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How the Press & the CIA Killed Gary Webb's Career   Today's Stories January 12, 2005 Paul Craig Roberts What's Our Biggest Problem in Iraq...the Insurgency or Bush? January 11, 2005 Tom Barry The US isn't "Stingy"; It's Strategic: Aid as a Weapon of Foreign Policy James Hodge and Linda Cooper Voice of the Voiceless: Father Roy Bourgeois and the School of the the Americas Linda S. Heard Farah Radio Break Down: Joseph Farah's Messages of Hate and Homophobia Derrick O'Keefe Electoral Gigolo?: Richard Gere and the Occupied Vote Gila Svirsky A Tale of Two Elections Harry Browne Irish "Peace Process", RIP   January 10, 2005 Ramzy Baroud Faith-Based Disasters: Tsunami Aid and War Costs Talli Nauman Killing Journalists: Mexico's War on a Free Press Uri Avnery Sharon's Monologue Dave Lindorff Tucker Carlson's Idiot Wind Dave Zirin Randy Moss's Moondance Dave Silver Left Illusions About the Democratic Party Charles Demers Plan Salvador for Iraq: Death Squads Come in Waves William A. Cook Causes and Consequences: Bush, Osama and Israel   January 8 / 9, 2005 Alexander Cockburn Say, Waiter, Where's the Blood in My Margarita Glass? John H. Summers Chomsky and Academic History Greg Moses Getting Real About the Draft Walter A. Davis Bible Says: the Psychology of Christian Fundamentalism Victor Kattan The EU and Middle East Peace John Bolender The Plight of Iraq's Mandeans Robert Fisk The Politics of Lebanon Fred Gardner Situation NORML Joe Bageant The Politics of the Comfort Zone Mickey Z. I Want My DDT: Little Nicky Kristof Bugs Out Ben Tripp CounterClockwise Evolution Ron Jacobs Elvis and His Truck: Out on Highway 61 Saul Landau Sex and the Country Rep. Cynthia McKinney Time to End the Blackout Ellen Cantarow NPR's Distortions on Palestine Richard Oxman Bageantry Continued Poets' Basement Gaffney, Landau, Albert, Collins January 7, 2005 Omar Barghouti Slave Sovereignty: Elections Under Occupation Kent Paterson The Framing of Felipe Arreaga: Another Mexican Environmentalist Arrested Niranjan Ramakrishnan Old Vijay Merchant and the Tsunami David Krieger Cancel the Inauguration Parties Gideon Levy New Year, Old Story Dave Lindorff Ohio Protest: First Shot Fired by Congressional Progressives Christopher Brauchli Privatizing the IRS Roger Burbach / Paul Cantor Bush, the Pentagon and the Tsunami     January 6, 2005 Brian J. Foley Gonzales: Supporting Torture is not His Greatest Sin Greg Moses Boot Up America!: Gen. Helmly's Memo Leaks New Bush Deal Petras / Chomsky An Open Letter to Hugo Chavez Alan Maass The Decline of the Dollar Dave Lindorff Colin Powell's Selective Sense of Horror Jenna Orkin The EPA and a Dirty Bomb: 9/11's Disastrous Precedent P. Sainath The Tsunami and India's Coastal Poor     January 5, 2005 Alan Farago 2004: An Environmental Retrospective Winslow T. Wheeler Oversight Detected?: Sen. McCain and the Boeing Tanker Scam Jean-Guy Allard Gary Webb: a Cuban Perspective Fred Gardner Strutting, Smirking, As If The Mad Plan Was Working David Swanson Albert Parsons on the Gallows Richard Oxman The Joe Bageant Interview Bruce Jackson Death on the Living Room Floor       January 4, 2005 Michael Ortiz Hill Mainlining Apocalypse Elaine Cassel They Say They Can Lock You Up for Life Without a Trial Yoram Gat The Year in Torture Martin Khor Tragic Tales and Urgent Tasks from the Tsunami Disaster Gary Leupp Death and Life in the Andaman Islands   January 3, 2005 Ron Jacobs The War Hits Home Dave Lindorff Is There a Single Senator Who Will Stand Up for Black Voters? Mike Whitney The Guantanamo Gulag Joshua Frank Greens and Republicans: Strange Bedfellows Maria Tomchick Playing Politics with Disaster Aid Rhoda and Mark Berenson Our Daughter Lori: Another Year of Grave Injustice David Swanson The Media and the Ohio Recount Kathleen Christison Patronizing the Palestinians     January 1 / 2, 2005 Gary Leupp Earthquakes and End Times, Past and Present Rev. William E. Alberts On "Moral Values": Code Words for Emerging Authoritarian Tendencies M. Shahid Alam Testing Free Speech in America Stan Goff A Period for Pedagogy Brian Cloughley Bush and the Tsunami: the Petty and the Petulant Sylvia Tiwon / Ben Terrall The Aftermath in Aceh Ben Tripp Requiem for 2004 Greg Moses A Visible Future? Steven Sherman The 2004 Said Awards: Books Against Empire Sean Donahue The Erotics of Nonviolence James T. Phillips The Beast's Belly David Krieger When Will We Ever Learn Poets' Basement Soderstrom, Hamod, Louise and Albert     December 31, 2004 Farrah Hassen The Palestinian Right of Return: a View from Syria Dave Lindorff US Air's Bold New Idea: Work for Your Boss for Free! George Capaccio Tsunami Hits Iraq Mike Whitney Iraq v. Tsunami: Media Duplicity Peter Phillips The Tsunami and the Corporate Media: Waves of Hypocrisy Christopher Deliso War and the Tsunami: Putting It in Perspective       December 30, 2004 Lila Rajiva Unnatural Disaster? Earthquakes, Tsunamis and Nuclear Testing Robert Fisk The Ghosts of Vietnam Roger Burbach Argentina v. the IMF Stan Cox 9/11 and 12/26: How to React Walter Brasch Bush and Tsunamis: Heartless in Crawford Christopher Brauchli Empire of the Misers Alexandra Spieldoch NAFTA Through a Gender Lens: "Free Trade" Pacts and Women Paul Kincaid Jameison Grief, Relief and the Stingy West Dan Bacher The