What Cynthia Nixon said

Isaiah The World Today Just Nuts "Super Model President" and I love it. I'm not going to blog about it tonight.

I'm a rape victim, I don't hide that. I've shared it online. The little stunt the Senate pulled over the weekend pisses me off to no end. I am very glad Cynthia Nixon is speaking out. This is from her interview with CNN:


CNN: You've been very outspoken in the past few years about LGBT issues and rights, but not as much about reproductive health. When did you start becoming vocal about being pro-choice?
Cynthia Nixon: I've been involved since I was 15, so we're talking almost 30 years now.
My mother had an illegal abortion pre-1973, and it's something that I would never want to face or want my daughter to be facing or any of her friends. Abortion is a right I feel must not go away, and I feel like people aren't mobilizing so much because it's so complicated and it's difficult to understand.
CNN: But some say that all the Stupak-Pitt amendment does is essentially hold up the current law that restricts federal funding from providing abortions.
Nixon: That's patently false. The new people coming in would be people making less than $88,000 a year in a family of four and would be getting their insurance in the form of tax credit. That credit is coming through the federal government.
[For] the majority of women who have health insurance now, abortion is covered as a complete given. Once these new people come in, we're looking at adding 36 million people to these tax credits, and they will not have abortion offered as an option on their health insurance. That's a really large chunk of people, but the thing is also how it will affect the marketplace. ...
They're saying you could buy [a rider] additionally, but for how much? It's going to be exorbitantly expensive, and it's not a thing people are going to do.
By the very nature of abortion, nobody intends to have one. Nobody intends to get pregnant by mistake, nobody intends to be raped, nobody intends to be [a victim of incest], and no one intends, in the course of a wanted pregnancy, to have a catastrophic event that requires an abortion.


I really don't think I have anything that improves on what she said. I will add that we covered the assault on women's rights yesterday in "Editorial: Women's rights thrown under the bus."

This is C.I.'s "Iraq snapshot:"

Monday, December 21, 2009. Chaos and violence continue, the Iraqi oil contracts out of Baghdad are illegal, the US military declares pregnancy to be an 'offense' and one that can result in a court-martial, Tony Blair stares ever more into his looking glass, did Iran seize an oil field, March 20th is a national day of action, and more.


Starting in the US with the latest effort to spit on women. No, not the US Senate, the US military brass. Saturday, BBC World Service Radio offered a report from Iraq, where US General Anthony Cucolo yammered away about the new development for US service members: If you end up pregnant, you can be court-martialed. [Click here for BBC story online in text form.] Long gone are the days of "act of God." If you end up pregnant, married or not, and you're in Iraq, you can be court-martialed. For pregnancy. It's the US military's production of The Scarlet Letter. Cuculo and others claim the US military is in Iraq for 'freedom.' It's not the Iraqis freedom (they've been given nothing but chaos and violence) and it's certainly not America's freedom. Apparently it's Cuculo's freedom. His freedom to be an ASS in public.At some point, someone's going to grasp that women in the military are now sexless beings. They can't have sex with other women becuase of the military's ban on being openly gay. They can't have sex with men because they might end up pregnant. It's amazing that the same institution that does NOTHING to protect women in the ranks from rape, is more than happy to ensure that any consensual sex risks punishment. Paula Brooks (Lez Get Real) reports:A well place Pentagon source told LGR yesterday, that for Cucolo it is a pretty "black and white" issue... but added the Pentagon is also "watching this one pretty carefully," since this prohibition is "mine field" of legal, ethical and policy issues.... "Personally... Even though the JAG people have said this is legal... I think this one is probably going to come back to bite us in the ass at some point, if not legally, then in the form of some really terrible PR," said our source. "Here you really have issues that go to the core of personal integrity: reproductive rights," said Eugene Fidell, a professor of military law at Yale Law School in a Star and Stripes Article. There are also issues of enforcement, Fidell said. The woman is immediately suspect once the pregnancy comes to light, but unless she identifies her partner, the male could go unpunished despite bearing the same culpability under the order.

On CNN today (link has text and video), Melissa Long spoke with Eugene Fidell who played 'seer' which isn't his role. Don't "assume," don't pretend you know why the order has been made if you don't. You're brought on as a legal expert and you're not a columnist. You're there for your legal expertise. Stick to that, Fidell. In the text, not the clip, Fidell is stating that during Vietnam, something similar happened in that a female service member could be dishcharged if she became pregnant. (A) Discharge is not court-martial. (B) There were a much more limited number of women then and it would be interesting to know how many of them were married or unmarried? Most likely, the order Fidell's referring to applied only to unmarried women. You'll note he also doesn't say anything about what would happen to a man involved with that woman? That's an interesting omission on his part -- and it's an interesting turnaround by him over the weekend on this order. Sarah Netter (ABC News) reports on the issue and John Hutson is sure, sure it's legal. Really? Why? Because the general needs everyone? Well okay, here's what let's do, let's put in a stipulation that a heart attack or a stroke or any health condition brought on -- in part or in full -- by poor nutrition results in a court-martial. We won't do that though,will we? It's only when the health issue is pregnancy that men suddenly want to propose punishments and start legislating. Hutson does worry about abortion access for those overseas. Of course he does. If you're pregnant, you're going to be thinking about an abortion and, let's be real, one's going to be 'suggested' to you by some 'helpful' higher ranking military official. [For drive bys, I'm pro-choice and pro-abortion. I believe it's the woman's choice. That means I do not believe she's forced into an abortion she doesn't want. Especially by some technocrat with a few bars on their uniform threatening her with court-martial and telling her how bad it will be on the man involved unless she has an abortion. "We can go through all the paperwork and the court-martial, or you can have an abortion," might be one way it's 'suggested' to her.] Free Speech Radio News covers the news in today's broadcast.

Andrew Stelzer: A US commander in northern Iraq is being criticized for a new policy that states soldiers who become pregnant or the men who impregnante them could be court-martialed. The policy went into effect on November 4th but was written about in the Stars and Stripes newspaper this weekend. Until now, soldiers could be sent home if they became pregnant but there was no disciplinary action but under the new rule, designed to keep forces at full strength, any military or military-related civilian personnel could be sentenced to jail for being pregnant even if they are married.


Turning to the theft of Iraqi oil, on the most recent Inside Iraq (Al Jazeera -- which began airing Friday), Jasim al-Azzawi discussed the issue of Iraqi oil with Iraqi Oil Minister Hussain Ibrahim Saleh al-Shahristani and the country's previous Oil Minister Issam al-Chalabi.

Jasim al-Azzawi: Dr. al-Shahristani, with no oil law in place -- Parliament has not enacted that law -- why not wait until that law is enacted so that everything will be under the supervision and according to the law?

Hussain al-Shahristani: Well the new oil and gas law has not been legislated. But this does not mean that there are no prevailing laws in the country that govern this important sector of the country of the economy of Iraq and the current laws that have been used in the previous regime are still valid and until they are replaced by new legislation, those laws are still governing the sector. And all our contracts are based on those laws which authorizes the Minister of Oil, alone, to sign any oil deal with field development or any other sector. However, the Minister of Oil has taken it on itself that any unforseen developments for the oil field will be presented to the cabinet and once it is approved by the cabinet, which is the highest executive authority --

Jasim al-Azzawi: Before it goes to the cabinet and before -- since you mentioned existing laws and rules, most probably, you are referring to Law Number 97, issued in 1967. That particular law, Dr. al-Shahristani, stipulates that each contract needs to have a special law, needs to have a special authorization from Parliament. And, according to what I know, you did not go through Parliament, you did not seek a special permission or special authorization for whether the Rumala contract or the Memorandum of Understanding.

Hussain al-Shahristani: Yeah laws always are superceded by the Constitution. The current Iraqi Constitution that was voted by 80% of the Iraqi population is the surpeme law of the country and it is very clear in the Constitution that international agreements between the government of Iraq and foreign governments or treaties between Iraq and other countries that require legislation in the Parliament. Any commercial contract between an Iraqi public company and a foreign company -- as is the case with the oil contracts -- these are within the competency of the government and they do not require any new legislation so --

Jasim al-Azzawi: That being the case, sir, Dr. al-Shahristani, I'm not sure under which legislation you are operating then. Are you saying -- you just said that you were working under existing rules and regulations and I assume it is Law 97. When I challenge that, you say it's according to the Constitution. So which way is it?

Hussain al-Shahristani: Well-well, first of all, there is a number of law, it's not only one law that you refer to and the Constitution, I explained, is the supreme law. If any of the laws contradicts the Constitution, then the Constitution prevails. In the -- under the Constitution, if there is a need for a new law, then that law should be legislated. And that's what we have done. We have drafted a new hydro-carbon law. By the way, even in the new hydro-carbon law, there is no need for presenting any oil deal or contract for legislation to the Parliament. On the contrary, the new draft authorizes what is called a Federal Council for Oil & Gas to approve any contract. What we are doing now, we are presenting it to the full cabinet for approval. Whenever --

Jasim al-Azzawi: That being the case, let me take a case in question. The Rumala contract, the Rumala deal, was negotiated by your ministry and was referred to the cabinet, per regulations, and the cabinet in turn sent it to the legal committee, and that legal committee had sixty-five stipulations and question marks about this oil deal. It was referred back to the cabinet. The cabinet met for one day. And, to my knowledge, those sixty-five questions were never answered fully and, in one day, the cabinet just approved the Rumala contract.

Hussain al-Shahristani: No. First of all, a number of the questions that were raised were simply questions and the questions were appropriately answered and the Minister of Oil has sent a detailed answer on every specific question to the legal advisor of the prime minister and a number of these uuuuuh questions have been considered by the ministry. And, uhm, the contracts, the flow of contracts have been amended if we are convinced that this will make the contract, uh, more clear. As a matter of fact, none of these points that were raised had any legal or economic impact on the contract at all. Or technical. They were purely matter of wordings. In some cases. And matter of specificity.

We'll jump ahead to the other half of the show, when Jasim al-Azzawi spoke with Issam al-Chalabi.

