[Peace] News notes 2005-10-16

[Carl Estabrook]

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        Notes from last week's "global war on terrorism,"
        for the Sunday, 16 October 2005, meeting of AWARE,
        "Anti-War Anti-Racism Effort" of Champaign-Urbana.
        (Sources provided on request; some are indicated.)
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[1] Iraqis were invited to vote on the constitution that the US had
prepared for them, and the vote was overseen by the US military.  Most
Iraqis had not seen the text of the constitution, and it was announced
this week that it may be altered after the vote.  Not surprisingly,
turnout was lower than in the January election for the transitional
parliament, when many Iraqis thought a successful vote would end the
occupation.  Patrick Cockburn writes from Iraq, "The need for the White
House to produce a fantasy picture of Iraq is because it dare not admit
that it has engineered one of the greatest disasters in American history.
It is worse than Vietnam, because the enemy is punier and the original
ambitions greater."  One may doubt the last point, but Cockburn's long
article in the Independent/UK this week is the best summary I've seen of
the situation in Iraq.

[2] The letter allegedly sent by al-Qaida leader Zawahiri to Zarqawi in
Iraq is pretty clearly a forgery: Juan Cole of Informed Content concludes
from internal evidence that it was written by a Shi'ite, not an Egyptian
Sunni like Zawahiri.  The BBC suggested it was a fake, although it's
treated universally by the U.S. media as completely factual.  Iran and the
Shi'ite parties and of course the US are the suspected forgers.

[3] The NYT reports incursions by US troops into Syria and compares Syria
explicitly with Cambodia, invaded by Nixon during the Vietnam War.

[4] Jack Straw, the British Foreign Secretary, said this week, "I am
optimistic about Iraq. I think in five to 10 years [sic] we will see it
becoming stable." Meanwhile, former UK PM Thatcher (admittedly in her
dotage), asked by the Washington Post whether she would have invaded Iraq
given the intelligence at the time, said, "The fact was that there were no
facts, there was no evidence, and there was no proof. As a politician the
most serious decision you can take is to commit your armed services to war
from which they may not return."

[5] A conversation between Bush and Blair In January 30, 2003 (before the
invasion of Iraq) has been revealed: Bush was worried about the
possibility that Hans Blix, the top United Nations weapons inspector,
would report "that Saddam was beginning to cooperate." (Cf. the nightmare
scenario from the Bush-I administration, which was desperately afraid,
after Saddam's invasion of Kuwait in 1990, that he would withdraw from
Kuwait and leave a puppet government as the US had just done in Panama
before the US was able to get its war on.  In both cases, the USG rejected
negotiations in its rush to kill people.)

[6] Bush propaganda continued this week with a staged TV conversation with
US troops, presided over by Deputy Assistant Defense Secretary Allison
Barber (the Barber of Civility?).  It may be a sign of the media's
disenchantment with the administration that the fact it was staged was
revealed.

[7] [A group called] After Downing Street raised money online to pay
serious, non-partisan pollsters to ask if Americans think Congress should
impeach Bush if he lied about his reasons for invading Iraq. (Pollsters
weren't willing to do it otherwise, because apparently it isn't a subject
of public interest [altho' Zogby ran a similar poll last winter].)  As it
turns out, 50% of Americans think Congress should consider impeaching Bush
under those circumstances, while 44% disagree. This is significant news,
because the possibility of impeaching Bush is never, ever mentioned on TV.
Perhaps now as many as one member of Congress will stand up and represent
the views of half of America. For comparison's sake, at the high water
mark for Clinton impeachment fervor when it was on television twenty-four
hours a day-only 36% supported hearings to consider impeachment, and only
26% supported actual impeachment and removal. [tinyrevolution]

[8] I must say that I was one of those who supported the impeachment and
removal of Clinton at the time.  It would have established a modern
precedent for presidential impeachment, and now with hindsight, we can see
that it probably would have prevented George Bush from becoming president
in 2000, if Al Gore was the incumbent.  In Sweden this week, Gore said
that if he had been elected, "We would not have invaded a country that
didn't attack us.  We would not have taken money from the working families
and given it to the most wealthy families.  We would not be trying to
control and intimidate the news media. We would not be routinely [sic]
torturing people..."

