by Richard C. Cook
Dandelion Salad
November 11, 2007
Strange events are taking place in the U.S.
By August 2007, a lot of very smart people were reading the tea leaves, convinced that the upper echelons of the U.S. government had their own hidden reasons for forecasting an event even more heinous than the attacks of September 11, 2001.
On Nov. 11, 2007, Peace activist George Mische spoke in Baltimore, MD, at St. John’s Methodist Church. In discussing the topic of U.S. foreign policy, he raised the issue of AIPAC. See, http://ksgnotes1.harvard.edu/Research… Mr. Mische shared his views about the powerful pro-Israeli lobbying group and its impact on and its relationship with electoral politics, particularly the national Democratic Party; Rep. James Moran (D-VA); former Rep. Cynthia McKinney (D-GA); Rep. Betty McCollum (D-MN); and former U.S. President, Jimmy Carter. Background on Mr. Mische: He took a strong moral and legal stand against the Vietnam War and was one of the “Catonsville Nine,” along with the late, great Phil Berrigan. Check out: http://www.jonahhouse.org/catonsville… Mr. Mische has also been a Labor organizer and a former St. Cloud, MN’s City Councilman. His talk was sponsored by Red Emma’s Bookstore and Coffeehouse, See, http://www.redemmas.org/.
By Ghaith Abdul-Ahad in Baghdad
ICH
11/10/07 “Guardian”
With summary beatings and imprisonments, he has the methods of a mafia don. But he and others like him are crucial to American strategy
On a recent Friday morning in west Baghdad, 20 of Hajji Abu Abed’s men were shifting their feet nervously in the dusty yard outside his house as they waited for their leader to emerge.
The men, young and well armed with Kalashnikovs, pistols and hand grenades, were wearing the favoured dress for militiamen in Iraq these days: green camouflage commando uniforms decorated with bits of US army kit – a pouch on one man, webbing on another, a cap here, sunglasses there, a few flak jackets between them. Some bore the insignia of Iraqi army officers.
Around noon, a fighter came running from the large house across the street and shouted: “The Hajji is coming!”
A pick-up truck came speeding into the yard, followed by several saloon cars packed with fighters. In the back of the pick-up, a man with a bandanna swung a big machine gun on its mounting. The great iron gate opened and Hajji Abu Abed emerged – a squat, chubby fellow with close-cropped hair and a thin goatee and moustache. Half his face was covered with large wraparound sunglasses, a pistol was tucked into his belt and a short machine gun dangled in his hand. Three guards ran in front of him and jumped into a new Toyota saloon. With sirens wailing and men brandishing their guns in the air, the convoy drove the 50 metres from Hajji Abu Abed’s house to his headquarters.
Abu Abed, a member of the insurgent Islamic Army, has recently become the commander of the US-sponsored “Ameriya Knights”. He is one of the new breed of Sunni warlords who are being paid by the US to fight al-Qaida in Iraq. The Americans call their new allies Concerned Citizens.
It is a strategy that has worked well for the Americans, on paper at least. This week, the US military claimed it had forced the extremist group al-Qaida in Mesopotamia out of Baghdad altogether, and cut the number of murders in the city by 80%. Major General Joseph Fil, commander of US forces in Baghdad, said: “The Iraqi people have decided that they’ve had it up to here with violence.”
Critics of the plan say they are simply creating powerful new strongmen who run their own prisons and armies, and who eventually will turn on each other.
A senior Sunni sheikh, whose tribe is joining the new alliance with the Americans against al-Qaida, told me in Beirut that it was a simple equation for him. “It’s just a way to get arms, and to be a legalised security force to be able to stand against Shia militias and to prevent the Iraqi army and police from entering their areas,” he said.
“The Americans lost hope with an Iraqi government that is both sectarian and dominated by militias, so they are paying for locals to fight al-Qaida. It will create a series of warlords.
“It’s like someone who brought cats to fight rats, found himself with too many cats and brought dogs to fight the cats. Now they need elephants.”
A former intelligence officer and a pious Sunni, Hajji Abu Abed has the aura of a mafia don. And for Abu Abed, like a don, connections are everything. His office is decorated with pictures of him hugging US officers, including the senior commander in Iraq, General David Petraeus, and a Captain Cosper.
On Abu Abed’s desk stands a glass box containing a black suede cavalry hat and a letter proclaiming him an honorary US cavalryman. In a silver frame is a picture of him with a female interpreter in military uniform.
As the Hajji settled into his office, a long line of men formed at the door. From a small purse tucked into his belt he dispensed handfuls of Iraqi dinars to his followers as they filed through. He is the only figure of authority many of them have seen for several years.
One old man asked him for an electricity generator; another, carrying a large file, asked him about a US construction contract that he was promised. Two young boys were seated next to him. One had brought him a leather ammunition belt, and the other handed him the keys to a new pick-up truck Abu Abed had ordered.
Neurotic
The Americans pay him $400 (£200) a month for each fighter he provides, he said, and he had 600 registered. His men are awed by his courage, his piety and his neurotic rages.
Like many other insurgent groups, the Islamic Army had an uneasy alliance with al-Qaida. On one hand they needed financial support; on the other, al-Qaida became a burden, bringing upon the Sunnis the wrath of Shia militias and death squads who started an organised campaign of sectarian cleansing against the Sunnis in retaliation against al-Qaida’s mass killing of Shia.
“We lost our area,” Abu Abed said. “It became a battle zone between al-Qaeda and the Shia militias.”
So when a prominent Iraqi Sunni politician who had lived in the US returned to Iraq last year and started direct talks between the Islamic Army commanders from his tribe and the Americans, Abu Abed was prepared to listen. “A year ago we reached the decision that we needed to fight al-Qaida,” he said. “I knew I couldn’t fight them face to face – they had more men and weapons. So I started gathering intelligence on their commanders. I knew them all very well.”
The turning point came last year, when al-Qaida declared the establishment of the Islamic State of Iraq and attempted to impose itself on other insurgent groups. In one instance in west Baghdad, they demanded 25% of all the loot from other insurgent groups’ operations. The Islamic Army refused to pay and direct confrontations ensued.
“The bodies piled up in the streets,” Abu Abed said. “Most of the people had to leave the area and flee.”
The Hajji and his men used the same techniques they mastered as insurgents against their former allies. Sitting on a big sofa in his office, he recounted the events. “When we decided to attack we started with assassinations. We killed six [al-Qaida] commanders in the first week of fighting,” he said. “We would drive in unmarked cars, shoot a commander dead and then flee. At first, no one knew who was killing them.”
Soon an open war started. Of the hundreds who pledged to fight al-Qaida, only 13 actually stuck with Abu Abed. These days, almost all his followers claim to have been one of the 13. “When the Americans intervened, we went out with them on missions, leading them to the Qaida fighters,” he said.
He pulled his pistol out and showed it to me. It was a Glock, supplied by the US to Iraqi security forces. “This belonged to the commander of al-Qaida here,” he said. “They called him the White Lion. I killed him and got his gun.”
Our conversation was interrupted by the arrival of a big man named Bakr with a bandolier of bullets over his chest. He squatted next to Abu Abed, laid his big BKC machine gun down and spoke to him conspiratorially, covering his mouth with his hand like a schoolgirl.
Bakr was Abu Abed’s head of intelligence. “I was told that someone from al-Qaida is in the area,” Bakr said. “We will go out, develop some intelligence and then raid the house.”
The only vehicles in the streets belonged to our screeching convoy. A few shops were open and people walked past carrying plastic shopping bags. All around us were the traces of battle: craters in the road from improvised bombs, facades pockmarked with bullet holes, a pile of rubble that had once been a building.
Ameriya is a closed zone, surrounded by high concrete walls. Only pedestrians are allowed through the two Iraqi army checkpoints out of the suburb. The “knights” are the only authority inside.
When we arrived at the house where the alleged al-Qaida commander was hiding, Bakr was already in action. He was dragging a plump man into a car, grabbing his neck with one hand and his BKC machine gun with the other.
The horrified man begged them not to take him. “By Allah, I didn’t say Qaida is better than you, you are our brothers, just let me go!” A gunman kicked the man and pushed him into a car.
The suspect’s brother, still in his pyjamas, pleaded, and women in nightgowns stood in the street wailing and begging the gunmen to release him.
The gunmen pointed their guns at the people and pushed them back. A young fighter carrying an old British sub-machine gun fired a burst into the air.
Abu Abed walked into the scuffle. The detained man was not the target. Someone had overheard him saying Abu Abed’s men were “worse than al-Qaida” after Bakr’s men raided the house.
Furious at the insult, Abu Abed aimed his gun at the brother. “Al-Qaida is better than us, huh? Did you forget when the bodies were piled in the streets?”
Some neighbours intervened, and the man was released. His brother grabbed him by the arm and pushed him inside.
Abu Abed, shaking his head and waving his gun, walked back to his car, murmuring “Al-Qaida, better than us…”
He stopped in mid-stride and turned to charge with his men back into the house. They pushed the gate open and ran inside firing their weapons in the air. In the dark kitchen, they grabbed the man again, pushed him to the floor and kicked him. The women were screaming and crying. One of them pulled away her headscarf and wailed, holding on to the man’s ripped shirt as Abu Abed and the gunmen dragged him out, kicking and slapping him. Other fighters fired their Kalashnikovs in the air. The man was shoved into a car, as was his brother.
Abu Abed, screaming and pointing his gun, charged at the crowd. “Qaida is better than me? I will show you!”
He held his gun high and quoted al-Hajjaj, a 7th-century ruler of Iraq, in a hoarse voice: “Oh, people of Iraq, I had come to you with two swords, one is for mercy which I have left back in the desert, and this one” – he pointed his gun at the crowd -“is the sword of oppression, which I kept in my hand.”
The convoy drove off, sirens blaring, fighters hanging out of the car windows.
After we had settled again in his office, Abu Abed told me of his grand dreams. “Ameriya is just the beginning. After we finish with al-Qaida here, we will turn toward our main enemy, the Shia militias. I will liberate Jihad [a Sunni area next to Ameriya taken over by the Mahdi army] then Saidiya and the whole of west Baghdad.”
