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What You're Missing in Our Subscriber-only CounterPunch Newsletter Blood Diamonds: the Inside Story An amazing expose by T.R. Naylor: How the "Blood" or "Conflict Diamonds" Myth peddled by NGOs Helped a Vicious Mining Company Shore Up Its Monopoly, Made a Pile of Money for A Washington Post Reporter and Leonardo di Caprio, Served As A Propaganda Myth in the "War on Terror" and had Nothing to Do With Osama Bin Laden. Pinochet is gone, and the world is a cleaner place. JoAnn Wypijewski recalls 1988 in Santiago, when Chile lost its fear. And yes, here they are in charge of Congress again, ready to facilitate a troop hike in Iraq. Alexander Cockburn re-introduces an old acquaintance: the Democrats--Party of War. Remember, we are funded solely by the subscribers to the print edition of CounterPunch. Please support this website by buying a subscription to our newsletter, which contains fresh material you won't find anywhere else, or by making a donation towards the cost of this online edition. Remember contributions are tax-deductible. Click here to make a donation. If you find our site useful please: Subscribe Now Get CounterPunch By Email for Only $35 a Year

Today's Stories December 23 / 24, 2006 Marjorie Cohn What's Going On? December 22, 2006 David Rosen Bush's Foreign Sex Policy: Imperialism's Second Front Christopher Brauchli When the Secret is the Question: Secret Prisons, Top Secret Interrogations John Ross Flashlights in the Tunnel of Hate J.L. Chestnut, Jr. Political Sell-Outs in Black and White Rahul Mahajan Dennis Kucinich: Maverick or Stalking Horse? Arthur Neslen Provoking Civil War in the Occupied Territories Peter Rost, MD The Secrets of His Success: Fired Pfizer CEO Walks Away with $198 Million Website of the Day 10 Ways to Change the World in 2007 December 21, 2006 Rosa Mariam Elizalde An Interview with Gore Vidal: "I am Jealous of Cuba" Arundhati Roy Breaking the News Brian Cloughley Poppies Rising: Afghanistan's Drug Catastrophe Daniel White Jimmy Carter in Austin: Time to Come Clean on the Shoot Down of That Itavia DC-9 John V. Whitbeck On Israel's Right to Exist Sam Smith Still Smearing Ralph Nader for 2000 Paris Reidhead GM Ice Cream: Something's Fishy in Your Good Humor Bar Kevin Wehr Denying Disaster: Katrina and the Case for Impeachment Website of the Day Pesticides and Amphibians: a Vital New Database December 20, 2006 Gabriel Kolko Rumsfeld and the American Way of War Winslow T. Wheeler The Pentagon Measures the Chaos in Iraq Tariq Ali The War is Lost Saree Makdisi Israel, Apartheid and Jimmy Carter Bruce Jackson Saying "Oh!": John Mohawk and the Power to Make Peace Dave Lindorff Democrats Walk Into a Bush Trap on Iraq Leslie Radford The Winter Harvest of the South Central Farmers Dave Jansson Divided We Stand, United We Fall: Secessionists Confront the Empire Johnny Barber Jesus is a Terrorist Website of the Day Is It for Freedom? December 19, 2006 Alexander Cockburn Democrats Prepare to Fund Longer War Jonathan Cook End of the Strongmen Greg Moses Globalized Gulag: Palestinian Refugees and Children Held in Hutto, TX Jail Sean Penn Georgie, There's a Crowd Downstairs Dave Lindorff Innocents Abroad: Cracking Down on Gitmo Detainees Despite Overwhelming Evidence Most Are Not Terrorists Ralph Nader Going Postal Laura Carlsen Latin America's Pink Tide? Carlos Villarreal The Well is Poisoned: Victory Requires an Immediate Pull-Out Website of the Day Chuck Spinney on the Pentagon December 18, 2006 Luis J. Rodriguez En Lak Ech: Chicanos, Mayans and Mel Gibson Norman Solomon Washington Refuses to End the War: Powell, Baker, Hamilton--Thanks for Nothing! Uri Avnery Lebanon: War Without a Plan Ron Jacobs More Troops, More Body Bags Phil Gasper Afghanistan: Bush's Other War Unravels Behrooz Ghamari-Tabrizi Iran's Elections: The World Isn't Florida and Bush Isn't Its Supreme Leader William Blum The United States of Punishment Jim Goodman So What's the Big Deal If Wal-Mart Makes a Mistake? James Brooks Talking Surge: Let's Kill Some More Before We Go Maria C. Khoury Walking Into the Art World: Designing a Palestinian Academy for the Arts Website of the Day Got Powell December 16 / 17, 2006 Weekend Edition Vijay Prashad A Perilous Way to Socialism Saul Landau Filming Fidel Anthony Arnove The US Occupation of Iraq: Act III of a Tragedy of Many Parts Paul Cantor The Puppet and the Puppeteer: Pinochet and Kissinger Annie Nocenti Baluchistan's Fight: The Khan of Kalat Gathers the Tribes Nicole Colson Hard Times on the Killing Floor: Smithfield's Rotten Record Stephen Gowans Tehran's Holocaust Conference Jordan Flaherty A Catastrophic Failure: Foundations, Nonprofits and the Second Looting of New Orleans Fred Gardner Dustin Costa Faces 15 to Life P. Sainath There's