People Before Profit blog

Iraqi Progressives Ready to Elect National Assembly

Fri, 28 Jan 2005 08:48:00 +0000

Despite the ongoing violence aimed at undermining the political process, Iraq’s communists plan full participation in what they see as the first step on the only viable path toward real national liberation and sovereignty – Sunday's elections.

While some observers fear that violence will undermine the legitimacy of the elections, Iraqi Communist Party spokesperson, Salam Ali counters that the majority of Iraqis disapprove of the tactics of the insurgents and favor a peaceful political process to ending the US-led occupation.

On the issue of the violence, Ali states that many insurgents have the 'goal of destabilization' by 'creating a climate of fear and terror.' Ali says these groups want to restore the privileges and powers they enjoyed under the Saddam dictatorship.

'These anti-people groups, mainly members of the former intelligence apparatus in collaboration with extremist fundamentalist elements' disguise their agenda as anti-occupation, Ali argues. They really are interested in restoring dictatorial rule.

'They aim to alienate the people, marginalize them in the ongoing political process, and spread despair and fear among them,' Ali contends.

To accomplish this they have targeted progressive, working class, and other political forces that successfully fought to force the Bush administration to agree to hold elections and press forward into a new phase in the political process of achieving national sovereignty.

Anti-election insurgents recently assassinated respected labor activist Hadi Saleh, a leader in the Iraqi Federation of Trade Unions, bringing a universal condemnation from the international labor movement as well as some major peace organizations.

But Ali points out that religious figures have also been targeted. Baqir Al-Hakim, the leader of the Supreme Council of Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI) in August 2003, the leader of the Islamic Daawa Movement, Mr Izz-el-deen Selim in April 2004, and more recently some aids of the Ayatollah al-Sistani (al-Sistani is believed to have been the real target) are among the well-known individuals that have been assassinated.

Terrorist strikes on the railroad lines from al-Nasiriyyah to Basra and numerous mosques, which have killed hundreds of Iraqi civilians, in Baghdad and other cities also have meant to create fear surrounding the election and to provoke ethnic, religious, and political strife among the competing political forces.

The Iraqi Communist Party along with other progressive organizations put together a list of 275 candidates known as 'People’s Unity' to stand for Sunday’s elections. The People’s Unity list is a coalition that includes communists, democrats and independent patriotic and social figures. It includes 91 women candidates and covers all of Iraq’s provinces. According to the People’s Unity platform, 'The candidates represent the full social, ethnic and religious spectrum of Iraqi society.'

Ali points out that the 'ICP’s agenda, calling for eradicating the legacy of both dictatorship and occupation and opening up prospects for a truly sovereign, independent and democratic Iraq is diametrically opposed' to the real goals and objectives of insurgents who are fighting to undermine the elections. The tactic of spreading terror through killing 'holds no prospects whatsoever for liberating Iraq,' Ali adds, 'and present no prospects or real hope for a better future for the people.'

In fact, the violence, insists Ali, 'only serves to perpetuate the occupation, provides a pretext for increased foreign military presence (as recent events have shown), helps to bring further death and devastation, and continues the vicious cycle of violence which clearly serve the schemes of extreme right-wing circles in the US under the cover of ‘war against international terrorism.’'

Ali remarked that 'the forthcoming elections are very important for beginning the next phase in the political process.' According to UN mandate the National Assembly that will be chosen this weekend will draft the country’s new constitution and prepare the groundwork for the general elections next year.

Because the national assembly will represent a broad section of Iraq’s population it will be 'more legitimate,' Ali says, and will have influence and oversight on the current transitional government and representative.

Most importantly, Ali says, the national assembly should not be timid about exercising real power and 'should seize back control over security matters, as well as the economic policy and other sovereign powers, from the occupiers.'

'This will be an important step,' Ali adds, 'forward along the path of regaining national sovereignty and independence.'

Iraq’s Communist Party proposes to be an important part of the process of regaining sovereignty and building a democratic society. 'After decades of repression, fascist terror, wars, sanctions and finally foreign occupation,' Ali concludes, Iraqis are longing for 'freedom and a dignified life.'

The People's unity platform calls for full civil rights, religious freedom, and equality for all members of Iraqi society. It envisions a federal democracy that guarantees the rights of minority nationalities. It calls for an end to the occupation and full national sovereignty and control over state apparatuses and policies.

The platform's main focus, however, is on repairing the economy and recovering from the effects of dictatorship and Bush's war and occuaption. It demands the reduction of unemployment, adequate wages for working people, helping the disabled and pensioners, enforcement of workers' rights, abolition of Iraq's debts incurred by Saddam Hussein, full social security, a free health care system, and reforming the public education system. Additionally, the platform calls for the reconstruction of the public economic sector and development of the private.

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Lula Speaks at World Social Forum; activists denounce US militarization in Latin America

Fri, 28 Jan 2005 06:14:00 +0000

Meat and Poultry Workers Risk Their Lives on the Job

Fri, 28 Jan 2005 04:09:00 +0000

From AFL-CIO

U.S. meat and poultry companies often use illegal tactics to quash workers’ efforts to gain a union voice on the job to improve unsafe working conditions that lead to injury and death, according to a new report from Human Rights Watch (HRW). “Meatpacking is the most dangerous factory job in America,” says Lance Compa, author of Blood, Sweat and Fear: Workers’ Rights in U.S. Meat and Poultry Plants. Dangerous conditions are cheaper for companies, he says, “and the government does next to nothing.”

The increasing volume and speed of production, close quarters, poor training and insufficient safeguards combine to create working conditions that violate international labor standards, the report finds. The report also finds the meat processing industry—dominated by such giants as Tyson Foods Inc., Smithfield Foods Inc. and Nebraska Beef Ltd.—frequently denies workers’ compensation to injured employees and threatens their immigrant status to keep them quiet about abuses. In fact, one worker every 23 minutes is fired or harassed on the job for union organizing activity, according to an analysis of statistics from the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) by American Rights at Work, a research and advocacy group aimed at improving workers’ ability to exercise their legal rights in the workplace. “The meatpacking companies hire immigrant workers because they are often the only ones who will work under such terrible conditions,” says Jamie Fellner, director of HRW’s U.S. Program. Smithfield: Among the Worst Abusers of Workers’ Rights At the world’s largest hog processing facility in Tar Heel, N.C., Smithfield workers have sought a voice at work with the United Food and Commercial Workers since shortly after the plant opened in the early 1990s. Some 60 percent of the 5,000-strong workforce is Latino and approximately 30 percent is African American.

The company’s anti-union consultants have crushed two union elections with tactics that included telling Latinos and African Americans that the union’s organizing drive was an effort by the other to take their jobs. After charging Smithfield with massive labor law violations in connection with the 1994 and 1997 elections—including assaulting and wrongly terminating workers—the NLRB ordered another vote, an order Smithfield is appealing.

Smithfield is the only North Carolina manufacturing plant employing its own private police force, which uses its state-granted public powers to intimidate union supporters, according to HRW. The HRW report describes a January 2004 incident in which deputies took Lorena Ramos and her husband Jorge Vela off the production line in Tar Heel, threw them in an on-site jail cell and accused them of trying to start a fire at the plant, according to the UFCW.

Before the district attorney of Bladen County dismissed all charges against them last September, the district attorney repeatedly offered to reduce the charges if the couple would plead guilty to a lesser crime. They refused. 'I would rather go to jail than admit to something I didn't do,' Ramos says.

Employers in a range of industries routinely obstruct workers’ efforts to gain a voice at work with a union through threats and harassment. Some employers even fire workers for trying to form unions, which is against the law, according to Cornell University scholar Kate Bronfenbrenner. Bronfenbrenner found 75 percent of private-sector employers hire outside consultants to run anti-union campaigns, often based on mass psychology and distorting the law. Half of employers threaten to shut down partially or totally if employees join together in a union. Passage of Employee Free Choice Act Key to Gaining a Voice at Work

Based on the report’s findings, HRW recommends industry-wide rules to protect basic workplace health, safety and compensation benefits, as well as passage of the Employee Free Choice Act — bipartisan federal legislation that would ensure when a majority of employees in a workplace decide to form a union, they can do so without the debilitating obstacles employers now use to block their workers’ free choice. It also urges Congress to strengthen governmental agencies so they enforce existing labor laws that would help the meat and poultry workers. “Workers shouldn’t have to form unions and secure basic workplace protections despite the law,” says AFL-CIO President John J. Sweeney. “We need stronger enforcement mechanisms within the law to ensure that workers’ fundamental human rights are upheld and respected.”

Donovan McNabb: Proud 'Black Quarterback'

Fri, 28 Jan 2005 03:59:00 +0000

We should never pass up the opportunity to point out that Rush Limbaugh is not only a racist pig but, unlike the swine, one of our stupider mammals as well.

This past weekend, as All-Pro quarterback Donovan F. McNabb led the Philadelphia Eagles to their first Super Bowl in 25 years, Limbaugh was undoubtedly chasing oxycontin with Kahlua in a state of utter misery.

Last year, Limbaugh ignited an inferno by wheezing on ESPN's NFL pre-game show that McNabb was 'overrated' because of the 'media's social concern' to see a successful Black quarterback. It was textbook Limbaugh, linking race and performance with a jab at 'liberal affirmative action' advancing the 'unqualified'. The fact that Limbaugh was a paid football announcer for ESPN still boggles the mind. Was G. Gordon Liddy unavailable? David Duke too expensive? Limbaugh was run out of ESPN on a rail after thousands of complaints, but he smirked back to talk radio, more a hero to his minions than ever before.

Yet even Limbaugh had to grudgingly eat crow regarding the Great McNabb on his Monday radio show. The rotund race baiter choked out the words that McNabb might actually be better than he thought - and that he is 'much improved' from a year ago. But Rush, in typical fashion, was quick to firmly stand by his original rant - that Black quarterbacks are given a free ride by a liberal media conspiracy that wants at all costs to see them succeed.

Limbaugh's words bear mention because there is an argument currently afoot that the durable color line-- which has in the past kept the NFL quarterback position as 'white-only' as a 1950s Greensboro lunch counter--is finally over.