Jasim al-Azzawi: Issam, how dangerous is it for Iraq to sign these contracts and Memorandum of Understanding with no oil law in place.

Issam al-Chalabi: With all due respect, Dr. al-Shahristani seems to be moving on a shaky ground. I think he had fallen in his answers to your question, had fallen in the conflict between the Constitution and the existing laws. The Constitution says that, the two Articles about the oil and gas ought to be explained and there will be separate law to be issued. Until then, in a very clear, separate Article, it says that all existing oils will remain valid. Hence Law 97 of 1967 is valid as he mentioned and he ought to abide by it. That means, yes, the Minister of Oil is authorized provided they go and seek endorsement from the existing legislative body which is the Parliament for each case.

Jasim al-Azzawi: So far they haven't done that. Is that a reflection on the lack of oversight by Iraqi Parliament about this huge and overreaching contracts?

Issam al-Chalabi: No, the Oil & Gas Committee and many Parliamentarians have sought that and they have asked him, they have subpeoned him, that they should look into the matter. In fact, one particular member had gone to the federal court. And you asked about the dangers of these new contracts, I do say that it is very possible that in the future these contracts could very well be under questioning and somebody could question the legitimacy of these contracts and maybe they would be required to be amended or maybe anulled.

Jasim al-Azzawi: We are only three months away from very crucial elections in Iraq and it is quite likely tremendous changes is going to happen in Iraq and the ministries, especially in the Ministry of Oil. Even the Prime Minister might not be in the saddle. Once again, will we see rising chorus for changing these contracts or even cancelling them now that Iraqi nationalism is rising again?

Issam al-Chalabi: Well nobody knows what's going to happen from the elections and who will form the new government but definitely I would say that there are a lot of question marks. There many people are questioning the legitimacy of these contracts. And why did he rush into it? Why didn't he wait until after the elections and go to the Parliament? And also why signing so many contracts?

Here's reality on the law. If you don't have a new law, you follow the existing law. For a moment, al-Shahristani grasped that. Then, under questioning, he began stating well he's also using the Constitution. The Constitution did not resolve the oil issue, did not contain any laws on the oil. That means Law 97 is the governing law. al-Shahristani wants credit (or wants to hide behind) the fact that he's doing something in a draft law -- a proposed law. A proposed law is not a law. If the Parliament wanted it to be a law, it would have been one long, long ago. Law 97 is the law. That's it. When a new law is passed by Parliament (or if one is) that becomes the law. For now, Law 97 is the law. Law 97 is not being followed. The contracts are invalid. If a new government comes into being (meaning Nouri's kicked out as prime minister) and they want to nullify the contract, they can. The law was not followed. If that happens, the countries can sue anyone (you can sue anyone) but the only real case they have is with al-Shahristani who broke the law and Nouri who looked the other way. Even with a new government, they may not choose to invalidate the contracts. But for the life of those contracts, they will always remain iffy and the companies will have little 'muscle' in any conflict because Iraq can always say, "The contracts were illegal, we're cancelling them."

And in case it's not clear, one more time, al-Shahristani (or any Oil Minister) cannot cobble together bits of a law with bits of bill (an unpassed law) and say, "I'm following the law." No. The law is the law. In this case, Law 97 is the law. Unless and until Parliament passes a new oil law, Law 97 is the law.

Meanwhile, UPI reports, "Multinational forces were called on to ramp up their patrols in northern Iraq to protect vital oil export arteries, a spokesman for the Iraqi Oil Ministry said." "Multinational forces"? What MNF? It's the US. The UK's 200 is not in the north. There are no multinational forces anymore. Everyone else has gone home. It's the US military patroling the 'vital oil exports'. AFP reports "the pipleine to the Turkish port of Ceyhan" was attacked and that exports have not resumed as a result of the damage. RTT notes, "This is the second attack this month on oil pipelines in northern Iraq."

On the subject of oil, let's try to play catch up since Friday when Iran seized an Iraqi oil field . . . or maybe it did that two weeks ago . . . or maybe it never did that. As we go through the reports, a hint, if you can't follow or make sense of it, don't fret, no one knows any more than they did on Friday. Timothy Williams and Sa'ad al_izzi (New York Times) reported Saturday, "The Iranian government said Saturday that an oil field that its troops occupied a day earlier was on its side of the border with Iraq, despite Iraqi claims to the contrary." RTT News reported that Iran continued to deny they seized an Iraqi oil field. Iran's Press TV reported Iran's official line that the coverage is overblown and an attempt to drive a wedge between Iran and Iraq while also noting that, "Iran and Iraq have decided to establish an arbitration commission to clear up the misunderstanding between the two countries over an oil well in the border region." Muhanad Mohammed,Suadad al-Salhy, Mohammed Abbas, Parisa Hafezi, Missy Ryan and Andrew Dobbie (Reuters) added, "The Iranian flag was flying over the disputed oil well in a remote desert area southeast of Baghdad early on Saturday and an Iranian military tent was pitched nearby." The Telegraph of London observed the reported skirmish has resulted in a higher price for oil and they add, "An official in Maysan, who asked to go unnamed, said the Iranian troops were still present at Fakka on Saturday, and that the local government would send a delegation out to the remote desert area on Sunday." Sunday Kadhim Ajrash and Zahraa Alkhalisi (Bloomberg News) reported Iraq's Deputy Minister of Oil, Abdul Kareemal-Luaibi, has declared that, following "an armed confrontation," the Iranians who allegedly took over an Iraqi oil field have left. Just when you can almost make sense of the latest claims, along comes Timothy Williams and Duraid Adnan (New York Times) explained that Iraq's Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs is stating the Iranian troops left the oil field but not Iraq while reports out of Iran claim "that the soldiers had never crossed into Iraq." And if you're confused, grasp that you're supposed to be. On such a serious issue, no government sends out "deputy ministers" to speak. You only send out someone that low level -- on an issue of territorial integrity -- if you want to be able to reserve the right to deny any statements made. What really happened? Who knows? About the only thing that is known is that all the rumors did wonders for the price of oil.

Bombings?

Fang Yang (Xinhua) reports a Falluja car bombing which claimed the life of 1 police officer, a Baghdad roadside bombing which wounded two police officers, a second Baghdad roadside bombing which injured two people, a Baghdad sticky bombing which injured two people and "the Mayor of Tal Afar town in the northern province of Nineveh was killed toegher with his driver and his bodyguard when a suicide bomber struck their convoy in the town" also injuring seven other people. Sahra Issa (McClatchy Newspapers) reports a third Baghdad roadside bombing which injured two people, two Baghdad sticky bombings (one was already reported on by Yang but 1 person has died from that one and 1 person died in the second one) and a Mosul explosion which injured two Iraqi soliders.

Shootings?

Sahar Issa (McClatchy Newspapers) reports 1 person shot dead in Mosul (assailants used silencers) and an attack on a Mosul police checkpoint in which 1 police officer was killed. Reuters adds 1 police officer was shot dead in Kirkuk and, dropping back to last night, 1 pesh merga was injured in a Kirkuk shooting.

The Iraq War continues. Ron Jacobs (at Dissident Voice) observes:

It's now December 2009. US forces forcibly occupy two nations -- Iraq and Afghanistan. While the US casualty figures in the former are relatively minimal nowadays, it was only a year or two ago that US military men and women were dying at the rate of one hundred a month. Meanwhile, in Afghanistan, the casualty figures are double what they were a year ago and tens of thousands more US soldiers and Marines are getting ready to deploy there (along with untold numbers of mercenaries). They have been told by their commander-in-chief that their cause is just. Once again, the protest is muted. The government in Afghanistan is a creation of Washington and would not exist without the foreign military presence there. It is also one of the most corrupt governments in the world. Women in Afghanistan suffer some of the worst human rights abuses in the world. Many of those abuses derive from the male supremacist interpretation of the Muslim religion by forces on all sides of the conflict. Many more of the abuses are the result of the ongoing conflict in that country. From displacement and hunger to death and maiming caused by US and resistance forces, the military conflict is probably the greatest violator of women's rights. Yet, the people of the United States have been told over and over again that one of the reasons for the US military presence in Afghanistan is to free the Afghan women.
So, why is there so little protest? Is it because many liberals and progressives who opposed the war in Iraq somehow see this misadventure in Afghanistan as righteous? Or do they believe that Barack Obama really does have a plan that will guarantee peace through the waging of war? If the latter is true, than these folks have truly succumbed to the wiles of imperial thought. There is no promise to end the war in any particular year, much less a specific date. If history tells us anything, the only way to stop a war is to make it difficult for the government waging it to continue to do so. This scenario will not occur within the walls of Congress. Nor will it take place inside the White House or the Pentagon. It can only occur in the streets of the United States. As long as the US government is convinced it has at least tacit support for its adventures overseas, it will continue them. As the recent escalation proves, it will not only continue them but will expand them.
Now, there are many folks who say they oppose the war but will argue that there is no point in mounting any protest against it. Their arguments will include the caveat that protests make no difference or that they will never reach the so-called regular people. I disagree. It seems to me that if the connection between the increasing failure of the government to fund essential services like schools, health care, infrastructure and even job creation can be connected to the ridiculously high cost of the wars and occupations, then the antiwar movement can reach the American people. Currently, it seems that there is a disconnect in most people's minds between the cutting of services and the ongoing wars and occupations. That disconnect must be terminated and the connections between the expanding price of imperial war and the decreasing quality of our services must be made. In addition, the profits of war must be exposed for what they are–theft of taxpayer's money by a small number of citizens. It is a theft on a scale so huge very few can even imagine it. It is also a theft that does not benefit the majority of the American people and certainly not most of the people of Iraq or Afghanistan in any meaningful way. Although they claim to be protecting us, the only thing these corporations and their uniformed cohorts are protecting is their bank accounts.
That does not have to continue. In fact, there is already an effort being organized by the National Assembly to End the Wars and Occupations to hold a massive antiwar protest on March 20, 2010 in Washington, DC and San Francisco.

