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Special Investigation:
Have Journalists Been Deliberately Murdered in Iraq by the US Military?

Our new CounterPunch newsletter, just out, Christopher Reed examines the growing body count of journalists in Iraq and documents numerous incidents where US troops have deliberately targeted reporters. Charles Glass offers a stark comparison of the uprooting of Palestians in the Galilee during the 1948 war to the lush compensation of Israelis living on the same land who were displaced by the war on Lebanon. 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

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Today's Stories

December 9 / 10, 2006

Greg Grandin
Jeane Kirkpatrick, Mid-Wife of the Neo-Cons

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

 

Weekend Edition
November 11 / 12, 2006

John Walsh
Rahm's Losers

Barucha Calamity Peller
Oaxaca at Any Cost

Al Krebs
Be Careful What You Wish For

Niall Meehan
Ireland's Freedom Struggle and the Foster School of Historical Falsification

Conn Hallinan
The Ills of War: Shafting the Vets

Patrick Cockburn
"We Worry About Staying Alive, Not the U.S. Elections"

Gary Leupp
Democrats Can Be NeoCons, Too

P. Sainath
India High and Low: the Anatomy of a Tiger

Nikolas Kozloff
The Return of Tom Lantos: Beware Venezuela, Here Come the Democratic Hawks

Lawrence R. Velvel
Throwing Rumsfeld Under the Bus

Fred Gardner
Marijuana, the Anti-Drug

Ralph Nader
Taking on the Boss: Claybrook vs. the Chamber

Ben Terrall / John Miller
East Timor: 15 Years After the Massacre

Mike Whitney
Cheney in a Box

Joshua Frank
Post-Electoral Deliriums

Mukul Dube
The Death Penalty Case of Mohd. Afzal

Jason Hribal
Jesse: Eulogy for a Working Dog

Daniel Wolff
The Unseen Springsteen

Michael Donnelly
Red Rock Blues: the Moab Folk Festival

Lord Montague
A Dissenting Note on the Balfour Declaration of November 2, 1917

Poets' Basement
Davies, Louise, Buknatski and Orloski

 

November 10, 2006

Alexander Cockburn
Lame Duck

Marjorie Cohn
The War Crimes Case Against Rumsfeld

Jorge Mariscal
What Veterans See

Gregory Elich
The Trial of Saddam: Who Will Pass Judgment on the Judges?

Joshua Frank
Blue Dog Group: Bye-Bye Coke, Hello Pepsi

Megan Boler
The Joke is On Us: How "Borat" Lowers the Bar of Political Satire

Ramzy Baroud
The Treacherous Road to Oslo Begins Here

Farzana Versey
An Iraqi in India

Roberto Rodriguez
A Thumpin' or a Whippin'?

Cartoon of the Day
Splat!

 

November 9, 2006

Jennifer Loewenstein
How Gaza Offends Us All

Patrick Cockburn
War of the Snipers

Paul Craig Roberts
Will Democrats Become Part of the Problem?

Manuel Garcia, Jr.
The Roots of Corruption

Mike Whitney
Bush's Chernobyl Economy

Alan Maass
The Repudiation of One-Party Rule

Robert Jensen
Blood on the Tracks: the Elections and the Coming Train Wreck

Nicola Nasser
Saddam's Trial in Context

John Chuckman
As I Lay Dying: Watching the US Elections from Canada

Jamal Juma
Between Resistance and Deception in Palestine

Felice Pace
Can the Klamath be Restored?

Website of the Day
The Robert Gates Files

 

November 8, 2006

Alexander Cockburn / Jeffrey St. Clair
Count Your Blessings: NeoCons and NeoLibs Take Big Hit as Voters Say No to Bush, War and Free Trade

Lawrence E. Walsh
Robert Gates and Iran/Contra: Lies, Cover Ups and Slanted Intelligence

Bruce K. Gagnon
What's Next for the Peace Movement?: Confront the Democrats, Now!

Neve Gordon
Anti-Semitism? Mr. Dershowitz, You Just Don't Like What I Say

Dave Lindorff
Election Post-Mortem: What's Next?

Arthur Neslen
Another Tragic Day in Palestine

Joshua Frank
An Election Hangover: Thank God It's Over

James Goodman
The Corporate Food System is Broken

Charles Sullivan
Voting in the Absence of Choice

David Swanson
Subpoena Envy: The Dems Have the Power, But Will They Use It?

Missy Beattie
The Electorate Speaks and Barney Barks!

Dr. Susan Block
American Voters Say, "Bush Sucks!"