There is merit to this claim. As recently as 1984, there was only one Black QB in the entire league. But this year, Black quarterbacks held more than twenty NFL QB roster spots. Today, Black quarterbacks not only grace almost every roster, but also play every imaginable style. There are speed demons like Michael Vick, and lead-foots like Byron Leftwich. There are aged career back-ups like Jeff Blake and Rodney Peete, and young benchwarmers like David Garrard and Shaun King. There are also frightening talents like McNabb and Daunte Culpepper - players who have the ability and brains to pass their way to football immortality. The sill-sets of the Black QB run the gamut from brilliant to lousy. Yes, Black quarterbacks have earned the right to not only be stars, but also suck as much as white quarterbacks - which is a form of progress.

This ascension of Black quarterbacks carries a social impact that reverberates off the playing field. No athletic position in our society is as esteemed as that of the 'field general.' Quarterbacks are the heroes, the icons, the cover of the Wheaties Box. Denying Black athletes a chance to compete for this role held a much deeper symbolism about what Blacks could aspire to in our society. The message clearly being sent was that African Americans just didn't have the brains or 'intestinal fortitude' to truly lead.

Every Sunday was a demonstration for the country that while a Black player could run, catch, and jump, the signal-calling - control - was something that required white skin. When Randall Cunningham was drafted in 1984, the first question he was asked by a reporter was, 'What makes you think you're smart enough to read NFL defenses?' This is an ugly history, and much of it seems over.

As James Harris, who was the first Black quarterback to start a playoff game 30 years ago and who is the current Head of Player Personnel for the Jacksonville Jaguars, said recently, 'They're not using the word black quarterback any more. They're now referred to as quarterbacks and that's the way it should be. You're judged on your ability. It wasn't always that way.'

This progress should be celebrated. But – as Limbaugh reminds us – all the social implications of being a Black quarterback remain. This history cannot just be tossed into the back of America's closet, a few shelves up from the nooses and white sheets. If the rise of the Black quarterback is remembered as a period when people in power just 'got over' their prejudices, then past crimes become justified and the pioneers who struggled for a shot become forgotten.

It also has implications off the football field. The discrimination dynamic that surrounds the issue of Black leadership on the turf reflects the greater racism that shapes our entire society. Unemployment for African Americans is more than twice that of whites - hovering between 10-11%. For young Blacks under age 21, the rate is more like 33%. More than 1 million Blacks are behind bars, the overwhelming majority held for non-violent offenses. In a society that strains to blame the victim, the current danger is that Black quarterbacks will be pointed to – as the maxim is repeated, 'If they made it why can't you?' This is what we will get instead of the real history--that the door wasn't opened for Black quarterbacks, but was broken down.

To preserve this history of struggle, pioneering Black QB's Harris, Doug Williams and Warren Moon started an organization called the Field Generals [], dedicated to teaching and preserving the history of the African American quarterback. They are striving to preserve stories like the one of former Denver Broncos QB Marlon Briscoe, who negotiated his own contract and stipulated that he be given a three-day tryout as quarterback before they forced him to convert to defensive back. Briscoe nailed his tryout and set a Denver QB record when he threw 14 touchdowns as a rookie. During the following summer, however, Briscoe discovered the team was having QB meetings without him and he was replaced and made a receiver. Both the struggles of people like Briscoe, and the persistence of people like Limbaugh put the onus on us not to forget this history, but embrace it.

Two other people who believe this shouldn't be a taboo topic are Donovan McNabb and Michael Vick. Last weekend they became the first pair of Black quarterbacks to square off in a conference championship game. Unprompted by reporters, as soon as he sat down for a press conference, McNabb said, 'It's a special weekend for myself, a special weekend for [Vick] because this is an opportunity for obviously an African-American quarterback to represent in the Super Bowl.'

Vick echoed McNabb. 'It shows how far we've come,' Vick said. 'It shows how far the league has come. This game does mean a lot to me. Like Donovan said, it's a big step for all of us.'

But if Limbaugh and his ilk have taught us anything, it's that big steps forward can be erased if we don't treasure the journey traveled and the struggle waged to take them. As a wise man said, 'There is no sense standing on the shoulders of giants we refuse to open our eyes.'

We should all look forward to the day when quarterbacks can be just quarterbacks and not seen as 'Black quarterbacks.' But as long as institutional racism persists, we should not only recognize the accomplishments of Black QBs, but also treasure and celebrate their history as one of triumph in the face of seemingly intractable opposition.

--Dave Zirin's new book 'What's My Name Fool? Sports and Resistance in the United States will be in stores in June 2005. You can receive his column Edge of Sports, every week by e-mailing edgeofsports-subscribe@zirin.com. Contact him at editor@pgpost.com.

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Tsunami exposes Australian PM Howard's Asian agenda

Fri, 28 Jan 2005 03:55:00 +0000

From The Guardian

The response of ordinary people following the tsunami is truly amazing. Around the world people have expressed their sympathy with the communities that were devastated in the tragedy. They did not hesitate to dig deep into their pockets, organise fund raising activities and offer other forms of assistance. Volunteers joined with local communities, all giving selflessly in the most appalling and heart rending conditions. The tragedy has brought forth all that is good in people and shows a strong will to make sacrifices and pull together to help each other. This humanitarian response of ordinary people is in sharp contrast to that of the major corporations and the Australian and other western governments.

The Australian government was not slow in using the suffering of others to further its political, economic and military agenda in the region. Its $1 billion offer to Indonesia — half of it loans — came with strings attached including a say in how the money was spent. Australian companies are expected to get the lion's share of contracts under the package, with some work contracted out to lndonesian companies. The ANZ, Leighton, Thiess and Baulderstone Hornibrook, Linfox, Bluescope and others are lined up for the kill, with an estimated $22 billion of infrastructure contracts on offer by Indonesia.

Although the details of the deal between Howard and Indonesian President Susilo Yudoyono remain secret, the arrangement is called a 'partnership' and involves the long-term presence of Australian troops in Indonesia.

Foothold in Indonesia

Howard stated that Australia would not interfere in internal domestic matters in Indonesia; that Australia was 'not in the business of picking sides' when referring to the dispute in Aceh. However, the rush to send Australian troops to Aceh suggests a different agenda.

In his address to the nation earlier this month Howard called the 'partnership aid plan' a 'historic step in Australian-Indonesian relations'. He emphasised that there was a 'requirement' for a 'long-term commitment'.

The Howard Government has done a lot of chest thumping over its $1 billion tsunami aid package, but this amount was only promised after pressure from the international community and the example shown by the world's people. Australia's original offer was less than $30 million.

The US also initially promised a mere $30 million — less than the cost of an F-16 fighter plane. It then increased that to $450 million, the equivalent of the cost of one and a half days of the war in Iraq. Australia is spending $55 million a day on its military budget.

UN sidelined

Despite its medical and other assistance in the rescue and clean-up of tsunami torn areas, Australia is not endearing itself to the majority of its neighbours. The $1 billion package is for Indonesia. Thailand, Sri Lanka and India miss out.

The US and Australia have attempted to push the UN into a secondary role in the crisis and initially tried to take over the central role of coordinating relief themselves. Howard said of the UN's contribution, 'I don't think this is a question of who should be running it, it's a question of what works'.

What works for the US and Australia is a deal with the Indonesian Government that will see Indonesia become a partner in implementing the US-Australia agenda in the region, including the interference and direct intervention in the affairs of nations under their 'failed states' doctrine. The Australian government also has an interest in shaping the internal affairs of Indonesia to ensure that effective central government never takes root to transform the populous neighbour into an economic and strategic rival.

The sidelining of the UN would also have meant that aid agencies could be pressured by governments to carry out their political agendas. Aid organisations are not publicly controlled and accountable and in many cases act as lobbies implementing the objectives of governments.

The workings of some aid organisations were revealed by the Papua New Guinea government last year.

Using its 'failed state' doctrine the Howard Government threatened to withdraw Australian aid to PNG if it did not allow Australian police and officials take over important roles in the administration of the country.

PNG initially told the Howard Government to go ahead and take the aid back: that the majority of the aid money is sent back to agencies in the donor country anyway.

Debt

Most of the aid being given by the rich, developed nations is doled out with an eye to their short-term political gain — they are not interested in the long-term needs of the tsunami-hit countries.

The G7 nations — the world's richest — have agreed to suspend debt repayments of the tsunami-affected nations, but this does not even amount to the old 'debt restructure' approach involving the scrapping of some of the interest payments of debtor countries. There is no mention of scrapping the debt, which would be a truly genuine contribution to their recovery. Most of the debt — around $359 billion — is owed to the G7. Indonesia, the hardest hit by the tsunami, owes $48 billion. The Howard Government has refused to even freeze debt repayments for Indonesia — $1.3 billion — and other nations in the region.

Historically the developed western powers have used aid as a weapon to bully and blackmail the countries receiving it and this policy is continuing.

Reconstruction

Major corporations are set to make massive profits in contracts for reconstruction in those nations where infrastructure — housing and all basic services — have been destroyed. Some of the reconstruction is to take place under the control of the World Bank. Organisers have been quick to promise a 'transparent' process in the handing out of contracts.

No doubt they were moved by the corruption debacle in Iraq, where war profiteering by US corporations. Halliburton, once headed by US vice president Dick Cheney was given more than $10 billion of contracts by the Pentagon.

The auctioning of $1.97 billion of reconstruction projects has begun, with some of the world's biggest construction and financial conglomerates in the bidding. The claims of openness cannot but ring hollow. Despite all the billions of dollars handed to corporations for reconstruction in Afghanistan, most of its cities are still in ruins caused by the war. The destruction wrought by the Indonesian military in East Timor's capital Dili remains, with much of that city still in ruins.

It should be recalled that the Howard Government paid lip service to helping 'our neighbour' East Timor, while the cold, hard cash went into the corporate coffers and he stole the country's oil and gas reserves for the benefit of transnationals such as BHP.

He is now making the same empty gestures toward the tsunami victims — 'On this occasion we have not been moved by the bonds of empire and kinship … these are our neighbours'. But behind the grand statements are the same profit motive and a grab for control of the economic and political destiny of independent nations in our region.

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Cuba Calls on US to End Torture at Guantanamo Bay

Thu, 27 Jan 2005 06:57:00 +0000

Cuba calls on the United States to stop the torture of prisoners in Guantánamo

On January 19, 2005, reflecting the indignation of our people at the atrocities committed on prisoners held at the US Naval Base in Guantánamo, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs presented the US governmental authorities in Havana and Washington with a diplomatic note denouncing the flagrant violations of human rights that the said government is daily committing on Cuban territory illegally occupied by the above-mentioned naval base. This communication called for an immediate end to that inhuman and criminal conduct.

