Archive
1-7 January 2004

7 January 2004

Plame Leak Shameful No Matter How the White House Spins It
By Josh Marshall
The Hill, 7 January 2004
EXCERPT: With its current battles in the snowy wastes of Iowa and New Hampshire, the Democratic Party may be, for the moment, a house divided against itself. But Democrats at least have the consolation of the Plame investigation, which continues to validate their least generous suspicions about how the Bush White House operates and underscore the president’s seeming indifference to recklessness and law-breaking among high-level members of his own staff.

The S Factor Explains Bush's Popularity
By Neal Starkman
Seattle Post-Intelligencer, 5 January 2004
EXCERPT: None of the so-called theories can explain President Bush's popularity, such as it is. Even at this date in his presidency, after all that has happened, the president's popularity hovers at around 50 percent -- an astonishingly high figure, I believe, given the state of people's lives now as opposed to four years ago. What can explain his popularity? Can that many people be enamored of what he has accomplished in Iraq? Of how he has fortified our constitutional freedoms with the USA Patriot Act? Of how he has bolstered our economy? Of how he has protected our environment? Perhaps they've been impressed with the president's personal integrity and the articulation of his grand vision for America? Is that likely? Granted, there are certain subsections of the American polity that have substantially benefited from this presidency. Millionaires and charismatic Christians have accrued either material or spiritual fortification from Bush's administration. But surely these two groups are a small minority of the population. What, then, can account for so many people being so supportive of the president? The answer, I'm afraid, is the factor that dare not speak its name. It's the factor that no one talks about. The pollsters don't ask it, the media don't report it, the voters don't discuss it. I, however, will blare out its name so that at last people can address the issue and perhaps adopt strategies to overcome it. It's the "Stupid factor," the S factor: Some people -- sometimes through no fault of their own -- are just not very bright.
SEE ALSO: The Conservative Dean You Don't Know (TP)
SEE ALSO: Attacks on Dean Could Prove Harmful to Democrats (TP)

Two Loud Words About 9/11: Bush Knew!
By William Rivers Pitt
TruthOut.org, 5 January 2004
EXCERPTS: Two words: 'Bush Knew.' It is, frankly, amazing that this has fallen down the memory hole. Recall two headlines from that period. The first, from the UK Guardian on May 19, 2002, was titled 'Bush Knew of Terrorist Plot to Hijack US Planes.' ... Another story on the topic came from the New York Times on May 15, 2002, and was titled 'Bush Was Warned bin Laden Wanted to Hijack Planes.' ... George W. Bush is going to run in 2004 on the idea that his administration is the only one capable of protecting us from another attack like the ones which took place on September 11. Yet the record to date is clear. Not only did they fail in spectacular fashion to deal with those first threats, not only has their reaction caused us to be less safe, not only have they failed to sufficiently bolster our defenses, but they used the aftermath of the attacks to ram through policies they couldn't have dreamed of achieving on September 10. It is one of the most remarkable turnabouts in American political history: Never before has an administration used so grisly a personal failure to such excellent effect. Never mind the final insult: They received all these warnings and went on vacation for a month down in Texas. The August 6 briefing might as well have happened in a vacuum. September 11 could have and should have been prevented. Why? Because Bush knew.
SEE ALSO: What Bush Knew Before Sept. 11 (CBS)
SEE ALSO: George W. Bush: Words vs. Deeds (Intervention)

Bush Grabs New Power for FBI
By Kim Zetter
Wired, 6 January 2004
EXCERPT: While the nation was distracted last month by images of Saddam Hussein's spider hole and dental exam, President George W. Bush quietly signed into law a new bill that gives the FBI increased surveillance powers and dramatically expands the reach of the USA Patriot Act.
The Intelligence Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2004 grants the FBI unprecedented power to obtain records from financial institutions without requiring permission from a judge. Under the law, the FBI does not need to seek a court order to access such records, nor does it need to prove just cause.

'The Best Recovery Money Can Buy'
By William Keegan
Guardian (UK), 6 January 2004
EXCERPTS: Now you have it. The dollar is in free fall, but it's good for General Motors and it's good for the US - especially for the Bush administration during election year. To borrow a phrase from the Nixon administration of the early 1970s, US policy towards the dollar is one of benign neglect, benign for the US economy but potentially very malign for the eurozone.... Is it all too good to be true? Presumably the Democrats hope so. One possible cloud on the horizon is that falling inflows of foreign, mainly East Asian funds into the US may force a rise in interest rates in the run-up to the election. Another is that the oil producing exporting countries (Opec) may get fed up with the decline in the value of their dollar earnings and push up the price of oil. That was the trigger point for the first oil shock of the 1970s). But for the moment George Bush is riding high on an economic revival that everyone knows means trouble via the twin budget and trade deficits in the medium term. As for the fiscal stimulus, more and more commentators are noticing that it is not just tax cuts that are boosting the US economy but vast increases in military - or, in the case of lucrative contracts in Iraq, militarily-induced - spending. That 1950s-style military industrial complex is back.
SEE ALSO: US Dollar Continues to Slide (DowJonesWire)

Beef Industry Buys Off the FDA
By the Center for American Progress
TomPaine.com, 6 Januray 2004
EXCERPT: With the scare over mad cow disease escalating, the beef industry is being forced to accept regulation it has long fought. A story in The New York Times notes, "the current mad cow crisis reveals how government regulators sided with companies that adhered to those methods of operation." That influence is still reaping benefits. USA Today reports that even as a third cattle herd is quarantined, "the FDA has yet to close loopholes in mad-cow regulations" that would prevent "the use of cattle remains in animal feed"‹the very practice that spreads mad cow disease.
SEE ALSO: Terrorist Potatoes: Unsafe Food in the U.S. (TP)

Bush Administration Pushes Right Wing School Voucher Agenda
TomPaine.com, 6 January 2004
EXCERPT: While the administration starves its own No Child Left Behind (NCLB) legislation and disrupts local school districts through non-funded mandates, voucher advocates are lavished with taxpayer dollars to discredit the very concept of public education. Bush¹s Education Department, infested with right-wing ideologues, now serves as headquarters and paymaster for the public schools¹ fiercest enemies. "Over the past three years, more than $75 million in federal education funding has been diverted to just a handful of private, pro-voucher advocacy groups," said People for the American Way (PFAW) in its mid-November report, "Funding a Movement: U.S. Department of Education Pours Millions into Groups Advocating School Vouchers and Education Privatization." "This torrent of public funding appears to benefit and strengthen the advocacy infrastructures created by a network of right-wing foundations dedicated to the privatization of education." In plain language, the grants underwrite the salaries and expenses of a growing cadre of political operatives initially assembled by Republican fat cats in the late '90s.

EPA Plans to Allow Untreated Sewage in Waterways
BushGreenWatch.org, 6 January 2004
EXCERPT: The public has until Jan. 9 to comment on a Bush Administration plan to routinely allow sewage that's been only partially treated to be released into public waterways during storms. The proposal by the Environmental Protection Agency would exempt sewage treatment plants during heavy rains and snowmelts from having to put sewage through the standard biological treatment process to remove pathogenic organisms and other pollutants. Municipal treatment plants would be allowed to divert sewage around biological treatment units and then "blend" the largely untreated sewage with treated wastewater prior to discharge.
SEE ALSO: EPA Planst to Loosen Mountaintop Removal Rules (BGW)

Guess Which Jobs Are Going Abroad: Tax Accountants
CNN/Money, 5 January 2004
If a tax preparer gets you an unexpected refund this year, you may have an accountant in India to thank. That's because accounting firms are joining the outsourcing trend established years ago by cost-conscious American manufacturers. In fact, companies in a number of unexpected industries are now sending work overseas. From scientific lab analysis to medical billing, the service-sector workforce has gone global. CPA firms are just one example. In the 2002 tax year, accounting firms sent some 25,000 tax returns to be completed by accountants in India. This year, that number is expected to quadruple. The reason lies in the numbers; accountants in the United States typically earn $4,000 a month. In places like India it's closer to $400, says David Wyle, CEO and founder of SurePrep, a tax-outsourcing firm based in southern California that's employed more than 200 accountants in Bombay and Ahmedabad, India. "We've estimated firms will save between $40,000 to $50,000 for every 100 returns that are outsourced," adds Wyle, whose firm expects to do 35,000 returns in the coming year. That's up from 7,000 last year.

6 January 2004

 VIDEO LINK
View the 'Bush in 30 Seconds' TV Ad Contest Finalists
BushIn30Seconds.org
Here you'll find fifteen superb thirty-second commercials designed to bring the case against Bush to television viewers around the country. As the site says, "The winning commercial will be announced at an event on January 12th at the Hammerstein Ballroom in New York City. You can buy tickets online now. The finalists are also being sent out to our panel of celebrity judges which includes Michael Moore, Donna Brazile, Jack Black, Janeane Garofalo, Margaret Cho and Gus Van Sant. These judges will determine which ad wins the contest overall." Fantastic viewing! Share the link.

