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Today's
Stories
October 29
/ 30, 2005
Peter Linebaugh
The
Wedges of Hephaestus
October 28,
2005
Jared Bernstein
Inflation
Up; Wages Down: Fastest Decline in Wages on Record
Virginia Tilley
Embracing
the Anti-Aparthied Movement in Israel/Palestine
Phil Gasper
The
Race to Execute Tookie Williams
Jennifer Matsui
It's Mardi Graft Time!
Manual Garcia,
Jr.
Is the US Really Against Torture?
Monica Benderman
In the Name of Justice
Jason Leopold
Fitzgerald
Focuses on the Forgeries
Dave Lindorff
Suddenly, Bush Endorses Right of Fair Trials
Otober 27, 2005
Saul Landau
The
Scandal Isn't the Leak, But the Illegal War
Stuart Hodkinson
Bono
and Geldoff: "We Saved Africa" Oh No, They Didn't!
Ingmar Lee
Stop
the Troops!: No Glory or Honor in Iraq
Lila Rajiva
License
to Bill: Gates Does India
Ilan Pappe
The
Last Moment of Hope
Niranjan Ramakrishnan
Waiting for Fitzgerald
Michael Donnelly
Look Who's Talking Now: the GOP on Perjury
Ron Jacobs
Escape the Weight of Your Corporate Logo
Cockburn / St. Clair
White House in Meltdown
October 26,
2005
Kathy Kelly
For
Whom They Toll
Gary Leupp
Dialectics
of the Plame Affair
Mike Marqusee
Empire of Denial
Eric Ruder
War Crimes in Afghanistan
Patrick Cockburn
Iraq: a Constitutionally Divided Nation
Joshua Frank
Fitzgerald v. the Bushies: Hold Your Elation in Check
J.L. Chestnut, Jr.
The Legacy of Rosa Parks
Website of
the Day
Decent Work in America: the 2005 Work Environment Index
October 25,
2005
Paul Craig
Roberts
Condi
and Syrian Regime Change: Could Somebody Recommend a President?
Ken Sengupta / Patrick Cockburn
Attack on the Palestine Hotel
Conn Hallinan
Sleight of Hand: Iran, India and the US
Nafeez Mosaddeq Ahmed
Pulling the Court Strings
Jackie Corr
Barbara Bush: Poster Gorgon of the Houston Astros
Robert Day
Talk to Strangers
John Sugg
Judith
Miller and Me
October 24,
2005
Dave Lindorff
Revoke
Judy Miller's Pulitzer
Michael Donnelly
Shades of Iran/contra
Patrick Cockburn
A Nation Stands on Trial
Mike Whitney
Apres Rove
Norman Solomon
Iraq is Not Vietnam, But...
Bill and Kathleen
Christison
US
Foreign Policy and Palestine
October 22
/ 23, 2005
Alexander Cockburn
When
Divas Collide: Maureen Dowd v. Judy Miller
Billy Sothern
Letter
from the Circle Bar, New Orleans
Saul Landau
Bush, an Assessment
Ralph Nader
An
Open Letter to Bush on Harriet Miers
Behrooz Ghamari
Whose Justice Does Saddam's Trial Serve?
Brian Cloughley
Bush the Strategist: Pyrrhus Without a Victory?
Diana Barahona
Venezuela's National Workers' Union
Fred Gardner
Dershowitzed!
Lee Sustar
What the War on Terror is Really About
Patrick Cockburn
Murder of Saddam Trial Defense Lawyer
Laura Carlsen
Mexico City Seamstresses Recall 1985 Quake
James Petras
China Bashing and the Loss of US Competitiveness
Joshua Frank
Invading Iran: Who is to Stop Them?
Manuel Garcia,
Jr.