No Such Thing as a Free Cow Seth Sandronsky The Democrats and Social Security: Watch What the Party Says and Does Nadia Hijab An AIPAC Shot Across Baker's Bow? Deb Reich Dear Santa, (Or Someone): Greetings from the Occupied Holy Lands Susie Day Cops Shoot Another Rich White Man! Albert Wan Why Does It Take 50 Bullets? Missy Beattie Will the Next Leader Stand Up? Please! Martha Rosenberg Kicking the Wyeth Habit Saves Women's Lives Lee Ballinger The Devil's Highway: Clinton, Border Checkpoints and the Deaths of the Yuma 14 Michael Dickinson Kingdom of Fear Jeffrey St. Clair Live/Evil: Listening to Miles Davis Poets' Basement Davies, Buknatski and Ford Website of the Weekend "I Heard It Through the Grapevine"   December 15, 2006 Eliza Ernshire Palestinian "Civil War" and the Israeli Chocolate Ration Virginia Tilley What Are You Going to Do Now, Israel? Mike Ferner Roll Call for the Choir: If They Vote for War, Occupy 'Em! John Ross Mad Mel's Mayan Apocalypse Fred Wilhelms The Flip Side of Ahmet Ertegun: Where Did You Get Those Shoes? Kevin Zeese Dennis Kucinich's Strange Mission: Can You Be a Real Anti-War Candidate in a Pro-War Party? David Severn Social Engineering Begins at Home: Jeffrey Skoll, Billionaire Philantropist Dave Lindorff Sen. Tim Johnson Death Watch: Senate Gridlock May Be Best Outcome Sunsara Taylor As American as Shopping and Torture Website of the Day June 2, 2004: When Iraq Was There For The Looting   December 14, 2006 Jonathan Cook The Recognition Trap Riz Khan An Interview with Jimmy Carter Jason Hribal Kasatka, the Sea World Orca Pennick / Gray The Plight of Black Farmers: Racism in the US Farm Program Richard Levins That Embezzled Anti-Castro Money Pat Williams The College Crisis: Universal Access, Student Loan Debts and Pell Grants Peter Rost, MD Simply Irresistible: Do Women Prefer Bad Boys? Website of the Day The Sound of Rummy   December 13, 2006 Patrick Cockburn Iraq is Beyond Repair Greg Moses The Dixie Chicks Come Home to Roost Elizabeth Schulte Hungry for the Holidays Joshua Frank Death By Coke Debra Eschmeyer Corporations Control Your Dinner Leon Hadar Baker's Rescue Mission: Too Little, Too Late Peter Rost, MD I've Been a Very Bad Boy Margaret Knapke Mow bé and Malachi, Presenté! Reza Fiyouzat Are Cows Free? Fred Wilhelms A Last Minute Appeal: If You Know One of These Musicians Let Them Know They Are Owed Money--By Friday! Website of the Day The Crimes of Augusto Pinochet December 12, 2006 Fernando A. Torres The Last Man of the Junta: an Open Letter to Kissinger from One of Pinochet's Political Prisoners Paul Craig Roberts America's Injustice System is Criminal Stephen Soldz Abusive Interrogations Uri Avnery Baker's Cake William S. Lind Knocking Opportunity: From Vulcans to Vultures in Iraq Missy Beattie Convicted for Our Convictions: Trespassing for Truth at the UN Dave Lindorff The 35-Year Long Scream: Torture, Impeachment and a Vietnam Vet's Tears George Pyle Our Perverse Farm Plan: Where Christmas Comes Every Five Years Norman Solomon Is the USA the Center of the World? Website of the Day Citizens' War Tribunal   December 11, 2006 Virginia Tilley Banning Mandela Roger Burbach The Condor Model: the Atrocities of Pinochet and the US Col. Douglas MacGregor There's Only One Option Left: Leave! Fawwas Traboulsi Lebanon on the Brink Ron Jacobs Death of a Pig: Poetic Justice for Pinochet Gideon Levy The Cruel Line into Gaza: Elbow to Elbow, Like Cattle Mary McGrane Burning Books at Harvard Law Bernardo Ruiz The Disappeared of Oaxaca: a Message from One of the Actors in Apocalypto Website of the Day La Cancion de la Unidad Video of the Day Killing Castro: Congresswoman as Contract Killer?   December 9 / 10, 2006 Weekend Edition Alexander Cockburn Liberal Consensus for More Troops in Iraq Sen. Gordon Smith Out of Iraq: Cut and Run or Cut and Walk Greg Grandin Jeane Kirkpatrick, Mid-Wife of the Neo-Cons Paul Craig Roberts How Many More Will Die for Bush's Ego? Col. Dan Smith The Vietnamization of Iraq: Inside the Military Training Program Ralph Nader The Man from NAM: John Engler's Trail of Destruction Behrooz Ghamari The Donkey and the Date: Iran's Upcoming Municipal Elections Rev. Willliam Alberts Doing Unto Others: Pastor Haggard and President Bush James T. Phillips The James Gang: "Did You Kill Her?" Bennis / Leaver A Bi-Partisan Occupation Dave Lindorff A Congress of Hucksters and Pipsqueaks Nikolas Kozloff Robert Gates and Venezuela: Another Saber Rattler in Latin America Seth Sandronsky Activating White Racism Lucinda Marshall McKinney and Karpinsky: Silenced for Telling the Truth Mike Whitney Something's Gotta Give: James Baker vs. the Lobby John V. Whitbeck Recommendation No. 80 Faisal Kutty Is the Universal Declaration of Human Rights Merely a Western Construct? Hugh Sansom Smearing Jimmy