Quarantining Dissent
How the Secret Service protects Bush from free speech
James Bovard
San Francisco Chronicle, 4 January 2004
EXCERPT: When President Bush travels around the United States, the Secret Service visits the location ahead of time and orders local police to set up "free speech zones" or "protest zones," where people opposed to Bush policies (and sometimes sign-carrying supporters) are quarantined. These zones routinely succeed in keeping protesters out of presidential sight and outside the view of media covering the event. ...On May 30, 2002, Ashcroft effectively abolished restrictions on FBI surveillance of Americans' everyday lives first imposed in 1976. One FBI internal newsletter encouraged FBI agents to conduct more interviews with antiwar activists "for plenty of reasons, chief of which it will enhance the paranoia endemic in such circles and will further service to get the point across that there is an FBI agent behind every mailbox." The FBI took a shotgun approach toward protesters partly because of the FBI's "belief that dissident speech and association should be prevented because they were incipient steps toward the possible ultimate commission of act which might be criminal," according to a Senate report. On Nov. 23 news broke that the FBI is actively conducting surveillance of antiwar demonstrators, supposedly to "blunt potential violence by extremist elements," according to a Reuters interview with a federal law enforcement official. Given the FBI's expansive definition of "potential violence" in the past, this is a net that could catch almost any group or individual who falls into official disfavor.

White House Seeks Secrecy on Detainee
By GINA HOLLAND Associated Press Writer
AP in FindLaw.com, 5 January 2004
EXCERPT: In an extraordinary request, the Bush administration asked the Supreme Court on Monday to let it keep its arguments secret in a case involving an immigrant's challenge of his treatment after the Sept. 11 terror attacks. Mohamed Kamel Bellahouel wants the high court to consider whether the government acted improperly by secretly jailing him after the attacks and keeping his court fight private. He is supported by more than 20 journalism organizations and media companies. Solicitor General Theodore Olson told justices in a one-paragraph filing that "this matter pertains to information that is required to be kept under seal." Justices sometimes are asked to keep parts of cases private because of information sensitive for national security or other reasons, but it's unusual for an entire filing to be kept secret. Lucy A. Dalglish, executive director of The Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, said she was disappointed by the government's request. "The idea that there is nothing that could be filed publicly is really ridiculous," she said. "It just emphasizes our point that we're living in frightening times. People can be arrested, thrown in jail and have secret court proceedings, and we know absolutely nothing about it." The court will decide later whether to consider Bellahouel's appeal and at the same time whether to allow the secret filing. Justices will be able to review the government's private arguments.

Time to Take Rights Seriously
by Judd Legum
Center for American Progress, 5 January 2004
EXCERPT: The Padilla decision was more than just a political victory for civil libertarians; it was a firm rejection of the Bush administration’s cavalier approach to fundamental substantive and procedural legal protections. The 2nd Circuit’s decision, which requires Padilla to be released from military custody within 30 days, placed considerable emphasis on the Non-Detention Act of 1971. In so doing, the court provided a historical context for its ruling that demands closer examination. ...Rather than fighting the ruling, the administration should use the decision as an opportunity to reassess its legal approach to combating terrorism. We need fair, humane and articulate standards that govern the treatment, not just of Padilla and other citizens but also of the hundreds of noncitizens detained as “enemy combatants” in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba. Such procedures should be consistent with constitutional and statutory law and recognize the vital role of the independent judiciary in the process. After all, the purpose of rolling back the terrorist threat is to preserve our freedoms. If, in the process, we undermine the legal principles that are the source our freedoms, then what, exactly, are we fighting for?
SEE ALSO: Court Looks at More Terror Plan Challenges (AP in FindLaw.com)

U.S. Offers Tips for Business to Avoid OT Pay
By LEIGH STROPE
AP, 5 January 2004
EXCERPT: The Labor Department is giving employers tips on how to avoid paying overtime to some of the 1.3 million low-income workers who would become eligible under new rules expected to be finalized early this year. The department's advice comes even as it touts the $895 million in increased wages that it says those workers would be guaranteed from the reforms, which Labor Secretary Elaine Chao called long overdue. ...A final rule, revising the 1938 Fair Labor Standards Act, is expected to be issued in March. The act defines the types of jobs that qualify workers for time-and-a-half if they work more than 40 hours a week. Overtime pay for the 1.3 million low-income workers has been a selling tool for the Bush administration in trying to ease concerns in Congress about millions of higher-paid workers becoming ineligible. But the Labor Department, in a summary of its plan published last March, suggests how employers can avoid paying overtime to those newly eligible low-income workers.

Why Retirement Plans are Falling Short
By David R. Francis
AP in CS Monitor (FindLaw.com), 5 January 2004
EXCERPT: By now, it is no secret: Many American workers don't save adequately for retirement. And in most cases, the ever-popular 401(k) plans offered by private businesses will not make up for the inadequacy of a Social Security pension. In short, 401(k)s are failing many workers, especially younger ones - not because these plans are themselves inadequate, but because Americans are not taking full advantage of them. Consider:
* In 2000, half of working families (51 percent) did not own a private retirement savings account - no 401(k), no 403(b) offered by nonprofits, no Individual Retirement Account, and no Keogh account for the self-employed.
* A quarter of eligible workers do not join such plans, in effect giving up free money their employers would contribute.
* When changing jobs, nearly 60 percent of 401(k) participants cash out their accounts rather than leave it in the plan for retirement use. Such moves incur heavy tax penalties. These behaviors fall disproportionately on younger workers. Older people about to retire with a standard corporate pension are "pretty much OK," says Alicia Munnell, director of Boston College's Center for Retirement Research and coauthor of a new book, "Coming Up Short; The Challenges of 401(k) Plans." But baby boomers and younger workers may be "ill- prepared," she adds. Most workers in the United States - 96 percent - are covered by Social Security. But the average retired worker gets $900 a month, a spouse half of that. It is hardly lavish.

U.S. to Destroy 450 Calves in Mad Cow Probe
By Randy Fabi
Reuters, 5 January 2004
EXCERPT: The month-old offspring of a Washington state dairy cow infected with mad cow disease will be destroyed along with about 450 other calves as a safety precaution, the U.S. Agriculture Department said on Monday. ...The planned slaughter leaves at least 4,000 other cattle linked to the mad cow investigation still under quarantine.

Progressivism in 2004: Transcending the Liberal-Conservative Divide
by John Halpin
Center for American Progress, 5 Januar 2004
EXCERPT: ...progressivism points the way beyond the liberal-conservative divisions that are sure to occupy much of the public debate in 2004, to a politics grounded on reasonable action and ethical principles of what constitutes a good society and a strong America. Progressive political thought provides a blueprint for effective and publicly accepted solutions to major problems. In this framework, government should neither be feared nor favored, but made to be an effective force for good and opportunities for all Americans. Individuals must behave responsibly and take their role as citizens seriously. And ideologies of any stripe should be discarded in favor of the core American values that help lead us to the most sensible solutions to the challenges ahead.

5 January 2004

Mercurial Policy
Baltimore Sun, 4 January 2004
EXCERPT: The Bush administration decided to slow down the timetable for requiring power plants to install pollution controls aimed specifically at mercury. As a result, a targeted 90 percent reduction in mercury emissions, which the Clinton administration estimated could be reached by 2008, would be replaced by a reduction target of 70 percent with a deadline of 2018. What's more, the Environmental Protection Agency under Mr. Bush's direction proposed to downgrade the classification of mercury from "hazardous air pollutant" to a less stringent category so it can be part of a program that allows companies to buy pollution "credits" from cleaner plants. Of course, the difference in approach between thermometers and power plants isn't hard to figure out. Most of the mercury thermometers are made these days in China and India. They don't have a big lobby here. Utilities, meanwhile, have repeatedly been awarded special consideration by the Bush administration, which is being sued by Maryland and most of the other states in the Northeastern U.S. for relaxing other Clean Air Act requirements on those plants.

So, Is Orange the New Color of Safety?
By Ellen Goodman
Boston Globe, 4 January 2004
EXCERPT: Can we rerun the videotape back to Dec. 15 when Howard Dean qualified his pleasure at the capture of Saddam Hussein by saying that it "has not made America safer"? Dean was instantly lambasted by his opponents, especially Joe Lieberman, who said the doctor was climbing "into his own spider hole of denial." Well, six days later, after the sort of terrorist "chatter" designed to make your teeth chatter, the country was put on orange alert for a "spectacular" attack rivaling 9/11. Then six Air France flights destined to fly into the homeland were grounded. And finally, under "emergency rules," our government has required armed guards on foreign flights. Are we safer yet?

House Democrats Lose One to Republicans
AP, 3 January 2004
EXCERPT: Texas Rep. Ralph M. Hall switched parties Friday night, filing for reelection as a Republican after 23 years as one of the most conservative Democrats in Congress. "I've always said that if being a Democrat hurt my district, I would switch or I would resign," Hall said in an interview. He said GOP leaders had recently refused to place money for his district in a spending bill and "the only reason I was given was I was a Democrat." In an interview in which he said he had filed to run as a Republican, he also said he didn't agree with "all these guys running against the president."

Willie Nelson Sings for Peace and Dennis Kucinich
By John Nichols
The Nation, 4 January 2004
EXCERPT: Dennis Kucinich still faces an uphill climb in his campaign to win the Democratic presidential nomination. But his anti-Iraq war candidacy has already inspired better music than those of contenders who are garnering far more attention and campaign money. The New Year's weekend benefit for Kucinich at the Austin Music Hall was one of the finest campaign concerts in recent memory, and the sentiments of the stellar cast of performers was well summed up by singer Bonnie Raitt, who introduced a bluesy version of the Buffalo Springfield hit "For What It's Worth," be declaring, "Here's to free speech. Here's to fair elections. Here's to the possibility that Dennis Kucinich could win."... The highlight of the Saturday night show came when Kucinich's most high-profile musician backer, Willie Nelson, took the stage. Nelson, who has been talking up Kucinich's candidacy since last summer, says he was attracted to Kucinich first because of the Ohio congressman's passionate defense of family farmers -- a cause close to the heart of the country singer, who has been a core backer of the Farm Aid concerts. But, as he campaigned for Kucinich over the weekend, Nelson picked up on the anti-war message that has been central to Kucinich's run for the White House.

