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APRIL
30-21, 03
Archives |
 
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This is what U.S. cluster bombs do |
Cluster Bombs
Used
Also in Iraq April 30, 2003
It is an anti-personnel fragmentation bomb that consists
of a large bombshell holding 670 tennis ball-sized bomblets, each of which
contain 300 metal fragments. If all the bomblets detonate, some 200,000 steel
fragments will be propelled over an area the size of several football fields,
creating a deadly killing zone. Because the fragments travel at high velocity,
when they strike people they set up pressure waves within the body that do
horrific damage to soft tissue and organs: even a single fragment hitting
somewhere else in the body can rupture the spleen, or cause the intestines to
explode. This is not an unfortunate, unintended side-effect; these bombs were
designed to do this. During its wars in Indochina, the U.S. dropped enormous
amounts of cluster bombs. A B-52 bomber fitted with two Hayes dispensers could
drop 25,000 bomblets on a single bombing run. itvs.org
The
Next President April 30, 2003
by Geov Parrish WHILE
NEWS MEDIA are saturated with field reports from Iraq and Seattle war protesters
fume over unprovoked attacks from police, the battle that should concern
everyone the most is taking place away from the headlines. Welcome
to the 2004 presidential race. It'll be over--except for the voting, of
course--before 2004 even begins. For the long-term freedom, health, prosperity,
and security of Americans--and the world's other 6 billion people and all its
other species, too--there is no more critical task in the coming months than to
oust George W. Bush and the lunatics surrounding him in November 2004. seattleweekly.com
Conspiracy
Theories
April 30, 2003 Americans are now forced to do what they find hardest in
life: consider that the world does not revolve around them, that they are
secondary players on the global stage. The fate of the United States is in the
hands of other peoples, in other nations, whose strategies of resistance to the
Bush men's transparent grab for planetary hegemony will determine the general
character of the Pirate's inevitable failure. Blacks, other threatened
ethnicities, the poor, and political progressives of all backgrounds will have a
difficult enough time keeping heads above water and bodies out of prison as the
Bush men thrash about in a world they cannot master, and chickens come home to
roost. The United States is about to be redlined by the international community, and there
is nothing that Americans, pro- or anti-war, can do about it. The
good news is, American life as we know it is about to come to an end. The bad
news is... American life as we know it is about to come to an end. blackcommentator.com
 Strangely,
Bush Continues His Visit With the Children April 30, 2003
Word
of the tragedy first came to President Bush in
the hallway of a school in Sarasota, Florida at 8:46 a.m., soon after the first
plane hit New York's World Trade Center. Bush was escorted to an empty room
where he spoke by phone with National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice.
Strangely, Bush continues his visit with the children. Then, at 9:04 a.m., while
Bush listened to second-graders reading, staff chief Andrew H. Card Jr.
whisperered in his ear that a second plane had struck the other trade center
tower. Bush continued to listen to the second-graders read, smiling, he joked
that they “read so well, they must be sixth-graders.”
