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AS THE WORLD SQUIRMS
Sunday, February 04, 2007
ARCHIVE
Thank You US
Army Lt. Ehren Watada For Refusing To Fight An Illegal War Facing 4 Years In Prison, A Hero
Suffers For Our Sins…
Video ~Homepage~  What 'Israel's
right to exist' means to Palestinians John V. Whitbeck The Christian Science Monitor 2.2.07 (Excerpt) There is an enormous difference between "recognizing
Israel's existence" and "recognizing Israel's “right to exist."
From a Palestinian perspective, the difference is
in the same league as the difference between asking a Jew to acknowledge that
the Holocaust happened and asking him to concede that the Holocaust was
morally justified. For Palestinians to acknowledge the
occurrence of the “Nakba” - the expulsion of the great majority of
Palestinians from their homeland between 1947 and 1949 - is one thing. For them
to publicly concede that it was "right" for the “Nakba” to have
happened would be something else entirely. For the Jewish and Palestinian
peoples, the Holocaust and the “Nakba”, respectively,
represent catastrophes and injustices on an unimaginable scale that can
neither be forgotten nor forgiven.  Israel's
Kafkaesque "Matrix of Control" Stephen Lendman February 02, 2007 Znet (Excerpt) Finding an equitable solution to the intractable,
festering decades-long Israeli-Palestinian conflict is the Gordian Knot that
must be cut to achieve peace overall in the Middle East. Today, no
solution is in sight nor are any serious efforts planned to find one despite
occasional rhetoric to the contrary like what's now being heard from
Washington with similar disingenuous echoes inside Israel. Palestinians
know otherwise from long experience.
They've heard this siren song before.
It's the same old tired refrain going nowhere and not intending
to. The so-called "road map" goes nowhere, and the "peace
process" guarantees only more conflict because Israel wants it that way
to justify its harshness and refuses to discuss the most fundamental
Palestinian concerns. Unless they're
resolved there can never be peace.
They include:
They
also include ending what Palestinian-American scholar and activist Edward
Said once called Israel's agenda of "refined viciousness" against
the Palestinian people. Since Hamas' Palestinian Authority (PA) January, 2006 legislative
electoral victory, there's been nothing "refined" about it.
“Political language ... is designed to make lies sound truthful
and murder respectable, and to give an appearance of solidity to pure
wind.” ~George Orwell~
 As US power
fades, it can't find friends to take on Iran
Washington has
exaggerated Tehran's capabilities and intentions in Iraq. It is confused and
frustrated Jonathan Steele Friday February 2, 2007 (Excerpt) The US claims Iran has increased its subversion in Iraq in
recent months. The US has a record of self-serving and false intelligence on
Iraq but, even if true, Iran's actions cannot make much difference to the
problems the US is facing. The sectarian violence is perpetrated largely by
Iraqis on Iraqis. If outsiders provoke it, they are mainly Sunni jihadis
loyal to al-Qaida. As for attacks on US forces, these come primarily in Sunni
areas or the mixed province of Diyala. Some US officials now hint that
Iranians may be involved in these areas too. Links between Iran and Iraq's
Sunni insurgents would be new, but marginal. The real purpose of Washington's heightened talk of Iranian
subversion seems to be twofold. The administration is playing the blame game.
When the "who lost Iraq?" debate develops in earnest as the
presidential election contest hots up, Bush's people will name its fall guys.
