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Today's
Stories
October
25 / 26, 2003
Karyn
Strickler
Down
with Big Brother's Spying Eyes
October
24, 2003
Kurt Nimmo
Ashcroft's
War on Greenpeace
Lenni Brenner
The Demographics of American Jews
Jeffrey
St. Clair
Rockets,
Napalm, Torpedoes and Lies: the Attack on the USS Liberty Revisited
Sarah Weir
Cover-up of the Israeli Attack on the US Liberty
David
Krieger
WMD Found in DC: Bush is the Button
Mohammed Hakki
It's Palestine, Stupid!: Americans and the Middle East
Harry
Browne
Northern
Ireland: the Agreement that Wasn't
October
23, 2003
Diane
Christian
Ruthlessness
Kurt Nimmo
Criticizing Zionism
David Lindorff
A General Theory of Theology
Alan Maass
The Future of the Anti-War Movement
William
Blum
Imperial
Indifference
Stew Albert
A Memo
October
22, 2003
Wayne
Madsen
Religious
Insanity Runs Rampant
Ray McGovern
Holding
Leaders Accountable for Lies
Christopher
Brauchli
There's
No Civilizing the Death Penalty
Elaine
Cassel
Legislators
and Women's Bodies
Bill Glahn
RIAA
Watch: the New Morality of Capitalism
Anthony Arnove
An Interview with Tariq Ali
October 21, 2003
Uri Avnery
The
Beilin Agreement
Robert Jensen
The Fundamentalist General
David
Lindorff
War Dispatch from the NYT: God is on Our Side!
William S. Lind
Bremer is Deaf to History
Bridget
Gibson
Fatal Vision
Alan Haber
A Human Chain for Peace in Ann Arbor
Peter
Linebaugh
On the Bicentennial of the Hanging of Thomas Russell
October
20, 2003
Standard
Schaefer
Chile's
Failed Economy: an Interview with Michael Hudson
Chris
Floyd
Circus Maximus: Arnie, Enron and Bush Maul California
Mark Hand
Democrats Seek to Disappear Chomsky
& Nader
John &
Elaine Mellencamp
Peaceful
World
Elaine
Cassel
God's
General Unmuzzled
October
18 / 19, 2003
Robert
Pollin
Clintonomics:
the Hollow Boom
Gary Leupp
Israel, Syria and Stage Four in the Terror War
Saul Landau
Day of the Gropenfuhrer
Bruce Anderson
The California Recall
John Gershman
Bush in Asia: What a Difference a Decade Makes
Nelson P. Valdes
Bush, Electoral Politics and Cuba's "Illicit Sex Trade"
Kurt Nimmo
Shock Therapy and the Israeli Scenario
Tom Gorman
Al Franken and Al-Shifa
Brian
Cloughley
Public Propaganda and the Iraq War
Joanne Mariner
A New Way to Kill Tigers
Denise
Low
The Cancer of Sprawl
Mickey Z.
The Reverend of Doom
John Chuckman
US Missiles for Israeli Nukes?