3-4 January 2004

Bush's Budget for 2005 Seeks to Rein In Domestic Costs
By ROBERT PEAR
New York Times, 4 January 2004
EXCERPT: Facing a record budget deficit, Bush administration officials say they have drafted an election-year budget that will rein in the growth of domestic spending... (This action is being taken even though)...military and domestic security spending in the last two years dwarfed the increase in domestic discretionary programs, which did not quite keep pace with inflation. "The increases for defense, international affairs and homeland security have been much greater — and thus have played a much larger role in the return to deficits — than the increases for domestic appropriations."

Flight Groundings Lead Allies to Query Washington
By ERIC LICHTBLAU
New York Times, 2 January 2004
EXCERPT: British Airways canceled another flight to the United States on Friday as the Bush administration faced questions from American allies about the reliability of the intelligence information that has led to the recent rash of flight cancellations. ...Administration officials said no arrests had been made in connection with any of the more than a dozen international flights subjected to rigorous scrutiny. And officials have acknowledged that even now, they are uncertain whether they have succeeded in foiling a terrorist plot. "I don't think we know yet, and we may never know," a senior administration official said. ...But there appear to be limits to how far other nations will go to accommodate American concerns.

Bush Aims to Dodge Tough Poll Issues
By Lawrence Donegan
Guardian (UK), 4 January 2004
EXCERPT: There may be a conflict raging in Iraq that is killing US soldiers on a daily basis. There may be the threat of an economic crisis, too much unemployment and political debate infused with vitriol levels unseen for years. Yet President George W Bush is planning to win re-election by turning reality on its head. Bush is drawing up a positive, soft-focus and upbeat campaigning platform portraying him as the candidate of national unity.
SEE ALSO: Dean Surges Upward in Harris Poll, Against Bush

Dean Cites Terror Alert as Vindication
By Holly Ramer
AP, 2 January 2004
EXCERPT: Democratic presidential hopeful Howard Dean on Friday cited the higher terror alert and the number of U.S. troops killed in Iraq in arguing that he was right to say Saddam Hussein's capture didn't make America safer. "They got all excited, but here we are," Dean told a town-hall meeting. "We've lost 10 more troops and F-16s are escorting foreign passenger jets into our air space because we're now more worried than we were before."

Most of the World Thinks Bush Sucks.  Why Don't We?
Patricia Ernest (Pissed Off Patricia's Blog )
OpEdNews.com, January 2004
EXCERPT: Dr. Dean was absolutely correct.  We are no safer now than we were last February.  Wanna know why?  Well, it's because we have made some newer bigger enemies and we seem to be adding to the list almost every day.  Yes, apparently Saddam is in custody, but I wasn't afraid of him when he was running lose so why would I feel more secure now that he's in jail.  His neighbors may feel better, but I don't remember hearing them say that. To tell you the truth, I believe that there are a lot more dangerous people in this world than Saddam.  Some maybe not even that far away.

The Law of War in the War on Terror
Kenneth Roth, Executive Director of Human Rights Watch
From Foreign Affairs, January/February 2004
Summary: The Bush administration has literalized its "war" on terrorism, dissolving the legal boundaries between what a government can do in peacetime and what's allowed in war. This move may have made it easier for Washington to detain or kill suspects, but it has also threatened basic due process rights, thereby endangering us all.

Republican Fundraising in Texas is Target of Probe
By Scott Gold
LA Times, 3 January 2004
EXCERPT: Authorities are conducting a criminal investigation into whether corporate money, including hundreds of thousands of dollars linked to U.S. House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, improperly financed the Republican Party's takeover of the Texas Capitol. The probe is focused on several political and fundraising organizations run by Republican activists, investigators said. One of the organizations, the political action committee Texans for a Republican Majority, has direct ties to DeLay, a Texas Republican and one of the most powerful politicians in Washington. At issue is whether the organizations improperly used corporate contributions to help finance the campaigns of more than 20 Republican candidates for the Texas House of Representatives in 2002, according to documents and interviews with prosecutors and government investigators.

Pat Robertson Predicts Bush in 2004 Blowout
Associated Press, 2 January 2004
EXCERPTS: Pat Robertson said Friday that God told him President Bush will be re-elected in a landslide. "I think George Bush is going to win in a walk,'' the religious broadcaster said on his "700 Club'' program on the Virginia Beach-based Christian Broadcasting Network, which he founded.... The Rev. Barry W. Lynn, a frequent Robertson critic and executive director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State, said he had a prediction of his own. "I predict that Pat Robertson in 2004 will continue to use his multimillion broadcasting empire to promote George Bush and other Republican candidates,'' Lynn said in a statement. "Maybe Pat got a message from (Bush political adviser) Karl Rove and thought it was from God.''

Justice Could Decide Leak Was Not a Crime
By Mike Allen
Washington Post, 2 January 2004
EXCERPT:  The Justice Department investigation into the leak of a CIA agent's identity could conclude that administration officials disclosed the woman's name and occupation to the media but still committed no crime because they did not know she was an undercover operative, legal experts said this week. "It could be embarrassing but not illegal," said Victoria Toensing, who was chief counsel of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence when Congress passed the law protecting the identities of undercover agents.
SEE ALSO: Another Perspective On This Article (TPM)
SEE ALSO: And More (TPM)

The Cow Jumped Over the U.S.D.A.
By ERIC SCHLOSSER
New York Times, 2 January 2004
EXCERPT: The Agriculture Department has a dual, often contradictory mandate: to promote the sale of meat on behalf of American producers and to guarantee that American meat is safe on behalf of consumers. For too long the emphasis has been on commerce, at the expense of safety. The safeguards against mad cow that Ms. Veneman announced on Tuesday — including the elimination of "downer cattle" (cows that cannot walk) from the food chain, the removal of high-risk material like spinal cords from meat processing, the promise to introduce a system to trace cattle back to the ranch — have long been demanded by consumer groups. Their belated introduction seems to have been largely motivated by the desire to have foreign countries lift restrictions on American beef imports. Worse, on Wednesday Ms. Veneman ruled out the the most important step to protect Americans from mad cow disease: a large-scale program to test the nation's cattle for bovine spongiform encephalopathy. The beef industry has fought for nearly two decades against government testing for any dangerous pathogens, and it isn't hard to guess why: when there is no true grasp of how far and wide a food-borne pathogen has spread, there's no obligation to bear the cost of dealing with it.

Slaughterhouse Politics: Ranchers Fought Rules That Might Have Prevented Mad Cow
by James Ridgeway
Village Voice, 31 December 2003 - January 6, 2004
EXCERPT: When it comes to politics you just can't beat the cattlemen for bellyaching. They are forever running around Washington, wanting to pay lower fees for overgrazing the public range or demanding cutbacks in environmental laws that might actually slightly intrude on their operations, and like everyone else under the big Republican tent, babbling on about the wonders of the "free market."

Bush Aims to Dodge Tough Poll Issues
By Lawrence Donegan
Guardian (UK), 4 January 2004
EXCERPT: There may be a conflict raging in Iraq that is killing US soldiers on a daily basis. There may be the threat of an economic crisis, too much unemployment and political debate infused with vitriol levels unseen for years. Yet President George W Bush is planning to win re-election by turning reality on its head. Bush is drawing up a positive, soft-focus and upbeat campaigning platform portraying him as the candidate of national unity.
SEE ALSO: Dean Surges Upward in Harris Poll, Against Bush

Dean Cites Terror Alert as Vindication
By Holly Ramer
AP, 2 January 2004
EXCERPT: Democratic presidential hopeful Howard Dean on Friday cited the higher terror alert and the number of U.S. troops killed in Iraq in arguing that he was right to say Saddam Hussein's capture didn't make America safer. "They got all excited, but here we are," Dean told a town-hall meeting. "We've lost 10 more troops and F-16s are escorting foreign passenger jets into our air space because we're now more worried than we were before."

The Law of War in the War on Terror
Kenneth Roth, Executive Director of Human Rights Watch
From Foreign Affairs, January/February 2004
Summary: The Bush administration has literalized its "war" on terrorism, dissolving the legal boundaries between what a government can do in peacetime and what's allowed in war. This move may have made it easier for Washington to detain or kill suspects, but it has also threatened basic due process rights, thereby endangering us all.

Republican Fundraising in Texas is Target of Probe
By Scott Gold
LA Times, 3 January 2004
EXCERPT: Authorities are conducting a criminal investigation into whether corporate money, including hundreds of thousands of dollars linked to U.S. House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, improperly financed the Republican Party's takeover of the Texas Capitol. The probe is focused on several political and fundraising organizations run by Republican activists, investigators said. One of the organizations, the political action committee Texans for a Republican Majority, has direct ties to DeLay, a Texas Republican and one of the most powerful politicians in Washington. At issue is whether the organizations improperly used corporate contributions to help finance the campaigns of more than 20 Republican candidates for the Texas House of Representatives in 2002, according to documents and interviews with prosecutors and government investigators.

