligence probes that were started against several high-profile neo-cons but never followed up with prosecutions, to the great frustration of counter-intelligence officers, in some cases.

Some of these past investigations involve top current officials, including Deputy Secretary of Defence Paul Wolfowitz; Undersecretary of Defence for Policy Douglas Feith, whose office appears to be the focus of the most recently disclosed inquiry; and Richard Perle, who resigned as Defence Policy Board (DPB) chairman last year.

All three were the subject of a lengthy investigative story by Stephen Green published by `Counterpunch` in February. Green is the author of two books on U.S.-Israeli relations, including `Taking Sides: America`s Secret Relations with a Militant Israel`, which relies heavily on interviews with former Pentagon and counter-intelligence officials.

At the same time, another Pentagon office concerned with the transfer of sensitive military and dual-use technologies has been examining the acquisition, modification and sales of key hi-tech military equipment by Israel obtained from the United States, in some cases with the help of prominent neo-conservatives who were then serving in the government.

Some of that equipment has been sold by Israel -- which in the last 20 years has become a top exporter of the world`s most sophisticated hi-tech information and weapons technology -- or by Israeli middlemen, to Russia, China and other potential U.S. strategic rivals. Some of it has also found its way onto the black market, where terrorist groups -- possibly including al-Qaeda -- obtained bootlegged copies, according to these sources.

Of particular interest in that connection are derivatives of a powerful case-management software called PROMIS that was produced by INSLAW, Inc in the early 1980s and acquired by Israel`s Mossad intelligence agency, which then sold its own versions to other foreign intelligence agencies in the Middle East, Asia and Eastern Europe.

But these versions were modified with a ”trap door” that permitted the seller to spy on the buyers` own intelligence files, according to a number of published reports.

A modified version of the software, which is used to monitor and track files on a multitude of databases, is believed to have been acquired by al-Qaeda on the black market in the late 1990s, possibly facilitating the group`s global banking and money-laundering schemes, according to a `Washington Times` story of June 2001.

According to one source, Pentagon investigators believe it possible that al-Qaeda used the software to spy on various U.S. agencies that could have detected or foiled the Sep. 11, 2001 attack.

The FBI is reportedly also involved in the Pentagon`s investigation, which is overseen by Deputy Undersecretary of Defence for International Technology Security John A ”Jack” Shaw with the explicit support of Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld.

The latest incident is based on allegations that a Defence Intelligence Agency (DIA) career officer, Larry Franklin -- who was assigned in 2001 to work in a special office dealing with Iraq and Iran under Feith -- provided highly classified information, including a draft on U.S. policy towards Iran, to two staff members of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), one of Washington`s most powerful lobby groups. One or both of the recipients allegedly passed the material to the Israeli embassy.

Franklin has not commented on the allegation, and Israel and AIPAC have strongly denied any involvement and say they are co-operating fully with FBI investigators.

The office in which Franklin has worked since 2001 is dominated by staunch neo-conservatives, including Feith himself. Headed by William Luti, a retired Navy officer who worked for DPB member Newt Gingrich when he was speaker of the House of Representatives, it played a central role in building the case for war in Iraq.

Part of the office`s strategy included working closely with the Iraqi National Congress (INC) led by now-disgraced exile Ahmad Chalabi, and the DPB members in developing and selectively leaking intelligence analyses that supported the now-discredited thesis that former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein had close ties to al-Qaeda.

Feith`s office enjoyed especially close links with Vice President Dick Cheney`s chief of staff, I Lewis Libby, to whom it ”stovepiped” its analyses without having them vetted by professional intelligence analysts in the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), the DIA, or the State Department Bureau for Intelligence of Research (INR).

Since the Iraq war, Feith`s office has also lobbied hard within the U.S. government for a confrontational posture vis-à-vis Iran and Syria, including actions aimed at destabilising both governments -- policies which, in addition to the ousting of Hussein, have been strongly and publicly urged by prominent, hard-line neo-conservatives, such as Perle, Feith and Perle`s associate at the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), Michael Ledeen, among others.

Despite his status as a career officer, Franklin, who is an Iran specialist, is considered both personally and ideologically close to several other prominent neo-conservatives, who have also acted in various consultancy roles at the Pentagon, including Ledeen and Harold Rhode, who once described himself as Deputy Secretary of State Paul Wolfowitz`s chief adviser on Islam.

In December 2001, Rhode and Franklin met in Europe with a shadowy Iranian arms dealer, Manichur Ghorbanifar, who, along with Ledeen, played a central role in the arms-for-hostages deal involving the Reagan administration, Israel and Iran in the mid-1980s that became known as the ”Iran-Contra Affair.”

Ledeen set up the more recent meetings that apparently triggered the FBI to launch its investigation, which has intensified in recent months amid reports that Chalabi`s INC, which has long been championed by the neo-conservatives, has been passing sensitive intelligence to Iran.

Feith has long been an outspoken supporter of Israel`s Likud Party, and his former law partner Marc Zell has served as a spokesman in Israel for the Jewish settler movement on the occupied West Bank.

He, Perle and several other like-minded hardliners participated in a task force that called for then-Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu to work for the installation of a friendly government in Baghdad as a means of permanently altering the balance of power in the Middle East in Israel`s favour, permitting it to abandon the Oslo peace process, which Feith had publicly opposed.

Previously, Feith served as a Middle East analyst in the National Security Council in the administration of former President Ronald Reagan (1981-89), but was summarily removed from that position in March 1982 because he had been the object of a FBI inquiry into whether he had provided classified material to an official of the Israeli embassy in Washington, according to Green`s account.

But Perle, who was then serving as assistant secretary of defence for international security policy (ISP), which, among other responsibilities, had an important say in approving or denying licenses to export sensitive military or dual-use technology abroad, hired him as his ”special counsel” and later as his deputy, where he served until 1986, when he left for his law practice with Zell, who had by then moved to Israel.

Also serving under Perle during these years was Stephen Bryen, a former staff member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and the subject of a major FBI investigation in the late 1970s for offering classified documents to an Israeli intelligence officer in the presence of AIPAC`s director, according to Green`s account, which is backed up by some 500 pages of investigation documents released under a Freedom of Information request some 15 years ago.

Although political appointees decided against prosecution, Bryen was reportedly asked to leave the committee and, until his appointment by Perle in 1981, served as head of the Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs (JINSA), a group dedicated to promoting strategic ties between the United States and Israel and one in which Perle, Feith and Ledeen have long been active.

In his position as Perle`s deputy, Bryen created the Defence Technology Security Administration (DTSA) which enforced regulations regarding technology transfer to foreign countries.

During his tenure, according to one source with personal knowledge of Bryen`s work, ”the U.S. shut down transfers to western Europe and Japan (which were depicted as too ready to sell them to Moscow) and opened up a back door to Israel” -- a pattern that became embarrassingly evident after Perle left office and the current deputy secretary of state, Richard Armitage, took over in 1987.

Soon, Armitage was raising serious questions about Bryen`s approval of sensitive exports to Israel without appropriate vetting by other agencies.

”It is in the interest of U.S. and Israel to remove needless impediments to technological cooperation between them,” Feith wrote in `Commentary` in 1992. ”Technologies in the hands of responsible, friendly countries facing military threats, countries like Israel, serve to deter aggression, enhance regional stability and promote peace thereby.”

Perle, Ledeen, and Wolfowitz have also been the subject of FBI inquiries, according to Green`s account. In 1970, one year after he was hired by Senator Henry ”Scoop” Jackson, an FBI wiretap authorised for the Israeli Embassy picked up Perle discussing classified information with an embassy official, while Wolfowitz was investigated in 1978 for providing a classified document on the proposed sale of a U.S. weapons system to an Arab government to an Israeli official via an AIPAC staffer.

In 1992, when he was serving as undersecretary of defence for policy, Pentagon officials looking into the unauthorised export of classified technology to China, found that Wolfowitz`s office was promoting Israel`s export of advanced air-to-air missiles to Beijing in violation of a written agreement with Washington on arms re-sales.

The FBI and the Pentagon are reportedly taking a new look at all of these incidents and others to, in the words of a `New York Times` story Sunday, ”get a better understanding of the relationships among conservative officials with strong ties to Israel.”

It would be a mistake to see Franklin as the chief target of the current investigation, according to sources, but rather he should be viewed as one piece of a much broader puzzle. (END/2004)



Copyright © 2004 IPS-Inter Press Service. All rights reserved.

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Published on Wednesday, September 1, 2004 by CommonDreams.org
Rove`s Brain and Media Manipulation
by Norman Solomon


I just saw a horror movie -- "Bush`s Brain" -- the new documentary based on a book with the same name by journalists James Moore and Wayne Slater. The book`s subtitle is "How Karl Rove Made George W. Bush Presidential." I`ll spare you the grim details. What matters most now is that Rove`s long record of shady and vicious media operations is not just in the past.

Rove is more than a master manipulator of the news media. He`s a stealthy smear artist who does whatever he can get away with. And Rove has gotten away with plenty. That`s how George W. Bush became governor of Texas ... and president of the United States. What remains to be seen is whether Rove`s techniques will again prove successful when this country votes on Nov. 2.

For all his deft skullduggery, Rove is smart enough to always remember that you can`t beat something with nothing. It`s not enough to tar the opponent with accusations and innuendos. It`s also necessary to tout Rove`s candidate as a guy just this side of the angels. And so, the Bush campaign is combining out-of-sight stilettos and out-front verbal attacks with elaborate poses of ultimate Goodness.

Yes, lots of campaigns routinely trash the foe -- and puff up the fair-haired boy or girl as the wondrous alternative to disaster. But the extremism of the Bush administration is comprehensive. The way it governs is the way it campaigns. A regime that goes all-out to lie and deceive while dragging the country into war can hardly be expected to hang back from similar endeavors when its hold on the presidency is at stake.

More than anything else, the most important added advantage that Karl Rove has this time around is incumbency. He was working for challengers when, as "Bush`s Brain" sketches out, he engaged in dirty tricks against two governors running for re-election in Texas. And he didn`t have access to the levers of White House power when his man defeated Al Gore in 2000. Now, Rove`s capacity to make some huge things happen (with a prudent degree or two of separation) is greatly enhanced.

The Swift Boat uproar that erupted in mid-August was vintage Rove. He didn`t sign the checks for the scurrilous anti-Kerry commercials, yet much of the financing and advising for those ads came from Republicans who`ve had a close working relationship with Rove.

Now, it`s a safe bet that the two months between the end of the 2004 Republican National Convention and Election Day will be the nastiest stretch drive in modern presidential politics. Campaigns have always strived to win, but the top strategist behind the Bush-Cheney ticket is something else. Just ask some Texas politicians -- like former Gov. Mark White and former Gov. Ann Richards. Or ask former Sen. Max Cleland.

The evidence is strong that Rove bugged his own office at a key moment in the 1986 gubernatorial campaign and then spun the Texas media to point the finger at Gov. White. Eight years later, Gov. Richards found herself subjected to below-the-radar whisper campaigns. The Rove-style line of attack was much more flagrant in 2002 when the successful GOP candidate in Georgia ran TV commercials depicting the wheelchair-bound Vietnam veteran Cleland as a soul-mate of Osama bin Laden.

A couple of decades ago, Lee Atwater was a mentor to Karl Rove. And it could not have escaped Rove`s attention that Atwater helped to craft the Willie Horton commercial -- utilizing lies about Michael Dukakis` record as governor of Massachusetts, appealing to racism and providing a boost to victory for George H.W. Bush in the 1988 presidential election.

Since then, it has become clear that Rove believes in nothing more than winning. But the news media should adhere to a different set of ethics.

It`s not enough to provide stenographic services for candidates and campaign strategists. Journalism is supposed to dig for truth and bring it to light. But in the real world, activists need to demand that mainstream media outlets stop evading and start exposing deception in real time.

Norman Solomon is co-author, with Reese Erlich, of "Target Iraq: What the News Media Didn`t Tell You." His columns and other writings can be found at www.normansolomon.com.

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Der ganze, lange Artikel:
http://www.isreview.org/issues/37/chomsky.shtml

Published in the September/October 2004 issue of The International Socialist Review
War Crimes and Imperial Fantasies
Excerpt of an interview of Noam Chomsky by David Barsamian


David Barsamian: Every four years Americans, those who vote, are faced with what is often called the lesser of two evils as their presidential options. Dave Dellinger, who passed away in May, used to call it "the evil of two lessers." You say that there is "a fraction" of difference between George Bush and John Kerry. And this raised some eyebrows. I heard, "It sounds like Chomsky is coming out for Kerry." Could you expand on your position.

Noam Chomsky: There are differences. They have different constituencies. There are different groups of people around them. On international affairs I wouldn’t expect any major policy changes. It would probably be more like back to the Clinton years, when you have sort of the same policies, but more modulated, not so brazen and aggressive, less violent. And I would expect a kind of return to that.

On domestic issues there could be a fairly significant difference–it’s not huge–but different in its outcomes. The group around Bush are real fanatics. They’re quite open. They’re not hiding it; you can’t accuse them of that. They want to destroy the whole array of progressive achievements of the past century. They’ve already more or less gotten rid of progressive income tax. They’re trying to destroy the limited medical care system. The new pharmaceutical bill is a step towards that. They’re going after Social Security. They probably will go after schools. They do not want a small government, any more than Reagan did. They want a huge government, and massively intrusive. They hate free markets. But they want it to work for the rich. The Kerry people will do something not fantastically different, but less so. They have a different constituency to appeal to, and they are much more likely to protect some limited form of benefits for the general population.

There are other differences. The popular constituency of the Bush people, a large part of it, is the extremist fundamentalist religious sector in the country, which is huge. There is nothing like it in any other industrial country. And they have to keep throwing them red meat to keep them in line. While they’re shafting them in their economic and social policies, you’ve got to make them think you’re doing something for them. And throwing red meat to that constituency is very dangerous for the world, because it means violence and aggression, but also for the country, because it means harming civil liberties in a serious way. The Kerry people don’t have that constituency. They would like to have it, but they’re never going to appeal to it much. They have to appeal somehow to working people, women, minorities, and others, and that makes a difference.

These may not look like huge differences, but they translate into quite big effects for the lives of people. Anyone who says "I don’t care if Bush gets elected" is basically telling poor and working people in the country, "I don’t care if your lives are destroyed. I don’t care whether you are going to have a little money to help your disabled mother. I just don’t care, because from my elevated point of view I don’t see much difference between them." That’s a way of saying, "Pay no attention to me, because I don’t care about you." Apart from its being wrong, it’s a recipe for disaster if you’re hoping to ever develop a popular movement and a political alternative.

Noam Chomsky, internationally renowned MIT professor, practically invented modern linguistics. In addition to his pioneering work in that field he has been a leading voice for peace and social justice. He is in such demand as a public speaker that he is booked years in advance. And wherever he appears, he draws huge audiences. The New Statesman calls him, "The conscience of the American people." He is the author of scores of books, his latest is the bestseller Hegemony or Survival. He has done a series of books with David Barsamian. The most recent one is Propaganda & the Public Mind. David Barsamian is the director and producer of the award-winning Alternative Radio in Boulder, Colorado. He interviewed Noam Chomsky at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge on June 11, 2004.

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Diese Woche ist Parteitag der Republikaner und wie üblich wird dabei John Kerry gewaltig durch den Dreck gezogen und George W. Bush in den höchsten Tönen gelobt.
Da die Reden wenig Überraschendes enthalten, schaue ich sie mir auch nicht an und warte bis die Redner abgeschlossen haben, um dann durch die die einzelnen Programme zu zappen und die Kommentare und die Zusammenfassungen anzuhören.
Heute waren Dick Cheney und Zell Miller die Hauptredner.

Zell Miller war heute die interessantere Person, weil von Cheney immer Einheitspropaganda gegen Kerry kommt.

Zell Miller, auch ZigZag Zell genannt, ist ein Senator aus Georgia, der obwohl eigentlich Demokrat immer zusammen mit den Republikanern im Senat stimmt.
Und jetzt haben ihn die Republikaner auch noch zu ihrem Parteitag eingeladen, damit er gewaltig gegen Kerry, den Massachussetts Liberalen, vom Leder ziehen kann. Das hat ZigZag Zell dann auch getan, obwohl er wunderlicherweise noch vor drei Jahren in den höchsten Tönen von Kerry geschwärmt hat.
Nach Abschluss der Reden war ZigZag Zell zuerst bei CNN zu Gast, wo man ihm schon mal gesagt hat, dass er während seiner Rede einen so verärgerten Eindruck hinterlassen habe, dass das beim Publikum nicht so gut ankommen könnte. Dann hat man ihm auch noch gesagt, dass damals nicht nur Kerry wie in Zell`s Rede erwähnt in den 90er Jahren gegen bestimmte Waffensysteme gestimmt habe, sondern auch Dick Cheney, der damals sogar Verteidigungsminister war.

Das wollte der gute alte Zell dann aber doch nicht wahrhaben und hat den Kommentatoren dabei mit seiner langen Liste von Kerry Entscheidungen im Senat vor der Nase herumgefuchtelt.

Gleich darauf war ZigZag Zell auf CNBC bei Chris Matthews auf Sendung. Die Politshow heisst Hardball und wenn Matthews gut drauf ist, spielt er nicht wie sonst im amerikanischen Fernsehen üblich Softbälle zu, sondern es geht richtig zur Sache.
Heute war wieder so ein Tag, an dem Matthews kanllharte Fragen an Zell gestellt und ihn in die Enge getrieben hat, woraufhin der arme alte Zell im Laufe des Interviews so in Rage kam, dass er Matthews äusserst aufgebracht androhte, wenn es noch die alten Zeiten gäbe und Matthews nicht weit weg von ihm im Studio sitzen würde, er diese Auseinandersetzung mit einem Duell beenden würde.

So ist er eben, der gute, alte ZigZag Zell aus den Bergen von North Georgia.

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SPIEGEL ONLINE - 01. September 2004, 9:16
URL: http://www.spiegel.de/politik/ausland/0,1518,316015,00.html

Republikaner-Parteitag

Dr. Jekyll und Mr. Hyde

Von Marc Pitzke, New York

Arnold Schwarzenegger begeisterte den Republikaner-Parteitag mit einer furiosen Rede, die auf die Wähler der Mitte zielte. Ein anderes Gesicht der Partei zeigt sich abseits der Kameras: wertkonservativ, ideologisch, religiös - und kriegsbereit.

New York - Nichts bleibt dem Zufall überlassen. Für jeden Redner verteilt die Parteitagsregie hier im Madison Square Garden neue Pappschilder, mit denen die Delegierten auf Kommando winken. Abertausende identische Schilder sind es, auf denen zum Beispiel die Polit-Parole des Tages aufgedruckt ist: "Nation des Muts", "Menschen des Mitgefühls", "Land der Gelegenheit". An diesem Abend aber steht auf ihnen nur ein einziger Vorname: "Arnold!"

Stars brauchen keine Nachnamen. Madonna. Cher. Und heute abend, live, vom 38. Wahlparteitag der Republikaner in New York City: Arnold!

"Wow", staunt Arnold Schwarzenegger, als er unter Minuten langen Ovationen ans Podium tritt. "Das ist ja, als wenn man einen Oscar gewinnt." Kunstpause. "Als ob ich das wüsste."

Und so charmeurt er sich ins Herz des Wechselwählers, der liberale Gouverneur aus Kalifornien, den die restlichen Amerikaner aber bis heute meist nur als Action-Star kennen. Das dürfte sich nun geändert haben, da er sein Charisma in den Dienst des gar nicht so liberalen Präsidenten stellt: Schwarzeneggers Rede zur besten Sendezeit erinnert, mit all ihrem populistischen Hollywood-Wortbombast, an einen anderen aus der Zunft, der es in der Politik ganz hoch brachte - Ronald Reagan.

