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Today's
Stories
October 12,
2004
Roxane Dunbar-Ortiz
"Indian
Country"
Bill and Kathleen Christison
Israel as Sideshow
October 11,
2004
Robert Fisk
Iraq:
Unforgivable Betrayals and Broken Promises
Kevin Pina
The
Untold Story of Aristide's Departure from Haiti
Patrick Gavin
Rethinking
Columbus Day
Chris Floyd
Tribes with Flags in the New Afghanistan
Daniel Wolff
Radioactive Money: Entergy, Political Cash and America's Most
Dangerous Nuclear Plant
Walter Brasch
The Only Ones Who Believe Saddam Had WMDs are Bush, Cheney...and
40% of All Americans
Mike Whitney
The Phony Afghan Elections: Ballot of the Disappearing Ink
Ari Shavit
"He Talks to Condi Rice Every Day": an Interview with
Sharon's Lawyer
Paul Craig
Roberts
The
Debates and the Big Lie
Website of the Day
Dylan's Greatest Recording?
October 9 /
10, 2004
Alexander Cockburn
"There
Are No Innocents"
Paul de Rooij
Northern Ireland is Still the Issue: a Conversation with Gerry
Adams
M. Shahid Alam
Making Sense of Our Times
Laura Carlsen
Protest and Populism in Latin America
Fred Gardner
Pot Shots: ASA Goes to Court
Col. Dan Smith
Bush's Credibility Gap
Paul Craig
Roberts
Faith-Based Economics
Greg Bates
What If Nader Critics Get What They Demand?
Joshua Frank
Cobb, the Greens and the Collapse of the Left
Felice Pace
Wilderness, Politics and the Oligarchy: How the Pew Charitable
Trust is Smothering the Grassroots Environmental Movement
Walter A. Davis
Of Pynchon, Thanatos and Depleted Uranium
William A.
Cook
The Agony of Colin Powell
Phyllis Pollack
Twas No Crank Call Love Affair: London Calling, 25 Years Later
Poets' Basement
Klipschutz, Albert, Ford
Website of the Weekend
Abu Ghraib: the Taguba Annexes
October 8,
2004
Jennifer Loewenstein
The
Israeli Invasion of Gaza
Moshe Adler
Edwards' Gambit: He Hoped No One Would Notice the Similarities
David Swanson
Media Blackout: Press Continues to Ignore Labor's Opposition
to Iraq War
Dave Zirin
CounterPunch Contest: Let's Name the New DC Baseball Team!
Rep. Ron Paul
The Draft is a Form of Slavery
William S. Lind
Keeping Our SA Up
Samar Assad
Kerry v. Bush: No Difference When It Comes to Israel / Palestine
Jim Ingalls
and Sonali Kolhatkar
The Elections in Afghanistan
October 7,
2004
Dave Lindorff
All
Out of Volunteers: A Draft is in the Air
Masha Hamilton
Fear in Kandahar
Christopher
Brauchli
Master of Corruption: the Ripening Scandals of Tom Delay
Jason Leopold
Is There Still Time to Impeach Bush?
Bruce K. Gagnon
Bombing the Panhandle: Fighting the Pentagon in Rural Florida
Meredith Kolodner
Where
is the Urgency?: The Anti-War Movement's Election Year Challenge
October 6,
2004
Jeffrey St.
Clair
"Please,
Dude, Can I Take Them Out?": Targeting Civilians in Fallujah
Ron Jacobs
Going
Nuclear: the Ghost of Edward Teller Lives
Michael Colby
The National Flip-Flop: Suddenly Bush is Unfit to Lead?
Tarif Abboushi
More of the Same: Israel Wins the Debates
Matthew Behrens
Canadian Firms Profit from Iraqi Blood
Mike Whitney
Rethinking WMDs
John Pilger
Stealing Diego Garcia
Ben Tripp
Kerry's "Triumph"
Kevin McKiernan
Cheney's Poison Lab: Wrong Time, Wrong Target
Patrick Cockburn
Elections
Will Not End the Fighting in Iraq
Website of the Day
Is There an Islamic Problem?
October 5,
2004
Anthony Loewenstein
Rupert
Murdoch and the Marginals: "Personally Creating Outcomes"
Mark Clinton
and Tony Udell
The
Suicide of an Iraq War Veteran
Greg Bates
Trading
Idiots: an Open Letter to Eric Alterman
Dave Lindorff
What's
the Frequency, Karl?