Rumours
Hours later the Ameriya Knights were on the streets again. There were rumours that Iraq’s Sunni vice-president, Tariq al-Hashemi, was visiting Ameriya for the first time in two years. As we approached the mosque where he was believed to be praying, the street was blocked by his guards.
“Open the road for the Ameriya Knights,” yelled one of Abu Abed’s men.
“I can’t, I don’t have orders,” replied a gunman. “Do you know who I am? I am the commander of Ameriya,” Abu Abed screamed at the vice-president’s commander of guards. “Who are you? Did you dare to show your faces here before I kicked al-Qaida out? Even the Americans with their tanks couldn’t come before I liberated Ameriya.” Bakr pointed his gun at the entourage. Guns were cocked on all sides.
“Abu Abed, we all know who you are, but this is the vice-president of Iraq.”
“This is Ameriya, not Iraq! Here I rule, I am the commander, I can make sure that you won’t show your faces here!”
“We are all Sunni brothers. The Shia militias will be happy to see us fighting; we have the same enemy,” said the man.
“You are trying to claim my victory. I will show you!” Abu Abed pushed the officer and went back to his car.
That night, Abu Abed decided to attack another group of Ameriya Knights under his general command. He suspected their commander, Abu Omar, was allied with the vice-president’s Islamic party, which has been trying to control the Sunni area.
“I have to show them there is one commander. If the Americans don’t like it, I will withdraw my men,” he told me. “Let’s see if they can fight al-Qaida alone.” By sunset, his men were gathered in front of the house again. He distributed extra guns and he carried an extra shotgun with his machine gun.
All the way to Abu Omar’s HQ he was humming an Islamic verse in a beautiful voice. “Oh prophet, how beautiful your light is, oh prophet of God.”
Abu Omar’s gunmen, thinking Abu Abed was there for an inspection, took away the coils of razor wire and opened the gates. Then Abu Abed’s Knights charged for the third time that day, this time accompanied by gunfire. Bullets whizzed in their confused way and red tracers flashed against the dark blue sky.
Abu Omar’s men were rounded up. Some were put in pick-up trucks, others were squeezed in car boots. By the light of headlamps, Abu Abed’s men looted weapons, ammunition boxes and radios.
One terrified child was brought for questioning. “Where are Abu Omar’s sniper rifles?” Abu Abed asked him.
“I don’t know,” replied the boy.
“Look, this head of yours, I will cut it off and put it on your chest if you don’t tell where the guns are by tomorrow.” He tried to put his shotgun in the boy’s mouth but his men restrained him.
Humming
Back at Abu Abed’s HQ, the men were put into cells. Men in US-supplied blue uniforms were being jailed by men in US-supplied green uniforms.
An American officer, Captain Cosper, visited Abu Abed that night. He sat in the office trying to make sense of what was going on. “They [the Concerned Citizens] are not allowed to detain people or conduct raids,” he told me.
In a nearby room, two blindfolded men were being questioned by Abu Abed’s men. An American soldier put his head inside, watched for a few seconds and left. “They won’t do anything to them while we’re here,” he said.
When Capt Cosper had gone, the men were beaten up and taken to the cell. Later, one of Abu Abed’s men drove up and shouted: “I brought another one.” His face was shining with happiness.
“Where is he?” asked a captain.
“In the boot,” replied the gunman. “I found him standing in the street behind Abu Omar’s building.”
“Are you sure you didn’t capture Mudhar? I asked him to guard the back.”
“No, no, I am sure he is one of them,” said the fighter. The captain pulled out a shaking man from the boot like a magician pulling out a rabbit. “Ah Mudhar, I am sorry,” said the captain. “I told you he is one of us.”
The fighter kissed Mudhar twice and said he was sorry but Mudhar should try not to look so suspicious in future.
Mudhar, still shaky, looked at him. Then, confused and angry, walked away.
Guardian Unlimited © Guardian News and Media Limited 2007
FAIR USE NOTICE: This blog may contain copyrighted material. Such material is made available for educational purposes, to advance understanding of human rights, democracy, scientific, moral, ethical, and social justice issues, etc. This constitutes a ‘fair use’ of any such copyrighted material as provided for in Title 17 U.S.C. section 107 of the US Copyright Law. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, the material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond ‘fair use’, you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.
by Susan Rosenthal
Susan Rosenthal’s website
November 11, 2007
Want to know a secret? A healthy human mind is incompatible with capitalism. Let me explain.
by Cindy Sheehan
Dandelion Salad
featured writer
Nov. 11, 2007
Dear Friends:
Instead of sending your Impeachment letters for Dick Cheney to Nancy Pelosi’s office, send them to my office so we can get an official count.
Please send them to:
Cindy for Congress
RE: Impeach Dick Cheney
1260 Mission Blvd
San Francisco, Ca 94103
Please pass this around and have them sent by Friday, November 16th and we will have them delivered to her office in San Francisco before Thanksgiving.
Spread this far and wide so we can take sacks of letters to her.
Don’t include anything besides the letter (like a contribution) because we won’t be opening the envelopes.
Love
Cindy
h/t: After Downing Street
see
Impeachment: A Message to Iowa Democrats by 35 Percenters (video; Kucinich)
Cindy Sheehan Candidacy Announcement (video)
11/11/07 “ICH”
Whew! What a week for the stock market. On Wednesday the market took a 360 point nosedive followed, two days later, by a 220 point belly-flop. By the time it was over, the trading pits looked more like a sausage-packing plant than the world’s financial epicenter. After the bell, downcast traders could be seen tiptoeing through the carnage on their way to the local liquor store to load up on “Stoly” and boxes of Franzia—anything that would steady their nerves and put the week behind them.
Everyone could see it coming; the train-wreck. It was mostly carry-over from the night before when Asian stocks took a thumping on reports of slower growth in the US and growing troubles in the credit markets. That put the first domino in motion. Fed chief Bernanke’s announcement that the economy will face “a sharp slowdown from the housing market’s contraction” and an “inflationary surge from sharply higher oil prices and the weaker dollar”, didn’t help either. His remarks triggered a blow-off in the currency markets while equities were frog-marched to the chopping-block.
The Shanghai market took the worst hit dropping nearly 5% before the trading-day ended. Taiwan and Hong Kong followed suit, sliding 3.9% and 3.2% respectively. Share prices in Japan fell 2%. The next morning, Wall Street crashed. It was a massacre.
This is a bear market now. The last bull was dragged from the Street on Friday with a harpoon in its chest.
The subprime contagion has now spread beyond the US and Europe to markets in the Far East. No one is fooled by Bernanke’s sunny predictions that the economy will bounce back next year with a strong showing in the first quarter. That’s baloney and everyone knows it. The economy has stumbled down the elevator shaft and is just waiting to hit bottom. Consumer confidence is flagging, housing is falling, foreign capital is fleeing, and the greenback is one flush away from the sewage-treatment plant. Bernanke’s soothing bromides are meaningless.
“I don’t see any significant change in the broad holdings of dollars around the world. Dollars remain the dominant reserve asset and I expect that to continue to be the case,” Bernanke said to the Congressional Economic Committee.
Really? So why is the greenback plummeting if people aren’t dumping it, Ben? What an absurd comment. The dollar has lost 63% against the euro and dropped to record lows against a basket of world currencies. Foreign central banks and investors have been ditching it as fast as they can before it loses more value. The dollar’s tumble has been the most dazzling currency-flameout in modern times and Bernanke is acting like he’s still asleep at the switch. It’s madness.
The greenback is getting clobbered by the Fed’s “low-interest” snake oil and the gargantuan current account deficit. If Bernanke clips rates again to bail out the stock market, the dollar will slip into irreversible respiratory failure. Food and oil prices will shoot to the moon overnight and the remains of the greenback will be carted off to the nearest boneyard.
September’s trade deficit was another blow to the waning dollar. The Census Bureau reported on Friday that the deficit clocked in at $56.5 billion. That’s $684 billion per annum! Bush has been crowing about the “shrinking deficit”, but the numbers are nothing to boast about. We’re still borrowing more than we’re producing. We’re still living beyond our means. The lower numbers just reflect the decline in home construction which is import-intensive. The fact is, we’re addicted to debt-fueled consumption and forgotten that, eventually, the trillions that we’ve borrowed from foreign creditors, will have to be repaid. If the dollar is replaced as the world’s reserve currency, then we’ll have to pay back $9 trillion of outstanding debt. We might as well hang out the “Foreclosed” sign right now and get fitted for Chinese workers-suits.
This is from Bloomberg News:
“As the dollar tumbles, concern is growing that its weakness may augur the end of the U.S. currency’s 62-year reign as the world’s specie of choice for trade, financial transactions and central-bank reserves…..The dollar owes its position as the world’s premier international currency to its status as a haven during times of turmoil, the absence of a suitable rival, weak domestic demand in other countries and plain old inertia. Geopolitics also play a role.”
Nonsense. Who believes this rubbish? The dollar is the so-called “international currency” because the Federal Reserve and its well-heeled patrons are the directors of the US-Euro-Japan banking cabal which is at the center of the global Fiat money scam. There’s nothing more to it than that. Notice the recent “unilateral” clamp-down on Iran by the US-led banking syndicate. The action was initiated without UN approval for the simple reason that the UN, the World Bank, the IMF, the WTO and thousands of NGOs are just more of the Central Banks’ prime properties. Don’t expect the father to ask the child for permission to punish one of his errant children. The banks are the one’s who really call the shots and—behind the curtain of feigned respectability—they are the driving force behind the endless wars.
The Fed’s plan to “devalue” our way to prosperity appears to have hit a few ill-placed speed-bumps. The stock market is hanging by a thread and consumer confidence is at its lowest ebb since the start of the Iraq War. The falling dollar is expected to put a damper on Christmas spending and knock equities for a loop. That can’t be good for economy—especially when 72% of GDP comes from consumer spending.
We’ve already begun to see the telltale signs that the consumer is loosing ground and about to slip into a debt-induced coma.
According to data from the University of Michigan:
“Consumer confidence reached its lowest level in more than two years this month amid concerns over record-high oil prices, continued trouble in the housing market and higher inflation…Although consumer attitudes deteriorated across the board, the substantial drop in expectations contributed heavily to the sizeable decline in the overall index.”
