*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

BARRIO UNIDO FOR A GENERAL AND UNCONDITIONAL AMNESTY

We make a call to the immigrant community and all those who are
in solidarity with our struggle to join us in front of the Federal Building
to protest the raids that we have been victims of and that are occurring
in different parts of the country.

They harass us as though we are animals of prey.
They lock us up in prisons for working for a miserable salary.
They steal our salaries that we earn with the sweat of our brow.
They separate us from our children leaving them traumatized for life......

We denounce the North American government for treating us like garbage
to be thrown away and taking advantage of our search for our daily bread
for their own political reasons.

We denounce the Mexican and Latin American governments for being
accomplices with the North American government for our misery and
for this involuntary exodus that has been forced upon us because
of the political, social, and economic conditions of our countries

We demand.......
To cease the immigration raids now!
To free all detained workers!
To return jobs to all those detained!
The right to all undocumented immigrants to unionize!

We demand a General and Unconditional Amnesty for all!

Protest the United States government

When: Friday, January 12, 2007
Where: 450 Golden Gate (Federal Building)
Time: 4pm to 7pm
Join in the struggle!

For more information call 415-431-9925

In Spanish:

BARRIÓ UNIDO POR UNA AMNISTÍA GENERAL E INCONDICIONAL
Hace un llamado a la población emigrante y a todos las que se
solidarizan con ella a un piquete enfrente del Edificio Federal
en protesta a las redadas de que estamos siendo victimas
en diferentes partes del país.
DONDE:
Se nos acosa como si fuéramos animales de caza.

Se nos encierra en prisiones para trabajar por sueldos de miseria.

Se nos roban los sueldos que hemos ganado con el sudor de
nuestra frente...

Se nos separa de nuestros hijos dej*ndolos traumados de por vida......

Denunciamos al gobierno Norte Americano por tratarnos como
basura desechable y utilizar nuestra búsqueda por el pan de cada
día para sus propósitos políticos...

Denunciamos a los gobiernos de México y América latina por ser
cómplices con el gobierno de Estados Unidos de nuestra miseria
y de este éxodo involuntario que las condiciones políticas,
sociales, y económicas de nuestros países nos ha obligado
a emprender.

Demandamos...

¡Cese a las redadas de la migra ahora!
¡Libertad a todos los trabajadores detenidos!
¡Regreso a su puesto de trabajo a todos los detenidos!
¡Derecho de los indocumentados a sindicalizarse!
¡Demandamos una Amnistía General e Incondicional para todos!

Piquete al Gobierno de Estados Unidos
Cuando: Viernes, 12 de Enero 2007
Dónde: 450 Golden Gate
Hora: 4pm a 7pm
Únete a la lucha
Para mas información llame a 415-431-9925

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
ARTICLES IN FULL:
*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

1) Military considers recruiting foreigners
Expedited citizenship would be an incentive
By Bryan Bender, Globe Staff
December 26, 2006
http://www.boston.com/news/nation/washington/articles/2006/12/26/military_co
nsiders_recruiting_foreigners/

2) A PALESTINIAN VIEW OF JIMMY CARTER'S BOOK
Ali Abunimah
The Wall Street Journal
26 December 2006
http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article6310.shtml

3) Free Healthcare in Venezuela Regardless of Class
Ronald Suarez Rivas
and Alberto Borrego Avila (photos),
special envoys
GRANMA
December 27, 2006
Here for you in English. Not yet in English at:
http://www.granma.cubaweb.cu/2006/12/27/cubamundo/artic02.html

4) When Iraqis Gave Up on Government
Inter Press Service
Dahr Jamail and Ali Al-Fadhily
http://dahrjamailiraq.com

5) My Reflections On The Delphi Struggle In The Year Gone By
by John Goschka/UAW Local 699
December 27, 2006
http://www.futureoftheunion.com/

6) Diamonds' Glitter Fades for a Brazilian Tribe
By LARRY ROHTER
December 29, 2006
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/29/world/americas/29diamonds.html?ref=america
s

7) Police Officers Charged in Deaths in Hurricane's Aftermath
By SHAILA DEWAN
December 29, 2006
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/29/us/29bridge.html

8) Pentagon to Request Billions More in War Money
By DAVID S. CLOUD
December 30, 2006
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/30/washington/30budget.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

9) Arctic Ice Shelf Broke Off Canadian Island
By ANDREW C. REVKIN
December 30, 2006
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/30/science/earth/30ice.html?ref=world

10) Middle School Girls Gone Wild
By LAWRENCE DOWNES
December 29, 2006
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/29/opinion/29fri4.html?em&ex=1167627600&en=fd
80f5afa9d5d414&ei=5087%0A

11) Saddam at the End of a Rope
By TARIQ ALI
December 30, 2006

12) Officer in 2004 Fatal Shooting Is Given a 30-Day Suspension
By DARYL KHAN
December 31, 2006
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/31/nyregion/31suspend.html

13) After 50 Shots in Queens, Officer Talks to Prosecutors
By WILLIAM K. RASHBAUM
December 31, 2006
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/31/nyregion/31testify.html

14) Opportunities Behind Bars
By PAUL B. BROWN
December 30, 2006
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/30/business/30offline.html

15) Lebanon Destroyed, Destabilised, Desperate for Change
Inter Press Service
Dahr Jamail
http://dahrjamailiraq.com

16) Execution Begins to Deepen Divisions
Inter Press Service
Dahr Jamail and Ali al-Fadhily
http://dahrjamailiraq.com

17) Threats may hinder efforts to revive JROTC
by Heather Cassell
h.cassell@ebar.com
http://www.ebar.com/news/article.php?sec=news&article=1436

18) The Low Profile: CNN and the New York Times Execute a
Denial of History
John Collins, Electronic Iraq
31 December 2006
electronicIraq.net

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

1) Military considers recruiting foreigners
Expedited citizenship would be an incentive
By Bryan Bender, Globe Staff
December 26, 2006
http://www.boston.com/news/nation/washington/articles/2006/12/26/military_co
nsiders_recruiting_foreigners/

WASHINGTON -- The armed forces, already struggling to meet recruiting
goals, are considering expanding the number of noncitizens in the ranks
-- including disputed proposals to open recruiting stations overseas and
putting more immigrants on a faster track to US citizenship if they
volunteer -- according to Pentagon officials.

Foreign citizens serving in the US military is a highly charged issue,
which could expose the Pentagon to criticism that it is essentially
using mercenaries to defend the country. Other analysts voice concern
that a large contingent of noncitizens under arms could jeopardize
national security or reflect badly on Americans' willingness to serve
in uniform.

The idea of signing up foreigners who are seeking US citizenship
is gaining traction as a way to address a critical need for the Pentagon,
while fully absorbing some of the roughly one million immigrants that
enter the United States legally each year.

The proposal to induct more noncitizens, which is still largely on the
drawing board, has to clear a number of hurdles. So far, the Pentagon
has been quiet about specifics -- including who would be eligible
to join, where the recruiting stations would be, and what the minimum
standards might involve, including English proficiency. In the meantime,
the Pentagon and immigration authorities have expanded a program
that accelerates citizenship for legal residents who volunteer
for the military.

And since Sept. 11, 2001, the number of imm igrants in uniform
who have become US citizens has increased from 750 in 2001
to almost 4,600 last year, according to military statistics.

With severe manpower strains because of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan
-- and a mandate to expand the overall size of the military --
the Pentagon is under pressure to consider a variety of proposals
involving foreign recruits, according to a military affairs analyst.

"It works as a military idea and it works in the context of American
immigration," said Thomas Donnelly , a military scholar at the conservative
American Enterprise Institute in Washington and a leading proponent
of recruiting more foreigners to serve in the military.

As the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan grind on, the Pentagon has warned
Congress and the White House that the military is stretched "to the
breaking point."

Both President Bush and Robert M. Gates, his new defense secretary,
have acknowledged that the total size of the military must be
expanded to help alleviate the strain on ground troops, many
of whom have been deployed repeatedly in combat theaters.

Bush said last week that he has ordered Gates to come up with
a plan for the first significant increase in ground forces since the
end of the Cold War. Democrats who are preparing to take control
of Congress, meanwhile, promise to make increasing the size
of the military one of their top legislative priorities in 2007.

"With today's demands placing such a high strain on our service
members, it becomes more crucial than ever that we work
to alleviate their burden," said Representative Ike Skelton ,
a Missouri Democrat who is set to chair the House Armed
Services Committee, and who has been calling for a larger
Army for more than a decade.

But it would take years and billions of dollars to recruit, train,
and equip the 30,000 troops and 5,000 Marines the Pentagon
says it needs. And military recruiters, fighting the perception that
signing up means a ticket to Baghdad, have had to rely on financial
incentives and lower standards to meet their quotas.

That has led Pentagon officials to consider casting a wider net for
noncitizens who are already here, said Lieutenant Colonel Bryan
Hilferty , an Army spokesman.

Already, the Army and the Immigration and Customs Enforcement
division of the Department of Homeland Security have "made it
easier for green-card holders who do enlist to get their citizenship,"
Hilferty said.

Other Army officials, who asked not to be identified, said personnel
officials are working with Congress and other parts of the government
to test the feasibility of going beyond US borders to recruit soldiers
and Marines.

Currently, Pentagon policy stipulates that only immigrants legally
residing in the United States are eligible to enlist. There are currently
about 30,000 noncitizens who serve in the US armed forces, making
up about 2 percent of the active-duty force, according to statistics
from the military and the Council on Foreign Relations. About
100 noncitizens have died in Iraq and Afghanistan.

A recent change in US law, however, gave the Pentagon authority
to bring immigrants to the United States if it determines it is vital
to national security. So far, the Pentagon has not taken advantage
of it, but the calls are growing to take use the new authority.

Indeed, some top military thinkers believe the United States should
go as far as targeting foreigners in their native countries.

"It's a little dramatic," said Michael O'Hanlon , a military specialist
at the nonpartisan Brookings Institution and another supporter
of the proposal. "But if you don't get some new idea how to do this,
we will not be able to achieve an increase" in the size of the
armed forces.

"We have already done the standard things to recruit new soldiers,
including using more recruiters and new advertising campaigns,"
O'Hanlon added.

O'Hanlon and others noted that the country has relied before on
sizable numbers of noncitizens to serve in the military -- in the
Revolutionary War, for example, German and French soldiers
served alongside the colonists, and locals were recruited into
US ranks to fight insurgents in the Philippines.

