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/ St. Clair's Scorching New History of a Decade of War
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Today's
Stories
June 19 / 20, 2004
Diane
Christian
Morality and Death: a Meditation on
Bush and Blake
Walter
A. Davis
Passion of the Christ in Abu Ghraib
Josh Frank
How Democrats Helped Bush Rape Mother Nature
Col. Dan
Smith
Respectable Genocide?: the Crisis in Sudan
Brian
Cloughley
A Profound Disruption of the Senses
Bruce
Anderson
Frozen Gringos
June 18,
2004
Chris
Floyd
Blood Victory
Dave Zirin
Danielle Green, Basketball Player &
Disabled Vet, Speaks Out Against War
Justin
E.H. Smith
The Christian Question in American Politics
Gary
Leupp
The "Long-Established" Link?:
Iraq, al-Qaeda, and al-Zarqawi
June
17, 2004
Noel
Ignatiev
Zionism, Anti-Semitism and the People
of Palestine
Kurt
Nimmo
The Bush-Kerry Conundrum
Ed
Cardoni
The Persecution of Steve Kurtz
Ron Jacobs
Power Relations: Rounding Up Everyone Who Knows More Than They Do
Dave
Lindorff
Philly Daily News: "Four Wasted Years"
Greg
Moses
Geneva Ignored
Norm
Dixon
How Reagan Armed Saddam with Chemical
Weapons
June
16, 2004
Lenni
Brenner
A Question for Kerry Supporters
Davey
D
Hip Hop Reflections on Reagan
Daniel
Wolff
Why Did Michael Moore Withhold Video Evidence of US Prisoner
Abuse?
Bruce
Jackson
Harry Levin and the Penultimate Manuscript of Finnegans Wake
Patrick
Cockburn
Boom! Boom! Out Go the Lights: Bombings Target Oil and Power
Facilities
Gary
Handschumacher
Mourn Ben Linder, Not His Killer: Reagan's Death Squads
JG
Turning Haiti into One Big Sweatshop
Mario
Benedetti
Obituary with Cheers
Vicente
Navarro
Meet the New Head of the IMF: Who
is Rodrigo Rato?
Website
of the Day
Iraqi Oil Revenue Watch
June
15, 2004
Harry
Browne
Ireland Adds a Brick to Fortress Europe
Neve
Gordon
The Palestinian Refugee Problem Revisited
David
Palmer
Richard Armitage, Abu Ghraib and CACI
John
Blair
Lovelock's Misguided Call: Nukes Are No Solution to Global Warming
Dave
Lindorff
God Wins in TKO
Bill
Quigley
Blood-Pouring Peace Activists: State Charges Dropped; Feds Step
In
Patrick
Cockburn
Carbombs and Street Dances: 13 More Killed in Baghdad Blast
John
Chuckman
John Kerry, Political Placebo
June
14, 2004
John
Stanton / Wayne Madsen
Torture, Inc: Oliver North Joins
the Party
Kathy
Kelly
Requiems: What Happens When Compassion Dies?
Bruce
Jackson
Bush Gets Testy About Torture
Lee
Sustar
Strikers Defy Visteon's Company Thugs
Kurt
Nimmo
The Desperate Censors: the Republican Plot to Kill Farhenheit
9/11
Jim
Davis
Hard Right Nativism
Eliot
Katz
Death and War
Uri
Avnery
The Nightmare Comes True
Website
of the Day
Instruments of Statecraft
June 12 / 13, 2004
Peter
Linebaugh
Remembering the Common Hood: Soweto
and Runnymede
Team
CounterPunch
CP's Favorite Albums
Jeffrey
St. Clair
Troy, Now and Then
Gary
Leupp
Not Really a Puppet Government in Iraq?
Brian
Cloughley
US Military in Crisis
Antonio
Ponvert, III
Iraqi Prisoner Abuse: the Connecticut Connection
Ben
Tripp
The Polls Get Stupider
Joe
Bageant
Mash Note to the "Girl with the Leash"
Ron
Jacobs
The Return of the Hip Hop Insurgency
Forrest
Hylton
Object Lessons from the Case of Francisco Cortés
Christopher
Brauchli
Federal Bureau of Errors
Kurt
Nimmo
Going After Qaddafi, Again
Wayne
Madsen
Israel's Slap at Reagan
Anthony
Loewenstein
Al Jazeera Awakens the Arab World
Michael
Donnelly
A Lightship in the Forest: Greenpeace Docks in the Siskiyous
Greg
Moses
Who Will Tell Us More About the Workers of Nasiriyah?
Susan
Davis
Harry Potter & the Prisoner of Azkaban
Joseph
Ramsey
Weather Report: a Review of The Weather Underground
Niranjan
Ramakrishnan
The 18th Brumaire in the 21st
Century
Wayne
Saunders
The Gipper, D-Day and the Stanley Cup
Poets'
Basement
Richey, Ford, La Morticella, Albert
Website
of the Weekend
Insurgent Music
| June
19 / 20, 2004
An Open
Letter to John Ashcroft
For Sake
of Balance: Deport Me
By
PRUDENCE CROWTHER
Dear Mr. Attorney General:
I
write at a moment when we can perhaps agree the image of the United
States generally has become an ugly graffito, defacing many of its most
cherished ideals at home and around the world. I hope you may be susceptible,
therefore, to a notion that, while discreet in its initial deployment,
stands a reasonable chance of growing into a large and winning gesture,
capable of quietly but surely helping to redeem our good name.