Alte Kalauer, neu aufgewärmt

Doch Präsident kann er selbst als im Ausland geborener Einwanderer nicht werden, und deshalb tut er, mit frisch getöntem Haar und schwer geschminkt fürs parteipolitische Close-Up, das Zweitbeste: Er hilft einem Präsidenten, im Amt zu bleiben.

Jedes Wort, jede Geste, jede Anekdote zielt auf den unentschlossenen Wechselwähler daheim, mit Schmäh und Schmuh und Emotion. Wie ein B-Movie-Drehbuch eben, das Klischees zu Visionen erhebt. "Dies ist der Traum eines Immigranten", sagt er über seinen Aufstieg vom Muskelmann zum Machtinhaber. "Das ist der American Dream!"

Womit er gleich beim verordneten Tagesmotto des Parteitags landet: "Es gibt kein Land, das mitfühlender ist als die Vereinigten Staaten." Welcher Amerikaner will da widersprechen?

Ein guter Amerikaner, spinnt Schwarzenegger die Assoziationskette parteikonform weiter, ist automatisch auch ein guter Republikaner, und das digitale Sternenbanner auf der Mammutleinwand hinter ihm weht sanft. Über Demokraten wollen wir lieber nicht reden: Die sind "Girlie-Men". Ja, diesen alten Kalauer bekommen sie auch hier zu hören, und sie jubeln, als hören sie ihn zum ersten Mal.

Instruktionen vom Ideologen

"Vielleicht stimmen Sie mit dieser Partei nicht in jeder Frage überein", sagt Schwarzenegger an die Adresse der "Swing Voters". Und versichert dann gleich: "Das ist nicht nur okay. Das ist es, was an diesem Land so toll ist."

Es ist genau die Message, die die Parteispitze an diesem Abend unter die Leute bringen will, mit Schwarzenegger und auch mit First Lady Laura Bush, die einen netten Vortrag über die sensiblen Qualitäten ihres Gatten hält: Wir sind wie ihr, wir sind nicht böse, wir sind nette, offene, spaßige, ja, liberale Menschen.

Ein schönes Spiel. Ein ganz anderes, zutreffenderes Gesicht der Partei zeigt sich jedoch abseits der Kameras: erzkonservativ, ideologisch, tief religiös - und kriegsbereit.

Zum Beispiel in den Katakomben eines Hotels an der Carnegie Hall, wenige Stunden vor Schwarzeneggers Auftritt. Dort versammelt sich eine Hundertschaft Delegierte und Basiskämpfer um Newt Gingrich, ihren legendären Chef-Ideologen und Revolutionär, um sich Wahlkampf-Instruktionen abzuholen.

Weltkrieg bis 2070

"Wir müssen als Republikaner viel härter werden", bläut Gingrich den Besuchern dieses "Grassroots-Seminars" ein, bei dem die Parteigänger vier Stunden lang für den Frontkampf trainiert werden. Gingrich kann das gut: 1994 inszenierte er den Marsch der Republikaner zur Kongressmehrheit. Heute wirkt er hinter den Kulissen, guter Hoffnung: "Die Dinge bewegen sich dramatisch."

Und damit sich das auch weiter zu ihren Gunsten bewegt, warnt Gingrich vor einer Zukunft ohne Republikaner: "Die Wahl ist nicht zwischen Krieg oder Frieden, die Wahl ist zwischen Krieg oder etwas viel Schlimmerem." Seine apokalyptische Vision ist die einer Nation, die von der "säkularen Linken" zerstört werde: Überrannt von Immigranten, die nicht wüssten, "wie man Amerikaner ist"; regiert von gottlosen Gerichten; ruiniert von neuen Wirtschaftsriesen wie China.

Doch Gingrich hat ein Gegenrezept: "patriotische Erziehung", verbindliches Schulgebet, öffentliche Zurschaustellung der zehn Gebote, Beurlaubung" von Richtern, "die nicht wissen, was sie tun" - und einen Terror-Weltkrieg "bis 2070 oder noch länger".

Stimmen der Ausgrenzung

Da jubeln die Anwesenden, denn solche Worte liegen den meisten von ihnen in Wahrheit näher als die gut verdaulichen Mainstream-Häppchen, die Schwarzenegger der TV-Nation serviert. Während Arnold die Wähler im Auge hat, zielt Gingrich auf die Seele der Partei: Zwei Drittel der Delegierten in New York bezeichnen sich als streng konservativ, nur ein Drittel dagegen als moderat. Allen sanften Tönen vom Rednerpult zum Trotz: Das Herz der Republikaner schlägt rechts.

Das zeigt auch das Wahlprogramm, das die Delegierten verabschieden - ein streng sozialkonservatives Dokument, das selbst in der Partei auf Unmut stößt. Doch setzt sich der rechte Flügel in allen gesellschaftlichen Streitpunkten durch: Abtreibungsverbot, Verfassungsverbot der Schwulenehe, keine staatliche Stammzellenforschung.

Es ist eine eklatante Schizophrenie, die die Republikaner bei ihrem "Passionsspiel" ("National Journal") hier an den Tag legen: sanft, tolerant und einfühlsam auf der TV-Bühne, hart, ausgrenzend und unverzeihlich hinter den Kulissen - Dr. Jekyll und Mr. Hyde. Während sich die Redner als "Menschen des Mitgefühls" gerieren, mobilisiert Bush derweil, wie das "Wall Street Journal" berichtet, in den Kirchen des Landes die Stimmen der christlich-konservativen Basis - mit Hilfe der Pastoren.

Der Delegierte Amo Houghton aus New York, der sich selbst als moderat einstuft, bezeichnet sich schon als "aussterbende Rasse": "Die Partei ist zu weit nach rechts gewandert." Auch Patrick Guerriero sieht das so: Das "gemeine Wahlprogramm" sei von den "Stimmen der Ausgrenzung" diktiert worden, klagt der Vorsitzende der Log Cabin Republicans, der Schwulenfraktion der Republikaner. "Derweil werden die Stimmen der Eingrenzung in TV-Primetime präsentiert."

"We Love Laura"

Doch auch die Konservativen sind unfroh. Viele murren über Bushs PR-Avancen an die Mitte, über das gigantische Haushaltsdefizit, über gestiegene Staatsausgaben. "Wir sehen einen Kampf um die Zukunft der Partei", sagt Charlie Cook, Herausgeber des Newsletters "Cook Report".

Wie wichtig diese Zukunftsfragen sind, zeigt sich auch auf dem "Grassroots"-Seminar. Da gibt Ex-Parteichef Haley Barbour, heute Gouverneur von Mississippi, den Basishelfern Überlebenstipps für den Alltag in feindlichem Wahlland: Von Tür zu Tür gehen, Freunde und Nachbarn anwerben (selbst wenn die "nicht unbedingt Republikaner sind"), "nicht umfallen, sobald es die erste Kritik gibt" - und unbedingt "diszipliniert auf Message bleiben".

Zur Not hilft da die Parteiführung aus. Nach Schwarzeneggers Rede zum Beispiel werden den Delegierten im Saal neue Winke-Schilder in die Hand gedrückt, für die nächste Rednerin am Pult. Aufschrift: "We Love Laura."

© SPIEGEL ONLINE 2004

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September 2, 2004
NEWS ANALYSIS
The Cheney View of the World, With a Focus on Danger and Boldness
By DAVID E. SANGER

Vice President Dick Cheney reverted last night to the simple, bold declarations of how America should exercise its power that were often heard in the first year after the Sept. 11 attacks, when Iraq had not yet been invaded, intelligence reports had not yet proved false, and 17 months of insurgency had not yet raised the question of whether George W. Bush had taken a wrong turn in the fight against terror.

Instead, Mr. Cheney jettisoned the complications of the past year, honing the central argument of the Republican campaign: that the country could not trust Senator John Kerry to strike decisively in the defense of American interests. "Senator Kerry began his political career by saying he would like to see our troops deployed `only at the directive of the United Nations,` " Mr. Cheney said.

He added: "He declared at the Democratic convention that he will forcefully defend America - after we have been attacked. My fellow Americans, we have already been attacked.``

On the convention floor, the delegates broke into cheers of "U.S.A.! U.S.A.! U.S.A." Mr. Cheney went on to declare that the nation could not be safe without a president who was instinctively ready to go on offense to eliminate threats to the United States.

To some it may seem an overdistilled message, discarding much of what the Bush administration has learned, often the hard way, over the past year. It largely ignores discussion of the value of alliances, the need to treat the roots of terrorism, or the requirements of slow, patient diplomacy in places where there are no real military options. Mr. Bush`s critics will say it sidesteps the problems of murky intelligence and deeply festering resentments of American power around the world.

But as Mr. Bush`s and Mr. Cheney`s advisers have repeatedly said in recent weeks, campaigns and the subtleties of national security policy do not easily mix. So they have settled on a strategy designed to sow doubts about their opponent`s character, while hoping that some bold declarations about taking the fight to the enemy would overwhelm memories of the missteps of the past year.

It is an argument that Mr. Bush has been making with increasing ferocity on the campaign trail. He draws huge cheers when he derides Mr. Kerry`s "new nuance`` on whether it was right to invade Iraq. The president usually follows with this explanation of his own philosophy: "The world is working together and I`ll continue to build our alliances,`` Mr. Bush said in Perrysburg, Ohio, on Saturday. "But I will never turn over America`s national security decisions to leaders of other countries.``

It is a line he frequently delivers. Mr. Bush and Mr. Cheney have turned pre-emption from a post-cold-war doctrine of American defense strategy into a campaign theme. In that process, a lot has been thrown overboard. Washington may still be talking about missing unconventional weapons, or whether the occupation of Iraq is aiding the battle against terrorism or fueling it, but little of that debate has been acknowledged at Madison Square Garden.

At the convention, Iraq and the war on terrorism are rolled into one, and the only alternative to an assertive United States is described as a world run by the United Nations.

"There`s no question that the war in Iraq is, if anything, reducing the number of terrorists,`` the chairman of the New Mexico Republicans, Allen E. Weh, said on Tuesday, fresh from a tour of duty as a marine colonel in Iraq.

Campaigns, of course, are about simple slogans, not policy debates. Richard M. Nixon finished off George McGovern, a decorated World War II veteran, by questioning whether he had the guts to stand up to the North Vietnamese.

Mr. Cheney`s speech last night may remind the rest of the world of the "with us or against us`` language that Mr. Bush used in the wake of Sept. 11, language that the president had begun to modulate earlier this year.

The reversion to such simple precepts and harsh language may be in part a response to polls that show growing doubts about how Mr. Bush and Mr. Cheney have conducted the country`s national security policy. While they consistently say Mr. Bush is doing a good job of handling terrorism, Americans are less certain about his handling of foreign policy in general, and Iraq in particular.

In a CBS News poll conducted just before the convention began, 41 percent of the respondents said they approved of the way Mr. Bush was handling foreign policy, while 49 percent disapproved. Similarly, 40 percent of the respondents said they approved of the way Mr. Bush was handling the situation in Iraq, while 54 percent disapproved.

Mr. Bush`s response has been two-pronged. In recent days, he has begun to admit to some errors of judgment in Iraq, or "miscalculation" as he put it in an interview last Thursday with The New York Times. But he describes those as minor failures to anticipate the swiftness of American military victory and its aftermath, and argues that it is a problem already on its way to solution.

"So the fundamental question is, what are you doing about it?" Mr. Bush asked. "And what we`re doing about it is dealing with it. We`ve got a flexible plan."

But the second element of the strategy is to insist that the Iraq war is part of the broader war on terror, even in the face of doubts that Saddam Hussein had a working relationship with Al Qaeda or other active terror groups. And at nearly every campaign stop Mr. Bush emphasizes the military response to terrorism, rather than the steps to understand its causes and enact a strategy of prevention.

That kind of talk is intended to contrast sharply with Mr. Kerry`s line about waging a "more sensitive war on terror," and that is exactly where Mr. Cheney was attacking Mr. Kerry last night. Mr. Kerry, he said, talked "as though Al Qaeda will be impressed with our softer side."

The reality, said Richard Haass, who left a senior post in the State Department last year, is that "we`ve finally put on the agenda the need for a strategy not only for dealing with today`s terrorists, but with future terrorists." Yet it is an agenda Mr. Cheney, the voice of the hawks in the administration, did not spend much time addressing. Instead, he described Mr. Bush as a man who knows where to strike because he sees a world of good and evil.

"In the great divide of our time," he said, "he has put this nation where America always belongs: against the tyrants of this world."

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company

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Michael Moore zum Dritten!

Don`t send more kids to die
By Michael Moore
NEW YORK — Tonight, it`s show time for George W. Bush, and I can`t wait to hear what he has to tell the Republican convention.

It has been a pretty thrilling week so far, my favorite moment by far being the rebellious Bush twins who, in just a few short minutes, delivered on their promise to issue "payback" to their parents and all authority in general. (Related stories: Moore index page)

They revealed their parents` pet name for each other: "Bushie" or "Bushy" — no spelling was provided. They seemed to have embarrassed their grandmother with a joke about the TV show Sex and the City as a place to have sex. And they claimed to have seen their boogieing parents "shake it like a Polaroid picture." That`s one picture that took the rest of the night for me to shake out of my head.

Nonetheless, I loved the Bush daughters: They were funny, sassy and free spirits. Back in 1999, they told their father in no uncertain terms that they did not want him to run for president. They wanted their dad at home, they wanted their privacy, and they wanted to go to college in peace. He chose to ignore their pleas — and I guess Tuesday night was their way of saying, "Thanks, Dad."

And thank him they should. He and Laura have obviously done a good job raising two bright, independent women. He made their privacy a top priority and did what he could to protect them. They clearly love their parents and, when you see that happen, you know the Bushes did something right in their home. For that, they should be commended.

Other fathers and mothers who loved their daughters and sons across America can no longer celebrate with them. That`s because their children are dead on the streets and roads of Iraq, sent there by Mr. Bush to "defend" America.

This week, in an appearance leading up to his arrival here Wednesday night, Bush acknowledged he had miscalculated what would happen in Iraq after he invaded it. He had thought it was going to be much easier. It turned out to be much, much worse.

That must be some comfort to the parents of nearly 1,000 brave soldiers now dead because of his "miscalculation." If I made a miscalculation and ran over a child on the street, what do you think would happen to me? Do you think the cops would simply say, "Hey, Mr. Moore, you did your best driving down this street, you made a miscalculation, the kid is dead, but you are trying to save the world, so be on your way?" Something tells me this is not what would happen. What I don`t get is that Mr. Bush makes his mistake and thinks he has a right to continue in his job.

Let`s hope he isn`t getting his inspiration from Richard Nixon, the same man Arnold Schwarzenegger hailed Tuesday night as his reason for becoming a Republican. You have to give Arnold an award for guts. He must be the first Republican convention speaker to mention Nixon since he resigned. Nixon snuck into office in 1968 with his secret plan to end the Vietnam War. Another miscalculation: The war continued for years, and thousands more died.

I would love to hear Bush apologize tonight to the parents and loved ones of those who have died in Iraq. I would like to hear him say he knows what it means to love your children and that he, in good conscience, cannot send any more children to their deaths.

I would like to hear him say tonight, "I`m sorry. There never were weapons of mass destruction and there never was a connection between Saddam Hussein and 9/11. There was no imminent threat, our lives were not in danger, no missiles were going to hit Cleveland. Because of our desire to get our hands on the second largest supply of oil in the world, we sacrificed a thousand of your sons and daughters. For this, we are greatly sorry."

I guess a boy can dream.

The other thing I would like to hear tonight is: Why haven`t you caught Osama bin Laden? You`ve had three years to find him. The man killed nearly 3,000 people here on our soil.

Maybe Bush has no worse explanation than he just hasn`t been able to do it. Well, if your town`s dogcatcher couldn`t catch a wild dog that has been on the loose biting people for three years, what would be the dogcatcher`s chances for re-election? Not good.

And so it should be for Bush.

Unless he has the answers tonight. Perhaps he has a reason or can accept responsibility for his actions and promise to send no one else`s child off to die for a cause that has nothing to do with the defense of this country.

If he takes a moment to look into his daughters` eyes tonight, he will know the answer and give the greatest speech of his life.





Find this article at:
http://www.usatoday.com/news/opinion/columnist/2004-09-01-mo…

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September 2, 2004
IRAQ
7 Kidnapped Drivers Freed as Kuwaiti Trucker Pays Ransom
By ALEX BERENSON

BAGHDAD, Iraq, Sept. 1 - Kidnappers released seven foreign truckers held for 43 days on Wednesday after the head of a Kuwaiti transport company said he had paid a $500,000 ransom.

"We paid half a million dollars in order to release the hostages, and in the past we had paid other sums,`` the chairman of the Kuwait and Gulf Link Transport Company, Saeed Dashti, told reporters in Kuwait, according to Reuters.

Iraqi and American officials have opposed ransom payments, out of concern that they stimulate further kidnappings, but Iraqis and foreigners have tacitly acknowledged making payments of several hundred thousand dollars to release hostages.

Although the kidnappers, who had identified themselves as the Holders of the Black Banners, made numerous demands during long negotiations, Mr. Dashti was quoted in wire reports as saying that in the end they basically wanted money.

The hostages included three Indians, three Kenyans and an Egyptian, and their fates had become major issues in each of their countries. Their release came a day after another group of kidnappers posted a video showing the killing of 12 Nepalese hostages. Two French journalists taken hostage last month remained in captivity.

"We know that France didn`t take part in the last war and didn`t send any troops," said Hisham Ad-Dulaimi, a mediator who has helped win hostage releases before. "We will, by God, reach positive results."

The hostage release came as the interim National Assembly convened for the first time on Wednesday, in a small and tentative step toward representative government for Iraq.

The United States military announced that it conducted a late-night airstrike against two buildings in Falluja believed to be safe houses for the suspected terrorist Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. Wire reports quoted medical workers as saying at least 14 people had died.

But otherwise, a general quiet prevailed despite the collapse of peace talks between the interim Iraqi government and negotiators for the Shiite cleric Moktada al-Sadr. On Tuesday, the government rejected a tentative deal that would have barred American forces from the streets of Sadr City, a Shiite slum in Baghdad that is a stronghold of Mr. Sadr`s. In return, insurgents loyal to Mr. Sadr would have agreed to disarm. But the two sides discussed resuming negotiations on Wednesday, and Sadr City remained quiet.

Allied forces did not report any American or allied soldiers killed. More than 1,100 American and allied soldiers have been killed since the war began, including 978 United States troops, according to icasualties.org, which compiles casualty counts. About 6,500 American soldiers have been wounded.

In the Assembly`s two-hour inaugural session, representatives took an oath promising to work to make Iraq safer and more prosperous. Then they left. Three more days of meetings are scheduled before Sunday. The assembly`s most important task is to draw up the rules for national elections scheduled for January 2005.

Because of the violence dogging Iraq, the meeting took place under heavy security at a convention center in downtown Baghdad that is protected by American forces. Some delegates did not attend. Insurgents tried to attack the session, firing several mortars, including two that struck nearby while the assembly was meeting. One person outside the center was wounded.

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company

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September 2, 2004
Mr. Bush and the Truth About Terror

While Republican delegates have been meeting in New York City, terrorist bombs have been exploding in the rest of the world. The horrific pictures of victims on an Israeli bus and slain airplane and subway passengers, as well as of a school held hostage in Russia, are a stark reminder to Americans that terrorism is not all about us. It is the tactic of preference for the self-obsessed radical movements of our age.

President Bush was absolutely right when he said it was impossible to win a war against terrorism - it`s like announcing we can win a war against violence. Terrorism can only be minimized and controlled, and that can be done only with a worldwide strategy, joined by all of the world`s sensible and peaceful nations. We hope that when Mr. Bush accepts his party`s nomination for re-election tonight, he makes that argument.

