http://www.wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=48648
Bristling defiance – in retreat
Patrick J. Buchanan
Posted: February 3, 2006
1:00 a.m. Eastern
© 2006 WorldNetDaily.com
"The road of isolationism and protectionism may seem broad and inviting, yet it ends in danger and decline," railed President Bush in his State of the Union. Again and again, Bush returned to his theme.
"America rejects the false comfort of isolationism ...
"Isolationism would not only tie our hands in fighting enemies, it would keep us from helping our friends in desperate need ...
"American leaders from Roosevelt to Truman to Kennedy to Reagan rejected isolation and retreat."
Why would a president use his State of the Union to lash out at a school of foreign policy thought that has had zero influence in his administration? The answer is a simple one, but it is not an easy one for Bush to face: His foreign policy is visibly failing, and his critics have been proven right.
But rather than defend the fruits of his policy, Bush has chosen to caricature critics who warned him against interventionism. Like all politicians in trouble, Bush knows that the best defense is a good offense.
Having plunged us into an unnecessary war, Bush now confronts the real possibility of strategic defeat and a failed presidency. His victory in Iraq, like the wars of Wilson and FDR, has turned to ashes in our mouths. And like Truman's war in Korea and Kennedy's war in Vietnam, Bush's war has left America divided and her people regretting he ever led us in. But unlike the world wars, Korea and Vietnam, Bush cannot claim the enemy attacked us and we had no choice. Iraq is Bush's war. Isolationists had nothing to do with it. To a man and woman, they opposed it.
Now, with an army bogged down in Afghanistan and another slowly exiting Iraq, and no end in sight to either, Bush seeks to counter critics who warned him not to go in by associating them with the demonized and supposedly discredited patriots of the America First movement of 1940-41. His assault is not only non-credible, it borders on the desperate and pathetic.
"Abroad, our nation is committed to a historic long-term goal. We seek the end of tyranny in our world," said Bush. "Some dismiss that goal as misguided idealism. In reality, the future security of America depends upon it."
Intending no disrespect, this is noble-sounding nonsense. Our security rests on U.S. power and will, and not on whether Zimbabwe, Sudan, Syria, Cuba or even China is ruled by tyrants. Our forefathers lived secure in a world of tyrannies by staying out of wars that were none of America's business. As for "the end of tyranny in our world," Mr. President, sorry, that doesn't come in "our world." That comes in the next.
"By allowing radical Islam to work its will, by leaving an assaulted world to fend for itself, we would signal to all that we no longer believe in our own ideals or even in our own courage," said Bush.
But what has done more to radicalize Islam than our invasion of Iraq? Who has done more to empower Islamic radicals than Bush with his clamor for elections across a region radicalized by our own policies? It is one thing to believe in ideals, another to be the prisoner of some democratist ideology.
Bush has come to believe that the absence of democracy is the cause of terror and democracy its cure. But the cause of terror in the Middle East is the perception there that those nations are held in colonial captivity by Americans and their puppet regimes, and that the only way to expel both is to use tactics that have succeeded from Algeria in 1962 to Anbar province in 2005.
Given the franchise, Arab and Islamic peoples from Pakistan to Iran, Iraq, Lebanon, Gaza, the West Bank and Egypt have now voted for candidates with two credentials. They seemed to be devout Muslims, and they appeared dedicated to tossing America out of the region and the Israelis into the sea.
With opposition also rising to his free-trade policy, Bush reverted to the same tactic: Caricature and castigate critics of his own failed policies. "Protectionists," said Bush, pretend "we can keep our high standards of living, while walling off our economy."
But it was protectionists from Lincoln to Coolidge who gave us the highest standard of living on earth. And the record of Bush's merry band of free-traders? The largest trade deficits in history, a $200 billion trade surplus for Beijing at our expense in 2005, and 3 million lost manufacturing jobs since Bush first took the oath.
If America is angry over what interventionism and free trade have wrought, George Bush cannot credibly blame isolationists or protectionists. These fellows have an alibi. They were nowhere near the scene of the crime.
It is George W. Bush who is running out of alibis.
Friday, February 03, 2006
VOA News - Rumsfeld Compares Venezuela's Chavez to Hitler
VOA News - Rumsfeld Compares Venezuela's Chavez to Hitler: "Rumsfeld Compares Venezuela's Chavez to Hitler
By Al Pessin
Pentagon
02 February 2006
U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld has compared Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez to the Nazi leader Adolph Hitler, saying both were elected legally and then 'consolidated power.' Secretary Rumsfeld made the comment as part of an answer to a reporter's question about the election of left-wing leaders in Latin America.
Speaking at the National Press Club in Washington, Secretary Rumsfeld told the questioner that the rise of corruption in democratic governments in Latin America caused voters to look for what he called more 'populist' leaders.
'We've seen some populist leadership appealing to masses of people in those countries and elections, like Evo Morales in Bolivia, take place that clearly are worrisome,' said Mr. Rumsfeld.
Secretary Rumsfeld said he would not characterize the situation as 'a new wave of left-wing anti-American regimes,' as the questioner did. But he went on to criticize the leftist Venezuelan leader, Hugo Chavez, who has become a sharp critic of the United States and a close friend of Cuba's communist leader, Fidel Castro.
Venezuela's President Hugo Chavez
'We've got Chavez in Venezuela with a lot of oil money,' he noted. 'He's a person who was elected legally, just as Adolph Hitler was elected legally, and then consolidated power, and now is, of course, working closely with Fidel Castro and Mr. Morales and others. It concerns me.'
As Secretary Rumsfeld spoke, President Chavez was preparing to travel to Cuba late Wednesday to visit President Castro and accept an award from the United Nations for promoting Latin American culture.
Secretary Rumsfeld did not comment on, and at that time may not have known about, Venezuela's expulsion of a U.S. military attach�. The official, a U.S. Navy captain, was accused of spying. Several Venezuelan military officers have been accused of passing information to the U.S. military through the embassy in Caracas. There was no immediate response from the U.S. government."
By Al Pessin
Pentagon
02 February 2006
U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld has compared Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez to the Nazi leader Adolph Hitler, saying both were elected legally and then 'consolidated power.' Secretary Rumsfeld made the comment as part of an answer to a reporter's question about the election of left-wing leaders in Latin America.
Speaking at the National Press Club in Washington, Secretary Rumsfeld told the questioner that the rise of corruption in democratic governments in Latin America caused voters to look for what he called more 'populist' leaders.
'We've seen some populist leadership appealing to masses of people in those countries and elections, like Evo Morales in Bolivia, take place that clearly are worrisome,' said Mr. Rumsfeld.
Secretary Rumsfeld said he would not characterize the situation as 'a new wave of left-wing anti-American regimes,' as the questioner did. But he went on to criticize the leftist Venezuelan leader, Hugo Chavez, who has become a sharp critic of the United States and a close friend of Cuba's communist leader, Fidel Castro.
Venezuela's President Hugo Chavez
'We've got Chavez in Venezuela with a lot of oil money,' he noted. 'He's a person who was elected legally, just as Adolph Hitler was elected legally, and then consolidated power, and now is, of course, working closely with Fidel Castro and Mr. Morales and others. It concerns me.'
As Secretary Rumsfeld spoke, President Chavez was preparing to travel to Cuba late Wednesday to visit President Castro and accept an award from the United Nations for promoting Latin American culture.
Secretary Rumsfeld did not comment on, and at that time may not have known about, Venezuela's expulsion of a U.S. military attach�. The official, a U.S. Navy captain, was accused of spying. Several Venezuelan military officers have been accused of passing information to the U.S. military through the embassy in Caracas. There was no immediate response from the U.S. government."
Venezuela expels U.S. military official
International News Article | Reuters.com
Venezuela expels U.S. military official
Thu Feb 2, 2006 8:29 PM ET
By Patrick Markey
CARACAS, Venezuela (Reuters) - Venezuela expelled a U.S. Embassy naval attache on Thursday after accusing him of espionage for trying to get Venezuelan officers to hand over state secrets.
The expulsion aggravated already tense relations between the United States and the world's No. 5 oil exporter, as President Hugo Chavez aggressively promotes his socialist revolution to counter U.S. influence in South America.
Chavez, a populist former soldier allied to Cuban President Fidel Castro and Iran, warned he could expel the full U.S. military mission if its officers were caught spying.
"We have declared persona non grata U.S. naval captain John Correa, he must leave the country immediately," Chavez said at a ceremony to celebrate his seven years in government.
A U.S. State Department official in Washington rejected the espionage charges and the Pentagon said Correa was a Navy commander who had returned to the United States as part of his duties. He did not say when Correa left Caracas.
"We will respond through diplomatic channels," State Department spokesman Kurtis Cooper said, referring to a January 30 letter the United States received about Correa. "None of the U.S. attaches was or is engaged in inappropriate activities."
U.S. officials brand leftist Chavez an authoritarian who has trampled over democracy at home and threatened regional stability by using Venezuela's oil wealth to meddle in the politics of his South American neighbors.
Chavez often calls U.S. President George W. Bush "Mr. Danger," criticizes his foreign policies and has repeatedly accused Washington of trying to overthrow his government since he survived a 2002 coup.
Venezuelan authorities said last week they had "confidential evidence" that U.S. Embassy staff were involved with a group of Venezuelan military officers accused of passing state secrets to the U.S. Defense Department.
A U.S. Embassy spokeswoman said they had received a letter from authorities demanding Correa appear before investigators earlier this week and on Thursday another ordering him out.
Venezuela has 65 military officials in the United States and Washington has 21 officials in Venezuela.
'MR. DANGER'
Speaking later before a huge armed forces parade, Chavez lambasted U.S. imperialism and demanded Venezuelan soldiers reject attempts to turn them against his revolution aimed at reversing years of neglect of the impoverished majority.
Chavez purged the armed forces after the 2002 coup. He has created a national reserve he says will help defend Venezuela against a U.S. invasion and sought military equipment from Spain and Brazil with deals the United States says could destabilize the region.
"We must finish the exorcism, because they injected us with the devil of a military doctrine ..., the imperialist military doctrine," roared Chavez, a former paratrooper who himself led a coup six years before winning power at the ballot box.
Chavez was due to travel to Havana later on Thursday to meet with Castro.
Flush with oil cash, Chavez has promoted himself as the frontman for a burgeoning left-wing resurgence in South America, where Evo Morales has become Bolivia's first indigenous president on the back of resistance to U.S.-backed policies.
In Washington, U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld had harsh words for Chavez but did not address the expulsion.
"He's a person who was elected legally, just as Adolf Hitler was elected legally and then consolidated power, and now is of course working closely with Fidel Castro and Mr. Morales and others," he said at the National Press Club.
(Additional reporting by Saul Hudson in Washington)
Venezuela expels U.S. military official
Thu Feb 2, 2006 8:29 PM ET
By Patrick Markey
CARACAS, Venezuela (Reuters) - Venezuela expelled a U.S. Embassy naval attache on Thursday after accusing him of espionage for trying to get Venezuelan officers to hand over state secrets.
The expulsion aggravated already tense relations between the United States and the world's No. 5 oil exporter, as President Hugo Chavez aggressively promotes his socialist revolution to counter U.S. influence in South America.
Chavez, a populist former soldier allied to Cuban President Fidel Castro and Iran, warned he could expel the full U.S. military mission if its officers were caught spying.
"We have declared persona non grata U.S. naval captain John Correa, he must leave the country immediately," Chavez said at a ceremony to celebrate his seven years in government.
A U.S. State Department official in Washington rejected the espionage charges and the Pentagon said Correa was a Navy commander who had returned to the United States as part of his duties. He did not say when Correa left Caracas.
"We will respond through diplomatic channels," State Department spokesman Kurtis Cooper said, referring to a January 30 letter the United States received about Correa. "None of the U.S. attaches was or is engaged in inappropriate activities."
U.S. officials brand leftist Chavez an authoritarian who has trampled over democracy at home and threatened regional stability by using Venezuela's oil wealth to meddle in the politics of his South American neighbors.
Chavez often calls U.S. President George W. Bush "Mr. Danger," criticizes his foreign policies and has repeatedly accused Washington of trying to overthrow his government since he survived a 2002 coup.
Venezuelan authorities said last week they had "confidential evidence" that U.S. Embassy staff were involved with a group of Venezuelan military officers accused of passing state secrets to the U.S. Defense Department.
A U.S. Embassy spokeswoman said they had received a letter from authorities demanding Correa appear before investigators earlier this week and on Thursday another ordering him out.
Venezuela has 65 military officials in the United States and Washington has 21 officials in Venezuela.
'MR. DANGER'
Speaking later before a huge armed forces parade, Chavez lambasted U.S. imperialism and demanded Venezuelan soldiers reject attempts to turn them against his revolution aimed at reversing years of neglect of the impoverished majority.
Chavez purged the armed forces after the 2002 coup. He has created a national reserve he says will help defend Venezuela against a U.S. invasion and sought military equipment from Spain and Brazil with deals the United States says could destabilize the region.
"We must finish the exorcism, because they injected us with the devil of a military doctrine ..., the imperialist military doctrine," roared Chavez, a former paratrooper who himself led a coup six years before winning power at the ballot box.
Chavez was due to travel to Havana later on Thursday to meet with Castro.
Flush with oil cash, Chavez has promoted himself as the frontman for a burgeoning left-wing resurgence in South America, where Evo Morales has become Bolivia's first indigenous president on the back of resistance to U.S.-backed policies.
In Washington, U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld had harsh words for Chavez but did not address the expulsion.
"He's a person who was elected legally, just as Adolf Hitler was elected legally and then consolidated power, and now is of course working closely with Fidel Castro and Mr. Morales and others," he said at the National Press Club.
(Additional reporting by Saul Hudson in Washington)
The Silence of the Democrats
The Silence of the Democrats
The choice between abrupt withdrawal and endless war in Iraq is false.
We can negotiate an honorable exit -- in fact, we're already talking
with the insurgents.
Joe Conason, Salon, February 3, 2006
http://salon.com/opinion/conason/2006/02/03/iraq_timetable/
In this year's State of the Union address, George W. Bush proved again
his preference for the rhetoric of deception. Unable to marshal a
convincing argument for his war in Iraq yet determined to silence his
critics, Bush insisted that for patriotic Americans there is simply no
choice except his failing strategy.
"A sudden withdrawal of our forces from Iraq would abandon our Iraqi
allies to death and prison, would put men like [Osama] bin Laden and
[Abu Musab al-] Zarqawi in charge of a strategic country, and show that
a pledge from America means little," he warned. "However we feel about
the decisions and debates of the past our nation has only one option: We
must keep our word, defeat our enemies, and stand behind the American
military in this vital mission."
Predictably those clich?s won strong applause -- who doesn't clap when
the president demands support for U.S. troops? -- but as usual the bid
for inspiration concealed more than a bit of deception.
Would the withdrawal of our forces leave Baghdad to al-Qaida? No,
because the foreign-led jihadists represent a small fraction of the
insurgency. Must we continue the occupation indefinitely to prove that
we "stand behind" the American military? No, because the war is damaging
our military strength, and to support the troops means finding a way out
of the sand trap as swiftly as possible. And is there "only one option"
for the American nation? That's wrong too, although the Democratic
leadership didn't dare say so in the feeble response delivered by
Virginia Gov. Tim Kaine.
"There's a better way," Kaine repeated like a mantra, but he never
bothered to tell us what that might be. The answer is straightforward,
is honorable and might even succeed: The United States, its coalition
partners and the Iraqi government must open serious negotiations with
the Sunni insurgency, aiming toward a durable cease-fire and a timetable
for American withdrawal. There need be no political penalty for
advocating such negotiations because U.S. officers have already pursued
discussions with Iraqi insurgents -- and because those discussions
represent official policy in Iraq.
The U.S. media has devoted little space to those talks, but the
Washington Post and the British press have occasionally reported on
them. Last summer, the Sunday Times of London revealed that American
officers had participated in two meetings with insurgent leaders in a
villa north of Baghdad. Among those in attendance were representatives
of the Ansar al-Sunna army, the group responsible for the atrocious mess
hall bombing at the U.S. base near Mosul, Iraq, in December 2004.
Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and Gen. John Abizaid both
confirmed that those talks had taken place -- and that many more
meetings had occurred in hopes of "splitting" the insurgency.
This week, news of peace talks with the insurgents surfaced again. The
United Nations news service, IRIN, reported that Sunni politicians
claimed to be making progress in discussions with insurgent leaders,
while confronting an obstacle that remains beyond their control. "For
the last month we've been trying to convince militias to put down their
guns until they see whether or not the new government can bring positive
results," said Adnan al-Dulaimi, one of the leaders of the Iraqi Accord
Front, a Sunni Islamist coalition that supports participation in the
political process. According to him, the weekly meetings between his
party and the insurgents have encouraged hope for an eventual cease-fire.
"We've made good progress," he said. "But the presence of foreign troops
could cause this accord to fail at any time." That is hardly surprising,
since recent polls indicate that about 80 percent of Iraqis want
Washington and Baghdad to set a date for when the occupation will end.
The IRIN article quoted a man known as Abu Omar, identified as a leader
of the insurgent Muhammad army in Anbar province. He confirmed that his
group and several others had approved a possible cease-fire, but vowed:
"We will quit fighting only if the U.S. military gives us a date for its
withdrawal."
Then the insurgent leader hinted that serious negotiations could not
only extricate our troops from Iraq but simultaneously create the
conditions for an important victory against our real enemy.
"We're more open to the possibility of improvements in Iraq," said the
insurgent commander, "but al-Qaeda doesn't care for such things because
it's not composed of Iraqis. It's made up of foreigners who have come to
exploit the differences between our brothers."
The meaning of Omar's remarks could hardly be clearer. He and his
insurgent comrades will end their murderous rebellion against the Iraqi
government if and when they can be assured that U.S. troops will
withdraw. And when they are assured that we will leave, they will turn
on al-Qaida and either wipe it out or expel it from Iraq.
If the Bush administration insists that we must "defeat" the insurgency,
or stand up an Iraqi army that can pacify the country, then negotiations
are useless. If Bush insists on identifying all of the insurgents with
al-Qaida, then there isn't anyone with whom we can negotiate. If the
American objective is to create large permanent bases and to win control
of Iraqi oil, then our troops cannot leave and the bloody conflict will
grind on without any foreseeable conclusion.
The negotiations that have occurred already, fitful though they may be,
show another way home for our troops. The president's claim that we have
"only one option" in Iraq is untrue -- and the alternative is far more
likely to advance the interests of America and the civilized world.
Too bad we have no politician with the wisdom and stature to say so.
The choice between abrupt withdrawal and endless war in Iraq is false.
We can negotiate an honorable exit -- in fact, we're already talking
with the insurgents.
Joe Conason, Salon, February 3, 2006
http://salon.com/opinion/conason/2006/02/03/iraq_timetable/
In this year's State of the Union address, George W. Bush proved again
his preference for the rhetoric of deception. Unable to marshal a
convincing argument for his war in Iraq yet determined to silence his
critics, Bush insisted that for patriotic Americans there is simply no
choice except his failing strategy.
"A sudden withdrawal of our forces from Iraq would abandon our Iraqi
allies to death and prison, would put men like [Osama] bin Laden and
[Abu Musab al-] Zarqawi in charge of a strategic country, and show that
a pledge from America means little," he warned. "However we feel about
the decisions and debates of the past our nation has only one option: We
must keep our word, defeat our enemies, and stand behind the American
military in this vital mission."
Predictably those clich?s won strong applause -- who doesn't clap when
the president demands support for U.S. troops? -- but as usual the bid
for inspiration concealed more than a bit of deception.
Would the withdrawal of our forces leave Baghdad to al-Qaida? No,
because the foreign-led jihadists represent a small fraction of the
insurgency. Must we continue the occupation indefinitely to prove that
we "stand behind" the American military? No, because the war is damaging
our military strength, and to support the troops means finding a way out
of the sand trap as swiftly as possible. And is there "only one option"
for the American nation? That's wrong too, although the Democratic
leadership didn't dare say so in the feeble response delivered by
Virginia Gov. Tim Kaine.
"There's a better way," Kaine repeated like a mantra, but he never
bothered to tell us what that might be. The answer is straightforward,
is honorable and might even succeed: The United States, its coalition
partners and the Iraqi government must open serious negotiations with
the Sunni insurgency, aiming toward a durable cease-fire and a timetable
for American withdrawal. There need be no political penalty for
advocating such negotiations because U.S. officers have already pursued
discussions with Iraqi insurgents -- and because those discussions
represent official policy in Iraq.
The U.S. media has devoted little space to those talks, but the
Washington Post and the British press have occasionally reported on
them. Last summer, the Sunday Times of London revealed that American
officers had participated in two meetings with insurgent leaders in a
villa north of Baghdad. Among those in attendance were representatives
of the Ansar al-Sunna army, the group responsible for the atrocious mess
hall bombing at the U.S. base near Mosul, Iraq, in December 2004.
Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and Gen. John Abizaid both
confirmed that those talks had taken place -- and that many more
meetings had occurred in hopes of "splitting" the insurgency.
This week, news of peace talks with the insurgents surfaced again. The
United Nations news service, IRIN, reported that Sunni politicians
claimed to be making progress in discussions with insurgent leaders,
while confronting an obstacle that remains beyond their control. "For
the last month we've been trying to convince militias to put down their
guns until they see whether or not the new government can bring positive
results," said Adnan al-Dulaimi, one of the leaders of the Iraqi Accord
Front, a Sunni Islamist coalition that supports participation in the
political process. According to him, the weekly meetings between his
party and the insurgents have encouraged hope for an eventual cease-fire.
"We've made good progress," he said. "But the presence of foreign troops
could cause this accord to fail at any time." That is hardly surprising,
since recent polls indicate that about 80 percent of Iraqis want
Washington and Baghdad to set a date for when the occupation will end.
The IRIN article quoted a man known as Abu Omar, identified as a leader
of the insurgent Muhammad army in Anbar province. He confirmed that his
group and several others had approved a possible cease-fire, but vowed:
"We will quit fighting only if the U.S. military gives us a date for its
withdrawal."
Then the insurgent leader hinted that serious negotiations could not
only extricate our troops from Iraq but simultaneously create the
conditions for an important victory against our real enemy.
"We're more open to the possibility of improvements in Iraq," said the
insurgent commander, "but al-Qaeda doesn't care for such things because
it's not composed of Iraqis. It's made up of foreigners who have come to
exploit the differences between our brothers."
The meaning of Omar's remarks could hardly be clearer. He and his
insurgent comrades will end their murderous rebellion against the Iraqi
government if and when they can be assured that U.S. troops will
withdraw. And when they are assured that we will leave, they will turn
on al-Qaida and either wipe it out or expel it from Iraq.
If the Bush administration insists that we must "defeat" the insurgency,
or stand up an Iraqi army that can pacify the country, then negotiations
are useless. If Bush insists on identifying all of the insurgents with
al-Qaida, then there isn't anyone with whom we can negotiate. If the
American objective is to create large permanent bases and to win control
of Iraqi oil, then our troops cannot leave and the bloody conflict will
grind on without any foreseeable conclusion.
The negotiations that have occurred already, fitful though they may be,
show another way home for our troops. The president's claim that we have
"only one option" in Iraq is untrue -- and the alternative is far more
likely to advance the interests of America and the civilized world.
Too bad we have no politician with the wisdom and stature to say so.
Thursday, February 02, 2006
The White House Memo
The White House Memo
By Gary Gibbon
Channel 4, London
Thursday 02 February 2006
Revealed: Bush and Blair discussed using American spy plane in UN colors to lure Saddam into war.
Channel 4 News tonight reveals extraordinary details of George Bush and Tony Blair's pre-war meeting in January 2003 at which they discussed plans to begin military action on March 10th 2003, irrespective of whether the United Nations had passed a new resolution authorising the use of force.
Channel 4 News has seen minutes from that meeting, which took place in the White House on 31 January 2003. The two leaders discussed the possibility of securing further UN support, but President Bush made it clear that he had already decided to go to war. The details are contained in a new version of the book 'Lawless World' written by a leading British human rights lawyer, Philippe Sands QC.
President Bush said that: "The US would put its full weight behind efforts to get another resolution and would 'twist arms' and 'even threaten'. But he had to say that if ultimately we failed, military action would follow anyway."
Prime Minister Blair responded that he was: "solidly with the President and ready to do whatever it took to disarm Saddam."
But Mr. Blair said that: "a second Security Council resolution would provide an insurance policy against the unexpected, and international cover, including with the Arabs."
Mr. Sands' book says that the meeting focused on the need to identify evidence that Saddam had committed a material breach of his obligations under the existing UN Resolution 1441. There was concern that insufficient evidence had been unearthed by the UN inspection team, led by Dr Hans Blix. Other options were considered.
President Bush said: "The US was thinking of flying U2 reconnaissance aircraft with fighter cover over Iraq, painted in UN colours. If Saddam fired on them, he would be in breach."
He went on: "It was also possible that a defector could be brought out who would give a public presentation about Saddam's WMD, and there was also a small possibility that Saddam would be assassinated."
Speaking to Channel 4 News, Mr. Sands said: "I think no one would be surprised at the idea that the use of spy-planes to review what is going on would be considered. What is surprising is the idea that they would be used painted in the colours of the United Nations in order to provoke an attack which could then be used to justify material breach. Now that plainly looks as if it is deception, and it raises some fundamental questions of legality, both in terms of domestic law and international law."
Also present at the meeting were President Bush's National Security Adviser, Condoleeza Rice and her deputy Dan Fried, and the President's Chief of Staff, Andrew Card. The Prime Minister took with him his then security adviser Sir David Manning, his Foreign Policy aide Matthew Rycroft, and and his chief of staff, Jonathan Powell.
Those present, as documented in Mr. Sands' book, also discussed what might happen in Iraq after liberation.
President Bush said that he: "thought it unlikely that there would be internecine warfare between the different religious and ethnic groups."
The Foreign Office issued a statement: "The Government only committed UK forces to Iraq after securing the approval of the House in the vote on 18 march 2003."
"The decision to resort to military action to ensure Iraq fulfilled its obligation imposed by successive UN Security Council Resolutions was taken only after all other routes to disarm Iraq had failed."
"Of course during this time there were frequent discussions between UK and US Governments about Iraq."
By Gary Gibbon
Channel 4, London
Thursday 02 February 2006
Revealed: Bush and Blair discussed using American spy plane in UN colors to lure Saddam into war.
Channel 4 News tonight reveals extraordinary details of George Bush and Tony Blair's pre-war meeting in January 2003 at which they discussed plans to begin military action on March 10th 2003, irrespective of whether the United Nations had passed a new resolution authorising the use of force.
Channel 4 News has seen minutes from that meeting, which took place in the White House on 31 January 2003. The two leaders discussed the possibility of securing further UN support, but President Bush made it clear that he had already decided to go to war. The details are contained in a new version of the book 'Lawless World' written by a leading British human rights lawyer, Philippe Sands QC.
President Bush said that: "The US would put its full weight behind efforts to get another resolution and would 'twist arms' and 'even threaten'. But he had to say that if ultimately we failed, military action would follow anyway."
Prime Minister Blair responded that he was: "solidly with the President and ready to do whatever it took to disarm Saddam."
But Mr. Blair said that: "a second Security Council resolution would provide an insurance policy against the unexpected, and international cover, including with the Arabs."
Mr. Sands' book says that the meeting focused on the need to identify evidence that Saddam had committed a material breach of his obligations under the existing UN Resolution 1441. There was concern that insufficient evidence had been unearthed by the UN inspection team, led by Dr Hans Blix. Other options were considered.
President Bush said: "The US was thinking of flying U2 reconnaissance aircraft with fighter cover over Iraq, painted in UN colours. If Saddam fired on them, he would be in breach."
He went on: "It was also possible that a defector could be brought out who would give a public presentation about Saddam's WMD, and there was also a small possibility that Saddam would be assassinated."
Speaking to Channel 4 News, Mr. Sands said: "I think no one would be surprised at the idea that the use of spy-planes to review what is going on would be considered. What is surprising is the idea that they would be used painted in the colours of the United Nations in order to provoke an attack which could then be used to justify material breach. Now that plainly looks as if it is deception, and it raises some fundamental questions of legality, both in terms of domestic law and international law."
Also present at the meeting were President Bush's National Security Adviser, Condoleeza Rice and her deputy Dan Fried, and the President's Chief of Staff, Andrew Card. The Prime Minister took with him his then security adviser Sir David Manning, his Foreign Policy aide Matthew Rycroft, and and his chief of staff, Jonathan Powell.
Those present, as documented in Mr. Sands' book, also discussed what might happen in Iraq after liberation.
President Bush said that he: "thought it unlikely that there would be internecine warfare between the different religious and ethnic groups."
The Foreign Office issued a statement: "The Government only committed UK forces to Iraq after securing the approval of the House in the vote on 18 march 2003."
"The decision to resort to military action to ensure Iraq fulfilled its obligation imposed by successive UN Security Council Resolutions was taken only after all other routes to disarm Iraq had failed."
"Of course during this time there were frequent discussions between UK and US Governments about Iraq."
Fitzgerald Hints White House Records Lost
Fitzgerald Hints White House Records Lost
By PETE YOST , Associated Press, 02.01.2006, 09:28 PM
http://www.forbes.com/business/services/feeds/ap/2006/02/01/ap2493632.html
Special Counsel Patrick Fitzgerald is raising the possibility that records sought in the CIA leak investigation could be missing because of an e-mail archiving problem at the White House.
The prosecutor in the criminal case against Vice President Dick Cheney's former chief of staff said in a Jan. 23 letter that not all e-mail was archived in 2003, the year the Bush administration exposed the identity of undercover CIA officer Valerie Plame.
Lawyers for defendant I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby this week accused prosecutors of withholding evidence the Libby camp says it needs to mount a defense.
"We are aware of no evidence pertinent to the charges against defendant Libby which has been destroyed," Fitzgerald wrote in a letter to the defense team.
But the prosecutor added: "In an abundance of caution, we advise you that we have learned that not all e-mail of the Office of Vice President and the Executive Office of the President for certain time periods in 2003 was preserved through the normal archiving process on the White House computer system." His letter was an exhibit attached to Libby's demand for more information from the prosecution.
Lea Anne McBride, a spokeswoman for Cheney, said the vice president's office is cooperating fully with the investigation, and referred questions to Fitzgerald's office.
Libby is charged with five counts of perjury, obstruction and lying to the FBI regarding how he learned of Plame's identity and what he did with the information.
The Presidential Records Act, passed by Congress in 1978, made it clear that records generated in the conduct of official duties did not belong to the president or vice president, but were the property of the government.
The National Archives takes custody of the records when the president leaves office.
"Bottom line: Accidents happen and there could be a benign explanation, but this is highly irregular and invites suspicion," said Steve Aftergood, director of the Federation of American Scientists government secrecy project.
"A particular subset of records sought in a controversial prosecution have gone missing," Aftergood said. "I think what is needed is for the national archivist to ascertain what went wrong and how to ensure it won't happen again."
By PETE YOST , Associated Press, 02.01.2006, 09:28 PM
http://www.forbes.com/business/services/feeds/ap/2006/02/01/ap2493632.html
Special Counsel Patrick Fitzgerald is raising the possibility that records sought in the CIA leak investigation could be missing because of an e-mail archiving problem at the White House.
The prosecutor in the criminal case against Vice President Dick Cheney's former chief of staff said in a Jan. 23 letter that not all e-mail was archived in 2003, the year the Bush administration exposed the identity of undercover CIA officer Valerie Plame.
Lawyers for defendant I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby this week accused prosecutors of withholding evidence the Libby camp says it needs to mount a defense.
"We are aware of no evidence pertinent to the charges against defendant Libby which has been destroyed," Fitzgerald wrote in a letter to the defense team.
But the prosecutor added: "In an abundance of caution, we advise you that we have learned that not all e-mail of the Office of Vice President and the Executive Office of the President for certain time periods in 2003 was preserved through the normal archiving process on the White House computer system." His letter was an exhibit attached to Libby's demand for more information from the prosecution.
Lea Anne McBride, a spokeswoman for Cheney, said the vice president's office is cooperating fully with the investigation, and referred questions to Fitzgerald's office.
Libby is charged with five counts of perjury, obstruction and lying to the FBI regarding how he learned of Plame's identity and what he did with the information.
The Presidential Records Act, passed by Congress in 1978, made it clear that records generated in the conduct of official duties did not belong to the president or vice president, but were the property of the government.
The National Archives takes custody of the records when the president leaves office.
"Bottom line: Accidents happen and there could be a benign explanation, but this is highly irregular and invites suspicion," said Steve Aftergood, director of the Federation of American Scientists government secrecy project.
"A particular subset of records sought in a controversial prosecution have gone missing," Aftergood said. "I think what is needed is for the national archivist to ascertain what went wrong and how to ensure it won't happen again."
From the people that brought you Gitmo... - Media Monitors Network (MMN)
Home / Headlines / From the people that brought you Gitmo... - Media Monitors Network (MMN)
From the people that brought you Gitmo...
by Tom Mysiewicz
(Thursday February 02 2006)
"Chances are, though, the camps may be populated not just with illegal immigrants but with Moslems and others whose religious beliefs are "incompatible with a democratic society."
The people that brought you Gitmo are at it again, and this time their camps could be located right in the mainland U.S. These camps could be activated in the event of an "emergency", such as a threat to U.S. "national security" resulting from an attack on Iran and/or the expulsion of the Palestinians from East Jerusalem and the West Bank. Chances are, though, the camps may be populated not just with illegal immigrants but with Moslems and others whose religious beliefs are "incompatible with a democratic society".
Neoconservative lightning rod and talk-show host Michael "Savage" (a.k.a. Weiner) has been discussing the topic of late. While he is careful to intersperse terms like "radical Islam" with Moslem, Palestinian, Iranian and Arab (its doubtful the audience appreciates any of these subtle nuances), he has begun testing the waters for a roundup and possible expulsion of such individuals from the U.S. because their religious beliefs are "incompatible with a democratic society". To make such a roundup more palatable, he declares that such individuals are "cockroaches, mentally ill... lunatics... in filthy nightshirts.”
At about the same time Savage began his latest diatribe, word came that a conditional $385-million contract has been issued to the Kellogg Brown Root (KBR) subsidiary of Halliburton to construct temporary detention and processing camps--concentration camps--for Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE). ICE could use such camps as part of its so-called "removal program". Halliburton was apparently selected, in part, due to its previous and highly successful installation at the Gitmo facility in Cuba.
The U.S. is currently swamped with nearly 20-million illegal immigrants, mostly from Mexico. These are creating an intolerable social-welfare burden on many local governments and depressing overall U.S. wages. However, President Bush, in his recent State of the Union message, proposed legalizing such individuals through a "guest worker" proposal. So it's unlikely ICE would be targeting any such documented aliens in a future program of removal.
Other Neoconservative talk-show hosts have decried the presence of "Arabs" in South and Central America, citing countries such as Paraguay as particularly egregious examples. It may also be necessary to capture and deport such subversives during some future "emergency". The proposed FEMA camps could also be used to process and deport such dangerous aliens. There is a precedent for this. During World War II, German farmers and businessmen were seized throughout South and Central America and detained for the duration of the war. Most of the farmers lost their farms and all property built up over many years. (At least one of these "dangerous" subversives reportedly asked his captors about the health of the Kaiser, the leader of Germany in the First World War, because he was so isolated.)
Source:
by courtesy & © 2006 Tom Mysiewicz
From the people that brought you Gitmo...
by Tom Mysiewicz
(Thursday February 02 2006)
"Chances are, though, the camps may be populated not just with illegal immigrants but with Moslems and others whose religious beliefs are "incompatible with a democratic society."
The people that brought you Gitmo are at it again, and this time their camps could be located right in the mainland U.S. These camps could be activated in the event of an "emergency", such as a threat to U.S. "national security" resulting from an attack on Iran and/or the expulsion of the Palestinians from East Jerusalem and the West Bank. Chances are, though, the camps may be populated not just with illegal immigrants but with Moslems and others whose religious beliefs are "incompatible with a democratic society".
Neoconservative lightning rod and talk-show host Michael "Savage" (a.k.a. Weiner) has been discussing the topic of late. While he is careful to intersperse terms like "radical Islam" with Moslem, Palestinian, Iranian and Arab (its doubtful the audience appreciates any of these subtle nuances), he has begun testing the waters for a roundup and possible expulsion of such individuals from the U.S. because their religious beliefs are "incompatible with a democratic society". To make such a roundup more palatable, he declares that such individuals are "cockroaches, mentally ill... lunatics... in filthy nightshirts.”
At about the same time Savage began his latest diatribe, word came that a conditional $385-million contract has been issued to the Kellogg Brown Root (KBR) subsidiary of Halliburton to construct temporary detention and processing camps--concentration camps--for Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE). ICE could use such camps as part of its so-called "removal program". Halliburton was apparently selected, in part, due to its previous and highly successful installation at the Gitmo facility in Cuba.
The U.S. is currently swamped with nearly 20-million illegal immigrants, mostly from Mexico. These are creating an intolerable social-welfare burden on many local governments and depressing overall U.S. wages. However, President Bush, in his recent State of the Union message, proposed legalizing such individuals through a "guest worker" proposal. So it's unlikely ICE would be targeting any such documented aliens in a future program of removal.
Other Neoconservative talk-show hosts have decried the presence of "Arabs" in South and Central America, citing countries such as Paraguay as particularly egregious examples. It may also be necessary to capture and deport such subversives during some future "emergency". The proposed FEMA camps could also be used to process and deport such dangerous aliens. There is a precedent for this. During World War II, German farmers and businessmen were seized throughout South and Central America and detained for the duration of the war. Most of the farmers lost their farms and all property built up over many years. (At least one of these "dangerous" subversives reportedly asked his captors about the health of the Kaiser, the leader of Germany in the First World War, because he was so isolated.)
Source:
by courtesy & © 2006 Tom Mysiewicz
Bush to Request $120B More for War Funding
Bush to Request $120B More for War Funding
Thursday February 2, 2006 9:46 PM
By ANDREW TAYLOR
Associated Press Writer
NOTE: This comes less than 24 hours after a party line vote in the House to pass a savage $40 billion five year cut in social spending that targets the elderly, children, the infirm and the impoverished. It took Putsch less than a day to piss away three times as much on his useless, futile war.
WASHINGTON (AP) - The Bush administration said Thursday it will ask Congress for $120 billion more for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and $18 billion more this year for hurricane relief.
If approved by Congress, the war money would push spending related to the wars toward a staggering half-trillion dollars.
Details of the requests are not final, but the 2007 budget proposal that President Bush will submit next week will reflect the totals for planning purposes. The president also will ask Congress to devote an additional $2.3 billion this year for prepare for a bird flu epidemic.
About $70 billion of the new war money will be requested for operations in Iraq and Afghanistan this year, bringing total spending on the two campaigns to $120 billion for the current budget year. The other $50 billion in new war money will be set aside in the 2007 budget for the first few months of the fiscal year that begins Oct. 1. More money will likely be needed in 2007.
The Congressional Budget Office has estimated that $320 billion has been spent on Iraq and Afghanistan since the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, including $50 billion that Congress sent Bush in December.
Administration officials said the new figures were estimates.
Joel Kaplan, deputy director of the White House's budget office, said the administration was ``trying to balance the desire for transparency and accurate estimating with the unpredictable nature of war and the needs on the ground.''
Bryan Whitman, a Pentagon spokesman, said the requests reflect the president's desire to ``commit the resources that are necessary to fight and win the war on terrorism.''
The requested money would cover troop salaries and benefits, repairing and replacing equipment, supporting U.S. embassies in the two countries and taking on the insurgency. It would cover the costs of continuing to train Iraqi and Afghan security forces and protect U.S. troops.
Kaplan said the $50 billion request for Iraq and Afghanistan for 2007 is a placeholder and he suggested that the combined costs of the two campaigns could be different.
``We're still in the process of working out the details,'' he said.
Meantime, Donald Powell, the coordinator for rebuilding the Gulf Coast, confirmed that the administration would request $18 billion for that effort.
The money would push the total federal commitment for rebuilding to more than $100 billion, according to administration tallies. He said it probably would be the last such spending request for the current budget year. He said a detailed request would go to Congress within 10 days to 30 days.
Powell said he does not anticipate additional money for the region in the 2007 budget Bush planned to announce Monday.
Powell provided little detail about specifically what the money would be used for, saying it would include money for housing, roads and levees.
``That's a lot of money,'' he said, referring to the $100 billion.
The request is also likely to include funding for federal facilities such as military bases and veterans hospitals damaged by the September storm.
In December, Congress dedicated $29 billion of previously appropriated funds for such purposes as levee repair and construction, emergency funds to compensate homeowners whose hurricane insurance does not cover flood losses, and child care, mental health and other social services.
At that time, Congress exceeded Bush's request by $10.4 billion, mostly by approving $11.5 billion in flexible Community Development Block Grants.
---
Associated Press writers Liz Sidoti and Lara Jakes Jordan contributed to this story.
Thursday February 2, 2006 9:46 PM
By ANDREW TAYLOR
Associated Press Writer
NOTE: This comes less than 24 hours after a party line vote in the House to pass a savage $40 billion five year cut in social spending that targets the elderly, children, the infirm and the impoverished. It took Putsch less than a day to piss away three times as much on his useless, futile war.
WASHINGTON (AP) - The Bush administration said Thursday it will ask Congress for $120 billion more for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and $18 billion more this year for hurricane relief.
If approved by Congress, the war money would push spending related to the wars toward a staggering half-trillion dollars.
Details of the requests are not final, but the 2007 budget proposal that President Bush will submit next week will reflect the totals for planning purposes. The president also will ask Congress to devote an additional $2.3 billion this year for prepare for a bird flu epidemic.
About $70 billion of the new war money will be requested for operations in Iraq and Afghanistan this year, bringing total spending on the two campaigns to $120 billion for the current budget year. The other $50 billion in new war money will be set aside in the 2007 budget for the first few months of the fiscal year that begins Oct. 1. More money will likely be needed in 2007.
The Congressional Budget Office has estimated that $320 billion has been spent on Iraq and Afghanistan since the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, including $50 billion that Congress sent Bush in December.
Administration officials said the new figures were estimates.
Joel Kaplan, deputy director of the White House's budget office, said the administration was ``trying to balance the desire for transparency and accurate estimating with the unpredictable nature of war and the needs on the ground.''
Bryan Whitman, a Pentagon spokesman, said the requests reflect the president's desire to ``commit the resources that are necessary to fight and win the war on terrorism.''
The requested money would cover troop salaries and benefits, repairing and replacing equipment, supporting U.S. embassies in the two countries and taking on the insurgency. It would cover the costs of continuing to train Iraqi and Afghan security forces and protect U.S. troops.
Kaplan said the $50 billion request for Iraq and Afghanistan for 2007 is a placeholder and he suggested that the combined costs of the two campaigns could be different.
``We're still in the process of working out the details,'' he said.
Meantime, Donald Powell, the coordinator for rebuilding the Gulf Coast, confirmed that the administration would request $18 billion for that effort.
The money would push the total federal commitment for rebuilding to more than $100 billion, according to administration tallies. He said it probably would be the last such spending request for the current budget year. He said a detailed request would go to Congress within 10 days to 30 days.
Powell said he does not anticipate additional money for the region in the 2007 budget Bush planned to announce Monday.
Powell provided little detail about specifically what the money would be used for, saying it would include money for housing, roads and levees.
``That's a lot of money,'' he said, referring to the $100 billion.
The request is also likely to include funding for federal facilities such as military bases and veterans hospitals damaged by the September storm.
In December, Congress dedicated $29 billion of previously appropriated funds for such purposes as levee repair and construction, emergency funds to compensate homeowners whose hurricane insurance does not cover flood losses, and child care, mental health and other social services.
At that time, Congress exceeded Bush's request by $10.4 billion, mostly by approving $11.5 billion in flexible Community Development Block Grants.
---
Associated Press writers Liz Sidoti and Lara Jakes Jordan contributed to this story.
'Marlboro Man' Turns Against War He Symbolised
'Marlboro Man' Turns Against War He Symbolised
By Andrew Buncombe
The Independent UK
Thursday 02 February 2006
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/americas/article342643.ece
A cigarette hung from his mouth in the manner of John Wayne or Humphrey Bogart, his grime-covered face showed the exhaustion of battle.
This image of US Marine Lance-Corporal Blake Miller, taken during the battle of Fallujah, instantly captured the public imagination and for a while he was known simply as Marlboro Man.
But 15 month after that photograph appeared in more than 100 US newspapers, the 21-year-old is back from Iraq, back on civvy street and he is talking about the trauma of what he experienced and the scars he still bears, physical and mental. The once unquestioning Marine is now also questioning whether US forces should be in Iraq.
The mental health experts who are treating him call his condition post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) but Mr Miller describes it in more immediate language: nightmares, sleeplessness and periods when he will "blank out", not knowing where he is or what he is doing. "I could tell you stories about Iraq that would make the hair stand up on the back of your neck," he said. "And I could tell you things that were great over there. But that would still not tell you what it was actually like. You had to be there and go through it to really understand."
Mr Miller is not alone. The federal Veterans Affairs (VA) department revealed last week that up to a third of US troops returning from Iraq or Afghanistan - about 40,000 - suffer mental health problems. It is to spend an extra $29m (£16.3m) on troops who have PTSD. Days ago, The Independent reported the suicide of another veteran of the Iraq war, Doug Barber, a National Guardsman who took his life after struggling with his experiences of the war after he returned to civilian life.
Mr Miller, who received an honourable discharge last November after military psychologists decided he would be a threat to himself or his colleagues if he continued to serve, said there remained a stigma about mental health issues. He told Knight Ridder Newspapers: "I want people to know that PTSD is not something people come down with because they are crazy. It's an anxiety disorder, where you've experienced something so traumatic that you're close to death." Mr Miller's photograph was taken in November 2004 during the battle for Fallujah, the insurgent stronghold. The two-week operation resulted in the deaths of up to 50 US troops, an estimated 1,200 insurgents and an unknown number of civilians.
The former Marine says he now questions the US tactics and believes troops should have been withdrawn some time ago. He said: "When I was in the service my opinion was whatever the Commander-in-Chief's opinion was. But after I got out, I started to think about it. The biggest question I have now is how you can make a war on an entire country when a certain group from that country is practising terrorism against you. It's as if a gang from New York went to Iraq and blew some stuff up and Iraq started a war against us because of that."
Mr Miller's image was captured by the Los Angeles Times photographer Luis Sinco. At the time, he smoked five packs a day. Now, recently married and looking to make a fresh start, he has cut down to just one.
By Andrew Buncombe
The Independent UK
Thursday 02 February 2006
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/americas/article342643.ece
A cigarette hung from his mouth in the manner of John Wayne or Humphrey Bogart, his grime-covered face showed the exhaustion of battle.
This image of US Marine Lance-Corporal Blake Miller, taken during the battle of Fallujah, instantly captured the public imagination and for a while he was known simply as Marlboro Man.
But 15 month after that photograph appeared in more than 100 US newspapers, the 21-year-old is back from Iraq, back on civvy street and he is talking about the trauma of what he experienced and the scars he still bears, physical and mental. The once unquestioning Marine is now also questioning whether US forces should be in Iraq.
The mental health experts who are treating him call his condition post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) but Mr Miller describes it in more immediate language: nightmares, sleeplessness and periods when he will "blank out", not knowing where he is or what he is doing. "I could tell you stories about Iraq that would make the hair stand up on the back of your neck," he said. "And I could tell you things that were great over there. But that would still not tell you what it was actually like. You had to be there and go through it to really understand."
Mr Miller is not alone. The federal Veterans Affairs (VA) department revealed last week that up to a third of US troops returning from Iraq or Afghanistan - about 40,000 - suffer mental health problems. It is to spend an extra $29m (£16.3m) on troops who have PTSD. Days ago, The Independent reported the suicide of another veteran of the Iraq war, Doug Barber, a National Guardsman who took his life after struggling with his experiences of the war after he returned to civilian life.
Mr Miller, who received an honourable discharge last November after military psychologists decided he would be a threat to himself or his colleagues if he continued to serve, said there remained a stigma about mental health issues. He told Knight Ridder Newspapers: "I want people to know that PTSD is not something people come down with because they are crazy. It's an anxiety disorder, where you've experienced something so traumatic that you're close to death." Mr Miller's photograph was taken in November 2004 during the battle for Fallujah, the insurgent stronghold. The two-week operation resulted in the deaths of up to 50 US troops, an estimated 1,200 insurgents and an unknown number of civilians.
The former Marine says he now questions the US tactics and believes troops should have been withdrawn some time ago. He said: "When I was in the service my opinion was whatever the Commander-in-Chief's opinion was. But after I got out, I started to think about it. The biggest question I have now is how you can make a war on an entire country when a certain group from that country is practising terrorism against you. It's as if a gang from New York went to Iraq and blew some stuff up and Iraq started a war against us because of that."
Mr Miller's image was captured by the Los Angeles Times photographer Luis Sinco. At the time, he smoked five packs a day. Now, recently married and looking to make a fresh start, he has cut down to just one.
Deputy's Gunfire Looks Like a Crime to Some
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-highspeed2feb02,0,28796.story?track=tottext,0,3216044.story?track=tothtml
From the Los Angeles Times
Deputy's Gunfire Looks Like a Crime to Some
By Matt Lait and Lance Pugmire
Times Staff Writers
February 2, 2006
A San Bernardino County sheriff's deputy who shot a 21-year-old Air Force security officer in an incident captured by a video camera appears to have violated accepted police tactics and may have committed a criminal offense, experts in the use of force by police said Wednesday.
The experts cautioned that the low quality of the digital recording may obscure some important evidence. But what is visible — the image of the deputy firing multiple rounds at 21-year-old Elio Carrion as he appeared to follow the deputy's order to get off the ground — was shocking, they said.
"It's a criminal act," said Roger Clark, a former Los Angeles County sheriff's lieutenant who routinely testifies in court as an expert in police tactics. Clark has worked both for police officers and for citizens who have sued the police. "He shot an unarmed man who was complying with his orders," Clark said.
David Klinger, a use-of-force expert who teaches at the University of Missouri, St. Louis, and wrote a book titled "Into The Kill Zone: A Cop's Eye View of Deadly Force," said the recording was "the screwiest thing I've ever seen. It makes no sense."
"What I saw was totally incongruous with standard police doctrine," said Klinger, a professor of criminology and onetime LAPD officer.
San Bernardino County sheriff's officials have refused to release the name of the deputy, although state law makes the identity of law enforcement officers involved in shootings a matter of public record.
A source close to the investigation confirmed the identity of the deputy as Ivory J. Webb IV, 45.
Answering the front door of Webb's home, a woman said the deputy, currently on paid administrative leave, was not willing to discuss the shooting.
"We have nothing to say," the woman said. "Please leave our property."
Webb was named as one of seven co-defendants in a 2004 federal civil lawsuit against San Bernardino County sheriff's deputies that alleged excessive use of force by another deputy. Jurors in that case ruled for the officers and cleared Webb, who had been accused of failing to stop his colleague from misconduct.