The note reminds the US government that the atrocities being committed on the base and the very fact of utilizing that illegally occupied Cuban territory as a prison, is in violation of numerous instruments of international law and international humanitarian law, and moreover, violates the Coal and Naval Stations Agreement signed in February 1903 by the government of the United States and the Cuban government of that period, in conditions of inequality and disadvantage for our country, whose independence was circumscribed via the Platt Agreement.

According to Article II of that agreement, the US government committed itself to doing everything necessary to ensure that those locations should be exclusively used as coal or naval stations and for no other objective.

It is also important to recall that when the Cuban authorities were informed – although not consulted – of the US government decision to transfer a group of prisoners from the war in Afghanistan to this US military enclave in Guantánamo, the government of the Republic of Cuba informed national and internal opinion in a statement dated January 11, 2002, that 'although the transfer of foreign prisoners of war on the part of the government of the United States to one of its military installations located on part of our national territory over which we have been deprived of the right to exercise jurisdiction is not in line with the regulations that gave rise to that installation, we shall not create any obstacles to the development of the operation.' Moreover, the statement highlighted that our government had 'taken note with satisfaction of public statements from the US authorities in the context of the prisoners receiving adequate and humane treatment.'

The dramatic reality of the prisoners detained on the Guantánamo Naval Base, reported by the media to total 550 at the present time, likewise reveals the double standards of the US government in its hackneyed and manipulative campaigning on behalf of human rights.

The arbitrary detention of these foreign prisoners without the mediation of a legal trial, as well as the torture and degrading treatment to which they are being subjected, constitute a gross violation of human rights and numerous international treaties and conventions, in particular, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the Convention on torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.

With this hypocritical conduct, the government of the United States has demonstrated the falsity of its own public statements and once again has lied to the government of the Republic of Cuba, to its own people and to the international community by concealing the horrific acts of torture, cruelty and humiliating and denigratory treatment committed on prisoners detained on the Guantánamo Naval Base, only comparable with the torture inflicted on inmates in the prison of Abu Ghraib and other penitential establishments in occupied Iraqi territory.

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs adds its voice to the calls and demands of the international community that the government of the United States instantly end these flagrant violations of prisoners that, moreover, are being committed on illegally occupied Cuban territory.

Cuba has the total moral right afforded by an irreproachable history in this context and the right conferred on it to exercise sovereignty over all parts of Cuban territory to denounce these abuses and violations that the US government is daily committing on the detainees on the Guantánamo Naval Base and to demand the end of these practices that violate international law.

--STATEMENT FROM THE CUBAN MINISTRY OF FOREIGN AFFAIRS

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US activists oppose Bush's war

Thu, 27 Jan 2005 04:52:00 +0000

From Granma International

RESISTANCE to the government of President Bush should start right now and in every possible space, according to US academics in a call to the American people, published in The New York Times.

Prensa Latina reported that a full-page paid advertisement has appeared in the US newspaper highlighting a statement of conscience signed by figures such as Noam Chomsky, Howard Zinn, Eve Ensler and Alice Walker.

Along with other US intellectuals they are part of the national anti-war group Not In Our Name (NION), which criticizes the expansionist militarism of the current administration.

'As George W. Bush is inaugurated for a second term, let it not be said that people in the United States silently acquiesced in the face of this shameful coronation of war, greed, and intolerance. He does not speak for us. He does not represent us. He does not act in our name.'

The published declaration adds that: 'no election, however impartial or fraudulent, can legitimize criminal wars on foreign countries, torture, the wholesale violation of human rights and the end of science and reason.'

The promoters of the call affirm: 'We will not allow further crimes to be committed against nations or individuals deemed to stand in the way of the goal of unquestioned world supremacy.'

They also warn of policies that are limiting basic human rights, as well as the application of social policies based on 'Christian fundamentalism.'

'We cannot wait until (the 2008 presidential elections). The fight against the second Bush regime must start now.

'We must change the political reality of this country by mobilizing the tens of millions who know in their heads and hearts that the Bush regime’s 'reality' is nothing but a nightmare for humanity,' NION declares.

More than 9,000 people have signed this statement of conscience to date, and the intention is to circulate it widely both inside and outside the United States.

The signatories include writers like Barbara Kingsover, Russell Banks, Studs Terkel and Martín Espada, as well as rock star Rickie Lee Jones and Ry Cooder. The legendary poet Lawrence Ferlinghetti, Sam Hamill and Suheir Hammad, philosopher Cornel West and a variety of political activists, lawyers and progressive religious figures have similarly added their names.

NION announced that The New York Times had agreed to publish this paid advert last Friday, given that the statement is a response to the beginning of the second Bush mandate.

According to the group, nobody at the Times can explain what happened and this is the first time that an advert with a contract and confirmation has not been published on the agreed date.

The statement appeared in the Sunday edition and NION is demanding an explanation, as on the agreed day the main editorial of the paper urged 'acceptance' of the new president.

See also Not in our Name

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Cuban Medical Team Fights Tsunami Disaster

Thu, 27 Jan 2005 04:46:00 +0000

Cuban medical brigade working in Sri Lanka

From Granma International

GALLE, Sri Lanka.— They fell from the sky, the inhabitants said. And it’s not because here, 130 kilometers from the capital, they are lacking international aid, but that the Cuban doctors are different.

There is a notice up in the camp, written by the locals in English and Sinhalese, that says: “Cuban health care center”, but everyone there knows that these doctors are not just here to combat the diseases that are rife as a consequence of the tsunamis that seriously affected Sri Lanka and other nations in Asia and Africa, but also to try to and provide preventative care for the population in the face of healthcare deficiencies.

Galle was an area that was severely damaged and it is still not known how many of its 80,000 inhabitants died as a result of the disaster. Alleviating the pain of this terrible and sorrowful event is the labor of 24 members of the Cuban medical brigade who arrived in Sri Lanka on January 9.

It consists of 16 doctors, two nurses, two hygiene experts, three specialists from Labiofam and an engineer who is responsible for the electricity plant.

At the head of the brigade is Dr. Pedro Alfonso Aguilar, who tells us that the work of the group is based on four strategies: Taking medical assistance into the larger community, not just those living in the camp, and installing medical posts in the designated area along a 20-kilometer stretch of road. Attention to priority groups, such as the 1,400 pupils from an elementary and junior high school, an home for the elderly and an orphanage. The application of two tons of Biorrat that Labiofam brought which is already providing good results. Educational activities, all aimed at preventing epidemics from breaking out. Dr. Pedro Alfonso Aguilar – from the Medical Cooperation Unit in City of Havana – told us how the 20 patients from the old people’s home were saved and there was not a single death from the tsunami. The residents climbed onto their beds, the water rose up to their chests or necks, and there they waited until the waters subsided.

These elderly people, suffering complaints like sores, ulcers, and high blood pressure, have been attended to by the Cuban team. “They’re still here, and if we don’t go for two days, they call us,” he explained.

Generally speaking, Sri Lankans are very warm people “and especially in Galle, where they have opened their doors to our work. The group has been surprised by how grateful and humble they are,” affirmed the head of the Cuban medical brigade, who concluded by saying: “The members of this group believe in Patria o Muerte. They are active, creative and hardworking and want everything to go well. They are disciplined. I would go to the end of the world with this group.”

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Rice's Confirmation Bad News for Latin America

Thu, 27 Jan 2005 04:41:00 +0000

From Rice's outdated Cold War credo suggests her term at the helm of the State Department will witness no new diplomacy, let alone innovative ideas. Bush's championing of democracy and freedom in his inaugural address will no doubt remain nothing more than rhetoric, and dangerous rhetoric at that. More bad news for Latin America: while Rice’s words on the region are few, they are retrogressive and full of clichés, displaying a total absence of any new vision for the region. Rice’s Latin America

Ever since President Bush made his much-anticipated announcement that National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice would succeed Colin Powell as the Secretary of State in the President's second term, Dr. Rice's confirmation by the Senate has never been in doubt, given the newly enhanced Republican majority in that body. Not surprisingly, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee voted to approve her nomination on January 19 with only two of its members dissenting, John Kerry (D-MA) and Barbara Boxer (D-CA). The only other hint of protest came when venerable parliamentarian and senior Senator Robert Byrd (D-WV)insisted on a week's delay in the full Senate vote.

However, any display of bipartisanship visible at the hearing should not be taken as evidence that the new Secretary of State intends to be moderate, intent on broadening the conservative and ideologically-driven Latin American policy agenda implemented by the Bush administration in its first term. This approach previously had been vigorously defended by Rice in her capacity as National Security Adviser over the past four years. In her new post, Rice will likely gloss over key issues such as trade reform, workplace democracy, enhanced human rights protections, anti-corruption measures or increased transparency in governance. Instead, Rice will narrowly focus on drugs, terrorism and the pursuit of oil (especially in Mexico, Canada and Venezuela) and other essential strategic resources by China’s increasingly consumption-driven economy. This hemispheric strategy, up to this point, had been devised and implemented by a small group of conservative policymakers and former protégés of retired Senator Jesse Helms. These include the former White House special envoy to the Western Hemisphere, Otto Reich, the current Assistant Secretary of State for Hemispheric Affairs Roger Noriega, and the latter’s assistant, Dan Fisk. These ultra-operatives have been abetted from the sidelines by the Department's arch ideologue, undersecretary of state for arms control and international security John Bolton.

Setbacks on Many Fronts

Among the most damaging of these initiatives, all of which Rice defended and pledged to support in her Senate confirmation hearings, have been the continued pursuit of the administration's puerile and irrational grudge against President Hugo Chávez of Venezuela. Also, there is sure to be continued and steadfast support for President Alvaro Uribe in Colombia, irrespective of his potentially dangerous consolidation of power and hands-off relationship with murderous right-wing guerrilla groups while he engages in a massive military mobilization against their leftist counterparts. In the Caribbean, Rice will continue the administration's automatic anti-Cuba bashing, but is unlikely to utter a word of reproach for the illegitimate and hapless government of Haitian interim prime minister Gerard Latortue and his lawless Justice Minister Bernard Gousse, who have presided over escalating political chaos and rampant human rights abuses on the beleaguered island. As for the English-speaking Caribbean, Rice is likely to ignore the CARICOM countries or use her economic leverage to extort its members’ large number of votes in the UN and OAS.

