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  • BAUAW NEWSLETTER
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    Saturday, November 27, 2004
     

    BAUAW NEWSLETTER-SATURDAY, NOV.27, 2004

    Bay Area United Against War Presents a film screening of:

    "WMD: Weapons of Mass Deception

    Meet film director Danny Schechter "The News Dissector."
    Danny will be available for a question and answer period
    right after the movie.

    Saturday, Dec. 11th, 2004
    (Showtime to be announced)
    Embarcadero Center Cinema
    One Embarcadero Center, Promenade Level
    San Francisco, CA 94111
    (415) 267-4893

    " 'WMD' paints a meticulous and damning portrait of the media's coverage of
    the Iraq war. In sobering detail, Danny Schechter shows us how the TV
    networks now prefer the role of cheerleader, to that of objective
    journalist," says Mike Nisholson of austinnforkerry.org.

    "Schechter tackles his subject like a cross between Errol Morris and a
    Dashiell Hammet detective, following close on the tail of big media
    reporters as they in turn track the march toward war, embed themselves in
    the military industrial complex and then get out when the fighting gets
    tough and leave the cleanup work to stringers, " writes Shandon Fowler of
    film's Hamptons International Film Festival appearance, Oct. 20-24.

    To learn more about the film visit:
    www.wmdthefilm.com
    www.bauaw.org

    (Distributed by Cinema Libre Studio, www.cinemalibrestudio.com)

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

    1) Saving the Iraqi Children
    By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF
    OP-ED COLUMNIST
    November 27, 2004

    http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/27/opinion/27kristof.html?oref=login&hp

    [Note: This Op-Ed piece is an example of the bankruptcy of the
    arguments in favor of the continued American occupation of Iraq.
    After claiming, ³Among Iraqis, the risk of death by violence was
    58 times greater after the war than before, and infant mortality
    nearly doubled.² the author argues, ³If U.S. troops leave Iraq too
    soon, the country will simply fall apart.²

    But while the article accurately exposes the depth of the mayhem
    this war has brought to the people of Iraq, especially its children,
    the authors convoluted reasoning leads to more occupation, more
    bombing, more troops, more of the same.

    Kristof goes on to conclude his argument against the withdrawal
    of U.S. troops by claiming, ³The best answer to that question, I think,
    is that our mistaken invasion has left millions of Iraqis desperately
    vulnerable, and it would be inhumane to abandon them now. If we
    stay in Iraq, there is still some hope that Iraqis will come to enjoy
    security and better lives, but if we pull out we will be condemning
    Iraqis to anarchy, terrorism and starvation, costing the lives of
    hundreds of thousands of children over the next decadeŠThose
    hundreds of thousands of Iraqi children, whose lives we placed
    at risk by invading their country, are the reasons we should remain
    in Iraq, until we can hand over security to a local force. Saving
    hundreds of thousands of lives is a worthy cause to risk American
    lives for, even to die for.²

    The antiwar movement must counter this sinister argument by
    demanding that all the troops be withdrawn from Iraq and
    Afghanistan immediately. Our movement must demand that
    the entire U.S. military budget be wrested from the hands of
    the warlords. We must insist that these billions of dollars be
    used, instead, for massive humanitarian aid to the people of
    Iraq and Afghanistan--with no American strings attached;
    as well as for healthcare, education, jobs, affordable housing
    and social services here at home. There is enough money to pay
    for all of this if we do away with this filthy, illegal, immoral war
    and the giant U.S. corporate war machine that controls and
    profits from it.

    As musical artist Michael Franti says, ³You can bomb the world
    to pieces but you can¹t bomb it into peace.²

    The world is at a great turning point that will determine the fate
    of all life on Earth. The time for the worldwide antiwar movement
    to stand united is now. If we wish to prevent genocide against
    the entire planet by the greedy few who seek to own the wealth
    of the world through force of violence we must stand united
    against them.

    The extent of the cynicism expressed by Kristof in this apology
    for the continued bombing and killing of Iraqi children is astounding.
    Killing children in order to ³save them² goes beyond even George
    Orwell. More importantly, this argument can be applied wherever
    resistance to U.S. domination arises. No one is safe from their
    plundering rampages for oil, wealth and power.

    This article stands as a clear mandate to all of us who are horrified
    by this reasoning to gather all of our forces together to bring this
    war to an end NOW!

    ALL OUT JANUARY 20TH ­ BRING THE TROOPS HOME NOW!

    Bonnie Weinstein, Bay Area United Against War]




    2) Sentencing-Guideline Study Finds Continuing Disparities

    WASHINGTON

    November 27, 2004

    http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/27/national/27sentencing.html



    3) Foreign Interest Appears to Flag as Dollar Falls

    By EDMUND L. ANDREWS

    WASHINGTON

    November 27, 2004

    http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/27/business/27dollar.html











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



    1) Saving the Iraqi Children

    By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF

    OP-ED COLUMNIST

    November 27, 2004

    http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/27/opinion/27kristof.html?oref=login&hp



    Iraqis are paying a horrendous price for the good intentions of well-meaning
    conservatives who wanted to liberate them. And now some well-meaning
    American liberals are seeking a troop withdrawal that would make matters
    even worse.



    Heaven protect Iraq from well-meaning Americans.



    Lately, I've been quiet about the war because it's easy to rail about the
    administration's foolishness last year but a lot harder to offer
    constructive suggestions for what we should do now. President Bush's policy
    on Iraq has migrated from delusional - we would be welcomed with flowers, we
    should disband the Iraqi army, security is fine, the big problem is
    exaggerations by nervous Nellie correspondents - to reasonable today. These
    days, the biggest risk may come from the small but growing contingent on the
    left that wants to bring our troops home now.



    Consider two recent reports.



    First, The Lancet, the London-based medical journal, published a study
    suggesting that at least 100,000 Iraqis, and perhaps many more, had died as
    a result of the invasion of Iraq. Among Iraqis, the risk of death by
    violence was 58 times greater after the war than before, and infant
    mortality also nearly doubled.



    That's apparently because of insecurity. A doctor in Basra told me last year
    how physicians and patients alike had had to run for cover when bandits
    attacked the infectious diseases unit, firing machine guns and throwing hand
    grenades, so they could steal the air-conditioners. Given those conditions,
    women are now more likely to give birth at home, so babies and mothers are
    both more likely to die of "natural" causes.



    The second troubling report, in The Washington Post, recounted that acute
    malnutrition among children under 5 soared to 7.7 percent this year from 4
    percent before the war. Those are preliminary figures, but they suggest that
    400,000 Iraqi children are badly malnourished, and suffering in some cases
    from irreversible physical and mental stunting.



    Those glimpses at the public health situation in Iraq are a reminder not
    only of the disastrous impact of our invasion, but also of the humanitarian
    impact if we pull out our troops prematurely.



    If U.S. troops leave Iraq too soon, the country will simply fall apart. The
    Kurdish areas in the north may muddle along, unless Turkey intervenes to
    protect the Turkman minority or to block the emergence of a Kurdish state.
    The Shiite areas in the south might establish an Iranian-backed theocratic
    statelet that would establish order. But the middle of the country would
    erupt in bloody civil war and turn into something like Somalia.



    What would that mean? If Iraq were to sink to Somalia-level child mortality
    rates, one result by my calculation would be 203,000 children dying each
    year. If Iraq were to have maternal mortality rates as bad as Somalia's,
    that would be 9,900 Iraqi women dying each year in childbirth.



    Granted, my argument for staying the course is a difficult one to make to
    American parents whose immediate concerns are the lives of their own
    children. There is no getting around the fact that if we stay, more
    Americans will die, and this burden will fall inequitably on working-class
    families and members of minority groups.



    I also have to concede that those calling for withdrawal may in the end be
    proven right: perhaps we'll stick it out in Iraq and still be forced to
    retreat even after squandering the lives of 1,000 more Americans. Those of
    us who believe in remaining in Iraq must answer the question that John Kerry
    asked about Vietnam: "How do you ask a man to be the last man to die for a
    mistake?"



    The best answer to that question, I think, is that our mistaken invasion has
    left millions of Iraqis desperately vulnerable, and it would be inhumane to
    abandon them now. If we stay in Iraq, there is still some hope that Iraqis
    will come to enjoy security and better lives, but if we pull out we will be
    condemning Iraqis to anarchy, terrorism and starvation, costing the lives of
    hundreds of thousands of children over the next decade.



    Those hundreds of thousands of Iraqi children, whose lives we placed at risk
    by invading their country, are the reasons we should remain in Iraq, until
    we can hand over security to a local force. Saving hundreds of thousands of
    lives is a worthy cause to risk American lives for, even to die for.



    Copyright 2004 The New York Times



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



    2) Sentencing-Guideline Study Finds Continuing Disparities

    WASHINGTON

    November 27, 2004

    http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/27/national/27sentencing.html



    WASHINGTON, Nov. 26 (AP) - The number of minority inmates in federal
    penitentiaries, as a percentage of all federal prisoners, has increased
    sharply since sentencing guidelines took effect in 1987 and now accounts for
    a majority of the prison population, a study reviewing 15 years of data has
    concluded.



    The study was conducted by the United States Sentencing Commission, which
    sets the guidelines for federal judges. The panel examined how well the
    guidelines had brought uniformity to punishments, and found that while
    sentencing had become "more certain and predictable," disparities still
    existed among races and regions of the country, with blacks generally
    receiving harsher punishment than whites.



    The findings come as the Supreme Court considers the constitutionality of
    the guidelines, which advocates say are crucial to achieving fairness in
    punishment. The justices could decide as early as next week whether to throw
    out the system because it allows judges, rather than juries, to consider
    factors that can add years to sentences.



    Yet before the guidelines were created in 1987, judges had wide discretion
    in issuing sentences. The guidelines, in contrast, give them a range of
    possible punishments for a given crime and make it difficult for them to go
    outside those boundaries.



    The study found that the average prison sentence today is about 50 months,
    twice what it was in 1984, when lawmakers began calling for a uniform
    sentencing system. The difference, the study determined, is due mostly to
    the guidelines' elimination of parole for offenses like drug trafficking.



    "The big unanswered question is, Do we need to have sentences growing this
    way?" said one sentencing expert, Douglas A. Berman, a law professor at Ohio
    State University. "Nobody wants to go back to the bad old days of complete
    unguided judicial discretion."



    Whites made up 35 percent of the prison population in 2002, a sharp decline
    from nearly 60 percent in 1984, according to the report. It attributed the
    decrease to a striking growth in Hispanics imprisoned on immigration charges
    - to 40 percent of federal prisoners, from about 15 percent.



    In addition, the gap in punishment between blacks and whites widened. While
    blacks and whites received an average sentence of slightly more than two
    years in 1984, blacks now stay in prison for about six years, compared with
    about four years for whites. The report attributed this disparity in part to
    harsher mandatory minimum sentences that Congress imposed for drug-related
    crimes like cocaine possession. In 2002, 81 percent of offenders in such
    cases were black.



    The study found harsher punishments generally in the South than in the
    Northeast and the West, though it concluded that legal differences in
    individual cases "explain the vast majority of variation among judges and
    regions."



    A bigger problem causing sentencing disparities, it said, is plea
    bargaining. The study said that as an incentive for getting guilty pleas,
    prosecutors offered more lenient punishments than those mandated in the
    guidelines in as many as one-third of cases.



    Copyright 2004 The New York Times



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



    3) Foreign Interest Appears to Flag as Dollar Falls

    By EDMUND L. ANDREWS

    WASHINGTON

    November 27, 2004

    http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/27/business/27dollar.html





    WASHINGTON, Nov. 26 - Investors and market analysts are increasingly worried
    that the last big source of support for the American dollar - heavy buying
    by foreign central banks - is fading.



    The anxiety was on full display Friday, when the dollar abruptly slid to a
    record low against the euro after a report suggesting that the Chinese
    central bank might start to reduce its holdings in the American currency.



    Though Chinese officials later denied the report, and the dollar recovered,
    analysts say the broader trend is that foreign governments are becoming less
    willing to finance the growing debt of the United States government.



    On Tuesday, a top official with the Russian central bank said his government
    had become worried about the sinking value of the dollar and might switch
    some foreign reserves to euros.



    A day later, India's central bank hinted that it was worried about the same
    issue and might shift some reserves into other currencies.



    Japan and China, which together have amassed nearly $900 billion in United
    States Treasury securities, have both slowed their buying sharply from the
    frenetic pace in February and March.



    "There is an emerging consensus that banks around the world are moving to
    expand their reserves of euros at the expense of dollars," said Laidi
    Ashraf, chief currency analyst at MG Financial Group in New York.



    The Bush administration has essentially condoned the dollar's decline. At
    meetings with foreign ministers last week, the Treasury secretary, John W.
    Snow, repeated the American mantra of support for a "strong dollar" but also
    for letting "market forces" determine exchange rates.



    A continued decline of the dollar would be good for American manufacturers,
    because it would make exports cheaper in foreign markets and push up the
    cost of imports.



    But a diminished foreign appetite for dollars could push up interest rates.
    The Federal Reserve has already raised short-term rates four times this
    year, but the shift in the sentiment of foreign investors may soon
    seriously affect long-term rates that influence the cost of home mortgages.



    "Sell U.S., buy Europe," summed up Richard Berner, chief United States
    economist at Morgan Stanley , in a report last week. Mr. Berner noted that
    investors have begun demanding higher yields for 10-year Treasury securities
    than for comparable European bonds, and he predicted that the spread would
    widen.



    Recent data from the Treasury Department indicated that foreign governments
    had sharply slowed their purchases of Treasury securities. The question is
    whether those purchases will continue to slow or start to increase again as
    countries try to shore up the American currency to help maintain their own
    industries' competitiveness.



    Japanese purchases of Treasury securities, which ballooned by about $100
    billion from October 2003 to March of this year, have slowed sharply and
    actually declined slightly in September.



    Largely as a result, the dollar has sunk to its lowest level against the
    Japanese yen, about 102.5 yen to the dollar on Friday, in four and a half
    years.



    Chinese purchases of Treasury securities slowed to a crawl, increasing just
    $2 billion in September, to $174 billion.



    On Friday, a top Chinese central bank official denied reports in a Chinese
    newspaper that the government planned to reduce its holdings of Treasury
    bonds.



    But Chinese officials, under prodding from the Bush administration, have
    repeatedly said they want to gradually relax their 10-year-old policy of
    locking its currency, the yuan, at a fixed exchange rate to the dollar. Any
    move to a more flexible exchange rate for China would probably cause the
    dollar to drop in value and allow the Chinese central bank to stop buying
    United States debt securities.



    America's current account deficit, the broadest measure of its indebtedness
    to other countries, is on track to exceed $600 billion next year, about 6
    percent of its gross domestic product. The United States needs to attract
    about $2 billion a day to keep its spending at current levels.



    The nation attracted enormous sums of foreign money in the late 1990's as
    well, but the character of that money has changed. Back then, a big part of
    the inflow was through foreign direct investment and purchases of American
    stocks.



    This year, by contrast, foreigners have been net sellers of stocks. The big
    growth has been in foreign purchases of Treasury securities, and the big
    buyers have been foreign central banks that wanted to prevent their own
    currencies from rising too much against the dollar.



    Tony Norfield, currency strategist for ABN Amro in London, said he was
    convinced that central banks were trying to scale back their purchase of
    dollar assets, a move that could push the euro, already up about 30 percent
    in the last years, even higher.



    "You do not need the central banks to sell Treasuries for the dollar to go
    down," Mr. Norfield said. "All they have to do is buy less and the dollar
    is going to be in trouble."



    The euro hit a new high of $1.3329 on Friday in light trading, before
    settling back about a half-penny.



    European leaders are alarmed about the potential damage of a sinking dollar
    to their exports.



    "Recent moves on exchange markets of the dollar versus the euro are
    unwelcome," said Jean-Claude Trichet, president of the European Central
    Bank, at a banking seminar on Friday in Rio de Janeiro.



    "I want to underline the importance of recent statements by the Treasury
    secretary of the United States on his determination to pursue a strong
    dollar policy," Mr. Trichet added.



    But Mr. Snow and Alan Greenspan, the chairman of the Federal Reserve,
    offered no hint that they would intervene in currency markets to prop up the
    dollar.



    "The market for U.S. Treasury securities is deep and liquid and continues to
    be attractive to a broad and diverse pool of investors," a spokesman for
    Mr. Snow, Robert Nichols, said.



    That remains to be seen. According to the most recent Treasury data, the
    biggest source of growth in securities came not from China, Japan or Europe
    but from Caribbean banking centers.



    Copyright 2004 The New York Times


    Friday, November 26, 2004
     

    BAUAW NEWSLETTER-FRIDAY, NOV.26, 2004


    Bay Area United Against War Presents
    a film screening of:

    "WMD: Weapons of Mass Deception"

    Meet film director Danny Schechter "The News Dissector."
    Danny will be available for a question and answer period
    right after the movie.

    Saturday, Dec. 11th, 2004
    (Showtime to be announced)
    Embarcadero Center Cinema
    One Embarcadero Center, Promenade Level
    San Francisco, CA 94111
    (415) 267-4893

    " 'WMD' paints a meticulous and damning portrait of the media's
    coverage of the Iraq war. In sobering detail, Danny Schechter
    shows us how the TV networks now prefer the role of cheerleader,
    to that of objective journalist," says Mike Nisholson of
    austinnforkerry.org.

    "Schechter tackles his subject like a cross between Errol Morris
    and a Dashiell Hammet detective, following close on the tail of
    big media reporters as they in turn track the march toward war,
    embed themselves in the military industrial complex and then
    get out when the fighting gets tough and leave the cleanup work
    to stringers, " writes Shandon Fowler of film's Hamptons
    International Film Festival appearance, Oct. 20-24.

    To learn more about the film visit:
    www.wmdthefilm.org
    www.bauaw.org

    (Distributed by Cinema Libre Studio, www.cinemalibrestudio.com)

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

    1) 'Unusual Weapons' Used in Fallujah
    ** Dahr Jamail's Iraq Dispatches **
    ** http://dahrjamailiraq.com **
    November 26, 2004

    2) U.S. Still Has Half of Falluja to Clear of Weapons
    By Michael Georgy
    NEAR FALLUJA, Iraq (Reuters)
    Fri Nov 26, 2004 04:03 AM ET
    http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=6926834&src=eD
    ialog/GetContent§ion=news

    3) TRANSLATION: EU creating 13 rapid intervention 'tactical groups'

    4) Of Mice, Men and In-Between
    Scientists Debate Blending Of Human, Animal Forms
    By Rick Weiss
    Washington Post Staff Writer
    Saturday, November 20, 2004; Page A01
    http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A63731-2004Nov19

    5) A Moment of Silence, Before I Start this Poem
    by Emmanuel Ortiz
    9.11.02

    6) Where's Picasso?
    Falluja: The 21 st Century Guernica
    By Saul Landau
    http://www.progresoweekly.com/index.php?progreso=Landau&otherweek=110136240

    7) Radio exchange contradicts army version of Gaza killing
    Chris McGreal in Jerusalem
    Wednesday November 24, 2004
    The Guardian
    An Israeli army officer who repeatedly shot a 13-year-old
    Palestinian girl in Gaza dismissed a warning from another
    soldier that she was a child by saying he would have killed
    her even if she was three years old.

    8) January 20 Call to Action: RISE Against
    Bush/SHINE For A Peaceful
    (Can't we all just unite together on Jan. 20 and
    March 20, 2005? ...as I said, people the world over will
    be demonstrating on January 20, 2005 against the death and
    devastation the U.S.Government has brought upon Iraq-based
    all on lies.)

    9) Vietnam Vet, 53, Called for Duty in Iraq-Report
    PHILADELPHIA (Reuters)

    10) Still Worlds Apart on Iraq
    EDITORIAL
    November 26, 2004
    http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/26/opinion/26fri1.html?oref=login&hp

    11) Leading Iraqi Parties Call for Election Delay
    By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
    BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP)
    Filed at 12:33 p.m. ET
    November 26, 2004
    http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/international/AP-Iraq-Elections.html?hp&ex=1
    101531600&en=ab08003b4e7ba050&ei=5094&partner=homepage



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

    1) 'Unusual Weapons' Used in Fallujah
    ** Dahr Jamail's Iraq Dispatches **
    ** http://dahrjamailiraq.com **
    November 26, 2004


    Dahr Jamail

    BAGHDAD, Nov 26 (IPS) - The U.S. military has used poison gas and other
    non-conventional weapons against civilians in Fallujah, eyewitnesses report.

    "Poisonous gases have been used in Fallujah," 35-year-old trader from
    Fallujah Abu Hammad told IPS. "They used everything -- tanks, artillery,
    infantry, poison gas. Fallujah has been bombed to the ground."

    Hammad is from the Julan district of Fallujah where some of the heaviest
    fighting occurred. Other residents of that area report the use of
    illegal weapons.

    "They used these weird bombs that put up smoke like a mushroom cloud,"
    Abu Sabah, another Fallujah refugee from the Julan area told IPS. "Then
    small pieces fall from the air with long tails of smoke behind them."

    He said pieces of these bombs exploded into large fires that burnt the
    skin even when water was thrown on the burns. Phosphorous weapons as
    well as napalm are known to cause such effects. "People suffered so much
    from these," he said.

    Macabre accounts of killing of civilians are emerging through the cordon
    U.S. forces are still maintaining around Fallujah.

    "Doctors in Fallujah are reporting to me that there are patients in the
    hospital there who were forced out by the Americans," said Mehdi
    Abdulla, a 33-year-old ambulance driver at a hospital in Baghdad. "Some
    doctors there told me they had a major operation going, but the soldiers
    took the doctors away and left the patient to die."

    Kassem Mohammed Ahmed who escaped from Fallujah a little over
    a week ago told IPS he witnessed many atrocities committed by U.S.
    soldiers in the city.

    "I watched them roll over wounded people in the street with tanks," he
    said. "This happened so many times."

    Abdul Razaq Ismail who escaped from Fallujah two weeks back said
    soldiers had used tanks to pull bodies to the soccer stadium to be
    buried. "I saw dead bodies on the ground and nobody could bury them
    because of the American snipers," he said. "The Americans were dropping
    some of the bodies into the Euphrates near Fallujah."

    Abu Hammad said he saw people attempt to swim across the Euphrates to
    escape the siege. "The Americans shot them with rifles from the shore,"
    he said. "Even if some of them were holding a white flag or white
    clothes over their heads to show they are not fighters, they were all
    shot.."

    Hammad said he had seen elderly women carrying white flags shot by U.S.
    soldiers. "Even the wounded people were killed. The Americans made
    announcements for people to come to one mosque if they wanted to leave
    Fallujah, and even the people who went there carrying white flags were
    killed."

    Another Fallujah resident Khalil (40) told IPS he saw civilians shot as
    they held up makeshift white flags. "They shot women and old men in the
    streets," he said. "Then they shot anyone who tried to get their
    bodies...Fallujah is suffering too much, it is almost gone now."

    Refugees had moved to another kind of misery now, he said. "It's a
    disaster living here at this camp," Khalil said. "We are living like
    dogs and the kids do not have enough clothes."

    Spokesman for the Iraqi Red Crescent in Baghdad Abdel Hamid Salim told
    IPS that none of their relief teams had been allowed into Fallujah, and
    that the military had said it would be at least two more weeks before
    any refugees would be allowed back into the city.

    "There is still heavy fighting in Fallujah," said Salim. "And the
    Americans won't let us in so we can help people."

    In many camps around Fallujah and throughout Baghdad, refugees are
    living without enough food, clothing and shelter. Relief groups estimate
    there are at least 15,000 refugee families in temporary shelters outside
    Fallujah.

    More writing, photos and commentary at http://dahrjamailiraq.com

    You are subscribed to the Dahr Jamail's email Iraq Dispatches
    because you requested a subscription at some point.

    You can visit http://dahrjamailiraq.com/email_list/ to subscribe
    or unsubscribe to the email list.

    Or, you can unsubscribe by sending an email to
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    or the body of the email.

    Iraq_Dispatches mailing list
    http://lists.dahrjamailiraq.com/mailman/listinfo/iraq_dispatches

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

    2) U.S. Still Has Half of Falluja to Clear of Weapons
    By Michael Georgy
    NEAR FALLUJA, Iraq (Reuters)
    Fri Nov 26, 2004 04:03 AM ET
    http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=6926834&src=eD
    ialog/GetContent§ion=news

    NEAR FALLUJA, Iraq (Reuters) - U.S. Marines have cleared
    over 50 percent of Falluja's houses of weapons caches after
    mounting an offensive that crushed the Iraqi city's rebels,
    their top commander said Friday.

    Lieutenant General John Sattler told reporters Marines
    would search every house in Falluja to pave the way for
    rebuilding and stabilizing the city ahead of elections
    scheduled for January.

    He spoke after the visiting secretary of the U.S. Navy told
    Marines at a Purple Heart medal award ceremony that the Falluja
    offensive "broke the back" of the insurgency in Iraq.

    U.S. air strikes, artillery barrages and infantry
    operations wrested control of Falluja this month, and the
    military said they killed over 1,000 foreign Muslim militant
    fighters and insurgents loyal to toppled Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein.

    But Marines still face resistance in Falluja, where many
    buildings were reduced to piles of rubble.

    Sattler said insurgents threw grenades at Marines as they
    entered a house Thursday, killing two. Three insurgents were
    killed in return fire, he said.

    "We will keep searching for weapons until we put a green X
    on the last house in Falluja," he said.

    Marine officers have said they would inspect an estimated
    50,000 houses in the city west of Baghdad, a tedious task that
    involves searching everything from ventilation systems to
    couches as guerrilla snipers await opportunities to fire.

    The United States hopes the searches will deprive Iraq's
    guerrillas of their main base and weapons point, putting a lid
    on insurgent suicide bombings, shootings and kidnappings.

    Asked if he thought the offensive will seriously damage the
    insurgency across Iraq, U.S. Navy Secretary Gordon England
    said: "It will at least in Falluja. This was their
    stranglehold. It will hurt them."

    The Purple Heart award was a reminder that the U.S.
    military remains vulnerable in Iraq. More than 50 U.S. troops
    were killed in the Falluja offensive and hundreds were wounded.
    In all, more than 1,200 have been killed since the invasion.

    Lance Corporal Joseph Judans, 26, of Jacksonville, Florida,
    received the medal for sustaining a shrapnel wound to the
    forehead on Nov. 4 when a roadside bomb exploded near his
    convoy on the outskirts of Falluja.

    He is a combat engineer who regularly defuses those types
    of bombs, which U.S. military officials say are behind about 30
    percent of the deaths of soldiers killed in action.

    Sattler was optimistic despite remaining risks in Iraq.

    "Our goal is to get every single person in Falluja to vote
    in the elections," he said.

    (c) Copyright Reuters 2004.

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

    3) TRANSLATION: EU creating 13 rapid intervention 'tactical groups'

    [On Friday, *L'Humanité* (Paris) reported on the decision of the defense
    ministers of the European Union to create 13 tactical combat groups able,
    within a matter of days, to intevene militarily anywhere in the world. --
    Since the operational capability of these groups will continue to depend on
    NATO's logistical transport capability, which is controlled by the U.S.,
    Okba
    Lamrani believes they are likely to end up functioning as support troops for
    U.S. military missions. --Mark]

    http://www.ufppc.org/content/view/1818/

    [Translated from *L'Humanité* (Paris)]

    Europe

    EUROPEAN SUPPORT TROOPS FOR THE BENEFIT OF THE UNITED STATES
    By Okba Lamrani

    ** Creation beginning in 2005 of 13 "tactical groups," able to intervene
    anywhere in the world, complements combat forces of NATO, an organization
    dependent on Americans **

    L'Humanité (Paris)
    November 26, 2004
    Page 13

    The ministers of defense of the
    Twenty-Five [member states of the European
    Union (EU)] have decided to put in
    place a new rapid intervention structure.
    This is not to be confused with the
    so-called "global" objective defined at
    Helsinki foreseeing the creation of
    a force that could reach 65,000 men and be
    deployed in 60 days. According to
    the very pro-NATO Henk Kamp, Dutch minister
    of defense and president of the council
    of defense ministers, the Union is
    planning to dispose of 13 "tactical"
    groups "able to be deployed independently
    in a matter of days anywhere in the
    world in case of an emergency."

    The objective (defined at last week's
    meeting between Tony Blair and Jacques
    Chirac) is to put at the disposition of
    the Union beginning in 2005 one
    tactical group permanently on stand-
    by, and two in 2006. All the groups are
    supposed to be operational in 2007.

    The goal is one or several groups
    composed of 1,500 men, their weapons, and
    means of transport, permanently
    available for deployment on more than one
    front. For example, in Africa and
    in the Balkans. This process would be
    placed under the European political
    authority symbolized by Javier Solana,
    whose functions, so far, no one is
    able to define clearly in the dense
    institutional tangle of Europe.

    Four of these groups would be
    organized around one of the leader countries
    (United Kingdom, France, Italy, Spain),
    and the others being multinational and
    able to join the four leader countries in
    the event of a large-scale
    intervention.

    The operational model was Operation
    Artemis, sent to Ituri in the Democratic
    Republic of Congo, which was made up
    in large part of French soldiers; it also
    included Belgian and British soldiers.

    According to London and Paris, "these
    tactical groups will be particularly
    useful in the support that we are able
    to bring to the United Nations in
    Africa, in Europe, or in other crisis
    areas." From the point of view of the
    British minister, COPS (meaning
    'policemen' in English, or, more prosaically,
    Comité politique et de sécurité
    ['Political and Security Committee']), and in
    every case from the point of view
    of the Dutch minister and that of new NATO
    members, the United States remains
    at the heart of decision-making [sic -- the
    sentence is also incoherent in the original --MKJ].
    All the more easily, in
    that only the United States
    disposes of the logistical means needed to
    transport "Defense Europe" units
    to the operational theaters they are designed
    for. Given these conditions, it looks
    as if European COPS are likely to serve
    as support troops for the United States,
    as they are doing in Iraq and
    Afghanistan.

    The temptation for a military confrontation
    with the Americans is illusory and
    dangerous. Europe has another card to
    play. Namely, that of defusing far in
    advance developing crises. But this
    implies not only conferences, but also
    concrete economic, social, and political
    operations. Otherwise, the United
    States risks turning European capabilities
    into instruments of its own
    policies, with the tacit accord of the EU to boot.

    --
    Translated by Mark K. Jensen
    Associate Professor of French
    Department of Languages and Literatures
    Pacific Lutheran University
    Tacoma, Washington 98447-0003
    Phone: 253-535-7219
    Web page: http://www.plu.edu/~jensenmk/
    E-mail: jensenmk@plu.edu

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

    4) Of Mice, Men and In-Between
    Scientists Debate Blending Of Human, Animal Forms
    By Rick Weiss
    Washington Post Staff Writer
    Saturday, November 20, 2004; Page A01
    http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A63731-2004Nov19

    In Minnesota, pigs are being born with human blood in their
    veins.

    In Nevada, there are sheep whose livers and hearts are largely
    human.

    In California, mice peer from their cages with human brain cells
    firing inside their skulls.

    These are not outcasts from "The Island of Dr. Moreau," the 1896
    novel by H.G. Wells in which a rogue doctor develops creatures
    that are part animal and part human. They are real creations of
    real scientists, stretching the boundaries of stem cell research.

    Biologists call these hybrid animals chimeras, after the mythical
    Greek creature with a lion's head, a goat's body and a serpent's
    tail. They are the products of experiments in which human stem
    cells were added to developing animal fetuses.

    Chimeras are allowing scientists to watch, for the first time, how
    nascent human cells and organs mature and interact -- not in the
    cold isolation of laboratory dishes but inside the bodies of living
    creatures. Some are already revealing deep secrets of human
    biology and pointing the way toward new medical treatments.

    But with no federal guidelines in place, an awkward question
    hovers above the work: How human must a chimera be before
    more stringent research rules should kick in?

    The National Academy of Sciences, which advises the federal
    government, has been studying the issue and hopes to make
    recommendations by February. Yet the range of opinions
    it has received so far suggests that reaching consensus may
    be difficult.

    During one recent meeting, scientists disagreed on such
    basic issues as whether it would be unethical for a human
    embryo to begin its development in an animal's womb, and
    whether a mouse would be better or worse off with a brain
    made of human neurons.

    "This is an area where we really need to come to a reasonable
    consensus," said James Battey, chairman of the National
    Institutes of Health's Stem Cell Task Force. "We need to
    establish some kind of guidelines as to what the scientific
    community ought to do and ought not to do."
    Beyond Twins and Moms


    Chimeras (ki-MER-ahs) -- meaning mixtures of two or more
    individuals in a single body -- are not inherently unnatural.
    Most twins carry at least a few cells from the sibling with whom
    they shared a womb, and most mothers carry in their blood
    at least a few cells from each child they have born.

    Recipients of organ transplants are also chimeras, as
    are the many people whose defective heart valves have
    been replaced with those from pigs or cows. And
    scientists for years have added human genes to
    bacteria and even to farm animals -- feats of
    genetic engineering that allow those critters to
    make human proteins such as insulin for use as
    medicines.

    "Chimeras are not as strange and alien as at first
    blush they seem," said Henry Greely, a law
    professor and ethicist at Stanford University who
    has reviewed proposals to create human-mouse
    chimeras there.

    But chimerism becomes a more sensitive topic
    when it involves growing entire human organs
    inside animals. And it becomes especially
    sensitive when it deals in brain cells, the building
    blocks of the organ credited with making humans human.

    In experiments like those, Greely told the academy last
    month, "there is a nontrivial risk of conferring some
    significant aspects of humanity" on the animal.

    Greely and his colleagues did not conclude that such
    experiments should never be done. Indeed, he and many
    other philosophers have been wrestling with the question
    of why so many people believe it is wrong to breach the species
    barrier.

    Does the repugnance reflect an understanding of an important
    natural law? Or is it just another cultural bias, like the once
    widespread rejection of interracial marriage?

    Many turn to the Bible's repeated invocation that animals should
    multiply "after their kind" as evidence that such experiments
    are wrong. Others, however, have concluded that the core
    problem is not necessarily the creation of chimeras but rather
    the way they are likely to be treated.

    Imagine, said Robert Streiffer, a professor of philosophy and
    bioethics at the University of Wisconsin, a human-chimpanzee
    chimera endowed with speech and an enhanced potential to learn
    -- what some have called a "humanzee."

    "There's a knee-jerk reaction that enhancing the moral status
    of an animal is bad," Streiffer said. "But if you did it, and you
    gave it the protections it deserves, how could the animal complain?"