Click
for RealVideo (excerpt 7 megabytes)
Cutbacks
Imperil Health Coverage for States' Poor April 30, 2003
By ROBIN TONER and ROBERT PEAR WASHINGTON, April 27 —
Millions of low-income Americans face the loss of health insurance or sharp cuts
in benefits, like coverage for prescription drugs and dental care, under
proposals now moving through state legislatures around the country. State officials and health policy experts say the cuts
will increase the number of uninsured, threaten recent progress in covering
children and impose severe strains on hospitals, doctors and nursing homes. nytimes.com
Toys that explode for children |
Jewish Group Uses Toys To Blast
Palestinian Schools (So
these are God's chosen people) April
29, 2003 By Maha Abdul Hadi Palestine Correspondent OCCUPIED JERUSALEM, A radical right-wing Jewish group that claimed
responsibility for recent explosions rocking a number of Palestinian schools
used attractive toy-like explosive devices to cause large numbers of casualties,
a Palestinian human rights organization said Saturday, April 26. "An
organization calling itself ‘Revenge of the Babies’ that detonated
explosives at occupied Jerusalem, al-Khalil and Jenin along with other
aggressive activities, planted the load in boxes apparently attractive to the
school pupils," Al-Haqq organization said in a report. islam-online.net
Iraqis killed in protest April
29, 2003 Thirteen Iraqis were reportedly killed when US forces opened fire
on demonstrators. There are conflicting reports as to what happened on Monday
night in the town, which lies 50 kilometres (35 miles) west of Baghdad. A US
spokesman said soldiers started shooting after people in the crowd fired on them
- but Iraqi witnesses said the protesters were unarmed. American forces are
reported to have entered Falluja for the first time two days ago. A local Sunni
cleric, Kamal Shaker Mahmoud, said the demonstrators were unarmed and had gone
to a local school occupied by US forces to ask them to leave, Reuters news
agency reports. "It was a peaceful demonstration. They did not have any
weapons. They were asking the Americans to leave the school so they could use
it," the cleric is quoted as saying. According to local residents, several
children were among the dead. bbc.co.uk
Israeli calls for "regime change" in Iran
and Syria April 29, 2003 By Jonathan
Wright The Israeli ambassador in Washington has called for "regime
change" in Iran and Syria through diplomatic isolation, economic sanctions
and what he calls "psychological pressure". Ambassador Daniel Ayalon
said on Monday the U.S. invasion of Iraq and overthrow of Iraqi President Saddam
Hussein helped create great opportunities for Israel but it was "not
enough". swissinfo.org
Female workers file bias suit
against Wal-Mart April 29, 2003 By Karen
Gullo Wal-Mart Stores Inc. female employees said in a
lawsuit seeking lost pay and damages on behalf of as many as 1.6 million female
workers that they had to visit strip clubs while on business and were called
"little Janie Qs" by male managers. Statements
from 110 female workers claiming they were denied promotions and paid less than
men were filed in a motion requesting class-action status. Wal-Mart denies it
discriminates and says the suit is based on isolated events. If
approved by a judge, the class action would be the largest employment
discrimination suit against a U.S. company. Damages could be in the billions,
said San Francisco employment lawyer Cliff Palefsky. detnews.com
I Wonder
April 29, 2003 by Bill Chickering I wonder when America will say
it's had enough of the lies, the god-posturing, the policy of naked aggression
cloaked with moral assurance and certainty, and the destruction of our freedoms.
I wonder whether or not people will get tired of the day to day struggle of
feeding a family, paying the mortgage or rent and watching their leaders strip
away the threadbare benefits they now receive from their employers. I wonder
when we will grow tired of the thought of perpetual war for the aggrandizement
of the few. And when will we grow weary of our sons and daughters sacrificing
their lives on the altar of one man's ego and sense of divine calling. buzzflash.com
It's the same Guy! April 29, 2003 During the same week, the front covers of
Newsweek and US News and World Report showed the same Iraqi kissing different
soldiers. And the guy also had a prominent spot smashing the statue of Saddam at
the stage-managed pull-down in Baghdad. Surely Hollywood will soon be calling
for this hot young actor. Enlargement_thememoryhole.org
Top
5 reasons why the Iraqi people should be more like Americans:
April 29, 2003 by: dwilson - Reason
# 1: According to a
recently published Census Bureau's report on income and poverty in America, the
inequality of family incomes, as measured by the Gini
index, was at its highest since the Census Bureau started publishing annual
figures in 1947. The amount of money required to bring poor American households
up to the poverty line is amazingly small: 0.5% of GDP, or just over 3% of the
income of the richest fifth of households. Clearly it's much more important that
the affluent be able to buy stocks and SUVs than to accomplish this
bleeding-heart goal. However, our leaders have made promises and can be trusted
