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Exclusive to CounterPunch Newsletter Subscribers! How Bill (and Monica) Saved Hillary from a Federal Indictment Here's the second in Alexander Cockburn and Jeffrey St. Clair's series as they describe Hillary Clinton's years in Little Rock and her narrow escape from federal charges that would have destroyed her political career for ever. PLUS KEVIN ALEXANDER GRAY on how Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama and John Edwards are failing Black America even as they hunt for votes in So uth Carolina's "Black Primary." Get your copy today by subscribing online or calling 1-800-840-3683 Remember contributions to CounterPunch are tax-deductible. Click here to make a donation. If you find our site useful please: Subscribe Now Order CounterPunch By Email for Only $35 a Year and Receive a Free Copy of "Imperial Crusades: a Diary of Three Wars" by Cockburn and St. Clair

Today's Stories August 22, 2007 Marc Levy Sleepless in Iraq August 21, 2007 Saul Landau The FBI's New Power Alan Farago Sand Houses and Missing Beaches John Stauber Iraq: the Gift that Keeps on Bleeding Phillip Rizk Gaza and the Jordanian Option Debbie Nathan Giuliani's Garden District Binoy Kampmark The Art of Sinning Martha Rosenberg The Fastow Economy Sunsara Taylor Back to School During Wartime Website of the Day Coffee with the Troops   August 20, 2007 Paul Craig Roberts Padilla Jury Opens Pandora's Box Uri Avnery Stumbling Toward Another War Rannie Amiri Nasrallah's Surprise: a Warning from Beirut's No Bluff Zone John Ross The Fine Art of Bad Elections Harvey Wasserman The Senate's Radioactive Rip-Off Robert Billyard Canada's Disgrace: the Cases of Maher Arar and Omar Khadr Dave Lindorff Excuse Us, Nancy Pelosi James Rothenberg Why Your Vote Will Never Matter David "DC" Larson To Smear a King Website of the Day Bird Cinema August 18 / 19, 2007 Alexander Cockburn Exit Karl Rove, Everyone's Useful Demon Saul Landau The FBI in War and Peace Ralph Nader Greed and Folly on Wall Street Patrick Cockburn A Bloody Week in Iraq Robert Fantina Cannon Fodder: Beau Biden and other "Deployable Assets" Robert S. Eshelman Azar's Story: an Iraqi Refugee Living in Syria P. Sainath The Last Battle of Laxmi Panda Dave Lindorff Tossing Fuel on a Fire: US Military Aid to Israel Anthony DiMaggio Iraq, Iran & the Vanishing Context in American News Fred Gardner The Politics of Schizophrenia Ron Jacobs The Virtues of Resistance Tom Turnipseed War Profiteering and Corruption: From Lexington, S.C. to the White House Paul Krassner Assholes of the Week: Special Preachers, Priests and Clerics Edition! Ben Tripp I'm So Screwed Andrew Wimmer Living With Grief Nancy Oden Where Inmates Can Grow for Free N.D. Jayaprakash India Backtracks on Disarmament Rick Smith Reflections on Cuba: an Interview with Doug Morris Missy Beattie The Suicide Bomber Poets' Basement Engel, Ford, Orloski and McLellan Website of the Weekend Imperial Storm Troopers in Action August 17, 2007 Joanne Mariner Terrorizing Social Protest Paul Craig Roberts China is not the Problem Shepherd Bliss Returning to the Scene of the Crime: Chile, 30 Years Later Dave Lindorff Convicting Padilla: Bad News for All Americans John Muthyala The Water and the Road: Katrina, Poverty and the American Dream Patrick Cockburn Deepening Divsions in Iraq Sherwood Ross Military Interrogators are Posing as Lawyers at Gitmo Phil Doe The Old West Moves East: the Political Science of Colorado River Water David Michael Green Karl Rove and the Damage Done Website of the Day Gorilla Slaughter: a Personal Account August 16, 2007 Jonathan Cook The Second Lebanon War, a Year Later Christopher Brauchli Babes in Toxic Toyland Norman Solomon Backspin for War Lee Sustar / Orlando Sepuldeva Victory on the Picket Line: How Immigrant Workers Won Their Strike Against Cygnus George Bisharat Boycott Movement Targets Israel Binoy Kampmark Tasteless: Gordon Ramsey and the Death of Gastronomy Evelyn Pringle Protection Racket?: the FDA and Avandia Hugo Blanco The Epic Struggle of Indigenous Andean / Amazonian Website of the Day Burning Man: the Field Recordings   August 15, 2007 Paul Craig Roberts "No American President Can Stand Up to Israel" Michael Neumann In Memoriam: Raul Hilberg Jordan Flaherty The Struggle to Free the Jena Six Sonja Karkar Can You Hear the Cries from Gaza? Felice Pace NPR Watch: Will Linda Gradstein Go to Gaza? Joshua Frank On Censoring Pearl Jam Dave Lindorff Terrorist Nation? Carla Blank Elvis Presley: King or Apprentice? David Vest Guralnick, Elvis and Racism Harvey Wasserman Why the Neocons Won't Miss Karl Rove Peter Rost, M.D. FDA Approved Drug Makes You Hypersexual and a Compulsive Gambler Russell Mokhiber An Arab American's Pocket Political Dictionary Website of the Day Stoners Busted   August 14, 2007 Paul de Rooij Humanitarian Wars and Associated Delusions Winslow T. Wheeler Congress's Busted September: Disingenuous Gestures Amid Catastrophe David Rosen The Case of Genarlow Wilson: Racism, Justice and Age-of-Consent Laws in America Gary Leupp Bush Warns Puppets Not to Praise Iran Clifton Ross Latin America at the Crossroads Muhammad Idress Ahmad The Politics of Democracy Promotion Jacquelyn Godin A Circle of Poison: Pesticides in the Plantations Uri Avnery Oslo Revisited Ramzy Baroud A Palestinian Miracle at the UN? James McEnteer Philistines as Cultural Critics Website of the Day When Cheney Called Iraq a Quagmire   August 13, 