Disasters are Us
Michelle Bollinger
When Abortion Was Illegal
Missy Comley
Beattie
CSI: Iraq
Kona Lowell
Intelligent Design: Making High School Fun
Ben Tripp
Tanks for the Memories
Jeffrey St. Clair
Playlist: What I'm Listening To This Week
Poets' Basement
Albert and Engel
Website of
the Day
Indictment Watch
October 21,
2005
Dave Lindorff
The
Democrats' Abortion Hypocrisy
Winslow T. Wheeler
Paying for Their Mistakes: Incompetence, Deception and the Defense
Budget
Col. Dan Smith
The Destruction of the National Guard
Norman Solomon
Media at Crossroads: 25 Years After Reagan's Triumph
Madis Senner
Abusing Katrina
Michael Donnelly
Richard
Pombo: DeLay in Cowboy Boots
October 20, 2005
Dave Lindorff
Impeachment
Comes to NYC
Ray McGovern
16
Fatal Words: Cheney's Chickens Come Home to Roost
Jeremy Brecher
/
Brendan Smith
Attack Syria? Invade Iran?: By What Constitutional Right?
Patrick Cockburn
Saddam Refuses to Recognize Court
Kevin Zeese
Was the Iraqi Constitution Vote Fixed?
Ross Eisenbrey
Millions Would Lose Pay and Protections Under Enzi Amendment
Randy Shields
James McMurtry Makes It in Dayton
Justine Davidson
Prosecuting Bush in Canada for Torture: a Small Victory
After Lucas
Cranach
Judy and Holofernes
Joe Allen
The
Scandalous History of the Red Cross
October 19,
2005
Christopher Reed
Koizumi and the Rape of Nanking
Stephen Soldz
Bush
and Avian Flu: the Excuses Begin to Fly
Chet Richards
War
and Intelligence
Patrick Cockburn
Saddam on Trial
Scott Richard
Lyons
Multicultural
Columbus?
Ralph Nader
An Interview with Rev. William Sloane Coffin
Website of
the Day
Shocking Video: Why Birds May Be Taking Viral Vengeance on Humans
October 18,
2005
Chet Flippo
Merle
Haggard: "Let's Get Out of Iraq"
Ron Jacobs
Dual Devotions: the Catholic Church and the US Flag
Keeanga-Yamahtta
Taylor
A Tale of Two Cities: From DC to Toledo
Dave Lindorff
Judy Miller: Little Miss Run Amok
Virginia Rodino
A Winter Patriot: Reflections on the Antiwar Movement
Thomas Healy
The Weather in Goshen: Still Radical After All These Years
Ralph Nader
A New New Orleans
Stephen Lendman
The Sorrows of Haiti
Patrick Cockburn
On the Eve of Saddam's Trial: a Divided Iraq
October 17,
2005
Peter Linebaugh
Spinoza
and the Black Limos
Norman Solomon
Judith Miller, the Fourth Estate and the Warfare State
Cockburn /
Sengupta
"If
the Sunnis Don't Like It, That's Their Problem"
Mike Whitney
Miller's Confession: Last Gasp Before Indictments?
Uri Avnery
Iraq Now: What Awaits Samira?
Harold Pinter
Torture & Misery in the Name of Freedom
Website of
the Day
Al Joudi v. Bush
October 15
/ 16, 2005
Alexander Cockburn
Ayatollahs
of the Apocalypse
Patrick Cockburn
"This Constitution Won't Get Me a Job"
Saul Landau
Two Terrorists and a Lush: Osama, Posada and Bush's Drinking
Neve Gordon
"Beyond Chutzpah": Exposing Grave Moral Distortions
Moshe Adler
Poverty in New York City
Christopher Brauchli
Lynndie England's Burden
Diane Farsetta
The Emperor Doesn't Disclose: the Fight Against Fake News
Sam Husseini
Notes on Current Reporting About Judith Miller
Monica Benderman
From Chaos to Conscience to Peace
Mickey Z.
POW Abuse by US: Nothing New Going On Here
Douglas C.
