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Cockburn in Paris

Today's Stories

October 24, 2006

Marguerite Rose Jimenez
"About That Trip to Cuba:" When the FBI Came Calling

October 23, 2006

Saree Makdisi
Israel's Cluster Bomb War: "What We Did Was Insane and Monstrous"

Joshua Frank
The Antiwar Movement and Independent Politics: an Interview with Cindy Sheehan

Fred Gardner
What Have California Doctors Learned About Cannabis?

Ralph Nader
The End of Habeas Corpus and the Belligerent Despot-in-Chief

Ron Jacobs
Bush's Clark Clifford: James Baker Wants a Kinder, Gentler War

Norman Solomon
Punditry Without Consequences: Channeling Thomas Friedman

Richard Manning
Outside the Market: We Need and Owe Rural People

Neil Kitson
Canadians in Afghanistan: Bloody, Unbowed, Stoned?

William MacDougall
The Socialist, the Columnist, His Wife and the Prostitute

Gilad Atzmon
Surviving the Board of Deputies

Werther
The Evening of Empire

Website of the Day
Different Drummer: Internet Coffeehouse Movement

 

October 20 / 22, 2006

Alexander Cockburn
The Myth of Microloans

Gary Leupp
How the US Declared War on North Korea

Brian Cloughley
What Are They Dying For?

Dave Zirin
Pat Tillman's Brother Breaks His Silence

William Blum
Don't Look Back: Who Said Clinton Didn't Kill Anybody?

Christopher Brauchli
The Cronies' War

Winslow Wheeler
The Mad Logic of Pentagon Spending: As Costs Rise, Readiness Declines

Michael Donnelly
GOP Death Slide: Is the Party Really Over?

Fred Gardner
Corporate Drugs Useless Against Alzheimer's

Susie Day
How to Stay Out of Gitmo

Lucinda Marshall
Behind Closed Doors: the Invisibility of Domestic Violence

Fred Wilcox
The Second Palestinian Intifada: History of a Struggle for Survival

Alan Maass
Standing Up Against Racism at Columbia: a Wake Up Call to the Passive Left

Lee Sustar
A Bipartisan Border Wall: New Phases in the Crackdown on Immigrants

Ariadna Theokopoulos
Shame on You, Dr. Warf!: Hail the Epidemiologist in Chief!

Missy Beattie
Surges: the Dow and the Death Count

CP News Wire
Bush's Paraguay Land Grab: Hideout or Water Raid?

CP News Services
Sexually Repressed Republicans: Robert Bork, Riveted

Poets' Basement
Davies, Engel, Buknatski and Orloski

Website of the Weekend
Scenes from Oaxaca

 

October 19, 2006

Elaine Cassel
The Bush Administration's Assault on Defense Lawyers

Col. Dan Smith
Breaking Up That Old Gang of Mine: Cracks in the Bush / Blair Axis

Manuel Garcia, Jr.
North Korea's Nuclear Test: a Q & A

Josh Gryniewicz
Wal-Mart Tightens the Squeeze on Workers

Amira Hass
What is 20 Tons of Explosives?

Eric Holt-Gimenez
Poison and Famine in the Fields: How the Agri-Food Industry's Deadly Cycle Feeds Immigration

Jesse Hagopian
Arrested Democracy: On Trying to Ignore Aaron Dixon

Sam Husseini
How Third Parties Can Solve the "Spoiler" Problem and Win Elections

John Weisheit
A Gathering of Water Buffaloes: Feds Celebrate Death of the Colorado River

CP News Service
A Plea to U2 From Africa's Children: Stop Bono Before He Kills Again!

Website of the Day
George W. Bush: Hollywood Producer

Art Gallery of the Day
Botero's Abu Ghraib Paintings in Manhattan

 

October 18, 2006

Joshua Frank
Cindy Sheehan's Lesser Evilism: Democrats or Bust?

Dr. Curran Warf, MD
Slandering Sound Science: Bush's Attack on the Lancet Iraq War Death Study

Saul Landau
Bush's Foley: Will the Dems Blow It?