to provide food and health care to all of the 25 million Iraqi people. Reason # 2:
As the people of Iraq
recover from the brutality committed against them by the U.S. military, they can
look forward to decades of further death and destruction as they adopt Amercan
cultural values and ways. The USA is far and away the Murder Capital of the
World. Americans kill more than 15,000 Americans each year. No other major
industrialized country comes close. A majority
of
these murders are committed by family members or friends. Who needs enemies when
you have friends like us. Reasons
# 3, 4, 5
 The Other War The Bush Administration and the
End of Civil Liberties April 28, 2003 by
ELAINE CASSEL Our war on terror begins with al Qaeda, but it does not end
there. It will not end until every terrorist group of global reach has been
found, stopped, and defeated.--President George W. Bush, September 20, 2001. It
didn't take President Bush to tell Americans that the world changed on September
11, 2001. But it took Bush, Attorney General John Ashcroft, and an unquestioning
Congress to change the legal foundation of what it means to be "free"
in America. The president declared from the start that it would take more than
military might to wage the fight. This war would require a new arsenal of laws
and regulations at home. And he got them. If the September 11 suicide hijackers
hated us for our freedoms, as the president also said, today there is less to
hate. counterpunch.org
US will provide no estimate of Iraqi war
casualties April 28, 2003 By Jerry Isaacs
Bush administration and Pentagon officials have made it clear they have no
intention of providing an official estimate of the number of Iraqi soldiers and
civilians who were killed or wounded by US and British forces during the
three-week war. According to the military brass, the US no long does “body
counts,” a reference to the often-inflated battlefield reports that
contributed to galvanizing international and domestic opposition to the Vietnam
War. In line with its efforts to sanitize the image of the US military, the
Pentagon and the US news media have decided to conceal from the world and the
American public the extent of the massacre that has occurred in Iraq. The
military is following the precedent established by then-chairman of the Joint
Chiefs of Staff Colin Powell, who declared after the first Gulf War that he was
“not terribly interested” wsws.org
Jobless and Hopeless, Many Quit the Labor
Force April 28, 2003 By MONICA DAVEY with
DAVID LEONHARDT Worn down by job searches that have stretched on for months,
demoralized by disappointing offers or outright rejections, some unemployed
people have simply stopped the search. As the nation enters a third year of
difficult economic times, these unemployed — from factory workers to
investment bankers — have dropped out of the labor force and entered the
invisible ranks of people not counted in the unemployment rate. nytimes.com
'Peaceful'
nuclear power fuels spread of weapons April
27, 2003 Stephen Koff North Korea announces it has nuclear weapons and
could make more, and analysts say South Korea, Japan and Taiwan could follow.
Iran is building a plant to enrich uranium, possibly for a bomb, and experts say
Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Syria and even postwar Iraq, depending on its new
government, could be next.
The world is teetering on the brink of a new nuclear arms race. Countries are
seeking to get the deadliest of weapons as it becomes clear their neighbors and
regional rivals are already doing so, CIA Director George Tenet recently told
Congress. The "domino theory of the 21st century may well be nuclear,"
Tenet said. A major way such a dangerous arms race has become possible is the
ready availability of a source of weapons material - ordinary nuclear power
reactors. cleveland.com
Biting the (Bush) budget bullet Why raising taxes is the least painful way
out of the state's fiscal crisis April 27,
2003 By Peter R. Orszag and Joseph E. Stiglitz LIKE MASSACHUSETTS, STATE
governments across the nation are facing budget deficits of historic
proportions. Next year, they will face combined projected shortfalls of between
$70 billion and $85 billion-or about 15 percent of all the money they spend out
of their general funds. In response, they are cutting back on vital services,
curtailing school hours, and restricting access to Medicaid, as well as raising
tuition at public universities and increasing taxes. boston.com
 Can
An Entire Country Go Mad? April 26, 2003 By Ernest
Partridge Can an entire country go mad? Of course it can! And history
provides many examples: the Salem Colony during the witch trials (and its 20th
century counterpart, the McCarthy mania), Nazi Germany, Cambodia under Pol Pot,
and arguably the United States under George Bush. Worse yet, most people living
at a time of national
derangement perceive that condition as perfectly normal, and even moral. And
pity the poor soul who sees things differently: the "one-eyed person in the
land of the blind." If we are even to suggest that the American public has,
by and large, gone bonkers, we should begin with a definition of
"sanity" and, by implication, of "insanity." Perhaps Sigmund
Freud said it best: a sane person is someone with an operating "reality
principle" – someone who checks his beliefs against the readily-available
