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January 13, 2004
Adolfo Gilly
Chonchocoro:
The Prisoner and the Presidents
January 12, 2004
Ben Tripp
No Stan
for the Kurds
Norman Solomon
The
Dixie Trap: Democrats and the South
Mike Whitney
O'Neill's Revenge
Jason Leopold
From the Very First Instant It Was About Iraq
Uri Avnery
Syria's
Peace Proposal
January 10 / 11, 2004
Alexander Cockburn
Bush
as Hitler? Let's Be Fair
Susan Davis
Dangerous Books
Diane Christian
On Lying and Colin Powell
Lisa Viscidi
Exhumations: Unearthing Guatemala's Macabre Past
Daniel Estulin
Destroying History in Iraq
Saul Landau
Homeland Anxiety
Elaine Cassel
Who's Winning the War on Civil Liberties?
Bruce Jackson
Making the Shit List
Christopher Brauchli
Baptizing Hitler's Ghost
Francis A. Boyle
The Deep Scars of War
Lee Ballinger
Cold Sweat: Sweatshops and the Music Industry
Patrick W. Gavin
Hillary's Slur: Mrs. Lott?
Ramzy Baroud
What Invaders Have in Common
Michael Schwartz
Inside the California Grocery Strike
Gary Johnson
An Interview with Former Heavyweight Champ Greg Page
Dave Zirin
An Interview with Marvin Miller on Unions and Baseball
Mark Hand
A Review of Resistance: My Life for Lebanon
Poets' Basement
Thomas, Daley, Curtis, Guthrie and Albert
January 9, 2004
David Lindorff
The
Misers of War: Troop Strength and Chintzy Bonuses
Kurt Nimmo
Saddam's Defense: Summon Bush Sr. to the Stand
Mike Whitney
Orange Jumpsuits for the Bush Clan?: The Carnegie Report on Iraq's
Non-existent WMDs
Deb Reich
Palestinians and Israelis: This War is Unwinnable
David Vest
Disabled
Vets Fire Back at Rumsfeld
January 8, 2004
Neve Gordon
Israeli
Refuseniks Sentenced to Jail
Lenni Brenner
Dr.
Dean and the Godhead
Ray McGovern
Bush: Driving Without Breaks
Mark Scaramella
Inside
the DA's Office: Lies, Errors and Tedium
Yves Engler
Bush's Mexican Gambit
James Hollander
Journalists
Under Fire: the Death of José Couso in Baghdad
January 7, 2004
Democracy Now!
Uncharitable
Care: How Hospitals are Gouging and Even Arresting the Uninsured
Greg Weiher
The
Bush Administration's Ongoing Intelligence Problem
Ben Tripp
The Word of the Year, 2003
Dave Lindorff
Dean and His Democratic Detractors
Michael Leon
The NYT Does Chomsky
Bob Boldt
God Talk
Ramon Ryan
Small
Victories and Long Struggles: the 10th Anniversary of the Zapatista
Uprising
January 6, 2004
Dave Lindorff
RNC
Plays the Hitler Card: MoveOn Shouldn't Apologize for Those Ads
Ron Jacobs
Drugs
in Uniform: Hashish and the War on Terrorism
Josh Frank
Coffee and State Authority in Colombia
Doug Giebel
Permanent Bases: Leave Iraq? Hell No, We Won't Go
John Chuckman
Sick Puppies: David Frum's New Neo-Con Manifesto
Rannie Amiri
The Politics of the Iranian Earthquake
John L. Hess
A Record
to Dissent From
Thacher Schmid
A Cheesehead's Musings on the Sunday NYT
David Price
"Like
Slaves": Anthropological Thoughts on Occupation
January 5, 2004
Al Krebs
How
Now Mad Cow!