George Naggiar
A Veto of Public Diplomacy
Alison
Weir
Death Threats in Berkeley
Benjamin Dangl
Bolivian Govt. Falling Apart
Ron Jacobs
The Politics of Bob Dylan
Fidel Castro
A Review of Garcia Marquez's Memoir
Adam Engel
I Hope My Corpse Gives You the Plague
Poets' Basement
Jones, Albert, Guthrie and Greeder
October
17, 2003
Stan Goff
Piss
On My Leg: Perception Control and the Stage Management of War
Newton
Garver
Bolivia
in Turmoil
Standard
Schaefer
Grocery Unions Under Attack
Ben Terrall
The Ordeal of the Lockheed 52
Ron Jacobs
First Syria, Then Iran
David
Lindorff
Michael
Moore Proclaims Mumia Guilty
October
16, 2003
Marjorie
Cohn
Bush
Gunning for Regime Change in Cuba
Gary Leupp
"Getting Better" in Iraq
Norman
Solomon
The US Press and Israel: Brand Loyalty and the Absence of Remorse
Rush Limbaugh
The 10 Most Overrated Athletes of All Time
Lenni
Brenner
I
Didn't Meet Huey Newton. He Met Me
Website of the Day
Time Tested Books
October
15, 2003
Sunil
Sharma / Josh Frank
The
General and the Governor: Two Measures of American Desperation
Forrest
Hylton
Dispatch
from the Bolivian War: "Like Animals They Kill Us"
Brian
Cloughley
Those
Phony Letters: How Bush Uses GIs to Spread Propaganda About Iraq
Ahmad
Faruqui
Lessons
of the October War
Uri Avnery
Three
Days as a Living Shield
Website
of the Day
Rank and File: the New Unity Partnership Document
JoAnn
Wypijewski
The
New Unity Partnership:
A Manifest Destiny for Labor
October 14, 2003
Eric Ridenour
Qibya
& Sharon: Anniversary of a Massacre
Elaine
Cassel
The
Disgrace That is Guantanamo
Robert
Jensen
What the "Fighting Sioux" Tells Us About White People
David Lindorff
Talking Turkey About Iraq
Patrick
Cockburn
US Troops Bulldoze Crops
VIPS
One Person Can Make a Difference
Toni Solo
The CAFTA Thumbscrews
Peter
Linebaugh
"Remember
Orr!"
Website
of the Day
BRIDGES
October
11 / 13, 2003
Alexander
Cockburn
Kay's
Misleading Report; CIA/MI-6 Syrian Plot; Dershowitz Flaps Broken
Wings
Saul Landau
Contradictions: Pumping Empire and Losing Job Muscles
Phillip Cryan
The War on Human Rights in Colombia
Kurt Nimmo
Cuba and the "Necessary Viciousness" of the Bushites
Nelson P. Valdes
Traveling to Cuba: Where There's a Will, There's a Way
Lisa Viscidi
The Guatemalan Elections: Fraud, Intimidation and Indifference
Maria Trigona and Fabian
Pierucci
Allende Lives
Larry
Tuttle
States of Corruption
William A. Cook
Failing America
Brian
Cloughley
US Economic Space and New Zealand
Adrian Zupp
What Would Buddha Do? Why Won't the Dalai Lama Pick a Fight?
Merlin
Chowkwanyun
The Strange and Tragic Case of Sherman Marlin Austin
Ben Tripp
Screw You Right Back: CIA FU!
Lee Ballinger
Grits Ain't Groceries
Mickey Z.
Not All Italians Love Columbus
Bruce
Jackson
On Charles Burnett's "Warming By the Devil's Fire"
William Benzon
The Door is Open: Scorsese's Blues, 2
Adam Engel
The Eyes of Lora Shelley
Walt Brasch
Facing a McBlimp Attack
Poets'
Basement
Mickey Z, Albert, Kearney
October 10, 2003
John Chuckman
Schwarzenegger
and the Lottery Society
Toni Solo
Trashing
Free Software
Chris
Floyd
Body
Blow: Bush Joins the Worldwide War on Women
October
9, 2003
Jennifer
Loewenstein
Bombing
Syria
Ramzi
Kysia
Seeing
the Iraqi People
Fran Shor
Groping the Body Politic
Mark Hand
President Schwarzenegger?
Alexander
Cockburn
Welcome
to Arnold, King for a Day
Website of the Day
The Awful Truth about Wesley Clark
October
8, 2003
David
Lindorff
Schwarzenegger
and the Failure of the Centrist Dems
Ramzy
Baroud
Israel's
WMDs and the West's Double Standard
John Ross
Mexico
Tilts South
Mokhiber
/ Weissman
Repub Guru Compares Taxes to the Holocaust
James
Bovard
The
Reagan Roadmap for Antiterrorism Disaster
Michael
Neumann
One
State or Two?
