by BAR executive editor Glen Ford
Things fall apart; some things, like an ill-tied shoelace, sooner than others. Barack Obama's strategy to win the White House was to run a "race-neutral" campaign in a society that is anything but neutral on race. The very premise - that race neutrality is possible in a nation built on white supremacy - demanded the systematic practice of the most profound race-factual denial, which is ultimately indistinguishable from rank dishonesty. From the moment Obama told the 2004 Democratic National Convention that "there is no white America, there is no Black America," it was inevitable that the candidate would one day declare the vast body of Black opinion illegitimate.
That day came on Tuesday, April 29, when a battered and (truly) bitter Barack Obama made his final, irrevocable break with his former pastor, Rev. Jeremiah Wright, whose televised Black Liberation Theology tour de force the preceding Friday, Sunday and Monday had laid bare the contradictions of Obama's hopeless racial "neutrality." It was the masterful preacher and seasoned political creature Wright - not the racists who had endlessly looped chopped snippets of the reverend's past sermons together in an attempt to make him appear crazed - who forced Obama to choose in the push and pull of Black and white American worldviews. Obama was made to register his preference for the white racist version of truth over Rev. Wright's, whose rejection of Euro-American mythology reflects prevailing African American perceptions, past and present.
Obama was less than eloquent. "All it was is a bunch of rants that aren't grounded in truth," said Sen. Obama, low-rating Rev. Wright's remarks at the National Press Club, in Washington, the morning before. Rev. Wright had become a "caricature" of himself, said the wounded candidate - another way of calling the minister a clown.
Under questioning from reporters in Winston Salem, North Carolina, Obama swore up and down that he had never before, in 16 years as a member of Wright's Trinity United Church of Christ congregation, observed his pastor behave in such a way. The declaration rang patently false, as even a red-state Republican white evangelical observer would have recognized Wright's Press Club performance as that of veteran pulpit-master with a vast repertoire of church-pleasing moves and grooves to draw upon, all of them honed over decades for the entertainment of his parishioners - including Obama. But the senator was intent on giving the impression that Rev. Wright was - unbeknownst to Obama - a Jekyll and Hyde character, whose statements "were not only divisive and destructive, but I believe that they end up giving comfort to those who prey on hate."
An amazingly Bush-like turn of phrase! The man who married Barack and Michelle and baptized their children is now rhetorically linked to Osama bin Laden or the Ku Klux Klan.
Clearly, this is what panic looks and sounds like when Obama's flimsy tissues of "race neutrality" are stripped away. He berates Rev. Wright and other Black voices for self-centeredness in failing to strike a balance between African American grievances and whatever ails white people. "When you start focusing so much on the historically oppressed," said Obama, "we lose sight of the plight of others." Obama is desperate to convince these "others" that he rejects anything that smacks of an Afro-centric worldview, as represented by Rev. Wright. "What became clear to me was that he was presenting a world view that contradicts what I am and what I stand for."
Rev. Wright succeeded in drawing a line in the sand, whether that was his intention or not, daring Obama to take his stand on one side or the other. Race "neutrality" - an impossibility in the actually existing United States - went out the window as Obama in extremis positioned himself at the political/historical fault line alongside the defenders of the Alamo and American Manifest Destiny. As dictated by the logic of power, Obama furiously maneuvered toward "white space," shamelessly taking cover in a kind of populist white patriotism that has always branded Black grievances as selfish, even dangerous distractions from the larger national mission. Rev. Wright's "rantings" amounted to "a complete disregard for what the American people are going through," said Obama. "What mattered to him was him commanding center stage."
Obama had belabored the same theme in his Philadelphia speech on race, a few weeks earlier - a widely applauded piece of oratory that was at root an exercise in moral equivalence that equated white and Black grievances in the U.S., as if history and gross power discrepancies did not exist. Obama is as quick as any smug corporate commentator to dismiss as the ravings of extremists and those who "prey on hate" the very idea that U.S. imperialism is an historical and current fact. Chickens cannot possibly come home to roost in terroristic revenge as a response to American crimes against humanity, since "good" nations by definition are incapable of such crimes. It is beyond the pale to contemplate that the United States has Dr. Deaths on its covert payrolls dealing in ghastly biological warfare - the AIDS genesis theory.
In order for his race-neutral strategy to appear sane, Obama must constantly paint a picture of an America that does not exist. This cannot be accomplished without mangling the truth, assaulting the truth-tellers, and misrepresenting America's past and present.
Since Obama's candidacy is predicated on minimizing the pervasiveness of racism in American life, it is necessary that he cast doubt on the legitimacy of those with race-based grievances. Otherwise, he would be morally compelled to abandon his neutrality and side with the oppressed minority. Thus, he announces in Selma, Alabama that Blacks "have already come 90 percent of the way" to equality - a non-truth by virtually any measurement. He says the "incompetence was color-blind" in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, thereby deracializing all that occurred in New Orleans from the moment the winds died down to this very second. He claims that 1980s Ronald Reagan voters had understandable grievances due to "the excesses of the 1960s and 1970s," in the process cleansing the Reagan victory of any racist content.
Race neutrality requires that Barack Obama become a cleanup boy for racists, historically and in the present day. At the same time, Obama is driven to loath most those people and facts that might lead to divisiveness.America's worst enemies are not the racists, but those who point out the facts of racism, as Obama explained in mid-March in Philadelphia:
Race neutrality requires that Barack Obama become a cleanup boy for racists, historically and in the present day. At the same time, Obama is driven to loath most those people and facts that might lead to divisiveness.America's worst enemies are not the racists, but those who point out the facts of racism, as Obama explained in mid-March in Philadelphia: "Reverend Wright's comments were not only wrong but divisive, divisive at a time when we need unity; racially charged at a time when we need to come together to solve a set of monumental problems - two wars, a terrorist threat, a falling economy, a chronic health care crisis and potentially devastating climate change; problems that are neither black or white or Latino or Asian, but rather problems that confront us all."
Rev. Wright and his ilk, by this reasoning, are Public Enemy Number One, standing in the way of the racial harmony that is the natural order of things in Obama's mythical America.
Ironically, in practice, race-neutrality also requires that Obama disarm himself in the face of racist attacks. "If I lose," he told reporters with a straight face, "it would not be because of race. It would be because of mistakes I made along the campaign trail."
Perhaps it is fitting that, having absolved American racists of all manner of crimes against others, Obama also holds them blameless for their assaults on himself. That's his prerogative, as long as he's the only one being assaulted. But Obama was also dogged over the long weekend by the ghost of Sean Bell, whose death in a 50-shot New York City police fusillade was held blameless by a white judge. Many African Americans anxiously awaited Obama's reaction to the three police officers' acquittals on all charges. "We're a nation of laws, so we respect the verdict that came down," said Obama, when asked about the case by reporters in Indiana. "Resorting to violence to express displeasure over a verdict is something that is completely unacceptable and is counterproductive." That was it.
Hillary Clinton, aware that the Sean Bell verdict was an outrage to Black America, issued a prepared statement:
"This tragedy has deeply saddened New Yorkers - and all Americans. My thoughts are with Nicole and her children and the rest of Sean's family during this difficult time. The court has given its verdict, and now we await the conclusion of a Department of Justice civil rights investigation. We must also embrace this opportunity to take steps - in our communities, in our law enforcement agencies, and in our government - to make sure this does not happen again."
It is difficult not to conclude that Obama distanced himself from the facts of the acquittal - except to counsel against violence and urge folks to "respect" the verdict, whatever that means - while Clinton had the sense to prepare a statement that sounded sensitive to Black anger and on top of developments in the story. The Sean Bell police and judicial atrocity revealed with horrific clarity that Black life continues to be systematically devalued by police in the United States, even when the officers involved are of African descent, as were two of the three shooters in the Bell case. The New York verdict shows that Black lives are devalued by all actors in American society, including Black actors: the essence of institutional racism.
Institutional racism is alien to Barack Obama's version of the nation, a fantasy place where racial oppression has never been so endemic to the political culture as to overshadow the "promise" of America. In Obama's public vision, his Democratic caucus victory in 98 percent white Iowa, which began the cascade of Obama wins, proves that the U.S. is ready for profound racial "change." Left unnoted is the fact that Iowa incarcerates African Americans at 13 times the frequency that it locks up whites, the worst record in the nation.
For people like Rev. Jeremiah Wright, mass Black incarceration and slavery are seamlessly linked, part of the continuity of racial oppression in the U.S. Most African Americans see the world the way Rev. Wright does - that's why he's among the top five rated preacher-speakers in Black America. This Black American world view, excruciatingly aware of the nation's origins in genocide and slavery, is wholly incompatible with the American mythology championed by Barack Obama. When the two meet, they are mutually repellant.
The relationship between Rev. Wright and Sen. Obama has undergone "great damage," says Obama, understatedly. But the break was inevitable and is no tragedy, because it reveals the incompatibility of Obama's adapted world view with the body of knowledge amassed by African Americans since before the landing of the Mayflower. The truth is always a revelation.
BAR executive editor Glen Ford can be contacted at Glen. Ford@BlackAgendaReport. com.
Wednesday, April 30, 2008
Friday, April 25, 2008
NY Pigs Get Away With Murder - Sean Bell Case
Now it is justified if dudes up in NYC ride on the cops. The system ran its course and it has failed us once again. No one held responsible, they all get off scott free. There is nothing to stop the police from doing this over and over again. Fuck that, it's time for us to ride. The police have made up their minds that they're going to do to us whatever they want whenever they want. And with no accountability for killing our brother in cold blood on his wedding day, it's time for us to start fighting back. If we can't get justice in the courts, then we take justice in the streets. Fuck the police, kill them all!!! What the hell will it take for us to see that we must completely separate from our open enemy?
NYPD officers acquitted in groom slaying Sean Bell, 23, killed in hail of 50 bullets on night of his bachelor party
BREAKING NEWS
The Associated Press
updated 9:23 a.m. ET, Fri., April.25, 2008
NEW YORK - Three NYPD detectives were acquitted Friday of all counts in the 50-shot killing of an unarmed man on his wedding day.
Michael Oliver, Gescard Isnora and Marc Cooper were charged with manslaughter, reckless endangerment and assault in the 2006 slaying of Sean Bell.
Justice Arthur Cooperman delivered the verdict in a Queens courtroom packed with spectators, including the victim's fiance and parents. The ruling brings an end to a nearly two-month trial.
Bell, 23, was killed and two friends were seriously wounded early on the morning of Nov. 25, 2006 — Bell's wedding day. The shooting sparked protests and raised questions about police firepower and undercover tactics.
During the trial, defense attorneys painted the victims as drunken thugs who the officers believed were armed and dangerous. Prosecutors sought to convince the judge that the victims had been minding their own business and that the officers were inept, trigger-happy aggressors.
"This F-Troop of a unit caused the death of an innocent man and caused the injury of two others," prosecutor Charles Testagrossa said, referring to the classic TV sitcom. "This was a slipshod operation, with no real planning.
"Community support Bell's fiancee, parents and their supporters, including the Rev. Al Sharpton and other activists, have demanded that the officers be held accountable. Sharpton said he has sought to temper outrage over the shooting of three unarmed black men and let the trial take its course. Two of the three officers are black.
"We gave the city an opportunity to show that we would be a new city of fairness," he told reporters at City Hall earlier this week.
The defendants, who were investigating reports of prostitution at the Kalua Cabaret, say they became alarmed when they heard Bell and his friends trade insults around the 4 a.m. closing time with another patron who appeared to be armed. In grand jury testimony, Isnora claimed that he overheard one of Bell's companions, Joseph Guzman, say, "Yo, go get my gun.
"Isnora responded by trailing Bell, Guzman and Trent Benefield to Bell's car. He insisted that he ordered the men to halt and that he and other officers began shooting only after Bell bumped him with his car and slammed into an unmarked police van while trying to flee.
Guzman and Benefield both played down the dispute outside the club. They also testified that they were unaware police were watching them and that the gunfire erupted without warning.
Copyright 2008 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
URL: http://www.msplinks.com/MDFodHRwOi8vd3d3Lm1zbmJjLm1zbi5jb20vaWQvMjQzMDU2NjAv
NYPD officers acquitted in groom slaying Sean Bell, 23, killed in hail of 50 bullets on night of his bachelor party
BREAKING NEWS
The Associated Press
updated 9:23 a.m. ET, Fri., April.25, 2008
NEW YORK - Three NYPD detectives were acquitted Friday of all counts in the 50-shot killing of an unarmed man on his wedding day.
Michael Oliver, Gescard Isnora and Marc Cooper were charged with manslaughter, reckless endangerment and assault in the 2006 slaying of Sean Bell.
Justice Arthur Cooperman delivered the verdict in a Queens courtroom packed with spectators, including the victim's fiance and parents. The ruling brings an end to a nearly two-month trial.
Bell, 23, was killed and two friends were seriously wounded early on the morning of Nov. 25, 2006 — Bell's wedding day. The shooting sparked protests and raised questions about police firepower and undercover tactics.
During the trial, defense attorneys painted the victims as drunken thugs who the officers believed were armed and dangerous. Prosecutors sought to convince the judge that the victims had been minding their own business and that the officers were inept, trigger-happy aggressors.
"This F-Troop of a unit caused the death of an innocent man and caused the injury of two others," prosecutor Charles Testagrossa said, referring to the classic TV sitcom. "This was a slipshod operation, with no real planning.
"Community support Bell's fiancee, parents and their supporters, including the Rev. Al Sharpton and other activists, have demanded that the officers be held accountable. Sharpton said he has sought to temper outrage over the shooting of three unarmed black men and let the trial take its course. Two of the three officers are black.
"We gave the city an opportunity to show that we would be a new city of fairness," he told reporters at City Hall earlier this week.
The defendants, who were investigating reports of prostitution at the Kalua Cabaret, say they became alarmed when they heard Bell and his friends trade insults around the 4 a.m. closing time with another patron who appeared to be armed. In grand jury testimony, Isnora claimed that he overheard one of Bell's companions, Joseph Guzman, say, "Yo, go get my gun.
"Isnora responded by trailing Bell, Guzman and Trent Benefield to Bell's car. He insisted that he ordered the men to halt and that he and other officers began shooting only after Bell bumped him with his car and slammed into an unmarked police van while trying to flee.
Guzman and Benefield both played down the dispute outside the club. They also testified that they were unaware police were watching them and that the gunfire erupted without warning.
Copyright 2008 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
URL: http://www.msplinks.com/MDFodHRwOi8vd3d3Lm1zbmJjLm1zbi5jb20vaWQvMjQzMDU2NjAv
Thursday, April 17, 2008
Feds to collect DNA from every person they arrest
By EILEEN SULLIVAN, Associated Press Writer
Wed Apr 16, 7:39 PM ET
WASHINGTON - The government plans to begin collecting DNA samples from anyone arrested by a federal law enforcement agency — a move intended to prevent violent crime but which also is raising concerns about the privacy of innocent people.
Using authority granted by Congress, the government also plans to collect DNA samples from foreigners who are detained, whether they have been charged or not. The DNA would be collected through a cheek swab, Justice Department spokesman Erik Ablin said Wednesday.
That would be a departure from current practice, which limits DNA collection to convicted felons.
Expanding the DNA database, known as CODIS, raises civil liberties questions about the potential for misuse of such personal information, such as family ties and genetic conditions.
Ablin said the DNA collection would be subject to the same privacy laws applied to current DNA sampling. That means none of it would be used for identifying genetic traits, diseases or disorders.
Congress gave the Justice Department the authority to expand DNA collection in two different laws passed in 2005 and 2006.
There are dozens of federal law enforcement agencies, ranging from the FBI to the Library of Congress Police. The federal government estimates it makes about 140,000 arrests each year.
Justice officials estimate the new collecting requirements would add DNA from an additional 1.2 million people to the database each year.
Those who support the expanded collection believe that DNA sampling could get violent criminals off the streets and prevent them from committing more crimes.
A Chicago study in 2005 found that 53 murders and rapes could have been prevented if a DNA sample had been collected upon arrest.
"Many innocent lives could have been saved had the government began this kind of DNA sampling in the 1990s when the technology to do so first became available," Sen. Jon Kyl, R-Ariz., said. Kyl sponsored the 2005 law that gave the Justice Department this authority.
Thirteen states have similar laws: Alaska, Arizona, California, Kansas, Louisiana, Maryland, Minnesota, New Mexico, North Dakota, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas and Virginia.
The new regulation would mean that the federal government could store DNA samples of people who are not guilty of any crime, said Jesselyn McCurdy, legislative counsel for the American Civil Liberties Union.
"Now innocent people's DNA will be put into this huge CODIS database, and it will be very difficult for them to get it out if they are not charged or convicted of a crime," McCurdy said.
If a person is arrested but not convicted, he or she can ask the Justice Department to destroy the sample.
The Homeland Security Department — the federal agency charged with policing immigration — supports the new rule.
"DNA is a proven law-enforcement tool," DHS spokesman Russ Knocke said.
The rule would not allow for DNA samples to be collected from immigrants who are legally in the United States or those being processed for admission, unless the person was arrested.
The proposed rule is being published in the Federal Register. That will be followed by a 30-day comment period.
___
On the Net:
State Laws on DNA Data Banks:
http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/ap/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/storytext/dna_collection/27125545/SIG=11i8coc1h/*http://www.ncsl.org/programs/cj/dnadatabanks.htm
http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/ap/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/storytext/dna_collection/27125545/SIG=126l78lob/*http://www.dnaresource.com/documents/2008DNAExpansionLegislation.pdf
Wed Apr 16, 7:39 PM ET
WASHINGTON - The government plans to begin collecting DNA samples from anyone arrested by a federal law enforcement agency — a move intended to prevent violent crime but which also is raising concerns about the privacy of innocent people.
Using authority granted by Congress, the government also plans to collect DNA samples from foreigners who are detained, whether they have been charged or not. The DNA would be collected through a cheek swab, Justice Department spokesman Erik Ablin said Wednesday.
That would be a departure from current practice, which limits DNA collection to convicted felons.
