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Stunning New Print Edition of CounterPunch Will the US Labor Movement Rise Again in Chicago? Or is this just a power play at the top? JoAnn Wypijewski details what's really at stake in the great showdown as some of labor's most powerful bosses threaten to quit the AFL-CIO. No-holds-barred profiles of the SIEU's Andy Stern, Hoffa of the Teamsters and the other "insurgents". Jeffrey St Clair tells the incredible saga of the $30 billion bailout of Boeing. How the scandal reached the White House and Don Rumsfeld screamed, Let the woman take the fall. Plus Alexander Cockburn on the Judy Miller story. Get the answers you're looking for in the latest subscriber-only edition of CounterPunch ... CounterPunch Online is read by millions of viewers each month! But 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 for the online edition. Remember contributions are tax-deductible. Click here to make a donation. If you find our site useful please: Subscribe Now! CounterPunch's Hot New T-Shirts for Women! Call Toll Free 1-800-840-3683 or write CounterPunch, PO BOX 228, Petrolia, CA 95558

Now Available! Other Lands Have Dreams: From Baghdad to Pekin Prison by Kathy Kelly Click Here to Order the Hot New CounterPunch Book by 3-time Nobel Peace Prize Nominee Kathy Kelly! Today's Stories July 20, 2005 Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz Red Christmas   July 19, 2005 Joshua Frank Laura's Justice?: Meet Edith Brown Clement Tariq Ali An Isolated Regime John Ross Jihad Meets G-8 Davey D. More Clear Channel Censorship: "Don't F--K Around with Tha Police" Greg Weiher Muzzling Saddam: the Old Bait-and-Switch in Iraqi Jurisprudence Brian McKinlay An "Arse Licker" Goes to Washington: John Howard's Grand Tour Norman Solomon Nukes for India; Threats for Iran Dave Lindorff Get Back to Where We Once Belonged Bill Christison Bush's Itinerary: First Stop Syria, Next Stop Iran   July 18, 2005 Joshua Frank An Interview with Ward Churchill M. Shahid Alam A Muslim Problem: Did Thomas Friedman Flunk History? Jude Wanniski Memo to Patrick Fitzgerald Ron Jacobs A Weekend to Stop the War Mike Whitney The Straight Line Between Falluja and King's Cross Station William MacDougall From "Bring It On" to "London Can Take It" Seth Sandronsky Temporary Recovery: New Frontiers in Labor Flexibility Richard Lichtman The Consolations of George Lakoff Paul Craig Roberts Can Congressional Republicans End Bush's Wars? Website of the Weekend Novels of the Neo-Cons July 15 / 17, 2005 Alexander Cockburn Don't You Dare Call It Treason Jeffrey St. Clair Sticky Fingers: the Making of Halliburton Paul Craig Roberts Economic Treason Harry Browne "What They Do to Us, They Will Do to You": Shell Oil in Mayo, Ireland Uri Davis, Ilan Pappe and Tamar Yaron A Warning from Israel Andrew Rubin End of the Enlightenment: an Open Letter to Stephen Plaut Patrick Cockburn Iraq's Ghost Battalions J.L. Chestnut, Jr. Changes in Selma: Standing Up to Racism in the South Fred Gardner A Professional Bust Christopher Brauchli An Olympic Feat: How to "Double" Aid with No New Money Chris Floyd The Great Iraq Oil Giveaway Ben Tripp The Dark Incontinent Col. Dan Smith General Abizaid, I'm Glad You Asked Jason Leopold What Did Rove Say and When Did He Say It? Jack Random Miller Time Norman Solomon War and Venture Capitalism George Ochenski Liberate Montana's Rivers: Come One, Come All! Website of the Weekend Vote for CounterPuncher David Vest   July 14, 2005 Jeffrey St. Clair Sticky Fingers: the Making of Halliburton Subcomandante Marcos This is What Will Do and How We Shall Do It: the Sixth Declaration of the Selva Lacandona Dave Lindorff No More Moral Relativism: the US is a Terrorist State Joshua Frank Rove Agency: Liberals and the CIA Jude Wanniski Those 8 Black Pages: What's the Real Story on Karl Rove? Dave Zirin Storming the Castle Kevin Zeese Exit Strategy: Within Reach? Robert Jensen War Myths and the Press Reza Fiyouzat A Worldwide Call to Free Akbar Ganji Carol Norris Governor Paranoid: Schwarzenegger Comes Unhinged Website of the Day Nate Osborn: Heroic Human Rights Activist and CounterPuncher   July 13, 2005 Brian Cloughley Cold Blooded Murders in Iraq George Galloway We Can't Separate the London Bombings from the Political