Another key factor will be Rice’s use of the administration’s anti-terrorism and pro-democracy doctrine recently spelled out in President Bush’s inauguration address. Essentially, it will be the White House’s decision as to what acts fall under both the terrorism and democracy formulations, providing Rice with extraordinary powers that could be used to intimidate and harangue Latin American nations to comply with Washington’s dictates.

While Senators Christopher Dodd (D-CT) and Lincoln Chafee (R-RI)—both recently returned from a four-nation trip to South America—valiantly attempted to make the case in the Senate for a more measured, moderate and consistent regional policy, there is no evidence that the incoming Secretary of State has any intention of giving their consul more than a cursory hearing. Over the coming years, Rice will no doubt reveal that she is incapable of providing bold and independent analysis that does not automatically conform to standardized Cold War formulae. Accordingly, there is little cause for optimism that Bush's second term will bring even the most modest of improvements or display of enlightenment over his first term's hemispheric policies, undoubtedly one of the worst this nation has seen in generations.

The Demonization of Chávez

Among the most blatant of a series of vacuous statements formulated by Rice in her confirmation hearings were her virulent attacks on populist firebrand President Hugo Chávez of Venezuela. Chávez has long been a nemesis of the Bush administration for his self-proclaimed brotherly relations with Castro, opposition to U.S. trade initiatives, prolific third-way economic strategies and florid rhetorical attacks on U.S. policy toward Latin America and the world, particularly Iraq. Assistant Secretary of State Noriega even went so far as to give the State Department's blessing to a military coup that briefly unseated the president in April 2002, having met with a group of the plotters who visited Washington only weeks before the attempted putsch. Secretary of State Powell thus found himself in the embarrassing position of having to disown his controversial subordinate's actions and reaffirm Washington's support for democratic processes in the hemisphere, when Chávez was hurriedly returned to office by military loyalists. The president then went on to win a resounding victory in a popular referendum demanded by the Venezuelan opposition in August 2004.

This lesson does not appear to have made much of an impression on Rice, however, who denounced Chávez as an 'unconstructive' leader who was '[governing] in an illegal way' and stated that she had nothing positive to say about his administration, a judgment she did not extend to a range of other assorted tyrants discussed at the hearing, including the leaders of Iran, North Korea and Syria. Senator Chafee, who met with President Chávez on his recent tour of the region, was rightly incredulous, accurately noting that the president had gone head to head with his domestic opposition in a high-turnout referendum universally acknowledged to be free and fair and had 'cleaned their clocks and kicked their butts.' He went on to assert that such derogatory remarks about a democratically elected leader were openly disrespectful to the Venezuelan electorate. Even more pointedly, he demanded that the incoming Secretary of State justify her stubborn assertion that Chávez was 'unconstructive' at a time when the administration continues to enthusiastically engage apparently more 'constructively,' but also more authoritarian governments in Russia, Pakistan, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan.

Venezuela and the Regional Arms Race

At this juncture, Rice was aided by Senators Norm Coleman (R-MN) and freshman Mel Martinez (R-FL), coming to her rescue with the latter clearly eager to curry favor with his Cuban-American Miami constituency by energetically and vocally denouncing Chávez's ties with Castro. Martinez also took the opportunity to voice concerns about attempts by Caracas to purchase arms from Russia, suggesting that such actions had the potential to 'trigger an arms race in a region that frankly does not need one.' Given that Washington itself has funneled several billions of dollars in military and economic aid to Bogotá via Plan Colombia to purchase armaments ostensibly to be used to fight drug trafficking, but in reality also being employed in military strikes against the leftist FARC guerrillas, Martinez's outrage appears to be somewhat misplaced.

One of the relatively few voices of reason to be heard on the subject of Venezuela was that of committee chairman Senator Richard Lugar (R-IN), who highlighted Venezuela's major (and growing) importance as a U.S. oil supplier and suggested the administration reconsider its hostile bilateral agenda regarding Venezuela with this crucial point in mind. But despite Lugar's stature as a leading Republican moderate and foreign policy expert, Rice gave no ground on this or any of the administration's misplaced hemispheric strategies, and it seems clear that the Bush administration will continue to freeze out Chávez and limit its ties with Venezuela. Such a strategy could potentially hold hugely negative implications for U.S. relations with a broad coalition of center-left South American leaders, including Presidents Néstor Kirchner of Argentina, Tabaré Vazquez of Uruguay and most notably, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva of Brazil, all of whom have aligned themselves with the Venezuelan president.

The Bush administration also risks grievously damaging the United States' now fading reputation within Venezuela itself, where Chávez 's popularity, as demonstrated once again in last year's referendum, has remained vibrant, buoyed by his energetic and successful attempts to incorporate the long-neglected lower classes into the political process. Thus, while the days of endorsing coups in Caracas may have passed, balance and moderation have yet to return to the Bush administration's policy-making capacity towards Venezuela. On the contrary, its strategy continues to be driven by a knee-jerk reflex against Chávez's populism and his at times intemperate rhetoric, in the absence of any real comprehension of Venezuela's tempestuous history that may have affected such a development.

Colombia: Creeping Authoritarianism Ignored

Rice's violent denunciations of Chávez were matched by her equally immoderate praise of his Andean neighbor and ideological adversary, President Alvaro Uribe of Colombia. Since the beginning of Bush's term, Uribe has been graced with most-favored-hemispheric-leader status by Washington due to his conservative and pro-business economic stance, his eager participation in the 'War on Drugs' and 'War on Terror,' and, last but certainly not least, his chilly relations with Chávez, who he accuses of covertly supporting left-wing Colombian rebel groups.

Not only did Rice declare that 'Colombia has outstanding leadership in President Uribe,' she blatantly distorted the facts by wrapping Uribe's battle with guerrillas and paramilitaries—a long-running civil war with deep roots in the last four decades of Colombian history—in the banner of the “War on Terror,” stating that he has 'mobilized Colombian society, the Colombian people, to take on the terrorism, the narcoterrorism, in a new and renewed fashion.' The Colombian president's recent sanctioning of the kidnapping of a Colombian leftist guerrilla leader in Caracas, to be later handed over to Colombian authorities on their side of the border and most likely to be subsequently extradited to the U.S., was no doubt all part of this 'renewed' battle on narcoterrorism.

Rice also emphasized the administration's determination to press ahead in negotiating a free trade agreement with Bogotá, the next step in Washington's trade strategy that seeks to use bilateral agreements with compliant partners in order to increase pressure on negotiators for the currently stalled Free Trade Agreement of the Americas (FTAA). The first of these agreements was the 2003 accord between U.S.-Chile, which was followed by the Central American Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA), currently awaiting ratification, and now the pact with Colombia. At the same time, the FTAA, originally scheduled to be completed in 2005, has been blocked by the unwillingness of hemispheric heavyweights Brazil and Argentina, under the leadership of center-left presidents Lula da Silva and Kirchner, these two countries have been reluctant to press ahead without meaningful concessions from the United States on the subject of agricultural subsidies, a crucial deal-breaker for Latin American economies heavily dependent on their export sectors declining in such commodities.

Uribe and Human Rights

Not surprisingly, Rice failed to mention the increasing criticisms of the Uribe administration by human rights and civil society groups who have noted the president's growing tendency to centralize power in his own hands, including his single-mindedly successful promotion of a recently enacted constitutional amendment that will allow him to seek reelection in 2006. Nor did she address the Colombian leader’s apparent willingness to negotiate cease-fire agreements with right-wing paramilitary groups that will allow those guilty of the most barbarous crimes to walk away without judicial accounting for decades' worth of derelictions, and without surrendering any of the riches they accumulated through participation in the nation's flourishing drug trade.

It was left to feisty Senator Boxer, who won headlines around the world for her aggressive criticisms of the administration's flawed rationale for the war in Iraq, to question Rice's glowing endorsement of Uribe, while contrasting it with the administration's frigid relations with Venezuela and suggesting that the discrepancy revealed a certain inconsistency, if not blatant hypocrisy. As Boxer put it, 'you praise Uribe for democracy even though [...] he's trying to pass a law that would forbid sitting governors and sitting senators from running against him, and you condemn the head of Venezuela, Chávez, after having the administration [...] briefly praise a coup. And it wasn’t until the OAS spoke up and said, well, wait a minute, that's wrong, then we backed off. So we really do need more consistency here.' Boxer should be praised for her willingness to challenge Rice and to question the administration's Colombia policy, one of the less noticed of its many failed or double standard hemispheric endeavors.

Cuba: After Forty Years, Still No Sign of Thaw

Another notable, if hardly surprising, feature of Rice's confirmation hearings was her valiant but thankless attempt to defend the Bush administration's continuing embrace of a sterile hard-line position toward Cuba, reinforced most recently in 2004 with the promulgation of new restrictions on travel and remittances to the island. The revised rules led to the suspension of educational exchange programs and will limit Cuban-Americans to one trip per three years for visits only to members of their immediate family. Needless to say, the administration's Cuba policy received rousing endorsements from Florida's hardliners, particularly Senator Martinez, who seized the first of what will undoubtedly be many opportunities to prattle about the importance of disseminating 'free news and information' in Cuba through Radio Martí and boosting U.S. support for Cuban dissidents such as the leaders of the Varela petition project. In the past, brazen attempts by James Cason, the recently appointed head of the U.S. interests section in Havana, to intensify already provocative U.S. connections with dissidents and encourage them to engage in more overt opposition, have been damaging and unconstructive to both the individuals involved and the potential for further recruiting. They have served only to undermine the credibility of authentic Cuban critics of the Castro regime and incite new crackdowns by Havana against the minority of democracy advocates who have been attracted by Cason's handouts. Also, such anticipated acts of overreaction by Cuban officials are then used by Washington to justify a further tightening of the bankrupt U.S. embargo. None of these factors, of course, deterred Senator Martinez from launching his impassioned anti-Castro rant only days after his senatorial swearing-in.