promptings of "the real world." democraticunderground.com
Why won’t Washington allow the UN
weapons inspectors into Iraq? April 26, 2003 By
Peter Symonds There is simply no credible justification for the refusal of
the Bush administration this week to allow the return of UN weapons inspectors
to Iraq. In fact, White House spokesmen have not even bothered to try. The US
and its military allies invaded and occupied Iraq on the pretext that the
Hussein regime had vast stocks of “weapons of mass destruction,” If there
were any truth in its claims, Washington would have welcomed the involvement of
UN weapons experts to provide independent verification, and thus a veneer of
legitimacy, to the US occupation of Iraq. Instead, the Bush administration is
now doing everything it accused Saddam Hussein of. It is refusing to abide by
the terms of UN resolutions on Iraq. It has arrogantly rejected calls by Russia,
France and other countries for the return of UN inspection teams. And it baldly
declares that its officials and scientists should be believed without
independent corroboration. In short, the US is acting as a “rogue state,”
flouting the demands of the “international community”. wsws.org
Bush Shows 'Pattern of Hostility' Toward
Civil Rights April 26, 2003 Jim Lobe The
administration of President George W. Bush is steadily and systematically working to reverse longstanding civil
rights policies and impede the enforcement of U.S. civil rights laws, according
to a new report released Thursday by the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights
Education Fund (LCCREF). "For defenders of civil rights, this is a perilous
time," warned the LCCREF, a coalition of rights and religious groups whose
members include the National Council of Churches, the National Organization for
Women, and the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, among other grassroots groups. The groups charge that Bush and his
aides appear determined to impose what the report called "a radical view of
the Constitution in which states' rights are paramount" both through the
adoption of policies and regulations that undermine the basis on which federal
civil-rights protections stand and by packing the federal appeals courts with
"right-wing ideologues." yahoo.com
Stop Congress from Rolling Back Key Civil
Rights Protections April 26, 2003 Earlier
this month the Senate made clear that it would not allow federally funded
religious discrimination. Despite this, the Bush Administration and
several Members of Congress continue to promote religious discrimination with
taxpayer funds. Their most recent legislative attempt would roll-back key
civil rights protections and will soon be considered on the House
floor. The legislation -- the Workforce Reinvestment and Adult Education
Act (HR
1261) -- jeopardizes civil rights and religious freedom because it would
roll back protection against discrimination or misuse of government funds by
religious organizations. For the first time ever, it allows religious
organizations involved in federal job training programs to discriminate
according to religion when hiring staff for these taxpayer-funded services. aclu.org
US Forces Make Iraqis Strip and Walk Naked in
Public
April 26, 2003 The newspaper Dagbladet
(Norway) published photos of armed US soldiers forcing Iraqi men to walk
naked through a park. On the chests of the men had been scrawled an Arabic
phrase that translates as "Ali Baba - Thief." A military officer
states that the men are thieves, and that this technique will be used again. No
word yet from the newly liberated Iraqi people about some of them being
summarily found guilty of theft, forced at gunpoint to strip, having a racist
phrase written on their bodies, and then made to walk naked in public. No doubt
the Arab/Muslim world is impressed by this display of "democracy,"
"freedom," "due process," and "no cruel or unusual
punishment." We wonder if the soldiers will be using this technique on
their comrades who stole
$13.1 million in Iraq. Or the journalists who
looted Iraq's art. thememoryhole.org
U.S. Arms Dealer To Run Iraq’s
‘Humanitarian Relief’ April 26, 2003 (IslamOnline.net
& News Agencies) – Although the overwhelming majority countries agree
that the U.N. must be at the heart of the reconstruction and administration of
post-war Iraq, the U.S. once again challenged the will of the international
community and appointed a retired U.S. arms dealer - whose company helps the
U.S. bomb Baghdad - to oversee “humanitarian relief and rebuilding of Iraq”.
islamonline.net
 British
Gulf troops face tests for
cancer April 25, 2003 Paul Brown
Soldiers returning from the Gulf will be offered tests to check levels of
depleted uranium in their bodies to assess whether they are in danger of
suffering kidney damage and lung cancer as a result of exposure, the Ministry of
Defence said last night. The ministry was responding to a warning earlier in the
day from the Royal Society, Britain's premier scientific body, that soldiers and
civilians might be exposed to dangerous levels. It challenged earlier
reassurances from the defence secretary, Geoff Hoon, that depleted uranium was
not a risk. guardian.co.uk
Americans are being told that depleted
uranium weapons are safe and pose no health or environmental threats. When U.S.