Website of the Day
Stealing Olive Groves from Palestinians

 

November 7, 2006

Michael Neumann
Cut and Run from Iraq: Sooner Rather Than Later

Paul Wolf
Saddam Must Die: A Pre-Ordained Verdict

Nikolas Kozloff
In Nicaragua, a Chavez Wave?

Eliza Ernshire
The Women of Beit Hanoun

William S. Lind
The Smile on Saddam's Face: He's Tan, Rested and Ready

Mike Ferner
Pick a Number: Greater Than 47,615

Felice Pace
Pumping the Klamath Dry

Chris Genovali
The Problem with PBDEs: Why Canada's Proposed Ban Won't Protect People or Wildlife

Gilad Atzmon
Watching Borat

Dick J. Reavis
Going to Class War with the Proletariat We Got ...

Elizabeth Weill-Greenberg
Lives (and Votes) Lost: the Ordeal of Larry Peterson

Website of the Day
Magic Sam: a Sure Cure for the Election Day Blues

Question of the Day
Is Bush Gay?

 

November 6, 2006

Alexander Cockburn
The Message of Campaign 2006

Norman Solomon
Saddam's Unindicted Co-Conspirator: Donald Rumsfeld

Robert Fisk
A Guilty Verdict on America, as Well

Marjorie Cohn
The Banana Election: From Hanging Chads to Hanging Saddam

Paul Craig Roberts
The Goose and the Gander: Is Bush Next?

Nikolas Kozloff
Election Eve Jitters: the Chavez Factor

Newton Garver
The Progress in Bolivia: Morales' Stunning Victory Over Big Oil

Mike Whitney
Bush's Carnival of Blood

Jesse Hagopian
From the Black Panthers to the Green Party: an Interview with Aaron Dixon

Dr. Peter Rost, MD
The Genocide Election: When a Life Saving Industry Cheats, People Die

Website of the Day
Robert Pollin vs. Rick Wolff: Is Pomo Marxism Marxism?

 

November 4 / 5, 2006

Dave Zirin
Political Players: Where Athletes Give Their Money

Patrick Cockburn
When Does Incompetence Become a Crime?

Sanho Tree
War Timing and Opportunism

Ralph Nader
Failure Across All Fronts

Lee Sustar
The Obama Myth

Dr. Shepherd Bliss
Torture Memories

Adam Elkus
Babies and Banks: Celebrity Colonialism in Africa

Seth Sandronsky
Is Another Recession Looming?

Fred Gardner
10 Years of Medical Pot in California: Dr. Mikuriya's Observations

Joshua Sperber
How the US Lost Latin America

Evelyn Pringle
Ohio Redux: Mr. Blackwell and the Henhouse

Mitchel Cohen
The Left and the Environment: Notes on the Ecological Dimension

Missy Beattie
The Medium is the Massage

Michael Dickinson
Watching the Guards: a Prison Diary

John Holt
The Silk Road to Ruin

Dr. Susan Block
The Beastly Bombing

Poets' Basement
LaMorticella, Engel, Orloski and Davies


November 3, 2006

Laura Carlsen
Day of the Dead in Oaxaca

Stephan Said
Honoring Bradley Will

John Stauber
"Victory in Iraq:" The PR Machine Behind Bush's Favorite Slogan

Mike Whitney
Baghdad is Surrounded

Joshua Frank
DNC Deja Vu

Victoria Furio
More Than Timetables

Tammara~85,441
They Say He is Coming Home

Stuart Croswaithe
Beatings and Sugar Plums: New Labor's War on the Kurds

Missy Beattie
Bush Shock

Website of the Day
Howlin' Wolf


November 2, 2006

Winslow T. Wheeler
The US Body Count in Iraq: an Analysis of Who is Dying and How

Paul Craig Roberts
Evil is as Evil Does

Dave Lindorff
Kerry Out: the Joke's Still on Us

Uri Avnery
The Lovable Man? Lieberman and the Decline of Israeli Democracy

Jeff Birkenstein
Smearing Harold Ford in Black Face

John Ross
Slave Labor in Private Prisons

Zoltan Grossman
Recharging the Anti-War Movement

Eveyln Pringle
The SEC's Probe of Halliburton: Is Cheney Being Fitted for a Striped Jumpsuit?

Christopher Brauchli
Drug Profits and PACs: Why Big Pharma Pushes the GOP

 

November 1, 2006

Alan Dershowitz v. Bruce Jackson
On Torture

Brian Tokar
Running on Hype: the Real Scoop on Biofuels

Fred Leonhardt
Democrats, Sex Crimes and the Press: the Goldschmidt Affair

Richard W. Behan
Triumph of the Petropublicans: Bush's Other Civil War

Brenda Norrell
Indigenous Opposition to the Border Wall

Charles Sullivan
Spoils of Corruption: Who Will Stand Up When America Goes Wrong?