2007 Jeremy Scahill The Mercenary Revolution F. William Engdahl The Hidden Agenda Behind Bush's Biofuel Plan Alexander Cockburn The Veldt Will Never Be the Same Kathy Kelly Iraq's Refugees: "et to Work" Chris Floyd No Light, Light Tunnel: the Bipartisan Guarantee of More War in Iraq Paul Craig Roberts Hegemony of the Cockroach William Blum First Pullout, Then Bloodbath? Kenneth Couesbouc The Language of Dominion Rannie Amiri Tancredo's Screedo: a Lethal Mix of Ignorance and Insanity Brenda Norrell Priests Expose Secret Cycle of US Torture Fran Shor All Fall Down Ron Jacobs Dr. Strangelove Meets Dubya's Double Buzz Twofer Website of the Day The Beauty of Defiance   August 11 / 12, 2007 Alexander Cockburn How the Democrats Blew It in Only 8 Months Stan Goff The Cover-Up of Pat Tillman's Death Ralph Nader GM Radio: Payola to Rightwing Talk Shows? Vijay Prashad Destination Darfur: a New Cold War for Oil Greg Moses SubPrime People: Behind the Banking Crisis Alan Farago The Cratering Mortgage Market, WCI Communities and Amb. Al Hoffman Patrick Cockburn The Cracks in Saddam's Dam Ben Tripp On Fleeing the Country Robert Fantina Romney's Dance: The Rightwing Flip-Flop John Ross The Guelaguetza Strategy in Oaxaca Seth Sandronsky Organizing Nurses Paul Krassner Assholes of the Week: From Mitt Romney to Bill Richardson Website of the Weekend Pearl Jam: Censored by ATT   August 10, 2007 Paul Craig Roberts China's Threat to the Dollar is Real Stan Goff How Pat Tillman Died Marjorie Cohn A Blank Check for Domestic Spying Saul Landau In the Age of Immigrant Panic Chris Floyd Goading Xerxes: the Coming Strike on Iran Daniel Ellsberg A Vision for Cindy Sheehan's Campaign Anthony Papa The Upside Down Flag: a Country in Distress Farzana Versey On the Heels of Sir Salman Sgt. Kevin Benderman Freedom or Totalitarianism? Nuri Nuri Memories of T99 Nelson Website of the Day Lessons in Obfuscation from Sen. Larry Craig: How to Talk About Looting the Public Domain   August 9, 2007 Stan Goff The Fog of Fame: Pat Tillman as Everyone's Political Football Paul Craig Roberts In the Hole to China Alan Farago The Terror of the Mortgage Pools William S. Lind The Surge's New Math: One Step Forward, Two Back Doug Giebel Letter from Montana: What the Bushvolk Have Done to America Harvey Wasserman Radioactive Bailout in Advance Jacob Hill The Tail End of Free Trade: NAFTA's Impact on the Manufacturing Sector Raul Zibechi The Dark Side of Agrofuels Dave Zirin The Making of Barry bin Laden Website of the Day "Babies Just Come with the Scenery"   August 8, 2007 Andy Worthington Backing Up Lt. Col. Abraham on Gitmo Abuse Jeff Halper The Catch in Israel's "Generous Offers" at Jericho Greg Moses No Light in August for Texas Refugees: Judge Orders Baby Sent to Palestine Nurit Peled-Elhanan The Murder of Abir Aramin, 9 Years Old Sukant Chandan British Prisons as Islamic Universities Robert Fisk A Lebanese Surprise George H. Strauss The Military Society D.K. Wilson Bonds, the Haters and 756: Why Bob Costas Can't be Trusted Bill Day Leonardo DiCaprio's Baggage: the Perils of Celebrity Environmentalism Tim Campbell Monkey See, Monkey Do Politics Website of the Day Periodic Table of Visualization Methods   August 7, 2007 Patrick Cockburn Why the Surge Has Failed Andy Worthington Why Do We Need the Democrats?: They Have Failed to Restrain Bush on Gitmo, Iraq and Domestic Spying Kathy Kelly The Little Girl of Hiroshima Stan Cox The Antiwar Majority: Look Quickly, You Might Miss It Sonja Karkar Israel's Settlement Project Sen. Russ Feingold A License to Wiretap--Anyone Alan Farago Dancing in the Light of Florida Norman Solomon Let Us Now Praise an Infamous Woman Binoy Kampmark Giving Good Face: What Jeremy Bentham and Facebook Have in Common Dave Lindorff The Gelding Congress John Stauber Coffee with the Troops at Yearly Kos Website of the Day George Carlin on Education August 6, 2007 Bill Quigley Fighting for the Right to Learn in New Orleans Kathy Rentenbach Guatemalan Gold, Guatemalan Bones Uri Avnery White Elephants: Bush's Middle East Arms Deals Col. Dan Smith Of Time and Iraq Ralph Nader Cruise Ship Blues James Neshewat War? What War?: a Report from the New SDS Confab in Detroit D.K. Wilson Barry, Bud and 755 Greg Moses Safe Passage for Willie Nelson Fidel Castro Hard and Obvious Realities Mike Whitney Judgment Week on Wall Street   August 4 / 5, 2007 Alexander Cockburn Rupert Murdoch and the Luck of the Bancrofts Peter Linebaugh Speaking in Irish Tongues Saul Landau Faith-Based War Alan Farago The Candidates and the Collapsing Economy Dave Zirin When Domes Attack: Even in Minnesota Barucha Calamity Peller Oaxaca is Not Over Anthony DiMaggio Double Standards in U.S. Aid to the Middle East Dave Lindorff Spy Power: Bush Demands, Democrats Deliver--Again and Again and Again Fred Gardner Write Off Your Congressman Nicola Nasser The Iranian Option Benjamin Dangl Privatizing Repression in Paraguay Rannie Amiri Bribe, Divide and Conquer Daniel Gross CSR on Trial: Starbucks Behind the Brand Sherwood Ross Obama Renounces Use of Nuclear Weapons Manuel Garcia, Jr A Bridge Truth Movement?: From 9/11 to Minneapolis Missy Beattie The First Mannequin and the "Crime Scene" Ron Jacobs The Outlaw Trip to Mexico: Goin' Down the Road Feelin' Bad Website of the Weekend Photos: Texas Immigrant Prison   August 3, 2007 Gabriel Matthew Schivone An Interview with Noam Chomsky on Responsibility, War Guilt and Intellectuals Jonathan Cook Israel's Jewish