The chances of a serious dialogue about terror took a blow, of course, when Mr. Bush retracted his completely sensible statement about terrorism after the Kerry-Edwards campaign attacked it. So far, this has been an election season of monumental simple-mindedness, in which the candidates start each day by telling us this is the most important election in the history of the planet, then devote the rest of their waking hours to meaningless sniping. But it`s certainly not too late to elevate the conversation.

Tonight we do not need Mr. Bush to remind us that he went to ground zero and spoke through a bullhorn. It was a fine gesture that any president would have made. As far as judging his leadership, it is as irrelevant as the famous extra minutes he spent in a classroom in Florida during a reading of "The Pet Goat" after the World Trade Center was attacked.

We do not need to hear further justification of his invasion of Iraq. It seems clear to us that the whole war is a mistake, a detour from hunting down terrorists that was undertaken on the basis of wrong information and is likely in the end to do far more harm than good when it comes to ending fanaticism in the Middle East. But the president is certainly not going to admit any of that, and as far as the future goes, he and John Kerry are in agreement about staying the course in Iraq.

What Mr. Bush should really talk about tonight is staying the course in Afghanistan, which is a case study in the perils of battling groups like Al Qaeda as if they were nation-states. The American-led invasion was a success to the degree that a government friendly to the United States and opposed to terrorist groups has been installed in Kabul. But armed opponents of the government are still all over the rest of Afghanistan, including Qaeda remnants and a revived Taliban.

So are the people who sponsor them, like Abdul Rasul Sayyaf, a notorious warlord and savage fundamentalist who in the 1980`s and 1990`s served as the chief mentor and protector of Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, the Qaeda mastermind of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. Incredibly, Mr. Sayyaf has been a major beneficiary of the American-led invasion and is now one of the country`s leading power brokers. All of the main candidates in the coming presidential election in Afghanistan, including the American-backed incumbent, Hamid Karzai, actively seek his endorsement.

If Mr. Bush is going to speak seriously about terrorism tonight, he also needs to talk about Israel. With its fixation on Iraq, the administration has allowed the situation in Israel to turn into a stalemate in which the Sharon government continues to expand its suicidal West Bank settlements while attempting to keep the Palestinians under control with sheer military force. The West Bank is not just a breeding ground for terrorists; it is the perpetual wound Arabs use to justify supporting and financing violent extremists.

Iraqis can go to the polls to vote, but the Middle East will still be a hotbed of terrorism if Palestinians cannot grow up with hopes for a decent life in a land over which they have some control. There is no way that the current mess is going to improve without the very aggressive intervention of United States diplomacy.

The Bush campaign is betting the ranch on the idea that Americans, in the end, will vote for the candidate they think is most likely to keep the nation safe from terrorism. The president has been honest about saying we will never be totally safe. He has been much less frank about explaining that even relative safety depends on our ability to create international alliances and to pick our fights not on the basis of where our armies can successfully fight, or of settling old scores, but where the gravest dangers lie. There are few venues less promising for truth-telling than a political convention, but there are also few better opportunities to make the public listen.

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company

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September 2, 2004
What I Learned
By MILTON FRIEDMAN

Thirty years ago a sincere Republican president, Gerald Ford, did much to heal America after Vietnam and Watergate. Today we again hear Vietnam disputes and charges of dirty tricks.

This election is not about what I did during Vietnam. Nor should it be about Senator Kerry`s combat record. I abhor any effort to discredit war veterans - whether the target is Senator Kerry, Senator John McCain or former Senator Max Cleland.

In my acceptance speech four years ago, I said, "I believe in a God who calls us not to judge our neighbors but to love them."

I stand on my record as the war president who defeated Saddam Hussein, liberated Iraq and struck decisively against the terrorists.

Like President Ford, I seek national reconciliation. President Ford said on April 23, 1975, that "America can regain the sense of pride that existed before Vietnam, but it cannot be achieved by refighting a war that is finished as far as America is concerned." Today we must again transcend recriminations and offer leadership as a good neighbor to all and enemy to none.

I learned and grew in the presidency but I also made some mistakes - on weapons of mass destruction, bad intelligence and oversights in Iraq`s reconstruction. Iraq was no slam-dunk. After all, I am George Bush, not George Washington.

Domestically, issues like taxes, deficits, health care, stem-cell research, jobs and gasoline prices required better action.

My opponents now maintain that I am so conservative I fly only on airplanes with two right wings. The truth is that as a uniter, not a divider, I could have done more to unify our people - both right and left wings. To that end, I pledge to work toward a new era of national unity, one that will transform America and bring peace, growth and achievement. Our challenges require bipartisan solutions, cooperation and compromise.

But these challenges also demand leadership. And that, too, I pledge. America deserves a proven president, not an unpredictable alternative.

I pray that God make me his instrument to serve with honor and humility for the good of all.

May God bless America - and I mean all Americans.

Milton Friedman was special assistant to President Gerald R. Ford and a senior presidential speechwriter.

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September 2, 2004
OP-ED COLUMNIST
Cutups and Cutthroats
By MAUREEN DOWD

I always enjoy hearing about how a teenage Dick Cheney stood off to the side with buckets of water to put out Lynne`s flaming batons.

But there was an even better moment during Claire Shipman`s two-part "Good Morning America" interview at the Wyoming ranch this week. Trying to humanize Dr. No, ABC was let into the inner sanctum to watch Mr. Cheney take his 4-year-old granddaughter on her first solo horsie ride and hear how he`s teaching his granddaughters fly-fishing.

Ms. Shipman asked the vice president "his greatest guilty pleasure."

His wife quickly interjected that it was fishing. But we all know, of course, it`s global domination.

It`s always amusing to watch Republicans try to get down. At convention time, they stop bilking Joe Lunchbox to act like Joe Lunchbox.

How awkward in Columbus, when W., hanging with Jack Nicklaus, noted that his grandfather was born there, so they should "send a homeboy back to Washington, D.C." Do they know a homeboy from a Lawn-Boy?

How you livin`, dawg?

And speaking of dawgs, whuddup with that video of Barney debating that French poodle Fifi Kerry about taxes? By the time the twins finished their White House Valley Girl routine, and Karl Rove and Karen Hughes went all giddy in the sendup, the convention`s arc was clear.

Highly scripted screwball moments designed to soothe fears that the Bushies are bullies alternate with high-octane, turbo moments designed to stir up fears that we won`t be safe without the Bush bullies.

Unlike the arrogant Boston Kerry strategists, who focus-grouped and dial-a-metered their convention to death, scrubbing most of the direct attacks on President Bush, the arrogant Austin Bush strategists have encouraged their non-girlie-men speakers to put the pedal to the metal and flatten the poor Democrat who is windsurfing through his free fall.

Despite the fact that the economy is cratering, Iraq is teetering, Afghanistan is reverting to warlords, Dick Cheney is glowering at the world, the war on terror has created more acts of terror, Ahmad Chalabi is an accused spy for Iran and the Pentagon has an accused spy for Israel, Republicans felt so good about themselves that when Arnold Schwarzenegger said he was inspired to become a Republican by Richard Nixon, they exploded. When Tricky Dick is a hot applause line, they`re feeling cocky.

Republicans are political killers. They are confident that Americans, in a 9/11 world, are going to be more drawn to political killers who have made some "miscalculations" on Iraq, as W. put it, than with a shaggy-haired Vietnam War protester whom Bush 41 compares to Hanoi Jane.

"I still have great difficulty with his coming back and making those statements before the Congress and throwing medals away," the president`s father told Don Imus yesterday.

Republicans know that plunging ahead with a course of action, even if it becomes obvious it`s wrong, is an easier political sell than flip-flopping, even if it`s right.

When the president slipped, admitting that the war on terror is unwinnable - perhaps recognizing that terror`s a tactic, not an enemy - he had to be saved later by Laura Bush, who fixed his stumble into nuance. Then Mr. Kerry made the mistake of responding in Bush black-and-white, calling the war on terror winnable.

While Democrats whined about the meanies and their Swift boat attacks, the G.O.P. juggernaut rolled on.

Zell Miller, playing Cotton Mather behind the cross-like lectern, made Mr. Cheney seem rational, with a maniacal litany of weapons he said Mr. Kerry had opposed that can destroy any mud hut in any third world country: B-1 and B-2 bombers, F-14A Tomcats, F-15 Eagles, Patriot and Trident missiles, and Aegis cruisers.

Just as the "third party" ad effort has been ferocious and misleading, so have some of the attack speeches here. Dick Cheney stomped on John Kerry the way he`s stomped on the world. In fact, he stomped on Mr. Kerry for trying to get along with the world: "He talks about leading `a more sensitive war on terror` as though Al Qaeda will be impressed with our softer side." It`s nice to know Mr. Cheney remembers Al Qaeda.

As others raged, Mr. Bush flew to New York and went to an Italian community center to eat pizza with Queens firemen. The homeboy was having a ruthless, but effective, week.

Thomas L. Friedman is on leave until October, writing a book.

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company

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Und ich dachte immer Reagan sei Bush Ersatzvater.

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WASHINGTON (IWR News Parody) - Tonight on Larry King Live show, Bob Woodward revealed, that contrary to popular belief, President Bush actually worships the ghost of Richard Nixon and is involved in some weird personality cult with [urlArnold Schwarzenegger.]http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=politicsNews&storyID=6118932

"I couldn`t believe my eyes. I was on my way to the restroom when I saw Mr. Bush on his knees in the Oval Office praying to a portrait of former President Nixon. He seemed to be asking for some guidance on his campaign strategy," said Woodward.

Larry King then asked Woodward: "What the hell does this have to do with Lacy Peterson anyway, Bob?"[/url]
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The world election

Europeans don`t have a vote in the United States - but Americans do care what we think
Timothy Garton Ash
Thursday September 2, 2004

The Guardian
Welcome to the most important American election in living memory. A world election, in which the world has no vote. Four more years of Bush can confirm millions of Muslims in a self-defeating phobia against the west, Europe in hostility to America, and the US on the path to fiscal ruin. Four more years, and the Beijing Olympics will see ascending China dictating its terms to a divided world.

Don`t be fooled by those who say that one lot is as bad as the other, or even, like the New Statesman`s John Pilger, that Bush`s re-election may be the lesser evil, because "supremacy is the essence of Americanism; only the veil changes or slips". Don`t be put off by John Kerry`s attempts to out-Bush Bush, as he attacks rather than applauds the president for inadvertently admitting that this "war on terror" cannot be "won" in the way that the second world war was won. Beyond the electoral posturing, Kerry knows that is true. As president, he would act accordingly, and the change would make a vast difference to every one of us.

The American election will have far more consequences for Europe than the last European elections. It`s probably more important to Britain than the next British election. Yet there seems so little we can do to affect the outcome. We feel like a punter whose life savings have been invested in a bet on a single boxer in a single bout. All we can do is cheer our lungs out from the ringside. Except that if we shout too loudly for Kerry we may actually help the other man - especially if we shout in French.

George Bush`s chances of winning depend on convincing a sufficient number of American swing voters of the truth of his narrative about "America at war". While his close supporters fund accusations that John Kerry marginally falsified his own war story in Vietnam, the president`s whole campaign is premised on selling a false war story.

"Like the second world war," he declared in mid-August, "the war we are fighting now began with a ruthless, surprise attack on America." Well, tell that to the Poles. (I`m writing this on the 65th anniversary of the true beginning of the second world war, which was indeed a ruthless, surprise attack - on Poland.) Or the British. Or the French. But for President Bush, the second world war began only with the Japanese attack on America at Pearl Harbor.

The contemporary analysis is as bad as the history. Again and again, the war on terror - Wot, in Washington shorthand - is compared to the second world war or the cold war. There`s only one way to win the war on terror, his key political adviser Karl Rove told an audience of young Republicans in the run-up to the convention. And that is "to chase the enemy to the ends of the earth and utterly destroy him". Like the cowboy hero of a hundred westerns. At the convention, they rally support with a film of US army tanks advancing down a road and warships cutting through the seas. Bush`s own re-election website (www.georgewbush.com) has a homepage link entitled "Winning the war on terror". Of course, Republican leaders can make more sophisticated arguments in private conversation, but this whole campaign depends on projecting a grand narrative in which the US is engaged in a conventional war, which it will win mainly by martial valour and force of arms.

But it isn`t, and it won`t. "Utterly destroy him," cries Karl Rove. But who is he? Osama bin Laden? A Palestinian suicide bomber? An Iranian mullah? The unknown terrorist? The whole point of this new kind of struggle is that there is no single clearly identifiable leader or regime, no Hitler or Soviet Union, who can be thus destroyed. (Obviously, capturing Osama bin Laden, if he`s still alive, would certainly help.) And if we accept, as we should, that we face a serious array of new threats, among which Islamist terrorism plays an important part, what is the role of military force in reducing the threat? Much less than in earlier wars. If military force was 80% responsible for the west`s victory in the second world war, and perhaps - through the impact on the Soviet Union of the arms race - 30% responsible for the west`s victory in the cold war (and even that figure may be too high), it will only be 10% - or perhaps 15% - responsible for winning this one.

The victory will depend on courage, resolution, and a determination to defend what we value - American leaders are right to remind us of this. It will depend on skilled intelligence and police work. But it will depend, above all, on addressing the political and economic causes of terrorism, to dry the swamps in which al-Qaida mosquitoes breed, and preserving and unfolding the magnetic attractions of our own free societies. It`s here that Bush has been such a disaster. He has presided over the largest build-up of the American military since the end of the cold war, and the swiftest, most comprehensive dismantling of the country`s popularity in the world since Vietnam. In the weapons categories that really count, no one has done more to disarm America than George Bush.

A surprising number of Americans see this. In a recent Pew poll, 67% of those asked said that the US had become less respected in the world, and 43% thought this was a major problem. It`s not just wishful thinking that makes Democrats constantly harp on the argument that Bush has ruined America`s standing with its traditional allies and friends. They know it means votes.

So perhaps we are not such impotent bystanders at the ringside, after all. Yes, we don`t have a vote. Yes, if we shout too loudly for Kerry it may help his opponent. But most Olympic contenders testify to the importance of the crowd. And this election, unusually for an American election, is as much about events and reactions outside America`s borders as about anything at home, including even "the economy, stupid". In that same Pew poll, 41% of those asked say the most important problem facing the nation is "war/foreign policy/terrorism" against just 26% for economic issues.

It would obviously be disastrous if only those European countries that opposed the Iraq war now explicitly support Kerry. That would give credibility to the conservative senator Mitch McConnell`s acid jibe that "Kerry wants to outsource our foreign policy to Paris and Berlin." It would be even worse if those countries that supported the Iraq war, especially Britain, Poland and Italy, did anything to suggest that Bush could carry on as he has since 2001 and still enjoy their support. No European government would be wise to endorse either candidate. They can leave that to us unofficial Europeans. But European leaders can spell out clearly the terms on which Europe stands ready to be a full partner of the US in reducing the threat of terrorism that concerns Europe at least as much as it does America. From the ringside of the world election, we should shout not for Europe, not for Bush, not even for Kerry, but for America to win. They`ll know which America we mean.

· Timothy Garton Ash`s new book, Free World: Why a Crisis of the West Reveals the Opportunity of Our Time, was recently published by Penguin

www.freeworldweb.net
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Dubya doesn`t do nuance, Arnie does - but even he lets his slip show

Sidney Blumenthal
Thursday September 2, 2004

The Guardian
Dangerous confusion threatened the Republicans on the second day of their convention. In an interview on the NBC Today Show, President Bush was deferentially asked about the war on terrorism. "I don`t think you can win it," he replied. For hours afterwards, his campaign issued bulletins to say he hadn`t meant it.

Finally, appearing before the American Legion veterans in Nashville, Bush declared: "We will win."

Vice-President Dick Cheney helpfully explained: "The president certainly never intended to convey the notion that we can`t win."

By breaking his own iron law - "I don`t do nuance" - Bush had blurred himself into the negative image of John Kerry as a flip-flopper.

Nuance leads to ambivalence, which can lead to inaction; and who then can be an action hero?

Bush`s mistaken nuance set the stage for the larger-than-life persona of Conan the Barbarian, Predator, The Terminator, Commando, and, not least, Kindergarten Cop. "This is like winning an Oscar, as if I would know," said Arnold Schwarzenegger, governor of California.

Schwarzenegger is the only political figure in America who is married to the Kennedys and is an old Bush family retainer. His ability to operate in several dimensions at once is intrinsic to his rise. In 1988 he campaigned for the elder Bush. "They call me The Terminator, but, when it comes to America`s future, Michael Dukakis is the real Terminator," he said.

For that he was made the president`s fitness adviser and appeared at the White House to direct Colin Powell (then General Powell) in push-ups on the South Lawn.

Schwarzenegger`s policies as governor- pro-gay, pro-choice, pro-environmental - have little in common with Bush`s, and he has no chance of carrying his state for Bush. As a principal speaker on "People of Compassion" night, his role as supporting actor was to transfer his image to Bush and the party.

Arnold has an aesthetic sense that passes over the heads of the Republicans. No matter how scripted he may be, he remains pure in his underlying message. He makes the case for the narcissism of power through the power of narcissism.

No one is more narcissistic than the body builder. He builds his reputation standing before mirrors.

Schwarzenegger offered the Republican convention totemic worship of virility borne out of fear of its fading. It was an act he has been perfecting for decades. In its essence, he offered a sexual identity panic speech.

He told of being a "once scrawny" boy in Austria daydreaming about becoming an American, inspired by John Wayne movies. In 1968 he arrived, during a presidential campaign. "Listening to Nixon speak ... I said to my friend, `What party is he?` `He`s a Republican.` I said: `Then I`m a Republican.`"

He offered the flattery of the immigrant to the native: "Everything I have, my career, my success, my family, I owe to America."

Having established his citizenship, Schwarzenegger felt entitled to articulate the Republican credo - power over weakness. "If you believe this country, not the UN, is the best hope for democracy, then you are a Republican." Thus the immigrant blasted internationalism.

"If you believe that we must be fierce and relentless and terminate terrorism, then you are a Republican." Thus the Democrats were soft.

"And to those critics who are so pessimistic about our economy, I say: Don`t be economic girlie-men." "Girlie-man" is a peculiar accusation. It reveals fear of women and their complex values. The name-calling is a frantic effort to suppress nuance, which the action hero fears he may harbour within.

· Sidney Blumenthal is a former senior adviser to Bill Clinton, and the Washington bureau chief of salon.com.

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NEWS ANALYSIS
GOP Locks In on Theme, and Opens Fire on Kerry
By Ronald Brownstein
Times Staff Writer

September 2, 2004

NEW YORK — It`s the terrorism, stupid.

With their relentless, double-barreled attack on Democratic nominee John F. Kerry on Wednesday night, Vice President Dick Cheney and keynote speaker Sen. Zell Miller (D-Ga.) reduced President Bush`s case for reelection to virtually a single argument: Bush would be tough and resolute in the war on terrorism and Kerry would be neither.

Cheney, more than Miller, also sought to present Bush as a visionary leader who had reconstructed America`s foreign policy to confront global terrorism, much the same way President Truman and his advisors built a new international order after World War II.

But such positive arguments were overshadowed by an attack on Kerry far more sustained and ferocious than anything Bush faced during prime time at July`s Democratic National Convention in Boston.

As striking as the heated tone was the narrow focus: Apart from fleeting references to education and the economy from the vice president, Cheney and Miller confined their speeches almost entirely to national security.

That followed the pattern set by earlier speakers such as former New York Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani and Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), who lavishly praised Bush`s strategy in the fight against terrorism and staunchly defended the war in Iraq, but said almost nothing about the president`s domestic record.

The emphasis on national security has been every bit as determined as the economic focus in 1992 that led Bill Clinton`s campaign to summarize its strategy in the ringing phrase: "It`s the economy, stupid."

