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AS THE WORLD SQUIRMS Sunday – December 17, 2006
ARCHIVE
“Political language ... is designed to make lies sound truthful
and murder respectable, and to give an appearance of solidity to pure
wind.” ~George Orwell~
  No Going Back Charley
Reese 12.15.06 (Excerpt) East of Atlanta, an outcropping of granite rises 863 feet above
the Georgia plateau. It is rounded and about five miles in circumference.
Today, Stone Mountain is owned by the state of Georgia, and there is an
amusement park. In earlier years, however, visitors who climbed to the top would
sometimes walk toward what they thought was the edge. Because of its rounded
shape, there was no edge; there was only an ever-receding illusion of an
edge. Sometimes people would realize too late they had walked too far and,
unable to go back, would fall to their deaths. I believe
we Americans have walked too far
from
our original constitutional
republic, and it's now impossible to
restore it. I say this because I like to profess my belief
in the early republic just to aggravate the
politically correct. But there is a big difference between what one
wants and what is possible. We are
stuck with a big central government with imperial ambitions abroad. There are
far too many Americans who benefit financially from government — from paychecks, purchases or subsidies — to muster the political will to trim it down to size. Moreover,
most Americans
have learned to love government. They are content for the only debate to be
about patronage and who gets it. They are content with national political
conventions that are nothing more than scripted TV shows without a scrap of
debate about issues or candidates.  About Face:
Soldiers Call for Iraq Withdrawal Marc
Cooper The
Nation 12.16.06 (Excerpt) An organized, robust
movement of active-duty US military personnel has publicly surfaced to oppose
a war in which they are serving. Those involved plan to petition Congress to
withdraw American troops from Iraq. Not since 1969, when some 1,300
active-duty military personnel signed an open letter in the New York Times
opposing the war in Vietnam, has there been such a dramatic barometer of
rising military dissent.  TBRNews.org 12.14.06 (Excerpt) Baghdad, 14 Dec 06: “Although you will never see a word of it in the U.S. media, there
is a very serious, growing and potentially critical loss of morale here in
Iraq. A CIC major, working with the CID here inside the Green Zone, met with
me yesterday and told me they are working on a growing, but top secret,
investigation into what appears to be an organizing mutiny among U.S. combat
troops in at least three different locations in occupied Iraq. Deplorable
conditions here, including defective ammunition (and a serious lack of it due
to the Falcon disaster) lack of armor, increasingly sophisticated and very
deadly attacks on U.S. troops with no countermeasures either in place or at
all effective, coupled with Bush’s obvious intentions to
quickly and greatly increase the
number of troops here and his plans (often discussed by the brass) of a “huge new push” designed to “knock out the resistance and permit a withdrawal with face” ( a direct quote from a classified order.) have done nothing to
defuse what my informant believes is a “critical situation.” My source
in the CIC tells me that the team is in a dilemma at this point. If this gets
into the foreign media (it would never get into the tame U.S. media unless
mass rebellion broke out and then it would be heavily censored) the internet,
cursed by the administration, will cover it and given the gross inability of
the pencil-necked geeks in DoD’s propaganda division, it
would become a major political scandal stateside. If a swoop is made and GI instigators are
arrested, there is the very real risk that the one thing the Pentagon is
frantic to prevent and keep silent, will get out. The CIC has
an army of snitches running around all over Iraq, and especially here in
Baghdad, but the more they find out, the more frightened they are becoming.
Now, the rumors are that Russian or Iranian agents are fomenting rebellion
but this is very doubtful. It is known that Bush hates Putin and everyone
here knows Israel hates Iran so these rumors are obviously planted by these
parties. Arresting ringleaders (some of whom
are very obvious) might trigger more serious problems and transferring “infected” units to Germany for some “R&R” can’t be done because they are badly needed here and
worse, might terrify cadre in Germany to the point where the rot could easily
spread back to the States. This is
redolent of the mass mutinies of French troops in 1917/18 in which thousands
were shot out of hand. A pleasant
Christmas is expected here with myself planning to get home for a week. Who knows? I might resign
my commission and write a book…and then be shot while watering the lawn.”  The Army, Despite Its $168 Billions Budget, Greg Jaffe The Wall Street Journal 12.12.06 (Excerpt) The
Iraq war has exposed more than a decade's worth of mistakes and miscalculations
that are now seriously undermining the world's mightiest military force. According
to Major General Stephen Speakes, the Army was sent to war in Iraq $56
billion short of essential equipment. Army officials told the White House
that it needs at least an additional $24 billion, not in the 2007 budget,
just to pay its current bills. Cash shortfalls have forced the Army to lay
off janitorial staff, close base swimming pools, and even stop mowing lawns
on Army bases.  Gingrich raises alarm at event honoring those who stand up for freedom
of speech Riley
Yates-Staff (Excerpt) Gingrich,
speaking at a Manchester awards banquet, said a "different set of
rules" may be needed to reduce terrorists' ability to use the Internet
and free speech to recruit and get out their message. Former Speaker of the House Newt
Gingrich yesterday in Manchester said the country will be forced to reexamine
freedom of speech to meet the threat of terrorism.