Kathy Kelly
Squatting
in Baghdad's Bomb Craters
Jordy Cummings
The Dialectic of the Kristol Family: Putting the Neo in the Cons
Fran Shor
Mad Human Disease: Chewing the Fat Down on the Farm
Fidel Castro
"We Shall Overcome": On the 45th Anniversary of the
Cuban Revolution
Gary Leupp
North
Korea for Dummies
January 3 / 4, 2004
Brian Cloughley
Never
Mind the WMDs, Just Look at History
Vice Admiral Jack Shanahan
The Wrong War at the Wrong Time
William Cook
Failing to Respond to 9/11
Glen Martin
Jesus
vs. the Beast of the Apocalypse
Robert Fisk
Iraqi Humor Amid the Carnage
Ilan Pappe
The Geneva Bubble
Walter Davis
Robert Jay Lifton, or Nostalgia
Kurt Nimmo
Ashcroft vs. the Left
Mike Whitney
The Padilla Case
Steven Sherman
On Wallerstein's The Decline of American Power
Dave Lindorff
Bush's Taiwan Hypocrisy
William Blum
Codework Orange!
Mitchel Cohen
Learning from Che Guevara
Seth Sandronsky
Mad Cow and Main Street USA
Bruce Jackson
Conversations with Leslie Fiedler
Standard Schaefer
Poet Carl Rakosi Turns 100
Ron Jacobs
Sir Mick
Adam Engel
Hall of Hoaxes
Poets' Basement
Jones, Albert & Curtis
January 2, 2004
Stan Cox
Red Alert
2016
Dave Lindorff
Beef, the Meat of Republicans
Jackie Corr
Rule and Ruin: Wall Street and Montana
Norman Solomon
George Will's Ethics: None of Our Business?
David Vest
As the Top Wobbleth
January 1, 2004
Randall Robinson
Honor
Haiti, Honor Ourselves
David Krieger
Looking
Back on 2003
Robert Fisk
War Takes an Inhuman Twist: Roadkill Bombs
Stan Goff
War,
Race and Elections
Hammond Guthrie
2003 Almaniac
Website of the Day
Embody Bags
December 31, 2003
Ray McGovern
Don't
Be Fooled Again: This Isn't an Independent Investigation
Kurt Nimmo
Manufacturing Hysteria
Robert Fisk
The Occupation is Damned
Mike Whitney
Mad Cows and Downer George
Alexander Cockburn
A Great Year Ebbed, Another Ahead
December 30, 2003
Michael Neumann
Criticism
of Israel is Not Anti-Semitism
Annie Higgins
When
They Bombed the Hometown of the Virgin Mary
Alan Farago
Bush Bros. Wrecking Co.: Time Runs Out for the Everglades
Dan Bacher
Creatures from the Blacklight Lagoon: From Glofish to Frankenfish
Jeffrey St. Clair
Hard
Time on the Killing Floor: Inside Big Meat
Willie Nelson
Whatever Happened to Peace on Earth?
December 29, 2003
Mark Hand
The Washington
Post in the Dock?
David Lindorff
The
Bush Election Strategy
Phillip Cryan
Interested Blindness: Media Omissions in Colombia's War
Richard Trainor
Catellus Development: the Next Octopus?
Uri Avnery
Israel's
Conscientious Objectors
December 27 / 28, 2003
Alexander Cockburn
A
Journey Into Rupert Murdoch's Soul
Kathy Kelly
Christmas Day in Baghdad: A Better World
Saul Landau
Iraq
at the End of the Year
Dave Zirin
A Linebacker for Peace & Justice: an Interview with David
Meggysey
Robert Fisk
Iraq
Through the American Looking Glass
Scott Burchill
The Bad Guys We Once Thought Good: Where Are They Now?