Webb is believed to be the son of a former Compton chief of police, also named Ivory Webb. The elder Webb has a son whose birth date matches that of the San Bernardino deputy. That son played college football at Iowa, where he was a two-time letterman receiver and played in the 1982 Rose Bowl.
A woman who answered the telephone at the elder Webb's home said, "my son didn't do anything."
The shooting, which occurred on a residential street in Chino, was recorded by a bystander and shows Carrion crouching on the ground telling the deputy that he was "on your side" and meant him "no harm."
At one point, a voice on the recording appears to say "stay on the ground." Seconds later, however, the deputy appears to tell Carrion: "Get up, get up." As Carrion rises, the deputy, who is standing several feet away, shoots him three times.
Carrion remains hospitalized in good condition.
Carrion was the passenger in a blue Corvette that had led the deputy on a brief high-speed chase Sunday night. The chase ended when the driver crashed into a fence on a residential street. Neither Carrion nor the driver had any weapons, sheriff's officials said.
On Tuesday, the U.S. attorney's office said a federal civil rights probe of the shooting had been opened.
A separate investigation is being conducted by the San Bernardino County Sheriff's Department.
On Wednesday, county Dist. Atty. Michael Ramos said in a statement that "we fully expect the investigation to be both thorough and comprehensive." Once the sheriff's investigation is finished, Ramos said, his prosecutors will decide whether to bring charges against the deputy.
Law enforcement officials warned against making quick judgments about the shooting until the recording had been thoroughly analyzed and investigations completed.
The recording, which has received national media attention, is poor in quality and was shot at night and on a dark residential street. Conversations between the deputy and Carrion are at times difficult to hear, and some statements are too faint or garbled to be discerned.
Sheriff's spokeswoman Cindy Beavers said some dialogue appeared to be inaudible because of background noise.
"We're hoping the FBI's forensic exam of the tape will provide a complete description of the dialogue," Beavers said. "And then there will be no doubts."
Under state law, officers are allowed to use deadly force if they perceive that a person presents a deadly threat to themselves or others.
However, several law enforcement experts who reviewed the recording said they did not see any threat from Carrion that would justify the use of deadly force.
Carrion was not charged with any crime. The driver of the vehicle, Luis Fernando Escobedo, 21, was arrested on suspicion of felony evading but has not been charged. He was released from jail Tuesday night.
Escobedo held an impromptu news conference on the front lawn of his home in Montclair on Wednesday afternoon and said both he and Carrion were trying to cooperate with the deputy and that the deputy had no reason to open fire.
"We were both talking to the officer, saying, 'We're not armed,' " Escobedo said.
"Carrion opened his door to speak to the deputy, who told Carrion to move to the ground, Escobedo said. Later, the deputy ordered Carrion to get up, he said.
"When he pushed himself up, that's when the officer [started] shooting," said Escobedo, who remained in the vehicle throughout the incident. When asked if Carrion reached for anything, Escobedo said his friend had no weapon to reach for.
Some experts said the shooting could have been avoided had the deputy used better tactics. Specifically, they said, the deputy should never have placed himself so close to suspects. Instead, he should have used his own vehicle as cover, called for backup and issued commands from a safe distance.
Ideally, they said, a suspect should be lying prone on the ground and handcuffed before he is asked to stand up.
"It's a two-man operation," said Clark, "one to handcuff the suspect and the other to provide cover."
Good police tactics, he said, "prevent injuries and unnecessary uses of force." And, he added, "there is no room for anger in this profession, and this deputy looks really mad."
Geoffrey Alpert, another police expert on deadly force, said that even if Carrion were disobeying the deputy and standing up without permission, that would not seem to justify the shooting.
"I don't see where there is a threat to the officer," said Alpert, chairman of the University of South Carolina's department of criminology and criminal justice.
Alpert, like other experts, suggested that the deputy might have been pumped up with emotion after being involved in an adrenaline-charged pursuit.
"It's hard to say what was going through that deputy's mind," he said.
The incident was the second controversial shooting by a San Bernardino County sheriff's deputy that was recorded in the past seven months.
The county district attorney's office is investigating an August shooting.
In that incident, a store security camera showed an undercover deputy firing into an SUV at a Rialto shopping center, killing the unarmed driver, Antuan Conners.
Conners was a suspect in two jewelry store robberies, and deputies, traveling in unmarked cars, were attempting to take him into custody. They boxed in his car in the parking lot and got out of their cars. When Conners tried to accelerate around them, he was shot to death.
Sheriff's homicide investigators determined the deputy in that case was compelled to shoot because he feared for the safety of the deputies around him.
"We have the same diligence toward officer-involved shootings as we do with homicides," said Sgt. Frank Bell, the sheriff's lead homicide investigator in the Conners shooting.
"Our job is to present what happened as accurately as possible…. Mistakes are made. We have to understand [deputies] are human. If a guy panicked, we'll say it."
Bell, who is not involved with the investigation of Sunday's shooting, said videotape evidence can be extremely helpful, but added that it does not answer all the questions or reveal what's in the minds of the deputy or suspect.
*
Times staff writers Ashley Powers, Susannah Rosenblatt and Michelle Keller contributed to this report.
From the Los Angeles Times
Deputy's Gunfire Looks Like a Crime to Some
By Matt Lait and Lance Pugmire
Times Staff Writers
February 2, 2006
A San Bernardino County sheriff's deputy who shot a 21-year-old Air Force security officer in an incident captured by a video camera appears to have violated accepted police tactics and may have committed a criminal offense, experts in the use of force by police said Wednesday.
The experts cautioned that the low quality of the digital recording may obscure some important evidence. But what is visible — the image of the deputy firing multiple rounds at 21-year-old Elio Carrion as he appeared to follow the deputy's order to get off the ground — was shocking, they said.
"It's a criminal act," said Roger Clark, a former Los Angeles County sheriff's lieutenant who routinely testifies in court as an expert in police tactics. Clark has worked both for police officers and for citizens who have sued the police. "He shot an unarmed man who was complying with his orders," Clark said.
David Klinger, a use-of-force expert who teaches at the University of Missouri, St. Louis, and wrote a book titled "Into The Kill Zone: A Cop's Eye View of Deadly Force," said the recording was "the screwiest thing I've ever seen. It makes no sense."
"What I saw was totally incongruous with standard police doctrine," said Klinger, a professor of criminology and onetime LAPD officer.
San Bernardino County sheriff's officials have refused to release the name of the deputy, although state law makes the identity of law enforcement officers involved in shootings a matter of public record.
A source close to the investigation confirmed the identity of the deputy as Ivory J. Webb IV, 45.
Answering the front door of Webb's home, a woman said the deputy, currently on paid administrative leave, was not willing to discuss the shooting.
"We have nothing to say," the woman said. "Please leave our property."
Webb was named as one of seven co-defendants in a 2004 federal civil lawsuit against San Bernardino County sheriff's deputies that alleged excessive use of force by another deputy. Jurors in that case ruled for the officers and cleared Webb, who had been accused of failing to stop his colleague from misconduct.
Webb is believed to be the son of a former Compton chief of police, also named Ivory Webb. The elder Webb has a son whose birth date matches that of the San Bernardino deputy. That son played college football at Iowa, where he was a two-time letterman receiver and played in the 1982 Rose Bowl.
A woman who answered the telephone at the elder Webb's home said, "my son didn't do anything."
The shooting, which occurred on a residential street in Chino, was recorded by a bystander and shows Carrion crouching on the ground telling the deputy that he was "on your side" and meant him "no harm."
At one point, a voice on the recording appears to say "stay on the ground." Seconds later, however, the deputy appears to tell Carrion: "Get up, get up." As Carrion rises, the deputy, who is standing several feet away, shoots him three times.
Carrion remains hospitalized in good condition.
Carrion was the passenger in a blue Corvette that had led the deputy on a brief high-speed chase Sunday night. The chase ended when the driver crashed into a fence on a residential street. Neither Carrion nor the driver had any weapons, sheriff's officials said.
On Tuesday, the U.S. attorney's office said a federal civil rights probe of the shooting had been opened.
A separate investigation is being conducted by the San Bernardino County Sheriff's Department.
On Wednesday, county Dist. Atty. Michael Ramos said in a statement that "we fully expect the investigation to be both thorough and comprehensive." Once the sheriff's investigation is finished, Ramos said, his prosecutors will decide whether to bring charges against the deputy.
Law enforcement officials warned against making quick judgments about the shooting until the recording had been thoroughly analyzed and investigations completed.
The recording, which has received national media attention, is poor in quality and was shot at night and on a dark residential street. Conversations between the deputy and Carrion are at times difficult to hear, and some statements are too faint or garbled to be discerned.
Sheriff's spokeswoman Cindy Beavers said some dialogue appeared to be inaudible because of background noise.
"We're hoping the FBI's forensic exam of the tape will provide a complete description of the dialogue," Beavers said. "And then there will be no doubts."
Under state law, officers are allowed to use deadly force if they perceive that a person presents a deadly threat to themselves or others.
However, several law enforcement experts who reviewed the recording said they did not see any threat from Carrion that would justify the use of deadly force.
Carrion was not charged with any crime. The driver of the vehicle, Luis Fernando Escobedo, 21, was arrested on suspicion of felony evading but has not been charged. He was released from jail Tuesday night.
Escobedo held an impromptu news conference on the front lawn of his home in Montclair on Wednesday afternoon and said both he and Carrion were trying to cooperate with the deputy and that the deputy had no reason to open fire.
"We were both talking to the officer, saying, 'We're not armed,' " Escobedo said.
"Carrion opened his door to speak to the deputy, who told Carrion to move to the ground, Escobedo said. Later, the deputy ordered Carrion to get up, he said.
"When he pushed himself up, that's when the officer [started] shooting," said Escobedo, who remained in the vehicle throughout the incident. When asked if Carrion reached for anything, Escobedo said his friend had no weapon to reach for.
Some experts said the shooting could have been avoided had the deputy used better tactics. Specifically, they said, the deputy should never have placed himself so close to suspects. Instead, he should have used his own vehicle as cover, called for backup and issued commands from a safe distance.
Ideally, they said, a suspect should be lying prone on the ground and handcuffed before he is asked to stand up.
"It's a two-man operation," said Clark, "one to handcuff the suspect and the other to provide cover."
Good police tactics, he said, "prevent injuries and unnecessary uses of force." And, he added, "there is no room for anger in this profession, and this deputy looks really mad."
Geoffrey Alpert, another police expert on deadly force, said that even if Carrion were disobeying the deputy and standing up without permission, that would not seem to justify the shooting.
"I don't see where there is a threat to the officer," said Alpert, chairman of the University of South Carolina's department of criminology and criminal justice.
Alpert, like other experts, suggested that the deputy might have been pumped up with emotion after being involved in an adrenaline-charged pursuit.
"It's hard to say what was going through that deputy's mind," he said.
The incident was the second controversial shooting by a San Bernardino County sheriff's deputy that was recorded in the past seven months.
The county district attorney's office is investigating an August shooting.
In that incident, a store security camera showed an undercover deputy firing into an SUV at a Rialto shopping center, killing the unarmed driver, Antuan Conners.
Conners was a suspect in two jewelry store robberies, and deputies, traveling in unmarked cars, were attempting to take him into custody. They boxed in his car in the parking lot and got out of their cars. When Conners tried to accelerate around them, he was shot to death.
Sheriff's homicide investigators determined the deputy in that case was compelled to shoot because he feared for the safety of the deputies around him.
"We have the same diligence toward officer-involved shootings as we do with homicides," said Sgt. Frank Bell, the sheriff's lead homicide investigator in the Conners shooting.
"Our job is to present what happened as accurately as possible…. Mistakes are made. We have to understand [deputies] are human. If a guy panicked, we'll say it."
Bell, who is not involved with the investigation of Sunday's shooting, said videotape evidence can be extremely helpful, but added that it does not answer all the questions or reveal what's in the minds of the deputy or suspect.
*
Times staff writers Ashley Powers, Susannah Rosenblatt and Michelle Keller contributed to this report.
Administration backs off Bush's vow to reduce Mideast oil imports
Administration backs off Bush's vow to reduce Mideast oil imports
By Kevin G. Hall
http://www.realcities.com/mld/krwashington/news/nation/13767738.htm
Knight Ridder Newspapers
WASHINGTON - One day after President Bush vowed to reduce America's
dependence on Middle East oil by cutting imports from there 75 percent
by 2025, his energy secretary and national economic adviser said
Wednesday that the president didn't mean it literally.
What the president meant, they said in a conference call with reporters,
was that alternative fuels could displace an amount of oil imports
equivalent to most of what America is expected to import from the Middle
East in 2025.
But America still would import oil from the Middle East, because that's
where the greatest oil supplies are.
The president's State of the Union reference to Mideast oil made
headlines nationwide Wednesday because of his assertion that "America is
addicted to oil" and his call to "break this addiction."
Bush vowed to fund research into better batteries for hybrid vehicles
and more production of the alternative fuel ethanol, setting a lofty
goal of replacing "more than 75 percent of our oil imports from the
Middle East by 2025."
He pledged to "move beyond a petroleum-based economy and make our
dependence on Middle Eastern oil a thing of the past."
Not exactly, though, it turns out.
"This was purely an example," Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman said.
He said the broad goal was to displace foreign oil imports, from
anywhere, with domestic alternatives. He acknowledged that oil is a
freely traded commodity bought and sold globally by private firms.
Consequently, it would be very difficult to reduce imports from any
single region, especially the most oil-rich region on Earth.
Asked why the president used the words "the Middle East" when he didn't
really mean them, one administration official said Bush wanted to
dramatize the issue in a way that "every American sitting out there
listening to the speech understands." The official spoke only on
condition of anonymity because he feared that his remarks might get him
in trouble.
Presidential adviser Dan Bartlett made a similar point in a briefing
before the speech. "I think one of the biggest concerns the American
people have is oil coming from the Middle East. It is a very volatile
region," he said.
Through the first 11 months of 2005, the United States imported nearly
2.2 million barrels per day of oil from the Middle East nations of Saudi
Arabia, Kuwait and Iraq. That's less than 20 percent of the total U.S.
daily imports of 10.062 million barrels.
Imports account for about 60 percent of U.S. oil consumption.
Alan Hubbard, the director of the president's National Economic Council,
projects that America will import 6 million barrels of oil per day from
the Middle East in 2025 without major technological changes in energy
consumption.
The Bush administration believes that new technologies could reduce the
total daily U.S. oil demand by about 5.26 million barrels through
alternatives such as plug-in hybrids with rechargeable batteries,
hydrogen-powered cars and new ethanol products.
That means the new technologies could reduce America's oil appetite by
the equivalent of what we're expected to import from the Middle East by
2025, Hubbard said.
But we'll still be importing plenty of oil, according to the Energy
Department's latest projection.
"In 2025, net petroleum imports, including both crude oil and refined
products, are expected to account for 60 percent of demand ... up from
58 percent in 2004," according to the Energy Information
Administration's 2006 Annual Energy Outlook.
Some experts think Bush needs to do more to achieve his stated goal.
"We can achieve energy independence from the Middle East, but not with
what the president is proposing," said Craig Wolfe, the president of
Americans for Energy Independence in Studio City, Calif. "We need to
slow the growth in consumption. Our organization believes we need to do
something about conservation" and higher auto fuel-efficiency standards.
By Kevin G. Hall
http://www.realcities.com/mld/krwashington/news/nation/13767738.htm
Knight Ridder Newspapers
WASHINGTON - One day after President Bush vowed to reduce America's
dependence on Middle East oil by cutting imports from there 75 percent
by 2025, his energy secretary and national economic adviser said
Wednesday that the president didn't mean it literally.
What the president meant, they said in a conference call with reporters,
was that alternative fuels could displace an amount of oil imports
equivalent to most of what America is expected to import from the Middle
East in 2025.
But America still would import oil from the Middle East, because that's
where the greatest oil supplies are.
The president's State of the Union reference to Mideast oil made
headlines nationwide Wednesday because of his assertion that "America is
addicted to oil" and his call to "break this addiction."
Bush vowed to fund research into better batteries for hybrid vehicles
and more production of the alternative fuel ethanol, setting a lofty
goal of replacing "more than 75 percent of our oil imports from the
Middle East by 2025."
He pledged to "move beyond a petroleum-based economy and make our
dependence on Middle Eastern oil a thing of the past."
Not exactly, though, it turns out.
"This was purely an example," Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman said.
He said the broad goal was to displace foreign oil imports, from
anywhere, with domestic alternatives. He acknowledged that oil is a
freely traded commodity bought and sold globally by private firms.
Consequently, it would be very difficult to reduce imports from any
single region, especially the most oil-rich region on Earth.
Asked why the president used the words "the Middle East" when he didn't
really mean them, one administration official said Bush wanted to
dramatize the issue in a way that "every American sitting out there
listening to the speech understands." The official spoke only on
condition of anonymity because he feared that his remarks might get him
in trouble.
Presidential adviser Dan Bartlett made a similar point in a briefing
before the speech. "I think one of the biggest concerns the American
people have is oil coming from the Middle East. It is a very volatile
region," he said.
Through the first 11 months of 2005, the United States imported nearly
2.2 million barrels per day of oil from the Middle East nations of Saudi
Arabia, Kuwait and Iraq. That's less than 20 percent of the total U.S.
daily imports of 10.062 million barrels.
Imports account for about 60 percent of U.S. oil consumption.
Alan Hubbard, the director of the president's National Economic Council,
projects that America will import 6 million barrels of oil per day from
the Middle East in 2025 without major technological changes in energy
consumption.
The Bush administration believes that new technologies could reduce the
total daily U.S. oil demand by about 5.26 million barrels through
alternatives such as plug-in hybrids with rechargeable batteries,
hydrogen-powered cars and new ethanol products.
That means the new technologies could reduce America's oil appetite by
the equivalent of what we're expected to import from the Middle East by
2025, Hubbard said.
But we'll still be importing plenty of oil, according to the Energy
Department's latest projection.
"In 2025, net petroleum imports, including both crude oil and refined
products, are expected to account for 60 percent of demand ... up from
58 percent in 2004," according to the Energy Information
Administration's 2006 Annual Energy Outlook.
Some experts think Bush needs to do more to achieve his stated goal.
"We can achieve energy independence from the Middle East, but not with
what the president is proposing," said Craig Wolfe, the president of
Americans for Energy Independence in Studio City, Calif. "We need to
slow the growth in consumption. Our organization believes we need to do
something about conservation" and higher auto fuel-efficiency standards.
Wide Plot Seen in Guilty Plea in Iraq Project
Wide Plot Seen in Guilty Plea in Iraq Project
By JAMES GLANZ / NY Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/02/02/international/middleeast/02reconstruct.html?th=&emc=th&pagewanted=print
Robert J. Stein Jr. could not have been clearer about his feelings toward the American businessman who was receiving millions of dollars in contracts from Mr. Stein to build a major police academy and other reconstruction projects in Iraq.
"I love to give you money," Mr. Stein wrote in an e-mail message to the businessman, Philip H. Bloom, on Jan. 3, 2004, just as the United States was trying to ramp up its rebuilding program in Iraq.
As it turned out, Mr. Stein had the money to give. Despite a prior conviction on felony fraud that his Pentagon background check apparently missed, Mr. Stein was hired and put in charge of at least $82 million of reconstruction money in the south central Iraqi city of Hilla by the Coalition Provisional Authority, the American-led administration that was then running Iraq.
In United States District Court in Washington, court papers indicate, Mr. Stein will plead guilty today to conspiracy, bribery, money laundering, possession of a machine gun and being a felon in possession of firearms, for essentially giving millions of that money to Mr. Bloom, and taking millions more for himself. Mr. Stein used some of his stolen money, the papers say, to buy items as wildly diverse as grenade launchers, machine guns, a Lexus, "an interest in one Porsche," a Cessna airplane, two plots of real estate in Hope Mills, N.C., a Toshiba personal computer, 18 Breitling watches, a 6-carat diamond ring and a collection of silver dollars. The papers say that the ring of corruption was much wider than previously known, drawing at least seven Americans, including Mr. Stein, Mr. Bloom and five Army reserve officers, into what is portrayed as a maelstrom of greed, sex and gun-running at the heart of the American occupation of a conservative Muslim country.
As part of their bribery scheme, Mr. Stein and his co-conspirators dispensed and received a wide range of other items like cigars, alcohol, first-class plane tickets and "money laundering services," according to the papers. And if all of that were not enough reason for Mr. Stein to love giving money to his partner, the papers say, there was another: Mr. Bloom kept a villa in Baghdad where he provided women who gave sexual favors to officials he hoped to influence, including Mr. Stein. Mr. Bloom's lawyer, Robert A. Mintz, declined to comment on the case.
The court papers say the money was taken by outright theft of millions of dollars in cash — some of it then lugged aboard commercial flights back to the United States — by steering millions of dollars in construction contracts to Mr. Bloom's companies in return for bribes, and through international wire transfers of millions more.
Over all, Mr. Stein is accused of stealing at least $2 million of American taxpayer money and Iraqi funds, which came from Iraqi oil proceeds and money seized from Saddam Hussein's government, accepting at least $1 million in money and goods in direct bribes and grabbing another $600,000 in cash and goods that belonged to the Coalition Provisional Authority. In return, Mr. Stein and his cronies used rigged bids to steer at least $8.6 million in contracts for buildings like the police academy, a library and a center meant to promote democracy, the papers say.
The papers say "Stein and his co-conspirators recommended numerous construction projects in Hilla, Iraq, that were intended to be, and were in fact, steered" to Mr. Bloom. That charge suggests that Mr. Stein, using his perch at the provisional authority, was manipulating at least part of the reconstruction program to enrich himself and his cronies.
There have so far been four arrests in the case, including Mr. Stein, of Fayetteville, N.C., and Mr. Bloom, who lived for many years in Romania. The others, who like Mr. Stein served as C.P.A. officials whose authority extended over a vast territory centered on Hilla, are Lt. Col. Debra Harrison of Trenton and Lt. Col. Michael Wheeler of Amherst Junction, Wis. They were all arrested late last year. Lawyers for Colonel Harrison and Colonel Wheeler did not immediately respond to phone messages left late last night.
The papers covering Mr. Stein's likely plea deal refer to Mr. Bloom, Colonel Harrison and Colonel Wheeler only as numbered co-conspirators, but their names are easily deduced from the context. The remaining three people called co-conspirators have not yet been publicly charged with crimes and their names are not known. The papers also suggest that others may have been involved.
As described in the court papers, reports by the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction, and other public documents, the story of Mr. Stein's slide into the depths of corruption began shortly after he was sent to Iraq after being hired by S&K Technologies, a St. Ignatius, Mont., company that had won Army contracts to provide administrative support in Iraq.
Although S&K's contract called for Pentagon background checks, some of which were actually carried out, according to former S&K employees, Mr. Stein was given extraordinary authority in Iraq to authorize and spend money, in spite of his fraud conviction in the mid-1990's.
Mr. Stein's control over astonishing sums of cash became so great, interviews with former officials in Hilla indicate, that at one point he and others picked up $58.8 million in shrink-wrapped $100 bills from provisional authority headquarters and drove back with it to Hilla. There Mr. Stein controlled access to the vault where the cash was put — though not before local employees posed for pictures in front of the money.
The story of Mr. Stein's misdeeds begins, according to the court papers, with an e-mail message Mr. Stein sent to Mr. Bloom asking if one of the other conspirators was now "on board." A few days later, Mr. Stein sent an exultant note saying that he had pushed through the first of the police academy contracts, for preparing the ground. "I will give you 200K sometime tomorrow afternoon!" Mr. Stein wrote.
Some $7.3 million in contracts and grants ultimately was written for the academy, with much of it going to Mr. Bloom, the papers say. Agents from the special inspector general's office later found that the work was done improperly or not at all. Mr. Stein had authority only to write contracts for under $500,000. He evaded that limit by writing at least 11 separate contracts, each for under that amount, federal papers say.
A few days after that first e-mail message, in the first of a series of wire transfers, Mr. Bloom sent $30,000 from a bank in Kuwait to an account controlled by Mr. Stein's wife at the Bragg Mutual Federal Credit Union in North Carolina. Two weeks later, the papers indicate, $70,000 more went out by the same route. The bribes had begun.
From that point on, through contract after contract, Mr. Stein, Mr. Bloom and the other conspirators descended into unbridled corruption, the papers indicate. They appeared to draw more people into the scam and became fearful of being exposed. On Feb. 25, 2004, Mr. Stein wrote a message saying that the official who had been brought "on board" had just stomped out of Mr. Stein's office, the papers say. "I guess he was expecting the next chunk for 60 sent," Mr. Stein wrote, referring to a bribe of $60,000, "and he got a call from his wife stating he had not received it."
And after Mr. Bloom wrote back saying "I sent the funds a week ago" and "tell him to stop acting like a child," Mr. Stein replied, seemingly with trepidation: "Shall I go ahead and give" the official "the 50 or 60 to shut him up?" The demands of the co-conspirators seemed to grow more extreme as time went on. By late June, Mr. Bloom carried on a correspondence with a car dealer in the United States to satisfy highly expensive demands by yet another alleged player in the scheme.
"Your friend is seeking a very desirable, hard-to-find color: electric blue," the dealer wrote back. "It appears that there are only two blue Nissan 350Z hardtops in the western United States," adding that the person "wants the following specifications: Touring model, manual transmission, aerodynamics package, cargo convenience package, floor mats, splash guards and trunk mat." Cost: $35,990.
A frantic tone crept into Mr. Stein's correspondence as he realized investigators could be closing in. One official, Mr. Stein wrote on June 25 to the person who wanted the Nissan, "is pushing some things that could snowball out of control."
"I am doing my best to keep a formal investigation from happening," Mr. Stein wrote. He added, "I would like to know if you are going to stand behind me or not!"
Elizabeth Rubin contributed reporting for this article.
By JAMES GLANZ / NY Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/02/02/international/middleeast/02reconstruct.html?th=&emc=th&pagewanted=print
Robert J. Stein Jr. could not have been clearer about his feelings toward the American businessman who was receiving millions of dollars in contracts from Mr. Stein to build a major police academy and other reconstruction projects in Iraq.
"I love to give you money," Mr. Stein wrote in an e-mail message to the businessman, Philip H. Bloom, on Jan. 3, 2004, just as the United States was trying to ramp up its rebuilding program in Iraq.
As it turned out, Mr. Stein had the money to give. Despite a prior conviction on felony fraud that his Pentagon background check apparently missed, Mr. Stein was hired and put in charge of at least $82 million of reconstruction money in the south central Iraqi city of Hilla by the Coalition Provisional Authority, the American-led administration that was then running Iraq.
In United States District Court in Washington, court papers indicate, Mr. Stein will plead guilty today to conspiracy, bribery, money laundering, possession of a machine gun and being a felon in possession of firearms, for essentially giving millions of that money to Mr. Bloom, and taking millions more for himself. Mr. Stein used some of his stolen money, the papers say, to buy items as wildly diverse as grenade launchers, machine guns, a Lexus, "an interest in one Porsche," a Cessna airplane, two plots of real estate in Hope Mills, N.C., a Toshiba personal computer, 18 Breitling watches, a 6-carat diamond ring and a collection of silver dollars. The papers say that the ring of corruption was much wider than previously known, drawing at least seven Americans, including Mr. Stein, Mr. Bloom and five Army reserve officers, into what is portrayed as a maelstrom of greed, sex and gun-running at the heart of the American occupation of a conservative Muslim country.
As part of their bribery scheme, Mr. Stein and his co-conspirators dispensed and received a wide range of other items like cigars, alcohol, first-class plane tickets and "money laundering services," according to the papers. And if all of that were not enough reason for Mr. Stein to love giving money to his partner, the papers say, there was another: Mr. Bloom kept a villa in Baghdad where he provided women who gave sexual favors to officials he hoped to influence, including Mr. Stein. Mr. Bloom's lawyer, Robert A. Mintz, declined to comment on the case.
The court papers say the money was taken by outright theft of millions of dollars in cash — some of it then lugged aboard commercial flights back to the United States — by steering millions of dollars in construction contracts to Mr. Bloom's companies in return for bribes, and through international wire transfers of millions more.
Over all, Mr. Stein is accused of stealing at least $2 million of American taxpayer money and Iraqi funds, which came from Iraqi oil proceeds and money seized from Saddam Hussein's government, accepting at least $1 million in money and goods in direct bribes and grabbing another $600,000 in cash and goods that belonged to the Coalition Provisional Authority. In return, Mr. Stein and his cronies used rigged bids to steer at least $8.6 million in contracts for buildings like the police academy, a library and a center meant to promote democracy, the papers say.
The papers say "Stein and his co-conspirators recommended numerous construction projects in Hilla, Iraq, that were intended to be, and were in fact, steered" to Mr. Bloom. That charge suggests that Mr. Stein, using his perch at the provisional authority, was manipulating at least part of the reconstruction program to enrich himself and his cronies.
There have so far been four arrests in the case, including Mr. Stein, of Fayetteville, N.C., and Mr. Bloom, who lived for many years in Romania. The others, who like Mr. Stein served as C.P.A. officials whose authority extended over a vast territory centered on Hilla, are Lt. Col. Debra Harrison of Trenton and Lt. Col. Michael Wheeler of Amherst Junction, Wis. They were all arrested late last year. Lawyers for Colonel Harrison and Colonel Wheeler did not immediately respond to phone messages left late last night.
The papers covering Mr. Stein's likely plea deal refer to Mr. Bloom, Colonel Harrison and Colonel Wheeler only as numbered co-conspirators, but their names are easily deduced from the context. The remaining three people called co-conspirators have not yet been publicly charged with crimes and their names are not known. The papers also suggest that others may have been involved.
As described in the court papers, reports by the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction, and other public documents, the story of Mr. Stein's slide into the depths of corruption began shortly after he was sent to Iraq after being hired by S&K Technologies, a St. Ignatius, Mont., company that had won Army contracts to provide administrative support in Iraq.
Although S&K's contract called for Pentagon background checks, some of which were actually carried out, according to former S&K employees, Mr. Stein was given extraordinary authority in Iraq to authorize and spend money, in spite of his fraud conviction in the mid-1990's.
Mr. Stein's control over astonishing sums of cash became so great, interviews with former officials in Hilla indicate, that at one point he and others picked up $58.8 million in shrink-wrapped $100 bills from provisional authority headquarters and drove back with it to Hilla. There Mr. Stein controlled access to the vault where the cash was put — though not before local employees posed for pictures in front of the money.
The story of Mr. Stein's misdeeds begins, according to the court papers, with an e-mail message Mr. Stein sent to Mr. Bloom asking if one of the other conspirators was now "on board." A few days later, Mr. Stein sent an exultant note saying that he had pushed through the first of the police academy contracts, for preparing the ground. "I will give you 200K sometime tomorrow afternoon!" Mr. Stein wrote.
Some $7.3 million in contracts and grants ultimately was written for the academy, with much of it going to Mr. Bloom, the papers say. Agents from the special inspector general's office later found that the work was done improperly or not at all. Mr. Stein had authority only to write contracts for under $500,000. He evaded that limit by writing at least 11 separate contracts, each for under that amount, federal papers say.
A few days after that first e-mail message, in the first of a series of wire transfers, Mr. Bloom sent $30,000 from a bank in Kuwait to an account controlled by Mr. Stein's wife at the Bragg Mutual Federal Credit Union in North Carolina. Two weeks later, the papers indicate, $70,000 more went out by the same route. The bribes had begun.
From that point on, through contract after contract, Mr. Stein, Mr. Bloom and the other conspirators descended into unbridled corruption, the papers indicate. They appeared to draw more people into the scam and became fearful of being exposed. On Feb. 25, 2004, Mr. Stein wrote a message saying that the official who had been brought "on board" had just stomped out of Mr. Stein's office, the papers say. "I guess he was expecting the next chunk for 60 sent," Mr. Stein wrote, referring to a bribe of $60,000, "and he got a call from his wife stating he had not received it."
And after Mr. Bloom wrote back saying "I sent the funds a week ago" and "tell him to stop acting like a child," Mr. Stein replied, seemingly with trepidation: "Shall I go ahead and give" the official "the 50 or 60 to shut him up?" The demands of the co-conspirators seemed to grow more extreme as time went on. By late June, Mr. Bloom carried on a correspondence with a car dealer in the United States to satisfy highly expensive demands by yet another alleged player in the scheme.
"Your friend is seeking a very desirable, hard-to-find color: electric blue," the dealer wrote back. "It appears that there are only two blue Nissan 350Z hardtops in the western United States," adding that the person "wants the following specifications: Touring model, manual transmission, aerodynamics package, cargo convenience package, floor mats, splash guards and trunk mat." Cost: $35,990.
A frantic tone crept into Mr. Stein's correspondence as he realized investigators could be closing in. One official, Mr. Stein wrote on June 25 to the person who wanted the Nissan, "is pushing some things that could snowball out of control."
"I am doing my best to keep a formal investigation from happening," Mr. Stein wrote. He added, "I would like to know if you are going to stand behind me or not!"
Elizabeth Rubin contributed reporting for this article.
STATE OF THE UNION: An Underwhelmed Nation Yawns
STATE OF THE UNION
An Underwhelmed Nation Yawns
Last night, President Bush attempted to shift attention from his failing strategy in Iraq. He couldn't do it. The Washington Post notes that "his address lacked the rhetorical lift of some of his best efforts of the past, and the domestic policy agenda, although lengthy, included initiatives that have been around for some time. In that sense, the speech was a reminder of how much the war in Iraq has drained the administration's energy and creativity, and how much it continues to define the Bush presidency." Bush stressed that "with so much in the balance, those of us in public office have a duty to speak with candor." But Bush frequently glossed over " harsh global and political realities" in an effort to paint an optimistic picture of the State of the Union. Check out our comprehensive reality check on ThinkProgress.org.
THE REVIEWS ARE IN: " Encumbered by some of the lowest approval ratings of his presidency," President Bush delivered a speech that has been characterized as "generic," "small-bore," and without ambition. A CNN/USA Today/Gallup poll revealed that Bush's address last night received the lowest positive reaction of any State of the Union speech delivered during his tenure. News analyses have noted that Bush "displayed little ambition to tackle some of America's greatest challenges at home or abroad." In comparison to Bush's previous State of the Union addresses, last night's speech was "far less ambitious, his tone noticeably different." In style, the speech was "lackluster, ordinary and, most of all, generic." Bush repeated "arguments he regularly makes in national security speeches while running through a succession of economic proposals with little evident passion." " No sweeping proposals," according to Reuters. The New York Times adds, "[T]he speech was notable largely for a lack of big new proposals from a president who for five years has not shied from provocative and politically risky initiatives." "The solutions Bush offered were relatively small-bore and wrapped in familiar language," writes the Associated Press. Sen. Russ Feingold (D-WI) captured the sentiments of many: "we didn't hear anything new, and we didn't get any real answers."
BUSH ADDICTED TO ENERGY INDEPENDENCE RHETORIC: President Bush last night called for America to drastically reduce its dependence on foreign oil -- just as he's done in every other past State of the Union address -- despite the fact that our dependence on foreign oil has increased every year. Bush departed from his past failed policies of drilling our nation's remaining oil and gas supplies, cajoling Saudi Arabia and the other "allies" upon whom we depend for oil, and increasing subsidies to the fossil fuels industry. Despite seeking cuts in both alternative energy and biofuels programs in the FY06 budget, Bush last night proposed a 22 percent increase in financing for various clean energy research projects. Yet even those funding boosts represent "incremental adjustments" compared to the subsidies dished out in the energy bill Bush signed last year, "including $2 billion in tax breaks for oil and gas drillers over five years." Also missing from Bush's speech was any mention of "requiring higher fuel economy standards for consumer vehicles," which analysts say "would have the greatest impact on reducing U.S. oil demand and cutting imports." All in all, the New York Times noted, last night's rhetoric "was hardly the bold signal we've been waiting for through years of global warming and deadly struggles in the Middle East, where everything takes place in the context of what Mr. Bush rightly called our 'addiction' to imported oil." For a comprehensive progressive roadmap to energy independence, check out American Progress's plan: "Resources for Global Growth."
MEDIA HEAD-FAKE ON HEALTH CARE: The White House can claim at least one success from this year's State of the Union: falsely convincing the media that President Bush would take America's health care crisis seriously. " Health Care Is Now at Top of Bush's Agenda," a New York Times headline proclaimed prior to the speech, while the Associated Press reported that Bush would "attempt to shift focus from the polarizing war in Iraq to a more popular domestic priority: taming health care costs." "Health care will be the centerpiece of the White House's domestic agenda for 2006," reported the Weekly Standard. "In Tuesday's State of the Union, the president will focus on rising health costs, with more detailed policy announcements to follow in the weeks ahead." In fact, just 170 words of Bush's 5,400 word speech were devoted to the topic, reflecting the true priority Bush has placed on health care during his time in office.
WHAT WASN'T IN THE SPEECH: "The speech was notable for what Mr. Bush did not mention. He offered no new ideas for rebuilding New Orleans in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, made no mention of his troubled Medicare prescription drug program and offered no proposal to clamp down on lobbying abuses in Congress that have led to the investigation of Jack Abramoff, a formerly powerful lobbyist and a major fund-raiser for Mr. Bush." For any listener last night holding out hope that Bush would address these key issues, the speech was "a grave disappointment." Bush's own previous bad decisions have limited the scope of what he can achieve; he is in essence "hampered by his own track record." "The president's future horizons are constrained by his past choices, budgetary and political. At home, expensive tax cuts and a Medicare prescription drug entitlement limit his scope for new initiatives. Abroad, the commitment of troops, money and diplomatic capital to Iraq has narrowed the president's options."
STATE OF THE UNION
SOTU Tour Hits Music City USA
President Bush travels today to Nashville's Grand Ole Opry to promote his State of the Union agenda, focusing on health care, tax cuts, and energy costs. For the last five years, residents of the Volunteer State have seen their energy prices skyrocket, their number of uninsured swell, and the gap between the haves and the have-nots widen to a chasm. In response, Bush is offering "repackaged versions" of old proposals. There is a reason why the audience is hand-selected by Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-TN): for average Tennesseans this song is played out.
ENERGY -- TENNESSEE GASOLINE PRICES HAVE INCREASED NEARLY 50% SINCE 2004: Gas in Tennessee currently costs $2.27 per gallon, up from $1.53 per gallon in January 2004. The change in prices represents a 48 percent increase.
HEALTH CARE -- MORE THAN 800,000 TENNESSEANS ARE UNINSURED, HEALTH COSTS RISING RAPIDLY: According to data compiled by the Kaiser Family Foundation, 803,130 people in Tennessee do not have health insurance and 157,070 children are uninsured. The number of uninsured among the nonelderly increased by 4.0 percent from 2000-04.
TAX CUTS -- BUSH'S TAX CUTS ON DIVIDENDS AND CAPITAL GAINS DISPROPORTIONATELY BENEFIT STATE'S WEALTHY: The Citizens for Tax Justice found that if Bush made his tax cuts on dividends and capital gains permanent, Tennessee's wealthiest citizens would receive the lion's share of the benefits. According to the CTJ study, in the year 2010, the top 1% of earners in the state would receive 56.2 percent of the tax cuts. The lowest 20 percent earners would receive only 0.1 percent. The Center for Budget and Policy Priorities found Tennessee to be one of five states - along with New York, Texas, Arizona, and Florida - with the "largest income gap between the top and bottom fifths of families."
MEDICARE -- TENNESSEANS 'TEARING THEIR HAIR OUT' OVER MEDICARE PRESCRIPTION DRUG PLAN: The Nashville Tennessean reported local pharmacists "are saying that the federal government's new drug plan for the elderly and disabled is a nightmare for druggists and an out-and-out catastrophe for the poor." "I've talked to pharmacists who have been in practice for 25 years who say this is the most difficult time they've ever had," Baeteena Black, executive director of the Tennessee Pharmacists Association, said. "They're saying we have it rough right now, but the patients have it even worse." Roughly 25 companies offering 80 insurance plans are operating the drug plan in Tennessee. "It's been a nightmare only the government could have come up with," one pharmacist said. "Any pharmacy serving an older population is tearing their hair out." Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-TN) said the plan would improve access to drugs for seniors. "Prescription drugs in the past have been denied to our seniors, but will be there as a result of this legislation," Frist said in 2003. Frist called the bill's passage a "victory for our nation's seniors, and for all Americans," and he thanked Bush for his "leadership on the issue."
CORRUPTION -- BUSH OFFERS NO SOLUTIONS, STATES LIKE TENNESSEE TAKE THE LEAD: Bush said in the State of the Union Americans are "concerned about unethical conduct by public officials," but did not offer any solutions. Meanwhile, "Tennessee lawmakers are in special session to consider tough new restrictions on lobbying and campaign finance." Gov. Phil Bredesen (D-TN) convened the session to deal with the "culture of corruption in Nashville." The governor wants "a ban on most gifts by lobbyists to government employees and elected officials, disclosure of spending by lobbyists, new limits on cash campaign contributions and the creation of an independent ethics commission with broad enforcement power." Bredesen said of Abramoff scandal in Washington, "I'm telling the Legislature this is going to be front-page news for a year, so let's get out in front of the curve and be actively addressing these issues." The Tennessee state senate passed a version of the reform package yesterday.
Under the Radar
INTELLIGENCE -- GONZALES LIED UNDER OATH ABOUT BUSH'S SPYING PROGRAM: Attorney General Alberto Gonzales may have lied under oath to the Senate during his confirmation hearings a year ago. In a Jan. 30 letter to Gonzales, Sen. Russ Feingold (D-WI) charged that Gonzales misled the Senate "when he appeared to try to avoid answering a question about whether the president could authorize warrantless wiretapping of U.S. citizens." According to a transcript of the Jan. 6, 2005, exchange, Gonzales tried to waive off Feingold's question as "hypothetical," and said that "it's not the policy or the agenda of this President to authorize actions that would be in contravention of our criminal statutes." But in fact, Gonzales personally approved Bush's warrantless domestic spying program, in contravention of a criminal statute.
ECONOMY -- WAGE GROWTH LOWEST IN NINE YEARS: Wages and benefits "rose last year by the smallest amount in nine years," according to new figures released by the Labor Department. But even this small increase was not enough to keep up with inflation. "When inflation is considered, overall compensation fell by 0.3 percent." Additionally, "there was a slowing of benefit costs in 2005 as employers struggled to deal with surging health costs." But while working Americans struggle to deal with skyrocketing health care and home heating costs, Exxon Mobile's profits surged to a record $10.7 billion -- $1,073 a second -- "capping the most profitable year for any company in U.S. history."
CONTRACT CORRUPTION -- LITTLE-KNOWN CONTRACTOR PULLING IN BIG MONEY FOR SHODDY, UNFINISHED WORK: In 2002, the National Security Agency (NSA) hired Science Applications International Corp. (SAIC) "to help it build a state-of-the-art tool for plucking key threats to the nation from a worldwide sea of digital communication," in a project code-named "Trailblazer." More than three years later, the project has yet to get off the ground, but has cost taxpayers $1.2 billion. This isn't the first time SAIC has been paid high dollars by the federal government for unfinished business. SAIC received seven no-bid contracts for Iraq, including an $82 million no-bid contract to run the country's first post-Saddam TV network, even though the company had no broadcast experience. A surprise government visit found that while the work had not happened, SAIC had been paid anyway. Lucky for SAIC, it has friends in high places. Adm. William Owens, for example, went from SAIC president and CEO to a Secretary Rumsfeld's Defense Policy Board. Christopher Henry, former senior vice president at SAIC, became a key aide to Douglas Feith, who supervised contract work done by SAIC in Iraq.
ADMINISTRATION -- BUSH ADMINISTRATION RESTRICTS NEWS COVERAGE, ONE PHOTO AT A TIME: Not only does the Bush administration screen its audiences at speeches, but it also shuts out media photographers from many events, instead offering the press only White House-approved photos. "A review of Associated Press archives found that during the entire eight years of the Clinton administration, only 100 handout photos of events were released to the press. During the first five years of Bush's presidency, more than 500 have been distributed." Media photojournalists are regularly blocked out of White House events, forced to use official White House photos. "Would anyone on the word side take a press release and regurgitate it verbatim and publish it in the newspaper as legitimate news," asked Susan Walsh, an Associated Press photojournalist and president of the White House News Photographers Association. " Of course not." Other photographers "point out the power such an arrangement gives the White House to literally control news."
POLL - IRAQIS WANT TIMETABLE FOR A U.S. WITHDRAWAL: A new poll of the Iraqi public by the Program on International Policy Attitudes (PIPA) found that 70 percent of Iraqis favor setting a timetable for U.S. withdrawal, but 76 percent believe the United States would not withdraw within six months if asked to do so by the Iraqi government. 80 percent of the Iraqi public believes the United States plans to have permanent bases in Iraq.
An Underwhelmed Nation Yawns
Last night, President Bush attempted to shift attention from his failing strategy in Iraq. He couldn't do it. The Washington Post notes that "his address lacked the rhetorical lift of some of his best efforts of the past, and the domestic policy agenda, although lengthy, included initiatives that have been around for some time. In that sense, the speech was a reminder of how much the war in Iraq has drained the administration's energy and creativity, and how much it continues to define the Bush presidency." Bush stressed that "with so much in the balance, those of us in public office have a duty to speak with candor." But Bush frequently glossed over " harsh global and political realities" in an effort to paint an optimistic picture of the State of the Union. Check out our comprehensive reality check on ThinkProgress.org.
THE REVIEWS ARE IN: " Encumbered by some of the lowest approval ratings of his presidency," President Bush delivered a speech that has been characterized as "generic," "small-bore," and without ambition. A CNN/USA Today/Gallup poll revealed that Bush's address last night received the lowest positive reaction of any State of the Union speech delivered during his tenure. News analyses have noted that Bush "displayed little ambition to tackle some of America's greatest challenges at home or abroad." In comparison to Bush's previous State of the Union addresses, last night's speech was "far less ambitious, his tone noticeably different." In style, the speech was "lackluster, ordinary and, most of all, generic." Bush repeated "arguments he regularly makes in national security speeches while running through a succession of economic proposals with little evident passion." " No sweeping proposals," according to Reuters. The New York Times adds, "[T]he speech was notable largely for a lack of big new proposals from a president who for five years has not shied from provocative and politically risky initiatives." "The solutions Bush offered were relatively small-bore and wrapped in familiar language," writes the Associated Press. Sen. Russ Feingold (D-WI) captured the sentiments of many: "we didn't hear anything new, and we didn't get any real answers."
BUSH ADDICTED TO ENERGY INDEPENDENCE RHETORIC: President Bush last night called for America to drastically reduce its dependence on foreign oil -- just as he's done in every other past State of the Union address -- despite the fact that our dependence on foreign oil has increased every year. Bush departed from his past failed policies of drilling our nation's remaining oil and gas supplies, cajoling Saudi Arabia and the other "allies" upon whom we depend for oil, and increasing subsidies to the fossil fuels industry. Despite seeking cuts in both alternative energy and biofuels programs in the FY06 budget, Bush last night proposed a 22 percent increase in financing for various clean energy research projects. Yet even those funding boosts represent "incremental adjustments" compared to the subsidies dished out in the energy bill Bush signed last year, "including $2 billion in tax breaks for oil and gas drillers over five years." Also missing from Bush's speech was any mention of "requiring higher fuel economy standards for consumer vehicles," which analysts say "would have the greatest impact on reducing U.S. oil demand and cutting imports." All in all, the New York Times noted, last night's rhetoric "was hardly the bold signal we've been waiting for through years of global warming and deadly struggles in the Middle East, where everything takes place in the context of what Mr. Bush rightly called our 'addiction' to imported oil." For a comprehensive progressive roadmap to energy independence, check out American Progress's plan: "Resources for Global Growth."
MEDIA HEAD-FAKE ON HEALTH CARE: The White House can claim at least one success from this year's State of the Union: falsely convincing the media that President Bush would take America's health care crisis seriously. " Health Care Is Now at Top of Bush's Agenda," a New York Times headline proclaimed prior to the speech, while the Associated Press reported that Bush would "attempt to shift focus from the polarizing war in Iraq to a more popular domestic priority: taming health care costs." "Health care will be the centerpiece of the White House's domestic agenda for 2006," reported the Weekly Standard. "In Tuesday's State of the Union, the president will focus on rising health costs, with more detailed policy announcements to follow in the weeks ahead." In fact, just 170 words of Bush's 5,400 word speech were devoted to the topic, reflecting the true priority Bush has placed on health care during his time in office.
WHAT WASN'T IN THE SPEECH: "The speech was notable for what Mr. Bush did not mention. He offered no new ideas for rebuilding New Orleans in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, made no mention of his troubled Medicare prescription drug program and offered no proposal to clamp down on lobbying abuses in Congress that have led to the investigation of Jack Abramoff, a formerly powerful lobbyist and a major fund-raiser for Mr. Bush." For any listener last night holding out hope that Bush would address these key issues, the speech was "a grave disappointment." Bush's own previous bad decisions have limited the scope of what he can achieve; he is in essence "hampered by his own track record." "The president's future horizons are constrained by his past choices, budgetary and political. At home, expensive tax cuts and a Medicare prescription drug entitlement limit his scope for new initiatives. Abroad, the commitment of troops, money and diplomatic capital to Iraq has narrowed the president's options."
STATE OF THE UNION
SOTU Tour Hits Music City USA
President Bush travels today to Nashville's Grand Ole Opry to promote his State of the Union agenda, focusing on health care, tax cuts, and energy costs. For the last five years, residents of the Volunteer State have seen their energy prices skyrocket, their number of uninsured swell, and the gap between the haves and the have-nots widen to a chasm. In response, Bush is offering "repackaged versions" of old proposals. There is a reason why the audience is hand-selected by Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-TN): for average Tennesseans this song is played out.
ENERGY -- TENNESSEE GASOLINE PRICES HAVE INCREASED NEARLY 50% SINCE 2004: Gas in Tennessee currently costs $2.27 per gallon, up from $1.53 per gallon in January 2004. The change in prices represents a 48 percent increase.
HEALTH CARE -- MORE THAN 800,000 TENNESSEANS ARE UNINSURED, HEALTH COSTS RISING RAPIDLY: According to data compiled by the Kaiser Family Foundation, 803,130 people in Tennessee do not have health insurance and 157,070 children are uninsured. The number of uninsured among the nonelderly increased by 4.0 percent from 2000-04.
TAX CUTS -- BUSH'S TAX CUTS ON DIVIDENDS AND CAPITAL GAINS DISPROPORTIONATELY BENEFIT STATE'S WEALTHY: The Citizens for Tax Justice found that if Bush made his tax cuts on dividends and capital gains permanent, Tennessee's wealthiest citizens would receive the lion's share of the benefits. According to the CTJ study, in the year 2010, the top 1% of earners in the state would receive 56.2 percent of the tax cuts. The lowest 20 percent earners would receive only 0.1 percent. The Center for Budget and Policy Priorities found Tennessee to be one of five states - along with New York, Texas, Arizona, and Florida - with the "largest income gap between the top and bottom fifths of families."
