German and US Public Support for Wars: WHY SO LITTLE U.S. OPPOSITIION TO U.S. WARS? WHY IS THE PUBLIC SILENT? By Dick Bennett
Several explanations of German public support of Nazi wars and occupations give us material for analysis of public support of—or at least acquiescence to-- recurrent US wars and occupations.
Public support, once high, now is declining. A new CNN/Opinion Research poll (PDF) (Dec. 2010) shows support for the conflict continuing to wane. “The poll now shows 63percent of the American public opposed to the war. The breakdown showed strong opposition across race, gender, regional and age lines. President Obama’s claims of progress in the Afghan War don’t seem to be cutting into the realities of record death tolls and official predictions of more record death tolls to come, A secondary question asked the public how “things are going” in Afghanistan and showed 56 percent of Americans believe the war is going either “moderately badly” or “very badly.” An interesting aspect of this is that the poll was taken in the days (Dec. 17-19) immediately following the president’s Afghanistan speech (December 16).” (Ditz).
Of course one nation was a dictatorship and the other is a republic, but the issue is the aggression of their foreign policies and why the public went along.
How did the Nazis gain such broad support from the German population?
One view is that the Third Reich was a nightmare of fear and intimidation, created by the Gestapo, the prisons for dissenters, and torture. .
A much stronger explanation is that the German populace was already extremely anti-Semitic needing only a little incentive to be willing executioners.
A third view marshals the evidence of the power of Hitler’s personality greatly magnified by an extraordinary national propaganda machine.
And a forth explanation is that the Nazis satisfied the economic self-interest of the people, by decent wages, a graduated income tax, a pension system, and plunder from the occupied territories, which enabled the Nazis to keep their own populace and their soldiers content, and their occupied territories quiescent.
A historian has written, “The Nazis were not only the most notorious murderers in history but also the greatest thieves.” In comparison, the US is inefficient. But one historian does claim that “…a few million people have died in the American holocaust, and many more millions have been condemned to lives of misery and torture as a result of US interventions [against the alleged international communist conspiracy] extending from China and Greece in the 1940s to Afghanistan and Iraq in the 1990s” (Blum 1995). So the question stands: How did U.S. elected rulers gain such broad support for its longest war against Afghanistan fought simultaneously with a second war against Iraq, and additional wars emerging after ten years (Pakistan and Yemen)?
Of the four explanations listed above, only the first three seem to apply to the U. S.
Fear does permeate our country. The communist and socialist parties have been virtually eradicated. “Liberals” are now under similar attack. The FBI has revived aspects of their 1960s COINTELPRO. Many of the US populace do not want to sign petitions for fear of being placed on an “un-American” or “terrorist” list. The FBI is not the Gestapo, and the Marion super-max prison is not Buchenwald, but they’re enough, maybe, to explain why so few “citizens” publicly decry the leaders and policies of the government.
Replace Jews with Muslims and you see the parallel scapegoating today. Over a thousand Muslims were detained after 9-11, hundreds for extended periods without charge, and reports of bigoted actions against Muslims are numerous to the present. Invading and occupying Muslim nations and killing tens of thousands of Muslim civilians, and assassinating and torturing thousands of suspected terrorists without benefit of trial, have not produced more than the outcry of the peace movement. The U.S. willing executioners are small numerically compared to the Nazi slaughter, but intrinsically it’s similar behavior.
Presidents Bush and Obama are cardboard cutouts compared to Hitler; their rallies possessing the drama of a boy scout gathering compared to the spectacles organized by the Nazis at Nuremberg for Hitler’s rants, but combined with the fear and bigotry their speeches and persistence carried the Congress and the populace forward to continued war. Only one member of the House of Representatives voted against the resolution (not Declaration of War) supporting the invasion of Afghanistan, but that was much more the shock of the plane bombings and the pre-existent hatred of “ragheads” than from any cult of personality surrounding President G. W. Bush.
The fourth, economic, explanation does not seem to apply at all, for although the war industry capitalists are making money, the income of the general populations has continued to decline, along with state and municipal services.
Have we then answered the question why the U.S. public generally is so acquiescent against its governments’ illegal, unjust, financially disastrous wars? The peace movement can get to work especially on extricating the public from the fear and bigotry which fuels their support or their passivity? But these explanations don’t seem adequate to me. The public does not seem so timorous or so prejudiced; the presidents lack Hitler’s charisma. Other motives and causes seem to be in play.
Have the people become so cynical and exhausted by endless war that they cannot recognize and feel the suffering of the victims of our wars? MORE
Or is it something else, distinctly different from fear, hatred, cynicism, or numbness Is it simple proximity? The wars are over there and outside our peripheral vision. What’s happening to jobs, to income, to mortgage and credit rate--these engross attention. We don’t pay directly—we are not taxed directly—for the wars, but our government hides the reality by borrowing. The wars therefore affect these personal matters only tangentially. We don’t feel complicit in the deaths of innocent Iraqi and Afghan children. Even though we believe in a government of the people, by the people, for the people, few feel responsible for the harms perpetrated against innocent people abroad, even though we know our children and grandchildren will eventually pay the taxes that fund present harms.
Andrew Bacevich adds another persuasive explanation. Perhaps he has the key. He examines the cluster of assumptions and practices that have driven US foreign policy since WWII. They have become so deeply accepted by the public that few are aware of them. Bacevich divides this tenacious consensus into two parts to shine a light on them, which he labels "credo" and "trinity."
The US credo is a system of purposes by which the world should work and for which the US is responsible. These norms summon the US alone to transform the world as the US sees fit, since the US is fundamentally benign and good for the world. It has become virtually unquestioned dogma, Bacevich argues, which explains why US global leadership and primacy have become the prerequisite for U. S. political office and public approval. Question “the troops” under God, and political defeat is certain.
And the means is hard power, coercion above all. Thus the US must maintain military forces not for defense but for overwhelming armed force projected around the world. Military might is now as essential to the public’s identity as is the credo. The sacred trinity has become the second part of the US foreign policy cluster of iron assumptions: the US must maintain a global military dominance, must organize its forces for global power projection, and must counter real or imagined threats by global intervention and invasion.
“Together, credo and trinity—the one defining purpose, the other practice—constitute the essence of the way that Washington has attempted to govern and police the American Century.” Given this ingrained consensus during seventy years of imperial expansion, other explanations of US public conformity are clearly seen as functions of sustaining the consensus. And the similarity of German and US assumptions of national superiority justifying conquest becomes clearer.
References
--Aly, Gotz. Hitler’s Beneficiaries: Plunder, Racial War, and the Nazi Welfare State. Metropolitan/Holt, 2007. The Nazis used economic policy to retain power.
--Bacevich, Andrew. Washington Rules: America’s Path to Permanent War. Metropolitan, 2010.
--Blum, William. Killing Hope: U.S. Military and CIA Interventions Since World War II. Common Courage, 1995.
-- Ditz, Jason. “Poll: 63 Percent of Americans Oppose Afghan War: Opposition to War at Highest Levels Yet.” December 30, 2010
--Goldhagen, Daniel. Hitler’s Willing Executioners. 1996.
--Herzog, Dagmar. “Handouts from NYT Book Review (2-18-07). Rev. of Aly.
--Swanson, David. War Is a Lie. 2010.
Tuesday, January 4, 2011
OMNI: Opposing a Culture of Violence, Seeking a Culture of Peace
SEEKING A CULTURE OF PEACE
By Dick Bennett
The OMNI Center for Peace, Justice, and Ecology began in 2001 to protest and to affirm. Recognizing the war-nurtured identity of the United States--from the two hundred years of Indian wars to the many invasions of the last fifty years (from Vietnam and Guatemala, to Nicaragua and Panama, to Afghanistan and Iraq)--the founders of OMNI sought to oppose the causes and relieve the consequences of violence locally and nationally. We were only a few people in one small town, but our conviction was that a small beginning might accrue large results—and silence and passivity were not an alternative. Obviously, since such a national history would not be changed in our lifetimes, we tried from the beginning to create lasting structures of resistance against the ancient, entrenched structures of violence.
One of those structures, inseparable from the imperialism, is militarism. Former Senator J. William Fulbright was one mentor. In The Pentagon Propaganda Machine he describes our "chronic state of war" in which "patriotic militarism" has become "a monster bureaucracy" that replaces legitimate government and human needs and with its emphasis upon patriotism suppresses dissent.
Believing that local and national violence feed each other (school shootings and air war), our motto is "think and act globally and locally." From the beginning we supported local anti-violence/abuse organizations, such as the Arkansas Coalition Against the Death Penalty and the Project for Victims of Family Violence, and we sought connections with national and international peace, justice, and ecology organizations.
Some of the programs we have initiated to oppose the war of humans against humans and against nature have included: monthly anti-war play readings, annual August commemoration of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and other victims of war, rallies and forums opposing the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq, an annual United Nations Day Celebration, Peace Poles (at school, church, and park, and over 1000 mini-poles), World Peace Gardens, celebration of nonviolent heroes, annual PeaceWriting awards for unpublished books, book forums, celebration of the Bill of Rights and Universal Declaration of Human Rights, a Teen Leadership Corps, Womens Empowerment Group, alternative careers information at aHigh School, a conference on "Faith Communities, Peace Traditions," a Climate Change Task Force, and an e-newsletter 350 PPM. Many of our activities of protest and affirmation are inseparable, such as OMNI’s monthly Open Mic for Peace and Justice, where people sing and read in protest and celebration. We also network with many like-minded area groups who work for sustainability and justice, though we find that work for world peace is ignored by most others. Omni provides several endowments at the University of Arkansas for student and faculty development (for example, for nonviolence education, diversity and toleration, refugee students). And OMNI has purchased its own building.
OMNI is above all a group of people who affirm values they believe will create a more just and peaceful world. If the present culture has been made warlike, a future culture could be peaceful. What is a Culture of Peace? A peace culture, according to Elise Boulding, “promotes peaceable diversity" through "institutional arrangements" for "mutual caring and well-being as well as an equality that includes appreciation of difference, stewardship, and equitable sharing of the earth’s resources among its members and with all living beings."
This essay will be published in the Japanese magazine, MUSE, and placed in the website of the Center of Tokyo Raids and Damage.
By Dick Bennett
The OMNI Center for Peace, Justice, and Ecology began in 2001 to protest and to affirm. Recognizing the war-nurtured identity of the United States--from the two hundred years of Indian wars to the many invasions of the last fifty years (from Vietnam and Guatemala, to Nicaragua and Panama, to Afghanistan and Iraq)--the founders of OMNI sought to oppose the causes and relieve the consequences of violence locally and nationally. We were only a few people in one small town, but our conviction was that a small beginning might accrue large results—and silence and passivity were not an alternative. Obviously, since such a national history would not be changed in our lifetimes, we tried from the beginning to create lasting structures of resistance against the ancient, entrenched structures of violence.
One of those structures, inseparable from the imperialism, is militarism. Former Senator J. William Fulbright was one mentor. In The Pentagon Propaganda Machine he describes our "chronic state of war" in which "patriotic militarism" has become "a monster bureaucracy" that replaces legitimate government and human needs and with its emphasis upon patriotism suppresses dissent.
Believing that local and national violence feed each other (school shootings and air war), our motto is "think and act globally and locally." From the beginning we supported local anti-violence/abuse organizations, such as the Arkansas Coalition Against the Death Penalty and the Project for Victims of Family Violence, and we sought connections with national and international peace, justice, and ecology organizations.
Some of the programs we have initiated to oppose the war of humans against humans and against nature have included: monthly anti-war play readings, annual August commemoration of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and other victims of war, rallies and forums opposing the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq, an annual United Nations Day Celebration, Peace Poles (at school, church, and park, and over 1000 mini-poles), World Peace Gardens, celebration of nonviolent heroes, annual PeaceWriting awards for unpublished books, book forums, celebration of the Bill of Rights and Universal Declaration of Human Rights, a Teen Leadership Corps, Womens Empowerment Group, alternative careers information at aHigh School, a conference on "Faith Communities, Peace Traditions," a Climate Change Task Force, and an e-newsletter 350 PPM. Many of our activities of protest and affirmation are inseparable, such as OMNI’s monthly Open Mic for Peace and Justice, where people sing and read in protest and celebration. We also network with many like-minded area groups who work for sustainability and justice, though we find that work for world peace is ignored by most others. Omni provides several endowments at the University of Arkansas for student and faculty development (for example, for nonviolence education, diversity and toleration, refugee students). And OMNI has purchased its own building.
OMNI is above all a group of people who affirm values they believe will create a more just and peaceful world. If the present culture has been made warlike, a future culture could be peaceful. What is a Culture of Peace? A peace culture, according to Elise Boulding, “promotes peaceable diversity" through "institutional arrangements" for "mutual caring and well-being as well as an equality that includes appreciation of difference, stewardship, and equitable sharing of the earth’s resources among its members and with all living beings."
This essay will be published in the Japanese magazine, MUSE, and placed in the website of the Center of Tokyo Raids and Damage.
Sunday, January 2, 2011
US National Security State Militarism and Ideas for Peace
[Rev. Dave Hunter read the column by Nicholas Kristof on U.S. militarism and presented his own talk "Give Peace a Chance" at the 1-2-11 service at UUFF.