The March 20th action is the one that A.N.S.W.E.R. and other groups are calling. Ava and I included the flier in our TV commentary this week and, as Jim noted, Ava and I intend to include it in our TV commentaries every Sunday until the march (March 20th). We're doing that to get the word out on it. Ron Jacobs and others are working to get the word out on it but it's really only if you get the word out on it that it matters. Talking about this one on one or in small groups matters much more than anything someone's going to read online. The action takes place March 20th. And if you don't get the word out on it, who will?

Wait, The Nation? The Progressive? Are you trying to make me laugh? Former British prime minister Tony Blair made shocking statements regarding the Iraq War this month and where's the coverage. Less than two weeks ago and where's the coverage. We've covered the remarks. The first time was December 12th, it was big in the Monday, December 14th Iraq snapshot and has been covered repeatedly since. Ivor Roberts (Independent of London) explains their importance:

IT is difficult to exaggerate the sense of shock but not awe some of us felt when hearing Tony Blair say last weekend that he would have gone ahead with the invasion of Iraq even if he'd known that the Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD) so trumpeted in the "dodgy dossier" didn't exist. He would, he said, simply have deployed different arguments to achieve the same result, the removal of Saddam Hussein. He deserved to go as he was a local menace and had gassed his own people. He was, moreover, uniquely evil. There are quite a few things wrong with these arguments. Firstly, it flies in the face of the primacy of international law. Without it we simply return to the law of the jungle, the rule of the most powerful, the world of the Melian dialogue recorded in Thucydides' Peloponnesian War where "the strong do what they can, while the weak suffer what they must". This may have been the neo-cons' nostrum but it is not the basis on which the United Nations was constructed, and it is not the basis on which I served as a diplomat for nearly 40 years.

Tony Blair, Dominic Ponsford (Press Gazette) reports, is blaming the United Kingdom media. Citing Blair's interview in the Sunday Times of London, Ponsford quotes Blair insisting, "We've got a problem with the UK media. They don't approach me in an objective way. Their first question is how to belittle what I'm doing, knock it down, write something bad about it. It's not right. It's not journalism. They don't get me and they've got a score to settle with me. But they are not going to settle it." John Arlidge (Times of London) has the portrait of St. Tony of the Fan Rags, persecuted, misunderstood, victimized, in which Tony insists, ""It's not true that nobody likes me! Reading the papers in Britain, you'd end up thinking I'd lost three elections rather than won them. There is a completely different atmosphere around me outside the country. People accept the work that you are doing, as it is. They don't see anything wrong with being successful financially and also doing good work." When you're insisting to the press that it's not true that no one likes you, you've got a huge image problem. And in Tony's case, he brought it on himself. "I love my life as it is!" insisted Tony to John Arlidge. Then why the non-stop whining, Tony? Credit where it's due, what our alleged 'independent' media can't cover, The Huffington Post does. From Ben Cohen's piece there:

While Blair has certainly done some good after his tenure in office, his obsession with is own popularity shows why the British public grew to hate him in the first place. Blair's immense narcissism and unwavering belief that anything he did must be right led the country into a series of catastrophic choices with profound repercussions.
Blair led Britain to war under false pretense in both Iraq and Afghanistan, both of which were not only illegal but strategically disastrous. He also deregulated the city and allowed the banks to determine economic policy that ended up in one of the worst crisis in British history.


Lastly, in the US, yesterday was a national holiday. Madamab (The Widdershins) explains that it was "National 'We Told You So' Day!" so be sure you celebrated:

Wasn't this bill supposed to be the big, signature accomplishment of the Messiah of HopeyChangeness' first term? Clearly, it isn't going to be the economy. His solution to epic unemployment is to throw trillions in taxpayer money to the banking industry. Oh, whoops -- I forgot. Mea culpa. The "stimulus" package contained 40% tax cuts too. Yeah, cause tax cuts like totally create jobs, man. And they also cut through your tin cans and tomatos without rusting! Teh awesome!
Surely, peace and diplomacy won't be Obama's legacy, despite (hilariously) having ALREADY won the Nobel Peace Prize. Iraq is slowly, painfully, grinding to a partial close per Dubya's schedule (which Obama hasn't changed), while Afghanistan is being "surged," also per a Bush-Cheney timetable. Meanwhile, mini-Gitmo is set to open near Chicago (perhaps Reszko will build it!), kangaroo courts are being convened per Obama's order (unless you think the 9/11 "mastermind" is really going to get a "fair trial" in New York City after Obama has declared him guilty), and torture is still on the table.

And because I'm too angry to write about what Madamab is referencing, I'll just refer to the piece we did at Third on the Senate spitting on women. From "Editorial: Women's rights thrown under the bus:"
The new president of NOW, Terry O'Neill, issued a statement yesterday which included, "The National Organization for Women is outraged that Senate leadership would cave in to Sen. Ben Nelson, offering a compromise that amounts to a Stupak-like ban on insurance coverage for abortion care. Right-wing ideologues like Nelson and the Catholic Bishops may not understand this, but abortion is health care. And health care reform is not true reform if it denies women coverage for the full range of reproductive health services. We call on all senators who consider themselves friends of women's rights to reject the Manager's Amendment, and if it remains, to defeat this cruelly over-compromised legislation." Good for Terry and good for NOW. Good for them for speaking out and good for them for drawing a line in the sand. They say if the amendment isn't pulled from the bill, senators should "defeat this cruelly over-compromised legislation." And they have urged you to, "Take Action NOW: Please call your senators immediately and urge them to oppose the Manager's Amendment in the Senate health care reform bill, which will effectively make abortion coverage unavailable in health insurance exchanges and, ultimately, in private insurance policies as well. If the Manager's Amendment passes, urge your senators to oppose the entire health reform bill."

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Lilith

"I don't know what I mean. Sometimes I just say things. You shouldn't trust me."

That's from Lilith, a 1964 film directed by Robert Rossen and starring Warren Beatty and Jean Seberg. With Kim Hunter, Gene Hackman, Jessica Walter and Peter Fonda.

It's a film that works more for the performances than for any coherent screenplay. The whole thing frequently seems on the verge of falling apart and Peter Fonda appears to experiment with glasses size (at the end, in his final scene, they look huge). Kim Hunter gives the best performance. You may know her as "Stella!" (Streetcar Named Desire) or as the female doctor in the Planet of the Apes movies. But she's always doing something worth watching, even in bad movies. In this film, she's actually very attractive and you like her character. Does she have motherly feelings for Warren Beatty's character or is she lusting for him?

I think a combo of the two.

But he's lusting for mental patient Lilith played by Jean Seberg. Also lusting for her is mental patient Peter Fonda.

The film really requires that you believe all the doctors and staff will look the other way while therapist Warren conducts an affair with patient Jean.

If you can't buy that, you won't buy anything in the film.

Jean Seberg is shot all wrong and that hurts her performance. But she's still giving a strong one. Warren's is less assured but I understand he fought with the director. I don't blame him. The character -- even with Warren's work -- suffers a great deal. It's more 'type' than 'character.'

The line I quoted at the start is probably Warren's best moment.

He's very young in the film and has very, very long lashes. From certain angles, he looks like Ben Affleck.

Jessica Walter deserves strong praise for her mental patient. Near the end, she'll be important as her character and Sebergs engage in an affair. But at the start, she holds your attention even when the script's lost her and she turns into little more than an extra for the bulk of the movie.

Jean Seberg is most famous for Breathless. Warren Beatty is famous for many reasons and my favorite of all the film's he's done is Shampoo.


He and Seberg have a chemistry and the image above captures it and captures what the two are doing, creating performances that seem forced on the director. The performances, for me, are the only things that work.

Peter Fonda kills himself and Warren's 'haunted' in the way Kevin Costner is in The Body Guard and Clint Eastwood is in In The Line Of Fire. He ends the film asking "Help me" with the implication that he will no longer be an orderly at the hospital, he will now be a patient.

It is Friday, be sure to check out Stan's site to see what movie he's reviewing.


This is C.I.'s "Iraq snapshot:"

