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Today's Stories November 6, 2007 Andy Worthington The Torture of Ali al-Marri November 5, 2007 Alexander Cockburn How I Spent the Eighth Brumaire Russell Mokhiber Pelosi and Me: The Democrats and Single Payer David Macaray How to Turn Workers Against Each Other (and Make Them All Poorer) Gary Leupp General Musharaff's "State of Emergency" Dave Lindorff Those Minot Nukes Ludwig Watzal Israel's Dilemma in Palestine Patrick Cockburn Tensions Ease in Iraqi Kurdistan Peter Stone Brown John Fogerty Makes Peace with His Past Michael Simmons Yo! What Happened to Peace? Website of the Day Petition: In Defense of the Morton West HS Antiwar Students   November 3 / 4, 2007 Tariq Ali Pakistan Sinks Deeper into Night David Price Army's Price Salesman of Counterinsurgency Manual Seeks to Defend Stolen Scholarship Jeffrey St. Clair Splitsville Alan Farago The Housing Crash, Suburban Sprawl and the Crisis of the American Middle Class Paul Krassner He's Back! Don Imus Meets Michael Richards Rannie Amiri Why the U.S. is Safeguarding Iraq's War Criminals P. Sainath Indexing Humanity, Indian Style Ayesha Ijaza Khan Pakistan in a Daze Robert Fantina Is the Bush Administration Talking Itself Into a War With Iran? Seth Sandronsky The Politics of Health Care in California Ron Jacobs The Bebop of Baraka Ramzy Baroud A Case for Arab Dignity Heather Gray When Capitalists Get a Free Ride   November 2, 2007 Dr. Mary Pipher Acting on Conscience: Psychologists and Abusive Interrogations Saul Landau How Pete Stark Became a Pariah Andy Worthington Guantánamo as House Arrest Sharon Smith A Tale of Two Stadiums Gary Leupp Fascist Beatifications: the History and Politics of Sainthood Gregory Harms The Chorus of Slander on Palestine Christopher Brauchli Racism in High Places Peter Morici The Falling Dollar and the Stubborn Trade Deficit Dave Lindorff The Easy Way to Stop the Looming US Attack on Iran David Penner Zombie Nation Website of the Day Fall in Yosemite   November 1, 2007 Paul Craig Roberts The Wages of Hegemony Patrick Cockburn The Most Dangerous Dam in the World Dave Lindorff The Air Force Report on the Minot-Barksdale Nuclear Missile Flight Jonathan Feldman The Strange Political Economy of Death in the South Mike Ferner They Met the Resistance in Iraq William S. Lind A Question for Would-Be Presidents Diana Johnstone "Fascislamism" Versus "Shoah Business" Jacob Hornberger The War on Telephone Privacy A..K. Gupta The Apocalypse will be Televised Lyuba Zarsky / Kevin Gallagher The Enclave Economy of Mexico's Silicon Valley Felice Pace Does the SPLC Equate Anti-Zionism with Anti-Semitism? Website of the Day This One's for You, Ed Abbey   October 31, 2007 Bill Quigley New Orleans' Broken Criminal Justice System Rev. William E. Alberts A Trail of American Blood: From the White House to CBS News Ray McGovern Attacking Iran for Israel Eric Walberg Poisonous Espionage: Litvinenko and the New Cold War V. G. Smith The Second Death of Guy Môquet Luis J. Rodriguez "Social Cleansing" from Guatemala to LA Sheldon Richman Bush has Time to Run the World Walter Brasch A Real Halloween Scare Website of the Day Boogie Rocks! October 30, 2007 David Price Pilfered Scholarship Devastates Gen. Petraeus's Counterinsurgency Manual M. Shahid Alam The Pakistan Question Andy Worthington The Epiphany of Matthew Waxman: a Government Insider Turns Against Gitmo Patrick Cockburn The Bicycle Bomber of Baquba Anthony Papa The Twisted Logic of Drug Laws Floyd Rudmin What "All Options are on the Table" Really Means Sherwood Ross Giuliani and Torture Website of the Day The Worst Lobby? You Decide   October 29, 2007 Lisa Hajjar Inside Israel's Military Courts Joe DeRaymond The Politics of Lethal Injections Patrick Cockburn The High Stakes in Iraqi Kurdistan Isabella Kenfield / Roger Burbach Corporate Murder in Brazil Fred Gardner The Frivolous Investigation of Dr. Sterner Farzana Versey Caricaturing Islam Stephen Fleischman The Greening of the Oligarchy Marcelle Cendrars The Congressional Rip Cord Eamonn McCann Dan Keating, the Last of the Republican Irreconcilables Martha Rosenberg For Halloween, Ann Coulter Dresses as .... Ann Coulter! Website of the Day Campaign 2008   October 27 / 28, 2007 Alexander Cockburn So Much for Islamo-Fascism Awareness Jeffrey St. Clair The Dam That Isn't There James Bovard Breaking Down an Innocent Man: The FBI's Right to Threaten Torture Ralph Nader Beyond the Rule of