Pat Robertson Predicts Bush in 2004 Blowout
Associated Press, 2 January 2004
EXCERPTS: Pat Robertson said Friday that God told him President Bush will be re-elected in a landslide. "I think George Bush is going to win in a walk,'' the religious broadcaster said on his "700 Club'' program on the Virginia Beach-based Christian Broadcasting Network, which he founded.... The Rev. Barry W. Lynn, a frequent Robertson critic and executive director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State, said he had a prediction of his own. "I predict that Pat Robertson in 2004 will continue to use his multimillion broadcasting empire to promote George Bush and other Republican candidates,'' Lynn said in a statement. "Maybe Pat got a message from (Bush political adviser) Karl Rove and thought it was from God.''

Justice Could Decide Leak Was Not a Crime
By Mike Allen
Washington Post, 2 January 2004
EXCERPT:  The Justice Department investigation into the leak of a CIA agent's identity could conclude that administration officials disclosed the woman's name and occupation to the media but still committed no crime because they did not know she was an undercover operative, legal experts said this week. "It could be embarrassing but not illegal," said Victoria Toensing, who was chief counsel of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence when Congress passed the law protecting the identities of undercover agents.
SEE ALSO: Another Perspective On This Article (TPM)
SEE ALSO: And More (TPM)

Slaughterhouse Politics: Ranchers Fought Rules That Might Have Prevented Mad Cow
by James Ridgeway
Village Voice, 31 December 2003 - January 6, 2004
EXCERPT: When it comes to politics you just can't beat the cattlemen for bellyaching. They are forever running around Washington, wanting to pay lower fees for overgrazing the public range or demanding cutbacks in environmental laws that might actually slightly intrude on their operations, and like everyone else under the big Republican tent, babbling on about the wonders of the "free market."

2 January 2004

Some School Districts Challenge Bush's Signature Education Law
By SAM DILLON
New York Times, 2 January 2004
EXCERPT: A small but growing number of school systems around the country are beginning to resist the demands of President Bush's signature education law, saying its efforts to raise student achievement are too costly and too cumbersome. The school district here in Reading recently filed suit contending that Pennsylvania, in enforcing the federal law, had unfairly judged Reading's efforts to educate thousands of recent immigrants and unreasonably required the impoverished city to offer tutoring and other services for which there is no money. ...The law, known as No Child Left Behind and signed in January 2002, seeks to raise achievement by penalizing schools where test scores do not meet annual targets. It is the most sweeping plan to shake up public education in a generation, as well as the most intrusive federal intervention in local schools. But until recently it had provoked little more than grumbling, though polls showed that educators in most of the nation's 15,000 districts considered several of its requirements ill-conceived.

Scent of Sleaze Persists Amid US Boom
By David Teather
Guardian (UK), 2 January 2004
EXCERPT: Wall Street and the rest of corporate America did little during 2003 to repair the squalid image which took shape the previous year. But despite a new crop of scandals to keep federal prosecutors busy, there were no new Enrons, the energy company which was once the seventh largest business in the US and collapsed amid accounting fraud. Confidence returned to both the markets and the economy by year-end.... Whether the boom, fuelled by tax cuts and government spending lasts in 2004 is less certain. The dollar suffered a terrible year, largely due to the trading and federal budgetary deficits which fuelled GDP growth. In July 2001, one euro bought less than 84 cents. It now buys more than $1.20.

The Budget Politics of Being Poor
New York Times, 31 December 2003
EXCERPT:  Quietly and painfully, most states are choosing to crimp the health-care safety net for their poorest and most politically defenseless residents. An ominous new study shows that up to 1.6 million impoverished and working-poor Americans — at least a third of them children — have been deliberately knocked from publicly financed health care programs in the last two years. Officials in 34 states are opting to slash Medicaid and poor children's health insurance coverage as a path of least resistance to the balanced budgets mandated by law.

Progress Report 2004: The Road Ahead
Center for American Progress, 30 December 2003
David Sirota, Christy Harvey and Judd Legum take a look at what the new year may have in store for America in such areas as National Security, the economy and domestic policy.

And the Corporateer of the Year Is...
Lessons and victories in the fight against corporate corruption
Common Dreams, 31 December 2003
EXCERPT: The Foundation for Taxpayer and Consumer Rights (FTCR) today released its top 10 list of corporateering in 2003. The ranking tracks the worst instances of big industries putting their commercial gain above the interests of individuals and society. FTCR also announced the top five counter-corporateering advances. "The notion that the free market is more important than the free society was pushed to new heights during 2003," said FTCR president Jamie Court, who coined the term corporateering in his 2003 book Corporateering: How Corporate Power Steals Your Personal Freedom And What You Can Do About It (Tarcher/Putnam). "When the market is treated as more important than society, then individuals become shareholders in America rather than citizens with inalienable rights. At the same time, the counter- corporateering movement had a handful key victories this year that could set a new tone in 2004."
SEE ALSO: Death Penalty for Corporations that Defraud Government? (CD)

Who's Nader Now?
By Paul Krugman
New York Times, 2 January 2004
EXCERPT: The irony is that by seeking to undermine the election prospects of a man who may well be their party's nominee, Mr. Lieberman and Mr. Kerry have reminded us of why their once-promising campaigns imploded. Most Democrats feel, with justification, that we're facing a national crisis ‹ that the right, ruthlessly exploiting 9/11, is making a grab for total political dominance. The party's rank and file want a candidate who is running, as the Dean slogan puts it, to take our country back. This is no time for a candidate who is running just because he thinks he deserves to be president.

Who Wrote Bush's Love Poem, and Why Lie About It?
By Matt Bivens
The Nation, 1 January 2003
EXCERPT: Now that you know Bush didn't write it, look at the poem again. Can't you just hear some crapulous Republican operative in a rumpled suit croaking instructions? "Make sure you get their damned mutt Barney into it, those soccer dames love the dogs. But if there's gonna be a dog, you gotta mention the cat! Everybody knows that, kid! Put in some vague bedroom imagery -- somethin' about the bed. Nothing too explicit! And, uh, get in a slap at the French -- that French-bashing stuff is really going over well. Something about how they're so prissy, kissin' hands and all ..." So who wrote George Bush's love poem to Laura Bush? I suspect we'll just have to add it to all of the other mysteries -- like who lied in George Bush's State of the Union speech, and who had manual-labor-like relations with that doggoned "Mission Accomplished" banner, and which jerk at the White House unmasked a CIA agent to punish her husband, and why lie to Ground Zero rescue and cleanup workers, and how the President's brother got all that free sex and money when visiting Asia...

Challenging Bush:
Past Defeat and Personal Quest Shape Long-Shot Kucinich Bid
By SHERYL GAY STOLBERG
New York Times, 1 January 2004

After Halting Start, Clark Seems to Be Finding Legs
By EDWARD WYATT
New York Times, 2 January 2004

Gephardt Says Bush 'Worries Me'
By Dan Balz
Washington Post, 1 January 2004
EXCERPT: Rep. Richard A. Gephardt (D-Mo.) said yesterday that President Bush lacks an understanding of the complexities of national security policy and has displayed a cowboy mentality toward the rest of the world that threatens to leave the country less secure against terrorist and other threats. ...Gephardt said that, based on his meetings with Bush, he does not trust the president to conduct foreign policy. "He's not dumb," he said, "but he is not informed and he's not experienced and he hasn't surrounded himself with the right people to give him the information and the experience that he doesn't have. And he worries me."

1 January 2004

Don't Be Fooled: No Independent Counsel for CIA Leak
By Ray McGovern
TomPaine.com, 31 December 2003
EXCERPT: It seems it is all too easy to get caught up in the holiday spirit. How else to explain the reaction of the normally astute Sen. Charles Schumer (D-NY)to the news that Attorney General Ashcroft has finally done what The New York Times lauds as "the right thing." Schumer is quoted in today¹s Times as seeing the glass "three-quarters full" in light of Ashcroft¹s decisions regarding the Valerie Plame case. Ashcroft announced he will recuse himself from the investigation of the deliberate blowing of the cover of CIA official Valerie Plame, and appointed U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald as "special counsel" to investigate that felony. Howard Dean labeled the maneuver "too little, too late." I fear Dean is right. Even the Times, in its "Right Thing" editorial, notes that "there are still serious questions about the investigation," namely, whether Fitzgerald will have "true operational independence." The odds are strongly against it. Yesterday¹s maneuver should not obscure the fact that in naming Fitzgerald, who remains under the authority of Ashcroft¹s deputy, the Bush administration has rejected the only appropriate course‹naming a complete outsider to be special counsel.

(Other links inadvertently deleted.)

See previously selected articles in our archives.