    Unfortunately, said Harvard political philosopher Michael J. Sandel,
    speaking last fall at a meeting of the President's Council on
    Bioethics, such protections are unlikely.

    "Chances are we would make them perform menial jobs or
    dangerous jobs," Sandel said. "That would be an objection."
    A Research Breakthrough


    The potential power of chimeras as research tools became clear
    about a decade ago in a series of dramatic experiments by Evan
    Balaban, now at McGill University in Montreal. Balaban took small
    sections of brain from developing quails and transplanted them
    into the developing brains of chickens.

    The resulting chickens exhibited vocal trills and head bobs
    unique to quails, proving that the transplanted parts of the brain
    contained the neural circuitry for quail calls. It also offered
    astonishing proof that complex behaviors could be transferred
    across species.

    No one has proposed similar experiments between, say, humans
    and apes. But the discovery of human embryonic stem cells in
    1998 allowed researchers to envision related experiments that
    might reveal a lot about how embryos grow.

    The cells, found in 5-day-old human embryos, multiply
    prolifically and -- unlike adult cells -- have the potential to
    turn into any of the body's 200 or so cell types.

    Scientists hope to cultivate them in laboratory dishes and grow
    replacement tissues for patients. But with those applications
    years away, the cells are gaining in popularity for basic research.

    The most radical experiment, still not conducted, would be to
    inject human stem cells into an animal embryo and then transfer
    that chimeric embryo into an animal's womb. Scientists suspect
    the proliferating human cells would spread throughout the
    animal embryo as it matured into a fetus and integrate
    themselves into every organ.

    Such "humanized" animals could have countless uses. They
    would almost certainly provide better ways to test a new
    drug's efficacy and toxicity, for example, than the ordinary
    mice typically used today.

    But few scientists are eager to do that experiment. The risk,
    they say, is that some human cells will find their way to the
    developing testes or ovaries, where they might grow into
    human sperm and eggs. If two such chimeras -- say, mice --
    were to mate, a human embryo might form, trapped in a mouse.

    Not everyone agrees that this would be a terrible result.

    "What would be so dreadful?" asked Ann McLaren, a renowned
    developmental biologist at the University of Cambridge in England.
    After all, she said, no human embryo could develop successfully
    in a mouse womb. It would simply die, she told the academy.
    No harm done.

    But others disagree -- if only out of fear of a public backlash.

    "Certainly you'd get a negative response from people to
    have a human embryo trying to grow in the wrong place,"
    said Cynthia B. Cohen, a senior research fellow at Georgetown
    University's Kennedy Institute of Ethics and a member of
    Canada's Stem Cell Oversight Committee, which supported
    a ban on such experiments there.
    How Human?


    But what about experiments in which scientists add
    human stem cells not to an animal embryo but to an animal
    fetus, which has already made its eggs and sperm? Then the
    only question is how human a creature one dares to make.

    In one ongoing set of experiments, Jeffrey L. Platt at the Mayo
    Clinic in Rochester, Minn., has created human-pig chimeras by
    adding human-blood-forming stem cells to pig fetuses. The
    resulting pigs have both pig and human blood in their vessels. And
    it's not just pig blood cells being swept along with human blood
    cells; some of the cells themselves have merged, creating hybrids.

    It is important to have learned that human and pig cells can fuse,
    Platt said, because he and others have been considering
    transplanting modified pig organs into people and have been
    wondering if that might pose a risk of pig viruses getting into
    patient's cells. Now scientists know the risk is real, he said,
    because the viruses may gain access when the two cells fuse.

    In other experiments led by Esmail Zanjani, chairman of animal
    biotechnology at the University of Nevada at Reno, scientists have
    been adding human stem cells to sheep fetuses. The team now has
    sheep whose livers are up to 80 percent human -- and make all the
    compounds human livers make.

    Zanjani's goal is to make the humanized livers available to people
    who need transplants. The sheep portions will be rejected by the
    immune system, he predicted, while the human part will take root.

    "I don't see why anyone would raise objections to our work,"
    Zanjani said in an interview.
    Immunity Advantages


    Perhaps the most ambitious efforts to make use of chimeras come
    from Irving Weissman, director of Stanford University's Institute of
    Cancer/Stem Cell Biology and Medicine. Weissman helped make the
    first mouse with a nearly complete human immune system -- an
    animal that has proved invaluable for tests of new drugs against
    the AIDS virus, which does not infect conventional mice.

    More recently his team injected human neural stem cells into mouse
    fetuses, creating mice whose brains are about 1 percent human.
    By dissecting the mice at various stages, the researchers were able
    to see how the added brain cells moved about as they multiplied
    and made connections with mouse cells.

    Already, he said, they have learned things they "never would have
    learned had there been a bioethical ban."

    Now he wants to add human brain stem cells that have the defects
    that cause Parkinson's disease, Lou Gehrig's disease and other
    brain ailments -- and study how those cells make connections.

    Scientists suspect that these diseases, though they manifest
    themselves in adulthood, begin when something goes wrong
    early in development. If those errors can be found, researchers
    would have a much better chance of designing useful drugs,
    Weissman said. And those drugs could be tested in the chimeras
    in ways not possible in patients.

    Now Weissman says he is thinking about making chimeric mice
    whose brains are 100 percent human. He proposes keeping tabs
    on the mice as they develop. If the brains look as if they are taking
    on a distinctly human architecture -- a development that could hint
    at a glimmer of humanness -- they could be killed, he said. If they
    look as if they are organizing themselves in a mouse brain
    architecture, they could be used for research.

    So far this is just a "thought experiment," Weissman said, but
    he asked the university's ethics group for an opinion anyway.

    "Everyone said the mice would be useful," he said. "But no one
    was sure if it should be done."

    (c) 2004 The Washington Post Company
    washingtonpost.com

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

    5) A Moment of Silence, Before I Start this Poem
    by Emmanuel Ortiz
    9.11.02

    Before I start this poem, I'd like to ask you to join me in a moment
    of silence in honor of those who died in the World Trade Center and
    the Pentagon last September 11th.

    I would also like to ask you to offer up a moment of silence for all of
    those who have been harassed, imprisoned, disappeared, tortured,
    raped, or killed in retaliation for those strikes, for the victims in both
    Afghanistan and the U.S.

    And if I could just add one more thing...

    A full day of silence for the tens of thousands of Palestinians who
    have died at the hands of U.S.-backed Israeli forces over decades
    of occupation. Six months of silence for the million and-a-half
    Iraqi people, mostly children, who have died of mall-nourishment
    or starvation as a result of an 11-year U.S. embargo against the
    country.

    Before I begin this poem: two months of silence for the Blacks
    under Apartheid in South Africa, where homeland security made
    them aliens in their own country Nine months of silence for the
    dead in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, where death rained down and
    peeled back every layer of concrete, steel, earth and skin and the
    survivors went on as if alive. A year of silence for the millions of
    dead in Viet Nam - a people, not a war - for those who know a
    thing or two about the scent of burning fuel, their relatives' bones
    buried in it, their babies born of it. A year of silence for the dead
    in Cambodia and Laos, victims of a secret war ... ssssshhhhh ....
    Say nothing ... we don't want them to learn that they are dead.
    Two months of silence for the decades of dead in Colombia,
    whose names, like the corpses they once represented, have
    piled up and slipped off our tongues.

    Before I begin this poem,

    An hour of silence for El Salvador ... An afternoon of silence for
    Nicaragua ... Two days of silence for the Guetmaltecos ... None
    of whom ever knew a moment of peace in their living years. 45
    seconds of silence for the 45 dead at Acteal, Chiapas 25 years of
    silence for the hundred million Africans who found their graves far
    deeper in the ocean than any building could poke into the sky.
    There will be no DNA testing or dental records to identify their
    remains. And for those who were strung and swung from the
    heights of sycamore trees in the south, the north, the east,
    and the west... 100 years of silence...

    For the hundreds of millions of indigenous peoples from this
    half of right here, Whose land and lives were stolen,

    In postcard-perfect plots like Pine Ridge, Wounded Knee,
    Sand Creek, Fallen Timbers, or the Trail of Tears. Names
    now reduced to innocuous magnetic poetry on the refrigerator
    of our consciousness ...

    So you want a moment of silence?

    And we are all left speechless
    Our tongues snatched from our mouths
    Our eyes stapled shut
    A moment of silence
    And the poets have all been laid to rest
    The drums disintegrating into dust

    Before I begin this poem,
    You want a moment of silence

    You mourn now as if the world will never be the same
    And the rest of us hope to hell it won't be.
    Not like it always has been

    Because this is not a 9-1-1 poem
    This is a 9/10 poem,
    It is a 9/9 poem,
    A 9/8 poem,
    A 9/7 poem
    This is a 1492 poem.

    This is a poem about what causes poems like this to be
    written And if this is a 9/11 poem, then

    This is a September 11th poem for Chile, 1971

    This is a September 12th poem for Steven Biko in
    South Africa, 1977

    This is a September 13th poem for the brothers at
    Attica Prison, New York, 1971.

    This is a September 14th poem for Somalia, 1992.

    This is a poem for every date that falls to the
    ground in ashes

    This is a poem for the 110 stories that were never told

    The 110 stories that history chose not to write in textbooks

    The 110 stories that CNN, BBC, The New York Times,
    and Newsweek ignored

    This is a poem for interrupting this program.

    And still you want a moment of silence for your dead?
    We could give you lifetimes of empty:

    The unmarked graves
    The lost languages
    The uprooted trees and histories
    The dead stares on the faces of nameless children
    Before I start this poem
    We could be silent forever
    Or just long enough to hunger,
    For the dust to bury us

    And you would still ask us
    For more of our silence.

    If you want a moment of silence

    Then stop the oil pumps
    Turn off the engines and the televisions
    Sink the cruise ships
    Crash the stock markets
    Unplug the marquee lights,
    Delete the instant messages,
    Derail the trains, the light rail transit

    If you want a moment of silence, put a brick
    through the window ofTaco Bell,
    And pay the workers for wages lost

    Tear down the liquor stores,
    The townhouses, the White Houses, the jailhouses,
    the Penthouses and the Playboys.

    If you want a moment of silence,

    Then take it

    On Super Bowl Sunday,
    The Fourth of July
    During Dayton's 13 hour sale
    Or the next time your white guilt
    fills the room where my beautiful
    people have gathered

    You want a moment of silence
    Then take it
    Now,

    Before this poem begins.

    Here, in the echo of my voice,
    In the pause between goosesteps of the second hand
    In the space
    between bodies in embrace,
    Here is your silence.

    Take it.

    But take it all
    Don't cut in line.
    Let your silence begin at the beginning of crime.
    But we,
    Tonight we will keep right on singing
    For our dead.
    ---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*

    6) Where's Picasso?
    Falluja: The 21 st Century Guernica
    By Saul Landau
    http://www.progresoweekly.com/index.php?progreso=Landau&otherweek=110136240

    On November 12, as U.S. jets bombed Falluja for the ninth straight
    day, a Redwood City California jury found Scott Peterson guilty of
    murdering his wife and unborn child. That macabre theme captured
    the headlines and dominated conversation throughout workplaces
    and homes.

    Indeed, Peterson "news" all but drowned out the U.S. military's claim
    that successful bombing and shelling of a city of 300,000 residents
    had struck only sites where "insurgents" had holed up. On
    November 15, the BBC embedded newsman with a marine detachment
    claimed that the unofficial death toll estimate had risen to well over
    2,000, many of them civilians.

    As Iraqi eyewitnesses told BBC reporters he had seen bombs hitting
    residential targets, Americans exchanged viewpoints and kinky
    jokes about Peterson. One photographer captured a Falluja man
    holding his dead son, one of two kids he lost to U.S. bombers.
    He could not get medical help to stop the bleeding.

    A November 14 Reuters reporter wrote that residents told him
    that "U.S. bombardments hit a clinic inside the Sunni Muslim city,
    killing doctors, nurses and patients." The U.S. military denied the
    reports. Such stories did not make headlines. Civilian casualties
    in aggressive U.S. wars don't sell media space.

    But editors love shots of anguished GI Joes. The November
    12 Los Angeles Times ran a front page shot of a soldier with
    mud smeared face and cigarette dangling from his lips. This
    image captured the "suffering" of Falluja. The GI complained
    he was out of "smokes."

    The young man doing his "duty to free Falluja," stands in stark
    contrast to the nightmare of Falluja. "Smoke is everywhere," an
    Iraqi told the BBC (Nov 11). "The house some doors from mine
    was hit during the bombardment on Wednesday night. A 13-
    year-old boy was killed. His name was Ghazi. A row of palm
    trees used to run along the street outside my house - now only
    the trunks are left... There are more and more dead bodies on
    the streets and the stench is unbearable."

    Another eyewitness told Reuters (November 12) that "a 9-year-
    old boy was hit in the stomach by a piece of shrapnel. His parents
    said they couldn't get him to hospital because of the fighting,
    so they wrapped sheets around his stomach to try to stem the
    bleeding. He died hours later of blood loss and was buried in
    the garden."

    U.S. media's embedded reporters - presstitutes? - accepted
    uncritically the Pentagon's spin that many thousands of Iraqi
    "insurgents," including the demonized outsiders led by Abu
    Musab al-Zarqawi ,who had joined the anti-U.S. jihad, had
    dug in to defend their vital base. After the armored and air
    assault began and the ground troops advanced, reports filtered
    out that the marines and the new Iraqi army that trailed behind
    them had faced only light resistance. Uprisings broke out in
    Mosul and other cities. For the combatants, however, Falluja
    was Hell.

    Hell for what? Retired Marine Corps general Bernard Trainor
    declared that: militarily "Falluja is not going to be much of
    a plus at all." He admitted that "we've knocked the hell out
    of this city, and the only insurgents we really got were the
    nut-cases and zealots, the smart ones left behind_ the guys
    who really want to die for Allah." While Pentagon spin doctors
    boasted of a U.S. "victory, Trainor pointed out that the
    "terrorists remain at large."

    The media accepts axiomatically that U.S. troops wear the
    "white hats" in this conflict. They do not address the obvious:
    Washington illegally invaded and occupied Iraq and
    "re-conquered" Falluja - for no serious military purpose.
    Logically, the media should call Iraqi "militants" patriots
    who resisted illegal occupation.

    Instead, the press implied that the "insurgents" even fought
    dirty, using improvised explosive devices and booby traps to
    kill our innocent soldiers, who use clean weapons like F16s,
    helicopter gun ships, tanks and artillery.

    Why, Washington even promised to rebuild the city that its
    military just destroyed. Bush committed the taxpayers to debts
    worth hundreds of millions of dollars, which Bechtel, Halliburton
    and the other corporate beneficiaries of war will use
    for "rebuilding."

    Banality and corruption arise from the epic evil of this war,
    one that has involved massive civilian death and the
    destruction of ancient cities.

    In 1935, Nazi General Erich Luderndorff argued in his "The
    Total War" that modern war encompasses all of society; thus,
    the military should spare no one. The Fascist Italian General
    Giulio Douhet echoed this theme. By targeting civilians, he
    said, an army could advance more rapidly. "Air-delivered terror"
    effectively removes civilian obstacles.

    That doctrine became practice in late April 1937. Nazi pilots
    dropped their deadly bombs on Guernica, the ancient Basque
    capital - like what U.S. pilots recently did to Falluja. A year
    earlier, in 1936, the Spanish Civil War erupted. General
    Francisco Franco, supported by fascist governments in Italy
    and Germany, led an armed uprising against the Republic.
    The residents of Guernica resisted. Franco asked his Nazi
    partners to punish these stubborn people who had withstood
    his army's assault.

    The people of Guernica had no anti-aircraft guns, much less
    fighter planes to defend their city. The Nazi pilots knew that
    at 4:30 in the afternoon of market day, the city's center would
    be jammed with shoppers from all around the areas.

    Before flying on their "heroic mission," the German pilots
    had drunk a toast with their Spanish counterparts in a language
    that both could understand: "Viva la muerte," they shouted as
    their raised their copas de vino . The bombing of Guernica
    introduced a concept in which the military would make no
    distinction between civilians and combatants. Death to all!

    Almost 1,700 people died that day and some 900 lay wounded.
    Franco denied that the raid ever took place and blamed the
    destruction of Guernica on those who defended it, much as
    the U.S. military intimates that the "insurgents" forced the
    savage attack by daring to defend their city and then hide inside
    their mosques. Did the public in 1937 face the equivalent of
    the Peterson case that commanded their attention?

    Where is the new Picasso who will offer a dramatic painting to
    help the 21 st Century public understand that what the U.S.
    Air Force just did to the people of Falluja resembles what the
    Nazis did to Guernica?

    In Germany and Italy in 1937, the media focused on the
    vicissitudes suffered by those pilots who were sacrificing for
    the ideals of their country by combating a "threat." The U.S.
    media prattles about the difficulties encountered by the marines.
    It never calls them bullies who occupy another people's country,
    subduing patriots with superior technology to kill civilians and
    destroy their homes and mosques.

    On November 15, an embedded NBC cameraman filmed a U.S.
    soldier murdering a wounded Iraqi prisoner in cold blood. As
    CNN showed the tape, its reporter offered "extenuating
    circumstances" for the assassination we had witnessed.
    The wounded man might have booby-trapped himself as other
    "insurgents" had done. After all, these marines had gone through
    hell in the last week.

    The reporting smacks of older imperial wars, Andrew Greely
    reminded us in the November 12, Chicago Sun Times. "The
    United States has fought unjust wars before - Mexican American,
    the Indian Wars, Spanish American, the Filipino Insurrection,
    Vietnam. Our hands are not clean. They are covered with blood,
    and there'll be more blood this time."

    Falluja should serve as the symbol of this war of atrocity against
    the Iraqi people, our Guernica. But, as comedian Chris Rock
    insightfully points out, George W. Bush has distracted us. That's
    why he killed Laci Peterson, why he snuck that young boy into
    Michael Jackson's bedroom and the young woman into Kobe
    Bryant's hotel room. He wants us not to think of the war in Iraq.
    We need a new Picasso mural, "Falluja," to help citizens focus
    on the themes of our time, not the travails of the Peterson case.

    The Bush Administration sensed the danger of such a painting.
    Shortly before Colin Powell's February 5, 2003, UN Security
    Council fraudulent, power point presentation, where he made
    the case for invading Iraq, UN officials, at U.S. request, placed
    a curtain over a tapestry of Picasso's Guernica, located at the
    entrance to the Security Council chambers. As a TV backdrop,
    the anti-war mural would contradict the Secretary of State's
    case for war in Iraq. Did the dead painter somehow know that
    his mural would foreshadow another Guernica, called Falluja?

    Landau directs digital media at Cal Poly Pomona University's
    College of Letters, Arts and Social Sciences. He is also a fellow
    of the Institute for Policy Studies. His latest book is THE BUSINESS
    OF AMERICA: HOW CONSUMERS HAVE RPELACED CITIZENS AND
    HOW WE CAN REVERSE THE TREND.

    Copyright 2004(c) Progreso Weekly, Inc.

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

    7) Radio exchange contradicts army version of Gaza killing
    Chris McGreal in Jerusalem
    Wednesday November 24, 2004
    The Guardian
    An Israeli army officer who repeatedly shot a 13-year-old
    Palestinian girl in Gaza dismissed a warning from another
    soldier that she was a child by saying he would have killed
    her even if she was three years old.

    The officer, identified by the army only
    as Captain R, was charged this week
    with illegal use of his weapon, conduct
    unbecoming an officer and other
    relatively minor infractions after emptying
    all 10 bullets from his gun's magazine
    into Iman al-Hams when she walked into
    a "security area" on the edge of Rafah
    refugee camp last month.


    A tape recording of radio exchanges
    between soldiers involved in the
    incident, played on Israeli television,
    contradicts the army's account of the events
    and appears to show that the captain
    shot the girl in cold blood.


    The official account claimed that Iman
    was shot as she walked towards an army
    post with her schoolbag because soldiers
    feared she was carrying a bomb.


    But the tape recording of the radio
    conversation between soldiers at the
    scene reveals that, from the beginning,
    she was identified as a child and at no
    point was a bomb spoken about nor was
    she described as a threat. Iman was also
    at least 100 yards from any soldier.


    Instead, the tape shows that the soldiers
    swiftly identified her as a "girl
    of about 10" who was "scared to death".


    The tape also reveals that the soldiers
    said Iman was headed eastwards, away
    from the army post and back into the
    refugee camp, when she was shot.


    At that point, Captain R took the unusual
    decision to leave the post in
    pursuit of the girl. He shot her dead and
    then "confirmed the kill" by emptying his
    magazine into her body.


    The tape recording is of a three-way
    conversation between the army
    watchtower, the army post's operations
    room and the captain, who was a company
    commander.

    The soldier in the watchtower radioed
    his colleagues after he saw Iman: "It's
    a little girl. She's running defensively eastward."


    Operations room: "Are we talking
    about a girl under the age of 10?"


    Watchtower: "A girl of about 10, she's
    behind the embankment, scared to
    death."


    A few minutes later, Iman is shot in the
    leg from one of the army posts.


    The watchtower: "I think that one of
    the positions took her out."


    The company commander then moves
    in as Iman lies wounded and helpless.


    Captain R: "I and another soldier ... are
    going in a little nearer, forward,
    to confirm the kill ... Receive a situation
    report. We fired and killed her
    ... I also confirmed the kill. Over."


    Witnesses described how the captain shot
    Iman twice in the head, walked away,
    turned back and fired a stream of bullets
    into her body. Doctors at Rafah's
    hospital said she had been shot at least 17 times.


    On the tape, the company commander then
    "clarifies" why he killed Iman: "This
    is commander. Anything that's mobile, that
    moves in the zone, even if it's a
    three-year-old, needs to be killed. Over."


    The army's original account of the killing s
    aid that the soldiers only
    identified Iman as a child after she was
    first shot. But the tape shows that they
    were aware just how young the small,
    slight girl was before any shots were
    fired.


    The case came to light after soldiers under
    the command of Captain R went to
    an Israeli newspaper to accuse the army
    of covering up the circumstances of
    the killing.


    A subsequent investigation by the officer
    responsible for the Gaza strip,
    Major General Dan Harel, concluded that
    the captain had "not acted unethically".


    However, the military police launched
    an investigation, which resulted in
    charges against the unit commander.


    Iman's parents have accused the army
    of whitewashing the affair by filing
    minor charges against Captain R. They
    want him prosecuted for murder.


    Record of a shooting


    Watchtower

    'It's a little girl. She's running defensively eastward'

    Operations room

    'Are we talking about a girl under the age of 10?'

    Watchtower

    'A girl of about 10, she's behind the embankment, scared to death'

    Captain R (after killing the girl)

    'Anything moving in the zone, even a three-year-old, needs to be killed'

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

    8) January 20 Call to Action: RISE Against
    Bush/SHINE For A Peaceful
    (Can't we all just unite together on Jan. 20 and
    March 20, 2005? ...as I said, people the world over will
    be demonstrating on January 20, 2005 against the death and
    devastation the U.S.Government has brought upon Iraq-based
    all on lies.)

    Can't we all just unite together on Jan. 20 and March 20, 2005? ...bw)

    January 20 Call to Action: RISE Against
    Bush/SHINE For A Peaceful
    ------- Forwarded message -------
    From: jsmacdonald@riseup.net
    To: counter-inauguration@lists.riseup.net,
    stop-the-inauguration@lists.riseup.net
    Subject: [stop-the-inauguration] January 20 Call to Action: RISE Against
    Bush/SHINE For A Peaceful Tomorrow
    Date: Wed, 24 Nov 2004 14:03:13 -0800 (PST)

    RISE Against Bush
    SHINE For A Peaceful Tomorrow

    A Call for Anti-War Actions in Washington, DC, January 20, 2005

    Every morning, the sun rises up, penetrating and overcoming the darkness
    of night. What once was dark becomes bright, changed by the force of the
    sun's rays.

    Our world is in darkness tonight, plagued with war, poverty, environmental
    destruction, and attacks on many of the liberties that so many of us hold
    dear. The darkness over our world has grown yet darker with the election
    of George W. Bush to another 4 years in office.

    In the dark of the night, we need only wait for the sun. However, in the
    dark of our world, we cannot wait. If we are to see a new dawn, we must
    take action now. The DC Anti-War Network (DAWN) calls on the people of
    the world to RISE Against Bush and SHINE For A Peaceful Tomorrow.

    We RISE
    · Against the needless slaughter in and occupation of Iraq;
    · Against the assault on civil liberties, as represented by such acts as
    the Patriot Act and the immoral detaining of prisoners at Guantanamo Bay;
    · Against U.S. support of Israel's apartheid against the Palestinian
    people;
    · Against U.S. overthrow of Aristide in Haiti;
    · Against U.S. attempts to overthrow any other democratically elected
    leader, including Hugo Chavez in Venezuela;
    · Against any U.S. military action in Iran.

    We SHINE
    · For a world that embraces peaceful dialogue instead of war;
    · For a world where we respect the liberty of all beings;
    · For a world that looks out for all those who are now oppressed,
    including the poor, women, racial minorities, workers, the disabled,
    homosexuals, transgendered, as well as the earth and its creatures;
    · For a world that embraces social justice;
    · For democracy and the autonomy of all people to have a full say in how
    they are governed;
    · For each other.

    The Call
    DAWN calls for people all over the nation and world to converge on
    Washington, DC, on the day of George W. Bush's Inauguration, January 20,
    2005, for peaceful anti-war actions.

    While DAWN is coordinating with many groups for a day of actions, DAWN
    calls additionally for these specific actions:

    1. A permitted nonviolent anti-war rally followed by a march to Bush's
    inaugural parade route
    2. A nonviolent civil disobedience die-in, following the rally, in
    memorial to the dead at the hands of Bush and his Administration

    DAWN also calls for organizations, affinity groups, and individuals to
    partner with us in organizing these two actions.

    Next Steps
    If you or your group or organization wants to endorse DAWN's call to
    action, please send an e-mail to info@dawndc.net. Write also if you wish
    to collaborate in the planning or offer financial donations or other
    material support.

    Find out more information about DAWN's and other groups' actions at
    http://www.counter-inaugural.org, by participating in the DC Cluster
    Spokescouncil meetings (refer to website), or by participating in DAWN's
    weekly meetings. Check our website, http://www.dawndc.net for more
    details. Housing boards, events boards, working group information, and
    (soon) ride boards can be found at http://www.counter-inaugural.org. We
    will post updates of our actions, as they become available, to that
    website.

    The new dawn begins with our rising up. It will take a lot of light to
    break through such darkness, but we can do it. We have no other choice.
    Join us on J20!

    ***please forward widely***

    --
    Coalition for Peace and Justice
    UNPLUG Salem Campaign; 321 Barr Ave, Linwood
    NJ 08221; 609-601-8583; cell 609-742-0982
    ncohen12@comcast.net; www.unplugsalem.org

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

    9) Vietnam Vet, 53, Called for Duty in Iraq-Report
    PHILADELPHIA (Reuters)

    PHILADELPHIA (Reuters) - A 53-year-old Vietnam veteran from western
    Pennsylvania has been called up for active service with the U.S. military
    in the Iraq (news - web sites) war, The Tribune Review of Greensburg,
    Pennsylvania reported on Wednesday.




    Paul Dunlap, a sergeant in the Army National Guard, will join an armored
    division next month as a telecommunications specialist in Kuwait, and
    expects to be there for at least a year, the newspaper reported.



    Dunlap, who has not been in combat since serving as a 19-year-
    old Marine in Vietnam, could not be reached for comment. He will
    leave behind his wife Mary, four children and three grandchildren.



    "I don't think any of them want me to go," Dunlap told the paper.
    "I'm thinking it's a long time since I've been in war."



    Dunlap, from the town of Pleasant Unity, near Greensburg,
    Pennsylvania, said he received a call from his sergeant major
    and was told to report for a soldier readiness program, the
    newspaper said.



    Dunlap's wife was quoted as saying the entire family "prayed
    that he wouldn't pass his physical."



    "It's very, very scary," she said. "He's been a soldier since I met
    him, but there's a part of me that wonders at 53: Is he going
    to be up to doing what he needs to do over there?"



    Critics of the U.S.-led occupation of Iraq have argued that the
    current level of U.S. troops there is too low to control an
    insurgency that has destabilized the country since the ouster
    of former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein (news - web sites).



    The dependence of full-time troops on national guard members
    such as Dunlap shows the military is stretched too thin in Iraq
    and elsewhere, critics say.

    Change Links Progressive Newspaper.
    Act. Act in Love and Spirit.

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

    10) Still Worlds Apart on Iraq
    EDITORIAL
    November 26, 2004
    http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/26/opinion/26fri1.html?oref=login&hp

    Foreign ministers from all the right countries were present. The
    timing - two months before the scheduled date of Iraq's all-important
    elections - was promising. The Mideast location was symbolically apt.
    Too bad, then, that this week's big international conference on Iraq in
    the Egyptian seaside resort of Sharm el Sheik, bringing together all of
    Baghdad's neighbors and every permanent member of the United
    Nations Security Council, did so little to change the dismal overall
    equation.

    The ministers came, they dined and they endorsed the familiar
    uncontroversial list of desirable goals. They encouraged free
    elections. They condemned terrorism. They endorsed Iraq's
    territorial integrity. They reiterated the importance of humanitarian
    assistance. Then, still fundamentally disagreeing about how to
    achieve these goals, they flew off again, without committing
    themselves to anything likely to make any real difference.

    International conferences like these can be quite useful when
    the participants start out with some basic agreement about the
    nature of the problem and the outlines of some possible solutions.
    On Iraq, there is still no such agreement. More than 20 months
    after the United States unilaterally assumed responsibility for
    Iraq's future by invading without the support of the Security
    Council or most neighboring countries, it still finds itself largely
    on its own, with much of the rest of the world watching skeptically
    from the sidelines.

    This is not a healthy situation - for Iraq, for the United States,
    for the Middle East or for the international community. How
    things go in Iraq over the next few months will probably have
    widespread and lasting consequences for all. And they are
    unlikely to go very well unless all, or at least most, of the
    governments represented at Sharm el Sheik begin actively
    working together.

    But don't expect that to happen any time soon. The newly
    re-elected Bush administration seems more determined than
    ever to rely on military force to crush the Sunni insurgency,
    even if that means going ahead with elections next January that
    are not broadly inclusive. Most of the rest of the world, doubting
    that this strategy can bring security, legitimacy or real sovereignty,
    seems equally determined to remain largely aloof.

    The preferred strategy seems to be to hope for the best and
    offer such low-risk gestures as forgiving bad Iraqi debt that
    would surely never be repaid anyway. But even debt relief, which
    Western and Japanese government creditors agreed to last weekend,
    is further than Iraq's major Arab creditors, like Saudi Arabia and
    Kuwait, are now prepared to go. That makes it far more difficult
    for the new Iraqi government to obtain the credit it will need to
    revive and rebuild a devastated country. And so far only Romania
    and tiny Fiji have offered soldiers for the protective force needed
    to send more election workers to Iraq.

    That leaves America still going it almost alone. Apart from the
    British, most remaining multinational troops are more symbolic
    than militarily significant. Washington's other main partner is
    Iraq's interim prime minister, Ayad Allawi, who has not done
    enough to reach out to the estranged Sunni minority and now
    may be in danger of losing Shiite support to the new anti-American
    alliance of the former rebel leader Moktada al-Sadr and the former
    Pentagon favorite, Ahmad Chalabi.

    The newly trained Iraqi security forces the administration likes
    to talk about still do not exist in large enough numbers to
    safeguard polling places in January, nor has their reliability under
    fire yet been convincingly demonstrated. The more than 135,000
    United States troops now on long-term occupation duty cannot
    remain there indefinitely without seriously eroding America's
    worldwide readiness and credibility.

    To begin changing this bleak picture, the Bush administration
    will have to work much harder at international bridge building
    than it did in its first term. Simply soliciting support for current
    American policies will not be enough. Washington must also be
    willing to consider changing some of those policies as part of
    a renewed process of international consultation. That might
    lead to more productive international conferences in the future.

    Copyright 2004 The New York Times

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

    11) Leading Iraqi Parties Call for Election Delay
    By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
    BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP)
    Filed at 12:33 p.m. ET
    November 26, 2004
    http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/international/AP-Iraq-Elections.html?hp&ex=1
    101531600&en=ab08003b4e7ba050&ei=5094&partner=homepage

    BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) -- Seventeen political parties on Friday demanded
    postponement of the Jan. 30 elections for at least six months until the
    government is capable of securing polling places.

    The parties, mostly Sunni Arab, Kurdish and secular groups, made the
    call in a manifesto signed at the home of Sunni elder statesman Adnan
    Pachachi, who said he believed the government was waiting for such
    a request before seriously addressing the question of whether an
    election could be held by the end of January.

    Parties of the majority Shiite community strongly support holding
    the elections on time but there is widespread doubt within the
    minority Sunni community because of insurgent unrest in Sunni
    regions of central and northern Iraq.

    Sunni clerics from the Association of Muslim Scholars have called
    on Sunnis to boycott the election to protest this month's U.S.-led
    assault on the insurgent stronghold of Fallujah.

    A widespread boycott by the Sunni community could deny the
    elected parliament and government the legitimacy that U.S. and
    Iraqi authorities believe is necessary to help bring stability to
    Iraq and curb the insurgency.

    Mohsen Abdul Hamid, leader of the Iraqi Islamic Party, said that
    delaying the election was necessary because of ``threats facing
    national unity, and fears of inciting sectarian tensions if a certain
    sect was excluded from the elections,'' referring to the Sunnis.

    Other politicians said that the government was incapable of
    protecting voters from terror attacks if they tried to cast ballots.

    Mohel Hardan al-Duleimi of the Arab Socialist Movement said
    most people were afraid to vote and that the government's election
    commission had failed to educate the public about the election.

    ``There is strong political polarization with sectarian roots,''
    al-Duleimi said.

    Copyright 2004 The Associated Press


    Wednesday, November 24, 2004
     

    BAUAW NEWSLETTER-TUES.-THURS. NOV. 23-25, 2004



    Bay Area United Against War Presents

    a film screening of:



    "WMD: Weapons of Mass Deception"



    Meet film director Danny Schechter "The News Dissector." He will be
    available for a question and answer period right after the movie.



