UNDERNEWS OCT 24
Carol
Oct 24, 2002
From the Progressive Review:
Inside the Beltway, Out of the Loop, Ahead of the Curve
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WORD
JURY: A group of 12 people, who, having lied to the judge about their
health, hearing, and business engagements, have failed to fool him. - HL
MENCKEN
IRAQ
OLIVER BURKEMAN, GUARDIAN, LONDON - The Pentagon could be forced
to rewrite its timetable for an attack on Iraq, slowing down the build-up
of American troops and equipment in the Gulf region if the deadlock at the
United Nations over weapons inspections is not broken soon. Though the
defense department refuses to acknowledge publicly that troops in the region
are being readied for an invasion, soldiers and military gear have been
flooding
in to neighboring states for weeks. But now the strategists are rethinking
their plans. They need to avoid tying up tens of thousands of US troops
while they wait for the completion of a weapons inspections process in Iraq,
which - even after an agreement is reached at the UN - could last more than
three months. . . Russia, France and China remain implacable in their
opposition to a redrafted US resolution that threatens Saddam Hussein with
"serious consequences" if he resists UN weapons inspections and twice
accuses him of being in "material breach" of earlier resolutions - language
which they say implicitly authorizes George Bush to use military force
without returning to the security council.
Igor Ivanov, the Russian foreign minister, told reporters in Moscow that
"the American draft resolution does not answer the criteria which the
Russian side laid out earlier and which it confirms today." The UN delay,
when added to the estimated 105-day period that the inspectors would need to
do their work and report, threatens to frustrate the Pentagon's preference
for a January invasion.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,3604,817744,00.html
JAMES M. O'NEILL KNIGHT RIDDER - College campuses, which served as key
incubators for the antiwar protests of previous decades, are spawning a new
generation of activists opposed to a U.S. attack on Iraq. But unlike their
counterparts in the Vietnam era, whose opposition grew slowly over the
1960s, today's antiwar activists, using cell phones and the Internet, are
moving almost as quickly as President Bush. From a petition-signing campaign
at Haverford College and forums at St. Joseph's University to the University
of Pennsylvania and Temple University students arrested after a recent
sit-in at Sen. Rick Santorum's Philadelphia offices, engaged students and
faculty are prodding worried classmates to speak out in opposition to
military action. . . Today's students have tools their Vietnam-era
counterparts never dreamed of: Swarthmore students started a flashy Web site
called Why War?, while University of Pennsylvania activists recently
brandished cell phones on Locust Walk to let fellow students make calls of
protest to members of Congress. . .
Steven Hood, a politics professor at Ursinus College, said the Iraq
situation was permeating classroom debate. "There's not a day that we don't
discuss it," he said. "It's very much a hot topic." Some students have even
asked if essay assignments could be tweaked to include discussion of Islam.
THE NEW HAVEN BOARD OF ALDERMEN has passed a resolution opposing
military intervention in Iraq. The resolution was submitted by Green Party
Alderman John Halle and passed by a margin of 24 to 2 with one abstention.
The passage of the resolution has special significance because New Haven
is the home city of one of the leading supporters of military intervention,
Joseph Lieberman. New Haven is also the birthplace of President George
W. Bush.
AMERICAN GULF WAR VETERANS ASSOCIATION - Recent stories from
CNN and the Air Force Times reveal a "new" weapon to be used by our
military for "crowd control." The fact is that the military never tells about
new weaponry until it has been field tested and found to be affective.
Micro-wave technology has been around for years and it is well known
that it can be deadly if focused into a beam. Has it already been used?
Please look carefully at the photos of unfortunate Iraqis who were killed
during the Gulf War [See link below] They were provided to the American
Gulf War Veterans Association by a vet who had to smuggle them out of Iraq.
Ask yourself: How does one burn a body beyond recognition and leave the
clothing intact and not even singed? If this is the result of some new
microwave technology, is it really non-lethal, or can it be used in some
other
non-disclosed application? Were there other new weapon technologies that
were "field tested" during the Gulf War that have been yet to be disclosed
to the American public?