7 January 2004

 AUDIO/VIDEO LINK
Cheney Facing Prosecution In France For Halliburton Gas Deal In Nigeria
An interview with The Nation's Doug Ireland
Democracy Now!, 6 January 2004
EXCERPT: A French prosecutor is examining whether to prosecute Vice President Dick Cheney over suspected complicity in the abuse of corporate assets dating from the time he was head of the services company Halliburton. The case stems from a contract by a consortium including the American company Kellogg, Brown & Root (KBR), a Halliburton subsidiary, and a French company, Technip, to supply a gas complex to Nigeria. Since October, a Paris magistrate has been investigating complaints that $180 million was paid in secret commissions from the late 1990s to 2002 from funds established by the consortium. Cheney was Halliburton's chief executive from 1995 to 2000. In a letter to the attorney general's department, magistrate Reynaud van Ruymbeke ruled out directly prosecuting Cheney on a charge of bribing foreign officials but he did not exclude prosecution on the grounds of complicity in the misuse of corporate assets.
SEE ALSO: Will the French Indict Cheney? (The Nation)
SEE ALSO: Surprise! Army Clears Halliburton of Overbilling (Reuters)

Army Prevents Troops from Leaving
New York Times, 6 January 2004
EXCERPT: The Army is preparing an order that would require about 7,000 troops now in Iraq, Kuwait and Afghanistan to remain on duty through the end of their deployments this spring, even if they could otherwise leave the service before then, an Army personnel officer said Monday. Once these troops return to their bases, they may also be required to remain in the service for up to 90 days while they complete their formal separation from the Army, said the personnel officer, Col. Elton R. Manske. Another order, previously announced, already prevents active-duty and reserve troops rotating into Iraq and Kuwait this year from leaving the Army before serving 12 months on the ground, plus a similar 90-day period after they return.
SEE ALSO: Kucinich Calls Refusal to Discharge an 'Involuntary Draft'

Bush: Intoxicated With Power
By Ray McGovern
TomPaine.com, 6 January 2004
EXCERPT: It came at the very end of a long New York Times report of Jan. 2 regarding the havoc caused at Dulles airport in Washington, D.C. because of heightened concern there of a terrorist attack. "In a footnote, the director of security at Dulles airport was arrested Thursday on suspicion of drunk driving." Dulles airport's director of security, former Secret Service agent Charles Brady, was pulled over on suspicion of being drunk at the wheel at the very height of the emergency! What a telling metaphor for malfeasance at a more senior level, I thought to myself. While President George W. Bush may no longer be drinking, the year 2003 showed him to be DWI in a far more dangerous sense-driving while intoxicated with power. Worse still, unlike Brady and other drivers for whom the police provide disincentive to full-speed-ahead, the president sees no reason to apply the brakes--surrounded as he is with swift SUVs and with televangelist Pat Robertson riding shotgun. The top story of 2003, in my view, deals with official malfeasance, the difference between Brady and Bush, and the reasons why the latter has not yet been pulled over for reckless endangerment on an international scale.

Neocons Urge War With France, Korea, Syria and Iran
By Doug Ireland
TomPaine.com, 6 January 2004
EXCERPT: It's a helluva New Year's present: a new neocon manifesto which wants to put the United States on a course for war with three countries. Published the day before 2004 by Random House, An End to Evil: How to Win the War on Terror bears the signature of two of Washington's most influential ideologues. Richard Perle, known as the "Prince of Darkness", helped put together the now-famous 1999 neocon manifesto (signed by Donald Rumsfeld and Dick Cheney, among others) calling for war on Iraq. David Frum is Dubya¹s former speechwriter, the man who coined "axis of evil" and put it in the president's mouth. The book proposes harsh action against France‹which Perle and Frum say should be treated as an "enemy"‹and thunders that "We should force European governments to choose between Paris and Washington."

Israel Joins US in Training Foreign Armies
By Amos Harel
Haaretz, 5 January 2004
EXCERPT: The IDF is offering foreign armed forces training sessions in the training center for field units in the Ze'elim base. The move is intended to improve the relations with friendly states' armies as well as bring income into the IDF's empty coffers.
SEE ALSO: Israel Makes 'Water for Arms' Deal with Turkey (Guardian)
SEE ALSO: Syria Given Weapons Ultimatum (Telegraph, UK)
SEE ALSO: Israeli Troops Kill Palestinian Teenager (AFP)

Military Split on Use of Special Forces
By Gregory L. Vistica
Washington Post, 5 January 2004
EXCERPT: With Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld pressuring the Pentagon to take a more aggressive role in tracking down terrorists, military and intelligence officials are engaged in a fierce debate over when and how elite military units should be deployed for maximum effectiveness. Under Rumsfeld's direction, secret commando units known as hunter-killer teams have been ordered to "kick down the doors," as the generals put it, all over the world in search of al Qaeda members and their sympathizers. The approach has succeeded in recent months in Iraq, as Special Operations forces have helped capture Saddam Hussein and other Baathist loyalists. But in other parts of the world, particularly Afghanistan, these soldiers and their civilian advocates have complained to superiors that the Pentagon's counterterrorism policy is too inflexible in the use of Special Forces overall and about what units are allowed to chase down suspected terrorists, according to former commandos and a Defense Department official.

Iraq Police Fire on Demonstrators
BBC News, 6 January 2004
EXCERPT: Former Iraqi soldiers have clashed with Iraqi police and UK troops in an angry demonstration in the city of Basra. Several people were wounded when police fired on the protesters, who were demanding pensions they said had not been paid since September. The protests showed a level of anger not usually seen in the relatively calm city, which is controlled by UK forces.

Feeling Besieged, Iraq's Sunnis Unite
Once-Dominant Minority Forms Council To Counter Shiites and Negotiate Future
By Alan Sipress
Washington Post, 6 January 2004
EXCERPT: Iraq's minority Sunni Muslims, who enjoyed a favored place under former president Saddam Hussein and now complain of discrimination, have formed a national council to press their interests with U.S. occupation forces and counter the threat of domination by rival Shiite Muslims. ...the formation of the Sunni council could also complicate U.S. plans for transition to Iraqi sovereignty by July 1, because the Sunnis would be in a stronger position to resist these efforts. The council, for instance, is demanding that the next Iraqi government be selected by direct election rather than through local caucuses, as U.S. officials prefer.

Assad Given Weapons Ultimatum
By Anton La Guardia
The Telegraph' 7 January 2004
EXCERPT: America and Britain rebuffed President Bashar Assad of Syria yesterday, telling him bluntly that Damascus must give up its weapons of mass destruction or face ostracism - even if neighbouring Israel keeps its nuclear arms.

6 January 2004

North Korea Nuke Talks Remain in Limbo
By HANS GREIME
AP, 5 January 2004
EXCERPT: Talks on ending the North Korean nuclear crisis hung in limbo Monday: North Korea blamed the impasse on Washington's demand for disarmament, and South Korea and Russia said it was unlikely a new round of six-nation negotiations could open this month.

British Airline Rejects Guns on Flights
By Andrew Clark, Hugh Muir and Rosie Cowan
Guardian (UK), 6 January 2004
EXCERPT: Britain's biggest holiday flight operator, Thomas Cook Airlines, has become the first carrier to display open dissent to the government's new security requirements by refusing to carry sky marshals on flights to the US. The company, which operates 40 flights a week through US airspace, broke ranks over measures viewed as draconian by many airlines and pilots. Thomas Cook said if it were asked to carry armed marshals on any aircraft it would cancel the flight. It operates regular charter flights from Britain to Miami and Orlando in Florida, as well as services to Mexican and Caribbean resorts which fly over US territory.

Trouble Looms After Coalition Tells Kurds Self-Rule Can Stay
By Owen Bowcott and Brian Whitaker
Guardian (UK), 6 January 2004
EXCERPT: Kurdish political leaders have been reassured that their region's semi-autonomous status will be allowed to continue after the handover to Iraqi self-rule on June 30. The decision, which will infuriate neighbouring states and antagonise other Iraqis, is likely to have far-reaching consequences for any future constitutional settlement.

5 January 2004

The Battle for Iraqi Oil
By Aram Roston
The Nation, 2 January 2004
EXCERPT: David Horgan opposed the war on Iraq, but in other ways he is an antiwar protester's worst nightmare: The oil executive freely admits that he is in the bombed-out country "for greed and glory." His goal is a mammoth oil deal for the small Irish company he works for, Petrel Resources. Still, amid the shooting and kidnappings and chaos, the wiry 43-year-old Irishman says he will be satisfied with even crumbs. "A crumb in Iraq," he says eagerly, eyes widening, "would be hundreds of millions of dollars at present value. It is high risk, in every sense, but it is an excellent play." Horgan is no newcomer to Iraq and to this particular "play." He dealt with the administration of Saddam Hussein and he is willing to do business with whoever comes next, even a US puppet, as he believes it will be. "We'll deal with the puppet," he said one day at the Baghdad Sheraton, as a group of Nepalese Gurkha warriors clomped past loaded with body armor and rifles. "Any puppet will have exactly the same objectives and worries. His first priority is to get the oil flowing." That may sound cynical, but at least it sounds honest--which is more, as Horgan points out, than the Bush Administration can say about its justification for invading Iraq.