Martinez was joined on this point by his Democratic colleague from Florida, Senator Bill Nelson, who frequently is a rational voice on hemispheric affairs regarding such issues as Haiti, but like all Florida politicians dependent on Miami's votes, remains irrevocably under the sway of hardliners when it comes to defining bilateral relations with Havana. It was thus left to Senator Dodd, a respected foreign policy leader with decades of experience on hemispheric issues, to serve as one of the lone voices of reason in the debate over Rice's nomination. In a sharp and aggressive exchange with Rice, Dodd suggested that hopes for political evolution in Cuba are likely to be stifled rather than buoyed by a hermetic suspension of contact between the island and the United States and highlighted the absurd travel policy between the two nations. When the nominee attempted to defend the administration's policy by arguing that Castro skimmed the proceeds of tourism in Cuba and used the funds to prop up his regime, Dodd quickly retorted that the North Korean and Iranian governments no doubt do the same.

Ultimately, Dodd's trenchant postscript to his skillful exposition of the counterproductive nature of the administration's hard-line Cuban policy, including its fervent promotion of the decades-old embargo, was his observation that Bush administration Latin American policy was being shaped by 'domestic politics rather than foreign policy,' a truth long and widely acknowledged by analysts of U.S.-Cuba relations but rarely spoken out loud, much less in the Senate chambers. It is irrefutable that this administration's pathological hostility toward Havana is driven by the desire to ensure that Florida's diadem, its electoral votes (won narrowly by Bush in 2000 and more easily in last year's election) remain in the Republican column in 2008 and beyond. Senator Dodd is to be commendedfor exposing President Bush's 'Cuba policy' as the tawdry election vehicle that it has come to be.

Haiti: Chaos Unchecked

Ultimately, perhaps the most disturbing aspect of Dr. Rice's presentation before the committee was her utter inability to formulate even the rudiments of a strategy to address the intensifying political, economic and human rights crisis in Haiti, a country that has spiraled steadily downward into chaos since the U.S.-orchestrated coup against president Jean-Bertrand Aristide on February 29, 2004. The question was introduced by Nelson, who, not surprisingly, takes a particular interest in the achievement of political stability in Haiti in light of the past decade's history of waves of desperate Haitian refugees trying to reach Florida during periods of upheaval on the island. His criticism of the administration's Haiti policy spotlighted the stunning hypocrisy of the State Department's constant reaffirmations of support for democratization in the hemisphere while at the same time it gave explicit support to the ouster of Aristide, one of the first democratically elected presidents in Haiti's history. As Nelson put it, 'it's kind of hard to say we support democracy and elections and then we go and push him out.'

The senator went on to emphasize the insufficiency of the U.N.-mandated peacekeeping force, MINUSTAH, currently deployed in Haiti in order to reestablish political stability, and pressed Rice on the necessity to expand the force and to ensure that the $1 billion in aid pledged to Haiti at last summer's donors conference in fact materializes, even though it would be going to the notably corrupt and ineffective government led by interim Prime Minister Latortue. In her response, Rice was deliberately evasive, emphasizing the need to establish a professional police force in Haiti and the importance of the existing stabilization force taking on a more aggressive role in reining in the militias that have seized control over significant swaths of the country. This elaborate but airy response was clearly nothing more than a rhetorical ploy intended to distract attention from the undeniable fact that the administration has no intention of reengaging in Haiti or providing even a tiny fraction of the resources that are realistically required to begin the long process of political stabilization and economic recovery there until the prospect of a reemergence of Aristide’s party either directly or indirectly in the governmental process is prevented.

The phrase that perhaps best encapsulates the profoundly flawed nature of the administration's Haiti policy was Rice's bizarre statement that 'we probably dodged a bullet in the earlier days with the ability to get Aristide out peacefully, because he had lost the ability to control that country.' She thus wins the dubious honor of being the first person to apply the term 'peacefully' to the process leading up to the armed rebellion that all but toppled the Aristide government, which then had witnessed a coup de main administered by U.S. marines and the embassy in Port-au-Prince, and was then forced to give way to an illegitimate, Washington-imposed 'transitional' government characterized by international observers as among the most inept and worst violators of human rights in Haiti's recent history. She then went on to suggest that Washington has been in some way the hapless victim of the continued political upheavals in the beleaguered island nation, rather than its principal promoter. If her comments at the confirmation hearing are any indication, the Bush administration will not soon lose the distinction of being the main author behind Haiti's most recent crisis.

Toward 2008: Little Reason for Optimism

Despite the recent fanfare surrounding indications suggesting that the Bush administration intends to reorient itself to focus on domestic policy priorities in the president's second and final term, observers should not be fooled into believing that the foreign policy initiatives to be unveiled under the new leadership of incoming Secretary of State Rice will be any less invasive and presumptive than those unleashed by the Rumsfeld-Powell-Rice troika over the last four years. On the contrary, all the evidence suggests that the administration's actions abroad, and particularly in Latin America, will continue to be marked by a unilateralism stunning in its arrogance and an ignorance equally appalling in its breadth. It is to be hoped that a day will eventually arrive when Washington can begin to recoup the damage to its hemispheric reputation inflicted by this president's explosive combination of ideological fervor, a reckless disregard for the truth and a staff more adept at serving up elemental neoconservative dogma than sound foreign policy. The fulfillment of such aspirations, however, may have to wait until at least 2008, and perhaps beyond.

This analysis was prepared by Jessica Leight, COHA Research Fellow.

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'Waiting for Lefty' is a labor-movement history lesson

Thu, 27 Jan 2005 04:37:00 +0000

The first thing you notice in Capitol Hill Arts Center's production of 'Waiting for Lefty' is the guy in a brown suit and felt hat lying on the floor of the theater, a tin cup by his side.

A symbol of the destitute and homeless multitudes caught in America's Great Depression, the man remains still and silent as the audience files in around him.

But he's the last static image you'll see in CHAC's high-voltage version of this 1935 message play, which shakes off much of its historic must in the propulsion and intensity of Sheila Daniels' staging.

From its crouching male procession to a bitter chorale of 'Buddy, Can You Spare a Dime?' to its finale of downtrodden New York cabbies raising their fists and shouting, 'Strike!,' the show pulls you in by the lapels. And there you are, right in the furnace of anger, idealism and resistance where 'Waiting for Lefty' was forged by Odets and the Group Theatre, during the nation's worst economic crisis ever.

Yes, Odets' pamphleteering script contains glaring anachronisms. A collection of sketches that peel off and feed into an explosive cab drivers' union meeting, this is theater-as-megaphone. With no apology, it expresses the rage Odets, his peers and many others felt about the corruption and inequity of the American capitalistic system in the 1930s, and their desperate determination to revolt against it.

What still gives 'Waiting for Lefty' theatrical force, however, is Odets' punchy, New York-ese dialogue, and his gift for translating political convictions into compelling mini-melodramas.

Edna, a haggard young mother and wife (fiercely played by Jená Cane), is so angry that her cabbie husband, Joe (Peter Dylan O'Connor)has to drive long shifts for paltry wages while their children starve, she browbeats and bullies him into calling for a strike. ('The world was supposed to be for all of us!') Another driver, Sid (Troy Fischnaller), realizes that he and his beloved fiancée, Florrie (the poignant Kate Czajkowski),will never have the money to marry and get their own place, so he reluctantly initiates a breakup that anguishes them both.

In more bluntly didactic encounters, an impoverished actor (Garlyn Punao) gets the brush-off from a Broadway theater producer (John Farrage, who also plays a thuggish union boss) — and an expression of worker solidarity (and free copy of the Communist manifesto) from the bigwig's secretary (Laurie Johnson).

And a young Jewish doctor (Aimee Bruneau) confronts the twin evils of anti-Semitism and nepotism in the hospital workplace, as her ashamed superior (James Winkler) admits: 'Doctors don't run medicine here.'

If that statement is applicable to our own time (and health system), it's not the only line that has some modern sting. But much of 'Waiting for Lefty' is best understood in historical context — a context in which U.S. workers had no 'safety net' to protect them from dire poverty, and no realization Communism could also be corrupted, or that World War II wouldn't only be a bonanza for arms dealers but also an imperative struggle against fascism and genocide.

CHAC's production, however, never backs away from or glosses the script's raw edges. And Daniels, in some of her best work to date, gives the show a cinematic vitality by setting a tempo that rarely flags, threading emblematic '30s protest and pop tunes throughout the action and drawing impassioned work from an uneven but highly committed acting ensemble.

Clearly, this is a group effort, with key contributions also from music director and arranger John Osebold, lighting designer Patti West and costumer K.D. Schill. All deserve a salute.

(From Seattle Times)

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US Plans for Long Occupation; Japan Agrees to Help

Wed, 26 Jan 2005 11:15:00 +0000

Veterans' Benefits 'hurtful' to National Security, says Pentagon

Wed, 26 Jan 2005 10:04:00 +0000

The Wall Street Journal describes the pittance set aside for veteran’s benefits as 'Congress’ generosity' as the Republican-controlled Congress and Bush Pentagon get set to slash billions more from Veterans Administration’s (VA) programs. In an interview with the Wall Street Journal (1-25-05), Pentagon official David Chu, in a mockery of the contribution of veterans, defended a new round of cuts by ironically describing funding for programs like veterans' education and job training, health care, pensions, VA housing and the like as 'hurtful' to national security.

Despite Republican pretense that spending increases for the VA budget under the Bush administration have been large, new spending neither has matched inflation over the same period nor does it keep pace with growing need.

For example, as private sector health care costs skyrocket, veterans are more and more turning to the military’s health insurance program, Tricare. Retired service members account for half of the people covered by Tricare, whereas just five years ago they accounted for only 40 percent. The Bush administration wants to find ways to stem this tide – none of which have anything to do with keeping private sector insurance affordable. The slow rate of VA spending growth enforced by Bush and the congressional Republicans over the last four years won’t cover growing deferred benefits, such as education, housing, retirement, health care and so on, promised to current service members or that are supposed to be available for new enlistees.

Slow spending growth isn’t even the biggest immediate problem for vets. In the last two years, Bush ordered the closing of several VA hospitals in different parts of the country, pushing waiting lists for medical services for veterans as high as six months for about 230,000 vets. These closings followed in the wake of the congressional Republican’s concerted drive in 2003 to cut $15 billion from VA spending over the next ten years.

And, since his razor thin victory over Senator Kerry and his claim of 'political capital' to rule as he sees fit, President Bush, according to an Associate Press story about a leaked White House Budget Office memo, plans to slash veterans' health care benefits by over $900 million and veteran’s housing programs by $50 million in 2005 alone. A Center for American Progress analysis says, 'President Bush’s 2005 budget would increase prescription drug co-pays from $7 to $15 for many veterans. In 2002, the co-pay went from $2 to $7.' This co-pay increase would have the biggest impact on 'near-poor' veterans whose incomes are just high enough to require that they pay the new premium.