    Saturday, Dec. 11th, 2004

    (Showtime to be announced)

    Embarcadero Center Cinema

    One Embarcadero Center, Promenade Level

    San Francisco, CA 94111

    (415) 267-4893



    " 'WMD' paints a meticulous and damning portrait of the media's coverage of
    the Iraq war. In sobering detail, Danny Schechter shows us how the TV
    networks now prefer the role of cheerleader, to that of objective
    journalist," says Mike Nisholson of austinnforkerry.org.



    "Schechter tackles his subject like a cross between Errol Morris and a
    Dashiell Hammet detective, following close on the tail of big media
    reporters as they in turn track the march toward war, embed themselves in
    the military industrial complex and then get out when the fighting gets
    tough and leave the cleanup work to stringers, " writes Shandon Fowler of
    film's Hamptons International Film Festival appearance, Oct. 20-24.



    To learn more about the film visit:

    www.wmdthefilm.org

    www.bauaw.org



    (Distributed by Cinema Libre Studio, www.cinemalibrestudio.com)



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



    1) Fallujah Refugees

    ** Dahr Jamail's Iraq Dispatches **

    ** http://dahrjamailiraq.com **

    November 23, 2004

    (See below...bw)



    2) Occupier of a Prime Minister's Chair

    ** Dahr Jamail's Iraq Dispatches *

    November 23, 2004

    (See below...bw)



    3) U.S. Starts New Offensive South of Baghdad

    By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

    BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP)

    Filed at 12:13 p.m. ET

    November 23, 2004

    http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/international/AP-Iraq.html?hp&ex=1101272400&
    en=049a4b3f977459eb&ei=5094&partner=homepage

    (link only...bw)





    4) U.S. Death Toll in Iraq for Nov. Tops 100

    By ROBERT BURNS

    AP Military Writer

    WASHINGTON (AP)

    Nov 23, 8:01 AM EST

    http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/I/IRAQ_MARINE_DEATHS?SITE=NYSTA&SECTION
    =HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT

    (Link only...bw)



    5) Iraq: the unthinkable becomes normal

    John Pilger

    Green Left Weekly, issue #607, November 24, 2004

    Mainstream media speak as if Fallujah were populated only by foreign
    "insurgents". In fact, women and children are being slaughtered in our name.

    http://www.greenleft.org.au/back/2004/607/607p15.htm

    (Link only...bw)



    6) Convention Protesters File Lawsuit Over Detentions

    By JULIA PRESTON

    November 23, 2004

    http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/23/nyregion/23protest.html?oref=login

    (Link only...bw)



    7) Confusion Reigns as U.S. Raid Misses Target in Iraq

    By Luke Baker

    MOSUL, Iraq

    Published on Tuesday, November 23, 2004 by Reuters

    http://www.commondreams.org/headlines04/1123-09.htm

    (Link only...bw)



    8) The Netherlands tobogganing from crisis to crisis

    The end of the "polder" model

    By Erik Demeester

    (See below...bw)



    9) In a Land Torn by Violence, Too Many Troubling Deaths

    CASES WITHOUT BORDERS

    By JUAN FORERO

    RIOSUCIO, Colombia

    November 23, 2004

    http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/23/health/psychology/23trib.html

    (Link only...bw)



    10) Alert! Fed Massive Raid and Arrest Chinese Restaurant

    Workers Across U.S.!

    National Immigrant Solidarity Network Urgent Updates

    November 23, 2004

    URL: http://www.immigrantsolidarity.org


    (See below...bw)



    11) MILLION CON MARCH!

    (See below...bw)



    12) Rights Group Calls on Caterpillar to Halt Bulldozer Sales to Israel

    By Jim Lobe

    WASHINGTON

    Published on Tuesday, November 23, 2004 by OneWorld.net

    http://www.commondreams.org/headlines04/1123-02.htm

    (Link only...bw)



    13) A Mother Deported, and a Child Left Behind

    By NINA BERNSTEIN

    November 24, 2004

    http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/24/nyregion/24deport.html?oref=login

    (Link only...bw)



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



    1) Fallujah Refugees

    ** Dahr Jamail's Iraq Dispatches **

    ** http://dahrjamailiraq.com **

    November 23, 2004



    "Doctors in Fallujah are reporting there are patients in the hospital

    there who were forced out by the Americans," said Mehdi Abdulla, a 33

    year-old ambulance driver at a hospital in Baghdad, "Some doctors there

    told me they had a major operation going, but the soldiers took the

    doctors away and left the patient to die." He looks at the ground, then

    away to the distance.



    Honking cars fill the chaotic street outside the hospital where they'd

    just received brand new desks. The empty boxes are strewn about outside.

    Um Mohammed, a doctor at the hospital sat behind her old, wooden desk.

    "How can I take a new desk when there are patients dying because we

    don't have medicine for them," she asked while holding her hands in the

    air, "They should build a lift so patients who can't walk can be taken

    to surgery, and instead we have these new desks!" Her eyes were piercing

    with fire, while yet another layer of frustration is folded into her work.



    "And there are still a few Iraqis who think the Americans came to

    liberate them," she added while looking out the broken window. The glass

    lay about outside-shattered from a car bomb that had detonated in front

    of the hospital. "These people will change their minds about the

    liberators when they, too, have had a family member killed by them."



    Mehdi then takes us to a refugee camp of Fallujans over on the campus of

    the University of Baghdad. Tents

    00_3331>

    surround an old mosque. Kids run about

    00_3335>,

    several of them kicking around a half-inflated soccer ball. Some women

    are using two water taps to clean pots and wash clothing. Many people

    stand around, walking aimlessly, waiting.



    We contact a sheikh for permission to talk to some of the families. He

    greets us then says, "You can see how much we have suffered. We have 97

    families here now, with 50 more coming tomorrow. People are kidnapping

    refugee children and selling them."



    A 35 year-old merchant from Fallujah, Abu Hammad, starts telling us what

    he experienced, and barely breathes while doing so because he is so enraged.



    "The American warplanes came continuously through the night and bombed

    everywhere in Fallujah! It did not stop even for a moment! If the

    American forces did not find a target to bomb, they used sound bombs

    just to terrorize the people and children. The city stayed in fear; I

    cannot give a picture of how panicked everyone was."



    He is shaking with grief and anger. "In the mornings I found Fallujah

    empty, as if nobody lives in it. Even poisonous gases have been used in

    Fallujah-they used everything-tanks, artillery, infantry, poison gas.

    Fallujah has been bombed to the ground. Nothing is left."



    Several men standing with us, other refugees, nod in agreement while

    looking at the setting sun, the direction of Fallujah.



    Abu Hammad continues, "Most of the innocent people there stayed in

    mosques to be closer to God for safety. Even the wounded people were

    killed. Old ladies with white flags were killed by the Americans! The

    Americans announced for people to come to a certain mosque if they

    wanted to leave Fallujah, and even the people who went there carrying

    white flags were killed!"



    One of the men standing with us, a large man named Mohammad Ali is

    crying; his large body shuddering with each bit of new information

    revealed by Abu Hammad.



    "There was no food, no electricity, no water," continues Abu Hammad, "We

    couldn't even light a candle because the Americans would see it and kill

    us."



    He pauses, then asks, "This suffering of the people, I would like to ask

    everyone in the world if they have seen suffering like this. The people

    in Fallujah are only Fallujans. Ayad Allawi was a liar when he said

    there are foreign fighters there."



    He continues on, "There are bodies the Americans threw in the river. I

    saw them do this! And anyone who stayed thought they would be killed by

    the Americans, so they tried to swim across the river. Even then the

    Americans shot them with rifles from the shore! Even if some of them

    were holding a white flag or white clothes over their heads to show they

    are not fighters, they were all shot! Even people who couldn't swim

    tried to cross the river! They drowned rather than staying to be killed

    by the Americans."



    Mohammad cuts in and begins his plea. He is from the Julan district of

    Fallujah, where much of the heaviest fighting occurred, and continues to

    occur. "They call us terrorists when we live in the city. We own the

    city. We didn't go to fight the Americans-they came to our city to fight

    us. Fallujans are defending our city, our houses, our mosques, our

    honor. Ayad Allawi says we are his family-can you attack your family

    Allawi? Do you attack your own family Allawi?"



    He now raises his hands to the sky

    00_3339>

    and asks loudly, "We are asking Islam, all the Islamic countries to have

    a clear conscience to look at what is happening to Fallujah. We were the

    most secured city with the police and ING (Iraqi National Guard) without

    the presence of the Americans. But now when we come to Baghdad we are

    afraid because our cars and belongings will be looted."



    His large body continues to shudder as he talks on, "We did not feel

    that there is Eid after Ramadan this year because of our situation being

    so bad. All we have is more fasting. They said they are going to

    reconstruct Fallujah-but I would like to ask when and how, and what did

    they do to Sadr City when they stopped fighting there? They did nothing."



    I notice a man with one leg sitting near the mosque

    00_3329>

    nodding while he smokes his cigarette while Mohammad continues, "I would

    like to ask the whole world-why is this? I tell the presidents of the

    Arab and Muslim countries to wake up! Wake up please! We are being

    killed, we are refugees from our houses, our children have nothing-not

    even shoes to wear! Wake up! Wake up! Stop being traitors! Be human

    beings and not the dummies of the Americans!"



    He is weeping even more when he adds, "I left Fallujah yesterday and I

    am handicapped. I asked God to save us but our house was bombed and I

    lost everything."



    As Mohammad no longer speaks, a 40 year-old refugee, Khalil, speaks up.

    "When the Americans come to our city we refuse to accept any foreigner

    coming to invade us. We accept the ING's but not the Americans. Nobody

    has seen any Zarqawi. If the Americans don't come in our city, who do

    Fallujans attack? Fallujans don't attack other Iraqis. Fallujans only

    attack the American troops when they come inside or near our city."



    Rather than weeping like so many others I interviewed, Khalil is raging.

    His sadness is being covered with anger. "If we have a government-the

    government should solve the suffering of the people. Our government does

    not do this-instead they are always attacking us, our government is a

    dummy government. They are not here to help us. The Minister of Defense

    and Interior are speaking that we are their family-so why do they

    collapse our houses on our heads? Why do they kill all of us?"



    But then tears find his eyes, and while pointing to several small

    children nearby he says, "Eid is over. Ramadan is over-and the kids

    00_3343>

    are remaining without even a smile. They have nothing and nowhere to go.

    We used to take them to parks to amuse them, but now we don't even have

    a house for them."



    He continues pointing at the children, along with some women nearby,

    "What about the children? What did they do? What about the women? I

    can't describe the situation in Fallujah and the condition of the

    people-Fallujah is suffering too much, it is almost gone now."



    He then explains, "We got some supplies from the good people of Baghdad,

    and some volunteer doctors came on their own with some medicines, but

    they ran out daily because conditions are so bad. We saw nothing from

    the Ministry of Health-no medicines or doctors or anything."



    He said those who left Fallujah did not think they would be gone so

    long, so they brought only their summer clothes. Now it is quite cold at

    night, down to 10 degrees C at night and windy much of the time. Khalil

    adds, "We need more clothes. It's a disaster we are living in here at

    this camp. We are living like dogs and the kids do not have enough

    clothes."



    As of today, a spokesman for the Iraqi Red Crescent told me none of

    their relief teams had been allowed into Fallujah, and the military said

    it would be at least two more weeks before any refugees would be allowed

    into their city.



    More writing, photos and commentary at http://dahrjamailiraq.com



    You are subscribed to the Dahr Jamail's email Iraq Dispatches because you
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    ---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*---------*



    2) Occupier of a Prime Minister's Chair

    ** Dahr Jamail's Iraq Dispatches *

    November 23, 2004



    Dahr Jamail



    BAGHDAD, Nov 23 (IPS) - The prime minister is following in the footsteps

    of the last president. The rule of Ayad Allawi, the U.S. appointed

    interim prime minister of Iraq, is now more in the style of the

    dictatorship of Saddam Hussein than a leader of a supposedly democratic

    state.



    Most Iraqis had celebrated the overthrow of the regime of Saddam

    Hussein. But under what has developed into a brutal and bloody

    occupation people are turning against the interim prime minister as they

    turned against Saddam.



    One of Allawi's earliest moves after his appointment was to form a new

    version of the feared secret police in Iraq. The Economist reported that

    Allawi's rivals accused him of "recruiting former torturers to man a new

    apparatus of oppression."



    In July Paul McGeogh of the Sydney Morning Herald reported that two

    eyewitnesses saw Allawi execute six people at the security centre in the

    al-Amadiyah district of Baghdad. The men had been detained for allegedly

    attacking U.S. forces two weeks before the handover of power.



    The appointed interim prime minister has instituted martial law,

    threatened to detain journalists, and banned the Arab channel al-Jazeera

    from reporting within Iraq. Allawi's minister of justice has brought

    back the death penalty and spoken of chopping off the hands and heads of

    those described as insurgents.



    Now comes the siege of Fallujah. At a refugee camp in Baghdad filled

    with families from the besieged city, anger erupts at the mention of

    Allawi's name.



    "Ayad Allawi says we are his family," said Mohammad Ali, a 53-year-old

    refugee wounded by U.S. bombs in his home in Fallujah. "Can you attack

    your family, Allawi? Do you attack your own family, Allawi?"



    Allawi is a traitor to the people of Iraq, said Dr. Um Mohammed who

    works at a hospital in Baghdad. "He is an American puppet who enjoys the

    killing of Iraqis." A trader in central Baghdad Abdel Hakim Abdulla said

    Allawi has "never made a decision that benefits Iraqis."



    Anger is building up against Allawi also over the role he played before

    he was appointed interim prime minister. He is the man many hold

    responsible for providing fraudulent intelligence that Saddam Hussein

    posed a threat to the United States.



    His now discredited statements to U.S. intelligence that Saddam Hussein

    had links to the terrorist attacks of Sep. 11 were used to justify the

    invasion of Iraq. This had shaken his credibility amongst Iraqis from

    the beginning.



    The right-wing Daily Telegraph of London published a "newly discovered"

    document from Allawi Dec. 14 last year. Allawi, who was then a member of

    the Iraqi Governing Council stated that the mastermind of the Sep. 11

    terrorist attacks Mohammad Atta had been trained in Iraq with support

    from Saddam Hussein.



    This fraudulent information was cited by U.S. intelligence as compelling

    evidence that Saddam Hussein had contacts with al-Qaeda. It was cited as

    justification for the failing occupation of Iraq.



    A second part of the memo also believed to have been provided by Allawi

    alleged shipment of uranium from Niger to Iraq. This is another claim

    that has been proved false.



    Allawi was reported by the International Herald Tribune to have said

    that Saddam Hussein had stashed billions of dollars in banks around the

    world. No evidence of these billions has emerged.



    Allawi again was said again to have provided the 'intelligence' in a

    British government dossier that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction

    which could be made operational in 45 minutes, according to a report in

    the New York Times May 29 this year. This 'intelligence' has been

    acknowledged to be false.



    Allawi, a Shia Muslim, was "unanimously nominated" to the post of

    interim prime minister May 28 by the U.S.-appointed former Iraqi

    Governing Council.



    Adam Daifallah wrote in the New York Sun that Allawi heads a group

    comprising primarily former Baathist associates of deposed dictator

    Saddam Hussein and "has received funding from the CIA (Central

    Intelligence Agency of the United States) and has unsuccessfully worked

    with American intelligence for years to oust Saddam through coup attempts."



    Born in Baghdad in 1946 into a well-known business family, Allawi became

    a member of the Baath party after it rose to power. He left Iraq in 1971

    to go to university in London, and did not return to his home country

    until just after the U.S.-led invasion last year.



    You are subscribed to the Dahr Jamail's email Iraq Dispatches because you
    requested a subscription at some point.



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



    8) The Netherlands tobogganing from crisis to crisis

    The end of the "polder" model

    By Erik Demeester





    Rarely have we seen a country being catapulted from being one of the most
    stable and apparently harmonious parts of the world into a profound abyss of
    instability and uncertainty. This is the story of the Netherlands over the
    last two and a half years.



    It all started with the economy. After a period of rapid economic growth in
    the 1990's, well above the average of the other European countries, the GDP
    of the Netherlands has since moved at a snail's pace. From a peak of more
    than 7 percent in 2000 the economic growth fell to a mere 2 percent in 2003.
    Over the last five years the economy has gone through a severe boom-and-bust
    cycle. This is because of the high dependence on world trade, which has made
    the country very sensitive to changes on the world market. The "polder"
    model, which consists in the agreement that all big social and economical
    changes are to be negotiated between the government, the unions and the
    bosses, was clearly going to be seriously tested by this new situation.
    Through the polder model - a policy of intense class collaboration - the
    idea was cultivated of finding solutions to problems thanks to compromise
    and consensus. Dutch people, and also the workers, had even come to believe
    that consummate pragmatism and the tendency of avoiding conflict had become
    part of their national character.



    A model under attack



    The raw economic growth figures of the 1990's did not say everything about
    was happening in Dutch society. They hid the real social situation. The
    price for the economic progress was paid with wage restraint, the
    multiplication of short-term contracts, increased flexibility and
    generalised social insecurity inside and outside the workplace. Yes, the
    unemployment figures were lower than in neighbouring countries. But the
    number of people living off disability allowances was higher than the number
    of jobless workers. Many older, worn out and sick workers who couldn't stand
    the strain and stress anymore were channelled into those schemes. These are
    the same schemes that are now cynically being attacked by the right-wing
    government of Balkenende.



    All this took place with the support and active collaboration of the leaders
    of the trade unions and the social democratic party, the PVDA. Those were
    the years of coalition governments of the PVDA with the liberal VVD and
    "social-liberal" D66, known as the "Purple Coalition". The social peace
    imposed by this alliance of forces against the working class started to
    break down. Protests against mismanagement, for instance in the national
    railways (NS), were only possible thanks to the launching of "workers'
    collectives", built outside the unions and dubbed as anarchist by the media.
    At that time this seemed to be the only way of breaking the stranglehold of
    the union bureaucracy. Further to this, "senseless violence" and cases of
    extreme anti-social behaviour increased the feelings of alienation and
    malaise within Dutch society.



    There was an all-pervading hermetic "political correctness" which refused to
    even recognise the existence of these problems in a country like the
    Netherlands. "Problems in the world?" Not here in the Netherlands, where all
    causes of tension are eradicated before they can emerge, was the prevailing
    idea. There are few countries where the tensions between the considerable
    material and technological possibilities on the one hand and the lack of
    harmony in society on the other hand are so vivid as in the Netherlands.



    Slowly but surely the feeling that "Holland is full" was penetrating into
    the minds of a section of the Dutch people. As in other European countries,
    this was a contradictory phenomenon. On the one hand it had a reactionary
    side to it ("we are full of immigrants") and on the other hand it had a more
    progressive content (the feeling that the country was full of stress and
    frustration).



    Due to the lack of a left alternative this tension would sooner or later be
    channelled in an extreme rightward direction. In this the Netherlands was no
    different from any other country. The only difference was that it tried to
    take the form of something a little more subtle than the not so subtle
    demagogy of the Flemish Vlaams Blok that had penetrated Flemish minds as
    early as the early '90s. This is shown by the fact that the crypto-fascists
    of Janmaat and his gang, failed to get any significant support for their
    reactionary ideas among the Dutch population. Given the previous long
    history of so-called social peace and tolerance, the right-wing
    reactionaries could not present themselves for what they really are. They
    had to disguise somewhat their real nature. Thus, in order to sell to the
    Dutch people an extreme right-wing stock of ideas, one had to offer a bit
    more than mere racist mudslinging.



    The rise and fall of Pim Fortuyn



    "Something is going wrong" was a feeling shared by more and more people. For
    Pim Fortuyn, a well-spoken maverick professor, this was fertile terrain for
    his anti-establishment diatribes and racist demagogy. This man, who had
    written plenty of books on the lost soul of Europe, spoilt people, etc., was
    the accidental figure who was fill in the vacuum in Dutch politics, breaking
    down the dominant politics of consensus. His speeches struck a chord amongst
    broad layers of society, of course with the help of the media and his
    reactionary friends.



    Pim Fortuyn, racist

    demagogue



    Very soon he began to rise like a rocket in the opinion polls. His quickly
    assembled political formation "Lijst Pim Fortuyn" (LPF) rapidly became an
    electoral success. The LPF was never a fascist threat to the country and
    could not even be compared to the classic extreme right-wing parties such as
    the Front National in France or the Vlaams Blok in Belgium, which he even
    openly denounced. Pim Fortuyn was a reactionary upstart that seemed to come
    from nowhere, but he fed on the accumulated frustrations coming from the
    depths of society. He was a medieval witch doctor, a charlatan who after a
    bleeding... prescribes another bleeding - but he was at least able to put
    across what seemed a convincing case to wide layers of the electorate.
    However, he was a superficial and temporary phenomenon. But the social and
    political frustrations that he vented in a distorted way will prove not to
    be superficial at all.



    Then something happened which stupefied the country. Pim Fortuyn was
    assassinated a few days before the national elections by a Green activist.
    The commotion provoked by this killing is difficult to describe. People did
    not believe that a politically motivated assassination could take place in
    the Netherlands. In Haiti yes, in the United States also, but in the
    Netherlands? No, this was unthinkable. But many unthinkable and "un-Dutch"
    things were to surprise the Netherlands in the period that followed.



    A feeling of defiance toward the political elite started to spread rapidly.
    Thousands of people gathered spontaneously in the streets not only to mourn
    their hero, but also to protest against the "Purple" government. People went
    so far as to accuse government ministers of being responsible for the murder
    of Pim Fortuyn. It was clear something had profoundly changed in Dutch
    society.



    Storms ahead



    The 2002 elections had the effect of temporarily defusing the anger as many
    people found an outlet in the ballot box. The posthumous election success of
    the Pim Fortuyn List in reality proved to be the undoing of the Purple
    coalition of the PVDA, D66 and VVD. It also prepared the ground for a
    homogenous right-wing government consisting of the Christian Democratic CDA
    and the LPF. In those elections the PVDA lost a lot of its support and the
    Left Socialist party picked up some of the pieces.



    The LPF, without Pim Fortuyn, rapidly disintegrated amongst a lot of
    infighting. The first right-wing government was crisis ridden and gave way
    to new elections were the PVDA regained some lost ground but not enough to
    be able to impose a new "Purple" scenario.



    Even before the killing of Pim Fortuyn we had announced that a heavy storm
    was gathering over the Netherlands. We wrote in Vonk , the paper of the
    Belgian Marxists in April 2002: "In the next period the unions will be in
    the frontline of the fight against social and political breakdown. Social
    peace will de facto come to an end. If the union leadership does not do it
    the government will."



    Prime Minister Balkenende knows his friends



    The second option was the more realistic one. The new right-wing government,
    Balkenende II, this time also joined by the "social-liberal" D66, decided to
    go for a unilateral break with the polder model of consensus politics. The
    capitalists were demanding a rapid movement towards a programme of counter
    reforms, attacks against the welfare state and a worsening of wages and
    labour conditions. This was in order to be more competitive in the harsh
    conditions of the world market. Negotiations with the unions, the middle of
    the road policy of giving and taking, were seen as obstacles to a swift
    demolition operation. The liberal leader Bolkestein illustrated this idea by
    saying, "consensus is a good thing but a good policy is even better".



    The bosses and the right-wing government calculated that they would not
    encounter much resistance from the unions even if they were to push then to
    one side. At first the union leadership tried to cling desperately to their
    role of obedient middlemen between the workers and the bosses. They accepted
    a new period of wage restraint. This was grudgingly accepted by a majority
    of members in a ballot. More and more self-confident as a result of those
    clear signs of weakness on the part of the union leadership, the government
    and the bosses increased the intensity of their attacks against the welfare
    state. Their targets were the early retirement schemes (VUT, pre-pension),
    the age of retirement, unemployment benefits and the disability allowances
    (WAO). This led to a breakdown in negotiations in the middle of May of this
    year. The union leaders of the main federations FNV, CNV and MHP faced a
    fait accompli, which stunned them. They were left like fish out of water.
    The leader of the 1,2 million-member FNV union, Lodewijk de Waal, confessed
    after having left the negotiation table: "Now we are stuck".



    Workers arise



    The pressure was also increasing in the workplaces. When faced with the
    question in a new ballot if the union leaders were correct to oppose the
    plans of the government, 97 percent of the members voted yes. Significantly,
    the participation of the members in this later ballot doubled in comparison
    with the earlier one. This was a symptom of a growing awakening of important
    layers of the working class.



    During the summer the government continued to plan and carry out all kinds
    of measures of counter-reform in other fields as well. The front against the
    Balkenende government was growing. A coalition of more than 500
    organisations was formed under the banner of "Turn the Tide". This was
    another symptom of growing defiance. Things could not go on like they had
    done before. Reluctantly the union leaders were forced to issue a plan of
    action and mobilise their members. The reaction from below was overwhelming.



    Working class is not

    a dirty word anymore



    On the September 20th the main centres of activity were paralysed in
    Rotterdam as a result of a 24-hour strike. The Rotterdam docks, the biggest
    port in the world, were closed. The unions had been expecting 10,000
    demonstrators to turn up that day. Six times that figure turned up: 60,000
    workers marched over the main bridges of the city into the centre. The town
    hall was briefly occupied by firefighters. Left-wing trade unionists
    organised in a committee named "Enough is enough" played an important role
    in this amazing turnout. A daily paper carried the significant title "The
    hammer and sickle is flying again in Rotterdam". Rotterdam used to be a
    bulwark of the Communists in the past. The fighting traditions of the Dutch
    workers are coming back. The left-wing FNV trade union leader, Niek Stam, of
    the dockworkers answered the question why they were selling T-shirts with
    the English words "working class" to support their struggle in this way:
    "The term 'working class' is becoming popular. Especially when we say it in
    English our young people like it". (see: www.maatisvol.nl )



    An old bastion of the working class takes the lead



    The right wing pretended that nothing had happened. But Rotterdam was
    clearly a turning point and the less arrogant and obtuse ministers and
    bosses started to see this. The union leaders could not believe their eyes
    either. After Rotterdam other sections of the working class wanted to come
    out in protest, including the police! What would the next national demo on
    October 2nd bring? This was a demo on a Saturday and without a strike. The
    result was even more impressive: more than a quarter of a million
    demonstrated in Amsterdam (see Netherlands: Reawakening of the Dutch working
    class). The character of the demo was not purely trade union but it brought
    out a broader and larger layer of the working class and youth.



    Pressed by the media to comment on this turnout the Minister of Finances
    Zalm just said, "I wave to them". More and more workers and activists were
    demanding a national 24-hour general strike as the next step. Union
    membership was also undergoing important growth. The service union ABVAKABO,
    for instance, has reported that the rate of growth of its membership in
    September and October was ten times higher than in the same period in
    previous years.



    Sjaak van der Velden, a specialist in the history of strike movements in the
    Netherlands puts the strikes of the autumn in perspective thus:



    "Thirty years of cuts, in particular in the public services, have created a
    lot of anger. The only thing was the absence of a reaction against this.
    Maybe we can understand the rise of Fortuyn also in this context. In fact,
    changes were already visible during the demonstrations against the invasion
    of Iraq in February 2002. I also think it has something to do with the
    movement after the WTO summit in Seattle in 1999 and all the other
    international summits. You notice now that discontent has found a channel.
    The funny thing about this is that if we believe the dominant ideology since
    the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 these things should not have happened.
    This makes the demonstration of October 2 more special."



    The gigantic demonstration of October 2nd was followed by a plan of what was
    described as "relay" strikes involving all sections of industry in stoppages
    at different days over a period of a month and a half. It was not intended
    to culminate in an all-industry general strike, although some unions were
    pressing for such a strike on November 9th.



    Crescendo of strikes



    The trade union leadership also toyed with the idea of demanding a
    referendum as a way of protesting against the government policy. We think
    that would have been a wrong tactic, and it was clearly a way of avoiding
    showing the real power of the working class in the struggle against the
    government. A referendum would involve layers of society not affected by the
    government measures, such as the bourgeois themselves and the middle
    classes. The questions posed in such a referendum would also be limited to a
    few measures on pensions and not the whole package, thus replacing the need
    for a more consistent effort through strikes, demonstrations, etc. A
    referendum would also not be legally binding on the government. It would not
    be bound by the verdict. It would only have been consultative.



    At the end the dynamic of demonstrations and strikes got the upper hand. The
    first to go on strike after October 2nd were the transport workers (public
    and private) on October 14th. This was also a big success. It was the
    biggest turnout in this sector for fifteen years. Interestingly, activists
    commented that this time in the railway stations commuters were not hostile
    towards the strike. This was not the case in the past.



    The readiness to mobilise has increased with every step of the movement. Two
    weeks after the "mega-demo" of October 2nd a RTL4 poll on the same day of
    the transport stoppage showed that 51 percent supported the public transport
    strike. And seventy-one percent of the respondents were in favour of even
    harder actions against the government.



    Two weeks later the engineering workers downed tools. Two hundred factories
    closed involving 22,000 workers. Here again it was the biggest strike in
    this industry for 15 years.



    There was a clear crescendo in the level of participation, the willingness
    to struggle and the spread of the protest movement throughout the country.
    Nevertheless, the tactic of "relay" strikes also had a dangerous side to it.
    The danger was that without a clear goal of a national 24-hour general
    strike involving all sectors (a demanded that was being posed by a layer of
    the rank and file) this tactic would have the effect of dissipating the
    energy of the workers involved.



    Cracks and fissures



    The biggest danger, however, was to be found in the official programme of
    demands of the trade union leaders and their clear desire to use these
    mobilisations in order to win back their seats at the negotiation tables of
    the institutions of social partnership. Here we see how the union tops
    derive their position of privileged buffer between the workers and capital.
    The demands of the leaders of the union can be summarised as demanding a
    "softening" of the attacks. They themselves had in fact already agreed to
    the ending of the age of retirement at 60 and to other counter-reforms in
    social security. What they wanted was to be able to "correct" them socially
    - whatever that means - and to be able to implement them jointly with the
    government and the bosses. The demands of the workers were clear: "No
    dismantling of the welfare state! No to wage restraint and to the increase
    in the cost of living." Workers demanded no changes to their rights to
    disability allowances and early retirement, and they also demanded good
    pensions and not the poverty levels the bosses are proposing.



    The façade of unanimity of the government started to fissure. The CDA
    especially, which has some links with the CNV union, began to grow nervous.
    Forty-five CDA members of parliament demanded a more equitable social policy
    on the part of the government. The liberal VVD and D'66 parties held another
    opinion and continued to provoke the workers.



    Splits also appeared in the ranks of the bosses. The organisation of small
    and medium sized companies appealed for an agreement with the unions. The
    organisation of bosses of the building industry, Cobouw, publicly criticised
    the government and the bigger companies who didn't want an agreement with
    the unions. A very interesting editorial ("Monomania of the government will
    cost the Netherlands a lot of money") on the website of Cobouw states: "It
    looks as if the VNO-NCW (general bosses' organisation) and the government
    have an agenda to curtail the power of the unions. This is said to be
    necessary to reduce the costs of production and to increase competitiveness.
    [But] the social resistance against this cabinet is such that actions and
    strikes are becoming the rule and not the exception. And this is going to
    cost money." (Cobouw, October 9, 2004)



    The bosses' division, although significant, does not mean that they do not
    share the same interests and objectives. They would like to see the increase
    of the competitiveness of Dutch industry on the back of the workers.
    However, they do not agree on the method to achieve it. Some would want to
    get the union leadership to be involved as a way of containing mass protests
    and the cost of these. Another layer is ready to sit out the ride of the
    tug-of-war with the workers and has also the necessary reserves for it which
    is not the case with the smaller and medium sized companies.



    Strong working class and weak leadership



    The bosses and the right-wing parties had clearly underestimated the
    capacity of the working class to react. They tend to gauge the mood of the
    working class by the cowardice and weakness of the trade union leaders. This
    vision was undoubtedly also shared by the leaders of the left parties PVDA
    and SP and also by the trade union leaders, who believe that their own
    conservative outlook reflects that of their members. The trade union leaders
    were forced against their will to open the door slightly to mobilisation and
    discontent, at the same time opening a Pandora's box of anger and protest.



    The cabinet could even have been overthrown in these conditions. Sources in
    government circles indicated growing fears of a cabinet crisis. "The leader
    of the Christian Democratic faction in the senate, Jos Werner, predicts that
    if nothing is done the cabinet will fall within three weeks." ( Trouw,
    November 11, 2004)



    Polls also show that the right-wing cabinet has lost popular support and
    that the left PVDA, SP and Groen Links (the Greens) would have a majority if
    new elections were to be called. As soon as they realised this, the bosses
    and the right wing tried to open secret negotiations with the union
    leaders... in the kitchen of one of the ministers! After a few weeks a deal
    was struck, which made the leaders of the union very euphoric.



    The deal is a bad deal: the concessions made by the government do not alter
    the fundamental questions. The objectives of social counter-reforms have not
    been stopped. The only real difference is that now these will be implemented
    with the help of the trade union leaders. The question of wage moderation is
    typical of this approach. The government, which had proposed a law in
    parliament introducing a zero level for wage increases, has withdrawn it as
    a result of the deal. In exchange for this "concession" the unions committed
    themselves to serious efforts of self-restraint in wage demands! In other
    words, the union leaders will act as the economic policeman of the bosses on
    the shop floor.



    It might not be as easy as they imagine. Many workers hope to "correct" the
    effects of national measures by better deals at local levels. The deal is
    being presented for approval at a ballot of the members in the next few
    weeks. The result will be known at the beginning of December. Union leaders
    have also declared that even if the members reject the proposals they would
    be very hesitant to call for new strikes.



    The left union activists of the 'Maat is Vol' (Enough is enough) committee
    oppose the deal and are calling on the workers to participate in the union
    meetings and to vote No in the ballot. They are also calling for left trade
    unionists to come together and to strengthen the organised left in the
    union.



    The Socialist Party (SP), a left social democratic party (formerly Maoist),
    accepted the deal but warned against the continuation of the "neo-liberal
    agenda" of the cabinet. The social accord "is a victory on a few fronts. But
    the cabinet is still there. Its agenda has not changed and has not been
    blocked. The unions have won much but they lost the first prize, and that is
    the fall of the cabinet. This means that it can continue with its
    anti-social agenda." (November 6, 2004). Some of its leading members who are
    also active in the unions have declared they will vote against the deal. The
    party as such does not reject the deal and does not call upon the union
    members to oppose it during the ballot.



    The PVDA "is delighted about the fact that the cabinet and the social
    partners have reached a social agreement. It seems now that there will be an
    end to a period of great actions, strikes and protest. The PVDA has always
    called on all the parties to rapidly come to an accord in the interest of
    the country and we are happy that this has happened" (from a press release
    on www.pvda.nl ).