December 25, 2010
The Big (Military) Taboo By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF
We face wrenching budget cutting in the years ahead, but there’s one huge area of government spending that Democrats and Republicans alike have so far treated as sacrosanct. It’s the military/security world, and it’s time to bust that taboo. A few facts:
• The United States spends nearly as much on military power as every other country in the world combined, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute. It says that we spend more than six times as much as the country with the next highest budget, China.
• The United States maintains troops at more than 560 bases and other sites abroad, many of them a legacy of a world war that ended 65 years ago. Do we fear that if we pull our bases from Germany, Russia might invade?
• The intelligence community is so vast that more people have “top secret” clearance than live in Washington, D.C.
• The U.S. will spend more on the war in Afghanistan this year, adjusting for inflation, than we spent on the Revolutionary War, the War of 1812, the Mexican-American War, the Civil War and the Spanish-American War combined.
This is the one area where elections scarcely matter. President Obama, a Democrat who symbolized new directions, requested about 6 percent more for the military this year than at the peak of the Bush administration.
“Republicans think banging the war drums wins them votes, and Democrats think if they don’t chime in, they’ll lose votes,” said Andrew Bacevich, an ex-military officer who now is a historian at Boston University. He is author of a thoughtful recent book, “Washington Rules: America’s Path to Permanent War.”
The costs of excessive reliance on military force are not just financial, of course, as Professor Bacevich knows well. His son, Andrew Jr., an Army first lieutenant, was killed in Iraq in 2007.
Let me be clear: I’m a believer in a robust military, which is essential for backing up diplomacy. But the implication is that we need a balanced tool chest of diplomatic and military tools alike. Instead, we have a billionaire military and a pauper diplomacy. The U.S. military now has more people in its marching bands than the State Department has in its foreign service — and that’s preposterous.
What’s more, if you’re carrying an armload of hammers, every problem looks like a nail. The truth is that military power often isn’t very effective at solving modern problems, like a nuclear North Korea or an Iran that is on the nuclear path. Indeed, in an age of nationalism, our military force is often counterproductive.
After the first gulf war, the United States retained bases in Saudi Arabia on the assumption that they would enhance American security. Instead, they appear to have provoked fundamentalists like Osama bin Laden into attacking the U.S. In other words, hugely expensive bases undermined American security (and we later closed them anyway). Wouldn’t our money have been better spent helping American kids get a college education?
Paradoxically, it’s often people with experience in the military who lead the way in warning against overinvestment in arms. It was President Dwight Eisenhower who gave the strongest warning: “Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed.” And in the Obama administration, it is Defense Secretary Robert Gates who has argued that military spending on things large and small can and should expect closer, harsher scrutiny; it is Secretary Gates who has argued most eloquently for more investment in diplomacy and development aid.
American troops in Afghanistan are among the strongest advocates of investing more in schools there because they see firsthand that education fights extremism far more effectively than bombs. And here’s the trade-off: For the cost of one American soldier in Afghanistan for one year, you could build about 20 schools.
There are a few signs of hope in the air. The Simpson-Bowles deficit commission proposes cutting money for armaments, along with other spending. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton unveiled a signature project, the quadrennial diplomacy and development review, which calls for more emphasis on aid and diplomacy in foreign policy.
“Leading through civilian power saves lives and money,” Mrs. Clinton noted, and she’s exactly right. The review is a great document, but we’ll see if it can be implemented — especially because House Republicans are proposing cuts in the State Department budget.
They should remind themselves that in the 21st century, our government can protect its citizens in many ways: financing research against disease, providing early childhood programs that reduce crime later, boosting support for community colleges, investing in diplomacy that prevents costly wars.
As we cut budgets, let’s remember that these steps would, on balance, do far more for the security of Americans than a military base in Germany.
"Give Peace a Chance"
Rev. Dave Hunter
Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Fayetteville
January 2, 2011
Soon, we – we, the United Sates of America – will have been at war, in Afghanistan and Iraq, for ten years, for a full decade. We’re not there yet, but we’re getting closer and closer, and the exit date for Afghanistan has been moved back to 2014. Afghanistan isn’t another Vietnam yet, in duration or in American deaths, but we’ve already been fighting in Afghanistan twice as long as we were at war against Japan and Germany, in World War II.
Is there any chance that during this year, this new 2011, we could totally disengage militarily and withdraw all our troops and other personnel and instruments of war from Iraq and Afghanistan? And could we do this without leaving the people of those two unfortunate nations worse off than they would be if we stayed?
At the time we began these two wars, I believed – quite strongly – that both wars were mistakes. I have found no reason to second guess my original position.
When I was in law school, in the mid 1960s, I studied the United Nations Charter. Here is part of what Article II of that Charter says:
(3) All Members shall settle their international disputes by peaceful means in such a manner that international peace and security, and justice, are not endangered.
(4) All Members shall refrain in their international relations from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state, or in any other manner inconsistent with the Purposes of the United Nations.
Our wars against Afghanistan and Iraq were begun in violation of the United Nations Charter.
When I was a student for the ministry, in the years surrounding the turn of the century, I studied Just War Theory. Here are some of the just war principles that have evolved over the centuries:
(1) just cause – a nation may wage war only for a just cause – the evil that you would wage war against must be lasting, grave, and certain.
(2) right intention – a nation may wage war only for a just cause, and that just cause must be the sole motivation.
(3) last resort – a nation that would wage war must be able to show that means short of war for vindicating the just cause are impractical or ineffective; you must try other means first, such as diplomacy or economic sanctions, and you must not give up on the other means prematurely.
(4) probability of success – there must be serious prospects of success; and
(5) proportionality – the use of arms must not produce evils and disorders graver than the evil to be eliminated.
Our wars against Afghanistan and Iraq were begun in violation of Just War principles.
Once we got into the swamp, the quicksand, of war, the problem, of course, has been how to get out.
[Two prescriptions for ending the Iraq and Afghan occupations--and future US invasions. ]
And here I see a possible way out even now. If President Obama would announce, first, that we will continue to fight in Afghanistan and Iraq only if Congress agrees to reinstate the draft, so that a substantial proportion of those we send into harm’s way will have been conscripted to serve, and if the President would announce, second, that we will continue the struggle only if Congress will raise the federal income tax, especially on those earning more than $200,000 a year, enough to pay for the ongoing costs of the wars, including the cost of caring for injured veterans during the decades ahead, then the Congress and the people of our nation would be forced to confront the reality of war and to take responsibility for it. It is my belief – and certainly my hope – that if Mr. Obama asks us to commit our children and our treasure to our wars, we would say No.
December 25, 2010
The Big (Military) Taboo By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF
We face wrenching budget cutting in the years ahead, but there’s one huge area of government spending that Democrats and Republicans alike have so far treated as sacrosanct. It’s the military/security world, and it’s time to bust that taboo. A few facts:
• The United States spends nearly as much on military power as every other country in the world combined, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute. It says that we spend more than six times as much as the country with the next highest budget, China.
• The United States maintains troops at more than 560 bases and other sites abroad, many of them a legacy of a world war that ended 65 years ago. Do we fear that if we pull our bases from Germany, Russia might invade?
• The intelligence community is so vast that more people have “top secret” clearance than live in Washington, D.C.
• The U.S. will spend more on the war in Afghanistan this year, adjusting for inflation, than we spent on the Revolutionary War, the War of 1812, the Mexican-American War, the Civil War and the Spanish-American War combined.
This is the one area where elections scarcely matter. President Obama, a Democrat who symbolized new directions, requested about 6 percent more for the military this year than at the peak of the Bush administration.
“Republicans think banging the war drums wins them votes, and Democrats think if they don’t chime in, they’ll lose votes,” said Andrew Bacevich, an ex-military officer who now is a historian at Boston University. He is author of a thoughtful recent book, “Washington Rules: America’s Path to Permanent War.”
The costs of excessive reliance on military force are not just financial, of course, as Professor Bacevich knows well. His son, Andrew Jr., an Army first lieutenant, was killed in Iraq in 2007.
Let me be clear: I’m a believer in a robust military, which is essential for backing up diplomacy. But the implication is that we need a balanced tool chest of diplomatic and military tools alike. Instead, we have a billionaire military and a pauper diplomacy. The U.S. military now has more people in its marching bands than the State Department has in its foreign service — and that’s preposterous.
What’s more, if you’re carrying an armload of hammers, every problem looks like a nail. The truth is that military power often isn’t very effective at solving modern problems, like a nuclear North Korea or an Iran that is on the nuclear path. Indeed, in an age of nationalism, our military force is often counterproductive.
After the first gulf war, the United States retained bases in Saudi Arabia on the assumption that they would enhance American security. Instead, they appear to have provoked fundamentalists like Osama bin Laden into attacking the U.S. In other words, hugely expensive bases undermined American security (and we later closed them anyway). Wouldn’t our money have been better spent helping American kids get a college education?
Paradoxically, it’s often people with experience in the military who lead the way in warning against overinvestment in arms. It was President Dwight Eisenhower who gave the strongest warning: “Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed.” And in the Obama administration, it is Defense Secretary Robert Gates who has argued that military spending on things large and small can and should expect closer, harsher scrutiny; it is Secretary Gates who has argued most eloquently for more investment in diplomacy and development aid.
American troops in Afghanistan are among the strongest advocates of investing more in schools there because they see firsthand that education fights extremism far more effectively than bombs. And here’s the trade-off: For the cost of one American soldier in Afghanistan for one year, you could build about 20 schools.
There are a few signs of hope in the air. The Simpson-Bowles deficit commission proposes cutting money for armaments, along with other spending. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton unveiled a signature project, the quadrennial diplomacy and development review, which calls for more emphasis on aid and diplomacy in foreign policy.
“Leading through civilian power saves lives and money,” Mrs. Clinton noted, and she’s exactly right. The review is a great document, but we’ll see if it can be implemented — especially because House Republicans are proposing cuts in the State Department budget.
They should remind themselves that in the 21st century, our government can protect its citizens in many ways: financing research against disease, providing early childhood programs that reduce crime later, boosting support for community colleges, investing in diplomacy that prevents costly wars.
As we cut budgets, let’s remember that these steps would, on balance, do far more for the security of Americans than a military base in Germany.
"Give Peace a Chance"
Rev. Dave Hunter
Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Fayetteville
January 2, 2011
Soon, we – we, the United Sates of America – will have been at war, in Afghanistan and Iraq, for ten years, for a full decade. We’re not there yet, but we’re getting closer and closer, and the exit date for Afghanistan has been moved back to 2014. Afghanistan isn’t another Vietnam yet, in duration or in American deaths, but we’ve already been fighting in Afghanistan twice as long as we were at war against Japan and Germany, in World War II.
Is there any chance that during this year, this new 2011, we could totally disengage militarily and withdraw all our troops and other personnel and instruments of war from Iraq and Afghanistan? And could we do this without leaving the people of those two unfortunate nations worse off than they would be if we stayed?
At the time we began these two wars, I believed – quite strongly – that both wars were mistakes. I have found no reason to second guess my original position.
When I was in law school, in the mid 1960s, I studied the United Nations Charter. Here is part of what Article II of that Charter says:
(3) All Members shall settle their international disputes by peaceful means in such a manner that international peace and security, and justice, are not endangered.
(4) All Members shall refrain in their international relations from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state, or in any other manner inconsistent with the Purposes of the United Nations.
Our wars against Afghanistan and Iraq were begun in violation of the United Nations Charter.
When I was a student for the ministry, in the years surrounding the turn of the century, I studied Just War Theory. Here are some of the just war principles that have evolved over the centuries:
(1) just cause – a nation may wage war only for a just cause – the evil that you would wage war against must be lasting, grave, and certain.
(2) right intention – a nation may wage war only for a just cause, and that just cause must be the sole motivation.
(3) last resort – a nation that would wage war must be able to show that means short of war for vindicating the just cause are impractical or ineffective; you must try other means first, such as diplomacy or economic sanctions, and you must not give up on the other means prematurely.
(4) probability of success – there must be serious prospects of success; and
(5) proportionality – the use of arms must not produce evils and disorders graver than the evil to be eliminated.
Our wars against Afghanistan and Iraq were begun in violation of Just War principles.
Once we got into the swamp, the quicksand, of war, the problem, of course, has been how to get out.
[Two prescriptions for ending the Iraq and Afghan occupations--and future US invasions. ]
And here I see a possible way out even now. If President Obama would announce, first, that we will continue to fight in Afghanistan and Iraq only if Congress agrees to reinstate the draft, so that a substantial proportion of those we send into harm’s way will have been conscripted to serve, and if the President would announce, second, that we will continue the struggle only if Congress will raise the federal income tax, especially on those earning more than $200,000 a year, enough to pay for the ongoing costs of the wars, including the cost of caring for injured veterans during the decades ahead, then the Congress and the people of our nation would be forced to confront the reality of war and to take responsibility for it. It is my belief – and certainly my hope – that if Mr. Obama asks us to commit our children and our treasure to our wars, we would say No.
Bombing Western Pakistan
WESTERN PAKISTAN MUST BE BOMBED?
