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Exclusive to CounterPunch Newsletter Subscribers! Hillary Clinton's Fatal Vices Alexander Cockburn and Jeffrey St. Clair dissect HRC in her White House years and conclude their series on the woman who may be the next president. PLUS Eva Liddell on the man who really set the course of the Bush presidency PLUS Andy Worthington on the battle for the rights of the Guantanamo detainees PLUS Debbie Nathan on what the border crackdown has done to the women crossing the Rio Grande. 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 September 4, 2007 Jean Bricmont Why Bush Can Get Away with Attacking Iran September 3, 2007 Patrick Cockburn Brits Flee from Basra Eamon McCann Qana, Derry: The Dead Lie in Familiar Shapes Joshua Frank The End of the Green Party? Chris Floyd Post-Mortem America: Bush's Year of Triumph Marjorie Cohn A Look at Bush's Iran War Plans Walter Brasch The News Drones: How Fake Photos Helped Lead the US to War in Iraq Matt Reichel Redefining the American Dream Website of the Day Don't Get Fooled Again   September 1 / 2, 2007 Alexander Cockburn Entrapment Snares Larry Craig Andy Worthington Britain's Guantánamo Saul Landau The Tragic Ordeal of the Cuban Five David Keen An Occident Waiting to Happen: Intellectuals and the War on Terror Patrick Cockburn The Collapse of Iraq's Health Care Services Diana Johnstone Back in Uncle Sam's Pocket George Longstreth, MD & Karen Longstreth, RN The Sorrows of Occupation: Life in the West Bank Linda M. Woolf A Sad Day for Psychologists--a Sadder Day for Human Rights Ralph Nader Wrapping the World with Advertising Fred Gardner The Trial of Mollie Fry, MD Ben Tripp Enquiry in America Today David Michael Green American Indigestion: Why Bush Governs from the Gut Missy Comley Beattie Looking for Love in All the Wrong Places: What the GOP Hasn't Learned About Tolerance Michael Dickinson Who's Cheating: Remembering Princess Diana Paul Krassner Assholes of the Week: From Larry Craig to Wesley Clark Ron Jacobs A Sports Nation of Millions Poets' Basement Buknatski, Davies and Mickey Z   August 31, 2007 Jeff Gibbs Why I Am Not Going to the Protest Paul Craig Roberts The War Criminal in the Living Room Ray McGovern Do We Have the Courage to Stop War with Iran? Robert Weissman The Benchmarks Iraq is Missing Matt Vidal Subprime Lending and Shady Mortgages Robin Mittenthal The Biofuels Trap Chris Kutalik Auto Makers Push Health Care Trust Solution for Industry in Crisis Richard Forno Watching Freedom's Watch Binoy Kampmark Dianified Dave Zirin Kenneth Foster Lives Website of the Day Free the Jena 6   August 30, 2007 Gary Leupp Larry Craig on the Seat John Ross Dead Forest Defenders Anthony DiMaggio Arabic as a Terrorist Language: the Right-Wing Assault on the Gibran Academy Jordan Flaherty Racism and Criminal Justice in New Orleans Michael Donnelly The Sierra Club Greenwashes Al Gore (and Desecrates John Muir) Russell Mokhiber Whiskey is for Drinking, Water is for Fighting Dennis Brutus and Patrick Bond Global Financial Apartheid William S. Lind The Truth Tellers Martha Rosenberg They Call Him Dr. Cruel Jeff Leys / Brian Terrell Seasons of Discontent: a Presidential Occupation Project Website of the Day Bragg: "Old Clash Fan Fight Song" August 29, 2007 Patrick Cockburn Maliki and The Mass Shia Pilgrimage to Kerbala Winslow T. Wheeler The Costs of the Afghanistan War David Rosen The GOP's Outed All-Stars: The Forced Freeing of Gay Men from the Republican Closet Dave Zirin Confronting Katrina Paul Craig Roberts More Shame, More Sorrow Diane Farsetta Christie Todd Whitman's Nuclear Spinning Wheel Ben Davis Who Won't Stand Up for Kenneth Foster?: Charles Rangel, For One Alan Farago The Housing Crisis and the Environment Jenna Orkin Echoes of 9/11: Another Fire at Ground Zero Don Monkerud The Vanishing American Vacation Richard Nasser Surfing Gaza: More Uplifting News from NPR Website of the Day Don't Sleep on the Struggle   August 28, 2007 Uri Avnery The Language of Force Bill Quigley Katrina, Two Years Later Joshua Frank The Fight to Save the Rocky Mountains China Hand "I am Alden Pyle:" Bush's Vietnam Fantasy Firmin DeBrabander Drug Wars: From Afghanistan to Baltimore Charles Peña Nuclear Fear Factor Andy Worthington Good Riddance, Gonzales Ramzy Baroud Abbas and the Abyss Anthony Papa Roger Stone's New Patsy Ashley Smith Drawing the Line at Kennebunkport Website of the Day B is for Bomb August 27, 2007 Jorge Mariscal The General Reports Bill Christison Why the US and Israel Should Lose Middle East Wars Manuel Garcia, Jr. 911 Emergency! Calling Robert Fisk!: You are Now Entering a Black Hole Anthony DiMaggio Chronicle of a Coup Foretold?: Bush, al-Maliki and the Press Bruce A. Roth India and the New Nuclear Era John Walsh Abe Foxman's Genocide Denial