Other nations have recruited foreign citizens: In France, the famed
Foreign Legion relies on about 8,000 noncitizens; Nepalese soldiers
called Gurkhas have fought and died with British Army forces
for two centuries; and the Swiss Guard, which protects the Vatican,
consists of troops who hail from many nations.

"It is not without historical precedent," said Donnelly, author
of a recent book titled "The Army We Need," which advocates
for a larger military.

Still, to some military officials and civil rights groups, relying on large
number of foreigners to serve in the military is offensive.

The Hispanic rights advocacy group National Council of La Raza has
said the plan sends the wrong message that Americans themselves
are not willing to sacrifice to defend their country. Officials have also
raised concerns that immigrants would be disproportionately sent
to the front lines as "cannon fodder" in any conflict.

Some within the Army privately express concern that a big push to
recruit noncitizens would smack of "the decline of the American
empire," as one Army official who asked not to be identified put it.

Officially, the military remains confident that it can meet recruiting
goals -- no matter how large the military is increased -- without
having to rely on foreigners.

"The Army can grow to whatever size the nation wants us to grow
to," Hilferty said. "National defense is a national challenge, not
the Army's challenge."

He pointed out that just 15 years ago, during the Gulf War, the Army
had a total of about 730,000 active-duty soldiers, amounting to
about one American in 350 who were serving in the active-duty Army.

"Today, with 300 million Americans and about 500,000 active-duty
soldiers, only about one American in 600 is an active-duty soldier,"
he said. "America did then, and we do now, have an all-volunteer
force, and I see no reason why America couldn't increase the number
of Americans serving."

But Max Boot, a national security specialist at the Council on Foreign
Relations, said that the number of noncitizens the armed forces have
now is relatively small by historical standards.

"In the 19th century, when the foreign-born population of the United
States was much higher, so was the percentage of foreigners serving
in the military," Boot wrote in 2005.

"During the Civil War, at least 20 percent of Union soldiers were
immigrants, and many of them had just stepped off the boat before
donning a blue uniform. There were even entire units, like the
15th Wisconsin Volunteer Infantry [the Scandinavian Regiment]
and General Louis Blenker's German Division, where English was
hardly spoken."

"The military would do well today to open its ranks not only to legal
immigrants but also to illegal ones and, as important, to untold
numbers of young men and women who are not here now but
would like to come," Boot added.

"No doubt many would be willing to serve for some set period,
in return for one of the world's most precious commodities --
US citizenship. Some might deride those who sign up as
mercenaries, but these troops would have significantly different
motives than the usual soldier of fortune."

Bryan Bender can be reached at bender@globe.com

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

2) A PALESTINIAN VIEW OF JIMMY CARTER'S BOOK
Ali Abunimah
The Wall Street Journal
26 December 2006
http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article6310.shtml

President Carter has done what few American politicians
have dared to do: speak frankly about the Israel-Palestine
conflict. He has done this nation, and the cause of peace,
an enormous service by focusing attention on what he calls
"the abominable oppression and persecution in the occupied
Palestinian territories, with a rigid system of required
passes and strict segregation between Palestine's citizens
and Jewish settlers in the West Bank."

The 39th president of the United States, the most
successful Arab- Israeli peace negotiator to date, has
braved a storm of criticism, including the insinuation
from the pro-Israel Anti-Defamation League that his
arguments are anti-Semitic.

Mr. Carter has tried to mollify critics by suggesting that
his is not a commentary on Israeli policy inside Israel's
own borders, as compared with the West Bank, Gaza Strip
and East Jerusalem -- territories Israel occupied in 1967.
He told NPR, "I know that Israel is a wonderful democracy
with equal treatment of all citizens whether Arab or Jew.
And so I very carefully avoided talking about anything
inside Israel."

Given the pressure he has faced, it may be understandable
that Mr. Carter says this, but he is wrong. In addition to
nearly four million Palestinians living under Israeli rule
in the occupied territories, another one million live
inside Israel's pre-1967 borders. These Palestinians are
descendants of those who were not forced out or did not
flee when Israel was created in 1948.

They have nominal Israeli citizenship, and unlike blacks
in apartheid South Africa, they do vote for the country's
parliament. Yet this is where any sense of equality ends.
In Israel's history, no Arab-led party has ever been asked
to join a coalition government. And, among scores of
Jewish ministers, there has only ever been one Arab
minister, of junior rank.

Discrimination against non-Jewish citizens both informal
and legalized is systematic. Non-Jewish children attend
separate schools and live in areas that receive a fraction
of the funding of their Jewish counterparts. The results
can be seen in the much poorer educational attainment,
economic, health and life outcomes of Palestinian citizens
of Israel. Much of the land of the country, controlled by
the quasi-governmental Jewish National Fund, cannot be
leased or sold to non-Jews. This is similar in effect to
the restrictive covenants that in many U.S. cities once
kept nonwhites out of certain neighborhoods.

A 2003 law stipulates that an Israeli citizen may bring a
non- citizen spouse to live in Israel from anywhere in the
world, excluding a Palestinian from the occupied
territories. A civil rights leader in Israel likened it to
the American anti-miscegenation measures from the 1950s,
when mixed race couples had to leave the state of Virginia
to marry legally.

For Palestinians, the most blatant form of discrimination
is Israel's "Law of Return," that allows a Jewish person
from any country to settle in Israel. Meanwhile, family
members of Palestinian citizens of Israel, living in
exile, sometimes in refugee camps just a few miles outside
Israel's borders, are not permitted to set foot in the
country.

The rise of Avigdor Lieberman, the new deputy prime
minister, who openly advocates stripping Palestinians in
Israel of citizenship and transferring them outside the
state, reflects increasingly extremist politics. In
response to growing discrimination, leaders of
Palestinians inside Israel recently issued a report, "The
Future Vision of the Palestinian Arabs in Israel." It
calls for Israel to become a state where all citizens and
communities have equal rights, regardless of religion.
Many Israeli commentators reacted angrily, calling the
initiative an attempt to dismantle Israel as a "Jewish
state." However, even if Mr. Carter's recommendations are
implemented, and Israel withdraws from the territories
occupied in 1967, the struggle over the legitimacy of a
state that privileges one ethno- religious group at the
expense of another will not disappear.

As other divided societies, like South Africa,
Northern Ireland and indeed our own are painfully learning, only
equal rights and esteem for all the people, in the
diversity of their identities, can bring lasting peace.
This is an even harder discussion than the one President
Carter has courageously launched, but ultimately it is one
we must confront if peace is to come to Israel-Palestine.

Ali Abunimah is co-founder of The Electronic Intifada and
author of "One Country: A Bold Proposal to End the
Israeli-Palestinian Impasse" (Metropolitan Books, 2006).

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

3) Free Healthcare in Venezuela Regardless of Class
Ronald Suarez Rivas
and Alberto Borrego Avila (photos),
special envoys
GRANMA
December 27, 2006
Here for you in English. Not yet in English at:
http://www.granma.cubaweb.cu/2006/12/27/cubamundo/artic02.html

[(An exceptionally significant report with many implications for
the political and medical situation in Venezuela, Bolivia and
beyond. What a mistake it would be to simply limit medical care
to certain sections of the city or the society. The idea that
medical care is a right for all people is a solid principle to
be understood widely and, hopefully, emulated elswhere as well.
(It's a good thing that Venezuala isn't wasting any money on any
foreign wars and occupations, and with the price of oil on the
uprise, the country can afford to provide this care to everyone.
It will, furthermore, help to undercut opposition to the Chavez
government and the Bolivarian process generally. Keep in mind
that the private fee-for-service model of medical care bitterly
resents the competion from those who believe healthcare should
be a right, not a privilege for the wealth and something which
the rest can get if they are poor enough to quality for charity,
and then only if those wo give to charity give enough.
Strengthening the working class by providing free health care,
since many don't get it through their jobs, and at the same
time winning the support of as many in the middle classes as
possible by also cutting the cost of medical care can help to
undercut support for the Venezuelan opposition as well, which
is certainly not about to go away. So not only does this give
a practical demonstration of what a socialist government can
do, but it shows an astute sense of political strategy, too.
Compare the Venezuelan experience with the Honduran:
http://www.walterlippmann.com/docs070.html
(This is one readers should spread far and wide.)...Walter
Lippmann, www.walterlippmann.com ]

MIRANDA, Venezuela.- The doctor's office in the community of La
California Norte was inaugurated amid the protest of people beating
pots and pans and a shower of stones. In fact, the first patient that
same morning was a woman whose head was split open by a piece of dry
ice that somebody had thrown.

caption:
"THE SECRET TO BECOMING ACCEPTED
IS TO EXCEL IN OUR WORK," DR. MARISOL SAYS.

"They are communists, soldiers disguised as doctors who are coming to
brainwash people," some of the locals said of the Cuban doctors who
had come to serve at the new clinic as part of the Barrio Adentro
initiative in Venezuela that provides free neighborhood healthcare.

While among Venezuela's poor communities the program has been
received with enthusiasm, in this middle class neighborhood of the
state of Miranda it seemed that it would be impossible to establish.

To begin with, the Barrio Adentro clinics had been set up in the
poorest neighborhoods, but having a free and trusted healthcare
program was a request of all Venezuela and the clinics are starting
to spread to middle class neighborhoods.

"The Cuban doctors? They are very good. Whenever my children are sick
I bring them here for treatment," said Yolanda, a resident of La
California Norte.

Vitta, another local, suffers from high blood pressure and visits the
clinic on a daily basis to monitor her condition. "Before I had to go
to a drugstore, now I come here because I like it better, they take
good care of me and don't charge."

Despite the prevailing opposition to President Chavez in this
community, becoming part of the Barrio Adentro program was an
important step for several of the residents who came together to
create a health committee and support the project.

On May 12, 2004, when the health clinic opened, Dr. Marisol Pelaez
had already been serving the people of La California Norte for eight
months.

"In the beginning we provided our services at a resident's home [.]
and tried to become familiar with the community to become accepted.
The first days were really hard. We barely received two or three
patients, sometimes the same people came more than once so that we
would not be sent elsewhere because of a lack of work."

caption:
YUDITH SILVERA COMES FREQUENTLY
WITH ONE OF THE 20 CHILDREN OF THE
DAY CARE CENTER WHERE SHE WORKS.

But as time went by, the doctor's office turned into an essential
element within the neighborhood.

Carmen di Tercio owes her life to it. An aspirin she took caused an
adverse reaction while she was shopping at the Petare Market, and she
asked a taxi driver to take her to the Cuban doctors.