IRAQ PHOTOS
http://prorev.com/indexa.htm
AMERICAN GULF WAR VETERANS ASS
http://www.gulfwarvets.com/mission.htm
SLEEP WELL TONIGHT:
DAN QUAYLE IS ON THE CASE
O'DWYER'S PR - Former Vice President Dan Quayle is scouting for homeland
security contract opportunities for Cerberus Capital Partners. The New York
investment company, with $8.5 billion in assets under management, has
retained Phoenix-based Quayle & Assocs. to build relationships with several
federal agencies, and to identify work that may be available for companies
that CCP has made investment stakes in. The firm recently closed investment
deals with Anchor Glass, Peregrine Systems, Teleglobe and Wamnet. Q&A is
specifically charged with looking for opportunities in the White House
Office of Homeland Security, Energy Dept., Commerce Dept. and Federal
Emergency Management Agency. Quayle runs his firm with wife, Marilyn.
Craig Whitney is its executive VP.
http://www.odwyerpr.com/1021quayle.htm
BRAVE NEW WORLD
JULIA SCHEERES, WIRED - A surprise decision by the Food and Drug
Administration permits the use of implantable ID chips in humans, despite an
FDA investigator's recent public reservations about the devices. The FDA
sent chip manufacturer Applied Digital Solutions a letter stating that the
agency would not regulate the Verichip if it was used for "security,
financial and personal identification or safety applications," ADS said. But
the FDA has not determined whether the controversial chip can be used for
medical purposes, including linking to medical databases, the company added.
In the United States, ADS has principally marketed Verichip as a life-saving
tool, saying, for example, that unconscious patients brought to emergency
rooms could be scanned to determine their medical histories. . . The
decision comes five months after ADS made international headlines by
implanting three members of a Florida family with the Verichip, which is
slightly larger than a grain of rice and emits a 125-kilohertz radio
frequency signal that can be picked up by a scanner up to four feet away.
In an interview earlier this month, FDA investigator Wally Pellerite said he
was unaware of any implantable device that was not regulated by the FDA.
Cosmetic implants -- including breast and penile enhancers -- undergo a
rigorous FDA examination to determine their effect on the human body despite
having no medical function. Although ID chips have been used in animals for
years, they may have "inherent risks" when used in humans, Pellerite said in
the interview.
http://www.wired.com/news/politics/0,1283,55952,00.html
INDICATORS
ACCORDING TO A CNN - USA Today - Gallup poll, 70% of the American public
believes the federal government should continue to subsidize Amtrak.
COMPARING SMALL SCHOOLS (less than 300) with big schools
(1,000 or more), big schools have:
825 percent more violent crime
270 percent more vandalism
378 percent more theft and larceny
394 percent more physical fights or attacks
3,200 percent more robberies
1,000 percent more weapons incidents
(Department of Education, 1999)
LATIN AMERICA
GUARDIAN - So enfeebled is the Venezuelan economy that its cash-strapped
population is cutting back heavily on toilet paper, El Universal reports.
Sales are down 47% overall, with the biggest falls in medium quality and
luxury brands - but even the cheapest types suffered a drop of 19% in sales.
http://noticias.eluniversal.com/
THE WASHINGTON SNIPER
SEATTLE TIMES - A fingerprint lifted from a piece of paper found at the
Alabama shooting scene was traced to Malvo, the official said. Police then
traced Malvo to a Tacoma house where he had been living with Muhammad. . .
The task force in Maryland had received a tip from a man in Tacoma, a friend
of Muhammad's and Malvo's, who said he "had suspicions" about the pair, a
source said. Both Muhammad and Malvo were at the Tacoma house within the
past three months, a federal source said. The tipster described the pair as
"transients" or "nomads," who sometimes took target practice at the
property, according to the source, even though it is in the middle of a
densely populated residential neighborhood near Tacoma Mall. . .
Interviews with law-enforcement sources, former wives and acquaintances
created an emerging portrait of Muhammad: A Muslim convert and former Fort
Lewis soldier sympathetic to Islamic terrorists. A man who has gone through
at least two wives, with bitter custody battles over his children. A
neighbor who was friendly but a control freak who kidnapped his own
children. Classmates and officials at Bellingham High School said Malvo was
an unremarkable but friendly young man who hadn't been at school there for
nearly a year.
Muhammad is a 6-foot-tall, slender man who wears his pants pulled up tight
and keeps his hair cropped very short, acquaintances said. He is the father
of four children, including a grown son, and has spent much of his life
moving about the country, said an ex-wife and close friends of his ex-wives.