Law M. Reza Pirbhai The Wahhabis are Coming, the Wahhabis are Coming! Robert Sandels Pay the Invaders! Cuba, Claims and Confiscations Jacob G. Hornberger Ruling By Decree Missy Beattie The Arsonists in the West Wing John Ross U.S. Eyes on Oaxaca Robert Fantina Condi Rice, the Imperial Cheerleader Ron Jacobs Labor at the Crossroads Ali Moayedian In Search of Logic About Iran David Michael Green What If We Had a President Who Didn't Give a Damn About Terrorism? Poets Basement Block, Davies and Ford Website of the Day Bring 'Em Home: a Music Video   October 26, 2007 Brian Cloughley Revenging Bloodshed Saul Landau Portrait of Rudy Ahmad Al-Akras Getting Justice in the HLF Case Franklin Lamb Does "Loving" Lebanon Mean Never Having to Say You're Sorry? Mike Whitney Murdoch's Cuckoo's Nest Dave Lindorff Home of the Brave? Reducing US Casualties By Killing More Civilians Alan Farago A Castro Behind Every Bush Yifat Susskind Conscripting Feminism into the War on Terror Website of the Day Dead Life in a Political Prison October 25, 2007 Jeffrey St. Clair / Joshua Frank Iraq's Environmental Crisis Manuel Garcia, Jr. Homes of the Crash Test Dummies Paul Craig Roberts The Fraudulent War on Terror Col. Dan Smith The Politics of Paranoia: Jane Harman's War on the First Amendment Alan Farago The Way to Paradise? Chris Kutalik The Lesson of the Chrysler Rebels Brian McKinlay John Howard and the Curse of Bush Cindy Sheehan Pete, Nancy, George and WW III Website of the Day Support the America's Program!   October 24, 2007 Natalie Washington-Weik White Fantasies About Race-Based Intelligence Andy Worthington The Guantánamo Suicides Michael Birmingham What Happened in Nahr Al Bared? Corporate Crime Reporter The Nuclear Democrats Tariq Ali Bush's Cuba Detour Farzana Versey Imagining Serfdom in a Scarf Dave Zirin White Noise James Murren What "Support Our Troops" Means Todd Chretien Looking Reality in the Face Martha Rosenberg What Came First, the Chicken or the Cage? Website of the Day Hillary Clinton on Nuclear Power   October 23, 2007 Ralph Nader Bush's Catastrophic Rhetoric Lawrence R. Velvel Goldsmith Stands Convicted--By His Own Mouth: How a Harvard Law Professor Justified Rendition at the Bush Justice Dept. Vijay Prashad The Nuke Deal is Dead Bonnie Bricker / Adil E. Shamoo The True Cost of War for Oil Dave Lindorff Christopher Dodd's Make or Break Moment Mike Whitney The Big Squeeze Farzana Versey Race with the Devil Stanley Heller / Ben George Something New from the Antiwar Movement Marcelle Cendrars You Too Can Confront the Holy Executive Regan Boychuk Burma and Haiti: Comparing the Media Response Website of the Day King Corn   October 22, 2007 Ishmael Reed Should Blacks Go Green? Marjorie Cohn Mukasey and the Constitution: Another Loyal Bushie Rannie Amiri Is There a Method to Bush's Middle East Madness? Diane Farsetta Time to Pay for Payola: the FCC and Pundit-for-Hire Armstrong Williams Todd Alan Price Renewing No Child Left Behind: A Hurricane Katrina Aimed at Public Education Robert Jensen The Quagmire of Masculinity Stephen Lendman The UAW Leadership Sells Out Its Workers Jemima Khan The Kleptocrat in an Hermes Headscarf Sunsara Taylor David Horowitz Can't Handle the Truth Binoy Kampmark No Ideas, Please: the Australian Elections Website of the Day Support the Center for International Policy     October 20 / 21, 2007 Alexander Cockburn The Man Who Builds Hillaryworld Tariq Ali A Massacre Foretold Jeffrey St. Clair Greetings from Echo Park Andy Worthington The Shame of Diego Garcia Mike Whitney Housing Flameout Daniel Wolff Play It As It Lays David Rosen Deviants on Parade: Folsom St. Fair and America's 4th Sexual Revolution Saul Landau David and Goliath in Iraq Ron Jacobs COINTELPRO and the Panthers Robert Fantina The Strange Love of Mitt Romney and Bob Jones David Heleniak Erring on the Side of Hidden Harm Joe Allen Hoffa Brown-Nosing at UPS Prairie Miller Lions for Lambs Poets' Basement Gibbons, Holt and Buknatski Website of the Weekend Crash!   