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Today's
Stories
March 25, 2004
Saul Landau
Is Venezuela Next?
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
March 11, 2004
Ron Jacobs
Bedtime
for Democracy
Bill Kauffman
Hey,
Ralph! Why Not Another Party of the People?
James Hollander
Slaughter
in Madrid: Consolidating an Ally?
Norman Solomon
They
Shoot Journalists, Don't They?
Patrick Gavin
The Salvation of Dan Quayle: Family Values Return
Becky Burgwin
You're
Messing with the Wrong Generation
John Sugg
The FBI is on My Trail
March 10, 2004
Hammond Guthrie
Read
This Book!: "Who the Hell is Stew Albert?"
Chris Floyd
Operation Enduring Sweatshop: Another
Bush Brings Hell to Haiti
Elizabeth Corrie
Remembering the Death of Rachel Corrie
Mike Whitney
US Press Torpedoes Aristide
M. Junaid Alam
An Anti-Civilizational War?
Bob Feldman
The Occupation of Haiti: Recalling 1915-1934
John L. Hess
An Overload of Crises
Gary Leupp
On Abu
Musab al-Zarqawi and the Uses of al-Qaeda "Links"
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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March
25, 2004
Elections Without Politics
The
Military Budget Is Not an "Issue"
By JIMMER ENDRES
KERRY WINS SIX STATES, EDWARDS TO QUIT
WASHINGTON, MARCH 2, 2004 (Reuters)---John
Kerry captured the Democratic nomination . . . piling up a string
of coast-to-coast primary wins. . . . Bush called Kerry to congratulate
him, and the two had "a nice conversation," Kerry said.
"I said I hoped we had a great debate about the issues before
the country."
Here's an issue: "missile defense."
Where's the great debate? No major pronouncements from either
candidate despite its being, literally, the biggest Pentagon
boondoggle in history---yet another major issue Kerry could clobber
Bush on all year, if he weren't complicit in the swindle.
Bush's strategy has been: "deploy
anything," no matter what the cost. Perhaps the foremost
cost is to national security. The insane equilibrium of Mutual
Assured Destruction depends on a stalemate, and it was recognized
early in the Cold War that any anti-missile system would be inherently
destabilizing. In the Strangelovean logic of "nuclear exchange,"
a missile defense system lowers the danger, to a nuclear aggressor,
of launching a first strike---since the retaliation will presumably
be mitigated. Missile "defense" is thus rightfully
considered by other nuclear powers to be an aggressive weapons
system. It thus tempts adversaries to launch a first strike first.
Use it or lose it.
An important indirect cost in Bush's
recent budgets has been to shift funds away from effective nonproliferation
programs, like the already under-funded and mismanaged Nunn-Lugar
initiative, that would keep nuclear weapons out of the hands
of nameless enemies in the first place. Overall, the monetary
cost of the anti-missile folly, since Reagan's Strategic Defense
Initiative began in 1983, has exceeded $30 billion. Every dollar
has been wasted.
During the 2000 election, Bush pledged
to deploy missile defense "at the earliest possible date"---that
is to say, sometime before the 2004 election. That position provided
two benefits for his campaign: it sounded like decisive leadership,
and it also conveniently promised the gift of an irrevocable
commitment to Boeing, TRW, and friends, regardless of the outcome
in November 2004. And so the first systems are slated to go online
late this summer.
This decision comes in spite of the fact
that nobody seriously claims that the system is ready, and nobody
actually believes that it's ultimately feasible. The Union of
Concerned Scientists and MIT issued a comprehensive report, detailing
the "limitations and artificialities" of the Pentagon's
laughably rigged tests of these systems, and providing a consensus
summary of scientists' deep skepticism over the realism of any
system in principle. Their synopsis: "The system the Bush
administration plans to deploy by 2004 will have essentially
no defense capability."
Thomas P. Christie, in charge of the
Pentagon's testing program, admitted in January that "it
is not clear what mission capability will be demonstrated prior
to initial defense operations." In English: the tests are
meaningless; the system simply cannot be evaluated before it
is deployed. Then last month, just to put the frosting on the
cake, Russia successfully tested a missile designed to evade
the proposed defenses. If nothing else, the Russian effort is
concrete proof of an ominous new arms race spawned by the mere
threat of the deployment of a missile defense system. Meanwhile,
just last week the GAO issued a report urging that realistic
tests be carried out before deployment. On the same day, Christie
was again forced to testify that he can't be sure the system
will work, as Democrats on the Senate Armed Services Committee
postured over the White House's huge budget request for the program
(see below). Thirty billion dollars down the drain, and not a
peep from John Kerry.