Tom Barry
The Politics of Fear

Bruce Jackson
Thundersnow: a Report from Buffalo

Dave Lindorff
Loveless Among the Ruins: Even Repubs Flee Bush's Failed Middle East Policy

Frederico Fuentes
When Cochabamba Said "Enough!": Bolivia's Blow to Neoliberalism

Michael Simmons
Greetings from Echo Park: an Open Letter to Rolling Stone's Jann Wenner

Daryll E. Ray
The Root Problems in American Agriculture

Kate Doyle
The Dead of Tlatelolco

Website of the Day
The Lynne Stewart Defense Committee

 


October 17, 2006

Michael Neumann
Hit and Run: Guerrilla Reviewing

Manuel Garcia, Jr.
Nuclear Test, Political Flare: Interpreting the Physics and Politics of N. Korea's Nuclear Test

Stephen S. Pearcy
The Interrogation of Julia Wilson: Secret Service Grills 14 Year-Old Artist

Sharon Smith
Afghanistan Reconsidered: The Taliban Aren't Gone, Women Haven't Been Liberated

Al Krebs
The Corporate Assault on Zoning

David Underhill
Politicus Interruptus: Come Back, Jo Bonner!

Daniel Wolff
NY's Iraq Veterans Against the War Needs Your Help ... Now!

James Brooks
Desirable Duds: Israeli / US Cluster Bombs Litter Lebanon

Website of the Day
Stop Torture Now!

 

October 16, 2006

Gary Leupp
North Korea as a Religious State

Patrick Cockburn
General Mutinies Against Blair

David Wilson
Where Have All the Doctors Gone?: the Collapse of Iraq's Health Care Services

Robert Fisk
Confronting Turkey's Armenian Genocide

Robert Jensen
Racism and Cheap Thrills at U. of Texas Law School

Ingmar Lee / Krista Roessingh
An Appeal for S. India's Wild Elephants

Mike Whitney
America's Other War Party

Jake Whitney
The Courageous Dr. Rost

Sanho Tree
Sugar Daddy Politics: Was Foley Blackmailed to Secure His Vote on CAFTA?

Website of the Day
Best War Ever!

 


October 14/15, 2006
Weekend Edition

Uri Avnery
Gaza as Laboratory: the Great Experiment

John Walsh
How Rahm Emmanuel Has Rigged a Pro-War Congress

Jean Bricmont
A Fable About Palestine

Jennifer Van Bergen
Bush's Military Commissions Act and the Future of America

Ralph Nader
Wilted Yankees: the Fruits of Checkbook Baseball

Floyd Rudmin
The Logic of Proliferation: How Bush's Belligerence Prompted N. Korea to Pursue Nuclear Weapons

Mark Weisbrot
Correcting the Facts on US/Venezuela Relations

Laura Carlsen
Building a Future in the Mixteca

Hani Shukrallah
A Stroll Through the Cairo Mall: Shopping as Cultural Pursuit

Dr. Susan Block
The Spent Milk of Human Foley

John Chuckman
North Korea's Bomb: Still 1,126 Nuke Tests Behind the US

Lucinda Marshall
Is Betty Ugly?: the Profits of Denigration

Don Monkerud
The Case Against Depleted Uranium

Missy Comley Beattie
What Bush Means By Tolerable Violence in Iraq

Ron Jacobs
Shouting "No One is Illegal" in a Crowded Theater

Website of the Weekend
Ratfink Raunchfest

 

October 13, 2006

Jorge Mariscal
PowerPoint Racism: How Military Recruiters Pitch to Latinos

Stephen Philion
The Myth of the Spat Upon Vets: an Interview with Jerry Lembcke

John Blair
Strip Mining Wildlife Preserves: Black Beauty's Filthy Lucre

Col. Dan Smith
Oil, Atoms and War

Alastair Crooke / Mark Perry
How Hezbollah Defeated Israel: Part Two, Winning the Ground War

Stephen Fleischman
Journalism Then and Now

Charles Perroud
The Death Penalty's Invisible Victims

Anne E. Brodsky
Return to Afghanistan: Where the Rhetoric Doesn't Match the Reality

Website of the Day
Underwater Nuke Test

 

October 12, 2006

Jonathan Cook
Israel's Plan for a Military Strike on Iran

Norman Solomon
The Pundit Path to Death in Iraq

M. Shahid Alam
On Colonialism and Colleagues

Paul Craig Roberts
Can We Call It Genocide Now?

