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Today's
Stories
March 27 / 28, 2004
Jennifer Loewenstein
A Journey to Rafah
March 26, 2004
Christopher Brauchli
There's
a Chill Over the Country
Robert Fisk
The Man Who Knew Too Much: the Ordeal
of Mordechai Vanunu
Joe DeRaymond
Democracy in El Salvador? Think Again
Mike Whitney
Lessons on Apartheid from Ariel Sharon
Mickey Z.
Somalia and Iraq: Looking Back and Ahead
Chris Floyd
The Pentagon Archipelago
CounterPunch Photo Wire
Cheney's Close Shave?
John Breneman
Bush's Comic Bomb
Website of the Day
Dick
is a Killer
March 25, 2004
Lee Sustar
Who
is to Blame for Lost Jobs?
Standard Schaefer
An
Interview with Michael Hudson on Offshore Banking Centers
Roger Burbach
Lula vs. the IMF: Brazil Begins
to Throw Off the Austerity Planners
Jimmer Endres
Elections Without Politics: The Military Budget Is Not an "Issue"
Larry Tuttle
Acting in Your Name: Identity Theft and Public Interest Groups
Toni Solo
Misreporting Venezuela
Dan Bacher
A Memorial Wall for Iraq War's Dead and Wounded
Saul Landau
Is
Venezuela Next?
Website of the Day
The Spiral Railway
March 24, 2004
Gary Leupp
General
Musharraf's IOU
Richard Oxman
Shakespeare
for Kerry
William Lind
The Beginning
of Phase Three: 4G Warfare Hits Iraq
Rep. Ron Paul
Iraq One Year Later
Michael Dempsey
Killing Rachel Corrie Again
Alan Farago
The Bad Math of Mercury: Bush's War on the Unborn
Benjamin Dangl
and April Howard
Media
in Cuba
John L. Hess
No Lie Left Behind: Judy Miller Does Dick Clarke
Greg Weiher
Two Cheers for Dems: "We're Not as Bad as George"
Eva Golinger
An Open Letter to John Kerry on Venezuela
Grayson Childs
Where's Cynthia McKinney?
Steve Niva
Israel's Assassinations will Only
Fuel More Suicide Bombings
Website of the Day
The Bushiad and the Idiossey
March 23, 2004
Phillip Cryan
The
Drug War's Next Casualty: Colombia's National Parks
Ron Jacobs
They Shoot Men in Wheelchairs, Too?
Dave Lindorff
A Spanish Parallel: Scare Tactics and Elections
Mike Whitney
Richard Clarke and Teflon George
Brian McKinlay
Bush's Lil' Buddy in Trouble: John Howard Starts to Wobble
JG
Driving Mr. Koon: "Jim Crow Lives Next Door"
Phyllis Pollack
Gettin' Jigga with Metallica: the Battle Over the Double Black
CD
Ahmed Bouzid
Sharon's One-Way Track
Sean Carter
The G-Word Goes to Court: One Nation Under [Your Logo Here]
M. Shahid Alam
World's Greatest Country: Do the Facts Lie
March 22, 2004
Mazin Qumsiyeh
On Extrajudicial
Executions
Uri Avnery
The
Assassination of Sheikh Yassin is Worse Than a Crime
Gilad Atzmon
Sharon's Rampage
Mike Whitney
Guilty Until Proven Innocent: the Story of Captain James Yee
Jason Leopold
Firm With Ties to Cheney Faces Criminal Indictment in Cal Energy
Scam
Greg Moses
Stop
Walling and Stalling: a Report from Houston's Peace March
Phil Gasper
San Francisco: 25,000 March for an End to the Occupation
Lenni Brenner
Report
from NYC: Old and Young Parade for Peace
Julian Borger
The Clarke Revelations
Steve Perry
Karl Rove's Moment
Website of the Day
Enviros Against War
March 20 / 21, 2004
Alexander Cockburn
Gay
Marriage: Sidestep on Freedom's Path
Jeffrey St. Clair
Intolerable Opinions in an Age of Shock and Awe: What Would Lilburne
Do?