The average working stiff doesn’t put any stock in Bernanke’s palavering. He sees what’s going on for himself every time he pulls up to the gas pump or goes the grocery store. He doesn’t need the University of Michigan to tell him he’s getting screwed; he knows it! The economy is sinking, inflation is skyrocketing, and the country is adrift. Every farthing in the public till has been shoveled into a black hole in the Middle East. Does Bernanke really think working people don’t know that? Everyone knows that. Everyone knows the economy is on life-support; just like everyone knows the country is collapsing from mismanagement. Even the flag-waving, war-mongering maniacs on the Wall Street Journal’s op-ed page are starting to shutter from the avalanche of bad news. They see what’s going on and they’re scared—scared sh**less.
Unfortunately, the sudden shift in consumer sentiment is the hurting retailers who depend on Christmas to carry them through the year. We’ve already seen the sluggishness in housing and auto sales. Now it’s showing up in retail. Abercrombie, American Eagle, Ann Taylor, Chicos, Dillards, The Gap and Nordstrom are all reporting sagging sales. Walmart, Lowes and the other big-box stores are lowering their projections as well. It’s going to be a lean Christmas.
The poor US consumer is finally maxed-out and can’t tap into his home equity anymore for presto-credit. He’s mortgaged “to the hilt” and he’s already run up 6 or 7 credit cards to their limit. In fact, credit card debt is a growing concern for the banks, too.
The commercial banks are the victims’ of their own success. After years of seductive promotions and saturation mailings the credit card industry is at its zenith leaving consumers with a staggering bill of nearly $1 trillion. ($915 billion) More and more customers are finding themselves unable to make even minimum payments on their balances and defaults are piling up at a record pace. This is the next phase of the subprime fiasco and it has the potential to be nearly as disruptive as the housing meltdown. The problem is complex, too. After all, most credit card debt in the last 6 years has been “securitized” and passed on to investors in the secondary market. (pension funds, hedge funds etc.) That means we can expect more tremors in the stock market as corporate earnings go south after credit card-backed bonds are downgraded. It’s just more of the same “structured finance” chicanery; debt stacked on debt, until the whole edifice caves in.
It’s looking more and more like Reagan’s “shining city on the hill” was erected on a mountain of toxic debt. It’s a wonder it hasn’t sunk already.
The country is headed for recession and there’s nothing that Bernanke can do to stop it. The only question is whether we’ll be facing a colossal economy-busting meltdown like 1929 or a milder 5 or 6-year slump. That’s up to the Federal Reserve. If the Fed chief decides to pit himself against the falling markets by slashing rates and destroying the currency; then we are likely to be digging-out for years. But if Bernanke steps aside, and lets the chips fall where they may, then the pace of recovery will be quicker.
Whatever choice he makes, there’s no avoiding the inevitable downturn. The hammer is poised to strike the anvil. The stock market will fall, the over-extended banks and hedge funds will collapse, and the country will go into a protracted, economic tailspin. That much is certain. Economic fundamentals can only be shrugged off for so long. When markets correct it’s like a tidal-surge that sweeps-away the deadwood of bad bets and over-levered investments leaving behind a broad-expanse of empty beach.
Recession is a normal part of the business cycle. It can’t be avoided. The economy needs to unwind so debts can get written off and businesses can retool for the future. The upcoming recession is shaping up to be worse than its predecessors—a real doozey. The damage caused by the Fed’s excessive credit has been considerable. It’ll take years to mop up the red ink and set the house aright. The markets are in a shambles, investors have been battered and confidence is gone.
Structured finance has been an unmitigated disaster. It needs to be scrapped. We need a new financial system for a new epoch; a system that is heavily regulated and supervised to discourage the crooks and con-artists; a system that it maintains its essential link to the real, productive underlying economy and avoids the galaxy of complex derivatives, “securitized” liabilities, and opaque debt-instruments that have brought on the present crisis; a system that responds to the needs of working people and takes into consideration the looming problems of environmental degradation, resource scarcity, and climate change; a system that reinvests in communities, education and health-care rather than fattening the bottom-line of corporate racketeers and brandy-drooling elites. It’s time to remove the rotten scaffolding and rebuild the whole contraption brick by brick.
The system is broken. Maybe Greenspan did us all a favor by blowing it up with his “low interest” dynamite. Good riddance.
FAIR USE NOTICE: This blog may contain copyrighted material. Such material is made available for educational purposes, to advance understanding of human rights, democracy, scientific, moral, ethical, and social justice issues, etc. This constitutes a ‘fair use’ of any such copyrighted material as provided for in Title 17 U.S.C. section 107 of the US Copyright Law. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, the material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond ‘fair use’, you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.
see
Federal Reserve is Causing Dollar Value to Plummet by William Mac
Hosted by the Granite State Independent Living Center, this event was unprecedented in disability history as this was the first time that Presidential hopefuls met to discuss disability issues. http://www.endeavorfreedom.tv
Added: November 09, 2007
h/t: Dennis Kucinich for President (Official)
Leave it to Dennis by 35 Percenters (video; Kucinich)
What Is Single-Payer National Health Insurance? + California OneCare (video)
Join Sen. Gravel in a discussion with campaign advisor and Southeast Asia policy expert Gareth Porter about Iran.
This is the first of three parts.
Music and Editing by Dan Connor:
http://www.danconnor.com
see
June 11, 2008: House votes to send impeachment resolution to Judiciary Committee and Paul voted with the Dems “aye”. ~ Lo
Statement Regarding Impeachment of Vice President Cheney
Ron Paul Speech to Congress
by Ron Paul
November 6, 2007
Mr. Speaker, I rise, reluctantly, in favor of the motion to table House Resolution 799, Impeaching Richard B. Cheney, Vice President of the United States, of high crimes and misdemeanors, and in favor of referring that resolution to the House Judiciary Committee for full consideration. I voted to table this resolution not because I do not share the gentleman from Ohio’s desire to hold those responsible for the Iraqi debacle accountable; but rather, because I strongly believe that we must follow established protocol in matters of such importance. During my entire time in Congress, I have been outspoken in my opposition to war with Iraq and Iran. I have warned my colleagues and the administration against marching toward war in numerous speeches over the years, and I have voted against every appropriation to continue the war on Iraq.
I have always been strongly in favor of vigorous congressional oversight of the executive branch, and I have lamented our abrogation of these Constitutional obligations in recent times. I do believe, however, that this legislation should proceed through the House of Representatives following regular order, which would require investigation and hearings in the House Judiciary Committee before the resolution proceeds to the floor for a vote. This time-tested manner of moving impeachment legislation may slow the process, but in the long run it preserves liberty by ensuring that the House thoroughly deliberates on such weighty matters. In past impeachments of high officials, including those of Presidents Nixon and Clinton, the legislation had always gone through the proper committee with full investigation and accompanying committee report.
I noted with some dismay that many of my colleagues who have long supported the war changed their vote to oppose tabling the motion for purely political reasons. That move was a disrespectful to the Constitutional function of this body and I could not support such actions with my vote.
I was pleased that the House did vote in favor of sending this legislation to the Judiciary Committee, which essentially directs the committee to examine the issue more closely than it has done to this point.
h/t: nouMenon from a comment on this post:
Why Did Ron Paul Vote Against Impeachment? By Manila Ryce
***
Ron Paul…..Do You Support Impeachment?
I dialed up CSPAN and asked Republican 2008 Presidential Candidate Rep. Ron Paul (TX) if he supports the impeachment of George W. Bush.
Read the rest of the story at: http://www.tomsongs.com/tomsongshome/…
Added: March 13, 2007
***
For sake of Rule of Law, Congress must proceed
Only Clinton’s resignation should stop impeachment hearings
by Ron Paul
September 28, 1998
Despite partisan rancor and political positioning, no American should rejoice in the events which now grip our nation. In fact, this is indeed a solemn time for our country.
But at the same time, it is an opportunity – regardless of position, persuasion or party – for we as a nation to reassert that we are a nation built upon the Rule of Law, and not the whims of men. That all people are held to the same standards under the law, and that laws and correct procedures are followed.
The president stands accused of several things, and what is on the forefront of public attention is the charge of perjury and obstruction of justice before a federal grand jury in regards to a civil case involving sexual harassment.
Under our Constitution, the House of Representatives is charged with investigating allegations against a sitting president or judge. While some may talk about whether or not an offense is “impeachable,” that is only so much political rhetoric. The Constitution only specifies that Congress can impeach a president for “high crimes” and “misdemeanors,” but the definitions of those words are left to Congress to determine – anything a sufficient number of Members of Congress find offensive can be cause for impeachment.
In recent weeks I have been asked many times what the timetable might be for impeachment. We now have a tentative outline.
Currently, the Judiciary Committee of the House of Representatives is looking into the report issued by the Office of the Independent Prosecutor on charges that the president lied under oath.
According to Chairman Henry Hyde (R-Ill.), his committee will receive a full briefing on the evidence on October 1st or 2nd. Over the next three days, the full committee will debate the evidence. On either October 5 or 6, the committee will consider a resolution to begin an impeachment hearing.
The resolution would then go before the entire House for a vote within three days.
A simple majority of the House of Representatives is all that will be required to initiate impeachment hearings. Those hearings could begin immediately, or be held until early November, after the elections.
A big question will be whether or not the impeachment hearings will be limited solely to allegations that the president lied under oath, or if it will also include other charges. Those involve potentially treasonous activities in transferring advanced missile technology to the communist Chinese in exchange for campaign donations, as well as violations of peoples rights in the abuse of more than 1,000 confidential FBI files for partisan purposes. (By comparison, a man went to prison in the early 1970s for misuse of one FBI file.)
While one should never discount the importance of lying under oath, I am saddened that some congressional leaders have recently suggested hearings will not include these other, far more serious, allegations. Crimes against our Constitution must not be set aside for details of sexual escapades. I hope that after $40 million being spent on investigating these more serious charges of crimes against the Constitution, that the entirety of the hearings are not simply restricted to this matter of perjury.
Under our Constitution, in accordance with the Rule of Law, the hearings must be held as long as the allegations remain and the president is in office. Since the allegations are not going to go away, the only constitutionally and morally correct way for hearings to be stopped would be for the president to resign if he has indeed committed these crimes; knowledge certainly the president possesses.
Some claim this situation creates a “constitutional crisis” and an “embarrassment.” A crisis will develop only if we, as a nation, reject the Rule of Law, and embarrassment will result only if we forego constitutional hearings.