Although Muhammad served in the Army for many years, he was never trained as
a sniper, records show. He apparently has no felony record in Washington
state, according to court records.
He converted to Islam many years ago, after his first divorce, about the
same time he joined the Army, said Carol Williams, his first wife and the
mother of his first son. The couple divorced 17 years ago. Williams said she
last saw her ex-husband in early August, for the first time in eight years.
They both were in Baton Rouge, La., where she lives and he was visiting his
brother, Edward Williams, who is married to her sister. Williams also said
Muhammad was outgoing and "had a good sense of humor. He wasn't a quiet
type. He liked to talk; he liked to mingle with people." "After he changed
his religion, he called and told me what not to feed my child," she
recounted. "I told him as long as he (their son) lived with me, it was up to
me.". . .
Muhammad was not a violent man, Williams said. The two met when they were
both young. She was living at home with her mother, Muhammad had a car and
the two had a three-month courtship before marrying. Muhammad would call her
son every couple of years, she said, but aside from that had little contact.
Muhammad married another woman, Mildred Green. They had three children and
divorced in 2000 in Pierce County. Williams said Green called her a couple
of years ago to tell her that Muhammad had kidnapped their children and to
ask for help in getting them back. "I know she called me and asked me if I
would tell her if I heard anything," Williams said. "I was really wanting to
help her.". . .
Leo Dudley, a friend who lived a block from Muhammad in south Tacoma, said
Muhammad once provided security in Washington, D.C., for the Million Man
March. Muhammad was in excellent shape and knew karate, said Dudley, himself
an ex-Marine. "Any time he shook your hand, he would crush it," said Dudley.
"He was just country. He was from down South, and the military brought him
up here."
. . . One official told The Washington Post that an FBI trainee didn't
realize an incoming tip-line call was from the sniper and cut the
conversation short. "Five people had to die" because of it, the sniper's
letter reportedly claimed. According to several news reports, authorities
spent so much time trying to collect forensic evidence from the letter,
which was retrieved from Saturday night's shooting site in Ashland, Va.,
that they missed a deadline the sniper had imposed. The mistakes probably
emboldened the shooter, said forensic scientist Brent Turvey, author of the
book "Criminal Profiling."
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/134561452_sniper24m.html
GUARDIAN - The actor Sir Anthony Hopkins responded to suggestions that his
latest film, Red Dragon, might have inspired the sniper by canceling a
promotional tour. "Dear God, no. Don't let me have to wear this hideous
burden on my shoulders," the Sun reports him as saying.
NY POST - A man heard discussing details of the Psycho Sniper case that only
a suspect would know was sought in an intense dragnet last night, as cops
issued another odd message to the killer. An arrest warrant was issued for
John A. Muhammad, who was recently heard talking about one of the
Montgomery County, Md., shootings, a federal law-enforcement source told The
Post. Whoever overheard Muhammad called police, said the source.
BRIAN ROSS, ABC, July 25 - A training camp linked to Islamic militants has
been operating in Alabama, and European law enforcement officials believe
Muslim extremists were using it to prepare for a holy war. British
authorities also thought that militants from overseas were training in the
United States to take advantage of America's gun laws, sources told ABC
News. The looming question for law enforcement is whether there is a
connection between the camp and the al Qaeda terror network. . .
Bullet-riddled police cars and a school bus with mannequin targets are
scattered around the property. Inside a huge shed is an equally macabre
scene - shot-up mannequins, male and female, in domestic settings, some with
red, blood-like stains on them. Ground Zero's operators promised
state-of-the-art, world-class training in automatic weapons, urban warfare,
SWAT tactics and martial arts, supposedly to fight terror attacks.
http://abcnews.go.com/sections/wnt/DailyNews/WNT_alabama_camp020725.html
CYBER NOTES
DECLAN MCCULLAGH, C-NET - Google, the world's most popular search engine,
has quietly deleted more than 100 controversial sites from some search
result listings. Absent from Google's French and German listings are Web
sites that are anti-Semitic, pro-Nazi, or related to white supremacy,
according to a new report from Harvard University's Berkman Center. Also
banned is Jesus-is-lord.com, a fundamentalist Christian site that is
adamantly opposed to abortion. Google confirmed that the sites had been
removed from listings available at Google.fr and Google.de. The removed
sites continue to appear in listings on the main Google.com site.