Water Kings of California Paul Craig Roberts Unbecoming Conduct     December 29, 2004 Dave Lindorff Us, Stingy?: It's All Relative M. Shahid Alam America and Islam: Seeking Parallels Ronald D. Hoffman Tsunamis and Nuclear Power Plants Sam Bahour / Todd May Elections Without Democracy Fred Gardner Ricky Does 60 Minutes Ali Khan Who's Feeding the Bin Laden Legend? John Hansen Family Farms Are Being Fed to Corporate Sharks Sam Lewin How the Justice Department Continues to Screw the Sioux Richard Oxman As Time Goes By With Andy Goldsworthy Mickey Z. A Wave of Questions: Putting a Disaster in Context Website of the Day Banking While Muslim     December 28, 2004 Brian Cloughley The Chief Weirdo at the Pentagon: Rumsfeld Must Go Joshua Frank Privacy Piracy? What Howard Dean May Bring to the DNC Jessica Leight The Chilean Miracle: Less Than Meets the Eye Dave Lindorff A Shameful Response to Disaster John Walsh Disappearing the Anti-War Movement at the NYTs Dave Zirin The Death of Reggie White: an Off the Field Obituary Dr. Teresa Whitehurst Be Careful Not to Get Too Much Education: It's Happened to a Lot of Good Christians Ron Jacobs Iran 2004: The Resistance and the Western Anti-War Movement     December 27, 2004 M. Junaid Alam "Civilization v. Barbarism": an Interview with Noam Chomsky Michael Donnelly Greens and Greenbacks: How Nonprofit Careerism Derailed the "Revolution" Greg Moses Texas Election Scandal: Forty Faxes and a Whisper Toni Solo Colombia's Appalling Vista: Justice With Eyes Wide Open Brian Kwoba Blaming the Victims of the 2004 Elections Genna Goodman-Campbell Honduras Validates Its Banana Republic Status, Again Mike Whitney Disappearing Act: Fallujah and the Media Ari Shavit "Zionism Has Exhausted Itself": an Interview with Amos Elon Richard Oxman Reflections on a Handful of Activists Saul Landau James Cason's Cuban Delusions     December 25 / 26, 2004 Alexander Cockburn Yup, It's Moral Outrage Time Diane Christian The Christmas Christ Dr. Susan Block Faith-Based Sex Gary Leupp Rumsfeld, His Critics and the Draft Ron Jacobs Music in Wartime Elaine Cassel Articles I Didn't Write Jim Minick Beyond Organic Poets Basement Louise, Landau, Orloski, Albert and Collins     December 24, 2004 Diane Christian Winning: Rummy and John Milton Chad Nagle Ukraine's Real Underdog Saul Landau My Friend Richard Barnet Greg Moses Ramsey Muniz Speaks Joe DeRaymond The Endless War in Colombia: a View From Within Borzou Daragahi Iraq's Christians: Tolerated by Saddam; Targets Under Occupation Mike Whitney Rummy's Quagmire of Lies Francis A. Boyle O Little Town of Bethlehem: Another Christmas Under Occupation William Loren Katz Florida 1837: Christmas Eve Resistance to the First US Occupation     December 23, 2004 Chad Nagle Report from Kiev: Yushchenko's Not Quite Ready for Sainthood David Smith-Ferri The Real UN Disgrace in Iraq Bill Quigley Death Watch for Human Rights in Haiti Mickey Z. Crumbs from Our Table Christopher Brauchli Merck's Merry X-mas Greg Moses When No Law Means No Law Alan Singer An Encounter with Sen. Schumer: a Very Dangerous Democrat David Price Social Security Pump and Dump Website of the Day Gabbo Gets Laid   December 22, 2004 James Petras An Open Letter to Saramago: Nobel Laureate Suffers from a Bizarre Historical Amnesia Omar Barghouti The Case for Boycotting Israel Patrick Cockburn / Jeremy Redmond They Were Waiting on Chicken Tenders When the Rounds Hit Harry Browne Northern Ireland: No Postcards from the Edge Richard Oxman On the Seventh Column Kathleen Christison Imagining Palestine Website of the Day FBI Torture Memos     December 21, 2004 Greg Moses The New Zeus on the Block: Unplugging Al-Manar TV Dave Lindorff Losing It in America: Bunker of the Skittish Chad Nagle The View from Donetsk Dragon Pierces Truth* Concrete Colossus vs. the River Dragon: Dislocation and Three Gorges Dam Patrick Cockburn "Things Always Get Worse" Seth DeLong Aiding Oppression in Haiti Ahmad Faruqui Pakistan and the 9/11 Commission's Report Paul Craig Roberts America Locked Up: a System of Injustice     December 20, 2004 Gary Leupp Japan in Iraq Robert Fisk An Army Without Compassion Uri Avnery The Mountain and the Mouse Francisco Letelier My Case Against Pinochet Patrick Cockburn The Polls of Fear Bill Conroy Charles Bowden on the Legacy of Gary Webb: "He Drew Blood" Yoshie Furuhashi Chokeholds of a Giant: Attacking Wal-Mart's Supply Chain David Swanson Media Blackout of Bush's War on Labor Chad Nagle Did Yushchenko Poison Himself?     December 18 / 19, 2004 Alexander Cockburn Why They Hated Gary Webb Saul Landau Gen. Pinochet Should Also Face Charges in DC Patrick Cockburn Losing Mosul: Once They Called It a Model for the Occupation Douglas Valentine Wolves and Revolution in Venezuela: a Caracas Romance Ray McGovern Laughing Dragon, Dancing Bear: the New China / Russia Alliance Fred Gardner DEA Upholds Grower's Marijuana Monopoly Jean-Guy Allard Locked Up Naked in a Hole Within a Hole: Have the Cuban 5 Been Tortured in US Prisons? Ron Jacobs Drifters Escape, Again: Encounters with Berkeley's Police Raymond G. Helmick, S.J. The Law and Peace in the Middle East Sean Sellers Values Voters, Desperate Housewives and Sweatshop Tacos Lee Sustar Christmas on the Picket Line at CNH: "They Want to Break Our Unions" Richard Thieme Webb's Wife: "Gary Was Never