Smyth
George W. Bush, the Honorius of Our Time
Lee Sustar
Will Delphi Bust the UAW?
Fred Gardner
Cannabinoids Arrive in Realm of Established Fact
Elizabeth Schulte
A Former Panther's Georgia Campaign: an Interview with Elaine
Brown
Joshua Frank
Will the Democrats Save Harriet Miers?
David Vest
Down with Formalism! Up with Values!
Ben Tripp
Epistle II: the Reawakenign
Poets Basement
Engel, Albert, Ford and Louise
Website of
the Weekend
The
Hidden Canyon
October 14,
2005
Farrah Hassen
A
Somber Ramadan in Syria
Ron Jacobs
The
Black Panthers: They Haven't Forgotten; Neither Should We
Sasha Kramer
USAID
and Haiti: the Friendly Face of Imperialism?
Katrina Yeaw
The Student Struggle in Italy
Nicole Colson
Bird Flu: Militarizing Health Care
Raúl Zibechi
Survival and Existence in El Alto
Nikolas Kozloff
Hugo
Chávez and the Politics of Race
Website of the Day
LA Filmmakers Cooperative
October 13, 2005
Jeremy Scahill
Mr.
Bush Goes to Tikrit (Sort Of)
Jeff Birkenstein
A
Thoreau for Our Time: Why Cindy Sheehan Matters
Brendan Smith / Jeremy Brecher
Harriet Miers: Bush or the Constitution?
Stan Cox
Did You Know This About Iraq?
Anis Memon
The Curious Case of Russ Feingold
Gary Leupp
Miller, Libby and the June Notes
Dave Zirin
A Tribute to August Wilson
Matthew Koehler
America's Endangered Forests
Werther
The
Two-Headed Monster
Website of
the Day
Hurricane Song
October 12, 2005
Omar Waraich
Britain
and the Quake: Mean and Stingy
William Cook
Voices
Behind the Entombment Wall
Phil Gasper
Countdown
to a Legal Lynching
Dave Lindorff
Impeachment Now and Then: Clinton, Bush and the Polls
Matt Vidal
Capital, Power and Class
John Gautreaux
New Orleans will Never be the Same
Diana Johnstone
Srebrenica
Revisited: Using War as an Excuse for War
Mark Weisbrot
The IMF Has Lost Its Influence
Brian J. Foley
Gitmo Tribunals Endanger Public Safety
Website of
the Day
Columbus Day Lies
October 11,
2005
Roger Morris
/ Steve Schmidt
Strategic
Demands of the 21st Century
Lila Rajiva
Live from New Orleans: Abu Ghraib
Bill Quigley
New
Orleans: Leaving the Poor Behind Again
Paul Craig Roberts
Natural Born Liars
Dave Lindorff
Recruiters in Schools: No Lie Left Untried
Dr. Teresa Whitehurst
Suspect Thy Neighbor
Mitchel Cohen
Showdown at Chuck E. Cheese
Tariq Ali
Pakistan will Never Forget This Horror
Website of
the Day
L'Heure Americaine
October 10,
2005
Cindy and Craig
Corrie
Rachel's
Words Live
Joshua Frank
Washington's War Dems
Gideon Levy
The Beautiful Life Without Arafat
Alan Wallis
The Fight for Free Speech at Union Square
Mickey Z.
In Defense of Liars
CounterPunch News Service
Vermont Independence Convention
Paul Craig
Roberts
The
Police State is Closer Than You Think
Website of the Day
Dylan's Chronicles
October 8 /
9, 2005
Alexander Cockburn
Rhetoric
and Reality in the Business of Getting Rid of Black People
Ralph Nader
Katrina
and the Growls of Greed
Jennifer Van Bergen
New American Law: Legal Strategies in the Dharfir Case
Saul Landau
An Oily Religious Dream
Jeff Halper
Setting Up Abbas
Lenni Brenner
The Millions More Movement and Zionism
Nikolas Kozloff
Bird Flu and Bush
Brian Cloughley
Training Soldiers in Iraq
Alice Slater
A Nobel Prize for Chernobyl?