The
Warmonger’s Christmas Carols LewRockwell.com 12.14.06 (Excerpt) Although Christmas is the time when people celebrate
the birth of the Prince of Peace (Isaiah 9:6), if some people were honest
they would have to acknowledge that they also honor Mars, the Roman god of
war. And if this wasn’t bad enough, they honor
him every day of the year, not just on December 25. They honor Mars every
time they claim to support the troops. Americans are in love with the U.S. military.
As the fiasco that is the war in Iraq has shown, it doesn’t
matter how senseless the war, it doesn’t matter how many lies the
war is based on, it doesn’t matter how much the
Bush administration manipulated intelligence, it doesn’t
matter how much the war costs, it doesn’t matter how long the war
lasts, it doesn’t matter how many
thousands of American soldiers are killed or injured, and it certainly doesn’t
matter how many hundreds of thousands of Iraqis are killed or injured –
too many Americans can be found who still mindlessly repeat the refrain of
"support the troops." Some American Christians chime in with their
"obey the powers that be" mantra. Coupled with the melody of
"we can’t just cut and run"
and the chorus of "it is better to fight them over there so we don’t
have to fight them over here," we have a four-part warmonger harmony.  White House OKs $469 Billion Pentagon Budget, Not Including Wars Reuters 12.15.06 (Excerpt) "There has been a
upward trend in real terms, above the rate of inflation," he said,
citing a 23 percent real increase, above inflation, in the Pentagon's budget
from 2000 to 2007. Loren Thompson of the Virginia-based Lexington Institute,
said England's letter revealed the Pentagon's growing concern about being
able to modernize its forces and fund new weapons programs while paying
escalating war bills.  Ex-soldiers
break `silence' on Israeli excesses Yehuda Shaul tells
Haroon Siddiqui `something rotten' is going on in Gaza
and the West Bank "There's no such thing as a benign or an enlightened
occupation. You can't be an occupier and not be an occupier." Haroon
Siddiqui Toronto Star –
Canada 1.17.06 (Excerpt) Within three months of being
discharged in March 2004, Shaul and friends mounted an exhibit, Bringing
Hebron to Tel Aviv. It had powerful photos and video testimony
by 64 soldiers showing and describing the treatment meted out to Palestinians
by the troops as well as some of the settlers. There were pictures of Palestinians
bound and blindfolded. There was a photo of a settler carrying an assault rifle
with a decal on the magazine clip: "Kill 'em all, Let God sort 'em
out." Another was of graffiti on a wall: "Arabs to the gas
chamber." The exhibit drew 7,000 visitors and
much media coverage. Other soldiers who had served in the
West Bank and Gaza came forward. More photos were gathered, as well as about
400 audio and video testimonies. In them, soldiers talk about the
total power of the occupiers over the occupied — throwing Palestinians out of
their homes; making them stand for hours for disobeying the curfew or trying
to bypass a checkpoint or even smiling or arguing at the wrong time, Shaul
said. "We can play with them. This is
the mindset from which everything flows." In Hebron, Shaul manned a machine
gun. "It can shoot dozens of grenades a minute up to a distance of about
2,000 metres. We'd shoot 40 or 50 a day ... "We had three high posts, two
where we had kicked the Palestinian families out of and the third was a
Palestinian school which we had closed down. "The idea was that anytime they
shoot, we shoot back. "But the machine gun is not an
accurate weapon. You just shoot in the direction of the target ... We have no
idea how many we killed. I hope no one." Shaul said some acts "flow from
being afraid or being bored. You are there eight hours a night at the post.
You just aim and shoot the water tank." Or, "when you drive your tank or
your APC (armoured personnel carrier), you bump into a streetlight. As you
turn a corner, you bump into a wall. It's fun ... It's all about you. Nothing
else matters ... Palestinians are no longer human." Initially, Break the Silence members
did not speak to foreigners, to avoid "airing our dirty laundry."
But they have since changed their policy. Two members toured the United States last
year. Two exhibitions have been held in Geneva and Amsterdam. The group (http://www.shovrimshtika.org and http://www.breakthesilence.org.il) exists to break two kinds of silences: "First, the
soldiers keep quiet and, then Israeli society keeps quiet. "We provide the tools for people
to understand the deeply woven moral corruption and numbness of what we do
(in the Occupied Territories). It's like a slide; once you start going down,
you keep going down. "There's no such thing as a benign or an enlightened occupation.
You can't be an occupier and not be an occupier."  As tax rises,
more U.S. expats are giving up citizenship
International Herald Tribune 12.17.06 (Excerpt) "It's
a really hard thing to do," said the woman, a 16-year resident of Geneva
who had tired of the cost and time of filing yearly U.S. tax returns on top
of her Swiss taxes. "I just kept putting this off. But it's my kids and
the estate tax. I don't care if I die with only one Swiss franc to my name, but
the U.S. shouldn't get money I earned here when I die." Historically,
small numbers of Americans have turned in their passports every year for
political and economic reasons, with the numbers reaching a high of about
2,000 during a Vietnam War-era boom in the 1970s. But with new tax pressures facing
American expatriates due to legislation enacted in Washington this year, some
international tax lawyers say they detect rising demand from citizens to
renounce ties with the United States —
the only developed country that taxes it citizens while they are overseas. Americans
abroad are also taxed in foreign countries where they reside. "The administrative costs of
being an American and living outside the U.S. have gone up
dramatically," said
Marnin Michaels, a tax lawyer with Baker & McKenzie in Zurich. 
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