Friday, December 18, 2009. Chaos and violence continue, Iran may have invaded Iraq and taken over an oil field, or it may not have, opinions continue to come in on the Iraq Inquiry, Iraqi Christians continue to be targeted, it's a bad week for Tom Hayden who finds little to clip and paste into his scrapbook, and more. Today on NPR's The Diane Rehm Show -- after the unplanned bluegrass moment (for approximatly five minutes of the show "Some Morning Soon" is playing over the guests during today's show) -- Iraq was noted by Diane and her guests Youchi J. Dreazen (Wall St. Journal), Tom Gjelten (NPR) and Farah Stockman (Boston Globe).. Diane Rehm: Youchi Dreazen of the Wall St. Journal and you're listening to The Diane Rehm Show and, Youchi, tell us about this software breach involving US drones in Iraq. Youchi Dreazen: Yeah, what it is is that that the video feeds from the drones that are used and, frankly, from other aircraft as well but particularly the drones, the video feeds are not encrypted. Which means that if you're an insurgent nearby and you have a laptop and you have -- one of the programs you can use is called SkyGrabber which costs about $26 and you can download it off the web, you could then watch in real time and download and store the feeds of any Predator nearby which is significant for two reasons. One, the US often uses Predators over its own forces so that if there's a US operation, they have Predators overhead, so somebody who's watching that feed could be able to see our personnel. It's also significant because it shows somebody watching what we're looking for -- so Predators would be over a given highway, a given series of buildings, a lot of them are used along the Iraq-Iran border to try to cut down on weapon smuggling from Iran and this would show somebody watching those feeds theoretically what's being watched, when we're watching it, etc. What's somehow more surprising is that this has been known about for so long. It's been talked about in the Pentagon for so long and no one's done anything about it. This was an issue in Bosnia. And we reported today that in 2004 there was a concern about -- in 2004, it wasn't insurgents intercepting it, it was what if Russia and China basically use a James Cameron-style special effect so that somebody's watching a drone feed, they don't see anything and suddenly there's a tank? Or they do see something, but it's not actually there? So this has been known about, it's been discussed but no action's been taken -- Diane Rehm: Tom? Youchi Dreazen: -- at least until now. Tom Gjelten: Well, Diane, this is a really important story and we should point out that Youchi and his Wall St. Journal colleagues [Sibohan Gorman and August Cole] broke this story this week so, you know, credit where it's due. I think one of the complicating factors here is that ground troops, soldiers and marines are increasingly make use of use from drones and other-other aircraft. Now a lot of the time the troops on the ground don't have as high technology available to them, you know, as the drone operators do. So you have more simplified technology on the ground trying to make use of these feeds and the feeds are providing extremely important information to them to help chart their ground operations but the technology has to be to oversimplify it, it has to be simplified for the ground troops to make use of it. They may not have the decryption technology that is necessary so you can't have really highly encrypted signals coming from above if the soldiers and marines on the ground don't have the technology to decode it. That's one of the issues that complicates the solution of this problem. Diane Rehm: So somebody got hold of this. What use was made of the information? Youchi Dreazen: That's the open question. I mean, the way that this was discovered was a sort of interesting, cloak and dagger kind of case where US troops arrested a Shi'ite militant, took his laptop and started going through it and on the laptop found video files. Then, in July, arrested other militants elsewhere in Iraq, actually from another group as it turned out, went through their laptops and found an even wider array of drone video files so this is kind of interesting sort of spy versus spy, this power was discovered.The military continues to insist that no missions were compromised, nobody was hurt. In fairness, it's a hard thing to prove, one way or another, but that has been -- the military has been adament from the beginning till now that, yes, these were intercepted, yes, they could be used but they didn't see any evidence so far that they had been used. Diane Rehm: How embarrassing is this, Tom? Tom Gjelten: Well it is embarrassing and it's all the more embarrassing because it's coming at a time when this administration is really proposing a much broader uh use of these drone aircraft, the Predators in particular. I mean, yesterday -- between yesterday and today, there were ten drone strikes in Pakistan. Now I think that's the most in any two day period in a long, long time. And this fits into the broader counter-terrorism strategy that this administration is proposing for Pakistan and Afghanistan. So, you know, to-to-to highlight the vulnerability of this approach at the very time when you're really proposing an expansion of this approach is, as you say, embarrassing. Diane Rehm: Farah? Farah Stockman: It also just shows that these insurgents are a lot more technology savy than anybody ever imagined they would be and I think that's the -- that's the new world we're living in. NPR sidebar: Today on NPR's Fresh Air Nellie McKay was a guest. Fresh Air is played on various NPR stations during the day and some NPR stations repeat that day's broadcast also at night and, in addition, the segment can be streamed online. Her new album is Normal As Blueberry Pie and this is a plug for Nellie because she stood up to all kinds of pressure in 2008 when she supported Ralph Nader. It took guts and, along with huge artistic talents, she has tremendous strength. Much more so than Ralph's 2000 'friends' who showed what cowards they really were. Excuse me, cowards and bullies since so many of them not only refused to stand with Ralph but actively tore down others who did. I voted for Ralph or Cynthia McKinney (I'm not saying which -- now or ever -- nor is Ava saying which she voted for). Either was a strong vote. This community endorsed Ralph. When Oklahoma members discovered they only had the choice of voting for War Hawk Barack or War Hawk John McCain, they went with with McCain because they knew there would be a strong push back on each of McCain's War Crimes as opposed to the limp response offerd by so much of the 'left' for Barack's. John R. MacArthur (Harper's magazine) notes the limp response from Frank Rich (a bad 'drama' 'critic' trying to masquerade as a 'thinker'), Hendrick Hertzberg, and others. We'll note his section on Tom-Tom Hayden: Then there's Tom Hayden, the former radical and author of the Students for A Democratic Society's Port Huron Statement, who was a belligerent booster of Obama during last year's campaign. Hayden, too, is upset about Afghanistan, but not enough to cast aside his self-delusion about Obama. Claiming to speak for "the antiwar movement," he laments that the "costs in human lives and tax dollars are simply unsustainable" and, worse, that "Obama is squandering any hope for his progressive domestic agenda by this tragic escalation of the war." Unsustainable? Tragic? There's no evidence that Obama and his chief of staff see any limit to their ability to print dollars, sell Treasury bonds and send working-class kids to die in distant lands. And what "progressive" agenda is Hayden talking about? So far, Obama's big domestic goals have been compulsory, government-subsidized insurance policies that will further enrich the private health-care business, huge increases in Pentagon spending and purely symbolic regulation of Wall Street. While Obama was speaking to the unfortunate cadets, I couldn't help thinking of Richard Nixon and his "secret plan" to end the Vietnam War, a plan that entailed a long and pointless continuation of the fighting. Most liberals would agree that Nixon was a terrible president. Yet, for all his vicious mendacity, I think the sage of San Clemente had a bad conscience about the harm he did, about all he caused to die and be crippled. Instead of shoring up Obama's image of goodness, liberals really should be asking, "Does the president have a conscience?" Because if he does, he's really no better than Nixon. I always knew Tom-Tom would spend his faded years as Tricky Dick's mistress. Also noting Tom-Tom, is Glen Ford (Black Agenda Report -- link has text and audio) who explains Tommy and Bill Fletcher's organization "Progressives For Barack" has -- like Blackwater -- became an embarrassment so -- like Blackwater -- Tommy and Billy are trying for a clean slate by changing the organization's name to "Progressives For America": The left-wing Obamites were the nastiest of all. They viciously libeled anyone that advanced a Left critique of their hero, calling them enemies of a new "people's movement," when in fact it was they who were shutting the movement down in favor of a fan club and cheering section for Obama. Amiri Baraka spit poison at all who failed to pledge allegiance to the Great Obama, calling us infantile ultra-leftists and just plain "rascals." Bill Fletcher and Tom Hayden stuck with Obama like little sorcerer's apprentices as the president methodically savaged virtually every item on the progressive agenda. What else could they do? To break with Obama would amount to an admission that they were wrong about the progressive "potential" of their candidate; that he had always been a thoroughly corporate politician who would lurch to the Right as soon as he took office; and that, by failing to criticize Obama early in the campaign, they were guaranteeing that he would disrespect and ignore Blacks and progressives, once in office. Tom Hayden now declares it's finally "time to strip the Obama sticker" off his car. Well, whoopee. Back in the day, Hayden would have been expected to engage in some serious self-criticism for misleading so many people about Obama. The same goes for Bill Fletcher, who appeared on a Pacifica radio show last week sounding like he'd never been an Obama fan. Fletcher said it was inappropriate for the Nobel committee to award Obama the Peace Prize when the president had done nothing to cause a "fundamental shift" in U.S. foreign policy. You can't influence a president of the United States to do the right thing, Fletcher said, by giving him awards in hopes that he will earn them. But that's exactly what Fletcher and his fellow Obama fanatics tried to pull off when they endorsed candidate Obama on a wish and a prayer when there was no reason to believe he would undertake any "fundamental shift" in U.S. foreign or domestic policy. As a result, the Left played no role whatsoever in the 2008 election. They just blew kisses at Obama, hoping he'd kiss them back after the inauguration. Actually, it was worse than that. Throughout 2008, Barack repeatedly HIT the left and the response was to get starry-eyed and sing, "He hit me and it felt like a kiss." Especially true of Tom Hayden who was repeatedly used by Barack as a public punching bag (not limited to but including the sneer at "Tom Hayden Democrats"). As we noted January 1, 2009: "That sort of behavior is a sickness. 2008 saw that sickness over and over as Barack repeatedly tossed population segments under the bus, repeatedly caved and sold out and was never, ever held accountable. But, hey!, he might have a liaison to the 'progressive' community! [. . .] Likewise, the Barack groupies will have to grow up at some point. Whether they do so in 2009 or after he's on his way out of office will determine whether the people force the change they need or spend the next years cheerleading blindly out of fear that they might hurt their Dream Lover. " People need to get real. That includes grasping that a "draw-down" is what's promised in 2010, not a "withdrawal" from Iraq. Admiral Mike Mullens spoke of the "draw-down" today and yet notice all the sloppy so-called journalists calling it a "withdrawal." There is no talk of an Iraq withdrawal in 2010. The White House has been very clear that they plan a draw-down for 2010. Whether that will come to be, the world will have to wait and see. But a draw-down is not a withdrawal -- unless you're an ignorant fool. A real demand for withdrawal -- not draw-down -- is in the news. Iraq's requesting that Iran withdraw. Caroline Alexander and Margot Habiby (Bloomberg News) report, "Iraq's National Security Council said today that Iran violated their shared border and Iraq's 'territorial integrity' and called on the Islamic republic to withdraw its forces from the region." Timothy Williams and Eric Schmitt (New York Times) add, "The Iraqi government said Friday that Iranian troops had crossed the border and occupied a portion of an oil field situated on disputed land between the two countries, but Iranian officials immediately and vehemently disputed the account." Dow Jones Newswires states they were told that by a Missan Oil Compnay official that "Iranian forces took hold of an Iraqi well in a disputed section of the border after opening fire against Iraqi oil workers"; however, the official tells Dow Jones this action took place "two weeks ago." Suadad al-Salhy, Missy Ryan and Ralph Boulton (Reuters) quote Ahmed Ali al-Khafaji, Deputy Interior Minister, stating, "At 3:30 this afternoon, 11 Iranian [soldiers] infiltrated the Iran-Iraq border and took control of the oil well. They raised the Iranian flag, and they are still there until this moment." Gulf Daily News adds, "Officials have summoned Tehran's envoy in Iraq to discuss the matter, he said. Iraqi officials said the soldiers crossed into Iraqi territory yesterday and raised the Iranian flag at Fakka." Mosab Jasim (Al Jazeera) states, "The Iraqi president called for an emergency session to discuss what they describe as a violation from Iran, but nothing came out of the meeting and whatever actions they are going to take are still not clear." The President of Iraq is Jalal Talabani. However, the report indicates Jasim was referring to Iraq's prime minister, Nouri al-Maliki. Hannah Allam (McClatchy Newspapers) offers this context, "Reports of the incident aggravated long-standing tensions between the countries, which fought a 1980-88 war that claimed as many as a million lives. Although Iraq's Shiite Muslim-led government and Shiite Iran have grown closer since the 2003 U.S.-led invasion ousted Iraq's Sunni Muslim dictator, Saddam Hussein, border issues remain thorny, with sporadic posturing from both sides." If it's been seized, what's been seized? Alice Fordham (Times of London) explains, "The well is one of several in the Fakka oil field, which was part of a group offered to foreign investors in June, but no contract was awarded." She also notes that Interior Minister Jawad al-Bolani went on state television to insist, "Iraq will not give up its oil wealth" today. Adam Arnold (Sky News) offers US military reaction: "A spokesman for the US military confirmed the soldiers had taken control of the oil well but added it was in 'disputed territory' near the border and happened fairly frequently. 'There has been no violence related to this incident and we trust this will be resolved through peaceful diplomacy between the governments of Iraq and Iran,' he said." While that source is unnamed US Col Peter Newell is on the record offering Arnold context. What really happened? Who knows? It will slowly emerge over the weekend, most likely. What is known is that the talk/rumors/incident had one result. Nick Godt (MarketWatch) reports that the rumors led to an initial rise in the price of oil per barrel today. On the subject of oil, there seems to be a lot of confusion regarding US interests. We'll leave out the partisans on the right (to avoid mocking anyone) and instead note that the same talking point Jim Jubak (MoneyShow) which is boiled down to: The US is shut out of Iraq oil money. (A number of right-wingers are expanding and stating, "See the war wasn't about oil." Oil was part of it, oil wasn't the only thing.) Jubak laments America's lack of success in winning Iraq oil fields and points to "Royal Dutch Shell" and its success. Excuse me? What's that supposed to mean? "Royal Dutch Shell"? We think the Dutch are the only ones raking it in at Shell? Check their board of directors. 