Roadshow, Part 2 Dave Lindorff Gonzo's Gone Ron Jacobs Taking It to the Streets Binoy Kampmark Poshed Up: Why the Beckhams Should Go Back to Brighty Russell D. Hoffman My Favorite Scientist: John Gofman, Bane of the Nuclear Industry Website of the Day George W. Told the Nation   August 25 / 26, 2007 Alexander Cockburn Don't Carpool with Nouri al-Maliki James Petras The Great Financial Crisis Jeffrey Buchanan / Chris Kromm Where Did the Katrina Money Go? Marjorie Cohn Turning Iraq into Vietnam Rev. William E. Alberts Jesus, the Theological Prisoner of Christianity Robert Fantina Ari Fleischer, Freedom Watch and the Pro-War Lobbyists Brian Concannon Whitewashing the History of Abolition Ralph Nader What Do They Have to Hide? Laura Carlsen Extending NAFTA's Reach Fred Gardner Notes from Hempfest David Michael Green History, the Last Refuge of Scoundrels Stephen Soldz Why Mary Pipher Returned Her APA Award Mike Ferner Combatants for Peace: Former Enemies Find New Way Forward Paul Krassner Mort Sahl's Punchline Ben Tripp Resistance is Impossible--But Not Futile Missy Beattie President Druzilla Website of the Weekend Blue Print for Gulf Renewal   August 24, 2007 Paul Craig Roberts A Hegemonic Hubris Greg Moses A Cruel and Unusual Excuse William Schroder Bush, Vietnam and Iraq Alan Farago The Pain of Paper Millionaires Jackie Corr Uncle Ben Bernacke and the Nanny State Jeff Ballinger Naomi Klein and the Path Not Taken Bill Quigley Pere Jean-Juste Comes Home Dave Zirin Inching Toward Insanity Richard Rhames Deaver and the Making of Reagan Ryan Haygood How Newark Can Mend Website of the Day Lindorff's Iraq Rag   August 23, 2007 Kathy Kelly We Shouldn't be Causing This P. Sainath Meeting the Mahatma Ron Jacobs Bush, Vietnam and 14 More GIs Dead Christopher Brauchli Beyond Kafka: Mistakes, Soreheads and Eavesdropping D.K. Wilson When Sports Journalists Talk Race Joshua Frank The Weeds of Willapa Bay Dan Bacher Schwarzenegger's True Lies About Dams and Canals Brenda Norrell Bush's House of Snakes: Indians, Border Biometrics and Migrating Corporations John Wright The Ongoing Tragedy of Afghanistan David Vest Elvis and Racism, Round 2 Website of the Day Urgent Plea: the Black Agenda Report Needs Your Help!   August 22, 2007 Norman Finkelstein Remembering Raul Hilberg Marc Levy Sleepless in Iraq Lawrence R. Velvel When Courts Bow Down to Secrecy Ray McGovern Bush's Iran War Drums Beating Louder Norman Solomon How to Survive at the Pentagon on $2 Billion a Day John Walsh Abe Foxman's Genocide Denial Road Show Michael Dickinson Little Brother is Watching You William S. Lind Operation Kabuki?: the Credibility of David Petraeus Bill Hatch A Short Walk into the Valley of Death Kenneth E. Foster and John Joe Amador How We Will Protest Our Executions David Vest Predictable Parallels: CNN and PBS Website of the Day The Once and Future Steve Perry 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         Subscribe Online

September 4, 2007 The Haditha Massacre Spinning a War Crime By RON JACOBS The sheer criminality of the entire project was plain for all to see. Sunday night the CBS television show 60 Minutes re-broadcast an interview with Staff Sgt. Frank Wuterich, the patrol leader in the massacre of twenty-four civilians in Haditha, Iraq on November 19, 2005. The overall tone of the 60 Minutes segment was relatively objective, refusing to either exonerate the Marine patrol or condemn the men and their leader. At the same time, it was a fair representation of the thinking involved in the murder of civilians in modern warfare--a phenomenon that not only occurs more often than those of us in the homeland are led to believe, but is also part and parcel of modern warfare. Why else would the term "collateral damage" have been coined? Sgt. Wuterich was apologetic for the deaths yet remains convinced that he followed Marine engagement rules to the letter. Not only do I believe him, I am also convinced that he followed those rules. When the people you are supposed to kill are the people that live in the cities and towns your troops move in to and take over their homes and schools, then any one of those people is a potential enemy. In a Clintonian moment, Scott Pelley asked if the killings in Haditha constituted a massacre. Wuterich told Pelley and the 60 Minutes audience that "A massacre in my mind, by definition, is a large group of people being executed, being killed for absolutely no reason and that's absolutely not what happened here." This discussion of nuance may seem peculiar in light of what was being discussed (the murders of 24 men, women and children), but when considered in terms of the spin dispensed daily by the White House and Pentagon press offices regarding Iraq and Afghanistan, it is not surprising. There was no nuance involved, however, when