Backdrop Carlos Fierro A Supreme Waste of Time Sarah Knopp Hate on the Border Norman Solomon "Isolated Pockets of Problems": the Fake Optimism of Washington's Warriors Mickey Z. Water on the Brain Jim Minick The Right Tree in the Right Place Pat Williams American Indian Education for All Andrew N. Rubin Life Behind the Wall: "We are No Longer Able to See the Sun Set" Website of the Day "London's Burning": the Mikey Mix   July 12, 2005 Laith al-Saud Voices of Resistance: an Interview with Dr. Mohammed al-Obaidi of Iraq's Peoples' Struggle Movement Kara N. Tina "This is How We Do It": Report from the Gleneagles Battlefield William A. Cook The London Bombings: Why Has It Come to This? Jack Bratich 2 Live Cruise: Tom Cruise v. Big Pharma Amina Mire The Problem with Speaking in the Name of Others Dick J. Reavis Lessons from the Christian Jihadists: the Virtues of Burning Crosses and Colored Smoke Kevin Zeese Depleted Uranium: States Take Action to Protect Their Vets Paul Craig Roberts No-Think Nation Website of the Day Coke Gags Indian Artist     July 9 / 11, 2005 Alexander Cockburn After the Bombings Uri Avnery War of the Colors in Israel Sheldon Rampton Blaming Galloway: Rhetoric vs. Reality in London Bill Christison Hiroshima's 60th Anniversary and Nukes in Iran: an Opportunity or Just More Hand-wringing from the Peace Movement? Robert Fisk Blair's Alliance with Bush Bombed Stephen Winspear Collateral Damage in London? Saul Landau Mission Accomplished: Iraq is Broken Behrooz Ghamari Thomas Friedman's Muslim Problem Karl Beitel False Promises and Real Debt Relief Brian Concannon, Jr. Throwing Gasoline on Haiti's Fires Fred Gardner Sentencing Season John Whitlow And What Does the Market Say? Niranjan Ramakrishnan The London Blasts: Who's Being Transformed, Them or Us? Lila Rajiva Witches and Bastards Laura Carlsen CAFTA: Deepening the Inequities Jackie Corr Ted Turner and Jiminy Cricket Dave Lindorff "My Brother Went Over There Gung Ho; Now He's Just Bitter" N. D. Jayaprakash Why the CIA Tried to Kill Chou En Lai at the Bandung Conference Seth Sandronsky Meet the "Truth Tour": Rightwing Radio Hosts Go to Iraq Norman Madarasz The Choking of Brazil's Worker Party Ben Tripp The Inevitability of George W. Bush Poets' Basement Louise, Albert, Landau, Davies and Engel Website of the Weekend The Mother of All Enemies Lists   July 8, 2005 Paul Craig Roberts Blowback Hits Britain: Londoners Pay Heavy Price for Blair's Deception Tariq Ali The London Bombings: Why They Happened Monica Benderman One Soldier's Fight to Legalize Morality Rick Jahnkow Beyond Opt-Out: the Counter-Recruitment Movement Christopher Brauchli Dear Vet: If You Want to Eat While You Recuperate, You Gotta Pay Extra Kim Peterson Bombs in the Underground: Terror Begats Terror Joshua Frank Leakers and Liars: Inching Toward Indictments? Norman Solomon Messages from the Carnage Website of the Day An Interview with Ray McGovern   July 7, 2005 Cockburn / St. Clair Judy Miller: the Luckiest Martyr John Walsh More Hawkish Than Bush: Dems in Full Battle Cry Mike Marqusee Message from London Gilad Atzmon London's Burning Nicole Colson Showdown at the Supreme Court Jack Random Judith Miller, Anti-Hero Norman Solomon Judith Miller, Drum Majorette for War Len Colodny Is Bob Woodward Still Protecting Al Haig? Cockburn / St. Clair Judy Miller: the Luckiest Martyr     July 6, 2005 Elaine Cassel Political Necrophilia in Florida: Jeb Bush and Terri Schiavo, a Strange Affair Sean Donahue Why the G8 Debt Relief Plan Won't Help Nicaragua's Poor Jeremy R. Hammond State Sponsors of Terrorism, Applying the US Standard Joshua Frank Will Rove be Indicted? Ali Khan The "Gift" of US Democratization Michael Dickinson Billy Graham's Final Crusade: Blessed are the Warmakers Norman Solomon How to Plunge Deeper into a Quagmire: Withdrawal and US Credibility Dave Zirin Triumph of the Shrill: Tony Blair's Olympiad Gary Leupp Accusing Ahmadinejad Website of the Day Humiliation in Baghdad: "Not Something We Would Do"     July 5, 2005 Behrooz Ghamari What's the Matter with Iran?: How the Reformists Lost the Presidency Elaine Cassel Why This Progressive Will Miss Sandra Day O'Connor Ron Jacobs Robert and Mabel Williams's Great Fight for Justice Bob Libal The Right's Assault on Academia Dr. Peter Rost Mea Culpa