Norm Dixon
Why Washington Won't Save Darfur Villagers
Larry Kearney
God Talk and Burning Children
Bill Linville
Dirty Politics in the Land of "Clean" Government
Gary Leupp
What
Edwards Should Ask Cheney
Website of
the Day
A Guide to Halliburton for Tonight's Debate
October 4,
2004
Diane Christian
The
Gates of Hell
Joshua Frank
An Interview with David Cobb
Doug Giebel
Incurious George: What If Bush Didn't Lie?
John Chuckman
Strange Victory: Sen. Obvious and the Pathetic Lump
Ramzy Baroud
Reverse the Picture: Anatomy of a Palestinian Outrage
Julia Stein
Remembering Mario Savio and the FSM
Sean Donahue
Outsourcing
Terror: Kerry and Special Forces
Website of
the Day
Mapping
Mt. St. Helens as She Rocks
October 2 /
3. 2004
Paul Wright
John
Kerry on Criminal Justice
Kathleen and Bill Christison
An Exchange with Israeli Historian Bennie Morris
Kathie Helmkamp
My Son Trent: a Marine Who Doesn't Want to Kill
Phillip Cryan
Indigenous Mobilization in Colombia
Lenni Brenner
The First Ex-Catholic Saint: Memories of Mario Savio
Fred Gardner
Pot Shots: In Case You Missed "Montel"
Ron Jacobs
It Did Happen Here: When Neo-Nazis Terrorized Olympia
Ben Tripp
Sticker Shock
William S.
Lind
The Grand Illusion: Iraqi Security Forces
Dave Zirin
The Swindle of the Century: Baseball Comes to DC
Dave Lindorff
Lies from the Great Debate
Luscon Pierre-Charles
Haiti's Elections: a High-Tech Sham is Underway
Zoe Moskovitz
& Sasha Kramer
Separating Lies from Truth About Haiti
Nelson P. Valdes
Habana Night vs. Latin American Scholars in Vegas: 61 Banned
Cuban Academics
Alan Farago
The "Ownership Society" and the End of the Everglades
Nancy Haley
What is the Historical Jesus Trying to Tell Us?
Alex Billet
Long Live The Clash: London Still Calling After 25 Years
Steve Fesenmaier
Save and Burn: The War on Libraries
Poets' Basement
Smith, Holt, Albert
October 1,
2004
Steve Breyman
Kerry's
Missed Opportunities
Rose Gentle
My
Son Died for a Lie
Lee Sustar
Iran
in the Crosshairs
Ralph Nader
What
We Didn't Hear at the Debate: Where's the Exit Strategy?
Walter Andrews
We Are Less Secure Now Than Ever
Mike Whitney
Pandora's
Government
Mickey Z.
Debate
This
Saul Landau
The
Iraq Invasion: Lessons from the Pinochet Cases
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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October 12, 2004
America (and
Kerry) at the Crossroads
Dying
for a Mistake
By
TIMOTHY J. FREEMAN
When a country obtains great
power,
it becomes like the sea:
all streams run downward into it.
The more powerful it grows,
the greater the need for humility.
Humility means trusting the Tao,
thus never needing to be defensive.
A great nation is like a great
man:
When he makes a mistake, he realizes it.
Having realized it, he admits it.
Having admitted it, he corrects it.
He considers those who point out his faults
as his most benevolent teachers.
He thinks of his enemy as the shadow that he himself casts.
If a nation is centered in
the Tao,
if it nourishes its own people
and doesn't meddle in the affairs of others,
it will be a light to all nations in the world..
Lao Tzu, Tao te Ching,
Stephen Mitchell translation
With the 2004 Presidential election
just now a few weeks away America stands at the crossroads. Though
it seems that about half of likely voters are still completely
oblivious to it, one road ominously leads in a very dark direction.
This is the road the nation has been traveling the last four
years. A vacationing President, apparently more concerned with
perfecting his golf swing and cuttin' brush down on the ranch
rather than protecting the nation, didn't seem to find a security
briefing of August 6, 2001 entitled "Bin Laden Determined
to Strike in U.S." to be a matter of any particular urgency.
Having then allowed, through sheer incompetence or devious design
as many have come to suspect, the worst tragedy to ever strike
the nation on September 11, 2001, this President then used the
fear and anger which followed that tragedy to push through a
radical and reckless agenda that now has the nation facing a
very grim future. We now have record deficits and an economy
primed for catastrophic meltdown. We've moved backwards on addressing
the problems of global warming, environmental degradation and
finding a safe, renewable source of energy. We have "Patriot
Acts" that have seriously undermined our freedom at home.