By Dick Bennett
“The thing I find most puzzling about the United States today is how little real debate there has been over the almost unanimous acceptance of the idea that the only way to defeat terrorism is through policies of war.” These words apply to US actions, either through attack or threatened attack, in a dozen or more countries in recent years—from Panama to Serbia, to Afghanistan and Iraq.
Let’s take a hard case—Western Pakistan. In referring to the clans and tribes along the Afghan border, our government leaders and pundits sometimes sound like the citizen of Gabon, who said about its 72-year-old autocrat, Omar Bongo, the longest-serving leader in the world: “God brought him to us and only God can call him away.” Western Pakistan is perceived by US leaders and mainstream media as intractably violent and orderly only by violence. Vice-President Dick Cheney on March 20, 2008, urged Pakistan to battle extremists in its border regions, and almost on the same day apparently U.S. missiles from an unmanned drone struck a “suspected militant safehouse and killed about 20 people.”
With what result? Since then the drone attacks and special operations ground attacks have steadily intensified. At least 110 drone attacks on Western Pakistan were reported in 2010. In retaliation, “Talibanized” takeovers of mosques and suicide bombers have spread. .The Bajur region, for example, saw “an unusual show of strength by insurgents,” despite Pakistan military’s claim to have cleaned the area; and the first female suicide bomber killed at least 45 people. Expectedly; after all, Western Pakistan and Eastern and Southern Afghanistan are the home of the Pashtun tribe, main source of the Taliban. .
But such violence has not always been the case; the future of western Pakistan is not inevitably violent. Let’s remember three things about this in many ways benighted part of the world: the nonviolent movement of Ghaffar Khan during the 1930s, the yearning for schools apparently all along the northern and western frontiers, and the present rise to power of the three secular parties, including the third in size Awami National Party.
The biography of Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan by Eknath Easwaran, A Man to Match His Mountains: Badshah Khan, Nonviolent Soldier of Islam, centers on the metamorphosis Khan effected in the violence-afflicted Pashtuns of India's northwest frontier, turning them into the peaceful nonviolent disciples of Gandhi during India's independence movement. Easwaran focuses on the spiritual change and on Ghaffar Khan's leadership and his emergence as the frontier Gandhi. The book’s great achievement is telling an American audience about an Islamic practitioner of nonviolence at a moment when few in the West understand its effectiveness and fewer still associate it with anything Islamic.
The story of Greg Mortenson’s long struggle to bring education to the Balti children of northern Pakistan, entitled Three Cups of Tea, reinforces a vision of peace parallel to that of Khan’s (who also built schools). In this area similar to the Afghan border provinces, Minnesotan Mortenson encountered bandits, precarious mountainous travel, avalanches, being kidnapped, the absence of school materials, the shortage of food, water, and medicine. But he also became the hope of the many who wanted education (including refugees from Afghanistan after 9-11 who had been bombed by U.S. planes), and not the madrassa schools being built by Saudis. His conclusion: “If we try to resolve terrorism with military might alone, then we will be no safer than we were before 9-11. If we truly want a legacy of peace for our children, we need to understand that this is a war that will ultimately be won with books, not bombs.”
Finally, in the 2008 elections in Pakistan the deeply conservative northwest voters threw out the Islamist parties that ruled the ethnic Pathan/Pashtun North West Frontier Province for five years, and gave their support to secular parties that promised streets, jobs, and peaceful dialog (and opposed U.S. pressure to intensify attacks on suspected militants linked to al-Qaida and the Taliban). The main secular party in the northwest, the Awami National Party, was invited to join the government being formed by Bhutto’s Pakistan People’s Party and Nawaz Sharif’s Pakistan Muslim League-N (against President Mushaffraf’s Pakistan Muslim League-Q). The alliance of Awami with the two largest secular parties should not astonish, since Islamist parties in Pakistan have never won more than 11 percent of the vote.
Let us remember too UNESCO’s “Seville Declaration,” summarizing the scientific evidence against the view that we have an inherent tendency to make war, and Douglas Fry’s extraordinarily well-supported case in The Human Potential for Peace that humans possess propensities not only to behave aggressively but also to behave cooperatively with kindness for others.
We can assume that Western (Pashtun) Pakistan is not necessarily programmed for war, particularly not for war against the United States. So let us ask why they are behaving so violently now?
References:
Ali, Zulfiqar and Laura King. “Attack Kills at Least 20 in Pakistan.” TMN (3-17-08)(US bombing Pakistan).
Amazon.com, Editorial Reviews.
Easwaran, Eknath. A Man to Match His Mountains: Badshah Khan, Nonviolent Soldier of Islam. Plough, 1985.
Fry, Douglas. The Human Potential for Peace: An Anthropological Challenge to Assumptions about War and Violence. Oxford UP, 2006.
Gannon, Kathy. “Voters Toss Religious Extremists: Northwest Conservatives Back Secular Parties.”
Guerrero, Patty. Rev. of Mortenson, Greg, and David Relin, Three Cups of Tea, in Worldwide WAMM (March 2008).
“Missile Strike Kills 7 in Pakistan.” ADG (12-17-10).
“Pakistan,” ADG (Feb. 21, 2008) p. 8A.
Khan, Anwarullah. “Pakistan Bomber in Burqa Kills 45.” ADG (12-26-10).
“Pakistan Counts 25 Missile Kills: U.S. Drones Struck Militants’ Trucks.” ADG (12-28-10).
Pennington, Matthew. “Pakistan’s Key Opposition Agrees to Govern Together.” TMN (Feb. 22, 2008).
Pitman, Todd. “Bongo Now Longest-Serving Leader,” ADG (3-22-08).
Rubin, Trudy. “The General’s Dangerous Aim.” ADG (Nov. 12, 2007).
Wood, Edward, Jr. Worshipping the Myths of World War II: Reflections on America’s Dedication to War. Potomac Books, 2006.
By Dick Bennett
“The thing I find most puzzling about the United States today is how little real debate there has been over the almost unanimous acceptance of the idea that the only way to defeat terrorism is through policies of war.” These words apply to US actions, either through attack or threatened attack, in a dozen or more countries in recent years—from Panama to Serbia, to Afghanistan and Iraq.
Let’s take a hard case—Western Pakistan. In referring to the clans and tribes along the Afghan border, our government leaders and pundits sometimes sound like the citizen of Gabon, who said about its 72-year-old autocrat, Omar Bongo, the longest-serving leader in the world: “God brought him to us and only God can call him away.” Western Pakistan is perceived by US leaders and mainstream media as intractably violent and orderly only by violence. Vice-President Dick Cheney on March 20, 2008, urged Pakistan to battle extremists in its border regions, and almost on the same day apparently U.S. missiles from an unmanned drone struck a “suspected militant safehouse and killed about 20 people.”
With what result? Since then the drone attacks and special operations ground attacks have steadily intensified. At least 110 drone attacks on Western Pakistan were reported in 2010. In retaliation, “Talibanized” takeovers of mosques and suicide bombers have spread. .The Bajur region, for example, saw “an unusual show of strength by insurgents,” despite Pakistan military’s claim to have cleaned the area; and the first female suicide bomber killed at least 45 people. Expectedly; after all, Western Pakistan and Eastern and Southern Afghanistan are the home of the Pashtun tribe, main source of the Taliban. .
But such violence has not always been the case; the future of western Pakistan is not inevitably violent. Let’s remember three things about this in many ways benighted part of the world: the nonviolent movement of Ghaffar Khan during the 1930s, the yearning for schools apparently all along the northern and western frontiers, and the present rise to power of the three secular parties, including the third in size Awami National Party.
The biography of Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan by Eknath Easwaran, A Man to Match His Mountains: Badshah Khan, Nonviolent Soldier of Islam, centers on the metamorphosis Khan effected in the violence-afflicted Pashtuns of India's northwest frontier, turning them into the peaceful nonviolent disciples of Gandhi during India's independence movement. Easwaran focuses on the spiritual change and on Ghaffar Khan's leadership and his emergence as the frontier Gandhi. The book’s great achievement is telling an American audience about an Islamic practitioner of nonviolence at a moment when few in the West understand its effectiveness and fewer still associate it with anything Islamic.
The story of Greg Mortenson’s long struggle to bring education to the Balti children of northern Pakistan, entitled Three Cups of Tea, reinforces a vision of peace parallel to that of Khan’s (who also built schools). In this area similar to the Afghan border provinces, Minnesotan Mortenson encountered bandits, precarious mountainous travel, avalanches, being kidnapped, the absence of school materials, the shortage of food, water, and medicine. But he also became the hope of the many who wanted education (including refugees from Afghanistan after 9-11 who had been bombed by U.S. planes), and not the madrassa schools being built by Saudis. His conclusion: “If we try to resolve terrorism with military might alone, then we will be no safer than we were before 9-11. If we truly want a legacy of peace for our children, we need to understand that this is a war that will ultimately be won with books, not bombs.”
Finally, in the 2008 elections in Pakistan the deeply conservative northwest voters threw out the Islamist parties that ruled the ethnic Pathan/Pashtun North West Frontier Province for five years, and gave their support to secular parties that promised streets, jobs, and peaceful dialog (and opposed U.S. pressure to intensify attacks on suspected militants linked to al-Qaida and the Taliban). The main secular party in the northwest, the Awami National Party, was invited to join the government being formed by Bhutto’s Pakistan People’s Party and Nawaz Sharif’s Pakistan Muslim League-N (against President Mushaffraf’s Pakistan Muslim League-Q). The alliance of Awami with the two largest secular parties should not astonish, since Islamist parties in Pakistan have never won more than 11 percent of the vote.
Let us remember too UNESCO’s “Seville Declaration,” summarizing the scientific evidence against the view that we have an inherent tendency to make war, and Douglas Fry’s extraordinarily well-supported case in The Human Potential for Peace that humans possess propensities not only to behave aggressively but also to behave cooperatively with kindness for others.
We can assume that Western (Pashtun) Pakistan is not necessarily programmed for war, particularly not for war against the United States. So let us ask why they are behaving so violently now?
References:
Ali, Zulfiqar and Laura King. “Attack Kills at Least 20 in Pakistan.” TMN (3-17-08)(US bombing Pakistan).
Amazon.com, Editorial Reviews.
Easwaran, Eknath. A Man to Match His Mountains: Badshah Khan, Nonviolent Soldier of Islam. Plough, 1985.
Fry, Douglas. The Human Potential for Peace: An Anthropological Challenge to Assumptions about War and Violence. Oxford UP, 2006.
Gannon, Kathy. “Voters Toss Religious Extremists: Northwest Conservatives Back Secular Parties.”
Guerrero, Patty. Rev. of Mortenson, Greg, and David Relin, Three Cups of Tea, in Worldwide WAMM (March 2008).
“Missile Strike Kills 7 in Pakistan.” ADG (12-17-10).
“Pakistan,” ADG (Feb. 21, 2008) p. 8A.
Khan, Anwarullah. “Pakistan Bomber in Burqa Kills 45.” ADG (12-26-10).
“Pakistan Counts 25 Missile Kills: U.S. Drones Struck Militants’ Trucks.” ADG (12-28-10).
Pennington, Matthew. “Pakistan’s Key Opposition Agrees to Govern Together.” TMN (Feb. 22, 2008).
Pitman, Todd. “Bongo Now Longest-Serving Leader,” ADG (3-22-08).
Rubin, Trudy. “The General’s Dangerous Aim.” ADG (Nov. 12, 2007).
Wood, Edward, Jr. Worshipping the Myths of World War II: Reflections on America’s Dedication to War. Potomac Books, 2006.
Saturday, January 1, 2011
Palestinian Peace Hero
Mazin, formerly a professor in the US, now teaching in Bethlehem, visited Fayetteville several years as part of the WHEELS OF JUSTICE bus tour for Palestine. D
Mazin Qumsiyeh: Palestinian Peace and Human Rights Hero
[HumanRights] The first martyr of 2011 and where we go from here
Dear friends:
We were devastated to hear the news of the first martyr in 2011 being none
other than Jawaher, the sister of the martyr Bassem Abu Rahma from Bil'in.
Jawaher fainted in yesterday's demonstration but died apparently of this
toxic tear gas (a much stronger version with unknown chemicals than used in
the West). Here is a video of the demonstration where Jawaher was injured
(she was martyred in hospital the next day)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FErDPdMzWjY
Here is a video of the murder of her brother Bassem over a year ago
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5yM9U2y-op4
To keep up to date on developments in Bil'in, visit
http://www.bilin-ffj.org/
Those of you in Bethlehem area and want to get together to collect our
thoughts, share our feelings etc, are welcome to come to my house tonight
(Saturday until midnight). I will still go ahead and post my reflection
that I wrote last night on the ending year for my thoughts are only deepened
by this tragedy. You can also send condolence email to Dr. Rateb Abu Rahma
saborahmeh42@yahoo.com
-----
Many writers came up with many ideas about 2010 and even occasionally
predictions about 2011. Perhaps the most common theme among rational
commentators is that this was the year were truth began to come out in such
a large dose that it was hard to sustain mythology and the most common hope
for 2011 is to see peace and justice prevail (no more ethnic cleansing, no
more killing etc). When we mention truth we are not talking here merely
about wikileaks (what is released here still remains the tip of the
iceberg). We are talking about a number of studies, reports, slips, and
scandals that came out that shook those in power. Gideon Levy said in
Haaretz that we may reflect on it as a year of truth for Israel, a year
where the fog of mythologies cleared away and the world saw reality for what
it is, that Israel is a society that does not desire peace but that is a
racist society interested in more land grabs from native Palestinians. He
concludes that "There is nothing like sunshine for disinfecting, so this was
a relatively good year." Others brought out the Goldstone report about
Israeli massacres in Gaza. Others mentioned the smuggling of a long tape
(out of thousands of cameras, computers, photos, and documents) and the
testimony of survivors that showed the true nature of the criminal Israeli
attack on humanitarian ships in International waters (not the manufactured
tapes of the Israeli military). Palestinians talked about the scandals in
the Palestinian authority and now the beginning of eth fall of corruption
like with the Husseini and Dahlan affairs (both of them trying to protect
themselves by threatening to expose other corruption).