soldiers return home sick with systemic radiation poisoning the government gives
the sickness a funny name, 'Gulf War Syndrome,' insinuating a possible psychological
disorder. American soldiers have been told that it's all in their heads and they
are faking and they should get over it, and when their wives give birth to armless
legless children the government is silent. tpv editor
Journalism Under Siege
April 26, 2003 In spite of the U.S. corporate media's biased
pro-war coverage, outrageous examples of media
manipulation and the actual targeting
of journalists by the U.S. military in Iraq is mirrored regularly in the
Occupied Territories of Palestine. In the West Bank city of Nablus on Saturday
19 April, another journalist
was murdered by the Israeli military. Such incidents,
as well as the limiting
of access to the Territories for journalists who might report these
atrocities, appears to be standard policy for the forces of repression and
empire. http://indymedia.org/
Something deeply corrupt is consuming
journalism. A war so one-sided it was
hardly a war was reported like a Formula One race, as the teams sped to the
chequered flag in Baghdad, April 26, 2003 John Pilger On
8 April, newspapers around the world carried a despatch from a Reuters
correspondent, "embedded" with the US army, about the murder of a
ten-year-old Iraqi boy. An American private had "unloaded machine-gun fire
and the boy . . . fell dead on a garbage-strewn stretch of wasteland". The
tone of the report was highly sympathetic to the soldier, "a softly spoken
21-year-old" who, "although he has no regrets about opening fire, it
is clear he would rather it was not a child he killed". The child-killing
soldier was allowed uncritically to describe those like his victim as
"cowards". There was no suggestion that the Americans were invading
the victim's homeland. Perhaps guessing that readers might be feeling just a
touch uncomfortable at this stage, the Reuters correspondent added his own
reassuring words: "Before - like many young soldiers - he [the soldier]
says he was anxious to get his first 'kill' in a war. Now, he seems more
mature." pilger.carlton.com
Top US State department official calls
Gingrich an "idiot" April 26, 2003 LISBON
(AFP) A top US State Department official called former congressman and
current Pentagon adviser Newt Gingrich an "idiot" in an interview published
here. US Assistant Secretary of State for European Affairs Elizabeth Jones was
asked to comment on Gingrich's recent harsh criticism of her department's Middle
East diplomacy. "Newt Gingrich does not speak in the name of the Pentagon
and what he said is garbage," US Assistant Secretary of State for European
Affairs Elizabeth Jones told the Publico daily. "What Gingrich says does
not interest me. He is an idiot and you can publish that," she added. yahoo.com
SECRETARY OF THE ARMY THOMAS E. WHITE
RESIGNS April 26, 2003 Secretary Thomas E.
White today submitted his resignation as Secretary of the Army. Secretary of
Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld expressed his appreciation to Secretary White for his
long and able service to the country, first as a career U.S. Army officer and
then as Secretary of the Army for the past two years. The effective date of his
resignation is to be determined. defenselink.mil/news
Fenced off Lafayette Park
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High Price of Empire: the new White House bunker
mentality April 25, 2003 After beating up on
Iraq and Afghanistan, the Bush regime is increasingly frightened by the American
people. George W. Bush, "Emperor of the World" as the Europeans like
to call him, may be swaggering around this week after his forces demolished the
poor country of Iraq, but he fears his legitimacy among the American people. As
Bush builds his fundamentalist global empire, there are increasing signs that he
distrusts the American people, most of whom never voted for him in 2000. These
signs are more evident than ever with a new fence that has gone up around the
White House compound. Actually, the White House has now completely fenced off
Lafayette Park, a public park across from the White House where hundreds of
thousands of Americans have protested over the years. The Bush regime may have
an arsenal of precision-guided bombs and weapons of mass destruction, but it
still relies on high fences to keep out the American people who are interested
in democracy, not empire-building. infoshop.org
Russian official predicts 'catastrophic'
events April 25 2003
A top Russian Foreign Ministry official was quoted as saying yesterday in Tokyo
that a "catastrophic" development of events in the US-North Korean
nuclear standoff was imminent and could occur within the next day. "It is
probable that, as early as tomorrow, there will be a catastrophic development of
events," Itar-Tass quoted Deputy Foreign Minister Alexander Losyukov as
