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Now Available from CounterPunch for Only $10.50 (S/H Included) Today's Stories October 3 / 5, 2003 Bruce Jackson Addio All Armi October 2, 2003 Niranjan Ramakrishnan What's So Great About Gandhi, Anyway? Amy Goodman / Jeremy Scahill The Ashcroft-Rove Connection Doug Giebel Kiss and Smear: Novak and the Valerie Plame Affair Hamid Dabashi The Moment of Myth: Edward Said (1935-2003) Elaine Cassel Chicago Condemns Patriot Act Saul Landau Who Got Us Into This Mess? Website of the Day Last Day to Save Beit Arabiya! October 1, 2003 Joanne Mariner Married with Children: the Supremes and Gay Families Robert Fisk Oil, War and Panic Ron Jacobs Xenophobia as State Policy Elaine Cassel The Lamo Case: Secret Subpoenas and the Patriot Act Shyam Oberoi Shooting a Tiger Toni Solo Plan Condor, the Sequel? Sean Donahue Wesley Clark and the "No Fly" List Website of the Day Downloader Legal Defense Fund   September 30, 2003 After Dark Arnold's 1977 Photo Shoot Dave Lindorff The Poll of the Shirt: Bush Isn't Wearing Well Tom Crumpacker The Cuba Fixation: Shaking Down American Travelers Robert Fisk A Lesson in Obfuscation Charles Sullivan A Message to Conservatives Suren Pillay Edward Said: a South African Perspective Naeem Mohaiemen Said at Oberlin: Hysteria in the Face of Truth Amy Goodman / Jeremy Scahill Does a Felon Rove the White House? Website of the Day The Edward Said Page September 29, 2003 Robert Fisk The Myths of Western Intelligence Agencies Iain A. Boal Turn It Up: Pardon Mzwakhe Mbuli! Lee Sustar Paul Krugman: the Last Liberal? Wayne Madsen General Envy? Think Shinseki, Not Clark Benjamin Dangl Bolivia's Gas War Uri Avnery The Magnificent 27 Pledge Drive of the Day Antiwar.com Recent Stories September 26 / 28, 2003 Alexander Cockburn Alan Dershowitz, Plagiarist David Price Teaching Suspicions Saul Landau Before the Era of Insecurity Ron Jacobs The Chicago Conspiracy Trial and the Patriot Act Brian Cloughley The Strangeloves Win Again Norman Solomon Wesley and Me: a Real-Life Docudrama Robert Fisk Bomb Shatters Media Illusions M. Shahid Alam A Muslim Sage Visits the USA John Chuckman American Psycho: Bush at the UN Mark Schneider International Direct Action The Spanish Revolution to the Palestiniana Intifada William S. Lind How $87 Billion Could Buy Some Real Security Douglas Valentine Gold Warriors: the Plundering of Asia Chris Floyd Vanishing Act Elaine Cassel Play Cat and Moussaoui Richard Manning A Conservatism that Once Conserved George Naggiar The Beautiful Mind of Edward Said Omar Barghouti Edward Said: a Corporeal Dream Not Yet Realized Lenni Brenner Palestine's Loss is America's Loss Mickey Z. Edward Said: a Well-Reasoned Voice Tanweer Akram The Legacy of Edward Said Adam Engel War in the Smoking Room Poets' Basement Katz, Ford, Albert & Guthrie Website of the Weekend Who the Hell is Stew Albert?     September 25, 2003 Edward Said Dignity, Solidarity and the Penal Colony Robert Fisk Fanning the Flames of Hatred Sarah Ferguson Wolfowitz at the New School David Krieger The Second Nuclear Age Bill Glahn RIAA Doublespeak Al Krebs ADM and the New York Times: Covering Up Corporate Crime Michael S. Ladah The Obvious Solution: Give Iraq Back to the Arabs Fran Shor Arnold and Wesley Mustafa Barghouthi Edward Said: a Monument to Justice and Human Rights Alexander Cockburn Edward Said: a Mighty and Passionate Heart Website of the Day Edward Said: a Lecture on the Tragedy of Palestine September 24, 2003 Stan Goff Generational Casualties: the Toxic Legacy of the Iraq War William Blum Grand Illusions About Wesley Clark David Vest Politics for Bookies Jon Brown Stealing Home: The Real Looting is About to Begin Robert Fisk Occupation and Censorship Latino Military Families Bring Our Children Home Now! Neve Gordon Sharon's Preemptive Zeal Website of the Day Bands Against Bush September 23, 2003 Bernardo Issel Dancing with the Diva: Arianna and Streisand Gary Leupp To Kill a Cat: the Unfortunate Incident at the Baghdad Zoo Gregory Wilpert An Interview with Hugo Chavez on the CIA in Venezuela Steven Higgs Going to Jail for the Cause--Part 2: Charity Ryerson, Young and Radical Stan Cox The Cheney Tapes: Can You Handle the