"When she arrived she was unconscious. We immediately injected her,
did an intravenous connection and she regained consciousness within a
few minutes," said Dr. Pelaez.

Yudith Silvera frequently brings some of the 20 children from the
children's nursery where she works.

Before she had to go through an insurance company, "The service was
slow and very expensive, but here they provide care to us immediately
and they are excellent."

Fear? Dr. Pelaez says, "Our commitment with Fidel, the importance
that the Venezuelan Revolution advance because of what it means to
the world and the protection afforded by so many friends made it so
we were never afraid.

"We were always accompanied by members of the health committee, who
came to protect the clinic. Many of the people that were banging the
pots and pans were just misled and confused. They had been told that
we were bringing weapons and were going to preach communism, but
little by little they were able to see the reality. They have even
apologized to us.

"Our secret is to do the best work possible and demonstrate the human
qualities of Cubans. People thank us on a daily basis for what we do
for them, the courage to be here and for leaving behind our families
to come and help them."

Everyday in the waiting room there are both Chavez supporters and
detractors, they sit together and talk while waiting for their turn.

"Before, this type of thing was impossible, without a doubt this is
part of the change that Venezuela is going through," Dr. Pelaez says.

Recently, a rehab clinic opened next door. During its inauguration
there were no pots and pans banged or stones thrown, instead there
was lots of excitement.

Fernando Roca, one of the regular patients, comments: "There are
still people who want to make life impossible for the Revolution and
even for us who live here. The mass media has poisoned them. But we
will continue struggling to make the process advance and so that what
has been built lasts."

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

4) When Iraqis Gave Up on Government
Inter Press Service
Dahr Jamail and Ali Al-Fadhily
http://dahrjamailiraq.com

*BAGHDAD, Dec 27 (IPS) - The Iraqi government headed by Prime Minister
Noori al-Maliki, like earlier governments assigned by U.S. occupation
authorities in Iraq, appears to have killed Iraqi dreams of a brighter
future.*

General elections Dec. 15, 2005 brought in a government that was
supposed to listen to Iraqis all over the country. It was called a unity
government because the cabinet was formed to include ministers from all
ethnic and sectarian backgrounds after months of negotiations in the
parliament.

"This is a unity government that no one should object to," al-Maliki
told reporters recently in Baghdad. "All of the powers in parliament
should take part in improving security and services in order to achieve
success."

Maliki condemned groups such as Jabhat al-Tawafuq and The Iraqi Front
for National Dialogue, along with other political groups who have been
critical of the government.

Jabhat al-Tawafuq comprises three leading Sunni groups: the Iraqi
Islamic Party, the Iraqi People's Conference and the National Dialogue
Council. Their platform is based on national unity and ending the
occupation.

The Iraqi Front for National Dialogue also stands for ending the
occupation, rebuilding government institutions and improving the
economic and security situation.

But opposition leaders blame Maliki for denying them a role within
government, undermining his claim that there is indeed a unity government.

"We are not really in the government," Tariq al-Hashimi, leader of the
Islamic Party, and one of Iraq's two vice-presidents told IPS earlier.
"Maliki and his coalition never gave us any real role in the government,
and our ministers' actions are therefore paralysed."

Hashimi's group, like other Sunni groups and also some moderate Shia
groups, are nearly voiceless in the feeble Iraqi government.

The dominant Shia coalition was formed in accordance with advice from
Iranian-born Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, the revered Shia cleric who
lives in Najaf in the south. This coalition of Shia parties was formed
to secure power against a list of secular parties led by former interim
prime minister Iyad Allawi who formed 'The Iraqi List'.

The power of the Shia coalition forced reluctant Sunnis to participate
in the elections by banding together with their own list in order to win
the votes of Sunnis. The entire political process was divided along
religious and sectarian lines, and along ethnic lines because the
Kurdish list included all of the Kurdish parties.

Given this background, few Iraqis are surprised that their government is
fractured and fragmented, and at odds with itself.

"This government will definitely lead the country into disaster," Dr.
Salih al-Mutlaq, leader of The Iraqi Front for National Dialogue told
IPS earlier. "The country will slide into civil war if this sectarian
attitude remains, and that is why we decided not to participate in this
government."

Former prime minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari, with the support of Shia
cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, took over April 7, 2005. But Jaafari was
rejected by all other groups, and also by some parties within the Shia
coalition for his failure to lead the country.

Maliki was then assigned the job of prime minister on condition of fair
distribution of in the cabinet amongst winners, and fair treatment to
all Iraqis regardless of their religious or ethnic identity.

"Things only got worse, and this government and parliament won the title
of the worst in the history of Iraq," Thafir al-Ani from al-Tawafuq told
IPS. "The whole system needs to be changed, or else the country will be
divided into small states, and the catastrophe will be too vast to be
corrected."

Al-Ani cited recent polls to say that more than 90 percent of Iraqis are
angry with the government. People continue to blame the government for
everything going wrong from the high level of violence to lack of
employment and of water and electricity.

One of the darkest clouds of illegitimacy over the Iraqi government is
the alignment of top officials with the Sadr Movement, which has been
accused of backing most of the sectarian death squads that are now the
leading cause of death in Iraq.

"This government failed on all the promises it made to Iraqis, and so
all Iraqis want it changed," Muhammad Basher al-Faidhy, spokesman for
the Sunni Association of Muslim Scholars told IPS. "They are sorry they
ever took part in the elections. Our Association warned Iraqis that this
government would be the worst ever. They simply cannot get rid of death
squads because they are their major ally."

Most Iraqis see no future for Maliki's struggling government, which
barely controls the so-called Green Zone in Baghdad where its offices
are located. The rest of the country is fragmented, and the economy and
infrastructure are in ruins.

"They are going down despite the huge support they are getting from the
U.S. administration," Iraqi analyst Maki al-Nazzal told IPS. "They are
faced by an international denial after their resounding failure in
facing the deteriorating security situation and the comprehensive
collapse in services and reconstruction."

On the other hand, the Sadr movement finds itself in a strong enough
situation to turn away from al-Maliki and his Dawa Party. Sadr leaders
are now calling for early elections, and they are confident of winning
without other support, says their spokesman Hassan al-Zarqani.

"It seems that the United States have chosen the wrong ally once more,"
Zarqani told IPS. "So they will have to reconsider yet again." Sadr had
recently pulled his representatives from the government, but they came back.

Meanwhile, another crisis has arisen. Grand Ayatollah Sistani announced
last week that he will not support a U.S.-backed plan to build a
coalition across sectarian lines. The plan would have sought to
marginalise Muqtada al-Sadr by dividing the Shias.

Resistance to the occupation is rising, on the streets and politically,
as support for the government falls. Not a promising start to 2007.

(c)2006 Dahr Jamail

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

5) My Reflections On The Delphi Struggle In The Year Gone By
by John Goschka/UAW Local 699
December 27, 2006
http://www.futureoftheunion.com/

Good morning brothers and sisters, hero's of the workers and retirees
in this great world that we live in.

I would like too take the time to reflect on my thoughts on the labor
struggles during this past year. Every day that passes is history when
the new day arrives. Thus the years pass also. It's history and gone
forever. We will never be able to relive any of those days, but we
can and should learn from them.

We at Delphi have experienced what happens when the Devil himself
comes to town. The fears, emotional swings, the utter feelings of
helplessness. The few did rise up against this corruption, and indeed
they would be heard. But, what about the vast majority of the
workers and retirees? They would set the sidelines and believe
in our UAW IEB to defend us through concessions.

Even as the storm clouds darkened and we saw our brothers and
sisters in other industries losing their jobs and being thrown out
too the wolves, we could not unite the workers and retirees too
stop this great RAPE that we are experiencing. The CEO's are
rolling and playing in their new found riches, and they are being
given unconscionable bonuses and stock options.

The rich can't take their money with them when their life is over
here on earth. Yet, they can't seem to get enough of it. They will
suck the lifeblood from the poor to enhance their own egos and
bellies. They will steal billions of dollars from the workers and
then donate pennies to worthwile causes and "SHOUT, SEE,
WE CARE". Where there is no conscience, there is no mercy!!!

The workers and retirees at Delphi seem to have been pacified
for the most part through this great concessionary RAPE. Many
are unhappy with the results of what has happened, but they
are not mad enough to fight. They seem to look at the other
industries who have closed their doors and moved their
operations overseas with the attitude that "we have fared well".
Where is SOLIDARITY with that kind of an attitude?

Are we any better than the CEO's with this kind of an attitude?
If we don't stand and fight for our brothers and sisters, do we
not also suck the lifeblood from the poor? Yes, I make more
money in retirement than the new two tier wage earners earn
while working. I also have benefits, They have NONE. Do I want
to give up any of the retirement or benefits that I recieve?
HELL NO! Am I willing to SHOUT and FIGHT for my brothers
and sisters? HELL YES. It's the LEAST that I can do.

Yes, many are content too leave things as they are right now
at Delphi. But, they just fool themselves. Concessions are just
that, CONCESSIONS. The door has been opened WIDE and the
concessionary flow is in a direction that will hurt us more than
we can imagine. THEY WILL BE BACK FOR MORE!! I will write you
a guarentee on that.

Have the people who have stood and fought altered the original
plans for the Devils advocates on their planned bankruptcy?
I say, "yes they have". Miller and his henchmen weren't used
to a fight. They always relied on the workers and union to just
lay down and roll over. It just didn't happen this time. The
union played dead while being RAPED, but a band of people
who understood the true meaning of SOLIDARITY got together
and became a pain in the ass to the bankruptcy conspiracy.

I say that this band of dissidents, rogues, or whatever THEY
choose to call them, understands the true meaning of SOLIDARITY.
They squeaked like a mouse and the powers that be trembled.
History was altered for the time being. Can we see the writing
on the wall? Are we willing to read that writing? Do we understand
that the battle hasn't even begun yet? The concessionary advotaces
WILL be back. They never got what they wanted, you must know that.
They will be back.

Will we bury our heads in the sand and hope for the best? Their plans
have changed, but their goals remain the same. If we can't see this
writing on the wall and take the time to prepare for it, then they
will eventually crush us. They will find a way to quiet the squeaking
mouse and crush it also. If we would but unite and show the powers
that be what true SOLIDARITY is all about, we can change history
instead of just altering it. The mouse would become a lion.
A lion ROARS and will FIGHT.

Miller and his cronies tried to give Delphi away to their friends for
around 3.2 billion dollars. The offer was well recieved by the
henchmen and appeared to have been accepted. But, wait. A new
offer for 4.7 billion dollars was put on the table. Another greedy
interest in Delphi? The henchmen must be up in arms. That is an
automatic 1.5 billion dollars that won't reach their bloated bank
accounts. The Scrooge has struck.