On top of all that we are mired in a war in Iraq which has to
rank up there as one of the greatest mistakes ever committed
by a President of the United States. It is a war that has already
cost the nation the lives of over a thousand of our troops, thousands
more grievously wounded and already cost something close to 200
billion dollars. It is a war that seems only to get worse by
the day, a war which even many top-level military and intelligence
analysts consider to be a no-win situation. It is a war that
was launched despite unprecedented worldwide protests, and now
that its primary justifications have been completely exposed
as either outright falsifications or incredible misjudgments,
can only bring the nation shame and dishonor. It is a war that
promises to only further fan the flames of terrorism though it
is supposedly fought as part of a larger "war on terrorism."
It is a war that sets this nation on the warpath for many years
to come and seems more and more like a black hole from which
no light will ever come.
So America stands at a critical
crossroads with this election. But what road is it that John
Kerry would lead us upon? Those of us who can see where the President
is leading us have no doubt that it could not but be a better
road, but what will Kerry do about the war? As was abundantly
clear in the first Presidential debate, Kerry's position is conflicted.
He could not have more clearly stated that the war was a mistake
when, in the best line of the night, he quoted Richard Clark
in saying that attacking Iraq in response to 9/11 was like FDR
attacking Mexico in response to Pearl Harbor. How much more clearly
can one say that it was a mistake? And yet it seems he cannot
bring himself to fully face the implications of this mistake.
He was certainly right in charging the Bush Administration with
not leveling with the American people about Iraq, but did Kerry
really level with the people in responding to this question from
moderator Jim Lehrer:
LEHRER: Speaking of Vietnam,
you spoke to Congress in 1971, after you came back from Vietnam,
and you said, quote, How do you ask a man to be the last man
to die for a mistake?
LEHRER: Are Americans now dying in Iraq for a mistake?
KERRY: No, and they don't have to, providing we have the leadership
that we put -- that I'm offering.
I believe that we have to win this. The president and I have
always agreed on that.
The contradiction in Kerry's
position is obvious: the war is a mistake but our troops are
not dying for a mistake. What if Kerry had really leveled with
the American people and responded to Lehrer's question in this
way:
KERRY: Jim, sadly I must say
to you and the American people that our soldiers are now indeed
tragically dying for a mistake. I have already said that the
President made an error in judgment in launching a war that was
not a last resort. The fact is that this war was not a last resort
and thus not at all necessary. We now know that we were successful
in disarming Saddam Hussein. As bad as Saddam Hussein was he
was not such an imminent threat that necessitated a very costly
war. The very worst thing a President can do is to send our brave
troops to die in a war that was not really necessary. This is
the greatest difference between the President and myself. I will
never ask our troops to die for a mistake.
Of course we know very well why Kerry could not really level
with the American people in responding to Lehrer's question.
If Kerry had really leveled with the people it would very likely
have caused him to lose the election. The simple reason for this
is that too many of the American people, and most crucially those
remaining undecided voters, have still not yet realized that
the war was indeed a mistake. Even though every rationale for
the war has been thoroughly contradicted by the facts on the
ground in Iraq, too many of the American people just cannot face
the truth about the war in Iraq. Its easy to understand why there
is this reluctance to face the truth, especially for those whose
loved ones have their lives on the line and are suffering and
dying in Iraq-the truth is just simply to terrible to face.
Failing to Grok
This inability
to face the terrible truth about Iraq is well illustrated, for
example, in a right-wing blog called Trying to Grok in which the author reacts to a piece I wrote,
"The Terrible Truth About
Iraq," which appeared on CounterPunch in September
of 2003. Its easy to understand why a piece which undertook such
a thorough critical examination for the case for the war would
provoke such a rabid and venomous response-the author is a woman
who's husband is one of those who has bravely put his life on
the line in Iraq. I suppose it may very well be impossible for
Sarah to really grok that the war is a mistake, and I certainly
have no expectation that she, and those in her position, will
ever be able to grok it. Nevertheless, I have to say to her,
and those like her that haven't quite yet realized the mistake,
that it is on behalf of the soldiers like her husband (as well
as for the innocent people in Iraq) that I undertook a critical
examination of the case for the war. I honor and respect those
that have risked their lives in the service of their country.