The Economics of Empire
By Walden Bello
New Labor Forum via ZNet, 4 January 2004
EXCERPT: Talks at the WTO's fifth Ministerial in Cancun collapsed, and the organization is in gridlock. A massive obstacle to restarting negotiations is the refusal of the United States and the European Union (EU) to cut their massive subsidies in agriculture and their insistence, against widespread resistance from developing countries, on bringing non- trade issues such as investment and government procurement into the ambit of the WTO. Meanwhile, Washington and Brussels continue to be separated by a whole range of issues, including the EU's moratorium on genetically modified foods. Developing countries, some once hopeful that the WTO would in fact bring more equity to global trade, unanimously agree that most of what they have reaped from WTO membership are costs, not benefits. What happened? In a word, Empire. It turns out that globalization and U.S. unilteralism don't mix.
SEE ALSO: The Imperial Gong Show Year (AlterNet)

Kurdish Region in Northern Iraq Will Get to Keep Special Status
By STEVEN R. WEISMAN
New York Times, 5 January 2004
EXCERPT: The Bush administration has decided to let the Kurdish region remain semi-autonomous as part of a newly sovereign Iraq despite warnings from Iraq's neighbors and many Iraqis not to divide the country into ethnic states, American and Iraqi officials say. The officials said their new position on the Kurdish area was effectively dictated by the Nov. 15 accord with Iraqi leaders that established June 30 as the target date for Iraqi self-rule. Such a rapid timetable, they said, has left no time to change the autonomy and unity of the Kurdish stronghold of the north, as many had originally wanted. "Once we struck the Nov. 15 agreement, there was a realization that it was best not to touch too heavily on the status quo," said an administration official. "The big issue of federalism in the Kurdish context will have to wait for the Iraqis to resolve. For us to try to resolve it in a month or two is simply too much to attempt." The issue of whether Iraq is to be divided into ethnic states in a federation-style government is of great significance both inside the country and throughout the Middle East, where fears are widespread that dividing Iraq along ethnic or sectarian lines could eventually break the country up and spread turmoil in the region.

New Wars in Iraq: Making Compromises to Keep a Country Whole
By EDWARD WONG
New York Times, 4 January 2004
EXCERPT: As the countdown to the handover of power in Iraq enters its final six months, American officials are focusing on how to create a working democracy. They are trying to walk a fine line between giving ethnic and religious groups the territory, resources and autonomy they demand, and ensuring that such power does not give rise to dangerous nationalisms. That prospect was evident last week in northern Iraq, when clashes among Arabs, Kurds and Turkmen in Kirkuk left at least five people dead. Arabs are trying to lay claim to the oil-rich city, which Kurdish leaders say should be integrated into a proposed autonomous Kurdish region. That corner of the country seemed to be edging closer to more sweeping sectarian conflict. To avoid this, some experts say, the American authorities face the challenge of finding compromises: reallocating economic resources, divvying up power between central and regional governments and perhaps introducing a less familiar version of democracy, one that, for example, limits participation by extremist politicians campaigning on ethnic or religious differences. "By breaking up the country, you're more likely to get radicalism," said Stephen D. Krasner, a professor of political science at Stanford University. "Iraq looks like a very artificial country, but there's no evidence that breaking up countries makes them more democratic. I think the basic rule has to be, you need institutional arrangements that will make people want to stay with something that looks reasonably democratic, reasonably secular, rather than go elsewhere."

Distrust of U.S. Foils Effort to Stop Crippling Disease Polio
By John Murphy
Baltimore Sun, 4 January 2004
EXCERPT: A scourge of the mid-20th century eludes global eradication and begins to spread as fearful Nigerians shun vaccination. ...They (Nigerian villiagers) had heard a rumor circulating through the hot, dusty villages of northern Nigeria that the vaccine had been contaminated with an anti-fertility agent that would sterilize their children or perhaps infect them with the AIDS virus, all part of an American plot to depopulate the developing world. The villagers believed it. ...No one quite knows how the rumors about the vaccine's safety began, but local officials point to the northern state of Kano, which has the highest number of polio cases in Nigeria, as the likely source. ...As in much of the Muslim world, anti-American passions run high among Kano's residents. In such a climate, rumors of plots involving the polio vaccine found a receptive audience.

Scott Ritter: The Search for Iraqi WMD Has Become a Public Joke. But I Am Not Laughing
The Independent, 4 January 2004
EXCERPT: The misrepresentation and distortion of fact carried out by President Bush and Prime Minister Blair is no joke, but rather represent an assault on the very fabric of the concept of a free and democratic society which they espouse to serve. ...The damage done goes well beyond the borders of the US and Britain. One must also calculate the irreparable harm done to the precepts of international law, the viability of multilateral organisations such as the United Nations, and the concepts of diplomacy and arms control which kept the world from destroying itself during the last century. Iran, faced with 130,000 American soldiers on its border, has opened its nuclear facilities to inspection. North Korea has done the same. Libya, in a surprise move, has traded in its own overblown WMD aspirations in exchange for diplomatic recognition and economic interaction with the West. But none of these moves, as welcome as they are, have the depth and reach to compare with the decision by South Africa or the former republics of the Soviet Union to get rid of their respective nuclear weapons. The latter represented actions taken freely, wrapped in the principles of international law. The former are merely coerced concessions, given more as a means of buying time than through any spirit of true co-operation. Sold by George Bush and Tony Blair as diplomatic triumphs derived from the Iraq experience, the sad reality is that these steps towards disarmament are every bit as illusory as Saddam's WMD arsenal. They are all the more dangerous, too, because the safety net of international law that the world could once have turned to when these compelled concessions inevitably collapse no longer exists.

3-4 January 2004

What has Bush's special ally in the war on terror been up to?
From Rogue Nuclear Programs, Web of Trails Leads to Pakistan
By David E. Sanger and William J. Broad
New York Times, 4 January 2004
EXCERPT: President Bush, who regularly talks about nuclear dangers, has never mentioned Pakistan's laboratories or their proliferation in public ‹ probably out of concern of destabilizing President Pervez Musharraf, who has survived two assassination attempts in December. "He's been a stand-up guy when it comes to dealing with the terrorists," Mr. Bush said of General Musharraf on Thursday. "We are making progress against Al Qaeda because of his cooperation." He dismissed a question about the vulnerability of Pakistan's own nuclear weapons, saying, "Yes, they are secure," then changed the subject. Yet when President Bush talks about the horrors that could unfold if a nuclear weapon fell into the hands of terrorists, it is Pakistan's combustible mix of expertise, components, fuel and fully assembled weapons that springs to the minds of American and European intelligence experts. In public, the White House says it has received "assurances" from Pakistan that if there ever were nuclear exports they are finished. "There is this almost empty-headed recitation of assurances that whatever Pakistan did in the past it's over, it's no longer a problem," said one senior European diplomat with access to much of the intelligence about proliferation. "But there's is no evidence that it has ever stopped."
SEE ALSO: Bush Pledged $3 Billion to Pakistan Last June (Guardian)
SEE ALSO: Bush Hails Pakistan's Military Dictator (BBC, June 2003)
SEE ALSO: Bush Declares Pakistan America's Terror Ally (TruthOut.org, August 2002)

U.S. Prepares for Risky Iraq Troop Rotation
By Will Dunham
Reuters in WP, 4 January 2004
EXCERPT: The Pentagon is gearing up for a massive rotation of about a quarter million troops in and out of Iraq, a giant logistics chore complicated by concerns about opportunistic attacks targeting Americans as they arrive or depart. Between late January and May, 123,000 weary U.S. troops will be pulled out of Iraq and replaced with about 110,000 fresh Army soldiers and Marines. In addition, 11,000 U.S. troops in Afghanistan will be brought home and replaced with about the same number.

British Airways Will Refuse to Fly With Armed Guards
Juliette Jowit,
The Observer, 4 January 2004
EXCERPT: Controversial plans to put armed guards on British passenger planes were in disarray last night after British Airways effectively refused to fly with them aboard because it would mean there was a 'significant threat' to passengers.
An internal BA memo obtained by The Observer makes clear that executives are deep-seatedly opposed to the scheme unveiled by the Government last week as a vital new step to protect aircraft against hijackers.

Babies Who Threaten to Topple Israel
A looming birthrate crisis could make Jews a minority in their homeland within 20 years
Peter Beaumont
The Observer, 4 January 2004
EXCERPT: Avraham Burg, former Speaker of the Israeli parliament, has been stirring up trouble. In August, he charged Israel with having failed in its historic mission to be a 'light unto nations' through its belligerence. He was promptly accused of encouraging 'the Jew hatred sweeping all of Europe'.
A few weeks ago, Burg was at it again, articulating the nightmare all Israelis fear: 'Between the Jordan [River] and the Mediterranean, somewhere between next year and two years' time, there will be born the first Palestinian ... of the Palestinian majority,' - the generation of Arabs who will outnumber Israelis. Now figures released last week show that immigration - to a country beset by violence and a faltering economy - has collapsed to its lowest level in 15 years, dramatically cutting the population growth. This is the Achilles heel of the security policies of Ariel Sharon and his Likud-led government. In three years, immigration has fallen by half, despite Sharon's avowed aim to attract a million immigrants in the next decade. According to Israel's state statistics office, the population is now 6.75 million - 81 per cent Jewish and 'other' nationalities' and 19 per cent Arab.