Sources familiar with Bush`s acceptance speech, to be delivered tonight, insist he will promote a second-term domestic agenda built around encouraging ownership and reforming government. But that appears likely to register as only a minor chord in a convention that has vividly dramatized the Bush campaign`s belief that its best hope of victory is to burnish confidence in the president`s ability to protect the nation — and to heighten the doubts about whether Kerry is up to the job.

With only one night left, the Republican convention increasingly looks like the mirror image of the Democratic gathering. During their four nights, Democrats devoted the most effort to polishing Kerry`s credentials as a potential commander in chief and to questioning Bush`s strategy in the struggle against terrorism. Republicans are putting almost all of their energy into undermining Kerry`s credentials to be a commander in chief and defending Bush`s national security decisions.

The pile-driver attack on Kerry`s national security credentials at the Republican convention — following the assault on his military record from a group of Vietnam veterans over the last month — has created twin challenges for the Democrat: maintaining his credibility as a potential leader and finding ways to shift more attention to domestic issues, such as the economy and healthcare, where polls show he holds an advantage over Bush.

Senior Kerry advisors said they believed the attacks Wednesday were so heated that they would backfire with swing voters. But the intensity of the GOP assault this week could increase the pressure on Kerry from Democrats who believe his campaign has not been nearly aggressive enough in criticizing Bush and presenting a case for change.

Yet the convention`s never-give-an-inch defense of Bush`s strategy since Sept. 11, culminating in his decision to invade Iraq, also could seed dangers for the president later in the race.

In effect, the GOP has spent this week suggesting to voters that if reelected, Bush will not deviate from an approach to national security that has divided the nation. Bush receives strong marks in polls for his response to terrorism. But in recent surveys, including a University of Pennsylvania National Annenberg Survey released Wednesday, about half of Americans say the war in Iraq has not been worth the cost.

"It`s nice to be firm in what you believe in, unless of course it`s the wrong direction," said Madeleine Albright, secretary of State under President Clinton and a Kerry advisor. "At those times, resolute can be translated as stubborn and uncompromising."

Resolute might also best describe the way Wednesday`s speakers focused on national security and pressed their case against Kerry.

Cheney diverted from the theme only long enough to breeze through three quick paragraphs defending the administration`s record on education, the economy and healthcare. Miller sent some clear cultural signals to religiously devout voters by twice underscoring the president`s faith.

But mostly, Miller and Cheney encouraged voters to place national security at the top of their priority list by presenting the threat from terrorism in the starkest terms. Cheney called it "the greatest challenge of our time" and, echoing neoconservative thinkers, presented Islamic terrorism as a danger comparable to that posed by the most massive military machines the United States has confronted.

"Just as surely as the Nazis during World War II and the Soviet Communists during the Cold War, the enemy we face today is bent on our destruction," Cheney said.

Having defined the threat, Miller and Cheney moved in fierce and unrelenting language to portray Kerry — and the Democratic Party — as incapable of meeting it.

Miller`s martial, confrontational speech might have been the angriest at a national convention since Patrick J. Buchanan`s "culture war" address to the GOP in 1992. But in substance, Miller`s speech seemed more directly a descendant of a memorable convention address 20 years ago from another former Democrat. In 1984, Jeanne Kirkpatrick, President Reagan`s U.N. ambassador, electrified the GOP convention when she said that her former party wanted to "blame America first."

Miller, though still a nominal Democrat, presented Democrats in the same light. "In their warped way of thinking, America is the problem, not the solution," he said. "They don`t believe there is any real danger in the world except that which America brings upon itself through our clumsy and misguided foreign policy."

Both men reprised, albeit in even sharper language than usual, the Republican charges that Kerry was indecisive and weak. Miller insisted that Kerry`s attitude toward defense spending would leave the U.S. military armed with "spitballs."

Both men also echoed Giuliani in seeking to turn Kerry`s principal foreign policy argument against him. Throughout the campaign, Kerry has argued that Bush has weakened America`s security by alienating traditional allies and isolating the United States; the Democrat pressed that case again in his speech to the American Legion on Wednesday, condemning Bush`s Iraq strategy.

But Cheney and Miller presented Kerry`s pledge of greater cooperation as a sign of weakness. "Sen. Kerry denounces American action when other countries don`t approve, as if the whole object of our foreign policy were to please a few persistent critics," said Cheney, whose style was as understated as Miller`s was impassioned.

Democrats dismissed those criticisms as a misrepresentation of Kerry`s views. While Kerry has pledged to consult more closely with allies, he has also repeatedly said that he would never give other nations a veto over American security, and also had not ruled out the preemptive use of military force against terrorist threats.

"The bottom line is he has flat-out said he would not give up authority to the United Nations," Albright said. "But there are times that one has to recognize that we are stronger if we are able to take action in cooperation with others."

Yet even with the inevitable hyperbole and distortion, the parallel charges from the two sides — the Democratic claim that Bush has alienated allies, and the Republican charge that Kerry would capitulate to them — point toward a central choice facing Americans in November.

Kerry has made clear that he would give allies greater input into American decisions, hoping it would yield greater cooperation in Iraq and the war on terrorism more broadly. Bush, with his emphasis on preemptive military action and "coalitions of the willing," has devised an approach to foreign affairs that generally places American freedom of action as a higher priority than international consensus.

For more than a year, virtually every leading Democrat has argued that America will be more secure in a world where it is respected rather than resented. This week, by contrast, Republicans have repeatedly belittled the United Nations and presented foreign criticism of Bush as proof of his determination to protect America.

In the uncompromising words that have flowed from the podium this week, the GOP seems to be betting that in a dangerous world, Americans would rather be feared than liked.


Copyright 2004 Los Angeles Times

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MAX BOOT
Terrorists` October Surprise
Max Boot

September 2, 2004

The eyes of the political world will be on New York today as President Bush delivers his acceptance speech at the Republican National Convention. But, with foreign policy occupying center stage in a presidential election for the first time since 1972, the outcome of the election may hinge less on what the president does in New York than on what our enemies do in Kabul and Baghdad.

As he no doubt will make clear tonight, Bush is running as the man who liberated Afghanistan and Iraq. But despite initial U.S. military victories and considerable progress toward democracy (Afghans will vote Oct. 9; Iraqis by Jan. 30), both countries face vicious insurgencies in which the ultimate outcome is unknowable.

From an American political perspective, the effect of these rebellions is clear: The more successes the rebels have between now and Nov. 2, the more they help John F. Kerry and hurt George W. Bush.

So it stands to reason that the guerrillas will want to launch an offensive, if they can, to influence the U.S. election. Not because Kerry is in any way sympathetic to the goals of the extremists, but simply because it would be quite a coup for the rebels to topple any president.

They must also reckon that there is little chance that Kerry would be as resolute as Bush in fighting them. Indeed, the Democratic candidate has talked of bringing the troops home from Iraq in his first term.

There is plenty of precedent for guerrillas trying to affect a U.S. election. In 1900, American troops were embroiled in another nasty counterinsurgency halfway around the world that was not going as well as planned. After the Democratic nominee, William Jennings Bryan, promised to pull out of the Philippines, the insurrectos launched a fall offensive in order to secure his election. They failed. Republican William McKinley was reelected, and the U.S. went on to pacify the islands.

In 1968, yet another group of anti-American guerrillas was more successful. The Tet offensive, though a military defeat, turned into a political triumph for the Viet Cong by driving Lyndon B. Johnson from office and convincing most Americans the war could not be won. Even though Richard Nixon was hardly a dove, he began the pullout of U.S. forces that ultimately led to the fall of South Vietnam.

More recently, in March, the Madrid train bombings helped to defeat the conservative party in Spain`s elections and bring to power socialists committed to pulling Spanish troops out of Iraq.

It is doubtful that American voters would react to an attack on U.S. soil as the Spaniards did to the Madrid bombings. Appeasement is not in America`s DNA. More likely the U.S. reaction to another 9/11 would be like that of the Israelis under similar circumstances: Whenever Israel is bombed, it responds by supporting the most hawkish candidate.

But what if the terrorist attacks occur not in the U.S. but in Afghanistan or, more likely, Iraq?

During the last year, Bush`s political fortunes have been tied closely to battlefield developments. His poll ratings soared last December, when Saddam Hussein was captured, and sank in April and May, when revelations about prisoner abuses combined with uprisings in Fallouja and Najaf to shake public confidence in the war effort.

Bush is finally starting to recover from those blows, though only at the cost of a softer line on the guerrillas.

He has ceded control of Fallouja to Sunni Islamist extremists who are turning it into a Taliban-style stronghold. And he has allowed Shiite firebrand Muqtada Sadr to walk away from another confrontation with U.S. troops, which will boost Sadr`s prestige. No doubt much of the impetus for backing down comes from Iraqi Prime Minister Iyad Allawi, who is fearful that a major confrontation would undermine his shaky authority. But Bush also wants to avoid preelection violence that would spook U.S. voters.

The jihadists, who watch Al Jazeera and CNN, are well aware of the president`s predicament, and odds are they will try to exploit it by driving up U.S. casualties before the election. Based on present trends, U.S. fatalities in Iraq will exceed 1,000 within a few weeks. Voters have shown they will tolerate such losses only in a winning cause. If an "October surprise" offensive shakes American confidence in victory, Bush could easily lose.

The odds of a U.S. military victory in Iraq would then decrease because, for all of Bush`s failures and miscalculations (and there have been many), he has more of a stake in the outcome of this war than his challenger does. Thus not only could the U.S. election turn on battlefield developments, but what ultimately happens on the battlefield could turn on the election.

Karl von Clausewitz was only half right when he wrote that "war is the continuation of politics by other means." Politics can also be the continuation of war by other means.



Copyright 2004 Los Angeles Times

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Designer of Florida`s butterfly ballot loses job
She was blamed for confusion in 2000 presidential election
- John-Thor Dahlburg, Los Angeles Times
Thursday, September 2, 2004

Miami -- As a final irony, there has been a last-minute discrepancy in tallying absentee ballots. But Theresa LePore, the elections supervisor in Palm Beach County who gained national notoriety as designer of the "butterfly ballot" that contributed to Florida`s 2000 election chaos, appeared Wednesday to have lost her job.

"The voter anger was obvious, and LePore became the target this year," when she sought a third term, said Shari MacLachlan, professor of political science at Palm Beach Community College.

The Democratic Party, the dominant force in her county`s politics, criticized LePore, 49, for refusing to add safeguards to new touch-screen voting machines that would generate a paper trail for use in the event of a recount.

According to complete but still uncertified results from Tuesday`s primary, LePore lost to Arthur Anderson by 5,533 votes out of more than 177, 000 cast. Anderson, 63, is an education professor at Florida Atlantic University and former member of the county school board.

Though the race was nonpartisan, Anderson was championed by Democratic U. S. Rep. Robert Wexler of Boca Raton, and boosted by campaign appearances by former Democratic presidential candidates Sen. Joe Lieberman and former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean.

After a night spent following the returns, Anderson was sleeping and unavailable for comment, a family member at his Boca Raton home said Wednesday.

On Wednesday, co-workers in the supervisor`s office said LePore did not come to work. LePore began working in the county elections office in West Palm Beach as a file clerk 33 years ago.

"She`s worked in that office since she was 16 years old. So this is a significant shock and a loss that`s going to take some time to heal," spokesman Marty Rogol said.

LePore remains in office until January and therefore will oversee another presidential election.

In 2000, LePore created the so-called butterfly ballot, where the names of presidential candidates were listed on opposing pages. She said she did it to make the type bigger, so the ballot would be easier for the county`s seniors to read.

But almost immediately after polls in the last presidential election opened, some voters complained that LePore`s design led them to vote for conservative Reform Party candidate Patrick Buchanan instead of the Democrat, Vice President Al Gore. LePore quickly became the object of intense hatred and loathing, and when the Republican candidate, President Bush, was declared official winner in Florida by 537 votes, some blamed her.

She replied that the Democratic and Republican parties had signed off on the ballot before the election, and noted that Gore carried Palm Beach County by more than 116,000 votes.

"Unfortunately, Ms. LePore did not help matters for herself because she never took responsibility," said Carol Ann Loehndorf, chair of the Democratic Party of Palm Beach County. "There was a continuous effort to blame the voters. "

If LePore had advocated additional technology to create a paper record for the new touch-screen machines -- which the supervisor purchased to prevent a repeat of the 2000 debacle -- Loehndorf said Democrats would probably not have challenged her this year.

Asked to explain his boss` defeat, Rogol blamed "residual anger from 2000 and the relentless effort by Congressman Wexler to defeat her."

Wexler, who has sued in state and federal court to demand that the touch- screen machines be modified -- so far to no avail -- paid for a barrage of TV ads against LePore and brought in Dean and Lieberman to stump for her rival.

Though LePore presided over nearly flawless elections in 2002, some voters this year complained her new design for absentee ballots might lead to more miscast votes.

On Wednesday, a problem with tallying absentee ballots delayed certification of Palm Beach County returns until today at the earliest. Rogol said 31,095 ballots were received, but that the counting machine for some unknown reason showed it tallied 37,839. A recount was ordered. Rogol said he did not believe the county`s latest election-related glitch would affect the final results.

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Thoughts on the Middle East, History,and Religion
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Juan Cole is Professor of History at the University of Michigan

Thursday, September 02, 2004

Ivins: US Losses up from Last Year

Molly Ivins`s column today is all the refutation necessary to Dick Cheney`s strangely diffident speach Wednesday night. She writes:


` RECORD. We have already lost more American soldiers (488) in Iraq in 239 days of this year than we did in 287 days last year (482), when there was a war on and before our mission was accomplished.

The grind of the numbers is so relentless. Price of oil — pressing $50 a barrel. Poverty rate — increased again, third year in a row. Number of Americans without insurance — increased again, third year. Part of the “vibrant economy” Bush touts daily now. And the news from Iraq just keeps getting worse and worse.

Then, to liven things up, someone from Under Secretary of Defense Douglas Feith’s office is accused of passing classified information to the Israelis via the lobby group American Israel Public Affairs Committee. Be interesting to see whether Laurence A. Franklin, the alleged spy, gets as much publicity as Clinton’s former NSC adviser Sandy Berger did for allegedly taking notes on classified documents for his 9-11 Commission testimony. The Justice Department has announced no charges will be filed against Berger, and the matter is closed. `



I hadn`t known the statistic she cites at the beginning, and do find it troubling.

posted by Juan @9/2/2004 07:05:04 AM

Chatham House: Iraq from Bad to Worse

Chatham House, formerly the Royal Institute for International Affairs, has issued a highly pessimistic report (in pdf format) on Iraq. At best, it argues, the US and the UK will just muddle through in Iraq, but will fail to attain goals like installing a democracy, and stability will remain elusive. At worst, the authors of the report imagine Iraq falling apart as Yugoslavia did. They warn that the lesson of Yugoslavia is that old neighbors who lived peacefully together for decades can learn to hate each other violently virtually overnight.

I don`t personally find the break-up scenario very likely. Iraqis are generally very committed to their nation, and none of the neighbors would stand for a split. It could happen, but I find it only a remote possibility.

posted by Juan @ 9/2/2004 06:16:47 AM

Chalabi Survives Assassination Attempt
Sadr Aide Assassinated

Ahmad Chalabi`s convoy came under fire as he was returning to Baghdad from Najaf. Two of his bodyguards were injured, but he escaped harm. He was in Najaf consulting with Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani before returning to the first meeting of the National Council, in the capital. Chalabi has been indicted on counterfeiting charges, but no prosecution has been initiated. His nephew, Salem, in London, has been charged with murder.

Chalabi made the conference. I was surprised to hear that he was an attendee. Last I knew, the number of seats for the old Interim Council members had been reduced from 20 to 19, and I had assumed that Chalabi was out because of the indictment. But obviously not. It is not a good sign that the US continues to install this fraud in high Iraqi political office. It reflects poorly on America.

In a separate incident, Bashir al-Jazairi, an aide to Muqtada al-Sadr was killed Wednesday on his way from Najaf to Baghdad. That road runs near several militantly Sunni towns were Saddam is still popular, and al-Jazairi may have fallen victim to Sunni terrorists. On the other hand, there is now a big feud between the Sadr movement and the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq and the al-Dawa Party, because the latter two stood aside and let the Americans kill the Sadrists in Najaf (when they weren`t actively egging Washington on!) So the identity of the assassin is unknown at present.

posted by Juan @ [url9/2/2004 06:02:13 AM]http://www.juancole.com/2004_09_01_juancole_archive.html#109406137757310255[/url]

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Chatham House: Iraq from Bad to Worse

Chatham House, formerly the Royal Institute for International Affairs, has issued a highly pessimistic report (in pdf format) on Iraq. At best, it argues, the US and the UK will just muddle through in Iraq, but will fail to attain goals like installing a democracy, and stability will remain elusive. At worst, the authors of the report imagine Iraq falling apart as Yugoslavia did. They warn that the lesson of Yugoslavia is that old neighbors who lived peacefully together for decades can learn to hate each other violently virtually overnight.

I don`t personally find the break-up scenario very likely. Iraqis are generally very committed to their nation, and none of the neighbors would stand for a split. It could happen, but I find it only a remote possibility.


http://www.riia.org/pdf/research/mep/BP0904.pdf?PHPSESSID=d7…

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Part One: The Ties That Blind
Part Two: Mark His Words
Die beiden ersten Teile s.#20911 oder
http://www.counterpunch.org/stclair09022004.html

The Life and Crimes of George W. Bush

By JEFFREY ST. CLAIR

Part Three: More Pricks Than Kicks

Relations inside the Bush cabinet have not always collegial and harmonious. Take Richard Armitage, the longtime diplomatic fixer. Armitage had originally been slated by the Bush transition team for installation as the number two man at the Pentagon. But Armitage despised Donald Rumsfeld`s megalomaniacal style and reportedly denounced openly him as "a prick." Armitage ended up back at State and Paul Wolfowitz, the crafty neo-con, became Rumsfeld`s slavishly devoted deputy.

Rumsfeld had good reason to fear Armitage and some of the other old hands at State. Not because Armitage and Powell weren`t itching for war with Iraq. Oh, no. It was a tussle over who would call the shots and how it would be launched: Powell`s office wanted a reprise of the 1990 coalition; Rummy wanted war on his own terms. The men and women at Foggy Bottom knew some unsavory tidbits about Rumsfeld`s past relations with two pillars in Bush`s Axis of Evil: Iraq and North Korea.

In the early 1980s, Rummy was grazing in the corporate pastures as a top executive fixer at G.D. Searle, the drug giant involved in the aspartame scandal. Then Reagan called. The Gipper summoned Rumsfeld to serve as his special emissary for the Middle East, assigned with the delicate mission of delivering back channel communications from the White House to Baghdad. This was the beginning of the so-called Iraq Tilt, the subtle backing of Saddam during the gruesome Iran/Iraq war.

December 20, 1983 found Rumsfeld in Baghdad supping with Saddam and Iraq`s foreign minister Tariq Aziz. By all accounts the day long session was amiable and cordial. Rumsfeld chose not to issue a remonstrance about Iraq`s lethal use of chemical weapons against Iran. Rumsfeld, known as the Prince of Darkness by some of his staffers, was well acquainted with the slaughter. He was in possession of a State Department memo dated November 1, 1983 by Middle East specialist Jonathan Howe who warned the administration of "almost daily use of CW by Iraq against Iranian forces."

Rumsfeld blew off the reports of atrocities and instead encouraged Saddam to press his war on Iran. By February 1984, a UN investigation publicly confirmed the gassings, but that didn`t deter Rumsfeld from meeting with Tariq Aziz again on March 26, 1984, where he again failed to reprimand the Iraqis (now essentially pursuing a proxy war for the US) for the war crimes. Two decades later, Rumsfeld, without cracking a grin, repeatedly invoked Saddam`s use of poison gas in the 1980s as a justification for Bush`s pre-emptive war.