Truth? Robert Fisk Another Bloody Day in the Death of Iraq William S. Lind Learning from Uncle Abe: Sacking the Incompetent Elaine Cassel First They Come for the Lawyers, Then the Ministers Yigal Bronner The Truth About the Wall Website of the Day The Baghdad Death Count September 20 / 22, 2003 Uri Avnery The Silliest Show in Town Alexander Cockburn Lighten Up, America! Peter Linebaugh On the Bicentennial of the Execution of Robert Emmet Anne Brodsky Return to Afghanistan Saul Landau Guillermo and Me Phan Nguyen Mother Jones Smears Rachel Corrie Gila Svirsky Sharon, With Eyes Wide Open Gary Leupp On Apache Terrorism Kurt Nimmo Colin Powell: Exploiting the Dead of Halabja Brian Cloughley Colin Powell's Shame Carol Norris The Moral Development of George W. Bush Bill Glahn The Real Story Behind RIAA Propaganda Adam Engel An Interview with Danny Scechter, the News Dissector Dave Lindorff Good Morning, Vietnam! Mark Scaramella Contracts and Politics in Iraq John Ross WTO Collapses in Cancun: Autopsy of a Fiasco Foretold Justin Podur Uribe's Desperate Squeals Toni Solo The Colombia Three: an Interview with Caitriona Ruane Steven Sherman Workers and Globalization David Vest Masked and Anonymous: Dylan's Elegy for a Lost America Ron Jacobs Politics of the Hip-Hop Pimps Poets Basement Krieger, Guthrie and Albert Website of the Weekend Ted Honderich: Terrorism for Humanity?   September 19, 2003 Ilan Pappe The Hole in the Road Map Bill Glahn RIAA is Full of Bunk, So is the New York Times Dave Lindorff General Hysteria: the Clark Bandwagon Robert Fisk New Guard is Saddam's Old Jeff Halper Preparing for a Struggle Against Israeli Apartheid Brian J. Foley Power to the Purse Clare Brandabur Hitchens Smears Edward Said Website of the Day Live from Palestine     September 18, 2003 Mona Baker and Lawrence Davidson In Defense of the Boycott of Israeli Academic Institutions Wayne Madsen Wesley Clark for President? Another Neo-Con Con Job Alexander Cockburn and Jeffrey St. Clair Wesley Clark and Waco Muqtedar Khan The Pakistan Squeeze Dominique de Villepin The Reconstruction of Iraq: This Approach is Leading Nowhere Angus Wright Brazilian Land Reform Offers Hope Elaine Cassel Payback is Hell Jeffrey St. Clair Leavitt for EPA Head? He's Much Worse Than You Thought Website of the Day ALA Responds to Ashcroft's Smear   September 17, 2003 Timothy J. Freeman The Terrible Truth About Iraq St. Clair / Cockburn A Vain, Pompous Brown-noser: Meet the Real Wesley Clark Terry Lodge An Open Letter to Michael Moore on Gen. Wesley Clark Mitchel Cohen Don't Be Fooled Again: Gen. Wesley Clark, War Criminal Norman Madarasz Targeting Arafat Richard Forno High Tech Heroin Alexander Cockburn Behold, the Head of a Neo-Con! Website of the Day The Ultimate Palestine Resource Site! September 16, 2003 Rosemary and Walt Brasch An Ill Wind: Hurricane Isabel and the Lack of Homeland Security Robert Fisk Powell in Baghdad Kurt Nimmo Imperial Sociopaths M. Shahid Alam The Dialectics of Terror Ron Jacobs Exile at Gunpoint Christopher Brauchli Bush's War on Wages Al Krebs Stop Calling Them "Farm Subsidies"; It's Corporate Welfare Patrick Cockburn The Iraq Wreck Website of the Day From Occupied Palestine The Great Alejandro Escavedo Needs Your Help! September 15, 2003 Stan Goff It Was the Oil; It Is Like Vietnam Robert Fisk A Hail of Bullets, a Trail of Dead Writers Bloc We Are Winning: a Report from Cancun James T. Phillips Does George Bush Cry? Elaine Cassel The Troublesome Bill of Rights Cynthia McKinney A Message to the People of New York City Matthew Behrens Sunday Morning Coming Down: Reflections on Johnny Cash Uri Avnery Assassinating Arafat Hammond Guthrie Celling Out the Alarm Website of the Day Arnold and the Egg   September 13 / 14, 2003 Michael Neumann Anti-Americanism: Too Much of a Good Thing? Jeffrey St. Clair Anatomy of a Swindle Gary Leupp The Matrix of Ignorance Ron Jacobs Reagan's America Brian Cloughley Up to a Point, Lord Rumsfeld William S. Lind Making Mesopotamia a Terrorist Magnet Werther A Modest Proposal for the Pentagon Dave Lindorff Friendly Fire Will Doom the Occupation Toni Solo Fiction and Reality in Colombia: The Trial of the Bogota Three Elaine Cassel Juries and the Death Penalty