In fact the Republicans are so desperate to cut veterans' benefits they have started attacking fellow Republicans who want to preserve current benefit levels. The Wall Street Journal reports that 'the House Republican leadership took the unusual step of stripping New Jersey Rep. Christopher Smith of his chairmanship of the Veterans Affairs Committee' for pushing 'so aggressively for veterans benefits that he at times threatened to oppose their spending plans – and President Bush’s – unless more retiree benefits were included.'

The Wall Street Journal attributes the fact that the Republicans haven’t been able to cut more from the VA budget to the work of large veterans' lobby groups such as the Military Officers Association of America and other veterans groups like American Legion and Vietnam Veterans of America who have consistently blocked cuts and have pushed for expanded programs and spending. Veterans groups have called for expanded VA hospital usage, larger retiree, disability, and survivor benefits, equitable pay for service members and better access to health care and health insurance for retirees and survivors.

The Bush administration and the congressional Republicans lament the fact that increasing entitlements promised to veterans have forced them to limit the growth of spending for questionable missile systems and other weapons programs. New funding for their illegal war on Iraq, they claim, is also in jeopardy as long as so much new military spending is set aside for veterans' programs.

These 'compassionate conservatives' want to force American taxpayers to choose between the GOP’s vision of 'national security' and taking care of the people who have provided that national security. While the Republicans would like to see tax dollars handed over to the big defense that fund their election campaigns contractors – their version of an 'entitlement program,' they will also have to deal with the 28 million people who sacrificed their time and lives in the US military.

The Pentagon plans to reduce deferred benefit packages and increase one-time cash awards for new enlistees in the hopes of reducing, even eliminating, long-term benefit programs. In other words, recruiters will ask young people to sign up with enticements of several thousand-dollar payments and forget to tell them that they could have more for college. Further, one Pentagon official said that they’d like to change existing benefit plans to cause older service members to retire early and thus have smaller pensions and fewer benefits. Meanwhile, Republicans are blocking an effort to eliminate premium payments for some retirees who receive Medicare. Also, the reliance on reservists in Bush’s war on Iraq to participate in longer terms of active duty without adequate increases in pay is a de facto pay cut that affects thousands of service members who share equally the risks of military service.

The Republicans’ effort to cut veterans' benefits is just another sign of their callous attitude to the vast majority of people in this country. They feel that the very rich are entitled to hundreds of billions in tax cuts, but do not feel the least twinge of guilt in forcing veterans to forego the benefits and services promised in return for their sacrifices.

This morning it was announced that Bush plans to ask Congress for another $80 billion, bringing the total spent on his war to $280 billion. Critics of the new spending request see it as more money being thrown at a criminal invasion of Iraq based on lies about WMD and terrorist ties that also is draining national resources from programs that help people for a military machine that kills and tortures. Opponents of Bush’s war believe it has undermined national security making Americans the target of terrorism more than ever before, while Bush wants us to believe that making sure retired veterans have food, shelter, and medical care is a threat to national security.

--Joel Wendland can be reached at jwendland@politicalaffairs.net.

We the People? Not Anymore.

Wed, 26 Jan 2005 04:32:00 +0000

The Reagan Revolution is nearly complete. All that remains to do is gut Social Security and then make a small change in US Constitution – just remove 'We the People' and add 'Hooray for Me and Screw You.'

It’s not as flippant an idea as you might think. Let me explain.

In a town just south of Boston, on the day after the 1980 American presidential election, my grandfather and I sat at the kitchen table eating breakfast. Sometime between buttering my toast and drinking my orange juice, I asked my grandfather to explain the political philosophy of president-elect Ronald Reagan.

'That’s easy,' he answered, 'Hooray for me, and screw you.'

I was relatively young at the time, and his comment struck me as terribly sharp. After all, Republicans or Democrats, we were all Americans, all committed to the fundamental principle of 'We the People.' Or so I thought at the time.

I figured my grandfather was disappointed that Jimmy Carter had lost, and that the election of Ronald Reagan meant the rise of 'trickle-down' economics ('Pissing down economics,' he later grumbled). And I knew, too, that my grandfather believed Ronald Reagan had betrayed his generation and a solemn social contract with Americans forged nearly forty years before by Franklin D. Roosevelt.

I wondered if my grandfather’s politics had just passed with the times. After all, his politics were shaped by historical experiences mostly forgotten by the post WWII generation. He came of age during the Depression, riding the rails in the early 1930s looking for work. Later, during WWII, he fought for real liberty and freedom, sailing with the Merchant Marine (he was 4-F because of his poor eyesight). He opposed McCarthyism in the 1950s, Vietnam and Nixon in the 1960s and 70s. And I still remember, in 1976, his deep felt hope for America in the honesty, decency, and humanism of Jimmy Carter.

Interestingly, my grandfather was not politically a Democrat. Rather his politics embraced something more basic: he simply cared about the American people – all of them. He believed deeply in the first words of the US Constitution: 'We the People.' But by 1980, politics reflected the ideas of a new generation. And my grandfather suddenly seemed old.

'Remember,' my grandfather often reminded me after 1980, 'you take care of your own.' It was a message that I never forgot. He was still fighting that fight, in the middle of Reagan’s Revolution, when he died in May of 1985.

Why share his story now? Well, after nearly twenty-five years, I find myself remembering my grandfather’s blunt assessment of Reagan’s politics as Reagan’s philosophical son, George W. Bush, begins his ideological attack on Social Security. I say 'ideological' because the Bush attack on Social Security is not just a 'think-outside-the-box' idea for protecting 'We the People.' It’s something far deeper and darker.

Already the Bush Administration has brought a WMD-like fervour to their 'concerns' about Social Security. The crisis in the program, they say, is large and looming, and the program’s collapse is imminent. And as with the Iraqi WMD public relations campaign, Americans are being inundated with facts and figures and dazzling statistics to prove that the Social Security system is fast going bust.

And surprisingly – or perhaps not so surprisingly – some prominent Democrats agree. Time Magazine columnist and former Clinton adviser Joe Klein, for one, thinks privatizing Social Security has merit. Like Bush, Klein sees a cataclysmic future for publicly funded Social Security. And also like Bush, he looks to the 'success' of the Chilean and Swedish privatized retirement programs as models for America to imitate. But Klein and others on the Democratic side who share the Bush vision about Social Security are missing the larger ideological attack under way.

By privatizing Social Security, what the Bush administration is proposing is nothing less than a revolutionary shift in the American commitment to 'We the People.' The proposed changes mean Americans will no longer be obliged to take care of their own: of their elderly, of their weak, of their down trodden.

For a Republican Party whose supporters include so many Christian fundamentalists, one wonders: where, in Bush's privatization plan, is the Christian ideal of being one’s brother’s keeper? The irony, of course, is that this is Christian ideal already informing the existing Social Security system introduced by Franklin D. Roosevelt: that working Americans invest their tax dollars to ensure the safe retirement of those who came before them, that each generation will care for the next.

In this final stage of the Reagan Revolution, 'We' becomes 'Me.' The 'Freedom' and 'Liberty' that President George W. Bush plans to export to the world are simply the new brand names for 21st century social Darwinism – a ruthless, extreme, acquisitive individualism.

Or better yet: Hooray for me, and screw you.

--Steven Laffoley is a writer living in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada. You may e-mail him at

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Toto Constant, Former Death Squad Leader, To Be Sued

Wed, 26 Jan 2005 04:06:00 +0000

From Haiti Progress

On January 14, a process server ambushed Emmanuel 'Toto' Constant outside the U.S. Federal Building in lower Manhattan and handed him papers ordering him to appear in court to answer to a lawsuit filed by three women who had been raped by members of the death-squad he founded.

Constant's paramilitary group, the Revolutionary Front for the Advancement and Progress of Haiti or FRAPH, became internationally infamous in 1993 and 1994 for the terror it sowed under the military coup government that ruled Haiti at that time.

The San Francisco-based Center for Justice and Accountability (CJA), with the support of the New York-based Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR), has filed a lawsuit against Constant in U.S. federal court in the Southern District of New York on behalf of women who survived savage gang rapes and other forms of extreme violence, including attempted murder. The legal groups are using the Alien Tort Claims Act, adopted in 1789, which gives survivors of egregious human rights abuses, wherever committed, the right to sue persons responsible for the abuses in U.S. federal court. Since 1980, the law has been used successfully in cases involving torture (including rape), extrajudicial killing, crimes against humanity, war crimes, and arbitrary detention.

Since 1996, Constant has lived freely in and around Queens, New York, enjoying de facto political asylum from Washington. Once a week, he must check in with U.S. immigration authorities in Manhattan. That was where the CJA's process server caught him.

'Toto Constant's comfortable lifestyle in Queens has enraged and offended the Haitian community in this country as well as human rights activists around the globe,' said the CJA's Executive Director Sandra Coliver. 'We are honored to represent these courageous women who are taking great risks by coming forward. They brought this lawsuit in the name of the hundreds of women who cannot speak out because of the violence that reigns today in Haiti.'

Unlike the lawsuit that the CCR brought against the FRAPH June 1994, this action targets Constant personally. 'We aim to get a money judgement and move to get a collection from his assets, whatever those might be,' explained Moira Feeney, one of he CJA staff attorneys who has been working on the case from months. 'Secondly, we want to get an official judgement of liability and responsibility for his actions as the leader of FRAPH,' which committed a host of killings and human rights abuses in addition to rape.

Constant has 20 days to respond to the lawsuit. If he does not, 'we'll move for a default judgement,' Feeney said. In past default judgements, some judges have let the CJA 'bring forth a lot of important evidence which allowed us to set right the historical record,' Feeney said. 'That would be our hope in this case.'

The CJA has obtained favorable verdicts in similar cases. It won a $54 million judgement against two former generals from El Salvador who had come to live in the U.S., and similar rulings against human rights abusers from Bosnia and Chile. It presently has a case pending against former Haitian Colonel Carl Dorélien, who won the Florida State lottery in 1997. Feeney feels that the case against Constant is 'stronger' than all of those.

Nonetheless, Constant may have some powerful friends in the U.S. government, who may have even tipped him off that the CJA was quietly preparing a lawsuit against him. 'Our process server seemed to think that he was not surprised' when served with papers, Feeney said.