Expanding the DNA database, known as CODIS, raises civil liberties questions about the potential for misuse of such personal information, such as family ties and genetic conditions.
Ablin said the DNA collection would be subject to the same privacy laws applied to current DNA sampling. That means none of it would be used for identifying genetic traits, diseases or disorders.
Congress gave the Justice Department the authority to expand DNA collection in two different laws passed in 2005 and 2006.
There are dozens of federal law enforcement agencies, ranging from the FBI to the Library of Congress Police. The federal government estimates it makes about 140,000 arrests each year.
Justice officials estimate the new collecting requirements would add DNA from an additional 1.2 million people to the database each year.
Those who support the expanded collection believe that DNA sampling could get violent criminals off the streets and prevent them from committing more crimes.
A Chicago study in 2005 found that 53 murders and rapes could have been prevented if a DNA sample had been collected upon arrest.
"Many innocent lives could have been saved had the government began this kind of DNA sampling in the 1990s when the technology to do so first became available," Sen. Jon Kyl, R-Ariz., said. Kyl sponsored the 2005 law that gave the Justice Department this authority.
Thirteen states have similar laws: Alaska, Arizona, California, Kansas, Louisiana, Maryland, Minnesota, New Mexico, North Dakota, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas and Virginia.
The new regulation would mean that the federal government could store DNA samples of people who are not guilty of any crime, said Jesselyn McCurdy, legislative counsel for the American Civil Liberties Union.
"Now innocent people's DNA will be put into this huge CODIS database, and it will be very difficult for them to get it out if they are not charged or convicted of a crime," McCurdy said.
If a person is arrested but not convicted, he or she can ask the Justice Department to destroy the sample.
The Homeland Security Department — the federal agency charged with policing immigration — supports the new rule.
"DNA is a proven law-enforcement tool," DHS spokesman Russ Knocke said.
The rule would not allow for DNA samples to be collected from immigrants who are legally in the United States or those being processed for admission, unless the person was arrested.
The proposed rule is being published in the Federal Register. That will be followed by a 30-day comment period.
___
On the Net:
State Laws on DNA Data Banks:
http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/ap/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/storytext/dna_collection/27125545/SIG=11i8coc1h/*http://www.ncsl.org/programs/cj/dnadatabanks.htm
http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/ap/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/storytext/dna_collection/27125545/SIG=126l78lob/*http://www.dnaresource.com/documents/2008DNAExpansionLegislation.pdf
Monday, April 14, 2008
Gas prices could pass $3.50 in weeks
By JOHN WILEN, AP Business Writer
14 minutes ago
Gas prices fluctuated over the weekend but appear poised to resume their seemingly relentless trek toward a record high milestone of $3.50 a gallon. Forecasts call for gas to peak as high as $3.65 within a month.
Oil prices, meanwhile, rose to within a dollar of last week's record of $112.21 a barrel as the dollar fell and oil supplies were disrupted in the U.S. and overseas.
At the pump, the national average price of a gallon of gas edged lower overnight to $3.373 a gallon, 0.1 cent shy of a new record set Sunday, according to a survey of stations by AAA and the Oil Price Information Service. Still, prices are 0.8 cent higher than Friday, and almost 53 cents higher than a year ago.
The Energy Department recently predicted gas prices could average as much as $3.60 a month this summer, and said the daily national average could rise as high as $4 a times. Prices are already over $4 in some parts of the country.
But a growing number of analysts don't believe the national average will rise that high unless something unanticipated occurs.
"I don't think so, unless there is some sort of outage or refinery event," said Fred Rozell, retail pricing director at the Oil Price Information Service.
Indeed, barring such an event, prices could fall back to $3 a gallon, or lower, by late summer, said Jim Ritterbusch, president of Ritterbusch and Associates, an energy consultancy in Galena, Ill.
"Take your vacation late this year," said Ritterbusch, who believes prices will dip to those lows in July or August.
Still, unexpected refinery outages have forced pump price spikes in the past. Last spring, a string of unanticipated refinery outages caused gas prices to peak at record levels in May. Prices then mostly fell until late in the year, when they began to track crude oil higher.
Prices normally rise in the spring as suppliers stock up in advance of peak summer driving season, and as refiners switch over from making winter grade gasoline to the more expensive, but less polluting, summer version of the fuel. As they perform this switch, refiners try to sell off all of their winter grade fuel, driving overall supplies down.
This year, refiners are also facing short supplies of alkylate, a key ingredient in summer grade fuel. And gas prices are also following oil prices, which are near record levels. Light, sweet crude for May delivery rose $1.13 to $111.27 a barrel Monday as the dollar weakened. Many investors regard commodities such as oil as a hedge against a weak dollar and inflation. Also, a weaker dollar makes oil cheaper to investors overseas.
Oil prices also rose on word of supply disruptions, including the weekend closure of a 1.2 million barrel a day Royal Dutch Shell PLC pipeline in the Midwest due to a leak. The pipeline has since reopened and is operating at reduced capacity. In Nigeria, Italian energy giant ENI said sabotage has cut crude production from one of its facilities by about 5,000 barrels a day.
Still, analysts believe the weak dollar is the main reason oil prices have risen to record levels this year, and have held above $100 for more than a month. Ritterbusch said prices could rise a few dollars higher than last week's record, but expects that moves by world governments to support the dollar will send oil prices lower later in the year.
The Group of Seven industrialized nations raised concerns about the dollar's fall in a statement on Friday, a warning some analysts see as a sign the G7 may be contemplating an intervention that could lessen crude's attraction as an inflation hedge and send it lower.
"That should provide some relief at the pump," Ritterbusch said.
In other Nymex trading Monday, May gasoline futures rose 1.67 cents to $2.824 a gallon, and May heating oil futures rose 0.97 cent to $3.2072 a gallon. May natural gas futures rose 7.9 cents to $9.98 per 1,000 cubic feet.
In London, May Brent crude rose 81 cents to $109.56 a barrel on the ICE Futures exchange.
___
Associated Press Writers Pablo Gorondi in Budapest and Gillian Wong in Singapore contributed to this report.
14 minutes ago
Gas prices fluctuated over the weekend but appear poised to resume their seemingly relentless trek toward a record high milestone of $3.50 a gallon. Forecasts call for gas to peak as high as $3.65 within a month.
Oil prices, meanwhile, rose to within a dollar of last week's record of $112.21 a barrel as the dollar fell and oil supplies were disrupted in the U.S. and overseas.
At the pump, the national average price of a gallon of gas edged lower overnight to $3.373 a gallon, 0.1 cent shy of a new record set Sunday, according to a survey of stations by AAA and the Oil Price Information Service. Still, prices are 0.8 cent higher than Friday, and almost 53 cents higher than a year ago.
The Energy Department recently predicted gas prices could average as much as $3.60 a month this summer, and said the daily national average could rise as high as $4 a times. Prices are already over $4 in some parts of the country.
But a growing number of analysts don't believe the national average will rise that high unless something unanticipated occurs.
"I don't think so, unless there is some sort of outage or refinery event," said Fred Rozell, retail pricing director at the Oil Price Information Service.
Indeed, barring such an event, prices could fall back to $3 a gallon, or lower, by late summer, said Jim Ritterbusch, president of Ritterbusch and Associates, an energy consultancy in Galena, Ill.
"Take your vacation late this year," said Ritterbusch, who believes prices will dip to those lows in July or August.
Still, unexpected refinery outages have forced pump price spikes in the past. Last spring, a string of unanticipated refinery outages caused gas prices to peak at record levels in May. Prices then mostly fell until late in the year, when they began to track crude oil higher.
Prices normally rise in the spring as suppliers stock up in advance of peak summer driving season, and as refiners switch over from making winter grade gasoline to the more expensive, but less polluting, summer version of the fuel. As they perform this switch, refiners try to sell off all of their winter grade fuel, driving overall supplies down.
This year, refiners are also facing short supplies of alkylate, a key ingredient in summer grade fuel. And gas prices are also following oil prices, which are near record levels. Light, sweet crude for May delivery rose $1.13 to $111.27 a barrel Monday as the dollar weakened. Many investors regard commodities such as oil as a hedge against a weak dollar and inflation. Also, a weaker dollar makes oil cheaper to investors overseas.
Oil prices also rose on word of supply disruptions, including the weekend closure of a 1.2 million barrel a day Royal Dutch Shell PLC pipeline in the Midwest due to a leak. The pipeline has since reopened and is operating at reduced capacity. In Nigeria, Italian energy giant ENI said sabotage has cut crude production from one of its facilities by about 5,000 barrels a day.
Still, analysts believe the weak dollar is the main reason oil prices have risen to record levels this year, and have held above $100 for more than a month. Ritterbusch said prices could rise a few dollars higher than last week's record, but expects that moves by world governments to support the dollar will send oil prices lower later in the year.
The Group of Seven industrialized nations raised concerns about the dollar's fall in a statement on Friday, a warning some analysts see as a sign the G7 may be contemplating an intervention that could lessen crude's attraction as an inflation hedge and send it lower.
"That should provide some relief at the pump," Ritterbusch said.
In other Nymex trading Monday, May gasoline futures rose 1.67 cents to $2.824 a gallon, and May heating oil futures rose 0.97 cent to $3.2072 a gallon. May natural gas futures rose 7.9 cents to $9.98 per 1,000 cubic feet.
In London, May Brent crude rose 81 cents to $109.56 a barrel on the ICE Futures exchange.
___
Associated Press Writers Pablo Gorondi in Budapest and Gillian Wong in Singapore contributed to this report.
Tuesday, April 08, 2008
Law-Makers = Law-Breakers (The Spitzer Drama) by Mumia Abu-Jamal
[col. writ. 3/11/08]
(c) '08 Mumia Abu-Jamal
The rise and imminent fall of New York's Governor, Eliot Spitzer has all the drama and pathos of a TV movie.
If it weren't true, it could hardly be believed.
Spitzer, the Dick Tracy of the prosecutorial set (with his squinting blue eyes, and square jaw), has joined the peculiarly American photo op of the fallen politician, with his doleful wife dutifully standing beside him, a look in her eyes like a deer in headlights.
It is rare to see such a spectacle in Asia, Africa or Europe, where there is a certain maturity about affairs of the heart (or the loins).
But this is the U.S., not France.
While the Spitzer affair is but the latest in what seems like a seasonal event, it is different from those that came before because of the nature of the man, who built his political career on being the ruthless prosecutor, the 'clean up man' of the filthy political culture of the Empire state. It is indeed, more than the obvious: hypocrisy run wild. It is a classic case of a man 'hoisted by his own petard' (or destroyed by his own weapon).
For, inasmuch as the former state Attorney General won a trip to the Governor's Mansion in Albany because of his relentless attacks on Wall Street brokers, he also had an appetite for the doings of prostitution rings, one of which led to his own front door.
According to published and broadcast reports, Spitzer paid nearly $80,000 for his trysts with high-end call girls.
And while this still seems a peculiar American fascination and revulsion with sex, the particulars of his money-changing to secure these services suggests that he has violated federal criminal statutes -- some that have been on the books for nearly a century.
At issue is the infamous Mann Act -- a law known (particularly in the African-American community) because of its usage against the great Black boxing champ, Jack Johnson (1878-1946). The law is perhaps best known as the 'White Slavery' law, for it has been used to prosecute men charged with trafficking in the sexual services of white women.
The Mann Act, as defined by the prestigious Black's Law Dictionary, is as follows:
Federal statute (White Slave Traffic Act, 18 U.S.CA § 2421) making it a crime to transport a woman or girl in interstate or foreign commerce for the purpose of prostitution or debauchery, or for any other immoral purpose. {Black L. Dict.., 5th ed., (West Publ., 1979), p.869.}
Yet, if news reports are correct( that he essentially hired young women to cross state lines for 'immoral' purposes), it is doubtful that this high-ranking political figure will face a jail cell. For him, it might suffice to surrender his lofty office, while his loyal acolytes will fill op-ed pages with furtive prose that the public figure "has suffered enough."
In the legendary life of the first Black heavyweight boxing champ, Jack Johnson, this internationally renowned pugilist was charged, tried, convicted and sentenced for violating the Mann Act, for driving 2 white women across state lines to accompany him as he plied his trade. The government didn't claim that either of these women were prostitutes.
They were his wives! They were Etta Terry Duryea, whom he married in 1911, and after her suicide, Lucille Cameron.
The immorality? The mere fact that he, a Black man, had married white women.
After his 1913 conviction, he fled the U.S. for France to stay out of prison.
But that was the; this is now. Violations of the letter of the law don't mean the same thing when it comes to rich, powerful white men (unless they were prosecuted by Spitzer, that is).
In addition to being the most powerful political figure in the state, Spitzer wears (until his resignation) the title of super-delegate, and he has already pledged to vote for Hillary Clinton.
What does one of the nations' foremost feminists have to say about her homie, and his exploitation of women in the sex trades?
Hypocrisy, it seems, doesn't end in the Governor's Mansion.
--(c) '08 maj
{Source: Appiah, Kwame Anthony and Henry Louis Gates, eds., Africana: The Encyclopedia of the African and African-American Experience (Concise Desk Reference) Phila., PA: Running Press, 2003), pp.481-83}
(c) '08 Mumia Abu-Jamal
The rise and imminent fall of New York's Governor, Eliot Spitzer has all the drama and pathos of a TV movie.
If it weren't true, it could hardly be believed.
Spitzer, the Dick Tracy of the prosecutorial set (with his squinting blue eyes, and square jaw), has joined the peculiarly American photo op of the fallen politician, with his doleful wife dutifully standing beside him, a look in her eyes like a deer in headlights.
It is rare to see such a spectacle in Asia, Africa or Europe, where there is a certain maturity about affairs of the heart (or the loins).
But this is the U.S., not France.
While the Spitzer affair is but the latest in what seems like a seasonal event, it is different from those that came before because of the nature of the man, who built his political career on being the ruthless prosecutor, the 'clean up man' of the filthy political culture of the Empire state. It is indeed, more than the obvious: hypocrisy run wild. It is a classic case of a man 'hoisted by his own petard' (or destroyed by his own weapon).
For, inasmuch as the former state Attorney General won a trip to the Governor's Mansion in Albany because of his relentless attacks on Wall Street brokers, he also had an appetite for the doings of prostitution rings, one of which led to his own front door.
According to published and broadcast reports, Spitzer paid nearly $80,000 for his trysts with high-end call girls.
And while this still seems a peculiar American fascination and revulsion with sex, the particulars of his money-changing to secure these services suggests that he has violated federal criminal statutes -- some that have been on the books for nearly a century.
At issue is the infamous Mann Act -- a law known (particularly in the African-American community) because of its usage against the great Black boxing champ, Jack Johnson (1878-1946). The law is perhaps best known as the 'White Slavery' law, for it has been used to prosecute men charged with trafficking in the sexual services of white women.
The Mann Act, as defined by the prestigious Black's Law Dictionary, is as follows:
Federal statute (White Slave Traffic Act, 18 U.S.CA § 2421) making it a crime to transport a woman or girl in interstate or foreign commerce for the purpose of prostitution or debauchery, or for any other immoral purpose. {Black L. Dict.., 5th ed., (West Publ., 1979), p.869.}
Yet, if news reports are correct( that he essentially hired young women to cross state lines for 'immoral' purposes), it is doubtful that this high-ranking political figure will face a jail cell. For him, it might suffice to surrender his lofty office, while his loyal acolytes will fill op-ed pages with furtive prose that the public figure "has suffered enough."
In the legendary life of the first Black heavyweight boxing champ, Jack Johnson, this internationally renowned pugilist was charged, tried, convicted and sentenced for violating the Mann Act, for driving 2 white women across state lines to accompany him as he plied his trade. The government didn't claim that either of these women were prostitutes.
They were his wives! They were Etta Terry Duryea, whom he married in 1911, and after her suicide, Lucille Cameron.
The immorality? The mere fact that he, a Black man, had married white women.
After his 1913 conviction, he fled the U.S. for France to stay out of prison.
But that was the; this is now. Violations of the letter of the law don't mean the same thing when it comes to rich, powerful white men (unless they were prosecuted by Spitzer, that is).
In addition to being the most powerful political figure in the state, Spitzer wears (until his resignation) the title of super-delegate, and he has already pledged to vote for Hillary Clinton.
What does one of the nations' foremost feminists have to say about her homie, and his exploitation of women in the sex trades?
Hypocrisy, it seems, doesn't end in the Governor's Mansion.
--(c) '08 maj
{Source: Appiah, Kwame Anthony and Henry Louis Gates, eds., Africana: The Encyclopedia of the African and African-American Experience (Concise Desk Reference) Phila., PA: Running Press, 2003), pp.481-83}
Whore Nation by Mumia Abu-Jamal
[col. writ. 3/14/08]
(c) '08 Mumia Abu-Jamal
With the national media fascination over the Spitzer-Kristen scandal has come also revelation: We, all of us, are living in a nation of whores.
Doubt it?
Now, I'm not here referring to a young call girl; nor am I really talking about former N.Y. Gov. Eliot Spitzer. Although, in truth, there is much more than sex that unites them; more, in fact, than that which divides them.
For, despite first reports, Kristen hails from a well-to-do New Jersey family, who- having left home -- has experienced hard times. In that sense, both she and Spitzer hail from the same (or a somewhat similar) class.
Her sense of ambition for financial security drove her to the high-end business of prostitution. Similarly, Spitzer's ambition drove him to the law, and while not for financial enhancements, his pay was the most potent drug available: power.
And both whored themselves, just for different pay.
But this is bigger than the both of them (even as she entertains million-dollar offers for shots in the buff for porn magazines -- or, just another kind of whoring -- selling her image instead of her sweat).
In America, where culture, entertainment, politics, and all fields of endeavor are under the sway of capital, the question ain't whether we're for sale, but for how much?
And what is whoring, but exploitation?
In a nation fast facing de industrialization, where manufacturing is becoming a memory, and the economy tumbles into the bin of the service industries, what is the quintessential 'service', but the world's oldest profession -- prostitution?