It is in times of stress that the quality of metal is tested. The same is true for a nation.
***
‘High crimes and misdemeanors’
Hearings must be held for sake of nation
by Ron Paul
September 7, 1998
“Impeach the president!” and “Clinton must resign!” are phrases which were once relegated to the back rooms of – to borrow a phrase from the First Lady – a ‘vast right-wing conspiracy.’ Today, those statements are being boldly proclaimed in public by many, even by those who otherwise have strongly supported this president.
Unfortunately, those calls are only now being made after our nation’s president has admitted to living a life more akin to an afternoon soap opera than the traditional values which so many in our nation hold dear. While there is a great deal of significance to the fact that the president has admitted to lying under oath in a judicial proceeding, I have not considered – nor do I now – this “scandal” worthy of the attention it has received in the light of so much else before us.
It might be more pressing if this were the only impropriety involving President Clinton; lying under oath, tampering with witnesses and the litany of related crimes alleged, are certainly worthy of trial under our system of government.
But allegations of bribery, treason and oppression of rights are far more serious.
Almost a year ago, long before our national obsession with the Bill-said/Monica-said affair began, Rep. Bob Barr of Georgia and I cosponsored legislation called an “Inquiry into Impeachment,” House Resolution 304.
I did so because credible allegations have been raised that this president has abused the power of his office, domestically and abroad.
Discussions of a powerful man using influence in an attempt to secure employment for his much-younger mistress, while disgraceful and shameful, pale in comparison to the abuse of power in accessing hundreds of confidential files on private citizens and political opponents. It is disturbing that under this president’s watch, at least 900 files from the Federal Bureau of Investigations, detailing the intimate details uncovered for security background checks, were found to have been illegally transferred to the White House.
If this president used his powerful position to illegally secure information regarding political detractors, then this president must be impeached.
The situation would be bad enough if the allegations were limited to internal, domestic politics. But even more frightening allegations exist.
Far more pressing than the results of DNA tests on a cocktail dress are investigations into whether this president allowed highly-classified missile technology to be transferred to the communist Chinese government in exchange for campaign donations. The allegations and accompanying evidence are compelling, if not yet complete, to indicate that this has indeed been the case. Let us be clear about this: the government of China is not our ally, and in fact has nuclear missiles aimed at our cities. While we are “at peace,” we should be mindful that China is a foreign government with a system diametrically opposed to our own.
If this president not only broke the law by accepting donations from a potentially hostile foreign government, but proceeded to trade our nation’s military secrets as a “quid pro quo,” then this president must be impeached.
For far too long, Congress has abdicated its oversight responsibility to independent prosecutors. This Congress should begin proceedings to hear the facts behind these allegations, as the Inquiry legislation would require.
Congress must move forward now to secure the integrity of our system of justice, protect the liberties of our people, and to ensure our national security. But Congress must move forward with hearings for the sake of this president and the office he holds. If this president has done nothing meriting impeachment, public hearings will vindicate him and the sordid allegations – and purveyors of the falsehoods – will be revealed.
If, however, the allegations bear the weight of the evidence, then the man entrusted with the highest office in our land must be impeached. Should this be the case, it will be a difficult time for our nation, but it is far worse to allow transgressions against our sovereignty and liberty to go unpunished.
Impeach the president? For the sake of our nation, let us hold hearings and weigh the evidence; the allegations are simply too compelling.
see
Why Did Ron Paul Vote Against Impeachment? By Manila Ryce
Impeachment: A Message to Iowa Democrats (video; Kucinich)
Kucinich: I have 3-inch binder documenting Cheney’s crimes By David Edwards & Jason Rhyne (link)
Impeachment: What to do next (Action Alert; updated)
Rep. Wexler Will Urge the Judiciary Committee to Hold Immediate Hearings on Impeachment!!!
By Eric Margolis
Toronto Sun
Sun, November 11, 2007
Pakistan teeters on the edge while Bhutto, Musharraf plot out next moves
Pakistan’s grave political crisis is now entering the red zone. I’ve been in regular contact with former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto. She calls the situation “grim.” On Friday, she was put under house arrest, preventing her from leading a mass demonstration in Islamabad.
Bhutto tells me she may face another attempt to kill her. She accuses allies of President-General Pervez Musharraf of trying to assassinate her in the Oct. 18 bombing in Karachi that killed or wounded hundreds.
Bhutto had planned to lead a huge march next Tuesday from Lahore to Islamabad designed to confront the army — Musharraf’s power base — in a dramatic showdown.
She and other opposition leaders are calling on Musharraf to resign as military chief and run in fair, internationally-supervised elections.
Bhutto’s Pakistan People’s Party commands broad popular support, particularly among poor and illiterate. But her attempt to unleash mass demonstrations has so far been thwarted by violent police repression against her supporters and arrest of political allies.
My Pakistani sources report growing unrest in the 619,000-man armed forces. Senior commanders, recently promoted by Musharraf after pre-approval by Washington, support him. But they are increasingly dismayed by the threat of a clash with civilians.
NEXT STRONGMAN
Gen. Ashfaq Kiyani, the newly named vice-chief of staff, could be Pakistan’s next strongman. He’s Washington’s Plan B. If Musharraf does finally resign his command, Kiyani will control the military. Musharraf, who has near zero popular support, will be left without a power base — or even army protection.
Bhutto tells me pro-Taliban tribesmen and Uzbek allies in Northwest Frontier Province on the wild Afghan border are rapidly taking over cities and towns.
Army troops ordered to attack them have surrendered or refused to fire.
This could mark the beginning of a rebellion in the ranks.
The loyalty of the army’s senior officers has been rented by billions of dollars of secret aid the CIA has funnelled through Musharraf.
Official post-9/11 U.S. aid to Pakistan is $10.6 billion, but “black” payments are many times higher.
These mammoth payoffs have not trickled down to the mid and lower ranks. They have vanished into the pockets of the military brass and senior officials.
Gen. Hamid Gul, former director general of Pakistan’s intelligence service, ISI, and an old friend from the 1980s Afghan War, has also been arrested.
He kept accusing Musharraf of selling out Pakistan’s national interests in return for cash and U.S. support for his dictatorship — and of dishonouring the military. Gen. Gul, a Pakistani patriot, still has many friends in the army and ISI.
He shouted what many officers whisper.
BUSH AND MUSH
This week, the self-appointed apostle of democracy, George W. Bush, underlined his continued support for his ally, Musharraf. Bush called on Mush to doff his uniform and hold elections. Musharraf dutifully agreed to do so early next year and to hold elections.
But Musharraf has won every previous elections by blatant vote-rigging and bribery — we can expect more of the same.
He would lose any fair vote by a landslide.
Bush made no mention of Musharraf’s disgraceful firing of Supreme Court justices who were about to declare Mush’s ongoing rule violated the constitution. Nor has Bush or the U.S. Congress issued any demands that the exiled former PM Nawaz Sharif, leader of Pakistan’s other major political party, the Muslim League, be allowed to return to contest elections. So much for supporting democracy.
In Washington’s wrongheaded view, it’s either Mush or the mullahs. Or if Mush falters, then it’s Bhutto or Gen. Kiyani.
As of this writing, Bhutto still has not decided whether to collaborate with Musharraf or try to force a bloody confrontation with him.
Kiyani remains a cipher.
Anyone who still wonders why so many in the Muslim world hate the West needs look no further than Pakistan, where, in the name of “democracy” and “counter-terrorism,” Washington and London are stirring a witches brew of dictatorship, intrigue and violence.
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see
Our Man in Islamabad By Stephen Lendman
U.S. Aid to Musharraf is Largely Untraceable Cash Transfers By Spencer Ackerman
Antiwar Radio: Scott Horton Interviews Eric Margolis (+ video)
Dandelion Salad
By CASMII
ICH
11/09/07 “CASMII”
Five years into the US-UK illegal invasion of Iraq and its consequent catastrophe for Iraqi people, peace loving people throughout the world are appalled by the current Iran-US standoff and its resemblance to the run-up to the invasion of Iraq. The hawks, headed by Dick Cheney in Washington, are now shamelessly calling for a military attack on Iran. The same Israeli lobby which pushed for the invasion of Iraq is now pushing for a military attack on Iran. The same distortions which were attempted to dupe the western public opinion for the invasion of Iraq, are now used to pave the way for another illegal pre-emptive war of aggression against Iran. As in the case of Iraq, the UN Security Council Resolutions against Iran, extricated through massive US pressure, are meant to provide a veneer of legitimacy for such an attack. Contrary to the myth created by the western media, it is the US and its European allies which are defying the international community, in that they have rejected negotiations without pre-conditions. They show their lack of good faith by demanding that Iran concede the main point of negotiations, namely, suspension of enrichment of uranium which is Iran ‘s legitimate right under the Non-Proliferation Treaty, before the negotiations actually start.
The Campaign Against Sanctions and Military Intervention in Iran (CASMII) calls for immediate and direct negotiations between the US and Iran without any pre-conditions.
Here, we debunk the main unfounded accusations, lies and distortions by the US and Israel and their allies while highlighting the main reasons to oppose sanctions and military intervention against Iran.
IRAN ‘S NUCLEAR PROGRAMME: FACTS AND LIES
1. There is no evidence of a nuclear weapons programme in Iran. The US and its allies pressure Iran to prove that it is not hiding a nuclear weapons programme. This demand is logically impossible to satisfy and serves to make diplomacy fail in order to force regime change. Numerous intrusive and snap visits by International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) inspectors, totalling more than 2,700 person-hours of inspection, have failed to produce a shred of evidence for a weapons programme in Iran. Traces of highly enriched uranium found at Natanz in 2004, were determined by the IAEA to have come with imported centrifuges.
In July 2007, IAEA and Iran agreed on a work plan with defined modalities and timetable to clarify all issues of concerns in relation to Iran ‘s nuclear programme. On 27 th August 2007 IAEA announced that “The Agency has been able to verify the non-diversion of the declared nuclear materials at the enrichment facilities in Iran and has therefore concluded that it remains in peaceful use ”. The Agreement also cleared Iran ‘s plutonium experiments, which the Cheney Camp had accused of being evidence of Iran ‘s weaponisation programme.