http://news.com.com/2100-1023-963132.html
MIDDLE EAST
MARC PEARLMAN, FORWARD - The Palestinian Authority has told the Bush
administration it would consider abandoning its support for a two-state
solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and instead press for equal
citizenship for Palestinians inside one bi-national state if Israeli
settlement activity continues unabated. In a little-noticed memo and a
letter handed earlier this month to top American officials, the P.A. states
that Israeli settlement expansion is eliminating the possibility of a viable
Palestinian state and thus forcing the Palestinian leadership to reconsider
the two-state concept that has been the basis of negotiations during the
last decade.
While Israel and its supporters here have accused the P.A. of de facto
abandoning the two-state solution by launching the intifada in September
2000, the Palestinian leadership has never officially renounced the Oslo
process. The P.A. messages suggest the deepest deterioration yet of the
diplomatic process since the outbreak of the intifada, and come as the Bush
administration is pushing a three-year roadmap toward two states. . .
"This is just despair setting in," said Stephen P. Cohen, a Middle East
expert with the Israel Policy Forum, a left-leaning think tank. "There is a
growing realization in Israel and among Palestinians that the situation on
the ground is becoming defined by the erasure of the Green Line as
previously understood... You now have a Jewish state on both sides of the
Green Line, one where there is a Jewish majority and one where there is a
Jewish minority ruling an Arab majority. So you have the feeling we are back
to the notion of Palestinians getting civil rights in a single state."
Ahmed Qureia, the speaker of the Palestinian parliament and veteran
negotiator also known as Abu Ala, sent a letter to the White . . . "Israel's
ongoing colony construction and other unilateral measures in the Occupied
Palestinian territories are effectively pre-empting the possibility of a
two-state solution of a viable Palestinian State alongside Israel," the memo
said. "If the international community continues to remain unwilling to rein
in Israeli colony construction and expansion, irreversible 'facts on the
ground' and the de facto apartheid system such facts create will force
Palestinian policy makers to re-evaluate the plausibility of a two-state
solution. . . Israel's ultimate goal is to permit a Palestinian 'state'
which would be in effect the Middle Eastern equivalent of a Native American
Indian reservation."
http://www.forward.com/issues/2002/02.10.25/news1.html
EMENDATIONS
THE REPORT on the location of bin Laden yesterday came from Debka and not
from Debra, who has no idea where he is.
THE LETTER FROM THOR yesterday was actually from Tor Kristensen who notes
that "everyone puts an H in there." Kristensen, who is from Nikiski, Alaska,
and no lives in Copenhagen, also reports that "when I was in 6th grade, the
elementary school had to tear down the 'Metal Monster,' a huge
conglomeration of climbing platforms the was made out of old oil drilling
pipes from the platforms in Cook Inlet. Why? Because after several years of
use, someone ran a Geiger counter over it. Out school playground equipment,
donated by the local industry which employed the majority of our parents,
was radioactive."
JUST POLITICS
MIKE ALLEN, WASHINGTON POST - President Bush has harnessed the broad
resources of the federal government to promote Republicans in next month's
elections. From housing grants in South Dakota and research contracts in
Florida to Air Force One rides and photos in the White House driveway, Bush
has made Republican success on Nov. 5 a government-wide project. More than
330 administration appointees, some of whom were told by White House
officials that they needed to show their Republican credentials, have taken
vacation time and are being flown by the party to House and Senate campaigns
in states where control of Congress will be decided. The appointees will
organize volunteers, work the phones and go door to door. . .
Scholars called Bush's partisan use of the government unprecedented for a
midterm election, and said the aggressiveness and thoroughness of his
politicking approached that of a presidential reelection campaign. The broad
orchestration of executive branch activity to benefit campaigns was moved up
to the midterm elections this year because of a confluence of history: a
hairsbreadth margin of control in both chambers of Congress, the huge
repercussions of tiny swings in a closely divided electorate, and the dawn
of new campaign finance restrictions the day after the election.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A7405-2002Oct23.html
DRUG BUSTS
ALTERNET - According to the Drug Policy Alliance, only 3 percent of school
districts around the country have implemented random drug testing policies
for students involved in chess club, debate team, after-school music
programs and other activities. Others have implemented such programs only to
rescind them after analyzing the bottom line: at an average cost of $42 per
tested student and a relatively small pool of positive drug test results,
several school districts (including schools in Dublin, Ohio, which had spent
$35,000 per year to bust 11 students out of a total student body of nearly
1,500), have opted for alternative deterrence methods.