In 2010, a number of events on the personal level were meaningful:
- The death of both my brothers-in-laws leaving both of my sisters widows at
a young age (both younger than me).
- The death of other friends and inspiring personalities from Howard Zinn
- We had many run-ins with Israeli occupation authorities. Arrested twice,
detained twice, charged with non-existent "traffic' violation once, gassed
and pushed and harassed several times, soldiers invaded our neighborhood
looking for me once.
- Took trips to Italy (twice in January and June), to the US (in March), to
Turkey (in July), and to Germany (November) speaking about realities under
occupation (over 30 talks in total on these trips)
- I gave over 50 other talks to visiting groups in Palestine (delegations
from over 20 countries). I also helped put together four national and
international conferences.
- We finally got my book completed and published; this took much work during
the year. "Popular Resistance in Palestine: A History of Hope and
Empowerment" is already selling well and will be out in the US this week.
- Participated in over 100 events of resistance some like our march through
the wall from Bethlehem to Jerusalem during Palm Sunday (when even our
Donkey and mules were arrested) and our actions in the last week of the year
with over 80 activists from euro-Palestine were truly inspiring and highly
successful events
- We started offering services in our new clinical laboratory
- I provided consulting for laboratory in the US in clinical cytogenetics
- Taught courses at Birzeit and Bethlehem Universities
- We did field trips and research on aspects of biodiversity and chromosomes
of animals in Palestine
- Supervized research by masters students some of it yielded significant and
meaningful results that are of use in Palestine
- Our son visited us from the US during olive harvest and we had a great
harvest, twice the output of last year.
Events at the personal level as can be seen above are not
disconnected/separate from the bigger picture of happenings around us:
-The Israelis constructed a watch tower at Ush Ghrab and we protested but
those in power structures in the town wanted no protests
-There were over 100 meaningful actions of Boycotts, Divestments, and
Sanctions around the world
-Palestinian school students invent a seeing walking stick for the blind
-Hundreds of internationals attempt to get into Gaza with a freedom flotilla
of ships. Israeli criminal gangs (pirates) attack them in International
waters and murder 9 and kidnap all others. They finally released them after
mistreatment and after stealing all their cameras, videos, and photos
(trying to suppress the story). One video smuggled out showed Israeli
commandoes executing human rights activists
- The Haifa conference and the Houston conference and the Stuttgart and
other conferences around the world emphasized a one state scenario with the
right of return
- Israel attacks the Goldstone report and refuses an international
independent investigation of its breeches of International law
-The charade of a peace process was reignited for a while but then quickly
extinguished by continued Israeli colonial settlement activities
-Israel's government and public continue to support open racism in both laws
proposed and passed in the Knesset and those rulings in certain
municipalities and in edicts issued by prominent Rabbis. From laws to
demand loyalty from non-Jews to a "Jewish state" to demanding no dating or
marriage between Jews and non-Jews, to denial of right to rent in cities
like Safad (used to be Arab city and now Judaicized).
I send an email once a week summarizing events here in Palestine especially
on popular resistance and our own thoughts and experiences and these are
archived at http://www.qumsiyeh.org/rightsblog2010/
So we look with pride and sadness at the year that passed and look forward
to a better year to come. Like life in general, 2010 had lots of tragedies
and setbacks but also lots of successes and meaningful moments. I
especially appreciate that we met hundreds of new people during the year;
some have become very good friends. He last week for example, we traveled
around with nearly a hundred internationals to places like Al-Walaja and
Bil'in that so much suffering. We were energized by the actions even though
some of us were injured, some of us arrested. So we look for 2011 as
hopefully a year of peace and justice. This can only happen if enough
people get around ACTIONS (not mere talks), actions like popular resistance,
actions like media work, and actions like boycotts, divestments, and
sanctions.
Here are 50 actions you can do for Palestine in 2011
http://www.palestinejn.org/resources/resources-for-activism-
Mazin Qumsiyeh, PhD
http://qumsiyeh.org
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL:
_______________________________________________
HumanRights newsletter
http://lists.qumsiyeh.org/mailman/listinfo/humanrights
This message was sent to jbennet@uark.edu.
Mazin Qumsiyeh: Palestinian Peace and Human Rights Hero
[HumanRights] The first martyr of 2011 and where we go from here
Dear friends:
We were devastated to hear the news of the first martyr in 2011 being none
other than Jawaher, the sister of the martyr Bassem Abu Rahma from Bil'in.
Jawaher fainted in yesterday's demonstration but died apparently of this
toxic tear gas (a much stronger version with unknown chemicals than used in
the West). Here is a video of the demonstration where Jawaher was injured
(she was martyred in hospital the next day)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FErDPdMzWjY
Here is a video of the murder of her brother Bassem over a year ago
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5yM9U2y-op4
To keep up to date on developments in Bil'in, visit
http://www.bilin-ffj.org/
Those of you in Bethlehem area and want to get together to collect our
thoughts, share our feelings etc, are welcome to come to my house tonight
(Saturday until midnight). I will still go ahead and post my reflection
that I wrote last night on the ending year for my thoughts are only deepened
by this tragedy. You can also send condolence email to Dr. Rateb Abu Rahma
saborahmeh42@yahoo.com
-----
Many writers came up with many ideas about 2010 and even occasionally
predictions about 2011. Perhaps the most common theme among rational
commentators is that this was the year were truth began to come out in such
a large dose that it was hard to sustain mythology and the most common hope
for 2011 is to see peace and justice prevail (no more ethnic cleansing, no
more killing etc). When we mention truth we are not talking here merely
about wikileaks (what is released here still remains the tip of the
iceberg). We are talking about a number of studies, reports, slips, and
scandals that came out that shook those in power. Gideon Levy said in
Haaretz that we may reflect on it as a year of truth for Israel, a year
where the fog of mythologies cleared away and the world saw reality for what
it is, that Israel is a society that does not desire peace but that is a
racist society interested in more land grabs from native Palestinians. He
concludes that "There is nothing like sunshine for disinfecting, so this was
a relatively good year." Others brought out the Goldstone report about
Israeli massacres in Gaza. Others mentioned the smuggling of a long tape
(out of thousands of cameras, computers, photos, and documents) and the
testimony of survivors that showed the true nature of the criminal Israeli
attack on humanitarian ships in International waters (not the manufactured
tapes of the Israeli military). Palestinians talked about the scandals in
the Palestinian authority and now the beginning of eth fall of corruption
like with the Husseini and Dahlan affairs (both of them trying to protect
themselves by threatening to expose other corruption).
In 2010, a number of events on the personal level were meaningful:
- The death of both my brothers-in-laws leaving both of my sisters widows at
a young age (both younger than me).
- The death of other friends and inspiring personalities from Howard Zinn
- We had many run-ins with Israeli occupation authorities. Arrested twice,
detained twice, charged with non-existent "traffic' violation once, gassed
and pushed and harassed several times, soldiers invaded our neighborhood
looking for me once.
- Took trips to Italy (twice in January and June), to the US (in March), to
Turkey (in July), and to Germany (November) speaking about realities under
occupation (over 30 talks in total on these trips)
- I gave over 50 other talks to visiting groups in Palestine (delegations
from over 20 countries). I also helped put together four national and
international conferences.
- We finally got my book completed and published; this took much work during
the year. "Popular Resistance in Palestine: A History of Hope and
Empowerment" is already selling well and will be out in the US this week.
- Participated in over 100 events of resistance some like our march through
the wall from Bethlehem to Jerusalem during Palm Sunday (when even our
Donkey and mules were arrested) and our actions in the last week of the year
with over 80 activists from euro-Palestine were truly inspiring and highly
successful events
- We started offering services in our new clinical laboratory
- I provided consulting for laboratory in the US in clinical cytogenetics
- Taught courses at Birzeit and Bethlehem Universities
- We did field trips and research on aspects of biodiversity and chromosomes
of animals in Palestine
- Supervized research by masters students some of it yielded significant and
meaningful results that are of use in Palestine
- Our son visited us from the US during olive harvest and we had a great
harvest, twice the output of last year.
Events at the personal level as can be seen above are not
disconnected/separate from the bigger picture of happenings around us:
-The Israelis constructed a watch tower at Ush Ghrab and we protested but
those in power structures in the town wanted no protests
-There were over 100 meaningful actions of Boycotts, Divestments, and
Sanctions around the world
-Palestinian school students invent a seeing walking stick for the blind
-Hundreds of internationals attempt to get into Gaza with a freedom flotilla
of ships. Israeli criminal gangs (pirates) attack them in International
waters and murder 9 and kidnap all others. They finally released them after
mistreatment and after stealing all their cameras, videos, and photos
(trying to suppress the story). One video smuggled out showed Israeli
commandoes executing human rights activists
- The Haifa conference and the Houston conference and the Stuttgart and
other conferences around the world emphasized a one state scenario with the
right of return
- Israel attacks the Goldstone report and refuses an international
independent investigation of its breeches of International law
-The charade of a peace process was reignited for a while but then quickly
extinguished by continued Israeli colonial settlement activities
-Israel's government and public continue to support open racism in both laws
proposed and passed in the Knesset and those rulings in certain
municipalities and in edicts issued by prominent Rabbis. From laws to
demand loyalty from non-Jews to a "Jewish state" to demanding no dating or
marriage between Jews and non-Jews, to denial of right to rent in cities
like Safad (used to be Arab city and now Judaicized).
I send an email once a week summarizing events here in Palestine especially
on popular resistance and our own thoughts and experiences and these are
archived at http://www.qumsiyeh.org/rightsblog2010/
So we look with pride and sadness at the year that passed and look forward
to a better year to come. Like life in general, 2010 had lots of tragedies
and setbacks but also lots of successes and meaningful moments. I
especially appreciate that we met hundreds of new people during the year;
some have become very good friends. He last week for example, we traveled
around with nearly a hundred internationals to places like Al-Walaja and
Bil'in that so much suffering. We were energized by the actions even though
some of us were injured, some of us arrested. So we look for 2011 as
hopefully a year of peace and justice. This can only happen if enough
people get around ACTIONS (not mere talks), actions like popular resistance,
actions like media work, and actions like boycotts, divestments, and
sanctions.
Here are 50 actions you can do for Palestine in 2011
http://www.palestinejn.org/resources/resources-for-activism-
Mazin Qumsiyeh, PhD
http://qumsiyeh.org
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL:
_______________________________________________
HumanRights newsletter
http://lists.qumsiyeh.org/mailman/listinfo/humanrights
This message was sent to jbennet@uark.edu.
Ronald Reagan's Centenary
ON REAGAN'S CENTENARY SOME TRUTHS ABOUT REAGAN
Dick's Articles
William Blum's Essay
Alex Seitz-Wald Essay, Reagan no Conservative Super-Hero
Gene Lyons 2-10-11
Eric Alterman 3-2-11
Preparing for Ronald Reagan's centenary, you're going to hear a lot of disinformation. Mr. Blum knows what he is talking about. During the 80s I was a Reagan watcher and wrote several articles about Reagan.
"Page One, Sensationalism, and the Libyan 'Hit Team'." Newspaper Research Journal 4 (Fall 1982).
"Oceania and the United States in 1984: The Selling of the Soviet Threat." Social Theory and Practice 10 (Fall 1984).
"Out of Disaster a Pep Talk." Quarterly Rreview of Doublespeak 12.1 (October 1985).
"Doublethink and the Rhetoric of Crisis: President Reagan's October 22, 1983, Speech on Arms 'Reduction'." Kneupper, ed., Oldspeak/Newspeak (1985.
"President Reagan's Panegyric for the Marines Killed in Lebanon." North Dakota Quarterly 55.6 (Spring 1987).
"Censorship by the Reagan Administration." Index on Censorship 17.7 (August 1988).
Dick
The Anti-Empire Report
January 1st, 2011
by William Blum
www.killinghope.org
Preparing for the propaganda onslaught
February 6 will mark the centenary of the birth of Ronald Reagan, president of the United States from 1981 to 1989. The conservatives have wasted no time in starting the show. On New Year's Day a 55-foot long, 26-foot high float honoring Reagan was part of the annual Rose Parade in Pasadena, California. To help you cope with, hopefully even counter, the misinformation and the omissions that are going to swamp the media for the next few months, here is some basic information about the great man's splendid achievements, first in foreign policy:
Nicaragua
For eight terribly long years the people of Nicaragua were under attack by Ronald Reagan's proxy army, the Contras. It was all-out war from Washington, aiming to destroy the progressive social and economic programs of the Sandinista government — burning down schools and medical clinics, mining harbors, bombing and strafing, raping and torturing. These Contras were the charming gentlemen Reagan called "freedom fighters" and the "moral equivalent of our founding fathers". [Dick: All of it violated the US Constitution, UN Charter, and other conventions and treaties.]