Dr Mohammad El-Baradei, the IAEA Director General, said on 7 th September 2007, “For the last few years we have been told by the Security Council, by the board, we have to clarify the outstanding issues in Iran because these outstanding issues are the ones that have led to the lack of confidence, the crisis”, “We have not come to see any undeclared activities or weaponisation of their programme”.
Two years earlier, in June 2005, Bruno Pellaud, former IAEA Deputy Director General for Safeguards, was asked by Swissinfo if Iran was intent on building a nuclear bomb. He replied: “My impression is not. My view is based on the fact that Iran took a major gamble in December 2003 by allowing a much more intrusive capability to the IAEA. If Iran had had a military programme they would not have allowed the IAEA to come under this Additional Protocol. They did not have to.”
2. Iran ‘s need for nuclear power generation is real. Even when Iran ‘s population was one-third of what it is today, Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld and Paul Wolfowitz, negotiating on behalf of President Gerald Ford, persuaded the former Shah that Iran needed over twenty nuclear reactors. With Iran ‘s population of 70 million, and growing, and its oil resources fast depleting, Iran may be a net importer of oil in just over a decade from now. Nuclear energy is thus a realistic and viable solution for electricity generation in the country.
3. The “crisis” over Iran ‘s nuclear programme lacks the urgency claimed by Washington. Weapons grade uranium must be enriched at least to 85%. A 2005 CIA report determined that it could take Iran 10 years to achieve this level of enrichment. Many independent nuclear experts have stated that Iran would face formidable technical obstacles if it tried to enrich uranium beyond the 3.5% purity required for electricity generation. According to Dr Frank Barnaby of the Oxford Research Group, because of contamination of Iranian uranium with heavy metals, Iran cannot possibly enrich beyond even 20% without support from Russia or China. IAEA director, Dr. Mohammad ElBaradei, too, reiterated in October 2007 that “I don’t see Iran, today, to be a clear and present danger. And our conclusion here is supported by every intelligence assessment I’ve seen that even if Iran has ambitions to develop nuclear weapons, it’s still three to eight years away from that”.
4. Iran has met its obligations under the Nuclear non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT). Iran voluntarily accepted and enforced safeguards stricter than IAEA’s Additional Protocol until February 2006, when Iran ‘s nuclear file was reported, under the pressure from the US, to the Security Council. (The US, by contrast, has neither signed nor implemented the Additional Protocol, and Israel has refused to sign the NPT.)
Iran ‘s earlier concealment of its nuclear programme took place in the context of the US-backed invasion of Iran by Saddam. Not only the U.S., Germany, and the UK were complicit in the sale of chemical weapons to Saddam which were used against Iranian soldiers and civilians but Israel ‘s destruction of Iraq ‘s Osirak reactor in 1981 was treated with total impunity. Iranian leaders then concluded from these gross injustices that international laws are only “ink on paper”.
But the most direct reasons for Iran ‘s concealment were the American trade embargo on Iran and Washington ‘s organized and persistent campaign to stop civilian nuclear technology from reaching Iran from any source. For example, in 1995 Germany offered to let Kraftwerk Union (a subsidiary of Siemens) finish Iran ‘s Bushehr reactor, but withdrew its proposal under US pressure. The following year, China cancelled its contract to build a nuclear enrichment facility in Isfahan for the same reason. Thus Washington systematically violated, with impunity, Article IV of the NPT, which allows “signatories the fullest possible exchange of equipment, materials and scientific and technological information for the peaceful uses of nuclear energy”.
Nevertheless, Iran ‘s decision not to declare all of its nuclear installations did not violate its NPT obligations. According to David Albright and Corey Hinderstein, who first provided satellite imagery and analysis in December 2002 [7], under the safeguards agreement in force at the time, ” Iran is not required to allow IAEA inspections of a new nuclear facility until six months before nuclear material is introduced into it.”
5. Iran has given unprecedented concessions on its nuclear programme. Unlike North Korea, Iran has resisted the temptation to withdraw from the NPT. Besides accepting snap inspections under Additional Protocol until February 2006, Iran has invited Western companies to develop Iran ‘s civilian nuclear programme. Such joint ventures would create the best assurance that the enriched uranium would not be diverted to a weapons programme. Such concessions are very rare in the world, but the U.S. and its allies have refused Iran ‘s offer.
6. Enrichment of uranium for a civilian nuclear programme is Iran ‘s inalienable right. Every member of the NPT has the right to enrich uranium for a civilian nuclear programme and is entitled to full technical assistance.
But with the US as the back seat driver and in violation of their assistance obligations, France, Germany, and the UK insisted throughout the three years of negotiations that Tehran forfeit its right, in return for incentives of little value. Some European diplomats admitted to Asia Times Online on 7th September 2005, that the package offered by the EU-3 was “an empty box of chocolates.” But “there is nothing else we can offer,” the diplomats went on to say. “The Americans simply wouldn’t let us.”
7. The Western alliance has not tried true diplomacy and relies instead on threats. Iran refuses to suspend its enrichment of uranium before bilateral negotiations begin, as demanded by the White House, because it suspects Washington will stall with endless doubts regarding verification of suspension.
WESTERN HYPOCRISY
8. The UN resolutions against Iran, in contrast to the treatment of the US allies, South Korea, India, Pakistan, and Israel, smack of double standards. For example, in the year 2000, South Korea enriched 200 milligrams of uranium to near-weapons grade (up to 77%), but was not referred to the UN Security Council.
India has refused to sign the NPT or allow inspections and has developed an atomic arsenal, but receives nuclear assistance from the US in violation of the NPT. More bizarrely, India has a seat on the governing board of IAEA and, under US pressure, voted to refer Iran as a violator to the UN Security Council. Another non-signatory, Pakistan, clandestinely developed nuclear weapons but is supported by the US as a “war on terror” ally.
Israel is a close ally of Washington, even though it has hundreds of clandestine nuclear weapons, has dismissed numerous UN resolutions and has refused to sign the NPT or open any of its nuclear plants to inspections.
The US itself is the most serious violator of the NPT. The only country to have ever used nuclear bombs in war, the US has refused to reduce its nuclear arsenal, in violation of Article VI of NPT. The US is also in breach of the Treaty because it is developing new generations of nuclear warheads for use against non-nuclear adversaries. Moreover, Washington has deployed hundreds of such tactical nuclear weapons all around the world in violation of Articles I and II of the NPT.
9. Iran has not threatened Israel or attacked another country. The track records of the US, Israel, the UK and France are very different. These so called “democracies” have a bloody history of invading other countries. Iran ‘s supreme leader, Ayatollah Khamenei, has declared repeatedly that Iran will not attack or threaten any country. He has also issued a fatwa against the production, stockpiling and use of nuclear weapons and banned nuclear weapons as sacrilegious. Iran has been a consistent supporter of the Nuclear non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and called for a nuclear weapons free Middle East.
The comments of Iran ‘s President Ahmadinejad against Israel have been repeated by some of Iran ‘s leaders since 1979 and constitute no practical threat. The statement attributed to him that “ Israel should be wiped off the map” is a distortion of the truth and has been determined by a number of Farsi linguists, amongst them, Professor Juan Cole, to be a mistranslation. What he actually said was that “the regime occupying Jerusalem must vanish from the page of time”. Ahmadinejad has made clear that he envisions regime change in Israel through internal decay, similar to the demise of the Soviet Union. Iranian leaders have said consistently for two decades that they will accept a two-state solution in Palestine if a majority of Palestinians favour that option.
This is in sharp contrast to the explicit threats by Israeli and the US leaders against Iran, including aid to separatist movements to disintegrate and wipe Iran off the map, as reported by Seymour Hersh and Reese Erlich. There is considerable evidence of clandestine operations by the US, British and Israeli agents who are arming, training and funding terrorist entities such as Jundollah in Baluchistan, Arab separatists in Khuzestan, and PJAK in Kurdistan. These concrete attempts at disintegration of Iran, as well as the 100 million dollars congressional funding for ‘democracy’ promotion in Iran, constitute aggression and are interference in Iran ‘s domestic affairs and Iranian people’s rights of sovereignty. They violate the bilateral Algiers Accord of 1981, in which Washington renounced any such actions in the future.
Furthermore, President Bush and Vice President Cheney, former UN ambassador, John Bolton, Senator Lieberman, as well as presidential candidates Guilliani, Romney and McCain are openly advocating and pushing for pre-emptive military attack on Iran. The French President, Sarkouzy, and his Foreign Minister, Kouchner, the new recruits to the Neo Cons camp, have added their voice to this chorus for war. British Prime Minister, Gordon Brown, too has not ruled out the pre-emptive military option against Iran.
Iran is no match for Israel, whose security and military needs are all but guaranteed by the US. Iran is surrounded on all sides by the US Navy and American bases.
Iran has not invaded or threatened any country for two and a half centuries. The only war the Islamic Republic fought was the one imposed by Saddam’s army, which invaded Iran with the backing of the US and its allies. When Iraq used chemical weapons, supplied by the West, against Iranian troops, Iran did not retaliate in kind. When Afghanistan ‘s Taliban regime murdered eight Iranian diplomats in 1996 and remained unapologetic, Iran did not respond militarily.
10. The US “democratization” programme for Iran is a hoax. Although violations of human rights and democratic freedoms do occur too often in Iran, the country has the most pluralistic system in a region dominated by undemocratic client states of the US. It is sheer hypocrisy for the US, which turns a blind eye to the gross human rights abuses by its allies, such as Azerbaijan, Turkmenistan, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Israel, Libya, and Egypt, to misrepresent its agenda in Iran as a “democratization” programme. Washington ‘s pretensions ring especially hollow when one remembers that in 1953 Iran ‘s nascent democracy under Prime Minister Mohammad Mossadeq was overthrown by the CIA, which restored a hated military dictatorship for the benefit of American oil conglomerates.
UN SECURITY COUNCIL INVOLVEMENT TOTALLY UNJUSTIFIED
11. There are no legal bases for Iran ‘s referral to the UN Security Council. Since there is no evidence that Iran is even contemplating to weaponize its nuclear programme, no grounds exist for this sidelining of the IAEA.