To die for one's country is undoubtedly the greatest sacrifice.
But no one should be asked to make that sacrifice for a mistake.
That is precisely why the question of the justice of war is surely
the most important question the people of this republic can debate.
In response to my assertions regarding our failure as a nation
to adequately carry on this debate before the war, Sarah retorts:
Please point out to me how
we "never adequately examined the case for war." I
was under the impression that I had to watch a billion speeches
in front of the UN last winter.
Ok, let me try to help her
in pointing out the obvious difference between passively accepting
cleverly orchestrated propaganda and actually engaging in a critical
examination of the case for war. If we had adequately examined
the case for war we would have questioned the justifications
for the war given by the Administration to see if there really
was any substance to their claims. Just watching Colin Powell's
presentation before the UN (the billion speeches?) or the President's
2003 State of the Union Address does not count as an adequate
examination of the case for the war. There were numerous experts
within the intelligence community as well as academia who said
all along that there was no real evidence that Saddam Hussein
was ever an imminent threat. They said all along that there was
very little likelihood that he possessed any weapons of mass
destruction, and even less likelihood that he would have used
them if indeed he had them for anything other than self-defense.
Those who dared to examine the Administration's assertions knew
long before the war was launched that there really was no evidence
to back up the supposed connection between Saddam Hussein and
Osama bin Laden. Those who did examine the case for war knew
before the war that Iraq had nothing at all to do with the terrorist
attacks on 9/11. Now we know that those who raised these doubts
about the Administration's assertions were right all along. The
evidence has demonstrated that Bush's speech before the nation
and Powell's speech before the UN were based on distortions and
outright lies. It was all propaganda, but most Americans were
apparently like the soldier's wife who watched on in silent,
blinking acquiescence and thought that this amounted to an adequate
examination of the case for war.
In "The Terrible Truth
About Iraq" I tried to examine the case for war by reviewing
whether or not the arguments for war met the conditions for a
"just war" that are the result of a long philosophical
tradition, and which were enshrined in international law at the
end of the second World War. I asked then "what is it that
would justify war, if indeed anything ever justifies it."
the soldier's wife responded in this way:
Ah, there we go. That's what
he's really saying. The "terrible truth" is that nothing
ever justifies war.
I guess Sarah really needs
to work on her critical reading skills. For although I have more
respect for the pacifist position than she does, I did not question
this war from a pacifist position. I never said anything like
"The 'terrible truth' is that nothing ever justifies war."
The reason I never said anything of the sort is that one certainly
did not need to take a pacifist position to find this war unjustified.
To summarize my argument from
that earlier essay, the only justification for war is self-defense.
Both the Charter of the United Nations and the Charter of the
Nuremberg War Crimes Trials, documents that were ratified by
Congress and which the United States is thus bound to uphold,
are quite explicit in holding to this principle and condemning
a "war of aggression" as a war crime. A war is obviously
considered a case of self-defense in responding to an act of
aggression. A preemptive strike can even be considered self-defense
in response to an imminent threat of aggression. It can be considered
an act of defense and not a "war of aggression" in
responding to an actual attack or imminent threat of attack on
a neighbor state or ally. It has now been conclusively demonstrated
that Iraq was not an imminent threat. The recently released Duelfer
report is conclusive evidence that Iraq not only had no weapons
of mass destruction, but that they hadn't had any weapons of
mass destruction for over ten years and did not have any capacity
to develop such weapons in the near future. We now have solid
evidence that Hans Blix, the former UN disarmament chief in Iraq,
was right in his assertion that Iraq had complied with the UN
resolutions and had destroyed their remaining stockpile of weapons
of mass destruction. Despite the hard evidence to the contrary,
Bush continues to repeat this charge about the threat posed by
Saddam Hussein and his noncompliance with the UN resolution.
But the soldier's wife, like so many Americans today it seems,
would rather dismiss the evidence than begin to question Bush's
fables.
With the absence of any evidence
of any real threat posed by Saddam Hussein, the Bush Administration
has tried to justify the war on the grounds of some humanitarian
intervention. We launched a war on the Iraqi's, killing tens
of thousands, leaving many thousands more terribly wounded, and
generally made a hellish nightmare of their lives, all supposedly
to "liberate" them from Saddam Hussein, and even more
preposterously, to bring them "democracy"? A war might
indeed be considered to be not an "act of aggression"
and thus justified on the grounds of some humanitarian intervention.