El Salvador
Salvador's dissidents tried to work within the system. But with US support, the government made that impossible, using repeated electoral fraud and murdering hundreds of protestors and strikers. When the dissidents took to the gun and civil war, the Carter administration and then even more so, the Reagan administration, responded with unlimited money, military aid, and training in support of the government and its death squads and torture, the latter with the help of CIA torture manuals. US military and CIA personnel played an active role on a continuous basis. The result was 75,000 civilian deaths; meaningful social change thwarted; a handful of the wealthy still owned the country; the poor remained as ever; dissidents still had to fear right-wing death squads; there was to be no profound social change in El Salvador while Ronnie sat in the White House with Nancy.
Guatemala
In 1954, a CIA-organized coup [under Eisenhower] overthrew the democratically-elected and progressive government of Jacobo Arbenz, initiating 40 years of military-government death squads, torture, disappearances, mass executions, and unimaginable cruelty, totaling more than 200,000 victims — indisputably one of the most inhumane chapters of the 20th century. For eight of those years the Reagan administration played a major role.
Perhaps the worst of the military dictators was General EfraÃn RÃos Montt, who carried out a near-holocaust against the indians and peasants, for which he was widely condemned in the world. In December 1982, Reagan went to visit the Guatemalan dictator. At a press conference of the two men, RÃos Montt was asked about the Guatemalan policy of scorched earth. He replied "We do not have a policy of scorched earth. We have a policy of scorched communists." After the meeting, referring to the allegations of extensive human-rights abuses, Reagan declared that RÃos Montt was getting "a bad deal" from the media. [Montt's military officers were trained at the School of Americas, Fort Benning, as were the El Salvadoran officers.]
Grenada
Reagan invaded this tiny country in October 1983, an invasion totally illegal and immoral, and surrounded by lies (such as "endangered" American medical students). The invasion put into power individuals more beholden to US foreign policy objectives.
Afghanistan
After the Carter administration provoked a Soviet invasion, Reagan came to power to support the Islamic fundamentalists in their war to eject the Soviets and the secular government, which honored women's rights. In the end, the United States and the fundamentalists "won", women's rights and the rest of Afghanistan lost. More than a million dead, three million disabled, five million refugees; in total about half the population. And many thousands of anti-American Islamic fundamentalists, trained and armed by the US, on the loose to terrorize the world, to this day.
"To watch the courageous Afghan freedom fighters battle modern arsenals with simple hand-held weapons is an inspiration to those who love freedom," declared Reagan. "Their courage teaches us a great lesson — that there are things in this world worth defending. To the Afghan people, I say on behalf of all Americans that we admire your heroism, your devotion to freedom, and your relentless struggle against your oppressors." 12
The Cold War
As to Reagan's alleged role in ending the Cold War ... pure fiction. He prolonged it. Read the story in one of my books. 13
Some other examples of the remarkable amorality of Ronald Wilson Reagan and the feel-good heartlessness of his administration:
Reagan, in his famous 1964 speech, "A Time for Choosing", which lifted him to national political status: "We were told four years ago that 17 million people went to bed hungry each night. Well, that was probably true. They were all on a diet."
"Undermining health, safety and environmental regulation. Reagan decreed such rules must be subjected to regulatory impact analysis — corporate-biased cost-benefit analyses, carried out by the Office of Management and Budget. The result: countless positive regulations discarded or revised based on pseudo-scientific conclusions that the cost to corporations would be greater than the public benefit."
"Kick-starting the era of structural adjustment. It was under Reagan administration influence that the International Monetary Fund and World Bank began widely imposing the policy package known as structural adjustment — featuring deregulation, privatization, emphasis on exports, cuts in social spending — that has plunged country after country in the developing world into economic destitution. The IMF chief at the time was honest about what was to come, saying in 1981 that, for low-income countries, 'adjustment is particularly costly in human terms'."
"Silence on the AIDS epidemic. Reagan didn't mention AIDS publicly until 1987, by which point AIDS had killed 19,000 in the United States."
– Russell Mokhiber and Robert Weissman 14
"Reagan's election changed the political reality. His agenda was rolling back the welfare state, and his budgets included a wide range of cuts for social programs. He was also very strategic about the process. One of his first targets was Legal Aid. This program, which provides legal services for low-income people, was staffed largely by progressive lawyers, many of whom used it as a base to win precedent-setting legal disputes against the government. Reagan drastically cut back the program's funding. He also explicitly prohibited the agency from taking on class-action suits against the government — law suits that had been used with considerable success to expand the rights of low- and moderate-income families."
"The Reagan administration also made weakening the power of unions a top priority. The people he appointed to the National Labor Relations Board were qualitatively more pro-management than appointees by prior Democratic or Republican presidents. This allowed companies to ignore workers' rights with impunity. Reagan also made the firing of strikers an acceptable business practice when he fired striking air traffic controllers in 1981. Many large corporations quickly embraced the practice. ... The net effect of these policies was that union membership plummeted, going from nearly 20 percent of the private sector workforce in 1980 to just over 7 percent in 2006. "
– Dean Baker 15
Reaganomics: a tax policy based on a notion of incentives which says that "the rich aren't working because they have too little money, while the poor aren't working because they have too much."
– John Kenneth Galbraith
"According to the nostrums of Reagan Age America, the current Chinese system — in equal measure capitalist and authoritarian — cannot actually exist. Capitalism spread democracy, we were told ad nauseam by a steady stream of conservative hacks, free-trade apologists, government officials and American companies doing business in China. Given enough Starbuckses and McDonald's, provided with sufficient consumer choice, China would surely become a democracy."
– Harold Meyerson 16
Throughout the early and mid-1980s, the Reagan administration declared that the Russians were spraying toxic chemicals over Laos, Cambodia and Afghanistan — the so-called "yellow rain" — and had caused more than ten thousand deaths by 1982 alone, (including, in Afghanistan, 3,042 deaths attributed to 47 separate incidents between the summer of 1979 and the summer of 1981, so precise was the information). President Reagan himself denounced the Soviet Union thusly more than 15 times in documents and speeches. The "yellow rain", it turned out, was pollen-laden feces dropped by huge swarms of honeybees flying far overhead. 17
Reagan's long-drawn-out statements re: Contragate (the scandal involving the covert sale of weapons to Iran to enable Reaganites to continue financing the Contras in the war against the Nicaraguan government after the US Congress cut off funding for the Contras) can be summarized as follows:
I didn't know what was happening.
If I did know, I didn't know enough.
If I knew enough, I didn't know it in time.
If I knew it in time, it wasn't illegal.
If it was illegal, the law didn't apply to me.
If the law applied to me, I didn't know what was happening.
12.March 21, 1983, in the White House ↩
13."Killing Hope: US Military and CIA Interventions Since World War II", p.17-18. Also for the five countries listed above, see the respective chapters in this book. ↩
14.June, 2004; Mokhiber is editor of Corporate Crime Reporter; Weissman, editor of the Multinational Monitor, both in Washington, D.C. ↩
15.April, 2007; Baker is Co-Director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research, Washington, DC ↩
16.Washington Post columnist, June 3, 2009 ↩
17."Killing Hope", p.349 ↩
forwarded by Edrene M
Think Progress / By Alex Seitz-Wald "10 Things Conservatives Don't Want You to Know About Reagan" AlterNet http://www.alternet.org/story/149812/10_things_conservatives_don%27t_want_you_to_know_about_reagan/ The image of Reagan as a conservative superhero is myth, created to unite the various factions of the right behind a common leader.
February 6, 2011 | Sign up to stay up to date on the latest headlines via email.
TAKE ACTIONPetitions by Change.org|Get Widget|Start a Petition � Sunday marked the 100th anniversary of President Reagan’s birth, and all week, conservatives tried to outdo each others’ remembrances of the great conservative icon. Senate Republicans spent much of Thursday singing Reagan’s praise from the Senate floor, while conservative publications have been running non-stop commemorations. Meanwhile, the Republican National Committee and former GOP House Speaker Newt Gingrich are hoping to make a few bucks off the Gipper’s centennial.
But Reagan was not the man conservatives claim he was. This image of Reagan as a conservative superhero is myth, created to unite the various factions of the right behind a common leader. In reality, Reagan was no conservative ideologue or flawless commander-in-chief. Reagan regularly strayed from conservative dogma — he raised taxes eleven times as president while tripling the deficit — and he often ended up on the wrong side of history, like when he vetoed an Anti-Apartheid bill.
ThinkProgress has compiled a list of the top 10 things conservatives rarely mention when talking about President Reagan:
1. Reagan was a serial tax raiser. As governor of California, Reagan “signed into law the largest tax increase in the history of any state up till then.” Meanwhile, state spending nearly doubled. As president, Reagan “raised taxes in seven of his eight years in office,” including four times in just two years. As former GOP Senator Alan Simpson, who called Reagan “a dear friend,” told NPR, “Ronald Reagan raised taxes 11 times in his administration — I was there.” “Reagan was never afraid to raise taxes,” said historian Douglas Brinkley, who edited Reagan’s memoir. Reagan the anti-tax zealot is “false mythology,” Brinkley said.
2. Reagan nearly tripled the federal budget deficit. During the Reagan years, the debt increased to nearly $3 trillion, “roughly three times as much as the first 80 years of the century had done altogether.” Reagan enacted a major tax cut his first year in office and government revenue dropped off precipitously. Despite the conservative myth that tax cuts somehow increase revenue, the government went deeper into debt and Reagan had to raise taxes just a year after he enacted his tax cut. Despite ten more tax hikes on everything from gasoline to corporate income, Reagan was never able to get the deficit under control.
3. Unemployment soared after Reagan’s 1981 tax cuts. Unemployment jumped to 10.8 percent after Reagan enacted his much-touted tax cut, and it took years for the rate to get back down to its previous level. Meanwhile, income inequality exploded. Despite the myth that Reagan presided over an era of unmatched economic boom for all Americans, Reagan disproportionately taxed the poor and middle class, but the economic growth of the 1980′s did little help them. “Since 1980, median household income has risen only 30 percent, adjusted for inflation, while average incomes at the top have tripled or quadrupled,” the New York Times’ David Leonhardt noted.
4. Reagan grew the size of the federal government tremendously. Reagan promised “to move boldly, decisively, and quickly to control the runaway growth of federal spending,” but federal spending “ballooned” under Reagan. He bailed out Social Security in 1983 after attempting to privatize it, and set up a progressive taxation system to keep it funded into the future. He promised to cut government agencies like the Department of Energy and Education but ended up adding one of the largest — the Department of Veterans’ Affairs, which today has a budget of nearly $90 billion and close to 300,000 employees. He also hiked defense spending by over $100 billion a year to a level not seen since the height of the Vietnam war.
Think Progress / By Alex Seitz-Wald 155 COMMENTS 10 Things Conservatives Don't Want You to Know About Reagan
The image of Reagan as a conservative superhero is myth, created to unite the various factions of the right behind a common leader.
Continued from previous page
Advertisement 5. Reagan did little to fight a woman’s right to choose. As governor of California in 1967, Reagan signed a bill to liberalize the state’s abortion laws that “resulted in more than a million abortions.” When Reagan ran for president, he advocated a constitutional amendment that would have prohibited all abortions except when necessary to save the life of the mother, but once in office, he “never seriously pursued” curbing choice.
6. Reagan was a “bellicose peacenik.” He wrote in his memoirs that “[m]y dream…became a world free of nuclear weapons.” “This vision stemmed from the president’s belief that the biblical account of Armageddon prophesied nuclear war — and that apocalypse could be averted if everyone, especially the Soviets, eliminated nuclear weapons,” the Washington Monthly noted. And Reagan’s military buildup was meant to crush the Soviet Union, but “also to put the United States in a stronger position from which to establish effective arms control” for the the entire world — a vision acted out by Regean’s vice president, George H.W. Bush, when he became president.
7. Reagan gave amnesty to 3 million undocumented immigrants. Reagan signed into law a bill that made any immigrant who had entered the country before 1982 eligible for amnesty. The bill was sold as a crackdown, but its tough sanctions on employers who hired undocumented immigrants were removed before final passage. The bill helped 3 million people and millions more family members gain American residency. It has since become a source of major embarrassment for conservatives.
8. Reagan illegally funneled weapons to Iran. Reagan and other senior U.S. officials secretly sold arms to officials in Iran, which was subject to a an arms embargo at the time, in exchange for American hostages. Some funds from the illegal arms sales also went to fund anti-Communist rebels in Nicaragua — something Congress had already prohibited the administration from doing. When the deals went public, the Iran-Contra Affair, as it came to be know, was an enormous political scandal that forced several senior administration officials to resign.
