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Inside the New Print Edition of Our Subscriber-Only Newsletter! Report From the Afghan Front
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Inside the New Print Edition of Our Subscriber-Only Newsletter!
Report From the Afghan Front
It's Obama's War and It's Going Very BadlyExclusively for CounterPunch subcribers, Patrick Cockburn files a special report from Kabul: the Taliban's tightening grip on most of the country; plumetting US popularity in a bankrupt country rotted by corruption. For fifty years, Seymour Melman waged intellectual war on Pentagon capitalism, making the case for peaceful conversion. David Price brings to light decades of FBI secret surveillance. Senator Jim Webb is launching the first determined bid in forty years to overhaul the US criminal justice system at whose call is the American gulag. Alexander Cockburn reports on the prospects for his success. Get your new edition today by subscribing online or calling 1-800-840-3683 Contributions to CounterPunch are tax-deductible. Click here to make a donation. If you find our site useful please: Subscribe Now! CounterPunch books and gear make great presents.
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Today's Stories June 29, 2009 Ishmael Reed June 26-28, 2009 Alexander Cockburn Jeffrey St. Clair Doug Peacock Daniel Wolff Mike Whitney John Ross David Rosen Emily Ratner Gareth Porter Farid Marjai Nadia Hijab Paul Craig Roberts Fred Gardner Carl Ginsburg Paul Watson David Ker Thomson Farzana Versey Geoff Berne Todd Alan Price Ramzy Baroud Jeff Sher Dr. Carol Paris Despite My Arrest by Max Baucus, I Will Continue to Advocate for Quality Health Care for All Walter Brasch Adultery as Family Value? Glen Johnson Charlotte Laws Charles R. Larson Kim Nicolini David Yearsley Lorenzo Wolff Poets' Basement Website of the Weekend June 25, 2009 Kathy Kelly Jack Bratich Wendell Potter Charles R. Larson Alan Farago Jonathan Cook Gareth Porter Bitta Mostofi / David Macaray Mark Schuller Website of the Day June 24, 2009 Andrew Cockburn Dean Baker Andy Worthington James Bovard Diana Gibson / P. Sainath Gareth Porter Robert Alvarez Dave Lindorff Steven Colatrella Remembering Giovanni Arrighi Website of the Day
June 23, 2009 David Price Patrick Cockburn James Ridgeway / Dave Lindorff Carmelo Ruiz-Marrero Gary Leupp Brian M. Downing Robert Bryce Nicholas Dearden Yousef Munayyer Website of the Day June 22, 2009 Michael Hudson Esam Al-Amin Chris Floyd Jack Z. Bratich Atash Yaghmaian Laura Carlsen Paul Craig Roberts Vijay Prashad Fred Gardner Andy Thayer David Macaray Website of the Day
June 19 - 21, 2009 Alexander Cockburn Jeffrey St. Clair Patrick Cockburn Al Giordano Henry A. Giroux Anthony DiMaggio Paul Craig Roberts John Ross Gareth Porter Carl Ginsburg Tommi Avicolli Mecca Joe Bageant Serge Halimi P. Sainath Jim Goodman Dave Lindorff Rannie Amiri Robert Fantina Harvey Wasserman Walter Brasch David Ker Thomson Charles R. Larson David Yearsley Kim Nicolini Ben Sonnenberg Poets' Basement Website of the Weekend June 18, 2009 Uri Avnery Robert Sandels / Anthony DiMaggio Robert Weissman Joshua Frank Jonathan Cook Reza Fiyouzat Norman Solomon Ali Jawad James Ridgeway Website of the Day June 17, 2009 Carl Boggs Dr. Bryant Welch Winslow T. Wheeler Liaquat Ali Khan Jonathan Cook Binoy Kampmark Karim Makdisi Dave Lindorff David Swanson Gene Marx Website of the Day June 16, 2009 Patrick Cockburn John Ross Afshin Rattansi Marc Levy Paul Craig Roberts Behzad Yaghmaian Brian M. Downing Merle Lefkoff David Macaray Robert Jensen David Swanson Website of the Day June 15, 2009 Michael Hudson Reza Fiyouzat Patrick Cockburn James Ridgeway Marjorie Cohn Rannie Amiri Dave Lindorff Ron Jacobs Leonard Schwartz Martha Rosenberg Website of the Day June 12-14, 2009 Alexander Cockburn Gareth Porter Mike Whitney Mark Ames Esam Al-Amin Franklin Lamb Patrick Cockburn Andy Worthington Heather Gray Felice Pace Ron Jacobs George Wuerthner Jeffrey Buchanan / David Ker Thomson Renaud Lambert Kevin Zeese David Macaray Evelyn Pringle Chris Genovali David Michael Green Brian J. Foley Charles R. Larson Kim Nicolini David Yearsley Lorenzo Wolff Poets' Basement Website of the Weekend