Miller is no longer the CEO of Delphi. What's up now? Stay tuned,
I'm sure that more surprises will be in store for us. O'Neal will
be a puppet to the bankruptcy charades and fill his pockets also.

As I have previously stated, I believe that the brave few have
altered the history of Delphi. But, my beliefs are that alterations
are not good enough. We need to change history not only for Delphi,
but for the workers of the world. We most continue the fight
for decent wages and health care benefits. We can't rely on our
politicans and unions too make this happen. If we want it,
we will have to UNITE and FIGHT for it.

The mouse will eventually be crushed. But the lion, that's a different
story. If the lion will ROAR, I believe that history can and will be
changed. Until that time, we will continue to squeak and hope
to continue to alter history.

These are my views and thoughts as we soon enter into another
new year. I will not attempt to suck the lifeblood from the poor.
I will strive to do my best to help them throughout my life.
They are my brothers and sisters.

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

6) Diamonds' Glitter Fades for a Brazilian Tribe
By LARRY ROHTER
December 29, 2006
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/29/world/americas/29diamonds.html?ref=america
s

ROOSEVELT INDIGENOUS AREA, Brazil - Some of the world's most
abundant deposits of diamonds are embedded in the reddish soil
of the Amazon jungle here. But for the Cinta-Larga Indians who live
on this remote reservation, that discovery has brought more misfortune
than riches.

Outside miners began prospecting in earnest in 1999 and soon
overran the Indians' lands, bringing with them drink, drugs, disease
and prostitution. Dazzled by the promise of quick wealth from their
dealings with the outsiders, tribal leaders have accumulated debts
they cannot pay - especially now that the police have set up
roadblocks on the reservation's borders to prevent illegal diamond
trafficking.

Cinta-Larga means Broad Belt in Portuguese, a reference to the
tribe's former habit of wearing bark sashes around the waist.
For generations, the Cinta-Largas chose to live in isolation
here along the banks of the Roosevelt River, named for
Theodore Roosevelt, who led an expedition through this
region of the southwestern Amazon some 90 years ago.

"Back then, we had no idea what diamonds were worth," recalled
Roberto Carlos Cinta-Larga, a tribal leader who, following tradition,
uses the tribe's name as his surname. "We didn't have money
in those days and didn't even really know what money was, because
our nature was to stay apart from everyone else and not cultivate
friendships."

But in the 1960s, a highway was built west of here, opening the
jungle to exploitation by loggers. The discovery of gold, tin and
finally diamonds increased the opportunities for the Cinta-Largas
but also their resentment of white encroachments on land that
the Brazilian government had set aside for them.

Two years ago, the tensions finally boiled over. In an episode that
is still under investigation, and for reasons that remain unclear,
the Cinta-Largas killed 29 miners who were working without
their permission at the mine on the reservation.

Since then, the Cinta-Largas have become the most notorious
of Brazil's hundreds of Indian tribes, reviled in the press as
bloodthirsty savages who want the diamonds for themselves
and insulted when they leave their reservation for nearby towns.
In hopes of countering those negative portrayals, tribal leaders
recently invited this reporter to visit.

"We want it known that, despite what our enemies say, we are
not mining diamonds," Ita Cinta-Larga, another tribal leader,
said as he inspected the mining pit and its collection of abandoned
hoses and sluices. "We still catch miners trying to sneak in now
and then, but it's pretty calm here now, and that's the way
we want to keep it."

In return for an $810,000 grant for community development
from the Brazilian government, the Cinta-Largas agreed in April
to shut down the mine, allow the state environmental police
to patrol the site and refrain from killing intruders. But the
money is now running out, and Pio Cinta-Larga, a tribal leader,
warned that unless more help is forthcoming, "when the year
ends, the truce expires with it."

Mauro Sposito, director of the Brazilian Federal Police's Amazon
task force, said that in view of the tribe's history, such threats
must be taken seriously. "We know that they are violent and
that something could occur, which is why the main principles
of our activities from the start have been to try to negotiate
and avoid the use of brute force," he said.

Ivaneide Bandeira Cardozo works with an environmental and
indigenous rights group, Kaninde. She cites another factor that
the tribe is reluctant to discuss out of shame and embarrassment.
"From what the Cinta-Larga women told me, they were tired
of seeing the miners raping girls as young as 14 and bringing
in drugs," she said. "So they pressed their men to take a stand."

Rômulo Siqueira de Sá, an official of the National Indian Foundation,
the government agency that deals with indigenous affairs, said
diamond money led many Cinta-Largas to buy cars, houses and
other goods on credit through white intermediaries. With the mine
shut and government funds running out, he said, they have fallen
behind on payments and are facing repossession claims. As a
result, the pressure to resume illicit diamond trading and reopen
prospecting to outsiders is growing.

"The chiefs want government money so that they can pay private
debts derived from illegal activities, and there is no possibility
whatsoever that the government is going to do that," Mr. Sposito
said. "Brazilian law does not permit such a thing. What the
government can do is support the development of the community
and provide orientation, but not more than that."

Most of the Cinta-Larga leaders are men in their late 50s and
early 60s, from a generation that the Brazilian anthropologist
Ines Hargreaves calls "the orphans of contact." They were born
while the tribe lived in isolation, and so they can vaguely recollect
both that idealized past and the suffering they experienced
as children when Brazilian society erupted into their world
with violence and disease.

"I was already a teenager by the time miners had killed thousands
of our people, gunning them down in their malocas," or lodge
houses, said Ita Cinta-Larga, who gave his age as about 60.
"My own father died that way, and I can still remember the
bodies laid out and everyone crying."

All told, 27 Cinta-Larga leaders have been named as suspects
in the investigation into the killings of the miners. Though none
of the leaders interviewed here would admit direct responsibility,
they all acknowledged that members of the tribe were involved
in the killings, which they said were the result of their frustration
at seeing their complaints ignored by Brazilian authorities.

"We had asked the Federal Police over and over again to make
the miners leave, and when they didn't we took miners prisoner
and delivered them to the police ourselves," said Pio Cinta-Larga,
who often serves as the tribe's liaison to the outside world.
"But the police would release them the same day, and the miners
would immediately come back and threaten and make fun of us
Indians. So we said, 'Enough is enough, let's show these people
who we are.' "

Mr. Sposito acknowledged that the tribe had turned in miners
but noted that those who illegally invaded Indian territory were
entitled to be freed on bail under Brazilian law. That explanation
does not satisfy the Cinta-Largas, who see the police checkpoints
on roads leading in and out of the reservation as an infringement
upon their sovereignty rather than as a measure meant to protect
them.

"These are our lands, and we're in charge here," said João Bravo
Cinta-Larga, whom critics of the tribe have singled out as perhaps
the most intransigent of the chiefs. "No one can come in here and
tell us what to do. We have never allowed ourselves to be
dominated by anyone, and we're not going to start now."

Depending on how it is used, the word "bravo" can mean either
courageous or irate in Portuguese. João Bravo Cinta-Larga seems
to be both, complaining bitterly that the nickname "Lord of the
Stones," given to him by the Brazilian press, and the accusations
that he has used the diamond wealth to enrich himself at the
expense of his own community are malicious lies.

"I had a power plant built so that we can have electricity, and
we also started a fish farming project," he said. "We are not
just diamonds."

Other Cinta-Larga leaders have used money from diamonds
to buy large herds of cattle or to invest in orchards, hoping to
sell fruit to the Brazilian market. But the police say that tribal
leaders also have hundreds of diamonds hidden away and that
they have concealed mining equipment in the jungle, ready to
resume prospecting on short notice.

Recently, the Cinta-Largas were persuaded to sell some of their
stones through the government's savings banks rather than
illegally to middle men, the argument being that they would
get a fairer price. But the auction fetched much less than the
Indians expected, adding to their distrust of the government.

"They promised that representatives of our people would be
flown to the auction to see how it was done, and then they didn't
keep their word," Pio Cinta-Larga complained. "There were a lot
of good stones, but instead of the millions they said we would
see, we got almost nothing. They deceived us, just as the white
man always does."

Mr. Sposito responded that the Indians seemed to have forgotten
that "taxes exist, and we can't create a law that eliminates that."
He added: "The leaders are aware of this. They all have cars and
drivers licenses and bank accounts and houses in town. So they
know what their obligations are."

Geologists say the diamond potential of the reservation here has
barely been scratched. Tribal leaders, however, seem torn between
contradictory desires: to keep outsiders away so that they can
exploit the wealth themselves and to leave the diamonds in the
ground untouched.

"I used to think that money was good and that I wanted to be rich,
but now I don't," Pio Cinta-Larga said. "A little bit might be good,
but a lot is not. It only brings problems and suffering, when what
we really want is tranquillity."

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

7) Police Officers Charged in Deaths in Hurricane's Aftermath
By SHAILA DEWAN
December 29, 2006
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/29/us/29bridge.html

ATLANTA, Dec. 28 - Seven New Orleans police officers were indicted
Thursday on charges of first-degree murder or attempted murder
in connection with the deaths of two men on a bridge six days after
Hurricane Katrina struck.

Four other civilians suffered gunshot wounds in the episode, which
took place on Sept. 4, 2005. No officers were hurt.

The shootings occurred while much of the New Orleans area was
still under water, communication among officers was poor and the
city was chaotic. The New Orleans Police Department's initial account
- that officers were responding to reports of snipers firing on
contractors - seemed to confirm fears of rampant lawlessness
in the city.

But that account was repeatedly revised. At one point, the police
said they were responding to reports that two officers had been
shot. The victims, for their part, said they had simply been seeking
help after the storm left them stranded.

Frank Zibilich, a lawyer for one of the police officers, said that
although first-degree murder in Louisiana did not require proof
of premeditation, the charges were harsh.

"It's mind-boggling to me that officers, under the intense
circumstances that were going on in New Orleans at this time,
that seven officers decide simultaneously that they're going
to go commit murder," Mr. Zibilich said.

Two families were involved in the shootings. At the base of the
bridge, the officers encountered the Bartholomew family: a couple
and their teenage daughter and nephew, and the nephew's friend
James Brissette, 19. The family, which filed a civil lawsuit against
the officers and the police department, said in court papers that
it was trying to reach a grocery store on the other side of the
bridge when the police officers began firing at them. Mr. Brissette
died, while the nephew, Jose Holmes Jr., 19, jumped behind
a barricade. As he lay on the ground, according to the court
papers, he was shot at from a distance and then approached
by a man who shot him point blank in the abdomen.