Meredith Schafer / Chris Kutalik
Is a General Transportation Strike Looming for 2008? Can Labor Seize the Moment?

Carl Gelderloos
Images of Occupation: Teaching in Nablus

Alastair Crooke / Mark Perry
How Hezbollah Defeated Israel: Part One, Winning the Intelligence War

Charles Sullivan
Assassins of Truth

William S. Lind
Why Do We Still Fight a Lost War?

CP News Service
The South Turns Against the War

Website of the Day
There's a Riot Goin' On

 

October 11, 2006

John Feffer
Pyongyang 1, Bush 0

Dave Lindorff
A Killing Occupation

Jackson Katz
Gunning Down Women: Coverage of "School Shootings" Misses Central Issue

April Howard / Ben Dangl
The Tin War in Bolivia

Michael Carmichael
World War W

Ken Couesbouc
The New Witchcraft: Marvin Harris on the War on Terror

Gregory Afghani
Sleepless on Skid Row: Guilty of Being Homeless in America

Alexander Cockburn
600,000 Dead in Iraq: Chortles in the New Yorker for Slaughter's Cheerleader, C. Hitchens

Website of the Day
Petition: Defend Columbia Students Who Confronted the Minutemen

 

October 10, 2006

Paul Craig Roberts
Lost Wars and a Lost Economy

Robert Robideau
The Myth Keepers of Columbus

Joshua Frank
The Democrats and the War on Civil Liberties

Dave Lindorff
Free the Press! Free Linda Greenhouse!

Dave Zirin
Brother of the Fist

Heather Gray
Where Votes Matter: My Experience in South Africa

James Knotwell
Big Ag in the Heartland: the Future of Nebraska's Family Farms

Missy Beattie
The Return of James Baker, III

Mike Whitney
Bush and North Korea: Bumbling Toward Disaster

David Rosen
Sex Panic on Capitol Hill: Mark Foley and the Politics of Sex in America

Website of the Day
Eno / Byrne: Music to Enjoy the Foley Scandal By

 


October 9. 2006

Robert Fisk
The Age of Terror

Norman Solomon
Welcome to the Nuclear Club

Ron Jacobs
The Boom Heard Around the World

Gideon Levy
The Mystery of America

Walter Brasch
Their Back Pages: Sex, Lies and Family Values

Mickey Z.
Who Killed Michael Moore?

John Holt
Grizzlies in Our Midst: Can Humans and Bears Coexist?

Lucinda Marshall
Not So Pretty in Pink: Profits and Breast Cancer

Saul Landau
Post-Castro Cuba

Website of the Day
War, Inc.

 

 

October 7 / 8, 2006
Weekend Edition

Alexander Cockburn
Wargasms and Orgasms

Peter Kwong
The Chinese Face of Neoliberalism

Ralph Nader
Revolt of the Generals

Mark Donham
What Cynthia McKinney Means to Me

Dave Lindorff
Philly's Police Snoops

Peter Bosshard
World Bank Shuts Out Dissident Voices: Big Dams, Huge Profits & Political Corruption

Ron Jacobs
Evil Hour in Colombia

Lawrence R. Velvel
Governmental Derelicts: Moral Meltdown in America

Fred Gardner
Arnold Vetoes Hemp Bill

David Green
The US, Israel and the Invasion of Lebanon

Jim B.
Activism, Incorporated: Outsourcing Grassroots Politics?

Missy Beattie
Prayers for Peace at the Edge of the Abyss

Michael Donnelly
Blame the Page: Grand Old Perverts Go on Offensive

Jackson Thoreau
Enter Newt

Jon Hung
Revisiting Korematsu: Denying Civil Rights Based on National Origin

CounterPunch News Service
Why We Confronted the Minutemen at Columbia

Tom D'Antoni
Playlist

Poets' Basement
Orloski, Davies, Tirado, Gaffney and Ford

Website of the Weekend
Reagan Gone Wild

 


October 6, 2006

Alison Weir
Just Another Mother Murdered

Tiffany Ten Eyck / Mark Brenner
Made in (DeUnionized) America

Corporate Crime Reporter
Look Who's Behind "37 Reasons" to Vote for Big Business: Former Clinton PR Flak Mike McCurry