Cut to 1994. Now Rumsfeld plying his craft back in the corporate milieu, this time for the Swiss engineering giant ABB, which specializes in the construction of nuclear power plants. In the fall of that year, ABB received a $200 million contract to construct two light-water reactors for the Pyongyang government, under a deal sanctioned by the State Department during the Clinton years. Oddly, Rumsfeld was later to cite the reactors as evidence of North Korea`s malign intention to pursue the development of nuclear weapons and used the reactors as justification for sinking billions in Bush`s Star Wars scheme. When confronted by the fact that the reactors under scrutiny had been sold to North Korea by his very own company, Rumsfeld feigned ignorance, just has he had done when presented with a videotape of him greeting Saddam. But the boys at the State Department knew the score on both counts and Rummy didn`t like it.

Indeed, Rumsfeld, the Polonius of the Bush team, so distrusted the ecumenicalists in the State Department that he set up an off-the-shelf operation sequestered firmly under his control called the Office for Special Plans, headed by Douglas Feith. Sound familiar? It should. The OSP is not all that different from the William Casey/Oliver North operation that had its stealthy hands in illegal meddlings from Iran and Afghanistan to Honduras and Nicaragua. But see how far we`ve matured as a nation in 20 years. Rumsfeld`s group was an open secret, shedding even the pretense of covertness.

The OSP operates as kind of cut-and-paste intelligence shop that served up as fact any gothic tale peddled by Ahmed Chalabi or the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC). Feith made a pest of himself, meddling in the affairs of the war planners. He was reviled by Gen. Tommy Franks, who called him "the dumbest motherfucker on the face of the Earth."

This didn`t deter Feith in the least. He recruited a roster of pliant neo-cons into his office, who generated the phantasmagorical briefs for the war to topple Saddam, which he had hungered for since at least 1994. Feith`s OSP office was known by State Department hands as the Fantasy Factory. Among Feith`s pack of underlings, two have received special attention, Harold Rhode and Larry Franklin, for their intimate relationship with the state of Israel. Franklin, perhaps the scapegoat for a larger scandal, finds himself the target an FBI investigation into Israeli espionage ring in the Pentagon and National Security Council.

Feith himself is no stranger to such inquiries into leaking classified information to the Israeli. In 1982, Feith was fired from his position as an analyst on Middle East issues in the Reagan administration`s National Security Council on suspicion of leaking material to the an official with the Israeli embassy in Washington. Don`t cry for Feith. He simply moved out of the White House and over to the Pentagon as a "special assistant" to Richard Perle, then assistant secretary of Defense for International Security Policy.

When the Republicans were driven from office in 1992, Feith settled into a comfortable niche as a DC lawyer/lobbyist with the firm Feith and Zell, where he represented the interests of many Israeli firms hot to see the demise of Saddam. After Feith joined the Bush 2 administration, his former law partner, Marc Zell, moved the firm to Tel Aviv.

During the war on Iraq, Feith was given the responsibility`s planning for the occupation of Iraq and its reconstruction. Obviously, Feith spent little of his attention on the troublesome details of the occupation, swallowing the line that Iraqis would welcome their conquistadors. Instead, Feith devoted himself to the lucrative task of awarding many of the Coalition Provisional Authority`s reconstruction contracts. He steered many of the most lucrative deals, often on a no-bid basis, to clients associated with his former law firm, including Diligence, New Bridge Strategies and the Iraqi International Law Group, headed by Salem Chalabi-the nephew of Ahmed Chalabi. No sooner had Salem Chalabi, whose Law Group billed itself as "your professional gateway to the new Iraq," been appointed chief prosecutor in war crime trial of Saddam Hussein than he found himself indicted by an Iraqi prosecutor for involvement in a strange political murder plot. Now Salem Chalabi is on the lam in London.

Feith is one of those Washington creatures who seems to live his political life on the ropes, always saved by the paranoid solidarity of the neo-con claque, which suspects, rightly, that if one of their number topples he may take the rest down with him. Of course, even if Feith is forced to walk the plank at the Pentagon, he will almost certainly make a soft landing in the private sector, embraced by the firms he abetted while in office.

Sometimes even the stupidest motherfucker on the face of the earth can make out like a bandit.

* * *

Even Bush Sr. stood in line to profit handsomely from his son`s war-making. The former president on retainer with the Carlyle Group, the largest privately held defense contractor in the nation. Carlyle is run by Frank Carlucci, who served as the National Security advisor and Secretary of Defense under Ronald Reagan. Carlucci was also Donald Rumsfeld`s college roommate at Princeton.

Bush Sr. serves as a kind of global emissary for Carlyle. The ex-president doesn`t negotiate arms deals; he simply opens the door for them, a kind of high level meet-and-greet. His special area of influence is the Middle East, primarily Saudi Arabia, where the Bush family has extensive business and political ties. According to an account in the Washington Post, Bush Sr. earns at least $100,000 for each speech he makes on Carlyle`s behalf.

One of the Saudi investors lured to Carlyle by Bush was the BinLaden Group, the construction conglomerate owned by the family of Osama bin Laden. According to an investigation by the Wall Street Journal, Bush convinced Shafiq Bin Laden, Osama`s half brother, to sink $2 million of BinLaden Group money into Carlyle`s accounts. In a pr move, the Carlyle group cut its ties to the BinLaden Group in October 2001.

One of Bush Sr.`s top sidekicks, James Baker, is also a key player at Carlyle. Baker joined the weapons firm in 1993, fresh from his stint as Bush`s secretary of state and chief of staff. Packing a briefcase of global contacts, Baker parlayed his connections with heads of state, generals and international tycoons into a bonanza for Carlyle. After Baker joined the company, Carlyle`s revenues more than tripled.

Like Bush Sr., Baker`s main function was to manage Carlyle`s lucrative relationship with Saudi potentates, who had invested tens of millions of dollars in the company. Baker helped secure one of Carlyle`s most lucrative deals: the contract to run the Saudi offset program, a multi-billion dollar scheme wherein international companies winning Saudi contracts are required under terms of the contracts to invest a percentage of the profits in Saudi companies.

Baker not only greases the way for investment deals and arms sales, but he also plays the role of seasoned troubleshooter, protecting the interests of key clients and regimes. A case in point: when the Justice Department launched an investigation into the financial dealings of Prince Sultan bin Abdul Aziz, the Saudi prince sought out Baker`s help. Baker is currently defending the prince in a law suit brought by the families of the victims of the 9/11 attacks that he used Islamic charities as a pass-through for sending millions of dollars to al-Qaeda linked operations.

Baker and Carlyle enjoy another ace in the hole when it comes to looking out for their Saudi friends. Baker prevailed on Bush Jr. to appoint his former law partner, Bob Jordan, as the administration`s ambassador to Saudi Arabia.

Carlyle and its network of investors is well-positioned to cash in on Bush Jr.`s expansion of the defense and Homeland Security department budgets. Two Carlyle companies, Federal Data Systems and US Investigations Services, hold multi-billion dollar contracts to provide background checks for commercial airlines, the Pentagon, the CIA and the Department of Homeland Security. USIS was once a federal agency called the Office Federal Investigations, but it was privatized in 1996 at the urging of Baker and others and was soon gobbled up by Carlyle. The company is now housed in "high-security, state-of-the-art, underground complex" in Annandale, Pennsylvania. USIS now does 2.4 million background checks a year, largely for the federal government.

* * *

Thanks to Paul O`Neill, Bush`s former treasury secretary, we now know what we`d suspected all along: that the Iraq war was plotted long before al-Qaeda struck New York and Washington. Bush himself is depicted as entering office seething with vindictive rage like a character in a Jacobean revenge play. After all, he believed that Saddam had tried to kill his daddy in a bungled bomb plot during Bush Sr.`s triumphal entry into Kuwait City in 1993. Here we have one of the colorful features of the new dynastic politics of America: familial retribution as foreign policy.

O`Neill`s version is backed up by Richard Clarke, the former NSC terrorism staffer. Clarke charges that Iraq was an idée fixe with the Bush team since their entry into Washington. In his book, Clarke describes a meeting with the president a few days after the 9/11 attacks when it was clear to nearly everyone that they had been orchestrated by Bin Laden. Bush needled Clarke about finding a link to Saddam. Clarke said there was none. But his answer seemed to bounce off Bush`s brain like a handball off the back wall.

A few months later the invasion on Iraq seemed set in stone. "Fuck Saddam," Bush fumed at a meeting of the National Security Council in March of 2002. "We`re taking him out." Call it a case of pre-meditated pre-emption.

The game plan for deposing Saddam, seizing his oil fields and installing a puppet regime headed by a compliant thug such as Ahmed Chalabi or, as it turned out, the CIA favorite Ahmed Allawi, was drafted and tweaked by the National Security Council within weeks of taking office. Cheney`s shadowy energy task force even produced maps allocating Iraqi reserves to different oil companies. Of course, they didn`t offer an exit strategy. Perhaps, they didn`t plan on leaving?

On the remote chance that impeachment charges are ever leveled against this coven of pre-emptive warriors, Bush may have a minor case for plausible deniability here. According to O`Neill, the president drifts off during the excruciating tedium of these sessions. Bush only perks up during cabinet meetings when Condi Rice strolls into the room, whereupon he cleaves to each sanguinary phrase, nodding excitedly like his very own bobblehead doll.

Not that Bush seems to care all that much about the veracity of his briefings, but Rice`s information is not always noted for its reliability. For example, Rice, who got her start in politics working on the 1988 presidential campaign of Gary Hart, persisted for months in pushing the the preposterous notion that Iran was working with Pakistan to inflame anti-American sentiments across Southwest Asia. Of course, the rulers of Iran are Shiites and the elites of Pakistan are Sunni Muslim and, thus, as bitter rivals as Iran and Iraq-that is, until, the Bush administration succeeded in congealing their desperation and rage.

Tomorrow: Jesus Told Me Where to Bomb


Jeffrey St. Clair is the author of Been Brown So Long It Looked Like Green to Me: the Politics of Nature and, with Alexander Cockburn, Dime`s Worth of Difference: Beyond the Lesser of Two Evils.

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This article can be found on the web at
http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i=20040920&s=carroll
The Bush Crusade

by JAMES CARROLL

[from the September 20, 2004 issue]

At the turn of the millennium, the world was braced for terrible things. Most "rational" worries were tied to an anticipated computer glitch, the Y2K problem, and even the most scientifically oriented of people seemed temporarily at the mercy of powerful mythic forces. Imagined hobgoblins leapt from hard drives directly into nightmares. Airlines canceled flights scheduled for the first day of the new year, citing fears that the computers for the traffic-control system would not work. The calendar as such had not previously been a source of dread, but all at once, time itself held a new danger. As the year 2000 approached, I bought bottled water and extra cans of tuna fish. I even withdrew a large amount of cash from the bank. Friends mocked me, then admitted to having done similar things. There were no dances-of-death or outbreaks of flagellant cults, but a millennial fever worthy of medieval superstition infected the most secular of cultures. Of course, the mystical date came and went, the computers did fine, airplanes flew and the world went back to normal.

Then came September 11, 2001, the millennial catastrophe--just a little late. Airplanes fell from the sky, thousands died and an entirely new kind of horror gripped the human imagination. Time, too, played its role, but time as warped by television, which created a global simultaneity, turning the whole human race into a witness, as the awful events were endlessly replayed, as if those bodies leaping from the Twin Towers would never hit the ground. Nightmare in broad daylight. New York`s World Trade Center collapsed not just onto the surrounding streets but into the hearts of every person with access to CNN. Hundreds of millions of people instinctively reached out to those they loved, grateful to be alive. Death had shown itself in a new way. But if a vast throng experienced the terrible events of 9/11 as one, only one man, the President of the United States, bore a unique responsibility for finding a way to respond to them.

George W. Bush plumbed the deepest place in himself, looking for a simple expression of what the assaults of September 11 required. It was his role to lead the nation, and the very world. The President, at a moment of crisis, defines the communal response. A few days after the assault, George W. Bush did this. Speaking spontaneously, without the aid of advisers or speechwriters, he put a word on the new American purpose that both shaped it and gave it meaning. "This crusade," he said, "this war on terrorism."

Crusade. I remember a momentary feeling of vertigo at the President`s use of that word, the outrageous ineptitude of it. The vertigo lifted, and what I felt then was fear, sensing not ineptitude but exactitude. My thoughts went to the elusive Osama bin Laden, how pleased he must have been, Bush already reading from his script. I am a Roman Catholic with a feeling for history, and strong regrets, therefore, over what went wrong in my own tradition once the Crusades were launched. Contrary to schoolboy romances, Hollywood fantasies and the nostalgia of royalty, the Crusades were a set of world-historic crimes. I hear the word with a third ear, alert to its dangers, and I see through its legends to its warnings. For example, in Iraq "insurgents" have lately shocked the world by decapitating hostages, turning the most taboo of acts into a military tactic. But a thousand years ago, Latin crusaders used the severed heads of Muslim fighters as missiles, catapulting them over the fortified walls of cities under siege. Taboos fall in total war, whether crusade or jihad.

For George W. Bush, crusade was an offhand reference. But all the more powerfully for that, it was an accidental probing of unintended but nevertheless real meaning. That the President used the word inadvertently suggests how it expressed his exact truth, an unmasking of his most deeply felt purpose. Crusade, he said. Later, his embarrassed aides suggested that he had meant to use the word only as a synonym for struggle, but Bush`s own syntax belied that. He defined crusade as war. Even offhandedly, he had said exactly what he meant.

Osama bin Laden was already understood to be trying to spark a "clash of civilizations" that would set the West against the whole House of Islam. After 9/11, agitated voices on all sides insisted that no such clash was inevitable. But crusade was a match for jihad, and such words threatened nothing less than apocalyptic conflict between irreconcilable cultures. Indeed, the President`s reference flashed through the Arab news media. Its resonance went deeper, even, than the embarrassed aides expected--and not only among Muslims. After all, the word refers to a long series of military campaigns, which, taken together, were the defining event in the shaping of what we call Western civilization. A coherent set of political, economic, social and even mythological traditions of the Eurasian continent, from the British Isles to the far side of Arabia, grew out of the transformations wrought by the Crusades. And it is far from incidental still, both that those campaigns were conducted by Christians against Muslims, and that they, too, were attached to the irrationalities of millennial fever.

If the American President was the person carrying the main burden of shaping a response to the catastrophe of September 11, his predecessor in such a grave role, nearly a thousand years earlier, was the Catholic pope. Seeking to overcome the century-long dislocations of a postmillennial Christendom, he rallied both its leaders and commoners with a rousing call to holy war. Muslims were the infidel people who had taken the Holy Land hundreds of years before. Now, that occupation was defined as an intolerable blasphemy. The Holy Land must be redeemed. Within months of the pope`s call, 100,000 people had "taken the cross" to reclaim the Holy Land for Christ. As a proportion of the population of Europe, a comparable movement today would involve more than a million people, dropping everything to go to war.

In the name of Jesus, and certain of God`s blessing, crusaders launched what might be called "shock and awe" attacks everywhere they went. In Jerusalem they savagely slaughtered Muslims and Jews alike--practically the whole city. Eventually, Latin crusaders would turn on Eastern Christians, and then on Christian heretics, as blood lust outran the initial "holy" impulse. That trail of violence scars the earth and human memory even to this day--especially in the places where the crusaders wreaked their havoc. And the mental map of the Crusades, with Jerusalem at the center of the earth, still defines world politics. But the main point, in relation to Bush`s instinctive response to 9/11, is that those religious invasions and wars of long ago established a cohesive Western identity precisely in opposition to Islam, an opposition that survives to this day.

With the Crusades, the violent theology of the killer God came into its own. To save the world, in this understanding, God willed the violent death of God`s only beloved son. Here is the relevance of that mental map, for the crusaders were going to war to rescue the site of the salvific death of Jesus, and they displayed their devotion to the cross on which Jesus died by wearing it on their breasts. When Bush`s remark was translated into Arabic for broadcast throughout the Middle East, the word "crusade" was rendered as "war of the cross."

Before the Crusades, Christian theology had given central emphasis to the resurrection of Jesus, and to the idea of incarnation itself, but with the war of the cross, the bloody crucifixion began to dominate the Latin Christian imagination. A theology narrowly focused on the brutal death of Jesus reinforced the primitive notion that violence can be a sacred act. The cult of martyrdom, even to the point of suicidal valor, was institutionalized in the Crusades, and it is not incidental to the events of 9/11 that a culture of sacred self-destruction took equally firm hold among Muslims. The suicide-murderers of the World Trade Center, like the suicide-bombers from the West Bank and Gaza, exploit a perverse link between the willingness to die for a cause and the willingness to kill for it. Crusaders, thinking of heaven, honored that link too.

Here is the deeper significance of Bush`s inadvertent reference to the Crusades: Instead of being a last recourse or a necessary evil, violence was established then as the perfectly appropriate, even chivalrous, first response to what is wrong in the world. George W. Bush is a Christian for whom this particular theology lives. While he identified Jesus as his favorite "political philosopher" when running for President in 2000, the Jesus of this evangelical President is not the "turn the other cheek" one. Bush`s savior is the Jesus whose cross is wielded as a sword. George W. Bush, having cheerfully accepted responsibility for the executions of 152 death-row inmates in Texas, had already shown himself to be entirely at home with divinely sanctioned violence. After 9/11, no wonder it defined his deepest urge.

But sacred violence, once unleashed in 1096, as in 2001, had a momentum of its own. The urgent purpose of war against the "enemy outside"--what some today call the "clash of civilizations"--led quickly to the discovery of an "enemy inside." The crusaders, en route from northwestern Europe to attack the infidel far away, first fell upon, as they said, "the infidel near at hand"--Jews. For the first time in Europe, large numbers of Jews were murdered for being Jews. A crucifixion-obsessed theology saw God as willing the death of Jesus, but in the bifurcated evangelical imagination, Jews could be blamed for it, and the offense the crusaders took was mortal.

The same dynamic--war against an enemy outside leading to war against an enemy inside--can be seen at work today. It is a more complex dynamic now, with immigrant Muslims and people of Arabic descent coming under heavy pressure in the West. In Europe, Muslims are routinely demonized. In America, they are "profiled," even to the point of being deprived of basic rights. But at the same time, once again, Jews are targeted. The broad resurgence of anti-Semitism, and the tendency to scapegoat Israel as the primary source of the new discord, reflect an old tidal pull. This is true notwithstanding the harsh fact that Ariel Sharon`s government took up the Bush "dead or alive" credo with enthusiasm and used the "war on terrorism" to fuel self-defeating overreactions to Palestinian provocations. But some of Israel`s critics fall into the old pattern of measuring Jews against standards to which no one else is held, not even our President. That the war on terrorism is the context within which violence in Israel and Jerusalem has intensified should be no surprise. It wasn`t "Israel" then, but conflict over Jerusalem played exactly such a flashpoint role a thousand years ago.

The Crusades proved to have other destructive dynamics as well. The medieval war against Islam, having also targeted Europe`s Jews, soon enough became a war against all forms of cultural and religious dissent, a war against heresy. As it hadn`t been in hundreds of years, doctrine now became rigidly defined in the Latin West, and those who did not affirm dominant interpretations--Cathars, Albigensians, Eastern Orthodox--were attacked. Doctrinal uniformity, too, could be enforced with sacred violence. When the US Attorney General defines criticism of the Administration in wartime as treason, or when Congress enacts legislation that justifies the erosion of civil liberties with appeals to patriotism, they are enacting a Crusades script.