    The chairman of the second biggest Christian trade union CNV, Doekle
    Terpstra, who adamantly defends the deal, admitted that the members were
    very critical of the agreement. He declared in the union media that "those
    who think that the membership meetings are an easy ride are mistaken. The
    members are very critical. The leaders of the union movement may have signed
    a peace deal but the struggle over the policies of the government continues"
    (November 16, 2004 on www.cnv.nl ). He adds that the members do not trust
    the cabinet and are afraid of the consequences of this agreement. However,
    they tend to trust the union.



    The genie is out of the bottle



    Whatever the result of the ballot, the genie is out of the bottle. Workers
    who have been described as conservative, egocentric, as well as incapable of
    solidarity and strike action have been forced out of their lethargy and have
    had a taste of their own strength. This will have consequences for the
    future, especially in the branch and factory negotiations in the coming
    months. The weak deal, which has been presented by the trade union
    leadership as the best available, will be understood not as the result of
    low mobilisations or lack of solidarity but as a result of a weak
    leadership.



    The union leaders probably think that they are back in the cosy world of the
    polder model. They are wrong. Yes, they will be able to sit and wine and
    dine with the ministers and the bosses again. They will not even have to pay
    the bill for the restaurant! But another bill will be presented to them:
    they will be asked to "convince" their members of new cuts etc., in the name
    of the economy's and the country's interest. It is not guaranteed at all
    that the workers will swallow this as they have done in the past. This means
    that a period of questioning has opened up among the workers on what sort of
    union they want and what kind of society they need in order to live better.
    Reformism, which has dominated the unions and the left parties, will enter
    into crisis. Reformism in the period of capitalist crisis means the opposite
    of what the term pretends to be: it opens a period of counter-reforms and
    not new social reforms! As there is no solution for the workers under
    capitalism the best intentions turn into their opposite.



    Then came another earthquake



    On the last night of the secret negotiations between the unions and the
    government, a new political assassination was carried out. The filmmaker
    Theo van Gogh was shot and stabbed to death by a young Dutch man of Moroccan
    origin. A paper reports the reaction of the negotiators in the kitchen of
    Minister Zalm: "Everybody stared at each other and realised that social
    turmoil in the country must rapidly be brought to an end." ( Trouw ,
    November 11, 2004).



    It was worse than a political murder, it was a terrorist attack perpetrated
    by a network of reactionary Muslims based in the Netherlands. The young
    terrorist left a letter held to the back of Theo van Gogh with a knife,
    claming his murder in the name of Allah and announcing that other public
    figures would also be killed. The commotion was at its high point. Many
    people said they no longer recognise their country, that it was not like it
    used to be "before". There have been many "befores" and "afters" in the last
    two years. "The Netherlands are not the Netherlands anymore," a banner
    claimed. It goes without saying that we condemn this cowardly murder.
    Furthermore, it is pointless and can actually be used in a reactionary
    manner against all "immigrants".



    But who was Theo van Gogh and why was he a target for reactionary Muslims?
    Van Gogh was an eccentric and controversial filmmaker. He made a corrosive
    short film - together with the Liberal MP Ayaan Hirsi Ali who fled Kenya to
    escape a forced wedding - titled Submission , which dealt with domestic
    violence against women in Muslim families. Van Gogh was not the type of
    person the media have presented him as. He was not a "soldier of free
    speech". As a fan of Pim Fortuyn, he was known for his brutal intolerance
    when faced with criticism and did not hesitate to resort to vulgar insults
    against Muslims as well as Jews. He wrote such disgusting comments as: "I
    can smell caramel; today they must be burning Jews with diabetes." He
    despised Muslims whom he did not hesitate to describe as "the fifth column
    of goatfuckers". And the lazy "intellectual elite" adored his attacks
    against minorities. The fact that these so-called intellecetuals have fallen
    to these levels is a symptom of decadence at the top of society.



    Religious and racial tensions



    The struggle against the influence of reactionary religious prejudices among
    some layers of the Arab immigrants, such as the oppression of women cannot
    be combated in this way. Above all it certainly cannot be left to people
    like Van Gogh or to the government. It can only be done by a joint struggle
    of male and female workers as part of the struggle for social emancipation,
    that is a struggle for socialism. The method of Van Gogh is that of opposing
    one "civilisation" against the other, completely in Samuel Huttington's
    style. In doing this he and his apologists conveniently forget that in
    "Western Christian civilisation" the most dangerous place for women (apart
    from the workplace) is the family , where more women are raped, injured,
    terrorised and murdered than in the street!



    We condemn this murder, of course. Like all acts of individual terrorism it
    plays into the hands of reaction. In this case it has provoked a racist
    backlash and it has given the state the necessary consent from the
    population to strengthen repressive laws, social control and its attacks
    against democratic rights. In a tit-for-tat reaction, more than twenty
    mosques, churches and religious schools have been attacked and some of them
    have beeb destroyed in fires. This is the work of a very small minority of
    young people, often from extreme right-wing groups. In different cities
    Christian and Muslim workers have formed all-night vigils to protect the
    mosques from being attacked, as was the case in Lelystad. Young immigrants
    have been attacked on the streets and the whole of the Muslim community has
    been stigmatised as harbouring potential Osama bin Ladens.



    Some ministers of the government have even shouted about a "war situation"
    in the Netherlands. A climate of anti-Muslim hysteria is being cultivated.
    It is clear that the right wing wants the memory of the joint struggle of
    Dutch and immigrant workers and families against them to be erased. This
    experience is the only real antidote against racism and religious tension in
    the country, not the moralistic appeals "against all extremes" or "for
    tolerance".



    Mass psychology in times of crisis



    The reaction of the population in the Netherlands to this murder also
    teaches us something about the psyche of the masses. In the last two and
    half years we have witnessed wild shifts in moods. This has been expressed
    at the polls, in strikes, and on demonstrations, etc. There have been shifts
    from the left to the right and then back again. Left wing and right wing
    ideas coexist in the same heads at the same moment. During a referendum in
    2002 in Rotterdam on the privatisation of public transport the strongest
    'No' vote came from areas where Pim Fortuyn received a lot of support.
    Accidental figures like Pim Fortuyn can indeed function as catalysts. Two
    political assassinations in two years indicate that this society has entered
    a new period of storm and stress as never before.



    Confusion, anger, stupefaction and doubts are very common feelings today. We
    need a dialectical and a materialist approach to these changes in
    consciousness. Some left-wing people are seduced into believing that all
    these swings in moods show how irrationally people think. However, that
    would be showing a complete ignorance of how consciousness changes. Events
    are what determine the thoughts of people. The wild mood swings demonstrate
    that even the "peaceful Netherlands" have entered one of the most convulsive
    periods in history.



    The mass of the population have been tormented as never before during the
    last period, with fear of Islamic terrorism, the war in Afghanistan and
    Iraq. Added to this is the more imminent fear of social insecurity, job
    losses, disappearing incomes, etc. Old certainties are crumbling; points of
    reference that seemed solid are becoming more fluid; people feel lost. This
    makes people vulnerable to rapid shifts in mood. The dominant ideology in
    the Netherlands, the ideology of compromise and having a sense of
    proportion, is breaking down. This will be an important factor in the
    political devlopments of the years to come. People, not only workers, but
    young people and also the middle classes, are realising that things are much
    tougher here in the Netherlands than what they thought.



    Class society rears its ugly head again in the Netherlands



    A similar dynamic affects Muslim youth to one degree or another. Immigrant
    workers are still the most oppressed layer of society. They face racism,
    joblessness, victimisation, etc. Add to this a profound feeling of
    humiliation as a result of developments in the Middle East and one can begin
    to understand the alienation and radicalisation of some layers of immigrant
    youth.



    It is only a very small layer among them that is willing to accept
    fundamentalist rhetoric and an even smaller layer that is ready to engage in
    terrorist attacks. The racist backlash is strengthening this layer.



    United struggle is the only way forward



    This new situation has temporarily and partially cut across the class
    struggle, but only for a while. The Dutch workers have great traditions of
    militant struggle and of internationalist actions, such as the struggle
    against the imperialist domination of Indonesia. The bourgeois also have
    some traditions and stubborn habits which most of the Dutch people have
    forgotten about. But now they will start to remember. They have already
    realized that the Dutch bosses are the same as in any other country.



    When Pim Fortuyn was killed, the serving Prime Minister Kok commented that
    in the Netherlands "we have a tradition of sorting out our differences with
    words and not with bullets". Ask the peasants of Bali, Aceh, Java and the
    Molucca what they think about the "traditions" of the Dutch bourgeois. You
    just need to (re)read Max Havelaar to know what the colonial masses went
    through under Dutch domination.



    Those methods of repression and brutal social relations were also practised
    against native Dutch workers. Remember that in the 1980s the struggle for
    decent housing was repressed by the police. The forces of law and order
    intervened during the dockers' strike in the 1970s and even in more recent
    struggles.



    Dutch workers and young people, immigrant or native, are realising that the
    "humane and tolerant Netherlands" they imagined is not so humane anymore. It
    is ridden with all kinds of tensions and divisions, exploited by a rapacious
    bourgeois class, justified by a decadent intellectual elite, and without an
    alternative coming from the left parties like the PVDA and the SP. Genuinely
    "humane" solutions can only come from the working class in the struggle for
    socialism. In fact, the program of socialism is the only realistic solution.
    What is utopian is not the idea that the struggle for socialism is possible
    in the Netherlands. What is utopian is the idea that we can return to the
    old polder model. That is dead and buried. Instead of looking backwards, we
    must look forward.



    Over the last ten years many left leaders have abandoned the ideas of
    socialism, they have thrown away their copies of Marx and embraced
    capitalism as the only "realistic" system. This was compunded by many years
    of so-called social peace. The chain of events of the last two and a half
    years demonstrate how fragile that social peace was. The real situation has
    now become apparent and this will undoubtedly help young people, students
    and workers to seek an alternative to this rotten system. In doing this they
    will rediscover the beauty and humanity of genuine socialist ideas.



    November 23, 2004



    See also:

    The Netherlands: Reawakening of the Dutch working class by Erik Demeester.
    (October 4, 2004)

    The Netherlands: Set on a stormy course by Erik Demeester (May 22, 2002)

    After the French and Dutch Elections - Is there a threat of Fascism in
    Europe? by Alan Woods. (May 20, 2002)



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



    10) Alert! Fed Massive Raid and Arrest Chinese Restaurant

    Workers Across U.S.!

    National Immigrant Solidarity Network Urgent Updates

    November 23, 2004

    URL: http://www.immigrantsolidarity.org






    Last week on Texas and New York state, Federal agency raided several Chinese
    restaurants, detained and arrested over 100 restaurant workers and owners,
    charging them "conspiracy to harbor illegal aliens," "illegally employing
    unauthorized aliens," and "conspiracy to commit money laundering." U.S.
    Attorney said they will deport the undocumented workers back to China along
    with the restaurant owners for hiring them.



    It created a huge community outrage across the Chinese American community,
    and the Chinese consulate in Texas had voiced protests about Fed's roundup
    of restaurant workers. Almost on the same time, in the separate case, a
    Chinese restaurant owner in North Dakota had sentenced for trafficking and
    hiring undocumented workers and will go to four months prison and will face
    deportation.

    As Yang Chenqi, an attorney with the Chinese consulate in Houston, said
    "Immigration officials said they were victims of slave labor," Yang said,
    "but from the interviews (with restaurant workers) they are victims of the
    U.S. government." Because I never saw any white European sweatshop owners
    (Like: Wal-Mart) had been arrested & jailed for hiring undocumented
    immigrants, and faced deported .



    This not a justice but a racism! The story had absolutely missing from the
    major corporate media, sadly it was not event covered on left progressive
    media--where's the American labor, student, human rights activists?



    Lee Siu Hin

    National Immigrant Solidarity Network





    **Complete News Coverage**

    Chinese consulate protests roundup of restaurant workers

    By CHRIS ROBERTS - Associated Press

    http://www.immigrantsolidarity.org/cgi-bin/datacgi/database.cgi?file=Issues&
    report=SingleArticle&ArticleID=0110
    &report=SingleArticle&ArticleID=0110>

    EL PASO, Texas - A Chinese consulate official said Tuesday that the office
    is looking into the treatment of about 50 Chinese nationals who were
    questioned by immigration officials last week in what appears to be a human
    trafficking case.





    Grand Forks restaurant owner sentenced for trafficking

    By Stephen J. Lee - Grand Forks Herald (Grand Forks, N.D.)

    http://www.immigrantsolidarity.org/cgi-bin/datacgi/database.cgi?file=Issues&
    report=SingleArticle&ArticleID=0109
    &report=SingleArticle&ArticleID=0109>

    FARGO - A Grand Forks restaurant owner was sentenced Friday in federal court
    here to four months in prison on charges of human trafficking, according to
    assistant U.S. Attorney Nick Chase.





    Feds raid Chinese eateries

    By Robert Cristo - Tory Record (Troy, N.Y.)

    http://www.immigrantsolidarity.org/cgi-bin/datacgi/database.cgi?file=Issues&
    report=SingleArticle&ArticleID=0108
    &report=SingleArticle&ArticleID=0108>

    Federal authorities swooped in on a popular Colonie Chinese restaurant/motel
    and other local eateries and apartments in Albany and Rensselaer counties
    Monday and apprehended dozens of suspects on various immigration, money
    laundering and conspiracy charges.





    9 charged in restaurant raids

    By BRUCE A. SCRUTON - Times Union (Albany, N.Y.)

    http://www.immigrantsolidarity.org/cgi-bin/datacgi/database.cgi?file=Issues&
    report=SingleArticle&ArticleID=0107
    &report=SingleArticle&ArticleID=0107>
    &report=SingleArticle&ArticleID=0106>

    ALBANY -- Five people were charged Thursday with using illegal immigrants in
    their chain of upstate Chinese buffet restaurants and putting nearly $2
    million in a variety of bank accounts trying to hide the profits. Four
    others were charged with driving the workers to and from the restaurants.





    Local Chinese buffet under federal investigation

    By Jonathan Ment - Daily Freeman (Kingston, N.Y.)

    http://www.immigrantsolidarity.org/cgi-bin/datacgi/database.cgi?file=Issues&
    report=SingleArticle&ArticleID=0106
    &report=SingleArticle&ArticleID=0106>

    TOWN OF ULSTER - A local Chinese restaurant, Dragon Cheng Buffet,
    also-known-as Dragon Buffet, is under investigation by federal authorities,
    along with several other upstate Chinese buffet restaurants.





    Five restaurant owners charged in immigration sting

    By The Associated Press

    http://www.immigrantsolidarity.org/cgi-bin/datacgi/database.cgi?file=Issues&
    report=SingleArticle&ArticleID=0105
    &report=SingleArticle&ArticleID=0105>

    ALBANY, N.Y. -- Five owners of Chinese buffet restaurants in upstate New
    York were charged Thursday with hiring illegal aliens from China and Mexico
    and with setting up fake bank accounts to launder the business' illegal
    proceeds, police said.





    For the complete immigrant news updates, please visit:

    http://immigrantsolidarity.org/news.shtml








    National Immigrant Solidarity Network

    No Immigrant Bashing! Support Immigrant Rights!

    webpage: http://www.ImmigrantSolidarity.org


    New York: (212)330-8172

    Los Angeles: (213)403-0131





    Please consider making a donation to the important work of National
    Immigrant Solidarity Network

    Send check pay to:

    ActionLA/SEE

    1013 Mission St. #6

    South Pasadena CA 91030

    (All donations are tax deductible)



    *to join the immigrant Solidarity Network daily news litserv, send e-mail
    to: isn-subscribe@lists.riseup.net



    *a monthly ISN monthly Action Alert! listserv, go to webpage
    http://www.actionla.org/cgi-bin/mojo/mojo.cgi?f=list&l=isn



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



    11) MILLION CON MARCH!



    This is a great idea and I hope it's one whose time and come. Every one of

    the demands are supportable and show serious thought about the conditions of

    defendants ("guilty" or "innocent"), prisoners, and "ex-felons." And this is

    one Million ----- March where a turnout of five or ten thousand would be a

    clear cut and big victory and mark an unmistakable advance for the working

    class in the US and worldwide! On to the Million -- or whatever -- Con

    March! Fred Feldman





    Million Con March





    Michael D. Harris, #172430, president of Local Chapter 1020 of the National

    Lifers of America in the Thumb Correctional Facility in Lapeer, has a

    specific program of demands to address the U.S. prison crisis, an element

    missing from the Nov. 16 conference on prisons at the Detroit Opera House.

    He is calling for a "Million Con March" to be held in Washington, D.C. June

    25, 2005 to support these demands:



    - Pardons for falsely-convicted persons in every state.



    - Pardons and sentence commutations for non-parolable lifers who have

    rehabilitated themselves, after serving a maximum of 25 years.



    - Paroles for parolable lifers who have rehabilitated themselves after 15

    years.



    - Pardons and commutations for battered women serving time for killing their

    abusers.



    - Medical commutations and paroles for chronically and terminally ill

    prisoners.



    - Legislation permitting persons over 60 who have served one-third of their

    sentence to apply for early release.



    - Exempt juveniles from life sentencing.



    - Federal criminal sanctions against law enforcement officials who use false

    evidence, police perjury and corruption to obtain convictions.



    - Federal public hearings on falsification of forensic reports and lab

    evidence.



    - Reinstatement of funding for Corrections Ombudsmen in every state.



    - State reductions in spending for any county failing to racially diversify

    their jury polls to reflect the population and the defendant's ethnicity.



    - End to mandatory minimum sentencing.



    - End to "three strikes" laws.



    - End to the Patriot Act.



    - Voting Rights for all ex-felons across the country.



    - Educational and vocational trade programs for current prisoners.



    He is asking those who would like to help organize such a march to contact:



    Juanita Dixon 101 Mitchell St. Jackson, MI 48203 Phone 517-787-5197



    Betty Harris,c/o Doris Gates 2221 Baker St. Muskegon, Mi.



    Deshon Harris, 3501 E. 42nd Ave. #307, Anchorage, Alaska



    Kevin Carey, c/o 313-831-0750



    http://www.michigancitizen.com/default.asp?sourceid=&smenu=1&twindow=&ma

    d=&s



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




    Monday, November 22, 2004
     

    BAUAW NEWSLETTER-MONDAY, NOV.22, 2004


    Bay Area United Against War Presents:

    "WMD: Weapons of Mass Deception"

    A film by Danny Schechter
    "The News Dissector"

    Saturday, Dec. 11th, 2004
    (Showtime to be announced)
    Embarcadero Center Cinema
    One Embarcadero Center, Promenade Level
    San Francisco, CA 94111
    (415) 267-4893

    " 'WMD' paints a meticulous and damning portrait of the media's
    coverage of the Iraq war. In sobering detail, Danny Schechter
    shows us how the TV networks now prefer the role of cheerleader,
    to that of objective journalist," says Mike Nisholson of
    austinnforkerry.org.

    "Schechter tackles his subject like a cross between Errol Morris
    and a Dashiell Hammet detective, following close on the tail of big
    media reporters as they in turn track the march toward war, embed
    themselves in the military industrial complex and then get out
    when the fighting gets tough and leave the cleanup work to
    stringers, " writes Shandon Fowler of film's Hamptons
    International Film Festival appearance, Oct. 20-24.

    To learn more about the film visit:
    www.wmdthefilm.org
    www.bauaw.org

    There will be a showing of "WMD: Weapons of Mass Deception"
    sponsored by Media Alliance on Friday, Dec. 10th at the
    same location.

    (Distributed by Cinema Libre Studio, www.cinemalibrestudio.com)

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

    1) Benefit Concert for Chiapas
    December 8 - 7:30PM
    La Pena Cultural Center
    3105 Shattuck Ave., Berkeley

    2) Destroying Iraq to Save It
    Michael Kinsley
    November 21, 2004
    http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/commentary/la-oe-kinsley21nov21,0,779452
    9.column?coll=la-news-comment-opinions

    3) Alert! Falluja women, children in mass grave
    Sunday 21 November 2004
    http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/24EBE5BB-CA3F-462B-8279-546BC1D9B7E6.
    htm

    4) Tues. Nov. 23, 7pm
    ANSWER Educational Forum
    "After the Election: What's Next for the Movement Against
    War & Racism?"
    SF Women’s Building,
    3543 18th St. btwn Valencia & Guerrero

    5) Marines Hampered by Security Fears in Falluja
    By Michael Georgy
    FALLUJA, Iraq (Reuters)
    Mon Nov 22, 2004 08:23 AM ET
    http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=6884991&src=eD
    ialog/GetContent§ion=news

    6) Jackson fears Army will remain in Iraq for years
    By Colin Brown, Deputy Political Editor
    22 November 2004
    http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/politics/story.jsp?story=585402

    7) It Doesn't End With Fallouja
    EDITORIAL
    November 22, 2004
    http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/la-ed-iraq22nov22,0,5866020.story

    8) STRIKERS MASSACRED IN THE PHILIPPINES: BMP
    (initials for Solidarity of Filipino Workers, in
    Tagalog, one of the labor federations in the
    Philippines-KM) SOLIDARITY APPEAL

    9) Oil and gas update from the northeast
    -----Original Message-----
    From: G. Leona Green [mailto:glgreen@neonet.bc.ca]
    Sent: Friday, November 19, 2004 7:13 PM
    To: landwatch@onenw.org
    Subject: Fw: [BCEN LW:] Oil and gas update from
    the northeast
    November 19. The friend mentioned at the end of this
    posting, passed away this morning. Leona

    10) Lynne Stewart on trial in New York: civil liberties
    vs. the new McCarthyism
    By Monica Hill
    Freedom Socialist • Vol. 25, No. 4 • October-November

    11) Enforcement of Civil Rights Law Declined
    Since '99, Study Finds
    By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
    WASHINGTON
    November 22, 2004
    http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/22/national/22civil.html?oref=login


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

    1) Benefit Concert for Chiapas
    December 8 - 7:30PM
    La Pena Cultural Center
    3105 Shattuck Ave., Berkeley

    Son de La Tierra performs traditional son jarocho music
    from the state of Varacruz in Mexico

    You do not want to miss this group! Plus:
    "Messages from Chiapas" - a report from our November
    Encuentro in Chiapas. Also: New artesania from the women's
    cooperative in Polho, Chiapas - Great Christmas presents
    (gifts of conscience).

    See you all soon!
    Chiapas Support Committee
    www.chiapas-support.org

    P.O. Box 3421
    Oakland, CA 94609
    Tel: (510) 654-9587
    email: cezmat@igc.org

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

    2) Destroying Iraq to Save It
    Michael Kinsley
    November 21, 2004
    http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/commentary/la-oe-kinsley21nov21,0,779452
    9.column?coll=la-news-comment-opinions

    Has there ever before been a war that so many people disapproved
    of but so few wanted to stop? Have the reasons for starting a war
    ever been so thoroughly discredited without turning into reasons
    for ending it?

    The Vietnam-era antiwar movement had an agenda: Bring the troops
    home. Or, in two words - suitable for a picket sign or a T-shirt -
    "Out now."

    What seems to be today's antiwar position - it was a terrible mistake
    and it's a terrible mess, but we can't just walk away from it - was
    actually the pro-war position during Vietnam. In fact, it was close
    to official government policy for more than half the length of that war.

    Today's antiwar cause doesn't even have a movement, to speak of,
    let alone an agenda. It consists of perhaps 47% of the citizenry - the
    ones who voted for John Kerry - who are in some kind of existential
    opposition to the war but don't know what they want to do about it.

    Meanwhile, U.S. soldiers die by the hundreds and Iraqis - military
    and civilian - by the thousands in a cause these people (and I'm one
    of them) believe to be a horrible mistake.

    Kerry spent months untangling the knots of his Iraq position while
    tangling new ones even faster. He pounded George W. Bush over
    the phantom weapons of mass destruction, and he mocked Bush's
    confusion of Osama bin Laden with Saddam Hussein. Kerry said,
    famously, that Bush's invasion of Iraq was "the wrong war in the
    wrong place at the wrong time." So was he in favor of ending it? No,
    his position was that he would try, but not promise, to bring the
    troops home in four years. Four years! U.S. involvement in World
    War II lasted 3 1/2.

    Bush had a good point when he wondered how, as commander in
    chief, Kerry could ask American soldiers to die for the wrong war
    in the wrong place at the wrong time. Of course, that problem
    does not vindicate Bush's belief that Iraq is the right war in the
    right etc. etc. etc.

    But Bush's apparently sincere belief does relieve him from
    needing to explain why he doesn't want the war to end now.
    Kerry's studiously confused position was not, or not just, a political
    stratagem. It was an accurate reflection of the views of his
    constituency. Most of them deplore the war, but only a tiny
    fraction favor an immediate pull-out. Anyone who opposes the
    war but isn't ready to demand peace needs an answer to the
    question, "Why on Earth not?"

    There are answers, possibly even adequate answers. But none of
    them shine with the kind of obvious truth that makes the question
    unnecessary, let alone uninteresting, which is how it is being treated.
    The answers fall in two categories, each associated with a secretary
    of State.

    The Henry Kissinger answer is, in a word, credibility. A superpower
    that announces a goal and gives up without achieving it will not be
    super for long. In the end, President Nixon and Kissinger added five
    years to the length of the Vietnam War, and we lost it anyway. Did that
    add to our superpower credibility? Well, maybe. In the Kissingerian world
    of High Strategy, a reputation for pigheaded stupidity can be almost as
    valuable as a reputation for wise persistence. What could be more
    credible than a reputation for staying the course no matter how
    disastrous it turns out to be?

    The Colin Powell answer goes by the nickname "Pottery Barn," referring
    to the alleged policy of that purveyor of yuppieware that "if you break
    it, you own it." In fact, Pottery Barn's breakage policy is much kinder and
    gentler than that. But it's certainly true that a well-brought-up foreign
    policy doesn't occupy a country, wreck it and move on like a rock band
    checking out of a hotel room. The question is whether at this point
    we're actually helping to tidy up, or only making a bigger mess.

    The lead Page 1 headline in Monday's Los Angeles Times was, "Iraqi
    City Lies in Ruins." That would be Fallouja, a city of 300,000 (metro
    area) that Americans had never heard of until we felt impelled to
    destroy it. And our reasons were neither trivial nor contemptible.
    They followed with confident logic from the premise that Hussein
    was an intolerable danger to the United States. If so, he had to be
    taken down. And if that destabilized the country, we had to occupy
    it for a while and calm it down. And you can't run a national occupation
    with rebels occupying a major city, so you have to besiege the city
    and kill a lot of people and leave the place "in ruins."

    An American general in Vietnam famously said, "We had to destroy
    the village to save it." This has become the definitive expression of
    the macabre futility of war. Last week, we destroyed an entire city in
    order to save it (progress!), but our capacity to find that sort of thing
    ironic seems to have become shriveled and harmless.

    Copyright 2004 Los Angeles Times

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

    3) Alert! Falluja women, children in mass grave
    Sunday 21 November 2004
    http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/24EBE5BB-CA3F-462B-8279-546BC1D9B7E6.
    htm

    Residents of a village neighbouring Falluja have told Aljazeera that they
    helped bury the bodies of 73 women and children who were burnt to
    death by a US bombing attack.

    "We buried them here, but we could not identify them because they
    were charred by the use of napalm bombs used by the Americans,"
    said one resident of Saqlawiya in footage aired on Aljazeera on Sunday.

    There have been no reports of the US military using napalm in Falluja
    and no independent verification of the claims.

    The resident told Aljazeera all the bodies were buried in a single grave.
    Late last week, US troops in Falluja called on some residents who had
    fled the fighting to return and help bury the dead.

    However, according to other residents who managed to flee the
    fighting after US forces entered the city, hundreds more bodies
    still lay in the streets and were being fed on by packs of wild dogs.

    Danger zone

    Meanwhile, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said
    Falluja remained too dangerous to secure proper retrieval and burial
    of corpses.

    "We could not enter Falluja city so far due to the security measures
    and the continuing battles," Muain Qasis, ICRC spokesman in Jordan,
    told Aljazeera.

    When asked about the security measures, Qasis said: "In order to
    carry out an independent and acceptable humanitarian action, we
    must have guarantees ensuring the safety of the humanitarian staff.

    "The humanitarian situation in Falluja city is very difficult.

    "The city is still suffering shortage of public services. There is no
    water or electricity. There is no way to offer medical treatment for
    the injured families still surrounded inside the city," he added.

    Detained civilians released

    In related news, the US military in Falluja announced that it had
    released 400 of the 1450 men it had detained in the war-ravaged
    city.

    "More than 400 detainees have since been released after being
    deemed non-combatants," the military said, adding that 100 more
    were due to be released on Sunday.

    Aljazeera + Agencies

    URL: http://www.PeaceNoWar.net

    July 2003, Peace No War Visit and Video Interview in Fallujah
    http://www.actionla.org/Iraq/IraqReport/video.html#fallujah


    Los Angeles Times has a complete biographical Information on
    U.S. Soldiers Killed:
    http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/external/fmmac2.mm.ap.org/war2/adv_search.php?S
    ITE=CALOS&SECTION=MIDEAST

    For more photos and Videos from Iraq, visit:
    "Report from Baghdad" July, 2003
    http://www.actionla.org/Iraq/IraqReport/intro.html

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

    4) Tues. Nov. 23, 7pm
    ANSWER Educational Forum
    "After the Election: What's Next for the Movement Against
    War & Racism?"
    SF Women’s Building,
    3543 18th St. btwn Valencia & Guerrero

    Discussion and presentations by Bay Area activists about the ongoing
    occupation and resistance in Iraq and the role of the anti-war, anti-
    racist movement in the post-election period. Who is the Iraqi
    resistance and how is the international people’s movement
    confronting imperialism?

    $3-10 donation. Refreshments provided, wheelchair accessible.
    Call 415-821-6545 to reserve free childcare.

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

    5) Marines Hampered by Security Fears in Falluja
    By Michael Georgy
    FALLUJA, Iraq (Reuters)
    Mon Nov 22, 2004 08:23 AM ET
    http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=6884991&src=eD
    ialog/GetContent§ion=news

    FALLUJA, Iraq (Reuters) - U.S. Marines were conducting painstaking
    weapons searches in the Iraqi city of Falluja on Monday when they
    spotted a man with an AK-47 rifle on a nearby rooftop.

    Armed only with a light weapon, he could never stand up to what they
    were about to unleash. But he was enough to distract Marines from a
    task that is key to stabilizing Falluja after a U.S.-led offensive crushed
    rebels controlling the Sunni Muslim city.

    The angle of the rooftop could not quite accommodate the trajectory
    of a shoulder-launched Javelin missile so Marines fired the more direct,
    wire-guided TOW missile after a debate.

    Then they fired hefty .50 caliber machinegun rounds at the rooftop,
    blew up a door and stormed a living room. It was an impressive display
    of firepower but they raided the wrong house.

    When they finally made it to the pulverized rooftop with smoke still
    rising from the machinegun bullet holes, the man with one rifle they
    were seeking had escaped.

    "One of the main challenges we are facing in conducting weapons
    searches is these lone snipers who randomly appear and delay our
    operations," said 1st Lieutenant Christopher Wilkins, 24, as he led
    a weapons hunt in central Falluja.

    At that point, his platoon had only found a few sacks with AK-47s,
    some hand grenades, an artillery shell and, most notably, a pick-up
    truck mounted with surface-to-air missiles.

    After pounding Falluja with air strikes, artillery fire and tank shells,
    Marines are now scrambling to find caches so that some 300,000
    residents who fled before the assault can return.

    They have been astounded by the quantity and variety of weapons,
    from Egyptian submachineguns to Russian and German models and
    flame-throwing rifles.

    Hundreds of mortars, rocket-propelled grenades, rocket launchers
    and bomb-making equipment have been uncovered inside couches,
    behind hidden walls and even on top of the city water tower, Marine
    officers said.

    Marine officers say they know tracking down all insurgents is
    impossible but they hope the weapons searches will lead them
    to houses that guerrillas could use in future.

    Some insurgents are still keen to fight.

    A few were caught swimming across the Euphrates river to get
    back into Falluja at a spot near the hospital, holding up their
    AK-47s above the water and floating on beach balls, Marine
    officers said.

    "This could take weeks and even months to make Falluja safe
    for its people to return," said Lieutenant Colonel Larry Kling.

    Marines, who expect to stay in Falluja until Iraqi forces
    can take over security, can't afford to push too hard or fast
    in the house to house searches because they are trying to gain
    the trust of residents.

    Falluja's people might already have reason for anger. The
    offensive has reduced many parts of the city to rubble.

    But Marines searched aggressively in a middle class
    neighborhood; behind paintings, in couches and even toy boxes.

    "I tell my men not to be too aggressive so that people will
    not have more hatred when they come home," said Wilkins. "But
    the problem is these weapons are hidden in incredible places."

    Marines search between 20 and 50 houses a day and 80
    percent of them have weapons hidden inside. Some had time to
    joke despite the risky and sensitive challenge ahead.

    Standing over a crater six meters (20 ft) across and six
    meters deep in a street created by what he said was a 2,000-
    pound bomb during the offensive, Staff Sargeant Jonathan
    Knarth, 29, of Florida, looked at down the deep water at the
    bottom.

    "Hey look all you have to do is extend a slide from that
    rooftop to the water and you have an amusement park right here
    courtesy of the United States Air Force."

    (c) Copyright Reuters 2004.

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

    6) Jackson fears Army will remain in Iraq for years
    By Colin Brown, Deputy Political Editor
    22 November 2004
    http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/politics/story.jsp?story=585402

    British troops will be sent to help the US in conflict zones anywhere
    inside Iraq, prompting fears that soldiers could be stuck in the most
    dangerous parts of the country fighting insurgents for years to come.

    General Sir Mike Jackson, the officer commanding the Army, said in
    an interview with The Independent yesterday that troops could again
    be dispatched outside the Basra area to help the US and Iraqi forces if
    the insurgent threat escalates. The deployment could also go on beyond
    the end of 2005 when the US mandate for the coalition to stay in the
    country expires. "It is event-driven," he said.

    Sir Mike's remarks will raise fears among critics of the war that Britain
    is being sucked deeper into the mire in Iraq by extending its mission.

    Four British soldiers have died in suicide attacks and bombings since
    the Black Watch was sent north to support the US-led onslaught on
    Fallujah three weeks ago. It was the first time UK troops have left the
    British-controlled area of Basra.