Michael Spies of the New York-based Lawyers’ Committee on Nuclear Policy has clarified the issue: “Under the Statute (Art. 12(C)) and the Safeguards Agreement, the Board may only refer Iran to the Security Council if it finds that, based on the report from the Director General, it cannot be assured that Iran has not diverted nuclear material for non-peaceful purpose. In the past, findings of `non-assurance’ have only come in the face of a history of active and ongoing non-cooperation with IAEA safeguards. The pursuit of nuclear activities in itself, which is specifically recognized as a sovereign right, and which remain safeguarded, could not legally or logically equate to uncertainty regarding diversion.”
IAEA director, Dr ElBradei, has consistently confirmed that there has been no diversion of safeguarded nuclear material in Iran and the recent IAEA-Iran workplan of July 2007 has reconfirmed this. He has also said, under pressure from Washington, that he cannot rule out the existence of undeclared nuclear activities in the country. However, according to the IAEA’s Safeguards Implementation Report for 2005 (issued on 15 June 2006), 45 other countries, including 14 European countries, in particular Germany, are in this same category as Iran. ElBaradei added in September 2007 that in Iran “we have not come to see any undeclared activities… We have not seen any weaponisation of their programme, nor have we received any information to that effect”. He has also repeatedly urged skeptics in Western capitals to help the IAEA by sharing any possible proof in their possession of suspicious nuclear activity in Iran.i
Moreover, according to the UK-based Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament, certifying non-diversion of nuclear material to military purposes for any given country takes an average of six years of inspections and verification by the IAEA. In the case of Iran, these investigations have been going on for only about four years now.
Iran ‘s file, therefore, must be returned to the jurisdiction of the IAEA and the rules of the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty (NPT). The US and its allies violated the rules by exerting massive pressure on the IAEA to report Iran without any legitimacy to the UN Security Council. For example, David Mulford, the US Ambassador to India, warned the Government of India in January 2006 that there would be no US-India nuclear deal if India did not vote against Iran at the IAEA. On February 15th 2007, Stephen Rademaker, the former US Assistant Secretary for International Security and Non-Proliferation, admitted publicly that the US coerced India to vote against Iran. Clearly, reporting Iran to the UN Security Council and the subsequent adoption of the Resolutions 1696 and 1737 have been carried out with US coercion and have thus no legitimacy at all.
SANCTIONS NOT A GOOD IDEA
12. Dr ElBradei, the head of the IAEA, has said that more sanctions are counterproductive. Economic sanctions on Iran will harm the people of Iran, as they were devastating to Iraqis, resulting in the death of at least 500,000 children. Sanctions would not however bring the Islamic Republic to its knees. Instead, any kind of sanctions, including the so-called “targeted” or “smart” sanctions, are viewed by the Iranian people as the West’s punishment for Iran ‘s scientific progress (uranium enrichment for reactor fuel). As sanctions tighten, nationalist fervour will strengthen the resolve of Iranians to defend the country’s civilian nuclear programme.
13. Sanctions are not better than war; they can be exploited as a diplomatic veneer and a provocative prelude to military attack, as they were in Iraq. Thus, countries which support sanctions against Iran are only falling into the US trap in aiding the war drive on Iran.
STATEGIC SHIFT TO MULTI-FOCAL TARGETS
14. A US attack on Iran is imminent. The end of George Bush’s presidency in 2009 could be a serious set back for the NeoCons’ hegemonic dreams to control the energy resources in the region. He is unlikely to leave office bearing the legacy of failures in Afghanistan and Iraq and particularly leaving Iran a stronger player in the region. Thus the likelihood of military attack on Iran before Bush leaves office is a reality. Washington insiders have told security analysts that preparations for military attack have been made and are ready for execution.
Since January, in addition to the nuclear issue, the US has also focused its propaganda to falsely implicate Iran in the violence and failures of US policies in Afghanistan and Iraq. The Iran-US bilateral dialogue this summer was derailed amidst accusations that Iran aided the killing of American soldiers by providing sophisticated weapons and training to Afghan and Iraqi fighters. As in the nuclear case, Washington has provided no proof.
British Foreign Minister, David Miliband, admitted in an interview with the Financial Times on 8 th July 07 that there was “No Evidence” of Iranian involvement in the violence and instability in Iraq. Likewise, the British Defence Minister, Des Browne, in August 07 maintained categorically that “No Evidence” existed of Iranian government’s complicity or instigation in supplying weapons to Iraqi militias. The Washington Post, too, reported from Iraq that hundreds of British troops combing southern Iraq for sign of Iranian weapons have come up empty-handed. Furthermore, Hamid Karzai, the Afghan president, and Al-Maleki, the Iraqi Prime Minister, have stated Iran ‘s positive role in providing whatever limited stability there is in both these countries. Nevertheless, G eorge Bush’s speech on 28 th August, authorizing the American military to “ confront Tehran ‘s murderous activities”, and the deployment of British troops to the Iranian border to guard against Iran ‘s “proxy war” in Iraq, signaled a systematic building towards a casus belli for another illegal pre-emptive war. The Kyle-Lieberman Amendment to the Defence Authorisation Bill, too, accused Iran of killing American servicemen in Iraq and nearly authorized the military to take all necessary action to combat Iran.
A third focus in the US war drive has now been launched by branding Iran ‘s Revolutionary Guards as a terrorist organization. This unprecedented move in US foreign policy and international relations is the proclaimed basis for imposing the toughest sanctions ever on Iranian banks, companies and individuals.
These new measures represent a massive escalation in the US war drive, they are a prelude to a military attack on Iran and provide the legal pretext for the US military to wage war on Iran without the prior approval of the US Congress.
ILLEGALITY OF A MILITARY ATTACK
15. Foreign state interference in Iran violates the UN charter. According to Seymour Hersch, the US is running covert operations in Iran to foment unrest and ethnic conflict for the purpose of regime change. Unmanned US drones have also entered into Iranian air space to spy over Iranian military installations and to map Iranian radar systems. These actions violate the UN Charter’s guarantee of the right of self-determination for all nations.
The Bush Administration has also confirmed, in the 2006 US National Security Strategy, its long term policy for pre-emptive military action against Washington ‘s rivals. Former British prime minister, Tony Blair, supported this policy in his 21st March 2006 foreign policy speech, and his successor Gordon Brown has not rejected the pre-emptive use of military force against Iran. However, unprovoked strikes are illegal under international law. To remove this obstacle, John Reid, the then British Secretary of Defence, in his speech on 3rd April 2006 to the Royal United Services Institute for Defense and Security Studies, proposed a change in international law on pre-emptive military action.
16. Reports of nuclear attack scenarios against Iran can serve to raise the public’s tolerance for an act of aggression with conventional military means. People of conscience and sanity must not only condemn even contemplation of a nuclear attack, but also denounce any conventional attack.
UNINTENDED CONSEQUENCES OF AN ATTACK ON IRAN
17. Bombing cannot end Iran ‘s nuclear programme. Since Iran already has the expertise to enrich uranium up to the 3.5% grade for a fuel cycle, no degree of bombing will halt Iran ‘s civilian nuclear programme. On the contrary, the resulting mass casualties and destruction would strengthen the voices that argue Iran, like North Korea, should build a nuclear deterrent.
18. An attack on Iran will unite Iranians against the US and its allies. A great majority of the public in Iran support the country’s right to enrich uranium for civilian purposes. This has been confirmed by all opinion polls conducted in the country, including polls taken by Western institutions. Therefore, a bombing campaign will not lead to an uprising by the Iranian people for regime change as envisaged by the US. Rather, it would ignite nationalist feelings in the country and unite the population, including most of the government’s critics, against the West.
19. A nuclear attack on Iran would fuel a new nuclear arms race and ruin the NPT. Any military intervention against Iran will lead to a regional catastrophe and expanded terrorism. Senator McCain, the Republican presidential hopeful, who has himself advocated the use of force on Iran, has predicted that an attack against Iran will lead to Armageddon. American or Israeli aggression on Iran, coming on the heels of the Iraq disaster, would inflame the grievance and outrage of Muslims worldwide and help jihadi extremists with their recruitment campaign. The region wide conflagration resulting from an Israel/US attack on Iran would dwarf the Iraq catastrophe.
20. The cause of democracy in Iran will suffer gravely if the country is attacked. President Bush’s “axis of evil” rhetoric severely undermined the reformist movement in Iran at a time when the country’s president promoted Dialogue Among Civilizations. Bush’s hostile posture strengthened the hands of Iranian hardliners and contributed to the reformist movement’s electoral defeat in 2005. That setback would be dwarfed by the consequences of a military assault on the country.
© 2005 – 2007, Campaign Against Sanctions and Military Intervention in Iran http://www.campaigniran.org
FAIR USE NOTICE: This blog may contain copyrighted material. Such material is made available for educational purposes, to advance understanding of human rights, democracy, scientific, moral, ethical, and social justice issues, etc. This constitutes a ‘fair use’ of any such copyrighted material as provided for in Title 17 U.S.C. section 107 of the US Copyright Law. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, the material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond ‘fair use’, you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.
Ron Paul Drums Up Support At Local Rally
PHILADELPHIA (CBS 3) ― In the race for the White House one of the hottest names in politics, Ron Paul brought his upstart campaign to the region. Saturday’s rally proves he may be trailing in the polls but he cannot be ignored.They call it the Ron Paul revolution and on Saturday it came to Philadelphia.
Enthusiastic supporters flooded Independence Mall to see the ten-term Texas congressman who is running for the Republican presidential nomination is fueled by online support.
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Fox News Covers Philadelphia Rally
Presidential Candidate Ron Paul Makes Campaign Stop in Philly
Philadelphia — Presidential candidate Ron Paul has been called a conservative and a libertarian, but he’s on the republican ticket. This Texas congressman wants to end the federal income tax and opposes the patriot act. He’s an anti-establishment favorite who visited the City of Brotherly Love Saturday. Rachel Wulff reports.
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Federal Reserve is Causing Dollar Value to Plummet by William Mac
On October 30th CODEPINK fooled CBS, Politico and other mainstream news outlets with a fake press release announcing Blackwater’s new “Department of Integrity” which would set out to put the “Mercy back in Mercenary”.