Problem in Tehran Patrick Cockburn Sunnis Walk Out of Iraq Government Little Steven Van Zandt Die, Greedy Swine! Die! Die!: How the Record Companies are Killing Rock Music Christopher Brauchli Bush Makes Putin Look Like James Madison D. K. Wilson Two Sides and a Middle: Michael Vick Ain't the One to Ask Linda Ford and Ira Glunts Maxwell's Silver Hammer: Syracuse University Enlists in the Global War on Terror Kelly Overton The Casualties of Green Scare: the Feds' War on the Animal Rights Mvt. Monica Benderman In Freedom's Name Manuel Garcia, Jr. Minneapolis Bridge Collapse: Was Cheney at the Scene? Website of the Day A Cinematic Look at the Police State in Action   August 2, 2007 Paul Craig Roberts The Return of the Robber Barons Stanley Heller Report from the Land of Apartheid Eric Ruder Fighting PTSD; Fighting the Army Robert Fantina Still Getting It Wrong: the NYT and Iraq Alan Farago The Toxic Mortgage Waste Crisis Chris Floyd Chertoff, Chiquita and Death Squads Franklin Lamb Lebanon's Crucial Special Elections Sen. Russ Feingold Closing the Book on the Abramoff Era Anthony Papa Drug Treatment isn't a Silver Bullet Norman Solomon The Big Guns of August Website of the Day Louie, Louie Video Contest   August 1, 2007 Debbie Nathan More Secret Payments by Former NYT Reporter to Web Porn Star Surface in Nashville Courtroom Fred Gardner Ciao, Michelangelo Gary Leupp Why Iraq's Best-Loved Athlete Can't Go Home David Rosen America's Top 10 Political Sex Scandals Winston Warfield Is the Tillman Case Still a Coverup? Daniel McBride Lessons from Bomber Harris: If the US Strikes Pakistan Glen Ford The Corporate Plan to Crush Black Resistance Thomas P. Healy The Toxic Career of Indiana's Environmental Commissioner John V. Whitbeck The Five Percent Solution David Krieger Nuclear Weapons and the University of California Website of the Day The Tragic Story of Hisham Mohammed   July 31, 2007 Kathy Kelly Dancing in the Darkness: the Story of Abu Mahmoud Clancy Sigal The Ghosts of Passchendaele Paul Krassner Assholes of the Week: From Baby Doll to Cheney Joe DeRaymond Return to the Republic of Death? Diane Christian "Winning": What Bush Could Learn from the Shade of Achilles Chris Floyd Good News is No News: Why the Bush Adm. Buries Accounts of Extremist Recantations Ramzy Baroud Bush's Real Agenda in Palestine Alan Farago Battle for the Soul of Florida Fidel Castro In Spite of Everything: Reflections on the Pan American Games Dan Bacher The Fish Terminator: Schwarzenegger's Campaign to Build the Delta Canal and More Dams   July 30, 2007 Marjorie Cohn: Independent Counsel Time Patrick Cockburn Four Million Iraqis on the Run Peter Quinn Irish in America Uri Avnery A Warning to Tony Blair John Ross Zapatista Intergalatica Lands on Earth Ron Jacobs Free the San Francisco 8 David Vest Farewell, Old Friend: Another Legend of the Blues is Gone Jeffrey St. Clair T99 Nelson: Seduced by a Legend of the Blues Website of the Day Collateral Repair Project   July 28 / 29, 2007 Alexander Cockburn Now the NYT is Selling "Bloodbath" as a Rationale to Stay in Iraq Ralph Nader Rotten Justice Robert Fantina American Lies and Iraqi Nationalism Fred Gardner Prohibitionists Attack, Reformers Fundraise   July 27, 2007 John Ross Bombing Pemex--or Not? Arthur Neslen Gaza was a Gas for Blair Dave Lindorff Declaring the US a Battlefield: Martial Law is Now a Real Threat Julene Blair The Environmentalist Within Christopher Brauchli Bush Uses Children as Shock Troops in His War on Socialized Medicine Jesse Hagopian Fund the Wounded, Not the War Charles Modiano Manufacturing a Villain: Sports Illustrated's Vilification of Barry Bonds Bill Day The Hollow Environmentalism of Leonardo DiCaprio Walter Brasch Leaders Afraid to Lead M.D. Mitchell Farm Based Camps Website of the Day Fighting Sarcoma   July 26, 2007 Kathleen Christison The Siren Song of Elliot Abrams Andy Worthington Why the Pentagon's Gitmo Study is a Joke Clancy Chassay How the Bush White House Seeks to Destroy Lebanon Marjorie Cohn Showdown Over Executive Privilege Susie Day Apartheid Americana David Price Tour de Witch Hunt: Drugs, Diaries and Purges Marie Trigona Argentina's "Dirty War" Crimes Trial: The Torturer Priest Norman Solomon Media Spin on Iraq: We're Leaving (Sort Of) William S. Lind How to Win in Iraq Natsu Saito Ward Churchill and the Regents at the University of Colorado John Stauber Netroots and the Iraq War: Does Ending It Matter to Them Anymore? Website of the Day Sticking It to the Man   July 25, 2007 Andy Worthington Gains and Losses at Gitmo Gary Leupp Bush Speechwriter, Michael Gerson, Calls for Attack on Syria Ray McGovern The Sad Decline of John Conyers Dr. Susan Block Bonobo Bashing in the New Yorker Joshua Frank Hillary's Neocon: the Imperial Vision of Richard Holbrooke Tina Richards What Harry Reid Doesn't Know About His Own Bill Ben Terrall Indonesia's Bloody Brand of CounterTerrorism Farzana Versey God Acquitted!: Lessons from the Case of Darwood Ibrahim Mohammad Ali Salih A Bomb in My Briefcase? Laura Carlsen A Strange Homecoming: Reflections on the First US Social Forum Ron Jacobs Come to Kennebunkport! Sunsara Taylor Knocked Up is F**ked Up Website of the Day Wal-Mart's Flip Flops: Feet Killers July 24, 2007 Saul Landau How to Walk in Bushtime Kathy Kelly The Plight of Iraqi Refugees in Jordan Russell Mokhiber The Michael Vick / George Bush Thing M. Shahid Alam Islam Now, China Then Patrick Cockburn and Anne Penketh Meeting in