Ron Jacobs
Hell is Rising in Oaxaca: interview with a Oaxacan Rebel

Mike Knapp
Green Stench in Minnesota: the Commissioner and the Hog Lot

Moshe Adler
The Temptations of a Union Boss: the Case of Brian McLaughlin

Walden Bello
Chain Gang Economics

Lee Ballinger
The Collapse of Hip Capitalism: How Tower Records Committed Suicide

Joshua Frank
Party in a Cage: Snake Oil and the Midterm Elections

Carl Gelderloos
Cheerleading the Massacre in Oaxaca: an Open Letter to the Washington Post

Peter Rost, MD
Panic in Big Pharma

Saul Landau
Bush's Anti-Terrorism Record: Don't Look Too Close

Website of the Day
The Meatrix


 

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December 9 / 10, 2006

Say "Mission Accomplished" and Go Home

Recommendation No. 80

By JOHN V. WHITBECK

While almost the entire world other than President George W. Bush now views the American invasion and occupation of Iraq as a catastrophic failure, there is one notable exception.

During a visit to Washington last month, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, while affirming his categorical support for Mr. Bush's Iraq war policy and his confrontational strategy toward Iran, said, according to Ha'aretz (Nov. 14), that "the Iraq war had a dramatic positive effect on security and stability in the Middle East as well as strategic importance from Israel's perspective." (Ominously for the future, Mr. Olmert added with respect to his meeting with Mr. Bush, "Iran's role in the conversation was quite clear, very serious and very significant, and I left the meeting with an outstanding feeling.")

No one should be surprised by "Israel's perspective". In their now famous "Clean Break" policy paper, written in 1996 for incoming Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, the Israel-First neocons who were to be the principal advocates and masterminds of Mr. Bush's Iraq war cited the destruction of Iraq as a major Israeli strategic objective. In its geostrategic position, Israel would understandably view as undesirable the existence in its region of any Arab or Muslim state which was strong and independent, rather than intimidated by and subservient to Israel/America. From an Israeli security perspective, it would clearly be highly desirable for any such state to be neutered (like Egypt) and, if possible, fragmented into mutually hostile pieces.

Even before the invasion, it was widely understood that the principal motivation for the invasion was not oil -- there is no evidence of behind-the-scenes agitation or pressure from international oil companies in favor of war -- but, rather, Israel. In pre-war polls, Israel was the only country in the world (other than the United States) where a majority of the population favored the war.

Iraq has now been effectively destroyed and may be fragmenting into pieces. It is therefore no wonder that Mr. Olmert should be delighted with how the war has turned out and should wish to confirm publicly how "thankful" Israel is to the United States and Mr. Bush. His wisdom and good taste in doing so on American soil when most Americans are less delighted with how the war has turned out might be questioned. However, his genuine appreciation for what the United States has accomplished for Israel's benefit may suggest a better "way forward" than the 79 recommendations of the Baker-Hamilton Iraq Study Group.

Imagine this Recommendation No. 80: The President should explain honestly what the principal objective in invading Iraq really was, point out that, in terms of this objective, the political, economic and social collapse and chaos which the war and occupation have achieved in Iraq already constitute an outstanding "success", unfurl a huge "MISSION ACCOMPLISHED" banner on the White House and bring the troops home in triumph as rapidly as the necessary transport can be arranged.

This recommendation might well appeal to Mr. Bush, since it would offer him the only realistic chance to claim "success" before he leaves office -- presumably preferable in his eyes to his apparent current strategy of stalling (at enormous human cost to others) for the next two years so as to leave the recognition of (and, he must hope, blame for) "failure" or "defeat" to his successor. He could also be confident that no one in either American political party or in the American mainstream media would criticize him for having lied to the American people and the world as to his true motivation for invading Iraq if he made clear that he did so for the benefit of Israel.

The only potential drawback if this recommendation were to be implemented would be that it would free up the American military to give Mr. Olmert another "outstanding feeling" by attacking for Israel's benefit one or more other states on Israel's hit list, starting with Iran and Syria. Perhaps, next time, the American military, who don't have to stand for election and can therefore afford to put America first, will "just say no".

John V. Whitbeck, an international lawyer, is author of "The World According to Whitbeck". He can be reached at: jvwhitbeck@awalnet.net.sa


 

 

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