Ted Honderich
Tony Blair's Moral Responsibility for Atrocities
Saul Landau / Farrah Hassen
The Plot Against Syria: an Irresponsibility Act
Gary Leupp
On Viewing "The Passion of the Christ"
William A. Cook
Fence, Barrier, Wall
Phil Gasper
Bush v. Bush-lite: Chomsky's Lesser Evilism
Ron Jacobs
Fox News and the Masters of War
John Stanton
Which Way John Kerry? The Senator's Inner Nixon
Justin Felux
Kerry and Black America: Just Another Stupid White Man
Mike Whitney
Greenspan's Treason: Swindling Posterity
Augustin Velloso
Avoiding Osama's Abyss
Lawrence Magnuson
Eyes Wide Open: Is Spain Caving in to Terrorism?
Kathy Kelly
Getting Together to Defeat Terrorism
Tracy McLellan
Scalia & Cheney: Happiness is a Warm Gun
Kurt Nimmo
Emma Goldman for President!
Luis J. Rodriguez
The Redemptive Power of Art: It's Not a Frill
Mickey Z
The Michael Moore Diet
Jackie Corr
When Harry Truman Stopped in Butte
Niranjan Ramakrishnan
The Great Trial of 1922: Gandhi's Vision of Responsibility
Poets' Basement
Stew Albert & JD Curtis
Website of the Weekend
Virtual World Election
March 19, 2004
Jeffrey St. Clair
Zapatero
to Kerry: Back Off, Senator, Our Troops are Coming Home
Ann Harrison
So
Protesters, How Well Do You Know Your Rights?
William MacDougall
Fortress Britain's War on "Economic Migrants"
Greg Moses
Sold American: Cowboy Nation Gets Ready to Vote
Cynthia McKinney
Haiti and the Impotence of Black America: Roll Back This Coup,
Mr. Bush
Norman Solomon
Spinning the Past; Threatening the Future
John L. Hess
"Missing" Evidence and the NYTs
Vicente Navarro
The
End of Aznar, Bush's Best Friend
Website of the War
Naming the Dead
March 18, 2004
Gila Svirsky
Rachel
Corrie, One Year Later: She Never Lost Faith in Decency
Christopher Brauchli
Drilling a Hole in the Sanctions: How Halliburton Made $73 Million
from Saddam
William Kulin
Report from Iraq: Just Another Baghdad Car Bombing
Mike Whitney
Resistance: a Moral Imperative
Rep. Ron Paul
Broadcast Indecency Act: an Indecent Attack on the First Amendment
Josh Frank
The Nader Question
Jack Random
They Lied & They Lost: Madrid and the Lessons of Democracy
Greg Bates
What Makes a Nader Voter Tick? A Survey
Sam Hamod / Alfredo Reyes
Contempt of the World: Hastert, Bush and Cheney on Spain
Gary Leupp
The
Madrid Bombings: the Chickens Come Home to Roost
Website of the Day
Privatizing Armageddon: Buy Your Own Doomsday Key
March 17, 2004
Marjorie Cohn
Spain, the EU and the US: War on
Terror or Civil Liberties?
David MacMichael
Untruth
and Consequences
Michael Donnelly
Wear the Green, But Skip the Green Beer
Tom Stephens
"Steady Leadership": Let the Buyer Beware
Wayne Madsen
Sen. Kerry, Let Me Help You Out
Karyn Strickler
Who Owns the Sierra Club? Anonymous Donors and Rigged Elections
Peter Linebaugh
Bush:
Blanc Blanc
March 16, 2004
Lenni Brenner
James
Madison: the Anti-Clerical Father of the Bill of Rights
Scott Boehm
Madrid
Diary: How to Change World Order in Four Days
Alexander Lynch
From Franco to Aznar: the History
Behind the Spanish Elections
Sam Hamod and Alfredo
Reyes
The Truth About the Spanish Elections: Aznar Was Going Down Anyway
Elizabeth Weill-Greenberg
You Wouldn't Do a Dog This Way:
Executing David Clayton Hill
Mike Whitney
The Case for a Nuclear Iran
Robert Fisk
The Bloody Price of the "War
on Terror"
Bill Christison
The
Aftershocks from Madrid
CounterPunch Photo Wire
The Passion of St. Teresa
Website of the Day
Join the War on Art!