A False Dilemma
October
7, 2003
Uri Avnery
Slow-Motion
Ethnic Cleansing
Stan Goff
Lost in the Translation at Camp Delta
Ron Jacobs
Yom Kippurs, Past and Present
David
Lindorff
Coronado in Iraq
Rep. John Conyers, Jr.
Outing a CIA Operative? Why A Special Prosecutor is Required
Cynthia
McKinney
Who Are "We"?
Elaine Cassel
Shock and Awe in the Moussaoui Case
Walter
Lippman
Thoughts on the Cali Recall
Gary Leupp
Israel's
Attack on Syria: Who's on the Wrong Side of History, Now?
Website
of the Day
Cable News Gets in Touch With It's Inner Bigot
October
6, 2003
Robert
Fisk
US
Gave Israel Green Light for Raid on Syria
Forrest
Hylton
Upheaval
in Bolivia: Crisis and Opportunity
Benjamin Dangl
Divisions Deepen in Third Week of Bolivia's Gas War
Bridget
Gibson
Oh, Pioneers!: Bush's New Deal
Bob Fitrakis and Harvey
Wasserman
The Bush-Rove-Schwarzenegger Nazi Nexus
Nicole
Gamble
Rios Montt's Campaign Threatens Genocide Trials
JoAnn
Wypijewski
The
New Unity Partnership:
A Manifest Destiny for Labor
Website
of the Day
Guerrilla Funk
October
3 / 5, 2003
Tim Wise
The
Other Race Card: Rush and the Politics of White Resentment
Peter
Linebaugh
Rhymsters
and Revolutionaries: Joe Hill and the IWW
Gary Leupp
Occupation
as Rape-Marriage
Bruce
Jackson
Addio
Alle Armi
David Krieger
A Nuclear 9/11?
Ray McGovern
L'Affaire Wilsons: Wives are Now "Fair Game" in Bush's
War on Whistleblowers
Col. Dan Smith
Why Saddam Didn't Come Clean
Mickey
Z.
In Our Own Image: Teaching Iraq How to Deal with Protest
Roger Burbach
Bush Ideologues v. Big Oil in Iraq
John Chuckman
Wesley Clark is Not Cincinnatus
William S. Lind
Versailles on the Potomac
Glen T.
Martin
The Corruptions of Patriotism
Anat Yisraeli
Bereavement as Israeli Ethos
Wayne
Madsen
Can the Republicans Get Much Worse? Sure, They Can
M. Junaid Alam
The Racism Barrier
William
Benzon
Scorsese's Blues
Adam Engel
The Great American Writing Contest
Poets'
Basement
McNeill, Albert, Guthrie
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
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
The Great Alejandro Escavedo Needs Your Help!
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?
Hot Stories
Alexander Cockburn
Behold,
the Head of a Neo-Con!
Subcomandante Marcos
The
Death Train of the WTO
Norman Finkelstein
Hitchens
as Model Apostate
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
Gore Vidal
The
Erosion of the American Dream
Francis Boyle
Impeach
Bush: A Draft Resolution
Click Here
for More Stories.
|
October
25, 2003
Iraq War Memories
are Made of Lies
The
Minority of Billions and the Yankee Doodle Poodles
By BRIAN CLOUGHLEY
"Sweet, sweet, the mem'ries you
gave to me", warbled Dean Martin in -- oh dear me -- 1955
(although the song stuck around for years, and pleasant background
schmaltz it was, too). But memories tend to be short and some
are far from sweet. As the White House prepares for next year's
presidential election the American people and billions of us
elsewhere are in danger of failing to remember the lies we were
told about "Iraq's reconstituted nuclear program";
"mushroom clouds"; "Iraq will be able to pay for
its own development"; "500 tons of chemical agents";
"the Iraqi people will welcome us"; "we do not
need more troops"; and similar tripe uttered by Bush, Cheney,
Perle, Rice, Wolfowitz, Powell and Rumsfeld, to name only the
most prominent liars.