Chris Floyd
Bush's Iraq Plan is Right on Course: Saddam 2.0
Brian J. Foley
Don't Tread on Me: Act Now to Save the Constitution
Seth Sandronsky
Feedlot Sweatshops: Mad Cows and the Market
Susan Davis
Lord
of the (Cash Register) Rings
Ron Jacobs
Cratched Does California
Adam Engel
Crumblecake and Fish
Norman Solomon
The Unpardonable Lenny Bruce
Poets' Basement
Cullen and Albert
Website of the Weekend
Activism Through Music
December 26, 2003
Gary Leupp
Bush
Doings: Doing the Language
December 25, 2003
Diane Christian
The
Christmas Story
Elaine Cassel
This
Christmas, the World is Too Much With Us
Susan Davis
Jinglebells, Hold the Schlock
Kristen Ess
Bethlehem Celebrates Christmas, While Rafah Counts the Dead
Francis Boyle
Oh Little Town of Bethlehem
Alexander Cockburn
The
Magnificient 9
Guthrie / Albert
Another Colorful Season
December 24, 2003
M. Shahid Alam
The Semantics
of Empire
William S. Lind
Marley's
List for Santa in Wartime
Josh Frank
Iraqi
Oil: First Come, First Serve
Cpt. Paul Watson
The
Mad Cowboy Was Right
Robert Lopez
Nuance
and Innuendo in the War on Iraq
December 23, 2003
Brian J. Foley
Duck
and Cover-up
Will Youmans
Sharon's
Ultimatum
Michael Donnelly
Here
They Come Again: Another Big Green Fiasco
Uri Avnery
Sharon's
Speech: the Decoded Version
December 22, 2003
Jeffrey St. Clair
Pray
to Play: Bush's Faith-Based National Parks
Patrick Gavin
What Would Lincoln Do?
Marjorie Cohn
How to
Try Saddam: Searching for a Just Venue
Kathy Kelly
The
Two Troublemakers: "Guilty of Being Palestinians in Iraq"
December 20 / 21, 2003
Alexander Cockburn
How
to Kill Saddam
Saul Landau
Bush Tries Farce as Cuba Policy
Rafael Hernandez
Empire and Resistance: an Interview with Tariq Ali
David Vest
Our Ass and Saddam's Hole
Kurt Nimmo
Bush
Gets Serious About Killing Iraqis
Greg Weiher
Lessons from the Israeli School on How to Win Friends in the
Islamic World
Christopher Brauchli
Arrest, Smear, Slink Away: Dr. Lee and Cpt. Yee
Carol Norris
Cheers of a Clown: Saddam and the Gloating Bush
Bruce Jackson
The Nameless and the Detained: Bush's Disappeared
Juliana Fredman
A Sealed Laboratory of Repression
Mickey Z.
Holiday Spirit at the UN
Ron Jacobs
In the Wake of Rebellion: The Prisoner's Rights Movement and
Latino Prisoners
Josh Frank
Sen. Max Baucus: the Slick Swindler
John L. Hess
Slow Train to the Plane
Adam Engel
Black is Indeed Beautiful
Ben Tripp
The Relevance of Art in Times of Crisis
Michael Neumann
Rhythm and Race
Poets' Basement
Cullen, Engel, Albert & Guthrie
Hot Stories
Alexander Cockburn
Behold,
the Head of a Neo-Con!
Subcomandante Marcos
The
Death Train of the WTO
Norman Finkelstein
Hitchens
as Model Apostate
Steve Niva
Israel's
Assassination Policy: the Trigger for Suicide Bombings?
Dardagan,
Slobodo and Williams
CounterPunch Exclusive:
20,000 Wounded Iraqi Civilians
Steve
J.B.
Prison Bitch
Sheldon
Rampton and John Stauber
True Lies: the Use of Propaganda
in the Iraq War
Wendell
Berry
Small Destructions Add Up
CounterPunch
Wire
WMD: Who Said What When
Cindy
Corrie
A Mother's Day Talk: the Daughter
I Can't Hear From
Gore Vidal
The
Erosion of the American Dream
Francis Boyle
Impeach
Bush: A Draft Resolution
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January
13, 2004
Do Iraqis Have a Right
to Resist?
Outside
the Spectacle
By M. JUNAID ALAM
Lefthook.org
If you prick us do we not bleed?
If you tickle us do we not laugh?
If you poison us do we not die?
And if you wrong us, shall we not revenge?