MEDICARE -- TENNESSEANS 'TEARING THEIR HAIR OUT' OVER MEDICARE PRESCRIPTION DRUG PLAN: The Nashville Tennessean reported local pharmacists "are saying that the federal government's new drug plan for the elderly and disabled is a nightmare for druggists and an out-and-out catastrophe for the poor." "I've talked to pharmacists who have been in practice for 25 years who say this is the most difficult time they've ever had," Baeteena Black, executive director of the Tennessee Pharmacists Association, said. "They're saying we have it rough right now, but the patients have it even worse." Roughly 25 companies offering 80 insurance plans are operating the drug plan in Tennessee. "It's been a nightmare only the government could have come up with," one pharmacist said. "Any pharmacy serving an older population is tearing their hair out." Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-TN) said the plan would improve access to drugs for seniors. "Prescription drugs in the past have been denied to our seniors, but will be there as a result of this legislation," Frist said in 2003. Frist called the bill's passage a "victory for our nation's seniors, and for all Americans," and he thanked Bush for his "leadership on the issue."
CORRUPTION -- BUSH OFFERS NO SOLUTIONS, STATES LIKE TENNESSEE TAKE THE LEAD: Bush said in the State of the Union Americans are "concerned about unethical conduct by public officials," but did not offer any solutions. Meanwhile, "Tennessee lawmakers are in special session to consider tough new restrictions on lobbying and campaign finance." Gov. Phil Bredesen (D-TN) convened the session to deal with the "culture of corruption in Nashville." The governor wants "a ban on most gifts by lobbyists to government employees and elected officials, disclosure of spending by lobbyists, new limits on cash campaign contributions and the creation of an independent ethics commission with broad enforcement power." Bredesen said of Abramoff scandal in Washington, "I'm telling the Legislature this is going to be front-page news for a year, so let's get out in front of the curve and be actively addressing these issues." The Tennessee state senate passed a version of the reform package yesterday.
Under the Radar
INTELLIGENCE -- GONZALES LIED UNDER OATH ABOUT BUSH'S SPYING PROGRAM: Attorney General Alberto Gonzales may have lied under oath to the Senate during his confirmation hearings a year ago. In a Jan. 30 letter to Gonzales, Sen. Russ Feingold (D-WI) charged that Gonzales misled the Senate "when he appeared to try to avoid answering a question about whether the president could authorize warrantless wiretapping of U.S. citizens." According to a transcript of the Jan. 6, 2005, exchange, Gonzales tried to waive off Feingold's question as "hypothetical," and said that "it's not the policy or the agenda of this President to authorize actions that would be in contravention of our criminal statutes." But in fact, Gonzales personally approved Bush's warrantless domestic spying program, in contravention of a criminal statute.
ECONOMY -- WAGE GROWTH LOWEST IN NINE YEARS: Wages and benefits "rose last year by the smallest amount in nine years," according to new figures released by the Labor Department. But even this small increase was not enough to keep up with inflation. "When inflation is considered, overall compensation fell by 0.3 percent." Additionally, "there was a slowing of benefit costs in 2005 as employers struggled to deal with surging health costs." But while working Americans struggle to deal with skyrocketing health care and home heating costs, Exxon Mobile's profits surged to a record $10.7 billion -- $1,073 a second -- "capping the most profitable year for any company in U.S. history."
CONTRACT CORRUPTION -- LITTLE-KNOWN CONTRACTOR PULLING IN BIG MONEY FOR SHODDY, UNFINISHED WORK: In 2002, the National Security Agency (NSA) hired Science Applications International Corp. (SAIC) "to help it build a state-of-the-art tool for plucking key threats to the nation from a worldwide sea of digital communication," in a project code-named "Trailblazer." More than three years later, the project has yet to get off the ground, but has cost taxpayers $1.2 billion. This isn't the first time SAIC has been paid high dollars by the federal government for unfinished business. SAIC received seven no-bid contracts for Iraq, including an $82 million no-bid contract to run the country's first post-Saddam TV network, even though the company had no broadcast experience. A surprise government visit found that while the work had not happened, SAIC had been paid anyway. Lucky for SAIC, it has friends in high places. Adm. William Owens, for example, went from SAIC president and CEO to a Secretary Rumsfeld's Defense Policy Board. Christopher Henry, former senior vice president at SAIC, became a key aide to Douglas Feith, who supervised contract work done by SAIC in Iraq.
ADMINISTRATION -- BUSH ADMINISTRATION RESTRICTS NEWS COVERAGE, ONE PHOTO AT A TIME: Not only does the Bush administration screen its audiences at speeches, but it also shuts out media photographers from many events, instead offering the press only White House-approved photos. "A review of Associated Press archives found that during the entire eight years of the Clinton administration, only 100 handout photos of events were released to the press. During the first five years of Bush's presidency, more than 500 have been distributed." Media photojournalists are regularly blocked out of White House events, forced to use official White House photos. "Would anyone on the word side take a press release and regurgitate it verbatim and publish it in the newspaper as legitimate news," asked Susan Walsh, an Associated Press photojournalist and president of the White House News Photographers Association. " Of course not." Other photographers "point out the power such an arrangement gives the White House to literally control news."
POLL - IRAQIS WANT TIMETABLE FOR A U.S. WITHDRAWAL: A new poll of the Iraqi public by the Program on International Policy Attitudes (PIPA) found that 70 percent of Iraqis favor setting a timetable for U.S. withdrawal, but 76 percent believe the United States would not withdraw within six months if asked to do so by the Iraqi government. 80 percent of the Iraqi public believes the United States plans to have permanent bases in Iraq.
Everything you always wanted to know about Able Danger data mining project
Media is a Plural - Rory O'Connor's Blog - February 1, 2006
Able Danger Twenty Questions
Everything you always wanted to know (but were afraid to ask, or the answers were classified…) about the controversial Able Danger data mining project, which identified four 9/11 hijackers a year before the terror attacks.
1. Did Anthony Shaffer, or anyone on the Able Danger team, obtain a photo of Mohamed Atta from the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS), as Shaffer's interview with Government Security News (GSN) states?
The photo of Atta came from an information broker who provided it and others. Shaffer's comments were made to GSN based on his knowledge at the time, which came from his knowledge of what the US Army's Land Information Warfare Activity (LIWA) operations center had access to. Shaffer's interview with GSN took place before civilian analyst JD Smith came forward and clarified the issue. Shaffer did not know in 1999-2000 all the specifics of how Smith and company were doing the detailed data mining -- it was Shaffer's belief at the time that the photo had come from INS records. LIWA did have access to INS documents - and a Defense Department intelligence program called the Foreign Visitor Program, in which not only photos of foreign nationals but also their entire visa application were provided -- but Shaffer was not aware of LIWA's use of information brokers.
2. If Atta was identified as early as January or February of 2000 – as Captain Scott Phillpott has said - when were the other three hijackers (Shehhi, Mihdhar, and Hamzi) identified by Able Danger?
Within the same timeframe, since the missing chart contained the names of all four of the then-future hijackers. They were all listed in what Phillpott had called "the Brooklyn Cell" - not that they were all in Brooklyn, but they met the search criteria that linked them to the 1993 World Trade Center bombing.
3. Did anyone on the Able Danger team know that any of these four were ever in the US? If so, when did they find out and how?
They did not know, as it was not Able Danger's job to track individuals in the U.S. (based on legal restrictions.) Once it was determined by Defense Department (DOD) lawyers that the "Brooklyn Cell" information could not be used for offensive planning by the Able Danger planners, the Able Danger team then attempted to pass the information to the FBI for its use. At any given time, there was no specific knowledge of where the terrorists were regarding the continental United States. The Able Danger effort, and targeting of specific individuals, was focused on overseas locations.
4. By early June 2000, these four were the only ones to have entered the US. Most of the hijackers entered the US after May 2001. Is it reasonable to predict that Able Danger could have identified the others, had it not been shut down by then?
When the 2.5 terabytes of data were destroyed by LIWA in the summer of 2000, all information relating to the terrorists was destroyed as well. However, Able Danger II, which started from scratch (i.e. a 90 day full time search of the open Internet and open data sources to re-create the data base), did detect the same basic information about the Brooklyn Cell - and in addition discovered the Al Qaeda activity in the Port of Aden in Yemen.
5. Was there any effort by the Able Danger team not only to identify those individuals' link to Al Qaeda, but also to keep track of where they were located and what they were going?
Yes, but not in the continental United States. Able Danger was extensively targeting specific individuals and activities that were located overseas - and there were "options" prepared for Special Operations Command (SOCOM) to take action against these individuals and groups. The specifics of this remain highly classified.
6. Shaffer's attorney Mark Zaid told the Senate Judiciary Committee that Able Danger never identified Mohamed Atta as being physically present in the US. Does that mean that no one on the team knew he was in the US, or simply that they found out from someone else?
The Able Danger team could not and did not ascertain Atta's presence in the U.S. for two reasons: first, his ID came up as part of the "Brooklyn Cell" and therefore the Able Danger team could not look at him based on the legal guidance they were forced to follow; and second, the focus was on overseas targets. There were specific individuals and activities, which Able Danger could pursue, such as information relating to the attack on the USS Cole in October 2000, and the Able Danger team did provide the specific details of the threat days before the attack on the Cole.
7. Did anyone on the Able Danger team know Atta was in contact with the other three hijackers, as Mike Kelly of the Bergen Record reported? If so, when did Able Danger learn of contact between Atta and the others and how?
There were linkages discovered between multiple "clusters" of individuals. The clusters were tested to see if they were functioning as "cells." The connections between the individuals and the cells cannot be known without looking at the original chart and data. Therefore, at this point it is not possible to re-create how the four were linked. They were on the chart and in the "Brooklyn Cell" cluster. There was contact between cells - the contacts were examined and "tested" using classified methods - but this was done focused on overseas locations.
8. When Able Danger attempted to share information with the FBI, did this information include the names, photos, or any other information about Atta, Shehhi, Mihdhar, or Hamzi? Did it include their location in the US or any other specific information?
At the time that SOCOM wanted to pass "all data relating to the Brooklyn Cell" (since the SOCOM/DOD lawyers would not allow the Able Danger team to pursue them as a target), Shaffer attempted to set up meetings to pass this information. But SOCOM lawyers stopped the Able Danger officers from attending these meetings, and therefore prevented the passage of the information to the FBI. There were other disclosures made to the FBI on other targets within the continental United States, from LIWA (not Able Danger) to the FBI regarding other US locations of known terrorist activity. Both Attorney General Janet Reno and FBI head Louis Freeh were briefed on these other locations and the FBI did take action and make arrests based on the information. The specifics of this remain classified.
9. After the attack on the USS Cole, was there any attempt to use the information Able Danger had based its prediction on - either to investigate the attack, or to determine how they had been so accurate - in order to replicate their efforts?
Yes - there was an "after action" forensic investigation and briefing of the Able Danger data, which is still extant but highly classified.
10. Was Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) terrorism intelligence analyst Kie Fallis, who resigned in protest after the Able Danger warnings about the USS Cole were ignored, ever involved with the Able Danger program in any way?
Kie Fallis' superiors Bob Pecha and Greg Pruett were both aware of Able Danger since Shaffer briefed them on the program in the spring of 2000. In addition, DIA official Cal Temple (who worked Al Qaeda as a target) was aware and even made a visit to Garland, Texas to observe the Able Danger project. The intelligence data being produced by Able Danger was shared with Temple. It is possible he later shared this information with Fallis. Cal Temple, by his own admission, was sent to "spy" on the Able Danger effort so that he could secretly get the information for DIA and then learn the method and technology involved so that DIA could build its own version. DIA did have Cal build a version in secret, since DIA officials did not want SOCOM to know that they were creating a DIA model.
11. Others have said privately that the Cole attack had a "chilling effect" on anything related to "warnings" after Fallis quit. Was this also true of the Able Danger team?
The Able Danger effort culminated in a two-hour briefing to the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, which General Shelton now publicly acknowledges he received in January of 2001. It was very clear that once General Peter Schoomaker departed as the Commander in Chief of SOCOM in the fall of 2000, and Air Force General Holland took over, there was a diminution of focus and priority on the Able Danger effort. The Able Danger team was disbanded despite the best efforts of the team to continue the work and push to implement the offensive "options" that were derived from the intelligence information.
12. Did the correct prediction (in effect) of the Cole attack play any role, positive or negative, in the discussions when the program was shut down only months later?
Nothing was ever said directly linking the 'prediction' of the Cole attack or its after-action briefing with the demise of the Able Danger project. No one in Able Danger has a clear answer as to why Able Danger was shut down - all they know is that they fought to keep it going and lost.
13. After the Cole attack, did Able Danger make any further discoveries or predictions?
After the January 2001 briefing to General Shelton, the project was changed. There was no clear "ending" - just a quiet and deliberate dismantling of the personnel and capability. As the project was moved from Garland, Texas in January 2001 and dismantled, there was no opportunity to continue to exploit the intelligence information. Therefore, there were no new predictions.
14. When did Shaffer's last conversation with Scott Phillpott before 9/11 take place, when Phillpott was "desperately" trying to preserve the data so that someone could use it, even though Able Danger was being shut down?
The conversation occurred in the May 2001 timeframe. Shaffer was jogging outside the Pentagon at the outdoor portion of the Pentagon Athletic Center. Phillpott called Shaffer on his mobile phone to ask if he (Phillpott) could move the data to a clandestine facility in the area – one of four under Shaffer's control. This one in particular was used for other highly classified intelligence operations and Phillpott had toured it before. Shaffer had already been directed by Major General Rod Isler to "cease all support to Able Danger. " Shaffer said that he'd love to let Phillpott "use the facility" but felt that his leadership would say no. When Shaffer asked his boss, Colonel Mary Moffitt, she not only said no but also began the process of moving Shaffer from his leadership position to a "desk job" on the Latin America desk of DIA.
15. When were Phillpott and his team members reassigned to other work? Were they each reassigned to different projects or was their unit assigned a new task?
Everyone went back to his "normal" job as Able Danger was disbanded - Able Danger was a form of standing "Task Force". There was some DIA leadership retaliation against the DIA members of Able Danger, but that cannot be fully addressed until the DOD Inspector general completes his current investigation.
16. Raytheon's Robert Johnson has told Congressman Curt Weldon that data was transferred to SOCOM, including data the Garland unit used to identify Mohamed Atta, separate from the LIWA effort. When was this transferred and how much data was involved?
A new open Internet data run was conducted from about July to September 2000 - this consisted of "spiders" doing whole searches and downloading of web based information, as well as the integration of all available open sources of data. In addition, copies of the full DIA and NSA data bases were moved by STRATUS IVY (Shaffer's unit) to Garland, Texas - in essence the entire LIWA capability was re-created from scratch and began to function in earnest in early September 2000.
17. While not physical cells, Able Danger identified five cells of Al Qaeda worldwide. Who was identified as a member of which cells?
There were multiple data runs done with the technology, and cells were produced based on the search criteria. The chart that contained Atta and the Brooklyn cell also contained a German cell, a Mauritania cell, a Malaysia cell, and a cell in Yemen. The members on those cells would be on the charts that were produced, but the charts are not available, at least at this point.
18. Did the network of centers originally used to raise funds for the mujahadeen fighting the Soviets in Afghanistan have any relation to these cells?
There were connections to Afghanistan that the Able Danger team were targeting - this was then and remains classified. This information has been provided to Congress in closed discussions.
19. Shaffer told the 9/11 Commission that Able Danger had identified "two of the three cells" that carried out the 9/11 attacks. Which two of the three and who had the Able Danger team identified with what cells?
Shaffer did not know the specific membership of each terrorist to each cell - he knew from his work on Able Danger that the team had found two of the three cells - and the only name he remembered after the 9/11 attacks was Atta (due to seeing his picture on the news and hearing his name repeatedly.)
20. Was Able Danger a Top Secret code name, or was it just an operational name - which may or may not have itself been classified?
There are three categories of "names" in the Pentagon - Able Danger was the unclassified "nickname." Codenames are different and they are classified - there are also "trigraphs," which are three letters that stand for a three letter classified program. Other codenames and trigraphs were associated with Able Danger - but which ones and their names and associations are still classified.
Comment on this post . . .
This and other articles by Rory O'Connor are available on his blog.
Able Danger Twenty Questions
Everything you always wanted to know (but were afraid to ask, or the answers were classified…) about the controversial Able Danger data mining project, which identified four 9/11 hijackers a year before the terror attacks.
1. Did Anthony Shaffer, or anyone on the Able Danger team, obtain a photo of Mohamed Atta from the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS), as Shaffer's interview with Government Security News (GSN) states?
The photo of Atta came from an information broker who provided it and others. Shaffer's comments were made to GSN based on his knowledge at the time, which came from his knowledge of what the US Army's Land Information Warfare Activity (LIWA) operations center had access to. Shaffer's interview with GSN took place before civilian analyst JD Smith came forward and clarified the issue. Shaffer did not know in 1999-2000 all the specifics of how Smith and company were doing the detailed data mining -- it was Shaffer's belief at the time that the photo had come from INS records. LIWA did have access to INS documents - and a Defense Department intelligence program called the Foreign Visitor Program, in which not only photos of foreign nationals but also their entire visa application were provided -- but Shaffer was not aware of LIWA's use of information brokers.
2. If Atta was identified as early as January or February of 2000 – as Captain Scott Phillpott has said - when were the other three hijackers (Shehhi, Mihdhar, and Hamzi) identified by Able Danger?
Within the same timeframe, since the missing chart contained the names of all four of the then-future hijackers. They were all listed in what Phillpott had called "the Brooklyn Cell" - not that they were all in Brooklyn, but they met the search criteria that linked them to the 1993 World Trade Center bombing.
3. Did anyone on the Able Danger team know that any of these four were ever in the US? If so, when did they find out and how?
They did not know, as it was not Able Danger's job to track individuals in the U.S. (based on legal restrictions.) Once it was determined by Defense Department (DOD) lawyers that the "Brooklyn Cell" information could not be used for offensive planning by the Able Danger planners, the Able Danger team then attempted to pass the information to the FBI for its use. At any given time, there was no specific knowledge of where the terrorists were regarding the continental United States. The Able Danger effort, and targeting of specific individuals, was focused on overseas locations.
4. By early June 2000, these four were the only ones to have entered the US. Most of the hijackers entered the US after May 2001. Is it reasonable to predict that Able Danger could have identified the others, had it not been shut down by then?
When the 2.5 terabytes of data were destroyed by LIWA in the summer of 2000, all information relating to the terrorists was destroyed as well. However, Able Danger II, which started from scratch (i.e. a 90 day full time search of the open Internet and open data sources to re-create the data base), did detect the same basic information about the Brooklyn Cell - and in addition discovered the Al Qaeda activity in the Port of Aden in Yemen.
5. Was there any effort by the Able Danger team not only to identify those individuals' link to Al Qaeda, but also to keep track of where they were located and what they were going?
Yes, but not in the continental United States. Able Danger was extensively targeting specific individuals and activities that were located overseas - and there were "options" prepared for Special Operations Command (SOCOM) to take action against these individuals and groups. The specifics of this remain highly classified.
6. Shaffer's attorney Mark Zaid told the Senate Judiciary Committee that Able Danger never identified Mohamed Atta as being physically present in the US. Does that mean that no one on the team knew he was in the US, or simply that they found out from someone else?
The Able Danger team could not and did not ascertain Atta's presence in the U.S. for two reasons: first, his ID came up as part of the "Brooklyn Cell" and therefore the Able Danger team could not look at him based on the legal guidance they were forced to follow; and second, the focus was on overseas targets. There were specific individuals and activities, which Able Danger could pursue, such as information relating to the attack on the USS Cole in October 2000, and the Able Danger team did provide the specific details of the threat days before the attack on the Cole.
7. Did anyone on the Able Danger team know Atta was in contact with the other three hijackers, as Mike Kelly of the Bergen Record reported? If so, when did Able Danger learn of contact between Atta and the others and how?
There were linkages discovered between multiple "clusters" of individuals. The clusters were tested to see if they were functioning as "cells." The connections between the individuals and the cells cannot be known without looking at the original chart and data. Therefore, at this point it is not possible to re-create how the four were linked. They were on the chart and in the "Brooklyn Cell" cluster. There was contact between cells - the contacts were examined and "tested" using classified methods - but this was done focused on overseas locations.
8. When Able Danger attempted to share information with the FBI, did this information include the names, photos, or any other information about Atta, Shehhi, Mihdhar, or Hamzi? Did it include their location in the US or any other specific information?
At the time that SOCOM wanted to pass "all data relating to the Brooklyn Cell" (since the SOCOM/DOD lawyers would not allow the Able Danger team to pursue them as a target), Shaffer attempted to set up meetings to pass this information. But SOCOM lawyers stopped the Able Danger officers from attending these meetings, and therefore prevented the passage of the information to the FBI. There were other disclosures made to the FBI on other targets within the continental United States, from LIWA (not Able Danger) to the FBI regarding other US locations of known terrorist activity. Both Attorney General Janet Reno and FBI head Louis Freeh were briefed on these other locations and the FBI did take action and make arrests based on the information. The specifics of this remain classified.
9. After the attack on the USS Cole, was there any attempt to use the information Able Danger had based its prediction on - either to investigate the attack, or to determine how they had been so accurate - in order to replicate their efforts?
Yes - there was an "after action" forensic investigation and briefing of the Able Danger data, which is still extant but highly classified.
10. Was Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) terrorism intelligence analyst Kie Fallis, who resigned in protest after the Able Danger warnings about the USS Cole were ignored, ever involved with the Able Danger program in any way?
Kie Fallis' superiors Bob Pecha and Greg Pruett were both aware of Able Danger since Shaffer briefed them on the program in the spring of 2000. In addition, DIA official Cal Temple (who worked Al Qaeda as a target) was aware and even made a visit to Garland, Texas to observe the Able Danger project. The intelligence data being produced by Able Danger was shared with Temple. It is possible he later shared this information with Fallis. Cal Temple, by his own admission, was sent to "spy" on the Able Danger effort so that he could secretly get the information for DIA and then learn the method and technology involved so that DIA could build its own version. DIA did have Cal build a version in secret, since DIA officials did not want SOCOM to know that they were creating a DIA model.
11. Others have said privately that the Cole attack had a "chilling effect" on anything related to "warnings" after Fallis quit. Was this also true of the Able Danger team?
The Able Danger effort culminated in a two-hour briefing to the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, which General Shelton now publicly acknowledges he received in January of 2001. It was very clear that once General Peter Schoomaker departed as the Commander in Chief of SOCOM in the fall of 2000, and Air Force General Holland took over, there was a diminution of focus and priority on the Able Danger effort. The Able Danger team was disbanded despite the best efforts of the team to continue the work and push to implement the offensive "options" that were derived from the intelligence information.
12. Did the correct prediction (in effect) of the Cole attack play any role, positive or negative, in the discussions when the program was shut down only months later?
Nothing was ever said directly linking the 'prediction' of the Cole attack or its after-action briefing with the demise of the Able Danger project. No one in Able Danger has a clear answer as to why Able Danger was shut down - all they know is that they fought to keep it going and lost.
13. After the Cole attack, did Able Danger make any further discoveries or predictions?
After the January 2001 briefing to General Shelton, the project was changed. There was no clear "ending" - just a quiet and deliberate dismantling of the personnel and capability. As the project was moved from Garland, Texas in January 2001 and dismantled, there was no opportunity to continue to exploit the intelligence information. Therefore, there were no new predictions.
14. When did Shaffer's last conversation with Scott Phillpott before 9/11 take place, when Phillpott was "desperately" trying to preserve the data so that someone could use it, even though Able Danger was being shut down?
The conversation occurred in the May 2001 timeframe. Shaffer was jogging outside the Pentagon at the outdoor portion of the Pentagon Athletic Center. Phillpott called Shaffer on his mobile phone to ask if he (Phillpott) could move the data to a clandestine facility in the area – one of four under Shaffer's control. This one in particular was used for other highly classified intelligence operations and Phillpott had toured it before. Shaffer had already been directed by Major General Rod Isler to "cease all support to Able Danger. " Shaffer said that he'd love to let Phillpott "use the facility" but felt that his leadership would say no. When Shaffer asked his boss, Colonel Mary Moffitt, she not only said no but also began the process of moving Shaffer from his leadership position to a "desk job" on the Latin America desk of DIA.
15. When were Phillpott and his team members reassigned to other work? Were they each reassigned to different projects or was their unit assigned a new task?
Everyone went back to his "normal" job as Able Danger was disbanded - Able Danger was a form of standing "Task Force". There was some DIA leadership retaliation against the DIA members of Able Danger, but that cannot be fully addressed until the DOD Inspector general completes his current investigation.
16. Raytheon's Robert Johnson has told Congressman Curt Weldon that data was transferred to SOCOM, including data the Garland unit used to identify Mohamed Atta, separate from the LIWA effort. When was this transferred and how much data was involved?
A new open Internet data run was conducted from about July to September 2000 - this consisted of "spiders" doing whole searches and downloading of web based information, as well as the integration of all available open sources of data. In addition, copies of the full DIA and NSA data bases were moved by STRATUS IVY (Shaffer's unit) to Garland, Texas - in essence the entire LIWA capability was re-created from scratch and began to function in earnest in early September 2000.
17. While not physical cells, Able Danger identified five cells of Al Qaeda worldwide. Who was identified as a member of which cells?
There were multiple data runs done with the technology, and cells were produced based on the search criteria. The chart that contained Atta and the Brooklyn cell also contained a German cell, a Mauritania cell, a Malaysia cell, and a cell in Yemen. The members on those cells would be on the charts that were produced, but the charts are not available, at least at this point.
18. Did the network of centers originally used to raise funds for the mujahadeen fighting the Soviets in Afghanistan have any relation to these cells?
There were connections to Afghanistan that the Able Danger team were targeting - this was then and remains classified. This information has been provided to Congress in closed discussions.
19. Shaffer told the 9/11 Commission that Able Danger had identified "two of the three cells" that carried out the 9/11 attacks. Which two of the three and who had the Able Danger team identified with what cells?
Shaffer did not know the specific membership of each terrorist to each cell - he knew from his work on Able Danger that the team had found two of the three cells - and the only name he remembered after the 9/11 attacks was Atta (due to seeing his picture on the news and hearing his name repeatedly.)
20. Was Able Danger a Top Secret code name, or was it just an operational name - which may or may not have itself been classified?
There are three categories of "names" in the Pentagon - Able Danger was the unclassified "nickname." Codenames are different and they are classified - there are also "trigraphs," which are three letters that stand for a three letter classified program. Other codenames and trigraphs were associated with Able Danger - but which ones and their names and associations are still classified.
Comment on this post . . .
This and other articles by Rory O'Connor are available on his blog.
Venezuela to Tighten Terms on Oil Fields
MSN Money - Associated Press Business News: Venezuela to Tighten Terms on Oil Fields: "CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) - Venezuela plans to tighten the tax terms on 32 privately operated oil fields as it rewrites contracts that were signed in the 1990s, an executive at Venezuela's state-run oil company said Wednesday.
If royalty and income taxes payments are less than 50 percent of total revenue in any given year, companies will have to pay the difference, said Eulogio Del Pino, director of Petroleos de Venezuela SA, or PDVSA.
Companies operating the 32 fields pump approximately 500,00 barrels a day, roughly a fifth of the Venezuela's total petroleum production.
'The state will never receive less than 50 percent of gross revenue,' Del Pino said.
Companies operating the fields currently pay a 50 percent income tax rate and a 30 percent royalty rate after the oil ministry hiked taxes last year.
The new tax clause is part of an effort by President Hugo Chavez to assert greater control over Venezuela's vast oil reserves.
Private oil firms are currently negotiating with PDVSA to form joint ventures in which the state company will hold majority stakes and control management decisions. These firms currently pump oil under contract for PDVSA, but last year they signed letters of intent to become minority partners with the state firm in the joint ventures.
ExxonMobil Corp. is the only firm that has refused the terms, preferring to sell its stake in one of the fields to Spanish-Argentine oil giant Repsol.
PDVSA plans to deliver the terms of the new ventures, or so-called 'mixed companies,' for approval this year to a Venezuelan Congress dominated by allies of Chavez.
Following congressional approval, Del Pino said the 32 companies will undergo a series of mergers in an effort to reduce costs.
Venezuela is the world's fifth-largest exporter of oil. It has the largest proven oil reserves outside of the Mideast and the second-largest gas reserves in the Western Hemisphere.
� 2006 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
Back to News Home"
If royalty and income taxes payments are less than 50 percent of total revenue in any given year, companies will have to pay the difference, said Eulogio Del Pino, director of Petroleos de Venezuela SA, or PDVSA.
Companies operating the 32 fields pump approximately 500,00 barrels a day, roughly a fifth of the Venezuela's total petroleum production.
'The state will never receive less than 50 percent of gross revenue,' Del Pino said.
Companies operating the fields currently pay a 50 percent income tax rate and a 30 percent royalty rate after the oil ministry hiked taxes last year.
The new tax clause is part of an effort by President Hugo Chavez to assert greater control over Venezuela's vast oil reserves.
Private oil firms are currently negotiating with PDVSA to form joint ventures in which the state company will hold majority stakes and control management decisions. These firms currently pump oil under contract for PDVSA, but last year they signed letters of intent to become minority partners with the state firm in the joint ventures.
ExxonMobil Corp. is the only firm that has refused the terms, preferring to sell its stake in one of the fields to Spanish-Argentine oil giant Repsol.
PDVSA plans to deliver the terms of the new ventures, or so-called 'mixed companies,' for approval this year to a Venezuelan Congress dominated by allies of Chavez.
Following congressional approval, Del Pino said the 32 companies will undergo a series of mergers in an effort to reduce costs.
Venezuela is the world's fifth-largest exporter of oil. It has the largest proven oil reserves outside of the Mideast and the second-largest gas reserves in the Western Hemisphere.
� 2006 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
Back to News Home"
Pentagon Review Calls for No Big Changes - New York Times
Pentagon Review Calls for No Big Changes - New York Times
Pentagon Review Calls for No Big Changes
By DAVID S. CLOUD
WASHINGTON, Feb. 1 — A comprehensive military strategy review once billed as Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld's architecture for revamping the armed forces eliminates no major weapon systems and calls for only incremental change in other priorities, according to Pentagon officials, outside advisers and independent analysts.
The plan, which is due to be made public next week along with the Bush administration's fiscal 2007 budget, does contain some significant shifts like calls for training thousands of additional special operations troops and for building futuristic weapons to defeat terror groups and potential new adversaries like China.
But initial hopes by Defense Department civilians to use the yearlong reassessment, which takes place every four years, to force far-reaching changes in spending priorities have not materialized, in part, analysts said, because of resistance by the military services.
With much of his time taken up with managing the war in Iraq, Mr. Rumsfeld was far less involved in this year's review than he was in 2001, when the last review was conducted, officials and analysts said. He delegated much of the decision-making to aides and to Deputy Defense Secretary Gordon R. England.
In addition, some of the Pentagon civilian leadership's more innovative ideas were rejected because they were judged too expensive or ineffective by the many teams of the officers and analysts who have been combing through drafts of the blueprint for the past year.
Even Mr. Rumsfeld played down expectations on Wednesday that the review would produce monumental shifts, calling the document "a way point along a continuum of change that began some years past and will continue some years hence."
From the outset, the administration itself raised high expectations for the review, and the theme of "transformation" came to be something of a mantra in the Pentagon's corridors. Some said the fruits of the review might be as lasting a legacy of the Rumsfeld years as the outcomes of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Ryan Henry, a top Pentagon planning official, declared last fall that the effort, instead of the usual "periodic tool of refinement," would be the "fulcrum of transition to a post-9/11 world."
Instead, by keeping alive some programs whose projected costs have soared in recent years like the F/A-22 fighter, the Army's Future Combat Systems and the Navy's DD(X) destroyer, the review has raised questions about how more exotic weapons and capabilities that Mr. Rumsfeld believes are vital to fight terror groups and other unconventional foes can fit into future military budgets.
Andrew Krepinevich, a military analyst with the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments who participated in the review, said there was a widespread expectation that the review "would find the Defense Department confronting some tough decisions."
"In a sense, a lot of these tough choices are kicked down the road," Mr. Krepinevich said.
The essence of Mr. Rumsfeld's agenda for the military is to make the armed services more mobile and lethal, more capable of dealing with emerging threats from terror groups and insurgents, including weapons of mass destruction, while still able to dominate conventional battlefields. His imprint is plainly visible in decisions like the move to expand the number of special operations troops trained in psychological warfare and civil affairs by 3,700.
Mr. Rumsfeld also has long been worried that the armed forces lack the capability to strike quickly anywhere in the world with conventional weapons.
The review, known formally as the Quadrennial Defense Review, or Q.D.R., calls for doubling the procurement of attack submarines, from one a year to two, by 2012, and arming submarine-carried Trident missiles with conventional warheads.
But beyond such relatively small-scale initiatives, the review generally is better at defining the new threats the armed forces must deal with than precisely laying out how to defeat them, military analysts said. In the past few days and weeks, the conclusions of the review have been widely previewed in Washington.
"While the thrust of the document is that traditional threats are receding and unconventional threats are growing, you don't get the impression that they know what to do about it," said Loren Thompson, a military analyst with the Lexington Institute, a research organization in Washington.
Even small-scale initiatives in the plan could be derailed in Congress. A proposal to reduce the number of National Guard combat brigades from 34 to 28 has run into opposition from governors and lawmakers, who have argued that reducing the Guard's combat capability at a time it is playing a substantial role in Iraq and Afghanistan does not make sense.
Pentagon aides say the idea is to consolidate often underequipped and undermanned Guard units, increasing their effectiveness.
One reason this year's review did not make more far-reaching changes seems to be that the conflict in Iraq prevented Mr. Rumsfeld from devoting as much attention to this review as he did in the past.
"In 2001, you couldn't make a major decision without Secretary Rumsfeld in the room," said a former Pentagon official, Michelle Flournoy, who took part in the last review. "This time, he didn't take the hands-on role that he did in 2001."
Mr. Rumsfeld delegated much of the daily work to his aides and to Mr. England, a former weapons industry executive who was Navy secretary before succeeding Paul D. Wolfowitz in April. Several analysts who followed the process closely said that when Mr. England took over the review in early summer, he helped a process that was adrift but that he shied away from far-reaching changes in the priorities of the Army, Navy, Coast Guard and Marines.
When Mr. Rumsfeld's aides did try to pare down the services' wish lists, they were often outmaneuvered, analysts said. The Air Force was able to defeat a proposal to require it and the Navy to buy the same basic version of the Pentagon's next-generation fighter plane, an idea proposed as a cost-savings measure.
But Air Force officials argued that its needs differed substantially from the Navy's, and that it would end up needing costly modifications to any common design, said Mr. Thompson of the Lexington Institute.
"Analysis played a key role, and a lot of times the analysis did not support a lot of trendy ideas," Mr. Thompson said.
Pentagon Review Calls for No Big Changes
By DAVID S. CLOUD
WASHINGTON, Feb. 1 — A comprehensive military strategy review once billed as Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld's architecture for revamping the armed forces eliminates no major weapon systems and calls for only incremental change in other priorities, according to Pentagon officials, outside advisers and independent analysts.
The plan, which is due to be made public next week along with the Bush administration's fiscal 2007 budget, does contain some significant shifts like calls for training thousands of additional special operations troops and for building futuristic weapons to defeat terror groups and potential new adversaries like China.
But initial hopes by Defense Department civilians to use the yearlong reassessment, which takes place every four years, to force far-reaching changes in spending priorities have not materialized, in part, analysts said, because of resistance by the military services.
With much of his time taken up with managing the war in Iraq, Mr. Rumsfeld was far less involved in this year's review than he was in 2001, when the last review was conducted, officials and analysts said. He delegated much of the decision-making to aides and to Deputy Defense Secretary Gordon R. England.
In addition, some of the Pentagon civilian leadership's more innovative ideas were rejected because they were judged too expensive or ineffective by the many teams of the officers and analysts who have been combing through drafts of the blueprint for the past year.
Even Mr. Rumsfeld played down expectations on Wednesday that the review would produce monumental shifts, calling the document "a way point along a continuum of change that began some years past and will continue some years hence."
From the outset, the administration itself raised high expectations for the review, and the theme of "transformation" came to be something of a mantra in the Pentagon's corridors. Some said the fruits of the review might be as lasting a legacy of the Rumsfeld years as the outcomes of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Ryan Henry, a top Pentagon planning official, declared last fall that the effort, instead of the usual "periodic tool of refinement," would be the "fulcrum of transition to a post-9/11 world."
Instead, by keeping alive some programs whose projected costs have soared in recent years like the F/A-22 fighter, the Army's Future Combat Systems and the Navy's DD(X) destroyer, the review has raised questions about how more exotic weapons and capabilities that Mr. Rumsfeld believes are vital to fight terror groups and other unconventional foes can fit into future military budgets.
Andrew Krepinevich, a military analyst with the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments who participated in the review, said there was a widespread expectation that the review "would find the Defense Department confronting some tough decisions."
"In a sense, a lot of these tough choices are kicked down the road," Mr. Krepinevich said.
The essence of Mr. Rumsfeld's agenda for the military is to make the armed services more mobile and lethal, more capable of dealing with emerging threats from terror groups and insurgents, including weapons of mass destruction, while still able to dominate conventional battlefields. His imprint is plainly visible in decisions like the move to expand the number of special operations troops trained in psychological warfare and civil affairs by 3,700.
Mr. Rumsfeld also has long been worried that the armed forces lack the capability to strike quickly anywhere in the world with conventional weapons.
The review, known formally as the Quadrennial Defense Review, or Q.D.R., calls for doubling the procurement of attack submarines, from one a year to two, by 2012, and arming submarine-carried Trident missiles with conventional warheads.
But beyond such relatively small-scale initiatives, the review generally is better at defining the new threats the armed forces must deal with than precisely laying out how to defeat them, military analysts said. In the past few days and weeks, the conclusions of the review have been widely previewed in Washington.
"While the thrust of the document is that traditional threats are receding and unconventional threats are growing, you don't get the impression that they know what to do about it," said Loren Thompson, a military analyst with the Lexington Institute, a research organization in Washington.
Even small-scale initiatives in the plan could be derailed in Congress. A proposal to reduce the number of National Guard combat brigades from 34 to 28 has run into opposition from governors and lawmakers, who have argued that reducing the Guard's combat capability at a time it is playing a substantial role in Iraq and Afghanistan does not make sense.
Pentagon aides say the idea is to consolidate often underequipped and undermanned Guard units, increasing their effectiveness.
One reason this year's review did not make more far-reaching changes seems to be that the conflict in Iraq prevented Mr. Rumsfeld from devoting as much attention to this review as he did in the past.
"In 2001, you couldn't make a major decision without Secretary Rumsfeld in the room," said a former Pentagon official, Michelle Flournoy, who took part in the last review. "This time, he didn't take the hands-on role that he did in 2001."
Mr. Rumsfeld delegated much of the daily work to his aides and to Mr. England, a former weapons industry executive who was Navy secretary before succeeding Paul D. Wolfowitz in April. Several analysts who followed the process closely said that when Mr. England took over the review in early summer, he helped a process that was adrift but that he shied away from far-reaching changes in the priorities of the Army, Navy, Coast Guard and Marines.
When Mr. Rumsfeld's aides did try to pare down the services' wish lists, they were often outmaneuvered, analysts said. The Air Force was able to defeat a proposal to require it and the Navy to buy the same basic version of the Pentagon's next-generation fighter plane, an idea proposed as a cost-savings measure.
But Air Force officials argued that its needs differed substantially from the Navy's, and that it would end up needing costly modifications to any common design, said Mr. Thompson of the Lexington Institute.
"Analysis played a key role, and a lot of times the analysis did not support a lot of trendy ideas," Mr. Thompson said.
- They're expanding it...instead of Sunseting it....the Patriot ACT...not what we want???? The right to petition ou
New Patriot Act Provision Creates Tighter Barrier to Officials at Public Events
By Kelley Beaucar Vlahos
Fox News
Tuesday 31 January 2006
Washington - A new provision tucked into the Patriot Act bill now before Congress would allow authorities to haul demonstrators at any "special event of national significance" away to jail on felony charges if they are caught breaching a security perimeter.
Sen. Arlen Specter , R-Pa., chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, sponsored the measure, which would extend the authority of the Secret Service to allow agents to arrest people who willingly or knowingly enter a restricted area at an event, even if the president or other official normally protected by the Secret Service isn't in attendance at the time.
The measure has civil libertarians protesting what they say is yet another power grab for the executive branch and one more loss for free speech.
"It's definitely problematic and chilling," said Lisa Graves, senior counsel for legislative strategy at the American Civil Liberties Union , which has written letters to the chairmen and ranking members of the House and Senate Judiciary Committees, pointing out that the provision wasn't subject to hearings or open debate.
Some conservatives say they too are troubled by the measure.
"It concerns me greatly," said Bob Barr, former US prosecutor and Republican representative from Georgia. "It clearly raises serious concerns about First Amendment rights."
But not everyone agrees that rights are being trampled on by the additional provision. In fact, some say the ACLU is the problem when it comes to protecting national security.
Rocco DiPippo, a freelance writer for the conservative FrontPageMagazine.com and editor of The Autonomist Web log, said the ACLU has fought the government every step of the way over security measures following the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks.
"Its opposition to Specter's reasonable proposal is simply more of the same," he said. "I can understand the concern that we should be suspicious of government, but we shouldn't adopt this mindset: 'government is evil.' This is just more hatred of (President) Bush."
Under current law, the Secret Service can arrest anyone for breaching restricted areas where the president or a protected official is or will be visiting, but the new provision would allow such arrests even after those VIPs have left the premises of any designated "special event of national significance." The provision would increase the maximum penalty for such an infraction from six months to one year in jail.
In a post-Sept. 11 world many non-political events have been designated National Special Security Events and would rise to the higher status. Examples of possible NSSEs are the Olympics or the Super Bowl. In 2004, the presidential inaugural balls and President Ronald Reagan's June funeral procession in Washington, D.C., were designated NSSEs.
According to government sources with knowledge of the legislation, Secret Service protection and law enforcement authority would extend beyond protecting a specific person, rather the event itself would become the "protectee."
Currently, non-violent demonstrators who enter restricted areas at such events previously would be arrested and charged by local law enforcement with simple trespassing, said Graves. Under the provision included in the new law, they will be charged with felonies by the Secret Service.
"It's a different consequence to people," she said.
"You are talking about giving the executive branch broader authority to create these exclusion zones which could cover broad areas and last for days [during an event ]," David Kopel, a constitutional expert with the Cato Institute, told FOXNews.com.
A spokesman at Specter's office said the senator was surprised by the clamor over the provision, which merely makes a technical change to clear up legal confusion over who has arresting authority at NSSEs. His office had no further comment on the provision. Committee Ranking Member Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., also declined comment. Republican and Democratic House Judiciary Committee leaders did not return calls for comment.
White House sources say the measure was not instigated by the administration and pointed out that it was a stand-alone bill that was rolled into the Patriot Act by Specter's office during House-Senate conference negotiations. White House spokeswoman Dana Perino told FOXNews.com that the White House would not comment on the intent of the measure, but that the president is concerned with preserving individual rights.
"President Bush is committed to protecting the American people's national security as well as their civil liberties," she said.
Secret Service representatives said the agency does not comment on pending legislation.
The Bush administration has been criticized in the past for what many say are tactics that keep protesters far away from official events and by employing stringent policies to ensure favorable audiences for the president.
Last year, three ticket-holding audience members at one of the president's Social Security events in Denver, Colo., were apprehended by a man who they said identified himself as Secret Service. The three were forced away from the event because of an anti-war sticker on the driver's car.
"[The administration] has certainly demonstrated a desire to have carefully-controlled events," said Graves.
John Pike, director of GlobalSecurity.org, an Alexandria, Va.-based clearinghouse for domestic and international security information, said he "could certainly understand why the Secret Service would want that legal authority," given the enormous burden of making venues safe for VIPs today.
"However, I think many people have concluded that the way it is being used has nothing to do with protecting the president from Usama bin Laden and everything to do with suppressing dissent and making sure the protesters don't get on TV," Pike said.
Bush is not the first president to flex his authority in this area, said Kopel, who pointed out that beginning with Reagan, presidents have created a larger security bubble and greater distance between themselves and dissenters at public events. The 2001 terrorist attacks on the United States just intensified the situation, he said.
-------
By Kelley Beaucar Vlahos
Fox News
Tuesday 31 January 2006
Washington - A new provision tucked into the Patriot Act bill now before Congress would allow authorities to haul demonstrators at any "special event of national significance" away to jail on felony charges if they are caught breaching a security perimeter.
Sen. Arlen Specter , R-Pa., chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, sponsored the measure, which would extend the authority of the Secret Service to allow agents to arrest people who willingly or knowingly enter a restricted area at an event, even if the president or other official normally protected by the Secret Service isn't in attendance at the time.
The measure has civil libertarians protesting what they say is yet another power grab for the executive branch and one more loss for free speech.
"It's definitely problematic and chilling," said Lisa Graves, senior counsel for legislative strategy at the American Civil Liberties Union , which has written letters to the chairmen and ranking members of the House and Senate Judiciary Committees, pointing out that the provision wasn't subject to hearings or open debate.
Some conservatives say they too are troubled by the measure.
"It concerns me greatly," said Bob Barr, former US prosecutor and Republican representative from Georgia. "It clearly raises serious concerns about First Amendment rights."
But not everyone agrees that rights are being trampled on by the additional provision. In fact, some say the ACLU is the problem when it comes to protecting national security.
Rocco DiPippo, a freelance writer for the conservative FrontPageMagazine.com and editor of The Autonomist Web log, said the ACLU has fought the government every step of the way over security measures following the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks.
"Its opposition to Specter's reasonable proposal is simply more of the same," he said. "I can understand the concern that we should be suspicious of government, but we shouldn't adopt this mindset: 'government is evil.' This is just more hatred of (President) Bush."
Under current law, the Secret Service can arrest anyone for breaching restricted areas where the president or a protected official is or will be visiting, but the new provision would allow such arrests even after those VIPs have left the premises of any designated "special event of national significance." The provision would increase the maximum penalty for such an infraction from six months to one year in jail.
In a post-Sept. 11 world many non-political events have been designated National Special Security Events and would rise to the higher status. Examples of possible NSSEs are the Olympics or the Super Bowl. In 2004, the presidential inaugural balls and President Ronald Reagan's June funeral procession in Washington, D.C., were designated NSSEs.
According to government sources with knowledge of the legislation, Secret Service protection and law enforcement authority would extend beyond protecting a specific person, rather the event itself would become the "protectee."
Currently, non-violent demonstrators who enter restricted areas at such events previously would be arrested and charged by local law enforcement with simple trespassing, said Graves. Under the provision included in the new law, they will be charged with felonies by the Secret Service.
"It's a different consequence to people," she said.
"You are talking about giving the executive branch broader authority to create these exclusion zones which could cover broad areas and last for days [during an event ]," David Kopel, a constitutional expert with the Cato Institute, told FOXNews.com.
A spokesman at Specter's office said the senator was surprised by the clamor over the provision, which merely makes a technical change to clear up legal confusion over who has arresting authority at NSSEs. His office had no further comment on the provision. Committee Ranking Member Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., also declined comment. Republican and Democratic House Judiciary Committee leaders did not return calls for comment.
White House sources say the measure was not instigated by the administration and pointed out that it was a stand-alone bill that was rolled into the Patriot Act by Specter's office during House-Senate conference negotiations. White House spokeswoman Dana Perino told FOXNews.com that the White House would not comment on the intent of the measure, but that the president is concerned with preserving individual rights.
"President Bush is committed to protecting the American people's national security as well as their civil liberties," she said.
Secret Service representatives said the agency does not comment on pending legislation.
The Bush administration has been criticized in the past for what many say are tactics that keep protesters far away from official events and by employing stringent policies to ensure favorable audiences for the president.
Last year, three ticket-holding audience members at one of the president's Social Security events in Denver, Colo., were apprehended by a man who they said identified himself as Secret Service. The three were forced away from the event because of an anti-war sticker on the driver's car.
"[The administration] has certainly demonstrated a desire to have carefully-controlled events," said Graves.
John Pike, director of GlobalSecurity.org, an Alexandria, Va.-based clearinghouse for domestic and international security information, said he "could certainly understand why the Secret Service would want that legal authority," given the enormous burden of making venues safe for VIPs today.
"However, I think many people have concluded that the way it is being used has nothing to do with protecting the president from Usama bin Laden and everything to do with suppressing dissent and making sure the protesters don't get on TV," Pike said.
Bush is not the first president to flex his authority in this area, said Kopel, who pointed out that beginning with Reagan, presidents have created a larger security bubble and greater distance between themselves and dissenters at public events. The 2001 terrorist attacks on the United States just intensified the situation, he said.
-------
Iran's message to the west: back off or we retaliate
Iran's message to the west: back off or we retaliate
Ewen MacAskill and Simon Tisdall
Thursday February 2, 2006
http://www.guardian.co.uk/iran/story/0,,1700266,00.html
Guardian
Iran's foreign minister yesterday threatened immediate retaliation over a move to refer its nuclear weapons activities to the United Nations security council in comments which deepen his country's confrontation with the international community.
In an interview with the Guardian - his first with western media - Manouchehr Mottaki accused the US of manufacturing the crisis and insisted there was still time to avoid a collision. But he warned that any military action by the US or Israel against Iran would have "severe consequences" and would be countered "by all means" at Iran's disposal.
Reflecting a hardening Iranian position, he threatened to end snap UN inspections of Iranian nuclear facilities and all other voluntary cooperation with the UN nuclear watchdog, if Iran is referred to the UN today or tomorrow.
He also vowed that Iran will match any sanctions with measures of its own and warned that the west would quickly regret any resort to military action. The escalating crisis could further destabilise the Middle East by intensifying US and British difficulties in Iraq and Afghanistan, and could spell an end to the nuclear non-proliferation treaty, which seeks to prevent the spread of nuclear weapons.
Mr Mottaki, who was appointed by Iran's hardline president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, in September, said Iranian retaliation would come "simultaneously" with any decision on referral by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the UN nuclear watchdog, which meets in emergency session in Vienna today. Iran had not ruled out further steps, including withdrawal from the NPT and the permanent ejection of UN inspectors. "If the Iran dossier is reported to the security council, the additional protocol [which allows UN inspectors to conduct snap inspections] will be the first victim," he said.
Asked whether Iran was prepared to use its leverage in Iraq, where Iran has been accused of aiding attacks on British troops, and elsewhere in the region, Mr Mottaki said Tehran's actions would "correspond" to western political, military and economic pressure.
Israel, along with the US, has not ruled out air strikes against Iran's nuclear facilities if diplomacy fails. "Iran does not think that the Zionist regime is in a condition to engage in such a dangerous venture and they know how severe the possible Iranian response will be to its possible audacity," Mr Mottaki said. "Suffice to say that the Zionist regime, if they attack, will regret it." That message was underscored yesterday by Iran's defence minister who said that any attack on Iran would bring "a crushing response".
Mr Mottaki said the US, even with 200,000 troops on the ground in Iraq and Afghanistan, was unable to impose its will on the region. "It would be better for President Bush to spend the second half of his presidency governing his country in a calmer manner." He urged Britain and other European countries to postpone a decision on UN referral until a scheduled meeting of the IAEA on March 6. "There's still time for our European friends to take a wise decision not to take wrong steps."