Number one will be the Democrats, for failing to fund the war adequately and
allowing the "enemy" to take comfort from the sapping of American
will. Number two will be Iran for its alleged arming of militias and
insurgents. Number three will be Syria for allowing suicide bombers through
Damascus airport and into Iraq. The second purpose of Washington's anti-Iranian claims, as the
former national security adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski recently suggested, is
to prepare a case for a US military strike on Iran. It will be described as
defensive, just as the first attacks on North Vietnam two generations ago
were falsely said to be an answer to the other side's aggression. There could be a third aim: a desire to influence the internal
Iranian debate. A senior US official stated in London this week that the
Iranian government was a monolith and "we try to discern differences
within the Iranian regime at our peril". That may not be the majority
view within the administration. Ratcheting up accusations against Iran's
revolutionary guards who are close to President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad may be a
device to make a case for moderates like the former president Hashemi
Rafsanjani. He appears to favour a deal with Washington rather than
confrontation. The safest
conclusion is that Washington remains confused about what Iran is doing, and
frustrated by its own inability to find allies to support a response. All
options are being prepared, along with their "justifications". The
International Institute for Strategic Studies' annual survey rightly pointed
out this week that US power is fading. It can shape an agenda but not
implement it globally. Two stark new events prove that. One was the meeting between the
Saudi and Iranian security chiefs to try to stop Lebanon sliding back into
civil war. This showed Iran can be a force for regional stability, and that
Saudi Arabia is resisting US efforts to isolate Tehran. The other was
President Jacques Chirac's comment that it would not matter if Iran developed
a nuclear bomb or two as they could not be used productively. Described as a gaffe
since it broke ranks with Washington, it expressed the views of many
Europeans (as well as the contradiction inherent in the French and British
nuclear arsenals), since the French president added that the bigger problem
was the push for other nations to follow suit. As Washington's neocons go into eclipse and the realpolitikers
dither, Britain and other European governments need to be far clearer in
public than they have so far been. They should point out that the dispute with Iran
is not as monumental as Washington claims. Fomenting new divisions in the
Middle East or resorting to force are cures far worse than the disease.  The Murder of
Iran LewRockwell.com 2.3.07 (Excerpt) As the American disaster
in Iraq deepens and domestic and foreign opposition grows, "neocon"
fanatics such as Vice-President Cheney believe their opportunity to control
Iran’s oil will pass unless
they act no later than the spring. For public consumption, there are potent
myths. In concert with Israel and Washington’s
Zionist and fundamentalist Christian lobbies, the Bushites say their
"strategy" is to end Iran’s nuclear threat. In
fact, Iran possesses not a single nuclear weapon nor has it ever threatened
to build one; the CIA estimates that, even given the political will, Iran is
incapable of building a nuclear weapon before 2017, at the earliest. Unlike Israel and the
United States, Iran has abided by the rules of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation
Treaty, of which it was an original signatory and has allowed routine
inspections under its legal obligations – until gratuitous,
punitive measures were added in 2003, at the behest of Washington. No report
by the International Atomic Energy Agency has ever cited Iran for diverting
its civilian nuclear program to military use. The IAEA has said that for most
of the past three years its inspectors have been able to "go anywhere
and see anything." They inspected the nuclear installations at Isfahan
and Natanz on 10 and 12 January and will return on 2 to 6 February. The head
of the IAEA, Mohamed El-Baradei says that an attack on Iran will have
"catastrophic consequences" and only encourage the regime to become
a nuclear power. Unlike its two nemeses,
the US and Israel, Iran has attacked no other countries. It last went to war
in 1980 when invaded by Saddam Hussein, who was backed and equipped by the
US, which supplied chemical and biological weapons produced at a factory in
Maryland. Unlike Israel, the world’s fifth military power
with thermonuclear weapons aimed at Middle-East targets, an unmatched record
of defying UN resolutions and the enforcer of the world’s
longest illegal occupation, Iran has a history of obeying international law
and occupies no territory other than its own. The "threat"
from Iran is entirely manufactured, aided and abetted by familiar, compliant
media language that refers to Iran’s "nuclear
ambitions," just as the vocabulary of
Saddam’s
nonexistent WMD arsenal became common usage. Accompanying this is a
demonizing that has become standard practice. As Edward Herman has pointed out,
President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, "has done yeoman service in facilitating
this"; yet a
close examination of his notorious remark about Israel in October 2005
reveals its distortion. According to Juan Cole, American professor of Modern
Middle History, and other Farsi language analysts, Ahmadinejad did not call
for Israel to be "wiped off the map." He said, "The regime
occupying Jerusalem must vanish from the page of time." This, says Cole,
"does not imply military action or killing anyone at all."