http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=14144
THE MEDIACRACY
REPORTERS WITHOUT FRONTIERS - The first worldwide index of press freedom has
some surprises for Western democracies. The United States ranks below Costa
Rica and Italy scores lower than Benin. It also shows that such freedom is
under threat everywhere, with the 20 bottom-ranked countries drawn from
Asia, Africa, Latin America and Europe. The situation in especially bad in
Asia, which contains the four worst offenders - North Korea, China, Burma,
Turkmenistan and Bhutan.
The top end of the list shows that rich countries have no monopoly of press
freedom. Costa Rica and Benin are examples of how growth of a free press
does not just depend on a country's material prosperity. The index was drawn
up by asking journalists, researchers and legal experts to answer 50
questions about the whole range of press freedom violations (such as murders
or arrests of journalists, censorship, pressure, state monopolies in various
fields, punishment of press law offences and regulation of the media). The
final list includes 139 countries. The others were not included in the
absence of reliable information.
In the worst-ranked countries, press freedom is a dead letter and
independent newspapers do not exist. The only voice heard is of media
tightly controlled or monitored by the government. The very few independent
journalists are constantly harassed, imprisoned or forced into exile by the
authorities. The foreign media is banned or allowed in very small doses,
always closely monitored.
Right at the top of the list four countries share first place - Finland,
Iceland, Norway and the Netherlands. These northern European states
scrupulously respect press freedom in their own countries but also speak up
for it elsewhere, for example recently in Eritrea and Zimbabwe. The
highest-scoring country outside Europe is Canada, which comes fifth.
Some countries with democratically-elected governments are way down in the
index - such as Colombia (114th) and Bangladesh (118th). In these countries,
armed rebel movements, militias or political parties constantly endanger the
lives of journalists. The state fails to do all it could to protect them and
fight the immunity very often enjoyed by those responsible for such violence.
http://www.rsf.fr/article.php3?id_article=4116
HEALTH
ASSOCIATED PRESS - The drug companies that pay for major testing of most new
medicines give the participating university researchers little or no say in
how the studies are designed and how the findings are handled, a survey
found. . . While federal agencies sponsor much early research, large-scale
studies of drugs' safety and effectiveness are usually paid for by the
manufacturers. Typically, the companies hire medical school faculty members
to carry out the studies.
http://www.washtimes.com/national/20021024-88375337.htm
GREAT MOMENTS IN CRIME
NEWS, AUSTRALIA -
A man has been fined and ordered to pay compensation for repeatedly
squirting soy sauce at another man in a Brisbane shopping mall. Adam
Jonathon Meyer, 32, pleaded guilty to assaulting Brisbane real estate valuer
Gordon Price on the escalators at Post Office Square Food Court on June 12.
Brisbane's Magistrates Court heard Mr Price had just bought lunch and was
returning to work at 1.15 pm ahead of Meyer on the escalator when he was
squirted in the back of the trousers. The court was told Mr Price reported
feeling slight pressure and wetness on the back of his legs before turning
around to find Meyer aiming the sachet of sauce at him. Meyer dropped the
sachet and pulled out a second sachet which he also dropped to the ground
when the men reached the top and Mr Price threatened to call the police.
Mr Price reported the incident to police but revealed he had been the victim
of similar sauce attacks by Meyer in the past. He told police he didn't know
Meyer and hadn't given him any permission to squirt sauce at him or assault
him in any way. Meyer refused to be interviewed by police and was unable to
explain his behavior in court today.
http://www.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,4057,5345268%5E13762,00.html
THE WAR FOR WATER
BRAD KNICKERBOCKER, CHRISTIAN SCIENCE MONITOR - From that cooler outside
your office door filled with "mountain spring water" to the single faucet
supplying many villages in Africa and Asia, water is seen around the world
as an essential right for rich and poor alike. If not free - like the air we
all breathe - it's at least outside the normal realm of commerce. At least
that's been the general perception among most societies and governments.