The New Cold War: US and Russia Square Off Again
By Jonathan Steele
Guardian (UK), 2 January 2004
EXCERPT: In the dying weeks of another war-filled year, one bit of good news was the non-violent uprising which toppled Eduard Shevardnadze's regime in Georgia. But as the Caucasian republic goes to the polls tomorrow to choose a successor, the risk of bloodshed remains high and powerful external forces are trying to determine how the new president behaves. Indeed, it is no exaggeration to say that Georgia is the cockpit of a new cold war. During the Soviet period the struggle between the US and Russia was on a global scale. Massive arsenals were locked in stalemate in Europe, but wars ravaged Africa and Asia as the superpowers found it easier to compete there by interfering in local conflicts without the fear of nuclear conflagration. These were the so-called proxy wars. The USSR's collapse did not end the rivalry. It merely recast it on a more complex stage which stressed deviousness rather than outright hostility. Washington wooed post-communist Russia with offers of partnership while expanding the old anti-Russian alliance, Nato, to take in former Soviet allies as well as the three Baltic states.
SEE ALSO: Georgia Tries to Lift Itself from Political Turmoil (Guardian)

Too little, too late...
Rebranding Bush as a Man of Peace
Guardian (UK), 3 January 2004
EXCERPTS: The White House has retreated from its doctrine of regime change and pre-emptive military action and is returning to traditional diplomacy in an effort to repackage George Bush as a president for peace.... Analysts in Washington say the Bush administration has little choice if it is to fulfill a highly ambitious election year agenda that seeks to disarm "rogue states" such as North Korea while advancing towards a settlement between Israel and the Palestinians, encouraging conflict resolution in Sudan, and achieving credible transformations in Afghanistan and Iraq. All these objectives are complicated and to some degree hindered by the "war on terror" against a resurgent al-Qaida, and by America's failure to capture or kill Osama bin Laden.
SEE ALSO: US Soldiers Ransack Sunni Mosque (Guardian)

Chomsky Interviewed About Iraq
By Hawzheen O. Kareem
Komal Newspaper via ZNet, 2 January 2004
EXCERPT: It remains a very high priority to control the Gulf resources, which are expected to provide 2/3 of world energy needs for some time to come. Quite apart from yielding "profits beyond the dreams of avarice," as one leading history of the oil industry puts the matter, the region still remains "a stupendous source of strategic power," a lever of world control. Control over Gulf energy reserves provides "veto power" over the actions of rivals, as the leading planner George Kennan pointed out half a century ago.
Europe and Asia understand very well, and have long been seeking independent access to energy resources. Much of the jockeying for power in the Middle East and Central Asia has to do with these issues. The populations of the region are regarded as incidental, as long as they are passive and obedient. Few know this as well as the Kurds, at least if they remember their own history.
US planners surely intend to establish a client state in Iraq, with democratic forms if that is possible, if only for propaganda purposes. But Iraq is to be what the British, when they ran the region, called an "Arab facade," with British power in the background if the country seeks too much independence. That is a familiar part of the history of the region for the past century.
SEE ALSO: Tension Between US and British Authorities (Guardian)

Death Toll in Iraq
By REUTERS in NYT, 4 January 2004
Following is a summary of the deaths in the invasion of Iraq and subsequent occupation. The military numbers were compiled by the Pentagon. The Iraqi military data are unofficial; estimates of civilian Iraqi deaths are by www .iraqbodycount.net.
FOREIGN TROOPS IN COMBAT AND ATTACKS
United States 328
Britain 20
Bulgaria 5
Other nations 27

NONCOMBAT
United States 153
Britain 32
Other nations 3

IRAQIS KILLED
Military 4,895 to 6,370
Civilians 7,960 to 9,792

A Deadly, Dispassionate Intensity
By ERIC SCHMITT
New York Times, 2 January 2004
EXCERPT: The intimate horror of the guerrilla war here in Iraq seems most vivid when seen through the sights of a sniper's rifle. In an age of satellite-guided bombs dropped at featureless targets from 30,000 feet, Army snipers can see the expression on a man's face when the bullet hits. "I shot one guy in the head, and his head exploded," said Sgt. Randy Davis, one of about 40 snipers in the Army's new 3,600-soldier Stryker Brigade, from Fort Lewis, Wash. "Usually, though, you just see a dust cloud pop up off their clothes, and see a little blood splatter come out the front." Working in teams of two or three, Army snipers here in Iraq cloak themselves in the shadows of empty city buildings or burrow into desert sands with camouflage suits, waiting to fell guerrilla gunmen and their leaders with a single shot from as far as half a mile away.

Some Bulgarian Soldiers Refuse to Go to Iraq
AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE in NYT, 4 January 2004
EXCERPT: More than two dozen Bulgarian soldiers have refused to join a 500-member contingent heading for Iraq after attacks there in which five Bulgarian soldiers died, the chief of staff of the Bulgarian Army said Friday. "Between 25 and 30 soldiers have declined duty, probably as a result of pressure from their families," Gen. Nikola Kolev told Bulgarian radio.

What has Bush's special ally in the war on terror been up to?
From Rogue Nuclear Programs, Web of Trails Leads to Pakistan
By David E. Sanger and William J. Broad
New York Times, 4 January 2004
EXCERPT: President Bush, who regularly talks about nuclear dangers, has never mentioned Pakistan's laboratories or their proliferation in public ‹ probably out of concern of destabilizing President Pervez Musharraf, who has survived two assassination attempts in December. "He's been a stand-up guy when it comes to dealing with the terrorists," Mr. Bush said of General Musharraf on Thursday. "We are making progress against Al Qaeda because of his cooperation." He dismissed a question about the vulnerability of Pakistan's own nuclear weapons, saying, "Yes, they are secure," then changed the subject. Yet when President Bush talks about the horrors that could unfold if a nuclear weapon fell into the hands of terrorists, it is Pakistan's combustible mix of expertise, components, fuel and fully assembled weapons that springs to the minds of American and European intelligence experts. In public, the White House says it has received "assurances" from Pakistan that if there ever were nuclear exports they are finished. "There is this almost empty-headed recitation of assurances that whatever Pakistan did in the past it's over, it's no longer a problem," said one senior European diplomat with access to much of the intelligence about proliferation. "But there's is no evidence that it has ever stopped."
SEE ALSO: Bush Pledged $3 Billion to Pakistan Last June (Guardian)
SEE ALSO: Bush Hails Pakistan's Military Dictator (BBC, June 2003)
SEE ALSO: Bush Declares Pakistan America's Terror Ally (TruthOut.org, August 2002)

U.S. Prepares for Risky Iraq Troop Rotation
By Will Dunham
Reuters in WP, 4 January 2004
EXCERPT: The Pentagon is gearing up for a massive rotation of about a quarter million troops in and out of Iraq, a giant logistics chore complicated by concerns about opportunistic attacks targeting Americans as they arrive or depart. Between late January and May, 123,000 weary U.S. troops will be pulled out of Iraq and replaced with about 110,000 fresh Army soldiers and Marines. In addition, 11,000 U.S. troops in Afghanistan will be brought home and replaced with about the same number.

British Airways Will Refuse to Fly With Armed Guards
Juliette Jowit,
The Observer, 4 January 2004
EXCERPT: Controversial plans to put armed guards on British passenger planes were in disarray last night after British Airways effectively refused to fly with them aboard because it would mean there was a 'significant threat' to passengers.
An internal BA memo obtained by The Observer makes clear that executives are deep-seatedly opposed to the scheme unveiled by the Government last week as a vital new step to protect aircraft against hijackers.

Babies Who Threaten to Topple Israel
A looming birthrate crisis could make Jews a minority in their homeland within 20 years
Peter Beaumont
The Observer, 4 January 2004
EXCERPT: Avraham Burg, former Speaker of the Israeli parliament, has been stirring up trouble. In August, he charged Israel with having failed in its historic mission to be a 'light unto nations' through its belligerence. He was promptly accused of encouraging 'the Jew hatred sweeping all of Europe'.
A few weeks ago, Burg was at it again, articulating the nightmare all Israelis fear: 'Between the Jordan [River] and the Mediterranean, somewhere between next year and two years' time, there will be born the first Palestinian ... of the Palestinian majority,' - the generation of Arabs who will outnumber Israelis. Now figures released last week show that immigration - to a country beset by violence and a faltering economy - has collapsed to its lowest level in 15 years, dramatically cutting the population growth. This is the Achilles heel of the security policies of Ariel Sharon and his Likud-led government. In three years, immigration has fallen by half, despite Sharon's avowed aim to attract a million immigrants in the next decade. According to Israel's state statistics office, the population is now 6.75 million - 81 per cent Jewish and 'other' nationalities' and 19 per cent Arab.

The New Cold War: US and Russia Square Off Again
By Jonathan Steele
Guardian (UK), 2 January 2004
EXCERPT: In the dying weeks of another war-filled year, one bit of good news was the non-violent uprising which toppled Eduard Shevardnadze's regime in Georgia. But as the Caucasian republic goes to the polls tomorrow to choose a successor, the risk of bloodshed remains high and powerful external forces are trying to determine how the new president behaves. Indeed, it is no exaggeration to say that Georgia is the cockpit of a new cold war. During the Soviet period the struggle between the US and Russia was on a global scale. Massive arsenals were locked in stalemate in Europe, but wars ravaged Africa and Asia as the superpowers found it easier to compete there by interfering in local conflicts without the fear of nuclear conflagration. These were the so-called proxy wars. The USSR's collapse did not end the rivalry. It merely recast it on a more complex stage which stressed deviousness rather than outright hostility. Washington wooed post-communist Russia with offers of partnership while expanding the old anti-Russian alliance, Nato, to take in former Soviet allies as well as the three Baltic states.
SEE ALSO: Georgia Tries to Lift Itself from Political Turmoil (Guardian)

Too little, too late...
Rebranding Bush as a Man of Peace
Guardian (UK), 3 January 2004
EXCERPTS: The White House has retreated from its doctrine of regime change and pre-emptive military action and is returning to traditional diplomacy in an effort to repackage George Bush as a president for peace.... Analysts in Washington say the Bush administration has little choice if it is to fulfill a highly ambitious election year agenda that seeks to disarm "rogue states" such as North Korea while advancing towards a settlement between Israel and the Palestinians, encouraging conflict resolution in Sudan, and achieving credible transformations in Afghanistan and Iraq. All these objectives are complicated and to some degree hindered by the "war on terror" against a resurgent al-Qaida, and by America's failure to capture or kill Osama bin Laden.
SEE ALSO: US Soldiers Ransack Sunni Mosque (Guardian)