9. Reagan vetoed a comprehensive anti-Apartheid act. which placed sanctions on South Africa and cut off all American trade with the country. Reagan’s veto was overridden by the Republican-controlled Senate. Reagan responded by saying “I deeply regret that Congress has seen fit to override my veto,” saying that the law “will not solve the serious problems that plague that country.”
10. Reagan helped create the Taliban and Osama Bin Laden. Reagan fought a proxy war with the Soviet Union by training, arming, equipping, and funding Islamist mujahidin fighters in Afghanistan. Reagan funneled billions of dollars, along with top-secret intelligence and sophisticated weaponry to these fighters through the Pakistani intelligence service. The Talbian and Osama Bin Laden — a prominent mujahidin commander — emerged from these mujahidin groups Reagan helped create, and U.S. policy towards Pakistan remains strained because of the intelligence services’ close relations to these fighters. In fact, Reagan’s decision to continue the proxy war after the Soviets were willing to retreat played a direct role in Bin Laden’s ascendancy.
Conservatives seem to be in such denial about the less flattering aspects of Reagan; it sometimes appears as if they genuinely don’t know the truth of his legacy. When liberal activist Mike Stark challenged hate radio host Rush Limbaugh on why Reagan remains a conservative hero despite raising taxes so many times, Limbaugh flew into a tirade and demanded, “Where did you get this silly notion that Reagan raised taxes?“
See also: Gene Lyons, "A Fitting Celebration," ADG (2-10-11) on Reagan exposed on Limbaugh's program by Mike Stark.
Alexander Cockburn, "Dishonoring Reagan," The Nation 2-28-11). "Dishonours" Reagan by "listing his infamies." (Brief, limited list.)
Final comment by Dick: We who imagine a nonviolent world and the nonviolent path to it, must for awhile put aside our pleasant diversions, just as we would were the planet invaded by a great plague,, for the proponents of US violence and aggressive wars are strong and more damaging to our democracy and freedom even than the Nazis, Fascists, and Japanese militarists, because our own leaders have imitated those enemies and have so militarized our nation that the public accepts longer and longer more frequent wars of aggression and larger and larger numbers of killed. World War III from within.
Addendum:
Dick's Articles
William Blum's Essay
Alex Seitz-Wald Essay, Reagan no Conservative Super-Hero
Gene Lyons 2-10-11
Eric Alterman 3-2-11
Preparing for Ronald Reagan's centenary, you're going to hear a lot of disinformation. Mr. Blum knows what he is talking about. During the 80s I was a Reagan watcher and wrote several articles about Reagan.
"Page One, Sensationalism, and the Libyan 'Hit Team'." Newspaper Research Journal 4 (Fall 1982).
"Oceania and the United States in 1984: The Selling of the Soviet Threat." Social Theory and Practice 10 (Fall 1984).
"Out of Disaster a Pep Talk." Quarterly Rreview of Doublespeak 12.1 (October 1985).
"Doublethink and the Rhetoric of Crisis: President Reagan's October 22, 1983, Speech on Arms 'Reduction'." Kneupper, ed., Oldspeak/Newspeak (1985.
"President Reagan's Panegyric for the Marines Killed in Lebanon." North Dakota Quarterly 55.6 (Spring 1987).
"Censorship by the Reagan Administration." Index on Censorship 17.7 (August 1988).
Dick
The Anti-Empire Report
January 1st, 2011
by William Blum
www.killinghope.org
Preparing for the propaganda onslaught
February 6 will mark the centenary of the birth of Ronald Reagan, president of the United States from 1981 to 1989. The conservatives have wasted no time in starting the show. On New Year's Day a 55-foot long, 26-foot high float honoring Reagan was part of the annual Rose Parade in Pasadena, California. To help you cope with, hopefully even counter, the misinformation and the omissions that are going to swamp the media for the next few months, here is some basic information about the great man's splendid achievements, first in foreign policy:
Nicaragua
For eight terribly long years the people of Nicaragua were under attack by Ronald Reagan's proxy army, the Contras. It was all-out war from Washington, aiming to destroy the progressive social and economic programs of the Sandinista government — burning down schools and medical clinics, mining harbors, bombing and strafing, raping and torturing. These Contras were the charming gentlemen Reagan called "freedom fighters" and the "moral equivalent of our founding fathers". [Dick: All of it violated the US Constitution, UN Charter, and other conventions and treaties.]
El Salvador
Salvador's dissidents tried to work within the system. But with US support, the government made that impossible, using repeated electoral fraud and murdering hundreds of protestors and strikers. When the dissidents took to the gun and civil war, the Carter administration and then even more so, the Reagan administration, responded with unlimited money, military aid, and training in support of the government and its death squads and torture, the latter with the help of CIA torture manuals. US military and CIA personnel played an active role on a continuous basis. The result was 75,000 civilian deaths; meaningful social change thwarted; a handful of the wealthy still owned the country; the poor remained as ever; dissidents still had to fear right-wing death squads; there was to be no profound social change in El Salvador while Ronnie sat in the White House with Nancy.
Guatemala
In 1954, a CIA-organized coup [under Eisenhower] overthrew the democratically-elected and progressive government of Jacobo Arbenz, initiating 40 years of military-government death squads, torture, disappearances, mass executions, and unimaginable cruelty, totaling more than 200,000 victims — indisputably one of the most inhumane chapters of the 20th century. For eight of those years the Reagan administration played a major role.
Perhaps the worst of the military dictators was General EfraÃn RÃos Montt, who carried out a near-holocaust against the indians and peasants, for which he was widely condemned in the world. In December 1982, Reagan went to visit the Guatemalan dictator. At a press conference of the two men, RÃos Montt was asked about the Guatemalan policy of scorched earth. He replied "We do not have a policy of scorched earth. We have a policy of scorched communists." After the meeting, referring to the allegations of extensive human-rights abuses, Reagan declared that RÃos Montt was getting "a bad deal" from the media. [Montt's military officers were trained at the School of Americas, Fort Benning, as were the El Salvadoran officers.]
Grenada
Reagan invaded this tiny country in October 1983, an invasion totally illegal and immoral, and surrounded by lies (such as "endangered" American medical students). The invasion put into power individuals more beholden to US foreign policy objectives.
Afghanistan
After the Carter administration provoked a Soviet invasion, Reagan came to power to support the Islamic fundamentalists in their war to eject the Soviets and the secular government, which honored women's rights. In the end, the United States and the fundamentalists "won", women's rights and the rest of Afghanistan lost. More than a million dead, three million disabled, five million refugees; in total about half the population. And many thousands of anti-American Islamic fundamentalists, trained and armed by the US, on the loose to terrorize the world, to this day.
"To watch the courageous Afghan freedom fighters battle modern arsenals with simple hand-held weapons is an inspiration to those who love freedom," declared Reagan. "Their courage teaches us a great lesson — that there are things in this world worth defending. To the Afghan people, I say on behalf of all Americans that we admire your heroism, your devotion to freedom, and your relentless struggle against your oppressors." 12
The Cold War
As to Reagan's alleged role in ending the Cold War ... pure fiction. He prolonged it. Read the story in one of my books. 13
Some other examples of the remarkable amorality of Ronald Wilson Reagan and the feel-good heartlessness of his administration:
Reagan, in his famous 1964 speech, "A Time for Choosing", which lifted him to national political status: "We were told four years ago that 17 million people went to bed hungry each night. Well, that was probably true. They were all on a diet."
"Undermining health, safety and environmental regulation. Reagan decreed such rules must be subjected to regulatory impact analysis — corporate-biased cost-benefit analyses, carried out by the Office of Management and Budget. The result: countless positive regulations discarded or revised based on pseudo-scientific conclusions that the cost to corporations would be greater than the public benefit."
"Kick-starting the era of structural adjustment. It was under Reagan administration influence that the International Monetary Fund and World Bank began widely imposing the policy package known as structural adjustment — featuring deregulation, privatization, emphasis on exports, cuts in social spending — that has plunged country after country in the developing world into economic destitution. The IMF chief at the time was honest about what was to come, saying in 1981 that, for low-income countries, 'adjustment is particularly costly in human terms'."
"Silence on the AIDS epidemic. Reagan didn't mention AIDS publicly until 1987, by which point AIDS had killed 19,000 in the United States."
– Russell Mokhiber and Robert Weissman 14
"Reagan's election changed the political reality. His agenda was rolling back the welfare state, and his budgets included a wide range of cuts for social programs. He was also very strategic about the process. One of his first targets was Legal Aid. This program, which provides legal services for low-income people, was staffed largely by progressive lawyers, many of whom used it as a base to win precedent-setting legal disputes against the government. Reagan drastically cut back the program's funding. He also explicitly prohibited the agency from taking on class-action suits against the government — law suits that had been used with considerable success to expand the rights of low- and moderate-income families."
"The Reagan administration also made weakening the power of unions a top priority. The people he appointed to the National Labor Relations Board were qualitatively more pro-management than appointees by prior Democratic or Republican presidents. This allowed companies to ignore workers' rights with impunity. Reagan also made the firing of strikers an acceptable business practice when he fired striking air traffic controllers in 1981. Many large corporations quickly embraced the practice. ... The net effect of these policies was that union membership plummeted, going from nearly 20 percent of the private sector workforce in 1980 to just over 7 percent in 2006. "
– Dean Baker 15
Reaganomics: a tax policy based on a notion of incentives which says that "the rich aren't working because they have too little money, while the poor aren't working because they have too much."
– John Kenneth Galbraith
"According to the nostrums of Reagan Age America, the current Chinese system — in equal measure capitalist and authoritarian — cannot actually exist. Capitalism spread democracy, we were told ad nauseam by a steady stream of conservative hacks, free-trade apologists, government officials and American companies doing business in China. Given enough Starbuckses and McDonald's, provided with sufficient consumer choice, China would surely become a democracy."
– Harold Meyerson 16
Throughout the early and mid-1980s, the Reagan administration declared that the Russians were spraying toxic chemicals over Laos, Cambodia and Afghanistan — the so-called "yellow rain" — and had caused more than ten thousand deaths by 1982 alone, (including, in Afghanistan, 3,042 deaths attributed to 47 separate incidents between the summer of 1979 and the summer of 1981, so precise was the information). President Reagan himself denounced the Soviet Union thusly more than 15 times in documents and speeches. The "yellow rain", it turned out, was pollen-laden feces dropped by huge swarms of honeybees flying far overhead. 17
Reagan's long-drawn-out statements re: Contragate (the scandal involving the covert sale of weapons to Iran to enable Reaganites to continue financing the Contras in the war against the Nicaraguan government after the US Congress cut off funding for the Contras) can be summarized as follows:
I didn't know what was happening.
If I did know, I didn't know enough.
If I knew enough, I didn't know it in time.
If I knew it in time, it wasn't illegal.
If it was illegal, the law didn't apply to me.
If the law applied to me, I didn't know what was happening.
12.March 21, 1983, in the White House ↩
13."Killing Hope: US Military and CIA Interventions Since World War II", p.17-18. Also for the five countries listed above, see the respective chapters in this book. ↩
14.June, 2004; Mokhiber is editor of Corporate Crime Reporter; Weissman, editor of the Multinational Monitor, both in Washington, D.C. ↩
15.April, 2007; Baker is Co-Director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research, Washington, DC ↩
16.Washington Post columnist, June 3, 2009 ↩
17."Killing Hope", p.349 ↩
forwarded by Edrene M
Think Progress / By Alex Seitz-Wald "10 Things Conservatives Don't Want You to Know About Reagan" AlterNet http://www.alternet.org/story/149812/10_things_conservatives_don%27t_want_you_to_know_about_reagan/ The image of Reagan as a conservative superhero is myth, created to unite the various factions of the right behind a common leader.
February 6, 2011 | Sign up to stay up to date on the latest headlines via email.
TAKE ACTIONPetitions by Change.org|Get Widget|Start a Petition � Sunday marked the 100th anniversary of President Reagan’s birth, and all week, conservatives tried to outdo each others’ remembrances of the great conservative icon. Senate Republicans spent much of Thursday singing Reagan’s praise from the Senate floor, while conservative publications have been running non-stop commemorations. Meanwhile, the Republican National Committee and former GOP House Speaker Newt Gingrich are hoping to make a few bucks off the Gipper’s centennial.
But Reagan was not the man conservatives claim he was. This image of Reagan as a conservative superhero is myth, created to unite the various factions of the right behind a common leader. In reality, Reagan was no conservative ideologue or flawless commander-in-chief. Reagan regularly strayed from conservative dogma — he raised taxes eleven times as president while tripling the deficit — and he often ended up on the wrong side of history, like when he vetoed an Anti-Apartheid bill.
ThinkProgress has compiled a list of the top 10 things conservatives rarely mention when talking about President Reagan:
1. Reagan was a serial tax raiser. As governor of California, Reagan “signed into law the largest tax increase in the history of any state up till then.” Meanwhile, state spending nearly doubled. As president, Reagan “raised taxes in seven of his eight years in office,” including four times in just two years. As former GOP Senator Alan Simpson, who called Reagan “a dear friend,” told NPR, “Ronald Reagan raised taxes 11 times in his administration — I was there.” “Reagan was never afraid to raise taxes,” said historian Douglas Brinkley, who edited Reagan’s memoir. Reagan the anti-tax zealot is “false mythology,” Brinkley said.