Peace Action is a national grassroots
lobbying organization that helped establish the anti-nuclear
movement back in the 1950s. They have been working at the grassroots
level to oppose the missile defense rip-off as part of their
Campaign for a New American Foreign Policy. They published a
voter guide last year for which they solicited foreign policy
platforms from all the presidential candidates. Kerry's response
on missile defense:
If there is a real potential of a rogue
nation firing missiles at any city in the United States, responsible
leadership requires that we make our best, most thoughtful efforts
to defend against that threat. . . . If it were to happen, no
leader could ever explain not having chosen to defend against
the disaster when doing so made sense [sic].
I opposed the Bush Administration's decisions
to proceed with early deployment of a national missile defense
system. . . .
In other words, "Me too, but I'm
not George Bush." In fact, Kerry voted against missile defense
deployment in 1996 and 1998, but then, perhaps convinced by the
rigor of the Pentagon's tests (or with an eye on 2004), voted
for deployment in 1999.
Kerry exhibited bracing political courage
in January by attacking the Administration for---not pouring
enough missile defense slop into the "small business"
pork trough. In a letter to Donald Rumsfeld, Kerry opined: "I
don't understand why the Missile Defense Agency has been unable
to comply with the law and create jobs by dispersing more than
$90 million in research funds for small business." Fair
enough?
To put this preening critique in perspective,
the White House's proposed budget for missile defense is $10.2
billion (or as much as $10.7 billion, depending on what you count),
the largest single project in military budget history. That figure
is out of a "total" of over $400 billion for military
expenditures---not including funding for Iraq, Afghanistan, or
the "War on Terror." No matter how you do the math,
US military spending is about half of the federal budget. Distant
second in military spending is China, at under $30 billion. The
military spending of all of the other nations of the world, combined,
is less than that of the United States.
In terms of this presidential election,
the choice is between a faulty missile defense system deployed
immediately---and a phantom missile defense system funded indefinitely,
with deployment decisions put off indefinitely, always pending
more tests. The choice in the voting booth is always between
a growing military budget---and a growing military budget. It
is crucial to remember that the "defense" budget is
as much about maintaining and expanding global "strategic"
arrangements as it is about domestic industrial policy (read:
"pork") for aerospace and high technology generally.
The military budget is as bipartisan as Form 1040. And when it
comes to funding candidates, the defense sector is as bipartisan
as the military budget. Bush, Kerry, and Clinton have all been
leading recipients of campaign contributions from defense contractors.
But this observation is, in effect, trivial; they have all been
presidential contenders.
And so this week, the polite promises
of 'sticking to the issues' are long forgotten, and Dick Cheney
clamped his teeth into John Kerry's flesh for---nigh on twenty
years ago?---opposing various big ticket weapons programs. Kerry
obeyed his reflexes and hopped, yelping, to his right, clutching
his Purple Heart to his chest and insisting that in his soul
he's Strong on Defense. In the years since those votes, Kerry
has bent every effort toward rehabilitating himself to the right
wing of his party and the industries that back it. Stephen Zunes
has ably demonstrated Kerry's craven and consistent votes for
huge military budgets.
Clinton supported the missile defense
program right through the first fraudulent tests. We have the
damn thing to worry about today only because he failed to seize
the opportunity to kill it at the end of his second term. He
didn't want to look Weak on Defense and anyway he couldn't forget
his donors.
The stakes could hardly be higher: these
policies have already started to usher in the era of the global
nuclear saloon. On one side we have what's good for the military-industrial
corporate donors (tens of billions of dollars of profit straight
from the swollen teat of April 15th) and on the other we have
what's good for the population (continued survival).
So what will Kerry actually do, if he
reaches the White House? Here we come to the weakness of the
electoral process---the passive, superficial, timid, self-referential,
explicitly defeatist "lesser evil" political culture
that has grown up around our elections during the age of television.
Given his record and the agenda of his backers, we can reasonably
predict what Kerry will do---approximately what Clinton did.
Kerry's only recent utterance on the topic has been a meek suggestion
that perhaps missile defense spending can be curbed "until
there is better evidence the system works" so that new troops
can be paid without raising the military budget even further.
Why believe even that?
Jimmer Endres
is a Ph.D. candidate in molecular and cell biology at Berkeley
and a volunteer with California Peace Action. He can be reached
at: jimmerendres@yahoo.com.
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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