from a Big Pharma CEO Mark Engler The Big Debt Deal: Where's the Jubilee? Gideon Levy They Broke the Public's Heart Dave Zirin The Great Olympics Scam Sameer Dossani The Trouble with Gleneagles     July 2 / 4, 2005 Alexander Cockburn "Bomb Teheran!" Urges Jilted Condi? Lenni Brenner Jefferson, God and the Fourth of July Laura Carlsen Zapatista's Red Alert James Petras The Pretensions of Neoliberalism: Six Myths About the Benefits of Foreign Investment William A. Cook Kings of Serpents Brian Cloughley Quagmire of the Vanities Saul Landau The Mass Media, Symbols and Ownership Tom Crumpacker Who Has What to Hide About Luis Posada Carriles? Greg Moses Dylan's America Dr. Susan Block My Adelphia Story: a Tale of Censorship, Fraud, Christian Family Values and Really Lousy Cable Service Fran Shor Disassembling Bush's Iraq War: Liberated into a No Man's Land Fred Gardner Study: Smoking Marijuana Does Not Cause Lung Cancer Moshe Adler The New London Case: Corporate Giveaways That Destroy Communities, But Don't Create Jobs David Model The Downing Street Memo: So What's New? Seth Sandronsky California Spying, Schwarzenegger-Style Ramzy Baroud Managed Democracy in the Middle East Suzan Mazur Frank Carlucci the First: the "Sublime Prince" of Scranton Ben Tripp Voltaire, I Can Dig Your Rap Justin Taylor Faux Biography and the Pleasures of "Lint" Brendan Bailey Mesh Caps, Vice Magazine and the Trouble with Irony Poets' Basement Albert, Engel and Louise Website of the Weekend Radical Reference     July 1, 2005 Christopher Brauchli With Friends Like These: Bush Buddies Karimov and Musharraf Pat Williams What Real Westerners Think About Bush's Pseudo-Cowboy Palaver Gary Leupp Summer Surprise? John Stauber Mad Cow in America: the USDA Continues to Lie John Chuckman The Blessings of Canada Justicia y Paz Colombia's Disappeared: Their Names, At Least! Cockburn / St. Clair It's Put Up or Shut Up for Bush and the Dems on the Supreme Court   June 30, 2005 Kathy Kelly An Open Letter to Carl Levin: Compassion for Iraqis John Stauber Oprah Not the "Only" Mad Cow in America Virginia Rodino All Roads Lead to Baghdad: Unity in the Anti-War Movement Jason Leopold Meet the New Chair of the FERC: James Kelliher, the Man Who Invited Enron to Write Bush's Energy Policy Dave Lindorff What Was Bush Thinking? Greg Moses Racism at Cape Cod Norman Solomon Memo to the Iraq War Joshua Frank Israel's Theocrats Alexander Cockburn The Political Function of PBS   June 29, 2005 Mike Schaefer How the Washington Post Lied About Its Own War Poll Roger Burbach / Paul Cantor Bush's Big Democratic Hoax in Iraq Sharon Smith Democrats Shift into Reverse Sam Husseini A Quick Way to End the Insurgency John Stauber Put a Photo of Mad Cow #2 on a Milk Carton Ahmad Faruqui Is Militarism Irreversible in Pakistan? Linda S. Heard Bush's Speech: the View from Cairo Stew Albert Chet Helms: a Rock and Roll Hero Ray McGovern Bush at Ft. Bragg: Stay the Crooked Course     June 28, 2005 Paul Craig Roberts A Defeat Bred in Deceit Landau / Hassen Bush's Meddling in Internal Syrian Politics John A. Murphy Keeping Nader Off the Ballot: an Analysis of Political Profiling in Pennsylvania Mike Whitney More Lies from Rumsfeld: Those "Meetings" with Insurgents CounterPunch News Service JFK on Staying in Vietnam: Is Bush Reading from Kennedy's Playbook? Dave Zirin Pining for the Pistons Dave Lindorff Showtime in Washington Patrick Cockburn Iraq: a Bloody Mess     June 27, 2005 Paul Craig Roberts Blood Sacrifices for Empty Slogans Mike Marqusee G8: Who are the Hijackers? Mark Scaramella When a Corporate Raider Claims Economic Hardship: the Court-Approved Lies of Charles Hurwitz Leigh Saavedra Press Apologists for Torture Kathy Kelly Where is the UN? June 25 / 26, 2005 Alexander Cockburn The Supreme Court's Jackboot Liberals Jennifer Van Bergen America's Parallel Legal Systems George Corsetti This Land is Their Land: Condemnation for Corporations Mark Chmiel / Andrew Wimmer Let's Open the Gulag: a People's Mission to Gitmo Kevin Zeese Counter-Recruitment: How to Keep the Military From Getting their Hands on Your Kids P. Sainath Russian Roulette in Vidharbha John Stauber How to Bury a Mad Cow Scott Handleman Gay in the Third World Tom Barry The Politics & Ideologies of the Anti-Immigrationists John Walsh