the Same After They Attacked Him" Sam Bahour WANTED: Middle East Negotiator Joshua Frank The Spin Doctor: an Interview with Mickey Z. Dave Lindorff A Man Who Confers with God Should Have Good Hearing Stan Cox What Kids Cost: Dallas v. Delhi Chris Frasier Farming By Numbers: More Poets, Fewer MBAs Poets' Basement Katz, Melek, Harley, Albert and Ford     December 17, 2004 Cockburn / St. Clair CounterAttack: How the Press and the CIA Killed Gary Webb's Career Dave Lindorff Racism: Philly Style Dan Bacher Bush Abandons Salmon Restoration Marisa Jacott NAFTA and the Environment: Trade Still Runs Roughshod Francis Thicke How Now, Industrial Cow? Rupert Cornwell The Inuit Strike Back Website of the Day Franz Boas Unrolls Over in His Grave     December 16, 2004 Michael Neumann How We Became Barbarians Merlin Chowkwanyun An Interview with Ralph Nader Gabriel Espinoza Gonzales The Dubious Career of John Bolton Christopher Brauchli Louis Freeh's New Gig: Usurer Patrick Cockburn Allawi's Pre-Election Ploy: Putting "Chemical Ali" on Trial Mike Whitney Gearing Up for a Draft? Walter Brasch Hillbilly Humvees and Rumsfeld's New Physics Bill Conroy How Gary Webb Saved My Ass from the FBI Website of the Day Saturday Memorial for Gary Webb     December 15, 2004 Robert Fisk Who Killed Baha Mousa? Jennifer Van Bergen The Monster Under the Bed Heather Gray Will the Real Christians Please Stand?: a Personal Testimony Dave Lindorff The DNC, Albright and the Iraq Elections Luis Hernandez Navarro To Die a Little: Migration and Coffee in Mexico and Central America Joshua Frank The Ohio Recount: an Exercise in "Dumbocracy" Greg Moses Eighty-Sixing Civil Rights in Ohio? George Caffentzis The Petroleum Commons   December 14, 2004 Dave Lindorff DNC Meddling in the Ukraine Elections Larry Birns / Seth DeLong Haiti is Unraveling and No One is Saying Anything Richard Thieme My Last Talk with Gary Webb: "I Knew It Was the Truth and That's What Kept Me Going" Patrick Cockburn A Year After Saddam's Capture, Iraq is Getting Worse Chris Floyd Client State: Moral Values and Voluntary Servitude in Bush's America Akiva Eldar A One-time Hanukkah Miracle Burbach / Cantor The Legacy of Pinochet: Kissinger and the Teflon Tyrant     December 13, 2004 Cockburn / St. Clair Gary Webb: a Great Reporter, Trashed by the CIA's Claque David Phinney "Contract Meal Disaster" for Iraqi Prisoners: Rancid Food Sparked Abu Ghraib Riots Paul Craig Roberts A Dose of Non-Delusional Reality for Douglas Feith M. Junaid Alam The War is the War Crime Robert Jensen The US Has Lost the Iraq War...and That's a Good Thing Richard Oxman Kafkaesque Lessons for the Left Greg Moses Send No Messengers of Defeat Douglas Lummis The Pentagon's Neurosis: Fallujah Gulag   December 11 / 12, 2004 Alexander Cockburn Running an Empire on the Cheap Ron Jacobs The Drugs of War: Getting High in the Green Zone? Saul Landau Listening and Talking to God About Invading Other Countries Gary Leupp Bush's Capital Sharon Smith The Horrible Toll on US Troops Dave Lindorff Deja Vu All Over Again: 5,000 Desertions and Counting Uri Avnery The Boss Has Gone Crazy Jude Wanniski The Neo-Con Smear on Kofi Annan: What Food-for-Oil Scandal? Heather Gray How the South Became Republican: an Interview with John Egerton Patrick Cockburn / Ken Sengupta Fallujah: the Homecoming and the Homeless John Pilger Return to Kosovo: Calling the Humanitarian Bombers to Account Joshua Frank All the Rage: Mr. Solomon, Say You're Sorry Ben Tripp O Canada!: the Truth About the Election of 2004 John Stanton God Speaks! Laura Nathan Porn Stars are People, Too: a Talk with Christi Lake Poets' Basement Capaccio, Davies, Louise, Ford and Albert Website of the Day Fallujah Photos: Killed in Their Beds   December 10, 2004 Ralph Nader President Bush, Stop Destroying the Mosques of Iraq Greg Moses Whitewashing Voter Fraud Nicole Colson Rebellion in the Ranks: Grunts Are Resisting Stop-Loss Orders Frederick B. Hudson "They Still Got Those Dogs": A New Book Probes Old Civil Rights Lessons Patrick Cockburn Iraq's Insurgents Oppose the Occupation, Not the Elections Kathy Kelly From Haiti to Iraq: Burying Water     December 9, 2004 Greg Moses Ask Not Who Bankrolled Fallujah Joshua Frank Cobb and the Ohio Recount: Vote Fraud as Fundraiser! Ralph Nader An Open Letter to Bush: It's Time to Disclose the Real Casualty Figures Lee Sustar Bhopal: the Making of a Disaster Tom Barry Restrictionist Resurgence Mickey Z. Sander Hicks and the 9/11 Truth Movement Christopher Brauchli Bush in the Bubble Mark Donham Why are House Democrats Trying to Deny Cynthia McKinney Seniority? Gary Corseri On the Anniversary of John Lennon's Death, 2012 Paul de Rooij The Voices of Sharon's Little Helpers       December 8, 2004 Ralph Nader Will the Real Michael Moore Ever Re-Emerge? Ann Harrison The Ohio Recount: Reluctant Officials and Few Rules Paul Craig Roberts War Crime Dave Lindorff They've Got a Secret: Inside the $40 Billion Black Budget for Spying Patrick Cockburn / Andrew Buncombe CIA Warning on Iraq: Fallujah Did Not Break the Back of the Insurgency Col. Dan Smith Rules of Engagement in Iraq Emily Alves / Michael Johnson Paradise Lost: Corruption and Clientelism in Costa Rica Richard Oxman The Dylan Bob Wouldn't Mention: Up With Dylan Thomas Ron Jacobs In Fallujah, Freedom Isn't Free     December 7, 