All three plaintiffs in this case are women who were targeted by Constant and FRAPH as part of a systematic campaign of violence against women. Two of the women were gang-raped repeatedly by FRAPH members in front of their families. One of the plaintiffs became pregnant and bore a child as a result of the rape she suffered. FRAPH operatives attacked the third plaintiff because they could not find her husband. They left her for dead. Fearing reprisals, the plaintiffs in this case have filed their claims anonymously as Jane Doe 1, 2 and 3.

'It is important to highlight that this type of violence is occurring today in Haiti,' Feeney said. 'With almost the exact same modus operandi as the FRAPH attackers in 1993 and 1994, heavily armed masked men are attacking poor women in their homes at night, gang-raping them in front of their families.'

Constant's FRAPH was the principal agent of terror in Haiti in 1993 and 1994. FRAPH held a noisy and aggressive demonstration on the wharf in Port-au-Prince on October 13, 1993, when the U.S.S. Harlan County was supposed to offload U.S. and Canadian soldiers to prepare Aristide's scheduled October 30, 1993 return. In the face of the antics of a few dozen drunken hooligans, the U.S. troop carrier withdrew. The unwarranted retreat was later recognized as a Pentagon and CIA-directed act of sabotage of President Bill Clinton's first attempt to restore President Jean-Bertrand Aristide to power.

About a year later, after U.S. troops invaded and occupied Haiti on September 19, 1994, the U.S. Embassy tried to dress up FRAPH as the 'loyal opposition' to Aristide's Lavalas movement. But giant and hostile crowds surrounded and foiled a U.S. Embassy-organized press conference attempting to sell Constant to the public, and in December 1994, the Haitian Justice Ministry issued warrants for Constant's arrest.

Constant quietly slipped out of Haiti and legally entered the U.S. on a tourist visa. He began openly cavorting around New York, provoking Haitian community outrage. In February 1995, the U.S. said it was looking to deport him. Four months later, Immigration agents arrested Constant at his aunt's home in Queens on May 12, 1995. He spent the next 13 months in U.S. immigration detention centers, during which time he gave an interview to CBS's '60 Minutes' where he revealed that he had been working as a CIA agent in Haiti.

On June 19, 1996, Haïti Progrès broke the story about 'The Secret Deal to Free Emmanuel Constant,' (see Haïti Progrès, Vol. 14, No. 13) in which it outlined how Constant was freed on June 14 through a special deal between U.S. government agencies, including the CIA.

Since then, Constant has been the target of several Haitian community protests in Queens. In November 2000, he was convicted in absentia in Haiti for his role in the notorious 'Raboteau Massacre' of April 1994 in Gonaïves. Until now, no court in the U.S. or Haiti has forced him to face trial in person for the human rights abuses he committed against the people of Haiti. No one from the ranks of FRAPH or the Haitian Armed Forces has been held accountable for the hundreds of politically motivated rapes that were committed and continue to be committed against the women of Haiti.

One of the plaintiffs in the suit against Constant, speaking on behalf of all of the plaintiffs, said: 'We hope that the suit will deter at least some of the violence [happening today in Haiti], by sending a message that anyone who commits atrocities will no longer be able to visit or live in the U.S. with impunity.'

For more information on the suit, visit the Center for Justice and Accountability's website at www.cja.org.

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The Tsunami: A Warning to the World

Wed, 26 Jan 2005 04:02:00 +0000

Statement by the Central Executive Committee, Communist Party of Canada, Jan. 8, 2005

All members and friends of the Communist Party of Canada have been shocked by the impact of the Dec. 26 tsunami on the coastal regions of the Indian Ocean. A natural calamity of such a magnitude, resulting in a staggering death toll and wholesale destruction, fills us with deep sorrow and with determination to help overcome this tragedy. To all those who have suffered losses, we convey our heartfelt condolences.

The international response by working people to this tragedy is encouraging, but pledges from major western powers have been inadequate, to say the least. Much more emergency and long-term assistance will be required to help the peoples of these countries to rebuild their lives and communities. The Communist Party will pressure the Canadian government to increase its humanitarian aid commitments, and to support calls to cancel the $350 billion in external debts owed by the affected countries in the region. At this point, the international community has pledged some $4 billion in emergency relief, compared to the $44 billion spent on debt repayments last year by Thailand, India and Indonesia. Debt cancellation would help to ensure that the reconstruction process is guided by the sovereign decisions of the peoples of these countries, not dictated by outside forces.

We also feel it is necessary to raise other important issues posed by this disaster.

First, we join with others in asking why the U.S. administration, which knew of the potential for a tsunami from its bases in the Pacific, warned its military base at Diego Garcia but did not take immediate action to sound a wider alarm in the region. Clearly, the U.S. was guilty of criminal neglect, at the cost of thousands of lives.

Second is the larger issue of the priorities for our planet today. For just a few million dollars - a tiny fraction of the nearly one trillion dollar annual global military budget - supplementary tsunami warning devices could have been placed in the Indian Ocean. Not far from the scene of this disaster, U.S. and British imperialism are spending $50 billion per year to occupy Iraq, where an estimated 100,000 civilians have been killed since their illegal invasion. These two countries have so far pledged just $500 million for tsunami relief aid - less than they spend every four days in Iraq.

Finally, we remember that the terrible loss of life in this event is exceeded by other ongoing human tragedies, such as the AIDS/HIV crisis which claims 8,000 lives every day in the world's poorest countries, the millions killed in civil wars in Africa (fuelled by arms sales from the major powers), and the 1.4 million children who die each year for lack of clean drinking water and adequate sanitation. The need for solidarity with the tsunami victims must not push these urgent crises out of our awareness.

We also note the growing concensus among scientists that the world faces a rising threat of ecological calamities, such as climate changes and higher ocean levels linked to global warming. The time has come for humanity to make a conscious choice that our survival depends on curbing militarism and blocking further aggressions by the imperialist powers, so that the necessary material and human resources can be devoted to finding ways to avert global catastrophe. Otherwise, we may be doomed to live in a world where dominant imperialist powers completely discard international law in their scramble to seize resources and secure profits, at the expense of any hope for a better life for billions of working people.

In this sense, the Dec. 26 tsunami is a warning signal to the entire world. Our choice must be peace and life, not militarism and death!

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Coalition seeks better health care

Wed, 26 Jan 2005 03:59:00 +0000

A coalition of diverse groups is organizing throughout the state of Illinois to ensure fulfillment and implementation of the Illinois Health Care Justice Act of 2004.

The Health Care Justice Act was signed into law by Gov. Rod Blagojevich in August. It contains a mandate to the General Assembly to enact a health care access plan by Dec. 31, 2006, and to implement it by July 1, 2007. The plan would guarantee accessible, affordable, quality health care to all Illinoisans.

It is legislation that should have been announced with a fanfare.

It is the first time in the history of Illinois that a plan to provide health care for everyone was approved.

The Campaign for Better Health Care (CBHC) was founded in 1989 on the belief that accessible, affordable, quality health care is a basic human right for all people and the coalition has been working toward that goal ever since.

The coalition includes 326 diverse organizations that would have been considered strange bedfellows just a few years ago. In addition to a strong union component including the AFL-CIO, there are groups such as the Illinois Hospital Association, the Illinois Academy of Family Physicians, United Healthcare insurance, both the Illinois Education Association and the Illinois Federation of Teachers and the League of Women Voters.

Other organizations represent seniors, community groups, social service and people with disabilities.

In Granite City Thursday night, Jim Duffet, CBHC executive director, met with more than a dozen leaders from the United Steelworkers of America, AFSCME, PACE, SOAR and the United Congregations of Metro East to discuss strategy.

Under the Act, a task force is being put together consisting of 34 members, including five appointed by the governor, and six each by the majority and minority leaders in both Houses, plus as non-voting members the directors of the Departments of Public Health, Aging, Public Aid, Insurance and Human Services.

The Health Care Task Force will schedule public hearings in each Congressional District between now and Nov. 30. The coalition urges people throughout the state to attend the public hearings and let their stories about health care become a part of the record.

Duffet said nearly one out of three people in Illinois is uninsured and nearly 76 percent of the uninsured are workers. Part-time workers and the self-employed are more likely to be uninsured than full-time workers, but Illinoisans who work for small firms are also likely to be uninsured.

Most people who have health insurance have it through their employers who are finding it more and more difficult to keep up with the ever-increasing costs of premiums.

Duffet said when people are uninsured, everyone ends up paying higher premiums for health insurance. A wide pool of insured people would spread the cost of treatment over a broad base.

The Health Care Task Force will report to the governor and the General Assembly on March 15, 2006, its recommendation for how the state should proceed with the establishment of a health care program for all Illinoisans.

Some of the criteria for such a plan are stated in the Act: Provides access to a full range of preventive, acute, and long-term health care service; Maintains and improves the quality of health care services offered; Provides portability of coverage, regardless of employment status; Provides core benefits for all Illinois residents; Contains cost containment measures and has a cost analysis for each plan; and, Promotes affordable coverage options for small businesses. As the groups prepared to leave the meeting with Duffet, they discussed plans for efforts in the area.

'What our organization would like to do is build a strong coalition in Southern Illinois with AFSCME, USWA, SEIU and others,' Herb Reisinger of UCM said. 'If you look around this room you'll see the numbers represented: the Madison County Federation of Labor with 31,000 union members, the Southwestern Illinois federation with 24,000 members and UCM with 20,000. That's 75,000 represented here tonight.'

(From Edwardsville Intelligencer)

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Communist Party to play bigger role in state companies

Wed, 26 Jan 2005 03:55:00 +0000

The Central Committee of the Communist Party of China (CPC) issued an official circular on January 23 calling for strengthening and improving the building of the CPC organizations in state-owned enterprises, particularly those owned by the central government.

The circular, entitled 'The Proposals on Strengthening and Improving Party Building in Central Enterprises by the Organization Department of the CPC Central Committee and the Party Committee of the Commission for Supervision and Management of State-owned Properties under the State Council', urges the central and state-owned enterprises to strengthen the political role of Party organizations and push forward managerial reform.

Describing the state-owned enterprises as the pillar of China's national economy and the central companies as the main force playing a leading role in the state economy, the circular said: 'to bring the key role of the state companies, especially the central firms, into full play is a must for adhering to and improving the fundamental socialist economic system, developing the advanced productivity, increasing China's integrated national strength, and consolidating the Party's ruling status.'