John Gautreaux
A View from Cajun Country
Fred Gardner
Does the Controlled Substances Act Mean What It Says?
Niranjan Ramakrishnan
The Leveethan Approach
M.G. Piety
Rot in the Ivory Tower: Collusion, Cover-Up and Kierkegaard
Tom Gorman
The Hitchens Doctrine
Mike Whitney
Bunker Days with George
Aseem Shrivastava
Beyond the Wasteland: Lessons from Afghanistan
Ben Tripp
Religion, an Epistle
Poets' Basement
Albert, Engel and Ford
October 7,
2005
Larry Johnson
The
Plame Case: the Real Issues
Will Youmans
Why
Do We Hate Our Freedom? Recruiters and Thugs on Campus
Dave Lindorff
Bird Flu: Evolution or Intelligent Design?
Judith Scherr
Haiti's Children's Prison
Russell D. Hoffman
Nukes for Peace, Revisited?: Nobel Prize Debacle
Jared Bernstein
Katrina and Jobs
Jennifer Van
Bergen
New
American Law: the Case of Dr. Dhafir
Website of
the Day
FBI Witchhunt
October 6, 2005
P. Sainath
"Take
That, Tom Friedman": Indian Masses Reject NYT's Neoliberal
Idol Again
Scott Parkin
When Antiwar Activists Get Mugged
Paul Craig
Roberts
Blundering
into Syria
Andréa Schmidt
Haiti's Biometric Elections: a High-Tech Experiment in Exclusion
Dave Lindorff
Easy
Money in the Big Easy
Joshua Frank
In Defense of Lew Rockwell
M. Junaid Alam
Jackboots at George Mason
Matthew Koehler
Cock and Bull on the Bitterroot
Robert Pollin
Is
the Dollar Still Falling?
October 5,
2005
Heather Gray
Militarization is Not an Answer for
Reconstruction: the Case of the Philippines
Robert Jensen
Is
Bush a Racist?
Ramzy Baroud
Bush's Final Choice: America or
the Empire
Col. Dan Smith
Keeping Promises to Iraq: "Everything
is Bad"
Dave Zirin
Barry
Bonds Laughs Last
Paul Craig Roberts
Liberal Guilt? How the Neocons
Took Over
Alan Maass
Doing
the Right Wing's Dirty Work
October 4, 2005
Nikolas Kozloff
Shocking the Two Party System:
a Political Opportunity for Sheehan and the Antiwar Mvt.
Mike Roselle
Houston,
You've Got a Problem
Joshua Frank
The Scoop on Harriet Miers
John Chuckman
War
Porn: What the Gruesome Images Say
Alan Farago
Storm Warning for Jeb: Developers,
Hurricanes and the Keys
Mickey Z.
An
Interview with Thaddeus Rutkowski
Christine & Ethan Rose
Home Depot Exploits Hurricane Victims
Gary Leupp
An
Earlier Empire's War on Iraq: a Lesson from Roman History
Website of the Day
Rodney
Crowell on Bob Dylan
October 3,
2005
Vijay Prashad
Desperation at Holyoke
Paul Craig
Roberts
Condi
Rice: Gunslinger
Joshua Frank
An Interview with Cindy Sheehan
Seth Sandronsky
The
Hiring Crisis for Black Teens
Jeffrey St. Clair
The Great Green Scare
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Weekend Edition
October 29 / 30, 2005
Decoding
Bush's Latest Speech
Bushspeak: Dark and
Garbled Words
By JOHN CHUCKMAN
The
following quotes are from Bush's speech about the War on Terror,
as given October 6, 2005, and largely repeated October 28. It
was a speech especially dense with Bushspeak, a dialect which
never means what it seems to say. Perspective and the occasional
translation follow the quotes.