2004 Patrick Cockburn Running Battles in Baghdad Behrooz Ghamari Lost Muslim Voices of Dissent Dave Lindorff American Fantasies: Psst! Hey Buddy, Did You Hear How Well the War's Going? Joshua Frank Dean at the DNC? Richard Oxman Down with Dylan: the Insufferable Interview Ray McGovern All Mosquitoes, No Swamp John Chuckman The Invasion of Hallifax: The Imperial Wizard Visits Canada James Petras Latin America: the Empire Changes Gears Website of the Day ToxMap: Who's Poisoning You     December 6, 2004 Paul Craig Roberts Paranoia and Pre-emption: Is the Bush Administration Certifiable? December 4 / 6, 2004 Alexander Cockburn Politicize the CIA? You've Got to be Kidding Joe Bageant Dining with the Rhinos Alan Maass Reporting from the Ground in Iraq: an Interview with Patrick Cockburn Brian Cloughley Democracy, Bush-style, in the Gulf Laura Carlsen Latin America Shifts Left Lenni Brenner Jefferson, Madison, Bush and Religion Anna Ioakimedes Brazil's Haitian Mission: Doing God's Work or Washington's? Uri Avnery Widow of Opportunity? Fred Gardner Supreme Court Hears Medical Pot Case Dave Zirin Steroids to Heaven Jackie Corr Mining Camp Blues: the Red State Variation Don Fitz Will Greens Abandon IRV? Lucy Herschel "Art can be a Weapon of the Oppressed": an Interview with Artist Anthony Papa Richard Oxman No Angels in America: Bashing the Gay Play Ron Jacobs Holiday Greeting Card Poets' Basement Collins, Albert, LaMorticella   December 3, 2004 Dave Lindorff Lie Then Escalate Ben Tripp Fun With Boycotts: How to Shop in a Time of Crisis Joe Allen Murder in El Salvador: the Assassination of Teamster Organizer Gilberto Soto Matthew B. Riley Human Rights Court Fails Lori Berenson Meir Shalev In the End, It is the Violin that Wins Bob Wing The White Elephant in the Room: Race and Election 2004 Christopher Brauchli When McCain Bit His Tongue Sasan Fayazmanesh The EU, the US, Israel and Iran   December 2, 2004 Tito Tricot No Justice in Chile: I'm a Torture Survivor in a Country Where Torturers Still Run Free Behzad Yaghmaian The Murder of Theo Van Gogh and Muslim Migration Dr. Susan Block Lana and Me: Meetings with Remarkable Apes Frank / Chowkwanyun Liberalism and Its Bounds Lee Sustar Standoff in Ukraine: the Bad v. the Corrupt Patrick Cockburn Another Grim Record in Iraq Mark Engler Seattle at Five Michael Donnelly Something Stinks in South Bend: the Firing of Tyrone Willingham Nate Collins The Bay Area Mall on an Ohlone Burial Grounds Saul Landau The Assassination of Danilo Anderson   December 1, 2004 Phillip Cryan Associated with Whom? Rightist Bias in Wire Coverage of Colombia Dave Zirin What's the Matter with "Leon"?: Budweiser's Racist Commercial Ghali Hassan Iraq's Health Care Under the Occupation: 200 Children Die Every Day Donna J. Volatile Beware Western Nations Threatening "Democracy" Patrick Cockburn How Saddam Tried to Arm the Insurgency Nick Meo Chemical War Over Afghanistan Mike Ferner The Battle of Toledo Mokhiber / Weissman Shame and Determination on Global AIDS Day: 40 Million and Rising Kathy Kelly Looking the Other Way: the Real Crimes of the UN in Iraq   November 30, 2004 Jennifer Van Bergen The Veil of Secrecy Toni Nelson Herrera Meeting Kurtz: When Art is a Crime Paul Craig Roberts The Bush Delusions: Successful at Incompetence Patrick Cockburn The Insurgency Strikes Back: There Are No Safe Havens in Iraq Chuck Munson WTO Protests Five Years Later: Seattle Weekly Trashes Anti-Globalization Movement Adam Williams Citizenship Sold: Back to Business in Indiana Gregory Elich A Dangerous Turn in the US Plans for North Korea Website of the Day Read Lynne Cheney's Lesbian Novel Online!   November 29, 2004 Dave Lindorff Blowback in Ukraine: The Hand of the CIA? Omar Barghouti "The Pianist" of Palestine: Roadblock Concerto at Gunpoint Mike Whitney The US Media and Fallujah: How to Market a Siege Uri Avnery The Abu Mazen Style: "Give Me Some Credit!" Matt Vidal Globalization and Economic Inequality: a Look at the Numbers Patrick Cockburn An Interview with Iraq's Foreign Minister Alan Farago Sex Change and Salvation: God, Girly Men and Endocrine Disrupters Justin Huggler Bhopal 20 Years Later Antony Loewenstein How Australia Reported Arafat's Death and Legacy Gary Leupp Ukraine: Poll Results Aren't the Real Issue Website of the Day Mosul: Images from a Kill Zone     November 27 / 28, 2004 Peter Linebaugh Torture & Neo-Liberalism with Sycorax in Iraq Alexander Cockburn What Happened to O'Reilly's Loofa? Fred Gardner Ashcroft v. Raich: Medical Marijuana and the Supreme Court Kathy Kelly What We Can Control Diane Christian The Other Cheek: "Empire Doesn't Analyze, It Acts" Gary Leupp One More Neocon Target: South (Yes, South) Korea Lenni Brenner Equality and Rights of Return: Jefferson Instructs the New York Times Ron Jacobs Death Squads and Iraq's Elections: the Mysterious Murders of the AMS Clerics Joshua Frank An Interview with Kevin Zeese on Nader, Kerry and the ABB Crowd Toni Solo The Murder of Danilo Anderson Saul Landau Fallujah, the 21st Century Guernica JoAnn Wypijewski Matthew Shepard Case 6 Years Later: Why Hate Crimes Laws are No Cure for Homophobia Justin Taylor Empire's Lawless Opportunities Amos Harel The Case of Captain R. Walter A. Davis Tabloid Justice Stephen Hendricks God's Kind of Men Poets' Basement Albert, LaMorticella and Ford     