Mr. Holmes wound up partly paralyzed with a colostomy bag.
Susan Bartholomew, the mother, lost her right arm.

"The police in this case used the devastation of the storm to
behave in a criminal manner," said Gary W. Bizal, a lawyer who
is representing Mr. Holmes in the civil case. "They held themselves
above the law, and now it's coming back to roost."

Near the top of the bridge, according to a statement issued by
the office of Eddie Jordan, the Orleans Parish district attorney,
the police encountered Ronald Madison, a mentally retarded man,
and his brother Lance, who had been employed by Federal Express
for 25 years. The brothers had been forced to swim through
floodwaters and had been trying to reach their mother's house
across the bridge, their family said in its civil lawsuit. The family
said the brothers were on the bridge with other people they did
not know when a rental truck pulled up and a group of heavily
armed officers jumped out and began firing.

Ronald Madison, 40, died after being shot seven times in the back.
His brother was arrested at the scene and charged with eight counts
of attempted murder of a police officer, though no weapon was
recovered. The grand jury that handed down Thursday's indictments
declined to indict Lance Madison.

A spokeswoman for Warren J. Riley, the superintendent of police,
said he would not comment on the case.

Brenda Goodman contributed reporting.

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

8) Pentagon to Request Billions More in War Money
By DAVID S. CLOUD
December 30, 2006
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/30/washington/30budget.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

WASHINGTON, Dec. 29 - The Pentagon is seeking nearly $100 billion
for operations in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere, a request that,
if approved by Congress, would set an annual record for war-
related spending.

The $99.7 billion request, detailed in a 17-page internal Defense
Department memorandum dated Dec. 7, would be in addition to
$70 billion appropriated in September. The request would push
the total for the 2007 fiscal year to nearly $170 billion, 45 percent
more than Congress provided for 2006.

The request is likely to receive more scrutiny from Congress next
year than previous supplemental spending bills, in part because
Democrats now control both the House and Senate. Another reason
for the scrutiny is that Pentagon officials encouraged the services
to ask for "costs related to the longer war against terror," not just
continuing operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, according to
a memorandum that became public earlier this year.

About $50 billion - most of the money - would go to the Army,
which is conducting the bulk of the operations in Iraq and
Afghanistan. The request also includes $3.8 billion for the
Air Force and $3 billion for the Navy to buy or upgrade aircraft.
Both services have argued in recent months that they need
to replace planes used in combat operations.

But some experts questioned whether the services were exploiting
the must-pass nature of the supplemental bill to seek money
for other purposes like the modernization of aircraft rather than
just wartime replacements. Loren Thompson, a defense analyst
with the Lexington Institute, a policy analysis organization in Virginia,
pointed to the Air Force request for $62 million for ballistic missiles,
a weapon not being employed in Iraq or Afghanistan.

Mr. Thompson said the request, which is not described further in
the memorandum, may be part of a continuing Air Force project
to arm ballistic missiles with conventional warheads to be able
to strike terrorist targets quickly if other weapons cannot be used.

Even so, he added, "there are a number of weapons systems in
the supplemental request not normally associated with fighting
terrorists but which the services say still should be covered
as part of the global effort."

Altogether, the four military services would receive $26.6 billion
for "reconstitution," a term that the memorandum said covered
repair and replacement of equipment damaged in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Along with the $50 billion already provided this year, that is more
than double what Congress appropriated in 2006.

"There is a real question about how much of this is really related
to the war," said Steve Kosiak, a defense budget expert with the
Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments, a Washington
policy analysis group.

The Pentagon is also seeking $9.7 billion for training Iraqi and
Afghan security forces, almost as much as has been spent in total
since 2001, according to a study by the Congressional Research Service.
In a reflection of the worsening security situation in Afghanistan, more
than half of the requested money would go to training the country's
army and police forces.

The request also underscores the continuing strain that deployments
in Iraq and Afghanistan are putting on ground forces. The request
includes $3.7 billion to speed up its outfitting and training of two
Army combat brigades and three Marine battalions.

Since 2001, Congress has approved $507 billion for Afghanistan,
Iraq and other operations deemed part of combating terrorism.
Even with the Democrats in control, there is unlikely to be much
appetite for cutting the war-related spending requests,
Mr. Kosiak said.

"No one seems to be saying we're going to make deep cuts in
war-related expenditures," he said. "I don't see evidence that the
Democrats are interested in cutting this."

But the incoming Democratic chairmen of the House and Senate
Budget Committees have said they will push the Bush administration
to finance war costs in regular appropriations bills, not in supplemental
spending measures, to make the costs clearer.

The request also includes $10 billion for protective equipment for
troops and $2.5 billion for technology to defeat improvised bombs,
the leading cause of American combat casualties in Iraq.

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

9) Arctic Ice Shelf Broke Off Canadian Island
By ANDREW C. REVKIN
December 30, 2006
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/30/science/earth/30ice.html?ref=world

A 25-square-mile shelf of floating ice that jutted into the Arctic
Ocean for 3,000 years from Canada's northernmost shore broke
away abruptly in the summer of 2005, apparently freed by sharply
warming temperatures and jostling wind and waves, scientists
said yesterday.

The Ayles ice shelf, as the ancient 100-foot-thick slab was called,
drifted out of a fjord along the north coast of Ellesmere Island when
the jumbled sheath of floating sea ice that tended to press against
the coast there even in summers was replaced by open waters
because of the warming, the scientists said.

The change was first noticed by Laurie Weir of the Canadian Ice
Service as she examined satellite images taken of Ellesmere and
surrounding ice on and after Aug. 13, 2005. In less than an hour,
around midday that day, a broad crack opened and the ice shelf
was on its way out to sea.

The shelf is one of the few remnants of a broad expanse of floating
shelves of ice that once protruded along much of the Ellesmere coast,
somewhat like the brim on a hat.

Such shelves are far thicker and older than the milling cloak of sea
ice that drifts atop the Arctic Ocean. The sea ice consists of floes
ranging from 3 to 9 feet thick or so that are built up over just
a few years.

The Arctic sea ice has experienced sharp summertime retreats for
several decades, adding to evidence of significant warming near
the North Pole. (Neither melting ice shelves nor sea ice contribute
to rising sea levels because they sit in the sea already, like ice
cubes in a drink.)

Ninety percent of the 3,900 square miles of ice shelves that existed
in 1906 when the Arctic explorer Robert Peary first surveyed the region
are gone, said Luke Copland, the director of the University of Ottawa's
Laboratory for Cryospheric Research.

In a paper summarizing the event but not yet published, Dr. Copland
and other researchers said that the transformation of the Ayles ice
from a shorebound shelf to a drifting ice island appeared to be
a result of unusual Arctic warmth in 2005 on top of a longer-term
warming trend.

He said that it was premature to attribute the breakaway to human-
caused climate change, although he said that it was a clear sign the
warming in the region was producing significant and abrupt changes,
and more were likely in coming years. "The quick pace of these changes
right now is what stands out," he said.

The age of the Ayles ice shelf was estimated by using chemical means
to date driftwood found behind it, said Derek Mueller, one of those
who helped write the paper, from the University of Alaska in Fairbanks.

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

10) Middle School Girls Gone Wild
By LAWRENCE DOWNES
December 29, 2006
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/29/opinion/29fri4.html?em&ex=1167627600&en=fd
80f5afa9d5d414&ei=5087%0A

It's hard to write this without sounding like a prig. But it's just
as hard to erase the images that planted the idea for this essay,
so here goes. The scene is a middle school auditorium, where girls
in teams of three or four are bopping to pop songs at a student
talent show. Not bopping, actually, but doing elaborately
choreographed re-creations of music videos, in tiny skirts
or tight shorts, with bare bellies, rouged cheeks and glittery eyes.

They writhe and strut, shake their bottoms, splay their legs,
thrust their chests out and in and out again. Some straddle
empty chairs, like lap dancers without laps. They don't smile
much. Their faces are locked from grim exertion, from all that
leaping up and lying down without poles to hold onto. "Don't
stop don't stop," sings Janet Jackson, all whispery. "Jerk it like
you're making it choke. ...Ohh. I'm so stimulated. Feel so X-rated."
The girls spend a lot of time lying on the floor. They are
in the sixth, seventh and eighth grades.

As each routine ends, parents and siblings cheer, whistle and
applaud. I just sit there, not fully comprehending. It's my first
suburban Long Island middle school talent show. I'm with my
daughter, who is 10 and hadn't warned me. I'm not sure what
I had expected, but it wasn't this. It was something different.
Something younger. Something that didn't make the girls
look so ... one-dimensional.

It would be easy to chalk it up to adolescent rebellion, an
ancient and necessary phenomenon, except these girls were
barely adolescents and they had nothing to rebel against.
This was an official function at a public school, a milieu
that in another time or universe might have seen children
singing folk ballads, say, or reciting the Gettysburg Address.

It is news to no one, not even me, that eroticism in popular
culture is a 24-hour, all-you-can-eat buffet, and that many
children in their early teens are filling up. The latest debate
centers on whether simulated intercourse is an appropriate
dance style for the high school gym.

What surprised me, though, was how completely parents
of even younger girls seem to have gotten in step with society's
march toward eroticized adolescence - either willingly or
through abject surrender. And if parents give up, what can
a school do? A teacher at the middle school later told me
she had stopped chaperoning dances because she was put
off by the boy-girl pelvic thrusting and had no way to stop
it - the children wouldn't listen to her and she had no
authority to send anyone home. She guessed that if the
school had tried to ban the sexy talent-show routines,
parents would have been the first to complain, having
shelled out for costumes and private dance lessons
for their Little Miss Sunshines.

I'm sure that many parents see these routines as healthy
fun, an exercise in self-esteem harmlessly heightened
by glitter makeup and teeny skirts. Our girls are bratz,
not slutz, they would argue, comfortable in the existence
of a distinction.

But my parental brain rebels. Suburban parents dote
on and hover over their children, micromanaging their
appointments and shielding them in helmets, kneepads
and thick layers of S.U.V. steel. But they allow the culture
of boy-toy sexuality to bore unchecked into their little
ones' ears and eyeballs, displacing their nimble and
growing brains and impoverishing the sense of wider
possibilities in life.