saying. He added that the standoff had "reached an extreme stage" but
did not give a more detailed explanation about his warning. smh.com.au
"War means an intensification of the
exploitation of the US working class" April
25, 2003 “War and the social crisis in the United States.” The
resolution begins by noting that the turn to unbridled militarism by the Bush
administration is a manifestation of the deep-going internal crisis of American
society, which finds its most acute expression in levels of social inequality
not seen since the 1920s. If one considers the character of the demonstrations
that have taken place in the United States and internationally, it becomes clear
that this imperialist war has served as a catalyst to draw millions of people
into political struggle. But the streams that are contributing to this growth of
social dissent and political struggle have many sources—first and foremost,
the growth of social inequality, the attack on democratic rights, the inability
of broad masses to persuade or influence the capitalist state. wsws.org
Welcome to the Fourth Reich! April
25, 2003 By Sandra Here it is, The Truth. Many have told me you
won't care, that you will call it irrelevant. The truth is that we are in the
midst of the Fourth Reich. I know it sounds absurd, but it's true. President
George W. Bush's grandfather, Prescott Bush, was a NAZI SYMPATHIZER. He
personally financed the building of over 40 concentration camps including
Auschwitz. How did he do this and how does this relate to "Junior?"
Let me explain. theindependentjournal.com
U.S. Reporter Who Protested Iraq War
Fired April 25, 2003 A San Francisco
Chronicle reporter suspended after being arrested at a rally opposed to the U.S.
invasion of Iraq lost his job on Wednesday, a spokesman for the paper said. The
Chronicle suspended technology reporter Henry Norr, 57, last month, after he was
among more than 1,300 people arrested for blocking public streets the morning
after the Iraq war started. "He no longer works at the Chronicle, effective
today," spokesman Joe Brown said. news.yahoo.com
Fund-raiser for GOP
pleads guilty in case of child pornography
April 24, 2003 By
Allison Klein
Delgaudio took pictures of a 16-year-old girl A prominent Republican fund-raiser who once said former
President Bill Clinton was "a lawbreaker and a terrible example to our
nation's young people" pleaded guilty yesterday in Baltimore Circuit Court
to production of child pornography. Richard Anthony Delgaudio, who was sentenced
to two years' probation before judgment, admitted to taking lewd photographs of
a 16-year-old girl he met in East Baltimore's Patterson Park in 2001. In some of
the photos, he was engaged in sex with her, court records show. sunspot.net
America:
Too Far Gone? April 24, 2003 by
"Axle" When one thinks of how deep the sewage goes and how
well the Cenobites of Satan have entrenched themselves. It is very hard to be
optimistic. No laws are ever rescinded. A simple mental extrapolation of the
current situation provides a very bleak outlook on the future. This once great
country, The United States of America, can go nowhere but down... Many say,
"we must elect people that will return us to proper Constitutional
Government." Yeah, I bought that golden turd at one time, but the idea is
laughable to me now. With technology, population size, and World Government,
there is no turning back now. It's full speed ahead, straight to Hades. sianews.com
U.S.-led Invasion Morphs into Occupation
April 24, 2003 Although the bulk of the fighting in Iraq has subsided, the
aftermath of the war is only beginning. The civilian death count has yet
to be reported, and the Pentagon announced that it "has
no plans" to determine how many civilians were killed or injured during
the war. US forces remain firmly entrenched in Iraq, where they are likely
to remain for a long-term occupation. But last week, as Iraqi civilians
looted hospitals and archaelogical museums, US troops were busy
protecting the Ministry of Oil building. The US military continues to
impinge on the freedom of the press in Iraq, banning
from the Palestine Hotel members of the human rights group Voices in the
Wilderness. This occured after VITW released a press
release outline US failures in Iraq. http://indymedia.org/
Bush's World War Four Fall of Iraq sets
up new "Clashes of Civilizations"
April 24, 2003 By Larry Chin
According to the Bush administration, the "liberation" of Iraq was an
easy US military "cakewalk," warmly greeted by cheering Iraqis who
welcome their nation's "reconstruction." The truth is infinitely more
grotesque. Iraq, mysteriously given up by its own military, is being erased from
the map, replaced by a new US puppet regime. The sequential global war waged
under the fabricated
pretext of September
11, 2001, and driven by Peak
Oil (confirmed by a recent BBC
analysis), with Iraq a key