14 members of the board, 5 are British, 1 is American (Lawrence Ricciardi). 'Foreign company'? In this day and age are we that stupid? It's not "nationals," it's multi-nationals today. Jubank also notes Total's success. Total bills itself as "the fifth largest publicly-traded integrated international oil and gas company in the world" -- international. And we're not even looking at major shareholders in these companies. Again, these are "multi-nationals." That's the key word and this silly nonsense that some on the right are offering is nonsense. WQhat is British Petroleum (another winning bid)? Those not in the know would think, "State owned company in the United Kingdom." Uh, no, kids. BP was privatized sometime ago. And it absorged Standard Oil and Amoco. US companies. It's an international congolomerate, a multi-national at this point. George David sits on BP's board. George David is an American citizen. I'm not sure whether the right-wingers are that stupid or if they think we are but this idea that the US is shut out from the oil fields demonstrates (at best) a highly simplistic view of today's economic playing field and (at worst) a desire to knowingly deceive the public. In Iraqi political news, UPI reports that Ammar al-Hakim (head of the political party the Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council) was in Damascus today meeting with Syrian President Bashar Asaad with al-Hakim expressin "his appreciation for Syria's support for Iraq as it emerges from years of war." The trip might be to make Ammar al-Hakim look more like a stately world player ahead of the elections and it may be to draw a line between himself and Nouri al-Maliki. It may be any number of things but it is hard not to read as al-Hakim thumbing his nose at Nouri since Nouri has repeatedly blamed Syria for the bi-monthly Baghdad bombings beginning in August. Iraqi elections may take place in March. US Staff Sgt Natalie Hedrick writes at the US Army website that, "With the Iraqi national elections approaching, U.S. Soldiers are preparing to support the Iraqi Army and Iraqi Police while remaining in the background." Turning to violence. Tuesday two Christian churches were targeted with bombs in Mosul. Asia News reports that since then Zeid Majid Youssef has been murdered in a Mosul drive-by and that 1 of the men who murdered him "got out of the car to make sure he was dead". They note, "Speaking with AsiaNews Mgr Louis Sako, archbishop of Kirkuk, had slammed what was happening as the national government and the local governatorate proved unable to stop events, and the city's various ethnic groups, Arab, Kurdish and Turkmen, with possible foreign involvement, blamed each other." Alice Fordham (Times of London) also reports on the recent cases of Iraqi Christians again being targeted: Last week 100 Christian leaders and politicians of all religions held an emergency meeting just before fresh violence broke out in the northern city of Mosul, with attacks on churches and Christian schools. On Tuesday a baby was killed and 40 people, including schoolchildren, were injured in three simultaneous bombings. Two days ago a Christian man was shot dead as he travelled to work. "It is terrible," said Fadi, 26, an electricity worker from Mosul who asked that his real name not be used. "Most of the Christians are staying at home, or when they go out they watch their backs." In late 2008, killings of Christians in Mosul by insurgent groups left 40 dead and 12,000 fleeing their homes. Fadi reeled off a string of recent, smaller-scale attacks against Christians, fearful that the same level of violence would return. Bombings? Sahar Issa (McClatchy Newspapers) drops back to yesterday afternoon and night to report a Baghdad roadside bombing which left four people injured, a Baghdad car bombing which claimed 2 lives and left ten people wounded and a Baghdad roadside bombing which left three police officers wounded. Shootings? Sahar Issa (McClatchy Newspapers) reports water department employee Mohammed Abdullah was shot dead in Sulaimaniyah today. In London yesterday, the Iraq Inquiry concluded their public hearings for this year. They will resume public hearings next month. A number of commentators are weighing in on the Inquiry but before we get to that, we'll first note a section of yesterday's hearing. The committee, chaired by John Chilcot, heard from Jim Drummond, Martin Dinham and Stephen Pickford (link has video and transcript options). Committee Member Martin Gilbert: I would like to turn to the question of funding and, of course, the United States was investing huge sums in the reconstruction of Iraq. The scale of the task as it appeared to you, it appeared to the UK, involved an attempt to drum up support from other donors, and this was led or went through the Madrid donors conference in October 2003. Can you explain to us -- both Mr Pickford and Mr Drummond really -- what were the obstacles to securing greater donor support for Iraq, and as a corollary to that, what impact did the then deteroiorating situation have on the attempt to obtain greater funds, greater support? Jim Drummond: I think it had always been assumed that the World Bank and the UN would play a big role in the reconstruction of Iraq, and the UN and the World Bank did a joint needs assessment from July/August/September, so that a report was ready for the Madrid donors conference. It had a price tag on it of $55 billion, which is -- Stephen Pickford: I think the UN/World Bank one was 36 and then there was an extra 20 from the CPA, was my understanding. Jim Drummond: All right. Anyway, a very large sum -- which they presented to the donors in Madrid. DFID and Hilary Benn in particular played a big role in trying to drum up support from the others. I think the fact that the World Bank and the UN had done this made it easier. This wasn't just a US/UK number coming up. It made it easier to get extra support. We were worried initially that we wouldn't be successful. In the end the pledges, I think, on the day added up to about $32 billion, and there were a few more that followed after that. So in terms of money put on the table, that was successful. The UK pledge was getting on for $1 billion, the US pledge was I think $18 billion. So that sort of gives you an idea of the scale of relative contribution. The security situation did play a very big part in how fast people could disperse. We ended up with relatively few donors with a presence in Iraq. As Stephen said, the World Bank and the UN -- the UN had local staff who were -- remained active, but the World Bank and the IMF essentially pulled out. There were relatively few donor experts from other countries and so the main contribution was -- in terms of expertise was certainly the US and the UK. That's quite a constraint actually, if you have got large numbers of countries pledging money but then not having any expertise on the ground to spend it. That was one of the reasons why we wanted to establish this trust fund mechanism managed by the World Bank and the UN. Just while I'm talking about that, I think yesterday you were told -- the day before -- by General Rollo that the UK contributed $300 million to a UN trust fund. The UN -- the UK contributed 30 million pounds to the UN trust fund and 40 million pounds to the World Bank trust fund. Chair John Chilcot: Thank you for the correction. So that's one section of the hearing yesterday. Reflecting on the Inquiry? Peter Biles (BBC) feels, "This will be remembered as the week when the Iraq Inquiry went 'private' for the first time since the public hearings began in November." He's referring to this week when the decision was made to redact Jeremy Greenstock's testimony. He states, "The committee chairman, Sir John Chilcot, had taken advantage of the one minute delay on the broadcast to prevent some of Sir Jeremy's words being revealed. Three lines on page 68 of the Iraq Inquiry's official transcript were subsequently blacked out." (We covered that in Tuesday's snapshot, FYI.) Meanwhile, Chilcot's lengthy self-note (see yesterday's snapshot) is the focus for Chris Ames (Guardian): The inquiry's press chief doesn't want yesterday's statement by Chilcot, given at the end of the first batch of hearings, to be seen as a fightback against the very strong criticism it has endured. Fightbacks are seen as giving hostages to fortune and destined to backfire. But there has been a spin campaign this week, based on the line that the inquiry will be tougher when the big decision-makers appear in the second week of the New Year. Chilcot made clear that Blair will appear in a public session, although he didn't rule out that the former prime minister would also have a secret session. But will the questioning be more rooted in documentary evidence, as Chilcot has promised? Can we expect, for example, to see Blair questioned about the memo written by his foreign policy adviser Sir David Manning, which allegedly records that in January 2003 he and George Bush had made up their minds to invade Iraq whatever the intelligence and whatever happened at the UN? Trina hit on similar points last night noting "that John Chilcot feels challenged, feels his integrity (as well as that of the committee's) is being questioned." The New Statesman has a folder here for all their Iraq Inquiry coverage. [And John Lennon fans and friends (who isn't one?) click here for an excerpt of a 1968 interview.] Michael Savage (Belfast Telegraph) offers this evaluation of the public hearings held thus far by the Inquiry: One theme has emerged above all others. "This time, in contrast to previous inquiries, where it becomes essential, they are prepared to leave Blair in the firing line," said Brian Jones, a former Ministry of Defence intelligence analyst. It is not just disgruntled civil servants or under-resourced military chiefs hitting back, either. Even former advisers have left the inquiry ensuring that Mr Blair has more awkward questions to answer. While the former head of MI6, Sir John Scarlett, told the committee that Mr Blair had been made aware of last-minute intelligence that Saddam Hussein's weapons had been dismantled, his personal adviser also weighed in this week. Sir John Sawers, foreign affairs adviser to the former Prime Minister, said he did not share Mr Blair's confidence that invading had been the right decision. "Frankly, had we known the scale of the violence, it might well have led to second thoughts about the entire project," he said. Sir Jeremy Greenstock, who served as a special representative in Baghdad, added that Mr Blair had told him to make improving the media image of the situation in Iraq a priority, and accused him of giving him an unrealistic target for training Iraqi police. Frances Gibb (Times of London) notes concerns that the lack of lawyers on the committee could prevent a truthful picture from emerging in the Inquiry and quotes Shadow Justice Secretary Dominic Grieve stating, "Having waited so long for an inquiry into Iraq, it is vital that we learn the whole truth. It is surprising that the inquiry is not benefiting from the probing questioning that an experienced lawyer would provide, particularly when it comes to taking evidence from the witnesses and experts involved" Book notes. Yesterday, I noted: "Last month, AK Press released The Battle of the Story of The Battle Of Seattle by David Solnit and Rebecca Solnit. We did a book discussion about it at Third. It's a strong book and an important one. A good holiday present if you're looking for ideas. With Aimee Allison, David Solnit authored the must read and community favorite Army Of None. His sister Rebecca Solnit is known for her own numerous writings as well as for her work with Courage to Resist." December 8th, Ann noted the book and I should have included that. My apologies to Ann (who will say it's no big deal but I think it is). TV notes. Friday on most PBS stations (check local listings), NOW on PBS asks: "Can a breakthrough health care innovation in Rwanda work in the U.S.?" In rural Rwanda, the simple and time-tested idea of medical house calls is not only improving the health of the community, but stimulating its economy as well. On Friday, December 18 at 8:30 pm (check local listings), NOW travels to the village of Rwinkwavu to meet the Rwandan doctors, nurses and villagers who are teaming up with Boston-based Partners in Health and the Rwandan government to deliver medicine and medical counseling door-to-door. Would such an innovation work in America? In the capital of Kigali, NOW's David Brancaccio sits down with Rwandan President Paul Kagame to talk about international aid and Kagame's ultimate vision for a healthy, financially-independent Rwanda. Washington Week begins airing on many PBS stations tonight (and throughout the weekend, check local listings) and joining Gwen are Charles Babington (AP), Ceci Connolly (Washington Post), John Dickerson (Slate) and Greg Ip (Economist). Meanwhile Bonnie Erbe will sit down with Nicole Kurokawa, Patricia Sosa, Genevieve Wood and controversial stand-up comic Kim Gandy (new book: It's Okay To Fail Women -- And Liberating Too! -- They're Just Icky Girls With Cooties) to discuss the week's events on PBS' To The Contrary. Check local listings, on many stations, it begins airing tonight. And turning to broadcast TV, Sunday CBS' 60 Minutes offers: The Long Recession Scott Pelley returns to Wilmington, Ohio, to see how residents are coping a year after thousands of them lost their jobs when the town's largest employer shut down. The Patriarch Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew, the leader of the 300 million-member Orthodox Christian Church, feels "crucified" living in Turkey under a government he says would like to see his nearly 2,000-year-old Patriarchate die out. Bob Simon reports. | Watch Video Alec Baldwin Morley Safer profiles the versatile actor, who talks candidly about his career and his personal life - including his very public divorce and custody battle 60 Minutes, Sunday, Dec. 20, at 7 p.m. ET/PT. We'll close with this from "Elaine Brower to Army Recruiters: 'We Will be Your Worst Nightmare'" (World Can't Wait): I was sitting there in the back office, and then stated "I would like you to know that I am a member of a national organization called 'Military Families Speak Out' and it has about 4,000 members who all have loved ones who are serving or served in Iraq and Afghanistan. We oppose the wars vehemently and are doing everything in our power to stop them." I thought they would choke on their food at that point. Then I proceeded to say, "Since I work right here, I, along with hundreds of my activist friends, will be your worst nightmare!" As you could hear a pin drop and confusion spread all over their faces, I continued. "I am so against what you are doing. You strategically placed this recruiting center so that kids who are either coming out of high school with nowhere to go, or those who graduate college in lots of debt and no jobs because of the economy are enticed to join the military." "You are taking full advantage of the bad economy and sending more of our youth off to die and kill for illegal, immoral and illegitimate wars. You should be ashamed of yourselves and I don't know how you sleep at night." I stood up, took a button off my handbag that I received while protesting at West Point. I said, "This button is for you." I slammed it on the desk. "I got it when I was protesting at West Point when Obama was giving his "escalation speech." It demands all troops home now, you can keep it as a reminder." iraq npr the diane rehm show the wall st. journal sibohan gorman yochi j. dreazen august cole john r. macarthur glen ford black agenda report caroline alexander bloomberg news the new york times timothy williams eric schmitt mcclatchy newspapers hannah allam sahar issa alice fordham chris ames the belfast telegraph michael savage the new statesman the times of london frances gibb 60 minutes cbs news pbs now on pbs to the contrary bonnie erbe david solnit aimee allison courage to resist