There is no reason adulthood should be a low plateau
we all clamber onto around age 10. And it's a cramped
vision of girlhood that enshrines sexual allure as the
best or only form of power and esteem. It's as if there
were now Three Ages of Woman: first Mary-Kate, then
Britney, then Courtney. Boys don't seem to have such
constricted horizons. They wouldn't stand for it -
much less waggle their butts and roll around for
applause on the floor of a school auditorium.

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

11) Saddam at the End of a Rope
By TARIQ ALI
December 30, 2006

It was symbolic that 2006 ended with a colonial hanging--- most of it
(bar the last moments) shown on state television in occupied Iraq. It
has been that sort of year in the Arab world. After a trial so
blatantly rigged that even Human Rights Watch---the largest single
unit of the US Human Rights industry--- had to condemn it as a total
travesty. Judges were changed on Washington's orders; defense lawyers
were killed and the whole procedure resembled a well-orchestrated
lynch mob. Where Nuremberg was a more dignified application of
victor's justice, Saddam's trial has, till now, been the crudest and
most grotesque. The Great Thinker President's reference to it 'as a
milestone on the road to Iraqi democracy' as clear an indication as
any that Washington pressed the trigger.

The contemptible leaders of the European Union, supposedly hostile to
capital punishment, were silent, as usual. And while some Shia
factions celebrated in Baghdad, the figures published by a fairly
independent establishment outfit, the Iraq Centre for Research and
Strategic Studies (its self-description: "which attempts to spread
the conscious necessity of realizing basic freedoms, consolidating
democratic values and foundations of civil society") reveal that just
under 90 per cent of Iraqis feel the situation in the country was
better before it was occupied.

The ICRSC research is based on detailed house-to-house interviewing
carried out during the third week of November 2006.

Only five per cent of those questioned said Iraq is better today than
in 2003; 89 per cent of the people said the political situation had
deteriorated; 79 per cent saw a decline in the economic situation; 12
per cent felt things had improved and 9 per cent said there was no
change. Unsurprisingly, 95 per cent felt the security situation was
worse than before. Interestingly, about 50 per cent of those
questioned identified themselves only as "Muslims"; 34 per cent as
Shiites and 14 per cent as Sunnis.

Add to this the figures supplied by the UNHCR: 1.6 million Iraqis
(7 per cent of the population) have fled the country since March 2003
and 100,000 Iraqis leave every month, Christians, doctors, engineers,
women, etc. There are one million in Syria, 750,000 in Jordan,
150,000 in Cairo. These are refugees that do not excite the sympathy
of Western public opinion, since the US (and EU backed) occupation is
the cause. These are not compared (as was the case in Kosovo) to the
atrocities of the Third Reich. Perhaps it was these statistics (and
the estimates of a million Iraqi dead) that necessitated the
execution of Saddam Hussein?

That Saddam was a tyrant is beyond dispute, but what is conveniently
forgotten is that most of his crimes were committed when he was a
staunch ally of those who now occupy the country. It was, as he
admitted in one of his trial outbursts, the approval of Washington
(and the poison gas supplied by West Germany) that gave him the
confidence to douse Halabja with chemicals in the midst of the
Iran-Iraq war. He deserved a proper trial and punishment in an
independent Iraq. Not this. The double standards applied by the West
never cease to astonish. Indonesia's Suharto who presided over a
mountain of corpses (At least a million to accept the lowest figure)
was protected by Washington. He never annoyed them as much as Saddam.

And what of those who have created the mess in Iraq today?
The torturers of Abu Ghraib; the pitiless butchers of Fallujah; the
ethnic cleansers of Baghdad, the Kurdish prison boss who boasts that
his model is Guantanamo. Will Bush and Blair ever be tried for war
crimes? Doubtful. And Aznar, currently employed as a lecturer at
Georgetown University in Washington, DC , where the language of
instruction is English of which he doesn't speak a word. His reward
is a punishment for the students.

Saddam's hanging might send a shiver through the collective, if
artificial, spine of the Arab ruling elites. If Saddam can be hanged,
so can Mubarak, or the Hashemite joker in Amman or the Saudi royals,
as long as those who topple them are happy to play ball with
Washington.

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

12) Officer in 2004 Fatal Shooting Is Given a 30-Day Suspension
By DARYL KHAN
December 31, 2006
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/31/nyregion/31suspend.html

The police officer who shot and killed an unarmed teenager on
a Brooklyn rooftop nearly three years ago was suspended on
Thursday for 30 days without pay by Police Commissioner
Raymond W. Kelly, a department spokesman said yesterday.

The officer, Richard S. Neri Jr., was also permanently stripped
of his gun, has been reassigned to a property clerk’s office and
could be fired during the next year for any infraction, according
to Paul J. Browne, the Police Department spokesman.

On Jan. 24, 2004, the teenager, Timothy Stansbury Jr., 19, was
on the roof of the Louis Armstrong Houses in Bedford-
Stuyvesant when he was killed by Officer Neri, who had
been patrolling the rooftop. Commissioner Kelly said at the
time that the shooting did not appear to be justified. Officer
Neri has said that he accidentally fired his gun.

Irene Clayburne, 76, Mr. Stansbury’s grandmother, said
Officer Neri’s punishment was inadequate.

“He should spend the rest of his life in jail,” she said,
adding, “That man killed my grandchild.”

Initially, a judge at a departmental trial concluded that
Officer Neri should retain his gun and lose 30 vacation
days for the fatal shooting.

Mr. Browne said it would be unprecedented for an officer
to be fired for an accidental shooting and pointed out
that a grand jury in 2004 declined to indict Officer Neri.

Mitchell Garber, Officer Neri’s lawyer, declined to
comment yesterday.

Mike Ledbetter, 25, a friend of Mr. Stansbury’s, said
he felt betrayed that Officer Neri was not fired.

“That’s a smack in our faces,” he said. Mr. Ledbetter
pointed to a spot where he had broken down in tears
the night his friend had been killed.

“It hurts, it really hurts,” he said. “It could have been me.
It could have been my little niece.”

For Mr. Ledbetter and others, the killing of Mr. Stansbury
remains raw. The stretch of Lexington Avenue between
Tompkins and Marcy Avenues has been renamed Timothy
Stansbury Jr. Avenue. Every month, friends light candles
at a corner of the building where he lived.

Yesterday, tea candles still wet from a recent rain were
on display. One read: “We miss U kid.”

“We do it the 24th of every month,” Mr. Ledbetter said.
“We’ll do it until we get justice.”

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

13) After 50 Shots in Queens, Officer Talks to Prosecutors
By WILLIAM K. RASHBAUM
December 31, 2006
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/31/nyregion/31testify.html

One of the five police officers who together fired 50 shots at
a groom-to-be hours before his wedding, killing him and
wounding two of his friends, was interviewed by Queens
prosecutors last week, a person with knowledge of the
session said on Friday.

The officer, Paul Headley, a detective with nine years on the force,
fired one shot in the Nov. 25 encounter outside a strip club in
Jamaica, Queens, that left the groom, Sean Bell, 23, dead. Detective
Headley was questioned for about two hours on Wednesday,
according to the person, who spoke on the condition of anonymity
because of the investigation.

Detective Headley, 35, was accompanied by his lawyer, John Arlia,
during the session with prosecutors from the office of the Queens
district attorney, Richard A. Brown, which is investigating the
shooting, the person said. “He went in there, he answered all the
questions truthfully, and that’s it,” said the person, who would
not provide details. “He answered every question they had.”

Mr. Brown, through a spokesman, declined to comment.

Detective Headley answered questions without immunity and without
the protection of a “Queen for a day” agreement, under which
his answers would not be used against him in later proceedings,
the person said.

It is unclear whether he will testify before the grand jury hearing
evidence. It will determine whether there is evidence that a crime
may have been committed when the officers opened fire. The police
have said that the officers believed at least one of the men was armed.

Philip Karasyk, a lawyer for another officer in the shooting, the
28-year-old undercover detective who fired first, emptying his
11-shot pistol, has said his client, whose name has not been disclosed,
would be interviewed without immunity and would testify
before the grand jury.

Stephen L. Worth, a lawyer for Michael Carey, 26, who fired three
times, said that his client had not decided whether to meet with
prosecutors or testify before the grand jury.

It could not be learned Friday night whether the other two detectives,
Michael Oliver, a 35-year-old who fired 31 shots, and Marc Cooper,
a 39-year-old who fired four times, had decided how they would
proceed.

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

14) Opportunities Behind Bars
By PAUL B. BROWN
December 30, 2006
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/30/business/30offline.html

SEARCHING for a chance to tap into a $37 billion market that is
rapidly growing? Instead of seeking customers who can go somewhere
else if they are unhappy, why not try to serve those who have
no choice, that is, the nation’s prisoners?

There are more than two million inmates serving time in America’s
prisons, up from 744,000 in 1985, and as Business 2.0 reports,
it appears that number is not going to shrink anytime soon.
“That translates into plenty of work for companies looking to crack
the prison market,” Michael Myser writes.

There are opportunities just about everywhere:

-Huge overcrowding and limited budgets have created a growing
demand for prefab portable cells: “Think high-security cubicle.”
Over all, prison cells themselves are a $600 million market.

-If you have prisoners, you need a way to control them. The market
for things like maximum-security handcuffs and barbed wire is $1.5 billion.

-And something as simple as collect calls represents $1 billion in revenue.
Not surprisingly in a market this big, there are niches. For example,
Incarceration Optimization Program International in New York City offers a
100-hour, $20,000 course that “instructs mainly white-collar criminals
on the finer points of prison etiquette.”

There seems to be something in going after the ultimate captive market.

CRIME FIGHTERS Forget plastics. The best career advice you may be able
to offer someone entering the work force today is: “Become a corporate
ethics and compliance officer, my son (or daughter).”

“In the wake of high-profile accounting scandals, investigations into
stock option backdating practices and passage of the Sarbanes-Oxley
Act, many companies are hiring more ethics and compliance officers
in higher-level positions,” HR Magazine reports, adding that the
salaries are booming as a result.

The median compensation package for top global ethics and compliance
executives is $623,900; for top domestic executives it is $464,500.

If the trends continue, there is going to be no shortage of work.
Membership in the Ethics and Compliance Officer Association
has more than doubled in the last three years.

UNDERPAID C.E.O.’S? He is quick to acknowledge that the average chief
executive of a large publicly traded company makes $10.5 million
a year, about 300 times more than the average worker. Still, Dominic
Basulto argues that C.E.O.’s are underpaid compared with top athletes,
entertainers and, more to the point, the people who run hedge funds,
private equity firms and investment banks.