Looking for Peace in All the Wrong Places Justin E.H. Smith The Hairless Apes of Kansas vs. the Reality-Based Community: Why Progressives Have a Stake in the War on Evolution Alan Wallis The Story of Pinky: the Drug Trade in My Neighborhood Ben Tripp Negative Space: an Artful Lesson Frederick B. Hudson Songs to Lose Your Loneliness By: the Raised Voices of Sweet Honey in the Rock Poets' Basement Gaffney, Engel, Davies, and Albert     June 24, 2005 Ray McGovern The Downing St. Fixation: Fixing to Fix "Fixed" Jorge Mariscal "They Only Call Us Americans When They Need Us for War": the Paradox of Mexican Americans in Iraq Desiree Hellegers Portland vs. the FBI Zeynep Toufe What Do the American People Know and When Did They Know It? Joshua Frank Call Him Senator Con Job David Lindorff Which Flag Would Jesus Burn? Michael Neumann Victory and Recruitment Website of the Day Gagging Dr. Dean June 23, 2005 Christopher Brauchli Thomas Griffith and Rule 49: He Practiced Law Without a License; Now He's a Federal Appeals Court Judge Clay Conrad Killing Off the Jury with Tort Reform Standard Schaefer A Retort to Military Neo-Liberalism P. Sainath Vidharbha: No rains and 116F, But It Does Have "Snow" and Water Parks Mark Engler CAFTA Deserves a Quiet Death Norman Solomon Voluntary Amnesia in America Cockburn / St. Clair Frank Calzon Kathy Kelly Where You Stand Determines What You See   June 22, 2005 Kevin Zeese The Bush Administration's Psy-Ops on the American Public: an Interview with Col. Sam Gardiner William S. Lind Afghanistan: the Other War Arsalan Iftikhar Patriots Against the PATRIOT Act Dan Nagengast Give Populism a Chance: From France to Kansas David Krieger To the Graduates: We Live in an Interdependent World Kathleen & Bill Christison Tempest in Santa Fe: Confronting Israeli Myth-making     June 21, 2005 Brian Cloughley Destroy the Unbelievers! Mike Whitney President Disconnect Dave Lindorff Who Needs Big Bird, Anyway? Mark Weisbrot Bush's Lonely Campaign Against Hugo Chavez Matthew R. Simmons The Coming Saudi Oil Crisis Dave Zirin The Crass Slipper Fits: Ron Howard's Terrible "Cinderella Man" Virginia Rodino The Anti-War Movement and Impeachment Paul Craig Roberts A War Waged by Liars and Morons   June 20, 2005 Alan Maass The GM Job Massacre Tariq Ali To the Gates of the Gleneagles Hotel! Mickey Z. WMDs American-Style: It's 60 Years Since Alamogordo William Blum Some Things You Need to Know Before the World Ends Gary Leupp Old News Indeed: In 1999, Bush Craved Chance to Attack Iraq Jason Leopold Someone Tell Bush Iraq Wasn't Behind 9/11, Before He Starts Another War Dave Lindorff Why the Media Should be Schiavo'd Alan Maass The GM Job Massacre Uri Avnery Condi and Hamas Website of the Day Crimes Against Poetry                                                       Hot Stories Alexander Cockburn Behold, the Head of a Neo-Con! Subcomandante Marcos The Death Train of the WTO Norman Finkelstein Hitchens as Model Apostate Steve Niva Israel's Assassination Policy: the Trigger for Suicide Bombings? Dardagan, Slobodo and Williams CounterPunch Exclusive: 20,000 Wounded Iraqi Civilians Steve J.B. Prison Bitch Sheldon Rampton and John Stauber True Lies: the Use of Propaganda in the Iraq War Wendell Berry Small Destructions Add Up CounterPunch Wire WMD: Who Said What When Cindy Corrie A Mother's Day Talk: the Daughter I Can't Hear From Gore Vidal The Erosion of the American Dream Francis Boyle Impeach Bush: A Draft Resolution Click Here for More Stories.     Subscribe Online

July 20, 2005 "Bomba, Vámonos!" Red Christmas By ROXANNE DUNBAR-ORTIZ So, it happened that a United Nations seminar on racism was scheduled to take place in the midst of Operation Red Christmas. Was the timing a coincidence or was the purpose to disrupt the UN seminar? The $19.5 million in CIA funding for Red Christmas was announced with the bombing of the Nicaraguan airline at the México City airport, just as I was waiting to board the plane to attend the UN meeting. That day, December 13, 1981, seared my memory with the reality of terrorism and my country's role in state-sponsored terrorism. Once I arrived at the airport, I lingered as long as possible in its immense continuous main lobby. A microcosm of México City, it was lined with pharmacies, boutiques, banks, cafes, bookstores, art