    Aware of the unpopularity of the deployment, the Government has
    been at pains to say that the Black Watch troops will be back home
    by Christmas. And Tony Blair said last month that he "did not believe
    that there will be a further requirement for other troops" to be
    deployed away from Basra.

    "Yes, we have said that the Black Watch will come back by
    Christmas," the Prime Minister said. "As to what then happens,
    we cannot be sure. We do not believe that there will be a further
    requirement for other troops, but I cannot guarantee that, because,
    obviously, I do not know the situation that may arise."

    Meanwhile, Iraqi authorities announced yesterday that national
    elections would be held on 30 January despite escalating violence.
    The elections will clash with the annual haj, when millions of pilgrims
    travel overland through Iraq. They will come from Iran, Afghanistan
    and Pakistan, making it impossible to seal Iraq's borders.

    In Ramadi, 35 miles west of Fallujah, gunmen attacked a group of
    Iraqi National Guard troops yesterday, killing nine and wounding 17
    after hijacking a convoy and lining the men up for execution. Earlier
    in the day, several Iraqi civilians were killed when US Marines fired
    on a bus that drove through a checkpoint.

    Near Latifiyah, south of Baghdad, a Reuters reporter watched
    gunmen kill two off-duty National Guards troops and a policeman
    at a roadblock.

    In Mosul, Iraq's third city, the bodies of three men killed by insurgents
    were left lying on a street a day after US troops discovered the bodies
    of nine Iraqi soldiers. All 12 men had been shot in the back of the head.
    Four headless corpses were also discovered in the city last week.
    A group led by the al-Qa'ida ally Abu Musab al-Zarqawi has claimed
    responsibility for the killings. In Baghdad, four large explosions
    shook the area near the US-guarded Green Zone after sunset but
    no casualties were reported.

    Sir Mike said that all the British operations had been in the Basra
    area "until this one-off deployment of the Black Watch. That is
    not to say, in the future, there may not be a military requirement
    of the coalition as a whole for a British unit or units to be elsewhere".

    The Black Watch would be pulled back within a few weeks and
    would not be replaced at Camp Dogwood, he said.

    Sir Mike rejected claims by the Liberal Democrat leader, Charles
    Kennedy, that the Black Watch deployment was a sign of "mission
    creep''. "The mission is to provide Iraq with its political and
    economic future," he said. "That's the mission."

    Sir Mike also appeared to suggest that the British deployment
    could go on beyond December 2005, when the mandate for the
    coalition in Iraq officially ends. "How long we stay there is going
    to be event-driven," he said.

    Iraq was now more "challenging", he said, adding: "It's clear a minority
    - and I believe a pretty small minority - of Iraqis with some outside
    assistance cannot face the idea of progress in Iraq and are prepared
    to do some pretty revolting things to prevent it. And they cannot be
    allowed to succeed."

    (c) 2004 Independent Digital (UK) Ltd

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

    7) It Doesn't End With Fallouja
    EDITORIAL
    November 22, 2004
    http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/la-ed-iraq22nov22,0,5866020.story

    A Marine general commented last week after his men ousted nearly
    all Iraqi guerrillas from Fallouja that the two weeks of fighting had
    "broken the back of the insurgency." If only it were that simple.

    Marines did a good job of purging enemies from the city, but as the
    general spoke, flames and smoke rose in other Sunni Triangle cities
    in the north and west; foreigners and Iraqis were beheaded, shot or
    killed by suicide bombers; and political parties vowed to boycott
    national elections that the Bush administration has put forth as
    a harbinger of democracy in a nation where the concept is a stranger.

    More than 50 U.S. soldiers were killed in the Fallouja fight, which
    began Nov. 8 in one of the cities where Sunni Muslims are the majority,
    and the U.S. death toll in Iraq has now passed 1,200. An estimated
    1,200 insurgents were killed in Fallouja as well.

    The difficulties of pacifying Iraq were obvious last week. Insurgents
    showed the depths to which they're capable of sinking when evidence
    surfaced that Margaret Hassan, the kidnapped director of CARE
    International in Iraq, had been shot to death. And even as Marines
    tried to kill the last remnants of resistance in Fallouja, guerrillas
    stormed police stations in the northern city of Mosul, where more
    than 80% of police responded by abandoning their posts.

    The U.S. goal is to get an Iraqi army and police force trained to
    provide the nation's security and let American troops come home;
    that objective remains elusive. Iraqi soldiers following Marines
    into battle in Fallouja did well, but their numbers are few.

    Fallouja was thought to be the headquarters of militant leader
    Abu Musab Zarqawi; if so, he left before the Marines arrived.
    Zarqawi's followers continue to try to terrorize Iraqis into
    opposing the U.S. occupation by beheading natives and foreigners
    alike. Zarqawi was born in Jordan, but Marines said most of the
    fighters in Fallouja appeared to be Iraqi. That could be a hopeful
    sign that although the Iraq misadventure has inflamed Islamic
    opinion against Washington, few foreign fighters have wanted or
    been able to enter the country. But it also may mean Iraqis are
    sufficiently angered by the invasion to be willing to fight and
    die in large numbers without outside help.

    The brutality of battle was brought home in television footage
    of a Marine fatally shooting an Iraqi insurgent in a mosque. An
    inspection after the shooting indicated the insurgent was wounded
    and unarmed, and U.S. officials said they would investigate the
    incident. Soldiers faced with the possibility of booby-trapped
    corpses and suicide bombers trying to kill them are understandably
    on edge, but even if the shooting is found to be accidental, it will
    be used as anti-American propaganda, stacked next to the
    photographs from Abu Ghraib prison.

    As the killing has spread, the political battle has suffered setbacks.
    Dozens of political groups, many with mostly Sunni members,
    announced plans to boycott January's elections, in part because
    of anger over Fallouja. A boycott would undercut the legitimacy
    of balloting; the interim Iraqi government should try to bring
    all politicians into the process. If that proves impossible, those
    elected will have to try to govern in a manner that makes all
    Iraqis feel they have a stake in the nation, regardless of
    religious beliefs.

    Copyright 2004 Los Angeles Times

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

    8) STRIKERS MASSACRED IN THE PHILIPPINES: BMP
    (initials for Solidarity of Filipino Workers, in
    Tagalog, one of the labor federations in the
    Philippines-KM) SOLIDARITY APPEAL


    STRIKERS MASSACRED IN THE PHILIPPINES
    Three days ago, on 16 November, fourteen people were killed by
    army and police in the Philippines. They were strikers at the
    Hacienda Luisita, in Tarlac.

    The strike is in defence of 327 workers fired by management in
    a clear-cut case of union busting. The union was defending the
    right of workers to collectively bargain for wage increases.

    The strike busting was carried out by the Department of Labor
    and Employment Secretary Patricia Sto. Tomas, who through the
    strike breaking mechanism -- "assumption of jurisdiction" of the
    strike -- issued a "return to work order" thus setting the scene
    for the police and army to move in.

    Two of those killed were children, aged two and five, who died
    from suffocation as a result of the tear gas used. Some 35 people
    suffered gunshot wounds, 133 were arrested, hundreds more
    were wounded.

    Hacienda Luisita is owned by the family of former president
    Corazon Cojuangco-Aquino, who replaced the dictator Marcos
    during the 1986 Edsa uprising.

    The trade union movement in the Philippines has called for
    massive protests condemning the murders, demanding a full
    investigation of what happened. They are demanding justice for
    the workers, that hundreds of workers illegally dismissed be
    rehired, and that criminal charges against the strikers be dropped.
    They are also demanding the repeal of the 'assumption of
    jurisdiction' authority of the labor department, and resignation
    of the Labor Secretary Patricia Sto. Tomas.

    The protest actions have begun and will continue next week,
    with coordinated nation-wide actions, culminating in a major
    mobilisation on November 30.

    Please send your messages of solidarity to be read out at the
    protests and to be sent on to the Department of Labor and
    Employment.

    BMP International Desk

    bmp_philippines@yahoo.com mailto:bmp_philippines@yahoo.com

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

    9) Oil and gas update from the northeast
    -----Original Message-----
    From: G. Leona Green [mailto:glgreen@neonet.bc.ca]
    Sent: Friday, November 19, 2004 7:13 PM
    To: landwatch@onenw.org
    Subject: Fw: [BCEN LW:] Oil and gas update from
    the northeast
    November 19. The friend mentioned at the end of this
    posting, passed away this morning. Leona

    ----- Original Message -----
    From: G. Leona Green
    To: landwatch@onenw.org
    Sent: Monday, November 15, 2004 9:13 PM
    Subject: [BCEN LW:] Oil and gas update from the northeast

    Hello all,

    Tomorrow is the big day, the drilling company will frac the gas well to
    the southwest. I am told this is all very safe and the chemical cloud
    which is very small (so they say) will dissipate in no time! Why do I
    not believe any of this?

    To update you on the pleasure of living in the "patch". In Dawson Creek
    and area, the drug trade is estimated to be a one hundred and thirty-two
    million dollar per month trade. Break and enters are average of two each
    day of the month. The feed store where I deal has been broken into twice
    in the last ten days. What they expect to get there is beyond me. They
    now have steel reinforcements on the doors. My youngest son is in the
    security systems business, he cannot keep up with the demand for
    security systems.

    My second youngest son lives in Dawson Creek in one of the "better"
    neighborhoods. His doors are locked at all times and I have to ring the
    doorbell to let him know I am there if I go to see him. For reasons
    unknown, he has been vandalized.

    Prostitution, drugs, B&E, muggings, purse snatching, vehicle thefts,
    vagrants sleeping in ally ways. You name it, we got it.

    Ft.St.John is worse. My eldest son and his family live there. They have
    been broken into so many times that they now have a security system as
    well as bars on the windows and doors as well as two dogs. And they live
    in one of the "classier" sections of the city in a lovely home with a
    chain link fence around it. Had a visit from a man from the fair city of
    FT.St.John the other day, he has a twelve year old daughter. Said
    daughter goes only to school and other than that she refuses to go
    anywhere as it is not safe. I, myself have been nowhere in the evening
    for the last several months. Not even out to dinner or a concert. The
    city is not safe to be out in.

    I live on what used to be a quiet country road and usually knew every
    vehicle that drove by, what few there were. Now, day and night, the roar
    of the traffic is deafening and the speed with which they travel on
    these back roads is unreal. What I have described here is only a "drop
    in the bucket" so to speak. I have lived in the Dawson Creek area for
    many years, back when it was a "raw frontier" town. In those days one
    was perfectly safe on the streets day or night. How times have changed!

    We have a lovely park over in the Tumbler Ridge area. Won't be lovely
    for long. They are logging off forty acres next to the park to build one
    of the biggest gas plants ever built.

    I had started out to just tell you how "lovely' living in the "patch" is
    but I have just received word that a friend and neighbor who is only in
    her late forties is in Edmonton in a coma. She is a victim, we believe,
    of the gassing that we received from the sour gas well in 1998. She has
    suffered the exact same fate as all of my animals that died from the
    blood filled tumors. If she should recover enough to come out of the
    coma, she will be a "vegetable". She is still bleeding into the brain
    and that causes the brain to die. Why do they not just come and shoot us
    and our animals, it would be more humane!


    May God help us ....... no one else can. If I could ever hope to sell
    what has come to be known as death valley, I would leave. But I am stuck
    here come what may.

    Leona


    [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

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

    10) Lynne Stewart on trial in New York: civil liberties
    vs. the new McCarthyism
    By Monica Hill
    Freedom Socialist • Vol. 25, No. 4 • October-November


    For years, the government has been spying on New York attorney
    Lynne Stewart — to such an extent that civil liberties defenders say
    the Department of Justice ought to be arrested and tried for its
    actions. Instead, it is Lynne Stewart who is on trial, in a courtroom
    battle that pits the political Left against the far Right, the Constitution
    against the Attorney General, and the liberty-loving U.S. public against
    an empire determined to repress its critics and dump due process.

    It all adds up to a crucial fight against the neo-McCarthyism that has
    been ignited by the "war on terrorism."

    Inventing the crime to fit the punishment. Stewart's saga began
    in 1995, when the FBI charged Sheik Omar Abdel-Rahman and nine
    others with conspiring to bomb several New York landmarks.
    Abdel-Rahman, an Islamic fundamentalist leader known as the
    "blind cleric," was connected to a group in Egypt that was on the
    Secretary of State's list of terrorist organizations. A judge appointed
    Lynne Stewart to be the indigent sheik's attorney. Her legal team
    included translator Mohammed Yousry and paralegal Ahmed Sattar,
    who are both now codefendants in the Stewart case.

    Sheik Abdel-Rahman was eventually convicted of conspiring to
    blow up the UN, kill Egypt's president and bomb highway tunnels
    in New York. Historically, the government resorts to charges of
    conspiracy (contemplation of illegal acts) when it cannot prove
    illegal activity. The two key witnesses in the trial were informants.
    One was a former Egyptian army officer who made a million dollars
    spying for the FBI. The other was one of the alleged conspirators
    who pleaded guilty and agreed to cooperate with the government.

    After the conviction, Stewart continued to act as the sheik's legal
    representative. Abdel-Rahman, a major political and religious
    figure in the Middle East, was anxious not to disappear into the
    black hole of U.S. prisons. Stewart insists she was doing her job
    when, in April 2000, she released the cleric's press statement
    to Reuters for the Egyptian media.

    That's when the government began heavy-duty spying on Stewart,
    culminating in her arrest two years later. Attorney General Ashcroft
    jailed Stewart and her legal team for "aiding and abetting a terrorist
    organization." The highly publicized crackdown was calculated to
    silence dissidents and scare lawyers from defending them.

    Stewart's attorney Michael Tigar defines the case as "an attack
    on the First Amendment right of free speech, free press and
    petition" and on "the right to effective assistance of counsel."
    "The 'evidence' in this case," he says, "was gathered by wholesale
    invasion of private conversations, private attorney-client meetings
    and private faxes, letters and e-mails. I have never seen such an
    abusive use of governmental power."

    The people's heroine. Instead of being intimidated, Stewart took
    the principled and courageous road of bringing her case to the
    court of public opinion. A defense committee sprang up. Lawyers
    and civil liberties experts across the country denounced the arrests.
    Law students at City University New York (CUNY) gave her their
    annual award for public interest lawyer of the year. Stewart is
    invited to speak all over the country and a steady stream of
    supporters troop into the courtroom.

    In the post-9/11 chill characterized by brazen government
    detentions of people from the Middle East, Stewart is the first
    attorney targeted by the Justice Department. She attributes this
    to the fact that she is a radical and a woman.

    Long before she met Sheik Abdel-Rahman, Lynne Stewart's life
    and politics were decidedly leftist. She has marched and demonstrated,
    spoken up for and represented countless protesters. Her clients have
    included Black Panthers, the Weather Underground, the Ohio Seven,
    the Black Liberation Army and busloads of less visible cases. "My
    whole entire career," she says, "has been about the government
    expanding its powers to make more and more criminal what could
    be considered political."

    The rightwing Front Page Magazine sees Stewart as evil incarnate:
    "the most notorious terrorist advocate ... a self proclaimed champion
    of terrorism and an avowed Communist..." With enemies like these,
    Stewart must be doing something right!

    Inside the courtroom. The best way to get a picture of the trial is to
    read Stewart's fascinating blog (web journal) at www.lynnestewart.org.
    The government has been presenting its case for nearly two months
    and, as Stewart puts it, it's sheer "Snoozeville." Witnesses play
    damaged surveillance tapes and grainy videos. They read endless,
    poorly translated speeches by the sheik that are intended to show
    he's a terrorist and hence, by association, so must be Stewart and
    her codefendants. Innuendo and smears are the government's
    favored tactics. For example, shortly before the third anniversary
    of September 11, the prosecution showed the jury a four-year-old
    video of Osama bin Laden calling on Muslims to fight for Sheik
    Abdel-Rahman's freedom.

    The bright side of the trial is the show of public support for
    Stewart, Yousry and Sattar. Courtroom visitors have included Sharon
    Salaam, mother of one of the wrongly convicted youths in the Central
    Park jogger case; Kathleen Cleaver, former Black Panther leader;
    Rafael Anglada, an attorney who has defended Puerto Rican
    independistas and is on the defense team for the Miami Five;
    and one of Stewart's clients, Nasser Ahmen, who was held three
    years in solitary confinement on the basis of fraudulent secret
    evidence. "This is the face of my America," Stewart writes.

    Sometime in October, the defense will finally get to tell its story.
    It will resonate with the half-million people who marched against
    the Republican National Convention in New York City in August and
    with the millions across the country who are not fooled by the
    government's criminal "war on terror."

    Warns Stewart, "We are in our time the Communists of the Fifties,
    the Scottsboro Boys [of the 1930s], the Anarchists [in the late
    1800s]. And now the Terrorists — whatever Imperial America can
    frighten the people with. Judges included."

    Help keep Stewart and her codefendants out of prison by publicizing
    this fight and, if possible, attending the trial. Send donations to the
    Lynne Stewart Defense Committee, 350 Broadway, Ste. 700, New
    York, NY 10013. For more info, call 212-625-9696 or e-mail info @
    lynnestewart.org. Strike back for civil liberties!

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

    11) Enforcement of Civil Rights Law Declined
    Since '99, Study Finds
    By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
    WASHINGTON
    November 22, 2004
    http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/22/national/22civil.html?oref=login

    WASHINGTON, Nov. 21 (AP) - Federal enforcement of civil rights laws
    has dropped sharply since 1999, as the level of complaints received
    by the Justice Department has remained relatively constant, according
    a study released Sunday.

    Criminal charges of civil rights violations were brought against 84
    defendants last year, down from 159 in 1999, according to Justice
    Department data analyzed by the Transactional Records Access
    Clearinghouse at Syracuse University.

    The study also found that the number of times the Federal Bureau
    of Investigation or another federal investigative agency recommended
    prosecution in civil rights cases fell by more than one-third, from
    more than 3,000 in 1999 to just over 1,900 last year. Federal court
    data also show that the government has sought fewer civil sanctions
    against civil rights violators.

    One of the study's authors, David Burnham, said the results showed
    that civil rights enforcement dropped across the board in President
    Bush's first term in office. "Collectively, some violators of the civil
    rights laws are not being dealt with by the government," Professor
    Burnham said. "This trend, we think, is significant."

    It is unlikely the decline has occurred because of fewer civil rights
    violations occurring, the study suggests. The number of complaints
    about possible violations received by the Justice Department has
    remained at about 12,000 annually for each of the past five years.

    The Justice Department had no comment about the study.

    When he announced his resignation on Nov. 9, Attorney General
    John Ashcroft listed as one of the department's accomplishments
    a statistic that showed the number of civil rights prosecutions was
    slightly higher over the past three years than the previous three-
    year period. Mr. Ashcroft also said the department had tripled the
    number of defendants charged in human trafficking cases
    compared with the previous three years.

    The Syracuse report gives no conclusive reasons for the reduction
    over five years in civil rights enforcement but speculates that it
    could have resulted from federal prosecutors and investigators
    having spent far more time than in previous years on terrorism
    cases after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.

    Civil rights cases made up a tiny fraction of the Justice Department's
    total of 99,341 criminal prosecutions in 2003. The study found,
    however, that only civil rights and environmental prosecutions were
    down from 1999 to 2003 as the total caseload rose by about
    10 percent.

    By far the biggest criminal prosecution category is illegal drugs,
    at about 33,100 cases last year, followed by immigration, weapons
    violations, white-collar crime and others. The study was based on
    data collected from the Justice Department, federal courts and
    Congressional budget documents.

    Copyright 2004 The New York Times


    Sunday, November 21, 2004
     

    BAUAW NEWSLETTER-SUNDAY, NOV. 21, 2004

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



    1) More Blood, More Chaos

    ** Dahr Jamail's Iraq Dispatches **

    November 21, 2004



    2) In Defense of Unity: The following letter is in response

    to a number of serious redbaiting attacks on ANSWER and

    other Socialists involved in the antiwar movement from some

    people on the UFPJ discussion list. One from

    Rabbi Arthur Waskow, printed below, started the debate.

    It couldn't have come at a worse time. A time when

    overwhelming unity against this war is demanded of all of us.



    Also printed below are the wise comments of Carlos Rovira that

    I was inspired by.



    Bonnie Weinstein, BAUAW



    3) The Crushing of Fallujah

    By JAMES PETRAS (from Counterpunch)

    http://portland.indymedia.org/en/2004/11/303902.shtml



    4) In Falluja, Young Marines Saw the Savagery of an Urban War

    By DEXTER FILKINS

    FALLUJA, Iraq

    November 21, 2004

    http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/21/international/middleeast/21battle.html?hp&
    ex=1101099600&en=bc339766506f30ca&ei=5094&partner=homepage



    5) Iraq Schedules National Elections for Jan. 30

    By EDWARD WONG

    BAGHDAD, Iraq, Nov. 21

    http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/21/international/middleeast/21cnd-iraq.html?h
    p&ex=1101099600&en=a67b1fd95bdf31f7&ei=5094&partner=homepage
    hp&ex=1101099600&en=a67b1fd95bdf31f7&ei=5094&partner=homepag
    e>



    6) Booming prison numbers prompt reexamination of harsh sentencing

    MARK SCOLFORO

    HARRISBURG, Pa.

    Associated Press

    Posted on Sat, Nov. 20, 2004

    http://www.centredaily.com/mld/centredaily/news/politics/10233361.htm



    7) Soaring Interest Compounds Credit Card Pain for Millions

    THE PLASTIC TRAP

    By PATRICK McGEEHAN

    This article was reported by Patrick McGeehan, Lowell Bergman,

    Robin Stein and Marlena Telvick and written by Mr. McGeehan.

    November 21, 2004

    http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/21/business/21cards-web.html?hp&ex=1101099600
    &en=70effacd11d42b21&ei=5094&partner=homepage



    8) MSNBC 'Imus' Segment Refers to 'Raghead Cadaver'

    Muslims urged to renew demand for apology, reprimand

    (WASHINGTON, D.C., 11/19/04)

    http://www.cair-net.org/asp/article.asp?id=203&page=AA






    9) Holiday in Falluja

    Sent: Friday, November 19, 2004 2:03 PM

    hEkLe Falluja, Iraq www.ftssoldier.blogspot.com



    10) Fate of Lawyer in Terror Case Hinges on Sheik's Words

    By JULIA PRESTON

    November 14, 2004

    http://sf.indymedia.org/news/2004/11/1706139.php



    11) Government Looking at Military Draft Lists

    By ALMA WALZER

    The Monitor

    McALLEN, November 15, 2004

    http://www.brownsvilleherald.com/ts_more.php?id=62232_0_10_0_C



    12) 47 Parties Boycott Elections in Iraq

    Xinhua News Agency (China)

    November 17, 2004

    http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2004-11/17/content_2230350.htm



    13) Greenspan Sees No Rise Soon for the Dollar

    By MARK LANDLER

    FRANKFURT

    November 20, 2004

    http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/20/business/20greenspan.html



    14) US soldiers in Iraq suffer horrific brain and mental injuries

    By Rick Kelly

    20 November 2004

    World Socialist Web Site www.wsws.org

    http://www.wsws.org/articles/2004/nov2004/sold-n20.shtml



    15) Troops Round Up Corpses, Weapons in Fallouja

    THE CONFLICT IN IRAQ

    Their operation in the city has shifted to cleanup and

    rebuilding, amid sporadic fighting.

    By Patrick J. McDonnell

    Times Staff Writer

    November 19, 2004

    http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-fallouja19nov19,1,370254
    6.story



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



    1) More Blood, More Chaos

    ** Dahr Jamail's Iraq Dispatches **

    November 21, 2004





    In Ramadi today 6 civilians were killed in clashes between the

    resistance and military.



    The military sealed the city, closing all the roads while announcing

    over loudspeakers for residents in the city to hand over "terrorists."



    A man, woman and child died when the public bus they were riding in

    approached a US checkpoint there when they were riddled with bullets

    from anxious soldiers. A military spokesman said the bus was shot

    because it didn't stop when they asked it to.



    The city remains sealed by US forces as fierce clashes sporadically

    erupt across the area while the military decides how to handle yet

    another resistance controlled.



    As the mass graves in Fallujah continue to be filled with countless

    corpses, sporadic fighting flashes throughout areas of the destroyed

    battleground.



    "The Americans want every city in Iraq to be like Fallujah," said

    Abdulla Rahnan, a 40 year-old man on the street where I was taking tea

    not far from my hotel, "They want to kill us all-they are freeing us of

    our lives!"



    His friend, remaining nameless, added, "Everyone here hates them because

    they are making mass graves faster than even Saddam!"



    I never tell people I interview I am from America. I tell them I am

    Canadian of Lebanese descent-which is close enough since I am from

    Alaska. With this information, I am always greeted warmly, invited to

    meals and to spend the night wherever I go. Arab culture continues to

    impress me as the most beautiful, warm, civilized culture of any I've

    experienced in all of my travels.



    But as Abu Talat told me the other day when I asked him what he though

    about going to Ramadi or Fallujah, "Sure Dahr, we can go-but not until

    you get a steel neck!"



    He laughs his deep laugh, and I fake a laugh with him while peering out

    my car window.



    After conducting other interviews during the day, Salam and I are in my

    room working on a radio dispatch. As we begin recording, his cell phone

    and my room phone ring simultaneously.



    He gets news of another friend who has been shot by soldiers, while I am

    told by Abu Talat that al-Adhamiya is under a 6pm curfew as the military

    begins house to house searches. His frustrated voice tells me his wife

    and boys are afraid as he speaks above helicopters thumping the air over

    his home.



    Over in Sadr City, the military are now sealing off neighborhoods doing

    home searches as well-this after having agreed to a deal with Sadr's

    Mehdi Army the fighters turned in many of their weapons and agreed to a

    truce. Last night a small boy was shot there because he was out after

    curfew.



    Lieutenant-General Lance Smith, deputy US commander of the region of the

    Middle East that includes Iraq, announced that his command might be

    asking for 3-5,000 more troops for Iraq.



    This goal will most likely be attained by delaying the already scheduled

    departure of soldiers already here, and was announced at about the same

    time that the commander for the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force in

    Fallujah, Lieutenant-General John Sattler said that he believed the

    assault on Fallujah had "broken the back of the insurgency."



    Refugees from Fallujah have yet to be allowed to return to their city.



    One of my friends here works on the election commission for Iraq-he

    stopped by tonight laughing at the new date which has been set for the

    election of January 30th. "They have this new date for their rigged

    elections," he rolls his eyes, "And nobody in Iraq believes their

    propaganda. Elections? Here? I don't know anyone who will vote. Perhaps

    the entire country can vote absentee for reason of car bomb!"



    He and I were interviewed on a radio program this evening-while I was

    listening to commercials waiting to come back on, I laugh to myself as

    one of the advertisements is for folks to trade in their old Hummer for

    a new one with low financing!



    This against the backdrop of the show, where my friend and I had shared

    stories with the host and callers of death in the streets, Iraqi outrage

    over the failed occupation and other love stories from Iraq.



    Meanwhile, more oil facilities are sabotaged in the north, the "Green

    Zone" takes more mortars, and the usual gunfire is audible over the

    generators running out my window.



    You can visit http://dahrjamailiraq.com/email_list/ to subscribe or
    unsubscribe to the email list.



    Or, you can unsubscribe by sending an email to
    iraq_dispatches-request@dahrjamailiraq.com and write unsubscribe in the
    subject or the body of the email.



    Iraq_Dispatches mailing list

    Iraq_Dispatches@dahrjamailiraq.com

    http://lists.dahrjamailiraq.com/mailman/listinfo/iraq_dispatches



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



    2) In Defense of Unity: The following letter is in response

    to a number of serious redbaiting attacks on ANSWER and

    other Socialists involved in the antiwar movement from some

    people on the UFPJ discussion list. One from

    Rabbi Arthur Waskow, printed below, started the debate.

    It couldn't have come at a worse time. A time when

    overwhelming unity against this war is demanded of all of us.



    Also printed below are the wise comments of Carlos Rovira that

    I was inspired by.



    Bonnie Weinstein, BAUAW



    Dear fellow antiwar activists,



    What takes precedence over all right now is the bloody devastation

    this government is bringing to the people of Iraq. What is first and

    foremost for the American antiwar movement is the obligation we have

    to make our movement huge--to bring together all those who oppose this

    war inside the belly of this most ferocious beast.



    Opposition to this war is the common thread we all agree upon. History

    demands that we, who are already organized into this movement, come

    together and act in unison and LEAD A CALL FOR UNITY. The future of

    the planet demands this of us.



    There is no room for red-baiting or any propaganda that will divide

    instead of unite. That is the ongoing job of the warmongers--to

    divide and conquer. Now is the time to put aside our differences.



    The world will want to protest the inauguration of this warmonger

    and the "2nd anniversary" of the declaration of war against Iraq.



    We have had a series of National demonstrations--the Democratic

    National Convention, the Republican convention, the Million Worker

    March. What we don't have is a united grassroots movement based in

    cities and towns across the country--even though there is obviously

    tremendous sentiment against this war festering and waiting to be

    unleashed.



    There are antiwar groups all over. But each of us is "doing our

    own thing." There is nothing wrong with "doing your own thing"

    routinely. What is criminal is if we refuse to act in unison when

    it is necessary. Now is the time!



    How much more bloodshed will it take to convince folks that this

    is necessary.



    Every petty delay in the call for nationally unified actions gives

    this bi-partisan government the mandate to continue to escalate their

    terror on the world.



    Every delay in unity by the current leaders of the movement gives

    this bi-partisan government the impression that they can carry their

    war over to Iran, Korea, Cuba, Venezuela--to escalate this war and

    take it to wherever opposition to the U.S. oil-grab is growing.



    The entire world is waiting and watching for what the American people

    are going to do about their government. The world is demanding that

    we act.



    On inauguration day all the cities and towns across this country

    will see thousands of angry protesters in the streets in massive

    opposition to this war no matter who calls the demonstration.



    Coordinated, unified, national demonstrations throughout the country

    could give the antiwar movement the chance to reach out to all those

    opposed to the war and bring them into grassroots working groups

    with ties to a unified, national movement to bring the troops home

    now--no matter which group they belong to. This is the idea behind

    a United Front. This is the power of a United Front.



    In San Francisco, we proved that the majority of the people want

    to bring the troops home now. Our referendum won with 63.9% percent

    of the vote--a wide margin.



    The antiwar movement in our city, for sure, has a mandate to

    organize and act in unity.



    Suggestions such as Arthur Wascow's (see his email reprinted below)

    to demonstrate the day before inauguration day in order not to

    demonstrate with ANSWER is, in my opinion, profoundly shameful‹

    criminal, in fact, since it's redbaiting--something that should

    have ended with McCarthy. All such divisive speech should be viewed

    as actions benefiting the warmongers and should be reviled by the

    movement.



    The truth is self-evident. Tens of thousands have demonstrated in

    this country and throughout the world in demonstrations called by

    ANSWER, UFPJ, Not In Our Name and by many other small groups and

    large groups. In other words, demonstrators have been acting in

    unity in spite of the differences and fights for hegemony within

    the leadership of the movement.



    The people who are opposed to this war throughout the world have

    voted with their feet for unity many times over.



    When will the "leadership" catch up to the people of the world who

    say, "BRING THE TROOPS HOME NOW! U.S. OUT OF IRAQ!"?



    Yours for peace and solidarity,



    Bonnie Weinstein, Bay Area United Against War



    ......................................



    On 11/21/04 6:13 AM, "Carlos Rovira"






    Dear Hany and everyone



    The issue here IS NOT ANSWER or the

    ANSWER demonstration condemning the Bush

    inauguration. Entities like UFPJ have

    a right to decide with whom they unite

    or not unite at given times. ANSWER,

    like UFPJ, has its problems, but ANSWER is

    not the enemy, unless that is what is

    being said here (?).



    My question is - what do you all propose

    instead? Enough with the anti-ANSWER

    language because it is redolent of

    anti-communism, a pillar of the Bush

    doctrine, which I will most definitely

    NOT remain quiet about.



    Respectfully,



    Carlos Rovira - "Carlito"



    ........................................



    From Rabbi Arthur Waskow:



    Present counter-inaugural plans for Washington on Jan. 20

    are liable to turn into a zoo that hurts, rather than

    strengthens, the anti-war movement, particularly if they

    are (as now seems likely) dominated by ANSWER and if they

    bring down extreme security controls.



    What about combining a mass march in Washington the day before

    Jan 19 -- on the model of the mass march in NYC the day

    before the Republican Natl Convention that does not have

    an endless boring rally (at the time because we could not

    get a rally permit; in retrospect, I think, a blessing) --



    FOLLOWED BY doing a REAL "counter-inaugural" on January 20

    that is, an Inauguration of a continuing Opposition movement

    --a riff on the "Social Forum" form as was created during the

    National Conventions four years ago, an eclectic mix of progressive

    intellectual & political & cultural leaders in and out of the

    Democratic Party with a major gathering of people OUTSIDE WASHINGTON ­

    maybe in the Maryland suburbs? or Baltimore?



    Could such a People's Inaugural bring together a People's Cabinet

    with people like Ariana Huffington, Howard Dean, Dennis Kucinich,

    Jesse Jackson Sr & Jr., Ralph Nader, Maxine Waters, Howard Zinn,

    Julian Bond plus ideally some of the music stars that campaigned

    against Bush? Could it include interactive Internet and

    alternative-radio/ TV coverage around the country so people

    off the East Coast could take part?



    The Jan 19 event could create media buzz as the pre-convention

    march in NYC did, without trapping us in ANSWER-like politics

    and in street vandal acting-out (both likely on Jan 20), and

    then a much richer political/intellectual/cultural event on

    Jan 20 could actually advance our political vision and cohesion.



    Shalom, Arthur



    Rabbi Arthur Waskow directs The Shalom Center, a prophetic voice I

    n Jewish, multireligious, and American life. To subscribe to The

    Shalom Report (weekly on-line newsletter) and for a wealth of

    information on social action and its spiritual roots, click to --

    http://www.shalomctr.org



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



    3) The Crushing of Fallujah

    By JAMES PETRAS (from Counterpunch)

    http://portland.indymedia.org/en/2004/11/303902.shtml



    I am reading William Shirer's Berlin Diary, a journalist's account

    of Nazi political propaganda during the 1930's, as I watch the US

    'news' reports of the violent assault on Fallujah. The US mass

    media 'reports', the style, content and especially the language

    echo their Nazi predecessor of 70 years ago to an uncanny degree.