By Pepe Escobar
ICH
11/09/07 “Asia Times”
“… the literature on counter-insurgency is so enormous that, had it been put aboard the Titanic, it would have sunk that ship without any help from the iceberg. However, the outstanding fact is that almost all of it has been written by the losers.” – Martin van Creveld, in The Changing Face Of War, 2006
Amid the George W Bush administration’s relentless campaign to “change the subject” from Iraq to Iran, how to “win” the war against the Iraqi resistance, Sunni or Shi’ite, now means – according to counter-insurgency messiah General David Petraeus – calling an air strike.
On a parallel level, the Pentagon has practically finished a base in southern Iraq less than 10 kilometers from the border with Iran called Combat Outpost Shocker. The Pentagon maintains this is for the US to prevent Iranian weapons from being smuggled into Iraq. Rather, it’s to control a rash of US covert, sabotage operations across the border targeting Iran’s Khuzestan province.
With the looming Turkish threat of invading Iraqi Kurdistan and President General President Musharraf’s new “let’s jail all the lawyers” coup within a coup in Pakistan, the bloody war in the plains of Mesopotamia is lower down in the news cycle – not to mention the interminable 2008 US presidential soap opera. Rosy spinning, though, still rules unchecked.
The Pentagon – via Major General Joseph Fil, commander of US forces in Baghdad – is relentlessly spinning there’s now less violence in the capital, a “sustainable” trend. This is rubbish.
Fil cannot even admit to the basic fact that Baghdad has been reduced to a collection of blast-walled, isolated ghettos in search of a city. Baghdad, from being 65% Sunni, is now at least 75% Shi’ite, and counting. Sunni and Shi’ite residents alike confirm sectarian violence has died down because there are virtually no more neighborhoods to be ethnically cleansed.
When Fil says the Iraqi forces are “much, much more effective”, what he means is they are much more ferocious. Terrified middle class, secular Shi’ite residents have told Asia Times Online these guards – Shi’ites themselves – roaming Baghdad with their machine guns pointing to the sidewalks are “worse than the Americans”.
Violence has also (relatively) decreased because the bulk of Muqtada al-Sadr’s Mahdi Army is still lying low, following his strict orders, even though they are being targeted by constant US air strikes on Sadr City.
The falling numbers of US deaths have also been subjected to merciless spinning. Yet already more US troops have been killed in Iraq in 2007 than in all of 2006. This temporary fall is not caused by a burst of Sunni Iraqi resistance good will – even though an array of groups has taken some time out to concentrate forces in these past few months on unifying their struggle (See It’s the resistance, stupid Asia Times Online, October 17, 2007.)
Once again, Baghdad residents, who daily have to negotiate life in hell, reveal what’s going on. Lately, as a Shi’ite businessman says, “We have not seen the Americans. They used to come to my neighborhood almost every day at night, with Humvees and Bradleys. They stopped at the end of September.” This means less US-conducted dangerous “missions” in the Baghdad wasteland – with less exposure to snipers and improvised explosive devices (IEDs) – and more time spent in ultra-fortified bases.
The Pentagon even had to admit that sniper attacks, conducted by real pros, have quadrupled during the past year and could “potentially inflict even more casualties than IEDs”. The US Department of Defense’s Defense Advance Research Projects Agency had to rush a program using lasers to identify snipers before they shoot.
Anyway, whenever there is a mission in Baghdad now it inevitably means an air strike. Mega-slum Sadr City residents confirm the US keeps attacking alleged Mahdi Army “terrorist” haunts – but mostly from the air.
With the US corporate media operating virtually like a Pentagon information agency, the only news fit to print is that as of early this week there were 3,855 American dead in Iraq. But most of all – and never mentioned – there were 28,451 wounded in combat. And as of October 1, there were no less than 30,294 military victims of accidents and diseases so serious they had to be medically sent out of Iraq.
When in doubt, ‘liberate’ from the air
Brigadier General Qasim Atta, spokesman for the Baghdad security plan, revealed this week Iraq’s security forces have set up 250 spy cameras across Baghdad – presumably to track the Sunni resistance, the Mahdi Army and remaining al-Qaeda in the Land of the Two Rivers operatives. Atta has argued “the terrorists are now forced to resort to kidnappings and planting roadside bombs because our security plan is working”. That’s more rubbish.
Kidnapping is an established industry in Baghdad; with the exodus of the middle classes to Jordan, Syria and beyond, now there’s virtually no one flush enough to be kidnapped. IEDs continue to follow wherever American convoys roam. And since they are not roaming – they stick to base – fewer IEDs are exploding. As for al-Qaeda, it has relocated from Baghdad neighborhoods such as Dora – but it will be back.
With fewer missions on the ground, the Pentagon could not but launch four times more air strikes on Iraqis in 2007 – the year of Bush’s “surge” – than in the whole of 2006. Up to the end of September, there had been 1,140 air strikes. Last month, there were more air strikes than during the siege that devastated Fallujah in November 2004.
Even discounting the criminal absurdity of an occupation routinely dropping the bomb on packed neighborhoods of a city it already occupies, civilians are the inevitable “collateral damage” of these attacks – families, women, children, assorted “non-combatants”. The US Air Force does not even take responsibility – claiming the air strikes are ordered by scared-to-death convoys of Humvees patrolling, say, the mean streets of Sadr City.
The Pentagon talk of “precision strikes” and “reducing collateral damage” means nothing in this context. This appalling human-rights disaster has to be attributed to counter-insurgency messiah Petraeus, the “loser”, according to Martin van Creveld, who wrote the latest book on the matter, The Changing Face Of War.
But for public relations purposes inside the US, Petraeus’ “by his book” approach works wonders. The Pentagon can spin to oblivion to a cowered media that US deaths are falling. Who cares what the Nuri al-Maliki “sovereign” Iraqi government says? Maliki is nothing but the mayor of the Green Zone anyway. Who cares what the “fish” – who support the “sea” of the resistance, Sunni or Shi’ite – feel? 80% of them are unemployed anyway – and they merely struggle to survive as second-class citizens in their own land.
There’s hardly any electricity, fuel or food in Baghdad – everything is rationed – for anyone who’s not aligned with a militia-protected faction. The only other option is to flee. With at least a staggering 4.4 million, according to the United Nations, either refugees or internally displaced, options are dwindling fast. There may be as many as 2 million Iraqi refugees in Syria alone. Damascus, in despair, has tightened its visa rules: only academics and businessmen are now entitled. No less than 14% of the entire Iraqi population has been displaced – courtesy of the Bush administration.
Oh, but the Bush administration is “winning” the war, of course. Counter-insurgency doctrine rules that the enemy must be controlled with social, political, ideological and psychological weapons, and risks have to be taken so civilians can be protected.
The surging Petraeus turned that upside down. Or maybe not – he’s just providing his own scholarly follow-up to the indiscriminate bombings of Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia in the 1960s and 1970s. Petraeus, His master’s voice, might as well call an air strike over the whole of Mesopotamia and then call it “victory”.
Pepe Escobar is the author of Globalistan: How the Globalized World is Dissolving into Liquid War (Nimble Books, 2007). He may be reached at pepeasia@yahoo.com.
Copyright 2007 Asia Times Online Ltd.
FAIR USE NOTICE: This blog may contain copyrighted material. Such material is made available for educational purposes, to advance understanding of human rights, democracy, scientific, moral, ethical, and social justice issues, etc. This constitutes a ‘fair use’ of any such copyrighted material as provided for in Title 17 U.S.C. section 107 of the US Copyright Law. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, the material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond ‘fair use’, you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.
By Stephen Lendman
11/09/07 “ICH“
The Islamic Republic of Pakistan was established in August,1947 when its majority Muslim population separated from British-controlled India and became a sovereign state. Since then, the country has been plagued by wars, political instability, and a series of military coups as it continues stumbling unsuccessfully toward democracy.
Nominally, Pakistan is a federal democratic republic (declared in 1956) under a semi-presidential system and bicameral legislature consisting of a 100 member Senate and larger lower house National Assembly. The President is considered head of state and armed forces commander and chief (in a civilian capacity) and is elected by the Electoral College of Pakistan comprised of both houses of Parliament and the Provincial Assemblies. The Prime Minister is Pakistan’s head of government, is elected by the National Assembly, and is usually the largest party’s leader.
This is how government is supposed to work in Pakistan, but things are never that simple there. In its entire 60 year history, democracy has been a sham under various elected and military regimes. Musharraf is just the latest military one after he ousted elected Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif in an October, 1999 coup. At the time, few people were surprised as tensions between elements of Pakistan’s ruling classes had been building for months. Sharif had grown increasingly unpopular and had Musharraf not deposed him other opposition forces might have done it.
Elected as a champion of democracy, Sharif soon disappointed as did his predecessor, Benazir Bhutto, who’s now trying to reinvent herself as a democrat. Massive corruption accompanied his repressive right-wing rule that made his tenure widely unpopular. He sacked thousands of workers, cut food subsidies, let utility costs skyrocket, banned state union sectors and restricted workers’ rights to demonstrate and strike. At the same time, he and his cronies siphoned off millions of state funds, amassed enormous wealth, and hid it in offshore accounts. Under his rule, state institutions were collapsing, and workers and the poor suffered most. They wanted change, and the army obliged but not the way most people wanted.
Since taking power in 1999 and appointing himself President in June, 2001, Musharraf engaged in a precarious balancing act and ruled repressively. He tried to secure Pakistan’s traditional geopolitical and strategic South and Central Asian interests. In addition, he supported the domestic Islamic fundamentalist right against traditional political elites and popular opposition from below. He also aimed to please Washington post-9/11 under threat of being declared a hostile power if he didn’t and was summarily told by Deputy Secretary of State Armitage his punishment would be “to be bombed back to the stone age.” To avoid that, he stopped supporting the Taliban and provided the Bush administration vital logistical help in its attack and occupation of Afghanistan.
His reward was not being bombed and over $10 billion in military and other aid ever since through a virtual unaccountable blank check and blind eye to human rights abuses under his regime. Since he came to power, Musharraf tried to silence all political dissent and did it through disappearances, arbitrary detentions, extrajudicial killings and torture on the pretext of fighting “terrorism.” And as a “war on terror” ally, he launched military assaults against tribal and Taliban forces in Waziristan and Baluchistan, but that caused internal resentment to build against his increasingly unpopular rule. He also angered elements in the military that resent his lust for power and reckless behavior to hold on to it, and that ultimately may be his undoing.