Juan Antonio Montecino
Cleaving a False Divide in Latin America

Walden Bello
A Siamese Tragedy

Christopher Brauchli
Rank Invitations: Dining with Bush

Brynne Keith-Jennings
Dan Burton in Nicaragua: the Congressman, His Stick and the Elections

Jonathan Cook
The Struggle for Palestine's Soul

Website of the Day
Fighting Hog Farms and Clearcuts in the Heartland

 


October 5, 2006

John Walsh
Turn the Page

Carol Norris
The Radical Right, the Myth of the Gay Child Abuser and You: a Psychotherapist on the Hysteria Over Foley

Paul Craig Roberts
Will November Bring Hope or Another Stolen Election?

Ricardo Alarcón
The Truth About the Embargo of Cuba

James Abourezk
Waterboarding the Constitution: After Torture, What's Next?

Nicola Nasser
Removing Hamas: Brinksmanship or Coup d'Etat?

Kirkpatrick Sale
Breaking Away: the First North American Secessionist Conference

Uri Avnery
Peace with Syria: Lunch in Damascus

Website of the Day
More Naughty GOP Messages


October 4, 2006

Elizabeth Terzakis
The Walls That Racism Built: Blood Revenge, the Death Penalty and Kevin Cooper

Paul Wolf
The Mushy Rebellion: Pakistan Under Musharraf

Sean Penn
The Arrogant, the Misguided and the Cowards

Dave Lindorff
Outrage as Misdirection: The Real Scandal isn't Foley

Diane Farsetta
For Sale: Iraqi Kurdistan

Sharon Smith
Democrats: Yes to War, No to Pedophilia

Felice Pace
Revoking 1776

Sara Roy
The Economy of Gaza

Website of the Day
Alexander Cockburn: the Video Interview (Part Two)


October 3, 2006

Jennifer Van Bergen
Compassionate Conservative Pedophiles

Greg Moses
The Infallible Empire: Junking Habeas Corpus

Stan Cox
Real Bad ID: a National Driver's License and the Fading Right of Anonymity

Niranjan Ramakrishnan
How Empires Die

Evelyn Pringle
Big Pharma Takes a Hit: Alaska's Supreme Court Outlaws Forced Drugging

Fred Wilhelms
SoundExchange and Unpaid Music Artists: Help Us Find These Musicians and Get Them Paid!

Michael Abelman
Know Your Farmer, Know Your Food: the Risks of Convenience and Consolidation

Gary Leupp
The Foley Follies

Website of the Day
Bush and Blair: Endless Love

 

October 2, 2006

Eric Hazan
Roadmap to Nowhere: an Interview with Tanya Reinhart on Israel/Palestine Since 2003

Mike Whitney
Bloodbath on 60 Minutes: Court Stenographer Finally Comes Clean

Norman Solomon
American Narcissism and Iraq

Assaf Kfoury
Meeting Nasrallah

Missy Beattie
The Meaning of "ummmm": Speaker Hasert and the Over-Friendly Congressman

Arthur Neslen
Lie Less in Gaza

Paula J. Caplan
How the Supreme Court Mangled My Research

Website of the Day
Predator Drones Target Bechtel

 

Sept. 30 / 0ct. 1, 2006
Weekend Edition

Paul Craig Roberts
The New Face of Class War

Marjorie Cohn
Rounding Up US Citizens: a Consitutional Shredding

Ben Tripp
Deviant Conservative Males: an Analysis

Ron Jacobs
A Dismal and Chaotic Place: Iraq According to Patrick Cockburn

Ralph Nader
Torturer-in-Chief

Mike Whitney
Iraq: The Breaking Point

Christopher Reed
It Pays to Raise a Ruckus

Seth Sandronsky
The Housing Bust: Excess Investment and Its Discontents

Fred Gardner
The Chancellor's Wife

Mokhiber / Weissman
Hewlett Packard and the Erosion of Privacy

Michael Dickinson
My Escape Attempt from Prison Transfer: Extract from a Diary in Turkish Police Custody

Alan Gregory
Fake Green: Top 10 Ways Politicians Pretend to be Environmentalists

Poets' Basement
Gardner, Landau, Lindorff, Davies,& Buknatski

 

 

September 29, 2006

Bruce Jackson
Chavez's Reading, Bush's Reading

Michael J. Smith
The Lobby Debate Does Manhattan

Emira Woods
Oil Trip: Record Profits for Exxon, Deprivation for Africa

William S. Lind
The Sanctuary Illusion: Pakistan, Afghanistan and Iraq as Theme Parks for 4GW

David Swanson
Mommy, What's Waterboarding?