March 15, 2004
Harry Browne
Terror Nothing New to Europe
Mike Whitney
Justice
Not Murder: the Tragic Symmetry of Terrorism
Lidice Valenzuela
Haiti: a Coup without Consultation
Greg Moses
Lessons
from the Texas Primaries: Looking for a Coalition with Legs
Mickey Z.
Depraved Indifference: C-Sections, Patriarchy & Women's Health
Asaf Shtull-Trauring
AWOL
in New York: From Refusenik to Organizer
CounterPunch Wire
Gen. Gramajo Executed by Bees!
March 12 / 14, 2004
Gabriel Kolko
The
Coming Elections and the Future of American Global Power
Saul Landau
Oh, Jesus...It's the Movie!
William Blum
Neo-Con(tradictions)
William S. Lind
Why They Throw Rocks
Rahul Mahajan
The Meaning of Madrid: War on "Terrorism" Makes Us
All Less Safe
Neve Gordon
Demographic Wars
Kurt Nimmo
Kerry and the Progressive Interventionists
Mickey Z.
The "New" UN Blames the Poor
Mike Whitney
War Games: the American Media Leads the Charge
Helen Scott and Ashley
Smith
Aristide's Fall: What Led to the Coup?
Justin E.H. Smith
Loïc Wacquant: Against a Sociodicy
of the American Prison
Brandy Baker
Him Again? Al Gore Needs to Move On
Robin Philpot
Nobody Can Call It a "Plane Crash" Now: the Report
on the Assassination of Rwandan President Habyarimana
Mokhiber / Weissman
The Meat Monopoly Takes a Rare Pounding
Dave Zirin
She Turned Her Back on the War: an Interview with Toni Smith
Daniel Wolff
The Lord's Pier
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
Click Here
for More Stories.
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Weekend
Edition
March 27 / 28, 2004
The Yassin Assassination
A
Monstrous Insanity Blessed by the US
By WILLIAM A. COOK
Madeline Albright, this past Tuesday, offered
the 9/11 Commission her recommendations for dealing with terrorism
in the coming months and years. She made no mention of Israel
and no Commissioner asked her about Israel. Yet the ink still
ran on every front page around the world reporting on Sharon's
insanity at unleashing American missiles (more than one!) to
savagely murder Sheik Ahmed Yassin, an unarmed, deaf, half-blind,
crippled, 67 year old paraplegic being pushed in a wheelchair!
Does it not strike any sane individual, Comissioners included,
that this act by our blest "man of peace" does more
to raise hatred against America than any failing by our benumbed
President who sat immobile in a classroom while New York burned?
Sharon, with this monstrous act, declared war on America on behalf
of Hamas. Sharon unilaterally burned the "Road Map."
Sharon crucified America, sacrificing it for his own political
interests.
This last in a series of "extra
judicial executions," a euphemistic way of avoiding the
true word, "assassination," buries justice beneath
the mailed foot of the 21st century Medieval King who reigns
by terror and brute force. We've created a new Dark Age! Rage
determines behavior; rage becomes its own justification; rage
liberates the beast to devour at will. But what is good for the
beast is equally good for its intended victim; all kings become
targets of fanatical rage justified as "extra judicial executions."
After all, one individual's "good" is another's "evil"
and we have made acceptable the individual as judge, jury, and
executioner.