"All these separate images
of destruction and suffering that we see on the news can seem
like random and isolated acts of madness; innocent men and women
and children have died simply because they boarded the wrong
train, or worked in the wrong building, or checked into the wrong
hotel. Yet while the killers choose their victims indiscriminately,
their attacks serve a clear and focused ideology, a set of beliefs
and goals that are evil, but not insane. "
You might ask how is it possible
to choose victims more indiscriminately than by bombing cities?
The Pentagon doesn't even attempt to count Iraq's dead, civilian
or military. Two serious efforts have been made to count the
civilian toll of the barbarism called "Shock and Awe."
One, an effort to count bodies all over the country in morgues,
hospitals, and other likely places, came up with more than 25,000
killed. Another scientific study of Iraq's national mortality
tables, published in the British medical journal Lancet,
came up with about a 100,000.
What is Bush's understanding
of this "clear and focused ideology"?
"Some call this evil Islamic
radicalism; others, militant Jihadism; still others, Islamo-fascism."
Bush uses these coined-by-neocon
advertising slogans to describe an ideology, but in fact all
they do is attempt to re-package plain old religious extremists.
I cannot help wondering how we would distinguish them from Franklin
Graham preaching about using nuclear weapons following 9/11 or
Pat Robertson speaking about assassinating a democratically-elected
leader or the crazed preaching of heavily-armed American cults?
"We know the vision of the radicals because they've openly
stated it -- in videos, and audiotapes, and letters, and declarations,
and websites."
Do you believe the audiotapes
and videos periodically broadcast any more than you believe the
proved-fake documentation of Hussein buying uranium in Niger?
Are any of these so-called sources any more believable than the
ridiculous video CNN broadcast after the invasion of Afghanistan
in which dogs were being killed in a secret mountain weapons
laboratory run by men wearing sandals? How about spy satellite
shots of mobile weapons labs that never existed, evidence solemnly
presented by Colin Powell before the UN?
Do you even believe Osama bin
Laden is alive? Bush has no reason ever to reveal Osama's death,
an act which would convert Osama from leader in hiding to Martyr.
Of course, if you are reading this piece, you likely are the
wrong kind of person of whom to ask such questions. Bush's words
are crafted for people who let CNN do their thinking for them.
"Now they've set their
sights on Iraq. Bin Laden has stated: "The whole world is
watching this war and the two adversaries. It's either victory
and glory, or misery and humiliation." The terrorists regard
Iraq as the central front in their war against humanity. And
we must recognize Iraq as the central front in our war on terror."
Bush follows a dubious quote
from bin Laden with a preposterous conclusion. There were, before
Bush's invasion, no terrorists in Iraq. Iraq's secret police
hardly afforded a refuge to terrorists or any other potential
conspirators. Moreover, Hussein, the secularist, and bin Laden,
the religious fanatic, are known to have hated each other.
Post-invasion Iraq is crawling
with resistance fighters from many places and of every possible
description. In the words of the head of Canada's intelligence
service, CSIS, Iraq has become a training ground for thousands
who will threaten Western security for years to come. We all
have Bush to thank for this development.
"The radicals exploit
local conflicts to build a culture of victimization, in which
someone else is always to blame and violence is always the solution."
I can't imagine words that
better describe America's reaction to 9/11. About twenty people
committed a terrible crime. Instead of going about the business
of identifying and trying any others who were responsible, Bush
launched two wars he promises to continue for years to come.
A culture of victimization?
America is the world authority on that odd subject. Following
9/11 everything from the giant street signs at doughnut shops
to blinking signs on gas pumps insisted that Americans must never
forget. There were even sweatshirts being sold in supermarkets
and gardening centers. It was all one huge, confused, and dangerous
reaction spurred on by an incompetent man at the top muttering
about "with us or against us."
"And they exploit modern
technology to multiply their destructive power."