November 26, 2004 Peter Feng Gavin Newsom: Man or Machine? Greg Moses It's the White Vote, Stupid Liaquat Ali Khan The Devil's Work: Bush's Minority Appointments Michael Mandel / Gail Davidson Why Bush Should Be Banned from Canada: a Memo to the Ministry of Immigration Dave Lindorff Nation of Sheep, Turkey of an Election: Urkrainians Show the Way Gary Corseri When Black Friday Comes... Paul Craig Roberts Whatever Happened to Conservatives? Website of the Day Iraq Pipeline Watch     November 25, 2004 Willliam Loren Katz Giving Thanks to Whom?: "Thanks to God We Sent 600 Heathen Souls to Hell Today" Mitchel Cohen Why I Hate Thanksgiving Mike Ferner An Uncommon Mom     November 24, 2004 Gila Svirsky License to Kill: the Example of Violence is Set by the State Winslow T. Wheeler The Other Mess in Congress Christopher Brauchli The Company He Keeps: the Syndicate of Tom Delay Dave Lindorff Double Standards on Exit Polls: Hypocrisy Sans Irony Ron Jacobs The Occupation of Iraq is the Root of t he Problem Ken Sengupta Witnesses: War Crimes in Fallujah Diana Barahona The Final Holocaust or Why I Voted for Ralph Nader John L. Hess Safire the Shameless Jason Leopold Did Harvard Hire (Another) War Criminal? Jeffrey St. Clair The Mark of McCain: the Senator Most Likely to Start a Nuclear War Map of the Day Now and Then: 2004 v. 1860   November 23, 2004 Forrest Hylton Bush and Uribe at the Beach         November 22, 2004 Dave Zirin Fight Night in the NBA: Selective Outrage in Detroit Paul Craig Roberts On to Iran: We Won't Get Fooled Again? Michael Mandel / Gail Davidson Why Bush Should be Banned from Canada Kathie Helmkamp Our Son: a Marine Who Won't Kill Ken Sengupta The Triangle of Death: "This is Now the Most Dangerous Place in Iraq" Mike Whitney Greenspan's Hammer Roger Burbach Why They Hate Bush in Chile Website of the Day Fed Up with Government Lies and Corporate Spin?     November 20 / 21, 2004 Alexander Cockburn The Poisoned Chalice Todd May Religion, the Election and the Politics of Fear Abbas Ahmed Ibrahim The Horrors of Fallujah: a First-Hand Account Kevin Zeese Mishandling Nader Landau / Hassen After Arafat Tom Barry The Vulcans Consolidate Power: The Rise of Stephen Hadley Fred Gardner Pot Shots: Ask Dr. Todd Justin E.H. Smith Triumph of the Will: the Sequel Carl Estabrook Where We Are Now Gary Leupp Imperial History-Making vs. Reality-Based Thought: a Dialogue Dave Lindorff Apocalypse Soon Jenna Michelle Liut Plans Colombia and Patriota: Wanton Wastes of Money, Manpower and Lives Mickey Z. The Granma Moses of Radical Writing: an Interview with William Blum Greg Moses The Same Old Struggle Against Imperial America Sharon Smith Abortion Rights and the Election: What Now? Ron Jacobs Sandwiches and Car Bombs Ben Tripp Raising d'Etre: Finding Money in Hollywood These Days Richard Oxman Basketbrawl Two Pointer: Iraq Rules! Gilad Atzmon Politics and Jazz Poets' Basement LaMorticella, Albert, Ford, & Anon. Website of the Day Voice of the Forest                                                     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. 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January 12, 2005 The Tsunami and Military Rule Aceh's Dual Disasters By JOHN ROOSA On December 25, 2004, one day before Aceh was devastated by an earthquake-driven tsunami, the Indonesian military (TNI) announced that it had just killed eighteen guerrillas in the province.[1] Such news had long since become routine. A week earlier, the TNI killed five.[2] TNI chief Gen. Endriartono Sutarto stated in early December that his men had killed 3,216 Acehnese since martial law was imposed upon the province in May 2003.[3] In all these reported armed clashes, very few Indonesian soldiers died. The war was lopsided, with Acehnese, especially civilians (posthumously labeled "rebels" by the TNI), bearing nearly all the casualties. Aceh was already a killing field before the Indian Ocean wreaked havoc on the land. Under martial law, the military became the government. The military stationed nearly 40,000 security personnel in the province (about one soldier or policeman for every 100 civilians), replaced many civilian officials (such as district heads) with military personnel, banned foreigners, issued new identification cards, forced Acehnese to attend public ceremonies at which they pledged loyalty to the Indonesian state, and set up countless checkpoints on the roads. The transition from martial law to 'civil emergency' in May 2004 was a cosmetic change; the 40,000 troops remained and the killings continued. The seawater was one of the few things the military did not try to control. One should not imagine that the severity of the tsunami in Aceh (the latest estimate is more than 100,000 dead) renders this history of military rule irrelevant. The Indonesian government is now using the military as its primary coordinator of relief aid. Worse, the military is still waging war on the pro-independence Free Aceh Movement (GAM). Mother nature inflicted enormous damage on Aceh but did not fundamentally alter the pre-existing social institutions. The TNI remains intact (with claimed losses so far of about 500 personnel), as does GAM, whose guerrillas are mostly in the hills. The war between them has been remarkably perdurable; it has lasted on and off since the late 