Jonathan Cook
Bad Faith and the Destruction of Palestine

Website of the Day
Jesus: the Recruitment Tapes


September 28, 2006

Sen. Russ Feingold
The Flaws in the Military Commissions Act

Ron Jacobs
The Generals, the Democrats and Iraq: One Policy, Two Parties

Mokhiber / Weissman
Scenes from Laura's Book Festival: Elmo Will Not Save You

Lee Sustar
A Left Challenge to Lula

Robert Jensen
Finding My Way Back to Church--and Getting Kicked Out

John Chuckman
America Has Just Lost Two More Wars

Evelyn Pringle
Inside America's Nursing Homes: a Hidden Tragedy of Neglect and Abuse

Nicola Nasser
Bush and Islam: Words vs. Deeds

Uri Avnery
Political Corruption in Israel

Website of the Day
Art Against the Empire


September 27, 2006

Patrick Cockburn
A Final Explosion Looms in Mosul

Camilo Mejia
Blowback From Iraq: Giving Terrorism a Reason to Exist

Pat Williams
Tax Burdens and Cheaters in the Rockies: Send Those IRS Mercenaries in Search of Montana's Land Barons and Oil Drillers

Ben Terrall
Failing Haiti: Another Bungled UN Mission

Ridgeway / Ng
Paul Weyrich Explaines His Opposition to the Patriot Act: a Short Film

Joe Allen
Where are the Mass Protests?

Andrew Wimmer
Don't Disappear Into a Black Hole

Franklin C. Spinney
Rumsfeld's AutoCarterization: Skullduggery in the Pentagon's Budget

Website of the Day
Model Nukes: the Photo Contest


September 26, 2006

Hani Shukrallah
The American Mind: When Historical Analysis is Reduced to Whim

William Blum
If It's Election Season, It Must Be Time for a Terror Alert

Niranjan Ramakrishnan
Torturing the Obvious

Barbara Becnel
Witness to an Execution: a Slow and Very Painful Death

Paul Rockwell
Judicial Complicity in US War Crimes: the Watada Case

Dave Lindorff
Bush and Iran: Going to War to Save His Own Ass?

Rich Gibson
Lessons from the Detroit Teachers' Strike

Anthony Papa
The Danger of Meth Registries: "Have a Cold? Prove It, Then Sign Here"

Nate Mezmer
New Orleans is Back ... Without Blacks: Monday Night Football at the Superdome

Uri Avnery
Mohammed's Sword

Website of the Day
Only YOU Can Stop the Sale of Public Lands to Mining, Timber and Real Estate Corporations


September 25, 2006

Patrick Cockburn
The Most Dangerous Place in the World: a Journey to Iraq's "Taliban Republic"

Jonathan Cook
Human Rights Watch: Still Missing the Point on Lebanon

Joshua Frank
Did Maria Cantwell's Campaign Try to Buy Off Aaron Dixon?

Paul Craig Roberts
Is the Bush Administration Itching to Nuke Iran?

Robert Jensen
Defending Chavez on FoxNews

Dave Lindorff
Horowitz on Campus: This Mouth for Hire

Norman Solomon
Media Tall Tales for Next War

Dr. Charles Jonkel
Save a Grizzly, Visit a Library: "People like the Croc Hunter are Worse Than the Most Bloodthirsty Slob Hunter

Michael Dickinson
"The King's New Clothes:" a Play Written in a Turkish Jail

Alexander Cockburn
Flying Saucers and the Decline of the Left

Website of the Day
Great Bear Foundation

 

September 23 / 24, 2006
Weekend Edition

Jonathan Cook
How Israel is Engineering the "Clash of Civilizations"