2. Reagan nearly tripled the federal budget deficit. During the Reagan years, the debt increased to nearly $3 trillion, “roughly three times as much as the first 80 years of the century had done altogether.” Reagan enacted a major tax cut his first year in office and government revenue dropped off precipitously. Despite the conservative myth that tax cuts somehow increase revenue, the government went deeper into debt and Reagan had to raise taxes just a year after he enacted his tax cut. Despite ten more tax hikes on everything from gasoline to corporate income, Reagan was never able to get the deficit under control.
3. Unemployment soared after Reagan’s 1981 tax cuts. Unemployment jumped to 10.8 percent after Reagan enacted his much-touted tax cut, and it took years for the rate to get back down to its previous level. Meanwhile, income inequality exploded. Despite the myth that Reagan presided over an era of unmatched economic boom for all Americans, Reagan disproportionately taxed the poor and middle class, but the economic growth of the 1980′s did little help them. “Since 1980, median household income has risen only 30 percent, adjusted for inflation, while average incomes at the top have tripled or quadrupled,” the New York Times’ David Leonhardt noted.
4. Reagan grew the size of the federal government tremendously. Reagan promised “to move boldly, decisively, and quickly to control the runaway growth of federal spending,” but federal spending “ballooned” under Reagan. He bailed out Social Security in 1983 after attempting to privatize it, and set up a progressive taxation system to keep it funded into the future. He promised to cut government agencies like the Department of Energy and Education but ended up adding one of the largest — the Department of Veterans’ Affairs, which today has a budget of nearly $90 billion and close to 300,000 employees. He also hiked defense spending by over $100 billion a year to a level not seen since the height of the Vietnam war.
Think Progress / By Alex Seitz-Wald 155 COMMENTS 10 Things Conservatives Don't Want You to Know About Reagan
The image of Reagan as a conservative superhero is myth, created to unite the various factions of the right behind a common leader.
Continued from previous page
Advertisement 5. Reagan did little to fight a woman’s right to choose. As governor of California in 1967, Reagan signed a bill to liberalize the state’s abortion laws that “resulted in more than a million abortions.” When Reagan ran for president, he advocated a constitutional amendment that would have prohibited all abortions except when necessary to save the life of the mother, but once in office, he “never seriously pursued” curbing choice.
6. Reagan was a “bellicose peacenik.” He wrote in his memoirs that “[m]y dream…became a world free of nuclear weapons.” “This vision stemmed from the president’s belief that the biblical account of Armageddon prophesied nuclear war — and that apocalypse could be averted if everyone, especially the Soviets, eliminated nuclear weapons,” the Washington Monthly noted. And Reagan’s military buildup was meant to crush the Soviet Union, but “also to put the United States in a stronger position from which to establish effective arms control” for the the entire world — a vision acted out by Regean’s vice president, George H.W. Bush, when he became president.
7. Reagan gave amnesty to 3 million undocumented immigrants. Reagan signed into law a bill that made any immigrant who had entered the country before 1982 eligible for amnesty. The bill was sold as a crackdown, but its tough sanctions on employers who hired undocumented immigrants were removed before final passage. The bill helped 3 million people and millions more family members gain American residency. It has since become a source of major embarrassment for conservatives.
8. Reagan illegally funneled weapons to Iran. Reagan and other senior U.S. officials secretly sold arms to officials in Iran, which was subject to a an arms embargo at the time, in exchange for American hostages. Some funds from the illegal arms sales also went to fund anti-Communist rebels in Nicaragua — something Congress had already prohibited the administration from doing. When the deals went public, the Iran-Contra Affair, as it came to be know, was an enormous political scandal that forced several senior administration officials to resign.
9. Reagan vetoed a comprehensive anti-Apartheid act. which placed sanctions on South Africa and cut off all American trade with the country. Reagan’s veto was overridden by the Republican-controlled Senate. Reagan responded by saying “I deeply regret that Congress has seen fit to override my veto,” saying that the law “will not solve the serious problems that plague that country.”
10. Reagan helped create the Taliban and Osama Bin Laden. Reagan fought a proxy war with the Soviet Union by training, arming, equipping, and funding Islamist mujahidin fighters in Afghanistan. Reagan funneled billions of dollars, along with top-secret intelligence and sophisticated weaponry to these fighters through the Pakistani intelligence service. The Talbian and Osama Bin Laden — a prominent mujahidin commander — emerged from these mujahidin groups Reagan helped create, and U.S. policy towards Pakistan remains strained because of the intelligence services’ close relations to these fighters. In fact, Reagan’s decision to continue the proxy war after the Soviets were willing to retreat played a direct role in Bin Laden’s ascendancy.
Conservatives seem to be in such denial about the less flattering aspects of Reagan; it sometimes appears as if they genuinely don’t know the truth of his legacy. When liberal activist Mike Stark challenged hate radio host Rush Limbaugh on why Reagan remains a conservative hero despite raising taxes so many times, Limbaugh flew into a tirade and demanded, “Where did you get this silly notion that Reagan raised taxes?“
See also: Gene Lyons, "A Fitting Celebration," ADG (2-10-11) on Reagan exposed on Limbaugh's program by Mike Stark.
Alexander Cockburn, "Dishonoring Reagan," The Nation 2-28-11). "Dishonours" Reagan by "listing his infamies." (Brief, limited list.)
Final comment by Dick: We who imagine a nonviolent world and the nonviolent path to it, must for awhile put aside our pleasant diversions, just as we would were the planet invaded by a great plague,, for the proponents of US violence and aggressive wars are strong and more damaging to our democracy and freedom even than the Nazis, Fascists, and Japanese militarists, because our own leaders have imitated those enemies and have so militarized our nation that the public accepts longer and longer more frequent wars of aggression and larger and larger numbers of killed. World War III from within.
Addendum:
Search Results
Ronald Reagan Superstar. Eric Alterman. February 17, 2011 | This article appeared in the March 7-14, 2011 edition of The Nation. ...
www.thenation.com/article/158678/ronald-reagan-superstar - Cached
Ronald Reagan Superstar | The Nation
He is also "The Liberal Media" columnist for The Nation and a fellow of The ...
www.thenation.com/authors/eric-alterman - Cached
Eric Alterman | The Nation
WikiLeaks News #4
WIKILEAKS NEWS #4, January 1, 2011
The struggle for the transparency essential to a democracy and affirmation of the Bill of Rights are good platforms for opening this Blog on New Year’s Day 2011.
Contents
WikiLeaks and First Amendment
Robert Meeropol: Espionage Act Danger to Free Speech
Support for Manning, Assange, and Ethan McCord
Protesters Support Manning
Ray McGovern
From Rolling Stone: Petition, Twitter, Support Page
Glenn Greenwald on Corruption of Mainstream Journalism
Revelations of WikiLeaks 2010
Cables from WikiLeaks Reveal Truth about New York Times Report
Many Arab Officials Have Close CIA Links: Assange
WikiLeaking Covert Wars
Obama Protected Bush Aides
Israel in WikiLeaks
New Sedition Act Coming?
Lieberman Attacks New York Times
Interpol's Red Alert on Assange, and the US Attack on WikiLeaks
A Progressive’s Reservations
WIKILEAKS’ FIRST AMENDMENT RIGHTS
The ACLU, the Center for Constitutional Rights, the American Library Association and other groups have published an open letter to public officials opposing further government efforts to limit free speech in the wake of the WikiLeaks disclosures. The groups note that under Supreme Court rulings, publishers have a First Amendment right to print truthful political information free of prior restraint; publishers are protected by the First Amendment against liability for publishing truthful political information that is lawfully obtained, even if the original disclosure of that information to the publisher was unlawful; and Internet users have a First Amendment right to receive information.
https://mail.google.com/mail/?hl=en&shva=1#inbox/12d15314ec18af0e
Just Foreign Policy News on the Web:
http://www.justforeignpolicy.org/node/791
Robert Meeropol, “Why We Must Fight to Protect Julian Assange”
Robert Meeropol, Rosenberg Fund for Children
"The Espionage Act is a huge danger to our open society; it's been used to send hundreds of dissenters to jail just for voicing their opinions, transforming dissent into treason."
READ MORE https://mail.google.com/mail/?hl=en&shva=1#inbox/12d33a4b82411326
http://www.readersupportednews.org/
Support for Manning, Assange, and Ethan McCord
Please sign Bradley Manning petition to end torture. Support Whistleblowers. Support Truth-based Media.
https://mail.google.com/mail/?hl=en&shva=1#inbox/12d312a3cf3c9dab Demand Humane Treatment for WikiLeaks Whistleblower Bradley Manning
Forgetting Bradley Manning Click here to demand an end to Private Manning's torture and call on the Army to give him a trial or set him free.
Laura Flanders
Posted on December 16, 2010
Glen Greenwald On Julian Assange Release And Bradley Manning ...
Dec 16, 2010 ... Democracy NOW! DN! News - A High court in London has upheld a decision to grant bail to WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange.
onlinefreevideos.net/.../glen-greenwald-on-julian-assange-release-and-bradley-manning-democracy-now.html
Rally to Free Whistleblower Bradley Manning http://criminaljustice.change.org/blog/view/activists_rally_to_free_whistleblower_bradley_manning
Bradley Manning at Quantico, the New Gitmo
http://www.commondreams.org/video/2010/12/16-0
The Bradley Manning Defense Fund
The BBC: Wikileaks' Julian Assange tells of 'smear campaign' http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-12015140
Swedish State on Trial in Assange Case?
Remembering Why WikiLeaks Matters (Media) “The question of whether we want a real 'net is really the question of whether we want a real democracy.”
Ellsberg Calls Assange a Hero
http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2010/12/16-2
ETHAN MCCORD
Glen Ford, “Who Is the FBI Really Trying to Entrap?”
http://www.commondreams.org/view/2010/12/16-1
Below this message about Ethan McCord from WarIsaCrime.org and the message about Independent Media Network is the message from Santa.
When Wikileaks released a video called Collateral Murder earlier this year, one soldier was seen in the video rescuing injured children from a van that had been attacked by a U.S. helicopter. That soldier, Ethan McCord, spoke out against the incident of murder and the murderous war. He and another veteran, Josh Stieber, published an open letter of apology to the people of Iraq. Last summer peace activists were calling Ethan McCord the bravest man alive, and corporate newspapers were calling him a soldier for peace. Watch this speech he gave. Now Ethan McCord cannot pay his bills. The military doesn't even "support the troops" that keep quiet. There is little chance of it supporting Ethan. That's our job.
Do you appreciate what Ethan has done to expose the nature of our wars? Then please contribute directly to him. Every penny goes straight to Ethan: DONATE HERE.
Ethan McCord has also exposed more war crimes and even worse war crimes. http://warisacrime.org/content/videos-systematically-trained-abusive-soldiers
This is the kind of truth-telling that our government and our corporate media do not do. In fact, the government would like to criminalize it, and the corporate media would like to silence it. Wikileaks is only able to expose information when whistleblowers are willing to leak information or speak out. They must be rewarded.
Protesters at Beale Air Force Base Decry Treatment of Pfc. Bradley Manning
http://act.commondreams.org/go/3770?akid=326.126591.kK4Z0h&t=12
FROM ROLLING STONE
Petition
http://www.readersupportednews.org/off-site-news-section/368-wikileaks/4402-the-american-wikileaks-hacker
Also See:
WikiLeaks' Twitter Page: http://twitter.com/wikileaks
WikiLeaks' Support Page: http://wikileaks.ch/support.html
(CNN) Ex-CIA Ray McGovern Supports Wikileaks' Julian Assange http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MM_IdfPPmEY
Glenn Greenwald, “The Merger of Journalists and Government Officials,” Salon
Glenn Greenwald writes: "What an astounding feat to train a nation's journalist class to despise above all else those who shine a light on what the most powerful factions do in the dark and who expose their corruption and deceit, and to have journalists - of all people - lead the way in calling for the head of anyone who exposes the secrets of the powerful."