October 19, 2007 John Ross Che's Mexican Legacy Sheldon Rampton Shared Values Revisited: a Case Study in the Limits of Propaganda Rahul Mahajan A Tale of Two Atrocities: Blackwater and Haditha Devra Davis Deadly Secrets: Chemical Pollution and Cancer Christopher Brauchli Blasphemous Science Wadner Pierre Haiti After the Deluge Bill Quigley Jailed for Justice Website of the Day Textbook Sticker Shock   October 18, 2007 Saree Makdisi Academic Freedom is at Risk Meg Dwyer What I Learned from 9/11: Who Wouldn't Want Us Dead? Alevtina Rea Sketches of Russian Life Norman Solomon The United States of Violence Kristoffer Larsson Something is Rotten in Sweden Harvey Wasserman Nukes are Back and So are We Website of the Day Eve Ensler: "A Filibuster Would Stop This War"   October 17, 2007 Steve Niva Counter-Insurgency, American-Style Andy Worthington The Case of Mohamed Jawad Alan Farago The Credit Shock Russell Mokhiber The New Billionaire-Criminal Class Sharon Smith Democrats, AWOL When It Mattered Mike Whitney Time for the Banks to Face the Hangman Robert Fantina Iraq, Iran and the US: Business as Usual Chris Irwin Where Have All the Rednecks Gone? Website of the Day Sex Ed at Oral Roberts University October 16, 2007 Peter Linebaugh Doris Lessing and the Dynamite Prize Paul Findley Follow the Leader: The Open Secret About the Israel Lobby Robert Bryce Inconvenient Corrections: Al Gore's Wacky Facts Uri Avnery The Mother of All Pretexts Paul Craig Roberts The Iraqi Genocide Ray McGovern What Did Nancy Pelosi Know About NSA Spying and When Did She Know It? Norman Solomon The Pro-War Undertow of the Blackwater Scandal Martha Rosenberg The Curse of Cymbalta William S. Lind Out of the Frying Pan Joel S. Hirschborn Time to Boycott Voting Website of the Day Pipeline Through Paradise: Big Oil's Arctic Play         Subscribe Online

November 6, 2007 Prescriptions for a Coup Pakistan's Dark Future By LIAQUAT ALI KHAN On November 3, Pakistan delved into playing the Dark Future-a lawless game of alternate reality, a game in which the nation falls apart, the laws break down, and the players commit high crimes and misdemeanors to get ahead, to win. On this reckless day, Army Chief Pervez Musharraf, perhaps after receiving a signal from Washington D.C., proclaimed emergency throughout Pakistan and ordered that "the constitution shall remain in abeyance." Article 232 of the Pakistan constitution allows the President to issue a Proclamation of Emergency under grave circumstances. The November Proclamation, however, has been issued by Pervez Musharraf as the Army Chief, and not as the President. This legal twist empowers the Army Chief to exercise more authority than a constitutional Proclamation of Emergency would otherwise allow. The constitution does not authorize an Army Chief to declare emergency. Nor does the constitution allow a wholesale termination of services of Supreme Court judges. On its very face, therefore, the November Proclamation is incompatible with the constitution. It is by all means an extra-constitutional coup. Disestablishment of Judiciary The coup specifically targets Pakistan's judiciary. The judiciary, which was making a successful transition toward independence, has been stopped in the tracks. The Proclamation offers twelve reasons for the suspension of the constitution. Six reasons lay blame on the judiciary, holding the judges responsible for releasing terrorists, working at cross purposes with the government, overstepping the limits of judicial authority, and placing judges beyond accountability. These charges against the Supreme Court, in the opinion of the nation's most respected lawyers, are exaggerated and erroneous. Judges throughout the country are divided over supporting the suspension of the constitution. Judges who depend on their jobs for supporting families are unable to defy the Proclamation. So far, however, only four out of the nineteen Supreme Court judges have taken the oath under the Provisional Constitutional Order (PCO). A pro-military judge, under investigation for corruption, has been made the Chief Justice. Numerous judges of the four provincial high courts have also declined to take oath under the PCO. This unprecedented judicial resistance to the Proclamation will continue. The disestablishment of the judiciary will further deepen when lawyers boycott appearing before what they call "traitor judges." The lawyers are unlikely to boycott lower courts where ordinary cases are litigated. They will continue to seek relief for political workers who are unlawfully arrested. Some lawyers will continue to expose the abuses of power even in high courts. A permanent harm to the judiciary may be spared if judges are united in their resolve to oppose the Proclamation. Even judges who have taken the oath under the PCO can play an important role in limiting the lawlessness that the Musharraf regime may commence to enforce