1970s, through the collapse of President Suharto's dictatorship, through the tenures of three post-Suharto presidents, foreign mediation, peace talks, and cease-fires. The Indonesian military has been waging a counterinsurgency war against GAM. As in all such wars, including the one the Dutch fought in Aceh during the last thirty years of the nineteenth century, the military's goal has been to terrorize civilians so that they will not support the guerrillas. The Suharto regime, after very limited hostilities with GAM in the late 1970s, turned Aceh into a free-fire zone in 1990. The terror has been fairly constant since then. The only let-up (and that only partial) was in 1998-99 when the nation's political system was in crisis after Suharto's fall. During that brief reformist pause, the government sanctioned a human rights investigation that conservatively estimated that the military had killed about 2,000 to 4,000 people from 1990 to 1998.[4] As part of the counterinsurgency war, the military indiscriminately rounded up civilians for interrogations that invariably involved torture. Mutilated corpses were left by roadsides in the 1990s as a form of what the military called "shock therapy." The civilians at whom this 'therapeutic' practice was directed did not respond like good patients and retreat into a collective catatonic state. At the start of large-scale military operations in 1990, GAM consisted of several hundred armed guerrillas. It did not have mass support. Most Acehnese were as integrated into Indonesia as any other ethnic group. It was the military's manner of suppressing the rebels that fueled the revolt. Human rights activist Muhammad Isa noted last year that "when Aceh was declared a military operations zone, there were only a few hundred GAM insurgents in Pidie, North Aceh and East Aceh. Now, there are a lot more throughout Aceh." [5] Indonesia specialist Edward Aspinall wrote: "Many journalists and others who interviewed new GAM recruits in rural Aceh in 1999 noted that many of them were motivated by a desire to exact revenge for family members who had been killed, tortured or sexually abused by security forces earlier in the decade." [6] In a remarkable demonstration of public opinion, nearly a million people (one quarter of the population) attended a rally in 1999 calling for a referendum on independence. After nearly a decade of counterinsurgency warfare, the military had made succession mainstream opinion. Today, it nevertheless stoically persists in its Sisyphus-like labor, creating enemies in the process of killing them. Not all Acehnese, on coming to hate the military for its atrocities, have turned to GAM as an alternative. GAM has not articulated a coherent political program (its founder wishes to revive a monarchical form of government) and has not always followed the Geneva Conventions (it has, for instance, frequently taken Indonesian civilians as hostages). The military's repression of all forms of political dissent in Aceh has made it nearly impossible for any resistance to be waged except armed resistance. Acehnese who have tried to resist in civil fashion have been denounced as GAM members in disguise and have either been jailed, killed, or forced into exile. Tens of thousands of Acehnese have fled to other parts of Indonesia or foreign countries. The refrain one often hears from Acehnese is that the military has never bothered to distinguish GAM members from non-combatants. TNI troops view all Acehnese with suspicion. The main English daily newspaper in Indonesia, The Jakarta Post, in a rare moment of candid reporting, noted last month that a frequent remark by soldiers at the checkpoints was "Are you Acehnese? Then you must be GAM." Human rights campaigner Munir was not being hyperbolic when he stated last year that "ninety-nine percent of those detained are non-combatants, not GAM but NGO people, local politicians, students." [7] For the Acehnese, the tens of thousands of soldiers in the province are not a source of security; they are equivalent to a plague of locusts. The troops are expected to earn their own money, as the government covers only a part of their expenses. Thus, checkpoints have become moneymaking franchises; soldiers shakedown passing truckers, motorists, and motorcyclists. Many journalists have written about this practice since it is carried out so openly. Other fundraising methods are less obvious. It is unknown how much the military receives from the ExxonMobil natural gas plant in Aceh (which was unaffected by the tsunami). ExxonMobil pays the military to guard its enclave and, like all other businesses in Indonesia, must pony up money to meet periodic TNI requests for funds. This plant is a sore point for Acehnese. The Indonesian government earns about $1.2 billion annually from it but the Acehnese people see very little of that money. Most of the profits are pocketed by officials in Jakarta. Jakarta would like to use the tsunami as a means of wiping the slate of history clean. In the Indonesian media, officials frequently comment that they hope the tragedy will prompt Acehnese to put aside their comparatively petty political concerns and cooperate with the Indonesian government in the common struggle against nature. If the military suddenly abandoned its ingrained, institutional ethos of treating