    Coincidence? Of course! In both instances we have imperialist

    armies conquering countries, leveling cities and slaughtering

    civilians--and the mass media, private in form, state appendages

    in practice, disseminate the most outrageous lies, in defense and

    praise of the conquering 'storm troopers'--call them SS or Marines.

    Both in Nazi Germany and contemporary US, we are told by the mass

    media that the invading armies are "freeing the country" of "foreign

    fighters", "armed terrorists", who are preventing "the people" from

    going about their everyday lives. Yet we know that of the 1,000

    prisoners there are only 4 foreigners (3 Iranians and 1 Arab);

    Iraqi hospitals report less than 10% of foreign fighters. In other

    words over 90% of the fighters are Iraqis--most of who were born,

    educated, and raised families in the cities in which they are

    fighting.



    Like the Nazi media, the major US radio and TV networks only report

    what they call "military casualties"--failing to report the civilians

    killed since the war started and the thousands of women and children

    killed and wounded since the assault of Fallujah began. Like in Nazi

    Germany, the US mass media feature unconfirmed reports by the US

    military of the bloody murders, beheadings and kidnapping "by the

    foreign terrorists". The unconditional support of Nazi/US mass

    media of the killing fields is best captured in their reports of

    the massive bombing of densely populated city districts. For the

    US network NBC, the dropping of 500-pound bombs in the city of

    Fallujah is described as targeting an "insurgent tunnel network

    in the city". And the houses, markets, stores--the mothers and

    children above those tunnels--vaporized into "pink mist". Their

    existence never acknowledged by the leading reporters and

    broadcasters.



    Almost the entire population of non-Kurdish Iraq is opposed to the

    US military and its puppet regime--yet the media refer to the

    patriots defending their country from the imperial invaders as‹

    'insurgents' minimizing the significance of a nation-wide

    patriotic liberation movement. One of the most surreal euphemisms

    is the constant reference to the 'coalition forces'--meaning the

    US colonial conquerors and the mercenaries and satraps that they

    direct and control.



    The terror bombing of homes, hospitals and religious buildings by

    hundreds of airplanes and helicopter gunships are described by

    the media as 'securing the city for free elections'.



    'Freeing the city of insurgents' includes the systematic murder

    of friends, neighbors and relatives of every Iraqi living in the

    city of Fallujah.



    'Surrounding the insurgents' means cutting off water, electricity,

    medical aid for 200,000 civilians in the city and putting tens of

    thousands who fled under threat of a typhoid epidemic. 'Pacifying

    the city' involves turning it to absolute desolate poisoned rubble.



    Why do Washington and the mass media resort to gross, systematic

    lying and euphemisms? Basically to reinforce mass support at home

    for mass murder in Iraq. The mass media fabricates a web of lies

    to secure a gloss of legitimacy for totalitarian methods in order

    that the US armed forces continue to destroy cities with impunity.

    The technique perfected by Goebbels in Germany and practiced in the

    US is to repeat lies and euphemism until they become accepted

    'truths', and embedded in everyday language. The mass media by

    effectively routinizing a common language implicates the listeners.

    The tactical concerns of the Generals, the commanders directing the

    slaughter (pacification), and the soldiers murdering civilians are

    explained (and consumed by the millions listening and watching) by

    the unchallenged authorities to the compliant journalists and famous

    news anchors. The unity of purpose between the agents of mass murder

    and everyday US public is established via 'news reports': The

    soldiers 'paint the names' of their wives and sweethearts on the

    tanks and armored vehicles which destroy Iraqi families and turn

    Fallujah into ruins. Returning soldiers from Iraq are 'interviewed'

    who want to return to 'be with their platoon' and 'wipe out the

    terrorists'. Not all of US combat forces experienced the joys of

    shooting civilians. Medical studies report that one out of five

    returning soldiers are suffering from severe psychological trauma,

    no doubt from witnessing or participation in the mass killing of

    civilians. The family of one returned soldier, who recently

    committed suicide, reported that he constantly referred to his

    killing an unarmed child in the streets of Iraq--calling himself

    a 'murderer'. Aside from these notable exceptions, the mass

    propaganda media practice several techniques, which assuage

    the 'conscience' of US soldiers and civilians. One technique

    is 'role reversal' to attribute the crimes of the invading

    force to the victims: It is not the soldiers who cause destruction

    of cities and murder, but the Iraqi families who 'protect the

    terrorists' and "bring upon themselves the savage bombardment".

    The second technique is to only report US casualties from

    'terrorist bombs'--to omit any mention of thousands of Iraqi

    civilian killed by US bombs and artillery. Both Nazi and US

    propaganda glorify the 'heroism', 'success' of their elite forces

    (the SS and the Marines)--in killing 'terrorists' or 'insurgents'

    --every dead civilian is counted as a 'suspected terrorist

    sympathizer'.



    The US and German military have declared every civilian building

    a 'storehouse' or 'hiding place' for 'terrorists'--hence the

    absolutely total disregard of all the Geneva laws of warfare.

    The US and Nazi practice of 'total war' in which whole communities,

    neighborhoods and entire cities are collectively guilty of shielding

    'wanted terrorists'--is of course the standard operating military

    procedure of the Israeli government.



    The US publicizes the cruel and unusual punishment of Iraqi 'suspects'

    (any male between 14-60 years) taken prisoner: photos appear in Time

    and Newsweek of barefoot, blindfolded and bound young men led from

    their homes and pushed into trucks to be taken to 'exploitation

    centers' for interrogation. For many in the US public these pictures

    are part of the success story--they are told these are the 'terrorists'

    who would blow up American homes. For the majority who voted for Bush,

    the mass propaganda media has taught them to believe that the

    extermination of scores of thousands of Iraqi citizens is in their

    best interests: they can sleep sound, as long as 'our boys' kill

    them 'over there'.



    Above all the mass propaganda media has done everything possible

    to deny Iraqi national consciousness. Everyday in every way the

    reference is to religious loyalties, ethnic identities, past

    political labels, 'tribal' and family clans. The purpose is to

    divide and conquer, and to present the world with a 'chaotic'

    Iraq in which the only coherent, stable force is the US colonial

    regime. The purpose of the savage colonial assaults and the

    political labeling is to destroy the idea of the Iraqi nation--and

    in its place to substitute a series of mini-entities run by

    imperial satraps obedient to Washington.



    Sunday morning: November 14 .Today Fallujah is being raped and razed,

    captured wounded prisoners are shot in the mosques .In New York the mega

    malls are crowded with shoppers .



    Sunday afternoon: the Marines have blocked food ,water,and medicine

    from entering Fallujah..Throughout the US millions of men sit in

    front of the television watching football.



    Shirer reported that while the Nazis invaded and ravaged Belgium

    and bombed Rotterdam.,in Berlin the cafes were full,the symphony

    played and people walked their dogs in the park on sunny Sunday

    afternoons



    Sunday night November 14, 2004, I turn on the television to 60 Minutes

    and watch a replay of Mike Wallace's 'interviews' with Yasser Arafat.

    Like all US mass media 'stars', he ignores the Israeli invasion of

    Lebanon and Sharon's murder of thousands of Palestinians, the

    military occupation of Palestine and the wanton destruction of Jenin

    and Gaza City. Wallace accuses Arafat of being a liar, a terrorist,

    of being corrupt and devious. Thirty million US households watch this

    ugly spectacle of a self-righteous Zionist apologist flaunting the

    'Western ideals', which are so useful in razing cities, bombing

    hospitals and exterminating a nation.



    Yes, there are differences between Shirer's account of Nazi propaganda

    in defense of the conquest of Europe and the US media's apology for

    the invasion of Iraq and Israel's slaughter of the Palestinians: One

    is committed in the name of the Fuehrer and the Fatherland, the other

    in the name of God and Democracy. Go tell that to the bloated corpses

    gnawed by dogs in the ruins of Fallujah.



    ---------



    James Petras, a former Professor of Sociology at Binghamton University,

    New York, owns a 50 year membership in the class struggle, is an adviser

    to the landless and jobless in brazil and argentina and is co-author of
    Globalization Unmasked (Zed). He can be reached at:

    jpetras@binghamton.edu



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



    4) In Falluja, Young Marines Saw the Savagery of an Urban War

    By DEXTER FILKINS

    FALLUJA, Iraq

    November 21, 2004

    http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/21/international/middleeast/21battle.html?hp&
    ex=1101099600&en=bc339766506f30ca&ei=5094&partner=homepage



    FALLUJA, Iraq, Nov. 18 - Eight days after the Americans entered the

    city on foot, a pair of marines wound their way up the darkened

    innards of a minaret, shot through with holes by an American tank.



    As the marines inched upward, a burst of gunfire rang down, fired

    by an insurgent hiding in the top of the tower. The bullets hit the

    first marine in the face, his blood spattering the marine behind him.

    The marine in the rear tumbled backward down the stairwell, while

    Lance Cpl. William Miller, age 22, lay in silence halfway up,

    mortally wounded.



    "Miller!" the marines called from below. "Miller!"



    With that, the marines' near mystical commandment against leaving

    a comrade behind seized the group. One after another, the young marines

    dashed into the minaret, into darkness and into gunfire, and wound

    their way up the stairs.



    After four attempts, Corporal Miller's lifeless body emerged from the

    tower, his comrades choking and covered with dust. With more insurgents

    closing in, the marines ran through volleys of machine-gun fire back

    to their base.



    "I was trying to be careful, but I was trying to get him out, you know

    what I'm saying?" Lance Cpl. Michael Gogin, 19, said afterward.



    So went eight days of combat for this Iraqi city, the most sustained

    period of street-to-street fighting that Americans have encountered

    since the Vietnam War. The proximity gave the fighting a hellish

    intensity, with soldiers often close enough to look their enemies

    in the eyes.



    For a correspondent who has covered a half dozen armed conflicts,

    including the war in Iraq since its start in March 2003, the fighting

    seen while traveling with a frontline unit in Falluja was a qualitatively
    different experience, a leap into a different kind of battle.



    From the first rockets vaulting out of the city as the marines moved

    in, the noise and feel of the battle seemed altogether extraordinary;

    at other times, hardly real at all. The intimacy of combat, this

    plunge into urban warfare, was new to this generation of American

    soldiers, but it is a kind of fighting they will probably see again:

    a grinding struggle to root out guerrillas entrenched in a city, on

    streets marked in a language few American soldiers could comprehend.



    The price for the Americans so far: 51 dead and 425 wounded, a number

    that may yet increase but that already exceeds the toll from any battle

    in the Iraq war.



    Marines in Harm's Way



    The 150 marines with whom I traveled, Bravo Company of the First

    Battalion, Eighth Marines, had it as tough as any unit in the fight.

    They moved through the city almost entirely on foot, into the heart

    of the resistance, rarely protected by tanks or troop carriers,

    working their way through Falluja's narrow streets with 75-pound

    packs on their backs.



    In eight days of fighting, Bravo Company took 36 casualties, including

    6 dead, meaning that the unit's men had about a one-in-four chance of

    being wounded or killed in little more than a week.



    The sounds, sights and feel of the battle were as old as war itself,

    and as new as the Pentagon's latest weapons systems. The eerie pop

    from the cannon of the AC-130 gunship, prowling above the city at

    night, firing at guerrillas who were often only steps away from

    Americans on the ground. The weird buzz of the Dragon Eye pilotless

    airplane, hovering over the battlefield as its video cameras beamed r

    eal-time images back to the base.



    The glow of the insurgents' flares, throwing daylight over a

    landscape to help them spot their targets: us.



    The nervous shove of a marine scrambling for space along a brick

    wall as tracer rounds ricocheted above.



    The silence between the ping of the shell leaving its mortar tube

    and the explosion when it strikes.



    The screams of the marines when one of their comrades, Cpl. Jake

    Knospler, lost part of his jaw to a hand grenade.



    "No, no, no!" the marines shouted as they dragged Corporal Knospler

    from the darkened house where the bomb went off. It was 2 a.m., the

    sky dark without a moon. "No, no, no!"



    Nothing in the combat I saw even remotely resembled the scenes

    regularly flashed across movie screens; even so, they often

    seemed no more real.



    Mortar shells and rocket-propelled grenades began raining down on Bravo

    Company the moment its men began piling out of their troop

    carriers just outside Falluja. The shells looked like Fourth of

    July bottle rockets, sailing over the ridge ahead as if fired by

    children, exploding in a whoosh of sparks.



    Whole buildings, minarets and human beings were vaporized in barrages

    of exploding shells. A man dressed in a white dishdasha crawled across

    a desolate field, reaching behind a gnarled plant to hide, when he

    collapsed before a burst of fire from an American tank.



    Sometimes the casualties came in volleys, like bursts of machine-gun

    fire. On the first morning of battle, during a ferocious struggle

    for the Muhammadia Mosque, about 45 marines with Bravo Company's

    Third Platoon dashed across 40th Street, right into interlocking

    streams of fire. By the time the platoon made it to the other side,

    five men lay bleeding in the street.



    The marines rushed out to get them, as they would days later in the

    minaret, but it was too late for Sgt. Lonny Wells, who bled to death

    on the side of the road. One of the men who braved gunfire to pull

    in Sergeant Wells was Cpl. Nathan Anderson, who died three days

    later in an ambush.



    Sergeant Wells's death dealt the Third Platoon a heavy blow; as

    a leader of one of its squads, he had written letters to the parents

    of its younger members, assuring them he would look over them during

    the tour in Iraq.



    "He loved playing cards," Cpl. Gentian Marku recalled. "He knew all the
    probabilities."



    More than once, death crept up and snatched a member of Bravo Company

    and quietly slipped away. Cpl. Nick Ziolkowski, nicknamed Ski, was a

    Bravo Company sniper. For hours at a stretch, Corporal Ziolkowski would

    sit on a rooftop, looking through the scope on his bolt-action M-40

    rifle, waiting for guerrillas to step into his sights. The scope was

    big and wide, and Corporal Ziolkowski often took off his helmet to

    get a better look.



    Tall, good-looking and gregarious, Corporal Ziolkowski was one of

    Bravo Company's most popular soldiers. Unlike most snipers, who

    learned to shoot growing up in the countryside, Corporal Ziolkowski

    grew up near Baltimore, unfamiliar with guns. Though Baltimore boasts

    no beach front, Corporal Ziolkowski's passion was surfing; at Camp

    Lejeune, N.C., Bravo Company's base, he would often organize his

    entire day around the tides.



    "All I need now is a beach with some waves," Corporal Ziolkowski

    said, during a break from his sniper duties at Falluja's Grand Mosque,

    where he killed three men in a single day.



    During that same break, Corporal Ziolkowski foretold his own death.

    The snipers, he said, were now among the most hunted of American

    soldiers.



    In the first battle for Falluja, in April, American snipers had been

    especially lethal, Corporal Ziolkowski said, and intelligence

    officers had warned him that this time, the snipers would be targets.



    "They are trying to take us out," Corporal Ziolkowski said.



    The bullet knocked Corporal Ziolkowski backward and onto the roof.

    He had been sitting there on the outskirts of the Shuhada neighborhood,

    an area controlled by insurgents, peering through his wide scope.

    He had taken his helmet off to get a better view. The bullet hit

    him in the head.



    Young Men, Heavy Burdens



    For all the death about the place, one inescapable impression left

    by the marines was their youth. Everyone knows that soldiers are

    young; it is another thing to see men barely out of adolescence,

    many of whom were still in high school when this war began, shoot

    people dead.



    The marines of Bravo Company often fought over the packets of M&M's

    that came with their rations. Sitting in their barracks, they sang

    along with the Garth Brooks paean to chewing tobacco, "Copenhagen,"

    named for the brand they bought almost to a man:



    Copenhagen, what a wad of flavor



    Copenhagen, you can see it in my smile



    Copenhagen, hey do yourself a favor, dip



    Copenhagen, it drives the cowgirls wild



    One of Bravo Company's more youthful members was Cpl. Romulo

    Jimenez II, age 21 from Bellington, W.Va.. Cpl. Jimenez spent

    much of his time showing off his tattoos - he had flames climbing

    up one of his arms - and talking about his 1992 Ford Mustang. He

    was a popular member of Bravo Company's Second Platoon, not least

    because he introduced his sister to a fellow marine, Lance Cpl.

    Sean Evans, and the couple married.



    In the days before the battle started, Corporal Jimenez called his

    sister, Katherine, to ask that she fix up the interior of his

    Mustang before he got home.



    "Make it look real nice," he told her.



    On Wednesday, Nov. 10, around 2 p.m., Corporal Jimenez was shot

    in the neck by a sniper as he advanced with his platoon through

    the northern end of Falluja, just near the green-domed Muhammadia

    Mosque. He died instantly.



    Despite their youth, the marines seemed to tower over their peers

    outside the military in maturity and guts. Many of Bravo Company's

    best marines, its most proficient killers, were 19 and 20 years old;

    some directed their comrades in maneuvers and assaults. Bravo

    Company's three lieutenants, each responsible for the lives of

    about 50 men, were 23 and 24 years old.



    They are a strangely anonymous bunch. The men who fight America's

    wars seem invariably to come from little towns and medium-size

    cities far away from the nation's arteries along the coast. Line

    up a group of marines and ask them where they are from, and they

    will give you a list of places like Pearland, Tex.; Lodi, Ohio;

    Osawatomie, Kan.



    Typical of the marines who fought in Falluja was Chad Ritchie,

    a 22-year-old corporal from Keezletown, Va. Corporal Ritchie, a

    soft-spoken, bespectacled intelligence officer, said he was happy

    to be out of the tiny place where he grew up, though he admitted

    that he sometimes missed the good times on Friday nights in the

    fields.



    "We'd have a bonfire, and back the trucks up on it, and open up

    the backs, and someone would always have some speakers," Corporal

    Ritchie said. "We'd drink beer, tell stories."



    Like many of the young men in Bravo Company, Corporal Ritchie

    said he had joined the Marines because he yearned for an

    adventure greater than his small town could offer.



    "The guys who stayed, they're all living with their parents,

    making $7 an hour," Corporal Ritchie said. "I'm not going to be

    one of those people who gets old and says, 'I wish I had done

    this. I wish I had done that.' Every once in a while, you've got

    to do something hard, do something you're not comfortable with.

    A person needs a gut check."



    Holding Up Under Fire



    Marines like Corporal Ritchie proved themselves time and again in

    Falluja, but they were not without fear. While camped out one

    night in the Iraqi National Guard building in the middle of city,

    Bravo Company came under mortar fire that grew closer with each

    shot. The insurgents were "bracketing" the building, firing shots

    to the left and right of the target and adjusting their fire each

    time.



    In the hallways, where the men had camped for the night, the

    murmured sounds of prayers rose between the explosions. After

    20 tries, the shelling inexplicably stopped.



    On one particularly grim night, a group of marines from Bravo

    Company's First Platoon turned a corner in the darkness and headed

    up an alley. As they did so, they came across men dressed in

    uniforms worn by the Iraqi National Guard. The uniforms were so

    perfect that they even carried pieces of red tape and white, the

    signal agreed upon to assure American soldiers that any Iraqis

    dressed that way would be friendly; the others could be killed.



    The marines, spotting the red and white tape, waved, and the men

    in Iraqi uniforms opened fire. One American, Corporal Anderson,

    died instantly. One of the wounded men, Pfc. Andrew Russell, lay

    in the road, screaming from a nearly severed leg.



    A group of marines ran forward into the gunfire to pull their

    comrades out. But the ambush, and the enemy flares and gunfire

    that followed, rattled the men of Bravo Company more than any

    event. In the darkness, the men began to argue. Others stood

    around in the road. As the platoon's leader, Lt. Andy Eckert,

    struggled to take charge, the Third Platoon seemed on the brink

    of panic.



    "Everybody was scared," Lieutenant Eckert said afterward. "If

    the leader can't hold, then the unit can't hold together."



    The unit did hold, but only after the intervention of Bravo

    Company's commanding officer, Capt. Read Omohundro.



    Time and again through the week, Captain Omohundro kept his

    men from folding, if not by his resolute manner then by his

    calmness under fire. In the first 16 hours of battle, when the

    combat was continuous and the threat of death ever present,

    Captain Omohundro never flinched, moving his men through the

    warrens and back alleys of Falluja with an uncanny sense of

    space and time, sensing the enemy, sensing the location of his

    men, even in the darkness, entirely self-possessed.



    "Damn it, get moving," Captain Omohundro said, and his men,

    looking relieved that they had been given direction amid the

    anarchy, were only too happy to oblige.



    A little later, Captain Omohundro, a 34-year-old Texan, allowed

    that the strain of the battle had weighed on him, but he said

    that he had long ago trained himself to keep any self-doubt

    hidden from view.



    "It's not like I don't feel it," Captain Omohundro said. "But

    if I were to show it, the whole thing would come apart."



    When the heavy fighting was finally over, a dog began to follow

    Bravo Company through Falluja's broken streets. First it lay

    down in the road outside one of the buildings the company had

    occupied, between troop carriers. Then, as the troops moved on,

    the mangy dog slinked behind them, first on a series of house

    searches, then on a foot patrol, always keeping its distance,

    but never letting the marines out of its sight.



    Bravo Company, looking a bit ragged itself as it moved up

    through Falluja, momentarily fell out of its single-file line.



    "Keep a sharp eye," Captain Omohundro told his men. "We ain't

    done with this war yet."



    Copyright 2004 The New York Times



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



    5) Iraq Schedules National Elections for Jan. 30

    By EDWARD WONG

    BAGHDAD, Iraq, Nov. 21

    http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/21/international/middleeast/21cnd-iraq.html?h
    p&ex=1101099600&en=a67b1fd95bdf31f7&ei=5094&partner=homepage



    BAGHDAD, Iraq, Nov. 21 - The Electoral Commission of Iraq said

    today it has set Jan. 30 for the national elections, according

    to news agency reports.



    The announcement was made after violence surged through central

    and northern Iraq on Saturday as a tenacious insurgency led by Sunni

    Arabs kept up relentless assaults in several major cities, including

    Baghdad, Ramadi and Falluja, which the Americans devastated during

    an intense weeklong offensive aimed at routing the insurgency.



    But areas still beset by violence, including Falluja and Mosul, will

    participate in the elections, according to a spokesman for the electoral
    commission, Farid Ayar, who was quoted in a report by The Associated Press.



    "No Iraqi province will be excluded because the law considers Iraq as

    one constituency, and therefore it is not legal to exclude any province,"

    he said.



    Elsewhere, the United States military said today that Iraqi and American

    forces detained more than 1,450 people in connection with the Falluja

    offensive, but more than 400 detainees were later released after being

    deemed to be non-combatants.



    In the capital on Saturday, insurgents armed with Kalashnikov rifles

    and rocket-propelled grenades tried storming a police station at dawn

    in the northwestern neighborhood of Amariya, where American and Iraqi

    soldiers had engaged in a mosque shootout on Friday. The attack on the

    police station left three Iraqi police officers dead and two others

    wounded, said Col. Adnan Abdul-Rahman, a spokesman for the Interior

    Ministry.



    Hours later, a car bomb exploded in downtown Baghdad, at the eastern

    end of the bridge over the Tigris River leading to the Green Zone,

    the fortified compound housing the American Embassy and the headquarters

    of the interim Iraqi government. The bomb was aimed at a convoy of

    vehicles from a Western security contractor. At least one Iraqi was

    killed and another wounded, witnesses said.



    Four employees of the Public Works Ministry were gunned down from

    a passing car, and three Iraqi national guardsmen died in explosions

    in western Baghdad during gun battles with insurgents, Iraqi

    officials said.



    An ambush on an American military convoy in central Baghdad ended

    with the death of one soldier, the military said. Nine others were

    wounded in what appeared to be a highly coordinated attack, with

    insurgents using explosives, automatic rifles and rocket-propelled

    grenades. Fighting raged in the rubble of Falluja. Two marines were

    killed and four wounded in an ambush on Friday in which an insurgent

    deceived the Americans by waving a white flag, military officials

    said Saturday.



    The weeklong offensive, which began Nov. 8, smashed a haven for the

    insurgents, but guerrillas still roam the devastated streets,

    sniping at American troops and deterring military engineers brought

    in to try to rebuild the city.



    American commanders in Falluja say they are seeing an increasing

    number of guerrillas using white flags to pose as unarmed civilians.



    In a bit of positive news, a Polish woman abducted in October by

    insurgents announced her release to reporters in Warsaw in a brief

    news conference on Saturday with the Polish prime minister, Marek

    Belka, broadcast by the BBC and CNN.



    The woman, Teresa Borcz-Kalifa, 54, said her captors had treated her

    well. She is married to an Iraqi and had lived in Iraq for 30 years.

    Her captors made at least two videos that were shown on Al Jazeera,

    the Arab satellite television network, demanding the withdrawal of

    Polish troops.



    And today, news agency reports said that the Iraqi prime minister's

    75-year-old cousin, Ghazi Majeed Allawi, had been freed by captors

    who had detained him and two other family members on Nov. 9. A group

    called Ansar al Jihad had posted an Internet message saying the three

    would be beheaded unless Dr. Allawi called off the siege of Falluja

    and released all prisoners in Iraq.



    Two of the relatives, both women, were released last week. And today,

    Al-Arabiya news channel, quoted by Reuters, reported that Ghazi Allawi

    had been freed.



    The unrelenting wave of assaults in the Sunni-dominated parts of the

    country indicate that the attack on Falluja could have inflamed Sunni

    resentment against the American presence.



    American and Iraqi officials have found it impossible in the 19 months

    since the invasion to persuade hostile Sunni Arabs to lay down their

    arms and engage in the emerging political system.



    The Sunni Arabs, who make up a fifth of the population here, ruled

    the region known as modern Iraq for centuries, until the American

    invasion toppled Saddam Hussein.



    Mr. Hussein, himself a Sunni, heightened ethnic and religious

    differences by installing Sunnis in the most senior positions and

    persecuting Shiite Arabs and Kurds. Now, with a power and security

    vacuum throughout Iraq, those tensions are reviving and threatening

    to unravel the very social fabric of the country.



    Sunni-dominated cities exploded during and immediately after the

    Falluja offensive. In April, when the Marines tried to take control

    of Falluja, thousands of unruly Shiites rose up also, led by the

    firebrand cleric Moktada al-Sadr.



    During the more recent invasion, Mr. Sadr condemned the Americans'

    use of force but did not call on his militia to fight. These days,

    even radical Shiites appear ready to use legitimate politics to

    ensure that Shiites seize majority rule of the country. The most

    restive areas in Iraq are in Anbar Province, including Ramadi and

    Falluja, and, in the north, Nineveh Province, whose capital is Mosul,

    a city of two million that has become a second front of the insurgency.



    On Saturday, marines set up roadblocks around Ramadi, the capital of

    Anbar, and broadcast messages calling on residents to turn over

    "terrorists," Reuters reported. The marines are engaged in a holding

    action there. They have a presence at the government center and

    several outposts downtown, but they do not have real control of

    the city. Insurgents operate freely and regularly murder residents

    they say are collaborating with the Americans or the interim Iraqi

    government.



    Senior American commanders believe that many guerrillas fled Falluja

    before the offensive and sought a haven in Ramadi, just 30 miles

    west, causing a spike in violence there.



    In Mosul, Iraq's third largest city, 225 miles north of Baghdad,

    nine bodies of Iraqi Army soldiers with bullet wounds to the head

    were discovered Saturday, said Lt. Col. Paul Hastings, an Army

    spokesman. Seven of those were also decapitated. On Thursday, he

    said, four headless bodies were found in eastern Mosul.



    The group of the Jordanian militant Abu Musab al-Zarqawi posted an

    Internet message dated Thursday that said it had decapitated two

    Iraqi soldiers in public. At least one witness said that he saw

    the killings and that the bodies had been left in the street for

    hours because people had been afraid to collect them.



    American and Iraqi forces are trying to root out resilient insurgent

    bands in Mosul that pushed the city to the brink of chaos last week.

    On Nov. 11, groups of guerrillas stormed a half-dozen police stations

    and made off with weapons and uniforms after setting fire to the

    buildings and squad cars. Only 800 of the city's 4,000 police

    officers stayed on the job.



    The Army of Ansar al-Sunna, one of the country's most militant

    groups, posted a message on the Internet on Saturday saying it

    had shot and killed two members of the Kurdistan Democratic Party.

    A video showed two gagged and blindfolded men being shot in the

    back of their heads, Reuters reported.



    The car bombing in Baghdad took place at around 12:30 p.m., as a

    convoy of sport utility vehicles carrying Western security contractors

    drove near the Jumhuriya bridge. A suicide car bomber tried ramming

    into the convoy. The security contractors escaped, but an Iraqi man

    in a pickup truck behind the bomber was incinerated.



    Robert F. Worth contributed reporting from Falluja for this article,

    Richard A. Oppel Jr. from Mosul, Khalid al-Ansary from Baghdad and

    Christine Hauser from New York.



    Copyright 2004 The New York Times



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



    6) Booming prison numbers prompt reexamination of harsh sentencing

    MARK SCOLFORO

    HARRISBURG, Pa.

    Associated Press

    Posted on Sat, Nov. 20, 2004

    http://www.centredaily.com/mld/centredaily/news/politics/10233361.htm



    HARRISBURG, Pa. -The state prison population grew by 44 percent over

    the past decade as Pennsylvania embraced mandatory sentencing and

    dramatically increased the number of violent criminals forced to

    serve their maximum sentence.



    But the lock-'em-up approach to corrections - part of a national

    trend - has been accompanied by an ever-more-costly price tag and

    growing doubts about its effectiveness.



    Last month, Pennsylvania quietly joined a growing number of states

    taking a step back from the stiffer sentencing policies of the 1990s.

    The Republican-controlled Legislature approved a bill that would get

    nonviolent drug and alcohol offenders out of prison more quickly and

    into treatment programs, and on Friday, Democratic Gov. Ed Rendell

    signed it.



    The policy change is expected to save the state more than $20 million

    a year and reduce pressure on a prison system now housing nearly 41,000

    convicts, up from 28,302 in 1994. Corrections officials say treatment

    has also been shown to reduce the chance the inmates will end up back

    in prison.



    The typical inmate now spends about four years behind bars before being

    released. By one study, Pennsylvania keeps its inmates the longest of

    any state, more than twice the national average.



    The costs have been staggering. The Department of Corrections has

    proposed a $1.34 billion budget for next year, an increase of 295

    percent since fiscal year 1992-93, when the budget was just $453

    million. It currently employs more than 15,000 people.



    Nationally, more than half the states have loosened sentencing

    policies in the past three years, said Daniel F. Wilhelm, director

    of the State Sentencing and Corrections Project at the Vera Institute

    of Justice in New York.



    Driving those changes are budget pressures, concerns about the

    fairness of sentencing, and falling public concern about crime as

    the crime rate has dropped, he said. The nation currently spends

    an estimated $40 billion annually on corrections.



    Michigan abolished its mandatory sentencing scheme in December 2002.

    Kansas passed the nation's most comprehensive mandatory drug-treatment

    diversion act last year. Texas put more money into drug treatment.

    Other reforms were considered or passed in Washington, Hawaii and

    North Carolina.



    "What's interesting to note is in a lot of these states, it's not

    the liberal Democrats who are championing reforms. It's Republicans

    who are at the forefront," Wilhelm said.



    In Pennsylvania, prison spending has grown faster than any other part

    of the budget, said Montgomery County Sen. Stewart J. Greenleaf,

    Republican chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, "so I think

    we have to be smart in regard to how we incarcerate people."



    Despite the changes in Pennsylvania and elsewhere, much of the

    harshest anti-crime legislation from the past decade remains on

    the books, and earlier this month California voters narrowly rejected

    a referendum to weaken its three-strikes law.



    Pennsylvania's decision to pursue more treatment for inmates comes

    nearly a decade after tough anti-crime policies were pushed through

    a receptive Legislature by then-Gov. Tom Ridge, helped along by two

    highly publicized murder cases.



    Ridge's 1995 campaign was in its final weeks when pardoned inmate

    Reginald McFadden killed two people; Ridge's Democratic opponent had

    voted to pardon him. And during the Republican governor's first year

    in office, a New Jersey police officer was murdered by parolee Robert

    "Mudman" Simon.



    Almost immediately, inmates found it much harder to make parole and

    parole violators were increasingly sent back to complete their

    sentences.



    Those changes were widely supported, and many experts believe tough

    sentencing laws help reduce crime by keeping habitual criminals off

    the streets.



    But in Pennsylvania, new mandatory sentencing laws also fed an

    astronomical growth in the number of inmates convicted of drug

    offenses and other comparatively less serious crimes, so-called

    "Part 2" offenders. Their numbers are up 80 percent in the past

    seven years.



    "I think that there are people that we're confining that we either

    don't need to confine for as long a period of time or we don't need

    to confine at all," said Corrections Secretary Jeffrey A. Beard.

    "There are Part 2 offenders we have in our system that don't need

    to stay as long as they're staying."



    William DiMascio, executive director of the Pennsylvania Prison

    Society, recalled the case of a young grandmother from Berks County

    with no prior record who was arrested for distributing a small

    amount of marijuana within a block or two of a school.



    "So all of a sudden she had this horrendous mandatory imprisonment

    (the judge) had to give her," he said. "It happens almost every day.

    We have these ridiculous situations that serve no one's best interests."



    Longer sentences don't necessarily lower the crime rate and can

    create problems of their own, said Ryan S. King, a research associate

    with the Sentencing Project, a Washington, D.C., reform advocacy

    organization.



    "You've got people that are being removed from families, social

    networks being disrupted, people losing connections to jobs, education.

    In essence - particularly when it's concentrated in communities of

    color - you have an overall impact that basically disrupts the

    community," King said.



    The reforms that became law Friday will divert inmates with nonviolent

    convictions involving drugs or alcohol - even a theft conviction to

    support a drug habit would qualify - into an "intermediate punishment"

    program.



    Inmates will first do at least seven months in prison, although Beard

    said 12 months will probably be more typical. After that, they will

    spend at least two months at a community-based therapeutic facility

    and the rest of the minimum 24-month sentence at a halfway house or

    group home while receiving addiction treatment.



    The savings will come because they will spend less overall time in

    the system, and considerably less time in state correctional

    institutions, where it currently costs $28,000 annually per inmate.



    Beard said he is hopeful there will be additional long-term savings

    as a result of an expected drop in recidivism and through an

    expansion of the program to other classes of inmates.



    He said intensive drug or alcohol treatment, combined with aftercare,

    could cut in half recidivism rates from their current range of 50

    percent to 60 percent. Through shorter sentences, less costly forms

    of incarceration and lower numbers of probation violators coming back

    in, the state expects to eventually save more than $20 million annually.