What modern technology? The
men who died carrying out 9/11 possessed weapons like box cutters
to take over the planes. The young men in the London Underground
bombing carried backpacks with relatively crude bombs in them.
Bush deliberately confuses
the resistance in Iraq with terrorists in other places. The resistance
in Iraq now does have some improved technology for attacking
American armored vehicles. But why should this surprise anyone?
Many of these people have military experience and they have resources
that were stored away by Hussein. Besides, everyone learns quickly
during the deadly intensity of military conflict. During a few
years of World War I, new technologies for killing emerged quickly,
including tanks, machine guns, poison gas, and air bombardment.
"The hatred of the radicals
existed before Iraq was an issue, and it will exist after Iraq
is no longer an excuse. The government of Russia did not support
Operation Iraqi Freedom, and yet the militants killed more than
180 Russian schoolchildren in Beslan. "
Bush's cynicism and dishonesty
here are off the meter. The Russians have carried on for years
a hideous war against Chechen independence. Journalists from
Europe have reported almost indescribable horrors. The Chechens
are desperate for vengeance against so powerful and ruthless
an opponent. People who have experienced the treatment they have
experienced are indeed capable of almost anything. Were Russia
still the old Soviet Union, Bush would be sending weapons and
encouragement to Chechnya.
"He (bin Laden) assures
them that his -- that this is the road to paradise -- though
he never offers to go along for the ride."
Coming from someone who avoided
military service during a major war so that he could carry on
a carefree frat-life, someone whose National Guard records have
been mutilated, presumably to hide failings, this is quite a
statement. It is, moreover, quite wrong. Bin Laden, whatever
we may think of him, fought bravely in Afghanistan against the
Russians, gaining an almost legendary reputation. He is now,
assuming he is alive, a man whose age and health would rule out
military service.
"When 25 Iraqi children
are killed in a bombing, or Iraqi teachers are executed at their
school, or hospital workers are killed caring for the wounded,
this is murder, pure and
simple -- the total rejection of justice and honor and morality
and religion. These militants are not just the enemies of America,
or the enemies of Iraq, they are the enemies of Islam and the
enemies of humanity. We have seen this kind of shameless cruelty
before, in the heartless zealotry that led to the gulags, and
the Cultural Revolution, and the killing fields."
Bush has killed and mutilated
thousands of Iraqi children. It cannot be otherwise when you
bomb heavily in a country where so large a fraction of the population
is young.
"And Islamic radicalism,
like the ideology of communism, contains inherent contradictions
that doom it to failure."
Bush repeats the phrase "like
the ideology of communism" a number of times, trying to
establish a comparison that doesn't exist. Communism controlled
a number of major nations in the world. The opposition of these
governments to Western freedoms came directly out the fact that
you cannot run a highly centralized state and permit freedom
as we understand it. Islamic extremists control no states.
"Those who despise freedom
and progress have condemned themselves to isolation, decline,
and collapse."
Bush here applies an idea that
does not fit from theories of economic development. This was
always the case for communist governments whose abuse of basic
economic principles doomed them to eventual decline. Nevertheless,
for decades did America behave as though the analysis were true?
No, America spent trillions, literally trillions, of dollars
in a quasi-religious war against communism. In the end, communism
did collapse of its own contradictions.
From the American point of
view, the purpose of the Cold War, at least once the truly dangerous,
paranoid Stalin was dead (early 1953), was to secure American
hegemony through much of the world.
"the mastermind of the
USS Cole bombing, who was chief of al Qaeda operations in the
Persian Gulf."
Mastermind? One suicide bomber
in a small boat approached the Cole and blew a hole in her hull.
How does that require a "mastermind"? The man in the
small boat was determined, and the crew of the American ship
was lax guarding it - end of story.
"Second, we're determined
to deny weapons of mass destruction to outlaw regimes, and to
their terrorist allies who would use them without hesitation.