Increasingly, that view is changing as water and the means of providing it
are becoming economic commodities. Private companies own and operate water
systems around the world, with annual revenues estimated at $300 billion. In
the United States, water systems in Atlanta, Milwaukee, Houston, Jersey
City, Indianapolis, New Orleans, San Francisco, and other cities have been
at least partially taken over by corporations, some of them foreign-owned.
Fortune magazine has predicted that water "will be to the 21st-century what
oil was to the 20th." Indeed, Texas oilman (and corporate raider) T. Boone
Pickens now heads Mesa Water Inc., which has water rights covering more than
150,000 acres of the massive Ogallala aquifer.
Many governments, along with such international development agencies as the
World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, believe privatization of
water supplies - tying them to the marketplace - is a good thing, bringing
with it greater economic efficiencies and surer supplies to water-needy
areas along with profits. And that's seen as a good opportunity for
investors wanting to link up with a product that by its nature has
potentially an eternal market.
"Today, Western Europe's water management is almost 40 percent privatized;
in the US it's 15 percent," says Philip Rohmer, co-manager of a global water
investment fund launched earlier this year by Swiss Pictet Funds. "By 2015,
we think Europe will reach 75 percent privatization, and the US 65 percent,"
Mr. Rohmer told Thestreet.com recently. "So there's huge growth there."
http://www.csmonitor.com/2002/1024/p01s02-usec.html
FURTHERMORE. . .
VADIM PROKHOROV, ANDANTE - A Russian opera company is planning a
comic opera that will tell the infamous story of Monica Lewinsky and the
president. The Russian president, to be precise. . . Here's the story: The
American president has been greatly compromised by a sex scandal. The only
way to save his reputation is to divert the public's attention to a similar
scandal involving the Russian president, V. V. Krutin (in addition to
calling the
real-life Russian president to mind, the name is derived from krutoy, which
means "being tough"). With this purpose in mind, the CIA sends Lewinsky to
Russia, providing her with a love potion (her native charms being judged
insufficient to the task, apparently). . . Among the opera's highlights: a
sizzling tango danced by president Krutin and Levinsonova and an aria,
delivered by the deputy director of the CIA, titled "I did not invite you,
Monica, for a cocktail."
FEEDBACK
|||| WHOSE LEFT IS IT?
ALEX COCKBURN, COUNTERPUNCH - For what it's worth (and remembering
that the two editors of Counterpunch, self and Jeffrey St Clair, live in
California and Oregon), I liked some of what you said about the left and
non-left, but I think your contrasting of the doctrinaire sterility of failed
old "left" with creative, non doctrinaire spirited "real left" left a lot of
the story untold.
In my years of going around the country doing anti-intervention talks,
fund-raisers, book tours etc, etc, the first thing to notice is that there's
a truly vast left that is invisible to almost all east coast commentators.
Church people, labor people, public defenders, Lawyers Guild, faculty
people, farm people, radical greens, World Federalist types, red diapered
middle-agers, in almost every town. (And in every town the left will tell
you with gloomy pride how conservative their town is. )
You make sport of the Nation, and how your left never reads it, but you'd be
surprised (I know this because I used to buy their mail list and studied the
zip codes) how many small towns harbor venerable Nation readers who came
aboard in the 30s or 40s or 50s. e.g. 500 Nation subscribers in Alhambra,
LA. Nothing smart or metro about them.
And in meeting after meeting you can look at the audience and see older folk
who were labor commies in the 50s and who have certainly had their share of
doctrinal struggle and who have read Marx etc, and sixties vintage people
who might have fought their way through the RCP and out the other side, and
then younger people still who might have come aboard in WTO wars and who
read Counterpunch. It's a rich geology that varies from place to place. For
example in one town in Wisconsin the two most bustling left activists and
organizers were both kind of ex Revolutionary Communist Party. In the Deep
South I've met radical lawyers who are still the organizing backbone of
their communities who came down as Maoists in the 70s. In for the long haul
and lively and not deserving of your misprision. A lot of good organizers
are still in left groups you might instinctively deride as fossilized Trots
or Maoists or whatever.
Of course you're right in one thing: many of these, especially the younger
lot, couldn't give a toss about Hitchens. I was reminded of this when I gave
a speech in SF a few months ago and derided Hitchens' positions and a lively
young woman in a left group asked me impatiently what was all the talk about
this "Clifford Hutchins". As for Hitchens, he parted ways with anything
decently radical long, long ago, as I occasionally point out.