galleries, taco stands. I had to do some last minute shopping for items I didn't have time to buy in the rush to turn in my grades, things hard to find anymore in Nicaragua because of the U.S. economic blockade--aspirin, Pepto-Bismo, Bic lighters, batteries, and toothpaste. This airport was new since my travels in and out of the old one in 1968 during protests against the Olympics then being held in México City, protests that culminated in the massacre of hundreds of Mexican students. That airport was then a crowded, miserable place, with CIA agents checking the movements of all U.S. citizens to prevent us from traveling to Cuba, which was what I had been trying to do in 1968. One thing hadn't changed: thong-sandaled Indian women padded to and fro across the elegant marble floors, just as they had on the old concrete ones-mopping them. I checked my watch: 11 a.m., nearly time to go through immigration and on to the gate to catch the Nicaraguan plane. The flight was scheduled for 2 p.m., and even though the flight was notorious for always being late, the ticket agent had told me to arrive at the gate two hours before the scheduled departure time and to stay there. I had arrived from San Francisco at dawn on the Mexicana tecolote, the redeye flight. I had chosen that chaotic flight, filled with Mexican farmworkers wearing jeans and cowboy boots and hats, hugging new boomboxes and portable TVs, in order to secure a seat on the Nicaraguan flight. There had been no way to make a reservation from the United States. The Mexicana ticket agent in San Francisco had told me, "The State Department has a travel advisory on the computer. Travel agencies and airlines are not allowed to make reservations for travel to Nicaragua. Just fly to México and get to the airport at the crack of dawn and take your chances." I took that advice, and at the Aeronica counter, I had netted one of the two seats left. I tried to resist checking my carry-on leather duffel bag, but the ticket agent had insisted: "Security," he had said. The word echoed in my head; usually they said that size was the issue. At immigration on my way to the international area, the Mexican official snatched my U.S. passport and removed the Mexican tourist card. He asked my destination in English, and when I said, "Nicaragua," he looked up at me and smiled. Of course, I knew that Mexicans appreciated us gringos who defied our government. That made me feel good. I bought five cartons of Marlboros in the duty-free shop, as gifts, not for myself, as I had quit, again. I was two hours early to the Aeronica gate, but I was not the first. It seemed that the other passengers were already there in the austere, modern waiting room--mostly dark, wiry teenagers dressed almost identically in crisp designer jeans, tee-shirts in bright colors, and spotless white athletic shoes. I asked one young woman on the fringe of the group where they were from. They were Nicaraguan students at México's National University on Mexican scholarships, going home for Christmas vacation. But most Nicaraguans who left their country were not returning. They were pouring into San Francisco, complaining that they couldn't make a living in Nicaragua, and there were rumors of war. Suddenly, precious U.S. visas and green cards had, for some, people, become easy to obtain. I looked around and saw only one other possible gringo--bespectacled young, crop-haired blond man. I walked over to him, extended my hand, and asked him if he were going to the UN seminar in Managua. He introduced himself as Clifford Krauss, a Latin American correspondent for Cox News Service in Atlanta. He wasn't aware of the seminar, he said, rather was on a quest to find a Salvadoran combatant, who he heard was in Managua for an interview. He told me he was nervous about the flight because of the CIA program to organize anti-Sandinista forces in Honduras. We discussed the fact that Congress had just granted the CIA nearly $20 million for covert operations, and that the CIA was paying Argentine military officers to train former Somoza national guardsmen. He also said that he didn't trust taking Aeronica, but that the other Central American airlines had stopped flying to Managua under pressure from Washington. he worried that most