Jeffrey St. Clair
Star Wars Goes Online ... Crashes

Dr. Anon
A Doctor's Life in Baghdad

Tom Barry
Oil and Political Opportunism

Carl G. Estabrook
The Darfur Smokescreen

Laura Carlsen
Mexico's Two Presidents

Todd Chretien
The Axis of Lesser Evilism

Dr. Charles Jonkel
From Grizzly Man to the Croc Hunter: the Global Media and the Death of Bears

Debbie Nathan
I Was Disappeared By Salon

Fred Gardner
Dustin Costa Struggles Against Invisibility

Fred Wilhelms
The Money Belongs to the Artists Who Created the Music

Seth Sandronsky
The Cruel Economics of Health Care in America

Ralph Nader
Mavericks at Work

Rev. William Alberts
"Specks" and "Logs" and 9/11

Jon Van Camp
Who is Hezbollah?

Heather Gray
Conservatives and Technology

David Vest
Jerry Lightfoot, RIP

Jeffrey St. Clair
Playlist: What I'm Listenting to This Week

Poets' Basement
Landau / Davies

Website of the Weekend
Meet Me In The Morning: C. Wonderland & J. Lightfoot

Video of the Weekend
Is It a Bird? A Missile? Or, Just Perhaps, a Friggin' Plane?

 

September 22, 2006

Patrick Cockburn
Republic of Fear: Torture in Bush's Iraq, Worse Than Under Saddam

Michael Donnelly
It's the Manipulated Economy, Stupid!

Ramzy Baroud
The Next Palestinian Struggle

Evo Morales
"We Need Partners, Not Bosses": Address to the United Nations

Stanley Howard
Torture and Justice in Chicago

Sarah Leah Whitson
Hezbollah's Rockets and Civilian Casualties: a Reply to Jonathan Cook

JoAnn Wypijewski
Conservations at Ground Zero

Website of the Day
Cockburn in Atlanta: the Video Interview


September 21, 2006

Mahmoud Ahmadi-Nejad
"No Nation Should Have Superiority Over Others:" UN Address

Justin E. H. Smith
Ending the Death Penalty: Outline of an Abolitionist Program

Rick Kuhn
Australian Government Steps Up Attacks on Muslims: "I Certainly Don't Want That Type of People in Australia"

Mike Roselle
Ed Wiley's Long March: the Elementary School vs. the Strip Mine

Amira Hass
In the Name of Security: What Israeli Police Files Reveal About the Occupation of Palestine

Deborah Rich
From the Kitchen of Dr. Frankenstein: the Consumption of Gene-Engineeered Foods

Mickey Z.
10 Reasons Cars Suck

Saul Landau
Terrorism at Sheridan Circle

Website of the Day
Stop the Decapitation of Mountains!


September 20, 2006

Sharon Smith
Elections, Detentions and Deportations

Christopher Reed
Goodbye Koizumi, Hello Abe

John Ross
Mexico: Does AMLO Have a Future?

Joshua Frank
A Wasted Campaign: How Jonathan Tasini Helped Hillary Clinton and Distracted the Antiwar Movement

Arthur Neslen
The Clenched Fist of the Phoenix: What Made Israel Burn Lebanon, Again?

Norman Solomon
The Hollow Promise of Digital Technology

Michael Carmichael
The Vatican's Tyrant

Evelyn Pringle
The Merck Vioxx Litigation: a Scorecard

Hugo Chavez
Rise Up Against the Empire: Address to the United Nations

Website of the Day
Before You Enlist: Watch This Video!


September 19, 2006

Patrick Cockburn
Deadly Harvest: Lebanese Fields Sown with Israeli Cluster Bombs

Jeff Leys
Economic Warfare: Iraq and the IMF

Brian M. Downing
War, Taxes and Democracy

Col. Dan Smith
Dispelling Brutality

Liaquat Ali Khan
Presidential Incitements: Did Bush's Speech Violate Geneva Conventions on Genocide?

Ron Jacobs
Just Sign on the Dotted Line: Iraqi Oil and Production Sharing Agreements

Nik Barry-Shaw / Yves Engler
Canada in Haiti: Torture, Murder and Complicity

Lucinda Marshall
Air Paranoia: the Great Toothpaste and Hair Gel Scare

Saul Landau
The Pinochet Syndicate

Photo of the Day
Hold That Bridge!