The foreign minister said Mr Bush had lied to the American people about Iran in his state of the union speech on Tuesday night and he rejected any chance of direct contacts with the US. The Guardian interview in London was held before Mr Mottaki had talks with Jack Straw, the foreign secretary. A Foreign Office spokesman said later: "Mottaki was warned not to walk away from the IAEA additional protocol or to make threats."
Today's showdown at the IAEA follows Iran's decision to resume uranium enrichment research last month, a move condemned by Britain, France and Germany as a breach of earlier undertakings. Western countries suspect Iran's civil nuclear programme will be used to manufacture nuclear weapons. But Iran says it has an inalienable right to civil nuclear power and denies seeking the bomb. Mr Bush, in his Tuesday speech, called Iran "a nation now held hostage by a small clerical elite that is isolating and repressing its people". But Mr Mottaki said the president's attempt to appeal to the Iranian people was doomed to failure. "Six days from now in the Ashura ceremony [a Shia Muslim festival] in Tehran, the Iranian people will respond to Mr Bush's comments."
Mr Ahmadinejad, who also rejected the US president's comments yesterday, described the US as a "hollow superpower" that is "tainted with the blood of nations".
Mr Mottaki came to London for a two-day conference on the future of Afghanistan. In a further indication of hostility towards Israel, he urged Hamas, winner of last week's Palestinian elections, to continue its policy of armed struggle. "The victory is the victory of the resistance," he said. "Our impression is they will insist on the continuation of resistance until the rights of the Palestinian people are secure."
Ewen MacAskill and Simon Tisdall
Thursday February 2, 2006
http://www.guardian.co.uk/iran/story/0,,1700266,00.html
Guardian
Iran's foreign minister yesterday threatened immediate retaliation over a move to refer its nuclear weapons activities to the United Nations security council in comments which deepen his country's confrontation with the international community.
In an interview with the Guardian - his first with western media - Manouchehr Mottaki accused the US of manufacturing the crisis and insisted there was still time to avoid a collision. But he warned that any military action by the US or Israel against Iran would have "severe consequences" and would be countered "by all means" at Iran's disposal.
Reflecting a hardening Iranian position, he threatened to end snap UN inspections of Iranian nuclear facilities and all other voluntary cooperation with the UN nuclear watchdog, if Iran is referred to the UN today or tomorrow.
He also vowed that Iran will match any sanctions with measures of its own and warned that the west would quickly regret any resort to military action. The escalating crisis could further destabilise the Middle East by intensifying US and British difficulties in Iraq and Afghanistan, and could spell an end to the nuclear non-proliferation treaty, which seeks to prevent the spread of nuclear weapons.
Mr Mottaki, who was appointed by Iran's hardline president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, in September, said Iranian retaliation would come "simultaneously" with any decision on referral by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the UN nuclear watchdog, which meets in emergency session in Vienna today. Iran had not ruled out further steps, including withdrawal from the NPT and the permanent ejection of UN inspectors. "If the Iran dossier is reported to the security council, the additional protocol [which allows UN inspectors to conduct snap inspections] will be the first victim," he said.
Asked whether Iran was prepared to use its leverage in Iraq, where Iran has been accused of aiding attacks on British troops, and elsewhere in the region, Mr Mottaki said Tehran's actions would "correspond" to western political, military and economic pressure.
Israel, along with the US, has not ruled out air strikes against Iran's nuclear facilities if diplomacy fails. "Iran does not think that the Zionist regime is in a condition to engage in such a dangerous venture and they know how severe the possible Iranian response will be to its possible audacity," Mr Mottaki said. "Suffice to say that the Zionist regime, if they attack, will regret it." That message was underscored yesterday by Iran's defence minister who said that any attack on Iran would bring "a crushing response".
Mr Mottaki said the US, even with 200,000 troops on the ground in Iraq and Afghanistan, was unable to impose its will on the region. "It would be better for President Bush to spend the second half of his presidency governing his country in a calmer manner." He urged Britain and other European countries to postpone a decision on UN referral until a scheduled meeting of the IAEA on March 6. "There's still time for our European friends to take a wise decision not to take wrong steps."
The foreign minister said Mr Bush had lied to the American people about Iran in his state of the union speech on Tuesday night and he rejected any chance of direct contacts with the US. The Guardian interview in London was held before Mr Mottaki had talks with Jack Straw, the foreign secretary. A Foreign Office spokesman said later: "Mottaki was warned not to walk away from the IAEA additional protocol or to make threats."
Today's showdown at the IAEA follows Iran's decision to resume uranium enrichment research last month, a move condemned by Britain, France and Germany as a breach of earlier undertakings. Western countries suspect Iran's civil nuclear programme will be used to manufacture nuclear weapons. But Iran says it has an inalienable right to civil nuclear power and denies seeking the bomb. Mr Bush, in his Tuesday speech, called Iran "a nation now held hostage by a small clerical elite that is isolating and repressing its people". But Mr Mottaki said the president's attempt to appeal to the Iranian people was doomed to failure. "Six days from now in the Ashura ceremony [a Shia Muslim festival] in Tehran, the Iranian people will respond to Mr Bush's comments."
Mr Ahmadinejad, who also rejected the US president's comments yesterday, described the US as a "hollow superpower" that is "tainted with the blood of nations".
Mr Mottaki came to London for a two-day conference on the future of Afghanistan. In a further indication of hostility towards Israel, he urged Hamas, winner of last week's Palestinian elections, to continue its policy of armed struggle. "The victory is the victory of the resistance," he said. "Our impression is they will insist on the continuation of resistance until the rights of the Palestinian people are secure."
14 US Reps Want Bush Impeachment Probe
14 US Reps Want Bush Impeachment Probe
Wednesday, February 01 2006 @ 09:24 PM PST
Contributed by: Admin
http://www.infoshop.org/inews/article.php?story=20060201212402392&mode=print
(APN) The number of US House Representatives who have signed on to H. Res 635--supporting a probe looking into the grounds for impeaching Bush--has jumped to fourteen (14), including US Rep. John Conyers who initially sponsored the bill, Atlanta Progressive News has learned.
14 US Reps Want Bush Impeachment Probe
17 Total Want Bush to Resign or Be Impeached
By Matthew Cardinale, Atlanta Progressive News (February 01, 2006)
http://www.atlantaprogressivenews.com/pages/29/index.htm
(APN) The number of US House Representatives who have signed on to H. Res 635--supporting a probe looking into the grounds for impeaching Bush--has jumped to fourteen (14), including US Rep. John Conyers who initially sponsored the bill, Atlanta Progressive News has learned.
The total number of Members of US Congress who want Bush's impeachment or resignation is actually seventeen (17), including 14 co-sponsors of H. Res 635, plus US Rep. John Lewis (D-GA) who called for Bush's impeachment over wiretapping, and US Reps. Cynthia McKinney (D-GA) and Bobby Rush (D-GA) who have called for Bush to step down.
The 14 members who have signed on to H. Res. 635 are Rep. Neil Abercrombie (D-HI), Rep. Tammy Baldwin (D-WI), Rep. Lois Capps (D-CA), Rep. Wm. Lacy Clay (D-MO), Rep. Sheila Jackson-Lee (D-TX), Rep. Jim McDermott (D-WA), Rep. Jerrold Nadler (D-NY), Rep. Major Owens (D-NY), Rep. Donald Payne (D-NJ), Rep. Charles Rangel (D-NY), Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-IL), Rep. Fortney Pete Stark (D-CA), Rep. Maxine Waters (D-CA), and Rep. Lynn Woolsey (D-CA), according to Thomas.loc.gov.
Seven members added their names yesterday, January 31, 2006, while one of the erstwhile co-sponsors--Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-CA)--withdrew her name citing a clerical error.
Lofgren's Office advised Atlanta Progressive News last week that US Rep. Lofgren first learned she was listed as a co-sponsor after Atlanta Progressive News issued an article in December 2005. Her full statement is cited below.
The thing about H. Res. 635 is, it deals with impeaching Bush over a cluster of issues from misleading the public to go to war, to authorizing torture. Wiretapping was not listed as one of the reasons to investigate the grounds for Bush's impeachment in the bill because the existence of the secret, illegal wiretapping had not come to light yet when the bill was being prepared.
Some Members of Congress such as US Rep. John Lewis (D-GA) appear to see firmer grounds for impeaching Bush over his controversial authorization of illegal wiretapping on Americans, than for the reasons cited in H. Res. 635. Mr. Lewis told a radio station in December he would support impeachment over wiretapping.
It is unclear at this point whether Conyers or another member of Congress is prepared to introduce a new bill which would deal specifically with impeaching Bush over wiretapping.
Meanwhile, US Rep. Cynthia McKinney (D-GA) and Bobby Rush (D-IL) signed a "World Can't Wait" statement calling on Bush to "step down." Three other members of Congress signed that statement, that is, US Reps. John Conyers (D-MI), Maxine Waters (D-CA), and Major Owens (D-NY), but they are already included in APN's impeach-or-resign count due to their sponsoring of H. Res. 635.
"Mr. Speaker, during the December recess I was surprised to read in a newspaper article that I was listed as a cosponsor of House Resolutions 635, 636 and 637 since I had not cosponsored any of these measures. I discovered that due to administrative errors, my name was mistakenly added to these bills by the Judiciary Committee staff," Rep. Lofgren told Congress yesterday, according to the Congressional Record.
However, Rep. Lofgren is highly troubled about Bush's involvement in illegal wiretapping and is leaving impeachment options on the table, she says.
"Serious questions have been raised about President Bush's actions in approving warrantless wiretaps by the NSA, as well as questions about both the Vice President's and the President's information that was provided to the Congress as the basis for the decision to initiate war in Iraq. These important questions need to be answered, and Congress should then consider the answers in a careful, deliberate and thoughtful manner. It is important that this process be done in a dispassionate way that avoids partisanship. This thorough analysis should, in my judgment, be undertaken before anything such as these resolutions are considered."
Matthew Cardinale is the Editor of Atlanta Progressive News. He may be reached at matthew@atlantaprogressivenews.com
See also:
US Rep. Lewis Calls for Bush Impeachment (December 26, 2005)
http://www.atlantaprogressivenews.com/pages/13/index.htm
EXCLUSIVE: Bush Impeachment Inquiry Has 8 House CoSponsors (January 01, 2006)
http://www.atlantaprogressivenews.com/pages/14/index.htm
http://www.atlantaprogressivenews.com
Matthew Cardinale is Editor of Atlanta Progressive News. He has written previously for the Sun-Sentinel Newspaper, Shelterforce Magazine, The Advocate Magazine, and The San Francisco Bay View, and The Berkeley Daily Planet Newspaper. He has also written for numerous online publications including OpEdNews, BuzzFlash, CommonDreams, AlterNet, RawStory, and TruthOut. He may be reached at matthew@atlantaprogressivenews.com
Wednesday, February 01 2006 @ 09:24 PM PST
Contributed by: Admin
http://www.infoshop.org/inews/article.php?story=20060201212402392&mode=print
(APN) The number of US House Representatives who have signed on to H. Res 635--supporting a probe looking into the grounds for impeaching Bush--has jumped to fourteen (14), including US Rep. John Conyers who initially sponsored the bill, Atlanta Progressive News has learned.
14 US Reps Want Bush Impeachment Probe
17 Total Want Bush to Resign or Be Impeached
By Matthew Cardinale, Atlanta Progressive News (February 01, 2006)
http://www.atlantaprogressivenews.com/pages/29/index.htm
(APN) The number of US House Representatives who have signed on to H. Res 635--supporting a probe looking into the grounds for impeaching Bush--has jumped to fourteen (14), including US Rep. John Conyers who initially sponsored the bill, Atlanta Progressive News has learned.
The total number of Members of US Congress who want Bush's impeachment or resignation is actually seventeen (17), including 14 co-sponsors of H. Res 635, plus US Rep. John Lewis (D-GA) who called for Bush's impeachment over wiretapping, and US Reps. Cynthia McKinney (D-GA) and Bobby Rush (D-GA) who have called for Bush to step down.
The 14 members who have signed on to H. Res. 635 are Rep. Neil Abercrombie (D-HI), Rep. Tammy Baldwin (D-WI), Rep. Lois Capps (D-CA), Rep. Wm. Lacy Clay (D-MO), Rep. Sheila Jackson-Lee (D-TX), Rep. Jim McDermott (D-WA), Rep. Jerrold Nadler (D-NY), Rep. Major Owens (D-NY), Rep. Donald Payne (D-NJ), Rep. Charles Rangel (D-NY), Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-IL), Rep. Fortney Pete Stark (D-CA), Rep. Maxine Waters (D-CA), and Rep. Lynn Woolsey (D-CA), according to Thomas.loc.gov.
Seven members added their names yesterday, January 31, 2006, while one of the erstwhile co-sponsors--Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-CA)--withdrew her name citing a clerical error.
Lofgren's Office advised Atlanta Progressive News last week that US Rep. Lofgren first learned she was listed as a co-sponsor after Atlanta Progressive News issued an article in December 2005. Her full statement is cited below.
The thing about H. Res. 635 is, it deals with impeaching Bush over a cluster of issues from misleading the public to go to war, to authorizing torture. Wiretapping was not listed as one of the reasons to investigate the grounds for Bush's impeachment in the bill because the existence of the secret, illegal wiretapping had not come to light yet when the bill was being prepared.
Some Members of Congress such as US Rep. John Lewis (D-GA) appear to see firmer grounds for impeaching Bush over his controversial authorization of illegal wiretapping on Americans, than for the reasons cited in H. Res. 635. Mr. Lewis told a radio station in December he would support impeachment over wiretapping.
It is unclear at this point whether Conyers or another member of Congress is prepared to introduce a new bill which would deal specifically with impeaching Bush over wiretapping.
Meanwhile, US Rep. Cynthia McKinney (D-GA) and Bobby Rush (D-IL) signed a "World Can't Wait" statement calling on Bush to "step down." Three other members of Congress signed that statement, that is, US Reps. John Conyers (D-MI), Maxine Waters (D-CA), and Major Owens (D-NY), but they are already included in APN's impeach-or-resign count due to their sponsoring of H. Res. 635.
"Mr. Speaker, during the December recess I was surprised to read in a newspaper article that I was listed as a cosponsor of House Resolutions 635, 636 and 637 since I had not cosponsored any of these measures. I discovered that due to administrative errors, my name was mistakenly added to these bills by the Judiciary Committee staff," Rep. Lofgren told Congress yesterday, according to the Congressional Record.
However, Rep. Lofgren is highly troubled about Bush's involvement in illegal wiretapping and is leaving impeachment options on the table, she says.
"Serious questions have been raised about President Bush's actions in approving warrantless wiretaps by the NSA, as well as questions about both the Vice President's and the President's information that was provided to the Congress as the basis for the decision to initiate war in Iraq. These important questions need to be answered, and Congress should then consider the answers in a careful, deliberate and thoughtful manner. It is important that this process be done in a dispassionate way that avoids partisanship. This thorough analysis should, in my judgment, be undertaken before anything such as these resolutions are considered."
Matthew Cardinale is the Editor of Atlanta Progressive News. He may be reached at matthew@atlantaprogressivenews.com
See also:
US Rep. Lewis Calls for Bush Impeachment (December 26, 2005)
http://www.atlantaprogressivenews.com/pages/13/index.htm
EXCLUSIVE: Bush Impeachment Inquiry Has 8 House CoSponsors (January 01, 2006)
http://www.atlantaprogressivenews.com/pages/14/index.htm
http://www.atlantaprogressivenews.com
Matthew Cardinale is Editor of Atlanta Progressive News. He has written previously for the Sun-Sentinel Newspaper, Shelterforce Magazine, The Advocate Magazine, and The San Francisco Bay View, and The Berkeley Daily Planet Newspaper. He has also written for numerous online publications including OpEdNews, BuzzFlash, CommonDreams, AlterNet, RawStory, and TruthOut. He may be reached at matthew@atlantaprogressivenews.com
Charges Dropped Against Sheehan, Congressman's Wife- WTOPnews.com
http://www.wtopnews.com/?nid=25&sid=687224#
Charges Dropped Against Sheehan, Congressman's Wife
Feb 1st - 9:19pm
WASHINGTON (AP) - U-S Capitol police have dropped charges against anti-war activist Cindy Sheehan, who was removed from the House gallery before President bush's State of the Union address for wearing a T-shirt opposing the War in Iraq.
Capitol Police Chief Terrance Gainer has apologized to Sheehan, and to Beverly Young, the wife of Florida Republican Congressman Bill Young. She was also removed form the gallery but not charged, for wearing a T-shirt urging support for U-S troops.
Gainer says his officers made mistakes in their efforts to enforce unwritten rules prohibiting demonstrating in the Capitol.
Charges Dropped Against Sheehan, Congressman's Wife
Feb 1st - 9:19pm
WASHINGTON (AP) - U-S Capitol police have dropped charges against anti-war activist Cindy Sheehan, who was removed from the House gallery before President bush's State of the Union address for wearing a T-shirt opposing the War in Iraq.
Capitol Police Chief Terrance Gainer has apologized to Sheehan, and to Beverly Young, the wife of Florida Republican Congressman Bill Young. She was also removed form the gallery but not charged, for wearing a T-shirt urging support for U-S troops.
Gainer says his officers made mistakes in their efforts to enforce unwritten rules prohibiting demonstrating in the Capitol.
Videotape shows shooting of airman- Buffalo News
http://www.buffalonews.com/editorial/20060201/1004368.asp
Videotape shows shooting of airman
By JEREMIAH MARQUEZ
Associated Press
2/1/2006
CHINO, Calif. - A videotape released Tuesday shows a sheriff's deputy shooting an unarmed Air Force policeman who recently returned from Iraq as he appeared to obey an order to get up off the ground.
KTLA-TV broadcast a 40-second clip it said came from a Chino resident who videotaped Sunday night's shooting, which followed a 100 mph car chase.
Senior Airman Elio Carrion, 21, was listed in good condition in Arrowhead Regional Medical Center in Colton. He was shot three times in the chest, ribs and leg, his father-in-law, Ernesto Paz, told KTLA-TV.
Carrion was a passenger in a Corvette that crashed into a wall following the brief
chase, authorities said.
The dark, grainy videotape shows Carrion lying on the ground next to the car, talking to a silhouetted officer who is pointing a gun at him. Carrion supports himself on one arm and his face is brightly lit by the officer's flashlight.
Carrion is heard telling the officer he is unarmed and is in the military.
At one point, a voice is heard saying several times: "Get up."
Carrion says: "I'm gonna get up." As he rose, at least four shots were fired and Carrion collapsed.
Investigators from the San Bernardino County Sheriff's Department took the original tape, refusing to release it to the public or describe what it shows.
The deputy, whose name was not released, was placed on paid administrative leave, a routine procedure in officer-involved shootings.
Sheriff Gary Penrod said he could not comment until the investigation is completed.
Carrion was not charged with a crime, although the incident remained under investigation, according to sheriff's spokeswoman Robin Haynal.
The driver of the Corvette, identified by authorities as Luis Fernando Escobedo, 21, was arrested for investigation of felony evading.
Carrion and Escobedo had left a party at the home of Carrion's parents to drive to a store, said the airman's wife, Mariela.
Carrion was scheduled to report on Wednesday to his unit, the 2nd Security Forces Squadron, at Barksdale Air Force Base in Shreveport, La.
An Air Force spokesman, Lt. Frank Hartnett, said Carrion was a security officer at the base. Carrion joined the Air Force in January 2003 and recently returned from a six-month tour in Iraq, Hartnett said.
Videotape shows shooting of airman
By JEREMIAH MARQUEZ
Associated Press
2/1/2006
CHINO, Calif. - A videotape released Tuesday shows a sheriff's deputy shooting an unarmed Air Force policeman who recently returned from Iraq as he appeared to obey an order to get up off the ground.
KTLA-TV broadcast a 40-second clip it said came from a Chino resident who videotaped Sunday night's shooting, which followed a 100 mph car chase.
Senior Airman Elio Carrion, 21, was listed in good condition in Arrowhead Regional Medical Center in Colton. He was shot three times in the chest, ribs and leg, his father-in-law, Ernesto Paz, told KTLA-TV.
Carrion was a passenger in a Corvette that crashed into a wall following the brief
chase, authorities said.
The dark, grainy videotape shows Carrion lying on the ground next to the car, talking to a silhouetted officer who is pointing a gun at him. Carrion supports himself on one arm and his face is brightly lit by the officer's flashlight.
Carrion is heard telling the officer he is unarmed and is in the military.
At one point, a voice is heard saying several times: "Get up."
Carrion says: "I'm gonna get up." As he rose, at least four shots were fired and Carrion collapsed.
Investigators from the San Bernardino County Sheriff's Department took the original tape, refusing to release it to the public or describe what it shows.
The deputy, whose name was not released, was placed on paid administrative leave, a routine procedure in officer-involved shootings.
Sheriff Gary Penrod said he could not comment until the investigation is completed.
Carrion was not charged with a crime, although the incident remained under investigation, according to sheriff's spokeswoman Robin Haynal.
The driver of the Corvette, identified by authorities as Luis Fernando Escobedo, 21, was arrested for investigation of felony evading.
Carrion and Escobedo had left a party at the home of Carrion's parents to drive to a store, said the airman's wife, Mariela.
Carrion was scheduled to report on Wednesday to his unit, the 2nd Security Forces Squadron, at Barksdale Air Force Base in Shreveport, La.
An Air Force spokesman, Lt. Frank Hartnett, said Carrion was a security officer at the base. Carrion joined the Air Force in January 2003 and recently returned from a six-month tour in Iraq, Hartnett said.
FBI Probes Shooting of Barksdale Airman
News: "UPDATE: FBI Probes Shooting of Barksdale Airman
Wednesday, February 01, 2006
The FBI is investigating the police shooting of a Barksdale Airman and veteran of the Iraq war. A video of the event shows Elio Carrion appeared to be following police orders. The shooting followed a high speed chase involving a Corvette. 21-year-old Carrion was the passenger, not the driver. On the amateur videotape, Carrion is on the ground. he appears trying to calm down a deputy yelling at him. 'I`m here on your side. All right?,' Carrion said to the officer. 'I served more time than you in the (bleep) police and the (bleep) military, ok?'
On the tape, it sounds like one of the deputies tells Carrion to get off the ground. He does and that`s followed by a number of shots. Police say Carrion was hit four times. The driver of the vehicle was eventually arrested.
Carrion is recovering at a California hospital listed in good condition. His wife says the deputy ought to be fired. 'Since my husband was surrendering, they shot him,' said Mariela Carrion. 'They shot him on the shoulder, on the chest, and one on his leg.'
The FBI is now looking into the case. Police are running their own investigation. Carrion was supposed to report to Barksdale Wednesday."
Wednesday, February 01, 2006
The FBI is investigating the police shooting of a Barksdale Airman and veteran of the Iraq war. A video of the event shows Elio Carrion appeared to be following police orders. The shooting followed a high speed chase involving a Corvette. 21-year-old Carrion was the passenger, not the driver. On the amateur videotape, Carrion is on the ground. he appears trying to calm down a deputy yelling at him. 'I`m here on your side. All right?,' Carrion said to the officer. 'I served more time than you in the (bleep) police and the (bleep) military, ok?'
On the tape, it sounds like one of the deputies tells Carrion to get off the ground. He does and that`s followed by a number of shots. Police say Carrion was hit four times. The driver of the vehicle was eventually arrested.
Carrion is recovering at a California hospital listed in good condition. His wife says the deputy ought to be fired. 'Since my husband was surrendering, they shot him,' said Mariela Carrion. 'They shot him on the shoulder, on the chest, and one on his leg.'
The FBI is now looking into the case. Police are running their own investigation. Carrion was supposed to report to Barksdale Wednesday."
"Excuse me, Mr. Gonzales, but I do believe your pants are on fire."
"Excuse me, Mr. Gonzales, but I do believe your pants are on fire."
By Melissa McEwan
Posted on January 31, 2006
http://www.alternet.org/bloggers/mcewan/31632/
Remember when it would have mattered that our Attorney General is a big, stinking liar? Yeah, those were the days.
In a letter to the attorney general yesterday, [Sen. Russell Feingold (D-Wis.)] demanded to know why Gonzales dismissed the senator's question about warrantless eavesdropping as a "hypothetical situation" during a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing in January 2005. At the hearing, Feingold asked Gonzales where the president's authority ends and whether Gonzales believed the president could, for example, act in contravention of existing criminal laws and spy on U.S. citizens without a warrant.
Gonzales said that it was impossible to answer such a hypothetical question but that it was "not the policy or the agenda of this president" to authorize actions that conflict with existing law. He added that he would hope to alert Congress if the president ever chose to authorize warrantless surveillance, according to a transcript of the hearing.
In fact, the president did secretly authorize the National Security Agency to begin warrantless monitoring of calls and e-mails between the United States and other nations soon after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. The program, publicly revealed in media reports last month, was unknown to Feingold and his staff at the time Feingold questioned Gonzales, according to a staff member. Feingold's aides developed the 2005 questions based on privacy advocates' concerns about broad interpretations of executive power.
Gonzales was White House counsel at the time the program began and has since acknowledged his role in affirming the president's authority to launch the surveillance effort.
Hmm. Lying under oath, eh? Didn’t we impeach a president for that once upon a time…?
Notes AMERICAblog's Joe in DC:
Lying is standard operating procedure for the Bush Administation. They lie to the media all the time, but those patsies just keep regurgitating whatever the White House throws them. But, lying to Congress should have consequences. There was a time when that mattered. The Bush White House has emasculated Congress in the same way they did it to the press. Pathetic.
Agreed. Pathetic and fairly scary.
(AMERICAblog.)
Melissa McEwan writes and edits the blog Shakespeare's Sister. She lives in Indiana with two cats and a Scotsman.
By Melissa McEwan
Posted on January 31, 2006
http://www.alternet.org/bloggers/mcewan/31632/
Remember when it would have mattered that our Attorney General is a big, stinking liar? Yeah, those were the days.
In a letter to the attorney general yesterday, [Sen. Russell Feingold (D-Wis.)] demanded to know why Gonzales dismissed the senator's question about warrantless eavesdropping as a "hypothetical situation" during a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing in January 2005. At the hearing, Feingold asked Gonzales where the president's authority ends and whether Gonzales believed the president could, for example, act in contravention of existing criminal laws and spy on U.S. citizens without a warrant.
Gonzales said that it was impossible to answer such a hypothetical question but that it was "not the policy or the agenda of this president" to authorize actions that conflict with existing law. He added that he would hope to alert Congress if the president ever chose to authorize warrantless surveillance, according to a transcript of the hearing.
In fact, the president did secretly authorize the National Security Agency to begin warrantless monitoring of calls and e-mails between the United States and other nations soon after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. The program, publicly revealed in media reports last month, was unknown to Feingold and his staff at the time Feingold questioned Gonzales, according to a staff member. Feingold's aides developed the 2005 questions based on privacy advocates' concerns about broad interpretations of executive power.
Gonzales was White House counsel at the time the program began and has since acknowledged his role in affirming the president's authority to launch the surveillance effort.
Hmm. Lying under oath, eh? Didn’t we impeach a president for that once upon a time…?
Notes AMERICAblog's Joe in DC:
Lying is standard operating procedure for the Bush Administation. They lie to the media all the time, but those patsies just keep regurgitating whatever the White House throws them. But, lying to Congress should have consequences. There was a time when that mattered. The Bush White House has emasculated Congress in the same way they did it to the press. Pathetic.
Agreed. Pathetic and fairly scary.
(AMERICAblog.)
Melissa McEwan writes and edits the blog Shakespeare's Sister. She lives in Indiana with two cats and a Scotsman.
US Soldiers Shoot at Canadian Ambassador's Car in Baghdad
Published on Wednesday, February 1, 2006 by Agence France Presse
US Soldiers Shoot at Canadian Ambassador's Car in Baghdad
The US military shot at the Canadian ambassador's car in Baghdad but no-one was hurt in the "unfortunate incident," a US State department official said.
"There was an incident involving the (US) military and the Canadian ambassador's car today," a State Department official told AFP, speaking on condition of anonymity. "They shot on it."
"No-one was injured," the official said, calling it an "unfortunate incident" and adding: "We are in close contact with Canadian officials."
The official could provide no further details of the incident.
Four passengers were riding in the vehicle, including Stewart Henderson, Canada's charge d'affaires in Iraq, when US soldiers fired on it "after it reportedly wouldn't stop," Canada's CTV News reported.
The vehicle was apparently travelling alone in the heavily fortified Green Zone when it came across an American military convoy and tried to pass it, the report said.
Members of the US Army's 4th Infantry Divisions gave the driver hand signals to stop. When the car did not, they shot over it, then at it.
"Finally they plugged the car with three rounds. Two went through the hood into the engine block. One shot went through the lower part of the windshield," CTV said.
Canada's ambassador to Iraq, John Holmes, was not in the car, and neither the four passengers nor the driver were injured, the report said.
US Soldiers Shoot at Canadian Ambassador's Car in Baghdad
The US military shot at the Canadian ambassador's car in Baghdad but no-one was hurt in the "unfortunate incident," a US State department official said.
"There was an incident involving the (US) military and the Canadian ambassador's car today," a State Department official told AFP, speaking on condition of anonymity. "They shot on it."
"No-one was injured," the official said, calling it an "unfortunate incident" and adding: "We are in close contact with Canadian officials."
The official could provide no further details of the incident.
Four passengers were riding in the vehicle, including Stewart Henderson, Canada's charge d'affaires in Iraq, when US soldiers fired on it "after it reportedly wouldn't stop," Canada's CTV News reported.
The vehicle was apparently travelling alone in the heavily fortified Green Zone when it came across an American military convoy and tried to pass it, the report said.
Members of the US Army's 4th Infantry Divisions gave the driver hand signals to stop. When the car did not, they shot over it, then at it.
"Finally they plugged the car with three rounds. Two went through the hood into the engine block. One shot went through the lower part of the windshield," CTV said.
Canada's ambassador to Iraq, John Holmes, was not in the car, and neither the four passengers nor the driver were injured, the report said.
DOD tackles parallel processing challenges with new program
DOD tackles parallel processing challenges with new program
DOD tackles parallel processing challenges with new program
By Joab Jackson
GCN Staff
A programming tool for parallel-processing environments that was originally developed with Defense Department funding is now available commercially from Management Communications and Control Inc. of Arlington, Va.
The software, called the Autocoding Toolset, provides a graphical user interface as well as some reusable code and code-generation capability, said Christopher Robbins, MCCI president.
The Army Research Laboratory in Aberdeen, Md., has used the software to develop a heat flow program that now runs on a 2,000-processor system, Robbins added.
The Defense Research Projects Agency, the Missile Defense Agency (MDA) and the Navy funded portions of the program’s development through a number of Small Business Innovation Research and Advanced Technology Demonstration awards.
DARPA wanted to address two challenges with the work, Robbins said. One was to improve the productivity of the developers writing programs for the Defense Department’s high-performance computing systems. Writing programs for multiple-processor computer systems is a time-consuming task, given the complexities involved. Very few programmers are skilled at writing this sort of code. The Message Passing Interface library relieves some, though not all, of the work.
DARPA also wanted to produce programs that would use a greater percentage of the available processors. “There are cases of codes that run on thousands of processors getting one percent efficiency. You might as well not have bought the hardware at all,” Robbins said. Robbins said DARPA’s Information Processing Technology Office has a goal to develop programs that wring 90 percent efficiency from 256-processor systems.
MDA has its own goals. It is interested in developing the technology in order to address its own potential bottleneck in data gestation. The agency expects to collect vast amounts of data from its radar systems, which must be processed as quickly as possible, Robbins said.
Robbins hopes that the Autocoding Toolset will reduce development time by providing both a graphical user interface that can visually encapsulate the work in progress, as well as by automatically generating control classes.
The Autocoding Toolset uses a data flow language called Processing Graph Method, first developed for the Navy. “The flow of data through a program is like [the flow of] current in electrical circuits,” commented Robbins.
The application allows the developer to craft the flow of the data as it travels through the application, using graphing tools. Symbols represent different entities, such as variables and arrays. The program also has a library of standard math and processing functions. It can also encapsulate user code written in other languages, such as C, or ADA, even MatLab functions and scripts.
Robbins said experienced programmers can start using the Autocoding Toolset within a few hours of familiarization. The software runs on most variants of Unix, including Linux, and costs about $60,000.
DOD tackles parallel processing challenges with new program
By Joab Jackson
GCN Staff
A programming tool for parallel-processing environments that was originally developed with Defense Department funding is now available commercially from Management Communications and Control Inc. of Arlington, Va.
The software, called the Autocoding Toolset, provides a graphical user interface as well as some reusable code and code-generation capability, said Christopher Robbins, MCCI president.
The Army Research Laboratory in Aberdeen, Md., has used the software to develop a heat flow program that now runs on a 2,000-processor system, Robbins added.
The Defense Research Projects Agency, the Missile Defense Agency (MDA) and the Navy funded portions of the program’s development through a number of Small Business Innovation Research and Advanced Technology Demonstration awards.
DARPA wanted to address two challenges with the work, Robbins said. One was to improve the productivity of the developers writing programs for the Defense Department’s high-performance computing systems. Writing programs for multiple-processor computer systems is a time-consuming task, given the complexities involved. Very few programmers are skilled at writing this sort of code. The Message Passing Interface library relieves some, though not all, of the work.
DARPA also wanted to produce programs that would use a greater percentage of the available processors. “There are cases of codes that run on thousands of processors getting one percent efficiency. You might as well not have bought the hardware at all,” Robbins said. Robbins said DARPA’s Information Processing Technology Office has a goal to develop programs that wring 90 percent efficiency from 256-processor systems.
MDA has its own goals. It is interested in developing the technology in order to address its own potential bottleneck in data gestation. The agency expects to collect vast amounts of data from its radar systems, which must be processed as quickly as possible, Robbins said.
Robbins hopes that the Autocoding Toolset will reduce development time by providing both a graphical user interface that can visually encapsulate the work in progress, as well as by automatically generating control classes.
The Autocoding Toolset uses a data flow language called Processing Graph Method, first developed for the Navy. “The flow of data through a program is like [the flow of] current in electrical circuits,” commented Robbins.
The application allows the developer to craft the flow of the data as it travels through the application, using graphing tools. Symbols represent different entities, such as variables and arrays. The program also has a library of standard math and processing functions. It can also encapsulate user code written in other languages, such as C, or ADA, even MatLab functions and scripts.
Robbins said experienced programmers can start using the Autocoding Toolset within a few hours of familiarization. The software runs on most variants of Unix, including Linux, and costs about $60,000.
ALL of the voting errors - helped Bush. Coincidence ?
Election Theft Emergency
By Terrence McNally, AlterNet
Posted Jan. 27, 2006, Printed Feb. 1, 2006
For GOP voters,
the 2004 presidential election was little short of miraculous:
Behind in the Electoral College even on the afternoon of the vote,
the Bush-Cheney ticket staged a stunning comeback.
Usually reliable exit polls turned out to be wrong by an unprecedented
5% in swing states. Conservatives argued, and the media agreed,
that "moral values" had made the difference. In his latest book,
Fooled Again: How The Right Stole The 2004 Election, And Why
They'll Steal The Next One Too (Unless We Stop Them),
http://alternet.bookswelike.net/isbn/0465045790
Mark Crispin Miller argues that it wasn't moral values
which swung the election -- it was theft.
TERRENCE McNALLY: You're a professor of media studies.
According to your bio, you write about "film, television, propaganda,
advertising and the culture industries …" Why did you write this book?
MARK CRISPIN MILLER: Out of a sense of civic emergency.
I believe that "Fooled Again" makes the case quite persuasively
that there is actually no convincing evidence that Bush and Cheney
won re-election.This is a civic story of the utmost importance.
It has to do with the dire need for election reform in the United States.
But it's also a story about the colossal failure of the American press
to do precisely the kind of job that the framers had in mind
when they wrote the First Amendment. What they had in mind was
that the press would function as a reliable check on executive power.
It would keep the people informed about what their government was up to,
and it would keep them politically engaged in national debate.
The newspapers, as limited and defective as they were in the
18th century, did perform that function, and I believe
they performed that function for much of our history.
We now have a corporate media system that is not answerable
to the people nor concerned about the people, but [is] in the service
of its pay masters. And it is far too close to the government
for the health of anything like a democratic system.One of the points of
"Fooled Again" is that this is a story of tremendous importance,
as far as a democracy is concerned. Yet the press has for the most part
ridiculed those who have come up with very solid evidence of fraud.
They've been in the business less of talking about the situation
than of preventing anybody else from talking about it. And this includes
some of the progressive media as well. In fact, the most hostile
reviews that I've received have been in Mother Jones and Salon.
TM: I read the transcript of you on Democracy Now! with Mark Hertsgaard,
a progressive journalist who has been fairly dismissive of those
questioning Bush's victory. By the end he seemed to be agreeing
that everything should be more fully investigated.I would think that
the 2004 election story, if tracked and broken, would be huge
for whoever breaks it. Any other thoughts about why it's so ignored?
MCM: We have to understand that for some decades the press
has served basically an establishmentarian function.
They have the reputation, and they certainly have the self-image,
of being terribly skeptical, prone to disrespectful questions, probing
dark matters that authority would just as soon have them leave alone.
That's a very flattering view of the press but completely undeserved.
The press will not deal with any story that goes beyond a particular
scandal to cast doubt on the very viability of the entire system.
The press in this country will studiously ignore any story that
too violently rocks the boat, whose implications are too shattering.
This is not new. Watergate was a story that the press avoided
for months and months. Only the Washington Post pursued that story;
everybody else made fun of it. Now we look back on Watergate
with tremendous nostalgia and self-congratulation, telling ourselves
the press saved the system. But since Watergate the press
has preferred to deal with meaningless and trivial scandals
like the Clinton scandals.
They will not talk about 9/11,
they will not talk about the theft of the last three elections.
TM: You also include the 2002 congressional election.
That one also broke too consistently against predictions?
MCM: That's exactly right. In Colorado, in Minnesota,
in Georgia, and in a couple of other states -- there was
what we might call ="Diebold Magic"= everywhere.
In all these states, you had far-right-wing politicians
predicted to lose by pre-election newspaper polls
and by exit polls, and ALL of them WON.
TM: Why do you believe the two successive
Democratic candidates have given in so easily?
MCM: I think basically Al Gore in 2000 and John Kerry this last time
are far too concerned with establishment opinion, far too worried
that they'll seem to be sore losers, conspiracy theorists, etc.
They have therefore refused to go public with what they actually believe.
Kerry told me personally on October 28th at a fundraising party
that he believes the election was probably stolen.
TM: He then disavowed that in the press, didn't he?
MCM: Exactly -- a few hours after the story broke.
The Democratic Party is as much
a part of the problem as the Republican Party.
TM: Are there exceptions among the ranks of mainstream politicians?
I think of Barbara Boxer and John Conyers. Any others?
MCM: Tom Daschle has told me he thinks very highly of the book
and has given me permission to quote him to that effect.
Stephanie Tubbs Jones, Rush Holt.
There are growing numbers of Democratic politicians who
are willing to take the risks of facing the truth on this issue.
Let's put it less dogmatically.
All right, maybe I haven't proven that the election was stolen,
but I am completely confident that I've provided ample grounds
for a serious investigation of what went on last year.
It seems to me that any Democrat who refuses to even go
for that kind of inquiry is really failing his or her constituency.
TM: -- and failing the voters.
As a citizen, it bothers me that we leave it to a Gore or a Kerry,
who's thinking about his future reputation or his future career,
to stage the protest. I don't care about their careers.
I care about my vote getting counted or discounted.
What's the statement that you're willing to make in
"Fooled Again" about the 2004 election: stolen?
worthy of investigation? evidence clearly shows in six states …?
MCM: The evidence in Ohio, as anyone who followed the story knows,
is copious. Bush allegedly won that state by 118,000 votes.
As I point out -- and this part of the book is largely based
on John Conyers' report to the House Judiciary Committee -
- the various stratagems, tricks and tactics used to prevent people
from registering, to prevent them from voting, to throw away
provisional ballots -- all these add up to a number
far greater than 118,000.
TM:: That's news to me. Many people have said, yes, there were
long lines, yes, there was disproportionate distribution of voting machines,
yes, there was trouble with provisional ballots, yes, there was intimidation -
- but the margin was 120,000. You're saying that they add up to over 120,000?
MCM: Oh easily, easily. It was in the urban parts of Ohio that most
of this stuff went down. All the urban centers in Ohio were Democratic.
If people want to get a strong sense of what was happening
at the grassroots level coast to coast last year, go to a website
called the Election Incident Reporting System, EIRS.
Then type in the name of a state or a county, and you'll get a transcript
of all the complaints that were lodged that day by people who called
1-866-MY-VOTE.
Now a lot of them couldn't get through because it was understaffed,
but those who did get through left messages.
You can find copious firsthand evidence of what the average
person had to go through to try to vote against Bush.
This didn't happen only in Ohio. Electronic touchscreen machines
flipped Kerry votes into Bush votes in at least 11 states.
TM: You say similar practices (and occasionally worse ones)
were applied in several other key states -- Florida, Oregon,
Pennsylvania, New Mexico, Nevada, Arizona and even New York?
MCM: In New Mexico, for example, we're told that Bush won
by some 7,000 votes. We know of over 17,000 Democratic voters
who were unable to cast a vote for president because the touchscreen
machines in their districts refused to record a vote for president.
These 17,000-plus New Mexicans turned out to vote
in Democratic areas, and they didn't record a vote for president.
Seventeen thousand is 10,000 more than 7,000.
That glitch alone can account for the ostensible
victory margin of Bush over Kerry in New Mexico.
Greg Palast's new book will have a whole chapter on New Mexico.
It's hair-raising stuff, and we haven't heard a word about it.
The same kind of thing happened in Iowa,
where Bush supposedly won by under 10,000 votes.
Tom Daschle was supposedly beaten in South Dakota by 4,500 votes.
There was so much chicanery going on there,
that it's easy to argue that John Thunes should not have won.
I know Daschle believes he was robbed.
This isn't only a matter of the White House, it's also a matter
of the Congress. I don't believe that this government represents
the people of this country.
The people of this country, however frightened some of them may
be by terrorism, are essentially not theocratically inclined.
They don't want a Christian republic. They were not happy
with the way the government dealt with the Terry Schiavo case.
Americans basically believe in the American system of government.
Checks and balances, the separation of church and state.
The press kept telling us after the election that a huge outpouring
of religious voters account for Bush's miraculous victory. Well that's
nothing more than a talking point that the religious right itself put out
after the election. There is no statistical evidence whatsoever
that there was any increase in the number of religious voters.
TM: The big thing that people seized on was one particular exit poll
in which people, when given a choice of a few things, said moral values
was the No. 1 reason for their vote. More people answered moral values
in 1996 and in 2000 than in 2004. There was actually a drop in the
number of people who attributed their vote to moral values in 2004, not a rise.
Let me check a couple of things with you. I've heard that exit polls
were most inaccurate -- by a big margin -- in those areas
that used electronic voting machines with no paper trail. True?
MCM: That's basically true, and it was particularly noticeable
in 5 swing states. There's a lot of stuff floating around out there
in cyberspace about the exit polls. The question of the exit polls
has been very badly muddied by a lot of disingenuous argument. Now
a lot of people think that it's not a reliable gauge, it doesn't tell us anything.
That's actually the result of propaganda obfuscation. The exit polls'
- sudden divergence,- sudden wrongness in these 5 states
is really a remarkable deviation from the norm.
The guy doing the best work on that particular issue is a statistician
at the University of Pennsylvania named Steve Freeman, who will have
a book coming out in a few months primarily about the exit poll question.
Bogus reasons for why the exit polls were so wrong include
the reluctant responder argument, which holds that Bush voters
were strangely reluctant to tell exit pollsters how they voted.
Well, Freeman has read the raw data at precinct level
and has discovered that, as a matter of fact, if anyone showed
a greater reluctance to come forward and say honestly who they voted for
when confronted with an exit pollster, it was actually the Democrats.
There's no evidence of any numerical kind that can support
the view that somehow Republicans wouldn't fess up.
TM: I would assume that the very ones being referred to as reluctant
are the ones who would be proud to say they voted for God's candidate.
MCM: One of the weirdest things about this whole election business
is that one of the two parties has, for over the last year and longer,
been vociferously complaining about the dangers of election fraud,
and that's the Republican party.
TM: Thus the ID card in Georgia, right?
MCM: Exactly. They're the ones who are always screaming
about Democratic fraud, but the Republicans in this last race
were really the only ones engaging in election fraud. This has
to do with the peculiarly paranoid quality of the crusading mindset.
I believe this theft was to a great extent carried out thanks
to a kind of crusader mentality. I've got plenty of evidence in the book
that the religious right played an enormously large role
in the theft of the election last year.
TM: I think first of Diebold, I think of the Ken Blackwells
or the Kathryn Harrises. How does the religious right itself play
a role beyond mobilizing its own troops?
MCM: That mobilization is significant when you consider that a lot of
those troops have actually become embedded inside the election system.
TM: Local polling officials, that sort of thing?
MCM: One Democratic election judge tried to observe the vote count
in Pima County, Arizona. A roomful of polling personnel
who all belonged to the same evangelical church in the area
started to call him a liberal demon, a liberal scum.
TM: When you talk about a crusader mentality, you basically mean
that if you do not support my candidate you are an infidel -
- and the ends justify the means?
MCM: Precisely. See, all these crimes that I attest to in the book
were committed with impunity by people who regard their political
adversaries as demons. And that's not an exaggeration. You know,
this government is to a great extent dominated by people
who have that metaphysical view of the current political situation.
It is a very serious mistake I believe to think that all of this is happening
only because of the excessive greed of certain corporate powers.
That greed is decisive It played an enormous role.
There is no question about it.
But it could not have succeeded without the vigorous grassroots
assistance of a lot of people who are religious true believers.
And I think that they include the likes of Tom DeLay and others.
TM: I've heard that almost all irregularities worked in Bush's favor. True?
MCM: Absolutely true. I have not yet heard of a single example
of a touchscreen voting machine flipping a Bush vote into a Kerry vote.
This does not mean it never happened.
I'm just saying I haven't heard about it if it has.
TM: I've read that in New Hampshire, Ralph Nader's Green Party
campaign paid for an actual recount. They picked the precincts
they thought were suspicious, and the hand recount confirmed
the actual vote totals and showed that the exit polls were, in fact, wrong.
What do you say to that?
MCM: Well, the recount that they paid for
found no evidence of fraud in that particular case.
TM: It confirmed the hand recount, showing that the exit polls were
in fact wrong. So how does that fit your analysis of the whole scheme?
MCM: The only thing one can say about that with any scientific certainty
is that the particular hand count that they carried out did not reveal
any evidence of fraud. That does not mean that no fraud was committed.
This is a very fine point, but when we're dealing with questions of electoral
honesty and accuracy, I think we have the right to make fine points.
The distinction must be made -- that particular hand count involved
a sample, that sample revealed no fraud, but that does not mean
that we can then sit back and say, well, OK, so the exit polls were wrong.
TM: To the question "What is the point of revisiting the last election?"
you point out that there has never been a great reform that was not driven
by a major scandal. Do you believe that true election reform is not
going to happen until the people and the media finally wake up to this?
MCM: I think it's going to depend on the people. It's going to depend
on the people simply and irresistibly insisting that the media
finally deal with this subject. That's why I wrote the book.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Interviewer Terrence McNally hosts Free Forum on KPFK 90.7FM,
Los Angeles (streaming at http://www.kpfk.org).
© 2006 Independent Media Institute. All rights reserved.
View this story online at: http://www.alternet.org/story/31217/
By Terrence McNally, AlterNet
Posted Jan. 27, 2006, Printed Feb. 1, 2006
For GOP voters,
the 2004 presidential election was little short of miraculous:
Behind in the Electoral College even on the afternoon of the vote,
the Bush-Cheney ticket staged a stunning comeback.
Usually reliable exit polls turned out to be wrong by an unprecedented
5% in swing states. Conservatives argued, and the media agreed,
that "moral values" had made the difference. In his latest book,
Fooled Again: How The Right Stole The 2004 Election, And Why
They'll Steal The Next One Too (Unless We Stop Them),
http://alternet.bookswelike.net/isbn/0465045790
Mark Crispin Miller argues that it wasn't moral values
which swung the election -- it was theft.
TERRENCE McNALLY: You're a professor of media studies.
According to your bio, you write about "film, television, propaganda,
advertising and the culture industries …" Why did you write this book?
MARK CRISPIN MILLER: Out of a sense of civic emergency.
I believe that "Fooled Again" makes the case quite persuasively
that there is actually no convincing evidence that Bush and Cheney
won re-election.This is a civic story of the utmost importance.
It has to do with the dire need for election reform in the United States.
But it's also a story about the colossal failure of the American press
to do precisely the kind of job that the framers had in mind
when they wrote the First Amendment. What they had in mind was
that the press would function as a reliable check on executive power.
It would keep the people informed about what their government was up to,
and it would keep them politically engaged in national debate.
The newspapers, as limited and defective as they were in the
18th century, did perform that function, and I believe
they performed that function for much of our history.
We now have a corporate media system that is not answerable
to the people nor concerned about the people, but [is] in the service
of its pay masters. And it is far too close to the government
for the health of anything like a democratic system.One of the points of
"Fooled Again" is that this is a story of tremendous importance,
as far as a democracy is concerned. Yet the press has for the most part
ridiculed those who have come up with very solid evidence of fraud.
They've been in the business less of talking about the situation
than of preventing anybody else from talking about it. And this includes
some of the progressive media as well. In fact, the most hostile
reviews that I've received have been in Mother Jones and Salon.
TM: I read the transcript of you on Democracy Now! with Mark Hertsgaard,
a progressive journalist who has been fairly dismissive of those
questioning Bush's victory. By the end he seemed to be agreeing
that everything should be more fully investigated.I would think that
the 2004 election story, if tracked and broken, would be huge
for whoever breaks it. Any other thoughts about why it's so ignored?
MCM: We have to understand that for some decades the press
has served basically an establishmentarian function.
They have the reputation, and they certainly have the self-image,
of being terribly skeptical, prone to disrespectful questions, probing
dark matters that authority would just as soon have them leave alone.
That's a very flattering view of the press but completely undeserved.
The press will not deal with any story that goes beyond a particular
scandal to cast doubt on the very viability of the entire system.
The press in this country will studiously ignore any story that
too violently rocks the boat, whose implications are too shattering.
This is not new. Watergate was a story that the press avoided
for months and months. Only the Washington Post pursued that story;
everybody else made fun of it. Now we look back on Watergate
with tremendous nostalgia and self-congratulation, telling ourselves
the press saved the system. But since Watergate the press
has preferred to deal with meaningless and trivial scandals
like the Clinton scandals.
They will not talk about 9/11,
they will not talk about the theft of the last three elections.
TM: You also include the 2002 congressional election.
That one also broke too consistently against predictions?