Sometimes movies appear that reflect great, deep social or cultural shifts. Remember the movie "Pretty Woman", the vehicle featuring actress Julia Roberts? The theme was the whore with the heart of gold, who caught the eye of a wealthy man.
What do you think that film whispered to millions of little girls (or, for that matter, little boys) sitting in the dark, lost in flickering light, dreaming about tomorrow?
And what is our daily diet on TV, under the guise of so-called "reality shows", but selling oneself -- whoring oneself -- for dollars? The more humiliating, the more dough, it seems.
But, culture -- even corporate culture -- sometimes reflects and even presages what is happening in real life. What we laugh at during the nights' entertainment, becomes dreaded drudgery in morning light. For, it seems, what we find ridiculous on the tube, we lie on the job, for both reflect the daily humiliations of survival.
In politics, in entertainment, in business, in our social lives, we sell ourselves to the highest bidder -- whores in every sense but name.
At bottom, it's about power and exploitation; the sale of the body, which in capitalism's logic, is just another commodity.
Welcome to Whore Nation.
--(c) '08 maj
(c) '08 Mumia Abu-Jamal
With the national media fascination over the Spitzer-Kristen scandal has come also revelation: We, all of us, are living in a nation of whores.
Doubt it?
Now, I'm not here referring to a young call girl; nor am I really talking about former N.Y. Gov. Eliot Spitzer. Although, in truth, there is much more than sex that unites them; more, in fact, than that which divides them.
For, despite first reports, Kristen hails from a well-to-do New Jersey family, who- having left home -- has experienced hard times. In that sense, both she and Spitzer hail from the same (or a somewhat similar) class.
Her sense of ambition for financial security drove her to the high-end business of prostitution. Similarly, Spitzer's ambition drove him to the law, and while not for financial enhancements, his pay was the most potent drug available: power.
And both whored themselves, just for different pay.
But this is bigger than the both of them (even as she entertains million-dollar offers for shots in the buff for porn magazines -- or, just another kind of whoring -- selling her image instead of her sweat).
In America, where culture, entertainment, politics, and all fields of endeavor are under the sway of capital, the question ain't whether we're for sale, but for how much?
And what is whoring, but exploitation?
In a nation fast facing de industrialization, where manufacturing is becoming a memory, and the economy tumbles into the bin of the service industries, what is the quintessential 'service', but the world's oldest profession -- prostitution?
Sometimes movies appear that reflect great, deep social or cultural shifts. Remember the movie "Pretty Woman", the vehicle featuring actress Julia Roberts? The theme was the whore with the heart of gold, who caught the eye of a wealthy man.
What do you think that film whispered to millions of little girls (or, for that matter, little boys) sitting in the dark, lost in flickering light, dreaming about tomorrow?
And what is our daily diet on TV, under the guise of so-called "reality shows", but selling oneself -- whoring oneself -- for dollars? The more humiliating, the more dough, it seems.
But, culture -- even corporate culture -- sometimes reflects and even presages what is happening in real life. What we laugh at during the nights' entertainment, becomes dreaded drudgery in morning light. For, it seems, what we find ridiculous on the tube, we lie on the job, for both reflect the daily humiliations of survival.
In politics, in entertainment, in business, in our social lives, we sell ourselves to the highest bidder -- whores in every sense but name.
At bottom, it's about power and exploitation; the sale of the body, which in capitalism's logic, is just another commodity.
Welcome to Whore Nation.
--(c) '08 maj
The Politician & the Preacher by Mumia Abu-Jamal
[col. writ. 3/15/08]
(c) '08 Mumia Abu-Jamal
The recent quasi-controversy over the comments made by the Rev. Dr. Jeremiah Wright, retired pastor of the United Church of Christ, to which Sen. Barack Obama (D.IL), both belongs and attends, has shown us how limited, and how narrow, is this new politics peddled by the freshman Senator from Chicago.
Although first popularized via the web, the Reverend's comments caused Sen. Obama to say he was "appalled" by them, and he has repudiated such remarks as "offensive."
Just what were these comments? As far as I've heard, they were that Sen. Hilary Clinton (D.NY) has had a political advantage because she's white; that she was raised in a family of means (especially when contrasted with Obama's upbringing); and she was never called a nigger.
Sounds objectively true to me.
Rev. Wright's other remarks were that the country was built on racism, is run by rich white people, and that the events of 9/11 was a direct reaction to US foreign policy.
Again -- true enough.
And while we can see how such truths might cause discomfort to American nationalists, can we not also agree that they are truths? Consider, would Sen. Clinton be where she is if she were born in a Black female body? Or if she were born to a single mother in the projects? As for the nation, it may be too simplistic to say it was built on racism, but was surely built on racial slavery, from which its wealth was built. And who runs America, if not the super rich white elites? Who doesn't know that politicians are puppets of corporate and inherited wealth?
And while Blacks of wealth and means certainly are able to exercise unprecedented influence, we would be insane to believe that they 'run' this country. Oprah, Bob Johnson and Bill Cosby are indeed wealthy; but they have influence, not power. The limits of Cosby's power was shown when he tried to purchase the TV network, NBC, years ago. His offer received a corporate smirk. And Oprah's wealth, while remarkable, pales in comparison to the holdings of men like Bill Gates, or Warren Buffet.
Would George W. Bush be president today if he were named Jorje Guillermo Arbusto, and Mexican-American? (Not unless Jorje, Sr. was a multimillionaire!)
In his ambition to become America's first Black president, Obama is in a race to prove how Black he isn't; even to denouncing a man he has considered his mentor.
As one who has experienced the Black church from the inside, politics and social commentary are rarely far from the pulpit. The Rev. Dr. Martin L. King spoke of politics, war, racism, economics, and social justice all across America. His fair-weather friends betrayed him, and the press condemned his remarks as "inappropriate", "unpatriotic", and "controversial."
Rev. Dr. King said the US was "the greatest purveyor of violence" on earth, and that the Vietnam War was illegitimate and unjust. Would Sen. Obama be denouncing these words, as the white press, and many civil rights figures did, in 1967? Are they "inflammatory?"
Only to politics based on white, corporate comfort uber alles (above all)" only to a politics that ignores Black pain, and distorts Black history; only to a politics pitched more to the status quo, than to real change.
Politics is ultimately about more than winning elections; it's about principles; it's about being true to one's self, and honoring one's ancestors; it's about speaking truth to power.
It can't just be about change, because every change ain't for the better!
--(c) -08 maj
(c) '08 Mumia Abu-Jamal
The recent quasi-controversy over the comments made by the Rev. Dr. Jeremiah Wright, retired pastor of the United Church of Christ, to which Sen. Barack Obama (D.IL), both belongs and attends, has shown us how limited, and how narrow, is this new politics peddled by the freshman Senator from Chicago.
Although first popularized via the web, the Reverend's comments caused Sen. Obama to say he was "appalled" by them, and he has repudiated such remarks as "offensive."
Just what were these comments? As far as I've heard, they were that Sen. Hilary Clinton (D.NY) has had a political advantage because she's white; that she was raised in a family of means (especially when contrasted with Obama's upbringing); and she was never called a nigger.
Sounds objectively true to me.
Rev. Wright's other remarks were that the country was built on racism, is run by rich white people, and that the events of 9/11 was a direct reaction to US foreign policy.
Again -- true enough.
And while we can see how such truths might cause discomfort to American nationalists, can we not also agree that they are truths? Consider, would Sen. Clinton be where she is if she were born in a Black female body? Or if she were born to a single mother in the projects? As for the nation, it may be too simplistic to say it was built on racism, but was surely built on racial slavery, from which its wealth was built. And who runs America, if not the super rich white elites? Who doesn't know that politicians are puppets of corporate and inherited wealth?
And while Blacks of wealth and means certainly are able to exercise unprecedented influence, we would be insane to believe that they 'run' this country. Oprah, Bob Johnson and Bill Cosby are indeed wealthy; but they have influence, not power. The limits of Cosby's power was shown when he tried to purchase the TV network, NBC, years ago. His offer received a corporate smirk. And Oprah's wealth, while remarkable, pales in comparison to the holdings of men like Bill Gates, or Warren Buffet.
Would George W. Bush be president today if he were named Jorje Guillermo Arbusto, and Mexican-American? (Not unless Jorje, Sr. was a multimillionaire!)
In his ambition to become America's first Black president, Obama is in a race to prove how Black he isn't; even to denouncing a man he has considered his mentor.
As one who has experienced the Black church from the inside, politics and social commentary are rarely far from the pulpit. The Rev. Dr. Martin L. King spoke of politics, war, racism, economics, and social justice all across America. His fair-weather friends betrayed him, and the press condemned his remarks as "inappropriate", "unpatriotic", and "controversial."
Rev. Dr. King said the US was "the greatest purveyor of violence" on earth, and that the Vietnam War was illegitimate and unjust. Would Sen. Obama be denouncing these words, as the white press, and many civil rights figures did, in 1967? Are they "inflammatory?"
Only to politics based on white, corporate comfort uber alles (above all)" only to a politics that ignores Black pain, and distorts Black history; only to a politics pitched more to the status quo, than to real change.
Politics is ultimately about more than winning elections; it's about principles; it's about being true to one's self, and honoring one's ancestors; it's about speaking truth to power.
It can't just be about change, because every change ain't for the better!
--(c) -08 maj
Of Power & Empire by Mumia Abu-Jamal
[col. writ. 3/22/08]
(c) '08 Mumia Abu-Jamal
There is still over half a year until election day, and it is unclear who will prevail.
For argument's sake, let us suppose Sen. Barack Obama (D. - IL) becomes the history-maker of the hour.
What does that mean?
Well, it depends on whom you ask. For some Americans, it means a true social transformation in the nature of the nation. For others (especially those who consider themselves white supremacists) it means a nightmare come to life.
For international observers, it will be seen as both change and chance; change in how America is perceived; and a chance for a new road in U.S. foreign policy.
Some will view it with amazement; others will greet it with relief.
But when I was asked about it recently, my reply was brief; "It means a brown, new, pretty face for the empire. The present President is seen as an idiot, and the face of American bellicosity. This guy has brought so much chaos to bear, that they need a new face -- and Obama brings a new face.
The interviewer, a foreign journalist, sounded somewhat shocked, but there it is.
In manner and attitude, the U.S. empire brings to mind the Empire of Rome.
In ancient Rome, elections were made by proclamation, and acclamation. That means the would-be emperor would proclaim his right to rule, and if the Senate (which theoretically represented the People), and more importantly, the Army, acclaimed that right, the candidate was hailed as true emperor.
That's the theory, at least, but in reality the army often named emperors, and everybody else went along with their choice. They chose men of varying abilities and characters. Some, like Maximin, were brutes much like the military men who nominated them.
Others, like Nero and Caligula, were madmen, pure and simple.
As the great English historian, Edward Gibbon, in his classic The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (London: Penguin Classics, 200 [orig. 1776] wrote of the army as maker of emperors:
The daring hopes of ambition were set loose from the salutary restraints of law and prejudice; and the meanest of mankind might, without folly, entertain a hope of being raised by valour and fortune to a rank in the army, in which a single crime would enable him to wrest the sceptre of the world from his feeble and unpopular master. After the murder of Alexander Severus, and the elevation of Maximin, no emperor could think himself safe upon the throne, and every barbarian peasant of the frontier might aspire to that august, but dangerous station. [p.91]
An empire is a lot like a machine, and it matters little who pushes the button. Empires need figureheads, and figureheads are notoriously interchangeable -- for the question is, can the machine do, what the machine does?
In essence, can it work?
A president, no matter how powerful, does not the nation make.
They are, in many ways, the bully-in-chief, who can command not only military power, but the power to decide which issues will be deemed important.
But, as we've seen, there are limits to their power. They actually don't control the economy, for one thing; for another, there are limits to military power, as Iraq has shown, above all.
With the economy in free-fall, oil prices tripled since the war started, steroids, medicines, and human waste in drinking water, schools barely functional, the presidential race seems almost like the latest distraction.
As for the machine of imperial politics--does it work-for you?
--(c) '09 maj
(c) '08 Mumia Abu-Jamal
There is still over half a year until election day, and it is unclear who will prevail.
For argument's sake, let us suppose Sen. Barack Obama (D. - IL) becomes the history-maker of the hour.
What does that mean?
Well, it depends on whom you ask. For some Americans, it means a true social transformation in the nature of the nation. For others (especially those who consider themselves white supremacists) it means a nightmare come to life.
For international observers, it will be seen as both change and chance; change in how America is perceived; and a chance for a new road in U.S. foreign policy.
Some will view it with amazement; others will greet it with relief.
But when I was asked about it recently, my reply was brief; "It means a brown, new, pretty face for the empire. The present President is seen as an idiot, and the face of American bellicosity. This guy has brought so much chaos to bear, that they need a new face -- and Obama brings a new face.
The interviewer, a foreign journalist, sounded somewhat shocked, but there it is.
In manner and attitude, the U.S. empire brings to mind the Empire of Rome.
In ancient Rome, elections were made by proclamation, and acclamation. That means the would-be emperor would proclaim his right to rule, and if the Senate (which theoretically represented the People), and more importantly, the Army, acclaimed that right, the candidate was hailed as true emperor.
That's the theory, at least, but in reality the army often named emperors, and everybody else went along with their choice. They chose men of varying abilities and characters. Some, like Maximin, were brutes much like the military men who nominated them.
Others, like Nero and Caligula, were madmen, pure and simple.
As the great English historian, Edward Gibbon, in his classic The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (London: Penguin Classics, 200 [orig. 1776] wrote of the army as maker of emperors:
The daring hopes of ambition were set loose from the salutary restraints of law and prejudice; and the meanest of mankind might, without folly, entertain a hope of being raised by valour and fortune to a rank in the army, in which a single crime would enable him to wrest the sceptre of the world from his feeble and unpopular master. After the murder of Alexander Severus, and the elevation of Maximin, no emperor could think himself safe upon the throne, and every barbarian peasant of the frontier might aspire to that august, but dangerous station. [p.91]
An empire is a lot like a machine, and it matters little who pushes the button. Empires need figureheads, and figureheads are notoriously interchangeable -- for the question is, can the machine do, what the machine does?
In essence, can it work?
A president, no matter how powerful, does not the nation make.
They are, in many ways, the bully-in-chief, who can command not only military power, but the power to decide which issues will be deemed important.
But, as we've seen, there are limits to their power. They actually don't control the economy, for one thing; for another, there are limits to military power, as Iraq has shown, above all.
With the economy in free-fall, oil prices tripled since the war started, steroids, medicines, and human waste in drinking water, schools barely functional, the presidential race seems almost like the latest distraction.
As for the machine of imperial politics--does it work-for you?
--(c) '09 maj
Why the War Will Not Soon End by Mumia Abu-Jamal
[col. writ. 3/20/08]
(c) '08 Mumia Abu-Jamal
As America marches into its' 6th year of war in Iraq, there is a deep suspicion that the nation stands on the brink of a profound change in who holds the White House, and thus, who governs American foreign policy.
In essence, if polls are to be believed, a Democratic presidential candidate (either a Black man or a woman) will almost cruise into the Oval Office.
But there are at least two reasons why such an outcome is by no means certain.
First, because in politics, 8 months is an eternity, and it is difficult, if not impossible, to predict what can happen in so long a time. We have seen, in the space of less than a week, how the bitter convergence of the net, cable TV, and DVD's has dealt an undeniable blow to the front-running campaign of Sen. Barack Obama (D.ILL.). He may very well survive, and even outrun, this latest dustup, but let no one be fooled. There is blood in the air; and the hounds of hell have been loosed.
Secondly, Republicans and neo cons will not go quietly into that dark night, away from the light and warmth of power. They will fight, tooth and nail, to prevail -- and they may yet do so. Fear and patriotism are powerful levers with which to move minds.
That said, there is yet a third option. A Democrat may win, and once at the helm of the ship of state, reverse policies, for a politician's promises are a lot like a whore's kisses.
It's nothing personal; it's just business.
The great radical historian (author of the seminal Black Jacobins (1938), C.L.R. James once opined that professional politicians quickly learn the art of fooling the people.
Nor do we need to look far to see the position of politicians who have succeeded in that endeavor, for quite recently, when a reporter asked Vice-President Dick Cheney about pursuing a war policy opposed by three quarters of the electorate he laconically responded, "So?"
Having been elected and reelected to a second term as the bottom half of the Bush ticket, he could care less what three quarters of the electorate wanted.
Once in, politicians are deeply insulated from popular will.
C.L.R. James, as a revolutionary socialist organizer, called for direct democracy when organizing in Trinidad, and tried to build support for instant recall of politicians who disappointed or betrayed the people who voted for them. While his initiative failed (few parliamentarians would endorse such a radical notion), think of the implications.
In 2006, millions of U.S. voters went to the polls to put in a Democratic and presumably anti- Iraq War congressional majority. Once in, these congress people promptly jettisoned their anti war rhetoric, and instead voted for tens of billions in more public moneys for the Iraq Occupation.
As they found the funds to refuel the war based on lies and deception, tens of thousands of homeowners, many of whom voted to end this war, faced the horrors of foreclosures, and loss of their homes. How many sons and daughters of those millions who marched to the polls, still go to schools with inadequate resources, poorly trained teachers, or a failing physical plant?
Yet, they found mega-billions for war.
There is a lesson in this.
The question is, what have we learned?
--(c) '08 maj
(c) '08 Mumia Abu-Jamal
As America marches into its' 6th year of war in Iraq, there is a deep suspicion that the nation stands on the brink of a profound change in who holds the White House, and thus, who governs American foreign policy.
In essence, if polls are to be believed, a Democratic presidential candidate (either a Black man or a woman) will almost cruise into the Oval Office.
But there are at least two reasons why such an outcome is by no means certain.