All of this is implicit in the word that President Bush first used, which came to him as naturally as a baseball reference, to define the war on terrorism. That such a dark, seething religious history of sacred violence remains largely unspoken in our world does not defuse it as an explosive force in the human unconscious. In the world of Islam, of course, its meaning could not be more explicit, or closer to consciousness. The full historical and cultural significance of "crusade" is instantly obvious, which is why a howl of protest from the Middle East drove Bush into instant verbal retreat. Yet the very inadvertence of his use of the word is the revelation: Americans do not know what fire they are playing with. Osama bin Laden, however, knows all too well, and in his periodic pronouncements, he uses the word "crusade" to this day, as a flamethrower.

Religious war is the danger here, and it is a graver one than Americans think. Despite our much-vaunted separation of church and state, America has always had a quasi-religious understanding of itself, reflected in the messianism of Puritan founder John Winthrop, the Deist optimism of Thomas Jefferson, the embrace of redemptive suffering that marked Abraham Lincoln and, for that matter, the conviction of Eisenhower`s Secretary of State, John Foster Dulles, that Communism had to be opposed on a global scale if only because of its atheism. But never before has America been brought deeper into a dynamite-wired holy of holies than in our President`s war on terrorism. Despite the post-Iraq toning down of Washington`s rhetoric of empire, and the rejection of further crusader references--although Secretary of State Colin Powell used the word this past March--Bush`s war openly remains a cosmic battle between nothing less than the transcendent forces of good and evil. Such a battle is necessarily unlimited and open-ended, and so justifies radical actions--the abandonment, for example, of established notions of civic justice at home and of traditional alliances abroad.

A cosmic moral-religious battle justifies, equally, risks of world-historic proportioned disaster, since the ultimate outcome of such a conflict is to be measured not by actual consequences on this earth but by the earth-transcending will of God. Our war on terrorism, before it is anything else, is thus an imagined conflict, taking place primarily in a mythic realm beyond history.

In waging such a "war," the enemy is to be engaged everywhere and nowhere, not just because the actual nihilists who threaten the social order are faceless and deracinated but because each fanatical suicide-bomber is only an instance of the transcendent enemy--and so the other face of us. Each terrorist is, in effect, a sacrament of the larger reality, which is "terrorism." Instead of perceiving unconnected centers of inhuman violence--tribal warlords, Mafia chieftains, nationalist fighters, xenophobic Luddites--President Bush projects the grandest and most interlocking strategies of conspiracy, belief and organization. By the canonization of the war on terrorism, petty nihilists are elevated to the status of world-historic warriors, exactly the fate they might have wished for. This is why the conflict readily bleeds from one locus to another--Afghanistan then, Iraq now, Iran or some other land of evil soon--and why, for that matter, the targeted enemies are entirely interchangeable--here Osama bin Laden, there Saddam Hussein, here the leader of Iran, there of North Korea. They are all essentially one enemy--one "axis"--despite their differences from one another, or even hatred of one another.

Hard-boiled men and women who may not share Bush`s fervent spirituality can nonetheless support his purpose because, undergirding the new ideology, there is an authentic global crisis that requires an urgent response. New technologies are now making it possible for small groups of nihilists, or even single individuals, to wreak havoc on a scale unprecedented in history. This is the ultimate "asymmetric threat." The attacks of 9/11, amplified by the murderous echo of the anthrax mailer, the as-yet-unapprehended psychopath who sent deadly letters to journalists and government officials in the weeks after 9/11, put that new condition on display for all the world to see. Innovations in physics, biology, chemistry and information technology--and soon, possibly, in nanotechnology and genetic engineering--have had the unforeseen effect of threatening to put in a few hands the destructive power that, in former times, could be exercised only by sizable armies. This is the real condition to which the Bush Administration is responding. The problem is actual, if not yet fully present.

So, to put the best face on the Bush agenda (leaving aside questions of oil, global market control and economic or military hegemony), a humane project of antiproliferation can be seen at its core. Yet a nation that was trying to promote the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, especially nuclear weapons, would behave precisely as the Bush Administration has behaved over the past three years. The Pentagon`s chest-thumping concept of "full spectrum dominance" itself motivates other nations to seek sources of countervailing power, and when the United States actually goes to war to impose its widely disputed notion of order on some states, but not others, nations--friendly as well as unfriendly--find themselves with an urgent reason to acquire some means of deterring such intervention.

The odd and tragic thing is that the world before Bush was actually nearing consensus on how to manage the problem of the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, and had begun to put in place promising structures designed to prevent such spread. Centrally embodied in the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty of 1968, which had successfully and amazingly kept the number of nuclear powers, actual as well as admitted, relatively low, that consensus gave primacy to treaty obligations, international cooperation and a serious commitment by existing nuclear powers to move toward ultimate nuclear abolition. All of that has been trashed by Bush. "International law?" he smirked in December 2003. "I better call my lawyer."

Now indications are that nations all over the globe--Japan, Saudi Arabia, Argentina, Brazil, Australia--have begun re-evaluating their rejections of nukes, and some are positively rushing to acquire them. Iran and North Korea are likely to be only the tip of this radioactive iceberg. Nuclear-armed Pakistan and India are a grim forecast of the future on every continent. And the Bush Administration--by declaring its own nuclear arsenal permanent, by threatening nuclear first-strikes against other nations, by "warehousing" treaty-defused warheads instead of destroying them, by developing a new line of "usable" nukes, by moving to weaponize the "high frontier" of outer space, by doing little to help Russia get rid of its rotting nuclear stockpile, by embracing "preventive war"--is enabling this trend instead of discouraging it. How can this be?

The problem has its roots in a long-term American forgetfulness, going back to the acid fog in which the United States ended World War II. There was never a complete moral reckoning with the harsh momentum of that conflict`s denouement--how American leaders embraced a strategy of terror bombing, slaughtering whole urban populations, and how, finally, they ushered in the atomic age with the attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Scholars have debated those questions, but politicians have avoided them, and most citizens have pretended they aren`t really questions at all. America`s enduring assumptions about its own moral supremacy, its own altruism, its own exceptionalism, have hardly been punctured by consideration of the possibility that we, too, are capable of grave mistakes, terrible crimes. Such awareness, drawn from a fuller reckoning with days gone by--with August 6 and 9, 1945, above all--would inhibit America`s present claim to moral grandeur, which is simultaneously a claim, of course, to economic and political grandiosity. The indispensable nation must dispense with what went before.

"The past is never dead," William Faulkner said. "It isn`t even past." How Americans remember their country`s use of terror bombing affects how they think of terrorism; how they remember the first use of nuclear weapons has profound relevance for how the United States behaves in relation to nuclear weapons today. If the long American embrace of nuclear "mutual assured destruction" is unexamined; if the Pentagon`s treaty-violating rejection of the ideal of eventual nuclear abolition is unquestioned--then the Bush Administration`s embrace of nukes as normal, usable weapons will not seem offensive.

Memory is a political act. Forgetfulness is the handmaiden of tyranny. The Bush Administration is fully committed to maintaining what the historian Marc Trachtenberg calls our "nuclear amnesia" even as the Administration seeks to impose a unilateral structure of control on the world. As it pursues a world-threatening campaign against other people`s weapons of mass destruction, that is, the Bush Administration refuses to confront the moral meaning of America`s own weapons of mass destruction, not to mention their viral character, as other nations seek smaller versions of the American arsenal, if only to deter Bush`s next "preventive" war. The United States` own arsenal, in other words, remains the primordial cause of the WMD plague.

"Memory," the novelist Paul Auster has written, is "the space in which a thing happens for the second time." No one wants the terrible events that came after the rising of the sun on September 11, 2001, to happen for a second time except in the realm of remembrance, leading to understanding and commitment. But all the ways George Bush exploited those events, betraying the memory of those who died in them, must be lifted up and examined again, so that the outrageousness of his political purpose can be felt in its fullness. Exactly how the war on terrorism unfolded; how it bled into the wars against Afghanistan, then Iraq; how American fears were exacerbated by Administration alarms; how civil rights were undermined, treaties broken, alliances abandoned, coarseness embraced--none of this should be forgotten.

Given how they have been so dramatically unfulfilled, Washington`s initial hubristic impulses toward a new imperial dominance should not be forgotten. That the first purpose of the war--Osama "dead or alive"--changed when Al Qaeda proved elusive should not be forgotten. That the early justification for the war against Iraq--Saddam`s weapons of mass destruction--changed when they proved nonexistent should not be forgotten. That in former times the US government behaved as if facts mattered, as if evidence informed policy, should not be forgotten. That Afghanistan and Iraq are a shambles, with thousands dead and hundreds of thousands at risk from disease, disorder and despair, should not be forgotten. That a now-disdainful world gave itself in unbridled love to America on 9/11 should not be forgotten.

Nor, given Bush`s reference, should the most relevant fact about the Crusades be forgotten--that, on their own terms and notwithstanding the romance of history, they were, in the end, an overwhelming failure. The 1096 campaign, the "First Crusade," finally "succeeded" in 1099, when a remnant army fell upon Jerusalem, slaughtering much of its population. But armies under Saladin reasserted Islamic control in 1187, and subsequent Crusades never succeeded in re-establishing Latin dominance in the Holy Land. The reconquista Crusades reclaimed Spain and Portugal for Christian Europe, but in the process destroyed the glorious Iberian convivencia, a high civilization never to be matched below the Pyrenees again.

Meanwhile, intra-Christian crusades, wars against heresy, only made permanent the East-West split between Latin Catholicism and "schismatic" Eastern Orthodoxy, and made inevitable the eventual break, in the Reformation, between a Protestant north and a Catholic south. The Crusades, one could argue, established basic structures of Western civilization, while undermining the possibility that their grandest ideals would ever be realized.

Will such consequences--new global structures of an American imperium, hollowed-out hopes for a humane and just internationalism--follow in the train of George W. Bush`s crusade? This question will be answered in smaller part by anonymous, ad hoc armies of on-the-ground human beings in foreign lands, many of whom will resist Washington to the death. In larger part, the question will be answered by those privileged to be citizens of the United States. To us falls the ultimate power over the American moral and political agenda. As has never been true of any empire before, because this one is still a democracy, such power belongs to citizens absolutely. If the power is ours, so is the responsibility.

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September 2, 2004
Excerpts From President Bush`s Speech to the Convention
he following are excerpts from President Bush`s remarks to the 2004 Republican National Convention.

"I am running for President with a clear and positive plan to build a safer world, and a more hopeful America. I am running with a compassionate conservative philosophy: that government should help people improve their lives, not try to run their lives. I believe this Nation wants steady, consistent, principled leadership - and that is why, with your help, we will win this election."

To build a more hopeful America, the President will talk about the changing world we live in and the need for government to change with it so it is on the side of children, families and workers today.

"The times in which we live and work are changing dramatically. The workers of our parents` generation typically had one job, one skill, one career - often with one company that provided health care and a pension. And most of those workers were men. Today, workers change jobs, even careers, many times during their lives, and in one of the most dramatic shifts our society has seen, two-thirds of all Moms also work outside the home.

"This changed world can be a time of great opportunity for all Americans to earn a better living, support your family, and have a rewarding career. And government must take your side. Many of our most fundamental systems - the tax code, health coverage, pension plans, worker training - were created for the world of yesterday, not tomorrow. We will transform these systems so that all citizens are equipped, prepared - and thus truly free - to make your own choices and pursue your own dreams."

***

"In all these proposals, we seek to provide not just a government program, but a path - a path to greater opportunity, more freedom, and more control over your own life."

To build a safer world, he`ll talk about his strategy of staying on the offensive against terrorists and the progress we are making in winning the War on Terror in places like Afghanistan and Iraq. He`ll also talk about the power of liberty to transform countries and lives and bring a future of hope and peace. And that is his goal...to build a future where the world is safer and more at peace.

"So we have fought the terrorists across the earth - not for pride, not for power, but because the lives of our citizens are at stake. Our strategy is clear. We have tripled funding for homeland security and trained half a million first responders, because we are determined to protect our homeland. We are transforming our military and reforming and strengthening our intelligence services. We are staying on the offensive - striking terrorists abroad - so we do not have to face them here at home. And we are working to advance liberty in the broader Middle East, because freedom will bring a future of hope, and the peace we all want. And we will prevail."

***

"This moment in the life of our country will be remembered. Generations will know if we kept our faith and kept our word. Generations will know if we seized this moment and used it to build a future of safety and peace. The freedom of many, and the future security of our Nation, now depend on us."

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company

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September 2, 2004
Jobless Figures on Friday Could Emphasize Bush`s Big Weakness
By RICHARD W. STEVENSON

About 10 hours after President Bush accepts his party`s nomination tonight, the government will release an important report on the state of the economy. Even some of his allies say that if it is weak it could dampen Republican enthusiasm coming out of the convention and leave Mr. Bush on the defensive for a pivotal issue heading into the campaign homestretch.

Economists do not expect the employment report tomorrow to show terribly strong growth in jobs.

With economic statistics over the last month suggesting that the recovery has slowed or even faltered, Mr. Bush is heading into the final two months of the campaign vulnerable to any further bad economic news, especially in swing states like Michigan, Ohio and Pennsylvania, where employment losses have hit hard.

So on a day when unions organized a three-mile line of demonstrators waving pink slips to dramatize job losses, Republicans put aside momentarily their emphasize on national security and ushered a group of small-business owners and elected officials on stage last night at the party`s convention to talk up economic progress. Three families spoke about how they benefited from the president`s tax cuts

At a news conference Commerce Secretary Donald L. Evans deflected responsibility for the economy`s difficulties and suggested that Americans would increasingly feel better.

"The president inherited a Clinton recession and turned it into the early stages of Bush prosperity," Mr. Evans said, pinning the blame on Mr. Bush`s predecessor even though the generally accepted starting date for the recession is a month or two after Mr. Bush took office.

Mr. Bush himself is widely expected to devote part of his speech tonight to defend his economic record. But in many ways, the economy has been in the background throughout the proceedings, a distinct No. 2 to the thunderous proclamations about the battle against terrorism and the president`s credentials to be commander in chief. Senator John Kerry`s campaign said Mr. Bush was trying to run away from that record.

"The reason the economy has been conspicuous in its absence at the Republican convention is that the president cannot credibly argue that his policies are working," a strategist for Mr. Kerry, Tad Devine, said. "They have made a decision that they are going to fight this election almost totally on the war on terrorism."

Certainly for the White House, the economy poses a problem and has been overshadowed at the convention by the focus on terrorism.

The White House can hardly afford to ignore the subject. Polls suggest that the economy and employment continue to dominate the public`s agenda.

When asked what will be the most important campaign issue in their states, 32 percent of the respondents said the economy and jobs, followed by 18 percent who said the Iraq war, according to a New York Times/CBS News poll in mid-July. Just 4 percent said terrorism.

While Americans say they trust Mr. Bush to handle the campaign against terrorism, they are far less confident about his ability to manage the economy and create jobs. Even some experts sympathetic to Mr. Bush suggested that the economy was not a subject that the Republicans wanted to dwell on right now.

"Kerry didn`t talk about his Senate career" at the Democratic convention, said Irwin M. Stelzer, director of economic policy studies at the Hudson Institute, a conservative research group. "And the Republicans don`t want to talk about the economy."

Experts say the president cannot appear detached. In swing states, nearly half the voters polled said their communities had lost jobs under Mr. Bush. A CBS News poll taken before the convention found that 17 percent of the voters in those states said the number of jobs in their community had increased in the last four years; 47 percent said the number decreased and 29 percent said there had been no change.

Over all, 37 percent of all voters approve of the way Mr. Bush is handling the economy, according to the poll, while 54 percent disapprove, including 90 percent of Democrats and 57 percent of independents.

Criticism of Mr. Bush`s economic leadership is nothing new. Months after he took office, the public`s approval for his handling of the economy fell below the 50 percent mark. In April 2001, it was 47 percent.

For much of the last year approval of Mr. Bush`s handling of the economy has been at or below 40 percent.

Speaking to reporters at the convention, Republican officials said the economic outlook was improving because of Mr. Bush`s policies. Gov. Bill Owens of Colorado said perception about the economy lagged behind the improving reality. Gov. George E. Pataki of New York said Mr. Bush`s tax cuts had helped the economy and the financial markets.

Even Ohio, hard hit by losing manufacturing jobs, is making solid progress, said its governor, Bob Taft.

Democrats pointed to new figures for employment in swing states to make a case that things were getting worse rather than better.

Columbus, Ohio, where Mr. Bush campaigned yesterday before heading to New York, lost 2,400 jobs in July, the figures showed. Milwaukee, where he is to appear tomorrow, lost 7,000 jobs in July. Mr. Evans said a broad array of economic statistics and anecdotal evidence showed that the economy was healthy and growing stronger.

He said the month-to-month numbers were less important than the trend over the last several years, which he said showed clear improvement.

Mr. Bush has said he will offer a detailed agenda for a second term tonight. His aides said it would include items with economic components, including his call for adding private investment accounts to Social Security. But the president is not expected to advocate steps to bolster the economy in the short term, and his broader call for steps to promote an "ownership society" is not expected to include substantial new initiatives.

As a result, when it comes to the economy, Mr. Bush`s standing with voters over the next two months could be shaped more than anything by the latest statistics, starting with the employment report tomorrow.

"He is going to give a speech, and then something is going to happen to him on Friday morning," Mr. Stelzer of the Hudson Institute said. "At that point, there are two dimensions, what actually happens and the success of both parties in spinning what happens."

Janet Elder contributed reporting for this article.

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company

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The Curse of Black`s Perle
According to the Hollinger report, Conrad Black and Richard Perle richly deserved each other.
By Daniel Gross
Posted Thursday, Sept. 2, 2004, at 1:44 PM PT
http://slate.msn.com/id/2106175/fr/ifr/
The massive report on how newspaper baron Conrad Black and his cronies destroyed Hollinger International is unusually rich and entertaining. Too bad summer is over—it`s practically beach reading! Who knew that Richard Breeden, the former Securities and Exchange Commission head who headed a special investigation of Black`s activities, was such an acid prose stylist? (Sample section heading: "A Corporate Kleptocracy.")
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Some of the most intriguing passages in the report deal with Black`s relationship to Richard Perle, the former Reagan defense official and neocon icon. In a fine Washington Post article last May, David Hilzenrath described Perle`s many misadventures in the private sector, most of which were confined to lobbying. But Perle didn`t want to be a mere influence peddler. He wanted to be a businessman, a venture capitalist, a Big Swinging Dick. He saw his opportunity at Hollinger. That`s because Conrad Black imagined himself to be not merely a peddler of newspapers, but a Metternich in the boardroom. For Lord Black, owning a media company was an excuse to muse over the Treaty of Vienna with board members like Henry Kissinger. Black and Perle were made for each other. Perle got Black`s capital. Black added another trophy to his collection of prize conservative geopolitical thinkers.

As Hilzenrath noted, the two met at (natch!) the Bilderberg Conference. Perle joined the Hollinger board in 1994 and quickly became part of Black`s inner circle, serving on the company`s executive committee. In the late 1990s, as the section of the report beginning on Page 339 shows, Perle got it into his head that Hollinger should form a unit to invest in Internet companies. And who better to run it than a former assistant secretary of defense? Never mind that Perle knew as much about the prospects of Trip.com as Amazon.com CEO Jeffrey Bezos knew about throw weights. Perle was named chairman and chief executive officer of the new unit, Hollinger Digital. Still it was clear who was boss. "According to Perle, Black was the ultimate decision maker on investments," the report notes. What`s more, Perle "lacked the authority to commit Digital`s capital without Black`s approval."

But alas, the Black-Perle marriage soured. Hollinger Digital, which got started in the late 1990s, was a disaster. "Of the forty-five investments the Digital executives made, only five have resulted in gains," according to the report. By the end of 2003, the fund had lost $68 million on investments of $203 million, "yielding a total return of -33%."