Carter: an Open Letter to the New York Times Robert Gold My South American Journey: Impunity in Colombia Boots Riley Crash and Burn: an Urgent Message from The Coup Jeffrey St. Clair Playlist: What I'm Listening to This Week Poets' Basement Engel & Buknatski Website of the Weekend Alive in Mexico December 8, 2006 Patrick Cockburn The Iraq Study Group's Cautious Appraisal Leutisha Stills Just How Progressive is the Congressional Black Caucus? Norman Finkelstein The Media Lynching of Jimmy Carter Will Youmans Mr. Lieberman Comes to Washington: Brookings Hosts an Ethnic Cleanser Peter Rost, MD What Went Wrong at Pfizer? Jonathan Demme My Friend Bruce Langhorne: a Great Musician Needs Your Help! Ray McGovern Senate Democrats Give Gates a Free Pass Lucinda Marshall What She Wore Tariq Ali / Robin Blackburn The Lost John Lennon Interview Website of the Day John Lennon's FBI Files   December 7, 2006 Alex Friedman Rev. Phelps' Hate-Fueled Fanatics Find a Home in the Kansas Prison Industry Maureen Webb Risk Scoring and the National Insecurity State Paul Craig Roberts Catastrophe Still Awaits Dave Lindorff Prosecutor Admits: Mumia Abu-Jamal Had "No True Defense" Matt Vidal Drug Pushers, Inc.: Power and Profit in the Legal Drug Trade Yifat Susskind Looking for a Few Good Principles: What Should be Done in Iraq Rodriguez / Jones NYPD's Death Squads: From Diallo to Sean Bell Website of the Day 2006, Remixed December 6, 2006 Robert Bryce Omitting the Obvious with James Baker: From the S&L Crisis to the Iraq Study Group William S. Lind The Boomerang Effect: When Will the First IED Strike Cincy? Zoe Blunt The Clearcut Truth About the Great Bear Rainforest Corporate Crime Reporter The New Conventional Wisdom: Prosecute Individuals, Not Corporations Amira Hass A Regrettable Indifference: Israel's Treatment of Palestinian Prisoners Richard W. Behan The Surreal Politics of Premeditated War Sophie McNeill Why Hezbollah is Broadcasting Sunday Mass December 5, 2006 Virginia Tilley Apartheid Israel: a Beacon of Hope? Sharon Smith The New Washington Consensus: Blame the Victims in Iraq Joe Bageant Somewhere a Banker Smiles Ron Jacobs A War Washington Can't Win Norman Solomon Media Consensus, Stay in Iraq! Mike Whitney Rumsfeld's Final Snowflake: "I Was Just About to Change Everything ... " Derrick O'Keefe Regimes Unchanged: Chavez's Victory Strengthen's Cuba Julian Assange The Road to Hanoi Missy Beattie Bush, the Unhappy Helmsman Website of the Day Lessons of Suez and Iraq   December 4, 2006 Alexander Cockburn Gaza and Darfur George Ciccariello-Maher Tears of the Escualidos: Election Diary, Venezuela Ray McGovern Lame Ducks, Hold That Nomination!: a CIA Insider's Take on Gates John Ross Repression on the Menu in Mexico Walden Bello Hurricane Milton: Friedman, Bayonets and Markets Peter Rost, MD Pfizer's Clueless Executives Stephen Lendman The Withering of the Bush Dynasty Gideon Levy This Ceasefire will Go Up in Flames Website of the Day The "Babes" of Hizbullah?   December 2 / 3, 2006 Weekend Edition Barucha Calamity Peller The Dirty War of Oaxaca Paul Craig Roberts Is Bush Sane?: When Denial Goes Pathological Ralph Nader The Big Boys of Financial Crime Winslow T. Wheeler Committee of Enablers: Is Gates Fit to Serve? Are the Senators? Amira Hass The Checkpoint Generation Maymanah Farhat Depoliticizing Arab Art: Christie's and the Rush to "Discover" the Arab World Dave Lindorff Fighting the Iraq War--At Home Fred Gardner Dr. Jimenez Defends His Practice Methods Col. Dan Smith The Semantics of Civil War Raed Jarrar Maliki's Monopoly of Power Seth Sandronsky US Prison Nation: Locking Up Surplus Labor K.-Y. Taylor The Bride Wore Black: the Shooting of Sean Bell and the Resurgence of American Racism Yifat Susskind Greed, Dogma and AIDS David Rosen Made in China: the Global Trade in Sex Toys Ron Jacobs All Hands on Deck!: the New Pirates of the Caribbean Nikolas Kozloff Venezuela Prepares to Vote Talli Nauman Fighting La Choya: the Secret Toxic Dump on the Border Alan Gregory Shadow Trout: Why Hatchery Fish Aren't Real Joe Allen RFK and Hollywood Mythmaking: Emilio Estevez's Beatification of Bobby Kennedy St. Clair / D'Antoni Playlist: What We're Listening to This Week Poets' Basement Davies, Engel, Ford and Orloski Website of the Day Demo for Oaxaca   December 1, 2006 Greg Grandin Midnight in Mexico: Calderón's Inauguration Behind Closed Doors Linn Washington, Jr. The Mumia Case After 25 Years: Still More Keystone Kops Antics George Ciccariello-Maher Sleeping with the Enemy: At Home with the Anti-Chavistas Brian J. Foley Taking Responsibility for Iraq Dave Zirin Rebel Athletes: Organizing the Jocks for Justice Joshua Frank The Montana Formula: Jon Tester's Neopopulism Chris Floyd Hideous Kinky: Thomas Friedman Comes Undone Ingmar Lee Atomic Porker