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Today's
Stories
April
13, 2004
Dave
Lindorff
The Real Lessons of Vietnam
April 10
/ 12, 2004
Alexander
Cockburn
The
Greatest Radical Journalist of His Age
Patrick
Cockburn
Ambush, Kidnap, Murder: Another Day in "Post War" Iraq
Ellen Cantarow
Health Under Siege on the West Bank
Tariq Ali
Iraqi
Resistance: a New Phase
Werther
Pseudoconservatism Revisited: When God is Pro War & Other Delicacies
Robert
Fisk
Bush's War Lords to Their Critics: "Just Shut Up"
Gary Leupp
Indian Wars, Vietnam and Orientalist Fantasy
Ron Jacobs
The Iranian Revolution, Cont.
Jorge Mariscal
Perils of the Bootstrap
Phil Gasper
Defying Stereotypes About Death Row
Dave Zirin
Bringing the Black Freedom Struggle Into Sports: an Interview with Lee
Evans
Brandy
Baker
The Revolution is Playing at a Theater Near You
Mickey Z.
Underground Music is Free Media: an Interview with Twiin
Ali Tonak
Get Ready for the Million Worker March
Harry Browne
Asking the Wrong Question About Richard Clarke & 9/11
Gideon
Samet
The Sharonizing of America
Conn Hallinan
Remote Control Warriors
Website
of the Weekend
Taboo
Tunes
April 9,
2004
Robert
Fisk
This
War's Simple Truth: Iraqis Do Not Want Us
John L.
Hess
The
Non-Confessions of a Warrior Princess: Condi on the Stand
Niranjan
Ramakrishnan
Condoleezza's Condescensions
Christopher Brauchli
Holes in the Sky: Bush's Crazed Missile Defense Plan
Don Santina
Forget the Alamo!: Glorifying the Fight for Slavery in Texas
William S. Lind
The 4G Warfare Seminar, Cont.
Bill Christison
9/11
Commission is Bush's New Lapdog
Website of the Day
What We've Done to Fallujah
April 8, 2004
Wayne Madsen
Rice
(and the Record) Proves It: Bush Knew, But Failed to Act
Kurt Nimmo
Will
Bush Flatten Fallajuh?
Patrick
Cockburn
Guided
Missile; Misguided War
Laura Flanders
Steamed
Rice
Larry Everest
What Condi Rice is Hiding
Adam Federman
Sacred Capitalism Hits Russia
M. Junaid
Alam
The Iraqi Intifada Begins
Norman Solomon
The Quest for a Monopoly on Violence
Douglas
Valentine
Echoes
of Vietnam: Phoenix, Assassination and Blowback in Iraq
Website of the Day
Xispas: Chicano Art, Culture and Politics
April 7,
2004
Alexander
Cockburn
Those
Pulitzers!
Sen. Robert
Byrd
Deeper
into the Mouth of Hell: We Must Find the Exit from Iraq
Ron Jacobs
Tet
in Iraq: Closer to the Cosmic Disaster?
Patrick
Cockburn
Battles
Across Iraq: US Death Toll Mounts
Kathy Kelly
Pacification: Worth the Price?
Sonali
Kolhatkar
What Are You Doing About Afghanistan?
Rahul Mahajan
Report from Baghdad: Opening the Gates of Hell
Robert
Fisk
US Airlifts Saddam to Qatar
Mike Whitney
America Out of Iraq, Now!
Sam Hamod
Bush, Pandora's Box and the Tiger
April 6, 2004
C.G. Estabrook
Mercenaries
and Occupiers
William
Blum
The
Anti-Empire Report: the Israel Lobby
Col. Dan
Smith
The
Language of Disbelief: 1.3 Billion Still Live in War Zones
Dr. Bulent Gokay
The Coming Islamic Republic of Iraq?
Lynn Landes
Faking Democracy: Americans Don't Vote; Machines Do
Sheila Samples
What Would Royko Write?
Jason Leopold
Condi's Blind Spot: Rice Never Mentioned al-Qaeda
Mickey Z.
A Reality Show with No End in Sight
Robert
Fisk
Iraq on the Brink of Anarchy
|
April
13, 2004
Previously Viewed, Now Playing
Film
Reviews from the Discount Bin
By RON JACOBS
The "Hurricane"
Directed by Norman Jewison
The
Hurricane is the story of boxer Rubin “Hurricane” Carter’s
1966 arrest, false conviction and subsequent imprisonment on triple
murder charges, and the decades long struggle to free him and the other
man falsely convicted and sent up with Carter (John Artis). Carter grew
up in a working-class family in Paterson, New Jersey. When he was eleven,
he stabbed a white man who was making sexual advances to his friends
and ended up in a reformatory. He escaped from the reformatory eight
years later after being denied his release despite a good behavior record.
He then joined the service and began boxing. His boxing instructor also
gave Carter an interest in Islam, books, and intellectual learning.
After his enlistment was up, Carter returned to Paterson, found work
and lived a relatively quiet life until he was arrested on charges stemming
from his escape from the reformatory. He was sent back to prison and
began to train as a boxer in earnest. Upon his release, he began to
box professionally and stunned the boxing world with his power and speed,
quickly racking up a number of impressive victories.
He
also began to acquire enemies because of his statements supporting the
civil rights movement and black liberation movements. It was Carter’s
belief from the beginning that these statements played a role in certain
boxing decisions that went against him despite an overwhelming consensus
that he had won these fights and were also primary motivations in his
arrest and conviction on the murder charges.