[9] Similarly, the latest polls show 59% of Americans want U.S. troops
withdrawn from Iraq "as soon as possible."  It's remarkable how many
Americans support "immediate" withdrawal even though no politicians in any
positions of power, nor any significant news media support that position.
Just imagine what the level of opposition might be if one-third of the
people on talk shows and one-third of the columnists were advocating
immediate withdrawal.

[10] The grand jury investigating the outing of CIA agent Valerie Plame
has less than two weeks to run.  Karl Rove testified again, for 4 1/2
hours.  The NYT reporter and neocon propagandist Judy Miller testified for
just over an hour.  The NYT published two stories on their reporter
Sunday, one written by three staff writers and one written by Miller
herself.  The NYT is less than kind to Miller. According to her own paper,
Miller was a "divisive newsroom figure" who many refused to work with, and
who was permitted to run "amok" with little editorial supervision.
Miller herself says that she "doesn't think" the name came from Cheney's
assistant Libby and she "can't recall" who did give her the name.

[11] On the 10th anniversary of the Million Man March, tens of thousands
marched on the Mall during the 12-hour event. Criticism of the Bush
administration was a consistent theme of the march. People carried signs
reading, "Bush Lied, People Died." Addressing the government's culpability
in the Hurricane Katrina fiasco, event organizer Louis Farrakhan charged
America with "criminal neglect."

[12] Early Friday morning, Russian special forces stormed a police station
in southern Russia. This was the latest in a 24-hour string of bloody
battles and the death toll could top 100. On Thursday morning, large
groups of gunmen assaulted government buildings, telecommunications
facilities and the airport. in the city of Nalchik. Chechen rebels claimed
responsibility for the attacks.

[13] Harold Pinter has won the 2005 Nobel Prize for literature.  He's
known for his activism and writing against the US invasion and occupation
of Iraq. He has called British Prime Minister Tony Blair a "deluded idiot"
and President Bush a "mass murderer."

[14] The US has announced the creation of a new intelligence agency led by
the CIA to co-ordinate all American overseas spying activities. The
National Clandestine Service or NCS will oversee spying by people rather
than by technical means.

[15] In Italy, 45 police officers, prison guards and medical staff went on
trial Wednesday for their role in beating and abusing protesters during
the 2001 G8 summit in Genoa. On Friday another 28 police officers go on
trial for taking part in a violent raid inside a Genoa school during the
summit.

[16] In Haiti, interim Prime Minister Gerard Latortue said that "technical
problems" have forced the government to delay elections set for Nov. 20 by
three weeks. If confirmed, the delay would be the second time the
elections have been postponed. The elections will be the first since the
elected government of President Jean Bertrand-Aristide was overthrown in
February 2004.

[17] Fighting escalated in Afghanistan in the run-up to a visit by
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice.  On Tuesday Rice was in Kyrgyzstan
where she reached an agreement with leaders of the Central Asian country
to maintain use of an aircraft base. In July Kyrgyzstan and three other
Central Asian states called on the U.S to evacuate all its bases in the
region.

[18] Israeli Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz announced that the Israeli army
will appeal last week's court ruling that bans the use of Palestinians as
"human shields" in the occupied territories.

[19] Consumer spending makes up about two-thirds of overall U.S. economic
activity, and consumer confidence in the US is at its lowest point since
1992, during the Bush-I recession, which brought us the Clinton
administration.

[20] John Bolton, the American ambassador to the United Nations, blocked a
United Nations envoy on Monday from briefing the Security Council on
rights violations in the Darfur region of Sudan.  But his new best friends
were interesting: along with the representatives of the US, China, Algeria
and Russia, he prevented Juan Mendez, a special adviser to Secretary
General Kofi Annan for the prevention of genocide, from briefing the
Council on his visit to Darfur, despite pleas from Kofi Annan and the 11
other Council members.

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  C. G. Estabrook, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
  109 Observatory, 901 South Mathews Avenue, Urbana, IL 61801
  ### <www.carlforcongress.org> <www.newsfromneptune.com> ###
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