Strikes Indian Point Nuke Plant Manuel Garcia, Jr. Dark Fire: the Fall of WTC 7 Website of the Day No Gun Ri Revisited Video of the Day Drunken Hack Goes Ape at Aussie "Pulitzers" November 30, 2006 Jonathan Cook Palestinians Are Being Denied the Right of Non-Violent Resistance Tariq Ali Axis of Hope: Venezuela and the Bolivarian Dream Winslow T. Wheeler Confirmation Hearings as Kabuki Dance Manuel Garcia, Jr Heat and Steel: the Thermodynamics of 9/11 William S. Lind More Troops Into a Lost War? Ray McGovern Gates is Rumsfeld Lite Fidel Castro "It is Our Duty to Save Our Species" Agustin Velloso Equatorial Guinea: So Close to the West, So Far From Democracy CP News Service The Arrest of Gerardo Bonilla: Muralist Among Oaxaca's Disappeared Website of the Day The Life and Times of H-Bomb Ferguson November 29, 2006 Glen Ford Barack Obama and the Winds of War Chris Sands Blood, Snow and NATO: the Latvian Summit Viewed from Afghanistan Rochelle Gause Dispatch from Oaxaca: Where Murderers Still Stalk the Streets, Protected by Police Manuel Garcia, Jr. The Physics of 9/11 Norman Finkelstein HRW's Shameful Press Release on Palestine Peter Rost, MD Pfizer's Shell Game: the Contraction Begins Gary Leupp CIA Report: No Evidence of Iranian Nuclear Weapons Program Joe DeRaymond From Norman Morrison to Malachai Ritscher: Self-Immolation as Anti-War Protest Christopher Fons Prostituting Democracy: History, Latvia and Bush's Night on the Town in Riga Sibel Edmonds Auctioning Off Former Statesmen and Dime-a-Dozen Generals Website of the Day Bombing a Mosque   November 28, 2006 Patrick Cockburn Iraq Nears the "Saigon Moment" Winslow T. Wheeler SASC-ing Robert Gates Michael Ratner The War Crimes Case Against Rumsfeld: a Q&A John Ross The War on Rebel Journalists Molly Secours Racism Kills: From Michael Richards to the NYPD Peter Rost, MD Big Pharma and "the Pill": Profits, Branding and Experimentation on Women Lucinda Marshall War Chic Website of the Day "Action" in Iraq   November 27, 2006 Kathleen and Bill Christison Genocide or Erasure of Palestinians: Does It Matter What You Call It? Uri Avnery An Evening in Jounieh Nikolas Kozloff The Rise of Rafael Correa: Ecuador and the Contradictions of Chavismo Michael Donnelly Freedom Air: Keeping the Skies Safe from Nipples and Muslims Ben Terrall / John Miller Bush's Big Indonesian Photo-Op Robert Jensen Digging In and Digging Deep Sol Littman Missing Canada's Health Care System in Tucson Website of the Day State Minimum Wages: a Policy That Works   November 25 / 26, 2006 Gabriel Kolko Factors in Our Colossal Mess Saul Landau Republic of the Repressed William Blum New Congress, Same Quagmire Ralph Nader The Trouble with the Bubble Fred Gardner The War on Us: Another 1.9 Million Victims Daniel Wolff Return to District 8, New Orleans M. Shahid Alam Pitting the West Against Islam James J. Brittain Censorship in Colombia: the Arrest of Freddie Muñoz George Ciccariello-Maher Contingency and Counter-Contingency in Venezuela Aseem Shrivastava India on 20 Cents a Day Seth Sandronsky The Washington Post's War on Social Security Julian Assange The Curious Origins of Political Hacktivism Christopher Brauchli The Rout and the Honeymoon: In and Out of Bed with Bush Michele Naar-Obed A Letter to the Judge Who Sentenced My Husband to Federal Prison for Protesting Nuclear Weapons Ramzy Baroud Reclaiming America Christiane Passevant / Larry Portis Women in the Israeli Army: Two New Films Adam Engel Striving of His Day-Days: a Prose Poem Jeffrey St. Clair / David Vest Playlists: What We're Listening to This Week Poets' Basement Davies, Gibbons, Louise, Buknatski, Orloski Website of the Weekend The Black Agenda   November 24, 2006 Charles Glass How to Let Lebanon Live Gideon Levy A Prayer in Paradise Jonathan Cook Syria as Fallguy Ron Jacobs Build a Fire on Main Street: Stop the War, Now! Brian McKenna Native Resurgence Spurs Hope: Giving Thanks to America's Indians Kim Ives The UN Fails Haiti, Again   November 23, 2006 Alexander Cockburn The Democrats and the Slaughterhouse November 22, 2006 Kathleen Christison The Massacre at Beit Hanoun Paul Craig Roberts Bush's Lone Victory: Defeating the Bill of Rights Mike Roselle Green Muscle on Election Day: Now is the Time for Boldness Dave Lindorff The First Task of the New Congress Greg Moses Up From Chiapas: Giving Thanks to Women's Revolution Dave Zirin Born Under Punches: the Pimping of Mike Tyson Nadia Martinez Dealing with Ortega Sherwood Ross Why the World Needs Trade Unions Now More Than Ever David Kalbfeisch I Am A Navy Veteran Against Wars Gilad Atzmon Palestinian Solidarity in a Time of Massacres Website of the Day Sorry, Charlie: No Draft   November 21, 2006 Robert Bryce The Ongoing Myth of Energy Independence John V. Walsh Spoilers of the World Unite! Luis Hernandez