First, because in politics, 8 months is an eternity, and it is difficult, if not impossible, to predict what can happen in so long a time. We have seen, in the space of less than a week, how the bitter convergence of the net, cable TV, and DVD's has dealt an undeniable blow to the front-running campaign of Sen. Barack Obama (D.ILL.). He may very well survive, and even outrun, this latest dustup, but let no one be fooled. There is blood in the air; and the hounds of hell have been loosed.
Secondly, Republicans and neo cons will not go quietly into that dark night, away from the light and warmth of power. They will fight, tooth and nail, to prevail -- and they may yet do so. Fear and patriotism are powerful levers with which to move minds.
That said, there is yet a third option. A Democrat may win, and once at the helm of the ship of state, reverse policies, for a politician's promises are a lot like a whore's kisses.
It's nothing personal; it's just business.
The great radical historian (author of the seminal Black Jacobins (1938), C.L.R. James once opined that professional politicians quickly learn the art of fooling the people.
Nor do we need to look far to see the position of politicians who have succeeded in that endeavor, for quite recently, when a reporter asked Vice-President Dick Cheney about pursuing a war policy opposed by three quarters of the electorate he laconically responded, "So?"
Having been elected and reelected to a second term as the bottom half of the Bush ticket, he could care less what three quarters of the electorate wanted.
Once in, politicians are deeply insulated from popular will.
C.L.R. James, as a revolutionary socialist organizer, called for direct democracy when organizing in Trinidad, and tried to build support for instant recall of politicians who disappointed or betrayed the people who voted for them. While his initiative failed (few parliamentarians would endorse such a radical notion), think of the implications.
In 2006, millions of U.S. voters went to the polls to put in a Democratic and presumably anti- Iraq War congressional majority. Once in, these congress people promptly jettisoned their anti war rhetoric, and instead voted for tens of billions in more public moneys for the Iraq Occupation.
As they found the funds to refuel the war based on lies and deception, tens of thousands of homeowners, many of whom voted to end this war, faced the horrors of foreclosures, and loss of their homes. How many sons and daughters of those millions who marched to the polls, still go to schools with inadequate resources, poorly trained teachers, or a failing physical plant?
Yet, they found mega-billions for war.
There is a lesson in this.
The question is, what have we learned?
--(c) '08 maj
Beyond Spitzer -- The Abyss of Business by Mumia Abu-Jamal
[col. writ. 3/25/08]
(c) '08 Mumia Abu-Jamal
It has been several days since the national fever has broken over the alleged sex scandal of the meteoric politician, Eliot Spitzer, and like a predator seeking fresh prey, the media has prowled on, seeking a new feeding ground.
But, even as the embers cool 'on the barby', we seem to have been drowsing, for we have missed the most important things about this scandal.
There is a reason why today's media is little more than a recurrent sex-fest, and a reality show machine.
This navel level of programming keeps us too dazed to appreciate what lies behind the curtain.
In Spitzer's case, yes, hypocrisy was a juicy story that few true reporters could ignore.
But what was more important; who he slept with, or what he was involved in shortly before his ungracious fall from grace?
The well-known investigative reporter and writer, Greg Palast (author of Armed Madhouse; Who's Afraid of Osama Wolf?.... (N.Y.: Dutton, 2006), was, in his pre-reporter days, a student of Milton Friedman, who earned a degree in finance.
He thus has insight into economic matters. In a recent article, * Palast has pointed to Spitzer's efforts to criminalize and outlaw the sub prime market, which Spitzer considered not just unjust, but illegal. That's because sub-prime lenders, using a process called "steering", directed some 71% of such business to Black and Latina high-income families. Only 17% of similar white families received such loans. The loans were essentially balloon payments, which had cheap teaser rates to attract (and indeed, entrap) home buyers, and once the bait was hooked, the monthly payments exploded. If home owners couldn't afford the increased payments, they were evicted, and their properties were rushed back to the market, and other families were snared.
It was great for everybody -- but homeowners.
On Feb. 13, Spitzer wrote, for the Washington Post, "When history tells the story of the sub prime lending crisis and recounts its devastating effects on the lives of so many innocent homeowners the Bush administration will not be judged favorably."
Spitzer added, "Not only did the Bush administration do nothing to protect consumers, it embarked on an aggressive and unprecedented campaign to prevent states from protecting their residents from the very problems to which the federal government was turning a blind eye."
That date is significant not only because that's when he penned these words, but on that evening he would visit a Washington hotel room and, of course, the rest is history.
As he began his precipitous fall from power, the federal government began its $200 billion bailout of the bankers who issued these sub primes.
For the bankers, everything; for the families who've lost their homes -- nothing.
And while Spitzer was far from a perfect public servant, his instincts were to follow the money (well-- everyone's but his own).
In law, what these bankers did was tantamount to predatory lending, or what's called "fraudulent conveyances" --- in a sense, this is a huge bait and switch!
But, they have nothing to fear. They were given the biggest public payoffs since the infamous savings and loan scandals of the 1980's.
But, Spitzer is, for all intents and purposes, out of the game, as surely as he was ejected from the governors mansion.
But, he's a wealthy man, and will always have a place to live.
For the duped borrowers, and their families, they should be so lucky.
--(c) '08 maj
[*Source: Palest, Greg, "Eliot's Mess: The $200 billion dollar bail our for predator banks and Spitzer charges are intimately linked," AirAmerica, Clout: _http://mailings.gregpalast.com//It/tgo.php?i=Mjuxnzu=&I=http--www.GregPalast.com_
(c) '08 Mumia Abu-Jamal
It has been several days since the national fever has broken over the alleged sex scandal of the meteoric politician, Eliot Spitzer, and like a predator seeking fresh prey, the media has prowled on, seeking a new feeding ground.
But, even as the embers cool 'on the barby', we seem to have been drowsing, for we have missed the most important things about this scandal.
There is a reason why today's media is little more than a recurrent sex-fest, and a reality show machine.
This navel level of programming keeps us too dazed to appreciate what lies behind the curtain.
In Spitzer's case, yes, hypocrisy was a juicy story that few true reporters could ignore.
But what was more important; who he slept with, or what he was involved in shortly before his ungracious fall from grace?
The well-known investigative reporter and writer, Greg Palast (author of Armed Madhouse; Who's Afraid of Osama Wolf?.... (N.Y.: Dutton, 2006), was, in his pre-reporter days, a student of Milton Friedman, who earned a degree in finance.
He thus has insight into economic matters. In a recent article, * Palast has pointed to Spitzer's efforts to criminalize and outlaw the sub prime market, which Spitzer considered not just unjust, but illegal. That's because sub-prime lenders, using a process called "steering", directed some 71% of such business to Black and Latina high-income families. Only 17% of similar white families received such loans. The loans were essentially balloon payments, which had cheap teaser rates to attract (and indeed, entrap) home buyers, and once the bait was hooked, the monthly payments exploded. If home owners couldn't afford the increased payments, they were evicted, and their properties were rushed back to the market, and other families were snared.
It was great for everybody -- but homeowners.
On Feb. 13, Spitzer wrote, for the Washington Post, "When history tells the story of the sub prime lending crisis and recounts its devastating effects on the lives of so many innocent homeowners the Bush administration will not be judged favorably."
Spitzer added, "Not only did the Bush administration do nothing to protect consumers, it embarked on an aggressive and unprecedented campaign to prevent states from protecting their residents from the very problems to which the federal government was turning a blind eye."
That date is significant not only because that's when he penned these words, but on that evening he would visit a Washington hotel room and, of course, the rest is history.
As he began his precipitous fall from power, the federal government began its $200 billion bailout of the bankers who issued these sub primes.
For the bankers, everything; for the families who've lost their homes -- nothing.
And while Spitzer was far from a perfect public servant, his instincts were to follow the money (well-- everyone's but his own).
In law, what these bankers did was tantamount to predatory lending, or what's called "fraudulent conveyances" --- in a sense, this is a huge bait and switch!
But, they have nothing to fear. They were given the biggest public payoffs since the infamous savings and loan scandals of the 1980's.
But, Spitzer is, for all intents and purposes, out of the game, as surely as he was ejected from the governors mansion.
But, he's a wealthy man, and will always have a place to live.
For the duped borrowers, and their families, they should be so lucky.
--(c) '08 maj
[*Source: Palest, Greg, "Eliot's Mess: The $200 billion dollar bail our for predator banks and Spitzer charges are intimately linked," AirAmerica, Clout: _http://mailings.gregpalast.com//It/tgo.php?i=Mjuxnzu=&I=http--www.GregPalast.com_
Of 'Crazy Uncles' and Kings by Mumia Abu-Jamal
[col. writ. 3/25/08]
(c) '08 Mumia Abu-Jamal
It has been 40 years - a lifetime - since Martin Luther King, Jr. was felled in Memphis, Tennessee.
His life of committed activism, and his martyrdom, has left an indelible mark upon the world.
There were, indeed, echoes of him, in Black and some white churches this past Easter, but also in what the corporate media has called "incendiary" speeches of the Rev. Jeremiah Wright.
Rev. Wright's Black Liberation Theology runs like a chain from the life and practice of two prominent Black religious leaders of the 20th century, which left their imprint upon the soul and psyche of Rev. Wright (Rev. Dr. Martin L. King, and Min. Malcolm X). Although condemned as "divisive", "incendiary" and "outrageous" by the corporate and right wing press, I found nothing of the sort to my ears. It actually reminded me of my youth, when, working at a white radio station, my boss called me into his office, and quietly asked me about the Rev. Leon Sullivan, one of the most prominent religious and business leaders in the country. I can't remember his question, but the gist of it was that he, and several other radio executives met with the man, and came away unimpressed. It taught me that people are deeply influenced by style, and some styles do not cross cultures well. I tried to communicate to him that Rev. Sullivan was a virtual lion in the community (indeed, his nickname was 'the lion of Zion' - for the name off his church, Zion Baptist Church).
Different cultures have different styles of speech, and communication.
I thought of this when the media - generated Wright controversy arose, when, initially Sen. Barack Obama (D.ILL.) suggested Wright was kinda like the crazy uncle that people invite to Thanksgiving, but really don't take too seriously.
The life and example of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. also came to mind. And while King has been almost deified by most Americans, like most such men, their words are actually rarely read, and those who truly knew them are little heeded.
Theologist and historian, Dr. Vincent Harding (a close confidant of King), has written about King's last year of life, when he turned towards the anti-war and anti-poverty movements, and by so doing, earned the enmity of the rich and powerful. None other than the Washington Post condemned King when he criticized the Vietnam war. In an editorial, they wrote, "He has diminished his usefulness to his cause, to his country, and to his people."
Dr. Harding wrote that King read a challenging article in Ramparts magazine, called "The Children of Vietnam." Harding writes:He told his staff that "after reading that article, I said to myself, 'Never again will I be silenton an issue that is destroying the soul of our nation and destroying thousands and thousandsof little children in Vietnam.' " For all who would hear his voice, he was saying, "I can nolonger be cautious about this matter. I feel so deeply in my heart that we are so wrong inthis country and the time has come for a real prophecy, and I'm willing to go that road."[Harding, V., Martin Luther King: The Inconvenient Hero (Maryknoll, N. Y.: Orbis Books, 1996), pp.100-01.]
Deserted by fair-weather friends, lambasted by the 'liberal' [white] press, bereft of donations that fueled the movement, the sensitive preacher was hurt, but he did not give up. As Harding wrote, he continued to resist what we now call imperialism:[Who knew that night, April 4, that he had precisely one more year to live, that the bullet was closing in?) For King saw the larger context. He had already declared in other places that his"beloved country" was "engaged in a war that seeks to turn the clock of history back and perpetuate white colonialism." Underlying this bitterness, he said, was America's refusalto recognize that "the evils of capitalism are as real as the evils of militarism and evils ofracism." [p.101]
Forty years ago, King was assassinated for standing against white supremacy, and the U.S. government's thirst for violence and conquest in Vietnam.
Today, the corporate media does the job that military and the spy agencies once did - for the same masters.
Yesterday, it was Martin L. King. Today, it's Rev. Dr. Jeremiah Wright.
--(c) '08 maj
(c) '08 Mumia Abu-Jamal
It has been 40 years - a lifetime - since Martin Luther King, Jr. was felled in Memphis, Tennessee.
His life of committed activism, and his martyrdom, has left an indelible mark upon the world.
There were, indeed, echoes of him, in Black and some white churches this past Easter, but also in what the corporate media has called "incendiary" speeches of the Rev. Jeremiah Wright.
Rev. Wright's Black Liberation Theology runs like a chain from the life and practice of two prominent Black religious leaders of the 20th century, which left their imprint upon the soul and psyche of Rev. Wright (Rev. Dr. Martin L. King, and Min. Malcolm X). Although condemned as "divisive", "incendiary" and "outrageous" by the corporate and right wing press, I found nothing of the sort to my ears. It actually reminded me of my youth, when, working at a white radio station, my boss called me into his office, and quietly asked me about the Rev. Leon Sullivan, one of the most prominent religious and business leaders in the country. I can't remember his question, but the gist of it was that he, and several other radio executives met with the man, and came away unimpressed. It taught me that people are deeply influenced by style, and some styles do not cross cultures well. I tried to communicate to him that Rev. Sullivan was a virtual lion in the community (indeed, his nickname was 'the lion of Zion' - for the name off his church, Zion Baptist Church).
Different cultures have different styles of speech, and communication.
I thought of this when the media - generated Wright controversy arose, when, initially Sen. Barack Obama (D.ILL.) suggested Wright was kinda like the crazy uncle that people invite to Thanksgiving, but really don't take too seriously.
The life and example of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. also came to mind. And while King has been almost deified by most Americans, like most such men, their words are actually rarely read, and those who truly knew them are little heeded.
Theologist and historian, Dr. Vincent Harding (a close confidant of King), has written about King's last year of life, when he turned towards the anti-war and anti-poverty movements, and by so doing, earned the enmity of the rich and powerful. None other than the Washington Post condemned King when he criticized the Vietnam war. In an editorial, they wrote, "He has diminished his usefulness to his cause, to his country, and to his people."
Dr. Harding wrote that King read a challenging article in Ramparts magazine, called "The Children of Vietnam." Harding writes:He told his staff that "after reading that article, I said to myself, 'Never again will I be silenton an issue that is destroying the soul of our nation and destroying thousands and thousandsof little children in Vietnam.' " For all who would hear his voice, he was saying, "I can nolonger be cautious about this matter. I feel so deeply in my heart that we are so wrong inthis country and the time has come for a real prophecy, and I'm willing to go that road."[Harding, V., Martin Luther King: The Inconvenient Hero (Maryknoll, N. Y.: Orbis Books, 1996), pp.100-01.]
Deserted by fair-weather friends, lambasted by the 'liberal' [white] press, bereft of donations that fueled the movement, the sensitive preacher was hurt, but he did not give up. As Harding wrote, he continued to resist what we now call imperialism:[Who knew that night, April 4, that he had precisely one more year to live, that the bullet was closing in?) For King saw the larger context. He had already declared in other places that his"beloved country" was "engaged in a war that seeks to turn the clock of history back and perpetuate white colonialism." Underlying this bitterness, he said, was America's refusalto recognize that "the evils of capitalism are as real as the evils of militarism and evils ofracism." [p.101]
Forty years ago, King was assassinated for standing against white supremacy, and the U.S. government's thirst for violence and conquest in Vietnam.
Today, the corporate media does the job that military and the spy agencies once did - for the same masters.
Yesterday, it was Martin L. King. Today, it's Rev. Dr. Jeremiah Wright.
--(c) '08 maj
Food riots fear after rice price hits a high
Shortages of the staple crop of half the world's people could bring unrest across Asia and Africa, reports foreign affairs editor Peter Beaumont
The Observer,
Sunday April 6 2008
Article history
A global rice shortage that has seen prices of one of the world's most important staple foods increase by 50 per cent in the past two weeks alone is triggering an international crisis, with countries banning export and threatening serious punishment for hoarders.
With rice stocks at their lowest for 30 years, prices of the grain rose more than 10 per cent on Friday to record highs and are expected to soar further in the coming months. Already China, India, Egypt, Vietnam and Cambodia have imposed tariffs or export bans, as it has become clear that world production of rice this year will decline in real terms by 3.5 per cent. The impact will be felt most keenly by the world's poorest populations, who have become increasingly dependent on the crop as the prices of other grains have become too costly.
Rice is the staple food for more than half the world's population. This is the second year running in which production - which increased in real terms last year - has failed to keep pace with population growth. The harvest has also been hit by drought, particularly in China and Australia, forcing producers to hoard their crops to satisfy local markets.
The increase in rice prices - which some believe could increase by a further 40 per cent in coming months - has matched sharp inflation in other key food products. But with rice relied on by some eight billion people, the impact of a prolonged rice crisis for the world's poor - a large part of whose available income is spent on food - threatens to be devastating.
The consequences are visible across the globe. In Bangladesh, government-run outlets that sell subsidised rice have been besieged by queues comprised largely of the country's middle classes, who will queue for hours to purchase five kilograms of rice sold at 30 per cent cheaper than on the open market.
In Thailand yesterday - where the price for lower-quality rice alone has risen by between $70 and $100 per tonne in the past week alone - Deputy Prime Minister Mingkwan Sangsuwan convened a meeting of key officials and traders yesterday to discuss imposing minimum export prices to control export volumes and measures to punish hoarders. The meeting follows moves by some larger supermarkets in Thailand to limit purchases of rice by customers.
In the Philippines, where the National Bureau of Investigation has been called in to raid traders suspected of hoarding rice to push up the prices, activists have warned of the risk of food riots.
Fear is so deep that the country's agricultural secretary, Arthur Yap, this month asked fast-food restaurants including McDonald's and KFC - which generally supply a cup of rice with their meals in Asian branches - to halve the amount of rice supplied, so that none would be wasted. In addition, traders who try to stockpile rice have been warned that they face a charge of 'economic sabotage', which in the Philippines carries a life sentence.
The shortage has afflicted India, too: on Monday, the government banned the export of non-basmati rice and also raised the price of basmati rice that can be exported.
And although China has said it is secure in its supplies of rice, the fact that the government has offered to pay farmers more to produce more rice and wheat suggests otherwise.