The Kosovo war was a debatable case. At least in that case there
was an ongoing program of "ethnic cleansing." But Iraq
was not like Kosovo. Whatever atrocities Saddam Hussein had committed
in the past, there was no evidence that his people were facing
any threat that justified this terribly destructive war. A just
war is one in which all peaceful means of responding to a problem
have been exhausted and is thus truly a last resort. The evidence
shows that the problem of Saddam Hussein was contained, he was
less of a threat to us, his neighbors, or his own people than
he had been ten years ago. Where was the necessity to launch
a destructive war to "liberate" the Iraqi people? There
is a currently ongoing genocide in Africa and yet we do nothing
about it. How then can anyone really believe that the war on
Iraq is justified on the grounds of a humanitarian intervention?
Finally, in the absence of
any real threat posed by Saddam Hussein, as well as any real
case for humanitarian intervention, the Administration would
like the American people to believe that our troops are dying
in Iraq just in order to bring the Iraqi's "democracy."
As I pointed out in the previous essay, it is really hard to
imagine President Bush using this as the only justification for
war in his 2003 State of the Union Address. If he had never made
any mention of weapons of mass destruction, never brought up
any threat posed by Saddam Hussein, and instead argued that we
need to spend hundreds of billions of dollars and send our troops
into battle to die in Iraq just in order to bring "democracy"
to the Iraqi people, I doubt very seriously there would have
been such an unquestioning clamoring for war in the mainstream
press and among the people. No, I will repeat my previous assertion
that he would probably have been hauled off to the insane asylum
right then and there. But after all the hard evidence has come
in, this is what we are left with as a justification for a costly
war. To make this claim that a war is justified just to bring
"democracy" to a people is really to claim that a "war
of aggression" is justified in the name of "democracy."
Lets's put this another way to see if it is more clear-to say
that this war was justified just to bring these people "democracy"
is to justify a war crime in the name of "democracy."
This notion is simply absurd.
If this is our justification for the brutality we have inflicted
upon the Iraqi people then we have degraded and disgraced the
very idea of democracy. It's doubtful that history will regard
this war as a shining moment for democracy. The Iraqi people
certainly don't seem very grateful for our sacrifice in "liberating"
them and bringing them "democracy."
I doubt this idea that we are
bringing "democracy" to the Iraqis has really anything
to do with what we can do for them. This idea of bringing "democracy"
to Iraq is really just a facade to cover over the fear here at
home that is the only reason for the war in Iraq. The soldier's
wife puts it really well:
I personally don't care one
flip about WMDs or yellowcake or imminent anything because I
saw the big picture long ago. The Arab world is a freaking mess,
and some of that mess has now started interfering with our lives
i.e. the WTC. The big picture is that we most certainly do need
to bring democracy to the Middle East to protect us all down
the line.
There it is, the real reason
for the war, and everyone has known it all along-September 11,
2001. This supposed connection between what happened on that
day and Iraq continues to be Bush's last remaining defense of
the war in Iraq. Though the connection between Iraq and 9/11
has been thoroughly discredited, Bush continues to fall back
on it in the recent debates.
Sarah thinks she sees the big
picture, but apparently like so many Americans, she hasn't even
yet opened her eyes-not to the reasons why the Arab world is
a "freaking mess," and thus not to the underlying reasons
for the problem of terrorism, and certainly not to the terrible
truth about the war in Iraq. Like too many Americans what she
has failed to grok is that there never was a connection between
Iraq and what happened on September 11, 2001. The evidence has
already come in that the whole case for war was based on an utter
fabrication.
None of the hijackers responsible
for 9/11 were Iraqi. No connection has ever been established
between Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden. They were enemies
not allies. Iraq stood to gain nothing by giving support to Al
Qaeda. Clark was not exaggerating in saying that attacking Iraq
in response to 9/11 was like FDR attacking Mexico in response
to Pearl Harbor. It sounds completely absurd, of course to those
that think like Sarah, but it is an apt analogy.
One could even say that attacking
Iraq in response to 9/11 was worse than FDR attacking Mexico
for Pearl Harbor. For now we have stirred up a real hornet's
nest of hatred in the whole Islamic world which has created a
much greater problem than FDR could have created with a similar
mistake. The war on Iraq can only make the problem of terrorism
much worse.
Americans have confused the
problem of Saddam Hussein with the problem of terrorism. They
were two separate problems. We already had the problem of Saddam
Hussein quite adequately contained. He was nothing but a two-bit
dictator who had already been rendered powerless. He was not
a threat to us and not connected with the problem of terrorism.