Things came to a boil when Musharraf suspended the nation’s Chief Justice, Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry, last March. He accused him of “misconduct and misuse of authority” as cover to remove a key official he thought might block his plan for another five year term as President along with remaining chief of army staff (COAS) that’s constitutionally illegal. He named an interim head justice, effectively placed Chaudhry under house arrest, and ordered the judicial council to investigate corruption charges.
The response to the move was outrage across the board from opposition parties, lawyers’ organizations and human rights groups. They called the action unconstitutional and rallied in street protests against it. At the same time, Musharraf faces other crises that led to his recent actions. The Bush administration wants more from him against the Taliban as well as assurances he’ll be a reliable ally if the US attacks Iran. In addition, Baluchistan’s insurgency has continued for the past two years, and the army has lost hundreds of troops confronting it. That’s caused mounting defections in its ranks, and public anger over it as well.
There are also economic issues because Musharraf adopted Washington Consensus policies that allowed poverty and discontent to grow hugely under his rule. People needs are ignored, social inequity has increased, food prices have spiraled, unions are cracked down on, and over half of government spending is for the military and debt service. In addition, corruption is rampant, the military practices crony capitalism, and Musharraf gets millions from it according to Pakistani analyst, Ayesha Siddiqa, in her recently published book – Military, Inc.: Inside Pakistan’s Military Economy.” On top of that, democracy in the country is a joke and always has been.
Nonetheless, Musharraf wants to retain power until 2012 and staged a bogus October 6 election to do it. It violated the law and was stage-managed by the military in a process neither free nor fair because the general’s allies dominate the Parliament from having rigged elections five years ago. As expected, Musharraf won easily getting all but five parliamentary votes (252 out of 257) cast and swept the Provincial Assembly balloting as well. Opposition MPs abstained or boycotted the proceeding calling it unconstitutional, and the Supreme Court said no winner could be declared until it rules if Musharraf could run in his joint COAS capacity.
Pakistan has seen increased political upheaval for months. Musharraf wants to keep power by confronting it and intends to stay allied with the Bush administration in the process. At the time though, he said he’d step down as army chief once the Supreme Court certified his election, but the fact remains he has no intention to do it.
Pakistan Post-November 3
That’s how things stood before November 3 when the general staged his second coup by declaring a state of emergency and suspending constitutional rule. But that’s nothing new in Pakistan’s history. The country’s first Constitution was adopted in 1956 but was short-lived. It was abrogated in 1958 when martial law was imposed. A new Constitution emerged in 1962 and then annulled in 1969, again under martial law. A third and current Constitution came in 1973. It was suspended in 1977, restored in 1985 with major changes, suspended again in 1999, and restored in 2002 with more changes until Musharraf acted on November 3.
Few in the country with long memories were surprised, and one analyst said it’s “back to the past again (in Pakistan.” Another put it this way: “Pakistan’s constitutional development illustrate(s)….that a constitutional morality (in the country) has not developed. The document is unable to discipline the political elite, especially the bureaucratic and military elite.” Put another way, these comments illustrate that the country is not yet ready for prime time.
Washburn University law professor Ali Kahn explained on CounterPunch that article 232 of Pakistan’s 1973 constitution “allows the President (as a civilian) to issue a Proclamation of Emergency under grave circumstances.” Kahn also said the Constitution doesn’t allow a “wholesale termination of services of Supreme Court judges,” thus rendering Musharraf’s action an “extra-constitutional coup.” But it’s not the first time he did it. After seizing power in 1999, he ordered all judges to swear a new oath of allegiance to him as military ruler. Thirteen of them on the Supreme Court refused, were sacked, and then replaced by more complaint ones in a blatantly unconstitutional act Musharraf got away with at the time.
Now he’s at it again with a brutal crackdown. After his November 3 action, Musharraf deployed his security forces across the capital; occupied Parliament and the Supreme Court; forced private TV stations off the air; suspended free speech and the press as well as free assembly, association and movement; disrupted mobile phone networks; and placed targeted opposition politicians, lawyers and others under “preventive detention” after empowering police to do it.
He further annulled the Supreme Court’s authority to rule against him, the Prime Minister, or anyone acting on his behalf and made it a crime to ridicule the President, armed forces, Parliament or the courts. Last July, the full Supreme Court bench reinstated Chief Justice Choudhry to his post, but on November 3 he was removed again along with six other Supreme Court justices because they refused to endorse Musharraf’s Provisional Constitutional Order (PCO) emergency decree. They were also placed under house arrest. The president of Pakistan’s Supreme Court Bar Association (SCBA), Aitzaz Ahsan, and other influential lawyers were also arrested as the general hardens his dictatorial rule.
Why This Measure and Why Now
Musharraf apparently feared an imminent Choudhry Supreme Court ruling against his October 6 reelection and acted preemptively to stop him. Reports in the country were that he likely knew how the Court would rule and decided weeks ago to quash it in his COAS capacity. Benazir Bhutto apparently knew it, too, and left the country to avoid looking complicit so as not to tarnish her pretense to be democratic. She returned to Islamabad November 6, the country is under martial law with the Constitution suspended, and Musharraf, as army chief, is a de facto dictator.
This event is front page news everywhere with Washington and western leaders feigning outrage. Condoleezza Rice calls Musharraf’s move “highly regrettable” while affirming the Bush administration’s support for his regime nonetheless. She claims it’s because he acted up to now to put Pakistan on a “path to democratic rule” that on its face is laughable.
Washington values Musharraf in its “war on terror” because he backs the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, is apparently on board against Tehran, and he lets the Pentagon use Pakistan territory for cross-border incursions against its Iranian neighbor in preparation for something bigger ahead. To prove it means it, the administration signaled on November 4 it will keep aiding the man George Bush calls one of his most important “counterrorism” allies, and America values “stability” over democracy.
After the coup, Tariq Ali wrote on CounterPunch and ZNet that Pakistan’s largest independent TV station, Geo TV, continues broadcasting outside the country, and one of its “sharpest journalists,” Hamid Mir, reported his sources told him “the US Embassy had green lighted the coup because they regarded (Chaudhry) as a nuisance and ‘Taliban sympathiser.’ ” He was at odds with Musharraf for months over key issues, according to Ali, such as “disappeared prisoners, harassment of women and rushed privatizations.” The greater fear, however, was that “he might (also be about to) declare a uniformed President illegal” which is likely true and an easy sell to forces opposed to an unpopular leader.
This has been building for months and was the reason behind Washington’s wanting a power-sharing arrangement between Musharraf and Benazir Bhutto. Those plans unravelled on November 3 even though Bhutto’s criticism of the coup was muted, and reports are she’s back to negotiating a deal while, at the same time, rallying her supporters for an opposition November 9 Rawalpindi rally.
Accomodating Musharraf is her only option to return to power (as Prime Minister) and to assure corruption charges against her are dropped. That part of the deal was sealed October 5 when Musharraf signed a “reconciliation ordinance” absolving her of all outstanding charges of looting up to $2 billion in public funds during her tenure. In her final year in office in 1996, Transparency International, an independent watchdog group, named Pakistan the second most corrupt country in the world even though its standing later improved modestly.
Fast-Moving Events in Pakistan
Pakistan remains in turmoil under martial law. Thousands have been arrested including hundreds of lawyers, opposition politicians, journalists and students according to independent sources although the Interior Ministry acknowledges only 1800. In addition, pitched battles are on the streets, and all George Bush can say is we’ll “continue to work with (Musharraf and hope) he will restore democracy as quickly as possible.” Military and other aid will continue, so it’s business as usual, but that’s to be expected from two nations with contempt for the law.
Consider this New York Times November 7 quote from prominent Islamabad lawyer Babar Sattar and relate it to US conditions post-911: “How do you function as a lawyer when the law is what the general says it is?” Consider also what lawyer and former cabinet member Athar Minallah said about Pakistan’s Supreme Court: “When the (Court) started acting (independently) for the first time in 60 years, they (Musharraf) came down very hard. In the past, the Supreme Court had always connived with the establishment and the military.”
That’s the state of things under George Bush. He unconstitutionally usurped “Unitary Executive” power to claim the law is what he says it is and once told Republican colleagues the Constitution is “just a goddamned piece of paper.” In addition, federal courts, including the Supreme Court, are stacked with supportive right wing justices, and the nation is about to get a new Attorney General who condones torture and approves of arbitrary executive power.
Where this will lead in the US next year and beyond is open to debate. In Pakistan it’s anyone’s guess as well as things remain fluid and events are breaking fast. January, 2008 Parliamentary elections are scheduled but are likely to be delayed or suspended even though on November 8 Musharraf is now saying, through his state media, the original timetable will be moved back to mid-February. Maybe not according to some observers who believe the political process is on hold until he secures his position as President for the next five years and most importantly continues as army chief because that’s where the real power in the country lies. Pakistan’s Constitution allows the legislature’s tenure to be extended up to a year so it’s possible that’s the plan.
In the meantime, the Pentagon, Bush administration, Democrats and corporate media back Musharraf even if some in his own military may not. Washington badly needs him with Afghanistan deteriorating badly and Iraq already a hopeless cause. It’s even more important given the reluctance of NATO and “coalition” defense ministers to commit more troops and a growing anxiety of some to pull out of Bush’s wars entirely. With this backdrop, Musharraf portrays himself as a rock of stability so who in Washington cares how he solidifies power or if he’ll accept Bhutto as Prime Minister. For Bush and Democrats, only the “war on terror” matters so any leader backing it is an ally. Bottom line despite muted criticism – democratic credentials are not an issue. Fact is they never are.
Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago and can be reached at lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net .
Also visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com and listen to The Steve Lendman News and Information Hour on TheMicroEffect.com Mondays at noon US central time.
FAIR USE NOTICE: This blog may contain copyrighted material. Such material is made available for educational purposes, to advance understanding of human rights, democracy, scientific, moral, ethical, and social justice issues, etc. This constitutes a ‘fair use’ of any such copyrighted material as provided for in Title 17 U.S.C. section 107 of the US Copyright Law. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, the material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond ‘fair use’, you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.
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U.S. Aid to Musharraf is Largely Untraceable Cash Transfers By Spencer Ackerman
Dandelion Salad 