Ahmadinejad compared the demise of the Jerusalem regime to the dissolution of
the Soviet Union. The Iranian regime is repressive, but its power is diffuse and
exercised by the mullahs, with whom Ahmadinejad is often at odds. An attack
would surely unite them. The one piece of "solid evidence" is
the threat posed by the United States. An American naval buildup in the
eastern Mediterranean has begun. This is almost certainly part of what the
Pentagon calls CONPLAN 8022, which is the aerial bombing of Iran. In 2004,
National Security Presidential Directive 35, entitled Nuclear Weapons
Deployment Authorization, was issued. It is classified, of course, but the
presumption has long been that NSPD 35 authorized the stockpiling and
deployment of "tactical" nuclear weapons in the Middle East. This does not mean Bush
will use them against Iran, but for the first time since the most dangerous
years of the cold war, the use of what were then called "limited"
nuclear weapons is being openly discussed in Washington. What they are debating is the prospect of other
Hiroshimas and of radioactive fallout across the Middle East and Central
Asia. Seymour Hersh disclosed in the New Yorker last year that American
bombers "have been flying simulated nuclear weapons delivery missions .
. . since last summer."  US ex-generals
reject Iran strike BBC-UK 2.4.07 They said
such action would have "disastrous consequences" for security in
the Middle East and also for coalition forces in Iraq. They said
the crisis over Tehran's nuclear programme must be resolved through
diplomacy, urging Washington to start direct talks with Iran. The letter
was published in Britain's Sunday Times newspaper. It was
signed by: ·
Lt Gen Robert Gard, a former
military assistant to the US defence secretary ·
Gen Joseph Hoar, a former
commander-in-chief, US Central Command ·
Vice Adm Jack Shanahan, a
former director of the Center for Defense Information "As former US military
leaders, we strongly caution against the use of military force against
Iran," the authors said. They said such action would
further exacerbate regional and global tensions. "A strategy of diplomatic engagement with Iran would serve the
interests of the US and the UK and potentially could enhance regional and
international security," the
letter said. It also said
that "the British government has a vital role play in securing a renewed
diplomatic push and making it clear that it will oppose any recourse to
military force". The US and
its Western allies suspect Iran of using its nuclear programme as a cover to
produce nuclear weapons, a claim denied by Tehran. Washington
has so far refused to rule out military action if Iran does not halt its
nuclear activities. The US has also
recently beefed up its military presence in the Gulf.  APARTHEID:
Jimmy Carter nails it
Editorial: H. Brandt Ayers - Chairman, Publisher
The Anniston Star –
Anniston, Alabama 02-04-2007 (Excerpt) At the heart of the
Accords [1978 Camp David Peace Accords] was Israel’s
agreement to respect U.N. Resolutions 242 and 338, which compel Israel to
withdraw from land that was seized by force of arms. Since 1976, Israel has consistently violated 242 and 338
by pockmarking the Palestinian West Bank and Gaza with Israeli settlements,
and now a giant electrified wall with guard towers that, for instance,
encircles Bethlehem, where the Prince of Peace was born. Much controversy has been centered on Carter’s use of “apartheid” in the title. I’ve spent time in South Africa when
that system was in force, and if that Israeli wall isn’t
apartheid, I don’t
know what to call it. The former president explains that the separation is not
racial but is about land. And land is the central fact:
the failure of the Israelis to surrender what they seized in war as they
agreed to do in 242 and 338. Jim Baker, secretary of state to George W. Bush’s father, put the issue plainly in a
speech to the Israeli lobby AIPAC, “Now is the time to
lay aside once and for all the unrealistic vision of a Greater Israel. ...