The
film is not just the story of Carter, however. It is also the story
of the struggle that eventually freed him. It was a battle waged by
a young African-American man schooled by and living with three Canadians.
This was after the mass movement of the mid-1970s to free Hurricane
perhaps best symbolized by Bob Dylan’s song “Hurricane”
had faltered. The young man, named Lezra Martin, picked up Hurricane’s
autobiography The Sixteenth Round at a used book sale and cannot put
the book down. He begins correspondence with Carter and eventually convinces
his guardians of Carter’s innocence. The four move to New Jersey
and began a long investigation that eventually results in Carter’s
freedom.
The
film occasionally teeters toward the presentation of justice in these
United States as ultimately fair, but the facts of Carter’s case
make it impossible for Hollywood to pull off such an endeavor. Rubin’s
eventual freedom after almost twenty years proves the exception, not
the rule. This is where the much-criticized character of the corrupt,
racist cop comes in. The film has been criticized for its fictionalizing
of Carter’s story with some critics observing that the story is
powerful enough without fictionalization. While this is certainly true,
it is this viewer’s perception that the fictionalization plays
an essential role in the movie’s politics. Specifically, the script
has been criticized for its enhancement of the role this policeman played
in Carter’s life even though he is not, as some have suggested,
entirely fictional. This character is not meant to be perceived literally.
His presence in the film is metaphorical. He represents the American
system of justice and the role it plays in oppressing Black people in
this country. When this cop tells Carter that Hurricane still owes him
time after arresting him on the aforementioned escape charges, this
policeman is the slave master telling all African-Americans that they
still owe time.
Although
there are a number of great performances here, this film is Denzel Washington's.
His portrayal of Hurricane Carter captures the pure emotion of the story
without shortchanging the political and ethical aspects. In essence,
Washington becomes Carter for the duration of the film. Carter's story
is an ugly tale of racism and oppression yet the movie is a work of
beauty.
However,
The Hurricane is more than the story of a man’s oppression. It
is also the tale of how a human can resist that oppression--an oppression
that is greater yet more petty than any individual. It is the story
of the hope of youth and the naiveté from which that hope springs.
Of course, as an individual who does what he can in the struggle to
free those I believe to unjustly incarcerated, it was impossible not
to draw parallels between the story of Hurricane and the tales of those
currently wrongly imprisoned. This makes Hurricane's story even more
important. It is a story that needs to be told and re-told until all
those who have been falsely imprisoned are released.
Born
On the Fourth of July
Directed by Oliver Stone
I
don’t usually like Tom Cruise and consider his acting to have
as much depth as a two-inch wading pool. Nor am I a fan of Oliver Stone,
whose obsession with violence and conspiracy tends to obscure whatever
story he’s trying to tell. However, in the movie Born On the Fourth
of July, both of these men do an extraordinary job in telling the story
of what it means to be a soldier in Uncle Sam’s military and the
value the war makers really place on a soldier’s life.
This
movie is based on the autobiography of Ron Kovic, a man from Long Island
whose primary dream as a boy was to join the Marines and fight America’s
enemies. To this end he joined the Marines right out of high school
and soon found himself in the midst of the growing US war against the
Vietnamese. Like the heroes he saw in the movies and on television,
Kovic shouldered his automatic weapon and lead his platoon into the
jungle to kill and be killed. Unlike those heroes, he ended up losing
both his legs after being hit by shrapnel in an attack during his second
tour of duty in Vietnam. From there he spent years in various VA hospitals.
It was during his hospital stays that he discovered what those who had
sent him to war really thought of him and his fellow soldiers. Rats
ran around the rooms he and his fellow GIs slept in. Nurses ignored
their appointed rounds, allowing the men to lay in their own waste and
pain. Therapy was intermittent, and compassion was not a part of the
recovery plan. Nonetheless, Kovic took it all in stride, still believing
in his country and its military and playing the good soldier.
When
doubts about his military activities began to affect him emotionally
Kovic, like so many other veterans, drowned them out with drugs and
alcohol. Naturally, this sent him into depressive episodes, which caused
even more drug and alcohol abuse. Meanwhile, his younger brother and
former girlfriend had begun protesting the war—attending and organizing
rallies and meetings in Syracuse, NY. Kovic eventually overcame his
mistrust and hatred of the antiwar movement and began to speak at rallies.
His experiences in Vietnam provided him with knowledge few other antiwar
activists had. Despite his continuing health problems, Kovic increased
his antiwar activities and, like many others, felt the impact of police
batons and right wing invective.
While
watching this movie recently, I was reminded of another young man who
also volunteered to serve in the US military and just as eagerly went
to war. That young soldier was John Kerry. As most readers know, Kerry
is running for president of the United States. Like Kovic, Kerry’s
stint in the army changed his life. Like Kovic, Kerry became involved
in the Vietnam Veterans Against the War and worked to organize his fellow
veterans to end the war. Unlike Kovic, Kerry drew the conclusion that
Vietnam was an aberration in US policy and not its logical outcome.
That’s why Mr. Kerry stands on the opposite pole from Mr. Kovic
as regards Washington’s current bloody adventures in Iraq and
Afghanistan. Candidate Kerry thinks that the US has a right to attack
and invade other countries for its own ends. Mr. Kovic knows not only
that wars will not resolve America’s problems, but also that its
problems are fundamental to its economic system that favors the rich
and the powerful. Perhaps he should converse with Mr. Kerry.
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