Navarro Lessons from the Teachers of Oaxaca Kevin Zeese An Interview with Michael Isikoff on Iraq Peter Rost, MD Rules of the Game: How Big Corporations Avoid Paying Their Taxes Evelyn Pringle Drug Your Fetus: How Big Pharma Hits on Pregnant Women Roger Morris Reason in an Age of Folly (and Felony) Don Monkerud Here Come the Democrats ... So? Website of the Day The Grind   November 20, 2006 David H. Price American Anthropologists Stand Up Against Torture and the Occupation of Iraq Col. Dan Smith Usurpation of Power Katherine Hughes Compassion on Trial in War on Terror: Muslim Charities and the Case of Dr. Rafil Dhafir Dave Himmelstein Ziodammerung: Netanyahu and the End Times Robert Jensen Opportunities Lost Joe Mowrey America's Progressive Nightmare: Here Come the Armani Democrats Mike Whitney Housing Bubble Smack Down: Alan Greenspan, Homewrecker Carl N. McDaniel Living Within Limits Robert Fisk Shia Walk Ramzy Baroud Killing Hope in Beit Hanoun Website of the Day Iraq: the Hidden Story   November 18 / 19, 2006 Weekend Edition Alexander Cockburn Top Dems to Voters: "Shut Up! We've Got a War to Run!" Ralph Nader The Hole in Bush's Brain: How Karl Rove Lost the Senate Barucha Calamity Peller Who Will Live on in the Oaxaca Uprising? John Ross Halliburton Wrecks Mexico Dave Lindorff The Albatross: Why the Democrats Should Cut Loose Joe Lieberman Fred Gardner The Adverse Effects of Marijuana: California Medical Survey Ron Jacobs Back in the Aether Again: Thomas Pynchon's Stunning Return Larry Portis The Songs of Basilio Martin Patino: Father of the New Spanish Cinema Frida Berrigan The Weapons Bonanza: a Perfect Storm of Profit Wes Enzinna Ghosts of Dictatorships Past: the School of the America's and Memory in Latin America Elizabeth Schulte The Fall of Donald Rumsfeld: Architect of a Disaster Peter Rost, MD The Credit Card Trap Martha Rosenberg We're Drinking What? Milk, rBST and Monsanto's Rats Seth Sandronsky University Unity: California's Professors and Students Unite Missy Beattie Explore This! Adam Engel Data Days Jeffrey St. Clair Playlist: What I'm Listening to This Week Poets' Basement Newberry and Curtis Website of the Weekend A Modest Proposal for the Art World   November 17, 2006 Greg Grandin The Road from Serfdom: Milton Friedman and the Economics of Empire Joseph Massad Pinochet in Palestine: Fateh's Unholy Alliance Kevin Zeese George McGovern's Return to Capitol Hill: "A Down-to-Earth Disengagement Plan" Gideon Levy After the Rain of Death Bill Quigley WMDs Protected!: Blood-Pouring Anti-Nuke Clowns Sent to Prison David Swanson Last Chance for the Democrats?: a Tale of Two Conyers Sherry Wolf Gay Rights: When Will the US Catch Up with Africa? Jerry Beisler What James Webb Knows Website of the Day Thanks for the False Memories!   November 16, 2006 Kathy Kelly Sources of Violence Col. Douglas MacGregor Was It Only Rumsfeld? Norman Solomon Operation Last Resort: the Media Offensive to Prolong the Iraq War Nikki Thanos From Oaxaca to Portland Cindy Sheehan Impeachment Proceedings Lena Khalaf Tuffaha Jimmy Carter and the "A" Word: Will the Democrats Listen to Carter on Palestine? Gloria La Riva Where is the Justice? Anti-Castro Terrorist Gets Only 4 Years Pat Williams How the Democrats Won the West Kerry Joyce From Rummy to Rahmmy: Bob Novak's New Source CP News Service Wal-Mart Charged with Selling Non-Organic Food as "Organic" David Letterman Top 10 Slogans for Wal-Mart Wine James Ridgeway Did Robert Gates' Planning Help Bring Black Hawk Down? Website of the Day A Conversation with West Point Grads Against the War   November 15, 2006 Jennifer Loewenstein Alice in Erez: the Gaza Crossing David Rosen Rev. Ted Haggard and the Eclipse of Evangelical Fury Ashley Smith A Socialist in the Senate? Landau / Hassen Talking Tough on Iraq Isn't Courageous Walden Bello Iraq After November 7: New Challenges for the AntiWar Movement Sibel Edmonds The Highjacking of a Nation Austin / Bernstein Why Bill Cosby is Wrong to Link Black Culture to Economic Decline Yitzhak Laor This Merchandise, Security James Rothenberg Unimpeachable: a Brief Argument Why Gail Dines "Borat": It's a Guy Thing Website of the Day Kakistocracy November 14, 2006 Werther Beltway Bromo-Seltzer: a Sneak Peak at the Baker Report Ray McGovern Benching Scowcroft John Walsh Korea, Vietnam and Iraq Syndrome: Alive, Well and Gaining Strength David MacMichael Gates to the Pentagon William S. Lind Lose a War, Lose an Election Sharon Smith Democrats, Born to Compromise Laura Carlsen Oaxaca Fights Back Ron Jacobs The Perishing Republic Peter Rost, MD Whistleblowers: Who Are They? Carol Norris Post-Campaign Ad Stress Disorder? Website of the Day A Map of the US Nuclear Arsenal     November 13, 2006 Kathleen and Bill Christison Screw the Palestinians, Full Steam Ahead Bill Quigley Robin Hood in Reverse: the Corporate Looting of the Gulf Coast Paul Craig Roberts The Democrats and Civil Liberties: Will They Turn a Blind Eye? Uri Avnery Call It What It Is: a Massacre! Joe DeRaymond The Strange Return of Daniel Ortega Norman Finkelstein Jimmy Carter's Roadmap Col. Dan Smith The Pentagon's Revolving Gates: Out with the Old, In with the Old Shepherd Bliss After the Party Dave Lindorff What Vote-Theft Conspiracy? Missy Beattie For Better / For Worse: Will Laura Stay the Course? Trenticosta / Fleming Vindication for the Angola 3       Subscribe Online