of the Aeronica pilots and crews had defected, and that there would b no one to fly the plane. He had been waiting two days, because the Nicaraguan plane--Aeronica owned only one jetliner--had not arrived the day before. Clifford and I drifted apart, and I sat down to read. The book was by the founder of the FSLN, Carlos Fonseca, who had been killed in an ambush by Somoza guardsmen in 1976. I was reading about the eastern half of the country: The Mosquitia of Nicaragua, bypassed by Spanish colonization, becomes for a time in the 17th century a refuge for African slaves who daringly escape the captivity imposed on them in the European-owned plantations of the Antilles islands. Following the consolidation of the colonization of indigenous lands, the Nicaraguan territory is virtually shared by the Spanish and British empires. The Pacific coast and center of Nicaragua remains under Spanish domination. The eastern region, no longer a refuge for fugitive slaves, falls under the domination of the British, who establish what they call "the Kingdom of Mosquitia," which of course is provided with a kinglet. Suddenly, everyone scurried toward the plate glass window. The Aeronica plane had arrived from San Salvador, where it had stopped to pick up passengers, and was even on time. The line, such as it was, formed at once. The students crowded in as close to the exit as possible, and inevitably, they had to be coaxed back to allow space for the arriving passengers. The Nicaraguan airline agent scolded the students, "Set a revolutionary example!" The young people inched back in unison, just enough to let the arrivals squeeze through. Then, the agent announced that the departure would be delayed until the replacement crew arrived--they were stuck in the México City afternoon rush hour. I visualized the specter of the monstrous traffic jams at la comida, the early afternoon meal when everyone drives home for two hours, then returns to work, and I reconciled myself to a two-hour wait. I knew that if the plane did not leave by 4 p.m., forget it, because there was no night radar equipment at the Managua airport, and night falls all year around at 6 p.m. in Central America. I also thought about Clifford's concern about the crews defecting. An hour passed quickly. The Nica students were all curled up sleeping, propped against each other near the gate. The silence of the waiting room was punctuated with flight announcements. I walked toward the airline agent to ask if the crew had arrived. Suddenly, a glaring light blinded me, then blackness. My ears rang and echoed. I was flat on my back on the floor and shards of glass rained down. An earthquake was my first thought. I lifted my head and took in the sight of people piled on top of each other, writhing, screaming. It was hard to tell that the plate glass window was gone, because every inch of glass had blown out. But the blaze sizzled, and tongues of fire lapped through the gaping mouth that had been the window. I realized that the plane could explode. A man shouted, "Bomba, Vámonos!" Somehow, I got to my feet and moved, for I found myself in the corridor leaning against a cool marble wall. Then, a rush of people running knocked me down. I sat cross-legged, head in hands. Someone grabbed me under the arms and dragged me. I looked up into the blood-soaked face of one of the Nicaragua teenagers. She said, "You know that bomb was supposed to go off in the air and kill us all. You see, your government doesn't even care if it kills its own citizens." As if I didn't know. I saw Clifford nearby, taking notes, his face smudged with soot. He walked toward me. "Well, there went Aeronica Internacional, embarrassing to be gringos, huh?" He offered me a Lucy Strike, and I took it, without a thought of having quit. Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz is a longtime activist, university professor, and writer. In addition to numerous scholarly books and articles she has published two historical memoirs, Red Dirt: Growing Up Okie (Verso, 1997), and Outlaw Woman: A Memoir of the War Years, 1960­1975 (City Lights, 2002). "Red Christmas" is excerpted from her forthcoming book, Blood on the Border: A Memoir of the Contra War, South End Press, October 2005. She can be reached at: rdunbaro@pacbell.net