Baghdad Dave Lindorff Overcoming John Conyers Binoy Kampmark You Tube You Can't: Failure of a Medium Richard Neville Murdoch's Transplant: a Warning to the Wall Street Journal Cindy Sheehan We Must Move Beyond Politics as Usual Evelyn Pringle Anti-Depressants and Birth Defects: Why is the CDC Downplaying the Risks? Norman Solomon Media Corrections We'd Like to See CP Newswire Reading Harry Potter Not Sinful Website of the Day Sea Islands Black Heritage Festival   July 23, 2007 Andy Worthington Narcolepsy on Gitmo Detainees Uri Avnery A Trap for Fools Patrick Cockburn Turkish Prime Minister Threatens to Invade Northern Iraq Sousan Hammad The Children Without a Title John Walsh Todd Gitlin's Nader Fixation Harvey Wasserman Spinning Kashiwazaki: PR Flacks Rush to Aid of Crippled Nuke Martha Rosenberg The Life and Times of a Hog-Hanging Farmer Collin Baber Here Come the MRAPs: Resurrecting Apartheid Armor for Iraq Reza Fiyouzat Iran's Forgotten Anti-Nuke Movement Stephen Lendman Saving a President: Scare-Mongering and Executive Orders Website of the Day The Port Huron Project   July 21 / 22, 2007 Alexander Cockburn Giuliani and the Dogs of War Werther How to Read a National Intelligence Estimate Ralph Nader Atomic Blowback David Keen Buy Hard: How to Sell an Endless War Fred Gardner Karl Rove, Pothead: When Good Drugs Happen to Bad People Gary Leupp Edelman's Edict: Is Hillary "Reinforcing Enemy Propaganda?" Robert Fantina Fear in Iraq Saker The Future of Palestine: an Interview with Jonathan Cook Rannie Amiri Nasrallah in the Crosshairs: How will the Third Lebanon War Start? Mike Whitney The Crisis in Hedgistan Dr. Susan Rosenthal, MD The Hidden Injuries of Powerlessness: Linking Alienation and Dissociation Monica Benderman Facing the Truth Dan Bacher Deltagate: the Politics of Fish Kills Michael Baney Fujimori's Long Race From Justice Missy Beattie Here, There and Everywhere Ron Jacobs Tremble, Tyrants Adam Engel Radical Language: an Introduction Thomas Naylor California Split: an Open Letter to Schwarzenegger Poets' Basement Landau, Ford and Engel Website of the Weekend Surge in Action   July 20, 2007 Eliza Szabo Fatal Neglect: Civilian Casualties in Afghanistan Pam Martens Doctoring the News: CNN's Sanjay Gupta, Laura Bush and Merck Alan Farago Winners and Losers in the Housing Market Crash Harvey Wasserman Lies and Leaks: The Earthquake That Screamed "No Nukes!" Marjorie Cohn Iraqis will be the Deciders Dave Zirin White Noise and the Black Athlete Anthony DiMaggio American Public Opinion and Israel Scott Liebertz Oaxaca on Edge Linn Washington, Jr. British Cops Assault Rape Allegations Bill Piper / Anthony Papa Flying High?: The Political Junkets of Bush's Drug Czar Ramzy Baroud Bush's War Policy: When Time Heals Nothing Website of the Day The Prankster Art of Mark Jenkins   July 19, 2007 Patrick Cockburn The Next Invasion of Iraq Remi Kanazi Is This Ben Gurion or Hell?: a Palestinian Adventure Through Israel's Largest Airport Winslow T. Wheeler The Surging Costs of the Iraq War Sharon Smith Democrats and Health Care: Behind the Rhetoric Dave Lindorff Killing Cabbies in Iraq Conn Hallinan Have Gun, Will Travel: Mercenaries in Iraq and Afghanistan D. K. Wilson The Michael Vick Case Pulls Back the Veil on Who We Really Are Joshua Frank Democrats as Leviathan: Another Step Toward War with Iran Norman Solomon The Ghost of Wayne Morse Russell Hoffman Rattling the Reactor: Quakes, Fires and Leaks at the World's Largest Nuke Ray McGovern Bush's Wooden Headedness Kills Website of the Day Protesting Power July 18, 2007 Brenda Norrell Spy Towers on the US Border Col. Dan Smith How the US Could "Lose" Saudi Arabia Martha Rosenberg Lord of Crookharbour: the Trial of Conrad Black Conn Hallinan Bombing and Spraying Afghanistan Binoy Kampmark The SIM Card Terror Case Patrick Bond / Rehana Dada Who Killed Sajida Khan? Tom Johnson The Long Road ... to Nowhere Paul Craig Roberts A Free Press or a Ministry of Truth? Bob Quellos Pushing the Poor Out of House and Home Felice Pace Falling for Lieberman's Iran Resolution Robert Weissman National Health Insurance: More Humane and More Efficient CP Newswire Shocking Report Showing Involvement of US Psychologists in Torture Website of the Day Gilad Atzmon Live!   July 17, 2007 Patrick Cockburn Just Another Day in Iraq: 100 Fathers, Mothers and Children Killed Marjorie Cohn Out of Control: Executive Power Plays Evelyn Pringle Inside Bush's FDA David Rosen Moral Hypocrisy on the Hill: the Christian Right, Sexual Scandal and the Pleasures of the Courtesan Susan Miller Width Matters: Displacement and Israel's Wall Franklin Lamb Did the UN Cave to Israel on Lebanon's Shabaa Farms? Don Monkerud Considering Victory in Iraq Harvey Wasserman Nuclear Surge Russell Hoffman Japan Dodges a Radioactive Bullet Dave Lindorff Feingold Turns to Dross Dave Zirin Reclaiming Sports as True Fiction Website of the Day Che at the UN: 1964   July 16, 2007 Gary Leupp Cheney Urges Bush to Strike Iran Ellen Cantarow The Untold Story of Iraqi Women Paul Craig Roberts Impeach Now Allan J. Lichtman The D.C. Madam's Public Service Dan Bacher Cheney and the Klamath: Was the Veep Behind the Nation's Worst Salmon Kill? Patrick Cockburn The Killing of Khalid W. Hassan Manuel Garcia, Jr. Property is Racism James Brooks AIPAC and Mahmoud Abbas: the Undemocratic Road to Defeat Liaquat Ali Khan The Judicial Crisis in Pakistan Julie Flint Suleiman Jamous in Limbo Website of the Day Free Suleiman Jamous!   