Weekend Edition December 23 / 24, 2006 From the Raid on "Fort Negro" to Iraq The First U.S. Foreign Invasion: Seizing Florida in 1816 By WILLIAM LOREN KATZ This year of 2006 will be remembered as the moment Americans got even with leaders who had lied to them in order to garner public support for invading and occupying Iraq. But given the public's preoccupation with a crucial election and the daily news of a dismal war, few took note of a significant 2006 anniversary: 190 years ago the United States launched its first foreign invasion. The parallels to the present are enlightening. In July 1816, General Andrew Jackson, Commander of the U.S. Southern District, ordered Army, Navy and Marine units to invade Florida, then under the flag of Spain. Jackson acted, probably on orders from President James Madison, without a Congressional declaration of war. Neither Spain nor its colonial outpost posed a threat to the U.S. or its citizens. Rather, the President and the General--both prominent slaveholders--had concluded that the slave economy and its human "property" were threatened by the several thousand Native Americans and African Americans, including escaped slaves, who had united in the Seminole Nation on Florida soil. As in the case of President George W. Bush's attack on Iraq, this first foreign sortie by the U.S. had an enormous impact on the Executive Branch and its presidential powers, on respect for the Constitution by those sworn to protect it, and on the public's right to know. Historian William Weeks points out that this episode established a number of dangerous precedents, some of which Secretary of State John Quincy Adams later regretted: · President Madison and Secretary Adams violated the Constitution when they bypassed Congressional input into the Executive decision to go to war. The Constitution grants war powers to the Congress alone. · Adams, in defending the invasion, lied to Congress and the public about the reasons for it. · Adams proclaimed that those Americans who opposed the war were not only wrong but were giving aid and comfort to the nation's foreign enemies, and he covered up atrocities committed under General Jackson's command. [1] Was Florida, in that distant time, any more of a menace to the strongest country in the Americas than Iraq was 19 decades later? Not really. Rather, the slaveholding elite was convinced that the Africans who fled from bondage on southern plantations to Florida's free air posed an immediate danger to Georgia, the Carolinas and perhaps the South's entire slave plantation system. In today's language they regarded these men and women -- who did not live under white masters, carried arms, were allied with Native Americans and welcomed runaways to their villages -- as potential "terrorists." So the slaveholders used the leverage afforded by their economic power to steer the White House toward a military response to the perceived threat. Who was "the enemy," really? Africans had been escaping from the southern English colonies and since 1738 were among the earliest explorers and pioneer settlers of Florida, where they built free, self-governing communities. Florida was their "American dream." When the Seminole Indians fled southward from Creek persecution, the Africans in Florida welcomed them and taught them methods of rice cultivation they had brought to the Americas from Senegambia and Sierra Leone. Pooling the wide range of their knowledge and skills, the two peoples united in a multicultural Seminole nation that was willing to fight slave-hunting posses from the American colonies in defense of their right to self-determination. [2] After the 1776 American Revolution the newly-minted United States stepped up the slave-hunting forays into Florida. By 1812, events had escalated. President Madison's administration provided covert support for a private force called "the Patriots," which crossed the border to plunder, seize free people for enslavement and wanted to incorporate the Florida peninsula into the new nation. A year later, Tennessee militia and federal government troops joined the Patriots, but the Seminole alliance repelled the combined force. In fact, the Seminole resistance led to the