all Acehnese as subversives, ended its corruption, and began to selflessly assist in Aceh's recovery, then perhaps Jakarta's hopes will be fulfilled. This tiger, however, is not likely to change its stripes. Reports by Indonesian volunteers and journalists in Aceh indicate that the military has not changed even in the midst of such staggering devastation. Consider the following account written by a wealthy Indonesian woman who flew to Aceh with her mother to carry some medical supplies. Within her narrative (which she wrote in English and circulated on an email list), she describes an encounter with a military checkpoint on December 31 while driving out of the capital city of Banda Aceh. The city was in ruins, but the soldiers still practiced their customary shakedowns at checkpoints: "As we reached the outskirts of the city we were stopped by military with rifles in hand. They initially blocked the way and refused to allow us to continue driving along the coast. They checked all of our boxes and asked us to hand over the goods to them. We knew that if we gave them the goods that they would never be distributed so a friend lobbied until we were able to pass in exchange for some women's underwear that we had brought. We are still puzzled by that one, but it was a small price to pay." When she returned to the city she brought with her several starving villagers who approached a colonel at the military headquarters, the center for the distribution of relief aid: "When one of the villagers explained to him that his village was in desperate need of food aid the colonel started interrogating and giving him a hard time. My mother and I listened on incredulously as he began asking for proof that there were indeed 300 hundred survivors and he said that he had a hard time believing that there were even that many survivors. Again with a friend's persuasion, the villagers were finally able to convince the colonel to give in and allow them to take 50 boxes of supermie [instant noodles] and a few hundred kilos of rice. We couldn't believe our eyes that this man was giving these villagers such a hard time as all around us there were hundreds of boxes of aid in the form of food, chainsaws, generators, pipes, buckets, you name it, piled high against the walls. My mother and I were even offered to help ourselves to a buffet of food that was laid out on two big tables. It dawned on us that the military was controlling all of the incoming domestic and foreign aid and that there had been little done to distribute any of it! Apparently they were expecting the villagers to come to the posko [command post] or refugee camps in Banda Aceh, which was unlikely since a lot of these stranded survivors were just too far away, not to mention some severely wounded, with no means of transport to get themselves there. We also discovered that the military was afraid that the aid would come into the hands of GAM rebels, which seemed to us such a minor problem in the face of such a catastrophe." The Jakarta government took the very positive step of allowing foreign journalists, relief workers, and military personnel into Aceh. Reports indicate that the military is no longer trying to monopolize aid distribution; though they are selling some aid that should be distributed freely, including food. But with foreigners inside Aceh, the military is worried, that the unaccountability it has enjoyed for 19 months may be coming to an end. Journalists are reporting that the military still checks Acehnese for their identity cards. Soldiers try to determine a person's political loyalty before handing out aid. Soldiers are weeding out people at the refugee camps and taking suspected GAM supporters into detention. The military is being stingy with its aid since it wants to ensure that not a grain of rice winds up in the hands of GAM. Any person carrying more than he or she can immediately consume is suspected of carrying goods for GAM. One journalist, reporting on January 7, observed soldiers at a checkpoint 40 kilometers outside of Banda Aceh: "All morning, troops wearing combat kit had been stopping those heading south, accusing them of forming new supply lines for rebels in the hills." [8] Most of the some $4 billion that has been raised worldwide for tsunami relief will likely be devoted to Aceh. The only other country that needs a large amount of aid is Sri Lanka. Both Thailand and India have stated they do not need foreign aid. This means that Indonesia's military in Aceh is now under an international microscope. There is no reason to believe, however, that this will guarantee better behavior. The last time the whole world was watching, in East Timor in 1999, the military laid a country to waste, accomplishing a level of destruction to rival a tsunami. The TNI worried little about international opinion during that September 1999 scorched earth campaign. It burned down 70% of East Timor's buildings, looted much of the country's wealth, killed hundreds, if not thousands, and forcibly deported about 250,000 people -- all while in the international spotlight. The generals responsible for those atrocities have enjoyed impunity; there has been no international tribunal. The general first appointed to head up Indonesia's Aceh relief effort was Adam Damiri, one of the key commanders responsible for the 1999 destruction of East Timor. The military high command replaced him at the last moment to avoid causing any friction with other governments. Although foreigners are now in Aceh, one should not believe that they are immune from eviction. Jakarta allowed in international observers in December 2002 after it signed a peace agreement with GAM. It then sent them packing only five months later when martial law was declared. Morever, the military high command, especially under the army chief of staff Gen. Ryacudu, has cultivated a paranoiac attitude towards foreign governments, arguing that they are fomenting internal unrest in a conspiracy to break up Indonesia.