prize, continues. The first casualty of war is truth. In Iraq, the truth has
been raped, butchered and left for dead. onlinejournal.com
Fox News nailed in Iraq looting charge
April 24, 2003 A US Fox television news employee has been charged with smuggling
artworks and monetary bonds from Iraq. Benjamin James Johnson - an engineer for
Fox news - stands accused of bringing into the US 12 paintings taken from a
palace belonging to Saddam Hussein's son Uday and also of making false
statements to the police. news.bbc.co.uk
Citizen Groups to Urge Supreme Court to Uphold
Integrity of U.S. Constitution, Deny Corporate 'Right to Lie' Claim in Nike Case
April 23, 2003
A broad range of public interest and citizen groups will rally in support of
Marc Kasky and the integrity of the Bill of Rights and against Nike's claim to a
Constitutional "right to lie." Speakers representing the Sierra Club,
ReclaimDemocracy.org, and Educating for Justice, along with a legal expert in
corporate personhood, will explain the vast consequences that would result from
a Court-sanctioned corporate "right to lie," damages that would affect
everything from the environment to human rights to consumer rights to the
quality of our democracy. usnewswire.com
Mounting attacks on free speech in US April
23, 2003 By Henry Michaels Even as
the Bush administration claims to be bringing democracy and political liberty to
Iraq, it is spearheading a deepening assault on basic democratic rights at all
levels in the United States. Emboldened by the military conquest of Iraq and
armed with the Bush administration’s Patriot Act, which authorizes
far-reaching restrictions on civil liberties in the name of the “war on
terrorism,” officials at federal, state and municipal levels are taking
draconian steps to stifle political dissent. In Oregon, for example, right-wing
radio show hosts and Republican legislators are pushing a state anti-terrorism
bill that would allow authorities to jail street-blocking protesters for at
least 25 years. wsws.org
A nation lost
April 23, 2003
By James Carroll EVEN BEFORE conclusions can be drawn about the war in
Iraq (Saddam? Weapons of mass destruction? Iraqi stability? Cost to civilians?
Syria?) a home front consensus is jelling around a radical revision of America's
meaning in the world. Centered on coercive unilateralism, the new doctrine
assumes that the United States not only stands apart from other countries but
above them. The primitive tribalism of boys at football games -- ''We're number
one!'' -- has been transformed into an axiom of strategy. Military force has
replaced democratic idealism as the main source of US influence. boston.com
Children held at Camp Xray, US admits April
23, 2003 The US military has revealed
it is holding juveniles at its high-security prison for terrorists at Guantanamo
Bay in Cuba, known as Camp Xray. The commander of the joint task force at
Guantanamo, Major General Geoffrey Miller, says more than one child under the
age of 16 is at the detention centre. However, Maj Gen Miller has revealed
little more about their welfare. Maj Gen Miller says the US is holding
"juvenile enemy combatants" at the centre, confirming rumours of
children being held. abc.net.au
Empire vs. Republic
April 23, 2003 By Robert Parry George W. Bush’s doctrine of
preemptive wars is creating a new deep divide in U.S. politics. On one side,
Bush and his backers see the Iraq War as the start of an American global empire
built around unparalleled military power. On the other, a scattered grouping of
skeptics dig in for what they see as a fight for the soul of the American
republic. Yet as imbalanced as this struggle now appears, both sides agree that
it holds in its outcome the future of the American democratic experiment. consortiumnews.com
Rumsfeld calls for regime change in North
Korea April 23,
2003 By David Rennie A secret Donald
Rumsfeld memorandum calling for regime change in North Korea was leaked
yesterday, opening a fresh foreign policy split in the Bush administration. The
classified discussion paper, circulated by the defence secretary, appears to cut
directly across State Department plans to disarm Kim Jong-il, the North's
dictator, through threats leavened by promises that his regime is not a target
for overthrow. telegraph.co.uk
Bush aides discuss 'punishment' for France
April 23, 2003
Senior aides to U.S. President George Bush met this week to consider ways to
punish France for its opposition to the war on Iraq, including sidelining Paris
at NATO and limiting its participation in transatlantic forums, officials said. japantoday.com
 Poor
Sean Hannity
April 23, 2003 By Charley Reese Sean Hannity, a radio talk-show
host and Fox News whiner, has a one-rut mind. Every criticism or dissent, no
matter what the subject, the topic or the source, is a left-wing attack against
his hero, George W. Bush. Well, what can you expect from an immature groupie?