My hope of course, which Jeffrey and I try to push along in Counterpunch is
that the left should understand that common cause can be made with many in
the populist right who take the Bill of Rights seriously Ashcroft is doing
his best to help.
[I agree with much of what you say, except that what you call the old left,
I would call the old, old left. My complaint is not with old, old leftists
but with their more contemporary imitators whose idea of social change is a
preemptive strike against the next public podium. Turning 30 in 1967, I
found myself between old and new left and often preferring the former. Not
being much of an ideologue myself, the fact that someone had been or was a
communist was of far less importance then what they were doing now. I would
learn of the role that far leftists played in the pre-Montgomery civil
rights movement when most whites - including liberals - didn't give a damn.
And I would notice how many marches and meetings were being organized by old
leftists while leaving the credit to the young, many of whom were using the
60s as a momentary crash pad for their souls.
But in the end, I have a strong bias towards inductive thinking - reasoning
from the specific towards the universal - which is one reason I'm a
journalist and one reason I never took to the great man theory of life that
predominated in my college classes until I escaped to the anthropology
department. I find stuffing life's experiences into artificially constructed
paradigms - whether they be those of fundamentalist Christianity or of
fundamentalist Marxism - often pointless and even at times dangerous. Which
is why, I suppose, I like to chill with the colloquial left. - SAM]
||||| SMART BOMBS
BOB - The article [on smart bombs] did not go quite far enough in explaining
the Amiriyah bunker incident. It was obvious at the time to anyone who would
consider the facts (though none of the "news" coverage I saw did so) that
the Iraqis had deliberately put radio antennas on top of the bunker to make
it appear to be a command bunker. I didn't at the time know of the further
traffic on the ground to further give that impression, but it was perfectly
obvious even without that info that Saddam Hussein deliberately caused women
and children casualties to create pressure on us to stop the war before we
went after him. The article describes the antenna being on the bunker, but
does not go the next step and describe it as a deliberate sacrifice of the
women and children.
Hussein has fortified Baghdad itself now by placing anti-aircraft guns and
rockets on top of hospitals and other civilian buildings, and placed
fortifications for his troops throughout the city in such a way that we
cannot destroy them without causing wholesale civilian casualties. He is in
effect placing the entire civilian population of Baghdad in the position of
hostages against us. Just as he's threatening the civilian population of
Israel with indiscriminate destruction in an effort to deter us. There may
well not be any way we can "regime change" without causing unacceptably
indiscriminate loss of civilian life.
|||| IRAQ AND IRELAND
WILLIAM GARTLAND, RIO WI - According to the people who wish to go to war
against Iraq, one reason is to affect what they call a "regime change"
designed to bring "democracy" to that unhappy and unenlightened land. If
that is the case, one feels obliged to ask why Prime Minister Tony Blair
does not respect democracy in his own country.
Poll after poll has shown the British people do not wish to see their sons
suffer death and mayhem on behalf of the American and British oil companies
scheduled to inherit control of the second largest deposit of oil in the
world. And yet Blair ignores the voice of the British public and continues
to play second fiddle in the one-man orchestra Bush is trying so desperately
trying to lead.
We must not forget that poll after poll has also shown that the British
public is sick and tired of imposing a bigoted sectarian regime on the Irish
Catholic population of the occupied counties in the north of Ireland. That
bigoted sectarian regime remains, for all practical purposes, in place in
spite of the Good Friday Agreement. The recent raid on Sinn Fein offices in
Belfast by the Royal Ulster Constabulary shows that there is a concerted
effort being made to once again bring back the days when Catholics could be
kicked around with absolute impunity. Britain's resumption of direct rule of
its northern Irish colony, and Blair's call for the "disbandment" of the IRA
are victories for Orange sectarian bigotry.
Blair's refusal to act forthrightly against the Orange sectarians makes him
a willing accomplice with Paisley and Trimble who wish to end permanently
the GFA measure of justice for the Catholic/Nationalist population of the
north. It is time for Blair to put down his fiddle and begin practicing the
democracy that he preaches with such grand hypocritical eloquence.
|||| ANTI-DEPRESSANTS
A. CLIENT - Like most others I am suspicious of pricing and methods of large
drug companies. However I would very much hate to loose an at least
partially effective tool in the treatment of depression. One psychiatrist
working on the front lines in an emergency intake section of a public mental
health clinic said of the new generation of antidepressants "at last we have
an effective tool." Depression has many types and shades and is adequately
understood by no one. Certainly not by me. I have suffered from it most if
not all my life. During two acute episodes it is my belief the use of Zoloft
saved my life.