Website of the Day
Scenarios for an Iranian War


September 18, 2006

Carl Boggs
Crimes of Empire

Uri Avnery
Peace Panic

Mike Stark / Jim Bullington
Ann Richards, the Original Texacutioner

Joshua Frank
Corporate E. Coli

John Murphy
The Price of Free Speech

Ramzy Baroud
Murdoch Almighty

Dave Lindorff
On Constitution Day

Bill Quigley
Showing Conviction at Echo 9

Website of the Day
Tutorial: How to Hack a Diebold Voting Machine

 

 

 

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October 24, 2006

From Kofi Annan to Woody Hayes

The Silence at Home, as America Eats Her Young

By Dr. TRUDY BOND

"Far more sinister . . . is the cult of victory that permeates every inch of American culture, from the football fields where it is practiced to the churches where it is preached. Conditioned to win at all costs, youth are reduced to passive vessels for the warrior spirit."--- David Ng

There are those moments in time when the macrocosmic global milieu, which we usually observe happening to someone else at a physical or political distance, harshly rains fire upon us as individual mortals. This often volatile merger of the macrocosm to the microcosm of our everyday lives, when the bloody and catastrophic imaginings of the mass of humanity affect us personally, is a transforming event of existential angst. Such are the times when the war, duly reported in the lazy lies of the 6 o'clock newscaster casually speaking of the dead on the far side of the planet, suddenly fires a shrapnel fragment into the brain casing of a sibling in uniform. Or whenever more frequently and frightening politicized violations of the Constitution come home to haunt as your child's individual freedom of speech is degradingly violated and the violator is exempt.

In April of this year, Kofi Annan visited his alma mater, Macalester College in St. Paul, to inaugurate their Institute for Global Citizenship. In his remarks that day, the Secretary-General asserted, "The three freedoms which all human beings crave -- freedom from want, freedom from war or large-scale violence, and freedom from arbitrary or degrading treatment -- are closely interconnected."

Macalester College has recently become one of the nation's premier liberal arts colleges. The 2007 Newsweek/Kaplan College Guide included Macalester as one of America's "25 New Elite Ivies." U.S. News & World Report ranked Mac in the top 25 among the 215 national liberal arts colleges, ranking it 5th for international student presence on campus. One of the most respected guides, the 2006 Fiske Guide notes that one of Mac's hallmarks is "an internationalist view of the world. . . Mac attracts the best and brightest. Macalester students are an open-minded, friendly bunch, more politically and socially progressive than their peers at similar institutions. The school provides an atmosphere of high-powered scholarship and success, pairing academic rigor with global perspective." In the Students' Guide to Colleges Macalester was listed as one of the "Top 10 Most Intellectual Schools."

One accolade, that of a winning football team, is not on the list. Given the credentials needed to gain admission to Mac, such would not be expected. Macalester and Carleton, a similar institution in St. Paul, play their rivalry each year for the "Book of Knowledge" trophy. The Book of Knowledge is being replaced by Woody Hayes and the 100-yard War , as the Mac Weekly introduced a new head coach with the headlines: "Mac Football pushes for change from top down; New head coach . . . sets his sights on wins, recruits, respect."

"We have a tall task here, in not just turning around the football program, but changing the culture and mentality of an entire community." One wonders what was meant by the need to change the culture and mentality of a college community that is viewed by most as one of most intelligent, liberal college communities in the nation . . . that Mac's football program must morph into the All-American model of anti-intellectual, Fellowship-of-Christian-Athlete, jocks-first, winning-is-everything warrior model? For my son, the actual meaning of those words, "changing the culture and mentality of an entire community," were to become apparent within a short time.

New turf was laid (literally) and plans for a new stadium and facilities to the tune of $45 mil were unveiled. The profile of Mac's football program changed as spring training was added, players were advised by coaching staff not to take any afternoon courses other than those required for a major that might interfere with an extended fall practice schedule, and the too-familiar image of a Woody Hayes coaching style became a regular experience for players.

Macalester's Statement of Purpose and Belief includes the assertion, "We believe that the benefit of the educational experience at Macalester is the development of individuals who make informed judgments and interpretations of the broader world around them and choose actions or beliefs for which they are willing to be held accountable."