Congressional defeat, in April 1814, of a Patriot resolution to annex Florida. By 1816, however, Andrew Jackson, now a famous war hero and "Indian fighter," resolved to take Florida in order to close down what he called "this perpetual harbor for our slaves." He ordered his field commander, General Edmund P. Gaines to: · provoke an attack on "Fort Negro" on the Apalachicola River, seize its powerful cannons and its 300 Black and Seminole residents, and · "restore the stolen negroes and property to their rightful owners." [3] Sailing down the Apalachicola, the U.S. naval vessels passed fifty miles of large and expanding African cornfields along the river banks. [4] Upon reaching "Fort Negro," U.S. forces confronted a Black commander named Garcia, who had four pieces of heavy artillery, six light cannons, a large store of ammunition and deep scorn for the interlopers. Garcia faced two Navy gunboats, hundreds of regular U.S. Army soldiers and 500 Creek Indians who hoped to capture runaway Seminoles. Gaines ordered the fort to surrender and sent a delegation of Creeks to negotiate with Garcia. Garcia rebuffed the order, routed the delegation and fired a cannon shot over the Creeks. Surgeon Marcus Buck, assigned to the U.S. Fourth Infantry Regiment, wrote: "We were pleased with their spirited opposition, though they were Indians, negroes and our enemies. Many circumstances convinced us that most of them determined never to be taken alive." [5] Gaines's forces surrounded "Fort Negro" and opened fire, but the initial artillery exchanges proved inconsequential. Then fortuitously, a cannon ball heated in the cook's galley and lobbed into the fort hit Garcia's ammunition magazine. The resulting spectacular explosion destroyed Fort Negro and killed 270 people. Of the 64 who survived, Garcia was executed, and the others were marched back to slavery. Hundreds of other Africans and Seminoles in the region fled to the Suwannee River, where they built villages that extended down the seacoast to Tampa Bay. [6] Within months, the relocated Black and Indian nation chose Billy Bowlegs as their king, and his chief Black advisor, Nero, as their military commander. They gathered horses, drilled and readied themselves to defend against future attacks. [7] Andrew Jackson, energized by his victory, notified incoming President James Monroe that he was ready to seize Florida "in sixty days." His troops captured Pensacola in May 1818. The General now shifted into high gear, embarking on "a campaign of terror, devastation, and intimidation" that included burning "sources of food in a calculated effort to inflict starvation on the tribes," according to historian William Weeks. His "exhibition of murder and plunder known as the First Seminole war," writes Weeks, was part of Jackson's goal of "removing or eliminating native Americans from the southeast."[8] Secretary of State John Quincy Adams, believing in "Indian removal, slavery, and the use of military force without congressional approval," and that it was "better to err on the side of vigor than on the side of weakness," defended the invasion, as well as Jackson's brutal search and destroy operations. In presenting that defense, writes Weeks, "he consciously distorted, dissembled, and lied about the goals and conduct of American foreign policy to both Congress and the public" -- an effort, Weeks believes, that "stands as a monumental distortion of the causes and conduct of Jackson's conquest of Florida, reminding historians not to search for truth in official explanations of events." [9] In 1819, the United States persuaded a war-weary Spain to sell Florida for $5 million, and in 1822 it entered the Union as a slave state. Although the first Seminole War had ended with a real estate deal that erased all claims of Florida's original inhabitants, many more years of war lay ahead. The U.S. had entered a quagmire, with, at times, half of its army tied down in ongoing skirmishes in Florida's swampland. The Second Seminole War began full scale in 1836. That year, soon after arriving to take command of U.S. operations in Florida, General Sidney Thomas Jesup warned of the war's consequences: "This, you may be assured, is a negro and not an Indian war; and if it be not speedily put down, the south will feel the effects of it on their slave population." He analyzed the task ahead: The two races, the negro and the Indian, are rapidly approximating; they are identical in interests and feelings. . . . Should the Indians remain in this territory the negroes among them will form a rallying point for runaway negroes from the adjacent states; and if they remove, the fastness of the country will be immediately occupied by negroes. [10] The war raged on, with U.S. officers violating truce agreements, seizing women and children