MCM: That's exactly right. In Colorado, in Minnesota,
in Georgia, and in a couple of other states -- there was
what we might call ="Diebold Magic"= everywhere.
In all these states, you had far-right-wing politicians
predicted to lose by pre-election newspaper polls
and by exit polls, and ALL of them WON.
TM: Why do you believe the two successive
Democratic candidates have given in so easily?
MCM: I think basically Al Gore in 2000 and John Kerry this last time
are far too concerned with establishment opinion, far too worried
that they'll seem to be sore losers, conspiracy theorists, etc.
They have therefore refused to go public with what they actually believe.
Kerry told me personally on October 28th at a fundraising party
that he believes the election was probably stolen.
TM: He then disavowed that in the press, didn't he?
MCM: Exactly -- a few hours after the story broke.
The Democratic Party is as much
a part of the problem as the Republican Party.
TM: Are there exceptions among the ranks of mainstream politicians?
I think of Barbara Boxer and John Conyers. Any others?
MCM: Tom Daschle has told me he thinks very highly of the book
and has given me permission to quote him to that effect.
Stephanie Tubbs Jones, Rush Holt.
There are growing numbers of Democratic politicians who
are willing to take the risks of facing the truth on this issue.
Let's put it less dogmatically.
All right, maybe I haven't proven that the election was stolen,
but I am completely confident that I've provided ample grounds
for a serious investigation of what went on last year.
It seems to me that any Democrat who refuses to even go
for that kind of inquiry is really failing his or her constituency.
TM: -- and failing the voters.
As a citizen, it bothers me that we leave it to a Gore or a Kerry,
who's thinking about his future reputation or his future career,
to stage the protest. I don't care about their careers.
I care about my vote getting counted or discounted.
What's the statement that you're willing to make in
"Fooled Again" about the 2004 election: stolen?
worthy of investigation? evidence clearly shows in six states …?
MCM: The evidence in Ohio, as anyone who followed the story knows,
is copious. Bush allegedly won that state by 118,000 votes.
As I point out -- and this part of the book is largely based
on John Conyers' report to the House Judiciary Committee -
- the various stratagems, tricks and tactics used to prevent people
from registering, to prevent them from voting, to throw away
provisional ballots -- all these add up to a number
far greater than 118,000.
TM:: That's news to me. Many people have said, yes, there were
long lines, yes, there was disproportionate distribution of voting machines,
yes, there was trouble with provisional ballots, yes, there was intimidation -
- but the margin was 120,000. You're saying that they add up to over 120,000?
MCM: Oh easily, easily. It was in the urban parts of Ohio that most
of this stuff went down. All the urban centers in Ohio were Democratic.
If people want to get a strong sense of what was happening
at the grassroots level coast to coast last year, go to a website
called the Election Incident Reporting System, EIRS.
Then type in the name of a state or a county, and you'll get a transcript
of all the complaints that were lodged that day by people who called
1-866-MY-VOTE.
Now a lot of them couldn't get through because it was understaffed,
but those who did get through left messages.
You can find copious firsthand evidence of what the average
person had to go through to try to vote against Bush.
This didn't happen only in Ohio. Electronic touchscreen machines
flipped Kerry votes into Bush votes in at least 11 states.
TM: You say similar practices (and occasionally worse ones)
were applied in several other key states -- Florida, Oregon,
Pennsylvania, New Mexico, Nevada, Arizona and even New York?
MCM: In New Mexico, for example, we're told that Bush won
by some 7,000 votes. We know of over 17,000 Democratic voters
who were unable to cast a vote for president because the touchscreen
machines in their districts refused to record a vote for president.
These 17,000-plus New Mexicans turned out to vote
in Democratic areas, and they didn't record a vote for president.
Seventeen thousand is 10,000 more than 7,000.
That glitch alone can account for the ostensible
victory margin of Bush over Kerry in New Mexico.
Greg Palast's new book will have a whole chapter on New Mexico.
It's hair-raising stuff, and we haven't heard a word about it.
The same kind of thing happened in Iowa,
where Bush supposedly won by under 10,000 votes.
Tom Daschle was supposedly beaten in South Dakota by 4,500 votes.
There was so much chicanery going on there,
that it's easy to argue that John Thunes should not have won.
I know Daschle believes he was robbed.
This isn't only a matter of the White House, it's also a matter
of the Congress. I don't believe that this government represents
the people of this country.
The people of this country, however frightened some of them may
be by terrorism, are essentially not theocratically inclined.
They don't want a Christian republic. They were not happy
with the way the government dealt with the Terry Schiavo case.
Americans basically believe in the American system of government.
Checks and balances, the separation of church and state.
The press kept telling us after the election that a huge outpouring
of religious voters account for Bush's miraculous victory. Well that's
nothing more than a talking point that the religious right itself put out
after the election. There is no statistical evidence whatsoever
that there was any increase in the number of religious voters.
TM: The big thing that people seized on was one particular exit poll
in which people, when given a choice of a few things, said moral values
was the No. 1 reason for their vote. More people answered moral values
in 1996 and in 2000 than in 2004. There was actually a drop in the
number of people who attributed their vote to moral values in 2004, not a rise.
Let me check a couple of things with you. I've heard that exit polls
were most inaccurate -- by a big margin -- in those areas
that used electronic voting machines with no paper trail. True?
MCM: That's basically true, and it was particularly noticeable
in 5 swing states. There's a lot of stuff floating around out there
in cyberspace about the exit polls. The question of the exit polls
has been very badly muddied by a lot of disingenuous argument. Now
a lot of people think that it's not a reliable gauge, it doesn't tell us anything.
That's actually the result of propaganda obfuscation. The exit polls'
- sudden divergence,- sudden wrongness in these 5 states
is really a remarkable deviation from the norm.
The guy doing the best work on that particular issue is a statistician
at the University of Pennsylvania named Steve Freeman, who will have
a book coming out in a few months primarily about the exit poll question.
Bogus reasons for why the exit polls were so wrong include
the reluctant responder argument, which holds that Bush voters
were strangely reluctant to tell exit pollsters how they voted.
Well, Freeman has read the raw data at precinct level
and has discovered that, as a matter of fact, if anyone showed
a greater reluctance to come forward and say honestly who they voted for
when confronted with an exit pollster, it was actually the Democrats.
There's no evidence of any numerical kind that can support
the view that somehow Republicans wouldn't fess up.
TM: I would assume that the very ones being referred to as reluctant
are the ones who would be proud to say they voted for God's candidate.
MCM: One of the weirdest things about this whole election business
is that one of the two parties has, for over the last year and longer,
been vociferously complaining about the dangers of election fraud,
and that's the Republican party.
TM: Thus the ID card in Georgia, right?
MCM: Exactly. They're the ones who are always screaming
about Democratic fraud, but the Republicans in this last race
were really the only ones engaging in election fraud. This has
to do with the peculiarly paranoid quality of the crusading mindset.
I believe this theft was to a great extent carried out thanks
to a kind of crusader mentality. I've got plenty of evidence in the book
that the religious right played an enormously large role
in the theft of the election last year.
TM: I think first of Diebold, I think of the Ken Blackwells
or the Kathryn Harrises. How does the religious right itself play
a role beyond mobilizing its own troops?
MCM: That mobilization is significant when you consider that a lot of
those troops have actually become embedded inside the election system.
TM: Local polling officials, that sort of thing?
MCM: One Democratic election judge tried to observe the vote count
in Pima County, Arizona. A roomful of polling personnel
who all belonged to the same evangelical church in the area
started to call him a liberal demon, a liberal scum.
TM: When you talk about a crusader mentality, you basically mean
that if you do not support my candidate you are an infidel -
- and the ends justify the means?
MCM: Precisely. See, all these crimes that I attest to in the book
were committed with impunity by people who regard their political
adversaries as demons. And that's not an exaggeration. You know,
this government is to a great extent dominated by people
who have that metaphysical view of the current political situation.
It is a very serious mistake I believe to think that all of this is happening
only because of the excessive greed of certain corporate powers.
That greed is decisive It played an enormous role.
There is no question about it.
But it could not have succeeded without the vigorous grassroots
assistance of a lot of people who are religious true believers.
And I think that they include the likes of Tom DeLay and others.
TM: I've heard that almost all irregularities worked in Bush's favor. True?
MCM: Absolutely true. I have not yet heard of a single example
of a touchscreen voting machine flipping a Bush vote into a Kerry vote.
This does not mean it never happened.
I'm just saying I haven't heard about it if it has.
TM: I've read that in New Hampshire, Ralph Nader's Green Party
campaign paid for an actual recount. They picked the precincts
they thought were suspicious, and the hand recount confirmed
the actual vote totals and showed that the exit polls were, in fact, wrong.
What do you say to that?
MCM: Well, the recount that they paid for
found no evidence of fraud in that particular case.
TM: It confirmed the hand recount, showing that the exit polls were
in fact wrong. So how does that fit your analysis of the whole scheme?
MCM: The only thing one can say about that with any scientific certainty
is that the particular hand count that they carried out did not reveal
any evidence of fraud. That does not mean that no fraud was committed.
This is a very fine point, but when we're dealing with questions of electoral
honesty and accuracy, I think we have the right to make fine points.
The distinction must be made -- that particular hand count involved
a sample, that sample revealed no fraud, but that does not mean
that we can then sit back and say, well, OK, so the exit polls were wrong.
TM: To the question "What is the point of revisiting the last election?"
you point out that there has never been a great reform that was not driven
by a major scandal. Do you believe that true election reform is not
going to happen until the people and the media finally wake up to this?
MCM: I think it's going to depend on the people. It's going to depend
on the people simply and irresistibly insisting that the media
finally deal with this subject. That's why I wrote the book.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Interviewer Terrence McNally hosts Free Forum on KPFK 90.7FM,
Los Angeles (streaming at http://www.kpfk.org).
© 2006 Independent Media Institute. All rights reserved.
View this story online at: http://www.alternet.org/story/31217/
United Press International - Security & Terrorism - Global Hawk passes sea surveillance tests
United Press International - Security & Terrorism - Global Hawk passes sea surveillance tests
Global Hawk passes sea surveillance tests
SAN DIEGO, Feb. 1 (UPI) -- Northrop Grumman's Global Hawk underwent sea trials recently that could position the unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) as an anti-smuggling asset.
Northrop said Wednesday that the RQ-4 flew three test flights over the Pacific recently to shake out the aircraft's maritime software modes designed to pick out small ships and other targets in vast stretches of ocean.
"Surveillance over the ocean is much more difficult than over land because you have a moving target, such as a ship, against a moving background, the ocean," said program manager Bill Beck. "During test flights, we proved that from an altitude of 60,000 feet, Global Hawk can track a ship or pinpoint a buoy in various sea states."
While generally used for military operations, the Global Hawk could provide narcotics agencies and coast guards around the world with an efficient sentry that can spot and track people smugglers and drug runners.
Suspicious vessels currently must be checked out by dispatching a patrol boat or aircraft.
The aircraft's high-altitude capabilities keep it above storms and prevailing sea winds for more than 35 hours at a time and a range of several thousand nautical miles.
Northrop said in a news release that the Global Hawk's update sensor package performed as expected, registering a paltry number of false target hits and being available for more than 98 percent of the flight. The aircraft crew on the ground was also able to switch from the maritime sensor mode to over-land mode once the ship returned to coastal air space.
Global Hawk passes sea surveillance tests
SAN DIEGO, Feb. 1 (UPI) -- Northrop Grumman's Global Hawk underwent sea trials recently that could position the unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) as an anti-smuggling asset.
Northrop said Wednesday that the RQ-4 flew three test flights over the Pacific recently to shake out the aircraft's maritime software modes designed to pick out small ships and other targets in vast stretches of ocean.
"Surveillance over the ocean is much more difficult than over land because you have a moving target, such as a ship, against a moving background, the ocean," said program manager Bill Beck. "During test flights, we proved that from an altitude of 60,000 feet, Global Hawk can track a ship or pinpoint a buoy in various sea states."
While generally used for military operations, the Global Hawk could provide narcotics agencies and coast guards around the world with an efficient sentry that can spot and track people smugglers and drug runners.
Suspicious vessels currently must be checked out by dispatching a patrol boat or aircraft.
The aircraft's high-altitude capabilities keep it above storms and prevailing sea winds for more than 35 hours at a time and a range of several thousand nautical miles.
Northrop said in a news release that the Global Hawk's update sensor package performed as expected, registering a paltry number of false target hits and being available for more than 98 percent of the flight. The aircraft crew on the ground was also able to switch from the maritime sensor mode to over-land mode once the ship returned to coastal air space.
Wounded Soldiers Told They Owe Money to Army]
http://dailynews.att.net/cgi-bin/news?e=pri&dt=060131&cat=frontpage&st=frontpageross_soldiers_pay_060131&src=abc
'Nightline' Investigation: Wounded Soldiers Told They Owe Money to Army
Updated 9:37 PM ET January 31, 2006
It was one of the thousands of roadside bombs in Iraq that paralyzed Staff Sgt. Eugene Simpson.
"My first instinct was to jump farther back into the Humvee, you know, for protection," Simpson said. "But in doing that, I opened my back up to all the scrap metal and debris, which hit my spine and severed my spine, paralyzing me."
He was soon on a plane home.
Fast-working, skilled Army doctors saved his life, as they have so many.
Slow, bumbling Army bureaucrats would make his life miserable, as they have so many.
"And the military basically is, like, they turn their back on you, you kind of feel that you've just been used," Simpson said.
No Pay for Four Months
It started with a phone call from his wife, home with their four children. She didn't have enough money to pay the bills.
"And she was like, well, we haven't been paid," Simpson said. "And you know, instantly I was like, I don't know what to do. You know, I'm still in the hospital. I can't actually get up and go around and talk to these different people."
And until "Nightline" inquired at the Pentagon, Simpson said he could not find out what happened.
"Every day is something different," he said. "Well, this person isn't in. I'll have them call you back, give it a couple days. Couple days go by, I call back, well I got somebody else for you to talk to. And days lead to weeks, and weeks lead to months."
It turns out the Army had mistakenly continued to pay Simpson a combat duty bonus while he was in the hospital.
He had been overpaid thousands of dollars, and the Army wanted the money back.
"By law, he's not entitled to the money," said Col. Richard Shrank, "so he must pay it back."
Shrank said although that is the law, soldiers can apply for debt forgiveness if they believe the debt is a mistake. So far, more than 800 soldiers have done so. More than 600 of those requests have been granted, amounting to more than $600,000.
So, the Army said it withheld the paralyzed soldier's pay until it got back the amount he owed -- with no advance notice, Simpson said.
"Four months," he said. "I didn't get paid for four months."
An Ongoing Problem
Simpson is not the only one. A study commissioned by the First Infantry Division estimated that eight out of 10 of its wounded soldiers from Iraq have gone through the same or a similar ordeal.
Capt. Michael Hurst, now out of the Army, conducted the study.
"You have to understand that these soldiers are suffering from incredible injuries, some of them have lost limbs, some of them may never walk again," Hurst said. "And in the midst of that struggle, to then get a paycheck for nothing really hurts morale."
And the Army can play tough to get its money back.
In the case of Sgt. Ryan Kelly, who lost his leg in Iraq, he had just finished going through rehabilitation when the Army sent a letter threatening to ruin his credit and call in debt collectors.
He had been overpaid by $2,200 while in the hospital, but, like most, never realized it.
It took Kelly almost a year to cut through the red tape and get the debt forgiven.
"Soldiers receive a paycheck and reasonably think that this is their accurate pay for the month," Hurst said. "And being in the situation they're in, having just been injured and in some cases spouses have to quit jobs in order to spend time at Walter Reed, many of these families are really hurting for funds. So a lot of that money gets spent right away."
'Failed Test'
The Government Accountability Office described the Army as having failed the test of taking care of its wounded from Iraq.
The report concluded that the soldiers fighting to defend the nation have paid the price for that failure.
Shrank disagreed, however. "No, I would not agree that we have failed the test, because we are making the fixes to bring it up to standard," he told "Nightline."
Shrank took over as commander of the United States Army Finance Command last summer to help fix the problem, a problem the GAO said had been ignored until the soldiers went public.
"Nightline" asked when the problem was first realized and why it took so long to realize it.
"We first realized it was a problem when it came into our view through many different channels," Shrank said. "You see it on [television], read about it in the papers. A soldier without a paycheck is a situation that nobody wants to see."
Shrank was asked if it had happened thousands of times. "I, no, I do not think thousands of times," he said. "It happened, one time is too many."
Shrank could not name an exact number, but the Army told "Nightline" that 5,549 soldiers, or about one out of five soldiers who were removed from battle for medical reasons later had payroll problems.
'Nobody Planned for This to Happen'
"You know, as a West Pointer and as a leader in the Army that one of the main things that we're taught is when you have soldiers that you are responsible, you have to take care of them, you have to take care of their family," Hurst said.
"And that's kind of the exchange that takes place between leaders and soldiers. And for a lot of these soldiers this is just a betrayal really. They feel abandoned, when they're in such a vulnerable position and their leaders aren't taking care of them."
Shrank said the process failed the soldiers, "but the leaders didn't fail the soldiers because we are making the changes to improve the processes to take care of our soldiers and their pay."
Shrank said he is not aware of anyone losing their command over the thousands of incidents. When asked if the problem could not have been anticipated, he said, "As we experienced taking care of pay for our wounded soldiers, we saw that the, what we had in place did not work. As I told you."
"Well," he added, "nobody planned for this to happen."
Shrank said, "It was planning that did not meet the standard and the execution that we wanted to achieve."
Fixing the Problem
Shrank said he's moving fast to fix the problem.
There's still no integrated payroll computer system, but now wounded soldiers are assigned a finance officer once they arrive at the Landstuhl Army Hospital in Germany to help keep track of payroll changes and problems.
And the colonel says wounded soldiers like Kelly will no longer be reported to credit agencies or have debt collectors go after them.
"The soldiers have a right to feel that the system let 'em down," he said. 'And it did let them down. This, we know this. We see this. This is why we fixed the system."
Meanwhile, Simpson gave up trying to rectify the situation. "I mean, I've had people on the phone just flat out tell me, I can't help you, no need for you to call here anymore," he said.
Shrank said for those like Simpson, "I would tell those soldiers that I care about them," he said, adding, "And I want to see that they received their proper pay."
In fact, he told "Nightline," he wants soldiers in this situation to call him. "Yes," Shrank said. "If that's what it takes, yes."
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'Nightline' Investigation: Wounded Soldiers Told They Owe Money to Army
Updated 9:37 PM ET January 31, 2006
It was one of the thousands of roadside bombs in Iraq that paralyzed Staff Sgt. Eugene Simpson.
"My first instinct was to jump farther back into the Humvee, you know, for protection," Simpson said. "But in doing that, I opened my back up to all the scrap metal and debris, which hit my spine and severed my spine, paralyzing me."
He was soon on a plane home.
Fast-working, skilled Army doctors saved his life, as they have so many.
Slow, bumbling Army bureaucrats would make his life miserable, as they have so many.
"And the military basically is, like, they turn their back on you, you kind of feel that you've just been used," Simpson said.
No Pay for Four Months
It started with a phone call from his wife, home with their four children. She didn't have enough money to pay the bills.
"And she was like, well, we haven't been paid," Simpson said. "And you know, instantly I was like, I don't know what to do. You know, I'm still in the hospital. I can't actually get up and go around and talk to these different people."
And until "Nightline" inquired at the Pentagon, Simpson said he could not find out what happened.
"Every day is something different," he said. "Well, this person isn't in. I'll have them call you back, give it a couple days. Couple days go by, I call back, well I got somebody else for you to talk to. And days lead to weeks, and weeks lead to months."
It turns out the Army had mistakenly continued to pay Simpson a combat duty bonus while he was in the hospital.
He had been overpaid thousands of dollars, and the Army wanted the money back.
"By law, he's not entitled to the money," said Col. Richard Shrank, "so he must pay it back."
Shrank said although that is the law, soldiers can apply for debt forgiveness if they believe the debt is a mistake. So far, more than 800 soldiers have done so. More than 600 of those requests have been granted, amounting to more than $600,000.
So, the Army said it withheld the paralyzed soldier's pay until it got back the amount he owed -- with no advance notice, Simpson said.
"Four months," he said. "I didn't get paid for four months."
An Ongoing Problem
Simpson is not the only one. A study commissioned by the First Infantry Division estimated that eight out of 10 of its wounded soldiers from Iraq have gone through the same or a similar ordeal.
Capt. Michael Hurst, now out of the Army, conducted the study.
"You have to understand that these soldiers are suffering from incredible injuries, some of them have lost limbs, some of them may never walk again," Hurst said. "And in the midst of that struggle, to then get a paycheck for nothing really hurts morale."
And the Army can play tough to get its money back.
In the case of Sgt. Ryan Kelly, who lost his leg in Iraq, he had just finished going through rehabilitation when the Army sent a letter threatening to ruin his credit and call in debt collectors.
He had been overpaid by $2,200 while in the hospital, but, like most, never realized it.
It took Kelly almost a year to cut through the red tape and get the debt forgiven.
"Soldiers receive a paycheck and reasonably think that this is their accurate pay for the month," Hurst said. "And being in the situation they're in, having just been injured and in some cases spouses have to quit jobs in order to spend time at Walter Reed, many of these families are really hurting for funds. So a lot of that money gets spent right away."
'Failed Test'
The Government Accountability Office described the Army as having failed the test of taking care of its wounded from Iraq.
The report concluded that the soldiers fighting to defend the nation have paid the price for that failure.
Shrank disagreed, however. "No, I would not agree that we have failed the test, because we are making the fixes to bring it up to standard," he told "Nightline."
Shrank took over as commander of the United States Army Finance Command last summer to help fix the problem, a problem the GAO said had been ignored until the soldiers went public.
"Nightline" asked when the problem was first realized and why it took so long to realize it.
"We first realized it was a problem when it came into our view through many different channels," Shrank said. "You see it on [television], read about it in the papers. A soldier without a paycheck is a situation that nobody wants to see."
Shrank was asked if it had happened thousands of times. "I, no, I do not think thousands of times," he said. "It happened, one time is too many."
Shrank could not name an exact number, but the Army told "Nightline" that 5,549 soldiers, or about one out of five soldiers who were removed from battle for medical reasons later had payroll problems.
'Nobody Planned for This to Happen'
"You know, as a West Pointer and as a leader in the Army that one of the main things that we're taught is when you have soldiers that you are responsible, you have to take care of them, you have to take care of their family," Hurst said.
"And that's kind of the exchange that takes place between leaders and soldiers. And for a lot of these soldiers this is just a betrayal really. They feel abandoned, when they're in such a vulnerable position and their leaders aren't taking care of them."
Shrank said the process failed the soldiers, "but the leaders didn't fail the soldiers because we are making the changes to improve the processes to take care of our soldiers and their pay."
Shrank said he is not aware of anyone losing their command over the thousands of incidents. When asked if the problem could not have been anticipated, he said, "As we experienced taking care of pay for our wounded soldiers, we saw that the, what we had in place did not work. As I told you."
"Well," he added, "nobody planned for this to happen."
Shrank said, "It was planning that did not meet the standard and the execution that we wanted to achieve."
Fixing the Problem
Shrank said he's moving fast to fix the problem.
There's still no integrated payroll computer system, but now wounded soldiers are assigned a finance officer once they arrive at the Landstuhl Army Hospital in Germany to help keep track of payroll changes and problems.
And the colonel says wounded soldiers like Kelly will no longer be reported to credit agencies or have debt collectors go after them.
"The soldiers have a right to feel that the system let 'em down," he said. 'And it did let them down. This, we know this. We see this. This is why we fixed the system."
Meanwhile, Simpson gave up trying to rectify the situation. "I mean, I've had people on the phone just flat out tell me, I can't help you, no need for you to call here anymore," he said.
Shrank said for those like Simpson, "I would tell those soldiers that I care about them," he said, adding, "And I want to see that they received their proper pay."
In fact, he told "Nightline," he wants soldiers in this situation to call him. "Yes," Shrank said. "If that's what it takes, yes."
*COPYRIGHT NOTICE** In accordance with Title 17 U. S. C. Section 107,
any copyrighted work in this message is distributed under fair use
without profit or payment to those who have expressed a prior interest
in receiving the included information for nonprofit research and educational purposes only.[Ref. http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml ]
Wednesday, February 01, 2006
Dead Man Talking
Dead Man Talking
By Joshua Holland, AlterNet
Posted on February 1, 2006
http://www.alternet.org/story/31639/
George Bush is hanging by a thread. As he gamed his way through his fifth State of the Union Speech last night, it was clear that his is a presidency laying in ruin. Except for a reactionary judiciary that will be his continuing legacy -- pushed past the too-little, too-late efforts of a limp Democratic Party -- Bush has no accomplishments he can look forward to in the next three years.
George is dead, spun-out of spin, yet like his zombie followers he just keeps on talking.
Gone was the swagger, the big ideas for shaping his corporatist "Ownership Society." As his party enters their Year of the Perp-walk, as many expect 2006 to play out, any semblance of a true politics of opposition will bring down the whole sordid experiment that he represents. We've come light years from the time when the White House's soft-peddle of compassionate conservatism could soothe public concern.
The roid-rage foreign policy that marked his earlier speeches -- focused on the the now infamous "Axis of Evil" -- was replaced last night with the tamer statement that military force could only go so far in the "War on Terra."
He addressed the threat posed by Iran, Axis of evil member and big winner after the U.S. invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan. But in doing so, he betrayed his own impotence in facing down Iran's nuclear program. At one point, Bush spoke "directly to the Iranian people," and the best he could come up with was: "We respect your right to choose your own future and win your own freedom."
On the domestic front, there were no grand plans to privatize Social security, no talk of a major tax overhaul. It was yesterday's thin soup, reheated. He told a country that's becoming increasingly anxious about globalization's impact on the middle class that America needs to be more competitive in a wide-open global economy. The only other choice, as usual, is "the road of isolationism and protectionism."
"We will build the prosperity of our country by strengthening our economic leadership in the world," Bush said. No mention of median incomes dropping every year of his presidency, or of the 71 percent increase in average healthcare premiums American families have shouldered since he took office. No mention of the 14-cent hike in the price of a gallon of gas announced last week. No mention of the national savings rate going negative for the first time in history even as the Fed raised rates, hiking the cost of debt.
What he did mention, naturally, was making his tax cuts for the wealthiest permanent: "the tax relief you passed has left 880 billion dollars in the hands of American workers, investors, small businesses, and families," he said. It's really his only economic policy. The trillions in debt that Bush has built on those tax cuts? Just one mention of the "plan" to cut the deficit in half by 2009, a bit of voodoo economics that leaves out military spending in Iraq and Afghanistan, among other sleights of hand.
"Keeping America competitive requires affordable energy," he said. "Here we have a serious problem: America is addicted to oil..." Bush proposed new tax credits and an "Advanced Energy Initiative -- a 22-percent increase in clean-energy research" -- laudable ideas if not for the fact that the same promises have turned into giveaways for the energy industry throughout his presidency. This, a day after Exxon announced that it had turned an all-time record profit in 2005.
He told the American people, 46 million of whom are uninsured, that their problem was too much insurance, and that he would beef up his Health Savings Accounts proposal. He said it even as seniors are in a grey revolt, trying to figure out how to maintain coverage under the prescription drug benefit, his last healthcare scheme.
And he continued to spin out his fantasy of how Iraq is shaping up. Things are going great, Iraqi forces are being trained and a tolerant, Jeffersonian democracy will break out any day. He has a Plan For Victory™.
And Bush was equally deranged in offering his solutions to the real-world problems he talked about: we heard platitudes and Bizarro-World market-based fixes; Wall Street brokers and the insurance companies in their portfolios will mend a broken healthcare system; lavishing taxpayers' largesse on big agribusiness and energy companies will break our dependency on oil.
That's it. That's all he had. After five years running the country, without a single policy he could point to that hasn't turned out to be a failure George Bush has only one thing left to say: "My presidency is finished."
Joshua Holland is an AlterNet staff writer.
By Joshua Holland, AlterNet
Posted on February 1, 2006
http://www.alternet.org/story/31639/
George Bush is hanging by a thread. As he gamed his way through his fifth State of the Union Speech last night, it was clear that his is a presidency laying in ruin. Except for a reactionary judiciary that will be his continuing legacy -- pushed past the too-little, too-late efforts of a limp Democratic Party -- Bush has no accomplishments he can look forward to in the next three years.
George is dead, spun-out of spin, yet like his zombie followers he just keeps on talking.
Gone was the swagger, the big ideas for shaping his corporatist "Ownership Society." As his party enters their Year of the Perp-walk, as many expect 2006 to play out, any semblance of a true politics of opposition will bring down the whole sordid experiment that he represents. We've come light years from the time when the White House's soft-peddle of compassionate conservatism could soothe public concern.
The roid-rage foreign policy that marked his earlier speeches -- focused on the the now infamous "Axis of Evil" -- was replaced last night with the tamer statement that military force could only go so far in the "War on Terra."
He addressed the threat posed by Iran, Axis of evil member and big winner after the U.S. invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan. But in doing so, he betrayed his own impotence in facing down Iran's nuclear program. At one point, Bush spoke "directly to the Iranian people," and the best he could come up with was: "We respect your right to choose your own future and win your own freedom."
On the domestic front, there were no grand plans to privatize Social security, no talk of a major tax overhaul. It was yesterday's thin soup, reheated. He told a country that's becoming increasingly anxious about globalization's impact on the middle class that America needs to be more competitive in a wide-open global economy. The only other choice, as usual, is "the road of isolationism and protectionism."
"We will build the prosperity of our country by strengthening our economic leadership in the world," Bush said. No mention of median incomes dropping every year of his presidency, or of the 71 percent increase in average healthcare premiums American families have shouldered since he took office. No mention of the 14-cent hike in the price of a gallon of gas announced last week. No mention of the national savings rate going negative for the first time in history even as the Fed raised rates, hiking the cost of debt.
What he did mention, naturally, was making his tax cuts for the wealthiest permanent: "the tax relief you passed has left 880 billion dollars in the hands of American workers, investors, small businesses, and families," he said. It's really his only economic policy. The trillions in debt that Bush has built on those tax cuts? Just one mention of the "plan" to cut the deficit in half by 2009, a bit of voodoo economics that leaves out military spending in Iraq and Afghanistan, among other sleights of hand.
"Keeping America competitive requires affordable energy," he said. "Here we have a serious problem: America is addicted to oil..." Bush proposed new tax credits and an "Advanced Energy Initiative -- a 22-percent increase in clean-energy research" -- laudable ideas if not for the fact that the same promises have turned into giveaways for the energy industry throughout his presidency. This, a day after Exxon announced that it had turned an all-time record profit in 2005.
He told the American people, 46 million of whom are uninsured, that their problem was too much insurance, and that he would beef up his Health Savings Accounts proposal. He said it even as seniors are in a grey revolt, trying to figure out how to maintain coverage under the prescription drug benefit, his last healthcare scheme.
And he continued to spin out his fantasy of how Iraq is shaping up. Things are going great, Iraqi forces are being trained and a tolerant, Jeffersonian democracy will break out any day. He has a Plan For Victory™.
And Bush was equally deranged in offering his solutions to the real-world problems he talked about: we heard platitudes and Bizarro-World market-based fixes; Wall Street brokers and the insurance companies in their portfolios will mend a broken healthcare system; lavishing taxpayers' largesse on big agribusiness and energy companies will break our dependency on oil.
That's it. That's all he had. After five years running the country, without a single policy he could point to that hasn't turned out to be a failure George Bush has only one thing left to say: "My presidency is finished."
Joshua Holland is an AlterNet staff writer.
Official: Army Has Authority to Spy on Americans
Source:
http://cqpolitics.com/cq.com/www.cq.com/public/20060131_homeland.html
Jan. 31, 2006 – 9:21 p.m.
Official: Army Has Authority to Spy on Americans
By Jeff Stein, CQ Staff
“Contrary to popular belief, there is no absolute ban on [military]
intelligence components collecting U.S. person information,” the
U.S.Army’s top intelligence officer said in a 2001 memo that surfaced
Tuesday.
Not only that, military intelligence agencies are permitted to “receive”
domestic intelligence information, even though they cannot legally
“collect” it,” according to the Nov. 5, 2001, memo issued by Lt. Gen.
Robert W. Noonan Jr., the deputy chief of staff for intelligence.
“MI [military intelligence] may receive information from anyone,
anytime,” Noonan wrote in the memo, obtained by Secrecy News, a
newsletter from the non-profit Federation of American Scientists in
Washington.
Defense Department and Army regulations “allow collection about U.S.
persons reasonably believed to be engaged, or about to engage, in
international terrorist activities,” Noonan continued.
“Remember, merely receiving information does not constitute ‘collection’
under AR [Army Regulation] 381-10; collection entails receiving ‘for
use,’ ” he added. (Army Regulation 381-10, “U.S. Army Intelligence
Activities,” was reissued on Nov. 22, 2005, but had not previously been
disclosed publicly.) “Army intelligence may always receive information,
if only to determine its intelligence value and whether it can be
collected, retained, or disseminated in accordance with governing policy,”
The distinction between “receiving” and “collecting” seems “to offer
considerable leeway for domestic surveillance activities under the
existing legal framework,” wrote editor Steven Aftergood in Tuesday’s
edition of Secrecy News.
“This in turn makes it harder to understand why the NSA domestic
surveillance program departed from previous practice.”
Aftergood was alerted to the existence of the memo by another security
expert, John Pike of GlobalSecurity.org, who thought that “there is
enough ambiguity in the language that with a bit of creativity in
managing the U.S. persons files there would have been not too much
trouble” applying existing rules to the warrantless eavesdropping by the
National Security Agency.
TALON Reports
The Pentagon’s Counterintelligence Field Activity (CIFA) was launched in
2002 with the mission of “gathering information and conducting
activities to protect DoD and the nation against espionage, other
intelligence activities, sabotage, assassinations, and terrorist
activities,” according to a CIFA brochure. Its TALON program has amassed
files on antiwar protesters, according to a Pentagon official.
“More than 5,000 TALON reports” were “received and shared throughout the
government” in the program’s first year of operation,” Carol A. Haave,
deputy undersecretary of Defense for counterintelligence and security,
told the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence in May 2004.
“At that rate, about 12,500 Talon reports would have been filed during
the approximately 2½ years the program has existed,” The Washington Post
concluded Tuesday.
• Office of the Deputy Chief of Staff for Intelligence: “Collecting
Information on U.S. Persons” (pdf)
• Edition of AR 381-10 dated July 1, 1984 (in effect until Dec. 22,
2005) (pdf)
Jeff Stein can be reached at jstein@cq.com.
http://cqpolitics.com/cq.com/www.cq.com/public/20060131_homeland.html
Jan. 31, 2006 – 9:21 p.m.
Official: Army Has Authority to Spy on Americans
By Jeff Stein, CQ Staff
“Contrary to popular belief, there is no absolute ban on [military]
intelligence components collecting U.S. person information,” the
U.S.Army’s top intelligence officer said in a 2001 memo that surfaced
Tuesday.
Not only that, military intelligence agencies are permitted to “receive”
domestic intelligence information, even though they cannot legally
“collect” it,” according to the Nov. 5, 2001, memo issued by Lt. Gen.
Robert W. Noonan Jr., the deputy chief of staff for intelligence.
“MI [military intelligence] may receive information from anyone,
anytime,” Noonan wrote in the memo, obtained by Secrecy News, a
newsletter from the non-profit Federation of American Scientists in
Washington.
Defense Department and Army regulations “allow collection about U.S.
persons reasonably believed to be engaged, or about to engage, in
international terrorist activities,” Noonan continued.
“Remember, merely receiving information does not constitute ‘collection’
under AR [Army Regulation] 381-10; collection entails receiving ‘for
use,’ ” he added. (Army Regulation 381-10, “U.S. Army Intelligence
Activities,” was reissued on Nov. 22, 2005, but had not previously been
disclosed publicly.) “Army intelligence may always receive information,
if only to determine its intelligence value and whether it can be
collected, retained, or disseminated in accordance with governing policy,”
The distinction between “receiving” and “collecting” seems “to offer
considerable leeway for domestic surveillance activities under the
existing legal framework,” wrote editor Steven Aftergood in Tuesday’s
edition of Secrecy News.
“This in turn makes it harder to understand why the NSA domestic
surveillance program departed from previous practice.”
Aftergood was alerted to the existence of the memo by another security
expert, John Pike of GlobalSecurity.org, who thought that “there is
enough ambiguity in the language that with a bit of creativity in
managing the U.S. persons files there would have been not too much
trouble” applying existing rules to the warrantless eavesdropping by the
National Security Agency.
TALON Reports
The Pentagon’s Counterintelligence Field Activity (CIFA) was launched in
2002 with the mission of “gathering information and conducting
activities to protect DoD and the nation against espionage, other
intelligence activities, sabotage, assassinations, and terrorist
activities,” according to a CIFA brochure. Its TALON program has amassed
files on antiwar protesters, according to a Pentagon official.
“More than 5,000 TALON reports” were “received and shared throughout the
government” in the program’s first year of operation,” Carol A. Haave,
deputy undersecretary of Defense for counterintelligence and security,
told the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence in May 2004.
“At that rate, about 12,500 Talon reports would have been filed during
the approximately 2½ years the program has existed,” The Washington Post
concluded Tuesday.
• Office of the Deputy Chief of Staff for Intelligence: “Collecting
Information on U.S. Persons” (pdf)
• Edition of AR 381-10 dated July 1, 1984 (in effect until Dec. 22,
2005) (pdf)
Jeff Stein can be reached at jstein@cq.com.
Canada: New Secret Commando Unit in Works
New Secret Commando Unit in Works
By STEPHANIE RUBEC, SUN OTTAWA BUREAU
Wed, February 1, 2006
OTTAWA -- A new secret commando unit will begin operating out of CFB Petawawa in Ontario by year's end and see its ranks swell to 750 strong, according to the force's new commander.
Col. David Barr said the first soldiers vying for a coveted spot on the special regiment will first have to complete a gruelling 16-week elite training session beginning in April in Petawawa.
Barr said he expects about 260 soldiers of that first group will meet the "high standard" set during the course and will then participate in some fall training before being deemed ready to conduct operations abroad.
"It will better enable us to counter, fight and defeat the terrorist threat at home and abroad," Barr told reporters yesterday after being sworn in as the first commander of the Canadian special operations forces command.
He said the first pool of soldiers will mostly be plucked from existing units located at CFB Petawawa.
The regiment is being created to complement the secretive Joint Task Force, whose commandos are now hunting down Taliban and al-Qaida forces in Afghanistan.
"It allows us to have JTF 2 do the real precision work, but be supported by special operators that they work with, they train with, that they have confidence in," Barr explained.
The regiment will also be deploying clusters of its members to conduct secret missions abroad without JTF 2 members.
JTF 2 is itself in the midst of a massive recruiting effort as the military moves to double the unit's numbers in an effort to increase its phalanx of assaulters and support staff.
All soldiers working under the Canadian special operations forces command, including JTF 2, the special operations regiment, the 467 helicopter squadron in Petawawa and the joint nuclear biological, chemical squadron in Trenton, Ont., will wear tan berets.
Barr said the creation of a special operations regiment has the Canadian Forces following in the footsteps of other militaries that discovered in recent years a need for a multi-tasking specialized unit that can provide muscle in missions abroad, support special forces soldiers and deploy in small units of about 12 soldiers to tackle tough jobs abroad. http://www.edmontonsun.com/News/Canada/2006/02/01/1420942-sun.html
By STEPHANIE RUBEC, SUN OTTAWA BUREAU
Wed, February 1, 2006
OTTAWA -- A new secret commando unit will begin operating out of CFB Petawawa in Ontario by year's end and see its ranks swell to 750 strong, according to the force's new commander.
Col. David Barr said the first soldiers vying for a coveted spot on the special regiment will first have to complete a gruelling 16-week elite training session beginning in April in Petawawa.
Barr said he expects about 260 soldiers of that first group will meet the "high standard" set during the course and will then participate in some fall training before being deemed ready to conduct operations abroad.
"It will better enable us to counter, fight and defeat the terrorist threat at home and abroad," Barr told reporters yesterday after being sworn in as the first commander of the Canadian special operations forces command.
He said the first pool of soldiers will mostly be plucked from existing units located at CFB Petawawa.
The regiment is being created to complement the secretive Joint Task Force, whose commandos are now hunting down Taliban and al-Qaida forces in Afghanistan.
"It allows us to have JTF 2 do the real precision work, but be supported by special operators that they work with, they train with, that they have confidence in," Barr explained.
The regiment will also be deploying clusters of its members to conduct secret missions abroad without JTF 2 members.
JTF 2 is itself in the midst of a massive recruiting effort as the military moves to double the unit's numbers in an effort to increase its phalanx of assaulters and support staff.
All soldiers working under the Canadian special operations forces command, including JTF 2, the special operations regiment, the 467 helicopter squadron in Petawawa and the joint nuclear biological, chemical squadron in Trenton, Ont., will wear tan berets.
Barr said the creation of a special operations regiment has the Canadian Forces following in the footsteps of other militaries that discovered in recent years a need for a multi-tasking specialized unit that can provide muscle in missions abroad, support special forces soldiers and deploy in small units of about 12 soldiers to tackle tough jobs abroad. http://www.edmontonsun.com/News/Canada/2006/02/01/1420942-sun.html
'15YR FLOOD OF HEROIN'
http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/tm_objectid=16651172%26method=full%26siteid=94762%26head
line=-15yr-flood-of-heroin---name_page.html
1 February 2006
'15YR FLOOD OF HEROIN'
CHEAP heroin will keep flooding into Britain for up to 15 years, Afghanistan
President Hamid Karzai warned yesterday.
He said hopes that poppy farms would soon be wiped out in his country - which
produces 80 per cent of UK heroin - were "naive". Mr Karzai added: "Terrorists and
drug money go hand in hand."
The warning comes as a world meeting in London pledged £1.1billion towards stability
in Afghanistan.
line=-15yr-flood-of-heroin---name_page.html
1 February 2006
'15YR FLOOD OF HEROIN'
CHEAP heroin will keep flooding into Britain for up to 15 years, Afghanistan
President Hamid Karzai warned yesterday.
He said hopes that poppy farms would soon be wiped out in his country - which
produces 80 per cent of UK heroin - were "naive". Mr Karzai added: "Terrorists and
drug money go hand in hand."
The warning comes as a world meeting in London pledged £1.1billion towards stability
in Afghanistan.
Wired News: AT&T Sued Over NSA Eavesdropping
Wired News: AT&T Sued Over NSA Eavesdropping
By Ryan Singel | Also by this reporter
16:03 PM Jan, 31, 2006 EST
The Electronic Frontier Foundation filed a class-action lawsuit against AT&T on Tuesday, accusing the telecom company of violating federal laws by collaborating with the government's secret, warrantless wiretapping of American citizens' phone and internet usage.
The suit (.pdf), filed by the civil liberties group in federal court in San Francisco, alleges AT&T secretly gave the National Security Agency access to two massive databases that included both the contents of its subscribers' communications and detailed transaction records, such as numbers dialed and internet addresses visited.
"Our goal is to go after the people who are making the government's illegal surveillance possible," says EFF attorney Kevin Bankston. "They could not do what they are doing without the help of companies like AT&T. We want to make it clear to AT&T that it is not in their legal or economic interests to violate the law whenever the president asks them to."
One of AT&T's databases, known as "Hawkeye," contains 312 terabytes of data detailing nearly every telephone communication on AT&T's domestic network since 2001, according to the complaint. The suit also alleges that AT&T allowed the NSA to use the company's powerful Daytona database-management software to quickly search this and other communication databases.
That action violates the First and Fourth amendments to the Constitution, federal wiretapping statutes, telecommunications laws and the Electronic Communications Privacy Act, according to the complaint.
The suit, which relies on reporting from the Los Angeles Times, seeks up to $22,000 in damages for each AT&T customer, plus punitive fines.
AT&T did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The lawsuit comes a little more than a month after The New York Times reported that in 2001, President Bush ordered the NSA to begin warrantless monitoring of Americans' overseas phone calls and internet usage.
The administration defends the eavesdropping program, saying it is only targeting communications to and from suspected terrorists, that government lawyers review the program every 45 days and that Congress authorized the president to track down 9/11 co-conspirators, thereby giving the president the ability to bypass wiretapping laws.
Some Senate Democrats and Republicans, along with civil libertarians and former government officials, counter that the wiretaps are simply illegal and that wiretapping warrants can be acquired easily if the government has probable cause to believe an American is affiliated with terrorists.
The government is not named in the lawsuit, though it is already being sued by the American Civil Liberties Union over the surveillance program.
Bankston estimates that millions of people nationwide would be eligible to join the class action, pushing the possible total fines into the billions. However, he expects the administration will try to kill the lawsuit by invoking the rarely used state secrets privilege.
"If state secrecy can prevent us from preserving the rights of millions upon millions of people, then there is a profound problem with the law," says Bankston.
By Ryan Singel | Also by this reporter
16:03 PM Jan, 31, 2006 EST
The Electronic Frontier Foundation filed a class-action lawsuit against AT&T on Tuesday, accusing the telecom company of violating federal laws by collaborating with the government's secret, warrantless wiretapping of American citizens' phone and internet usage.
The suit (.pdf), filed by the civil liberties group in federal court in San Francisco, alleges AT&T secretly gave the National Security Agency access to two massive databases that included both the contents of its subscribers' communications and detailed transaction records, such as numbers dialed and internet addresses visited.
"Our goal is to go after the people who are making the government's illegal surveillance possible," says EFF attorney Kevin Bankston. "They could not do what they are doing without the help of companies like AT&T. We want to make it clear to AT&T that it is not in their legal or economic interests to violate the law whenever the president asks them to."
One of AT&T's databases, known as "Hawkeye," contains 312 terabytes of data detailing nearly every telephone communication on AT&T's domestic network since 2001, according to the complaint. The suit also alleges that AT&T allowed the NSA to use the company's powerful Daytona database-management software to quickly search this and other communication databases.
That action violates the First and Fourth amendments to the Constitution, federal wiretapping statutes, telecommunications laws and the Electronic Communications Privacy Act, according to the complaint.
The suit, which relies on reporting from the Los Angeles Times, seeks up to $22,000 in damages for each AT&T customer, plus punitive fines.
AT&T did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The lawsuit comes a little more than a month after The New York Times reported that in 2001, President Bush ordered the NSA to begin warrantless monitoring of Americans' overseas phone calls and internet usage.
The administration defends the eavesdropping program, saying it is only targeting communications to and from suspected terrorists, that government lawyers review the program every 45 days and that Congress authorized the president to track down 9/11 co-conspirators, thereby giving the president the ability to bypass wiretapping laws.
Some Senate Democrats and Republicans, along with civil libertarians and former government officials, counter that the wiretaps are simply illegal and that wiretapping warrants can be acquired easily if the government has probable cause to believe an American is affiliated with terrorists.
The government is not named in the lawsuit, though it is already being sued by the American Civil Liberties Union over the surveillance program.
Bankston estimates that millions of people nationwide would be eligible to join the class action, pushing the possible total fines into the billions. However, he expects the administration will try to kill the lawsuit by invoking the rarely used state secrets privilege.
"If state secrecy can prevent us from preserving the rights of millions upon millions of people, then there is a profound problem with the law," says Bankston.
BOLIVIA: A COMING TRIAL BY FIRE?
http://www.ww4report.com/node/1532
BOLIVIA: A COMING TRIAL BY FIRE?
by Benjamin Dangl
After winning a landslide victory on Dec. 18th, Bolivian president-elect Evo Morales announced plans to nationalize the country's gas reserves, rewrite the constitution in a popular assembly, redistribute land to poor farmers and change the rules of the US-led War on Drugs in Bolivia. If he follows through on such promises, he'll face enormous pressure from the Bush administration, corporations and international lenders. If he chooses a more moderate path, Bolivia's social movements are likely to organize the type of protests and strikes that have ousted two presidents in two years. In the gas-rich Santa Cruz region, business elites are working toward seceding from the country to privatize the gas reserves. Meanwhile, US troops stationed in neighboring Paraguay may be poised to intervene if the Andean country sways too far from Washington's interests. For Bolivian social movements and the government, 2006 will likely be a trial by fire.
The Social Movements and the State
Among the presidential candidates that ran in the December election, Morales has the broadest ties to the country's social movements. However, he has played limited roles in the popular uprisings of recent years. During the height of the gas war in 2003, when massive mobilizations were organized to demand the nationalization of the country's gas reserves, Morales was attending meetings in Geneva on parliamentary politics. After the 2003 uprising ousted right-wing president Gonzalo Sanchez de Lozada, Morales urged social movement leaders to accept then-vice president Carlos Mesa as Sanchez de Lozada's replacement. In June 2005, when another protest campaign demanding gas nationalization forced Mesa to resign, Morales helped direct the social movements into governmental channels, pushing for an interim president while new elections were organized.
Morales' actions during these revolts were aimed at generating broad support among diverse sectors of society, including the middle class and those who didn't fully support the tactics of protest groups. This strategy, combined with directing the momentum of social movements into the electoral realm, resulted in his landslide victory on Dec. 18.
In spite of Morales' relative distance from social movements, his victory in a country where the political landscape has been shaped by such movements presents the possibility for massive social change. Once he assumes office, Morales has pledged to organize a Constituent Assembly of diverse social sectors to rewrite the country's constitution. It is possible that this could allow for a powerful collaboration between social movements and the state.
Vice President-elect Alvaro Garcia Linera says such collaboration is possible. He contends that MAS, the Movement Toward Socialism party which he and Morales belong to, is not a traditional political party but rather "a coalition of flexible social movements that has expanded its actions to the electoral arena. There is no structure; it is a leader and movements, and there is nothing in between. This means that MAS must depend on mobilizations or on the temperament of the social movements."
Oscar Olivera, a key leader in the revolt against Bechtel's privatization of Cochabamba's water system in 2000, believes the relationship between social movements and the Morales administration will play a vital role in creating radical change in the country. Olivera participated in the December election because he felt that it was part of "a process of building strength so that in the next government... we can regain control of natural resources and end the monopoly that the political parties have over electoral politics... We are creating a movement, a nonpartisan social-political front that addresses the most vital needs of the people through a profound change in power relations, social relations, and the management of water, electricity, and garbage."
To sustain their momentum and unity, an alliance between some of the most dynamic social groups was formed in early December 2005 in the first Congress of the National Front for the Defense of Water and Basic Human Services. This alliance includes the Water Coordinating Committee of Cochabamba, the Federation of Neighborhood Councils of El Alto, the Water and Drainage Cooperatives of Santa Cruz, as well as neighborhood organizations, cooperatives, irrigation farmers, and committees on electricity, water rights and other services from all over the country. In many cases, these autonomous groups have organized methods of providing citizens with basic services which the state fails to offer. Such a coalition of grassroots forces may pave the way for a nationwide alternative form of governance.
Tangling Over Coca
Morales plans to fully legalize the production of coca leaf and change the rules of the US-led War on Drugs in his country. White House officials are wary of any deviation from its anti-narcotics plan in Latin America; a strategy they claim has been successful. However, US government statistics and reports from analysts in Bolivia tell a different story.