Unchastened by the losses, Perle started his own private equity firm, Trireme Partners, which he founded in 2001 along with Gerald Hillman, a fellow member of the Pentagon`s Defense Policy Board. Perle tried to hit up Hollinger for a $25 million commitment, with $2.5 million up front. Black resisted, in part because Black, a world-class chiseler himself, felt he was getting chiseled by Perle. On Feb. 1, 2002, Black wrote a memo questioning Perle`s habit of submitting personal bills for reimbursement: "I have been consulted about your American Express account which has been sent to us for settlement. It varies from $1,000 to $6,000 per month and there is no substantiation of any of the items which include a great many restaurants, groceries and other matters."

In late 2002 and early 2003, negotiations between Black and Perle grew heated. Ultimately, Black seems to have concluded that $2.5 million was a small price to pay to get rid of Perle. In a Dec. 28, 2002, e-mail, he told colleagues the Trireme investment was, in the report`s words, "a means to remove Perle from Digital`s payroll."

And while the report documents how Black spent company cash on himself, he resented it when Perle did the same. The report, again: Black "told [Hollinger executive Peter] Atkinson in an e-mail dated [Dec. 29, 2002] that he was `well aware of what a trimmer and a sharper Richard is at times.` " Black wrote about Trireme. "As I suspected, there is a good deal of nest-feathering being conducted by Richard which I don`t object to other than that there was some attempt to disguise it behind a good deal of dissembling and obfuscation." (In Black`s book, it was OK to feather your nest but not OK to lie about it.)

Black admired—in a grudging way—how Perle worked on him. Black explained in a Jan. 7, 2003, e-mail to a colleague: "I have been exposed to Richard`s full repertoire of histrionics, cajolery, and utilization of fine print. He hasn`t been disingenuous exactly, but I understand how he finessed the Russians out of deployed missiles in exchange for non-eventual-deployment of half the number of missiles of unproven design." After discussing compensation with Perle, he wrote: "My feeling is that we are finally dealing with Richard Perle of Reykjavik and the Zero Option, who realizes that mental agility must be applied to bringing us into the coalition and not straight-arming us like a bunch of NATO-ninny psuedo-allies."

In the end, Hollinger did invest $2.5 million in February 2003 in Trireme Partners. True to its name, Perle`s venture firm has set about to try to ream its partners. According to the Breeden report, Hollinger`s $2.5 million investment in the fund is worth only $1.5 million—a loss of 40 percent in one year.

The report will no doubt prove embarrassing for Perle.

The section from Pages 482-492 is devoted to his exceptional shortcomings as a director. "It is, of course, possible for a conflicted board member to act at least somewhat responsibly," Breeden writes. "As a conflicted Executive Committee member, however, Perle did not. Rather, his Executive Committee performance falls squarely into the `head-in-the-sand` behavior that breaches a director`s duty of good faith and renders him liable for damages under Delaware law." (The investigative committee was stunned when Perle admitted that he frequently didn`t bother to read documents that he signed.) And because Perle routinely placed his own interests ahead of those of Hollinger`s public shareholders, the committee concluded, he shouldn`t be allowed "to retain any of his Hollinger compensation, including his Digital Incentive Plan bonuses, salary and directors` fees. The Special Committee intends to pursue a recovery from Perle, either consensually or through litigation."

Back when he was threatening to sue Seymour Hersh for libel, Perle must have come into contact with some good lawyers. He may need them.
Daniel Gross (www.danielgross.net) writes Slate`s "Moneybox" column. You can e-mail him at [e-mail].

Article URL: http://slate.msn.com/id/2106175/

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September 3, 2004
NEWS ANALYSIS
Bold Strokes, Few Details
By TODD S. PURDUM

For a nation divided over his stewardship, distressed about the economy and dubious about the war with Iraq, President Bush had one overriding message last night: He`s still the one.

Still the caring "compassionate conservative" voters met and liked four years ago, still the strong steward who has led them through tumultuous times of terrorism and war, still the man they can trust to face the problems of a second term - abroad, and at home.

But he offered few critical details of the second-term domestic agenda he outlined. His big policy ideas - restraining government spending, simplifying the tax code, offering tax credits for health savings accounts, allowing personal investment accounts for Social Security - were vague. And the specific proposals he cited - increasing money for community colleges, opening rural health centers - were mostly small.

Mr. Bush spoke confidently but saved his passion for national security issues, and sounded a tone of defiance at critics of his decision to invade Iraq, telling the roaring, flag-waving delegates that when faced with foreign threats, "I will defend America every time.``

And while he conceded in unusually personal terms that "some folks look at me and see a certain swagger, which in Texas is called `walking,` " and that "now and then I come across as a little too blunt," he suggested that those traits were bred in the bone and unlikely to change at 58. "For that," the president said, referring to his mother, Barbara, "we can all thank the white-haired lady sitting right up there."

The two-term limit makes second presidential terms notoriously disappointing, and big things difficult to achieve. Mr. Bush`s four years already have had enough excitement for eight. His old rival and now-fervent backer, Senator John McCain, said in an interview this week that like all his predecessors, Mr. Bush knows that his "legacy revolves as always around national security policy, the war on terror, but it also revolves around some need for major reform in some domestic areas."

Mr. Bush devoted the first half of his speech to domestic policy. But his biggest ideas were not really new, and he left the daunting details of the agenda items Mr. McCain outlined in the interview - a comprehensive overhaul of Social Security and Medicare, a reining in federal spending, a reshaping of immigration law - almost entirely unaddressed. The major items he did mention face significant opposition in Congress, and many would cost far more than his own party seems likely to be willing to spend.

Four years ago in Philadelphia, Mr. Bush criticized eight years of Democratic rule with the refrain: "They had their chance. They have not led. We will." No one - not even the two protesters who sneaked into Madison Square Garden to interrupt his speech - can dispute that he has, first by steamrolling big tax cuts through a compliant Congress, then toppling the Taliban and winning support for the controversial war with Iraq.

But Mr. Bush`s promise then to "extend the promise of prosperity to every forgotten corner of this country" remains unmet, slow job growth makes his assertion last night that "we have seen a shaken economy rise to its feet" debatable, and the war is enmeshed in what even he recently acknowledged as a "miscalculation of what the conditions would be." The overriding question for an electorate that remains as polarized as the one that failed to give him a popular victory in 2000 is where Mr. Bush wants lead the nation next, and how he intends to get there.

"You don`t want to have a battle over the status quo," said Matthew Dowd, his chief campaign strategist. "You want to talk about what are your policies, what are your plans?"

The Republicans have faulted John Kerry as failing to outline a more detailed idea of what he would do as president, and indeed he left the Democratic convention in Boston last month without explaining the meaning of his 19-year service in the Senate, or laying out much in the way of a future agenda, beyond promising not to be Mr. Bush.

Mr. Bush pledged to keep right on being himself, fighting "the terrorists across the earth - not for pride, not for power, but because the lives of our citizens are at stake." But Mr. Bush`s own stated rationale for deposing Saddam Hussein has shifted repeatedly, the unconventional weapons that he said threatened the world have not been found, and his opponents contend that his actions have inflamed Muslim extremists and put Americans at greater risk.

Even his father`s former national security adviser, Brent Scowcroft, who warned two years ago against rushing to war with Iraq, said in an interview published in The New York Observer this week that Mr. Bush may have overreacted to the threat posed by Al Qaeda and that the administration`s preoccupation with terrorism meant "we are maybe not paying enough attention to other problems in the world that have nothing to do with terrorism but are really significant."

Mr. Bush conceded no such error last night, instead repeating a version of a refrain he uses often: "Do I forget the lessons of Sept. 11 and take the word of a madman, or do I take action to defend our country? Faced with that choice, I will defend America every time."

In all, it was a remarkable moment for a man whose political career began just 10 years ago with his election as governor of Texas, who won the White House by just five electoral votes (and a single vote on the Supreme Court), and who now stands as one of the most decisive, unyielding presidents of modern times. Mr. Bush is hoping that his core voters will turn out in large numbers, and that even those undecided voters who may be uneasy about some of his decisions will respect his resolve.

Bill Clinton warned his fellow Democrats two years ago that "when people are insecure, they`d rather have somebody who`s strong and wrong than somebody who`s weak and right." That is why Mr. Kerry spent so much time in his convention last month attesting to his combat service in Vietnam.

Mr. Bush had a different challenge.

Voters take his strength for granted, as he acknowledged last night by saying: "In the last four years, you and I have come to know each other. Even when we don`t agree, at least you know what I believe and where I stand." But polls show Americans have doubts about Mr. Bush`s stubbornness, his truthfulness (only about one in five Americans now think he is telling the entire truth when he talks about Iraq), and even the likeability that helped him so much last time. So one of his tasks was to show that for all the vicissitudes of war, the intelligence failures that failed to stop Al Qaeda`s attacks and started American troops on the road to Baghdad, he remains the plain-spoken man they met four years ago.

He spoke of the pain of ordering troops into battle, "even when it is right," and of holding "children of the fallen, who were told their dad or mom is a hero, but would rather just have their dad or mom."

And he concluded: "One thing I`ve learned about the presidency is that whatever shortcomings you have, people are going to notice them and whatever strengths you have, you`re going to need them."

So the nation has. So Mr. Bush will.

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September 3, 2004
Mr. Bush`s Acceptance Speech

When President Bush accepted his party`s nomination last night, he energetically presented himself as the man who could keep America safe in a time of international terrorism. His handlers believe that is the key to his re-election. But if Mr. Bush intends to have a second term, he needs to do something more - particularly if he hopes to win by more than 500 votes this time. The president needs to speak to the large number of moderate voters who feel that things have been going in the wrong direction over the last four years, and convince them that he has the capacity to learn from mistakes and do better. On that count, his acceptance speech fell short.

Despite the enormous changes the United States has undergone since the last election, from terror attacks to recession, Mr. Bush has been sticking resolutely to the priorities he brought into the office in 2001. He won his tax cuts and his education initiative. American foreign policy managed to wind up focused on the same country on which Mr. Bush and his advisers had fixated from the beginning.

Each of those policies has cost the nation dearly: the tax cuts have exploded the budget deficit, Mr. Bush has failed to finance his education programs adequately, and the war in Iraq has been fumbled from the day Baghdad fell. Nobody expected the president to admit that any of his initiatives had turned out to be less than smashing successes, but wavering voters might have been buoyed by at least a hint that the administration realizes that the course needs adjustment.

Instead, the president presented troubled, half-finished initiatives like his prescription drug plan as fully completed tasks, just as he presented the dangerous and chaotic situation in Iraq as a picture of triumphant foreign policy on a par with the Marshall Plan. He tossed out a combination of extremely vague concepts - like creating an ownership society - along with small-bore ideas like additional college scholarships. The combination of minor thoughts and squishy generalities was typical of John Kerry`s convention speech as well. But Mr. Bush`s contribution doesn`t raise many hopes for the level of campaign discussion to come.

The president, who dropped his laudable attempt to begin desperately needed immigration reform as soon as he ran into political resistance, gave the idea not a mention last night. There was no hint that he realizes his "uniter, not a divider" vow ran aground on the administration`s insistence on right-wing judicial nominees and inflexibility on social issues like stem cell research.

There was nothing in the speech last night that suggested a new era of frankness from the White House, or hope that any of those fundamental problems would be approached with anything but the "my way or the highway" attitude Mr. Bush has used on issues like tax cuts and Iraq.

If Mr. Bush is rigid in his policies, he is remarkably flexible in marketing them. Once again, the Republican convention has led with its left, with a parade of prime-time speakers from what might be called the far moderate side of the party. Aside from a bizarre and nasty assault on Mr. Kerry by Senator Zell Miller, a registered Democrat, the tough talk was left mainly to the vice president.

It was depressing to hear Dick Cheney, who spoke on Wednesday night, repeat his crowd-pleasing snipe against Senator Kerry for calling for "a more sensitive war on terror." It was a phony criticism, given that Mr. Bush has used almost identical language in the past. But, worse, it signaled that Mr. Cheney and the administration`s other hit men will spend the next two months trying to sell their failed approach to foreign policy, and encouraging Americans to believe that anyone who acknowledges that the United States needs to take a more patient and humble approach to the world is in league with the girlie men.

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INSURGENTS
Militia Leaders Charging Betrayal by Iraqi Premier
By DEXTER FILKINS

BAGHDAD, Iraq, Sept. 2 - Leaders of the insurgent Mahdi Army declared Thursday that they had been betrayed by Prime Minister Ayad Allawi, who has been trying to lure away the militia`s supporters with millions of dollars in aid.

Yusef al-Nasiri, a senior leader of the group, said efforts to renew peace negotiations failed again on Thursday. Mr. Nasiri accused Dr. Allawi of deliberately stalling, as he tries to isolate the Mahdi Army and block its efforts to disarm and enter democratic politics.

Mr. Nasiri raised the prospect of renewed fighting with American forces, of the kind that has repeatedly engulfed Sadr City, the huge Baghdad slum that forms the main base of the Mahdi Army`s support.

Negotiations to disarm the militia, which is led by the rebel cleric Moktada al-Sadr, began last week, after the withdrawal of the Mahdi Army from the holy city of Najaf, but they broke down this week.

"The Iraqi government is not serious, they have ignored our efforts, and now the Americans are driving around Sadr City with their tanks, insulting people and acting aggressively," Mr. Nasiri said. "Nobody can guess what is going to happen next."

His frustration stems not just from the failure to revive the peace talks, but also from the aggressive efforts by Dr. Allawi to persuade some of the Mahdi Army`s key backers to break with the rebel group and fall in behind the government.

On Tuesday, the same day that Dr. Allawi abruptly canceled a peace deal struck with the Mahdi Army, he met with a group of more than 300 prominent leaders from Sadr City and asked them to withdrawal their support from the militia. As an inducement, he offered some $300 million in reconstruction projects for the neighborhood.

The meeting ended inconclusively, according to tribal sheiks who were there, but the prospect of millions of dollars in aid set off excited discussions throughout the area. Sadr City, a vast and impoverished area of Baghdad, has as many as three million people.

The strategy employed by Dr. Allawi toward the Mahdi Army, which is Shiite, mirrors one he is using on the Sunni-driven insurgency north and west of Baghdad. In those areas, he is trying to coax members of Saddam Hussein`s Baath Party into the political mainstream, while he tries to isolate and crush hard-core Islamic fundamentalists, considering them irredeemable.

So far, the strategy in the Sunni areas has failed. Several former Baathist leaders who tried to reach accommodations with Dr. Allawi`s government have been killed, and the Islamic fundamentalists, in places like Falluja and Ramadi, have tightened their grip.

With the Mahdi Army, Dr. Allawi is hoping that Sadr City`s tribal leaders harbor little enthusiasm for Mr. Sadr and that they support him mostly because they have no alternative.

But Dr. Allawi is pursuing a risky course: he could incite the Mahdi Army or set off internecine strife among the Shiites in Baghdad.

Some of the tribal sheiks of Sadr City said they were concerned that Dr. Allawi might have abandoned his efforts to disarm the Mahdi Army and to bring it into democratic politics; it appears he wants to crush the group by force, they said.

"We want to follow the prime minister, but this is a mistake," said Sheik Shaker al-Saady, a tribal leader in Sadr City. "We were all happy to hear Moktada say he plans to enter politics and declare a cease-fire. It made the people happy."

"Now, if the prime minister wants to divide the tribal leaders from other residents, it could create two conflicts involving the militia: one with the Americans and another with the tribal leaders," Mr. Saady said. "The prime minister needs to make a political settlement."

Another tribal leader, Qarim al-Bikhaty, said Dr. Allawi could reach a political settlement that included the disarming of the Mahdi Army if he would agree to get the Americans out of Sadr City. That, he said, was the source of all the problems there.

"The people hate them," Mr. Bikhaty said of the American soldiers. "The Iraqi government must tell the Americans to stay out of the city."

In northern Iraq, militants bombed the oil pipeline to Turkey on Thursday, Reuters reported, halting exports.

In Falluja, American officers said they conducted an airstrike Wednesday night against what they believed was a safe house used by the network of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the Jordanian militant suspected of carrying out several car bombings and kidnappings. The strike killed 17 people and wounded more than 13, according to Qasim Muhammad Abdul-Satar, a member a council of militants that controls the city.

Reuters quoted doctors in the city saying the dead included three children and one woman. There was no way to verify any of the claims.

The Americans said they staged the strike after they observed men killing a captive and burying a body. "The Zarqawi associates were observed removing a man from the trunk of a car, executing him, then burying the body," read a statement released by the American military.

The Americans said they had verified their intelligence on the strike from "multiple sources."

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September 1, 2004
Q&A: Bush Foreign Policy

From the Council on Foreign Relations, September 1, 2004

Melvyn P. Leffler, a leading historian on American diplomacy, says that the overall foreign-policy goals of the Bush administration are "compatible" with those of past presidencies, but that the widespread criticism levied at President Bush is "entirely justified, not because what the administration does is novel, but what it is doing is wrong-headed."

Leffler, the Edward Stettinius professor of history at the University of Virginia, says the war in Iraq, in particular, has undercut the war on terrorism because it has alienated key allies and hurt the chances for bringing democracy to the Middle East by antagonizing Arabs in the region.

"What is conspicuous about the Bush administration is the lack of compatibility between means and ends. In other words, I don`t think this administration has a clear-cut coherent strategy. The administration articulates goals--the democratization of the Middle East, the liberation of Iraq, the end of terrorism. But it doesn`t lay out tactics that are capable of achieving these goals," says Leffler, who in January will become the Henry Alfred Kissinger scholar in foreign relations and international relations at the Library of Congress.

He was interviewed on August 31, 2004, by Bernard Gwertzman, consulting editor for cfr.org.

Is the Bush administration`s foreign policy as unique as many people have asserted?

I think the administration`s goals are compatible with the stated objectives of most American administrations, certainly in the 20th century, and going back even further than that. But one might say that the employment of certain tactics and the emphasis on unilateralism are a departure from what was typical during the Cold War. However, I think the emphasis on the Bush administration`s unique unilateralism also has been much overstated. In fact, I believe that even with regard to the issue of unilateralism there is more continuity than one might expect.

Could you provide some historical analogies?

I would say that one of the most characteristic aspects of American foreign policy in its history is the pursuit of unilateralism. This goes back to the beginning of the Republic. What most commentators often refer to as "isolationism" has always in fact been "unilateralism." The United States has never been isolated from the international arena. The United States has always been inextricably interwoven with other countries, especially in international commercial activity. What did distinguish the United States was its emphasis on going it alone, or unilateralism. This was, of course, the policy articulated by [George] Washington, and then reiterated by [Thomas] Jefferson, and then embodied in some ways in the Monroe Doctrine itself.

The point of this was not that the United States wanted to be isolated from the world, but that it wanted to preserve its capacity to act unilaterally, which, in fact, it did throughout most of its history. Of course, the great departure from this was after World War I, during the Versailles Conference, and [Woodrow] Wilson`s emphasis on the League of Nations and what we would call today multilateralism and collective security. Even Wilson himself, however, had conspicuous doubts about the efficacy of these policies.

Are you an adviser to either presidential candidate?

No.

Many people, and the Democrats conspicuously at their convention, have said the Bush administration has neglected America`s allies.

Here I think the analogies are very worthwhile, too. When Democrats and others talk about American multilateralism and America`s sensitivity to allies` wishes during the Cold War, they are really talking primarily about American policies in Europe and American collaboration with our NATO allies with regard to European defense. In fact, all through the Cold War the United States often acted unilaterally in the Third World, much to the distress of our allies. In the most conspicuous example, of course, American behavior in Vietnam was undertaken pretty much irrespective of our major allies` wishes. In fact, the French, then as today, were extraordinarily critical of the way we carried on the war, and indeed, our intention even to wage the war. But so were the British, and so were many other allies. If you look carefully at American foreign-policy behavior during the Cold War and if you look at [U.S.] actions in the Third World and how our allies reacted to those actions, you would see that there was persistent criticism of much of American behavior. Nonetheless, the United States continued to act that way, because it acted upon its own perception of its interests.