“Should we care? Yes. If other positions pay far more, then the best
and the brightest minds will be drawn away from running major
businesses to pursuits that may not be as socially useful — if not to
the basketball court, then to money management,” he writes in
The American, successor to The American Enterprise magazine.
Mr. Basulto concedes that some corporate C.E.O. pay packages
are “outrageous,” but adds, “even more outrageous is a system
where Dr. Phil makes more than twice as much as Jeffrey Immelt,
C.E.O. of G.E., the world’s most valuable company,” and continues,
“ and where hedge fund managers who make the right bet on the
yen-dollar relationship can take home 10 times as much as the
head of the nation’s largest exporter.”

It will be interesting to see how many shareholder resolutions
are introduced next year to raise the chief executive’s pay.

FINAL TAKE As if your pending credit card statement for all that
holiday spending wasn’t awful enough, now consider the possible
link between shopping and sin.

A study by Daniel Hungerman of Notre Dame and Jonathan Gruber
of M.I.T. found that “when states drop blue laws,” which ban Sunday
commerce, “church attendance dipped by 15 percent among those
who were going weekly,” Readers Digest reports.

Churchgoers became as likely as nonattendees to use drugs and
their rate of heavy drinking increased markedly.

Mr. Hungerman’s take: “What you do Sunday morning could make
a big difference in how you spend Saturday night.” PAUL B. BROWN

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

15) Lebanon Destroyed, Destabilised, Desperate for Change
Inter Press Service
Dahr Jamail
http://dahrjamailiraq.com

BEIRUT, Dec. 31 (IPS) - The 34-day war between Israel and Hezbollah has
left Lebanon heavily damaged and politically destabilised, with hopes
for a better future only dimming as the New Year approaches.

Before Jul. 12 this year when the war broke out, many people in this
nation of four million situated north of Israel believed they were
finally shaking away the last of the dust from the 15-year civil war
1975-90 which decimated the country. That civil war was fought between
extreme Muslim and Christian groups. Lebanon is now believed to be about
60 percent Muslim.

In years of recovery from that civil war, tourism was up, business was
finally improving, Syrian occupation troops had left - even though it
was after the assassination of former prime minister Rafiq Hariri Feb.
14 last year -- and hope for a united Lebanon seemed at least a possibility.

All this changed dramatically after a Hezbollah paramilitary raid this
summer in which two Israeli soldiers were captured and three others
killed near the Israel border. The attack was similar to other clashes
along the heated border between the two countries, but this raid
provoked a devastating response from the Israeli military.

Less than 24 hours after the Israeli soldiers were captured, the Israeli
military bombed Beirut's Rafik Hariri international airport, enforced a
punishing air and naval blockade, and began massive aerial bombardments
across much of the country.

Israel's chief of staff Dan Halutz told reporters at the beginning of
the war: "If the soldiers are not returned, we will turn Lebanon's clock
back 20 years." Halutz made good on his promise.

Hezbollah leader Sayed Hassan Nasralla had planned to use the captured
Israeli soldiers as bargaining chips to free some of the thousands of
Lebanese and Palestinian prisoners held in Israeli jails. But Israeli
Prime Minister Ehud Olmert declared the Hezbollah raid an "act of war"
and responded with an all-out attack on Hezbollah positions that
destroyed much of capital Beirut and other cities.

By the time a ceasefire was implemented on Aug. 14, 1,200 Lebanese
civilians had been killed and another 4,500 wounded. About 250 Hezbollah
fighters were killed. A third of the Lebanese civilians killed were
children below 13 years of age.

On the Israeli side, 43 civilians were killed and another 1,350 were
wounded. The Israeli military lost 119 soldiers, with more than 400 injured.

More than a million Lebanese and as many as 300,000 Israelis were
displaced from their homes, and normal life ceased to exist across all
of Lebanon and most of northern Israel.

The war dragged on with diplomatic support for Israel from the
governments of the United States and Britain. According to a poll taken
two weeks into the war, only 8 percent of the Lebanese felt they had
support from the U.S.; 87 percent said they supported Hezbollah.

By the time the UN-brokered ceasefire went into effect, a move which
finally led Israel to lift its naval blockade of Lebanon Sep. 8, much of
the country's civilian infrastructure had been destroyed.

About 70 bridges and 94 roads were destroyed, along with all major
ports. Electrical power plants, 20 gas and fuel stations, 350 schools,
food factories, dams, churches, mosques, hospitals, ambulances and a UN
base were bombed, according to the UN and the government of Lebanon.

Israel's air force flew over 12,000 combat missions, its navy fired
2,500 shells, and the army fired more than 100,000 shells. On Jul. 26
Israeli forces destroyed a UN observer post. Israel later described the
attack as an accident, though UN officials made repeated calls to alert
Israeli forces of the danger to the UN observers, all four of whom were
killed. Rescuers who then attempted to reach the post were shelled.

About 15,000 civilian homes were destroyed; the estimated cost of
infrastructure damage exceeded 15 billion dollars, according to the
United Nations Development Programme (UNDP).

Air strikes on oil tanks on the coast led to spillage of 10,000 tons of
heavy oil that polluted 80km of Lebanon's coast, destroying the fishing
and tourism industry.

The Israeli military later admitted to using banned weapons such as
white phosphorous and cluster bombs. To date, much of southern Lebanon
remains uninhabitable due to unexploded cluster bombs. As of Dec. 1, a
quarter of a million Lebanese remain internally displaced as refugees
within their own country.

Hezbollah in turn launched thousands of rockets into northern Israel,
and engaged invading Israeli soldiers in a guerilla war in southern
Lebanon. Over 4,000 rockets fired into Northern Israel killed scores of
civilians, and damaged homes and businesses, forcing people to live in
underground bomb shelters for days on end.

War crimes were committed by both sides, with indiscriminate attacks in
civilian areas.

UN Resolution 1701 was approved Aug. 11, calling for Israeli withdrawal
from Lebanon, for Hezbollah to disarm and for a more effective UN force
in southern Lebanon. Hezbollah, however, has not disarmed.

Lebanese Prime Minister Fouad Siniora, head of a fractured and largely
impotent government, is now facing a crisis as Hezbollah withdrew its
ministers from government positions following demands for a "unity"
government free from "western influence."

Having emerged from the war with claims that it is the victor, the group
has flexed its newfound political muscle in making these demands to
pressure what it sees as a U.S.-backed government.

A southern Beirut victory demonstration late September brought over a
million supporters on the streets û a quarter of the entire population
of Lebanon. The demonstrators later reassembled to carry out continuing
protests against the Siniora-led government.

Portrayed as sectarian by most western media outlets, or as supporters
of a coup attempt engineered by Hezbollah allies Iran and Syria, the
demonstrators are really Lebanon's poor and disenfranchised, mostly the
Shia community. They are seeking a government that gives them both
representation and basic services.

Hezbollah, now in a position to provide these demands more than ever
following the war, promises to deliver.

As forces outside Lebanon continue to influence internal politics, the
people in Lebanon seem caught in the middle once again. But to avoid a
sectarian divide this time, Hezbollah has allied itself with Michel
Aoun, a Maronite Christian politician who promises to "clean up" the
corrupt Lebanese government.

Unless the Siniora government makes large concessions to include the
massive and growing power of Hezbollah and its followers, instability in
Lebanon could build up in 2007.

(c)2006 Dahr Jamail.

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

16) Execution Begins to Deepen Divisions
Inter Press Service
Dahr Jamail and Ali al-Fadhily
http://dahrjamailiraq.com

BAGHDAD, Dec. 30 (IPS) - New divisions appear to be opening up between
Iraqi political and religious leaders following the execution of Saddam
Hussein Saturday.

Former president Saddam Hussein was hanged at an army base in the
predominantly Shia district of Khadamiya in northern Baghdad outside of
Baghdad's Green Zone just before 6am local time.

The execution of the 69-year-old former dictator was witnessed by a
representative of Prime Minster Nouri al-Maliki and a Muslim cleric
among others.

The execution appears already to be generating more sectarianism, which
has already claimed tens of thousands of lives in the war-torn country.
Sectarian divisions have opened up primarily between Shias and Sunnis,
who follow different belief systems within Islam.

Several Shia leaders, particularly those of Iranian origin, say the
execution would be a blow to resistance against the Iraqi government by
Saddam loyalists. In Baghdad's sprawling Shia slum, the Sadr City, where
most of the three million inhabitants are loyal to the Shia cleric
Muqtada al-Sadr, people danced in the streets while others fired in the
air to celebrate the execution.

National security advisor Mouaffaq al-Rubaii, a Shia, declared that "we
wanted him to be executed on a special day."

Celebrations in Kurdish areas were no expression of unmixed joy, even
though Kurds were persecuted more than any other group under Saddam's
regime.

"The world ignored Saddam's crimes when he committed them," Azad Bakir,
a 35-year-old engineer in the northern Kurdish city Arbil told IPS on
phone. "But we are committing the same crime again by executing him like
this."

And few Sunnis were cheering Saddam's death. A senior member of the
Islamic Party who asked not to be named said the timing of the execution
at the start of the Muslim holiday Eid al-Adha would prove a grave
mistake. The festival marks the end of the Muslim pilgrimage to Mecca.

Muhammad Ayash, a spokesman for the Association of Muslim Scholars, a
leading Sunni group, said Saddam had served his country well, and had
been punished for the wrong reasons.

"He was executed for the good things he did such as fighting the U.S.
aggression against the Arab nation," Ayash told IPS. "He stopped the
dark Iranian plans in the area, and helped Palestinians survive the
continuous Israeli crimes."

In predominantly Sunni cities like Beji, Ramadi and Saddam's hometown
Tikrit, people fired shots in protest and swore to avenge the execution
of the "legitimate president" of Iraq.

The execution may not bring the end to violence across Iraq that some
Iraqi government leaders expect. At least 68 people were killed in
bombings after the execution Saturday.

So far 2,998 U.S. soldiers have been killed in Iraq, including 109 just
this month, according to the website Iraq Coalition Casualty Count.

The resistance to occupation is expected to continue. A spokesman for
the Al-Mujahideen Army resistance group in Ramadi told IPS that his
group saw Saddam Hussein simply as the leader of the Ba'ath Party who
was "a helpless man in jail when we conducted our heroic operations
against invaders."

The spokesman, who refused to give his name, added: "We praise his
bravery in facing death, but his death will not increase or decrease our
carefully planned actions until the U.S. invaders and their allies leave
our country."

Across Iraq, Saddam seems to have won respect for the calm with which he
went to his execution. And that could increase sympathy for him and his
family.