The sharp rise in rice prices has been driven by many factors, not least by a race between African and South-east Asian countries to secure sufficient stocks to head off the risk of food riots and social unrest.
Fears over the potential impact of the rice crisis has been heightened by estimates by both the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation - which has predicted the 3.5 per cent shortfall - and comments from the World Bank president, Robert Zoellick, on the organisation's website, estimating that '33 countries around the world face potential social unrest because of the acute hike in food and energy prices'.
According to the World Bank's figures, the real price of rice rose to a 19-year high last month, while the real price of wheat has hit a 28-year high.
Analysts have cited many factors for the rises, including rising fuel and fertiliser expenses, as well as climate change. But while drought is one factor, another is the switch from food to biofuel production in large areas of the world, in particular to fulfil the US energy demands. A continuing change in the global diet is also putting a further squeeze on rice. In China, for example, 100 million rural migrants to the country's big cities have switched from a staple of wheat to rice as they have become wealthier.
Rapid recent price increases are also likely to have a dangerous secondary effect of stoking further inflation in emerging countries, which are already suffering from record oil prices and surging agricultural commodity prices.
The depth of the crisis for the poorest was underlined in stark terms by the World Bank's managing director at a meeting of finance ministers from the Asian block. Juan José Daboub said governments needed to take steps to protect the poor and also ensure that long-term solutions were found to relieve shortages. 'In virtually every East Asian country, high food prices are raising headline inflation and contributing to a significant decline in the real income of the poor, most of whom spend a big chunk of their income on food,' he said last week.
The Observer,
Sunday April 6 2008
Article history
A global rice shortage that has seen prices of one of the world's most important staple foods increase by 50 per cent in the past two weeks alone is triggering an international crisis, with countries banning export and threatening serious punishment for hoarders.
With rice stocks at their lowest for 30 years, prices of the grain rose more than 10 per cent on Friday to record highs and are expected to soar further in the coming months. Already China, India, Egypt, Vietnam and Cambodia have imposed tariffs or export bans, as it has become clear that world production of rice this year will decline in real terms by 3.5 per cent. The impact will be felt most keenly by the world's poorest populations, who have become increasingly dependent on the crop as the prices of other grains have become too costly.
Rice is the staple food for more than half the world's population. This is the second year running in which production - which increased in real terms last year - has failed to keep pace with population growth. The harvest has also been hit by drought, particularly in China and Australia, forcing producers to hoard their crops to satisfy local markets.
The increase in rice prices - which some believe could increase by a further 40 per cent in coming months - has matched sharp inflation in other key food products. But with rice relied on by some eight billion people, the impact of a prolonged rice crisis for the world's poor - a large part of whose available income is spent on food - threatens to be devastating.
The consequences are visible across the globe. In Bangladesh, government-run outlets that sell subsidised rice have been besieged by queues comprised largely of the country's middle classes, who will queue for hours to purchase five kilograms of rice sold at 30 per cent cheaper than on the open market.
In Thailand yesterday - where the price for lower-quality rice alone has risen by between $70 and $100 per tonne in the past week alone - Deputy Prime Minister Mingkwan Sangsuwan convened a meeting of key officials and traders yesterday to discuss imposing minimum export prices to control export volumes and measures to punish hoarders. The meeting follows moves by some larger supermarkets in Thailand to limit purchases of rice by customers.
In the Philippines, where the National Bureau of Investigation has been called in to raid traders suspected of hoarding rice to push up the prices, activists have warned of the risk of food riots.
Fear is so deep that the country's agricultural secretary, Arthur Yap, this month asked fast-food restaurants including McDonald's and KFC - which generally supply a cup of rice with their meals in Asian branches - to halve the amount of rice supplied, so that none would be wasted. In addition, traders who try to stockpile rice have been warned that they face a charge of 'economic sabotage', which in the Philippines carries a life sentence.
The shortage has afflicted India, too: on Monday, the government banned the export of non-basmati rice and also raised the price of basmati rice that can be exported.
And although China has said it is secure in its supplies of rice, the fact that the government has offered to pay farmers more to produce more rice and wheat suggests otherwise.
The sharp rise in rice prices has been driven by many factors, not least by a race between African and South-east Asian countries to secure sufficient stocks to head off the risk of food riots and social unrest.
Fears over the potential impact of the rice crisis has been heightened by estimates by both the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation - which has predicted the 3.5 per cent shortfall - and comments from the World Bank president, Robert Zoellick, on the organisation's website, estimating that '33 countries around the world face potential social unrest because of the acute hike in food and energy prices'.
According to the World Bank's figures, the real price of rice rose to a 19-year high last month, while the real price of wheat has hit a 28-year high.
Analysts have cited many factors for the rises, including rising fuel and fertiliser expenses, as well as climate change. But while drought is one factor, another is the switch from food to biofuel production in large areas of the world, in particular to fulfil the US energy demands. A continuing change in the global diet is also putting a further squeeze on rice. In China, for example, 100 million rural migrants to the country's big cities have switched from a staple of wheat to rice as they have become wealthier.
Rapid recent price increases are also likely to have a dangerous secondary effect of stoking further inflation in emerging countries, which are already suffering from record oil prices and surging agricultural commodity prices.
The depth of the crisis for the poorest was underlined in stark terms by the World Bank's managing director at a meeting of finance ministers from the Asian block. Juan José Daboub said governments needed to take steps to protect the poor and also ensure that long-term solutions were found to relieve shortages. 'In virtually every East Asian country, high food prices are raising headline inflation and contributing to a significant decline in the real income of the poor, most of whom spend a big chunk of their income on food,' he said last week.
Police State Tactics: Tasering Pregnant Women and the Elderly
John W. Whitehead
The Rutherford Institute
April 7, 2008
In George Lucas’ film THX 1138 (1970), the police in a futuristic state make citizens compliant by shocking them with “pain prods.” After seeing the movie, I remember thinking that if the police were ever allowed to use implements such as these, we would rapidly move into a police state. This has now happened with tasers.
Tasers are electro-shock weapons that are currently used by more than 11,000 law enforcement agencies in the United States. Designed to cause instant incapacitation by delivering a 50,000-volt shock, tasers are hand-held electronic stun guns that fire two barbed darts. The darts, which usually remain attached to the gun by wires, deliver a high voltage shock and can penetrate up to two inches of clothing or skin. The darts can strike the subject from a distance of up to 35 feet, or the taser can be applied directly to the skin. Although a taser shot is capable of jamming the central nervous system for up to 30 seconds, it can disable the subject for even longer. And because tasers can be aimed anywhere on the body, they can immobilize someone more easily than pepper spray, which must be sprayed in the face.
Taser manufacturers and police agencies insist that tasers are a safer alternative to many conventional weapons typically used to restrain dangerous individuals. This may be true in situations where tasers are used as an alternative to other impact weapons that can cause serious injury, such as batons or lethal force. However, research shows that in many police departments, officers routinely use tasers primarily as a substitute for low-level force weapons such as pepper spray or chemical spray. Tasers have become a prevalent force tool, often used against individuals who pose no serious danger to themselves, the officers or others.
Amnesty International reports that in instances where tasers are used, 80% of the time they are used on unarmed suspects. In 36% of the cases, they are used for verbal non-compliance, but only 3% of the time for cases involving “deadly assault.”
Since 2001, over 300 cases indicate that tasers exacerbate health issues and accelerate death. In November 2003, a mentally disabled man was tasered by Georgia police a total of six times for violating a home detention order. Hours later, he died in jail.
Incredibly, police officers have tasered pregnant women, even when they are fully aware of their pregnancies. In 2001, Cindy Grippi was tasered in the back for entering her house against the instructions of police officers, despite the fact that she was not engaging in any truly disruptive or criminal behavior. As a result, Grippi fell onto her stomach and recounts that she “felt a sharp pain in her abdomen as the taser struck her.” Hours later, doctors diagnosed Grippi with “fetal demise,” and she delivered a stillborn child. Tianesha Robinson was tasered by police officers in 2006 for resisting arrest during a traffic stop. Days later, she suffered a miscarriage.
In Colorado, a man was repeatedly tasered in the genitals for “resisting” after being handcuffed and placed in the back of a police car. In 2003, an imprisoned African-American woman was asked to remove all her jewelry. When she asked for a mirror to help remove her eyebrow ring, she was pepper sprayed and tasered. The tasering caused her to “fall to the ground and lose control of her bladder. While on the ground, a male officer forcibly removed her eyebrow ring with pliers. She was left in her urine for several hours without being given anything to clean herself with.” In August 2007, a man was tasered while holding an infant–causing him to drop the child on its head.
Police using tasers are supposedly trained to press the trigger lightly to guarantee that the shock lasts no longer than five seconds. However, there are numerous cases in which police officers have continued to press down on their triggers in hopes of elongating the shot and maximizing pain. In other cases, police officers have continued to shock individuals repeatedly, despite the fact that the first shock achieved their goal of thoroughly immobilizing the target. In 2003, an elderly blind woman, who was also extremely hard of hearing, was struck by a taser three times for failing to respond to police officers. As a result of the taser shocks to her back and the pepper spray to her face, the woman’s prosthetic right eye was ultimately dislodged from its socket.
The use of tasers by police raises a number of concerns for the protection of human rights. Portable and easy to use, with the capacity to inflict severe pain at the push of a button without leaving substantial marks, tasers are obviously open to abuse by officers. Their use often violates standards set out under the United Nations Code of Conduct for Law Enforcement Officials, which requires that force be used as a last resort and that only the minimum amount necessary be used.
Taser International, the company that manufactures and sells the stun guns, has sold them primarily to law enforcement agencies. The company has sold several hundred thousand to such agencies nationwide. However, since 1994, slightly less powerful tasers have been sold to the general public.
This development is truly alarming. Silent and instantly crippling, the taser is an ideal weapon for criminals to assist them in robbery, rape, abduction, etc. An attacker can now carry his own personal victim-paralyzing device, powerful enough to instantly incapacitate the victim and give the attacker complete control.
Tasers are also ripe for sadistic use. For example, in January 2008, a man in Albany, N.Y., was sentenced to 46 months in prison and 24 months of probation for using a 30,000-volt stun gun on his 18-month-old son during a game of peek-a-boo. He claimed that he “wanted his child to be tough…to be the toughest cage fighter ever.” It is impossible to remain untroubled by these words, as well as the image of a father purposefully torturing his defenseless child. The Social Services caseworker who investigated the situation said, “The look in the child’s eyes will not easily be forgotten.”
Clearly, the use of tasers should be suspended immediately–or at least until a comprehensive medical study can be conducted proving they are safe to the general public when used by police officers. And the police must by law be severely restricted in their use. Otherwise, we are opening the door for rampant abuse and police state tactics.
The Rutherford Institute
April 7, 2008
In George Lucas’ film THX 1138 (1970), the police in a futuristic state make citizens compliant by shocking them with “pain prods.” After seeing the movie, I remember thinking that if the police were ever allowed to use implements such as these, we would rapidly move into a police state. This has now happened with tasers.
Tasers are electro-shock weapons that are currently used by more than 11,000 law enforcement agencies in the United States. Designed to cause instant incapacitation by delivering a 50,000-volt shock, tasers are hand-held electronic stun guns that fire two barbed darts. The darts, which usually remain attached to the gun by wires, deliver a high voltage shock and can penetrate up to two inches of clothing or skin. The darts can strike the subject from a distance of up to 35 feet, or the taser can be applied directly to the skin. Although a taser shot is capable of jamming the central nervous system for up to 30 seconds, it can disable the subject for even longer. And because tasers can be aimed anywhere on the body, they can immobilize someone more easily than pepper spray, which must be sprayed in the face.
Taser manufacturers and police agencies insist that tasers are a safer alternative to many conventional weapons typically used to restrain dangerous individuals. This may be true in situations where tasers are used as an alternative to other impact weapons that can cause serious injury, such as batons or lethal force. However, research shows that in many police departments, officers routinely use tasers primarily as a substitute for low-level force weapons such as pepper spray or chemical spray. Tasers have become a prevalent force tool, often used against individuals who pose no serious danger to themselves, the officers or others.
Amnesty International reports that in instances where tasers are used, 80% of the time they are used on unarmed suspects. In 36% of the cases, they are used for verbal non-compliance, but only 3% of the time for cases involving “deadly assault.”
Since 2001, over 300 cases indicate that tasers exacerbate health issues and accelerate death. In November 2003, a mentally disabled man was tasered by Georgia police a total of six times for violating a home detention order. Hours later, he died in jail.
Incredibly, police officers have tasered pregnant women, even when they are fully aware of their pregnancies. In 2001, Cindy Grippi was tasered in the back for entering her house against the instructions of police officers, despite the fact that she was not engaging in any truly disruptive or criminal behavior. As a result, Grippi fell onto her stomach and recounts that she “felt a sharp pain in her abdomen as the taser struck her.” Hours later, doctors diagnosed Grippi with “fetal demise,” and she delivered a stillborn child. Tianesha Robinson was tasered by police officers in 2006 for resisting arrest during a traffic stop. Days later, she suffered a miscarriage.
In Colorado, a man was repeatedly tasered in the genitals for “resisting” after being handcuffed and placed in the back of a police car. In 2003, an imprisoned African-American woman was asked to remove all her jewelry. When she asked for a mirror to help remove her eyebrow ring, she was pepper sprayed and tasered. The tasering caused her to “fall to the ground and lose control of her bladder. While on the ground, a male officer forcibly removed her eyebrow ring with pliers. She was left in her urine for several hours without being given anything to clean herself with.” In August 2007, a man was tasered while holding an infant–causing him to drop the child on its head.
Police using tasers are supposedly trained to press the trigger lightly to guarantee that the shock lasts no longer than five seconds. However, there are numerous cases in which police officers have continued to press down on their triggers in hopes of elongating the shot and maximizing pain. In other cases, police officers have continued to shock individuals repeatedly, despite the fact that the first shock achieved their goal of thoroughly immobilizing the target. In 2003, an elderly blind woman, who was also extremely hard of hearing, was struck by a taser three times for failing to respond to police officers. As a result of the taser shocks to her back and the pepper spray to her face, the woman’s prosthetic right eye was ultimately dislodged from its socket.
The use of tasers by police raises a number of concerns for the protection of human rights. Portable and easy to use, with the capacity to inflict severe pain at the push of a button without leaving substantial marks, tasers are obviously open to abuse by officers. Their use often violates standards set out under the United Nations Code of Conduct for Law Enforcement Officials, which requires that force be used as a last resort and that only the minimum amount necessary be used.
Taser International, the company that manufactures and sells the stun guns, has sold them primarily to law enforcement agencies. The company has sold several hundred thousand to such agencies nationwide. However, since 1994, slightly less powerful tasers have been sold to the general public.
This development is truly alarming. Silent and instantly crippling, the taser is an ideal weapon for criminals to assist them in robbery, rape, abduction, etc. An attacker can now carry his own personal victim-paralyzing device, powerful enough to instantly incapacitate the victim and give the attacker complete control.
Tasers are also ripe for sadistic use. For example, in January 2008, a man in Albany, N.Y., was sentenced to 46 months in prison and 24 months of probation for using a 30,000-volt stun gun on his 18-month-old son during a game of peek-a-boo. He claimed that he “wanted his child to be tough…to be the toughest cage fighter ever.” It is impossible to remain untroubled by these words, as well as the image of a father purposefully torturing his defenseless child. The Social Services caseworker who investigated the situation said, “The look in the child’s eyes will not easily be forgotten.”
Clearly, the use of tasers should be suspended immediately–or at least until a comprehensive medical study can be conducted proving they are safe to the general public when used by police officers. And the police must by law be severely restricted in their use. Otherwise, we are opening the door for rampant abuse and police state tactics.
Yoo Memos Prove That The Fourth Reich Is Here
Lee Rogers
Rogue Government
April 8, 2008
Recent news on the White House torture and spy memos has amazingly received very little coverage in the corporate controlled media. For instance, Barack Obama’s low bowling score has received more coverage than these memos. The media some how thinks Obama’s horrible bowling skills are more important than evidence that could be used to prosecute members of the Bush administration for all sorts of criminality including war crimes. That makes no sense, but of course when you consider that the corporate controlled media creates reality for people it makes perfect sense. Both of these memos were written by former Deputy Assistant Attorney General John Yoo and prove that the Bush administration sought to justify torture and ignore the Fourth Amendment under the guise of the phony war on terror. In the memos, Yoo concludes that Bush can torture and spy without a warrant if he is doing these things to protect the country from terrorists. Of course, the majority of the so called terrorists that the media and the government claims we are fighting are actually trained and funded by western governments so the whole thing is a big fraud. That of course is a whole other story. In these memos, it is clear that Yoo shows a blatant disregard for both U.S. and international law. Yoo and other members of the Bush administration should really be put on trial for war crimes but since the corporate controlled media thinks that Obama’s low bowling score is more important than smoking gun proof of war crimes, that’s probably not going to happen.
First let’s tackle the spying memo. Below is taken from an excerpt of an Associated Press report on the 37-page secret Justice Department memo in which Yoo concludes that the Fourth Amendment does not apply to domestic military operations.
For at least 16 months after the Sept. 11 terror attacks in 2001, the Bush administration believed that the Constitution’s protection against unreasonable searches and seizures on U.S. soil didn’t apply to its efforts to protect against terrorism.
That view was expressed in a secret Justice Department legal memo dated Oct. 23, 2001. The administration on Wednesday stressed that it now disavows that view.
The October 2001 memo was written at the request of the White House by John Yoo, then the deputy assistant attorney general, and addressed to Alberto Gonzales, the White House counsel at the time. The administration had asked the department for an opinion on the legality of potential responses to terrorist activity.
The 37-page memo is classified and has not been released. Its existence was disclosed Tuesday in a footnote of a separate secret memo, dated March 14, 2003, released by the Pentagon in response to a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit by the American Civil Liberties Union.