Merchant of Venice, III:1
William Shakespeare
Waging war is a peculiar American pastime: its
appeal does not diminish as corpses multiply. Quite the contrary
- each new round of this gruesome spectacle is greeted with the
greatest fervor by the elites, the loudest applause from the
intellectuals, and the proudest swagger of the patriots. No effort
is spared in hammering into the public consciousness two absolute
Truths about the contenders in this sordid spectacle: America
is absolutely good, and the Enemy absolutely evil. America, preaches
an appropriate (and appropriately paid) representative of Capital,
is the savior of the world, the benevolent exporter of democracy,
the deliverer of freedom; The Enemy, whatever small, poor, far-away
and relatively defenseless nation it may be, is savage, senseless,
a direct and immediate threat to American interests which must
be destroyed.
The rhetoric demanding the need for war--real,
manly, action--puffs up the audience with false pride, whetting
its appetite for blood, mayhem and destruction. Not against our
side, of course: not against Uncle Sam, its thousands of
armed, armored, killing machines and the larger machines those
thousands will wield to kill and destroy. Seating for those who
are (supposedly) cheering on the Enemy is arranged only
at torture camps and graveyards elsewhere. The partisan home
crowd directs its fury, fear, and hatred at the beaten and broken
creature cowering below--today, Iraq. Dragged into the arena
from a dungeon decorated with the skeletons of Indians, Filipinos
and Vietnamese, our latest hapless victim wondered what stories
the soothsayers would narrate to drown out its shrieks and cries.
Today we Americans know who the soothsayers
are and what stories were told. We know because many of us were
heeding them as thousands of Iraqis were snuffed out of existence
by cruise missiles and cluster bombs with less notice than a
quick turn of the page.
And what fantastic fairy tales they were.
A country bombed and pulverized by our last assault upon it,
strangled by our suffocating sanctions, possessing rusting weapons
two, three, generations old, holding one-tenth our population
and having one-thirty-seventh of our per-capita GDP, was said
to represent a serious and imminent danger to our well-being.
Is America so weak? Not one intelligence agency in the West found
a shred of evidence to prove links to al-Qaeda or September 11th,
bin Laden had called for Hussein's head and, finally, the President
admitted there was no link between Hussein's regime and September
11th--but nonetheless Iraq was declared to have supported al-Qaeda
and played some shadowy role in that attack. UN inspectors under
Ritter said Iraq no longer had weapons of mass destruction, more
UN inspectors under Blix found none, and US agents under Kay
have come up empty-handed--yet Iraq, we are told, still must
have possessed dangerous weapons.
By and large the public swallowed these
fantastic and unbelievable concoctions. The lies served their
purpose, for the deed was done. Our side had won, and America's
neoconservative war-makers had carried out America's task as
outlined by their leading intellectual, Michael Ledeen: "Every
10 years or so, the United States needs to pick up some small
crappy little country and throw it against the wall, just to
show the world we mean business."
But a problem emerged: Iraq got back
on its feet. Granted, the odious regime was overthrown, but the
vast numbers of Iraqis, not benefiting from our propaganda apparatus,
knew they were neither Hussein clones nor American pawns. Though
our free media tried to cuff them in Manichean chains, the Iraqi
masses were what our media mouthpieces never allowed them to
be: human beings. Stirred into anger and resentment against the
American occupation and all the chaos and injustice that marked
its presence, they began to fight back.
As Iraqi resistance intensifies, it has
become better organized, more deadly, more daring, and more numerous.
US troops fall prey more and more to hit-and-run attacks on convoys,
coordinated machine-gun and rocket-propelled-grenade fire, improvised
roadside explosives, and suicide attacks. Important and prominent
symbols of the occupation, including police stations, other foreign
troops, hotels catering to occupation authorities, even UN buildings,
have quickly become targets. Missiles have brought down a series
of helicopters and struck planes, illustrating an advanced development
of resistance capabilities. Rockets, wheeled around on donkey
carts, now strike at the most 'secure' symbols and residencies
of American imperialism in Iraq.