The world community abhors this state
of affairs, yet the world's body, the UN, does nothing about
it. Where is the condemnation of Israel for its illegal action?
Where is the Security Council resolution citing Israel for flaunting
the Geneva Accords and mocking human rights? Where is the United
States Congress and Senate condemnation on behalf of its people
of such a heinous act by a government that we support to the
tune of 10 billion a year? Why do we cower before Sharon's bluster
as he unleashes our $300,000 dollar missiles from our F-16 aircraft
to kill a helpless man and the innocent that become victims of
his vengeance? Why do our leaders not address the most obvious
and glaring reason America is targeted by terrorists: the aggressive
use of massive force by the state of Israel, using American supplied
ordinance against a defenseless people, while its leader, Ariel
Sharon, deifies, mocks, and ridicules the President who is responsible
for providing him the means to enforce his invasion and occupation
of territory belonging to another people?
The entire world has stated its objection
to Israel's intrusive militaristic policies; the entire world
has stated that Israel is the principal cause of terrorism in
the world; the entire world has marched against Israel's incarceration
of these hapless people behind Sharon's "Wall of Fear,"
yet this nation stands aside, stuttering mealy mouthed platitudes
that Israel has a right to defend itself against terrorists and,
after all, Israel is our only friend in the mid-east. If Sharon's
action in hunting down a man in a wheelchair and hurling missiles
of massive destructive capability at him, missiles larger than
the intended victim, knowing that by this act he was sowing seeds
of fanatical hatred in the community of the deprived and deranged,
than I would suggest that Sharon is the enemy of America not
its friend. How can our lawmakers listen to the chorus of countries
that cry to us to stop Israel's intentional rousing of terrorism,
intentional unsettling of any moves toward negotiation, intentional
belittling of America and the UN when they utter, submissa
voce, that perhaps the Wall should not be built, and intentional
defiance of the UN for over 50 years, and stand like deaf mutes
before an oncoming train of destruction?
It takes no genius to understand what
Sharon has created by his kingly decision to determine in his
own mind that a particular individual is a murderer and terrorist
and deserves to die. He has given license to those who see him
as evil personified to kill the "elected" leader of
the state of Israel, and, by extension, the right to execute
the "elected" leader of the state that supports his
terrorism, George W. Bush. More than this: Sharon's witch hunt
for the terrorist mind embedded in the frail frame of a 75 pound
paraplegic who, would you believe, threatened the fourth largest
military state in the world, opens the gates of Hell for those
religious fanatics that believe right-wing Zionist zealots and
American Christian Zionists like Franklin Graham, Pat Robertson,
John Hagee, and Jerry Falwell, have blasphemed against the Quran
and deserve to die; and Sharon has shown them the avenue to pursue,
hunt them down like animals and take them unexpectedly as they
emerge from their respective citadels of worship.
Bush and Sharon have co-opted the right
to preemptively kill anyone that does not agree with their determination
of who is evil, who threatens their respective states, and who
poses a potential threat to their capitalistic systems. It's
all in Bush's "National Security Strategy Report" of
September 2002. This is our new rule of law! This is the advance
of civilizations into the 21st century.
Consider what might have been the civilized
way to deal with Sheik Yassin. Israel had done this twice before.
Arrest him. Why did Sharon not drive a "handicapped"
van to the Mosque to pick him up, take him to a detention center,
submit allegations of murder, inciting to riot, and unjustified
creation of a militant organization, and let an international
court sit in judgment to find him guilty or not guilty? Nothing
prevented Israel from taking Yassin at will. Indeed, they have
been on a new rampage of invasion of Gaza this very week; bringing
Yassin to "justice" in the traditional western way
would have been but a diversion. Such action would have forced
the world to listen to the allegations and address Israel's righteous
outrage against Hamas. Should the allegations prove true, the
world would have to accept, perhaps with reluctance, Israel's
on-going fight against fanatical terrorists. Such behavior would
have created a positive atmosphere about Israel and America,
in both the Arab world and around the world, that would go a
long way to dissolve the bitterness and hatred that is fueling
vengeance and retaliation.