On September 7 of this year, my son Jacob, a second-year student at Macalester, made an "informed judgment and interpretation of the broader world" when he refused to take off his football helmet as the national anthem was played on an adjoining soccer field, after being militarily ordered to do so by a 24-year-old assistant coach. My son refused to honor the bombs-bursting-in-air bravado of U.S. military policy over the past 3 years, and was "held accountable" for his action by being dropped from the football team the next morning. These bombs bursting in air have resulted in more than 150,000 troops disabled from serving in Iraq and Afghanistan, the deaths of over 3,000 U.S. military in these wars, and the recently released and rabidly denied scientific estimate from Lancet of over 655,000 Iraqi deaths.

What followed his dismissal from the team was the only too-familiar reaction we've experienced repeatedly from our national government in the past few years: those in charge will manipulate the event so as not to be held accountable. The next days were a blur of conversations and emails involving college officials, my son and the St. Paul Pioneer Press. The head of athletics had established his position immediately in stating in an email to me and other football parents, "But most important to me, we will not use a public forum." The Dean of Students reassured alumni that the incident had been "sensationalized." A reporter from the press had interviewed my son and me repeatedly, set a meeting with Jacob for a "photo opportunity" (reporter's words), ideally with "football gear." Such was the threat to the athletic department at Macalester that the head coach first mentioned libel to the reporter if he ran a story, followed by saying Jacob's release from the team was Jacob's wish and finally, the coach made a call to the sports editor of the paper giving other reasons for Jacob's dismissal, to the point of using Jacob's neurological disability as the basis. The sports editor canned the story.

I began to understand the lies and cover-ups from our government the past few years that have formed our international reality in a more visceral manner. The tenor of these times is how easily facts are manipulated to serve the interests of the institutions, whatever those institutions might be. The public will not see the remains of U.S. soldiers arriving at air bases in flag-draped caskets as our government has banned news coverage and photography of dead soldiers' homecomings on all military bases. A jury in Ft. Hood, Texas found Lynndie England guilty of six counts of detainee abuse at the Abu Ghraib prison, but the memos from Gonzales and Yoo giving legal justification to her actions have survived all scrutiny.

Jessica Lynch was one of the first truly sensationalized lies, a heroine when the U.S. need one, her capture by the Iraqis and her rescue by US special forces became one of the first fantasies of the war. The truth as we later learned was that her Iraqi guards had long fled, she was being well cared for -- and doctors had already tried to free her. Pat Tillman died an unnecessary death by friendly fire, the result of numerous military mistakes. In the interest of the institution his family was told only a fact or two, only after the ceremonious funeral and media hype. On and on, ad nauseum. Most recently we have lost 800 years of individual freedoms in eliminating habeas corpus and the rule of law, justified by the continued lies and manipulations. Or as St. Paul's own Garrison Keillor wrote, "This week, we have suspended human rights in America."

I don't begin to compare my own experience with the above tragedies, except the last. Jacob had chosen an institution where we believed his values and beliefs would be respected, where he would be "free from arbitrary or degrading treatment." Never did I expect his First Amendment to be so forcefully violated, or the resulting silence of all involved, including the press. When our previously-known liberal institutions no longer value our first amendment rights, the times they are a'changing, but not for the better. The facts laid bare: a football player refused to take off his helmet for the national anthem; he was scolded harshly, shamed and humiliated for that action; he was removed from the team the following day; the official story changed to blame the target -- er, victim; the press was bullied away from reporting it.

In these times, when Empire's fictions and cover-ups come to kick down your door, you just know your life is about to change.

"America as often been called the land of opportunity
But you better be careful which one you choose cuz it might come with a penalty
There's lots of good jobs working in a factory cranking out the land mines
And you better be ready to pull the party line or you'll end up doing real time

America has her finger on the trigger
America's got her bullets in the gun
America's still stringing up niggers
America eats her young . . ."

'America Eats Her Young' , Dayglo Abortion (2004)

Dr. Trudy Bond is a psychologist in Toledo, Ohio. She can be reached at armordilo@aol.com.

Currently Mac's football team is 1-6.







 

 

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