Could you discuss the "newness" of the Bush administration`s "pre-emptive" policy?

I don`t think that "pre-emption" is radically new at all. In fact, technically speaking, pre-emption was always the policy of the United States during the Cold War. That is to say, if there were in fact real signs of an impending Soviet attack on the United States, it was American policy to act pre-emptively. So what is new, of course, is not the notion of pre-emptive action in a technical sense. What is new is the emphasis on "preventative action." That is to say, that the United States reserves the right to take military action even when there is no immediate or impending threat, but a long-term one.

Preventative action is what the debate is really about. Even in this respect, however, I don`t think that American policy is all that new. In fact, many of America`s actions in the Third World during the Cold War, were preventative actions. The United States instituted military action, or military intervention in one context or another, often unilaterally, because it saw a long-term threat, often defined in those days in terms of the domino theory [which posited that if one Third World country, like South Vietnam, fell to the communists, its neighbors would follow.] The domino theory justified American intervention in all sorts of places, most conspicuously Indochina. Nonetheless, the domino theory itself, in a sense, enveloped the policy of preventative action. The United States would take action to prevent additional dominos from falling if the loss of these additional countries would ultimately endanger American security. Hence, I don`t think that preventative action is all that new.

Furthermore, when you look closely at events over the last decade, particularly the rhetoric of the Clinton administration during the 1990s, you see that there is a good deal of continuity. If you look at the strategy statements of the Clinton administration, particularly the last one, as closely as most of us have looked at the strategy statement of the Bush administration, you will see that Clinton and his advisers preserved the right to take unilateral military action when vital security interests were endangered. This was explicitly stated in Clinton administration national security statements. In an important presidential policy memorandum, PDD 39 in 1995, with regard to counter-terrorism--we only have portions of the classified document--the [Clinton] administration explicitly preserved the right to take unilateral and pre-emptive action against terrorist threats.

So I don`t think the notion of pre-emption or, more explicitly, prevention, is really all that new. What is new is the public affirmation of that policy in what has become known as the Bush Doctrine. What previously had been an option has now become a public-policy doctrine.

So how has the Bush policy gone afoul? He is under a lot of criticism, abroad and at home. Is it style more than substance?

I think the criticism of the Bush administration is entirely justified, not because what the administration does is novel, but what it is doing is wrong-headed. What is conspicuous about the Bush administration is the lack of compatibility between means and ends. In other words, I don`t think this administration has a clear-cut coherent strategy. The administration articulates goals--the democratization of the Middle East, the liberation of Iraq, the end of terrorism. But it doesn`t lay out tactics that are capable of achieving these goals.

This is particularly conspicuous when you see what [National Security Adviser] Condoleezza Rice and President Bush often state are the three pillars of American policy. I think this has become an integral part of the Republican platform. The first was to tackle terrorism. The second was working with our allies in a collaborative way. And the third was fostering democracy. What is interesting, in looking at these three pillars, is that the way the Bush administration fights terrorism undermines its capacity to work with our allies and to nurture democracy. The war against terrorism and the way it has been conducted by the Bush administration has alienated our allies and in many respects retarded our capacity to promote the democratization of the Middle East.

The construction of one pillar has totally undermined the other pillars of the Bush administration`s foreign policy. They are inconsistent with one another. The three pillars make sense individually. But once again, there is no strategy aimed at designing tactics that are capable of achieving all three ends. This is the great failure of the administration. It articulated goals that far exceeded its capacity to design tactics to achieve those goals. And the goals themselves therefore should be looked upon as suspect; that is to say, we may be overreaching in terms of the goals themselves. It may be necessary to reconceptualize the goals as well as the strategy and tactics.

The main strategy, of course, is the war against terrorism. What would you recommend?

The key question is whether the war against terrorism necessitated the war against Iraq. If you believe it did not, or if you believe the war in Iraq has been carried out in an egregious way, then you can see how that war in Iraq has undermined the war against terrorism in a number of conspicuous ways. It has diverted resources, both financial and military, away from the war against terrorism. And secondly, and more significantly in the long run, the war in Iraq has severely antagonized the people in the Middle East, the prospective targets of our democratization initiative. The way the war in Iraq has been fought has undermined and eroded the goals that the administration has been pursuing. One of the pillars of American foreign policy, in the words of the Bush administration, is to preserve our alliances. That is one of their goals, but the Iraq war has undermined that goal.

The overriding point that I would make is that, throughout the Cold War, administrations made careful calculations about when to use multilateral initiatives, when to act collectively with our allies, when to be responsive to their needs or their attitudes or their concerns, and when not to be. It is not the principle of multilateralism; it is the way it is carried out. I think this administration has demonstrated an incapacity to make effective judgments. Ultimately, the benchmark of good foreign policy is the exercise of good judgment, the determination of when to use the right types of instruments of policy, whether they be unilateral or multilateral. I think this administration has exercised extremely poor judgment in making these sorts of determinations.

If John Kerry wins the election, will he be able to fix things?

I am not certain how effective Kerry`s foreign policies will be. Despite his emphasis on multilateralism, in his discussions about North Korea and his allusions to Iran, he is implying that we need to take tougher, more unilateral action. That is how I read what he has to say. If that is the case, he may be simply trying to distinguish himself from the Bush policy on Iraq as well as on these other issues, without necessarily taking a principled stand, or showing good judgment. So it is far from clear to me that Kerry`s policies themselves would make a huge difference in the overall foreign policy.

But I have the following caveat: Bush has so antagonized our major allies, particularly in Europe, that I do think that any rational observer of the international situation would come to the conclusion that Kerry has a much better chance of securing allied cooperation and collaboration in Iraq and elsewhere than the Bush administration. I also think that the types of tactics that the Kerry team has articulated on Iraq have better long-term possibilities for winning the goodwill of the peoples in the Middle East. Most important is that Kerry is likely to bring a new attitude to the Palestinian-Israeli question that I believe is absolutely indispensable to the development of a successful overall policy in the Middle East. The Bush administration`s failure over four years to seriously tackle that issue is a great negative in its record. The prospect that the Kerry people would at least try to approach this issue with renewed vigor and imagination is important.

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September 3, 2004
OP-ED CONTRIBUTOR
Secrets of the Garden
By ANNA DEAVERE SMITH

Brent Williams, my bull-rider friend in Idaho, sincerely believes that President Bush would help him haul hay when he`s home from the rodeos. He and his buddies appreciate how Mr. Bush took time to meet the 2003 rodeo champions. He can`t see Senator John Kerry doing that.

In November, the American people will show us which candidate has the broadest reach. Who finds them where they live? Who touches them where it matters? By visiting both the Democrats in Boston and the Republicans in New York, I intended to look at the theater of what each does, to see if it would lead me to understand a little bit more about the hearts and minds of the American people. I learned a lot about oratory in Boston from Bill Clinton and Barack Obama, in particular. In New York, I had the Bushes inside the hall and the demonstrators outside. I expected lots of theater.

One of the first things I noticed as I walked around this week was offstage, on the cover of Newsweek. President Bush, in a blue dress shirt that could also pass as a work shirt, is standing alone, with the words "No Excuses" emblazoned just below his chest.

I asked Elizabeth Roxas, former principal dancer at the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, "If I were to play Bush, how would I exude the kind of toughness that`s on that cover?" She said, "It leads from the chest. Even the way his arm is sort of separated from underneath his armpits - it`s not closed in." It looks like he`s going to reach for his guns.

The public has danced all over Mr. Bush`s verbal gaffes for four years. It has become clearer here that it`s not about the words.

Richard Slotkin, the author of "Gunfighter Nation: The Myth of the Frontier in 20th-Century America," explained to me how the cowboy gunslinger myth might fit with this political campaign.

"The thing that the cowboy knows, he knows instinctively," Mr. Slotkin said. "And everybody in the audience knows what it is. It`s `a man`s gotta do what a man`s gotta do.` You are pitted against an enemy that is so merciless that it`s kill or be killed."

Connected to this cowboy myth is the "scary" story. There was only one story at the convention, at least inside the halls, and that`s the story of Sept. 11. It`s a scary story, and the Republicans are getting better at telling it every day. There were a lot of Democrats in New York at the parties and luncheons and the gatherings around this convention, too. The ones I`ve talked to are very worried that Senator Kerry`s not telling scary enough stories.

To me, one potentially scary story could be built out of the dismissive reaction the Republicans, like Rudolph Giuliani, Arnold Schwarzenegger and Dick Cheney, had to John Edwards`s idea of "two Americas." At the microphone, they were deriding the idea, and yet, these last four days in New York were an evident tale of two cities. Don`t they see it?

Inside the Garden, I observed one thing, and outside I observed something different. The demonstrators on Sunday performed for an audience of police officers and agents lined up in front of the convention hall. They played as if Mr. Bush were there. I watched a woman do a jazz riff on the word "shame," while her companion improvised on a small African whistle. They had a lot to say, and not much equipment. Inside the hall, there was a lot of equipment, and a lot to say, but not much variety in the way that it was said. Simple language, simple sentences, received applause again and again.

Governor Schwarzenegger had no rhythmic variety whatsoever. Only the expression "girlie-men" leapt out as varied from the rest of what he said. Vice President Dick Cheney`s sentences rarely surpassed 25 seconds apiece. I learned that if you want to evoke a "boo" or thunderous applause, it`s best to keep it to 15. One of the most well-received Cheney phrases was "Senator Kerry says he sees two Americas. It makes the whole thing mutual. America sees two John Kerrys." Two world views are being enunciated. I`m told the last four years in Washington were bitter if you were on the wrong side of the aisle.

My mind went reeling back to Ibsen`s "Doll`s House," to the famous scene in which Nora and her husband, Torvald, have an argument, much like a debate, and she walks out on him, slamming the door. George Bernard Shaw called it "the door slam heard round the world." It is thought to have changed the course of modern drama. "For Nora to leave the house," said Mark Sandberg, an Ibsen scholar, "back then, was for her to leave society. To start some new form of social contract."

The idea of slamming the door, of walking out on America, is behind us. That`s not going to happen. If you were to see both the play outside the convention hall, and the play inside, you might wonder if it were time for a new kind of social contract. But it`s really the scene before Nora slams the door that proves instructive.

Nora, said Mr. Sandberg, is "seeing something that`s changed her world view and he doesn`t see it. He`s trying to talk about: `Don`t you believe in home and family and don`t you know your place in your home anymore?` She keeps revising his terms. And he`s not catching on to the shift in language and how that signifies a shift in her whole way of being. As a debater, she is actually quite good. She simply refuses to give ground on terms she finds crucial. And she won`t let words slide by with hidden assumptions."

Mr. Cheney, stubbornly plays Torvald to the Democrats` Nora and the demonstrators` Nora, refusing to accept terms other than his own. Unlike Torvald, though, he seems to be winning - for now. There has been a lot of language inside both convention halls and in the streets, and there`s more to come. But will it add up to the power that is potent in all of these small plays? The Democrats are worried that Mr. Kerry can`t communicate. The Republicans have turned Mr. Bush`s verbal limitations into virtues. Mr. Cheney describes the president as a man who speaks plainly. His audience believes that it sees all it needs to see. Perhaps they don`t think he`s masking himself in words. Is it possible that the mask is gesture?

I sat with three delegates in a bar, and asked specifically about what they connected to in Mr. Bush. "Sincerity," Bill Quinn of Pocono Lake, Pa., told me. "Speaking from the heart and believing in your convictions. Firm hand shake and he looks you in the eye. Gives you his word. That`s sincerity."

I asked Mike Johnson, a Republican political consultant, about that word, sincerity. He looked me right in the eye and said: "It`s comfort. And sincerity. The comfort level, the security level, the leadership level. And Bush shines."

I did not find theater in the hall of the Republican convention. The sentences were too short. There were more realities and facts than metaphors. And it worked. The crowd was not cynical, accepting speakers at their word.

Just in the last few weeks scholars and dramatists met at the Isben Festival 2004 in Oslo. It`s my understanding that they debated that door slam, meaning that they, too, may be thinking about a new kind of social contract for now. Unlike Mr. Schwarzenegger, I don`t think it`s an insult to ascribe a feminine element to the Democratic candidates. Let me suggest that they take a look at how to handle the Torvalds of the world by interpreting what Nora does to him in that last scene, that last debate. She listened, absorbed the question and gave it back on her own terms. She devastated her opponent and by all accounts, left him babbling and baffled on the stage. It`s really not so much what you say or even how you say it. It`s your intention and your commitment to it that weighs in on the hearts and minds of the recipient.

Anna Deavere Smith, an actress and playwright, is the director of the Institute on the Arts and Civic Dialogue at New York University.

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September 3, 2004
OP-ED COLUMNIST
Heads in the Sand
By BOB HERBERT

When asked this week on CNN how long the U.S. military is likely to remain in Iraq, Senator John McCain replied "probably" 10 or 20 years. "That`s not so bad," he said, adding, "We`ve been in Korea for 50 years. We`ve been in West Germany for 50 years."

Reporters have come to expect candor from Senator McCain, and in this case he didn`t disappoint. But there weren`t any speakers mounting the podium at the Republican National Convention to hammer home the message that G.I.`s would be in Iraq for a decade or two.

That`s not the understanding most Americans had when this wretched war was sold to them, and it`s not the view most Americans hold now.

If Senator McCain is correct (and the belief in official Washington is that he is), then boys and girls who are 5 or 10 years old now will get their chance in 2015 or 2020 to strap on the Kevlar and engage the Iraqi "insurgents" who, like the indigenous forces we fought in Vietnam, will never accept the occupation of their country by America.

Marcina Hale, a protester who came to New York this week from suburban Westport, Conn., said she has two teenage boys and that Iraq "is not a war that I`m willing to send my sons to." As the years pass and the casualties mount, that sentiment will only grow.

The truth is always the first casualty of politics. But there was a bigger disconnect than usual between the bizarre, hermetically sealed perspective that was on display in Madison Square Garden this week and the daunting events unfolding without respite in the real world.

Iraq is a mess. While the cartoonish Arnold Schwarzenegger was drawing huge laughs in the Garden and making cracks about economic "girlie men," reports were emerging about the gruesome murder of 12 Nepalese hostages who had traveled to Iraq less than two weeks earlier in search of work.

At the same time, an effort to disarm insurgents in the militant Baghdad slum of Sadr City collapsed, and the death toll among American forces in Iraq continued its relentless climb toward 1,000.

The Los Angeles Times noted yesterday that a report by the respected Royal Institute of International Affairs in London has concluded that Iraq will be lucky if it avoids a breakup and civil war. The often-stated U.S. goal of a full-fledged Iraqi democracy is beyond unlikely.

In Afghanistan, a legitimate front in the so-called war against terror, much of the country remains in the hands of warlords, and the opium trade is flourishing. Experts believe substantial amounts of money from that trade is flowing to terrorist groups.

In Israel, 16 people were killed by suicide bombers who blew themselves up on a pair of crowded buses on Tuesday. In Russia, a series of horrific terror attacks, in the air and on the ground, have cast a pall across the country.

Despite all the macho posturing and self-congratulating at the Republican convention, the wave of terror that`s been unleashed on the world is only growing. The American-led war in Iraq is feeding that wave, causing it to swell rather than ebb.

Any serious person who looked around the world this week would have to wonder what the delegates at the G.O.P. convention were so happy about.

The Republican conventioneers spent the entire week reminding America that we were attacked on Sept. 11, 2001. But interestingly, there was hardly a mention by name of those actually responsible for the attacks - Osama bin Laden and Al Qaeda.

Discussions about the nation`s real enemies were taboo. We don`t know where they are or what they`re up to. The over-the-top venom of some of the speakers and delegates was reserved not for Osama, but for a couple of mild-mannered guys named John.

What Americans desperately need is a serious, honest discussion of where we go from here. If we`re going to be in Iraq for 10 or 20 more years, the policy makers should say so, and tell us what that will cost in money and human treasure. The violence associated with such a long-term occupation is guaranteed to be appalling.

Vietnam tore this nation apart. As we`ve seen in this campaign, the wounds have yet to heal. Incredibly, we`re now traveling a similarly tragic road in Iraq.

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company

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September 3, 2004
OP-ED COLUMNIST
Feel the Hate
By PAUL KRUGMAN

I don`t know where George Soros gets his money," one man said. "I don`t know where - if it comes from overseas or from drug groups or where it comes from." George Soros, another declared, "wants to spend $75 million defeating George W. Bush because Soros wants to legalize heroin." After all, a third said, Mr. Soros "is a self-admitted atheist; he was a Jew who figured out a way to survive the Holocaust."

They aren`t LaRouchies - they`re Republicans.

The suggestion that Mr. Soros, who has spent billions promoting democracy around the world, is in the pay of drug cartels came from Dennis Hastert, the speaker of the House, whom the Constitution puts two heartbeats from the presidency. After standing by his remarks for several days, Mr. Hastert finally claimed that he was talking about how Mr. Soros spends his money, not where he gets it.

The claim that Mr. Soros`s political spending is driven by his desire to legalize heroin came from Newt Gingrich. And the bit about the Holocaust came from Tony Blankley, editorial page editor of The Washington Times, which has become the administration`s de facto house organ.

For many months we`ve been warned by tut-tutting commentators about the evils of irrational "Bush hatred." Pundits eagerly scanned the Democratic convention for the disease; some invented examples when they failed to find it. Then they waited eagerly for outrageous behavior by demonstrators in New York, only to be disappointed again.

There was plenty of hatred in Manhattan, but it was inside, not outside, Madison Square Garden.

Barack Obama, who gave the Democratic keynote address, delivered a message of uplift and hope. Zell Miller, who gave the Republican keynote, declared that political opposition is treason: "Now, at the same time young Americans are dying in the sands of Iraq and the mountains of Afghanistan, our nation is being torn apart and made weaker because of the Democrats` manic obsession to bring down our commander in chief." And the crowd roared its approval.

Why are the Republicans so angry? One reason is that they have nothing positive to run on (during the first three days, Mr. Bush was mentioned far less often than John Kerry).

The promised economic boom hasn`t materialized, Iraq is a bloody quagmire, and Osama bin Laden has gone from "dead or alive" to he-who-must-not-be-named.

Another reason, I`m sure, is a guilty conscience. At some level the people at that convention know that their designated hero is a man who never in his life took a risk or made a sacrifice for his country, and that they are impugning the patriotism of men who have.

That`s why Band-Aids with Purple Hearts on them, mocking Mr. Kerry`s war wounds and medals, have been such a hit with conventioneers, and why senior politicians are attracted to wild conspiracy theories about Mr. Soros.

It`s also why Mr. Hastert, who knows how little the Bush administration has done to protect New York and help it rebuild, has accused the city of an "unseemly scramble" for cash after 9/11. Nothing makes you hate people as much as knowing in your heart that you are in the wrong and they are in the right.

But the vitriol also reflects the fact that many of the people at that convention, for all their flag-waving, hate America. They want a controlled, monolithic society; they fear and loathe our nation`s freedom, diversity and complexity.

The convention opened with an invocation by Sheri Dew, a Mormon publisher and activist. Early rumors were that the invocation would be given by Jerry Falwell, who suggested just after 9/11 that the attack was God`s punishment for the activities of the A.C.L.U. and People for the American Way, among others. But Ms. Dew is no more moderate: earlier this year she likened opposition to gay marriage to opposition to Hitler.

The party made sure to put social moderates like Rudy Giuliani in front of the cameras. But in private events, the story was different. For example, Senator Sam Brownback of Kansas told Republicans that we are in a "culture war" and urged a reduction in the separation of church and state.

Mr. Bush, it`s now clear, intends to run a campaign based on fear. And for me, at least, it`s working: thinking about what these people will do if they solidify their grip on power makes me very, very afraid.

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company |