READ MORE https://mail.google.com/mail/?hl=en&shva=1#inbox/12d3862e6399f47e
“How WikiLeaks Enlightened Us in 2010”
Joshua Norman, CBS News
Joshua Norman writes: "WikiLeaks has brought to light a series of disturbing insinuations and startling truths in the last year, some earth-shattering, others simply confirmations of our darkest suspicions about the way the world works."
https://mail.google.com/mail/?hl=en&shva=1#inbox/12d3d9653b89d5ff
http://www.readersupportednews.org/
“Walk It Back Award: New York Times” [Thanks to WikiLeaks]
On November 29, the New York Times published an explosive piece based on the WikiLeaks diplomatic cables. "Iran Fortifies Its Missiles With the Aid of North Korea" was the headline, and the piece stated that Iran now possesses powerful missiles with "the capacity to strike at capitals in Western Europe." The Times declined to publish the cable that made this case "at the request of the Obama administration," but the cable was on the WikiLeaks website--and provided ample grounds to be skeptical about the Times' definitive conclusion. (It's not clear, it turns out, that the kind of missile Iran supposedly bought from North Korea even exists.) After critiques were published by FAIR and others, the Times published a follow-up (12/3/10), "Wider Window Into Iran's Missile Capabilities Offers a Murkier View." The piece suggested that "a review of a dozen other State Department cables" and interviews "with American government officials offer a murkier picture of Iran's missile capabilities." But that "murky view" should have been obvious from the start. The Times' first account was taken as fact in countless media outlets; their quiet follow up wasn't a correction, but it should have been. (From FAIR’s “2010 P.U.-litzer Prizes”)
https://mail.google.com/mail/?hl=en&shva=1#inbox/12d383b0ddb1874d
“Many Arab Officials Have Close CIA Links: Assange”
http://act.commondreams.org/go/3765?akid=326.126591.kK4Z0h&t=2
WikiLeaking Covert Wars (Internet and New Media, Covert Ops, War on Terrorism) The latest WikiLeaks dump has corroborated, in part, what sources recently told The Nation about covert military actions in over seventy-five countries.
https://mail.google.com/mail/?hl=en&shva=1#inbox/12d3cc2a5955abca
“WikiLeaks: How ObamaProtected the Bush Administration”
Carol Rosenberg, The Miami Herald (from Reader Supported News)
Carol Rosenberg reports: "It was three months into Barack Obama's presidency, and the administration - under pressure to do something about alleged abuses in Bush-era interrogation policies - turned to a Florida senator to deliver a sensitive message to Spain: Don't indict former President George W. Bush's legal brain trust for alleged torture in the treatment of war on terror detainees, warned Mel Martinez on one of his frequent trips to Madrid. Doing so would chill US-Spanish relations."
READ MORE https://mail.google.com/mail/?hl=en&shva=1#inbox/12d2e3075fd2cd21
Bob Barr, “WikiLeaks May Spawn New Sedition Act”
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution Bob Barr writes: "If the congressional critics of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange have their way, a new and revised version of the Sedition Act may be in the offing."
READ MORE https://mail.google.com/mail/?hl=en&shva=1#inbox/12d29321d122de44
http://www.readersupportednews.org/
Lieberman Attacks New York Times Over WikiLeaks Documents: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/dec/07/wikileaks-joe-lieberman-new-york-times-investigated
“Something is Rotten: The Strange Case of Interpol's Red Alert on Assange, and the US Attack on WikiLeaks
Fri, 12/10/2010 - 14:56 — lindorff http://www.thiscantbehappening.net/node/337
WIKILEAKS ON ISRAEL (from Just Foreign Policy News on the Web)
WikiLeaks says it will publish hundreds of "sensitive" US diplomatic cables on Israel, AFP reports. "Sensitive and classified documents" on Israel's 2006 war on Lebanon and January's assassination in Dubai of Hamas militant Mahmud al-Mabhuh would be released, Julian Assange told Al-Jazeera.
https://mail.google.com/mail/?hl=en&shva=1#inbox/12d15314ec18af0e
Just Foreign Policy News on the Web:
http://www.justforeignpolicy.org/node/791
A PROGRESSIVE’S RESERVATIONS
In These Times regular columnist Susan Douglas in “WikiLeaks: The TMZ of Global Politics” wonders about Assange’s motives in revealing so much under Obama’s admin. and condemns the mix of significant information needed by citizens and mere gossip.
The struggle for the transparency essential to a democracy and affirmation of the Bill of Rights are good platforms for opening this Blog on New Year’s Day 2011.
Contents
WikiLeaks and First Amendment
Robert Meeropol: Espionage Act Danger to Free Speech
Support for Manning, Assange, and Ethan McCord
Protesters Support Manning
Ray McGovern
From Rolling Stone: Petition, Twitter, Support Page
Glenn Greenwald on Corruption of Mainstream Journalism
Revelations of WikiLeaks 2010
Cables from WikiLeaks Reveal Truth about New York Times Report
Many Arab Officials Have Close CIA Links: Assange
WikiLeaking Covert Wars
Obama Protected Bush Aides
Israel in WikiLeaks
New Sedition Act Coming?
Lieberman Attacks New York Times
Interpol's Red Alert on Assange, and the US Attack on WikiLeaks
A Progressive’s Reservations
WIKILEAKS’ FIRST AMENDMENT RIGHTS
The ACLU, the Center for Constitutional Rights, the American Library Association and other groups have published an open letter to public officials opposing further government efforts to limit free speech in the wake of the WikiLeaks disclosures. The groups note that under Supreme Court rulings, publishers have a First Amendment right to print truthful political information free of prior restraint; publishers are protected by the First Amendment against liability for publishing truthful political information that is lawfully obtained, even if the original disclosure of that information to the publisher was unlawful; and Internet users have a First Amendment right to receive information.
https://mail.google.com/mail/?hl=en&shva=1#inbox/12d15314ec18af0e
Just Foreign Policy News on the Web:
http://www.justforeignpolicy.org/node/791
Robert Meeropol, “Why We Must Fight to Protect Julian Assange”
Robert Meeropol, Rosenberg Fund for Children
"The Espionage Act is a huge danger to our open society; it's been used to send hundreds of dissenters to jail just for voicing their opinions, transforming dissent into treason."
READ MORE https://mail.google.com/mail/?hl=en&shva=1#inbox/12d33a4b82411326
http://www.readersupportednews.org/
Support for Manning, Assange, and Ethan McCord
Please sign Bradley Manning petition to end torture. Support Whistleblowers. Support Truth-based Media.
https://mail.google.com/mail/?hl=en&shva=1#inbox/12d312a3cf3c9dab Demand Humane Treatment for WikiLeaks Whistleblower Bradley Manning
Forgetting Bradley Manning Click here to demand an end to Private Manning's torture and call on the Army to give him a trial or set him free.
Laura Flanders
Posted on December 16, 2010
Glen Greenwald On Julian Assange Release And Bradley Manning ...
Dec 16, 2010 ... Democracy NOW! DN! News - A High court in London has upheld a decision to grant bail to WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange.
onlinefreevideos.net/.../glen-greenwald-on-julian-assange-release-and-bradley-manning-democracy-now.html
Rally to Free Whistleblower Bradley Manning http://criminaljustice.change.org/blog/view/activists_rally_to_free_whistleblower_bradley_manning
Bradley Manning at Quantico, the New Gitmo
http://www.commondreams.org/video/2010/12/16-0
The Bradley Manning Defense Fund
The BBC: Wikileaks' Julian Assange tells of 'smear campaign' http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-12015140
Swedish State on Trial in Assange Case?
Remembering Why WikiLeaks Matters (Media) “The question of whether we want a real 'net is really the question of whether we want a real democracy.”
Ellsberg Calls Assange a Hero
http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2010/12/16-2
ETHAN MCCORD
Glen Ford, “Who Is the FBI Really Trying to Entrap?”
http://www.commondreams.org/view/2010/12/16-1
Below this message about Ethan McCord from WarIsaCrime.org and the message about Independent Media Network is the message from Santa.
When Wikileaks released a video called Collateral Murder earlier this year, one soldier was seen in the video rescuing injured children from a van that had been attacked by a U.S. helicopter. That soldier, Ethan McCord, spoke out against the incident of murder and the murderous war. He and another veteran, Josh Stieber, published an open letter of apology to the people of Iraq. Last summer peace activists were calling Ethan McCord the bravest man alive, and corporate newspapers were calling him a soldier for peace. Watch this speech he gave. Now Ethan McCord cannot pay his bills. The military doesn't even "support the troops" that keep quiet. There is little chance of it supporting Ethan. That's our job.
Do you appreciate what Ethan has done to expose the nature of our wars? Then please contribute directly to him. Every penny goes straight to Ethan: DONATE HERE.
Ethan McCord has also exposed more war crimes and even worse war crimes. http://warisacrime.org/content/videos-systematically-trained-abusive-soldiers
This is the kind of truth-telling that our government and our corporate media do not do. In fact, the government would like to criminalize it, and the corporate media would like to silence it. Wikileaks is only able to expose information when whistleblowers are willing to leak information or speak out. They must be rewarded.
Protesters at Beale Air Force Base Decry Treatment of Pfc. Bradley Manning
http://act.commondreams.org/go/3770?akid=326.126591.kK4Z0h&t=12
FROM ROLLING STONE
Petition
http://www.readersupportednews.org/off-site-news-section/368-wikileaks/4402-the-american-wikileaks-hacker
Also See:
WikiLeaks' Twitter Page: http://twitter.com/wikileaks
WikiLeaks' Support Page: http://wikileaks.ch/support.html
(CNN) Ex-CIA Ray McGovern Supports Wikileaks' Julian Assange http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MM_IdfPPmEY
Glenn Greenwald, “The Merger of Journalists and Government Officials,” Salon
Glenn Greenwald writes: "What an astounding feat to train a nation's journalist class to despise above all else those who shine a light on what the most powerful factions do in the dark and who expose their corruption and deceit, and to have journalists - of all people - lead the way in calling for the head of anyone who exposes the secrets of the powerful."
READ MORE https://mail.google.com/mail/?hl=en&shva=1#inbox/12d3862e6399f47e
“How WikiLeaks Enlightened Us in 2010”
Joshua Norman, CBS News
Joshua Norman writes: "WikiLeaks has brought to light a series of disturbing insinuations and startling truths in the last year, some earth-shattering, others simply confirmations of our darkest suspicions about the way the world works."
https://mail.google.com/mail/?hl=en&shva=1#inbox/12d3d9653b89d5ff
http://www.readersupportednews.org/
“Walk It Back Award: New York Times” [Thanks to WikiLeaks]
On November 29, the New York Times published an explosive piece based on the WikiLeaks diplomatic cables. "Iran Fortifies Its Missiles With the Aid of North Korea" was the headline, and the piece stated that Iran now possesses powerful missiles with "the capacity to strike at capitals in Western Europe." The Times declined to publish the cable that made this case "at the request of the Obama administration," but the cable was on the WikiLeaks website--and provided ample grounds to be skeptical about the Times' definitive conclusion. (It's not clear, it turns out, that the kind of missile Iran supposedly bought from North Korea even exists.) After critiques were published by FAIR and others, the Times published a follow-up (12/3/10), "Wider Window Into Iran's Missile Capabilities Offers a Murkier View." The piece suggested that "a review of a dozen other State Department cables" and interviews "with American government officials offer a murkier picture of Iran's missile capabilities." But that "murky view" should have been obvious from the start. The Times' first account was taken as fact in countless media outlets; their quiet follow up wasn't a correction, but it should have been. (From FAIR’s “2010 P.U.-litzer Prizes”)
https://mail.google.com/mail/?hl=en&shva=1#inbox/12d383b0ddb1874d
“Many Arab Officials Have Close CIA Links: Assange”
http://act.commondreams.org/go/3765?akid=326.126591.kK4Z0h&t=2
WikiLeaking Covert Wars (Internet and New Media, Covert Ops, War on Terrorism) The latest WikiLeaks dump has corroborated, in part, what sources recently told The Nation about covert military actions in over seventy-five countries.
https://mail.google.com/mail/?hl=en&shva=1#inbox/12d3cc2a5955abca
“WikiLeaks: How ObamaProtected the Bush Administration”
Carol Rosenberg, The Miami Herald (from Reader Supported News)
Carol Rosenberg reports: "It was three months into Barack Obama's presidency, and the administration - under pressure to do something about alleged abuses in Bush-era interrogation policies - turned to a Florida senator to deliver a sensitive message to Spain: Don't indict former President George W. Bush's legal brain trust for alleged torture in the treatment of war on terror detainees, warned Mel Martinez on one of his frequent trips to Madrid. Doing so would chill US-Spanish relations."
READ MORE https://mail.google.com/mail/?hl=en&shva=1#inbox/12d2e3075fd2cd21
Bob Barr, “WikiLeaks May Spawn New Sedition Act”
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution Bob Barr writes: "If the congressional critics of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange have their way, a new and revised version of the Sedition Act may be in the offing."
READ MORE https://mail.google.com/mail/?hl=en&shva=1#inbox/12d29321d122de44
http://www.readersupportednews.org/
Lieberman Attacks New York Times Over WikiLeaks Documents: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/dec/07/wikileaks-joe-lieberman-new-york-times-investigated
“Something is Rotten: The Strange Case of Interpol's Red Alert on Assange, and the US Attack on WikiLeaks
Fri, 12/10/2010 - 14:56 — lindorff http://www.thiscantbehappening.net/node/337
WIKILEAKS ON ISRAEL (from Just Foreign Policy News on the Web)
WikiLeaks says it will publish hundreds of "sensitive" US diplomatic cables on Israel, AFP reports. "Sensitive and classified documents" on Israel's 2006 war on Lebanon and January's assassination in Dubai of Hamas militant Mahmud al-Mabhuh would be released, Julian Assange told Al-Jazeera.
https://mail.google.com/mail/?hl=en&shva=1#inbox/12d15314ec18af0e
Just Foreign Policy News on the Web:
http://www.justforeignpolicy.org/node/791
A PROGRESSIVE’S RESERVATIONS
In These Times regular columnist Susan Douglas in “WikiLeaks: The TMZ of Global Politics” wonders about Assange’s motives in revealing so much under Obama’s admin. and condemns the mix of significant information needed by citizens and mere gossip.
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