"Our office recently concluded that the Fourth Amendment had no application to domestic military operations," the footnote states, referring to a document titled "Authority for Use of Military Force to Combat Terrorist Activities Within the United States."
First off, domestic military operations at the time this memo was written were forbidden by the 1878 Posse Comitatus Act. On top of that, Yoo is essentially saying that the executive branch has the power to search and seize property without a warrant during domestic military operations.
Through this memo, Yoo is saying that the administration can disregard the Fourth Amendment so long as they claim that they are trying to protect America from terrorists. This is absurd considering that the Constitution is the supreme law of the land and there are no provisions for its suspension just because the executive branch says there is a state of war. This memo represents an attempt to justify spying on the American people without a warrant when there is no justification for it anywhere in the law.
Now let’s go to the torture memo. News on the torture memo actually leaked out to the press back in 2004 following the Abu Ghraib scandal in which pictures of U.S. soldiers torturing and humiliating prisoners were made public. Now, the memo in its entirety has been declassified via a Freedom of Information Act request by the ACLU. Although the memo was eventually rescinded, it gave authority to the Bush administration to legally order torture and ways to get around U.S. and international law that prohibited such activity.
Below is an excerpt from an Associated Press report on the declassification of the torture memo.
The Pentagon made public a now-defunct legal memo that approved the use of harsh interrogation techniques against terror suspects, saying that President Bush’s wartime authority trumps any international ban on torture.
The Justice Department memo, dated March 14, 2003, outlines legal justification for military interrogators to use harsh tactics against al-Qaida and Taliban detainees overseas — so long as they did not specifically intend to torture their captives.
Even so, the memo noted, the president’s wartime power as commander in chief would not be limited by the U.N. treaties against torture.
"Our previous opinions make clear that customary international law is not federal law and that the president is free to override it at his discretion," said the memo written by John Yoo, who was then deputy assistant attorney general for the Office of Legal Counsel. The memo also offered a defense in case any interrogator was charged with violating U.S. or international laws.
"Finally, even if the criminal prohibitions outlined above applied, and an interrogation method might violate those prohibitions, necessity or self-defense could provide justifications for any criminal liability," the memo concluded.
First off, torture is forbidden by the Geneva Conventions as well as the Eighth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. It is against both international and federal law so it is ridiculous that Yoo would try to justify this immoral and illegal activity by using Bush’s wartime authority as trumping any bans on torture. First off, Congress hasn’t issued a declaration of war so the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq are illegal which means that Bush has no wartime authority to begin with. In fact, the occupation and on-going wars in both Afghanistan and Iraq are unconstitutional and illegal. There is simply no moral or legal basis that justifies the arguments in Yoo’s memo.
Yoo didn’t stop there though. In 2006, he said that the President actually had the authority to crush the testicles of children during an exchange with human rights scholar Doug Cassel.
There needs to be an immediate Congressional investigation into this matter. Adolf Hitler and the Nazis did not even have the guts to say or put this type of stuff down on paper. The torture and spying memos authored by Yoo is proof that he is not only a criminal but a war criminal.
Anyone in the Bush administration military or non-military who used the memo as justification to order or participate in the torture of other human beings should also be put on trial for war crimes. This is proof that the events in Abu Ghraib, Guantanamo Bay and in secret European prisons were authorized at very high levels in the Bush administration. These events were not the result of rogue low level soldiers, it was in fact policy.
Since we have so many militarized police running around in Darthvader outfits, perhaps they can finally be used to go after the real criminals. They can first pay a visit to Yoo’s office at UC Berkeley and then they can go round up the rest of them at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington DC. It is time to bring down the Fourth Reich.
Rogue Government
April 8, 2008
Recent news on the White House torture and spy memos has amazingly received very little coverage in the corporate controlled media. For instance, Barack Obama’s low bowling score has received more coverage than these memos. The media some how thinks Obama’s horrible bowling skills are more important than evidence that could be used to prosecute members of the Bush administration for all sorts of criminality including war crimes. That makes no sense, but of course when you consider that the corporate controlled media creates reality for people it makes perfect sense. Both of these memos were written by former Deputy Assistant Attorney General John Yoo and prove that the Bush administration sought to justify torture and ignore the Fourth Amendment under the guise of the phony war on terror. In the memos, Yoo concludes that Bush can torture and spy without a warrant if he is doing these things to protect the country from terrorists. Of course, the majority of the so called terrorists that the media and the government claims we are fighting are actually trained and funded by western governments so the whole thing is a big fraud. That of course is a whole other story. In these memos, it is clear that Yoo shows a blatant disregard for both U.S. and international law. Yoo and other members of the Bush administration should really be put on trial for war crimes but since the corporate controlled media thinks that Obama’s low bowling score is more important than smoking gun proof of war crimes, that’s probably not going to happen.
First let’s tackle the spying memo. Below is taken from an excerpt of an Associated Press report on the 37-page secret Justice Department memo in which Yoo concludes that the Fourth Amendment does not apply to domestic military operations.
For at least 16 months after the Sept. 11 terror attacks in 2001, the Bush administration believed that the Constitution’s protection against unreasonable searches and seizures on U.S. soil didn’t apply to its efforts to protect against terrorism.
That view was expressed in a secret Justice Department legal memo dated Oct. 23, 2001. The administration on Wednesday stressed that it now disavows that view.
The October 2001 memo was written at the request of the White House by John Yoo, then the deputy assistant attorney general, and addressed to Alberto Gonzales, the White House counsel at the time. The administration had asked the department for an opinion on the legality of potential responses to terrorist activity.
The 37-page memo is classified and has not been released. Its existence was disclosed Tuesday in a footnote of a separate secret memo, dated March 14, 2003, released by the Pentagon in response to a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit by the American Civil Liberties Union.
"Our office recently concluded that the Fourth Amendment had no application to domestic military operations," the footnote states, referring to a document titled "Authority for Use of Military Force to Combat Terrorist Activities Within the United States."
First off, domestic military operations at the time this memo was written were forbidden by the 1878 Posse Comitatus Act. On top of that, Yoo is essentially saying that the executive branch has the power to search and seize property without a warrant during domestic military operations.
Through this memo, Yoo is saying that the administration can disregard the Fourth Amendment so long as they claim that they are trying to protect America from terrorists. This is absurd considering that the Constitution is the supreme law of the land and there are no provisions for its suspension just because the executive branch says there is a state of war. This memo represents an attempt to justify spying on the American people without a warrant when there is no justification for it anywhere in the law.
Now let’s go to the torture memo. News on the torture memo actually leaked out to the press back in 2004 following the Abu Ghraib scandal in which pictures of U.S. soldiers torturing and humiliating prisoners were made public. Now, the memo in its entirety has been declassified via a Freedom of Information Act request by the ACLU. Although the memo was eventually rescinded, it gave authority to the Bush administration to legally order torture and ways to get around U.S. and international law that prohibited such activity.
Below is an excerpt from an Associated Press report on the declassification of the torture memo.
The Pentagon made public a now-defunct legal memo that approved the use of harsh interrogation techniques against terror suspects, saying that President Bush’s wartime authority trumps any international ban on torture.
The Justice Department memo, dated March 14, 2003, outlines legal justification for military interrogators to use harsh tactics against al-Qaida and Taliban detainees overseas — so long as they did not specifically intend to torture their captives.
Even so, the memo noted, the president’s wartime power as commander in chief would not be limited by the U.N. treaties against torture.
"Our previous opinions make clear that customary international law is not federal law and that the president is free to override it at his discretion," said the memo written by John Yoo, who was then deputy assistant attorney general for the Office of Legal Counsel. The memo also offered a defense in case any interrogator was charged with violating U.S. or international laws.
"Finally, even if the criminal prohibitions outlined above applied, and an interrogation method might violate those prohibitions, necessity or self-defense could provide justifications for any criminal liability," the memo concluded.
First off, torture is forbidden by the Geneva Conventions as well as the Eighth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. It is against both international and federal law so it is ridiculous that Yoo would try to justify this immoral and illegal activity by using Bush’s wartime authority as trumping any bans on torture. First off, Congress hasn’t issued a declaration of war so the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq are illegal which means that Bush has no wartime authority to begin with. In fact, the occupation and on-going wars in both Afghanistan and Iraq are unconstitutional and illegal. There is simply no moral or legal basis that justifies the arguments in Yoo’s memo.
Yoo didn’t stop there though. In 2006, he said that the President actually had the authority to crush the testicles of children during an exchange with human rights scholar Doug Cassel.
There needs to be an immediate Congressional investigation into this matter. Adolf Hitler and the Nazis did not even have the guts to say or put this type of stuff down on paper. The torture and spying memos authored by Yoo is proof that he is not only a criminal but a war criminal.
Anyone in the Bush administration military or non-military who used the memo as justification to order or participate in the torture of other human beings should also be put on trial for war crimes. This is proof that the events in Abu Ghraib, Guantanamo Bay and in secret European prisons were authorized at very high levels in the Bush administration. These events were not the result of rogue low level soldiers, it was in fact policy.
Since we have so many militarized police running around in Darthvader outfits, perhaps they can finally be used to go after the real criminals. They can first pay a visit to Yoo’s office at UC Berkeley and then they can go round up the rest of them at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington DC. It is time to bring down the Fourth Reich.
White House asked DOJ how Bush could sidestep Fourth Amendment
Jason Leopold
Online JournalApril 7, 2008
Last week, the Pentagon declassified an 81-page memorandum John Yoo, a former deputy in the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel, drafted in March 2003 that authorized military interrogators to use brutal techniques to obtain information about terrorist plans from prisoners held at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
The memo was publicly released as part of the American Civil Liberties Union’s Freedom of Information Act lawsuit against the Pentagon.
Buried deep within that legal document is a footnote that refers to an Oct. 23, 2001, legal memorandum written by Yoo.
“Our office recently concluded that the Fourth Amendment had no application to domestic military operations,” the footnote states, referring to a 37-page document titled “Authority for Use of Military Force to Combat Terrorist Activities Within the United States.”
Jameel Jaffer, director of the ACLU’s National Security Project, said the Bush administration has never argued publicly that the Fourth Amendment did not apply to military operations within the U.S.
But an investigation has found that that this controversial policy adopted by the White House in October 2001 took shape 10 days after 9/11. It was then that Yoo drafted a 20-page memorandum offering up suggestions on how Fourth Amendment protections against unreasonable searches and seizures would be applied if the U.S. military used “deadly force in a manner that endangered the lives of United States citizens.”
Yoo came up with a number of different scenarios. He suggested shooting down a jetliner hijacked by terrorists; setting up military checkpoints inside a U.S. city; implementing surveillance methods far more superior than those available to law enforcement; or using military forces “to raid or attack dwellings where terrorists were thought to be, despite risks that third parties could be killed or injured by exchanges of fire,” says a copy of the little known Sept. 21, 2001, memo.
Yoo, the author of an August 2002 legal opinion widely referred to as the “Torture Memo” that gave CIA interrogators the legal authority to use brutal methods against suspected terrorists to extract information, drafted the memo in response to a question posed by Timothy E. Flanigan, the former deputy White House counsel, who wanted to know “the legality of the use of military force to prevent or deter terrorist activity inside the United States,” according to a copy of Flanigan’s memo.
Yoo wrote that his ideas would likely be seen as violating the Fourth Amendment. But he said the terrorist attacks on 9/11 and the prospect that future attacks would require the military to be deployed inside the U.S. meant President Bush would “be justified in taking measures which in less troubled conditions could be seen as infringements of individual liberties.”
“We think that the Fourth Amendment should be no more relevant than it would be in cases of invasion or insurrection,” Yoo’s memo stated.
Yoo also wrote in the Sept. 21, 2001, memo that domestic surveillance activities, such as monitoring telephone calls and without a court’s permission, might be proper notwithstanding the ban in the Fourth Amendment on unreasonable searches and seizures.
The Sept. 21, 2001, memo Yoo sent to Flanigan was referred to in a lengthy story published in the New York Times on October 24, 2004. The Times story said Yoo’s suggestions for suspending the Fourth Amendment was hypothetical at best.
Yoo based his opinion on the 1990 drug case, US v. Verdugo-Urquide, in which the Supreme Court refused to hear a lawsuit brought against the United States by a Mexican citizen whose home was searched by federal agents without a search warrant. In rejecting the Fourth Amendment claim, the court said aliens could not claim the benefit of the Constitution for conduct outside the United States — such aliens were not part of the “we the people” who benefited from the Fourth Amendment. Further, the Court found that allowing such claims would have significant and deleterious consequences for the United States in conducting activities beyond its boundaries, not just in drug cases . . . but in the use of armed forces abroad “for the protection of American citizens or national security.”
Yoo refers to the case in his 2006 book, “War by Other Means: An Insider’s Account of the War on Terror,” where he argues in more than 23 separate pages about the various legal reasons local and federal law enforcement agencies, as well as a sitting U.S. president, could ignore the Fourth Amendment. Yoo’s legal theories revolve primarily around domestic surveillance activities.
“If Al-Qaeda organizes missions within the United States, our surveillance simply cannot be limited to law enforcement,” Yoo wrote in his book. “The Fourth Amendment’s warrant requirement should not apply, because it is concerned with regulating searches, not with military attacks.”
The Bush administration accepted Yoo’s legal theory as policy for more than one year, beginning in late October 2001.
White House spokesman Tony Fratto said last Thursday the administration hasn’t relied on Yoo’s Oct. 23, 2001, memo for more than five years.
Still, Congress said it has spent a considerable amount of time trying to pry loose the memo from the Department of Justice.
Last Thursday, John Conyers, the Democratic chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, wrote a letter to Attorney General Michael Mukasey saying he was rebuffed on two previous occasions — February 12 and 20 — when he wrote the DOJ requesting the Oct. 23, 2001, memo be turned over to his committee “Based on the title of the October 23, 2001, memorandum, and based on what has been disclosed and the contents of similar memoranda issued at roughly the same time, it is clear that a substantial portion of this memorandum provides a legal analysis and conclusions as to the nature and scope of the Presidential Commander in Chief power to accomplish specific acts within the United States,” Conyers wrote.
“The people of the United States are entitled to know the Justice Department’s interpretation of the President’s constitutional powers to wage war in the United States,” Conyers added. “There can be no actual basis in national security for keeping secret the remainder of a legal memorandum that addresses this issue of Constitutional interpretation The notion that the President can claim to operate under ’secret’ powers known only to the President and a select few subordinates is antithetical to the core principles of this democracy. We ask that you promptly release the October 23, 2001, memorandum.”
Online JournalApril 7, 2008
Last week, the Pentagon declassified an 81-page memorandum John Yoo, a former deputy in the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel, drafted in March 2003 that authorized military interrogators to use brutal techniques to obtain information about terrorist plans from prisoners held at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
The memo was publicly released as part of the American Civil Liberties Union’s Freedom of Information Act lawsuit against the Pentagon.
Buried deep within that legal document is a footnote that refers to an Oct. 23, 2001, legal memorandum written by Yoo.
“Our office recently concluded that the Fourth Amendment had no application to domestic military operations,” the footnote states, referring to a 37-page document titled “Authority for Use of Military Force to Combat Terrorist Activities Within the United States.”
Jameel Jaffer, director of the ACLU’s National Security Project, said the Bush administration has never argued publicly that the Fourth Amendment did not apply to military operations within the U.S.
But an investigation has found that that this controversial policy adopted by the White House in October 2001 took shape 10 days after 9/11. It was then that Yoo drafted a 20-page memorandum offering up suggestions on how Fourth Amendment protections against unreasonable searches and seizures would be applied if the U.S. military used “deadly force in a manner that endangered the lives of United States citizens.”
Yoo came up with a number of different scenarios. He suggested shooting down a jetliner hijacked by terrorists; setting up military checkpoints inside a U.S. city; implementing surveillance methods far more superior than those available to law enforcement; or using military forces “to raid or attack dwellings where terrorists were thought to be, despite risks that third parties could be killed or injured by exchanges of fire,” says a copy of the little known Sept. 21, 2001, memo.
Yoo, the author of an August 2002 legal opinion widely referred to as the “Torture Memo” that gave CIA interrogators the legal authority to use brutal methods against suspected terrorists to extract information, drafted the memo in response to a question posed by Timothy E. Flanigan, the former deputy White House counsel, who wanted to know “the legality of the use of military force to prevent or deter terrorist activity inside the United States,” according to a copy of Flanigan’s memo.
Yoo wrote that his ideas would likely be seen as violating the Fourth Amendment. But he said the terrorist attacks on 9/11 and the prospect that future attacks would require the military to be deployed inside the U.S. meant President Bush would “be justified in taking measures which in less troubled conditions could be seen as infringements of individual liberties.”
“We think that the Fourth Amendment should be no more relevant than it would be in cases of invasion or insurrection,” Yoo’s memo stated.
Yoo also wrote in the Sept. 21, 2001, memo that domestic surveillance activities, such as monitoring telephone calls and without a court’s permission, might be proper notwithstanding the ban in the Fourth Amendment on unreasonable searches and seizures.
The Sept. 21, 2001, memo Yoo sent to Flanigan was referred to in a lengthy story published in the New York Times on October 24, 2004. The Times story said Yoo’s suggestions for suspending the Fourth Amendment was hypothetical at best.
Yoo based his opinion on the 1990 drug case, US v. Verdugo-Urquide, in which the Supreme Court refused to hear a lawsuit brought against the United States by a Mexican citizen whose home was searched by federal agents without a search warrant. In rejecting the Fourth Amendment claim, the court said aliens could not claim the benefit of the Constitution for conduct outside the United States — such aliens were not part of the “we the people” who benefited from the Fourth Amendment. Further, the Court found that allowing such claims would have significant and deleterious consequences for the United States in conducting activities beyond its boundaries, not just in drug cases . . . but in the use of armed forces abroad “for the protection of American citizens or national security.”
Yoo refers to the case in his 2006 book, “War by Other Means: An Insider’s Account of the War on Terror,” where he argues in more than 23 separate pages about the various legal reasons local and federal law enforcement agencies, as well as a sitting U.S. president, could ignore the Fourth Amendment. Yoo’s legal theories revolve primarily around domestic surveillance activities.