Abstractions

What do you see above?

It's an illustration from "NPR keeps selling the wars (Ava and C.I.)" (Third Estate Sunday Review). Betty's kids did the illustration. Ava and C.I. used it and generally, when they have more than one article, they'll grab one of the illustrations Betty's kids have done. It would be great if they popped up more.

Jim asked, "What is it?"

That's why he wasn't using it for another piece.

Ava and C.I. liked that you didn't necessarily have a concrete answer to that question. They thought that made the illustration all the better.

I'm going to have to agree with them on that. I can (and have) study it and wonder what it is? Is it a ghost? A flower? Is there a message? Is it a dust storm?

For someone like me, the abstract will just captivate.

This is C.I.'s "Iraq snapshot:"

Thursday, December 17, 2009. Chaos and violence continue, the Iraq Inquiry decides it's all about them, the US House prepares to give even more money to the Pentagon,

Starting with War Hawk Tony Blair, former prime minister of England and lapdog to George W. Bush. Neil Clark (First Post via Information Clearing House) notes that the Blair War Crimes Foundation has "an online petition addressed to the President of the UN General Assembly and the UK Attorney General, which lists 14 specific complaints relating to the Iraq war, including 'deceit and conspiracy for war, and providing false news to incite passions for war' and violations of the Geneva Conventions by the occupying powers." Tony Blair is set to testify next year to the Iraq Inquiry in London. Today at the Iraq Inquiry, Chair John Chilcot declared will be in public. At the end of the hearing, he declared:

Evidence will only be heard in private in the narrow circumstances we have set out in the published protocols on our website. But I would like to be absolutely clear about this: eveidence sessions with key decision makers, including the former Prime Minister, will be in public. They will be openly questioned about the big issues that they were involved in.

Will come back to today's hearing in a minute. Of the remarks made by Tony Blair over the weekend that he would have found another rationale for the Iraq War if WMD hadn't been handy, Mick Hume (Spiked) offers the opinion that people are missing the point:

Today the obsession with the tired arguments about Iraq's imaginary nuclear arsenal is also distracting attention from the bigger political questions about the war. Yes, we all know now there were no WMD, it seems the authorities knew it before they invaded Iraq, and many of us had firm suspicions about all that for years beforehand. So, why did Blair and New Labour take Britain to war?
There are two bigger issues here that should be examined, which have little or nothing to do with WMD, or indeed with events in Iraq. The first is about old-fashioned great power realpolitik -- the importance of the US-UK alliance to the British state. The second concerns a more contemporary problem: the domestic crisis of authority facing the British elite.
The role that Britain's relationship with America played in drawing the UK into the invasion has been raised around the Iraq inquiry, but only in terms of what one former official described as Blair's 'sycophancy' towards President George W Bush's administration. The New Labour leader may well have loved the limelight on the White House lawn. But the fact is that any UK prime minister from any establishment party would have found it hard not to sign up for the Iraq War.
Standing alongside America in such conflicts is about more than being Washington's 'poodle'. It is the one chance Whitehall still has of looking like a British bulldog on the world stage. Being a nuclear power with the military force to play a part in great power politics is what still gives the British government a place at the top table of world affairs. That is why, for all the talk of how Gordon Brown would pursue a very different policy towards America from the 'sycophant' Blair, Brown is now the main European cheerleader and lieutenant for President Obama's Afghan adventure. It will take a more courageous political class than this to face up to the truth about Britain's place in the world.

Another opinion is expressed by Aijaz Zaka Syed (Arab News): "Blair and Bush told us this war had been absolutely critical to the security and stability of the "civilized world." Just like the morally bankrupt politicians before them did, they told us the war was necessary for peace! Even when the whole world stood up against the war, from Americas to Asia, the coalition stuck to its guns, insisting the war on Iraq -- already on the brink after two major wars and years of devastating Western sanctions -- was essential to rid the world of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction! And now Blair turns around to tell us WMD or no WMD, the Coalition of the Willing would have invaded Iraq anyway. Ironically though, in doing so, the man who has turned the old-fashioned deceit and lying into a refined art, may be telling the truth for a change! In a now infamous interview with BBC's Fern Britton, Blair gloated: 'I would still have thought it right to remove him (Saddam). I mean obviously you would have had to use and deploy different arguments, about the nature of the threat'." Sian Ruddick (Great Britain's Socialist Worker) reminds, "It is against international law to attack a country on the basis of regime change."