A close friend of Saddam Hussein's daughters in Amman in Jordan spoke
with IPS on condition of anonymity. She said that when the daughters got
news of the execution, "they cried of course, but then they praised God
for having such a great father who faced death with such courage and faith."

A friend of Saddam's oldest daughter Raghad told IPS: "The family's only
concern now is to receive the body for burial in a dignified way
suitable for a martyr and a national hero."

(c)2006 Dahr Jamail

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

17) Threats may hinder efforts to revive JROTC
by Heather Cassell
h.cassell@ebar.com
http://www.ebar.com/news/article.php?sec=news&article=1436

Students in the Junior Reserve Officers' Training Corps program
in San Francisco public schools hope to make their case for retaining
the program to the new Board of Education next month. But recent
alleged threats to one student opponent of JROTC and to an incoming
board member may hinder that effort.

The school board voted 4-2 in November to disband the JROTC
program by the 2008 academic year. In its place, commissioners called
for the creation of alternative programs that they said would provide
the same benefits without the military's involvement.

The Bay Area Reporter reported several weeks ago of threats made
on the MySpace page of Lowell High School student Mara Kubrin,
an outspoken critic of JROTC. Since then, the paper has learned
of threats made to Commissioner-elect Jane Kim. Commissioner
Mark Sanchez also received a threatening e-mail.

An article published in The Lowell student paper at the beginning
of December stated that students plan to try to bring the JROTC
phase-out issue before the board in January. They hope that with
three new board members being sworn in on January 9, they
will be able to sway more votes toward saving JROTC.
Additionally, the board will elect its new president
at the same meeting.

Openly gay Commissioner Mark Sanchez, who is poised to
potentially be the next board president, said that it's "not
likely that we will do that." Sanchez was one of the leaders
behind the resolution to phase out JROTC.

The Web bulletin board and e-mail threats received by Kubrin,
the student who presented 800 signatures against the JROTC
program to the Board of Education at the November 14 meeting,
and incoming Commissioner Kim are still under investigation.

Some board members are confident that they have identified
the student who posted a threat on a Web bulletin board stating,
"Jane Kim must die." Kim, along with Commissioner Eric Mar,
spoke with the student, whom they declined to identify in order
to protect his identity.

Kim told the B.A.R. that she decided the best way to handle the
situation was to speak directly with the student and that she
felt his regrets for his actions were sincere.

Mar, who found the post and forwarded it on to the board's
legal counsel, disagrees with Kim that the student expressed
genuine remorse for his actions. He views the threats as very
serious and has the board's legal counsel working with the San
Francisco Police Department to look into the matter. It remains
unclear whether the person who allegedly hacked into Kubrin's
MySpace account and posted her contact information along
with altered photos of her on the Internet encouraging harm
is the same person who posted the threat to Kim.

Kubrin immediately deleted her MySpace account and told
the B.A.R. during a recent interview that nothing has happened
since the initial threats. The SFPD has been uncooperative by
making it difficult for Kubrin to add to her police report after
doing some of her own investigating as well as not returning
her parents' phone calls checking on the progress of their
report, according to Kubrin and her father, David Kubrin.

The Kubrins filed a second police report on December 19,
but the officer stated there wasn't much that they could do,
Mara Kubrin said.

San Francisco police did not return a call seeking comment.

"I don't think that the cops will actually do anything about this
because it's not as much of a direct threat and because nothing
ever happened to me," said Kubrin. "I would like to know the
person who is responsible for publicly humiliating me and trying
to encourage violence against me and for him to get a little
bit punished."

Sanchez agreed with Kubrin. "I don't know how much the
school itself can do about others infiltrating somebody's MySpace
account, but my suspicion is that since the school administration
and our district administration is pro-JROTC they might be
reluctant to try to go after people who are pro-JROTC," he
said. "I hope that's not the case, but it may very well be the
case."

"It seems to me that district staff are not even following our
anti-discrimination, [anti-] harassment, and hate crimes policies
even though a student was the victim of hate speech which
was sexist and violent," said Mar in an e-mail to the B.A.R.
"Our staff at Lowell were not alert, did not immediately respond
to Mara and her dad's requests for help, and they have done
little to create a supportive environment for her safety and
well-being."

Mar also said that the teaching moment to make students aware
of the school district's anti-discrimination and anti-harassment
policies and the consequences for violating these policies has
been lost.

Lowell Principal Amy Hanson was not available for comment.
Previously, the JROTC instructor at Lowell, Doug Bullard, told the
B.A.R. that Kubrin had brought the threatening messages to his
attention but that he had not alerted Hanson.

Kubrin said that she hopes the incidents will help prevent the
board from reversing its November decision to phase out JROTC.

"I would like people to know that the students who are supposedly
being taught discipline are using that to threaten people who
disagree with them," said Kubrin. She hopes that JROTC students
will focus on working to develop a program that they like
in place of JROTC.

Sanchez is confident about the board's ability to come up with
several programs to replace JROTC by the time it is phased out.
He pointed out that commissioners have a year and a half to prepare,
but the board won't waste any time. In January, the board is expected
to issue a call to select members from constituent groups as well
as students to establish a task force to seek out new programs.

12/28/2006

*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*
*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

18) The Low Profile: CNN and the New York Times Execute a
Denial of History
John Collins, Electronic Iraq
31 December 2006
electronicIraq.net

An existential question: If journalism is the first
draft of history, then what is journalism that denies
history? Is it still journalism?

The question came to mind Friday night as CNN's
Anderson Cooper led Americans through the initial
moments following the execution of Saddam Hussein.

Conveniently carried out just five minutes past the
hour when "Anderson Cooper 360" goes on the air,
the execution provided an opportunity for viewers
to think about the long story of the Iraqi leader's
brutal reign. Yet when it came to informing the
audience about one key aspect of that history -
the role of the United States in helping to create
and maintain the "butcher of Baghdad" - CNN
offered only amnesia. In the rush to celebrate the
death of the "butcher oBaghdad," we are up to
our necks in denial.

Throughout the CNN broadcast, as news gradually
trickled in concerning the details of the execution,
viewers were treated to a highly selective loop of
stock images of the condemned: Saddam brandishing a
tribal sword offered as a gift by one of his fawning
subjects, Saddam firing a gun, Saddam laughing his
cartoonish dictator laugh, Saddam defiantly reading a
statement at the start of the U.S. invasion in 2003,
Saddam smoking a cigar, Saddam being checked for lice
by U.S. military doctors, Saddam wildly gesturing
during his recent trial.

And the photo of Saddam shaking hands with U.S. envoy
Donald Rumsfeld back in December 1983? Absent. With
the inevitable headline ("Death of a Dictator")
already in place, the storyline was set. This was to
be about Saddam facing "justice" for crimes that he
alone committed. The U.S. presence in the story was to
be, at most, a ghostly one limited to providing legal
and moral guidance from behind the scenes. As if to
confirm this paternalistic and self-serving fiction,
CNN's Elaine Quijano dutifully reported from Waco that
President Bush, not wanting to appear that he was
"gloating" over the final humiliation of the Iraqi
leader, was keeping a low profile.

Viewers who were dissatisfied with "Anderson Cooper
360" might have found themselves turning to the New
York Times for a better sense of perspective. Yet
while yesterday's obituary in the Times was impressive
for its length (over 5000 words), it provided little
more in terms of historical context.

Rather than offering readers a responsible assessment
of their own government's role in the life and crimes
of the Iraqi leader, author Neil MacFarquhar elected
to repeat the kind of sensational details Americans
have come to expect when the country's designated
enemies are profiled: Saddam as megalomaniac (he
believed "he was destined by God to rule Iraq forever"
and possessed "boundless egotism and self-delusion"),
Saddam as Mafioso (the "Corleone-like feuds" of his
family "became the stuff of gory public soap operas"),
Saddam as traumatized child ("persistent stories
suggest that Mr. Hussein's stepfather delighted in
humiliating the boy and forced him to tend sheep"),
Saddam as sadistic murderer (while reading the names
of Baath party officials allegedly involved in a
supposed coup plot, "Mr. Hussein paused from reading
occasionally to light his cigar, while the room
erupted in almost hysterical chanting demanding death
to traitors"), Saddam as narcissist ("He dyed his hair
black and refused to wear his reading glasses in
public, according to interviews with exiles"), Saddam
as paranoid ("Delicacies like imported lobster were
first dispatched to nuclear scientists to be tested
for radiation and poison"), and on and on.

And the inconvenient history of U.S. support for the
man now being mentioned in the same breath as Hitler,
Stalin and Pol Pot? Aside from a single reference to
the U.S. decision to back Iraq in its war with Iran,
the obituary is silent.

All other references to the U.S. cover events from
1990 onwards. The choice of verbs tells it all:
Saddam, his regime, and his country are variously
described as being "toppled," "routed," "penetrated,"
and "expelled" by U.S. military might. One has to look
to the bloggers, muckrakers and scholars to find the
verbs that tell the rest of the story: "installed,"
"provided," "enabled," "encouraged," and "sold."

Reading and watching the kind of mainstream coverage
provided by CNN and the New York Times during the last
48 hours, one could be forgiven for believing that the
relationship between Saddam and the U.S. had always
been one of enmity and violence. Yet as Juan Cole and
others have tirelessly pointed out, the U.S.
government began "enabling" Saddam as early as 1959
when the CIA enlisted his help in undermining the
government of Abdul Karim Qasim.

The cozy relationship, which it now appears included
U.S. support for the coup that put Saddam in power in
1968, continued into the 1980s. The infamous Rumsfeld
visit symbolized the U.S. policy of providing military
and diplomatic assistance to the Iraqi regime in its
catastrophic war with Iran. Cole points out that
Secretary of State George Shultz even went so far as
to shield Saddam from a possible UN condemnation for
Iraq's use of chemical weapons against Iran.

At a time when the airwaves are filled with pious
reminders of the need to "remember the victims" of
Saddam's brutality, how are we to read the systematic
absence of references to the U.S. role in helping to
produce these and other victims? It seems that while
President Bush was keeping a "low profile" in Waco,
the corporate media were safely ensconced in a bunker
of amnesia. Indeed, "low profile" is an apt
description for the way that the corporate media
continue to treat the scandalous history of U.S.
support for repressive regimes across the globe.

In his enormously useful book States of Denial (Polity
Press, 2001), Stanley Cohen argues that most denial
can be divided into three categories: literal denial
("it did not happen"), interpretive denial ("it
happened, but it's not what it looks like"), and
implicatory denia