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April 24, 2002
Kevin Alexander Gray
Help Save the Life of an Innocent Man:
Ask for Clemency for Ricky Johnson
Tanya
Reinhart
Jenin,
the Propaganda Battle
Todd May
Drowning Children, Palestinians and American
Responsibility
Alexander
Cockburn
The
Loneliest Road
Nir Rosen
The Broken Home:
Revisiting Israel
Mokhiber
/ Weissman
A
Big Blow to Big Tobacco
April 23, 2002
Brian Wood
Where Is the Aid for the Victims in
Jenin?
John Chuckman
I,
George:
Gomer as Claudius
Norman Madarasz
French Presidential Elections
Absenteeism and Le Pen
Dr. Susan
Block
Bernard
Parks, Goodbye:
A Farewell to My Chief
Joan Smith
Who Will Rid Us of
These Pedophile Priests?
April 22, 2002
CounterPunch
Wire
EPA
Ombudsman Resigns
in Protest
Dave Marsh
DeskScan: What's Playing
at My House This Week
Ron Jacobs
A20
in DC: Taking the
Message to the Beast's Belly
Kathy Kelly
An Open Letter to
Israeli Soldiers
Irit Katriel
Word
Games and Body Bags
Rep. Cynthia McKinney
We Come for Peace
Daniel
Bar-Tal
Is
There a Way Out?
Occupation, Terror
and Understanding
David Wilson
A Week of Coups, But Now
The Freedom Train Hits Town
Shaik
Ubaid
Today
I Was a Palestinian
April 21, 2002
Michelle Campos
Suckered Again in Israel
Mike Leon
200,000
in DC Protest Say:
"We Are All Palestinians Today"
C.G. Estabrook
Sex and Power in Catholicism
Kathy
Kelly
Gimme
Some Truth Now
A Walk Through Jenin
April 20, 2002
Philip Farruggio
Drowning in a Sea of Apathy
Kristen
Schurr
Leaving
Nablus
Bernard Weiner
Israel and the Intifada
for Dummies
Jean-Guy
Allard
A
Coup Signed by Otto Reich
Chris Floyd
The "Grandeur" That Was Rome:
A Letter from the Front
April 19, 2002
Eric Flint
Free
the Books!
David Krieger
A Peace Proposal:
Bring in the Children
Jeff Paterson
Advice
to Recruits from
a Gulf War Vet
Jeffrey St. Clair
From Sen. "Lunkhead" to
Bush Energy Czar: A Year in the Life of Spencer Abraham
April 18, 2002
Tom Turnipseed
Latin
America's Dilemma:
The Propaganda of Otto Reich
Sam Bahour
Bush is Playing Russian
Roulette with Palestinians
M. Shahid
Alam
A
Colonizing Project
Built on Lies
Resources:
100s of Links
About 9/11
CounterPunch:
Complete
Coverage of 9/11 and Its Aftermath
Five
Days That
Shook The World:
Seattle and Beyond
By Alexander
Cockburn
and Jeffrey St. Clair
Photos by Allan Sekula
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How the CIA's Backing of the Mujahideen Created the World's Most
Robust Heroin Market and Helped to Finance the Rise of the Taliban
and Osama bin Laden
Whiteout:
CIA, Drugs & the
Press
by Alexander
Cockburn
and Jeffrey St. Clair
The New Crusade:
America's War on Terrorism
By Rahul Mahajan
The Memphis Blues Again:
Six Decades of Memphis Music Photographs
Photos by Ernest Withers
Text by Daniel Wolff
The New Intifada:
Resisting Israel's Apartheid
Edited by Roane Carey
A Pocket Guide to
Environmental Bad Guys
by James Ridgeway
and Jeffrey St. Clair
The
Phoenix Program
by Douglas Valentine
Al Gore:
A User's Manual
by Cockburn
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April 25, 2002
On Stopping Open-ended, Permanent
War on Terrorism
By Rep Dennis Kucinich
On Saturday, thousands of American citizens gathered
in Washington, DC to challenge the open-ended war the United
States is now waging. They are right to do so, and the broader
American public would do well to listen.
Congress authorized a police action to
apprehend the conspirators behind the September 11 attack. Congress
did not declare war because the President did not ask Congress
to declare war. Yet, the Administration is conducting itself
as if it were engaged in a declared war, sending military special
operations forces to many new countries and ramping up defense
spending. The Administration's budget contains real, inflation-adjusted
spending increases only for military spending. Non-military
spending is projected to remain flat, and funding for many important
programs is decreased, in spite of growing unmet needs. The
list of national priorities from which the Administration has
taken away federal funds includes education, housing for the
elderly, health care, and transportation.
This war footing will ultimately make
the world a more dangerous place. Already, the Administration
has derailed efforts to negotiate the termination of North Korea's
missile program and undermined efforts by President Khatami
and other pro-reform Iranians to moderate the policies of Islamic
fundamentalists in Iran. The Administration's unilateral intention
to withdraw from the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty, its abandonment
of efforts to pass a Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, and its
refusal to negotiate enforcement mechanisms for the Biological
Weapons Convention will only compound this instability.
The protestors are also concerned about
having civil liberties and basic rights undermined at home.
The USA Patriot Act, which 65 of my colleagues and I opposed,
allows widespread wiretapping and internet surveillance without
judicial supervision. It also allows secret searches without
a warrant and gives the Attorney General the power to determine
what is and isn't a domestic terrorist group. The law allows
the U.S. government to imprison suspected terrorists for an
indefinite period of time without due process or access to family
members or lawyers. Last November, the President announced his
intention to establish military tribunals as well. The Administration
remains confused about extending internationally recognized
treatment under the Geneva Convention.
The protestors' central observation is
that these actions will likely have the opposite effect of what
is intended -- U.S. efforts intended to quell international
terrorism will provoke more of it. History is replete with the
unintended and counterproductive consequences of U.S. action:
the <U.S.-led> embargo of Iraq, which has led to the deaths
of thousands of Iraqi civilians, has solidified Saddam Hussein's
hold on power. Our government secretly sponsored anti-Soviet
fundamentalists in Afghanistan and this led to the rise of the
Taliban and their harboring of Osama bin Laden.
The path to ending terrorism, whether
by individuals, organizations or nation states, is a foreign
or domestic policy based on social and economic justice - not
corporate concerns. This is the hopeful premise of HR 2459,
a bill to create a Department of Peace. This Cabinet-level Department
would serve to promote nonviolence as an organizing principle
in our society. We should treat others as we would want them
to treat us. We should follow international law, if we want
others to do so. We should practice non-violence and encourage
non-violent conflict resolution whenever possible. We should
stop supporting repressive regimes, if we want democracy to
flourish.
But that is not the path the Administration
has chosen. Those gathering in Washington, DC believe we cannot
stop terrorism with an open-ended, permanent war. They believe
the time has come for new thinking in meeting the challenges
of terrorism. I believe they are right.
Dennis Kucinich
represents the 10th congressional district of Ohio. He can be
reached through his website.
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