A recent report from the US Government Accountability Office states: "While the US has poured 6 billion dollars into the drug war in the Andes over the past five years...the number of drug users in the US has remained roughly constant."
In an interview on National Public Radio (NPR), Nicholas Burns, the State Department's undersecretary for political affairs, said the Bush administration hopes "that the new government of Evo Morales in Bolivia does not change course, does not somehow assert that it's fine to grow coca and fine to sell it."
Though it is a key ingredient in cocaine, coca has been used for centuries in the Andean region for medicinal purposes; it relieves hunger, sickness and fatigue. It's also an ingredient in, cough syrups, wines, chewing gum, diet pills and, many claim, Coca-Cola. The US Embassy's website for Bolivia suggests chewing coca leaves to alleviate altitude sickness.
"Trying to compare coca to cocaine is like trying to compare coffee beans to methamphetamines; there‚s a universe of difference between the two," Sanho Tree from the Institute for Policy Studies explained on NPR. "We have to respect that indigenous cultures have used and continue to use coca in its traditional form, which is almost impossible to abuse in its natural state."
Georg Ann Potter worked from 1999 to 2002 as an advisor to Morales, and since then has been the main advisor to the Coordination of the Six Women Federations of the Chapare, the country's biggest coca growing region. Potter stated that although Morales plans to continue a hardline approach against the drug trade, the current policies of the US War on Drugs need to change.
"One billion dollars has been spent [on alternative crop development] over the last 20 years and there is little to show for it," she said. "Forced eradication resulted in many dead, more wounded, armed forces thieving and raping."
It's widely held among critics of Washington's anti-narcotics agenda for Latin America that the US government uses the War on Drugs as an excuse for maintaining a military and political presence in the region.
A report from the Congressional Research Service stated that the US War on Drugs has had no effect on the price, purity and availability of cocaine in the US. Potter explained that even the US government admits that "Bolivian cocaine, what there is of it, does not go to the US, but rather to Europe."
The Andean Information Network, a Bolivia-based NGO which monitors human rights issues in the US-led War on Drugs, recommends that "the US should recognize studies that have determined that domestic education, prevention, and rehabilitation programs are more effective in altering drug consumption, and accordingly address the demand side of the war on drugs."
Between a Rock and Hard Place
In regard to the country's gas reserves, the Morales administration could go in two directions. It could fully nationalize the gas reserves and face the wrath of multinational corporations and lending institutions that want exactly the opposite to happen. Or it could renegotiate contracts with gas corporations, and partially nationalize the industry. Choosing the latter option would likely generate massive protests and road blockades. Social movement leaders have stated that if Morales doesn't fully nationalize the gas, the population will mobilize to hold the administration's feet to the flames.
"We will nationalize the natural resources, gas and hydrocarbons," Morales stated after his election. "We are not going to nationalize the assets of the multinationals. Any state has the right to use its natural resources. We must establish new contracts with the oil companies based on equilibrium. We are going to guarantee the returns on their investment and their profits, but not looting and stealing."
Any move that Morales makes is likely to upset either corporate investors, social movements or both. Previous Bolivian presidents Carlos Mesa and Gonzalo Sanchez de Lozada walked similar gauntlets and ended up being ousted from office by protests.
A secession movement in Santa Cruz, the wealthiest district in the country, also threatens Bolivia's peace. An elite group of businessmen lead the movement to separate Santa Cruz from the rest of the country, which would allow for the full privatization of the gas industry regardless of what protest groups and the national government demand. This group has been accused of maintaining militias organized to defend their autonomy.
Other methods of destabilization are already underway. Documents obtained through the Freedom of Information Act reveal that the US government has spent millions to support discredited right-wing political parties and stifle grassroots movements in Bolivia. Between 2002 and 2004, a grant from the US National Endowment for Democracy (NED) allowed for the training of thirteen "emerging political leaders" from right-wing parties in Bolivia. These 25-to 35-year-old politicians were brought to Washington for seminars. Their party-strengthening projects in Bolivia were subsequently funded by the NED.
US Troops in Paraguay
Outright US military intervention in Bolivia is a possibility. An airbase in Mariscal Estigarribia, Paraguay is reportedly being utilized by hundreds of US troops. The base, which was constructed by US technicians in the 1980s under Paraguayan dictator Alfredo Stroessner, is 200 kilometers from the border with Bolivia and is larger than the international airport in Paraguay's capital. Analysts in the region believe these troops could be poised to intervene in Bolivia to suppress leftist movements and secure the country‚s gas reserves.
Under US Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld's direction, the Pentagon has pushed for a number of small Cooperative Security Locations (CSLs) based around Latin America. These military installations permit leapfrogging from one location to another across the continent. Such a strategy reflects an increased dependence on missiles and unmanned aircraft instead of soldiers. CSLs offer the opportunity for a small but potent presence in a country. Such outposts exist at Eloy Alfaro International Airport in Manta, Ecuador; Reina Beatrix International Airport in Aruba; Hato International Airport in nearby Curacao; and at the international airport in Comalapa, El Salvador. Paraguay may already be home to the region's next CSL.
The US Embassy in Paraguay contends that no plans for a military outpost are underway and that the military operations are based on humanitarian efforts. However, State Department reports do not mention any funding for humanitarian works in Paraguay. They do mention that funding for the Counterterrorism Fellowship Program in the country doubled in 2005.
U.S. officials say the triple border area, where Paraguay, Argentina and Brazil meet, is a base for Islamic terrorist networks. Analysts in Latin America believe that the U.S. government is using the threat of terrorism as an excuse to secure natural resources in the region.
"The objectives of the USA in South America have always been to secure strategic material like oil in Colombia, Ecuador, and Venezuela, tin mines in Bolivia, copper mines in Chile, and always to maintain lines of access open," Luiz Alberto Moniz Bandeira, a Brazilian political scientist at the Universidade de Brasilia, wrote in the Folha de São Paulo.
Orlando Castillo, a Paraguayan human rights leader, said the goal of US military operations in his country is to "debilitate the southern bloc...and destabilize the region's governments, especially Evo Morales..."
While grappling with these challenges, the Morales administration will have to answer to the millions of Bolivians who, in the December election, gave him the biggest mandate in the country's history.
For centuries Bolivians have, in the words of Uruguayan writer Eduardo Galeano, "suffered the curse of their own wealth." The country's tin, copper and silver were exploited by foreign companies that made enormous profits while Bolivia struggled on. For many Bolivians, the election of Morales offers the hope that history will stop repeating itself. As Galeano writes, "Recovery of the resources that have always been usurped is the recovery of our destiny."
------
Benjamin Dangl has traveled and worked as a journalist in Bolivia and Paraguay. He edits Upside Down World, uncovering activism and politics in Latin America, and Toward Freedom, a progressive perspective on world events.
This story originally appeared in Toward Freedom, Jan. 12
http://towardfreedom.com/home/content/view/724/
SOURCES:
"Two Opposing Views of Social Change in Bolivia," by Raul Zibechi, International Relations Center—Americas Program, Dec. 14, 2005
http://americas.irc-online.org/am/2987
"Bolivia after the election victory of the MAS: Morales cannot serve two masters," by Jorge Martin, In Defense of Marxism, Oct. 1, 2005
http://www.marxist.com/bolivia-election-victory-mas100106.htm
"Exporting Gas and Importing Demoracy in Bolivia," by Reed Lindsay, North American Congress on Latin America, November 2005
http://www.nacla.org/art_display.php?art=2603#
"US Military in Paraguay Prepares To 'Spread Democracy,'" by Benjamin Dangl, Upside Down World, Sept. 15, 2005
http://upsidedownworld.org/main/content/view/47/44/
"US Military Moves in Paraguay Rattle Regional Relations," by Sam Logan and Matthew Flynn, IRC—Americas, Dec. 14, 2005
http://americas.irc-online.org/am/2991
"An Interview with Paraguayan Human Rights Activist Orlando Castillo," by Benjamin Dangl, Upside Down World, Oct. 16, 2005
http://upsidedownworld.org/main/content/view/48/44/
See also our last features on Bolivia:
"Bolivia: 'Gas War' Impunity Aggravates Tension," by Kathryn Ledebur and Julia Dietz, WW4 REPORT #117
http://ww4report.com/node/1432
"Paraguay: The Pentagon's New Latin Beachhead," by Benjamin Dangl, WW4 REPORT #116
http://ww4report.com/node/1340
-------------------
Reprinted by WORLD WAR 4 REPORT, Feb. 1, 2006
Reprinting permissible with attribution
BOLIVIA: A COMING TRIAL BY FIRE?
by Benjamin Dangl
After winning a landslide victory on Dec. 18th, Bolivian president-elect Evo Morales announced plans to nationalize the country's gas reserves, rewrite the constitution in a popular assembly, redistribute land to poor farmers and change the rules of the US-led War on Drugs in Bolivia. If he follows through on such promises, he'll face enormous pressure from the Bush administration, corporations and international lenders. If he chooses a more moderate path, Bolivia's social movements are likely to organize the type of protests and strikes that have ousted two presidents in two years. In the gas-rich Santa Cruz region, business elites are working toward seceding from the country to privatize the gas reserves. Meanwhile, US troops stationed in neighboring Paraguay may be poised to intervene if the Andean country sways too far from Washington's interests. For Bolivian social movements and the government, 2006 will likely be a trial by fire.
The Social Movements and the State
Among the presidential candidates that ran in the December election, Morales has the broadest ties to the country's social movements. However, he has played limited roles in the popular uprisings of recent years. During the height of the gas war in 2003, when massive mobilizations were organized to demand the nationalization of the country's gas reserves, Morales was attending meetings in Geneva on parliamentary politics. After the 2003 uprising ousted right-wing president Gonzalo Sanchez de Lozada, Morales urged social movement leaders to accept then-vice president Carlos Mesa as Sanchez de Lozada's replacement. In June 2005, when another protest campaign demanding gas nationalization forced Mesa to resign, Morales helped direct the social movements into governmental channels, pushing for an interim president while new elections were organized.
Morales' actions during these revolts were aimed at generating broad support among diverse sectors of society, including the middle class and those who didn't fully support the tactics of protest groups. This strategy, combined with directing the momentum of social movements into the electoral realm, resulted in his landslide victory on Dec. 18.
In spite of Morales' relative distance from social movements, his victory in a country where the political landscape has been shaped by such movements presents the possibility for massive social change. Once he assumes office, Morales has pledged to organize a Constituent Assembly of diverse social sectors to rewrite the country's constitution. It is possible that this could allow for a powerful collaboration between social movements and the state.
Vice President-elect Alvaro Garcia Linera says such collaboration is possible. He contends that MAS, the Movement Toward Socialism party which he and Morales belong to, is not a traditional political party but rather "a coalition of flexible social movements that has expanded its actions to the electoral arena. There is no structure; it is a leader and movements, and there is nothing in between. This means that MAS must depend on mobilizations or on the temperament of the social movements."
Oscar Olivera, a key leader in the revolt against Bechtel's privatization of Cochabamba's water system in 2000, believes the relationship between social movements and the Morales administration will play a vital role in creating radical change in the country. Olivera participated in the December election because he felt that it was part of "a process of building strength so that in the next government... we can regain control of natural resources and end the monopoly that the political parties have over electoral politics... We are creating a movement, a nonpartisan social-political front that addresses the most vital needs of the people through a profound change in power relations, social relations, and the management of water, electricity, and garbage."
To sustain their momentum and unity, an alliance between some of the most dynamic social groups was formed in early December 2005 in the first Congress of the National Front for the Defense of Water and Basic Human Services. This alliance includes the Water Coordinating Committee of Cochabamba, the Federation of Neighborhood Councils of El Alto, the Water and Drainage Cooperatives of Santa Cruz, as well as neighborhood organizations, cooperatives, irrigation farmers, and committees on electricity, water rights and other services from all over the country. In many cases, these autonomous groups have organized methods of providing citizens with basic services which the state fails to offer. Such a coalition of grassroots forces may pave the way for a nationwide alternative form of governance.
Tangling Over Coca
Morales plans to fully legalize the production of coca leaf and change the rules of the US-led War on Drugs in his country. White House officials are wary of any deviation from its anti-narcotics plan in Latin America; a strategy they claim has been successful. However, US government statistics and reports from analysts in Bolivia tell a different story.
A recent report from the US Government Accountability Office states: "While the US has poured 6 billion dollars into the drug war in the Andes over the past five years...the number of drug users in the US has remained roughly constant."
In an interview on National Public Radio (NPR), Nicholas Burns, the State Department's undersecretary for political affairs, said the Bush administration hopes "that the new government of Evo Morales in Bolivia does not change course, does not somehow assert that it's fine to grow coca and fine to sell it."
Though it is a key ingredient in cocaine, coca has been used for centuries in the Andean region for medicinal purposes; it relieves hunger, sickness and fatigue. It's also an ingredient in, cough syrups, wines, chewing gum, diet pills and, many claim, Coca-Cola. The US Embassy's website for Bolivia suggests chewing coca leaves to alleviate altitude sickness.
"Trying to compare coca to cocaine is like trying to compare coffee beans to methamphetamines; there‚s a universe of difference between the two," Sanho Tree from the Institute for Policy Studies explained on NPR. "We have to respect that indigenous cultures have used and continue to use coca in its traditional form, which is almost impossible to abuse in its natural state."
Georg Ann Potter worked from 1999 to 2002 as an advisor to Morales, and since then has been the main advisor to the Coordination of the Six Women Federations of the Chapare, the country's biggest coca growing region. Potter stated that although Morales plans to continue a hardline approach against the drug trade, the current policies of the US War on Drugs need to change.
"One billion dollars has been spent [on alternative crop development] over the last 20 years and there is little to show for it," she said. "Forced eradication resulted in many dead, more wounded, armed forces thieving and raping."
It's widely held among critics of Washington's anti-narcotics agenda for Latin America that the US government uses the War on Drugs as an excuse for maintaining a military and political presence in the region.
A report from the Congressional Research Service stated that the US War on Drugs has had no effect on the price, purity and availability of cocaine in the US. Potter explained that even the US government admits that "Bolivian cocaine, what there is of it, does not go to the US, but rather to Europe."
The Andean Information Network, a Bolivia-based NGO which monitors human rights issues in the US-led War on Drugs, recommends that "the US should recognize studies that have determined that domestic education, prevention, and rehabilitation programs are more effective in altering drug consumption, and accordingly address the demand side of the war on drugs."
Between a Rock and Hard Place
In regard to the country's gas reserves, the Morales administration could go in two directions. It could fully nationalize the gas reserves and face the wrath of multinational corporations and lending institutions that want exactly the opposite to happen. Or it could renegotiate contracts with gas corporations, and partially nationalize the industry. Choosing the latter option would likely generate massive protests and road blockades. Social movement leaders have stated that if Morales doesn't fully nationalize the gas, the population will mobilize to hold the administration's feet to the flames.
"We will nationalize the natural resources, gas and hydrocarbons," Morales stated after his election. "We are not going to nationalize the assets of the multinationals. Any state has the right to use its natural resources. We must establish new contracts with the oil companies based on equilibrium. We are going to guarantee the returns on their investment and their profits, but not looting and stealing."
Any move that Morales makes is likely to upset either corporate investors, social movements or both. Previous Bolivian presidents Carlos Mesa and Gonzalo Sanchez de Lozada walked similar gauntlets and ended up being ousted from office by protests.
A secession movement in Santa Cruz, the wealthiest district in the country, also threatens Bolivia's peace. An elite group of businessmen lead the movement to separate Santa Cruz from the rest of the country, which would allow for the full privatization of the gas industry regardless of what protest groups and the national government demand. This group has been accused of maintaining militias organized to defend their autonomy.
Other methods of destabilization are already underway. Documents obtained through the Freedom of Information Act reveal that the US government has spent millions to support discredited right-wing political parties and stifle grassroots movements in Bolivia. Between 2002 and 2004, a grant from the US National Endowment for Democracy (NED) allowed for the training of thirteen "emerging political leaders" from right-wing parties in Bolivia. These 25-to 35-year-old politicians were brought to Washington for seminars. Their party-strengthening projects in Bolivia were subsequently funded by the NED.
US Troops in Paraguay
Outright US military intervention in Bolivia is a possibility. An airbase in Mariscal Estigarribia, Paraguay is reportedly being utilized by hundreds of US troops. The base, which was constructed by US technicians in the 1980s under Paraguayan dictator Alfredo Stroessner, is 200 kilometers from the border with Bolivia and is larger than the international airport in Paraguay's capital. Analysts in the region believe these troops could be poised to intervene in Bolivia to suppress leftist movements and secure the country‚s gas reserves.
Under US Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld's direction, the Pentagon has pushed for a number of small Cooperative Security Locations (CSLs) based around Latin America. These military installations permit leapfrogging from one location to another across the continent. Such a strategy reflects an increased dependence on missiles and unmanned aircraft instead of soldiers. CSLs offer the opportunity for a small but potent presence in a country. Such outposts exist at Eloy Alfaro International Airport in Manta, Ecuador; Reina Beatrix International Airport in Aruba; Hato International Airport in nearby Curacao; and at the international airport in Comalapa, El Salvador. Paraguay may already be home to the region's next CSL.
The US Embassy in Paraguay contends that no plans for a military outpost are underway and that the military operations are based on humanitarian efforts. However, State Department reports do not mention any funding for humanitarian works in Paraguay. They do mention that funding for the Counterterrorism Fellowship Program in the country doubled in 2005.
U.S. officials say the triple border area, where Paraguay, Argentina and Brazil meet, is a base for Islamic terrorist networks. Analysts in Latin America believe that the U.S. government is using the threat of terrorism as an excuse to secure natural resources in the region.
"The objectives of the USA in South America have always been to secure strategic material like oil in Colombia, Ecuador, and Venezuela, tin mines in Bolivia, copper mines in Chile, and always to maintain lines of access open," Luiz Alberto Moniz Bandeira, a Brazilian political scientist at the Universidade de Brasilia, wrote in the Folha de São Paulo.
Orlando Castillo, a Paraguayan human rights leader, said the goal of US military operations in his country is to "debilitate the southern bloc...and destabilize the region's governments, especially Evo Morales..."
While grappling with these challenges, the Morales administration will have to answer to the millions of Bolivians who, in the December election, gave him the biggest mandate in the country's history.
For centuries Bolivians have, in the words of Uruguayan writer Eduardo Galeano, "suffered the curse of their own wealth." The country's tin, copper and silver were exploited by foreign companies that made enormous profits while Bolivia struggled on. For many Bolivians, the election of Morales offers the hope that history will stop repeating itself. As Galeano writes, "Recovery of the resources that have always been usurped is the recovery of our destiny."
------
Benjamin Dangl has traveled and worked as a journalist in Bolivia and Paraguay. He edits Upside Down World, uncovering activism and politics in Latin America, and Toward Freedom, a progressive perspective on world events.
This story originally appeared in Toward Freedom, Jan. 12
http://towardfreedom.com/home/content/view/724/
SOURCES:
"Two Opposing Views of Social Change in Bolivia," by Raul Zibechi, International Relations Center—Americas Program, Dec. 14, 2005
http://americas.irc-online.org/am/2987
"Bolivia after the election victory of the MAS: Morales cannot serve two masters," by Jorge Martin, In Defense of Marxism, Oct. 1, 2005
http://www.marxist.com/bolivia-election-victory-mas100106.htm
"Exporting Gas and Importing Demoracy in Bolivia," by Reed Lindsay, North American Congress on Latin America, November 2005
http://www.nacla.org/art_display.php?art=2603#
"US Military in Paraguay Prepares To 'Spread Democracy,'" by Benjamin Dangl, Upside Down World, Sept. 15, 2005
http://upsidedownworld.org/main/content/view/47/44/
"US Military Moves in Paraguay Rattle Regional Relations," by Sam Logan and Matthew Flynn, IRC—Americas, Dec. 14, 2005
http://americas.irc-online.org/am/2991
"An Interview with Paraguayan Human Rights Activist Orlando Castillo," by Benjamin Dangl, Upside Down World, Oct. 16, 2005
http://upsidedownworld.org/main/content/view/48/44/
See also our last features on Bolivia:
"Bolivia: 'Gas War' Impunity Aggravates Tension," by Kathryn Ledebur and Julia Dietz, WW4 REPORT #117
http://ww4report.com/node/1432
"Paraguay: The Pentagon's New Latin Beachhead," by Benjamin Dangl, WW4 REPORT #116
http://ww4report.com/node/1340
-------------------
Reprinted by WORLD WAR 4 REPORT, Feb. 1, 2006
Reprinting permissible with attribution
Spying, Lying, and Saying No - Thomas Powers and Tom Engelhardt
Spying, Lying, and Saying No - Thomas Powers and Tom Engelhardt
Spying, Lying, and Saying No
Thomas Powers and Tom Engelhardt
Tom Dispatch
On the day that Ayman al-Zawahiri appeared in his nine thousandth video from – assumedly – the remarkably technologized wilds of the Afghan-Pakistan border region, mocking President Bush for a botched Predator-drone missile attempt on his life, another article caught my eye. In a piece in the Los Angeles Times, headlined "CIA Expands Use of Drones in Terror War," Josh Meyer reported: "Despite protests from other countries, the United States is expanding a top-secret effort to kill suspected terrorists with drone-fired missiles as it pursues an increasingly decentralized al-Qaeda, U.S. officials say." These high-tech, long-distance "targeted killings" from the air – they used to be called "assassinations," and Chris Dickey of Newsweek files them away under the rubric of "boys with toys" – turn out, like acts of torture, to be staggeringly counterproductive. This particular one, which reportedly killed a number of women and children, shook the regime of Pakistani military strong man and U.S. ally Pervez Musharraf.
Like National Security Agency warrantless spying on U.S. citizens, the waterboarding of captives, and so many other actions of this administration, such assassination attempts rely on the shakiest and most dubious of legal findings produced more or less out of thin air. In fact, thanks to a recent Newsweek investigative piece, "Palace Revolt" by Daniel Klaidman, Stuart Taylor Jr., and Evan Thomas, we know a good deal more about just how thin that air was. As they report, with the president, vice president, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, and CIA director George Tenet convinced that the 9/11 attacks "and the threat of more and worse to come – were perfect justification for unleashing the CIA and other long-blunted weapons in the national security arsenal," all that was needed was "legal cover, so [the CIA] wouldn't be left holding the bag if things went wrong."
Here's where what we now know as the "unitary executive theory," the idea of an unfettered presidency in which George Bush would be commander in chief not just of the military but of all us, came into play. As the three reporters describe the process, David Addington, then the vice president's legal counsel (now his chief of staff), fearing opposition within the bureaucracy, "came up with a perfect solution: cut virtually everyone else out." Thus, a legal cabal supported the Rumsfeld/Cheney "cabal" former Colin Powell Chief of Staff Lawrence Wilkerson has written about so vehemently.
In this way, a wide-ranging legal justification for the president's right to do whatever he cared to do as long as we were "at war" burst from the fevered brows of a few top officials and a small group of administration lawyers. From the point of view of my own fevered brow, a single institutional law seems to apply to the administration's subsequent efforts: Always expand. All programs involving the secret powers of the president – to torture, imprison, create prison networks globally, assassinate, spy on citizens and others, or generally involve the military in civilian life – started from modest seeds and simply grew and grew without bounds or even any particular relationship to their efficacy. Take the Pentagon's three year old Counterintelligence Field Activity, or CIFA. Initially a small office charged with "protecting military facilities and personnel," it now has nine directorates, a staff of 1,000, a large secret budget, and a full-scale secret spying program, code-named Talon, that reported as a "national security threat" 10 peace activists "who handed out peanut butter and jelly sandwiches outside Halliburton's headquarters in Houston in June 2004." The same could be said of CIA secret prisons, NSA domestic spying operations, or the new U.S. Northern Command that the administration set up in 2002.
Thomas Powers, author of Intelligence Wars: American Secret History from Hitler to al-Qaeda, explores the meaning of the recent NSA spying scandal below in fascinating detail and the abject failure of Congress (or the American public) to rein in this administration. As he writes trenchantly, "In public life as in kindergarten, the all-important word is no." It's clear that the expansion of secret (and not so secret) "war time" powers proved a heady, addictive experience for top officials of this administration. (Where's Nancy Reagan and her "just say no" program when we need them most?) Powers' superb essay will be running in the Feb. 23 issue of the New York Review of Books just now heading toward the newsstands. It appears here as an online exclusive thanks to the kindness of that magazine's editors. Tom
Spying, Lying, and Saying No
Thomas Powers and Tom Engelhardt
Tom Dispatch
On the day that Ayman al-Zawahiri appeared in his nine thousandth video from – assumedly – the remarkably technologized wilds of the Afghan-Pakistan border region, mocking President Bush for a botched Predator-drone missile attempt on his life, another article caught my eye. In a piece in the Los Angeles Times, headlined "CIA Expands Use of Drones in Terror War," Josh Meyer reported: "Despite protests from other countries, the United States is expanding a top-secret effort to kill suspected terrorists with drone-fired missiles as it pursues an increasingly decentralized al-Qaeda, U.S. officials say." These high-tech, long-distance "targeted killings" from the air – they used to be called "assassinations," and Chris Dickey of Newsweek files them away under the rubric of "boys with toys" – turn out, like acts of torture, to be staggeringly counterproductive. This particular one, which reportedly killed a number of women and children, shook the regime of Pakistani military strong man and U.S. ally Pervez Musharraf.
Like National Security Agency warrantless spying on U.S. citizens, the waterboarding of captives, and so many other actions of this administration, such assassination attempts rely on the shakiest and most dubious of legal findings produced more or less out of thin air. In fact, thanks to a recent Newsweek investigative piece, "Palace Revolt" by Daniel Klaidman, Stuart Taylor Jr., and Evan Thomas, we know a good deal more about just how thin that air was. As they report, with the president, vice president, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, and CIA director George Tenet convinced that the 9/11 attacks "and the threat of more and worse to come – were perfect justification for unleashing the CIA and other long-blunted weapons in the national security arsenal," all that was needed was "legal cover, so [the CIA] wouldn't be left holding the bag if things went wrong."
Here's where what we now know as the "unitary executive theory," the idea of an unfettered presidency in which George Bush would be commander in chief not just of the military but of all us, came into play. As the three reporters describe the process, David Addington, then the vice president's legal counsel (now his chief of staff), fearing opposition within the bureaucracy, "came up with a perfect solution: cut virtually everyone else out." Thus, a legal cabal supported the Rumsfeld/Cheney "cabal" former Colin Powell Chief of Staff Lawrence Wilkerson has written about so vehemently.
In this way, a wide-ranging legal justification for the president's right to do whatever he cared to do as long as we were "at war" burst from the fevered brows of a few top officials and a small group of administration lawyers. From the point of view of my own fevered brow, a single institutional law seems to apply to the administration's subsequent efforts: Always expand. All programs involving the secret powers of the president – to torture, imprison, create prison networks globally, assassinate, spy on citizens and others, or generally involve the military in civilian life – started from modest seeds and simply grew and grew without bounds or even any particular relationship to their efficacy. Take the Pentagon's three year old Counterintelligence Field Activity, or CIFA. Initially a small office charged with "protecting military facilities and personnel," it now has nine directorates, a staff of 1,000, a large secret budget, and a full-scale secret spying program, code-named Talon, that reported as a "national security threat" 10 peace activists "who handed out peanut butter and jelly sandwiches outside Halliburton's headquarters in Houston in June 2004." The same could be said of CIA secret prisons, NSA domestic spying operations, or the new U.S. Northern Command that the administration set up in 2002.
Thomas Powers, author of Intelligence Wars: American Secret History from Hitler to al-Qaeda, explores the meaning of the recent NSA spying scandal below in fascinating detail and the abject failure of Congress (or the American public) to rein in this administration. As he writes trenchantly, "In public life as in kindergarten, the all-important word is no." It's clear that the expansion of secret (and not so secret) "war time" powers proved a heady, addictive experience for top officials of this administration. (Where's Nancy Reagan and her "just say no" program when we need them most?) Powers' superb essay will be running in the Feb. 23 issue of the New York Review of Books just now heading toward the newsstands. It appears here as an online exclusive thanks to the kindness of that magazine's editors. Tom
KHON2 - The Team That Knows Hawaii | Top Stories
KHON2 - The Team That Knows Hawaii | Top Stories: "Buried at Sea: Pentagon to release report
Gina Mangieri
The Pentagon releases a report on Wednesday on the extent of chemical weapons dumped off Hawaii's coast.
And Congressman Neil Abercrombie will introduce a bill to research dump sites and assess clean-up costs.
That's in response to KHON2's series 'Buried at Sea.' We investigated Army documents and witness accounts, revealing thousands of tons of chemical weapons off Hawaii's shores, especially the Waianae coast.
Ordnance experts say many dangerous conventional weapons also appear to be dumped there.
Chemical munitions known to be offshore contain mustard gas and other deadly agents. Conventional ordnance can have cancer-causing elements.
Following our stories, Congress demanded full disclosure from the Pentagon, and we'll bring you the latest on that on Wednesday. "
Gina Mangieri
The Pentagon releases a report on Wednesday on the extent of chemical weapons dumped off Hawaii's coast.
And Congressman Neil Abercrombie will introduce a bill to research dump sites and assess clean-up costs.
That's in response to KHON2's series 'Buried at Sea.' We investigated Army documents and witness accounts, revealing thousands of tons of chemical weapons off Hawaii's shores, especially the Waianae coast.
Ordnance experts say many dangerous conventional weapons also appear to be dumped there.
Chemical munitions known to be offshore contain mustard gas and other deadly agents. Conventional ordnance can have cancer-causing elements.
Following our stories, Congress demanded full disclosure from the Pentagon, and we'll bring you the latest on that on Wednesday. "
Pentagon’s possible move to eliminate special ops oversight office could trigger Hill ire
Pentagon’s possible move to eliminate special ops oversight office could trigger Hill ire
Pentagon’s possible move to eliminate special ops oversight office could trigger Hill ire
By Roxana Tiron
A Bush administration proposal to fold a civilian office tasked with oversight of the Pentagon’s special-operations forces could face stiff resistance in Congress.
Sources tell The Hill that Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld is considering a proposal to eliminate the office of the assistant secretary of defense for special operations and low-intensity conflict (ASD SO/LIC) and spreading its responsibilities across other Pentagon offices.
The proposal comes from Ryan Henry, the principal deputy undersecretary of defense for policy, according to a source familiar with the plan.
It is unclear whether Rumsfeld would sign off on such a suggestion or would reject it. If he agrees to the idea, the Pentagon would face an uphill battle in getting the plan endorsed by Congress.
Many lawmakers would be unwilling to go along with the idea — especially at a time when special-operations forces are growing and have primary responsibility in the war on terrorism.
It is not the first time such a proposal has been floated. In 2001, then-Defense Undersecretary for Policy Doug Feith tried to disenfranchise the position. Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman John Warner (R-Va.) thwarted Feith’s proposal and could play a role in killing the Pentagon’s recycled proposal.
The position was included as part of the Goldwater-Nichols Department of Defense Reorganization Act, which also created the United States Special Operations Command.
The Special Operations Command oversees each military service’s elite warriors, such as the Army’s Green Berets, Rangers and Delta Forces, the Navy SEALs and the Air Force special operators.
The assistant secretary’s office, which is run by civilians with extensive special operations background, was created to ensure that the special-operations forces would receive the attention and resources from the Pentagon that Congress thought was necessary.
The idea of folding and devolving the responsibility of the office is “something that we would have to look at very closely,” a Senate Armed Services Committee aide said. “I do not see a rationale for that. DoD [the Department of Defense] has no convincing argument right now.”
The office is one of several offices under the umbrella of the undersecretary of defense for policy, now headed by Eric Edelman.
Thomas O’Connell is in charge of assistant secretary’s office and is Rumsfeld’s principal civilian adviser on matters regarding special operations and low-intensity conflict.
In broad terms, O’Connell’s office oversees several functions: information operations, counternarcotics, stability operations and the so-called “special operations/combating terrorism.”
Under that last function, the office provides the first civilian signatures on operations against high-value targets, according to a former government official familiar with the office. It is unclear who would take over this function if the office is dissolved.
The assistant secretary of defense for special operations and low-intensity conflict is one of four assistant secretaries of defense mandated by statute. To dissolve or reorganize that office without congressional authorization would be impossible, sources said.
“It has never gone so far” as this new proposal, the former official said. The official said that so far the proposal has not been signed or rejected by Rumsfeld. If he decides to sign off, he would need congressional approval to dissolve the office.
Even though not aware of the specific proposal to fold ASD SO/LIC, “there are always efforts within the DoD to achieve economies of scale, to consolidate similar work and cut through bureaucracy,” said a Pentagon spokesperson who asked not to be quoted by name. “Especially in the policy office there have been ideas how to streamline the policy office including the ASD SO/LIC.”
The official added that the Pentagon cannot get rid of the office “without congressional approval and without a detrimental effect to the Special Operations Command.”
The official acknowledged that there are ideas on the table to “minimize the policy footprint.” In the case of this office, however “you pinch too hard and the baby screams,” the DoD official said.
Cutting away at the office’s responsibility would “influence their ability to do their work and Congress will be concerned,” the official added.
John Ullyot, spokesman for Warner, said, “SO/LIC has been useful in the past,” However, he declined to comment further because the committee had not been briefed on the Pentagon plan.
Sources familiar with the dynamic in the office of the undersecretary for policy said that infighting and tension between Henry and the assistant secretary’s office could have led to the several proposals made so far to change or disenfranchise the office. However, others point out that the office is not without its own faults.
“A lot of the SO/LIC problems are self-inflicted,” the former government official said. “SO/LIC has missed opportunities to transform the special-operations forces,” with policy on how to fight wars 20 years from now and how to have the appropriate mix of forces to fight those wars.
Pentagon’s possible move to eliminate special ops oversight office could trigger Hill ire
By Roxana Tiron
A Bush administration proposal to fold a civilian office tasked with oversight of the Pentagon’s special-operations forces could face stiff resistance in Congress.
Sources tell The Hill that Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld is considering a proposal to eliminate the office of the assistant secretary of defense for special operations and low-intensity conflict (ASD SO/LIC) and spreading its responsibilities across other Pentagon offices.
The proposal comes from Ryan Henry, the principal deputy undersecretary of defense for policy, according to a source familiar with the plan.
It is unclear whether Rumsfeld would sign off on such a suggestion or would reject it. If he agrees to the idea, the Pentagon would face an uphill battle in getting the plan endorsed by Congress.
Many lawmakers would be unwilling to go along with the idea — especially at a time when special-operations forces are growing and have primary responsibility in the war on terrorism.
It is not the first time such a proposal has been floated. In 2001, then-Defense Undersecretary for Policy Doug Feith tried to disenfranchise the position. Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman John Warner (R-Va.) thwarted Feith’s proposal and could play a role in killing the Pentagon’s recycled proposal.
The position was included as part of the Goldwater-Nichols Department of Defense Reorganization Act, which also created the United States Special Operations Command.
The Special Operations Command oversees each military service’s elite warriors, such as the Army’s Green Berets, Rangers and Delta Forces, the Navy SEALs and the Air Force special operators.
The assistant secretary’s office, which is run by civilians with extensive special operations background, was created to ensure that the special-operations forces would receive the attention and resources from the Pentagon that Congress thought was necessary.
The idea of folding and devolving the responsibility of the office is “something that we would have to look at very closely,” a Senate Armed Services Committee aide said. “I do not see a rationale for that. DoD [the Department of Defense] has no convincing argument right now.”
The office is one of several offices under the umbrella of the undersecretary of defense for policy, now headed by Eric Edelman.
Thomas O’Connell is in charge of assistant secretary’s office and is Rumsfeld’s principal civilian adviser on matters regarding special operations and low-intensity conflict.
In broad terms, O’Connell’s office oversees several functions: information operations, counternarcotics, stability operations and the so-called “special operations/combating terrorism.”
Under that last function, the office provides the first civilian signatures on operations against high-value targets, according to a former government official familiar with the office. It is unclear who would take over this function if the office is dissolved.
The assistant secretary of defense for special operations and low-intensity conflict is one of four assistant secretaries of defense mandated by statute. To dissolve or reorganize that office without congressional authorization would be impossible, sources said.
“It has never gone so far” as this new proposal, the former official said. The official said that so far the proposal has not been signed or rejected by Rumsfeld. If he decides to sign off, he would need congressional approval to dissolve the office.
Even though not aware of the specific proposal to fold ASD SO/LIC, “there are always efforts within the DoD to achieve economies of scale, to consolidate similar work and cut through bureaucracy,” said a Pentagon spokesperson who asked not to be quoted by name. “Especially in the policy office there have been ideas how to streamline the policy office including the ASD SO/LIC.”
The official added that the Pentagon cannot get rid of the office “without congressional approval and without a detrimental effect to the Special Operations Command.”
The official acknowledged that there are ideas on the table to “minimize the policy footprint.” In the case of this office, however “you pinch too hard and the baby screams,” the DoD official said.
Cutting away at the office’s responsibility would “influence their ability to do their work and Congress will be concerned,” the official added.
John Ullyot, spokesman for Warner, said, “SO/LIC has been useful in the past,” However, he declined to comment further because the committee had not been briefed on the Pentagon plan.
Sources familiar with the dynamic in the office of the undersecretary for policy said that infighting and tension between Henry and the assistant secretary’s office could have led to the several proposals made so far to change or disenfranchise the office. However, others point out that the office is not without its own faults.
“A lot of the SO/LIC problems are self-inflicted,” the former government official said. “SO/LIC has missed opportunities to transform the special-operations forces,” with policy on how to fight wars 20 years from now and how to have the appropriate mix of forces to fight those wars.
Capitol Hill Blue: Bush's lies can't hide the truth about relationship with Jack Abramoff
Bush's lies can't hide the truth about relationship with Jack Abramoff
By DOUG THOMPSON
Publisher, Capitol Hill Blue
Jan 30, 2006, 08:36
Email this article
Printer friendly page
President George W. Bush’s ability to lie his way out of trouble is failing him as the White House tries unsuccessfully to hide the truth about the President’s close relationship to scandal-scarred lobbyist Jack Abramoff.
Nobody – Republican or Democrat – buys Bush’s ludicrous claims that he didn’t know Abramoff, the well-connected GOP lobbyist who raised more than $100,000 for his campaign, served on his transition team and whose lobbying logs listed more than 200 contacts a year with the White House.
“The president has dug himself into a very deep hole on this one,” says political scientist George Harleigh. “He’s told one lie too many.”
Even Republican now publicly say Bush must come clean on just how many times he and his administration met with Abramoff and what White House action were affected by the influence peddler’s money.
“I'm one who believes that more is better, in terms of disclosure and transparency,”said Sen. John Thune, R-S.Don Fox News Sunday. “So I'd be a big advocate for making records that are out there available."
And while Republicans publicly still support Bush, privately they admit the White House and the party are in serious trouble from the Abramoff affair.
“We came into town promising to clean up the system,” says one GOP Congressman elected in the Republican takeover of Congress in 1994. “Now we’re the very problem we promised to fix.”
Republican attempts to spin the Abramoff scandal as a bi-partisan problem where Democrats also took money from the tainted lobbyists have failed to sell with a public fed up with GOP corruption and abuse of power on Capitol Hill.
Abramoff was a product of a determined GOP effort to put more lobbyists on K Street, the stretch of Washington real estate that is home to many of the rich and powerful sellers of influence. That was former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay’s job and DeLay is as crooked as Abramoff.
“Fuck the law,” Delay told me in a meeting in 1990. “I don’t give a rat’s ass about the law.” I met with Delay through my role as Vice President for Political Programs for the National Association of Realtors. DeLay wanted us to hire more Republicans.
When I told Delay that I didn’t care whether the folks I hired were Republican or Democrat as long as they did the job, he got mad.
“Listen you cocksucker,” he said, his eyes narrowing. “I’m tired of mealy-mouthed assholes like you kowtowing to the Democrats. We’re keeping a list and you’re on it. Either start supporting Republicans or you’ll find yourself out in the cold.”
I kept good notes on that meeting so I could report back to my boss, Realtor chief lobbyist Stephen Driesler, who laughed and shook his head.
“Yeah, that’s Tom,” he said, “but we have to listen to him because he will be a power someday.”
DeLay became even more of a power when Republicans took control of Congress in 1994. That power intensified with his political buddy George W. Bush took office in 2001 and both DeLay and Bush gladly accepted political largesse from their good buddy Jack Abramoff.
Bush introduced Abramoff to a campaign gathering in Florida in 2004, calling the lobbyist “a great friend to this administration.” Capitol Hill Blue first revealed on January 18 that the lobbyist kept pictures of he and the President today at his office, including one taken at the President’s ranch in Crawford, Texas, and autographed to “My great friend Jack.” Other news sources quickly followed with reports of the photos but the White House refused to release them.
Bush also faces damaging new information that his former chief procurement officer, David Safavian provided "sensitive and confidential information" about four subsidiaries of Tyco International to Abramoff, warning the lobbyist of pending government actions against his clients.
Court records in a pending criminal case against Safavian also show a tight relationship between Abramoff and David Flanigan, a lawyer for Tyco who was nominated by Bush last October to be assistant attorney general under Alberto Gonzales. Bush later withdrew the nomination when questions surfaced over his relationship with Safavian and Abramoff.
“This web of scandal and deceit is ever-widening and Bush cannot escape the fact that he is at the center of it,” says Harleigh, who worked in the Nixon administration. “It is usually the cover up that brings an administration down. The President would do well to remember that.”
© Copyright 2006 by Capitol Hill Blue
By DOUG THOMPSON
Publisher, Capitol Hill Blue
Jan 30, 2006, 08:36
Email this article
Printer friendly page
President George W. Bush’s ability to lie his way out of trouble is failing him as the White House tries unsuccessfully to hide the truth about the President’s close relationship to scandal-scarred lobbyist Jack Abramoff.
Nobody – Republican or Democrat – buys Bush’s ludicrous claims that he didn’t know Abramoff, the well-connected GOP lobbyist who raised more than $100,000 for his campaign, served on his transition team and whose lobbying logs listed more than 200 contacts a year with the White House.
“The president has dug himself into a very deep hole on this one,” says political scientist George Harleigh. “He’s told one lie too many.”
Even Republican now publicly say Bush must come clean on just how many times he and his administration met with Abramoff and what White House action were affected by the influence peddler’s money.
“I'm one who believes that more is better, in terms of disclosure and transparency,”said Sen. John Thune, R-S.Don Fox News Sunday. “So I'd be a big advocate for making records that are out there available."
And while Republicans publicly still support Bush, privately they admit the White House and the party are in serious trouble from the Abramoff affair.
“We came into town promising to clean up the system,” says one GOP Congressman elected in the Republican takeover of Congress in 1994. “Now we’re the very problem we promised to fix.”
Republican attempts to spin the Abramoff scandal as a bi-partisan problem where Democrats also took money from the tainted lobbyists have failed to sell with a public fed up with GOP corruption and abuse of power on Capitol Hill.
Abramoff was a product of a determined GOP effort to put more lobbyists on K Street, the stretch of Washington real estate that is home to many of the rich and powerful sellers of influence. That was former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay’s job and DeLay is as crooked as Abramoff.
“Fuck the law,” Delay told me in a meeting in 1990. “I don’t give a rat’s ass about the law.” I met with Delay through my role as Vice President for Political Programs for the National Association of Realtors. DeLay wanted us to hire more Republicans.
When I told Delay that I didn’t care whether the folks I hired were Republican or Democrat as long as they did the job, he got mad.
“Listen you cocksucker,” he said, his eyes narrowing. “I’m tired of mealy-mouthed assholes like you kowtowing to the Democrats. We’re keeping a list and you’re on it. Either start supporting Republicans or you’ll find yourself out in the cold.”
I kept good notes on that meeting so I could report back to my boss, Realtor chief lobbyist Stephen Driesler, who laughed and shook his head.
“Yeah, that’s Tom,” he said, “but we have to listen to him because he will be a power someday.”
DeLay became even more of a power when Republicans took control of Congress in 1994. That power intensified with his political buddy George W. Bush took office in 2001 and both DeLay and Bush gladly accepted political largesse from their good buddy Jack Abramoff.
Bush introduced Abramoff to a campaign gathering in Florida in 2004, calling the lobbyist “a great friend to this administration.” Capitol Hill Blue first revealed on January 18 that the lobbyist kept pictures of he and the President today at his office, including one taken at the President’s ranch in Crawford, Texas, and autographed to “My great friend Jack.” Other news sources quickly followed with reports of the photos but the White House refused to release them.
Bush also faces damaging new information that his former chief procurement officer, David Safavian provided "sensitive and confidential information" about four subsidiaries of Tyco International to Abramoff, warning the lobbyist of pending government actions against his clients.
Court records in a pending criminal case against Safavian also show a tight relationship between Abramoff and David Flanigan, a lawyer for Tyco who was nominated by Bush last October to be assistant attorney general under Alberto Gonzales. Bush later withdrew the nomination when questions surfaced over his relationship with Safavian and Abramoff.
“This web of scandal and deceit is ever-widening and Bush cannot escape the fact that he is at the center of it,” says Harleigh, who worked in the Nixon administration. “It is usually the cover up that brings an administration down. The President would do well to remember that.”
© Copyright 2006 by Capitol Hill Blue
Monday, January 30, 2006
NSA listens from Army's Yakima Training Center
NSA listens from Army's Yakima Training Center
NSA listens from Army's Yakima Training Center
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
YAKIMA, Wash. -- Just a few miles north of town, the National Security Agency is eavesdropping on the world with satellite dishes that pick up satellite and microwave signals from cell phones, e-mails and home phones.
The listening post has a view of Interstate 82 from its location on the Army's gigantic Yakima Training Center, but it may be one of the best kept secrets in the Pacific Northwest.
That could change during the debate over Bush administration surveillance of domestic communications with parties overseas.
"In the entire country, it happens to be in your back yard," said James Bamford, a former network news investigative producer who documented the Yakima installation in his 1982 book about the NSA, "The Puzzle Palace."
"It doesn't make noise, doesn't send smoke," he said. "It's almost invisible. The whole agency is virtually invisible."
Bamford and others keyed into electronic eavesdropping say the Yakima Research Station has played a major role for decades in Echelon, the global surveillance network operated by the NSA and its counterparts in the British Commonwealth - Great Britain, Canada, Australia and New Zealand.
advertising
And it has a sister installation in Sugar Grove, W.Va.
According to Bamford, the low-profile NSA has 58,000 employees in the United States and abroad more than the CIA and FBI combined. Its budget, reportedly more than $6 billion, is classified.
Created by a secret executive order signed by President Truman in 1952, the agency spent its early days doing wiretaps of telephones and telegraph lines. By the late 1960s, it had a growing array of listening posts capable of intercepting satellite signals.
Because the Earth is curved, intercepting satellite communications takes teamwork. The result is Echelon and its network of listening posts. The biggest is thought to be at Menwith Hill north of London.
Patrick Radden Keefe, author of "Chatter: Dispatches from the Secret World of Global Eavesdropping," contends the Yakima site is even more mysterious.
"People don't know a lot about it (Menwith Hill) but at least they know it's there, because you have 1,400 people who live and work there going out into the surrounding communities," he said in a recent telephone interview.
"Of the different listening posts around the country and the world, Yakima was the hardest one for me to get any information about."
Neither Keefe nor Bamford could say how many people work at the Yakima Research Station.
They say it is used mainly for intercepting and relaying communications, not analyzing data or translating foreign languages. They doubt its size is anything close to Menwith Hill, but concede they don't know for sure.
"These bases tend to keep a very low profile," Keefe explained. "That's part of the point."
So passers-by can see the satellite dishes from the freeway north of Selah but that's as close as they're likely to get.
Access is severely restricted, enforced by its location inside a 260,000-acre Army base used primarily for artillery training and target practice.
The base's official Web site does not mention the installation.
"We really don't have any comment about the research station," center spokesman Jim Reddick told the Yakima Herald-Republic newspaper last week.
According to Bamford, such installations have the capability to analyze 2 million intercepts an hour, which are then whittled down to one or two reports a day for NSA brass at agency headquarters in Fort Meade, Md.
Supercomputers scan for key words and phrases - kind of like a Google search except they can handle billions of instructions per second.
Because of its size and relative isolation, the Yakima provides a quiet electronic background. Keefe says the "frontier-style" isolation may explain the installation's Echelon code name: Cowboy.
At issue in the debate are provisions of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978. The law established a special court that for 27 years has reviewed warrant applications by the U.S. attorney general for authorization of electronic surveillance aimed at obtaining foreign intelligence information.
The administration, citing wartime powers, contends the law does not apply to pursuit of al-Qaida terrorists living in the U.S. and communicating with handlers overseas.
---
Information from: Yakima Herald-Republic, http://www.yakima-herald.com
NSA listens from Army's Yakima Training Center
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
YAKIMA, Wash. -- Just a few miles north of town, the National Security Agency is eavesdropping on the world with satellite dishes that pick up satellite and microwave signals from cell phones, e-mails and home phones.
The listening post has a view of Interstate 82 from its location on the Army's gigantic Yakima Training Center, but it may be one of the best kept secrets in the Pacific Northwest.
That could change during the debate over Bush administration surveillance of domestic communications with parties overseas.
"In the entire country, it happens to be in your back yard," said James Bamford, a former network news investigative producer who documented the Yakima installation in his 1982 book about the NSA, "The Puzzle Palace."
"It doesn't make noise, doesn't send smoke," he said. "It's almost invisible. The whole agency is virtually invisible."
Bamford and others keyed into electronic eavesdropping say the Yakima Research Station has played a major role for decades in Echelon, the global surveillance network operated by the NSA and its counterparts in the British Commonwealth - Great Britain, Canada, Australia and New Zealand.
advertising
And it has a sister installation in Sugar Grove, W.Va.
According to Bamford, the low-profile NSA has 58,000 employees in the United States and abroad more than the CIA and FBI combined. Its budget, reportedly more than $6 billion, is classified.
Created by a secret executive order signed by President Truman in 1952, the agency spent its early days doing wiretaps of telephones and telegraph lines. By the late 1960s, it had a growing array of listening posts capable of intercepting satellite signals.
Because the Earth is curved, intercepting satellite communications takes teamwork. The result is Echelon and its network of listening posts. The biggest is thought to be at Menwith Hill north of London.
Patrick Radden Keefe, author of "Chatter: Dispatches from the Secret World of Global Eavesdropping," contends the Yakima site is even more mysterious.
"People don't know a lot about it (Menwith Hill) but at least they know it's there, because you have 1,400 people who live and work there going out into the surrounding communities," he said in a recent telephone interview.
"Of the different listening posts around the country and the world, Yakima was the hardest one for me to get any information about."
Neither Keefe nor Bamford could say how many people work at the Yakima Research Station.
They say it is used mainly for intercepting and relaying communications, not analyzing data or translating foreign languages. They doubt its size is anything close to Menwith Hill, but concede they don't know for sure.
"These bases tend to keep a very low profile," Keefe explained. "That's part of the point."
So passers-by can see the satellite dishes from the freeway north of Selah but that's as close as they're likely to get.
Access is severely restricted, enforced by its location inside a 260,000-acre Army base used primarily for artillery training and target practice.