Binoy Kampmark (CounterPunch) focuses on the Inquiry members themselves, "The body reeks of musty establishment. [Director of Public Prosecutions, Ken] Macdonald is quite right to note the less than taxing nature of the proceedings so far. Questioning has been 'unchallenging' and the chair, Sir John Chilcot, has done nothing to suggest that things might change in 2010." Media Lens (via Dissident Voice) has a similar conclusion, "In short, Brown's selection of the Chilcot inquiry committee was one more establishment insult to the British people and to our victims attempting to survive in the wreckage of Iraq. It was one more gesture of contempt for compassion, truth and democracy." Of what the Inquiry has seen during public testimony, Adrian Hamilton (Independent of London) offers: "Senior officials from the Foreign Office turned up before Chilcot to whine about how they were kept out of the loop of Blair's planning, with the implication that somehow it might all have been different if they had been brought in. Sir Jeremy Greenstock, our representative to the UN before the invasion and in Baghdad after, even declared that he was prepared to resign if another UN resolution went against us. Prepared to resign? Anyone who has ever worked in an organisation knows that the threat of future resignation isn't worth the paper it isn't written on." Chris Ames (at Iraq Inquiry Digest) looks at some of the press on the inquiry:To get the headline issues out of the way first, the Daily Mail and others focus on witnesses' doubts about whether the human cost of the war was justified by the outcome, the Independent and Mirror look at Sir John Sawers' admission that Britain had some advance knowledge of problems at Abu Ghraib and the BBC covers both issues, as well as pointing out that:"Panel member Sir Roderic remarked that [Lt Gen Sir Robert Fry] was the first witness to suggest that the UK's contribution was 'critical' to winning the war."The BBC's Peter Biles also says that:"With the steady accumulation of evidence over the past few weeks, there has been a noticeable and welcome change of tone at the inquiry."Mehdi Hasan (New Statesman) offers this take on Sawers, "So, according to the head of MI6 - who also happens to be a former foreign-affairs adviser to Tony Blair - it was not 'reasonable' to assume the violence should have been foreseen and that only President Mubarak of Egypt predicted the manner in which the invasion of Iraq would exacerbate the threat of al-Qaeda-related terrorism, inside and outside Iraq. Is he lying, suffering from amnesia or just plain ignorant? It must be one of the three because I can assure Sir John that countless intelligence reports, terrorism experts, diplomats, politicians and pundits, at home and abroad, warned that invading Iraq wouldn't be the 'cakewalk' predicted by the neocons and that it would only radicalise Muslims across the globe, destabilise the country and the region and provide new opportunities for jihadists to attack western troops on a Muslim battlefield." Sawers' testimony isn't the only one being loudly questioned. From yesterday's snapshot:In addition to Sawers possible problems noted earlier by Sparrow and Ames, the Belfast Telegraph states that another witness, also with M16 at one point (Sawers is the current head of M16) has problems: John Scarlett. They note his claim that the assertion of Iraq being able to attack England "within 45 minutes" was both "reliable and authoritative" is refuted by Brian Jones ("senior WMD analyst"): "Dr Jones, who was head of the nuclear, chemical and biological branch of the Defence Intelligence Staff in the run-up to the invasion, said that it was 'absolutely clear' the intelligence the Government relied upon was coming from untried sources. The 45-minute claim was one of the key assertions that convinced MPs to take Britian to war."Today Michael Savage (Independent of London) reports:The Iraq inquiry committee has come under pressure to recall Britain's former spy chief to give further public evidence after allegations that he misled them over Saddam Hussein's ability to use weapons of mass destruction. Sir John Scarlett, who oversaw the drafting of the government's controversial 2002 dossier outlining the case for invading Iraq, had claimed that intelligence indicating that Iraq could launch missiles within 45 minutes was "reliable and authoritative". But Dr Brian Jones, the most senior WMD analyst who saw the original intelligence, told The Independent that it was vague, inconclusive and unreliable.

And those sort of opinions -- which are held by a great many -- may be why today's hearing seemed to be less about the witnesses and more about the Inquiry itself. Jim Drummond, Martin Dinham and Stephen Pickford appeared before the committee (link goes to transcript and video options -- unless otherwise noted, all quotes are from the transcript). Today Chilcot announced that the hearing would draw to a close . . . and then went on to speak and speak in a defensive manner (including the already quoted section about Blair testifying in public). On and on he spoke. "With that I will draw this session to a close" appears at the bottom of page 113. And then launches into a defensive ramble that finally ends at the bottom of page 118. "We have . . ." "We expect . . ." "We will . . ." Criticism appears to be getting to Chilcot (that's a good thing). Let's hear a bit of the defensive posturing:

Chair John Chilcot: In the hearings so far, a huge amount of valuable and illuminating evidence has been uncovered, and that's why we approach the opening phase of hearings in the way we did. We have not been trying to ambush witnesses or score points. This is a serious Inquiry and we are not hear to provide public sport or entertainment. The whole point of our approach has been to get to the facts. We have been asking fair questions and have been expecting, and getting, full and truthful answers. That is the essence of a formal public inquiry and witness[es] have responded to this approach by being commendably open and candida, highlighting a number of issues which we shall examine much more closely as the Inquiry continues. Our model of questioning and our selection of witnesses in the hearing up until 11 January is designed to help to establish the narrative. We took a conscious decision to do this through the oral hearings rather than through the publication of a mass of documentary material because we believe that this is the most helpful way to provide the necessary context. We have, therefore, not yet made any requests to government to declassify documents to allow them to be published. As we move into the next phase of evidence taking, where we will hear from ministers and the most senior civil servants and military officers, the Inquiry will increasingly wish and need to draw on government documents and records which are currently classified, in some cases highly classified, in its questioning.

Chilcot's salutation, or 'ring off,' came as the Iraq Inquiry rested for the rest of the year. They will next reconvene January 5th in the new year. When that happens, they might try pursuing a list of questions Michael Evans (Times of London) has proposed including: "Why was no action taken when intelligence arrived in March 2003 -- just before the invasion -- that Saddam's chemical weapons had been disassembled?" We may go over today's hearing in tomorrow's snapshot but the big point today was Chilcott's need to offer a lengthy defense of the inquiry he is chairing.

In other news, Andy Sullivan (Reuters) reports that yesterday in the United States, the House of Representatives signed off on a $636 billion military spending bill (395 members voted for it, 34 against it). The huge figure only covers operations through the end of the 2010 fiscal year (September 30, 2010) and doesn't include the monies US President Barack Obama will need for his Afghanistan 'surge.' Today the Center For Arms Control and Non-Proliferation breaks down the bill that $497.7 billion of that is just Dept of Defense "base" spending and not to fund the "military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan." The analysis by Christopher Hellman shows that weapons and gadgets rank third on the funding (under "Procurement" with $105.2 billion) and they include such big ticket items as F/A-22 "Raptor" Fighter, C-130J Transport Aircraft, Joint Cargo Aircraft and C-17 Trasnport. $1.6 billion is budgeted for EA-18G Jamming Aircraft. Jamming aircraft?

All that money goes to waste if the military doesn't even understand the importance of encrypting. Mike Mount and Elaine Quijano (CNN -- link has text and video) report an "unamed" US Official has told them that 'insurgents' have been able to monitor the live streaming feeds the Predator drones flying over Iraq have been sending to the US military. The story was first reported this morning by the Wall St. Journal's Sibohan Gorman, Yochi J. Dreazen and August Cole who noted, "Senior defense and intelligence officials said Iranian-backed insurgents intercepted the video feeds by taking advantage of an unprotected communications link in some of the remotely flown planes' systems. Shiite fighters in Iraq used software programs such as SkyGrabber -- available for as little as $25.95 on the Internet -- to regularly capture drone video feeds, according to a person familiar with reports on the matter." Brett Israel (Discover Magazine) blogs, "The Defense Department has responded by saying they discovered the vulnerability a year ago, and are working to encrypt all drone communications links in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Pakistan. However, there are at least 600 unmanned vehicles and thousands of ground stations to upgrade, so the security improvement will not happen overnight. However, officials say they have made technical adjustments to systems in key threat areas to block the signal interception." Chris Gaylord (Christian Science Monitor) provides the walk through: "The setup requires a PC, satellite dish, satellite modem, and software such as SkyGrabber, which was developed by the Russian firm SkySoftware. Because of Iraq and Afghanistan's rough terrain, military officials cannot assume the Predators will have a clean, line-of-sight connection with the bases that send them orders. To work around the problem, the drones switch to satellite linkups. However, unlike credit card payments and cellphone calls, this military satellite data is not encrypted." Ewen MacAskill (Guardian) offers, "The US air force is responsible for drones in Iraq and Afghanistan, and the CIA for those in Pakistan. The CIA video feeds are reported to have been encrypted, while some of the air forces ones were not." Take away? Declan McCullagh (CBS News) observes that the "apparent security breach [. . .] had been known in military and intelligence circles to be possible".


Another known is that Iraqi Christians have been repeatedly targeted throughout the Iraq War. Tuesday two Christian churches were targeted with bombs in Mosul. Meelad Qaseera (Azzaman) reports today that Yonadam Kanna ("the Christian representative in the Iraqi parliament") believes that the targeted is based on "political motives rather than religious beliefs" and "Kanna said it appeared that the government and its troops were incapable of protecting the Christian minority and bringing the perpetrators of violence to justice." Catholic News Agency reports, "Archbishop Francis Chullikat, the Apostolic Nuncio to Iraq and Jordan, has demanded the immediate intervention by Iraqi leaders to 'guarantee the necessary safety of the Christian minority,' in the wake of the attacks on two churches in the city of Mosul." Asia News quotes the Archbishop of Kirkuk, Louis Sako, stating, "The situation is very tense. Just last week two Christian brothers were killed and two more were abducted. Where was the local government? And the Central government? Where are the representatives of the ruling parties?" Spero News interviews Biship Shlemon Warduni ("the Chaldean Catholic Auxiliary Bishop of Baghdad")

[Question:] What is the current situation of the Christian community in Iraq?[Bishop Shlemon Warduni:] Our situation sparks concern and pain. The context is well-known: for years, Iraq has been ravaged by internal and external wars that have robbed the people of peace and basic social services like health and education. The consequences of the last war and military occupation are tragic. The political instability and anarchy has generated misery and destruction. This is why many Christians - along with thousands of other citizens - have had to leave the country. We have lost about a third of our community. It is a tragedy of vast dimensions, which is witnessed by the world.[Question:] Have you noticed improvements in the last year? What do you hope from the new elections?[Bishop Shlemon Warduni:] What has occurred is that the lack of political planning has led to the proliferation of terrorism, which today has its own agenda and destabilizes the country. Legality and security are lacking, the government is weak, and the elections (not yet established with certainty) will have to address these urgent needs, otherwise they will be useless. Meanwhile, attacks on churches and Christians continue: in the last two weeks there have been explosions in three churches in Mosul, not to mention in Baghdad, where three months ago a car bomb outside a church killed two young people and wounded 30, causing great material damage. [For us], tranquility is a small break between two attacks.