July 14 / 15. 2007 Alexander Cockburn Support Their Troops? Andy Worthington Gitmo's Tangled Web: Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, Majhid Khan, Dubious US Convictions and a Dying Man Ralph Nader Lawlessness, Waste and Incompetence Robert Fantina The Illegalities of the Iraq War Ron Jacobs Architecture as Military Strategy Joshua Frank Eat, Fight, Screw, Pray: An Interview with Joe Bageant Conn Hallinan Guns, Foundations and Free Trade: How the Right Targets Africa Dr. Susan Rosenthal, MD War and Dissociation John Ross No En Nuestro Nombre!: a Letter to the Mexican Antiwar Movement Fred Gardner Who's Afraid of Cannabidiol? Rannie Amiri A Primer on Israeli Doublespeak Charles Modiano ESPN's Rap Sheet: Pacman as Black Man Anthony DiMaggio America's Parochial Press China Hand Executive Orders and Coercive Diplomacy Missy Comley Beattie Reprobate Rhetoricians Dr. James J. Murtagh, Jr. Harry Potter Battles Big Brother Kenneth Rexroth On Thomas More's "Utopia" Poets' Basement Engel, Davies and Orloski Website of the Weekend GOP Sex Hypocrites: a Slideshow   July 13, 2007 Patrick Cockburn The Decider in Denial Winslow T. Wheeler Bush's Iraq Benchmarks Assessment: Grading on a Curve for the Wrong Test Imran Khan When Dictators Serve US Interests Todd Chretien The Wal-Mart of Garbage Sam Husseini Killing the Constitution Dr. Herman Mindshaftgap Why, in Truth, There is No Surge Anthony Papa The Hard Road Home D. K. Wilson The Wonderful World of Mike Greenberg and Barry Bonds David Michael Green In the Last Throes, Judiciously Website of the Day Strange Attraction: Mrs. Thompson and Mr. Wolfowitz   July 12, 2007 Paul Craig Roberts Restoring the People's Power Robert Jensen Lessons from the Lal Masjid Tragedy Dr. Susan Block Hookergate II: The Senator and the Veep Joshua Frank The Liberal Thrashing of Ward Churchill John Chuckman How Terror Lost Its Meaning Corporate Crime Reporter The Problem with Bribeline Mike Whitney Demonizing Putin Nicola Nasser Will New Delhi's Palestinian Policy be Neutralized? Richard Rhames Requiem for the Paxilated William S. Lind Not Fourth Generation Warfare Website of the Day Video: World's Largest Nuclear Explosion     July 11, 2007 Patrick Cockburn The Benchmark Blame Game Richard Neville Is This Man a Psychopath? Bomber McNeill, the Faceless Pol Pot of the Sky Debra McNutt Privatizing Women: Military Prostitution and the Iraq Occupation John V. Walsh A Plea to Ralph Nader Scott Liebertz Where's the Outcry? Mexico's Monitor Radio vs. RCTV George C. Wilson Beware the Iran Hawks James McEnteer My Impossible Dream Candidate Philip Rizk Submission or Resistance in Gaza? Johnny Hazard Mexico Commemorates a Fraud Dave Lindorff On the Road with Impeachment Website of the Day Sly Stone's Higher Power   July 10, 2007 James Ridgeway True North: Big Oil in the Arctic Tariq Ali New Clashes in Islamabad: Judges and Jihadis Torment the Regime Javed Hussein Pakistan's Waco?: The Storming of the Red Mosque William Blum Neocons, Theocons, Demcons, Excons and Future Cons Ralph Nader Grown in China Jay Arena New Orleans, Public Housing and the Non-Profit Industrial Complex Anthony DiMaggio A Begrudging Reversal: The New York Times and the "Anti-War" Turn Eva Liddell Has Ann Coulter Got the Hots for John Edwards? Jerry Kroth Democratic Defectors and the Israel Lobby Alice Woodward White Supremacy and the Jena Six Nikolas Kozloff Where's Jerry?: On Cheney Impeachment, Rep. Nadler's a No Show Paul Shannon It's Time to Reform Sex Offender Laws Website of the Day March for Remembrance   July 9, 2007 Fidel Castro The Killing Machine: Reflections from a Target of the CIA Diana Johnstone King Sarko the First John Walsh Will the Greens Seize the Moment? Uri Avnery The Jordanian Option Ramzy Baroud The Palestinian Left: a Lost Opportunity? John Ripton The New West Bank Palestinian State Stephen Lendman Making Gaza Scream Bruce Jackson Bush Going Down: the Correct Way to Affix a Stamp Michael Donnelly What's the Matter with Winchester? Doug Giebel Wanted: Old Men with Nothing to Lose Website of the Day Ron Paul on This Week with George   July 7 / 8, 2007 Saul Landau Blame the Puppet Ismael Hossein-zadeh Parasitic Imperialism Fawzia Afzal-Khan What Lies Beneath: Dispatches from the Frontlines of t he Burqa Brigade Alan Maass Will "Sicko" Spark a Movement?: a Film, Militant Nurses and a New Opportunity for Single Payer Health Care John Ross The Fire Last Time Pat Williams The Supreme Court and Mr. Peanut Rannie Amiri The Unbreakable Mordechai Vanunu Farzana Versey Does the Taj Mahal Deserve to be a Wonder of the World? Bart Gruzalski Bush, the Revolution and the Iraq War Paul Rockwell An Army of None Reza Fiyouzat Tax Cuts for the Rich Only Benefit the Economy of the Rich Monica Benderman Americans, Honestly! Kenneth Couesbouc Total War: From Clausewitz to Clinton and Bush Dave Lindorff Poll: Impeach the Bastards Charles Modiano History's Hit Job on Thomas Paine Missy Beattie King Cretin Dal LaMagna A Peacemaker's View of Baghdad Jean Gerard Those So-Called Oil Contracts in Iraq Anne Dachel Autism: an Epidemic of Fairly Recent Origin Ron Jacobs Modes and Melodies of Resistance Poets' Basement Gibbons, Orloski, Engel and Buknatski Website of the Day Van Morrison and Bob Dylan in Athens July 6, 2007 Daniel Ellsberg When the Crimes of the White House are Unpunishable Gary Leupp The Cracks in Cheney's World Harvey Wasserman Leonard Peltier vs. Scooter Libby: the Hero and the Henchman Omer Subhani Our Dead are Not the Same: Ignoring Civilian Deaths in Afghanistan Marjorie Cohn Compassion, Conspiracy and Commutation Christopher Brauchli Kingly Edicts: Bush's Executive Orders David Michael Green Scalia Time: the Wrecking Ball Court China Hand Catfish Blues: Food Safety, the FDA and the Emerging Trade War with China Renee Saucedo and Todd Chretien The New Challenges Facing the Immigrant Rights Movement Corporate Crime Reporter The Crime Wave Behind the Media Curtain Website of the Day Jean Bricmont on the Humanitarian Interveners   July 5, 2007 Andy Worthington Two Americas, Both Unjust: Scooter Libby vs. the "Enemy Combatants" Mike Stark Double Standards of North Carolina "Justice" Norman Solomon The Keyboard Hawks: a Bloody Media Mirror Michael Schwartz Killing 10,000 Iraqis Every Month Susie Day Killer Lesbians Mauled by Killer Court (and Media Wolfpack) Jacob Hornberger A Tangled Web of Lies: Bush and the Libby Case Bill Hatch Smoking with Arnold: The Strange Return of Toxic Mary Nichols Don Fitz When Building Green Ain't So Green John Wright The Crisis of Imperialism Website of the Day Anti-Flag and Tom Morello: "This Land is Your Land"   July 4, 2007 St. Clair / Frank Obama's Nuclear Ambitions Vijay Prashad Democrat (Punjab): Obama and Outsourcing Carl G. Estabrook The Declaration of Independence and the Right to Exist Ron Jacobs Texas Wants to Kill Another Man, the Law be Damned: the Disturbing Case of Kenneth Foster David R. Dow The Quality of Bush's Mercy: the Ghosts of Texas Claudia Johnson Is My Doctor a Terrorist? William S. Lind What Israel's Defeat in Lebanon Means for Defense Industry Fat Cats Gregory Afghani Truth and Tenure: Finkelstein and the Perils of Impeccable Scholarship Paul Edwards End It Now! D. K. Wilson The Sliming of Tank Johnson Niranjan Ramakrishnan Thank You, Mr. President: Bush/Cheney for Dummies Thomas Jefferson The Spirit of Resistance: Lethargy is the Forerunner of the Death of Public Liberty Cindy Sheehan Call Out the Instigator Website of the Day Springsteen: 4th of July, Ashbury Park July 3, 2007 Bill Quigley Injustice in Jena: Black Nooses Hanging from the "White" Tree Gary Leupp Civil Strife in Palestine: a Broader Context Lynda Brayer Norman Finkelstein and the Catholic Church Richard Thieme Mind Wars: Brain Research, Nanotech and the Military Helen Redmond They Don't Come Back the Same: the Mind of the Returning Iraq War Vet David Swanson Scooter and the Commuter: When Presidents Pardon Their Own Crimes Jacob Hornberger Martha Stewart vs. Scooter Libby: Commutation as Cover-Up Ayesha Ijaz Khan Pakistan's New Jihad Franklin Lamb The Edginess of Lebanon Ray McGovern Unimpeachably Impeachable: Start with Cheney Kevin Zeese The Air Force vs. Rev. Lennox Yearwood Dave Lindorff Nancy Pelosi and the Low Bar Democrats Website of the Day A Military Guide to the Iraq War         Subscribe Online

August 22, 2007 From the Fresno Catastrophe to Tsakopolis A Short Walk into the Valley of Death By BILL HATCH Recently accused by a local planning commissioner of being a dishonest journalist, I reviewed my notebooks for moral reassurance. I found notes from an interview I once did with a city planning-department staffer in charge of maps. This Galilean fundamentalist believed that satellite enhanced geography was the queen of the sciences and would set us free. I honestly reported this lunacy for the local newspaper. Our little region of the globe contains three north San Joaquin Valley CA counties in the largest parts of two congressional districts formerly known as Pombozastan in honor of representatives Pombo and Cardoza, of anti-Endangered Species Act fame. The three county seats are tops in the nation for mortgage foreclosures. Three other Central California cities, Sacramento, Fresno and Bakersfield, also score high for mortgage foreclosure rates. These land-use jurisdictions, whose elected officials approved the massive construction boom driven by speculation, are awash in debt and planning maps: county limits, city limits, specific urban development plans, spheres of influence, blueprints, greenprints and regional partnerships. Years ago, state Assembly Speaker Willie Brown, irritated with local governments in Northern California, advanced an idea to consolidate its 50 counties into conveniently large land-use jurisdictions like the eight counties south of the Tehachapis, which contain the largest population in the state. I don't remember the speaker's exact political purpose for this suggestion, but it threatened the livelihoods and power of thousands of county officials, presumably to some positive outcome for the speaker's agenda at the time. To my knowledge, Brown's proposal has not returned in his forthright terms, but it has gained momentum by other means. As anyone knows, whose life has detoured for some reason into the intellectual sump called "land-use planning" in California, the topic is rich in absurdity and cannot be faced, let alone comprehended without deep study of the comic novel and neglected masterpieces of 18th-century Neapolitan social theory. Although the environment constantly deteriorates under the impact of "inevitable growth," although the resource-carrying capacity of the state is breaking down all around us, although new slogans along the lines of the familiar chestnut "smart growth" are endlessly confected by land-use propagandists - we know we cannot take this sugar-coated