[9] Acehnese attitudes concerning independence will probably not change even with the remarkable outpouring of sympathy from Indonesian civilians, who have volunteered to serve as relief workers and contributed large sums of money. The Acehnese have never had major problems with Indonesian civilians; their problems have been with the military. Only if Indonesian civilians in Java and the rest of the archipelago are able to appreciate what Acehnese suffered prior to the tsunami and work to restrain military operations will there be a possibility for true rapprochement with Acehnese. But substantive military reform appears a distant goal, especially with a former general just voted in as president. It is obvious that immediate relief work and long-term reconstruction can not proceed if Aceh is a warzone. Foreign governments and international agencies need to pressure Jakarta to resume negotiations with GAM so that a cease-fire can be established. Both sides say they would like a cease-fire and that they are only carrying out defensive actions. But both blame the other for not reciprocating. Without negotiations to iron out the details and relieve the atmosphere of tension the armed clashes will continue. Jakarta has been quick to blame GAM for any gunfire (such as a shooting near the UN compound on January 8 which some Indonesian officials now say was done by a stressed-out soldier) or accident (such as the crash of a US navy helicopter that cabinet minister Alwi Shihab suggested was the work of GAM). A journalist has noted that Jakarta wishes to make foreign relief workers frightened of GAM as "gun-toting killers who are attacking aid convoys and using survivor camps as hideouts." [10] GAM, meanwhile, has issued statements assuring relief workers that it will neither attack them nor interfere with the aid distribution. SIRA, the leading popular organization supporting a referendum on the region's political future, has called for international mediation in the war: "A political resolution between Indonesia and GAM must be found immediately at the international negotiating tables and the war must end for the sake of humanitarian aid, peaceful development, and the long-term liberty of the Acehnese people. If a peace process is not immediately conducted then the suffering and oppression of the Acehnese people will be compounded in the aftermath of the tsunami disaster." [11] John Roosa, Assistant Professor of History at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, Canada, is co-editor of The Year that Never Ended: Understanding the Experiences of the Victims of 1965: Oral History Essays (Jakarta: Elsam, 2004). Notes: 1. Agence France Press (AFP), December 25, 2004. 2. AFP, December 17, 2004. 3. Jakarta Post, December 3, 2004. 4. Laporan Akhir Komisi Independen Pengusutan Tindak Kekerasan di Aceh [Final Report of the Independent Investigation Commission on Violent Actions in Aceh] (Jakarta: Komisi Independen Pengusutan, July 2000). The report estimated 1,000 to 3,000 killed plus another 900 to 1,400 disappeared persons presumed dead. Human rights groups estimate that another two to three thousand Acehnese were killed from 1999 to the declaration of martial law in May 2003. Some 1,300 people were killed in 2002 alone. Human Rights Watch, "Indonesia: Human Rights Key to Lasting Peace in Aceh," press release, December 11, 2002. 5. Jakarta Post, December 13, 2004. Gen. Sutarto stated that GAM had 10,000 guerrillas by May 2003. Jakarta Post, January 11, 2005. 6. Inside Indonesia, Oct-Dec 2003. 7. AFP, May 18, 2004. Munir was given a lethal dose of arsenic while on a Garuda flight in early September 2004. Many suspect a military hand but no proof of that has emerged yet. The case is still under investigation. 8. The Australian, January 7, 2004. 9. Detik.com December 25, 2003 ("60,000 foreign agents enter Indonesia to weaken TNI ­ Ryacudu"); Kompas, December 26, 2003 ("Pernyataan KSAD Soal Pemilu dan Agen Asing Perlu Diperhatikan" [The Chief of Staff's statement on the election and foreign agents needs attention]; and Detik.com, May 12, 2004 ("Aggressor States Conspiring to Destroy and Control Indonesia: Army Chief"). 10. Michael Casey, Associated Press (AP), January 10, 2005. Also see the interview with Gen. Sutarto, Jakarta Post, Jakarta Post, January 11, 2005. 11. Open Letter by Sentral Informasi Referendum Acheh, Banda Acheh, January 6, 2005. Weekend Edition Features for November 27 / 28, 2004 Peter Linebaugh Torture & Neo-Liberalism with Sycorax in Iraq Alexander Cockburn What Happened to O'Reilly's Loofa? Fred Gardner Ashcroft v. 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