Before we look at some memories that
should be kept fresh, please let me explain why I, as a foreigner,
comment frequently on Bush's Washington. (I've had some pointed
emails about this.) It is not because America, qua America, is
an evil place. Indeed the US is a wonderful, amazing, vibrant,
successful nation whose energy and people are difficult not to
admire. (Offer a green card and two hundred thousand dollars
to every Islamic extremist in exchange for a promise to cool
it and they would have to be fought off from the consulates.
I'm only half-joking.) Rather it is because Bush interferes so
much in the affairs of all of us out here. His policies and their
implementation have an enormous and sometimes catastrophic impact
on our simple lives. Getting down to the basics and descending
to the level of non-American ordinary people like me who are
affected by the Bush plans for the world, let me describe our
local circumstances.
To the south of the five acres my wife
and I own in the well-named Bay of Plenty in the North Island
of New Zealand there is a flower nursery, and to the west and
north a citrus plantation. Further along the way there is a cattle
farmer who recently planted maize in addition to grazing his
forty head. To the east is another farmer with about 20 cattle
and 80 sheep. And we have two acres of lemon trees ourselves.
All are modest enterprises from which most of the produce is
exported. And remember there is not a cent of subsidy provided
to any primary producer in New Zealand. We have one of the most
open trade systems in the world. Not for us the billions of dollars
and euros lavished on greedy US and European agribusinesses that
make such vast profits and are cushioned from taxes (and bribe
politicians with campaign donations of taxpayers' money). So
our flowers, fruit, beef and lamb go out undefended to a highly
competitive marketplace. Profits are small, but producers can
make a reasonable living. (In our area most small farmers and/or
their wives have part-time or even full-time jobs in town.) However,
we have one big problem, name of Bush.
The law of the land is that no ship that
is nuclear-powered or carrying nuclear weapons is permitted to
dock in a New Zealand port. Now, it isn't as if there have been
many requests for such vessels to drop anchor in GodZone (as
we modestly call ourselves). In fact it is difficult to recollect
the last time any such request was made. But Washington insists
this is an 'unfriendly' national law that "causes problems".
So Bush has declared that when he endorses a free trade agreement
with Australia he is not going to permit a comparable free trade
accord with New Zealand because we are not bowing the knee to
him, unlike little Johnnie Howard, the prime minister of Australia,
and his Yankee Doodle poodles. (Howard boasted he was 'Deputy
Sheriff' to Bush in the region, but Bush contradicted this and
said he was "The Sheriff". What an accolade, to be
sure. Little wonder the Asia-Pacific nations admire Washington
and Canberra so much.)
Exclusion from Australia's free trade
with the US will mean hardship for Russell (citrus), Graham (flowers
-- he provided blooms for the Oscar ceremonies this year), Harry
(beef and maize), and Gary (beef and lamb). And our 400 lemon
trees might as well be bulldozed down, just as US troops do in
Iraq to citrus groves of farmers who do not tell them the names
of guerrillas who attack them, which would, of course, lead to
instant murder of the farmers by the guerrillas. But our guerrilla
is Bush, because he is encouraging Australian producers to destroy
us by giving them preferential economic treatment. New Zealand
is hardly an economic or any sort of threat to the US, but this
decision by Bush will have an enormously adverse impact on the
entire population (which Bush, absurdly, says he "respects").
He cares not that New Zealand has troops doing his bidding in
Iraq at this very moment ; he demands total, utter, complete,
non-negotiable subjugation, just as he did the other day from
a group of senators he summoned to his office for orders. (Which
reminds me of the story of the autocratic Duke of Wellington
who, after years of having orders obeyed unquestioned, was appointed
prime minister of Britain and met some elected legislators. "D'ye
know!" he later exclaimed to a friend, "I told them
what to do and the damn' fellas wanted to discuss it!")