its writ. Terrorism Unbounded Escalating terrorism is the other reason offered for suspending the constitution. The Proclamation highlights heinous terrorist activities, IED explosions, and suicide bombings that have bedeviled the government. These reasons are tendered to persuade Americans that a non-democratic regime in Pakistan is good for America. America understands that an unlawful government in Pakistan is a godsend for terrorists. Despite deceptive appearances of cooperation with the United States, Pakistani intelligence agencies team up with militants to inflict harm on American soldiers. A vast geographical area spanning through the four contiguous Muslim countries--Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, and Pakistan-furnishes militants unlimited breathing space and logistical support for planning and executing reprisals. Frustrated American forces may now be allowed to openly attack militants inside Pakistan. This course of action however will be imprudent. It is totally understandable, though morally discomforting, that the United States is using Pakistan for its own national benefit. No Kantian imperative dictates that American foreign policy must treat Pakistan as an end in itself and not a means. Still, wiser heads in Washington will refuse to destabilize Pakistan to win an elusive war on terrorism. Time is ripe for America to support democracy in Pakistan to win the hearts and minds of its population. Saving Musharraf is a liability that the United States cannot afford. Another Coup? Meanwhile, Pakistan abounds with rumors and speculations that another military coup is imminent. In the past sixty years, Pakistani army chiefs have staged revolutions on the theory that the armed forces are highly disciplined in that no mutiny raises head in ranks and files once the army chief makes a decision to suspend the constitution. This theory may not work this time since Musharraf has become a pariah both outside and inside the armed forces. Outside the armed forces, Musharraf has no constitutional or political cover. The constitution has been effectively suspended. The Supreme Court has been effectively dissolved. The existing national and provincial assemblies would soon complete their terms and cease to exist. Ironically, though, a constitutional proclamation of emergency allows the extension of the term of the national assembly by a year. Musharraf may invoke this provision of the constitution to extend the life of the existing Parliament and postpone the general elections due in January 2008. These measures will not stabilize Pakistan. Lawyers, political parties, and the media are determined to challenge the continuation of the Musharraf regime. Things are worse inside the armed forces. Inside, Musharraf is viewed as a crass political operator. He is no longer a professional soldier. His uniform annoys the armed forces. It is no symbol of pride. It is a symptom of addiction to power. Furthermore, the armed forces resent ground realities. Soldiers have been placed in predicaments to kill innocent villagers. They surrender to the militants, saying brothers don't kill brothers. As world criticism mounts, lawyers boycott the courts, and confusion grips Islamabad, General Ashfaq Kiani, the designated army chief, will come under tremendous pressure to safeguard the honor of the armed forces and remove an ineffective addict from power. This coup may not be peaceful. Ali Khan is a professor of law at Washburn University School of Law in Topeka, Kansas. This story is written for his two sons, Harun and Kashif. He can be reached at: ali.khan@washburn.edu   The New Print Edition of CounterPunch, Only for Our Newsletter Subscribers! Israel's Very Dangerous Gamble STEPHEN GREEN reports on the real motivations behind Israel's MISSILE STRIKE on SYRIA. PETER MONTAGUE on the NUCLEAR RENAISSANCE or How the Nuke Industry is using Gore's Prize and Global Warming to Plot Its Big Comeback. WILLIAM BLUM on the DEVALUING of "ANTI-SEMITE" or How to Make a Term Meaningless. Get your copy today by subscribing online or calling 1-800-840-3683 Remember contributions to CounterPunch are tax-deductible. Click here to make a donation. If you find our site useful please: Subscribe Now Order CounterPunch By Email for Only $35 a Year and Receive a Free Copy of "Imperial Crusades: a Diary of Three Wars" by Cockburn and St. Clair Your Ad Here

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