Mickey Z. A Parable for Cancun Jeffrey Sommers Issam Nashashibi: a Life Dedicated to the Palestinian Cause David Vest Driving in No Direction (with a Glimpse of Johnny Cash) Michael Yates The Minstrel Show Jesse Walker Adios, Johnny Cash Adam Engel Something Killer Poets' Basement Cash, Albert, Curtis, Linhart Website of the Weekend Local Harvest   September 12, 2003 Writers Block Todos Somos Lee: Protest and Death in Cancun Laura Carlsen A Knife to the Heart: WTO Kills Farmers Dave Lindorff The Meaning of Sept. 11 Elaine Cassel Bush at Quantico Linda S. Heard British Entrance Exams John Chuckman The First Two Years of Insanity Doug Giebel Ending America as We Know It Mokhiber / Weissman The Blank Check Military Subcomandante Marcos The Death Train of the WTO Website of the Day A Woman in Baghdad     September 11, 2003 Robert Fisk A Grandiose Folly Roger Burbach State Terrorism and 9/11: 1973 and 2001 Jonathan Franklin The Pinochet Files Niranjan Ramakrishnan Postcards to the President Norman Solomon The Political Capital of 9/11 Saul Landau The Chilean Coup: the Other, Almost Forgotten 9/11 Stew Albert What Goes Around Website of the Day The Sights and Sounds of a Coup   September 10, 2003 John Ross Cancun Reality Show: Will It Turn Into a Tropical Seattle? Zoltan Grossman The General Who Would be President: Was Wesley Clark Also Unprepared for the Postwar Bloodbath? Tim Llewellyn At the Gates of Hell Christopher Brauchli Turn the Paige: the Bush Education Deception Lee Sustar Bring the Troops Home, Now! Elaine Cassel McCain-Feingold in Trouble: Scalia Hogs the Debate Norman Finkelstein Hitchens as Model Apostate Hammond Guthrie When All Was Said and Done Website of the Day Fact Checking Colin Powell   Hot Stories Steve Niva Israel's Assassination Policy: the Trigger for Suicide Bombings? Dardagan, Slobodo and Williams CounterPunch Exclusive: 20,000 Wounded Iraqi Civilians Steve J.B. Prison Bitch Sheldon Rampton and John Stauber True Lies: the Use of Propaganda in the Iraq War Wendell Berry Small Destructions Add Up CounterPunch Wire WMD: Who Said What When Cindy Corrie A Mother's Day Talk: the Daughter I Can't Hear From William Blum Myth and Denial in the War on Terrorism Standard Schaefer Experimental Casinos: DARPA and the War Economy Uzma Aslam Khan The Unbearably Grim Aftermath of War: What America Says Does Not Go Paul de Rooij Arrogant Propaganda Gore Vidal The Erosion of the American Dream Francis Boyle Impeach Bush: A Draft Resolution Click Here for More Stories.     Subscribe Online Search CounterPunch

Weekend Edition October 3 / 5, 2003 On War: Versailles on the Potomac Vive Le Roi! By WILLIAM S. LIND According to the September 23 Washington Post, when America's viceroy, L. Paul Bremer, testified to Congress on why he needs more than $20 billion to rebuild Iraq, he said those dollars "bespeak grandeur of vision equal to the one which created the free world." So now we really know why we are in Iraq. It isn't because Saddam had anything to do with 9/11; even George Bush says he didn't. It isn't because Saddam had weapons of mass destruction, because we have found none. It is for "grandeur," that old quest of kings, French kings in particular. Who, I thought, could tell us about the perils of "grandeur" better the Sun King himself, Louis XIV? To do an interview, I bought a ticket on a flight to Hell (available from any airline except Midwest Express; just ask for coach class). I found old Louis on one of Hell's minor circles, the one reserved for rulers who sacrificed their country to their own egos. The king, like his neighbors, was standing on his head, which was encased in a solid block of ice. I thought he might have difficulty talking, but as I looked more closely I realized he had developed a second face on his backside, with his sphincter as a mouth. "Your Majesty?" I said hesitantly to his bottom. "Not anymore," the king's rear end replied. "Um, nothing personal, but why did the Devil put a new face on your butt?" "Actually, zat happened earlier," the king said. "It was kissed so often by my courtiers, I could not help it. It is ze same in your Maison Blanche, non?" "Yea, these days it seems to be," I said. "No one sees willing to tell