That problem is rooted in a "freaking mess" that is
at least partly our own doing. Until Americans can begin to address
the underlying reasons why Islamic fundamentalists would choose
to become suicidal terrorists the problem of terrorism will never
be met.
As has become abundantly clear
in numerous revelations over the past summer, the Bush Administration
never really was focused on the problem of terrorism. We know
that Bush and neo-cons had plans to attack Iraq long before 9/11,
and apparently they were too preoccupied with these war plans
for Iraq to pay adequate attention to intelligence warnings of
terrorist threats. They then used the ensuing terrorist attack
to push through their plans for war on Iraq.
The real reasons for the war
could never have been made public-they simply wanted American
control of a region that was strategically crucial both for its
location and resources. Oil may not have been the only reason,
but control of the vast oil resources of Iraq was a major reason
for the war on Iraq. Yet they never would have been able to have
their war without 9/11. The neo-cons conned America, and in pulling
off this con they not only turned their attention away from the
real perpetrators of 9/11, they have succeeded brilliantly in
exponentially increasing the antagonism and hatred in the Arab
world for the United States. In raining death and destruction
down on the Iraqi people Bush and the neo-cons haven't done the
Iraqis any favors, and certainly haven't protected us.
The world is not better off,
certainly not the United States, nor even Iraq, now that we have
removed Saddam Hussein from power in this way. We already had
a weapons inspections program in place that had achieved its
primary objectives. Saddam Hussein may have been a brutal dictator
but it wasn't necessary to launch a destructive war to remove
him from power. One day America will finally realize he wasn't
worth the trouble. Now, tragically, Iraq really is a "freaking
mess" and it is we that have made it so.
Sending troops into battle
to die in a war that was not necessary has to be the very worst
thing a President can do. That is why a great leader should never
rush to war. A decision to go to war should be made only after
considering all the counter-arguments, weighing all the best
intelligence, and going forward only when it is absolutely necessary
and thus truly a last resort. The Bush Administration simply
ignored all the counter-arguments. They fabricated evidence which
was then used to coerce Congress into giving the President the
authority for war. Instead of doing their best to avoid war and
find a peaceful solution, they did their utmost to avoid peace
and find a reason for war. They committed our troops to battle
when it was not really necessary and thus our troops are indeed
dying for a mistake.
No one who risks their life
in service to their country should be asked to die for a mistake.
I certainly do pray that Sarah's husband, and all our troops
come home safely. But this war is likely to continue for many
years to come unless this nation realizes and admits to a mistake.
That's something our current President is obviously not very
good at. Will Kerry be able to bring the nation to realize, admit
and then correct this mistake? That really depends upon the
character of the people that make up this nation. It will be
dificult, very difficult for many Americans to realize the terrible
truth about the war in Iraq, but that's the only way out of Iraq
and the only way America might perhaps one day again be a light
to all nations.
Timothy J. Freeman is Adjunct Professor of Philosophy.
The University of Hawaii-Hilo. He can be reached at freeman@hawaii.edu.
Weekend
Edition Features for September 18 / 19, 2004
Alexander Cockburn
Forgeries,
Fingerprints and Forensic Fakery
Jeffrey St. Clair
High Plains Grifter: Bush's Mask of Anarchy
Patrick Cockburn
Into the Abyss: the Week Iraq's Dream of Peace Fell Apart
Fred Gardner
Pot Shots: Financial Torture (Asset Forfeiture)
Joe Allen
The Comrades Kerry Abandoned: the Real Story of Vietnam Vets
Against the War
George Corsetti
Poletown Revisited: Finally, Some Vindication
Scott Handleman
The Knock-Knock of a Sledgehammer: Sequestered in Nablus
Richard Ward
Two Weeks in Beit Arabiya
Conn Hallinan
Ashcroft and Indonesia
Lori Smith
Health Care in America: And Then I Got Sick...
Dave Zirin
Hold the Booyah!: SportsCenter Out of the Middle East
John L. Hess
Rather Will Take the Heat, As Bush's War Deteriorates
Brian J. Foley
W is for Wimp: So Why do Manly Men Love Him?
Mickey Z.
Pat Tillman and Osama bin Laden: Odd Juxtapositions
Poets' Basement
Vest, Landau & Albert
Website of the Weekend
Eye on the NYTs
/
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