There is no need to alter the law of
New Zealand about nuclear ships. For Pete's sake, how often does
the Pentagon want to send one to Wellington or Auckland? Is it
going to make the smallest difference to the foreign or military
policies (they seem to be different) of the United States if
a tiny country of 4 million people decides that as a symbol of
disapproval of nuclear weapons it doesn't want to have nuclears
in its harbours? Will it affect the 'War on Terror'? Will it
for a moment cause the Bush juggernaut of militarism to even
hesitate in its elephantine (in fact dinosaurian) advance? Of
course not. But this doesn't matter, because the Bush doctrine
is Do What We Say Or We Will Humiliate And Crush You (providing
you are small enough and can't hit back). This is spiteful, paranoid,
and poisonous.
This is why I and other foreigners consider
we are entitled to comment about Bush and the misanthropic weirdoes
around him in Washington. His pitiless determination to economically
cripple even the most minor and completely unthreatening nation
that dares disagree with his inflexible doctrine of domination
is reason enough for us out here, the Minority of Billions, to
raise our voices against the new emperor who seeks to subjugate
the world. We see Bush as Shakespeare's Macbeth, surrounded by
latter-day witches with their drip-feed of venom disguised by
opaque mumbo-jumbo. Macbeth surged from paranoia to murderous
dementia, and we fear the regime of Bush is embarked on the same
course.
So back to the memories, for they are
made of lies and affect us all. They are bitter memories of deceit,
because Bush was warned eloquently and elegantly by "old
Europe" (as witch, second class, Rumsfeld calls it) that
his attack on Iraq would have a dreadful outcome. Better, said
President Chirac, to wait, to let the UN inspectors do their
work with the threat of a big stick in the background. Just as
President de Gaulle warned Presidents Kennedy and Johnson about
impending disaster in Vietnam, so the latter-day Cassandras,
gifted to foretell the future but doomed to be disbelieved, politely
told Bush his foray would not only be illegal but calamitous.
Hatred of America, they said, would be but one result. Unheeding
of this and other wise counsel, Bush and his minions pressed
on with their lunatic attack, and lied to the world, then and
later, about their reasons. (The latest arrant twisting of truth
is presentation of the 'Terrorism Medal' to soldiers in Iraq,
in an attempt to continue linking 9/11 with Saddam Hussein in
the minds of the American people.)
One person who forever will have memories
of the war is a boy, or, rather, three-quarters of a boy, called
Ali Abbas who was orphaned in a US attack that blew off his arms.
He has been fitted with artificial limbs and is grateful for
that but said last week "They're very nice but they will
never replace my real arms . . . I don't understand why adults
do it. I would never wish a war upon anyone. I would like to
have it that children never have to fear war." (This was
a widely reported interview of considerable human interest in
Europe, but there wasn't much in the US about it.) Ali's sentiment
sounds reasonable, for wouldn't we all "prefer never to
have to fear war"? Well, no, not quite all of us, because
there are some wild-eyed, pseudo-intellectual barbarians in Washington
who thrive in reputation, influence and self-esteem by advocating
violence. We must remember them, for they were the originators
and purveyors of the mammoth lies about Iraq in their search
for world domination.
The memories of Cheney, Rice, Bush, Wolfowitz,
Perle and Rumsfeld are not of war as such (for they have never
seen war); nor are they of crippled children. Their memories
are of glitzy video games of flashing crashing smashing missiles
and fiery explosive pillars of cloud that show the remorseless
superiority of their military machine. In similar fashion to
stomping tiny, inoffensive New Zealand because he cannot bear
to be thwarted in the slightest degree, Bush and the demented
zealots who joined him to create and run the new empire are determined
to crush individuals, groups and nations who dare defy the imperial
will. If this can involve flash crash and smash, so much the
better. It will impress and humble the surviving natives more
effectively : just like 'Shock and Awe', that classic terrorist
principle.