In this qualitatively new situation,
a routine exercise of American chauvinism--state terrorism followed
by the usual unfulfilled promises about patching up the victim
nation - has turned into a total nightmare. The well-orchestrated
and planned-out event, replete with 'Shock and Awe' fireworks,
pronouncements about freeing Iraqis, and staged destruction of
Saddam statues, has fallen apart.
This decisive development demands an
understanding of an occupied people's right to resist the occupier
of their country, for the insurgency has been the main
trigger for a renewed anti-war movement. While the anti-war protests
and actions carried out prior to the invasion were inspiring,
the movement lacked the political and theoretical coherency to
survive the likely possibility that war would be carried out.
Once the bombs started falling on Baghdad the movement dissipated.
It must also be admitted that prior to the invasion, the majority
of Americans supported war. In no other country did a majority
of the populace support the war--except Israel.
There is nothing surprising in this.
Former Special Forces officer and member of Bring Them Home
Now Stan Goff explained clearly in an interview with Derek
Seidman at Left Hook (http://www.lefthook.org):
"The vast majority of people are
not motivated by abstractions. They are motivated by what they
can feel on their skin. The entry point for this movement into
the consciousness of new people is not through morality... The
freshest stratum in any movement are those who are there through
trauma and fear. Soldiers getting killed is a very serious thing,
because these are our families."
It is the emergence of resistance on
the ground from Iraqis themselves which lifted the veil of lies
from the war for many Americans. Were it not for the daily casualties
and attacks inflicted upon U.S. troops in Iraq, it is doubtful
that the recent uproar about the falsity of war claims and the
merits of the occupation itself would be so loud and widespread
at home now.
This blunt truth is stated not to sermonize
about the American public's relative indifference to the consequences
of war unless 'our side' is affected, nor to pander to the idea
that US soldiers' deaths is the main reason for us to end the
occupation. Rather, the point is to soberly recognize the starting
point of criticism of the war in Iraq for most Americans so that
we can extend and enrich anti-war awareness more effectively.
It would be politically unwise, for instance, to lecture about
the historical record of atrocities and duplicities carried out
in imperialist ventures without conscious reference to the attacks
on US troops, just as it would be dangerous to latch onto this
least-common-denominator of consciousness, using the death of
soldiers to replace other very real reasons for why we must withdraw
from Iraq immediately. The point, in a word, is neither to separate
nor to substitute, but to connect.
For the intensification of guerrilla
warfare, with all its sensational drama and deadliness, is only
the most obvious and eye-catching aspect of the war. The true
depth and dimension of hostility to the U.S. occupation extends
far beyond this or that rocket attack. It speaks to the hostility
of the entire Arab world to America's overall imperial project
and its history of dominating and humiliating Arabs, either directly
or through its local pit-bull, Israel. To appreciate and emphasize
the full context of the war and its brutal impact on American
lives not only in Iraq but here - and then not only to
American lives but to all lives - is a crucial
and necessary step for the anti-war movement.
The dangers of not doing so are patently
obvious. Already many supposedly anti-war 'radicals' have jumped
on the 'Anybody But Bush' bandwagon, throwing in their support
for Democrats like Dean or Clark. To oppose the war yet support
these candidates may seem contradictory, but a superficial opposition
to war is entirely compatible with such decisions. For those
who oppose the war as a matter of style may be impressed by anti-war
rhetoric even if mouthed by one who has declared support for
sending more troops (Dean), and those whose concerns are limited
to troop casualties may feel more comfortable with a former general
at the helm (Clark).
Some on the Left offer generous advice
on how to make the occupation more effective tactically, while
others wonder aloud if leaving Iraq would be an 'abandonment'
of an 'unfinished job', as if by his deed of murder a murderer
is historically fitted to follow up by playing carpenter.