The base's official Web site does not mention the installation.
"We really don't have any comment about the research station," center spokesman Jim Reddick told the Yakima Herald-Republic newspaper last week.
According to Bamford, such installations have the capability to analyze 2 million intercepts an hour, which are then whittled down to one or two reports a day for NSA brass at agency headquarters in Fort Meade, Md.
Supercomputers scan for key words and phrases - kind of like a Google search except they can handle billions of instructions per second.
Because of its size and relative isolation, the Yakima provides a quiet electronic background. Keefe says the "frontier-style" isolation may explain the installation's Echelon code name: Cowboy.
At issue in the debate are provisions of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978. The law established a special court that for 27 years has reviewed warrant applications by the U.S. attorney general for authorization of electronic surveillance aimed at obtaining foreign intelligence information.
The administration, citing wartime powers, contends the law does not apply to pursuit of al-Qaida terrorists living in the U.S. and communicating with handlers overseas.
---
Information from: Yakima Herald-Republic, http://www.yakima-herald.com
Military Hides Cause of Women Soldiers' Deaths
Military Hides Cause of Women Soldiers' Deaths
By Marjorie Cohn
t r u t h o u t | Report
Monday 30 January 2006
In a startling revelation, the former commander of Abu Ghraib prison testified that Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez, former senior US military commander in Iraq, gave orders to cover up the cause of death for some female American soldiers serving in Iraq.
Last week, Col. Janis Karpinski told a panel of judges at the Commission of Inquiry for Crimes against Humanity Committed by the Bush Administration in New York that several women had died of dehydration because they refused to drink liquids late in the day. They were afraid of being assaulted or even raped by male soldiers if they had to use the women's latrine after dark.
The latrine for female soldiers at Camp Victory wasn't located near their barracks, so they had to go outside if they needed to use the bathroom. "There were no lights near any of their facilities, so women were doubly easy targets in the dark of the night," Karpinski told retired US Army Col. David Hackworth in a September 2004 interview. It was there that male soldiers assaulted and raped women soldiers. So the women took matters into their own hands. They didn't drink in the late afternoon so they wouldn't have to urinate at night. They didn't get raped. But some died of dehydration in the desert heat, Karpinski said.
Karpinski testified that a surgeon for the coalition's joint task force said in a briefing that "women in fear of getting up in the hours of darkness to go out to the port-a-lets or the latrines were not drinking liquids after 3 or 4 in the afternoon, and in 120 degree heat or warmer, because there was no air-conditioning at most of the facilities, they were dying from dehydration in their sleep."
"And rather than make everybody aware of that - because that's shocking, and as a leader if that's not shocking to you then you're not much of a leader - what they told the surgeon to do is don't brief those details anymore. And don't say specifically that they're women. You can provide that in a written report but don't brief it in the open anymore."
For example, Maj. Gen. Walter Wojdakowski, Sanchez's top deputy in Iraq, saw "dehydration" listed as the cause of death on the death certificate of a female master sergeant in September 2003. Under orders from Sanchez, he directed that the cause of death no longer be listed, Karpinski stated. The official explanation for this was to protect the women's privacy rights.
Sanchez's attitude was: "The women asked to be here, so now let them take what comes with the territory," Karpinski quoted him as saying. Karpinski told me that Sanchez, who was her boss, was very sensitive to the political ramifications of everything he did. She thinks it likely that when the information about the cause of these women's deaths was passed to the Pentagon, Donald Rumsfeld ordered that the details not be released. "That's how Rumsfeld works," she said.
"It was out of control," Karpinski told a group of students at Thomas Jefferson School of Law last October. There was an 800 number women could use to report sexual assaults. But no one had a phone, she added. And no one answered that number, which was based in the United States. Any woman who successfully connected to it would get a recording. Even after more than 83 incidents were reported during a six-month period in Iraq and Kuwait, the 24-hour rape hot line was still answered by a machine that told callers to leave a message.
"There were countless such situations all over the theater of operations - Iraq and Kuwait - because female soldiers didn't have a voice, individually or collectively," Karpinski told Hackworth. "Even as a general I didn't have a voice with Sanchez, so I know what the soldiers were facing. Sanchez did not want to hear about female soldier requirements and/or issues."
Karpinski was the highest officer reprimanded for the Abu Ghraib torture scandal, although the details of interrogations were carefully hidden from her. Demoted from Brigadier General to Colonel, Karpinski feels she was chosen as a scapegoat because she was a female.
Sexual assault in the US military has become a hot topic in the last few years, "not just because of the high number of rapes and other assaults, but also because of the tendency to cover up assaults and to harass or retaliate against women who report assaults," according to Kathy Gilberd, co-chair of the National Lawyers Guild's Military Law Task Force.
This problem has become so acute that the Army has set up its own sexual assault web site.
In February 2004, Rumsfeld directed the Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness to undertake a 90-day review of sexual assault policies. "Sexual assault will not be tolerated in the Department of Defense," Rumsfeld declared.
The 99-page report was issued in April 2004. It affirmed, "The chain of command is responsible for ensuring that policies and practices regarding crime prevention and security are in place for the safety of service members." The rates of reported alleged sexual assault were 69.1 and 70.0 per 100,000 uniformed service members in 2002 and 2003. Yet those rates were not directly comparable to rates reported by the Department of Justice, due to substantial differences in the definition of sexual assault.
Notably, the report found that low sociocultural power (i.e., age, education, race/ethnicity, marital status) and low organizational power (i.e., pay grade and years of active duty service) were associated with an increased likelihood of both sexual assault and sexual harassment.
The Department of Defense announced a new policy on sexual assault prevention and response on January 3, 2005. It was a reaction to media reports and public outrage about sexual assaults against women in the US military in Iraq and Afghanistan, and ongoing sexual assaults and cover-ups at the Air Force Academy in Colorado, Gilberd said. As a result, Congress demanded that the military review the problem, and the Defense Authorization Act of 2005 required a new policy be put in place by January 1.
The policy is a series of very brief "directive-type memoranda" for the Secretaries of the military services from the Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness. "Overall, the policy emphasizes that sexual assault harms military readiness, that education about sexual assault policy needs to be increased and repeated, and that improvements in response to sexual assaults are necessary to make victims more willing to report assaults," Gilberd notes. "Unfortunately," she added "analysis of the issues is shallow, and the plans for addressing them are limited."
Commands can reject the complaints if they decide they aren't credible, and there is limited protection against retaliation against the women who come forward, according to Gilberd. "People who report assaults still face command disbelief, illegal efforts to protect the assaulters, informal harassment from assaulters, their friends or the command itself," she said.
But most shameful is Sanchez's cover-up of the dehydration deaths of women that occurred in Iraq. Sanchez is no stranger to outrageous military orders. He was heavily involved in the torture scandal that surfaced at Abu Ghraib. Sanchez approved the use of unmuzzled dogs and the insertion of prisoners head-first into sleeping bags after which they are tied with an electrical cord and their are mouths covered. At least one person died as the result of the sleeping bag technique. Karpinski charges that Sanchez attempted to hide the torture after the hideous photographs became public.
Sanchez reportedly plans to retire soon, according to an article in the International Herald Tribune earlier this month. But Rumsfeld recently considered elevating the 3-star general to a 4-star. The Tribune also reported that Brig. Gen. Vincent Brooks, the Army's chief spokesman, said in an email message, "The Army leaders do have confidence in LTG Sanchez."
Marjorie Cohn is a professor at Thomas Jefferson School of Law, President-elect of the National Lawyers Guild, and the US representative to the executive committee of the American Association of Jurists. She writes a weekly column for t r u t h o u t.
By Marjorie Cohn
t r u t h o u t | Report
Monday 30 January 2006
In a startling revelation, the former commander of Abu Ghraib prison testified that Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez, former senior US military commander in Iraq, gave orders to cover up the cause of death for some female American soldiers serving in Iraq.
Last week, Col. Janis Karpinski told a panel of judges at the Commission of Inquiry for Crimes against Humanity Committed by the Bush Administration in New York that several women had died of dehydration because they refused to drink liquids late in the day. They were afraid of being assaulted or even raped by male soldiers if they had to use the women's latrine after dark.
The latrine for female soldiers at Camp Victory wasn't located near their barracks, so they had to go outside if they needed to use the bathroom. "There were no lights near any of their facilities, so women were doubly easy targets in the dark of the night," Karpinski told retired US Army Col. David Hackworth in a September 2004 interview. It was there that male soldiers assaulted and raped women soldiers. So the women took matters into their own hands. They didn't drink in the late afternoon so they wouldn't have to urinate at night. They didn't get raped. But some died of dehydration in the desert heat, Karpinski said.
Karpinski testified that a surgeon for the coalition's joint task force said in a briefing that "women in fear of getting up in the hours of darkness to go out to the port-a-lets or the latrines were not drinking liquids after 3 or 4 in the afternoon, and in 120 degree heat or warmer, because there was no air-conditioning at most of the facilities, they were dying from dehydration in their sleep."
"And rather than make everybody aware of that - because that's shocking, and as a leader if that's not shocking to you then you're not much of a leader - what they told the surgeon to do is don't brief those details anymore. And don't say specifically that they're women. You can provide that in a written report but don't brief it in the open anymore."
For example, Maj. Gen. Walter Wojdakowski, Sanchez's top deputy in Iraq, saw "dehydration" listed as the cause of death on the death certificate of a female master sergeant in September 2003. Under orders from Sanchez, he directed that the cause of death no longer be listed, Karpinski stated. The official explanation for this was to protect the women's privacy rights.
Sanchez's attitude was: "The women asked to be here, so now let them take what comes with the territory," Karpinski quoted him as saying. Karpinski told me that Sanchez, who was her boss, was very sensitive to the political ramifications of everything he did. She thinks it likely that when the information about the cause of these women's deaths was passed to the Pentagon, Donald Rumsfeld ordered that the details not be released. "That's how Rumsfeld works," she said.
"It was out of control," Karpinski told a group of students at Thomas Jefferson School of Law last October. There was an 800 number women could use to report sexual assaults. But no one had a phone, she added. And no one answered that number, which was based in the United States. Any woman who successfully connected to it would get a recording. Even after more than 83 incidents were reported during a six-month period in Iraq and Kuwait, the 24-hour rape hot line was still answered by a machine that told callers to leave a message.
"There were countless such situations all over the theater of operations - Iraq and Kuwait - because female soldiers didn't have a voice, individually or collectively," Karpinski told Hackworth. "Even as a general I didn't have a voice with Sanchez, so I know what the soldiers were facing. Sanchez did not want to hear about female soldier requirements and/or issues."
Karpinski was the highest officer reprimanded for the Abu Ghraib torture scandal, although the details of interrogations were carefully hidden from her. Demoted from Brigadier General to Colonel, Karpinski feels she was chosen as a scapegoat because she was a female.
Sexual assault in the US military has become a hot topic in the last few years, "not just because of the high number of rapes and other assaults, but also because of the tendency to cover up assaults and to harass or retaliate against women who report assaults," according to Kathy Gilberd, co-chair of the National Lawyers Guild's Military Law Task Force.
This problem has become so acute that the Army has set up its own sexual assault web site.
In February 2004, Rumsfeld directed the Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness to undertake a 90-day review of sexual assault policies. "Sexual assault will not be tolerated in the Department of Defense," Rumsfeld declared.
The 99-page report was issued in April 2004. It affirmed, "The chain of command is responsible for ensuring that policies and practices regarding crime prevention and security are in place for the safety of service members." The rates of reported alleged sexual assault were 69.1 and 70.0 per 100,000 uniformed service members in 2002 and 2003. Yet those rates were not directly comparable to rates reported by the Department of Justice, due to substantial differences in the definition of sexual assault.
Notably, the report found that low sociocultural power (i.e., age, education, race/ethnicity, marital status) and low organizational power (i.e., pay grade and years of active duty service) were associated with an increased likelihood of both sexual assault and sexual harassment.
The Department of Defense announced a new policy on sexual assault prevention and response on January 3, 2005. It was a reaction to media reports and public outrage about sexual assaults against women in the US military in Iraq and Afghanistan, and ongoing sexual assaults and cover-ups at the Air Force Academy in Colorado, Gilberd said. As a result, Congress demanded that the military review the problem, and the Defense Authorization Act of 2005 required a new policy be put in place by January 1.
The policy is a series of very brief "directive-type memoranda" for the Secretaries of the military services from the Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness. "Overall, the policy emphasizes that sexual assault harms military readiness, that education about sexual assault policy needs to be increased and repeated, and that improvements in response to sexual assaults are necessary to make victims more willing to report assaults," Gilberd notes. "Unfortunately," she added "analysis of the issues is shallow, and the plans for addressing them are limited."
Commands can reject the complaints if they decide they aren't credible, and there is limited protection against retaliation against the women who come forward, according to Gilberd. "People who report assaults still face command disbelief, illegal efforts to protect the assaulters, informal harassment from assaulters, their friends or the command itself," she said.
But most shameful is Sanchez's cover-up of the dehydration deaths of women that occurred in Iraq. Sanchez is no stranger to outrageous military orders. He was heavily involved in the torture scandal that surfaced at Abu Ghraib. Sanchez approved the use of unmuzzled dogs and the insertion of prisoners head-first into sleeping bags after which they are tied with an electrical cord and their are mouths covered. At least one person died as the result of the sleeping bag technique. Karpinski charges that Sanchez attempted to hide the torture after the hideous photographs became public.
Sanchez reportedly plans to retire soon, according to an article in the International Herald Tribune earlier this month. But Rumsfeld recently considered elevating the 3-star general to a 4-star. The Tribune also reported that Brig. Gen. Vincent Brooks, the Army's chief spokesman, said in an email message, "The Army leaders do have confidence in LTG Sanchez."
Marjorie Cohn is a professor at Thomas Jefferson School of Law, President-elect of the National Lawyers Guild, and the US representative to the executive committee of the American Association of Jurists. She writes a weekly column for t r u t h o u t.
Alito and Opus Dei
Alito and Opus Dei
Jackboots of the Church
By MICHAEL CARMICHAEL
Is Judge Samuel Alito a member of Opus Dei?
If so, does it matter? If it matters, why?
A Senate staffer confirmed that the Judiciary Committee received numerous "notes and letters" stating that Judge Samuel Alito is a member of Opus Dei.
A controversial Catholic organization*, Opus Dei is now widely known from the bestseller, The Da Vinci Code, a novel by American author Dan Brown, soon to be a major film starring Tom Hanks that will premiere at the Cannes Film Festival in May.
In 1928, a Catholic priest who acquired a doctorate in law, JosemarÃa Escrivá founded Opus Dei in Spain. Escrivá's juridical attitude to religious doctrine permeates Opus Dei and is the source of its attraction to members of the legal profession. Opus Dei received massive political support after the fascist victory in the Spanish Civil War. Generalissimo Francisco Franco protected and fostered conservative elements within Opus Dei by appointing eight ministers to powerful positions in his government. In Spain, Opus Dei is still regarded as a potent political force. In 2002, Escrivá was canonized.
Why, then, is an Alito membership in Opus Dei of major significance? In addition to his activist record on the federal bench and his conservative ideology, Alito is deemed to be a menace to the balance of power as well as the constitutional rights of Americans. Judge Alito's affiliation with Opus Dei may be a factor in the strident opposition from Edward Kennedy and John Kerry, both progressive Roman Catholics who do not approve of the influence of religious dogma on political ideology. The majority of Americans believe in the separation of church and state, while many religious conservatives such as Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell would transform America into a theocratic state. Robertson and Falwell are staunch supporters of Judge Alito.
While the Moral Majority, the 700 Club and a growing bloc of Christian Conservatives have wielded a great deal of political influence in America, two years ago these protestant fundamentalists formed a coalition with conservative Catholics to re-elect President George Bush. In 2004, the Vatican intervened directly into the US presidential election to endorse their champion, George Bush. The back-story is both fascinating and compelling, for it illuminates the political dynamics taking shape in the nomination, possible confirmation and conflict centring on Alito.
In June, 2004, soon after Bush's papal audience with the late pontiff, Pope John Paul II, a letter signed by Former Cardinal Josef Ratzinger, who now reigns as Pope Benedict XVI, threatened to excommunicate any Catholic politician in favour of abortion as well as any Catholic voters who would support Kerry at the polls. At that point in the presidential campaign George Bush was trailing John Kerry by double digits in the polls, and Bush seemed doomed to become a one-term president like his father.
During his papal audience with the late Pope John Paul II, Bush is reported to have complained to the pontiff and other members of the curia, including Former Cardinal Ratzinger, that he did not have the total support of all of the US Bishops. Ratzinger's letter swiftly resolved that dilemma for the politically beleaguered president.
In a perceptive article titled "Holy Warriors," Sidney Blumenthal, a former advisor to President Clinton, ascribed Bush's narrow victory over Kerry directly to the political impact of the Ratzinger letter. During his long career at the Vatican, Former Cardinal Ratzinger's decisive handling of complicated problems had become a matter of record. His official investigation of the priestly child abuse scandal involving Catholic clerics gave him the knowledge and understanding of the political and legal dynamics prevalent in Bush's America.
During 2002 and 2003, Former Cardinal Ratzinger had been the Prefect of The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF). In previous centuries, the CDF was known as the Inquisition. In his official capacity as Prefect, he was largely responsible for the Vatican's ecclesiastical investigation into thousands of cases of priestly child sexual abuse. Former Cardinal Ratzinger's handling of that scandal has been the subject of substantial analysis and criticism.
At the height of the scandal, Former Cardinal Ratzinger wrote a letter that altered official procedure by reserving all cases of priestly child sexual abuse to the CDF. Prior to Former Cardinal Ratzinger's letter, cases of priestly sexual abuse were not restrained in the exclusive purview of the CDF. Attorneys for victims of priestly child sexual abuse in Texas argued in court that Former Cardinal Ratzinger's letter was an obstruction of justice. In a public statement, Former Cardinal Ratzinger told the Catholic News Service, "Less than one percent of priests are guilty of acts of this type." Many Catholics view this statement as callous and an attempt to cover-up the scandal. Former Cardinal Ratzinger's apparent indifference to the scandal shocked many Catholics. Many members of the College of Cardinals harkened to his message of minimizing the importance of the scandal. One Cardinal attempted to place the blame for the scandal on America's reputation for excessive litigation. He stated that attorneys were merely seeking "to make money" from the scandal. In 2005 shortly after his election to the papacy, Cardinal Ratzinger appeared to promise to make amends for earlier miscalculations in handling the charges of priestly child sexual abuse when he made a public commitment to 'attend' to the scandal. How he intends to resolve the scandal remains to be seen.
The Department of Justice under former Attorney General John Ashcroft, himself an ardent born again Christian, took no action in that case, or, more accurately, those cases. Ten thousand victims of priestly child sexual abuse were discovered in America alone, and the Catholic Church identified four thousand four hundred and fifty (4,450) of its own priests who had been incriminated in the United States. As a direct result of the scandal, the Catholic Church is known to have paid out more than $1 billion in settlements to the victims of priestly child sexual abuse. During the past two years many new reports of priestly child sexual abuse have surfaced in the United States as well as in other nations. For instance, in Brazil a recent report identified over 1,400 priests incriminated in child sexual abuse. Whether any members of Opus Dei were involved in the scandal or the handling of it is obscured by the secrecy screening the organization's membership from public scrutiny. Whether members of Opus Dei wield significant influence in the Vatican's ongoing attempts to resolve the scandal through negotiations with American government, law enforcement and criminal justice agencies may never be made public.
What adds additional interest to the role of Opus Dei and the Catholic Church in US political life is that for many years unconfirmed reports have linked Supreme Court Justices Scalia and Thomas to Opus Dei. In March, 2001, Newsweek reported that the wife of Justice Scalia, "attended Opus Dei's spiritual functions." Justice Scalia's son, Father Paul Scalia, personally mediated the conversion of Justice Clarence Thomas to Roman Catholicism following his confirmation to the Supreme Court.
In recent years, the ultra-conservative jurist Robert Bork has converted to Roman Catholicism. In Washington, speculations about Bork and Opus Dei are relatively common. Other conservative Catholic politicians associated in the popular media with Opus Dei include Senators Sam Brownback and Rick Santorum. While the names of priests and officials of Opus Dei are made public, the identities of the lay members are not matters of public record, making it appear to be a secret organization. This situation leaves a question mark over those markedly conservative Catholics with political prominence.
Opus Dei purports to be apolitical, but its members have been associated with right-wing political causes since its inception. While the vast majority of America's Catholics are moderate to progressive in their views like Senators Kennedy and Kerry and Justice Kennedy, there is a small but vocal minority who adhere to ultra-conservative doctrine and dogma and consistently support neoconservative political candidates and their causes.
The rise to power of religious dogmatists in the guise of an Opus Dei clique on the Supreme Court through the rulings of Scalia, Thomas, and potentially Alito is a legitimate cause for concern not only on Capitol Hill, but also throughout America. Just imagine the outcry if the Supreme Court had four radical Islamicists, four zealous Zionists or four fixated followers of Reverend Sun Myung Moon. The case of Samuel Alito raises a serious question: is George Bush attempting to pack the Supreme Court with religious extremists?
If Alito is confirmed, his presence will create a majority of five Catholic justices on the US Supreme Court. Justice Anthony Kennedy is a liberal Catholic, while the recently appointed Chief Justice, John Roberts, is another deeply conservative Catholic jurist whose devout religious views have also given rise to speculation involving Opus Dei. Alito would bring to four the total of ultra-conservative Catholics on the US Supreme Court, forming an alliance that would be legal, judicial and religious.
In his infamous text, The Way, Saint JosemarÃa Escrivá wrote,
"Nonsectarianism. Neutrality. Those old myths that always try to seem new. Have you ever bothered to think how absurd it is to leave one's Catholicism aside on entering a university, or a professional association, or a scholarly meeting, or Congress, as if you were checking your hat at the door?"
There can be little serious doubt that the progressive Catholic members of the Senate are well aware of this famous tenet of Opus Dei. That may well be why they are stridently opposing the confirmation of the arch-conservative and dogmatic Catholic jurist, Judge Samuel Alito.
*Opus Dei, in full Prelature of the Holy Cross and Opus Dei, was founded in 1928 in Spain by JosemarÃa Escrivá de Balaguer y Albá (canonized in 2002). It is theologically conservative and accepts the teaching authority of the church without question. It was granted special status as the first and only personal prelature in the church by Pope John Paul II in 1982. Opus Dei is the subject of a growing body of academic papers, articles, books, documentaries and films surveying trends in western religion probing its political influence and its connection to fascist regimes.
Michael Carmichael has been a professional public affairs consultant, author and broadcaster since 1968, . In 2003, he founded The Planetary Movement Limited, a global public affairs organization based in the United Kingdom. He has appeared as a public affairs expert on the BBC's Today Programme, Hardtalk, PM, as well as numerous appearances on ITN, NPR and many European broadcasts examining politics and culture. He can be reahced through his website: www.planetarymovement.org
Jackboots of the Church
By MICHAEL CARMICHAEL
Is Judge Samuel Alito a member of Opus Dei?
If so, does it matter? If it matters, why?
A Senate staffer confirmed that the Judiciary Committee received numerous "notes and letters" stating that Judge Samuel Alito is a member of Opus Dei.
A controversial Catholic organization*, Opus Dei is now widely known from the bestseller, The Da Vinci Code, a novel by American author Dan Brown, soon to be a major film starring Tom Hanks that will premiere at the Cannes Film Festival in May.
In 1928, a Catholic priest who acquired a doctorate in law, JosemarÃa Escrivá founded Opus Dei in Spain. Escrivá's juridical attitude to religious doctrine permeates Opus Dei and is the source of its attraction to members of the legal profession. Opus Dei received massive political support after the fascist victory in the Spanish Civil War. Generalissimo Francisco Franco protected and fostered conservative elements within Opus Dei by appointing eight ministers to powerful positions in his government. In Spain, Opus Dei is still regarded as a potent political force. In 2002, Escrivá was canonized.
Why, then, is an Alito membership in Opus Dei of major significance? In addition to his activist record on the federal bench and his conservative ideology, Alito is deemed to be a menace to the balance of power as well as the constitutional rights of Americans. Judge Alito's affiliation with Opus Dei may be a factor in the strident opposition from Edward Kennedy and John Kerry, both progressive Roman Catholics who do not approve of the influence of religious dogma on political ideology. The majority of Americans believe in the separation of church and state, while many religious conservatives such as Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell would transform America into a theocratic state. Robertson and Falwell are staunch supporters of Judge Alito.
While the Moral Majority, the 700 Club and a growing bloc of Christian Conservatives have wielded a great deal of political influence in America, two years ago these protestant fundamentalists formed a coalition with conservative Catholics to re-elect President George Bush. In 2004, the Vatican intervened directly into the US presidential election to endorse their champion, George Bush. The back-story is both fascinating and compelling, for it illuminates the political dynamics taking shape in the nomination, possible confirmation and conflict centring on Alito.
In June, 2004, soon after Bush's papal audience with the late pontiff, Pope John Paul II, a letter signed by Former Cardinal Josef Ratzinger, who now reigns as Pope Benedict XVI, threatened to excommunicate any Catholic politician in favour of abortion as well as any Catholic voters who would support Kerry at the polls. At that point in the presidential campaign George Bush was trailing John Kerry by double digits in the polls, and Bush seemed doomed to become a one-term president like his father.
During his papal audience with the late Pope John Paul II, Bush is reported to have complained to the pontiff and other members of the curia, including Former Cardinal Ratzinger, that he did not have the total support of all of the US Bishops. Ratzinger's letter swiftly resolved that dilemma for the politically beleaguered president.
In a perceptive article titled "Holy Warriors," Sidney Blumenthal, a former advisor to President Clinton, ascribed Bush's narrow victory over Kerry directly to the political impact of the Ratzinger letter. During his long career at the Vatican, Former Cardinal Ratzinger's decisive handling of complicated problems had become a matter of record. His official investigation of the priestly child abuse scandal involving Catholic clerics gave him the knowledge and understanding of the political and legal dynamics prevalent in Bush's America.
During 2002 and 2003, Former Cardinal Ratzinger had been the Prefect of The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF). In previous centuries, the CDF was known as the Inquisition. In his official capacity as Prefect, he was largely responsible for the Vatican's ecclesiastical investigation into thousands of cases of priestly child sexual abuse. Former Cardinal Ratzinger's handling of that scandal has been the subject of substantial analysis and criticism.
At the height of the scandal, Former Cardinal Ratzinger wrote a letter that altered official procedure by reserving all cases of priestly child sexual abuse to the CDF. Prior to Former Cardinal Ratzinger's letter, cases of priestly sexual abuse were not restrained in the exclusive purview of the CDF. Attorneys for victims of priestly child sexual abuse in Texas argued in court that Former Cardinal Ratzinger's letter was an obstruction of justice. In a public statement, Former Cardinal Ratzinger told the Catholic News Service, "Less than one percent of priests are guilty of acts of this type." Many Catholics view this statement as callous and an attempt to cover-up the scandal. Former Cardinal Ratzinger's apparent indifference to the scandal shocked many Catholics. Many members of the College of Cardinals harkened to his message of minimizing the importance of the scandal. One Cardinal attempted to place the blame for the scandal on America's reputation for excessive litigation. He stated that attorneys were merely seeking "to make money" from the scandal. In 2005 shortly after his election to the papacy, Cardinal Ratzinger appeared to promise to make amends for earlier miscalculations in handling the charges of priestly child sexual abuse when he made a public commitment to 'attend' to the scandal. How he intends to resolve the scandal remains to be seen.
The Department of Justice under former Attorney General John Ashcroft, himself an ardent born again Christian, took no action in that case, or, more accurately, those cases. Ten thousand victims of priestly child sexual abuse were discovered in America alone, and the Catholic Church identified four thousand four hundred and fifty (4,450) of its own priests who had been incriminated in the United States. As a direct result of the scandal, the Catholic Church is known to have paid out more than $1 billion in settlements to the victims of priestly child sexual abuse. During the past two years many new reports of priestly child sexual abuse have surfaced in the United States as well as in other nations. For instance, in Brazil a recent report identified over 1,400 priests incriminated in child sexual abuse. Whether any members of Opus Dei were involved in the scandal or the handling of it is obscured by the secrecy screening the organization's membership from public scrutiny. Whether members of Opus Dei wield significant influence in the Vatican's ongoing attempts to resolve the scandal through negotiations with American government, law enforcement and criminal justice agencies may never be made public.
What adds additional interest to the role of Opus Dei and the Catholic Church in US political life is that for many years unconfirmed reports have linked Supreme Court Justices Scalia and Thomas to Opus Dei. In March, 2001, Newsweek reported that the wife of Justice Scalia, "attended Opus Dei's spiritual functions." Justice Scalia's son, Father Paul Scalia, personally mediated the conversion of Justice Clarence Thomas to Roman Catholicism following his confirmation to the Supreme Court.
In recent years, the ultra-conservative jurist Robert Bork has converted to Roman Catholicism. In Washington, speculations about Bork and Opus Dei are relatively common. Other conservative Catholic politicians associated in the popular media with Opus Dei include Senators Sam Brownback and Rick Santorum. While the names of priests and officials of Opus Dei are made public, the identities of the lay members are not matters of public record, making it appear to be a secret organization. This situation leaves a question mark over those markedly conservative Catholics with political prominence.
Opus Dei purports to be apolitical, but its members have been associated with right-wing political causes since its inception. While the vast majority of America's Catholics are moderate to progressive in their views like Senators Kennedy and Kerry and Justice Kennedy, there is a small but vocal minority who adhere to ultra-conservative doctrine and dogma and consistently support neoconservative political candidates and their causes.
The rise to power of religious dogmatists in the guise of an Opus Dei clique on the Supreme Court through the rulings of Scalia, Thomas, and potentially Alito is a legitimate cause for concern not only on Capitol Hill, but also throughout America. Just imagine the outcry if the Supreme Court had four radical Islamicists, four zealous Zionists or four fixated followers of Reverend Sun Myung Moon. The case of Samuel Alito raises a serious question: is George Bush attempting to pack the Supreme Court with religious extremists?
If Alito is confirmed, his presence will create a majority of five Catholic justices on the US Supreme Court. Justice Anthony Kennedy is a liberal Catholic, while the recently appointed Chief Justice, John Roberts, is another deeply conservative Catholic jurist whose devout religious views have also given rise to speculation involving Opus Dei. Alito would bring to four the total of ultra-conservative Catholics on the US Supreme Court, forming an alliance that would be legal, judicial and religious.
In his infamous text, The Way, Saint JosemarÃa Escrivá wrote,
"Nonsectarianism. Neutrality. Those old myths that always try to seem new. Have you ever bothered to think how absurd it is to leave one's Catholicism aside on entering a university, or a professional association, or a scholarly meeting, or Congress, as if you were checking your hat at the door?"
There can be little serious doubt that the progressive Catholic members of the Senate are well aware of this famous tenet of Opus Dei. That may well be why they are stridently opposing the confirmation of the arch-conservative and dogmatic Catholic jurist, Judge Samuel Alito.
*Opus Dei, in full Prelature of the Holy Cross and Opus Dei, was founded in 1928 in Spain by JosemarÃa Escrivá de Balaguer y Albá (canonized in 2002). It is theologically conservative and accepts the teaching authority of the church without question. It was granted special status as the first and only personal prelature in the church by Pope John Paul II in 1982. Opus Dei is the subject of a growing body of academic papers, articles, books, documentaries and films surveying trends in western religion probing its political influence and its connection to fascist regimes.
Michael Carmichael has been a professional public affairs consultant, author and broadcaster since 1968, . In 2003, he founded The Planetary Movement Limited, a global public affairs organization based in the United Kingdom. He has appeared as a public affairs expert on the BBC's Today Programme, Hardtalk, PM, as well as numerous appearances on ITN, NPR and many European broadcasts examining politics and culture. He can be reahced through his website: www.planetarymovement.org
Democracy's Double Standard
NYTimes.com
Democracy's Double Standard
By HOSSEIN DERAKHSHAN
Tel Aviv
THE day before Iran's ninth presidential elections last June, President Bush sent a discouraging message to potential voters. Iran's electoral process "ignores the basic requirements of democracy," Mr. Bush declared, and these elections would be "sadly consistent" with the country's "oppressive record." For Iranians, there was no mistaking the American president's point: he was tacitly sanctioning the call that some Iranian exiles and activists had issued for an election boycott, based on exactly this logic.
An American administration that had called on other Middle Eastern populaces to vote in flawed elections greeted the Iranian electoral process with nothing but open disdain. It is worth revisiting this odd judgment call at a time when Hamas's victory in the Palestinian elections has raised even more questions about Washington's confused strategy of democracy promotion.
In Iran last June, the call for a boycott resonated with frustrated and apathetic voters. Many, if not most, moderates and reform advocates stayed home from the polls. And we all know what followed: the philosophy-loving moderate, Mohammad Khatami, was replaced as president by a radical militant, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad — a former military commander who presides over one of the most extreme governments post-revolutionary Iran has yet had.
That's right: with what appeared to be the endorsement of President Bush and dozens of American-backed satellite television channels that broadcast in Farsi, the disillusioned young people of Iran effectively took one of the world's most closely watched nuclear programs out of the hands of a reformer and placed it into the hands of a hard-line reactionary.
Can anyone now doubt that Iranian elections, however flawed, really do matter? When Mr. Khatami came to power, his declared goals were to establish the rule of law, demand equal rights for all citizens and reconcile Iran with the world. He may not have succeeded in all of those endeavors, but Mr. Ahmadinejad has entered government with manifestly opposite priorities.
The new president's allies in Parliament recently concluded that nearly 80 percent of the books published under President Khatami violated revolutionary values and should be placed under restrictions. Films that promote feminism, secularism and liberalism are to be banned. And while President Khatami built his international reputation on his call for a "dialogue among civilizations," President Ahmadinejad has reached out to racists and anti-Semites instead.
It's true that Iranian elections are not quite democratic, because the unelected Guardian Council reserves the right to bar candidates. But the real problem here is that boycotting semi-democratic elections ultimately will not make such a system more democratic.
The rise of Mr. Ahmadinejad, and the threat he poses to the stability of a volatile region, demonstrates that promoting apathy in a semi-democratic system can only strengthen the radical anti-democracy forces. And it raises a question as to whether that is what hawks in Washington actually wanted.
Contrast the "don't vote" message that President Bush sent to Iranians to the one delivered to Iraqis through a major media campaign and other costly means: "Your destiny is in your own hands. Disappoint the anti-democracy radicals and go out and vote."
If the United States is serious about promoting democratic change in Iran, it needs to try the same approach that brought Iraqis to the polls despite mortal danger. Mr. Bush and his supporters should encourage the people of Iran to participate in the next election. And they should urge Iranians to vote for someone who will make their country more open and democratic, rather than more threatening, as Iran under President Ahmadinejad has become.
Democracy's Double Standard
By HOSSEIN DERAKHSHAN
Tel Aviv
THE day before Iran's ninth presidential elections last June, President Bush sent a discouraging message to potential voters. Iran's electoral process "ignores the basic requirements of democracy," Mr. Bush declared, and these elections would be "sadly consistent" with the country's "oppressive record." For Iranians, there was no mistaking the American president's point: he was tacitly sanctioning the call that some Iranian exiles and activists had issued for an election boycott, based on exactly this logic.
An American administration that had called on other Middle Eastern populaces to vote in flawed elections greeted the Iranian electoral process with nothing but open disdain. It is worth revisiting this odd judgment call at a time when Hamas's victory in the Palestinian elections has raised even more questions about Washington's confused strategy of democracy promotion.
In Iran last June, the call for a boycott resonated with frustrated and apathetic voters. Many, if not most, moderates and reform advocates stayed home from the polls. And we all know what followed: the philosophy-loving moderate, Mohammad Khatami, was replaced as president by a radical militant, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad — a former military commander who presides over one of the most extreme governments post-revolutionary Iran has yet had.
That's right: with what appeared to be the endorsement of President Bush and dozens of American-backed satellite television channels that broadcast in Farsi, the disillusioned young people of Iran effectively took one of the world's most closely watched nuclear programs out of the hands of a reformer and placed it into the hands of a hard-line reactionary.
Can anyone now doubt that Iranian elections, however flawed, really do matter? When Mr. Khatami came to power, his declared goals were to establish the rule of law, demand equal rights for all citizens and reconcile Iran with the world. He may not have succeeded in all of those endeavors, but Mr. Ahmadinejad has entered government with manifestly opposite priorities.
The new president's allies in Parliament recently concluded that nearly 80 percent of the books published under President Khatami violated revolutionary values and should be placed under restrictions. Films that promote feminism, secularism and liberalism are to be banned. And while President Khatami built his international reputation on his call for a "dialogue among civilizations," President Ahmadinejad has reached out to racists and anti-Semites instead.
It's true that Iranian elections are not quite democratic, because the unelected Guardian Council reserves the right to bar candidates. But the real problem here is that boycotting semi-democratic elections ultimately will not make such a system more democratic.
The rise of Mr. Ahmadinejad, and the threat he poses to the stability of a volatile region, demonstrates that promoting apathy in a semi-democratic system can only strengthen the radical anti-democracy forces. And it raises a question as to whether that is what hawks in Washington actually wanted.
Contrast the "don't vote" message that President Bush sent to Iranians to the one delivered to Iraqis through a major media campaign and other costly means: "Your destiny is in your own hands. Disappoint the anti-democracy radicals and go out and vote."
If the United States is serious about promoting democratic change in Iran, it needs to try the same approach that brought Iraqis to the polls despite mortal danger. Mr. Bush and his supporters should encourage the people of Iran to participate in the next election. And they should urge Iranians to vote for someone who will make their country more open and democratic, rather than more threatening, as Iran under President Ahmadinejad has become.
Sunday, January 29, 2006
US Army forces 50,000 soldiers into extended duty
US Army forces 50,000 soldiers into extended duty
Sun Jan 29, 2006 2:46 PM GMT16
Printer Friendly | Email Article | RSS
By Will Dunham
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. Army has forced about 50,000 soldiers to
continue serving after their voluntary stints ended under a policy called
"stop-loss," but while some dispute its fairness, court challenges have
fallen flat.
The policy applies to soldiers in units due to deploy for the Iraq and
Afghanistan wars. The Army said stop-loss is vital to maintain units that
are cohesive and ready to fight. But some experts said it shows how badly
the Army is stretched and could further complicate efforts to attract new
recruits.
"As the war in Iraq drags on, the Army is accumulating a collection of
problems that cumulatively could call into question the viability of an
all-volunteer force," said defence analyst Loren Thompson of the Lexington
Institute think tank.
"When a service has to repeatedly resort to compelling the retention of
people who want to leave, you're edging away from the whole notion of
volunteerism."
When soldiers enlist, they sign a contract to serve for a certain number of
years, and know precisely when their service obligation ends so they can
return to civilian life. But stop-loss allows the Army, mindful of having
fully manned units, to keep soldiers on the verge of leaving the military.
Under the policy, soldiers who normally would leave when their commitments
expire must remain in the Army, starting 90 days before their unit is
scheduled to depart, through the end of their deployment and up to another
90 days after returning to their home base.
With yearlong tours in Iraq and Afghanistan, some soldiers can be forced to
stay in the Army an extra 18 months.
HARDSHIP FOR SOME SOLDIERS
Lt. Col. Bryan Hilferty, an Army spokesman, said that "there is no plan to
discontinue stop-loss."
"We understand that this is causing hardship for some individual soldiers,
and we take individual situations into consideration," Hilferty said.
Hilferty said there are about 12,500 soldiers in the regular Army, as well
as the part-time National Guard and Reserve, currently serving involuntarily
under the policy, and that about 50,000 have had their service extended
since the program began in 2002. An initial limited use of stop-loss was
expanded in subsequent years to affect many more.
"While the policies relative to the stop-loss seem harsh, in terms of
suspending scheduled separation dates (for leaving the Army), they are not
absolute," Hilferty said. "And we take individual situations into
consideration for compelling and compassionate reasons."
Hilferty noted the Army has given "exceptions" to 210 enlisted soldiers "due
to personal hardship reasons" since October 2004, allowing them to leave as
scheduled.
"The nation is at war and we are stop-lossing units deploying to a combat
theatre to ensure they mobilise, train, deploy, fight, redeploy and
demobilise as a team," he said.
NO LUCK IN COURT
A few soldiers have gone to court to challenge stop-loss.
One such case fizzled last week, when U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth in
Washington dismissed a suit filed in 2004 by two Army National Guard
soldiers. The suit claimed the Army fraudulently induced soldiers to enlist
without specifying that their service might be involuntarily extended.
Courts also have backed the policy's legality in Oregon and California
cases.
Jules Lobel, a University of Pittsburgh law professor who represented the
National Guard soldiers, said a successful challenge to stop-loss was still
possible.
"I think the whole stop-loss program is a misrepresentation to people of how
long they're going to actually serve. I think it's caused tremendous morale
problems, tremendous psychological damage to people," Lobel said.
"When you sign up for the military, you're saying, 'I'll give you, say, six
years and then after six years I get my life back.' And they're saying, 'No,
really, we can extend you indefinitely.'"
Congressional critics have assailed stop-loss, and 2004 Democratic
presidential nominee John Kerry called it "a back-door draft." The United
States abolished the draft in 1973, but the all-volunteer military never
before has been tested by a protracted war.
A report commissioned by the Pentagon called stop-loss a "short-term fix"
enabling the Army to meet ongoing troop deployment requirements, but said
such policies "risk breaking the force as recruitment and retention problems
mount." It was written by Andrew Krepinevich, a retired Army officer.
Thompson added, "The persistent use of stop-loss underscores the fact that
the war-fighting burden is being carried by a handful of soldiers while the
vast majority of citizens incur no sacrifice at all."
© Reuters 2006. All Rights Reserved.
Sun Jan 29, 2006 2:46 PM GMT16
Printer Friendly | Email Article | RSS
By Will Dunham
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. Army has forced about 50,000 soldiers to
continue serving after their voluntary stints ended under a policy called
"stop-loss," but while some dispute its fairness, court challenges have
fallen flat.
The policy applies to soldiers in units due to deploy for the Iraq and
Afghanistan wars. The Army said stop-loss is vital to maintain units that
are cohesive and ready to fight. But some experts said it shows how badly
the Army is stretched and could further complicate efforts to attract new
recruits.
"As the war in Iraq drags on, the Army is accumulating a collection of
problems that cumulatively could call into question the viability of an
all-volunteer force," said defence analyst Loren Thompson of the Lexington
Institute think tank.
"When a service has to repeatedly resort to compelling the retention of
people who want to leave, you're edging away from the whole notion of
volunteerism."
When soldiers enlist, they sign a contract to serve for a certain number of
years, and know precisely when their service obligation ends so they can
return to civilian life. But stop-loss allows the Army, mindful of having
fully manned units, to keep soldiers on the verge of leaving the military.
Under the policy, soldiers who normally would leave when their commitments
expire must remain in the Army, starting 90 days before their unit is
scheduled to depart, through the end of their deployment and up to another
90 days after returning to their home base.
With yearlong tours in Iraq and Afghanistan, some soldiers can be forced to
stay in the Army an extra 18 months.
HARDSHIP FOR SOME SOLDIERS
Lt. Col. Bryan Hilferty, an Army spokesman, said that "there is no plan to
discontinue stop-loss."
"We understand that this is causing hardship for some individual soldiers,
and we take individual situations into consideration," Hilferty said.
Hilferty said there are about 12,500 soldiers in the regular Army, as well
as the part-time National Guard and Reserve, currently serving involuntarily
under the policy, and that about 50,000 have had their service extended
since the program began in 2002. An initial limited use of stop-loss was
expanded in subsequent years to affect many more.
"While the policies relative to the stop-loss seem harsh, in terms of
suspending scheduled separation dates (for leaving the Army), they are not
absolute," Hilferty said. "And we take individual situations into
consideration for compelling and compassionate reasons."
Hilferty noted the Army has given "exceptions" to 210 enlisted soldiers "due
to personal hardship reasons" since October 2004, allowing them to leave as
scheduled.
"The nation is at war and we are stop-lossing units deploying to a combat
theatre to ensure they mobilise, train, deploy, fight, redeploy and
demobilise as a team," he said.
NO LUCK IN COURT
A few soldiers have gone to court to challenge stop-loss.
One such case fizzled last week, when U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth in
Washington dismissed a suit filed in 2004 by two Army National Guard
soldiers. The suit claimed the Army fraudulently induced soldiers to enlist
without specifying that their service might be involuntarily extended.
Courts also have backed the policy's legality in Oregon and California
cases.
Jules Lobel, a University of Pittsburgh law professor who represented the
National Guard soldiers, said a successful challenge to stop-loss was still
possible.
"I think the whole stop-loss program is a misrepresentation to people of how
long they're going to actually serve. I think it's caused tremendous morale
problems, tremendous psychological damage to people," Lobel said.
"When you sign up for the military, you're saying, 'I'll give you, say, six
years and then after six years I get my life back.' And they're saying, 'No,
really, we can extend you indefinitely.'"
Congressional critics have assailed stop-loss, and 2004 Democratic
presidential nominee John Kerry called it "a back-door draft." The United
States abolished the draft in 1973, but the all-volunteer military never
before has been tested by a protracted war.
A report commissioned by the Pentagon called stop-loss a "short-term fix"
enabling the Army to meet ongoing troop deployment requirements, but said
such policies "risk breaking the force as recruitment and retention problems
mount." It was written by Andrew Krepinevich, a retired Army officer.
Thompson added, "The persistent use of stop-loss underscores the fact that
the war-fighting burden is being carried by a handful of soldiers while the
vast majority of citizens incur no sacrifice at all."
© Reuters 2006. All Rights Reserved.
Newsweek: Bush appointees revolted over executive
Newsweek: Bush appointees revolted over executive
branch 'overreach'
RAW STORY
Published: January 29, 2006
Print This | Email This
Excerpted from Monday's Newsweek (to highlight central
themes in a long article), titled "Palace Revolt: They
were loyal conservatives, and Bush appointees. They
fought a quiet battle to rein in the president's power
in the war on terror. And they paid a price for it. A
NEWSWEEK investigation. By Daniel Klaidman, Stuart
Taylor Jr. and Evan Thomas." Full article here.
#
Feb. 6, 2006 issue - James Comey, a lanky, 6-foot-8
former prosecutor who looks a little like Jimmy
Stewart, resigned as deputy attorney general in the
summer of 2005. The press and public hardly noticed.
Comey's farewell speech, delivered in the Great Hall
of the Justice Department, contained all the
predictable, if heartfelt, appreciations. But mixed in
among the platitudes was an unusual passage. Comey
thanked "people who came to my office, or my home, or
called my cell phone late at night, to quietly tell me
when I was about to make a mistake; they were the
people committed to getting it right—and to doing the
right thing—whatever the price. These people," said
Comey, "know who they are. Some of them did pay a
price for their commitment to right, but they wouldn't
have it any other way."
One of those people, NEWSWEEK reports, was former
assistant attorney general Jack Goldsmith.
Advertisement
Goldsmith and other Justice Department lawyers, backed
by their intrepid boss Comey, had stood up to the
hard-liners, centered in the office of the vice
president, who wanted to give the president virtually
unlimited powers in the war on terror. Demanding that
the White House stop using what they saw as farfetched
rationales for riding rough-shod over the law and the
Constitution, Goldsmith and the others fought to bring
government spying and interrogation methods within the
law. They did so at their peril; ostracized, some were
denied promotions, while others left for more
comfortable climes in private law firms and academia.
Some went so far as to line up private lawyers in
2004, anticipating that the president's eavesdropping
program would draw scrutiny from Congress, if not
prosecutors. These government attorneys did not always
succeed, but their efforts went a long way toward
vindicating the principle of a nation of laws and not
men.
In December 2003, Goldsmith was steering the White
House Official of Legal counsel. He informed the
Defense Department that their March 2003 torture memo
was "under review" and could no longer be relied upon.
It is almost unheard-of for an administration to
overturn its own OLC opinions. Cheney's chief of staff
was beside himself. But his problems with Goldsmith
were just beginning. In the jittery aftermath of 9/11,
the Bush administration had pushed the top-secret
National Security Agency to do a better and more
expansive job of electronically eavesdropping on Al
Qaeda's global communications. Under existing law—the
Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, or FISA,
adopted in 1978 as a post-Watergate reform—the NSA
needed (in the opinion of most legal experts) to get a
warrant to eavesdrop on communications coming into or
going out of the United States. Reasoning that there
was no time to obtain warrants from a secret court set
up under FISA (a sometimes cumbersome process), the
Bush administration justified going around the law by
invoking a post-9/11 congressional resolution
authorizing use of force against global terror.
There was one catch: the secret program had to be
reapproved by the attorney general every 45 days. It
was Goldsmith's job to advise the A.G. on the legality
of the program. In March 2004, John Ashcroft was in
the hospital with a serious pancreatic condition. At
Justice, Comey, Ashcroft's No. 2, was acting as
attorney general. The grandson of an Irish cop and a
former U.S. attorney from Manhattan, Comey, 45, is a
straight arrow. (It was Comey who appointed his
friend—the equally straitlaced and dogged Patrick
Fitzgerald—to be the special prosecutor in the Valerie
Plame leak-investigation case.) Goldsmith raised with
Comey serious questions about the secret eavesdropping
program, according to two sources familiar with the
episode. The White House was told: no reauthorization.
Ultimately, a compromise was worked out. But Goldsmith
would eventually be sidelined and leave for Harvard,
taking a post in academia.
Read the full article here.
http://rawstory.com/news/2005/Newsweek_Bush_appointees_revolted_over_executive_0129.html
branch 'overreach'
RAW STORY
Published: January 29, 2006
Print This | Email This
Excerpted from Monday's Newsweek (to highlight central
themes in a long article), titled "Palace Revolt: They
were loyal conservatives, and Bush appointees. They
fought a quiet battle to rein in the president's power
in the war on terror. And they paid a price for it. A
NEWSWEEK investigation. By Daniel Klaidman, Stuart
Taylor Jr. and Evan Thomas." Full article here.
#
Feb. 6, 2006 issue - James Comey, a lanky, 6-foot-8
former prosecutor who looks a little like Jimmy
Stewart, resigned as deputy attorney general in the
summer of 2005. The press and public hardly noticed.
Comey's farewell speech, delivered in the Great Hall
of the Justice Department, contained all the
predictable, if heartfelt, appreciations. But mixed in
among the platitudes was an unusual passage. Comey
thanked "people who came to my office, or my home, or
called my cell phone late at night, to quietly tell me
when I was about to make a mistake; they were the
people committed to getting it right—and to doing the
right thing—whatever the price. These people," said
Comey, "know who they are. Some of them did pay a
price for their commitment to right, but they wouldn't
have it any other way."
One of those people, NEWSWEEK reports, was former
assistant attorney general Jack Goldsmith.
Advertisement
Goldsmith and other Justice Department lawyers, backed
by their intrepid boss Comey, had stood up to the
hard-liners, centered in the office of the vice
president, who wanted to give the president virtually
unlimited powers in the war on terror. Demanding that
the White House stop using what they saw as farfetched
rationales for riding rough-shod over the law and the
Constitution, Goldsmith and the others fought to bring
government spying and interrogation methods within the
law. They did so at their peril; ostracized, some were
denied promotions, while others left for more
comfortable climes in private law firms and academia.