We all remember 9/11, of course; that
day on which every reasonable human being sympathised with the
US in its hours of danger and horror. There was hardly a country
in the world whose peoples did not grieve with America. Sure,
there were some loonies who danced in the streets in Cairo and
Jakarta, for example, just as there were loonies in America who
rejoiced when bombs and cruise missiles blew up such as Ali Abbas
and killed his entire family. (What does the Caped Crusader Boykin
have to say about maiming Iraqi kids?)
Proclivity for savagery knows no boundaries,
and even compassion has few. But global commiseration and solidarity
with Washington were at first gradually, then with accelerating
and startling rapidity, expunged by arrogant assumption on the
part of Bush and his zealots that the atrocities of 9/11 could
be used -- manipulated -- to extend the power and majesty of
the imperial dream. We all have memories of New York's finest
and New York's bravest, but perforce they have been overtaken
by stark realisation that their gallantry has been prostituted
in the cause of empire and a second term for the Emperor.
The world was on the side of George Bush
in these tense but touchingly unifying September days. But not
much longer, because in his arrogance he chose to ignore its
sympathy, experience and advice. Like a charlatan quack hawking
cure-alls for boils and blisters he refused to acknowledge the
existence, practicability and desirability of sensible remedies,
and convinced himself (or was convinced by fellow-Crusaders)
that war on Iraq was the solution for all his ills. His apparent
inclination for confrontation became a pigheaded obsession. "You
are with us or against us" was a not a rallying cry to advance
freedom but a declaration of rigid intolerance. The State of
the Union Address was a chauvinistic and xenophobic appeal to
prejudice and bigotry. The Patriot Act is reminiscent of the
worst period of the House Un-American Activities Committee of
evil memory -- just at the time, indeed, when Dino Martin recorded
"Memories are made of this".
Martin Luther King declared "I have
a Dream" of equality that was created from memories of persecution
of his people. Ali Abbas has a dream of peace created by memories
of a missile that wiped out his family. George Bush has a dream
of aggressive domination created by memories of nothing atall.
The Bush adherents, that grim and devious band of malevolent
ruffians who surround him, are conjuring up the next episode
of shock and awe.
We should not forget them, because they
convinced 75 percent of Americans that Saddam Hussein was linked
to the September 11 attacks, that he had weapons of mass destruction
ready for use, and that the occupation of Iraq could be funded
by its oil. All three beliefs were spread by the Bush coterie.
All were majestically wrong. Some memories, and all those of
the official reasons for the Iraqi war, are made of lies.
Brian Cloughley
writes about defense issues for CounterPunch, the Nation (Pakistan),
the Daily Times of Pakistan and other international publications.
His writings are collected on his website: www.briancloughley.com.
He can be reached at: beecluff@aol.com
Weekend
Edition Features for Oct. 18 / 19, 2003
Robert
Pollin
Clintonomics:
the Hollow Boom
Gary Leupp
Israel, Syria and Stage Four in the Terror War
Saul Landau
Day of the Gropenfuhrer
Bruce Anderson
The California Recall
John Gershman
Bush in Asia: What a Difference a Decade Makes
Nelson P. Valdes
Bush, Electoral Politics and Cuba's "Illicit Sex Trade"
Kurt Nimmo
Shock Therapy and the Israeli Scenario
Tom Gorman
Al Franken and Al-Shifa
Brian
Cloughley
Public Propaganda and the Iraq War
Joanne Mariner
A New Way to Kill Tigers
Denise
Low
The Cancer of Sprawl
Mickey Z.
The Reverend of Doom
John Chuckman
US Missiles for Israeli Nukes?
George Naggiar
A Veto of Public Diplomacy
Alison
Weir
Death Threats in Berkeley
Benjamin Dangl
Bolivian Govt. Falling Apart
Ron Jacobs
The Politics of Bob Dylan
Fidel Castro
A Review of Garcia Marquez's Memoir
Adam Engel
I Hope My Corpse Gives You the Plague
Poets' Basement
Jones, Albert, Guthrie and Greeder
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