Wuterich described the process used by Marines to clear a house. After breaking down the front door, the men "prepped" the inside rooms by opening the door a crack and rolling a grenade inside. "But when you roll a grenade in a room through the crack in the door, that's not positive identification, that's taking a chance on anything that could be behind that door," Pelley responded. Wuterich's answer was clear. "Well that's what we do. That's how our training goes." Just like the pilots of bombers and helicopter gunships, the lives of those on the ground not in friendly uniforms are not important. Their fate is determined by their proximity to those buildings and people the imperial forces are determined to destroy. Furthermore, many of the air wars targets are primarily civilian in nature, but are destroyed in order to prevent a country's ability to maintain basic services. Perhaps the clearest evidence of this strategy can be found in the US destruction of Iraq's water purification and electrical systems. As most readers know, Iraqis continue to suffer from this destruction unless they live in the fully serviced Green Zone. As of this writing, only Wuterich still faces charges. The other accused men on patrol that day have been cleared. Meanwhile, the killing continues. And so does the criminality an dour complicity as long as we do nothing to stop it.   Hakim to the Rescue? The Los Angeles Times ran an article over the weekend of September 2, 2007 that spoke of the assumption of leadership of the Iraqi Supreme Council by Ammar Hakim. For those of you who might not recognize Hakim, he is a Shia cleric whose father was a sworn enemy of Saddam Hussein and helped form the feared Badr Brigades. It is the Badr Brigades that constitute much of the current Iraqi security forces and are considered responsible for many of the death squad killings in the past couple years. Ammar Hakim lived in Iran from 1979 until the US invasion in 2003. He returned to Iraq around the same time as Mohammed Baqir al-Hakim, who was killed shortly thereafter during a pilgrimage to Najaf. Ammar's father stepped into the vacuum left by Baqir al_Hakim's death, but is suffering from cancer. Since that time, the Badr Brigades have consolidated their power while Ammar Hakim slowly rose to the top of The Supreme Council (formerly SCIRI)--the party that serves as the political wing of the Brigades. During the US buildup to the 2003 invasion, the forerunners of the SCIRI organization received US monies and were major players in the Iraqi National Congress--the exile organization formed by the White House and CIA designed to take over Iraq after Saddam was taken down. Unlike Shia leader al-Sadr's organization, the Supreme Council's appeal is to the Shia merchant class. This helps explain their friendship with elements of the Iranian government, given the dominance of that government by similar elements in Iran. Indeed, in a general way, it is fair to say that the element in Iran that financially supports Rafsanjani and other such clerics is similar to the element that supports the Supreme Council in Iraq. Likewise, the element that supports Iran's populist president Ahmenijad is similar to those in the Iraqi Shia population that support al-Sadr. The difference is not in religious beliefs but in class differences. Besides Hakim, there is Allawi. If one recalls this man, hew was put in place by the US and could very well be the CIA's man for the job if and when al-Maliki meets his fate. Secular to a fault, this man not only has no support among Iraqis, his only allegiance seems to be to Washington. Given this fact, if he does end up taking over the Green Zone government, it's a pretty safe bet that his tenure would be brief and his end might well be quite bloody. Back to that spin machine. George Bush landed in Iraq today for a surprise visit. We all know he saw nothing of Iraq and very little of the men and women he and his Congressional cohorts have sent over there to install some kind of American dream. Nonetheless, you can be certain that the visit was all part of the plan revealing itself as Washington and its media machine prepares to release the Petraeus report in the next ten days. It is a report that will most likely guarantee the continued escalation of the war accompanied by the requisite handwringing from Democrats elected to end this debacle. Ron Jacobs is author of The Way the Wind Blew: a history of the Weather Underground, which is just republished by Verso. Jacobs' essay on Big Bill Broonzy is featured in CounterPunch's collection on music, art and sex, Serpents in the Garden. His first novel, Short Order Frame Up, is published by Mainstay Press. He can be reached at: rjacobs3625@charter.net Your Ad Here

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