The United States, working with Great Britain, Pakistan, and
other nations has exposed and disrupted a major black-market
operation in nuclear technology led by A.Q. Khan."
Outlaw regimes with weapons
of mass destruction? Doesn't that exactly describe Pakistan?
And before 9/11, that was pretty much the official American view.
General Musharraf is a coup-installed dictator, and his government
developed atomic weapons in direct opposition to American policy.
Yet today, magically, he is listed with democracies in the fight
against terror.
Mr. Khan is Pakistani and is
regarded as father of the country's atomic-weapons program. Despite
assertions otherwise, it seems inconceivable his covert activities
in spreading nuclear know-how were unknown to his government.
"The United States makes
no distinction between those who commit acts of terror and those
who support and harbor them, because they're equally as guilty
of murder."
Has Bush heard the name Luis
Posada Carriles, a man who blew up an airliner full of people
and is kept from facing trial in Venezuela? Of course he has,
and that makes this statement ridiculous.
"The terrorist goal is
to overthrow a rising democracy, claim a strategic country as
a haven for terror, destabilize the Middle East, and strike America
and other free nations with ever-increasing violence. Our goal
is to defeat the terrorists and their allies at the heart of
their power -- and so we will defeat the enemy in Iraq."
This is preposterous. Guerilla
forces do not work this way. The hide, harass, and make life
unpleasant for those they oppose. Taking control of a state only
invites retaliation against a clearly-defined target. Look what
Bush did to the city of Fallujah, thinking it was a hotbed of
terrorists. Marines turned it into a ghost town, yet resistance
still flourishes.
"With every random bombing
and with every funeral of a child, it becomes more clear that
the extremists are not patriots, or resistance fighters -- they
are murderers at war with the Iraqi people, themselves."
No, what they mainly are is
one side in a civil war precipitated by Bush's invasion, and
civil wars are always the nastiest wars.
"Some observers question
the durability of democracy in Iraq. They underestimate the power
and appeal of freedom."
Democracy and freedom are not
the same thing. Majorities often deny minorities their rights
and freedoms. America has a long history of government with democratic
trappings that has denied freedom to others. Ask the people of
Hawaii. Ask Hispanics in Texas or California. Ask almost any
black American.
Sunnis and others in Iraq feel
Bush has stacked things against their interests with the new
constitution, and they are right.
"We're standing with dissidents
and exiles against oppressive regimes, because we know that the
dissidents of today will be the democratic leaders of tomorrow."
But the people Bush calls terrorists
often are the dissidents in their own lands. Bin Laden certainly
could claim this description in his native Saudi Arabia.
"Iraqi soldiers are sacrificing
to defeat al Qaeda in their own country."
Al Qaeda? Is that really Bush's
enemy in Iraq? Surely, even he does not believe that. His enemies
there include the normal resistance fighters against invasion
we would find anywhere, native minority groups whose interests
are threatened by the government he installed, and undoubtedly
many angry young men from other lands who see grievous injustice
in Bush's invasion.
The name War on Terror
is itself perhaps the darkest example of Bushspeak. You cannot
have a war on ideas, or a war on religious beliefs, or even a
war on people's feelings of grievance and injustice. The War
on Terror is code for belligerent interference in the Middle
East. It is also code for the suppression of dissent in America,
something dear to the kind of people with which Bush surrounds
himself, people who lie, cheat, and profit from billions of dollars
being squandered. And all this crashes over us as a result of
what the intelligence community calls blowback from
bad policies and neglect of years ago.
|
Coming in the Fall
from CounterPunch Books!
The Case
Against Israel
By Michael Neumann
Click Here to Advance Order Philosopher
Michael Neumann's Devastating Rebuttal of Alan Dershowitz
WHAT'S
INSIDE
Grand
Theft Pentagon:
Tales of Greed and Profiteering in the War on Terror
by Jeffrey St. Clair
|