The circular puts forward the guiding ideology, general goal and major tasks for strengthening and improving the Party building in the central companies so as to push forward the renovation in their mechanism, technology and management.

The circular proposes that members of the Party committees in a state company may become members of the board of directors, the board of supervisors, and the managerial board by legal procedure, while the members of these boards who are Party members can be allowed to become members of the Party committee.

If qualified, the chairman of the board of directors and the secretary of the Party committee in a state company could be the same one person. But in principle, the chairman of the board and the general manager should be different persons.

The roles of the Party organizations in the state companies are to set the criterion for selecting the managerial personnel, strictly checking the candidates, improving the assessment mechanism, and strengthening supervision.

The circular says that efforts should be made to actively advance the building of Party's work style and the anti-corruption drive in state companies and to probe effective ways for bringing staff workers' role of democratic management into full play and safeguarding their legal rights and interests under the modern corporate system.

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Chavez enjoys mass support; World Social Forum set to begin

Tue, 25 Jan 2005 10:40:00 +0000

Open letter to President George W. Bush

Tue, 25 Jan 2005 06:42:00 +0000

From Al-Ahram Weekly From an 'expelled' Muslim to an elected American

Mr. President,

By a strange twist of fate, this year's calendar puts your inauguration on the same day as the most important religious day of the year for Muslims. Is it a historical irony that links these two celebrations together? As you are inaugurated for your second term, I, a European Muslim, want to share with you a few thoughts.

Mr. President, I was banished from the United States by your administration. My visa was revoked, as I was about to assume my position as a Professor at Notre Dame University. To this day, I have not been told the reasons behind this action.

I do know, as does Homeland Security and the State Department, that my file is empty. The Patriot Act was put forward as an excuse and I was asked to reapply. Since then, there has been total silence. Why was this decision taken? What are you afraid of? Is it perhaps that academic freedom of expression has become a danger for you? Or is it perhaps the fact that it would have fortified criticism against you, no matter how constructive, especially coming from a Muslim intellectual?

What are you doing to your country, Mr. President?

Along with the majority of Muslims around the world, I condemned the September 11 attacks. I shared and sympathized with the American people's pain. We understood their fears and the depth of their doubts. To transcend that traumatic experience, two things were crucial. First, Muslims had to firmly and clearly denounce terrorism and extremism, which they did, even if at times it was done timidly. Second, the American government should have shed light on the facts: how were such odious acts possible? Who was responsible for the multiple and repeated information failures? The people of the United States, like the rest of the world, needed explanations, transparency and truth.

However, since September 11th, 2001 your administration has continued to accumulate shadowy dealings. Boards of inquiry were delayed or strangely constituted; state secrets and sinister silences mushroomed. In the name of the 'war against terrorism', the ultimate reason for legitimacy, did you permit your officials to make decisions and to act illegitimately, without a hint of accountability? Under your watch, laws eradicating civil liberties have been enacted which put into question the rights of citizens. Discrimination against Arabs and Muslims has been institutionalized and legalized. There is limitless scrutiny, individuals are arrested, and lying in the name of the State has become the norm.

Whatever the tone of your generous speeches, facts do not lie: this is not a good time to be a Muslim in the United States. The consequences of the Patriot Act has been exactly what its' most virulent detractors had predicted - an infringement of citizens' rights and legalized discrimination that is reminiscent of the McCarthy era.

Your commitment on the international stage is no less alarming. Your intervention in Afghanistan killed thousands of civilians who had nothing to do with the attacks of September 11th. The situation is unresolved. Bin Laden is still a fugitive and tortures exerted by those under your administration are a daily happening as confirmed by Human Rights Watch.

Inhumane treatment inflicted on the Guantanamo prisoners in a declared 'no rights' area is scandalous. Your intervention in Iraq only confirmed these practices, characterized by lies, systematic manipulation and in the end, the death of tens of thousands of Iraqis and Americans. The horrors of Abu Ghuraib prison, which appeared as revelations of torture were in fact institutionalized, from Afghanistan to Guantanamo. The American soldiers in Iraq are not primarily responsible: someone at the head of your administration had undoubtedly given the green light. Mr. Bush, would it be that you are in favour of torture exerted against Arabs and Muslims? Is this the message that one must understand from these actions?

For the last three years, your policy has consisted in victimizing the American super power to such an extent that in return, it has had total disrespect for basic human rights. Instead of calming spirits with more truth and dialogue, you have spread fear by keeping Americans in the dark and lying to them. It was expected that you would assist in surpassing the trauma of September 11th, not sustain it dangerously. You have won the elections by feeding the fears of your citizens and presenting yourself as their only guarantor of security. You won by playing on emotions, not intelligence.

Mr. President,

I have visited the United States more than twenty times in the past three years. I know that your country abounds with people of critical intelligence and honesty. Many of your citizens are not easily deceived. They are not only ashamed of the image you give of your country but, more deeply, of the way in which you are transforming it into a citadel besieged by fear and arrogance.

As a European Muslim, frightened by your unilateralism and the serious excesses of your policies, it is towards worthy and critical American citizens that I invite Muslims to turn to and to bring together their hopes. If the Muslims are right in not trusting you, they should not confuse the American people with the increasingly blunt spirits that surround you.

It's been a couple of weeks that you have made your support for the victims of the Tsunami disaster public in order to show Muslims that you were capable of compassion and that you respected them. At the heart of this natural disaster, aware of the desolation and deaths, know Mr. President, that these Muslims remain lucid. You will not gain their trust through emotions.

Your second mandate begins January 20th. You presented yourself to the American people as the solution but you are in fact the problem. You have not ceased to deepen the gap between the United States and the rest of the world - not only the Muslim world but also Europe. As a European Muslim, I had the hope that by relocating to your country, I would have been able to bring a critical and constructive contribution. Your administration preferred to exclude me, like so many other Muslim intellectuals, in order to protect itself from debate and dialogue.

I finally decided not to try settling in your country anymore. I am not sure what, during this second mandate, could rid you of this Manichean view and dangerous interpretation of the world. I do not know what could persuade you to use less lies and more truths.

I know simply that the Muslims celebrate on this 20th of January, a faith which they consider stronger then your capriciousness. If with strength of conscience and intelligence, they succeed in distinguishing between your administration and the American people and continue to dialogue with those of your fellow-citizens who have not been blinded, then hope remains. That is the only hope, unless you are touched by grace and that you understand that it is urgent, for the good of our planet, that you change your policies.

By Tariq Ramadan

www.tariqramadan.com Last book : Western Muslims and the Future of Islam, Oxford University Press, 2003

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The Outing of Sponge-Bob SquarePants

Tue, 25 Jan 2005 05:21:00 +0000

Thank the gods for the faux Christian Right! One of their hate groups, Focus on the Family, has uncovered a sinister [left wing?] plot to corrupt America’s youth. David Kirkpatrick reported in The New York Times of 1/20/05 ('Conservatives Taking Aim At Soft Target') that James C. Dobson, the Focus founder, has denounced Mr. Sponge-Bob SquarePants for taking part in a 'pro-homosexual video.'

Not since the Tele Tubby scandal a few years ago has the so-called X-tian Right (I use the 'X' because I don’t think Christ would want his name associated with these jokers) made such an important contribution to the defense of the Republic.

The video is going to be sent to thousands of elementary schools throughout the nation. It was made by the We Are Family Foundation founded by Nile Rogers, who wrote the song 'We Are Family' after 9/11. (Not to be confused with the pro-gay advocacy group called We Are Family-- a different outfit. Our X-tian friends may have done this).

Besides Mr. SquarePants, the video features other suspicious characters whose sexual identities may be a problem for Mr. Dobson-- such as Barney. Mr. SquarePants behavior on his own show may also be an issue as well. He does hold hands with his friend Patrick and he has questionable television viewing habits. Mr. Kirkpatrick reports that he and Patrick (while holding hands mind you) watch 'The Adventures of Mermaid Man and Barnacle Boy'-- a fact, I am sure, that has not been missed by Mr. Dobson and his inquisitional friends.

Mr. SquarePants has also become 'a camp figure among adult gay men.' Mr. Dobson cannot be pleased with this information. Mr. Dobson was first alerted to the possibility that Sponge-Bob might better be called Sponge-Bob HotPants by another organization claiming to be X-tian, namely the American Family Association.

Both groups are committed to the prevention of same sex marriages-- arguably the most important issue of the last two thousand years or so. Is the Sponge-Bob video subliminally programming the elementary school children who watch it to be tolerant in the future of same sex unions, or even, heaven forbid, to practice them?

However, the video itself, which has already been shown on network television, according to the Times article, has 'nothing in it or its accompanying materials [that] refers to sexual identity.' Nevertheless, there is that troubling handholding.

What is the real purpose of this video? Why is it being sent to elementary schools? The video makers state its purpose is to 'teach children about multiculturalism' and 'tolerance.' Perhaps this does not make sense to Mr. Dobson. He may think elementary school children have enough problems just learning one culture. How can they learn many?

In any event, Mr. Dobson, and others of his ilk, will have none of this un-X-tian propaganda foisted off on the children of America. He is quoted as saying, 'We see the video as an insidious means by which the organization [the We are Family Foundation, but Dobson is probably confused about this] is manipulating and potentially brainwashing [with a sponge yet!] kids.'

But surely these so-called X-tians have Sunday schools to correct any ideas of tolerance and respect for others that may have contaminated their children in the public school systems.

Meanwhile, on the editorial page of the same issue of the Times, we learn that homophobia is weakening our national defense. The government has a serious shortage of people who can read and speak Arabic, as well as other languages, so that there is now a backlog of 120,000 messages in Arabic that, characterized as a 'looming threat,' remain untranslated.

The Times is rightly upset because in the last few years 20 vital Arabic specialists were discharged by the military for being gay. The mindless homophobia displayed by the government puts all of us at risk. Suppose somewhere in that backlog of 120,000 messages is another 9/11 plot.

No doubt it is more important to purge the armed forces of gays than to get through that backlog and provide security to the American people. Maybe Nile Rogers can send a few of those videos staring the insidious Mr. SquarePants to the Pentagon big-wigs, although I don’t think 'tolerance' is a very high priority for Mr. Rumsfeld and his cronies.

--Thomas Riggins writes frequently for Political Affairs' online edition.

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