George he's in deep camel dung in Iraq, right up to his political eyeballs. But if I may ask, why are you upside down?" "Because in my earthly life, I put my gloire, my grandeur, above my duty to my people. Since I got zings upside down, I am now upside down myself." "And the block of ice for your head?" "Zay say ice reduces swelling." "Not to be indelicate or anything here, but do you find it difficult talking through your butt?" "You forget, monsieur, zat I was both a politician and a general. Besides, my friends tell me French sounds more natural spoken zis way." "Louis, you just used a word I came here to interview you about. You said 'grandeur.' What can you tell us about grandeur?" "Alors, grandeur was ze reason you now see me here. As I said on my deathbed, I became too fond of war. It was my quest for grandeur zat made me so." "As I recall, you did fight a lot of wars." "France was at peace during only a few years in my long reign. I had a policy you would now call 'permanent war.'" "How did that hurt France?" "First, it made everyone hate and fear her, bringing all other nations together against France. It cost ze lives of many of my subjects. And it saddled France with a vast amount of debt. No activity of ze state is more expensive than la guerre." "Were these wars necessary?" "Non, monsieur, not a one. France was ze largest, strongest and richest country in Europe. Italy and Germany were geographic expressions, ze Dutch just wanted to make money and England was a little piss-pot of a country. France faced no threats until I created them." "Louis, did your quest for grandeur lead to the French Revolution?" "Oui, mon ami. I, far more zan my descendent Louis XVI and his good-hearted wife, made zat catastrophe. My 'grandeur' separated ze king from his people. It made ze people into nothing more zan a source of taxes and troops. And ze debt from wars kept piling up, until it was a mountain no finance minister could surmount. Ze debt was ze direct cause of calling ze Etats-generaux in 1789, which in turn created zat dreadful revolution and twenty-five years of war in Europe." "Some people in America now call the Pentagon 'Versailles on the Potomac.'" "To zat I cannot agree, monsieur. Versailles had good manners and good music." "Louis, is there any advice you would like to pass on to those now in power in the world?" "You might want to tell your King George zat I have heard his name mentioned down here lately. Zat is not entirely a good sign." Suddenly, we were both startled by a tremendous "thud." Turning, we saw that a whole iceberg had just dropped into Hell. I grabbed one of the imps who were running toward it and asked, "How many newcomers is that for?" "It's all for one guy," replied the demon. "Who?" I asked. "We don't know. Engineering just told us it takes this much ice to shrink a swelled head from Texas." William S. Lind's On War column appears weekly in CounterPunch. Weekend Edition Features for Sept. 26 / 28, 2003 Alexander Cockburn Alan Dershowitz, Plagiarist David Price Teaching Suspicions Saul Landau Before the Era of Insecurity Ron Jacobs The Chicago Conspiracy Trial and the Patriot Act Brian Cloughley The Strangeloves Win Again Norman Solomon Wesley and Me: a Real-Life Docudrama Robert Fisk Bomb Shatters Media Illusions M. Shahid Alam A Muslim Sage Visits the USA John Chuckman American Psycho: Bush at the UN Mark Schneider International Direct Action The Spanish Revolution to the Palestiniana Intifada William S. Lind How $87 Billion Could Buy Some Real Security Douglas Valentine Gold Warriors: the Plundering of Asia Chris Floyd Vanishing Act Elaine Cassel Play Cat and Moussaoui Richard Manning A Conservatism that Once Conserved George Naggiar The Beautiful Mind of Edward Said Omar Barghouti Edward Said: a Corporeal Dream Not Yet Realized Lenni Brenner Palestine's Loss is America's Loss Mickey Z. Edward Said: a Well-Reasoned Voice Tanweer Akram The Legacy of Edward Said Adam Engel War in the Smoking Room Poets' Basement Katz, Ford, Albert & Guthrie Website of the Weekend Who the Hell is Stew Albert? Keep CounterPunch Alive: Make a Tax-Deductible Donation Today Online! home / subscribe / about us / books / archives / search / links /