It
seems to me whoever could devise a frank and even-handed method of demonstrating
to people of the Muslim faith that the U.S. is not engaged in a crusade
against them, as has been ecumenically charged, would deserve so well
of the public (to borrow some earlier diction) as to have his name (for
I know a graven image would offend you) celebrated for a preserver of
the nation.
My
suggestion is this.
The
deportations from America of male Muslim immigrants, most from South
Asian or Middle Eastern countries, ongoing since September 11, and the
physical and civil-rights abuses commonly preceding them (insults now
grossly revivified by the recent revelations from Abu Ghraib), along
with the increasing repudiation of the war in Iraq by its own people--all
undermine the claim, often professed by our President and you yourself,
that our country is acting on behalf of free people everywhere.
Because
the point of these deportations has remained secret, they are widely
sensed to be frivolous, and therefore racially or religiously motivated.
It is precisely this odor of discrimination I know we both believe we
cannot afford, as a matter of pride and national security, if indeed
our greatest asset is the vigor of our democracy. Domestically, there
is the further question of how such constant and petty persecutions
must degrade the character and morale of your employees, not to mention
the burden imposed on the federal purse. All of these things we must
remedy in any way possible.
I
submit, then, for the sake of fairness, that for every Muslim male deported
for no substantive reason (in other words, for reasons previously insufficient
to warrant deportation), you also deport one person you deem to be as
much unlike the target population as possible, considered in terms of
profiling criteria.
To
this end, so the Department of Justice may better imagine the tactic
and to show good faith, I propose that you deport me: a white, heathen
woman, who came into America through no tragedy or yearning or enterprise
of my own, whose citizenship was conferred in the sport of my making,
and who never had to sacrifice language or patria to pursue life, liberty,
or happiness, hard enough to come by in any case.
And
if the objection be made, that whereas the men who have been rounded
up are at least guilty of infractions (however noncriminal) and I am
guilty of none, I confess I am as guilty, and am certain have committed
foibles in Connecticut, Kansas, California, Michigan, Illinois, Pennsylvania,
and New York City, where I now live (I volunteer the trail to spare
your staff the nuisance of tracing it).
Where
your Honor would send me, I leave to your discretion, although as a
nod to self-reliance--another national value I can assume you would
be eager to export--I offer to pay my way, since I can pay it (again,
where most of my fellows cannot). And while they say if you look like
your passport photo, you're too ill to travel, I ask for indulgence
there too.
But
lest you suspect I myself am being frivolous in making this offer, I
insist I would be exactly as devastated to be deported as those who
have preceded me, for reasons I need not trouble you with, although
forfeiture of even the simple liberty I have to compose this letter
is not the smallest of them.
I
can think of no objection to be raised against such a plan, unless it
should be: it will only serve to double the cruelty involved in the
present dragnet. This I freely concede. But let us talk of no other
possibilities--of proscribing racial or religious profiling, of chastening
our too ready self-regard, of repairing the hypocritical neglect of
due process, of being fastidious not to exchange our consciences for
a pottage of fear, of practicing to have even one degree of mercy toward
the immigrants who have labored to come here--let no one bray about
any of these expedients until he has a prayer they will ever be put
into practice.
Finally,
I declare I have no personal interest in this proposal, aspiring as
I do to have no other home than Manhattan for myself, or for my issue,
as I am past child-bearing.
Yours
sincerely,
Prudence Crowther
Prudence
Crowther is an editor and writer living in New York City.
Weekend Edition June 12 / 13, 2004
Peter
Linebaugh
Remembering the Common Hood: Soweto and Runnymede
Team CounterPunch
CP's Favorite Albums
Jeffrey
St. Clair
Troy, Now and Then
Gary Leupp
Not Really a Puppet Government in Iraq?
Brian
Cloughley
US Military in Crisis
Antonio
Ponvert, III
Iraqi Prisoner Abuse: the Connecticut Connection
Ben
Tripp
The Polls Get Stupider
Joe Bageant
Mash Note to the "Girl with the Leash"
Ron
Jacobs
The Return of the Hip Hop Insurgency
Forrest
Hylton
Object Lessons from the Case of Francisco Cortés
Christopher
Brauchli
Federal Bureau of Errors
Kurt Nimmo
Going After Qaddafi, Again
Wayne
Madsen
Israel's Slap at Reagan
Anthony
Loewenstein
Al Jazeera Awakens the Arab World
Michael
Donnelly
A Lightship in the Forest: Greenpeace Docks in the Siskiyous
Greg Moses
Who Will Tell Us More About the Workers of Nasiriyah?
Susan
Davis
Harry Potter & the Prisoner of Azkaban
Joseph
Ramsey
Weather Report: a Review of The Weather Underground
Niranjan
Ramakrishnan
The 18th Brumaire in the 21st Century
Wayne
Saunders
The Gipper, D-Day and the Stanley Cup
Poets'
Basement
Richey, Ford, La Morticella, Albert
Website
of the Weekend
Insurgent Music
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