as hostages, attacking peaceful villages and destroying crops. The Army tried mightily to pit the Blacks against the Indians through various diplomatic maneuvers, but the attempts at racial division failed. Unable to sunder Seminole solidarity, a U.S. military victory remained elusive. The Seminoles, using classic guerilla tactics, continued to run circles around the most modern army in the Americas. On Christmas Eve, 1837, about 400 red and black Seminoles, though outnumbered more than two to one, inflicted the most stunning loss suffered by the U.S. Army in decades of Indian warfare. [11] After a year of guerilla warfare, Jesup restated his view: "The warriors have fought as long as they had life," which he credited to "the determination of those who influence their councils--I mean the leading negroes." He concluded, "The negroes rule the Indians, and it is important that they should feel themselves secure; if they should become alarmed and hold out, the war will be resumed." Jesup proposed that the entire Seminole nation, with its Black members, be allowed to migrate west. While planters greeted the idea with "violent protests," ultimately Jesup's proposal would prove to be the only plan that could bring peace. [12] In the Second Seminole War 1500 U.S. soldiers had died, Congress had spent more than $40,000,000 (pre-Civil War dollars!) and thousands of soldiers were wounded or had died of disease. Seminole losses, particularly civilians, were undoubtedly much higher. Finally, thousands of red and black Seminoles, having won assurances that they could remain free and united as a nation, agree to migrate to the Oklahoma Indian Territory. Others neither surrendered nor left their Florida homeland. The Seminoles of Florida had operated the largest station on the Underground Railroad and had emerged undefeated, with their community intact, from nearly 50 years of siege. Their accomplishment has no equal in United States history. William Loren Katz is the author of Black Indians: A Hidden Heritage. His new, revised edition of THE BLACK WEST [Harlem Moon/Random House, 2005] also includes information on the Philippine occupation, and can now be found in bookstores. He can be reached through his website: www.williamlkatz.com Notes [1] William Weeks, John Quincy Adams and the American Global Empire (Kentucky, 1992).; See also, Noam Chomsky, Failed States, [New York, 2006] 89-92 for a discussion of how precedents established by the 1816 invasion of Florida impacted on American foreign policy through the current occupation of Iraq. [2] The following sources inform this article: Kenneth W. Porter, The Negro on the American Frontier [New York, 1971] a pioneering collection of scholarly articles on African Americans and Native Americans, based on primary sources presents reliable information on the Seminole alliance. Newer sources confirm Porter's major findings: Daniel F. Littlefield, Africans and Seminoles from Removal to Emancipation [Greenwood Press, 1977]; William Loren Katz, Black Indians: A Hidden Heritage [Atheneum 1986] a popular history; Kevin Mulroy, Freedom on the Border: Seminole Maroons in Florida, the Indian Territory, Cuahuila, and Texas [Texas Tech University Press, 1992]; Kenneth W. Porter, The Black Seminoles: History of a Freedom-Seeking People, [University Press of Florida] 1996, "revised and edited by Alcione M. Amos and Thomas P. Senter" from a Porter manuscript. [2] Major General Sidney T. Jesup, Jesup Papers, box 14; 25th Congress, Second session, 1837-1838, House Executive Doc., Vol. III, no. 78, p. 52. [3] Porter, 202, 212. [4] Report of Col. Clinch on "the destruction of Fort Negro, on the Apalachicola, July 29, 1816" [Washington: War Records Office, National Archives] [5] Porter, 219 [6] Porter, 221 [7] Porter, 223 [8] William Weeks, Op. Cit.; see also Richard Immerman and Regina Gramer, Passport, (newsletter of the Society of Historians for American Foreign Relations, August 2005. [9] Washington Chauncey Ford, ed., Writings of John Quincy Adams [Macmillan, 1916], volume 6, p. 385n [10] Major General Jesup, in American State Papers, Military Affairs, vol. 7, 820-822; see also Porter, 272, 281, 282. [11] For U.S. efforts to sow racial discord, see exchanges between General Gaines and King Hatchy in American State Papers, 1 (Washington, D.C., 1832) 723, and Chief Emachutochustern to General Thompson, Indian Agent, 1835 in American State Papers, Military Affairs 4, (Washington, D.C., 1861) 463; Porter, 1996, "revised and edited," 88-93; Porter, "Seminole Flight from Ft. Marion," Florida Historical Quarterly xxvi (July, 1947) 92-98. [12] Major General Jesup, March 26, 1837 in American State Papers, Military Affairs, VII. 835.; Porter, 276-277; Mulroy, 29.

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