“If Al-Qaeda organizes missions within the United States, our surveillance simply cannot be limited to law enforcement,” Yoo wrote in his book. “The Fourth Amendment’s warrant requirement should not apply, because it is concerned with regulating searches, not with military attacks.”
The Bush administration accepted Yoo’s legal theory as policy for more than one year, beginning in late October 2001.
White House spokesman Tony Fratto said last Thursday the administration hasn’t relied on Yoo’s Oct. 23, 2001, memo for more than five years.
Still, Congress said it has spent a considerable amount of time trying to pry loose the memo from the Department of Justice.
Last Thursday, John Conyers, the Democratic chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, wrote a letter to Attorney General Michael Mukasey saying he was rebuffed on two previous occasions — February 12 and 20 — when he wrote the DOJ requesting the Oct. 23, 2001, memo be turned over to his committee “Based on the title of the October 23, 2001, memorandum, and based on what has been disclosed and the contents of similar memoranda issued at roughly the same time, it is clear that a substantial portion of this memorandum provides a legal analysis and conclusions as to the nature and scope of the Presidential Commander in Chief power to accomplish specific acts within the United States,” Conyers wrote.
“The people of the United States are entitled to know the Justice Department’s interpretation of the President’s constitutional powers to wage war in the United States,” Conyers added. “There can be no actual basis in national security for keeping secret the remainder of a legal memorandum that addresses this issue of Constitutional interpretation The notion that the President can claim to operate under ’secret’ powers known only to the President and a select few subordinates is antithetical to the core principles of this democracy. We ask that you promptly release the October 23, 2001, memorandum.”
Monday, April 07, 2008
Shoppers' fear shakes U.S. economy
ANNE D 'INNOCENZIO
Associated Press
The gloomiest outlook for the economy in 35 years may be forcing Americans to live with what they have and save up for what they want.
Lynda Nicely has been living in a sparsely furnished rental apartment in a Milwaukee suburb since October while she saves enough money for furniture at a second-hand store. And when temperatures soar this summer, she plans to buy a fan, not an air-conditioner.
"I am a little rattled, " said the 28-year-old resident of West Allis, who took a second job as a waitress and plans to hoard three months worth of emergency cash just in case she loses her primary job in public relations.
• Recession? Experts don't agree
A growing number of anxious people across all income segments are shopping at less-expensive stores, reacquainting themselves with the library, paying down credit-card debt and cutting back on new clothes and cars, vacations and meals out.
The psychology of the American consumer has turned as worries heighten about the job market, the slump in real estate and soaring daily living costs.
Industry followers say shoppers ' fear, which has been escalating since last July, could very well worsen what ails us.
Such spending cuts could be "a self-fulfilling prophesy " and could hasten the economy 's slide, said Lynn Franco, director of The Conference Board Consumer Research Center.
"I don 't think (the spending slump) has bottomed out, " said Candace Corlett, principal at consulting firm WSL Strategic Retail. "Shoppers are learning a new behavior: how to resist temptation. There is a lot of fear out there. "
Shopping at discounters
Such worries are driving shoppers to cut back on big-ticket items like appliances, delay redecorating their houses and shop at discounters like Wal-Mart and thrift stores for second-hand clothing. They 're particularly avoiding full-priced fashion chains and department stores at the mall.
Consumers have every right to be nervous -- the government data out Friday showed unemployment and job losses were higher than expected. It also reported only modest wage growth, which makes people feel like they are losing money as food and gas prices keep rising.
Shoppers ' economic outlook for the next six months is at a 35-year low, levels not seen since the oil embargo and the Watergate scandal, according to a reading last week by the Conference Board, a business-backed research group. The report showed that fewer consumers plan to buy big appliances like air-conditioners, TVs and refrigerators within the next six months.
Sluggish sales
Retailers struggled through yet another sluggish month, with March sales at stores open at least a year expected to fall slightly from a year earlier, according to the International Council of Shopping Centers-UBS tally.
J.C. Penney Co. warned last week of at least a 10 percent drop in same-store sales for March and slashed its first-quarter earnings forecast. Retailers are set to report final figures on Thursday.
Many analysts expect only a small sales lift starting in May when consumers begin receiving rebate checks from the federal government 's stimulus plan, but any bump should only be temporary. Michael P. Niemira, chief economist at the shopping center group, believes the malaise could extend into next year.
Consumers are also increasingly concerned about inflation, with the Energy Department anticipating that gas prices will peak near $3.50 a gallon this spring. Many analysts believe prices could go much higher.
Mounting debt payments are also making shoppers cut back on stuff they can live without. U.S. families now spend more money on debt service, absorbing more than 14 percent of disposable income, than on food, which accounts for 13 percent, according to a Merrill Lynch & Co. report. That is higher than during the last recession in 2001 when 13.2 percent of household disposable income went toward debt, Merrill Lynch said.
That shows how "deep the credit problem is in terms of its impact on household cash flow, " wrote Merrill Lynch economist David Rosenberg.
80,000 jobs cut
The latest Labor Department figures didn 't give consumers any comfort. Employers slashed 80,000 jobs in March, the most in five years and the third straight month of losses. The national unemployment rate rose to 5.1 percent from 4.8 percent. Over the past 12 months, wages grew 3.6 percent, slowing from about 4 percent growth early last year.
Job security is key to consumers ' willingness to spend, and amid the persistently dreary news many are taking drastic measures.
Nicely, who doesn 't have any credit-card debt, is so unsettled by the softening job market that she is also now working as a cocktail waitress. With food costs soaring, she eats almost everything in her pantry and fridge before going back to the grocery store.
Given such anxiety, Corlett says, retailers need to reassure consumers that shopping at their stores makes "smart use of their money. "
Thrift stores popular
Thrift stores across the country are seeing a surge in business as shoppers shift to buying used clothes or selling items from their closets to get extra cash. Buffalo Exchange, a second-hand clothing chain based in Tucson, Ariz., reported a 17 percent rise in sales at established stores so far this year -- the biggest gain since the late 1980s, according to owner Kerstin Block.
Trend analyst Faith Popcorn, founder of the consulting firm BrainReserve, sees the "stripping down " trend as positive.
"I think we are going back to the '50s decade, " said Popcorn, who expects consumers will start growing food in their own gardens and learn to extend the life of worn garments by mending them.
Such a picture offers less comfort to Angela Durepo of Cincinnati, who said she has cut back on buying clothes as higher gas and food prices consume more of her income.
"I 'm also not going to the movies as much or buying CDs and other kinds of extras, " the legal secretary said. "I 'm mostly shopping for groceries, hygiene products, gas for the car -- things you have to have. "
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Associated Press
The gloomiest outlook for the economy in 35 years may be forcing Americans to live with what they have and save up for what they want.
Lynda Nicely has been living in a sparsely furnished rental apartment in a Milwaukee suburb since October while she saves enough money for furniture at a second-hand store. And when temperatures soar this summer, she plans to buy a fan, not an air-conditioner.
"I am a little rattled, " said the 28-year-old resident of West Allis, who took a second job as a waitress and plans to hoard three months worth of emergency cash just in case she loses her primary job in public relations.
• Recession? Experts don't agree
A growing number of anxious people across all income segments are shopping at less-expensive stores, reacquainting themselves with the library, paying down credit-card debt and cutting back on new clothes and cars, vacations and meals out.
The psychology of the American consumer has turned as worries heighten about the job market, the slump in real estate and soaring daily living costs.
Industry followers say shoppers ' fear, which has been escalating since last July, could very well worsen what ails us.
Such spending cuts could be "a self-fulfilling prophesy " and could hasten the economy 's slide, said Lynn Franco, director of The Conference Board Consumer Research Center.
"I don 't think (the spending slump) has bottomed out, " said Candace Corlett, principal at consulting firm WSL Strategic Retail. "Shoppers are learning a new behavior: how to resist temptation. There is a lot of fear out there. "
Shopping at discounters
Such worries are driving shoppers to cut back on big-ticket items like appliances, delay redecorating their houses and shop at discounters like Wal-Mart and thrift stores for second-hand clothing. They 're particularly avoiding full-priced fashion chains and department stores at the mall.
Consumers have every right to be nervous -- the government data out Friday showed unemployment and job losses were higher than expected. It also reported only modest wage growth, which makes people feel like they are losing money as food and gas prices keep rising.
Shoppers ' economic outlook for the next six months is at a 35-year low, levels not seen since the oil embargo and the Watergate scandal, according to a reading last week by the Conference Board, a business-backed research group. The report showed that fewer consumers plan to buy big appliances like air-conditioners, TVs and refrigerators within the next six months.
Sluggish sales
Retailers struggled through yet another sluggish month, with March sales at stores open at least a year expected to fall slightly from a year earlier, according to the International Council of Shopping Centers-UBS tally.
J.C. Penney Co. warned last week of at least a 10 percent drop in same-store sales for March and slashed its first-quarter earnings forecast. Retailers are set to report final figures on Thursday.
Many analysts expect only a small sales lift starting in May when consumers begin receiving rebate checks from the federal government 's stimulus plan, but any bump should only be temporary. Michael P. Niemira, chief economist at the shopping center group, believes the malaise could extend into next year.
Consumers are also increasingly concerned about inflation, with the Energy Department anticipating that gas prices will peak near $3.50 a gallon this spring. Many analysts believe prices could go much higher.
Mounting debt payments are also making shoppers cut back on stuff they can live without. U.S. families now spend more money on debt service, absorbing more than 14 percent of disposable income, than on food, which accounts for 13 percent, according to a Merrill Lynch & Co. report. That is higher than during the last recession in 2001 when 13.2 percent of household disposable income went toward debt, Merrill Lynch said.
That shows how "deep the credit problem is in terms of its impact on household cash flow, " wrote Merrill Lynch economist David Rosenberg.
80,000 jobs cut
The latest Labor Department figures didn 't give consumers any comfort. Employers slashed 80,000 jobs in March, the most in five years and the third straight month of losses. The national unemployment rate rose to 5.1 percent from 4.8 percent. Over the past 12 months, wages grew 3.6 percent, slowing from about 4 percent growth early last year.
Job security is key to consumers ' willingness to spend, and amid the persistently dreary news many are taking drastic measures.
Nicely, who doesn 't have any credit-card debt, is so unsettled by the softening job market that she is also now working as a cocktail waitress. With food costs soaring, she eats almost everything in her pantry and fridge before going back to the grocery store.
Given such anxiety, Corlett says, retailers need to reassure consumers that shopping at their stores makes "smart use of their money. "
Thrift stores popular
Thrift stores across the country are seeing a surge in business as shoppers shift to buying used clothes or selling items from their closets to get extra cash. Buffalo Exchange, a second-hand clothing chain based in Tucson, Ariz., reported a 17 percent rise in sales at established stores so far this year -- the biggest gain since the late 1980s, according to owner Kerstin Block.
Trend analyst Faith Popcorn, founder of the consulting firm BrainReserve, sees the "stripping down " trend as positive.
"I think we are going back to the '50s decade, " said Popcorn, who expects consumers will start growing food in their own gardens and learn to extend the life of worn garments by mending them.
Such a picture offers less comfort to Angela Durepo of Cincinnati, who said she has cut back on buying clothes as higher gas and food prices consume more of her income.
"I 'm also not going to the movies as much or buying CDs and other kinds of extras, " the legal secretary said. "I 'm mostly shopping for groceries, hygiene products, gas for the car -- things you have to have. "
Copyright 2007 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. Learn more about our Privacy Policy at http://apdigitalnews.com/privacy.html.
Contract Justice
by JEREMY SCAHILL
[posted online on April 6, 2008]
For the first time since 1968, the Pentagon has charged a civilian contractor under military law. But the individual in question is not one of the Blackwater "shooters" alleged to have gunned down seventeen Iraqi civilians in Baghdad's Nisour Square last September, nor is it the Blackwater contractor accused of shooting to death a bodyguard to the Iraqi vice president inside the Green Zone on Christmas Eve 2006. In fact, the contractor is not even a US citizen. Nor is he an armed contractor. And the crime in question was not committed against an Iraqi civilian.
The swiftness of the military's response to this alleged crime, the nature of that crime and the identity of the victim speaks volumes about the priorities of US oversight and law enforcement when it comes to contractor crimes in Iraq. What's more, the news of the prosecution came just days before the State Department announced that despite the serious allegations against Blackwater, it was extending the company's Iraq "security" contract for yet another year.
The accused contractor, Alaa Mohammad Ali, is a dual Canadian-Iraqi citizen who worked for the US corporation Titan as a military translator in the western Iraqi town of Hit. He reportedly emigrated to Canada after fleeing Iraq in the aftermath of Saddam Hussein's violent suppression of the 1991 Shiite uprising. Now, Ali stands accused of stabbing in the chest a fellow contractor--reportedly another translator--on February 23. The military began the process of charging him four weeks later, on March 27.
By contrast, more than six months after the incident, no charges have been brought--under any legal system--against Blackwater's personnel for the Nisour Square shootings, despite a US military investigation that found all seventeen of the Iraqi victims died as a result of unjustified and unprovoked shooting in an incident the military labeled a "criminal event." Nor have charges been brought against the Blackwater operative alleged to have killed the Iraqi vice president's bodyguard. Baghdad called that killing a "murder." Weeks after the alleged killing, the Blackwater contractor was back in the Middle East working for another war contractor.
Ali's case is the first to be brought since the release of a March 10 memorandum from Defense Secretary Robert Gates asserting greater military authority to prosecute contractors for crimes committed abroad. The memo was sparked by a 2006 Congressional amendment to the Uniform Code of Military Justice. "They want to test out a new American law on somebody who is not even an American," said Capt. Clay Compton, Ali's military lawyer, in an interview with the New York Times. "This is not the type of case that Congress envisioned would be tried. We will be challenging the justification for this case."
But while lawyers, military officials and legislators debate the particulars of Ali's case, the gorilla in the room is the stunning lack --for five years of occupation-- of any accountability for the crimes of the members of the 180,000-strong force that makes up the shadow army of contractors working for the US in Iraq.
Despite the fact that contractors now outnumber US soldiers in Iraq, there have to date only been two prosecutions of private personnel. Unlike Ali, they were charged under US civilian law.
But like Ali's alleged crime, neither of these cases involved offenses against Iraqi civilians. One was a KBR contractor alleged to have stabbed a co-worker; the other was a contractor who pled guilty to possession of child pornography images on his computer at Abu Ghraib prison. There have been at least sixty four US soldiers court martialed on murder-related charges in Iraq alone. Not a single armed contractor--like those that work for Blackwater--has been charged with a crime stemming from their actions in Iraq.
There is great debate in the legal community about whether crimes committed by personnel from Blackwater--which is a State Department contractor--could be, or should be, prosecuted by the military. There are also jurisdictional questions about whether the current US civilian law on contractors--the Military Extraterritorial Jurisdiction Act--could be effectively applied to Blackwater's forces. Congress is considering expanding that Act, but has met resistance from the Administration. The changes have passed the House but the bill is now stuck in the Senate. The bigger issue, however, is that the White House has displayed a complete refusal to hold armed contractors accountable in any effective way. Scott Horton, a lecturer at Colombia Law School, has argued that contractors could be tried under the US War Crimes Act, but that has not happened. "There clearly is jurisdiction and a basis to act against them," Horton says. "But the Bush Administration doesn't want to go there, doesn't want to touch that. I think they've made that point clear."
For all practical purposes, Iraq War contractors have operated in an enforcement- and accountability-free zone, where de facto immunity and impunity have gone hand in hand.
Instead of holding these forces to the same standard as active duty soldiers, the Bush Administration continues to reward Blackwater for its consistently lethal conduct, which numerous US military leaders have bluntly deemed to be at "cross purposes" with the US mission in Iraq and Washington's so-called "counter-insurgency" campaign.
In the two weeks after Nisour Square, Blackwater and the Administration signed more than $140 million in "protective services" contracts in Iraq and Afghanistan and millions more since. On April 4, just as the news of Ali's prosecution was breaking, the State Department announced that it was extending Blackwater's Iraq contract. "We can terminate contracts with the convenience of the government if we have to," said Assistant Secretary of State Gregory Starr.
"And if that was the decision, that we had to terminate the contract, we could terminate the contract." But, of course, they didn't. This could well mean that, like most of US policy in Iraq, the Blackwater "problem" will be left for the next president.
"This is bad news," said Sami al-Askari, a senior adviser to Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, about the extension of Blackwater's contract. "I personally am not happy with this, especially because they have committed acts of aggression, killed Iraqis, and this has not been resolved yet positively for families of victims." But what is best for Iraqis when it comes to Blackwater and other contractors has never been the US priority. "After careful consideration of the operational requirements necessary to support the US Government's foreign policy objectives in Iraq," Starr asserted, Blackwater's contract was extended. "The US government needs protective services."
As for the translator, Alaa Mohammad Ali, if he is guilty of the alleged stabbing of a fellow contractor, he should face the consequences. The appropriate venue for such a trial is debatable. But the fact that an Iraqi who fled Saddam's regime only to return as a translator to support the US occupation is the token example of the new US "crackdown" on contractors, while the Americans of Blackwater alleged to have gunned down seventeen Iraqi civilians walk around free men, shows just how morally bankrupt the outsourcing of Washington's war--and the de facto immunity offered to the shadow army-- has been from day one.
[posted online on April 6, 2008]
For the first time since 1968, the Pentagon has charged a civilian contractor under military law. But the individual in question is not one of the Blackwater "shooters" alleged to have gunned down seventeen Iraqi civilians in Baghdad's Nisour Square last September, nor is it the Blackwater contractor accused of shooting to death a bodyguard to the Iraqi vice president inside the Green Zone on Christmas Eve 2006. In fact, the contractor is not even a US citizen. Nor is he an armed contractor. And the crime in question was not committed against an Iraqi civilian.