    "They're still going to do hard time in prison, but we're going to

    give them a program that meets their needs, so that when they go out,

    they're going to be less likely to prey on society," Beard said.

    "I see it as a public safety issue."



    Supporters who see the new law as a relatively modest change of

    direction hope it is a harbinger of even broader reforms.



    "It's not the most creative thing in the world, but insofar as

    it's the world we're operating in, it's a good step in the right

    direction," DiMascio said.



    (c) 2004 AP Wire and wire service sources. All Rights Reserved.

    http://www.centredaily.com



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



    7) Soaring Interest Compounds Credit Card Pain for Millions

    THE PLASTIC TRAP

    By PATRICK McGEEHAN

    This article was reported by Patrick McGeehan, Lowell Bergman,

    Robin Stein and Marlena Telvick and written by Mr. McGeehan.

    November 21, 2004

    http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/21/business/21cards-web.html?hp&ex=1101099600
    &en=70effacd11d42b21&ei=5094&partner=homepage



    When Ed Schwebel was whittling down his mound of credit card debt

    at an interest rate of 9.2 percent, the MBNA Corporation had a happy

    and profitable customer. But this summer, when MBNA suddenly doubled

    the rate on his account, Mr. Schwebel joined the growing ranks of irate
    cardholders stunned by lenders' harsh tactics.



    Mr. Schwebel, 58, a semiretired software engineer in Gilbert, Ariz.,

    was not pleased that his minimum monthly payment jumped from $502 in

    June to $895 in July. But what really made him angry, he said, was the

    sense that he was being punished despite having held up his end of

    the bargain with MBNA.



    "I paid the bills the minute the envelope hit the desk," said Mr.

    Schwebel, who had accumulated $69,000 in debt over five years before

    the rate increase. "All of a sudden in July, they swapped it to 18

    percent. No warning. No reason. It was like I was blindsided."



    Mr. Schwebel had stumbled into the new era of consumer credit, in

    which thousands of Americans are paying millions of dollars each

    month in fees that they did not expect and that strike them as

    unreasonable. Invoking clauses tucked into the fine print of their

    contract agreements, lenders are doubling or tripling interest rates

    with little warning or explanation.



    This year, credit card companies are changing the terms of their

    accounts at a historically high rate, said Michael Heller, an

    industry consultant.



    As those practices spread, they are creating a rift between the

    lenders and some of their more lucrative customers, according to

    cardholders, current and former bank consultants and regulators

    who were interviewed for a joint report by The New York Times and

    "Frontline," the PBS documentary program.



    People like Mr. Schwebel, who carry balances from month to month

    and pay finance charges regularly, feel they should be the favored

    customers of the credit card business, which is now the most

    lucrative segment of banking. They make up the profitable majority

    of the 144 million Americans who have general-purpose credit cards.

    To a degree, they subsidize the 40 percent of credit card customers

    who pay in full each month without incurring any fees or charges.



    But increasingly, they say, what should be a warm embrace has

    turned into a painful squeeze as lenders employ new tactics to

    extract more and bigger penalties for even the slightest financial

    transgressions. In the last few years, lenders have more frequently

    raised customers' rates because of slip-ups elsewhere, like late

    payment of a phone or utility bill, or simply because they felt

    a customer had taken on too much debt.



    The practice, called universal default, started after a rash of

    bankruptcy filings in the mid-to-late 1990's and has increasingly

    become standard in the industry. While MBNA declined to comment on

    any specific customer's account, its general counsel, Louis J. Freeh,

    the former F.B.I. director, said in a statement that it was being

    prudent by raising rates when it had reason to think the risk of

    not being repaid had increased.



    Edward L. Yingling, executive vice president of the American Bankers

    Association, said bankers must have the flexibility to change terms

    on short notice. The bankruptcy filings of the 90's - many by customers

    who had been paying their bills on time - caught banks off-guard,

    he said.



    Lenders decided they needed to watch for signs of trouble elsewhere,

    like missed car payments, he said. In those cases, he added, there are

    only two logical responses: "We're not going to let you have this credit

    card loan anymore and we're going to say, 'Pay it off,' or we can say,

    'You're now more risky; we're going to raise your rate.' "



    Still, some critics say the severity of the punishment does not match

    the risk of default. The suddenness and perceived unfairness of the

    penalties have left many consumers feeling burned by lenders who

    relentlessly courted them with promises of low rates.



    To some cardholders and consumer advocates, credit card companies

    are acting like modern-day loan sharks, strong-arming their customers

    to pay more - with no legal limit on how much they can charge.



    In eight years, the major card companies have increased the fee

    charged to cardholders for being even an hour late with a payment

    to $39, from $10 or less.



    Unleashing an Industry



    Duncan MacDonald, who, as a lawyer for Citibank was involved in its

    successful case for deregulation of fees before the United States

    Supreme Court in 1996, now says he fears that he helped to unleash

    a monster.



    Until that ruling, most banks still charged an annual fee of about

    $25 for the use of a card and a single fixed rate to all borrowers,

    usually around 18 percent. Applicants either qualified for the

    privilege of carrying a card or they did not.



    "I certainly didn't imagine that someday we might've ended up

    creating a Frankenstein," said Mr. MacDonald, who predicted that

    the penalty fees could rise to $50 in another year. "I look at that

    and I say to myself, 'Is $50 a fair fee, plus a 25 percent interest

    rate and all these other fees that are thrown on, for folks who are

    probably not that risky? Is that fair?' "



    Mr. MacDonald said federal bank regulators should investigate the

    fairness of universal default and some of the banks' harsh penalties.

    But regulators and lawmakers have been reluctant to crack down on

    a popular consumer product that fuels America's economic engine.

    Consumer spending pulled the country through the last economic

    downturn, powered largely by purchases financed with debt, to

    the tune of $2 trillion.



    Few consumer products today are as cherished or reviled as credit

    cards. The typical household has eight cards with $7,500 on them.

    People like Mr. Schwebel are known as "revolvers" in the industry

    because they roll balances over from month to month, never paying

    in full.



    Without the 85 million Americans who revolve, card issuers would be

    struggling to please their investors. But with them and the hefty

    finance charges they accrue from the moment cashiers swipe their

    cards, the industry is reaping record gains. Last year, card issuers

    made $2.5 billion a month in profit before taxes.



    "I think it is generally understood that those that use the revolving

    part of the credit card are kind of the sweet spot," said Mr. Yingling

    of the bankers' association, who spoke on behalf of several of the

    biggest issuers, including Citigroup ,J. P. Morgan Chase and MBNA,

    all of which declined to make executives available for interviews.



    But the lenders' aggressive tactics have prompted a surge in

    complaints and lawsuits and even a warning from the primary regulator

    of national banks in September. In an advisory letter, the Office of

    the Comptroller of the Currency said banks should not raise card rates

    without having fully and prominently disclosed the circumstances that

    might cause an increase.



    Changing the Terms



    The case that opened up the industry came in 1978 when the Supreme

    Court decided that a bank could charge its cardholders any rate allowed

    in the bank's home state. Major banks swiftly moved their credit card

    operations to places like South Dakota and Delaware that had removed

    caps on interest rates. There is no federal limit on consumer credit

    rates.



    After that ruling on interest rates, credit cards, which until then

    had generally been an uncertain business, started to look potentially

    lucrative. Banks began to innovate and compete. They cut the required

    minimum monthly payment to 2 percent of the balance, from 5 percent,

    to encourage customers to borrow more and stretch out the repayment.

    They dropped annual fees and dangled offers of low interest, or none

    at all, to lure new customers.



    At the same time, legal teams crafted contracts of 12 or more single-

    spaced pages that gave the banks the leeway to change their terms

    whenever they wanted. A typical term sheet for a Visa card issued by

    Bank One , which was acquired this year by J. P. Morgan Chase, includes:

    "We reserve the right to change the terms at any time for any reason."



    John Gould has worked in and around the credit card business for 25

    years, but he said he was shocked when his wife tried to make a last-

    minute payment over the phone and was charged an extra $15.



    "What a rip," he said. "That does get me mad."



    Fees like that are accounting for a greater share of the revenue that

    card companies garner from their customers. Last year, they collected

    $11.7 billion in penalty fees, more than half of the total $21.5 billion

    in fees they collected from cardholders, according to CardWeb, a research

    firm.



    Mr. Gould, a former executive of MasterCard International who conducts

    research for TowerGroup, a company owned by MasterCard, said he did not

    think that card companies were trying to trap people into financial

    distress. But he said it was "absurd" that 44 percent of them tell their

    customers that they might be penalized for one or two late payments with

    maximum rates that now exceed 28 percent.



    This practice has gone on while the short-term interest rates set by the

    Federal Reserve Board have been unusually low, now at 2 percent, he noted,

    but the rates have been rising in recent months.



    "What are they going to do if we have a spike in interest rates?" Mr.

    Gould said. "What are they going to start charging people, 35 percent,

    38 percent? If it comes to that, you might as well go to the loan sharks."



    But Andrew Kahr, a financial services consultant who devised some widely

    used consumer-lending strategies, including the zero-percent teaser

    rates, said consumers should be able to recognize that the business

    is a "game of chance." Interest rates shooting past 25 percent may

    seem scandalous to some, Mr. Kahr said, but they are "no less

    realistic" than the low introductory rates many cardholders receive.



    The lenders offer tantalizingly low initial rates because that is

    what it takes to lure customers from competitors, said Mr. Kahr,

    who was a founder and chief executive, until 1986, of the San

    Francisco lending company now known as Providian. After he left,

    Providian ran afoul of state and federal regulators for some of

    its credit card practices, and agreed to a $300 million settlement.



    But, he said that banks cannot earn an adequate return by lending

    for less than it costs them to borrow, so they look for ways to

    recoup losses on the low-rate chasers.



    "They do better when they apply these price increases selectively

    to customers who statistically have become more risky, or to those

    who have violated the rules of the account," Mr. Kahr said.



    Still, some cardholders complain that they did not know the rules

    until after they were punished for breaking them. Linda Sherry,

    editorial director for Consumer Action, an advocacy group, said

    "the consumer really has no rights to find out anything, to demand,

    'Why is this being done to me?' "



    Last month, a consumer advocacy group in San Diego, the Utility

    Consumers' Action Network, filed suit against Discover Financial

    Services, the issuer of the Discover card, asserting that it had

    changed the rules late in the game. The group contends that a

    recent rewording of Discover's universal-default policy is unfair

    to consumers, especially those in difficult financial situations.



    The change, disclosed to cardholders in April, allowed Discover

    to raise the interest rate to 19.99 percent, from as low as zero,

    for a single late payment. But the infraction did not have to

    follow the revision, because Discover reserved the right to look

    back 11 months for a late payment that could justify the increase.



    "It has gotten to the point where the fine print is becoming

    almost outright abusive of their customers," said Michael Shames,

    executive director for the consumer group. "The customers who are

    affected most by this practice are those who, for one reason or

    another, are having trouble making payments and have a large balance."



    Jennifer Kang, a spokeswoman for Discover Financial, said she could

    not comment because of the pending litigation. Discover executives

    declined repeated requests for an interview.



    Mr. Heller of Argus Information & Advisory Services in White Plains,

    the industry analyst who has studied the rate of change in credit

    card terms, said that his research showed that in the first half of

    this year, MBNA - the card issuer that doubled the interest rate for

    Mr. Schwebel, the Arizona engineer - repriced a smaller share of its

    card accounts than the industry average.



    But MBNA, in the statement from Mr. Freeh, said: "If we see indications

    that a customer is taking on too much debt, has missed or is late on

    payments to other creditors, or is otherwise mishandling their personal

    finances, it is not unreasonable to determine that this behavior is

    an increased risk. In the interest of all of our customers, we must

    protect the portfolio by adjusting a customer's rate to compensate

    for that increased risk."



    The Credit Score



    The interest rate on a credit card is theoretically correlated to

    the likelihood that a borrower will make good on his debts. Lenders

    typically measure those odds by a three-digit number known as a

    FICO score.



    Calculated by and short for the Fair Isaac Corporation, a company

    in Minneapolis, that score has become the most vital of statistics

    to many Americans.



    Credit scores are used to determine everything from how much a

    person can borrow to how much he or she pays for life insurance to

    whether he or she can rent a home. A utility company in Texas even

    experimented last summer with using credit scores to set prices

    for electricity.



    The number crunchers at Fair Isaac do not make lending decisions.

    They simply take information collected by the three largest credit-

    reporting agencies, Experian, Equifax and TransUnion, and apply

    mathematical formulas to boil it down to a single number on a

    scale that runs to 850.



    "Lenders use that score, almost like a thermometer, to determine

    if they're going to grant credit or not," said Tom Quinn, a

    spokesman for Fair Isaac. He estimated that his company had

    calculated a credit score for about 75 percent of American adults.



    The average FICO score is 720, he said. A score below 620 lands a

    consumer in the riskiest category, known as subprime, and virtually

    ensures the highest borrowing rates, if the consumer can obtain any

    credit at all. Credit reports generally note only those payments made

    at least 30 days late.



    Consumers with better-than-average scores are usually, but not always,

    eligible for the lowest rates. As Steve Strachan, a flower importer

    in York, Pa., learned, a relatively high credit score does not

    guarantee favorable terms.



    A thick credit report on Mr. Strachan from January showed a FICO

    score above 730, but by then he had already been through a battle

    with the issuer of a card that had once been his favorite method

    of payment.



    In the 1990's, Mr. Strachan traveled frequently from his home on

    the West Coast to Amsterdam and other foreign cities to meet with

    suppliers of tulips and exotic flower varieties that he distributed

    to domestic florists and wholesalers. He obtained a WorldPerks Visa

    card that rewarded him with seat upgrades through Northwest Airline's

    frequent-flier program.



    "I used that card whenever I possibly could because of the travel

    benefits," he recalled, sitting in his living room before stacks

    of credit card bills, change-of-terms notices and other correspondence

    between him and several lenders. "Never paid a penny of interest."



    He was such a valued customer then, he said, that US Bank, which

    issued the card, had extended him a high credit limit of $54,000 even

    though the card rate was just one percentage point above the prime rate.

    When the economy wilted after the collapse of the stock market in early

    2000, so did Mr. Strachan's business. He began using his credit lines

    on that Visa card and a few others to stay afloat, paying smaller

    portions of his growing balances.



    Then, in May of last year, US Bank sent Mr. Strachan a letter telling

    him that it planned to raise the card's rate to 20.21 percent, nearly

    quadrupling the existing rate of 5.25 percent.



    "I wasn't late, and I didn't go over the credit limit, and I didn't

    write bad checks," Mr. Strachan said. A representative of US Bank told

    him he was using too much of his available credit, he said.



    A US Bank spokesman declined to comment on Mr. Strachan's account.



    The monthly interest charge on his $50,000 balance jumped from $209

    in June to $756 in July and $808 in August. He eventually persuaded

    the bank to restore the original rate, but the bank closed the account,

    shutting off a key source of credit.



    By then, Bank One, another creditor, had compounded Mr. Strachan's

    woes. He was carrying a balance of about $70,000 on one account when

    the bank started raising his rates, first to 19.99 percent in April

    2003, then to 22.99 percent the next month, then to 24.99 percent in

    June. By October of last year, he was incurring a monthly finance

    charge of about $1,500 on a $77,000 balance.



    "It was like they almost all had a little meeting in the back room

    and said, 'Let's get Strachan,' " he said of his creditors. "How does

    it serve them to treat people like that? Are they trying to force

    them into bankruptcy?"



    Lawyers he consulted advised Mr. Strachan to take the easy - and

    increasingly popular - way out by filing for bankruptcy protection,

    but he refused. He is struggling to make good on his debts "because

    I have principles and ethics."



    But the battle to dig out of a deepening hole has taken a toll. Mr.

    Strachan said he had lost 30 pounds and described himself as a

    "broken man."



    Lately, he said, Bank One has periodically reduced his credit limit

    to a level just above his remaining balance, leaving him little

    margin for error. Some months, he said, if he were to pay only the

    minimum due, the ensuing finance charge would put his balance over

    the limit, triggering a penalty fee.



    By doing that, he said, "They create their own little monster."



    The Regulators



    Consumer complaints prompted the Office of the Comptroller of the

    Currency, which oversees the nationally chartered banks that

    constitute most of the major card issuers, to warn banks about

    giving fair notice of term changes and about sending out tempting

    offers to people who are unlikely to qualify for them.



    Julie Williams, the acting comptroller, said in an interview that

    as long as the lenders were not intentionally deceiving their

    customers, they were free to set whatever rates and fees their home

    states allow. If customers do not want to pay a particular rate,

    "they have choice," she said. "They can find another card."



    But consumers clearly are unhappy with the choices they have. About

    80,000 people lodged complaints with the comptroller's office last

    year. Ms. Williams said the largest single source of their ire was

    credit cards. Those complaints are routed to examiners who monitor

    the banks, she said, but the examiners' foremost concern is to make

    sure the banks are financially sound.



    Ms. Williams described her agency as a "tough regulator," but critics

    contend that the comptroller's office has taken strong action against

    only one major issuer of credit cards in the last five years. In

    2000, the O.C.C. joined in an investigation into Providian that

    had been started by the San Francisco district attorney's office.



    Providian customers complained that they had been hit with late fees

    for payments that had been sent in on time but not credited to their

    accounts for days or weeks. Some said the resultant penalties pushed

    them over their credit limits, leading to additional fees.



    Later, Ms. Williams said, the two agencies joined forces to extract

    $300 million in a settlement with Providian.



    The comptroller's office has since angered state attorneys general

    by trying to limit their ability to regulate how national banks

    behave in their states.



    Eliot Spitzer, the attorney general of New York, said his office gets

    "thousands of complaints every year about credit card issues relating

    to the major banks, the major card issuers." But more often, he said,

    the banks' response has been that " 'we don't need to deal with you

    because the O.C.C. has told us - indeed, directed us - not to deal

    with state enforcement entities.' "



    Elizabeth Warren, a professor at Harvard Law School who has been a

    vocal critic of consumer lenders, said the comptroller's office should

    do more than express discomfort with the practices of credit card

    companies, as it did in September.



    The regulators did not say that "those are unfair practices, they are

    unsafe and unsound and don't do them," Ms. Warren said. "Instead, they

    said it's a problem. Look, if they think it's a problem, then tell the

    credit card companies to stop doing it."



    "Secret History of the Credit Card,"produced in conjunction with this

    article, will be shown Tuesday on "Frontline" (PBS, 9 p.m. in most

    cities).



    Copyright 2004 The New York Times



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



    8) MSNBC 'Imus' Segment Refers to 'Raghead Cadaver'

    Muslims urged to renew demand for apology, reprimand

    (WASHINGTON, D.C., 11/19/04)

    http://www.cair-net.org/asp/article.asp?id=203&page=AA



    (WASHINGTON, D.C., 11/19/04) - CAIR is once again calling on people of

    conscience to demand an apology from the MSNBC cable television network for

    anti-Arab/anti-Muslim remarks made on its "Imus in the Morning" program.



    In a segment today commenting on the apparent execution of a wounded Iraqi

    in Fallujah by a U.S. Marine, a fictitious "Senior Military Affairs

    Advisor" to the program justified the killing by referring to a

    "booby-trapped raghead cadaver." The fictitious advisor also said the

    killing provided an "Al-Jazeera moment" causing the "Muslim masses to

    respond with their routine pack of rabid sheep mentality."



    Yesterday, CAIR issued a similar call for an apology for a November 12th

    "Imus" program that referred to Palestinians as "stinking animals" and

    suggested that they all be killed.



    SEE: Palestinians Called 'Stinking Animals' on MSNBC's 'Imus'

    http://www.cair-net.org/asp/article.asp?id=201&page=AA



    "We thank all those who already contacted the network to express their

    concerns about the racist remarks and ask that they keep up the pressure

    until those concerns are properly addressed," said CAIR Executive Director

    Nihad Awad.



    Don Imus, the program's host, has a long history of controversy over

    anti-Arab and Islamophobic remarks. As early as 1985, he was forced to

    apologize for referring to Arabs as "goat-humping weasels." (Sunday Mail,

    4/21/85) He has also been criticized for using the derogatory term

    "raghead." (Accuracy in Media) In a reference to the crash of an Iranian

    airliner earlier this year that killed 43 passengers, Imus said, "When I

    hear stories like that, I think who cares." He then stated: "Too bad it

    wasn't full of Saudi Arabians." (National Iranian American Council)



    Earlier this year, CAIR announced a "Hate Hurts America" campaign designed

    to counter hate speech on talk radio.



    SEE: http://www.cair-net.org/hatehurtsamerica/



    ACTION REQUESTED: (As always, be POLITE and RESPECTFUL.)



    Contact NBC and MSNBC to renew your demand for an apology and a reprimand

    for all those involved in both programs. (Send a demand for an apology even

    if you sent one based on the earlier alert.)



    CONTACT:



    Mr. Rick Kaplan

    President

    MSNBC

    1 MSNBC Plaza

    Secaucus, NJ 07094-2419



    TEL: 201-583-5050

    FAX: 201-583-5179



    Mr. Neal Shapiro

    President

    NBC News

    30 Rockefeller Plaza

    New York, NY 10112-0002



    E-MAIL: rick.kaplan@msnbc.com, neal.shapiro@nbc.com

    COPY TO: imus@msnbc.com, alana.russo@msnbc.com, leslie.schwartz@msnbc.com,

    fccinfo@fcc.gov, cair@cair-net.org



    - PLEASE ANNOUNCE, POST AND DISTRIBUTE -



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



    9) Holiday in Falluja

    Sent: Friday, November 19, 2004 2:03 PM

    hEkLe Falluja, Iraq www.ftssoldier.blogspot.com





    These are ugly times for the US military in Iraq. It seems everywhere

    you turn, more and more troops are being killed and maimed in vicious

    encounters with determined rebel fighters. The insurgency is mounting

    incredibly in such places as Baghdad, Mosul, and Baquba; using more

    advanced techniques and weaponry associated with a well-organized

    guerilla campaign. Even in the massively destroyed city of Falluja rebel

    forces are starting to reappear with a callous determination to win or

    die trying. Many critics and political pundits are starting to realize

    that this war is, in many aspects, un-winnable.



    And why should anyone think that a complete victory is possible?

    Conventionally, our US forces win territory here or there, killing a

    plethora of civilians as well as insurgents with each new boundary

    conquered.



    However, such as the recent case in Falluja, the rebel fighters have

    returned like a swarm of angry hornets attacking with a vicious frenzy.



    I was in Falluja during the last two days of the final assault. My

    mission was much different from that of the brave and weary infantry and

    marines involved in the major fighting. I was on an escort mission,

    accompanied by a squad who's task it was to protect a high brass figure

    in the combat zone. This particularly arrogant officer went to the last

    battle in the same spirits of an impartial spectator checking out the

    fourth quarter of a high school football game.



    Once we got to the marine occupied Camp Falluja and saw artillery being

    fired into town, the man suddenly became desperate to play an active

    role in the battle that would render Falluja to ashes. It was already

    rumored that all he really wanted was his trigger time, perhaps to prove

    that he is the toughest cowboy west of the Euphrates.



    Guys like him are a dime a dozen in the army: a career soldier who spent

    the first twenty years of his service patrolling the Berlin Wall or

    guarding the DMZ between North and South Korea. This sort of brass may

    have been lucky to serve in the first Gulf War, but in all actuality

    spent very little time shooting rag heads. For these trigger-happy

    tough guys, the last two decades of cold war hostilities built into a

    war frenzy of stark emptiness, fizzling out almost completely with the

    Clinton administration. But this is the New War, a never ending, action

    packed "Red Scare" in which the communist threat of yesteryear was

    simply replaced with the white knuckled tension of today's "War on

    Terrorism".



    The younger soldiers who grew up in relatively peaceful times interpret

    the mentality of the careerists as one of making up for lost

    opportunities. To the elder generation of trigger pullers, this is the

    real deal; the chance to use all the cool toys and high speed training

    that has been stored away since the '70s for something tangibly

    useful.and its about goddamn time.



    However, upon reaching the front lines, a safety standard was in effect

    stating that the urban combat was extremely intense. The lightest

    armored vehicles allowed in sector were Bradley tanks. Taking a glance

    at our armored humvees, this commander insisted that our section would

    be fine. Even though the armored humvees are very stout and nearly

    impenetrable against small arm fire, they usually don't hold up well

    against rocket attacks and roadside bombs like a heavily armored tank

    will.



    The reports from within the war zone indicated heavy rocket attacks,

    with an armed insurgent waiting on every corner for a soft target such

    as trucks. In the end, the overzealous officer was urged not to

    infiltrate into sector with only three trucks, for it would be a death

    wish during those dangerous twilight hours. It was suggested that in

    the morning, after the air strikes were complete, he could move in and

    "inspect the damage".



    Even as the sun was setting over the hazy orange horizon, artillery was

    pounding away at the remaining twelve percent of the already devastated

    Falluja. Many units were pulled out for the evening in preparation of a

    full-scale air strike that was scheduled to last for up to twelve hours.

    Our squad was sitting on top of our parked humvees, manning the crew

    served machine guns and scanning the urban landscape for enemy activity.

    This was supposed to be a secured forward operating area, right on the

    edge of the combat zone. However, with no barbed wire perimeter set up

    and only a few scattered tanks serving as protection, one was under the

    assumption that if someone missed a minor detail while on guard, some

    serious shit could go down.



    One soldier informed me that only two nights prior an insurgent was

    caught sneaking around the bullet-ridden houses to our immediate west.

    He was armed with a rocket-propelled grenade, and was laying low on his

    advance towards the perimeter. One of the tanks spotted him through its

    night vision and hastily shot him into three pieces. Indeed, though it

    was safe enough to smoke a cigarette and relax, one had to remain

    diligently aware of his surroundings if he planned on making it through

    the night.



    As the evening wore on and the artillery continued, a new gruesome roar

    filled the sky. The fighter jets were right on time and made their

    grand appearance with a series of massive air strikes. Between the

    pernicious bombs and fierce artillery, the sky seemed as though it were

    on fire for several minutes at a time. First you would see a blaze of

    light in the horizon, like lightning hitting a dynamite warehouse, and

    then hear the massive explosion that would turn your stomach, rattle

    your eyeballs, and compress itself deep within your lungs. Although

    these massive bombs were being dropped no further than five kilometers

    away, it felt like it was happening right in front of your face. At

    first, it was impossible not to flinch with each unexpected boom, but

    after scores of intense explosions, your senses became aware and

    complacent towards them.



    At times the jets would scream menacingly low over the city and open

    fire with smaller missiles meant for extreme accuracy. This is what Top

    Gun, in all its glory and silver screen acclaim, seemed to be lacking in

    the movie's high budget sound effects. These air-deployed missiles make

    a banshee-like squeal, sort of like a bottle rocket fueled with

    plutonium, and then suddenly would become inaudible. Seconds later, the

    colossal explosion would rip the sky open and hammer devastatingly into

    the ground, sending flames and debris pummeling into the air. And as

    always, the artillery-some rounds were high explosive, some were

    illumination rounds, some were reported as being white phosphorus (the

    modern day napalm).



    Occasionally, on the outskirts of the isolated impact area, you could

    hear tanks firing machine guns and blazing their cannons. It was

    amazing that anything could survive this deadly onslaught. Suddenly a

    transmition came over the radio approving the request for

    "bunker-busters". Apparently, there were a handful of insurgent

    compounds that were impenetrable by artillery. At the time, I was

    unaware when these bunker-busters were deployed, but I was told later

    that the incredibly massive explosions were a direct result of these

    "final solution" type missiles.



    I continued to watch the final assault on Falluja throughout the night

    from atop my humvee. It was interesting to scan the vast skies above

    with night vision goggles. Circling continuously overhead throughout

    the battle was an array of attack helicopters.



    The most devastating were the Cobras and Apaches with their chain gun

    missile launchers. Through the night vision I could see them hovering

    around the carnage, scanning the ground with an infrared spotlight that

    seemed to reach for miles. Once a target was identified, a rapid series

    of hollow blasts would echo through the skies, and from the ground came

    a "rat-a-tatting" of explosions, like a daisy chain of supercharged

    black cats during a Fourth of July barbeque. More artillery, more

    tanks, more machine gun fire, ominous death-dealing fighter planes

    terminating whole city blocks at a time.this wasn't a war, it was a

    massacre!



    As I look back on the air strikes that lasted well into the next

    morning, I cannot help but to be both amazed by our modern technology

    and disgusted by its means. It occurred to me many times during the

    siege that while the Falluja resistance was boldly fighting us with

    archaic weapons from the Cold War, we were soaring far above their heads

    dropping Thor's fury with a destructive power and precision that may as

    well been nuclear. It was like the Iraqis were bringing a knife to a

    tank fight.



    And yet, the resistance toiled on, many fighting until their deaths.

    What determination! Some soldiers call them stupid for even thinking

    they have a chance in hell to defeat the strongest military in the

    world, but I call them brave. It's not about fighting to win an

    immediate victory. And what is a conventional victory in a

    non-conventional war? It seems overwhelmingly obvious that this is no

    longer within the United States hands.



    We reduced Falluja to rubble. We claimed victory and told the world we

    held Falluja under total and complete control. Our military claimed

    very little civilian casualties and listed thousands of insurgents dead.

    CNN and Fox News harped and cheered on the television that the Battle of

    Falluja would go down in history as a complete success, and a testament

    to the United States' supremacy on the modern battlefield.



    However, after the dust settled and generals sat in cozy offices smoking

    their victory cigars, the front lines in Falluja exploded again with

    indomitable mortar, rocket, and small arm attacks on US and coalition

    forces.



    Recent reports indicate that many insurgents have resurfaced in the

    devastated city of Falluja. We had already claimed the situation under

    control, and were starting to turn our attention to the other problem

    city of Mosul. Suddenly we were backtracking our attention to Falluja.

    Did the Department of Defense and the national press lie to the public

    and claim another preemptive victory? Not necessarily so.

    Conventionally we won the battle, how could anyone argue that? We

    destroyed an entire city and killed thousands of its occupants. But the

    main issue that both the military and public forget to analyze is that

    this war, beyond any shadow of a doubt, is completely guerrilla.



    Sometimes I wonder if the West Point graduated officers have ever

    studied the intricate simplicity and effectiveness of guerrilla warfare.

    During the course of this war, I have occasionally asked a random

    lieutenant or a captain if he at any time has even browsed through Che

    Guevara's Guerrilla Warfare. Almost half of them admit that they have

    not. This I find to be amazing! Here we have many years of guerrilla

    warfare ahead of us and our military's leadership seems dangerously

    unaware of what it all means!



    Anyone can tell you that a guerrilla fighter is one who uses hit and run

    techniques to attempt a breakdown of a stronger conventional force.

    However, what is more important to a guerrilla campaign are the

    political forces that drive it. Throughout history, many guerrilla

    armies have been successful; our own country and its fight for

    independence cannot be excluded.



    We should have learned a lesson in guerrilla fighting with the Vietnam

    War only thirty years ago, but history has a funny way of repeating

    itself. The Vietnam War was a perfect example of how quick, deadly

    assaults on conventional troops over a long period of time can lead to

    an unpopular public view of the war, thus ending it.



    Che Guevara stressed in his book Guerrilla Warfare that the most

    important factor in a guerrilla campaign is popular support. With that,

    victory is almost completely assured. The Iraqis already have many of

    the main ingredients of a successful insurrection. Not only do they have

    a seemingly endless supply of munitions and weapons, they have the

    advantage to blend into their environment, whether that environment is a

    crowded market place or a thickly vegetated palm grove. The Iraqi

    insurgent has utilized these advantages to the fullest, but his most

    important and relevant advantage is the popular support from his own

    countrymen.



    What our military and government needs to realize is that every mistake

    we make is an advantage to the Iraqi insurrection. Every time an

    innocent man, woman or child is murdered in a military act, deliberate

    or not, the insurgent grows stronger. Even if an innocent civilian is

    slain at the hands of his/her own freedom fighter, that fighter is still

    viewed as a warrior of the people, while the occupying force will

    ultimately be blamed as the responsible perpetrator.



    Everything about this war is political.every ambush, every bombing,

    every death. When a coalition worker or soldier is abducted and

    executed, this only adds encouragement and justice to the dissident

    fervor of the Iraq public, while angering and demoralizing the occupier.

    Our own media will prove to be our downfall as well. Every time an

    atrocity is revealed through our news outlets, our grasp on this once

    secular nation slips away. As America grows increasingly disturbed by

    the images of carnage and violent death of her own sons in arms, its

    government loses the justification to continue the bloody debacle. Since

    all these traits are the conventional power's unavoidable mistakes, the

    guerrilla campaign will surely succeed. In Iraq's case, complete

    destruction of the United States military is impossible, but through

    perseverance the insurgency will drive us out. This will prove to be

    the inevitable outcome of the war.



    We lost many soldiers in the final battle for Falluja, and many more

    were seriously wounded. It seems unfair that even after the devastation

    we wreaked on this city just to contain it, many more troops will die in

    vain to keep it that way. I saw the look in the eyes of a

    reconnaissance scout while I talked to him after the battle.



    His stories of gore and violent death were unnerving. The sacrifices

    that he and his whole platoon had made were infinite. They fought

    everyday with little or no sleep, very few breaks, and no hot meals.

    For obvious reasons, they never could manage to find time to email their

    mothers to let them know that everything turned out ok. Some of the

    members of his platoon will never get the chance to reassure their

    mothers, because now those soldiers are dead. The look in his eyes as he

    told some of the stories were deep and weary, even perturbed.



    He described in accurate detail how some enemy combatants were blown to

    pieces by army issued bazookas, some had their heads shot off by a 50

    caliber bullet, others were run over by tanks as they stood defiantly in

    the narrow streets firing an AK-47. The soldier told me how one of his

    favorite sergeants died right in front of him. He was taking cover

    behind an alley wall and as he emerged to fire his M4 rifle, he was shot

    through the abdomen with a rocket-propelled grenade. The grenade itself

    exploded and sent shrapnel into the narrator's leg. He showed me where

    a chunk of burned flesh was torn from his left thigh.



    He ended his conversation saying that he was just a dumb kid from

    California who never thought joining the army would send him straight to

    hell. He told me he was tired as fuck and wanted a shower. Then he

    slowly walked away, cradling a rifle under his arm.