Every time he tries to think, his face reflects the pain of the effort. But he
really showed his emptiness recently when he said that criticism of the United
States failing to guard the Iraqi National Museum was — you guessed it —
just left-wing soreheads who are mad that President Bush's war has been so
successful. reese.king-online.com
Pope puts pressure on US
April 23, 2003 By Owen Bowcott The Pope
sent a coded rebuke to Washington yesterday when he urged Iraqis to take charge
of rebuilding their country while working closely with the international
community. In the Vatican's diplomatic lexicon, the phrase "international
community" normally refers to the UN. Before the conflict started, Pope
John Paul II vigorously opposed the US-led assault and advocated resolution of
the crisis in the UN general assembly. guardian.co.uk
The
new dark age The looting and burning of Iraq's museums and libraries has left us
all losers April
21, 2003 Ben Okri We are now at the epicentre of a shift in the history
of the world. The war against Iraq has unleashed unsuspected forces. The first
signs are twofold. The need of the Americans to protect oil fields, but not
hospitals, museums and libraries. This is a catastrophic failure of imagination
and a signal absence of a sense of the true values of civilization. It does not
bode well for the future. The second sign is in the Iraqi people. We ask why
have they turned on themselves, looted their own museums, and burnt their
priceless National Library. The answer is simple. Some have been dehumanized.
They have been broken by sanctions, crushed by tyranny and annihilated by the
doctrine of overwhelming force. guardian.co.uk
Schools Not Teaching Pro-Israel
Views To Lose Funding Congress To Pass
'Ideological Diversity' Legislation April
21, 2003 By Michael Collins Piper American Free Press Republican members
of the Senate are planning to introduce police-state- style "thought
control" legislation designed to prohibit criticism of Israel on American
college campuses. The third-ranking Republican member of the U.S. Senate,
conservative Rick Santorum (Pa.), plans to introduce so-called "ideological
diversity" legislation that would cut federal funding for thousands of
American colleges and universities if those institutions are found to be
permitting professors, students and student organizations to openly criticize
Israel, which Santorum considers to be an act of "anti-Semitism." rense.com
Mccarthy |
Hollywood revives McCarthyist climate by
silencing and sacking war critics April 21
2003 By Andrew Gumbel Hollywood is often depicted in the US media
as a hotbed of anti-government dissent and left-wing politics but that is not
how it feels to Ed Gernon. Mr Gernon was, until recently, a television producer
at CBS responsible for a four-part miniseries on Hitler's rise to power, which
will be shown next month. He thought the timing was apt, and said so in an
interview with TV Guide magazine. "It basically boils down to an entire
nation gripped by fear, who ultimately chose to give up their civil rights and
plunged the whole nation into war," he said. "I can't think of a
better time to examine this history than now." independent.co.uk
Welcome To The Pale
April 21, 2003 By R. B. Ham I just got through reading an explosive
essay by Jackson
Thoreau. The
U.S. Iran-Contra Secret Government Rears its Ugly Head in Today's Bush
Administration raises many issues that are still not being openly debated in
the mainstream media, let alone acknowledged. Mr. Thoreau's own newspaper that
employs him apparently refused to run this article. Mr. Thoreau is just one of
countless others who have run up against the Pale Wall. Journalists and
entertainers have been running into this wall with astonishing regularity. This
Pale Wall is a well constructed and constantly manned parapet of ideological
thought control. shaw.ca
Radio Host Alex Jones Listener Incarcerated
For Believing Alex Jones April 21, 2003 This is the first
case that I am aware of, of an Alex Jones listener who has been arrested and
taken into mental health custody because he has believed in and promoted Alex
Jone's tapes and materials. server.co
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