Chomsky Interviewed About Iraq
By Hawzheen O. Kareem
Komal Newspaper via ZNet, 2 January 2004
EXCERPT: It remains a very high priority to control the Gulf resources, which are expected to provide 2/3 of world energy needs for some time to come. Quite apart from yielding "profits beyond the dreams of avarice," as one leading history of the oil industry puts the matter, the region still remains "a stupendous source of strategic power," a lever of world control. Control over Gulf energy reserves provides "veto power" over the actions of rivals, as the leading planner George Kennan pointed out half a century ago.
Europe and Asia understand very well, and have long been seeking independent access to energy resources. Much of the jockeying for power in the Middle East and Central Asia has to do with these issues. The populations of the region are regarded as incidental, as long as they are passive and obedient. Few know this as well as the Kurds, at least if they remember their own history.
US planners surely intend to establish a client state in Iraq, with democratic forms if that is possible, if only for propaganda purposes. But Iraq is to be what the British, when they ran the region, called an "Arab facade," with British power in the background if the country seeks too much independence. That is a familiar part of the history of the region for the past century.
SEE ALSO: Tension Between US and British Authorities (Guardian)

Death Toll in Iraq
By REUTERS in NYT, 4 January 2004
Following is a summary of the deaths in the invasion of Iraq and subsequent occupation. The military numbers were compiled by the Pentagon. The Iraqi military data are unofficial; estimates of civilian Iraqi deaths are by www .iraqbodycount.net.
FOREIGN TROOPS IN COMBAT AND ATTACKS
United States 328
Britain 20
Bulgaria 5
Other nations 27

NONCOMBAT
United States 153
Britain 32
Other nations 3

IRAQIS KILLED
Military 4,895 to 6,370
Civilians 7,960 to 9,792

A Deadly, Dispassionate Intensity
By ERIC SCHMITT
New York Times, 2 January 2004
EXCERPT: The intimate horror of the guerrilla war here in Iraq seems most vivid when seen through the sights of a sniper's rifle. In an age of satellite-guided bombs dropped at featureless targets from 30,000 feet, Army snipers can see the expression on a man's face when the bullet hits. "I shot one guy in the head, and his head exploded," said Sgt. Randy Davis, one of about 40 snipers in the Army's new 3,600-soldier Stryker Brigade, from Fort Lewis, Wash. "Usually, though, you just see a dust cloud pop up off their clothes, and see a little blood splatter come out the front." Working in teams of two or three, Army snipers here in Iraq cloak themselves in the shadows of empty city buildings or burrow into desert sands with camouflage suits, waiting to fell guerrilla gunmen and their leaders with a single shot from as far as half a mile away.

Some Bulgarian Soldiers Refuse to Go to Iraq
AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE in NYT, 4 January 2004
EXCERPT: More than two dozen Bulgarian soldiers have refused to join a 500-member contingent heading for Iraq after attacks there in which five Bulgarian soldiers died, the chief of staff of the Bulgarian Army said Friday. "Between 25 and 30 soldiers have declined duty, probably as a result of pressure from their families," Gen. Nikola Kolev told Bulgarian radio.

2 January 2004

US to Hussein: WMD A-OK
By Robert Scheer
The Nation, 30 December 2003
EXCERPT: The work of the National Security Archive, a dogged organization fighting for government transparency, has cast light on the trove of documents that depict in damning detail how the United States, working with US corporations including Bechtel, cynically and secretly allied itself with Hussein's dictatorship. The evidence undermines the unctuous moral superiority with which the current American President, media and public now judge Hussein, a monster the United States actively helped create. The documents make it clear that were the trial of Hussein to be held by an impartial world court, it would prove an embarrassing two-edged sword for the White House, calling into question the motives of US foreign policy. If there were a complete investigation into those who aided and abetted Hussein's crimes against humanity, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and former Secretary of State George Shultz would probably end up as material witnesses. It was Rumsfeld and Shultz who told Hussein and his emissaries that US statements generally condemning the use of chemical weapons would not interfere with relations between secular Iraq and the Reagan Administration, which took Iraq off the terrorist-nations list and embraced Hussein as a bulwark against fundamentalist Iran. Ironically, the United States supported Iraq when it possessed and used weapons of mass destruction and invaded it when it didn't.

Bush Undermining Reliance on Guard/Reserve Component of US Military
By Robert Burns
AP, 2 January 2004
EXCERPT: Citizen soldiers of the Army National Guard and Army Reserve are suffering an increasing share of American military deaths in Iraq, according to Pentagon statistics. ..."It's one more strain on the reserve" component of the military, said Michael O'Hanlon, a defense analyst at the Brookings Institution, a private think tank. "We are living a gamble to keep the reserve component intact," he said, at a time when reservists are coping with the double worries of being called to active duty for long periods and facing grave dangers in Iraq. The nation's citizen soldiers play a role in every major military operation because they offer skills and resources that are not available in sufficient numbers in the active-duty force. Military police, linguists and civil affairs specialists are called upon frequently, for example. But reservists in Iraq are also in direct combat roles, and their presence there is about to expand. Of the approximately 130,000 U.S. troops in Iraq now, about a fourth are reservists.

Protect this...
Civilians May be Target of Choice for Iraqi Insurgents
By Matthew Rosenberg
The Associated Press, 2 January 2004
EXCERPT: The New Year's Eve car bombing of an upscale Baghdad restaurant, which killed eight people, was a sign that opponents of the U.S.-led occupation forces may be shifting to civilian targets, U.S. and Iraqi officials said Thursday. The "hard targets" in Baghdad, like coalition complexes and Iraqi police stations, are increasingly well guarded, pushing insurgents toward soft targets, like the Nabil Restaurant, said a U.S. military officer with the 1st Armored Division. He spoke on the condition of anonymity. "When terrorists can target coalition forces or Iraqi police," they will, said Lt. Gen. Ahmed Kadhem, deputy Iraqi interior minister and Baghdad chief of police. "If they can't, they go to an easier target, aiming at civilians." He said security is being increased around hospitals and government buildings and called on schools to put up checkpoints and keep cars off campuses.

A safe investment of American tax dollars?
Bush Administration Plans Huge Embassy in Iraq
By Robin Wright
Washington Post, 2 January 2004
EXCERPT: In preparation for ending its occupation of Iraq, the United States is making plans to create the largest U.S. diplomatic mission in the world in Baghdad, complete with a staff of over 3,000 personnel, according to U.S. officials.
SEE ALSO: Iraq Car Blast Seen as Tactical Shift (AP)

Afghan Model Unraveling?
By Amir Shah
The Associated Press, 2 January 2004
EXCERPT: Afghanistan's constitutional convention came off the rails Thursday as panicked officials adjourned the gathering in the face of a boycott by opponents of President Hamid Karzai. The delay was the most severe setback yet to this war-ravaged nation's attempt to put its vision of a secure future on paper, and it raises real concern that the historic gathering will end in failure. Critics blamed the government for its insistence on a strong presidency and for its unwillingness to hear minority demands on such emotional issues as language rights. Others point to the machinations of warlords and faction leaders seeking a new niche if Karzai wins the powers he is seeking. "There are several fundamentalists at work here," said Mirwais Yasini, the loya jirga's deputy chairman. "The jihadi groups all want a share of the power."

It was the oil...
Britain Says U.S. Planned to Seize Oil in '73 Crisis
By LIZETTE ALVAREZ
New York Times, 1 January 2004
EXCERPT: The United States government seriously contemplated using military force to seize oil fields in the Middle East during the Arab oil embargo 30 years ago, according to a declassified British government document made public on Thursday. The top-secret document says that President Richard M. Nixon was prepared to act more aggressively than previously thought to secure America's oil supply if the embargo, imposed by Arab nations in retaliation for America's support for Israel in the 1973 Middle East war, did not end. In fact, the embargo was lifted in March 1974. The declassified British memorandum said the United States considered launching airborne troops to seize oil fields in Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Abu Dhabi, but only as a "last resort." President Nixon's defense secretary, James R. Schlesinger, delivered the warning to Lord Cromer, the British ambassador in Washington at the time. In the document, Lord Cromer was quoted as saying of Mr. Schlesinger, "it was no longer obvious to him that the United States could not use force." The seizure of the oil fields was "the possibility uppermost in American thinking when they refer to the use of force," the memorandum said.

1 January 2004

AUDIO/VIDEO LINK
A  Democracy Now! Review of 2003
With Noam Chomsky, John Pilger, Katha Pollitt, Martin Espada, Michael Parenti and Aarti Shahani
Democracy Now!, 31 December 2003
EXCERPT: On the international front, as the Bush administration expanded its occupation and war in Afghanistan, it intensified its battle to sell a war against Iraq. The American public was bombarded with stories of the grave danger posed by Saddam Hussein¹s alleged weapons of mass destruction. Administration officials spoke of mushroom clouds and smoking guns. In his January State of the Union address, televised across the world, President Bush accused Iraq of attempting to procure uranium for a nuclear weapons program, an accusation that was the lynchpin of the administration¹s justification for war. Though the administration was eventually forced to retract the charge after former US ambassador to Iraq Joseph Wilson blew the whistle , the damage was done.

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