The swiftness of the military's response to this alleged crime, the nature of that crime and the identity of the victim speaks volumes about the priorities of US oversight and law enforcement when it comes to contractor crimes in Iraq. What's more, the news of the prosecution came just days before the State Department announced that despite the serious allegations against Blackwater, it was extending the company's Iraq "security" contract for yet another year.
The accused contractor, Alaa Mohammad Ali, is a dual Canadian-Iraqi citizen who worked for the US corporation Titan as a military translator in the western Iraqi town of Hit. He reportedly emigrated to Canada after fleeing Iraq in the aftermath of Saddam Hussein's violent suppression of the 1991 Shiite uprising. Now, Ali stands accused of stabbing in the chest a fellow contractor--reportedly another translator--on February 23. The military began the process of charging him four weeks later, on March 27.
By contrast, more than six months after the incident, no charges have been brought--under any legal system--against Blackwater's personnel for the Nisour Square shootings, despite a US military investigation that found all seventeen of the Iraqi victims died as a result of unjustified and unprovoked shooting in an incident the military labeled a "criminal event." Nor have charges been brought against the Blackwater operative alleged to have killed the Iraqi vice president's bodyguard. Baghdad called that killing a "murder." Weeks after the alleged killing, the Blackwater contractor was back in the Middle East working for another war contractor.
Ali's case is the first to be brought since the release of a March 10 memorandum from Defense Secretary Robert Gates asserting greater military authority to prosecute contractors for crimes committed abroad. The memo was sparked by a 2006 Congressional amendment to the Uniform Code of Military Justice. "They want to test out a new American law on somebody who is not even an American," said Capt. Clay Compton, Ali's military lawyer, in an interview with the New York Times. "This is not the type of case that Congress envisioned would be tried. We will be challenging the justification for this case."
But while lawyers, military officials and legislators debate the particulars of Ali's case, the gorilla in the room is the stunning lack --for five years of occupation-- of any accountability for the crimes of the members of the 180,000-strong force that makes up the shadow army of contractors working for the US in Iraq.
Despite the fact that contractors now outnumber US soldiers in Iraq, there have to date only been two prosecutions of private personnel. Unlike Ali, they were charged under US civilian law.
But like Ali's alleged crime, neither of these cases involved offenses against Iraqi civilians. One was a KBR contractor alleged to have stabbed a co-worker; the other was a contractor who pled guilty to possession of child pornography images on his computer at Abu Ghraib prison. There have been at least sixty four US soldiers court martialed on murder-related charges in Iraq alone. Not a single armed contractor--like those that work for Blackwater--has been charged with a crime stemming from their actions in Iraq.
There is great debate in the legal community about whether crimes committed by personnel from Blackwater--which is a State Department contractor--could be, or should be, prosecuted by the military. There are also jurisdictional questions about whether the current US civilian law on contractors--the Military Extraterritorial Jurisdiction Act--could be effectively applied to Blackwater's forces. Congress is considering expanding that Act, but has met resistance from the Administration. The changes have passed the House but the bill is now stuck in the Senate. The bigger issue, however, is that the White House has displayed a complete refusal to hold armed contractors accountable in any effective way. Scott Horton, a lecturer at Colombia Law School, has argued that contractors could be tried under the US War Crimes Act, but that has not happened. "There clearly is jurisdiction and a basis to act against them," Horton says. "But the Bush Administration doesn't want to go there, doesn't want to touch that. I think they've made that point clear."
For all practical purposes, Iraq War contractors have operated in an enforcement- and accountability-free zone, where de facto immunity and impunity have gone hand in hand.
Instead of holding these forces to the same standard as active duty soldiers, the Bush Administration continues to reward Blackwater for its consistently lethal conduct, which numerous US military leaders have bluntly deemed to be at "cross purposes" with the US mission in Iraq and Washington's so-called "counter-insurgency" campaign.
In the two weeks after Nisour Square, Blackwater and the Administration signed more than $140 million in "protective services" contracts in Iraq and Afghanistan and millions more since. On April 4, just as the news of Ali's prosecution was breaking, the State Department announced that it was extending Blackwater's Iraq contract. "We can terminate contracts with the convenience of the government if we have to," said Assistant Secretary of State Gregory Starr.
"And if that was the decision, that we had to terminate the contract, we could terminate the contract." But, of course, they didn't. This could well mean that, like most of US policy in Iraq, the Blackwater "problem" will be left for the next president.
"This is bad news," said Sami al-Askari, a senior adviser to Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, about the extension of Blackwater's contract. "I personally am not happy with this, especially because they have committed acts of aggression, killed Iraqis, and this has not been resolved yet positively for families of victims." But what is best for Iraqis when it comes to Blackwater and other contractors has never been the US priority. "After careful consideration of the operational requirements necessary to support the US Government's foreign policy objectives in Iraq," Starr asserted, Blackwater's contract was extended. "The US government needs protective services."
As for the translator, Alaa Mohammad Ali, if he is guilty of the alleged stabbing of a fellow contractor, he should face the consequences. The appropriate venue for such a trial is debatable. But the fact that an Iraqi who fled Saddam's regime only to return as a translator to support the US occupation is the token example of the new US "crackdown" on contractors, while the Americans of Blackwater alleged to have gunned down seventeen Iraqi civilians walk around free men, shows just how morally bankrupt the outsourcing of Washington's war--and the de facto immunity offered to the shadow army-- has been from day one.
The coming food catastrophe
Gwynne Dyer
Canadian DimensionApril 5, 2008
“This is the new face of hunger,” said Josette Sheeran, executive director of the UN’s World Food Programme, launching an appeal for an extra $500 million so it could continue supplying food aid to 73 million hungry people this year. “People are simply being priced out of food markets. We have never before had a situation where aggressive rises in food prices keep pricing our operations out of our reach.”
The WFP decided on a public appeal several weeks ago because the price of the food it buys to feed some of the world’s poorest people had risen by 55 percent since last June. By the time it actually launched the appeal on March 20, prices had risen a further 20 percent, so now it needs $700 million to bridge the gap between last year‚s budget and this year’s prices.
In Thailand, farmers are sleeping in their fields after reports that thieves are stealing the rice, now worth $600 a tonne, straight out of the fields. Four people have died in Egypt in clashes over subsidized flour that was being sold for profit on the black market. There have been food riots in Morocco, Senegal, and Cameroon.
Last year, it became clear that the era of cheap food was over: food costs worldwide rose by 23 percent between 2006 and 2007. This year, what is becoming clear is the impact of this change on ordinary people's lives.
For consumers in Japan, France, or the United States, the relentless price rises for food are an unwelcome extra pressure on an already stretched household budget. For less fortunate people in other places, they can mean less protein in the diet or choosing between feeding the kids breakfast and paying their school fees, or even, in the poorest communities, starvation. And the crisis is only getting started.
It is the “perfect storm”: everything is going wrong at once. To begin with, the world’s population has continued to grow while its food production has not. For the 50 years between 1945 and 1995, as the world’s population more than doubled, grain production kept pace–but then it stalled. In six of the past seven years, the human race consumed more grain than it grew. World grain reserves last year were only 57 days, down from 180 days a decade ago.
To make matters worse, demand for food is growing faster than population. As incomes rise in China, India, and other countries with fast-growing economies, consumers include more and more meat in their diet: the average Chinese citizen now eats 50 kilograms of meat a year, up from 20 kilos in the mid-1980s. Producing meat consumes enormous quantities of grain.
Then there is global warming, which is probably already cutting into food production. Many people in Australia, formerly the world‚s second-largest wheat exporter, suspect that climate change is the real reason for the prolonged drought that is destroying the country‚s ability to export food.
But the worst damage is being done by the rage for “biofuels” that supposedly reduce carbon-dioxide emissions and fight climate change. (But they don’t, really–at least, not in their present form.) Thirty percent of this year’s U.S. grain harvest will go straight to an ethanol distillery, and the European Union is aiming to provide 10 percent of the fuel used for transport from biofuels by 2010. A huge amount of the world‚s farmland is being diverted to feed cars, not people.
Worse yet, rain forest is being cleared, especially in Brazil and Indonesia, to grow more biofuels.
A recent study in the U.S. journal Science calculated that destroying natural ecosystems to grow corn or sugar cane for ethanol, or oil palms or soybeans for biodiesel, releases between 17 times and 420 times more carbon dioxide than is saved annually by burning the biofuel grown on that land instead of fossil fuel. It‚s all justified in the name of fighting climate change, but the numbers just don‚t add up.
This is the one element in the perfect storm that is completely under human control. Governments can simply stop creating artificial demand for the current generation of biofuels (and often directly subsidizing them). That land goes back to growing food instead, and prices fall. Climate change is a real threat, but we don‚t have to have this crisis now.
“If more and more land [is] diverted for industrial biofuels to keep cars running, we have two years before a food catastrophe breaks out worldwide,” said Vandana Shiva, director of the Indian-based Research Foundation for Science, Technology, and Natural Resource Policy, in an interview recently. “It’ll be 20 years before climate catastrophe breaks out, but the false solutions to climate change are creating catastrophes that will be much more rapid than the climate change itself.”
Canadian DimensionApril 5, 2008
“This is the new face of hunger,” said Josette Sheeran, executive director of the UN’s World Food Programme, launching an appeal for an extra $500 million so it could continue supplying food aid to 73 million hungry people this year. “People are simply being priced out of food markets. We have never before had a situation where aggressive rises in food prices keep pricing our operations out of our reach.”
The WFP decided on a public appeal several weeks ago because the price of the food it buys to feed some of the world’s poorest people had risen by 55 percent since last June. By the time it actually launched the appeal on March 20, prices had risen a further 20 percent, so now it needs $700 million to bridge the gap between last year‚s budget and this year’s prices.
In Thailand, farmers are sleeping in their fields after reports that thieves are stealing the rice, now worth $600 a tonne, straight out of the fields. Four people have died in Egypt in clashes over subsidized flour that was being sold for profit on the black market. There have been food riots in Morocco, Senegal, and Cameroon.
Last year, it became clear that the era of cheap food was over: food costs worldwide rose by 23 percent between 2006 and 2007. This year, what is becoming clear is the impact of this change on ordinary people's lives.
For consumers in Japan, France, or the United States, the relentless price rises for food are an unwelcome extra pressure on an already stretched household budget. For less fortunate people in other places, they can mean less protein in the diet or choosing between feeding the kids breakfast and paying their school fees, or even, in the poorest communities, starvation. And the crisis is only getting started.
It is the “perfect storm”: everything is going wrong at once. To begin with, the world’s population has continued to grow while its food production has not. For the 50 years between 1945 and 1995, as the world’s population more than doubled, grain production kept pace–but then it stalled. In six of the past seven years, the human race consumed more grain than it grew. World grain reserves last year were only 57 days, down from 180 days a decade ago.
To make matters worse, demand for food is growing faster than population. As incomes rise in China, India, and other countries with fast-growing economies, consumers include more and more meat in their diet: the average Chinese citizen now eats 50 kilograms of meat a year, up from 20 kilos in the mid-1980s. Producing meat consumes enormous quantities of grain.
Then there is global warming, which is probably already cutting into food production. Many people in Australia, formerly the world‚s second-largest wheat exporter, suspect that climate change is the real reason for the prolonged drought that is destroying the country‚s ability to export food.
But the worst damage is being done by the rage for “biofuels” that supposedly reduce carbon-dioxide emissions and fight climate change. (But they don’t, really–at least, not in their present form.) Thirty percent of this year’s U.S. grain harvest will go straight to an ethanol distillery, and the European Union is aiming to provide 10 percent of the fuel used for transport from biofuels by 2010. A huge amount of the world‚s farmland is being diverted to feed cars, not people.
Worse yet, rain forest is being cleared, especially in Brazil and Indonesia, to grow more biofuels.
A recent study in the U.S. journal Science calculated that destroying natural ecosystems to grow corn or sugar cane for ethanol, or oil palms or soybeans for biodiesel, releases between 17 times and 420 times more carbon dioxide than is saved annually by burning the biofuel grown on that land instead of fossil fuel. It‚s all justified in the name of fighting climate change, but the numbers just don‚t add up.
This is the one element in the perfect storm that is completely under human control. Governments can simply stop creating artificial demand for the current generation of biofuels (and often directly subsidizing them). That land goes back to growing food instead, and prices fall. Climate change is a real threat, but we don‚t have to have this crisis now.
“If more and more land [is] diverted for industrial biofuels to keep cars running, we have two years before a food catastrophe breaks out worldwide,” said Vandana Shiva, director of the Indian-based Research Foundation for Science, Technology, and Natural Resource Policy, in an interview recently. “It’ll be 20 years before climate catastrophe breaks out, but the false solutions to climate change are creating catastrophes that will be much more rapid than the climate change itself.”
Thursday, April 03, 2008
Puppy killer Marine further damages U.S. image
A video showing a U.S. Marine throwing a puppy off a cliff in Iraq could further damage the U.S. image abroad.
A mobile phone video showing a U.S. Marine throwing a puppy off a cliff in Iraq triggered a wave of criticism and threatened to further damage the U.S. image abroad.
In just two days, the video was viewed 150,000 times on YouTube before the video-sharing website decided to remove it.
More than four thousand comments were posted about the 17-second video, most of which criticised the two Marines who were seen joking as one of them was holding the black and white puppy before throwing it over a cliff.
A loud sound was heard as the puppy flied through the air.
“Cute little puppy, huh?” one of the marines says jokingly while holding the puppy by the scruff of the neck and showing it to the camera.
“Aww so cute, so cute, little puppy,” one of his comrade says.
“Uh, uh, uh, I tripped,” the man says before turning and throwing the puppy into the air.
One of their comrades was heard off-screen saying: “That’s mean. That’s mean, Motari.”
"Shocking and deplorable"
Some viewers raised doubts over whether the puppy was alive when the Marine threw him, despite the fact that whether dead or alive, throwing the puppy off the cliff is cruel, callous and inhumane.
According to the Times Online, Major Chris Perrine of the Marine Corps Base Hawaii says it appears the man is based with a unit in the islands.
In a statement, the Marines called the video "shocking and deplorable" and said it violates "the high standard we expect of every Marine".
“We do not tolerate this type of behaviour and will take appropriate action,” the statement added.
Some U.S. websites identified the puppy killer as 22-year-old David Motari, who recently returned from Iraq and is based in Hawaii.
Angry people started posting his personnel information on their websites, including his address, phone number and pictures of his car. Some bloggers called for Motari to be ostracised, while others said that the video was simply bringing home the horrors of the Iraq war.
"If David Motari is the puppy killer, he is undoubtedly a sociopath who does not feel remorse or shame," wrote Mike on the Crime and Federalism weblog.
"After confirming him as the puppy killer, we must engage in an online campaign to ensure that everyone who does business with or associates with him is warned. The puppy had no choice; humans, through education, will."
“Animal cruelty”
Motari's local newspaper, the Herald, said it had shown the video to some veterinarians at Washington State University, but they could not confirm whether it was genuine or not.
However, Dr Matt Mickas, chief of Community Practice Services at the university's veterinary college, said the video appears genuine because of the way the puppy went slack by being held from the neck.
"If this is something legitimate, it's one of the most egregious acts of animal cruelty I have ever seen, if not the most”, Dr Mikas said.
"To me, the sound on the YouTube clip sounded like a puppy in distress - the same sound we hear when the puppies come into the hospital," he added.
The puppy killing video adds to the atrocities committed by occupation forces in Iraq, where not only people are being killed on a daily basis, but apparently animals have their share too.
Source: AJP
A mobile phone video showing a U.S. Marine throwing a puppy off a cliff in Iraq triggered a wave of criticism and threatened to further damage the U.S. image abroad.
In just two days, the video was viewed 150,000 times on YouTube before the video-sharing website decided to remove it.
More than four thousand comments were posted about the 17-second video, most of which criticised the two Marines who were seen joking as one of them was holding the black and white puppy before throwing it over a cliff.
A loud sound was heard as the puppy flied through the air.
“Cute little puppy, huh?” one of the marines says jokingly while holding the puppy by the scruff of the neck and showing it to the camera.
“Aww so cute, so cute, little puppy,” one of his comrade says.
“Uh, uh, uh, I tripped,” the man says before turning and throwing the puppy into the air.
One of their comrades was heard off-screen saying: “That’s mean. That’s mean, Motari.”
"Shocking and deplorable"
Some viewers raised doubts over whether the puppy was alive when the Marine threw him, despite the fact that whether dead or alive, throwing the puppy off the cliff is cruel, callous and inhumane.
According to the Times Online, Major Chris Perrine of the Marine Corps Base Hawaii says it appears the man is based with a unit in the islands.
In a statement, the Marines called the video "shocking and deplorable" and said it violates "the high standard we expect of every Marine".
“We do not tolerate this type of behaviour and will take appropriate action,” the statement added.
Some U.S. websites identified the puppy killer as 22-year-old David Motari, who recently returned from Iraq and is based in Hawaii.
Angry people started posting his personnel information on their websites, including his address, phone number and pictures of his car. Some bloggers called for Motari to be ostracised, while others said that the video was simply bringing home the horrors of the Iraq war.
"If David Motari is the puppy killer, he is undoubtedly a sociopath who does not feel remorse or shame," wrote Mike on the Crime and Federalism weblog.
"After confirming him as the puppy killer, we must engage in an online campaign to ensure that everyone who does business with or associates with him is warned. The puppy had no choice; humans, through education, will."
“Animal cruelty”
Motari's local newspaper, the Herald, said it had shown the video to some veterinarians at Washington State University, but they could not confirm whether it was genuine or not.
However, Dr Matt Mickas, chief of Community Practice Services at the university's veterinary college, said the video appears genuine because of the way the puppy went slack by being held from the neck.
"If this is something legitimate, it's one of the most egregious acts of animal cruelty I have ever seen, if not the most”, Dr Mikas said.
"To me, the sound on the YouTube clip sounded like a puppy in distress - the same sound we hear when the puppies come into the hospital," he added.
The puppy killing video adds to the atrocities committed by occupation forces in Iraq, where not only people are being killed on a daily basis, but apparently animals have their share too.
Source: AJP
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