bullshit seriously. Down that path lies idiocy, and there are examples all around us of those who have ventured there and not returned. The area including 15 Central California counties is missing the two maps essential to understanding the true land-use jurisdictions. Each of the 15 counties has land-use authority over the unincorporated areas within its borders. The cities within them have land-use authority over the areas within their corporate city limits and consultative jurisdiction over areas beyond their limits depending on spheres of influence, specific urban development plans, and other arrangements with their counties. (As a canny realtor/city councilman once put it: "Counties don't grow; cities do.") As official land-use jurisdictions, these counties and their cities are subject to state and federal environmental laws and regulations, particularly the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA), which defines the state's unique procedures and requirements for environmental review. Federal laws and regulations define other duties and responsibilities of local land-use jurisdictions. The main federal laws are the Endangered Species Act (ESA), Clean Water Act and Clean Air Act. If the local jurisdictions corrupt these laws too blatantly, their decisions are open to legal challenge. Local land-use officials do not don sackcloth and sit in ashes when they are defeated in court. Their response to a negative ruling is to ramp up the propaganda attack against successful petitioners, courts, judges and environmental law, approve more projects and sacrifice to golden cows, praying for the extirpation of their enemies - from the San Joaquin Kit Fox to environmental organizations. After a few years of these rustic rites, a stranger arriving in their midst and observing their public behavior must theorize that they were born that way or that the idiocy is environmentally caused. The executive director of the San Joaquin Valley air board, controlled by pro-growth county supervisors, continues his campaign to convince the public that one of the two worst air quality basins in the nation, facing epidemic growing rates of childhood and elder asthma, has better air quality than it was 25 years ago. The only way to comprehend this is to realize that the San Joaquin Valley Regional Air Quality Board, like city councils and boards of supervisors in its region, has been wholly digested and evacuated by its "regulated community." Environmental laws and regulations governing the legal actions of local land-use jurisdictions theoretically obstruct developers in collusion with local officials from doing exactly what they want to do - create a continuous slurb from Chico to Bakersfield on the richest, most productive farm and ranch land in the nation and one of the greatest agricultural treasures in the world, also home to abundant wildlife. They seek to create residential subdivisions to profit while making the region's air unbreathable, its water unpotable and its wildlife extinct. There are numerous county and municipal general plans being updated at the moment. The state has mandated general plans since 1927 and has required frequent updates in recent years. The whole Valley is updating general plans that are out of compliance with unenforced state law. General plans are supposed to be made to guide development as if the existing population mattered. They are the main venue in which citizens have any say about what developers and their government enablers have planned for them. "Planning" is an activity conducted in an arcane jargon designed to impress and intimidate the populace. But, at least the jurisdictions covered by the general plans are relatively well marked on maps. Fresno and Merced are currently involved in probably the last county-boundary dispute in the state. Meanwhile, various forms of regional planning are going on. The seven counties around Sacramento have a regional transportation-planning agency called Sacramento Area Council of Governments (SACOG) that ceaselessly generating frosted cow pies for public consumption. Lately, the eight San Joaquin Valley counties have gotten into the business with a state-funded San Joaquin Valley Blueprint Planning Process, led by the Merced County Associations of Governments (MCAG). In addition to our blueprint, we have a special commission, the San Joaquin Valley Partnership, chaired by Stockton's largest developer. These parallel planning processes are coordinated in various backrooms and sprung upon the public as a series of "done deals" in which every agenda but protection of the environment is fulfilled. The transportation planning, for example, has one aim: persuading the state Department of Transportation that it should put SACOG or MCAG's special streets and roads projects at the top of the pile in the annual hogfest of requests to the Federal Highway Administration. The regional transportation planning process pays as little attention as possible to state and federal environmental law. While the local general plans must at least pretend an interest in the environment, regional transportation planning is motivated by its higher calling - federal highway funds. Thanks to the durable public-private/"win-win" partnership between developers and land-use authorities, housing is built without enough roads to handle the increased traffic (known in planning jargon as "inadequate transportation infrastructure"). Delegations