June 11, 2009 Kathy Kelly / James Bovard Tristan de Bourbon Dave Lindorff Kevin Zeese Ralph Nader Harvey Wasserman Nicole Colson Mark Weisbrot Dan Bacher Website of the Day June 10, 2009 Ismael Hossein-Zadeh Jennifer Van Bergen / Douglas Valentine Kathy Kelly Paul Craig Roberts Rev. William E. Alberts Peter Lee Carol Miller Emily Ratner Robert Weissman Dave Lindorff Website of the Day June 9, 2009 Winslow T. Wheeler Mike Whitney Stan Cox Sibel Edmonds Jonathan Cook David Macaray Robert Jensen Nadia Hijab Mark Weisbrot Website of the Day June 8, 2009 John Ross Paul Craig Roberts Franklin C. Spinney Franklin Lamb Uri Avnery Jonathan Cook Eric Toussaint Jim Goodman Norman Solomon Reza Fiyouzat Website of the Day June 5 -7, 200 Alexander Cockburn George Galloway Paul Craig Roberts Jennifer Loewenstein Franklin Lamb Mike Whitney Andy Worthington Missy Comley Beattie Farzana Versey Stanley Heller John V. Whitbeck Robert Weissman Lee Sustar Dave Lindorff William Blum Ernest Callenbach / Greg Moses Ron Jacobs David Yearsley Tim Stelloh Belén Fernández David Ker Thomson Karyn Strickler Christopher Brauchli Charles R. Larson Kim Nicolini Lorenzo Wolff Poets' Basement Website of the Weekend
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June 29, 2009 A Bribe Here, a Bribe ThereWhy Iraq is Now the Most Corrupt Country on the PlanetBy PATRICK COCKBURN "I paid $800 to get my job,” says Ahmed Abdul, a technician working for Karada municipality in Baghdad. “People know this is wrong, but there is no way round it.” In Iraq corruption is pervasive at every level. “Corruption exists all over the world but is at its worst here,” laments Ateej Saleh Midhat, a 26-year-old employee of the state-owned Rafidain Bank. “In 2008 and 2009 it was difficult for any graduate to have a job without paying $500 to $1,500 according to what kind of job it was. But what about the people who cannot afford to pay?” Iraq is the world’s premier kleptomaniac state. According to Transparency International the only countries deemed more crooked than Iraq are Somalia and Myanmar, while Haiti and Afghanistan rank just behind. In contrast to Iraq, which enjoys significant oil revenues, none of these countries have much money to steal. Iraqis resent paying a bribe for almost everything, but do not see what they can do about it. Nor will they believe that the government is serious in its claim to be clamping down on corruption until senior officials are punished. The first sign that this might be beginning to happen came last month when rhe former Minister of Trade Abdul Falah al-Sudani was arrested after the plane on which he was travelling to Dubai was dramatically turned round in mid-air and ordered to return to Baghdad. The Trade Ministry is known to Iraqis as “the Ministry of Corruption” because it administers the $6 billion food rationing system, which gives endless opportunities for making money through taking bribes from suppliers or sending tainted goods to the shops. The trade ministry scandal had already become very public when Mr al-Sudani’s guards shot it out at the ministry headquarters with police come to arrest ten officials who were able to escape through a back entrance during the gun battle. A video circulated from phone to phone in Baghdad shows Trade Ministry officials cavorting with prostitutes at a party. The corruption most Iraqis run into is at a humbler level and usually means that the smallest bureaucratic hurdle can only be overcome with a bribe. For instance several years ago the government starting issuing special new It is not just that Iraqis object to paying off officials, but they are not sure they will get what they pay for. Laila Fadel Amr is a young housewife who graduated from a teachers’ training institute in 2005, but has never held a job since. “I didn’t want to join any of the Islamic parties,” she says. “And I didn’t want to pay my money for a job and then find that promises are not kept and I have paid for nothing.” If a job is obtained then the bribe-giver has to start taking backhanders to pay back money borrowed to make the original bribe. Iraq has offered extraordinary opportunities for fraud since the fall of Saddam Hussein. War created enough confusion to divert attention from theft and made it difficult to check on what was really going on. In one notorious case in 2004-5 the