Forswear annexation. Stop settlement activity. Reach out to the Palestinians
as neighbors who deserve political rights.” Public opinion in both Israel and Palestine favors peace
in two secure neighboring states, a climate that Bush
failed to exploit for six years of exuberant favoritism toward Israel. The world awaits an American president who can inspire in
an Israeli leader the confidence to be a Jewish Truman, announcing an
Israeli-led alliance of nations to make Palestine a model first-world Arab
state. The precedent for
abandoning the failed eye-for-an-eye policy and initiating a Palestinian
Marshall Plan is the words of Israel’s
first president, Chaim Weizmann: “I
am certain the world will judge the Jewish state by how it will treat the
Arabs.”  Bush to Seek
Three-Quarters of a Trillion Dollars More for Wars AFP 2.3.07 President George W. Bush will ask Congress for hundreds of
billions more dollars for fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan, a US paper
reported. Bush is to submit a request Monday for 100 billion dollars
for the current fiscal year, atop 70 billion dollars already authorized, said
the Washington Post report, based on conversations with high-level
administration officials. Bush will also ask for 145 billion dollars for Iraq and
Afghanistan for fiscal 2008, which begins October 1, 2007. The daily added that administration officials have
indicated even more money will be needed. When added to 481 billion in 2008 regular budgeted
Pentagon spending, Bush's "war on terror"
reaches nearly three-quarters of a trillion dollars, which surpasses US
spending on the Vietnam War when adjusted for inflation.  US Attorney Firings Set Stage for
Congressional Battle Washington Post 2.4.07 (Excerpt) A
little-noticed provision passed last year allows Attorney General Alberto R.
Gonzales to appoint interim US attorneys indefinitely without seeking
approval from the Senate. Fearing an attempted end run around Congressional
prerogatives, both House and Senate Democrats have introduced legislation to
repeal the provision. The Senate Judiciary Committee is scheduled to hold a
hearing on the issue Tuesday. 
Dees  In D.C., Contractors Have Become
The “4th Branch of Government” New York Times 2.4.07 (Excerpt) Without a
public debate or formal policy decision, contractors have become a virtual
fourth branch of government. On the rise for decades, spending on federal
contracts has soared during the Bush administration, to about $400 billion
last year from $207 billion in 2000, fueled by the war in Iraq, domestic
security and Hurricane Katrina, but also by a philosophy that encourages
outsourcing almost everything government does. Contractors
still build ships and satellites, but they also collect income taxes and work
up agency budgets, fly pilotless spy aircraft and take the minutes at policy
meetings on the war. They sit next to federal employees at nearly every
agency; far more people work under contracts than are directly employed by
the government. Even the government's online database for tracking contracts,
the Federal Procurement Data System, has been outsourced (and is famously
difficult to use). The
contracting explosion raises questions about propriety, cost and
accountability that have long troubled watchdog groups and are coming under
scrutiny from the Democratic majority in Congress. While flagrant cases of
fraud and waste make headlines, concerns go beyond outright wrongdoing. Among
them: ·
Competition,
intended to produce savings, appears to have sharply eroded. An analysis by
The New York Times shows that fewer than half of all "contract
actions" - new contracts and payments against existing contracts - are
now subject to full and open competition. Just 48 percent were competitive in
2005, down from 79 percent in 2001. ·
The
most secret and politically delicate government jobs, like intelligence
collection and budget preparation, are increasingly contracted out, despite
regulations forbidding the outsourcing of "inherently governmental"
work. Scott Amey, general counsel at the Project on Government Oversight, a
watchdog group, said allowing CACI workers to review other contractors
captured in microcosm "a government that's run by corporations." ·
Agencies
are crippled in their ability to seek low prices, supervise contractors and
intervene when work goes off course because the number of government workers
overseeing contracts has remained level as spending has shot up. One federal
contractor explained candidly in a conference call with industry analysts
last May that "one of the side benefits of the contracting officers
being so overwhelmed" was that existing contracts were extended rather
than put up for new competitive bidding. ·
The
most successful contractors are not necessarily those doing the best work,
but those who have mastered the special skill of selling to Uncle Sam. The
top 20 service contractors have spent nearly $300 million since 2000 on
lobbying and have donated $23 million to political campaigns. "We've
created huge behemoths that are doing 90 or 95 percent of their business with
the government," said Peter W. Singer, who wrote a book on military
outsourcing. "They're not really companies, they're quasi
agencies." Indeed, the biggest federal contractor, Lockheed Martin, which
has spent $53 million on lobbying and $6 million on donations since 2000,
gets more federal money each year than the Departments of Justice or Energy. ·
Contracting
almost always leads to less public scrutiny, as government programs are
hidden behind closed corporate doors. Companies, unlike agencies, are not
subject to the Freedom of Information Act. Members of Congress have sought
unsuccessfully for two years to get the Army to explain the contracts for
Blackwater USA security officers in Iraq, which involved several costly
layers of subcontractors.   
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