speaking with "One Voice" are regularly dispatched to Congress demanding that the empty barrel of speculation-driven construction be filled with pork. The CAGs and COGs generate an abundance of beautiful, colored maps. However, the two most important maps are controlled by jurisdictions that do not share. The official boundaries of the region Formerly-Known-As- Pombozastan are clearly marked. Gerrymandered as they are according to vanities of the two-party system, the 11th and 18th congressional districts will remain the same until after the next US Census in 2010. But Pombozastan was never the most important political jurisdiction in its region. Extremely conservatively, I date the period of radical growth of the unmapped jurisdiction to the spring of 2005, when Stockton's largest developer held a fundraiser for representatives RichPAC Pombo and Dennis "Fairy Shrimp Slayer" Cardoza, after which the two congressmen split a reported $50,000. In attendance at the event were no doubt representatives of a Sacramento-based, unmapped political jurisdiction recently stung by defeat at the hands of the Army Corps of Engineers in the US Supreme Court, when the justice from Sacramento recused himself. In the fall of 2005, about the time Pombo and Cardoza introduced their latest bill to gut the ESA, the same Stockton developer was appointed by the Hun, our governor, to co-chair the San Joaquin Valley Partnership. The term "co-chair" is overly modest. The first great, undrawn map is now being layered over the San Joaquin Valley, for years known as the Territory of the Warring Irrigation Districts. This map is composed of two parts (befitting a partnership), representing a dual monarchy along Austro-Hungarian lines that must appeal to the Hun. In the north, we have a highly organized administrative unit built for growth called GrupeSpanopolis. The southern part of the Partnership, while not quite as well organized (though better monitored by the FBI) is called the Fresno Catastrophe, which contains a vast prison/mega-dairy complex in its southern provinces. In the Sacramento area, even the 7-county SACOG transportation planning region does not contain Tsakopolis, a perpetually expanding, dynastic development octopus reaching at certain points into the neighboring Partnership. Tsakopolis is also managed along Balkan lines, although it probably owes more to the Ottoman than to the Austro-Hungarian model. The state Capitol is simply one among many gated communities in Tsakopolis. This is the first layer of undrawn maps. One might say, (following Vico's New Science) that these are kingdoms of giants, representing, along with many other signals we are receiving, our entrance into a new age of barbarism. This map is unlikely to be drawn by local land-use jurisdictions because they must deny that the giants have any influence over land-use decisions governed by environmental law and regulation, some of the most popular laws in the state and nation. If even the existence of the kingdoms of the giants were admitted publicly and mapped, it could lead to investigations that might result in criminal prosecutions for mis, mal and non-feasance. This sort of reform could be like something out of the "Progressive Era," conjured up by the Hun from the dustheap of Republican Party history during the recall election. The Hun conquered a state capitol inside which no trooper can direct a tourist to the portrait of Gov. Hiram Johnson. A giant, perpetual propaganda campaign sells the idea that our developers are enlightened, benevolent and humble citizens fulfilling the deepest community needs. This campaign is as true as the inevitability of growth, the absolute necessity for the peripheral canal, Sykes and Temperance Flats reservoirs, that Westlands Water District must own San Luis Reservoir, that the quality of Valley air and water is better than it was 25 years ago, that several species of Delta fish are not going extinct, that thousands of acres of habitat for endangered species can be destroyed with impunity and that developers can build mile-long sewer lines through farmland without any legal permits at all. This campaign, fomented by the global information-management firm, Fee, Fai, Foe & Fumm LLP, runs larger campaigns denying global warming, peak oil, the loss of habeas corpus, extinction of the Polar Bear, defeat in Iraq and the global credit crunch. Like the prehistoric giants they resemble (said to have learned piety from fear of thunder and lightning), someday our giants might come to Jesus via flood, drought or both. But do not tempt your Lord about it. They would earn fabulous profits from reconstruction projects. Every child knows that giants prize gold above all. But, there is another undrawn map, the only map at the moment of any use to hundreds of thousands of our Valley residents now inhabiting the housing products the giants built. The Great Speculative Housing Boom has Busted and people don't know who holds their mortgages anymore than the mortgage holders know the people who aren't paying subprime resets. It would be dishonest journalism to say that I know of a map showing how mortgages in Tsakopolis, GrupeSpanopolis and the Fresno Catastrophe have been bundled and distributed among the hedge funds and banks that do not qualify for discount rates from the Federal Reserve. Bill Hatch can be reached at: wmmhatch@sbcglobal.net Your Ad Here

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