government allocated $1.3 billion for weapons purchases. These were carried out by the then head of military procurement, Ziyad Cattan, a Polish-Iraqi who had once run a pizza parlor outside Bonn. The Minister of Defence was Hazem al-Shalaan who had been involved in property in a small way in London in the 1990s. Little military equipment was ever received by the Iraqi military aside from some 28-year-old Soviet helicopters from Poland, too antique to fly, and second hand vehicles deemed obsolete by the Pakistani army. The violence in Iraq in 2004-7 made it highly dangerous to check if goods paid for by the government had ever been delivered or even existed. One instance now being investigated concerns $600 million in food rations supposedly sent to Anbar and other Sunni provinces at a time when they were part-controlled by the insurgents, which may never have reached the shops from where they were to be distributed to needy customers. Iraq was not always uniquely corrupt. In the 1970s its administration was probably more efficient and honest than in most oil producing countries. It was the aftermath of the invasion of Kuwait in 1990 which criminalized Iraqi society. UN sanctions imposed a tight economic siege and were designed to keep oil revenue out of the hands of ruling elite. Extended over 13 years they destroyed society and the economy. The government had no money to pay its employees. The currency collapsed. A university professor suddenly found he was paid only the equivalent of $5 a month and was not allowed to resign from government service. One I knew called Jawad only succeeded in retiring by faking a heart attack and paying off doctors to produce charts showing he was about to expire. Since they were not paid by the government, state employees simply charged the public for any services they provided. Though officials are now quite well paid thiis system still goes on. At the top end of government Saddam Hussein and his lieutenants quickly found ways of evading sanctions to their own advantage. They controlled the black market. Uday, Saddam’s eldest son, was paid off in millions of dollars by cigarette importers. Russian oil brokers kicked back on oil contracts they were awarded, so money went to the government in Baghdad and not to the UN as it was meant to do under the oil for food program. The men who orchestrated these black market deals under Saddam Hussein found they could quickly establish the same sort of corrupt relationship with post-Saddam-governments. A criminal network was already in place. As Iraq was impoverished by sanctions in the 1990s street robberies and burglaries became common. In a country which had has little civil crime, taxi drivers began carrying pistols. To stem criminal violence the government started amputating the ears and hands of thieves and showing the gory results on television. As violence ebbed from its highest point in 2006-7, Iraqis have become more resentful at corruption and theft. They know that many officials and politicians own luxury villas in Jordan and Egypt. Reconstruction is painfully slow as money allocated to it vanishes. Many families react to a relative being imprisoned by immediately finding out how much they have to pay to get him freed. Political parties use ministries they control as a source of plunder and patronage. Even the best connected have to pay. The relative of one man, a life-long opponent of Saddam Hussein, was shot and badly wounded earlier this year. The man knew everybody in the top ranks of government and was promised a prompt investigation. He had a strong suspicion about who might have carried out the attempted assassination. but he found the police and judges involved were moving very slowly. He suspected some dark conspiracy by his political enemies and consulted his lawyer about what to do. His lawyer laughed at his suspicions. “No, there is a simpler reason why the police and the judge aren’t doing anything to find the gunmen,” he said. “They are waiting for you to bribe them before they start their investigation.” Patrick Cockburn is the author of 'The Occupation: War, resistance and daily life in Iraq' and 'Muqtada! Muqtada al-Sadr, the Shia revival and the struggle for Iraq'.
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