    --

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



    10) Fate of Lawyer in Terror Case Hinges on Sheik's Words

    By JULIA PRESTON

    November 14, 2004

    http://sf.indymedia.org/news/2004/11/1706139.php



    Midway through the third day of a grueling cross-examination by a

    prosecutor in her terror trial, Lynne F. Stewart used an offhand

    phrase to summarize a telephone conversation she had with a news

    reporter in June 2000 that is a central point of contention in the

    case.



    "I'm just giving you the words of the sheik," Ms. Stewart said that

    she told the reporter, a Reuters correspondent in Cairo, as she

    read for him a statement from an imprisoned client, Sheik Omar

    Abdel Rahman. Ms. Stewart, a veteran defense lawyer, is accused

    of aiding terrorism by breaking strict gag rules imposed on the

    sheik by the federal government and relaying a warmongering message

    from him to his Islamic followers. The State Department has designated

    the sheik's organization in Egypt, the Islamic Group, a terrorist

    organization.



    From the evidence presented by prosecutors during the trial, which

    began in late June in Federal District Court in Manhattan, it is

    clear they agree with Ms. Stewart's summation of the crucial phone

    call. The prosecutors finished presenting their case last month and

    Ms. Stewart's lawyer, Michael E. Tigar, rested his defense this week.

    So far there has been little dispute about the key facts involving

    Ms. Stewart and two co-defendants, Mohamed Yousry, an Arabic translator,

    and Ahmed Abdel Sattar, a United States postal worker on Staten Island

    and a paralegal for the sheik.



    The trial is continuing as Mr. Yousry and then Mr. Sattar present their

    defense cases. The issue the jury will decide is whether Ms. Stewart,

    by disseminating Mr. Abdel Rahman's words beyond his jail cell, was

    participating in terrorism, as the government says, or legitimately

    defending a client shunned by the public, as Ms. Stewart contends.



    Ms. Stewart's fate hinges on the weight and meaning the jury will

    give to the words of the sheik, a blind fundamentalist Muslim cleric

    serving a life sentence in federal prison for inspiring a thwarted

    bombing conspiracy in New York City.



    The prosecutors have produced no evidence of any terrorist action

    that resulted from Ms. Stewart's conduct. In the statement that she

    provided the reporter on June 14, 2000 after a prison meeting a month

    earlier with the sheik, Mr. Abdel Rahman withdrew his support for a

    cease-fire the Islamic Group was observing in Egypt. But he only

    called for a debate among his followers. Indeed, the statement was

    a mild one for a man who, the prosecutors' evidence has shown, had

    in the past issued explicit calls for Muslims to murder Americans by

    any possible means.



    The trial has focused on events in Egypt and the prosecutors have

    not suggested any direct threat to the United States.



    Nor have they shown that Ms. Stewart had any detailed knowledge of

    hundreds of telephone calls that Mr. Sattar, the paralegal, made from

    his home to Egyptian militants across the globe, including one man,

    Rifai Taha, who was working with Osama bin Laden in Afghanistan.

    Transcripts of the calls, which were secretly recorded by the F.B.I,

    make up most of the prosecutors' evidence.



    Instead, the prosecutors' case against Ms. Stewart on terrorism

    charges is based on showing what she knew of the sheik's past calls

    for bloodshed in the name of jihad, or religious struggle, and of

    his influence over his followers in the Islamic Group who had claimed
    responsibility for several attacks before the cease-fire. This is

    why the prosecutors spent several weeks early in the trial reading

    aloud virulent sermons by Mr. Abdel Rahman that had already been

    part of the evidence in his 1995 terror trial, in which Ms. Stewart

    was his lead defense lawyer.



    That is also why one prosecutor, Andrew Dember, unleashed a withering

    sequence of questions to show that Ms. Stewart knew the sheik's

    name had been associated, whether fairly or not, with gruesome

    attacks against tourists in Egypt and with Al Qaeda's attack in

    Yemen on the U.S.S. Cole in October 2000.



    Mr. Dember also spent several hours of his cross-examination pressing

    Ms. Stewart about her own avowedly radical views. He sought to show

    that she was inclined to be an active supporter of the sheik's holy war.



    "I think that to rid ourselves of the entrenched voracious type of

    capitalism that is in this country that perpetuates sexism and racism,

    I don't think that can come nonviolently," Ms. Stewart told the court.

    "I'm talking about a revolution of the people that overthrows

    institutions."



    But Ms. Stewart, who remained generally calm and articulate under

    Mr. Dember's interrogation, said she was surprised by his questions

    about her personal opinions.



    "I have done a lot of cases that involved a certain level of violence

    and my personal views were never at issue," she said. "Because I'm the

    lawyer, it's not about my personal views. It is about what happened,

    what could be the motive that led to violence, perhaps."



    Behind these arguments are diverging assessments of Mr. Abdel Rahman

    held by Ms. Stewart and her longtime legal adversaries, the prosecutors

    in the Southern District of New York. One of them, Patrick J. Fitzgerald,

    was one of the prosecutors in the 1995 trial that sent the sheik to

    prison for life. He investigated and prosecuted several other Al Qaeda

    cases and traveled to the Middle East to probe the Cole bombing.



    Mr. Fitzgerald was familiar with several calls Mr. Bin Laden had

    issued after 1995 to free the sheik from jail, and the trail of Al

    Qaeda violence that had followed those calls. He wrote special prison

    rules in 1997 that barred the sheik from communicating with anyone but

    his lawyers and his wife, citing a high risk of bombings whenever Mr.

    Abdel Rahman spoke.



    To Ms. Stewart, however, Mr. Abdel Rahman was an ailing and weakened

    client, an Islamic scholar unfairly muzzled from expressing his

    theological views. Some of the more emotional parts of her testimony

    involved her descriptions of him after years of solitary confinement.

    He could not even read Braille, she said, because diabetes had dulled

    the sensation in his fingertips.



    "He could not hear birds, he could not hear anything," she said. "He

    was alone."



    The sheik "commanded a certain respect with the public in Egypt," she

    said. He had "a sense of righteousness," she said.



    Apart from the terror charges against Ms. Stewart is a much more

    concrete case in which she is accused of intentionally violating the

    prison rules. By adding two counts of providing material aid to

    terrorism, prosecutors have escalated what might be seen as procedural
    transgressions by Ms. Stewart into accusations that could bring her

    a jail sentence of at least 35 years, if she is convicted on all counts.



    Mr. Dember succeeded in making Ms. Stewart appear somewhat oblivious,

    in the global environment after the Sept. 11, 2001 terror attacks, to

    the threats that her client's extremist anti-American views could pose.

    But the jury will determine whether the prosecutors reached too far in

    trying to construe her dissonant views and provocative legal practice

    as acts of terror.



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



    11) Government Looking at Military Draft Lists

    By ALMA WALZER

    The Monitor

    McALLEN, November 15, 2004

    http://www.brownsvilleherald.com/ts_more.php?id=62232_0_10_0_C



    McALLEN, November 15, 2004 - It's taken one year, seven months

    and 19 days of combat in Iraq for the Lone Star State to lose

    100 of its own.



    Texas is the second state, after California, to lose 100 service

    members, according to The Associated Press.



    With continuing war in Iraq and U.S. armed forces dispersed to so

    many other locations around the globe, Americans may be wondering

    if compulsory military service could begin again for the first time

    since the Vietnam War era.



    The Selective Service System (SSS) and the U.S. Department of

    Education now are gearing up to compare their computer records, to

    make sure all men between the ages of 18 and 25 who are required to

    register for a military draft have done so.



    The SSS and the education department will begin comparing their

    lists on Jan. 1, 2005, according to a memo authored by Jack Martin,

    acting Selective Service director.



    While similar record checks have been done periodically for the past

    10 years, Martin's memo is dated Oct. 28, just a few days before the

    Nov. 2 presidential election, a hard-fought campaign in which the

    question of whether the nation might need to reinstate a military

    draft was raised in debates and on the stump.



    It took several more days, until Nov. 4, for the document to reach

    the Federal Register, the official daily publication for rules and

    notices of federal agencies and organizations.



    The memo was also produced after the U.S. House voted 402-2 on Oct.

    5, against House Resolution 163, a bill that would have required

    all young people, including women, to serve two years of military

    service.



    Under federal law, a military draft cannot be started without

    congressional support.



    About 94 percent of all men are properly registered for a draft,

    according to Richard Flahavan, associate director of the office of

    public and intergovernmental affairs for SSS.



    Martin's memo is just a routine thing, Flahavan said.



    "Back in 1982 a federal law was passed that basically linked

    federal grants, student loans and federal assistance to students

    with Selective Service," Flahavan said. "You had to register with

    Selective Service with a Social Security number (in order to receive

    federal assistance), and as a consequence of the law the Department

    of Education came up with an agreement on how to exchange and compare

    data to comply with the law.



    "It just so happens that the current agreement in effect expires next

    month," Flahavan said. "All we did is update the agreement slightly,

    but it has no substantive changes. There is nothing new or shocking

    to link this to some type of draft right around the corner because

    its all been in place for almost 18 years."



    Flahavan said the written agreements between SSS and the Department

    of Education normally run for about four or five years and suggested

    that a reporter search the 1999 or 2000 records of the Federal

    Register for the most agreement.



    A search of the Federal Register by The Monitor found four such

    agreements between the two agencies, with effective dates as

    follows: Jan. 1, 1995; July 1, 1997; Jan. 1, 2000; and July 1, 2002.



    All four agreements lasted for 18 months, during which time the

    SSS and the Department of Education could complete their comparisons.



    The most recent agreement, which began July 1, 2002, actually expired

    Jan. 1, 2004, according to federal records located by The Monitor.



    "This has nothing to with current events," Flahavan said. "This is just

    the periodic renewal of previous agreements - this one is 18 months but

    normally it runs four years and that's why we're doing it now. I'm not

    quite sure why it's 18 months versus the normal number of years."



    Flahavan said the agency was required to place the agreement in the

    Federal Register.



    "That's fine and we did," Flahavan said. "We believe the public wouldn't

    stand for a draft that isn't fair and equitable.



    "And the only way to be fair and equitable is if everyone who should

    register is registered, because that's the pool from which the people

    who would be drafted would be selected from. So you want everyone who

    should be in the pot in the pot," Flahavan said.



    U.S. Rep. Lloyd Doggett, D-Austin, who officially begins representing

    western Hidalgo County residents in January, said Congress has voted

    on record against a draft.



    "It was a near unanimous vote in the House," Doggett said. "When things

    are filed in the Federal Register, there will be standards, and they are

    a reminder that if we cannot get more international participation that

    the risk of a draft remains out there.



    "And I think we do need people to remain watchful of this possibility."



    Doggett said one type of "draft" was already being used by the military.



    "I'm concerned that a very real form of the draft is there now for those

    already in the service," Doggett said. "People are being forced to stay

    in beyond their commitment, and that's an indication of being overextended.



    "I want us to pursue policies that don't overextend us and involve more
    international participation, so that Americans don't have to do all the

    dying and endure all the pain for these international activities,"

    Doggett said.



    Flahavan said the computer records check would help Selective Service

    with its compliance rates.



    "From 1999 to 2000, it was dropping about a percent a year," Flahavan

    said. "It's now inching back up about a percent a year. Last year it

    was 93 percent.



    "At the end of 2004 we anticipate about a 94 percent compliance rate,"

    Flahavan said. "We're pleased we've got it back on the rise and that's

    where we want to keep it - that's our goal."



    Draft Gear Up?

    Who Has To Register?

    All male U.S. citizens and

    male aliens living in the U.S. between the

    ages of 18 and 25

    Dual nationals of the U.S.

    and another country, regardless of

    where they live

    Young men who are in prison

    or mental institutions do not

    have to regsiter while they are

    committed, but must do so if they

    are released and not reached age 26

    Disabled men who live at home and

    can move about indiependently.

    Myths

    Contrary to popular belief, only

    sons and the last son to carry a

    family name must register and they can be drafted.

    What Happens In A Draft

    Congress would likely approve a

    military draft in a time of crisis,

    in which the mission requires more

    troops than are in the volunteer military.

    Selective Service procedures would

    treat married men or those with

    children the same as single men.

    The first men to be called up will

    be those whose 20th birthday falls

    during that year, followed by those

    age 21, 22, 23,24 and 25.

    The last men to be called are 18

    and 19 years of age.

    Historical Facts

    The last man to be drafted was in June 1973.

    Number of Drafted for WWI : 2.8 million

    Number of Drafted for WWII: 10 million

    Number of Drafted for the Korean War: 1.5 million

    Number of Drafted for the Vietnam War: 1.8 million

    Source: Selective Service System







    Posted by: Gilbert Zarate on Nov 15, 04 | 12:04 am | Profile



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



    12) 47 Parties Boycott Elections in Iraq

    Xinhua News Agency (China)

    November 17, 2004

    http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2004-11/17/content_2230350.htm



    Baghdad - Forty-seven Iraqi political and religious

    parties have decided to boycott the general elections

    due in January in protest against the extended use of

    force throughout the country, a joint statement said

    on Wednesday.



    The reason for the move was "the (US-Iraqi) assaults

    in cities like Najaf, Karbala, Samarra, Sadr City,

    Adhmiya, and especially the genocidal crimes in

    Fallujah," said the statement obtained by Xinhua.



    "These crimes prevent us from taking part in the

    political process going on under the control of

    occupation forces," added the statement, signed by the

    parties and groups, mainly Sunni factions led by the

    Muslim Clerics Association.



    At least eight Shiite groups and one Christian party

    were also among them.



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



    13) Greenspan Sees No Rise Soon for the Dollar

    By MARK LANDLER

    FRANKFURT

    November 20, 2004

    http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/20/business/20greenspan.html



    FRANKFURT, Nov. 19 - Alan Greenspan came to the home of the euro

    on Friday and suggested that the relentless decline of the dollar

    might well continue, offering little relief to those here who worry

    that the United States is seeking to gain a competitive advantage

    for its industries from a weaker currency.



    In a speech to a banking congress here, Mr. Greenspan, the chairman

    of the Federal Reserve, said that ballooning foreign borrowing on

    the part of the United States poses a future risk to the dollar's

    value.



    He said that foreign investors, who help finance the large American

    trade and budget deficits by buying Treasury securities and other

    dollar-denominated assets, would eventually resist lending more money

    to the United States, causing the dollar to fall further.



    Mr. Greenspan's comments came two days after the Treasury secretary,

    John W. Snow, appeared to rule out intervening in currency markets to

    help Europe and Japan - both heavily dependent on exports to sustain

    economic growth - stem the decline of the dollar. Mr. Snow, speaking

    in London, prodded European leaders to tackle their home-grown economic

    problems.



    Taken together, the two speeches appear to be sending an unmistakable

    message that Washington, on the heels of President Bush's election to

    a second term, is prepared to tolerate a weaker dollar for the

    foreseeable future.



    A falling dollar makes it more expensive for Americans to travel abroad

    and risks reviving inflation and sending interest rates higher in the

    United States. But for American manufacturers, who have been shedding

    jobs for years, it provides a powerful shot of adrenaline by making

    their exports cost less abroad and adding to pressure on foreign

    industries to raise the price of imported goods in the United States.



    Given the uncertainties surrounding the global economy, Mr.

    Greenspan likened predicting the dollar's path to "forecasting

    the outcome of a coin toss."



    While Mr. Greenspan, as he often does, relied on carefully chosen

    phrases open to various interpretations, the message seemed clear

    here to European bankers, who laughed nervously at the metaphor:

    The dollar, which has fallen to record lows against the euro this

    week - giving fits to European politicians and business executives

    - is likely to fall even further.



    To analysts, the speech had a laissez-faire tone, leaving events in

    the hands of the market and giving speculators free rein to bet

    against the American currency without worrying that officials would

    get together to slap them down.



    On Friday, in New York, the stock market reacted by falling sharply.

    At the close of trading, the Dow industrial average was down more

    than 115 points, to 10,456,91, a decline of more than 1 percent.



    Currency traders drove the dollar to its lowest level in four and

    a half years against the Japanese yen, and near its record low against

    the euro. Treasury notes fell the most in two weeks.



    The hints from Washington policy makers that they have no intention

    of supporting the dollar could add to the strains between the United

    States and Europe, which is increasingly worried that the rise of the

    euro is choking off its tenuous recovery. In France and Germany,

    growth in the third quarter dropped to 0.1 percent, as exports dried up.



    European leaders are already raising distress flags. Germany's

    minister for economics, Wolfgang Clement, urged Asia, Europe and

    the United States to take coordinated action to stop the slide. The

    president of the European Central Bank, Jean-Claude Trichet - who is Mr.
    Greenspan's counterpart here - has called the shifts in exchange

    rates "brutal."



    Mr. Trichet, who traveled a few blocks from the headquarters of the

    European Central Bank to appear on the same panel as Mr. Greenspan,

    pointedly declined to repeat that characterization.



    Both central bankers later flew to Berlin for a meeting of the G-20,

    which includes the Group of 8 industrialized countries, as well as

    emerging economies. The downward path of the dollar is likely to be

    high on the agenda, but there is little hope for a concerted response.



    Analysts said Mr. Greenspan's speech made it clear that the Federal

    Reserve would make no effort to influence the process of narrowing

    the United States' current account deficit, either through interest

    rate increases aimed at deliberately supporting the dollar or by

    intervening in the market.



    The current account deficit, which encompasses annual trade as well

    as the balance of financial flows, has gone from zero in 1990 to

    nearly $600 billion this year. The nation's accumulated debt to

    foreign investors is $2.6 trillion, equivalent to 23 percent of

    the annual output of the economy.



    "It was an either-or message," said Thomas Mayer, the chief European

    economist at Deutsche Bank . "Either the current account deficit

    comes down. Or the market will do it, but at a cost to the dollar.

    Will the Fed play a role in this? Probably not. It will stick to

    its mandate."



    Speaking on a panel that included the deputy governor of the Bank

    of Japan, Kazumasa Iwata, Mr. Greenspan devoted most of his remarks

    to the effect that American fiscal policy has on global markets.



    "Current account imbalances, per se, need not be a problem," he

    said in a characteristically technical speech, "but cumulative

    deficits, which result in a marked decline of a country's net

    international position - as is occurring in the United States -

    raise more complicated issues."



    Mr. Greenspan said foreign investors, in part because they fear

    having too much money at risk in the United States, would

    eventually become reluctant to take on more such assets.



    "It seems persuasive that given the size of the U.S. current

    account deficit, a diminished appetite for adding to dollar

    balances must occur at some point," Mr. Greenspan said. "But

    when, through what channels, and from what level of the dollar?

    Regrettably, no answer to those questions is convincing."



    This is not the first time Mr. Greenspan has warned about the

    risks of a rapidly widening current-account deficit. In testimony

    before Congress last February, he said "foreign investors, both

    private and official, may become less willing to absorb ever

    growing claims on U.S. residents."



    As he did last winter, Mr. Greenspan said on Friday that his

    preferred remedy would be for the Bush administration to bring

    down the current account deficit by taking steps to shrink the

    federal budget deficit. That would make more domestic savings

    available in the United States, reducing the dependence on

    foreign borrowing.



    But analysts did not interpret Mr. Greenspan's remarks as a

    rebuke of the White House - which has indicated that it will

    seek to make the deep tax cuts of its first term permanent -

    but rather an effort to let the markets find their course.



    That will be cold comfort to many Europeans, who say that

    their currency is absorbing the bulk of the pressure from the

    declining dollar, since Japan and other Asian countries have

    intervened aggressively in the market to prevent their currencies

    from rising significantly against the dollar.



    Mr. Greenspan took issue with that suggestion, saying that based

    on his review of recent statistics, Asia's "very large" central

    bank interventions had had only a "moderate" effect on exchange

    rates.



    For his part, Mr. Trichet seemed determined not to breathe another

    word about the dangers of a rising euro. Describing his previous

    comments on the subject as "poetry," he turned aside questions

    about the exchange rate.



    Mr. Mayer of Deutsche Bank said Mr. Trichet's silence suggested

    that his earlier efforts to talk down the currency had fallen short.



    "They are basically seeing that there is very little they can

    do about it," Mr. Mayer he said. "They are not in a position to

    change interest rate policy to address it."



    Copyright 2004 The New York Times



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



    14) US soldiers in Iraq suffer horrific brain and mental injuries

    By Rick Kelly

    20 November 2004

    World Socialist Web Site www.wsws.org

    http://www.wsws.org/articles/2004/nov2004/sold-n20.shtml





    According to official figures, the Iraq war has so far seen 9,000 US

    soldiers wounded in action, in addition to the more than 1,200 troops

    killed. These wounded, whose numbers may well be underestimated,

    include those with gunshot and shrapnel wounds, lost limbs and other

    injuries caused by landmines and bombs. Less well known, however, is

    the terrible toll enacted through brain and psychological injuries,

    which frequently have devastating and permanent effects.



    The war has seen unusually high rates of traumatic brain injury (TBI).

    This head injury causes life-long damage in many cases. Symptoms

    include memory loss, difficulty with attention and reasoning, headaches,
    confusion, anxiety, irritability and depression.



    TBI rates in previous wars have been estimated at about 20 percent.

    In July, a San Francisco Chronicle survey of troops being processed

    through Walter Reed Army Medical Hospital in Washington DC indicated

    that as many as two-thirds of all soldiers wounded in Iraq suffer from

    the condition.



    The increase in brain injury cases is largely due to the advanced body

    armor and helmets now used by US forces. As the death rate of wounded

    troops has declined compared to previous conflicts, the rate of TBI has

    shot up. The nature of the Iraq war has also increased the number of brain
    injuries. Rocket propelled grenades, mortars, and other explosive devices

    cause concussive shock blasts damaging to the brain.



    Traumatic brain injury often goes undetected until the affected soldier

    returns home and his or her family notices that something is wrong. The

    San Francisco Chronicle reported on the case of Sgt. 1st Class Alec Giess,

    of the Oregon National Guard, whose truck rolled over him as it crashed

    while avoiding a suspected land mine:



    "Geiss' wife, Shana, noticed after his return that the easygoing,

    relaxed dad who went to Iraq had become a quick-tempered man who

    couldn't remember the family's daily schedule, jumped up screaming

    when the family cat landed on his bed and couldn't tolerate crowds.

    The world inside his head, Giess said, was even stranger: he felt

    bewildered, with no sense of time other than 'daytime' and 'nighttime.'

    He also felt cut off from his emotions. 'When my kids come and hug me,

    I don't feel a thing,' he said."



    Many other incidents of TBI are even more severe. ABC News reported last

    month on the situation in one Veterans Affairs hospital in Palo Alto,

    California. "The majority of [TBI patients], they're incontinent, both

    bowel and bladder, so we have to retrain them when to use the toilet,

    how to use the toilet," nurse manager Stephanie Alvarez said.



    Each patient at the facility is given a "memory book," which describes

    that day's schedule, and other important information. For many wounded

    soldiers this includes a reminder of why they are in hospital. "I had

    a head injury from an explosion in Iraq on June 14, 2004," one

    soldier's book read.



    Post-traumatic stress disorder



    The US military is also experiencing a very high rate of post-traumatic

    stress disorder (PTSD) among troops. Many of the symptoms are similar

    to traumatic brain injury. Post-traumatic stress disorder sufferers can

    experience feelings of detachment and isolation, poor concentration and

    memory, depression, insomnia, flashbacks, as well as headaches,

    gastrointestinal complaints, and immune system problems. Like TBI,

    soldiers suffering from psychological disorders have high rates of

    alcohol and drug abuse, and suicide.



    A study published by the New England Journal of Medicine in July

    found that up to 17 percent of the surveyed Iraq veterans suffered

    from PTSD, generalized anxiety, or major depression. This probably

    underestimated the true scale of the problem, since the soldiers in

    the study served in the early phase of the war, before the Iraqi

    resistance really intensified.



    "The bad news is that the study underestimated the prevalence of what

    we are going to see down the road," Dr. Matthew J. Friedman, executive

    director of the Veterans Affairs (VA) national center for post-traumatic

    stress disorder, told the Los Angeles Times last Sunday. "The

    complexion of the war has changed into a grueling counterinsurgency.

    And that may be very important in terms of the potential toxicity of

    this combat experience."



    "This is urban warfare," declared Dr. Alfonso Bates, the VA's national

    director for readjustment counseling. "There's no place to hide in Iraq.

    Whether you're driving a truck or you're a cook, everyone is exposed to

    extreme stress on a daily basis."



    There have been at least 30 reported suicides among soldiers in Iraq-a

    rate nearly one-third higher than the Army's historical average. Many

    more suicides occur in the US by those who have finished their tour

    of duty, but since the Pentagon does not track these incidents the

    number is not known.



    Associated Press, however, reported on October 18 that at least 12

    Marines had killed themselves after returning from Iraq or Afghanistan.

    "Military people are heavily vetted for any psychological problems

    before they enter the service," noted Steve Robinson, executive

    director of the National Gulf War Resource Center. "They're screened

    very well when they come in, and they're supposed to be screened

    very well when they leave. So when a Marine takes the ultimate step

    of checking out by taking his own life, it should make the hair on

    the back of your neck stand up. These are the guys who aren't

    supposed to do that."



    There is mounting evidence that the rate of suicide and psychological

    disorders is at least partially due to the brutality of the US-led

    occupation. Most of those serving in the military were drawn from

    working class and impoverished rural regions, and enlisted either

    to get a job or to advance their education.



    These young people have been dispatched to a war that was based on

    a series of flagrant lies, and that violated numerous precepts of

    international law. They are now being ordered to intimidate and

    terrorize the Iraqi people, and to crush any resistance to the

    occupation and Iyad Allawi's stooge interim government. The

    killing and brutalization of the Iraqi people has triggered

    guilt, shame and serious psychological problems for many soldiers.



    Last month Associated Press reported the case of Jeffrey Lucey,

    a 23-year-old Marine who suffered from serious depression and

    became dependent on alcohol after returning from Iraq in July 2003.

    On Christmas Eve he told his sister how he had been ordered to shoot

    two unarmed Iraqi soldiers. "He took off two dog tags around his

    neck, then threw them at me and said, 'Don't you understand? Your

    brother is a murderer,'" she recalled. Lucey killed himself

    in June.



    Former Army sergeant, Matt La Branche, told the Los Angeles

    Times that the memories of his nine-month stint as a machine-

    gunner in Iraq left him "feeling dead inside." He constantly

    struggles with the image of the Iraqi woman who died in his arms

    after he had shot her. The woman's children were also wounded in

    the incident. "I'm taking enough drugs to sedate an elephant, and

    I still wake up dreaming about it," he said.



    Affected soldiers receive grossly inadequate treatment from the

    military establishment. Brain trauma and psychological injuries

    often require months of expensive and intensive rehabilitation,

    long-term drug therapy and psychological counseling. Facilities

    that were already underfunded and overstretched are now at

    breaking point.



    Receiving treatment is especially difficult for sufferers of PTSD.

    Army psychologists are pressured to get their patients back out in

    the field as soon as possible, while the macho culture cultivated

    within the ranks leads many soldiers to deny that they have a

    problem. The New England Journal of Medicine study found that less

    than half of all soldiers affected by PTSD sought treatment, fearing
    stigmatization or damage to their careers.



    Officials also leave many families of PTSD sufferers completely

    unprepared for the shock of having to deal with the condition. One

    woman told the New Yorker how she had been advised prior to the

    return of her husband from Iraq: "When he was coming home, the Army

    gave us little cards that said things like 'Watch for psychotic

    episodes' and 'Is he drinking too much?' A lot of wives said it was

    a joke. They had a lady come from the psych ward, who said-and

    I'm serious-'Don't call us unless your husband is waking you up

    in the middle of the night with a knife at your throat.' Or,

    'Don't call us unless he actually chokes you, unless you pass

    out. He'll have flashbacks. It's normal.'"



    Such treatment is indicative of the way in which tens of thousands

    of young people are being used as cannon fodder in Iraq.

    Responsibility for their suffering rests with the criminals

    in the White House who launched the war of aggression, and more

    broadly, the entire US political establishment which is united

    on maintaining the indefinite occupation of Iraq.



    Copyright 1998-2004

    World Socialist Web Site

    All rights reserved





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



    15) Troops Round Up Corpses, Weapons in Fallouja

    THE CONFLICT IN IRAQ

    Their operation in the city has shifted to cleanup and

    rebuilding, amid sporadic fighting.

    By Patrick J. McDonnell

    Times Staff Writer

    November 19, 2004

    http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-fallouja19nov19,1,370254
    6.story



    FALLOUJA, Iraq - The Marines used a grappling hook with a long line

    to shift the battered body, so they would be protected by distance if

    the corpse were booby-trapped.



    "It's tough work," said Pfc. Keel Jesse, wearing surgical gloves and

    a mask, like the other U.S. troops collecting dead insurgents. "But

    someone has to do it."



    Down the road, in the city's gritty, industrial southeast, Army Capt.

    Douglas Walters was getting ready to blow up a car bomb factory, where

    an already-rigged Chevrolet Suburban was parked with a current Texas

    registration sticker in the windshield.



    "They had everything they needed here," Walters said, surveying what

    might look like an auto body shop but for the boxes of mortar rounds

    and other explosives.



    The battle for this former rebel stronghold has shifted to cleanup and
    reconstruction, even though pockets of resistance remain. Fighters

    occasionally emerge from homes or bunkers to fire at U.S.-led forces,

    but the troops are going house to house to wipe them out.



    A trip with Marine officers on Thursday offered a glimpse of what passes

    for life in this devastated, still largely deserted city, which became

    a worldwide symbol of resistance to U.S. power last spring. Amid the

    sporadic fighting, some troops have turned to such tasks as clearing

    out arms caches and organizing humanitarian aid.



    "This is not a linear battle, where one part ends and you move on to

    the next thing," said Marine Col. Craig Tucker, who heads one of the

    two regimental combat teams that swept down from the north early last

    week. "We have a lot of things going on at once right now."



    On Thursday, most of the explosions appeared to be the result of

    troops blowing up some of the trove of captured munitions. U.S.

    airstrikes, artillery blasts and mortar fire have diminished

    substantially.



    More civilians are emerging now, often carrying white flags, but they

    are still a rare sight in this beaten city. Some have gathered at

    places like Al Hadra al Muhammadiya mosque, once a hotbed of rebel

    activity but now a clinic and help center staffed by U.S.-allied

    Iraqi troops.



    "What about my father and my uncles?" Yhedder Ahmed, 14, asked as

    Tucker stopped by the mosque. On a previous visit, the commander

    had promised to find out the status of the men, who were arrested

    as insurgents.



    "Tell him that his father and uncles are doing well, but they were

    found with weapons and will remain in custody," Tucker told the boy

    through an interpreter. "No harm will come to them."



    The Iraqi commander, Col. Saad Ali, was worried about what would

    happen as refugees begin returning to a city that lacked a

    functioning infrastructure or economy.



    "The men must have jobs," said Ali, who hails from the southern

    city of Basra.



    Earlier in the week, an Iraqi who was waiting in line at the center

    was shot dead. In Fallouja, even seeking medical aid at a clinic

    sponsored by U.S. forces might be considered collaboration by some.



    Across the street to the north, Marines used wheelchairs to lug ammo

    boxes and weapons next to a building bearing the inscription, Islamic

    Benevolent Committee of Fallouja. The two-story facility had

    apparently been a combination clinic and guerrilla command center.



    The compound, U.S. commanders said, had been overrun while it

    was occupied by followers of Abu Musab Zarqawi, the Jordanian-

    born militant said to have been based in Fallouja.



    Inside, Marines found literature and banners of Zarqawi's group,

    Jamaat al Tawhid wal Jihad, which has renamed itself the Qaeda

    Organization for Jihad in Iraq. A computer and files also were

    seized.



    Outside, troops discovered two weapons caches in white metal

    containers, including antiaircraft missiles, land mines, mortar

    shells and AK-47 rifles. Lacking wheelbarrows, Marines used

    wheelchairs from the clinic to take the materiel to a vacant lot,

    where it was to be blown up.



    Deep in the southeastern sector, a dense, mazelike neighborhood of

    junkyards and anonymous automotive service outlets, soldiers had

    cordoned off several blocks. This industrial zone had long been

    known as a redoubt of insurgents; it had been pummeled by airstrikes

    for weeks before the invasion.



    Inside the cordoned zone, amid the dozens of seemingly identical

    storefront workshops, troops found a car bomb factory and, two

    doors down, a site where roadside bombs were manufactured.



    At the car bomb site, parts of vehicle doors were hung on the

    walls. They were often removed to pack explosives, then reattached

    to the vehicles. A welding machine stood in the main work area

    alongside boxes of ammunition, blasting caps, timers and various

    explosive materials. Inside an office were dozens of license

    plates, presumably from the stolen vehicles used in attacks.



    "This one was ready to go," Walters said, pointing to the green

    Suburban with tinted windows. No one could explain how the vehicle

    got a 2004 Texas inspection sticker.



    The vehicle, along with everything else in the shop and the bomb

    factory, was later destroyed in a booming explosion that shook

    the city.



    In northeastern Fallouja, where some of the most intense fighting

    has been concentrated in recent days, Capt. Lee Johnson tracked

    insurgents.



    Intelligence data led him to almost a dozen homes where suspected

    rebels were holed up, had stayed or had stored weapons. He found

    some of them sitting in a house, their athletic shoes off and

    their weapons nowhere to be seen.



    "They all took their sneakers off and pretended to be civilians,"

    Johnson said.



    As he spoke, he stood alongside a 6-foot bunker dug by insurgents.

    A metal slab placed atop the ditch was meant to provide cover. On

    the streets behind him, his troops - backed by two tanks - were

    going through houses, a hazardous process.



    The streets were littered with spent ammunition from battles that

    occurred early in the invasion. Commanders suspected that guerrillas

    reoccupied some of the houses as troops pushed south.



    U.S. forces estimate that as many as 1,600 guerrillas have been

    killed. Family members and Iraqi volunteers have removed some

    bodies, but the threat of booby-trapped corpses has prompted

    Iraqis to shy away from the grisly task.



    On Thursday, U.S. teams began removing corpses to avert a health

    crisis. Members of one crew threw a grappling hook attached to a

    long line, then turned over the remains while taking cover. Other

    Marines kept their weapons trained on nearby vehicles, alert for

    attacks. After it was deemed safe, the bodies were quickly zipped

    into black vinyl bags and hoisted onto a 7-ton truck.



    They were taken to a makeshift morgue with refrigeration units on

    the grounds of a former potato farm, Tucker said. There, he added,

    the people of Fallouja could claim the remains of their husbands,

    sons and fathers.



    Copyright 2004 Los Angeles Times












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