Meanwhile Alsumaria reports, "Christians started preparations and shopping for this year's season wishing peace security and happiness for all Iraqis." But AINA offers a different picture for Iraqi Christians in Basra, "Christmas is likely to be a subdued affair for the dwindling Christian population of this once-cosmopolitan city. This year, the holiday falls amid the Shiite festival of Ashoura, when much of the city's population will take to the streets to commemorate the martyrdom of the Prophet Muhammad's grandson -- many by ritually cutting themselves and whipping their backs with chains." In other religious minority news, AFP reports a Yazidi Murad Sardar was arrested on Monday and his family has not seen him since. His crime? Apparently selling alcohol in Babylon Province. He is the last known seller of alcohol. "Freedom brought to Iraq by the USA! This message brought to you by the Re-Elect Barack Obama Committee."

In other news of violence . . .

Bombings?

Reuters notes a Baghdad car bombing targeting "lawmaker Nadeem al-Jabiri" in which 1 person died and ten people were douned (but al-Jabiri was not present), a Baiji grenade attack which injured police officer Mudher Ahmed, a Baghdad sticky bombing which injured two people, a Kirkuk car bombing which injured a police officer and a Mosul bombing that left one child wounded.

Shootings?

Laith Hammoudi (McClatchy Newspapers) reports 1 police officer shot dead in Mosul. Reuters notes 1 "Christian lab assistant . . . shot dead . . . in Mosul," another police officer shot dead in Mosul

Laith Hammoudi (McClatchy Newspapers) reports 1 corpse discovered in Mosul.


In the US, March Forward! is a new group, one that's "an affiliate of the ANSWER Coalition," composed of veterans and active-duty service members including James Circello and Michael Prysner whom we've noted here before. The group has a "10 Point Program for Struggle:"1) We demand the right to refuse illegal and immoral orders.Service members should no longer be bound to carry out the plans of the Pentagon and Wall Street in violation of U.S. law, international law and people's right to self-determination. Service members deserve the right to resist, without persecution, orders that conflict with internationally recognized laws or that conflict with their own conscience. 2) We demand an immediate end to the criminal occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan. Service members should no longer be sent to fight, kill, die, be seriously wounded and/or psychologically scarred furthering the domination of U.S. corporations over other nations. We have nothing to gain from these wars. The occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan serve only the interests of the rich, not the service personnel who are sent over and over to repress people who have the right to determine their own destiny. The people of Iraq and Afghanistan are not our enemies. The more than 800 U.S. bases in 130 countries around the world should be shut down and the troops, fleets and air power brought home. 3) We demand an end to the existing officer corps. The existing class stratification in the military must end. Officers -- who are overwhelmingly from more privileged sectors of society -- enjoy a much higher standard of living. They are paid significantly more, are provided much higher quality housing, and have access to services not available to enlisted personnel. Officers advance their careers on the backs of enlisted personnel, going so far as to send their troops into harm's way for the good of their resumes. The existing officer corps should be dismantled and replaced by enlisted service members who are democratically elected by their units and who are subject to recall at anytime. Officers should no longer enjoy special privileges, including hand salutes. We also demand the right for lower enlisted ranks to unionize and form committees to address grievances with the chain of command, the unit and the military. 4) We demand an end to racism, sexism and homophobia prevalent in the military. These are intentional barriers to rank-and-file unity against the will of the Pentagon, and must be eliminated through comprehensive education and strict disciplinary action. We demand an end to the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy and all other discriminatory measures against lesbian, gay, bisexual, transsexual and transgender individuals. 5) We demand adequate funding for The Department of Veterans Affairs.Veterans should have full access to quality health care. Services should be drastically expanded to meet the real physical and mental health needs of veterans and their families. Independent medical investigations should be initiated to research the effects of potentially harmful experimental drugs and chemical, biological and nuclear agents to which service members have been exposed. Any service member who has served in a combat theater should automatically receive lifetime compensation from the VA for being forced to suffer or inflict physical and/or psychological harm in advancing the interests of U.S. corporations. 6) We demand the right to a job, housing, health care and education for all.Service members are lured into the military with the hopes of escaping economic hardship as a civilian, and to obtain education benefits and job training. Yet thousands of service members must remain in the military, literally trapped due to the lack of opportunities in the civilian world. No service member should have to choose between military service and poverty. Housing, a job, and access to free quality education and job training should be a right for everyone. 7) We demand the immediate end to all military aid to governments in service of US imperialism. U.S. domination is not only exercised through direct military involvement, but also through a myriad of brutal client regimes and comprador governments that are funded, supported and directed by the U.S. government. Service members should not have to serve a military that uses billions of dollars in funds and weapons to prop up governments that are guilty of committing war crimes or repressing their citizens for the interests of the Pentagon and Wall Street. Aid to such countries as Israel, Colombia, Saudi Arabia, Taiwan, South Korea, Uganda and Egypt should be immediately cut off. All remaining funds, military equipment and weapons should be repossessed. Reparations should be paid to the populations that the military aid was used to repress. 8) We demand the immediate dismantling of the permanent military-industrial complex. As long as there is a system in place that allows U.S. corporations to reap massive profits from going to war, there will be war for profit. The domination of the military-industrial complex has caused the death of tens of thousands of service personnel, and millions of innocent people -- all in the name of profit. All private military corporations should be shut down or nationalized. The more than 1 trillion dollars a year that feeds the Pentagon and the military-industrial complex should be used to meet people's needs. 9) We demand that all those involved in pursuing war for profit be indicted.To ensure that service personnel no longer have to fight for the interests of the rich, all those responsible must be held accountable. Politicians, policy makers, lobbyists, CEOs and others involved in pursuing warfare -- both military and economic -- as a means to reap profit should be indicted for war crimes. Media outlets involved in disseminating false information in support of these plans should also be held accountable. 10) We demand full reparations paid, with interest, to all victims of the U.S. military. As service members in the U.S. military, we have been told that our enemy is the poor and oppressed abroad. But they are not our enemies. To begin to undo the injustices in which we have been forced to take part, the U.S. government should pay for the rebuilding of every structure bombed, compensating families for every person killed and providing a lifetime of health care and disability benefits for every individual wounded, including resistance fighters who took up arms against the U.S. military.

Joe Wolverton II (The New American) adds, "In what is sure to be a controversial call to action or inaction, the organization March Forward, a group of patriotic retired and active-duty servicemen, has recommended that soldiers refuse orders to deploy to Afghanistan and Iraq."

Tonight on Anderson Cooper 360 (CNN):Roy Hallums was kidnapped in 2004. He was rescued in 2005. He endured 311 days as a hostage in Iraq. He was actually buried alive when he was rescued and now we have the exclusive videotape of his rescue. We'll show you how the special forces team did it. Hallum says what might appear hyperbolic with a calm earnestness. "I hoped they wouldn't decide to just cut off my head and videotape the occasion for mass distribution to the international media." Instead, we have the videotape of his rescue. Michael Ware reports Thursday at 10 p.m. ET.


Unrelated to Iraq but US House Rep Jared Polis has a column at CNN ("No good reason to be in Afghanistan"). Staying with the topic of TV, "Can a breakthrough health care innovation in Rwanda work in the U.S.?" asks NOW on PBS this Friday (on most PBS stations -- check local listings):In rural Rwanda, the simple and time-tested idea of medical house callsis not only improving the health of the community, but stimulating itseconomy as well. On Friday, December 18 at 8:30 pm (check locallistings), NOW travels to the village of Rwinkwavu to meet the Rwandandoctors, nurses and villagers who are teaming up with Boston-basedPartners in Health and the Rwandan government to deliver medicine andmedical counseling door-to-door. Would such an innovation work inAmerica? In the capital of Kigali, NOW's David Brancaccio sits down with RwandanPresident Paul Kagame to talk about international aid and Kagame'sultimate vision for a healthy, financially-independent Rwanda.

We'll close with this from independent journalist David Bacon's "In Oakland, Hunger Is Multicultural" (East Bay Express):

Everyone knows that Oakland is diverse. Probably more people from more races and nationalities live in the city than anywhere west of New York or north of Los Angeles. But before we celebrate diversity, think of its most diverse places. Some of them are surely the lines of hungry people lining up for food.
Oakland has many food pantries -- programs run primarily by churches on a shoestring. Church elders are often found at the Alameda County Community Food Bank's huge warehouse out by the airport, buying as much food as they can for as little money as possible. They worry that the bags of cans and produce they distribute will run out before everyone in line gets one.
Reverend Lee from the Cornerstone Baptist Church, a food bank stalwart, fills the small storefront off MacArthur Boulevard with white plastic bags of cans, dried goods, and bread. Then the people come. Mostly Chinese-American and African-American families get their food from the African-American activists from his church.

David Bacon's latest book is Illegal People -- How Globalization Creates Migration and Criminalizes Immigrants (Beacon Press) which just won the CLR James Award. Bacon can be heard on KPFA's The Morning Show (over the airwaves in the Bay Area, streaming online) each Wednesday morning (begins airing at 7:00 am PST). And I'm going to squeeze in one more thing. Last month, AK Press released The Battle of the Story of The Battle Of Seattle by David Solnit and Rebecca Solnit. We did a book discussion about it at Third. It's a strong book and an important one. A good holiday present if you're looking for ideas. With Aimee Allison, David Solnit authored the must read and community favorite Army Of None. His sister Rebecca Solnit is known for her own numerous writings as well as for her work with Courage to Resist.

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the independent of londonmichael savageadrian hamiltonchris ames
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bbc newsthe times of londonmichael evanssian ruddick
mike mountthe wall street journalyochi j. dreazenaugust cole
mcclatchy newspaperslaith hammoudicnnanderson cooper 360anderson coopermichael ware
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david baconkpfathe morning show
david solnitaimee allisoncourage to resist