Some went so far as to line up private lawyers in
2004, anticipating that the president's eavesdropping
program would draw scrutiny from Congress, if not
prosecutors. These government attorneys did not always
succeed, but their efforts went a long way toward
vindicating the principle of a nation of laws and not
men.
In December 2003, Goldsmith was steering the White
House Official of Legal counsel. He informed the
Defense Department that their March 2003 torture memo
was "under review" and could no longer be relied upon.
It is almost unheard-of for an administration to
overturn its own OLC opinions. Cheney's chief of staff
was beside himself. But his problems with Goldsmith
were just beginning. In the jittery aftermath of 9/11,
the Bush administration had pushed the top-secret
National Security Agency to do a better and more
expansive job of electronically eavesdropping on Al
Qaeda's global communications. Under existing law—the
Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, or FISA,
adopted in 1978 as a post-Watergate reform—the NSA
needed (in the opinion of most legal experts) to get a
warrant to eavesdrop on communications coming into or
going out of the United States. Reasoning that there
was no time to obtain warrants from a secret court set
up under FISA (a sometimes cumbersome process), the
Bush administration justified going around the law by
invoking a post-9/11 congressional resolution
authorizing use of force against global terror.
There was one catch: the secret program had to be
reapproved by the attorney general every 45 days. It
was Goldsmith's job to advise the A.G. on the legality
of the program. In March 2004, John Ashcroft was in
the hospital with a serious pancreatic condition. At
Justice, Comey, Ashcroft's No. 2, was acting as
attorney general. The grandson of an Irish cop and a
former U.S. attorney from Manhattan, Comey, 45, is a
straight arrow. (It was Comey who appointed his
friend—the equally straitlaced and dogged Patrick
Fitzgerald—to be the special prosecutor in the Valerie
Plame leak-investigation case.) Goldsmith raised with
Comey serious questions about the secret eavesdropping
program, according to two sources familiar with the
episode. The White House was told: no reauthorization.
Ultimately, a compromise was worked out. But Goldsmith
would eventually be sidelined and leave for Harvard,
taking a post in academia.
Read the full article here.
http://rawstory.com/news/2005/Newsweek_Bush_appointees_revolted_over_executive_0129.html
Spy vs Spy
Spy vs Spy
Putsch counts on stupidity, fear and ignorance to get his way
© Bryan Zepp Jamieson
1/29/06
http://www.mytown.ca/zepp
The good news is that the American people can’t possibly be as stupid as
George W. Putsch thinks they are.
The bad news is that still leaves room for an awful lot of stupid.
In the continuing saga over domestic spying (corporate media-speak for
“illegal wiretapping”), Putsch has come out with a new gambit. “I can do
it” didn’t seem to convince the public that yes, he can do it. “I
checked with Congress” didn’t work when Congress chorused, “No you
didn’t.” “The Constitution says I can do it” didn’t work, because anyone
with half a brain could tell you that the fourth amendment expressly
says he can’t do it. “I’m only spying on terrorists” didn’t work, since
it was unlikely that there were millions of terrorists inside the United
States. If there are, all the wiretaps in the world can’t save the
government now. For better or for worse, though, it’s pretty unlikely
that there’s as many as 1,000 terrorists in America, and most of those
wouldn’t talk to a member of al-Qaida for any reason in the world.
What’s more, they are all-American terrorists who usually vote
Republican. When they are preparing for the coming Race War or figuring
out new ways to make abortionists pay for their sins.
So the latest gambit is to ask permission while not admitting that he
acted improperly. Although he’s already warned Congress that he won’t
explain why he needs permission or why for security reasons. (Oddly
enough, the same reason was proffered for withholding documents relating
to federal response on Katrina: Jon Stewart wryly suggested that if they
released documents on how to deal with hurricanes, future hurricanes
would know our weaknesses.)
Politicians do this all the time, the act of securing ex post facto
legal justification for misdeeds, and it often gets them off the hook.
But in this case, the permission is not Congress’s to give. They can’t
pass a law directing the President to disregard the bill of rights. Even
a finely tuned legal mind like Scam Scalito’s would have to admit to that.
But Putsch is going to try that one anyway, and hope that if he can get
the lickspittles in the House GOP to rubberstamp his actions, the
American public will just shrug, mumble, “Oh, well, in that case...” and
turn back to munching chips and watching American Idol.
One of the more whorish television networks ran a poll on the issue,
asking if people minded the government listening in on phone calls with
suspected terrorists. Not surprisingly, most people said they wouldn’t mind.
But the poll didn’t mention that said eavesdropping would be without
warrants, and would be snooping, not just on terrorists, but on peace
activists, environmentalists, anyone who was acquainted with anyone who
might know someone who knew a possible terrorist, and Democrats.
AP-Ipsos ran a slightly more honest poll, asking people if the
government should be required to get a warrant before conducting a
wiretap on a conversation with a suspected terrorists. Only a
disheartening 56% agreed. Forty-two percent of respondents were
perfectly happy to throw away the bill of rights for “the war on terror”.
Worse was a poll that asked if people minded the president foregoing
warrants for wiretaps if it meant going after terrorists. Fifty four
percent agreed with that.
I hope these clowns just didn’t think before answering. If it’s their
considered stance, I hope they’ll stop calling themselves “Americans”
and thus not insult the ten generations of Americans who fought and
sometimes died for the right to not have the government snoop at will in
their personal affairs.
America’s always had custardheads. “Only the English can protect us from
the French and the Indians.” “Yes, slavery is nasty, but it’s the only
way to avoid a civil war.” “Maybe we can work some sort of deal with
Hitler.” “George needs to spy on our phone calls so he can catch bin Laden.”
They are a useless nuisance, normally. But if they are in the majority,
America really is finished.
Lots of room for stupid. Another poll says that 57% support military
action against Iran. Granted, the poll is dishonest, and stipulates that
Iran is going to have a nuclear weapon in the near future (most analysts
don’t see that happening for ten years, at least), and of course
“military action” is carefully left vague. You have to be pretty stupid
just to believe this administration’s assertion that Iran is on the
verge of developing the bomb.
I’m guessing that most people have only the vaguest notion that there is
a sort of a stand off going with Iran, and they probably think it’s just
some third world backwards desert place that’s full of Arabs.
It’s none of those things. It’s a country of sixty million with a
fully-developed infrastructure. That’s nearly four times the size of
Iraq. The people generally like their government and their leader, and
will fight for both. And much of the country is mountainous, and heavily
forested. Lots of places to hide lots of things, and one intelligence
report says that the Iranian nuclear program is widely scattered, in
between 40 and 120 locales, with lots of redundancy so if Israel and
America were to attack, get lucky, and actually hit part of their
program, it wouldn’t be an irreplaceable loss.
So a “military strike” in the form of a bombing raid or two would not
only be useless, but quite probably counterproductive. The president if
Iran is a religious fundamentalist who gets people to follow him by
trash-talking a potential enemy. That would be pretty much like the
President of America. Which means he’s no crazier than Putsch
The bad news is that still leaves room for awful lot of crazy.
An attack from Israel and/or America would play right into his hands,
and give him justification for scaremongering. It would be for him what
9/11 was for Putsch. In fact, he might just arrange to have an attack
that is very gaudy and blame Israel and America for it. It’s not like
that’s never happened before.
So 57% favor an attack on a country for reasons that are pretty much
bogus, that will accomplish nothing, and will only hurt American interests.
Say, isn’t that about where we were three years ago, when Putsch was
trying to persuade us that Saddam had or was about to get the bomb? Any
reason why anyone who isn’t capital-S Stupid should believe him this
time around?
Putsch counts on stupidity, fear and ignorance to get his way
© Bryan Zepp Jamieson
1/29/06
http://www.mytown.ca/zepp
The good news is that the American people can’t possibly be as stupid as
George W. Putsch thinks they are.
The bad news is that still leaves room for an awful lot of stupid.
In the continuing saga over domestic spying (corporate media-speak for
“illegal wiretapping”), Putsch has come out with a new gambit. “I can do
it” didn’t seem to convince the public that yes, he can do it. “I
checked with Congress” didn’t work when Congress chorused, “No you
didn’t.” “The Constitution says I can do it” didn’t work, because anyone
with half a brain could tell you that the fourth amendment expressly
says he can’t do it. “I’m only spying on terrorists” didn’t work, since
it was unlikely that there were millions of terrorists inside the United
States. If there are, all the wiretaps in the world can’t save the
government now. For better or for worse, though, it’s pretty unlikely
that there’s as many as 1,000 terrorists in America, and most of those
wouldn’t talk to a member of al-Qaida for any reason in the world.
What’s more, they are all-American terrorists who usually vote
Republican. When they are preparing for the coming Race War or figuring
out new ways to make abortionists pay for their sins.
So the latest gambit is to ask permission while not admitting that he
acted improperly. Although he’s already warned Congress that he won’t
explain why he needs permission or why for security reasons. (Oddly
enough, the same reason was proffered for withholding documents relating
to federal response on Katrina: Jon Stewart wryly suggested that if they
released documents on how to deal with hurricanes, future hurricanes
would know our weaknesses.)
Politicians do this all the time, the act of securing ex post facto
legal justification for misdeeds, and it often gets them off the hook.
But in this case, the permission is not Congress’s to give. They can’t
pass a law directing the President to disregard the bill of rights. Even
a finely tuned legal mind like Scam Scalito’s would have to admit to that.
But Putsch is going to try that one anyway, and hope that if he can get
the lickspittles in the House GOP to rubberstamp his actions, the
American public will just shrug, mumble, “Oh, well, in that case...” and
turn back to munching chips and watching American Idol.
One of the more whorish television networks ran a poll on the issue,
asking if people minded the government listening in on phone calls with
suspected terrorists. Not surprisingly, most people said they wouldn’t mind.
But the poll didn’t mention that said eavesdropping would be without
warrants, and would be snooping, not just on terrorists, but on peace
activists, environmentalists, anyone who was acquainted with anyone who
might know someone who knew a possible terrorist, and Democrats.
AP-Ipsos ran a slightly more honest poll, asking people if the
government should be required to get a warrant before conducting a
wiretap on a conversation with a suspected terrorists. Only a
disheartening 56% agreed. Forty-two percent of respondents were
perfectly happy to throw away the bill of rights for “the war on terror”.
Worse was a poll that asked if people minded the president foregoing
warrants for wiretaps if it meant going after terrorists. Fifty four
percent agreed with that.
I hope these clowns just didn’t think before answering. If it’s their
considered stance, I hope they’ll stop calling themselves “Americans”
and thus not insult the ten generations of Americans who fought and
sometimes died for the right to not have the government snoop at will in
their personal affairs.
America’s always had custardheads. “Only the English can protect us from
the French and the Indians.” “Yes, slavery is nasty, but it’s the only
way to avoid a civil war.” “Maybe we can work some sort of deal with
Hitler.” “George needs to spy on our phone calls so he can catch bin Laden.”
They are a useless nuisance, normally. But if they are in the majority,
America really is finished.
Lots of room for stupid. Another poll says that 57% support military
action against Iran. Granted, the poll is dishonest, and stipulates that
Iran is going to have a nuclear weapon in the near future (most analysts
don’t see that happening for ten years, at least), and of course
“military action” is carefully left vague. You have to be pretty stupid
just to believe this administration’s assertion that Iran is on the
verge of developing the bomb.
I’m guessing that most people have only the vaguest notion that there is
a sort of a stand off going with Iran, and they probably think it’s just
some third world backwards desert place that’s full of Arabs.
It’s none of those things. It’s a country of sixty million with a
fully-developed infrastructure. That’s nearly four times the size of
Iraq. The people generally like their government and their leader, and
will fight for both. And much of the country is mountainous, and heavily
forested. Lots of places to hide lots of things, and one intelligence
report says that the Iranian nuclear program is widely scattered, in
between 40 and 120 locales, with lots of redundancy so if Israel and
America were to attack, get lucky, and actually hit part of their
program, it wouldn’t be an irreplaceable loss.
So a “military strike” in the form of a bombing raid or two would not
only be useless, but quite probably counterproductive. The president if
Iran is a religious fundamentalist who gets people to follow him by
trash-talking a potential enemy. That would be pretty much like the
President of America. Which means he’s no crazier than Putsch
The bad news is that still leaves room for awful lot of crazy.
An attack from Israel and/or America would play right into his hands,
and give him justification for scaremongering. It would be for him what
9/11 was for Putsch. In fact, he might just arrange to have an attack
that is very gaudy and blame Israel and America for it. It’s not like
that’s never happened before.
So 57% favor an attack on a country for reasons that are pretty much
bogus, that will accomplish nothing, and will only hurt American interests.
Say, isn’t that about where we were three years ago, when Putsch was
trying to persuade us that Saddam had or was about to get the bomb? Any
reason why anyone who isn’t capital-S Stupid should believe him this
time around?
Audit: U.S.-Led Occupation Squandered Aid
Audit: U.S.-Led Occupation Squandered Aid
By JIM KRANE, Associated Press Writer
42 minutes ago
Iraqi money gambled away in the Philippines. Thousands
spent on a swimming pool that was never used. An
elevator repaired so poorly that it crashed, killing
people.
A U.S. government audit found American-led occupation
authorities squandered tens of millions of dollars
that were supposed to be used to rebuild Iraq through
undocumented spending and outright fraud.
In some cases, auditors recommend criminal charges be
filed against the perpetrators. In others, it asks the
U.S. ambassador to Iraq to recoup the money.
Dryly written audit reports describe the Coalition
Provisional Authority's offices in the south-central
city of Hillah being awash in bricks of $100 bills
taken from a central vault without documentation.
It describes one agent who kept almost $700,000 in
cash in an unlocked footlocker and mentions a U.S.
soldier who gambled away as much as $60,000 in
reconstruction funds in the Philippines.
"Tens of millions of dollars in cash had gone in and
out of the South-Central Region vault without any
tracking of who deposited or withdrew the money, and
why it was taken out," says a report by the Special
Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction, which is in
the midst of a series of audits for the Pentagon and
State Department.
Much of the first audit reports deal with contracting
in south-central Iraq, one of the country's
least-hostile regions. Audits have yet to be released
for the occupation authority's spending in the rest of
Iraq.
The audits offer a window into the chaotic U.S.-led
occupation of Iraq of 2003-04, when inexperienced
American officials — including workers from President
Bush's election campaign — organized a cash-intensive
"hearts and minds" mission to rebuild Iraq's
devastated economy.
But the corruption and incompetence documented in the
reports reveal that much of the effort, however
well-intentioned, was wasted.
The failure of the rebuilding effort has been borne
out most vividly by the rise of a virulent
anti-American insurgency that has claimed most of the
2,237 U.S. military lives lost since the war began.
In some cases, auditors could find no trace of cash,
much of which came from Iraqi oil revenues overseen by
the occupation authority.
"Those deficiencies were so significant that we were
precluded from accomplishing our stated objectives,"
the auditors said of U.S. officials in Hillah being
unable to account for $97 million of the $120 million
in Iraqi oil revenues earmarked for rebuilding
projects.
An October 2005 audit found documentation for the
spending of just $8 million of that money.
Negligence proved deadly in at least one case. Three
Iraqis plummeted to their deaths in an elevator in the
Hillah General Hospital that was certified to have
been replaced by a contractor who received $662,800.
Also in Hillah, occupation officials spent $108,140 to
replace pumps and fix the city's Olympic swimming
pool. But the contractor merely polished the old
plumbing to make it look new and collected his money.
When the pool was filled, the water came out a murky
brown and the pool's reopening had to be canceled. The
reports did not identify the contractors involved.
Auditors have asked the U.S. ambassador to recover a
total of $571,823 that the reports describe as
overpaid funds.
In some cases, cash simply disappeared.
Two occupation authority field agents responsible for
paying contractors left Iraq without accounting for
more than $700,000 each. When auditors confronted
their manager and asked where the money was, the
manger tried to clear one of the agents through false
paperwork.
"This appears to be an attempt to remove outstanding
balances by simply washing accounts," the auditor
said. The two agents were not identified and there was
no word on whether the pair were referred for
prosecution.
One report describes mismanagement of more than 2,000
small contracts in south-central Iraq worth $88
million. Occupation staffers or those they supervised
handed out millions to companies that never submitted
required competitive bids or that were paid for
unfinished work.
Other examples cited in the reports:
_Only a quarter of $23 million entrusted to civilian
and military project and contracting officers to pay
contractors ever found its way to those contractors.
_One contractor was paid $14,000 on four separate
occasions for the same job.
_Of $7.3 million spent on a police academy near
Hillah, auditors could account for just $4 million.
They said $1.3 million was wasted on overpriced or
duplicate construction or equipment not delivered.
More than $2 million was missing.
_U.S. personnel "needlessly disbursed more than $1.8
million" of the estimated $2.3 million spent for
renovating the library in the Shiite holy city of
Karbala.
_The library contractor delivered only 18 of 68
personal computers called for and did not install
Internet wiring or software. The computers worked only
as stand-alones.
_The U.S.-led security transition command spent
$945,000 for seven armored Mercedes-Benzes that were
too lightly armored for Iraq. Auditors were able to
account for only six of the cars.
_At one point, several paying agents kept cash inside
the same filing cabinet in the Hillah vault. One agent
took $100,000 from another's stack of cash to clear
his own balance. "This was only discovered because the
other paying agent had to make a disbursement that day
and realized that he was short cash," the report says.
___
On the Net:
Special Inspector General:
http://www.sigir.mil/audit(underscore)reports.html
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060129/ap_on_re_mi_ea/iraq_squandered_aid&printer=1;_ylt=AmLIBi85P9HtMzLs9qrSrxIUewgF;_ylu=X3oDMTA3MXN1bHE0BHNlYwN0bWE-
By JIM KRANE, Associated Press Writer
42 minutes ago
Iraqi money gambled away in the Philippines. Thousands
spent on a swimming pool that was never used. An
elevator repaired so poorly that it crashed, killing
people.
A U.S. government audit found American-led occupation
authorities squandered tens of millions of dollars
that were supposed to be used to rebuild Iraq through
undocumented spending and outright fraud.
In some cases, auditors recommend criminal charges be
filed against the perpetrators. In others, it asks the
U.S. ambassador to Iraq to recoup the money.
Dryly written audit reports describe the Coalition
Provisional Authority's offices in the south-central
city of Hillah being awash in bricks of $100 bills
taken from a central vault without documentation.
It describes one agent who kept almost $700,000 in
cash in an unlocked footlocker and mentions a U.S.
soldier who gambled away as much as $60,000 in
reconstruction funds in the Philippines.
"Tens of millions of dollars in cash had gone in and
out of the South-Central Region vault without any
tracking of who deposited or withdrew the money, and
why it was taken out," says a report by the Special
Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction, which is in
the midst of a series of audits for the Pentagon and
State Department.
Much of the first audit reports deal with contracting
in south-central Iraq, one of the country's
least-hostile regions. Audits have yet to be released
for the occupation authority's spending in the rest of
Iraq.
The audits offer a window into the chaotic U.S.-led
occupation of Iraq of 2003-04, when inexperienced
American officials — including workers from President
Bush's election campaign — organized a cash-intensive
"hearts and minds" mission to rebuild Iraq's
devastated economy.
But the corruption and incompetence documented in the
reports reveal that much of the effort, however
well-intentioned, was wasted.
The failure of the rebuilding effort has been borne
out most vividly by the rise of a virulent
anti-American insurgency that has claimed most of the
2,237 U.S. military lives lost since the war began.
In some cases, auditors could find no trace of cash,
much of which came from Iraqi oil revenues overseen by
the occupation authority.
"Those deficiencies were so significant that we were
precluded from accomplishing our stated objectives,"
the auditors said of U.S. officials in Hillah being
unable to account for $97 million of the $120 million
in Iraqi oil revenues earmarked for rebuilding
projects.
An October 2005 audit found documentation for the
spending of just $8 million of that money.
Negligence proved deadly in at least one case. Three
Iraqis plummeted to their deaths in an elevator in the
Hillah General Hospital that was certified to have
been replaced by a contractor who received $662,800.
Also in Hillah, occupation officials spent $108,140 to
replace pumps and fix the city's Olympic swimming
pool. But the contractor merely polished the old
plumbing to make it look new and collected his money.
When the pool was filled, the water came out a murky
brown and the pool's reopening had to be canceled. The
reports did not identify the contractors involved.
Auditors have asked the U.S. ambassador to recover a
total of $571,823 that the reports describe as
overpaid funds.
In some cases, cash simply disappeared.
Two occupation authority field agents responsible for
paying contractors left Iraq without accounting for
more than $700,000 each. When auditors confronted
their manager and asked where the money was, the
manger tried to clear one of the agents through false
paperwork.
"This appears to be an attempt to remove outstanding
balances by simply washing accounts," the auditor
said. The two agents were not identified and there was
no word on whether the pair were referred for
prosecution.
One report describes mismanagement of more than 2,000
small contracts in south-central Iraq worth $88
million. Occupation staffers or those they supervised
handed out millions to companies that never submitted
required competitive bids or that were paid for
unfinished work.
Other examples cited in the reports:
_Only a quarter of $23 million entrusted to civilian
and military project and contracting officers to pay
contractors ever found its way to those contractors.
_One contractor was paid $14,000 on four separate
occasions for the same job.
_Of $7.3 million spent on a police academy near
Hillah, auditors could account for just $4 million.
They said $1.3 million was wasted on overpriced or
duplicate construction or equipment not delivered.
More than $2 million was missing.
_U.S. personnel "needlessly disbursed more than $1.8
million" of the estimated $2.3 million spent for
renovating the library in the Shiite holy city of
Karbala.
_The library contractor delivered only 18 of 68
personal computers called for and did not install
Internet wiring or software. The computers worked only
as stand-alones.
_The U.S.-led security transition command spent
$945,000 for seven armored Mercedes-Benzes that were
too lightly armored for Iraq. Auditors were able to
account for only six of the cars.
_At one point, several paying agents kept cash inside
the same filing cabinet in the Hillah vault. One agent
took $100,000 from another's stack of cash to clear
his own balance. "This was only discovered because the
other paying agent had to make a disbursement that day
and realized that he was short cash," the report says.
___
On the Net:
Special Inspector General:
http://www.sigir.mil/audit(underscore)reports.html
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060129/ap_on_re_mi_ea/iraq_squandered_aid&printer=1;_ylt=AmLIBi85P9HtMzLs9qrSrxIUewgF;_ylu=X3oDMTA3MXN1bHE0BHNlYwN0bWE-
The rumor is that Iran will carry out a nuclear experiment in March...
http://www.turkishpress.com/news.asp?id=105626
The rumor is that Iran will carry out a nuclear experiment in March...
Published: 1/29/2006
Teheran is getting ready to counter a “preemptive strike” by USA and Israel. The Air Force Command of the Revolutionary Guard has ordered its Shahap-3 Missile Units to keep their mobile missile ramps in motion in preparation for such an attack. Responding to this order, in darkness of the night the primary missile ramps have been moved to Kirmanshah and Hamedan, and the reserve ramps to Isfahan and Fars regions.
The above actions are the basis for the efforts of the USA to attract Russia and China, as well as Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Egypt to its side, and for commenting that a military intervention is always on the table. These actions are also the basis for Israel’s overt preparation for a possible offensive action and for making authoritative announcements that it “will not permit Iran” to proceed with its nuclear plans. Suddenly, all these activities have created a renewed global atmosphere of war. They are spreading anxiety and paranoia.
Israel is the only nuclear power in the Middle East. It has never accepted any international agreement on nuclear weapons, and has never allowed inspections of its nuclear facilities. Yet, it is aggressively beating the war drums as if Iran is the country involved in nuclear development in the area. What kind of innocence is this?
Attacks to selected centers in Iran are foreseen to take place sometime in March-June.
Even the Pope called upon Russia and China, requesting that they reconsider the subject of Iran. Iran can do what the Arab countries cannot: withdrawing its funds deposited at Western banks and moving them to Asian banks.
Somehow, big steps are seemingly being taken toward a war. According to them, just two months remain. Within the next two months, confusing allegations will resonate as to how much of a threat Iran has become.
So, why was the month of March chosen? What is behind the prediction that Iran will carry out a nuclear experiment in March? In other words, why are the USA and Israel drawing global attention to the month of March? Why are Turkey, Egypt and Saudi Arabia being pushed into a race of weapons build-up by bringing up the possibility that they may also acquire nuclear weapons?
Because, there is another event expected to occur in March, which could have an impact on the economy of the USA equivalent to a nuclear attack: in March, Teheran will implement its 2004 decision that it will start using the Euro instead of the Dollar in its petroleum trade, establishing a petroleum market, and breaking the “petrodollar” monopoly. Iran will open its petroleum market in March. Euro will replace Dollar in the petroleum trade. This will constitute a major attack on a vital component of the American Empire. Once the decision is implemented, a real debate will start on this doomsday scenario for the American economy.
Thereafter, the monopoly of USA/United Kingdom in international petroleum trade will collapse. The petroleum markets in New York and London will receive a heavy blow. The International Petroleum Market in London and the New York Mercantile Exchange controlled by the Americans are in a state of panic.
The Iranian position is being supported by the Chinese. The Japanese are also inclined to switch to Euro; this way, they could lower their Dollar reserves.
What are the implications of the widespread switch to the Euro, and the preference of Russia, European Union, Japan and some of the Arab countries to use the Euro in petroleum trade? What would happen if Russia that has major trade relations with Europe, China and Japan were to start using the Euro in the energy market? What would happen if the petroleum-producing Arab countries would also see the Euro as the alternative to compensate for the loss of Dollar’s value? Indeed, loss of Dollar’s value will force many countries to prefer the Euro.
This scenario will progressively lead to a profitable business.
If these issues were to lead to an escape from the Dollar, and dramatically reduce the flow of money to the USA, what will be the shape of the American economy?
There lies the wisdom of the month of March. This danger hides behind the hullabaloo that Iran will conduct a nuclear experiment in March. An Iranian petroleum market that is indexed on the Euro is more dangerous for the USA than any nuclear weapon.
The USA, which is working on controlling global petroleum markets under the label of “fighting terrorism” is actually fighting an economic war. However, as it becomes more and more aggressive, it is sinking deeper and deeper...
Information distributed by electronic mail by a reliable source in Turkey. Verbatim translation from Turkish into English language.
The rumor is that Iran will carry out a nuclear experiment in March...
Published: 1/29/2006
Teheran is getting ready to counter a “preemptive strike” by USA and Israel. The Air Force Command of the Revolutionary Guard has ordered its Shahap-3 Missile Units to keep their mobile missile ramps in motion in preparation for such an attack. Responding to this order, in darkness of the night the primary missile ramps have been moved to Kirmanshah and Hamedan, and the reserve ramps to Isfahan and Fars regions.
The above actions are the basis for the efforts of the USA to attract Russia and China, as well as Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Egypt to its side, and for commenting that a military intervention is always on the table. These actions are also the basis for Israel’s overt preparation for a possible offensive action and for making authoritative announcements that it “will not permit Iran” to proceed with its nuclear plans. Suddenly, all these activities have created a renewed global atmosphere of war. They are spreading anxiety and paranoia.
Israel is the only nuclear power in the Middle East. It has never accepted any international agreement on nuclear weapons, and has never allowed inspections of its nuclear facilities. Yet, it is aggressively beating the war drums as if Iran is the country involved in nuclear development in the area. What kind of innocence is this?
Attacks to selected centers in Iran are foreseen to take place sometime in March-June.
Even the Pope called upon Russia and China, requesting that they reconsider the subject of Iran. Iran can do what the Arab countries cannot: withdrawing its funds deposited at Western banks and moving them to Asian banks.
Somehow, big steps are seemingly being taken toward a war. According to them, just two months remain. Within the next two months, confusing allegations will resonate as to how much of a threat Iran has become.
So, why was the month of March chosen? What is behind the prediction that Iran will carry out a nuclear experiment in March? In other words, why are the USA and Israel drawing global attention to the month of March? Why are Turkey, Egypt and Saudi Arabia being pushed into a race of weapons build-up by bringing up the possibility that they may also acquire nuclear weapons?
Because, there is another event expected to occur in March, which could have an impact on the economy of the USA equivalent to a nuclear attack: in March, Teheran will implement its 2004 decision that it will start using the Euro instead of the Dollar in its petroleum trade, establishing a petroleum market, and breaking the “petrodollar” monopoly. Iran will open its petroleum market in March. Euro will replace Dollar in the petroleum trade. This will constitute a major attack on a vital component of the American Empire. Once the decision is implemented, a real debate will start on this doomsday scenario for the American economy.
Thereafter, the monopoly of USA/United Kingdom in international petroleum trade will collapse. The petroleum markets in New York and London will receive a heavy blow. The International Petroleum Market in London and the New York Mercantile Exchange controlled by the Americans are in a state of panic.
The Iranian position is being supported by the Chinese. The Japanese are also inclined to switch to Euro; this way, they could lower their Dollar reserves.
What are the implications of the widespread switch to the Euro, and the preference of Russia, European Union, Japan and some of the Arab countries to use the Euro in petroleum trade? What would happen if Russia that has major trade relations with Europe, China and Japan were to start using the Euro in the energy market? What would happen if the petroleum-producing Arab countries would also see the Euro as the alternative to compensate for the loss of Dollar’s value? Indeed, loss of Dollar’s value will force many countries to prefer the Euro.
This scenario will progressively lead to a profitable business.
If these issues were to lead to an escape from the Dollar, and dramatically reduce the flow of money to the USA, what will be the shape of the American economy?
There lies the wisdom of the month of March. This danger hides behind the hullabaloo that Iran will conduct a nuclear experiment in March. An Iranian petroleum market that is indexed on the Euro is more dangerous for the USA than any nuclear weapon.
The USA, which is working on controlling global petroleum markets under the label of “fighting terrorism” is actually fighting an economic war. However, as it becomes more and more aggressive, it is sinking deeper and deeper...
Information distributed by electronic mail by a reliable source in Turkey. Verbatim translation from Turkish into English language.
Pentagon Can Now Fund Foreign Militaries
Pentagon Can Now Fund Foreign Militaries
Pentagon Can Now Fund Foreign Militaries
Defense Secretary Pushed for New Powers to Better Deal With Emergencies
By Bradley Graham
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, January 29, 2006; A10
Congress has granted unusual authority for the Pentagon to spend as much as $200 million of its own budget to aid foreign militaries, a break with the traditional practice of channeling foreign military assistance through the State Department.
The move, included in a little-noticed provision of the 2006 National Defense Authorization Act passed last month, marks a legislative victory for Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, who pushed hard for the new powers to deal with emergency situations.
But it has drawn warnings from foreign policy specialists inside and outside the government, who say it could lead to growth of a separate military assistance effort not subject to the same constraints applied to foreign aid programs that are administered by the State Department. Such constraints are meant to ensure that aid recipients meet certain standards, including respect for human rights and protection of legitimate civilian authorities.
"It's important that diplomats remain the ones to make the decisions about U.S. foreign assistance," said George Withers, a senior fellow at the Washington Office on Latin America and a former staff member on the House Armed Services Committee. "They can ensure such decisions are taken in the broader context of U.S. foreign policy."
Many lawmakers, too, were initially cool to Rumsfeld's request. The Armed Services committees in both the House and Senate declined to write the provision into their original defense authorization bills, citing concerns about a lack of jurisdiction and an absence of detail about where the money would be spent.
But the Pentagon pressed its case, with senior commanders joining top officials in weighing in with reluctant members.
"This was the most heavily lobbied we've been by the Pentagon in the several years I've been here," said one Senate staff member. "They really, really wanted this."
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice also threw her support behind the measure, overruling lower-ranking staff members who had argued that existing laws were sufficient and who had cautioned against granting the Pentagon such flexibility, department officials said. She joined Rumsfeld last summer in a letter to Congress urging passage of the legislation.
The initiative addresses an issue that both the Pentagon and the State Department have identified as crucial in fighting terrorism and bolstering stability abroad -- namely, "building partnership capacity" in Africa and other developing regions.
Administration officials complain that attempts to provide such security assistance, especially in crisis situations, have often been hampered by a patchwork of legal restrictions and by a division of responsibilities among U.S. government departments. Improving security in a failing foreign nation, for instance, might involve drawing on the Pentagon for military training, the State Department for police training, the Department of Homeland Security for border protection and the Treasury Department for financial enforcement. Cobbling such pieces together can take many months, officials say.
After striking out with the Armed Services committees, Pentagon officials found an ally in Sen. James M. Inhofe (R-Okla.), who has a particular interest in Africa. Inhofe agreed to propose the new authority on the Senate floor as an amendment to the Defense Authorization Act. To ensure compliance with existing foreign aid rules, language was included saying that funds for the missions would be transferred from the Pentagon to the State Department before being expended and would be subject to limitations of the Foreign Assistance Act.
These conditions were dropped in a later Senate-House conference. But other conditions were added still reflecting congressional reservations.
The final version -- Section 1206 of the authorization act -- says the Pentagon can provide training, equipment and supplies "to build the capacity" of foreign militaries to conduct counterterrorist operations or join with U.S. forces in stability operations. But the section also stipulates that orders for such aid must originate with the president, and it requires the Pentagon to work closely with the State Department in formulating and implementing the assistance.
This new authority cannot be used to provide any assistance banned by other U.S. laws, the provision adds. Further, the measure grants less money than initially requested -- $200 million instead of $750 million. And it expires after two years, far short of the open-ended mandate that Rumsfeld had sought.
"We're calling it a pilot program," said Sen. John W. Warner (R-Va.), chairman of the Armed Services Committee. "But I think it'll prove its worth."
Defense officials say they are pleased with the outcome. "It's a very good start," said Jeffrey Nadaner, deputy assistant secretary of defense for stability operations. "For the Congress, which hasn't done this before, we think it's a bold, cooperative move."
Reaction at the upper levels of the State Department also has been positive. Under a separate provision approved with the train-and-equip measure, the department is getting $200 million from the Pentagon to bolster a new Reconstruction and Stabilization Office for coordinating civilian assistance. This provision stirred its own controversy among lawmakers, who as a matter of principle have opposed shifting Pentagon funds to the State Department.
Having gained this much, the Pentagon and State Department are now setting their sights on a more ambitious overhaul of foreign assistance rules.
"In the longer run, we need to have our assistance structured in a way that will give us even broader flexibility," said Philip Zelikow, the State Department's counselor. "The president and his advisers must be able to devise a program that can allocate money as needed among whatever agencies have the skill sets to deliver the capabilities, whether State, Defense, Justice or other government agencies."
Pentagon Can Now Fund Foreign Militaries
Defense Secretary Pushed for New Powers to Better Deal With Emergencies
By Bradley Graham
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, January 29, 2006; A10
Congress has granted unusual authority for the Pentagon to spend as much as $200 million of its own budget to aid foreign militaries, a break with the traditional practice of channeling foreign military assistance through the State Department.
The move, included in a little-noticed provision of the 2006 National Defense Authorization Act passed last month, marks a legislative victory for Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, who pushed hard for the new powers to deal with emergency situations.
But it has drawn warnings from foreign policy specialists inside and outside the government, who say it could lead to growth of a separate military assistance effort not subject to the same constraints applied to foreign aid programs that are administered by the State Department. Such constraints are meant to ensure that aid recipients meet certain standards, including respect for human rights and protection of legitimate civilian authorities.
"It's important that diplomats remain the ones to make the decisions about U.S. foreign assistance," said George Withers, a senior fellow at the Washington Office on Latin America and a former staff member on the House Armed Services Committee. "They can ensure such decisions are taken in the broader context of U.S. foreign policy."
Many lawmakers, too, were initially cool to Rumsfeld's request. The Armed Services committees in both the House and Senate declined to write the provision into their original defense authorization bills, citing concerns about a lack of jurisdiction and an absence of detail about where the money would be spent.
But the Pentagon pressed its case, with senior commanders joining top officials in weighing in with reluctant members.
"This was the most heavily lobbied we've been by the Pentagon in the several years I've been here," said one Senate staff member. "They really, really wanted this."
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice also threw her support behind the measure, overruling lower-ranking staff members who had argued that existing laws were sufficient and who had cautioned against granting the Pentagon such flexibility, department officials said. She joined Rumsfeld last summer in a letter to Congress urging passage of the legislation.
The initiative addresses an issue that both the Pentagon and the State Department have identified as crucial in fighting terrorism and bolstering stability abroad -- namely, "building partnership capacity" in Africa and other developing regions.
Administration officials complain that attempts to provide such security assistance, especially in crisis situations, have often been hampered by a patchwork of legal restrictions and by a division of responsibilities among U.S. government departments. Improving security in a failing foreign nation, for instance, might involve drawing on the Pentagon for military training, the State Department for police training, the Department of Homeland Security for border protection and the Treasury Department for financial enforcement. Cobbling such pieces together can take many months, officials say.
After striking out with the Armed Services committees, Pentagon officials found an ally in Sen. James M. Inhofe (R-Okla.), who has a particular interest in Africa. Inhofe agreed to propose the new authority on the Senate floor as an amendment to the Defense Authorization Act. To ensure compliance with existing foreign aid rules, language was included saying that funds for the missions would be transferred from the Pentagon to the State Department before being expended and would be subject to limitations of the Foreign Assistance Act.
These conditions were dropped in a later Senate-House conference. But other conditions were added still reflecting congressional reservations.
The final version -- Section 1206 of the authorization act -- says the Pentagon can provide training, equipment and supplies "to build the capacity" of foreign militaries to conduct counterterrorist operations or join with U.S. forces in stability operations. But the section also stipulates that orders for such aid must originate with the president, and it requires the Pentagon to work closely with the State Department in formulating and implementing the assistance.
This new authority cannot be used to provide any assistance banned by other U.S. laws, the provision adds. Further, the measure grants less money than initially requested -- $200 million instead of $750 million. And it expires after two years, far short of the open-ended mandate that Rumsfeld had sought.
"We're calling it a pilot program," said Sen. John W. Warner (R-Va.), chairman of the Armed Services Committee. "But I think it'll prove its worth."
Defense officials say they are pleased with the outcome. "It's a very good start," said Jeffrey Nadaner, deputy assistant secretary of defense for stability operations. "For the Congress, which hasn't done this before, we think it's a bold, cooperative move."
Reaction at the upper levels of the State Department also has been positive. Under a separate provision approved with the train-and-equip measure, the department is getting $200 million from the Pentagon to bolster a new Reconstruction and Stabilization Office for coordinating civilian assistance. This provision stirred its own controversy among lawmakers, who as a matter of principle have opposed shifting Pentagon funds to the State Department.
Having gained this much, the Pentagon and State Department are now setting their sights on a more ambitious overhaul of foreign assistance rules.
"In the longer run, we need to have our assistance structured in a way that will give us even broader flexibility," said Philip Zelikow, the State Department's counselor. "The president and his advisers must be able to devise a program that can allocate money as needed among whatever agencies have the skill sets to deliver the capabilities, whether State, Defense, Justice or other government agencies."
Police 'faked Tube death log'
Police 'faked Tube death log'
Special Branch 'altered record' in attempt to switch the blame for de Menezes shooting
By Sophie Goodchild, Chief Reporter
Published: 29 January 2006
Extraordinary allegations that Special Branch officers deliberately falsified vital evidence to hide mistakes which led to the killing of Jean Charles de Menezes at a south London Underground station were made last night.
According to claims in the News of the World, police altered the contents of a logbook, which detailed the Brazilian electrician's final movements, in a bid to cover up their blunders.
The 27-year-old was shot dead at Stockwell Tube station, in the wake of the London bombings, by police exercising a shoot-to-kill policy.
Specific words were understood to have been changed to cover up the fact that surveillance officers had wrongly identified Mr de Menezes as terror suspect Hussein Osman.
Alterations were hastily made to amend the wording of the official log once the shocking truth emerged that the dead man was not, in fact, the extremist wanted in connection with the failed 21 July Tube bombings.
This was in a bid to pass the blame for the shooting on to the firearms officers who actually shot the electrician and on to senior officers at Scotland Yard who were in charge of the operation.
These revelations are reportedly contained in the report of the Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC). Last night, despite calls to the Metropolitan Police, the Home Office and the IPCC, The Independent on Sunday was unable to corroborate or substantiate the claims.
The family of the dead man said the revelations were "shocking" and demanded an immediate public inquiry. Asad Rehman, the family's spokesman, said these latest reports reinforced their belief that there had been a deliberate cover-up over Mr de Menezes death.
"It reinforces their belief that his killing was not the result of a catalogue of errors but that there was something more malign behind this," said Mr Rehman, who has written to the Attorney General and the Crown Prosecution Service demanding an official inquiry into Mr de Menezes' death. "Yet again, the family has to find out through leaks what might have happened to Jean Charles. We believe a public inquiry is the only solution for the real truth to be established."
The story, if proved correct, will add to the controversy surrounding the shooting. Sir Ian Blair, the Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, is already facing a separate inquiry into complaints made by Mr de Menezes' family that he made misleading comments about the shooting to the public.
The Stockwell killing has also highlighted communications failures between surveillance teams and commanding officers as well as calling into question Operation Kratos, the Met's secret policy on dealing with potential suicide bombers.
The IPCC review of the Stockwell killing was handed to lawyers at the CPS just over a week ago. Copies have also been delivered to Charles Clarke, the Home Secretary, as well as to the Metropolitan Police Authority and to Scotland Yard. It is expected that they could take up to a year to decide if there are sufficient grounds on which to bring a prosecution against any of the officers.
However, sources quoted by the News of the World allege that the IPCC report reveals that the log was altered from "it was Osman" to read instead "and it was not Osman".
The alteration should have been signed but was not. This was regarded as a clumsy error by the IPCC investigators. Their report says: "This looks like an attempt to try to distance Special Branch from the decision [to shoot de Menezes].
http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/crime/article341765.ece
Special Branch 'altered record' in attempt to switch the blame for de Menezes shooting
By Sophie Goodchild, Chief Reporter
Published: 29 January 2006
Extraordinary allegations that Special Branch officers deliberately falsified vital evidence to hide mistakes which led to the killing of Jean Charles de Menezes at a south London Underground station were made last night.
According to claims in the News of the World, police altered the contents of a logbook, which detailed the Brazilian electrician's final movements, in a bid to cover up their blunders.
The 27-year-old was shot dead at Stockwell Tube station, in the wake of the London bombings, by police exercising a shoot-to-kill policy.
Specific words were understood to have been changed to cover up the fact that surveillance officers had wrongly identified Mr de Menezes as terror suspect Hussein Osman.
Alterations were hastily made to amend the wording of the official log once the shocking truth emerged that the dead man was not, in fact, the extremist wanted in connection with the failed 21 July Tube bombings.
This was in a bid to pass the blame for the shooting on to the firearms officers who actually shot the electrician and on to senior officers at Scotland Yard who were in charge of the operation.
These revelations are reportedly contained in the report of the Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC). Last night, despite calls to the Metropolitan Police, the Home Office and the IPCC, The Independent on Sunday was unable to corroborate or substantiate the claims.
The family of the dead man said the revelations were "shocking" and demanded an immediate public inquiry. Asad Rehman, the family's spokesman, said these latest reports reinforced their belief that there had been a deliberate cover-up over Mr de Menezes death.
"It reinforces their belief that his killing was not the result of a catalogue of errors but that there was something more malign behind this," said Mr Rehman, who has written to the Attorney General and the Crown Prosecution Service demanding an official inquiry into Mr de Menezes' death. "Yet again, the family has to find out through leaks what might have happened to Jean Charles. We believe a public inquiry is the only solution for the real truth to be established."
The story, if proved correct, will add to the controversy surrounding the shooting. Sir Ian Blair, the Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, is already facing a separate inquiry into complaints made by Mr de Menezes' family that he made misleading comments about the shooting to the public.
The Stockwell killing has also highlighted communications failures between surveillance teams and commanding officers as well as calling into question Operation Kratos, the Met's secret policy on dealing with potential suicide bombers.
The IPCC review of the Stockwell killing was handed to lawyers at the CPS just over a week ago. Copies have also been delivered to Charles Clarke, the Home Secretary, as well as to the Metropolitan Police Authority and to Scotland Yard. It is expected that they could take up to a year to decide if there are sufficient grounds on which to bring a prosecution against any of the officers.
However, sources quoted by the News of the World allege that the IPCC report reveals that the log was altered from "it was Osman" to read instead "and it was not Osman".
The alteration should have been signed but was not. This was regarded as a clumsy error by the IPCC investigators. Their report says: "This looks like an attempt to try to distance Special Branch from the decision [to shoot de Menezes].
http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/crime/article341765.ece
BBC NEWS | World | Europe | Hopes fade after Poland collapse
BBC NEWS | World | Europe | Hopes fade after Poland collapse
Hopes fade after Poland collapse
Hopes of finding any more survivors are fading after a building collapsed in southern Poland, killing at least 65 people, rescuers said.
Some 500 people were in the trade hall in Katowice for a pigeon exhibition when the roof caved in - possibly under the weight of snow - on Saturday.
Among the dead and some 140 injured were Poles, Belgians and Germans.
President Lech Kaczynski has announced a day of mourning for what he called a "catastrophe" unprecedented in Poland.
Rescue official Leszek Suski told a news conference: "With such a low temperature the chances of finding someone alive are slim but we still have hope."
'Panic and chaos'
A central section of the roof collapsed at 1730 local time (1630GMT). A second collapse happened more than an hour later, during rescue operations.
We are going to keep our hope until the end
Jaroslaw Wojtasik
Katowice firefighters' spokesman
Hundreds of rescuers with sniffer dogs worked through the night as temperatures dropped to minus 15C.
Rescuers have been blowing warm air into the wreckage to increase the chances of survival for those still inside.
Police said people had been telephoning from inside on mobile phones, reporting dead bodies near them.
But no-one had been found alive since 2100 GMT Saturday.
Officials confirmed that at least one child was among the dead.
"The dogs have located 13 places where there are bodies but it is impossible to determine how many people will be found there," local fire brigade official Kazimierz Krzowski.
Survivor's story
One of the survivors described the scenes of panic and chaos immediately after the roof collapsed.
I am now very worried about the other buildings here made of similar construction, in particular the shopping centres
Mark Fordham, Katowice
"We heard something snap like a match breaking and people started to panic right away, realising what was happening," the unnamed survivor told private television TVN24.
"I started to run and something fell on me, others trampled over me and I was able to crawl out on hands and knees," the survivor added.
Many people, some clutching head wounds, milled around ambulances.
Some of the victims were in serious or critical condition, officials said.
New building
The cause of the disaster is not yet certain.
Jacob Parade, a journalist with TVN24 in Poland, told the BBC the collapse was a surprise as the hall - built in the late 1990s - was so new.
The fire brigade and police said the weight of snow on the roof was responsible.
But the building's manager told Polish TV that snow had been regularly cleared from the roof.
This was backed up by at least two people in BBC interviews.
One woman whose father had been at the scene, Sascha Kraus, said there had been little snow on the roof.
Graf Pietro also told the BBC the snow on the roof was not heavy and that those responsible for clearing it had done a good job.
Another theory is that the extreme cold caused steel beams to fail.
There were more than 120 exhibitors from countries across Europe at the Pigeon 2006 fair.
Polish Prime Minister Kazimierz Marcinkiewicz arrived at the scene, pledging a public inquiry into the accident.
Fifteen people died on 2 January when the roof of an ice rink collapsed under heavy snow in the southern German town of Bad Reichenhall.
In December, at least 14 people, 10 of them children, were killed when a roof collapsed at a swimming pool in the Urals region of Russia. Snowfall was again thought a possible cause. Simpson column:
Have you been affected? Contact us with your stories and eyewitness accounts.
You can send pictures or video to yourpics@bbc.co.uk or by mms by dialling +44 (0)7725 100100.
You should not endanger yourself or others, take any unnecessary risks or infringe any laws.
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/1/hi/world/europe/4659030.stm
Hopes fade after Poland collapse
Hopes of finding any more survivors are fading after a building collapsed in southern Poland, killing at least 65 people, rescuers said.
Some 500 people were in the trade hall in Katowice for a pigeon exhibition when the roof caved in - possibly under the weight of snow - on Saturday.
Among the dead and some 140 injured were Poles, Belgians and Germans.
President Lech Kaczynski has announced a day of mourning for what he called a "catastrophe" unprecedented in Poland.
Rescue official Leszek Suski told a news conference: "With such a low temperature the chances of finding someone alive are slim but we still have hope."
'Panic and chaos'
A central section of the roof collapsed at 1730 local time (1630GMT). A second collapse happened more than an hour later, during rescue operations.
We are going to keep our hope until the end
Jaroslaw Wojtasik
Katowice firefighters' spokesman
Hundreds of rescuers with sniffer dogs worked through the night as temperatures dropped to minus 15C.
Rescuers have been blowing warm air into the wreckage to increase the chances of survival for those still inside.
Police said people had been telephoning from inside on mobile phones, reporting dead bodies near them.
But no-one had been found alive since 2100 GMT Saturday.
Officials confirmed that at least one child was among the dead.
"The dogs have located 13 places where there are bodies but it is impossible to determine how many people will be found there," local fire brigade official Kazimierz Krzowski.
Survivor's story
One of the survivors described the scenes of panic and chaos immediately after the roof collapsed.
I am now very worried about the other buildings here made of similar construction, in particular the shopping centres
Mark Fordham, Katowice
"We heard something snap like a match breaking and people started to panic right away, realising what was happening," the unnamed survivor told private television TVN24.
"I started to run and something fell on me, others trampled over me and I was able to crawl out on hands and knees," the survivor added.
Many people, some clutching head wounds, milled around ambulances.
Some of the victims were in serious or critical condition, officials said.
New building
The cause of the disaster is not yet certain.
Jacob Parade, a journalist with TVN24 in Poland, told the BBC the collapse was a surprise as the hall - built in the late 1990s - was so new.
The fire brigade and police said the weight of snow on the roof was responsible.
But the building's manager told Polish TV that snow had been regularly cleared from the roof.
This was backed up by at least two people in BBC interviews.
One woman whose father had been at the scene, Sascha Kraus, said there had been little snow on the roof.
Graf Pietro also told the BBC the snow on the roof was not heavy and that those responsible for clearing it had done a good job.
Another theory is that the extreme cold caused steel beams to fail.
There were more than 120 exhibitors from countries across Europe at the Pigeon 2006 fair.
Polish Prime Minister Kazimierz Marcinkiewicz arrived at the scene, pledging a public inquiry into the accident.
Fifteen people died on 2 January when the roof of an ice rink collapsed under heavy snow in the southern German town of Bad Reichenhall.
In December, at least 14 people, 10 of them children, were killed when a roof collapsed at a swimming pool in the Urals region of Russia. Snowfall was again thought a possible cause. Simpson column:
Have you been affected? Contact us with your stories and eyewitness accounts.
You can send pictures or video to yourpics@bbc.co.uk or by mms by dialling +44 (0)7725 100100.
You should not endanger yourself or others, take any unnecessary risks or infringe any laws.
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/1/hi/world/europe/4659030.stm
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