From the article: "But in more severely depressed people, 'these drugs do
work,' said Professor Parker. 'Forty to 60 per cent of people get benefit
from them. I don't want these people to be diminished by being told they're
just getting a placebo effect. . . the drugs take the brakes off and let the
spontaneous remission take place.'"
As I understand it no mater what the contributing factors, depression is a
result of chemical imbalance in brain chemistry. One method used to make a
diagnosis is to discover what anti-depressant a patient responds to.
Different types patients are helped by different drugs. I would speculate
that those that do not have the particular imbalance the drug in question
addresses, like well individuals would not be helped or much affected except
for possible side effects.
Testing for side effects is one thing but designing a meaningful test for
efficacy must be extremely difficult as the test population is almost but
not quite defined as those who respond to the drug being tested. I don't
believe we have the knowledge of human brain function or the technology to
properly define the test population at this time.
Antidepressants are not "happy pills". A psychologist and wag of my
acquaintance cautioned "antidepressants don't work on reality".
|||| LOOKING ON THE BRIGHT SIDE
LLOYDYBOY - As scary as the thought of the Iraqis and the North Koreans
having (or maybe having) weapons of mass destruction is, it is worth
reminding ourselves that Saddam Hussein and Kim Jong Il together could never
kill as many people as has Phillip Morris
FIELD NOTES
THE JOVIAL ATHEIST
http://wwww.jovialatheist.com
OLD BOOKS BY HOWARD ZINN NEWLY AVAILABLE
- SNCC: The New Abolitionists An indispensable study of the organization,
of the 1960s, and of the process of social change.
- THE SOUTHERN MYSTIQUE Zinn challenges the stereotypes surrounding
the South, race relations, and how change happens in history.
- VIETNAM: THE LOGIC OF WITHDRAWAL Includes a powerful speech
written by Zinn that President Johnson should have given to lay out the case
for ending the war.
- DISOBEDIENCE AND DEMOCRACY: Nine Fallacies of Law and Order Zinn
lays out a clear and dynamic case for civil disobedience and protest,
challenging the dominant arguments against forms of protest.
- POSTWAR AMERICA: 1945-1947 By critically examining U.S. militarism
abroad and racism at home, Zinn questions this often-romanticized era.
- JUSTICE IN EVERYDAY LIFE: The Way It Really Works This anthology
edited by Zinn covers the reality of justice, which has always stood in
sharp contrast to the rhetoric about equal rights under the law.
- FAILURE TO QUIT: Reflections of an Optimistic Historian In this essay
collection, Zinn discusses a wide range of topics, from the role of the
Supreme Court in U.S. history to the nature of higher education today.
http://www.southendpress.org/books/radical60s.shtml
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
RECENT ADDITIONS AT OUR WEB SITE
IRAQ AND THE MEDIA http://prorev.com/iraqmedia.htm
FAILURES OF INTELLIGENCE The triumph of hope over experience
http://prorev.com/intel.htm
POLL ANALYSIS GORE LOSS NOT DUE TO NADER
http://prorev.com/green2000.htm
HOW CITIES BECAME BLACK AND POOR: THE REAL STORY
http://prorev.com/blackcitdies.htm
THE REAL WAR: BETWEEN MYTH AND REALITY
http://prorev.com/realwar.htm
WHY THE ALL THE NIXON TAPES SHOULD BE RELEASED
http://prorev.com/hoff2.htm
FALSE PROFITS An excerpt from Why Bother? that is increasingly apt as news
of corporate criminality rolls in http://prorev.com/wbprofits.htm
IN TECHNOCRACY WE TRUST: Most Americans profess Christianity, but we
practice technocracy http://prorev.com/technocrat.htm
CORPORATIONS AND AMERICA: The counter-revolution against democracy
http://prorev.com/corpsandus.htm
WHOSE LAND IS IT, ANYWAY? Reflections on patriotism
http://prorev.com/patriot.htm
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