This kind of approach is flawed to the
core. We are still in the arena, still part of the spectacle,
cheering on the brutalization of another country, only with different
slogans, temporarily running to the concession stand until 'our
side' is winning again, whispering advice to Uncle Sam on the
way. What must be soundly condemned and opposed is the spectacle
itself, the debasement and killing of the racial Other in which
we ourselves are debased, and--yes - sometimes even killed.
Failure to adopt this principle leads
into an abyss of endless lies and falsifications. Deep in this
abyss already are top American officials of all branches, who,
immersed in their state of self-delusion, rail against the presence
of 'foreign fighters' in a country where they sent 150,000 American
troops, praise the preciousness of democracy while propping up
puppet councils, and decry resistance as 'terrorism' because
their newest effort to terrorize the Arabs is meeting real opposition.
Standing outside the spectacle requires
one to rub out from one's eyes the flash of the arena's stage
lights and propagandistic pyrotechnics. Through ritualized demonization
of Saddam and pious denunciations of his misdeeds, the media
junta convinced many the purpose of the war was to remove a tyrant.
That America once financed and installed the tyrant--indeed many
tyrants - was declared irrelevant. But now that he has been captured
and whisked away for 'interrogation' elsewhere, the boogeyman
excuse for staying in Iraq has unraveled completely. Still, reckoned
the faithful, America after all was America, and after invading
and taking over Iraq, would generously disseminate its superior
values and institutions, like free-market democracy, rule of
law, freedom of expression, and McNuggets. White Man's Burden
was back on the agenda; Civilization would extend its white hand
to reach out to the backward natives.
Reach out it did, dagger as always concealed
in the cuff. The occupation has utterly failed in bringing about
the most basic improvements to the lives of ordinary Iraqis.
More Iraqis now than ever face increasing hardship and misery
on all fronts: insecurity, unemployment, intermittent and broken
basic services, and a farcical puppet government. The mainstream
press carries out daily reports recording the myriad failures
of black-booted Bremer's bureaucracy to win 'hearts and minds'
in Iraq, from the lack of electricity and jobs to curfews and
random house raids.
But to even begin an honest appraisal
of our disastrous foreign occupation, one must first stand outside
of the spectacle, outside of that artificial arena which pits
man against man, nation against nation, race against race. Freedom,
dignity, and a desire not be dominated by a foreign power or
controlled by an outside force: these are the driving impulses
of the vast majority of Iraqi fighters and their sympathizers
in the local population--indeed, the driving impulses of people
everywhere.
Recognition of this basic truth is the
foundation of all future anti-war progress. For any number of
chauvinist justifications to strangle Iraq-and no small number
have already been aired and accepted-can sounds sweet to an ear
that is deaf to the inherent right of a people to fight for their
own independence.
M. Junaid Alam,
20, Boston, co-editor and web-designer of new leftist journal
for American youth, Left Hook,
where this essay originally appeared. He can be reached at: alam@lefthook.org
Weekend
Edition Features for January 10 / 11, 2004
Alexander Cockburn
Bush
as Hitler? Let's Be Fair
Susan Davis
Dangerous Books
Diane Christian
On Lying and Colin Powell
Lisa Viscidi
Exhumations: Unearthing Guatemala's Macabre Past
Daniel Estulin
Destroying History in Iraq
Saul Landau
Homeland Anxiety
Elaine Cassel
Who's Winning the War on Civil Liberties?
Bruce Jackson
Making the Shit List
Christopher Brauchli
Baptizing Hitler's Ghost
Francis A. Boyle
The Deep Scars of War
Lee Ballinger
Cold Sweat: Sweatshops and the Music Industry
Patrick W. Gavin
Hillary's Slur: Mrs. Lott?
Ramzy Baroud
What Invaders Have in Common
Michael Schwartz
Inside the California Grocery Strike
Gary Johnson
An Interview with Former Heavyweight Champ Greg Page
Dave Zirin
An Interview with Marvin Miller on Unions and Baseball
Mark Hand
A Review of Resistance: My Life for Lebanon
Poets' Basement
Thomas, Daley, Curtis, Guthrie and Albert
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