But Sharon knows that America is in the
midst of a 9/11 inquisition that fills front pages and TV screens;
he knows that Europe is consumed, and rightly so, with the bombings
in Spain; he realizes that the people of the United States are
more concerned with the rising death toll and continued waves
of destruction taking place in liberated Iraq than with events
in Israel. Knowing these realities, he is free to act undisturbed
by a beleaguered George Bush. And Sharon does not want peace
or a Palestinian state; he wants all of Palestine for his Jewish
state and he wants the Palestinians out of Palestine. If this
action does not show the Bush administration that Sharon is a
liar, nothing will.
Consider this. If Sharon acted unilaterally,
without US knowledge, to murder the Sheik knowing that he was
placing America in the midst of a religious war, then he is a
traitor to the country that supports him because he has put America
in jeopardy; if he contacted our President before he decided
to murder the Sheik and received no objection then our President
willingly acceded to an act that would enflame the mid-east and
raise America's fear of terrorism to a level unforeseen heretofore.
If it is not the responsibility of the
9/11 Commission to investigate why America became a target of
fanatical zealots in 2001, it should be because Sharon's execution
of the Sheik endangers America and begs for a meaningful understanding
of why fanatics hate us. Fanatics find fault with America because
it supports a regime that occupies Arab land, a regime that knowingly
defies the United Nations and has done so over a fifty-year span
of time, a regime that refuses to return that land to its indigenous
people. These fanatics watch America over the years control puppet
governments in Saudi Arabia, Iran, Iraq, Egypt, and Jordan while
we control the natural energy resources of their states and they
remain in poverty. Fanatics understand that America needs Israel
as its military weight in the mid-east, a state that condemns
their religion and considers their race inferior. This Commission
needs to ask why Madeline Albright made no mention of Israel,
indeed, they must ask themselves why they do not raise the specter
of Israel as a possible cause for terrorism against America.
Sharon's monstrous insane act demands it.
William Cook
is a professor of English at the University of La Verne in southern
California. His new book, Psalms
for the 21st Century, was just published by
Mellen Press. He can be reached at: cookb@ULV.EDU
Weekend
Edition Features for March 20 / 21, 2004
Alexander Cockburn
Gay
Marriage: Sidestep on Freedom's Path
Jeffrey St. Clair
Intolerable Opinions in an Age of Shock and Awe: What Would Lilburne
Do?
Ted Honderich
Tony Blair's Moral Responsibility for Atrocities
Saul Landau / Farrah Hassen
The Plot Against Syria: an Irresponsibility Act
Gary Leupp
On Viewing "The Passion of the Christ"
William A. Cook
Fence, Barrier, Wall
Phil Gasper
Bush v. Bush-lite: Chomsky's Lesser Evilism
Ron Jacobs
Fox News and the Masters of War
John Stanton
Which Way John Kerry? The Senator's Inner Nixon
Justin Felux
Kerry and Black America: Just Another Stupid White Man
Mike Whitney
Greenspan's Treason: Swindling Posterity
Augustin Velloso
Avoiding Osama's Abyss
Lawrence Magnuson
Eyes Wide Open: Is Spain Caving in to Terrorism?
Kathy Kelly
Getting Together to Defeat Terrorism
Tracy McLellan
Scalia & Cheney: Happiness is a Warm Gun
Kurt Nimmo
Emma Goldman for President!
Luis J. Rodriguez
The Redemptive Power of Art: It's Not a Frill
Mickey Z
The Michael Moore Diet
Jackie Corr
When Harry Truman Stopped in Butte
Niranjan Ramakrishnan
The Great Trial of 1922: Gandhi's Vision of Responsibility
Poets' Basement
Stew Albert & JD Curtis
Website of the Weekend
Virtual World Election
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