Coming
in October
From AK Press
Today's
Stories
September 10, 2003
Norman Finkelstein
Hitchens
as Model Apostate
September 9, 2003
William A. Cook
Eating
Humble Pie
Robert Jensen / Rahul
Mahajan
Bush
Speech: a Shell Game on the American Electorate
Bill Glahn
A Kinder, Gentler RIAA?
Janet Kauffman
A Dirty River Runs Beneath It
Chris Floyd
Strange Attractors: White House Bawds Breed New Terror
Bridget Gibson
A Helping of Crow with Those Fries?
Robert Fisk
Thugs
in Business Suit: Meet the New Iraqi Strongman
Website of the Day
Pot TV International
Recent
Stories
September 8, 2003
David Lindorff
The
Bush Speech: Spinning a Fiasco
Robert Jensen
Through the Eyes of Foreigners: the US Political Crisis
Gila Svirsky
Of
Dialogue and Assassination: Off Their Heads
Bob Fitrakis
Demostration Democracy
Kurt Nimmo
Bush and the Echo Chamber: Globalizing the Whirlwind
Sean Carter
Thou Shalt Not Campaign from the Bench
Uri Avnery
Betrayal
at Camp David
Website of the Day
Rabbis v. the Patriot Act
September 6 / 7, 2003
Neve Gordon
Strategic
Abuse: Outsourcing Human Rights Violations
Gary Leupp
Shiites
Humiliate Bush
Saul Landau
Fidel
and The Prince
Denis Halliday
Of Sanctions and Bombings: the UN Failed the People of Iraq
John Feffer
Hexangonal Headache: N. Korea Talks Were a Disaster
Ron Jacobs
The Stage of History
M. Shahid Alam
Pakistan "Recognizes" Israel
Laura Carlson
The Militarization of the Americas
Elaine Cassel
The Forgotten Prisoners of Guantanamo
James T. Phillips
The Mumbo-Jumbo War
Bill Glahn
RIAA Watch: Slumlords of the Internet
Walter A. Davis
Living in Death's Dream Kingdom
Adam Engel
Midnight's Inner Children
Poets' Basement
Stein, Guthrie and Albert
Book of the Weekend
It Became Necessary to Destroy the Planet in Order to Save It
by Khalil Bendib
September 5, 2003
Brian Cloughley
Bush's
Stacked Deck: Why Doesn't the Commander-in-Chief Visit the Wounded?
Col. Dan Smith
Iraq
as Black Hole
Phyllis Bennis
A Return
to the UN?
Dr. Susan Block
Exxxtreme Ashcroft
Dave Lindorff
Courage and the Democrats
Abe Bonowitz
Reflections on the "Matyrdom" of Paul Hill
Robert Fisk
We Were
Warned About This Chaos
Website of the Day
New York Comic Book Museum
September 4, 2003
Stan Goff
The Bush
Folly: Between Iraq and a Hard Place
John Ross
Mexico's
Hopes for Democracy Hit Dead-End
Harvey Wasserman
Bush to New Yorkers: Drop Dead
Adam Federman
McCain's
Grim Vision: Waging a War That's Already Been Lost
Aluf Benn
Sharon Saved from Threat of Peace
W. John Green
Colombia's Dirty War
Joanne Mariner
Truth,
Justice and Reconciliation in Latin America
Website of the Day
Califoracle
September 3, 2003
Virginia Tilley
Hyperpower
in a Sinkhole
Davey D
A Hip
Hop Perspective on the Cali Recall
Emrah Göker
Conscripting Turkey: Imperial Mercenaries Wanted
John Stanton
The US is a Power, But Not Super
Brian Cloughley
The
Pentagon's Bungled PsyOps Plan
Dan Bacher
Another Big Salmon Kill
Elaine Cassel
Prosecutors Weep' Ninth Circuit Overturns 127 Death Sentences
Uri Avnery
First
of All This Wall Must Fall
Website of the Day
Art Attack!
September 2, 2003
Robert Fisk
Bush's
Occupational Fantasies Lead Iraq Toward Civil War
Kurt Nimmo
Rouind Up the Usual Suspects: the Iman Ali Mosque Bombing
Robert Jensen / Rahul Mahajan
Iraqi Liberation, Bush Style
Elaine Cassel
Innocent But Guilty: When Prosecutors are Dead Wrong
Jason Leopold
Ghosts
in the Machines: the Business of Counting Votes
Dave Lindorff
Dems in 2004: Perfect Storm or Same Old Doldrums?
Paul de Rooij
Predictable
Propaganda: Four Monts of US Occupation
Website of the Day
Laughing Squid
August 30 / Sept. 1,
2003
Alexander Cockburn
Handmaiden
in Babylon: Annan, Vieiera de Mello and the Decline and Fall
of the UN
Saul Landau
Schwarzenegger
and Cuban Migration
Standard Schaefer
Who
Benefited from the Tech Bubble: an Interview with Michael Hudson
Gary Leupp
Mel Gibson's Christ on Trial
William S. Lind
Send the Neocons to Baghdad
Augustin Velloso
Aznar: Spain's Super Lackey
Jorge Mariscal
The Smearing of Cruz Bustamante
John Ross
A NAFTA for Energy? The US Looks to Suck Up Mexico's Power
Mickey Z.
War is a Racket: The Wisdom of Gen. Smedley Butler
Elaine Cassel
Ashcroft's Traveling Patriot Show Isn't Winning Many Converts
Stan Cox
Pirates of the Caribbean: the WTO Comes to Cancun
Tom and Judy Turnipseed
Take Back Your Time Day
Adam Engel
The Red Badge of Knowledge: a Review of TDY
Adam Engel
An Eye on Intelligence: an Interview with Douglas Valentine
Susan Davis
Northfork,
an Accidental Review
Nicholas Rowe
Dance
and the Occupation
Mark Zepezauer
Operation
Candor
Poets' Basement
Albert, Guthrie and Hamod
Website of the Weekend
Downhill
Battle
August 29, 2003
Lenni Brenner
God
and the Democratic Wing of the Democratic Party
Brian Cloughley
When in Doubt, Lie Your Head Off
Alice Slater
Bush Nuclear Policy is a Recipe for National Insecurity
David Krieger
What Victory?
Marjorie Cohn
The Thin Blue Line: How the US Occupation of Iraq Imperils International
Law
Richard Glen Boire
Saying Yes to Drugs!
Bister, Estrin and Jacobs
Howard Dean, the Progressive Anti-War Candidate? Some Vermonters
Give Their Views
Website of the Day
DirtyBush
August 28, 2003
Gilad Atzmon
The
Most Common Mistakes of Israelis
David Vest
Moore's
Monument: Cement Shoes for the Constitution
David Lindorff
Shooting Ali in the Back: Why the Pacification is Doomed
Chris Floyd
Cheap Thrills: Bush Lies to Push His War
Wayne Madsen
Restoring the Good, Old Term "Bum"
Elaine Cassel
Not Clueless in Chicago
Stan Goff
Nukes in the Dark
Tariq Ali
Occupied
Iraq Will Never Know Peace
Arnold Schwarzenegger
Behold, My Package
Website of the Day
Palestinian
Artists
August 27, 2003
Bruce Jackson
Little
Deaths: Hiding the Body Count in Iraq
John Feffer
Nuances and North Korea: Six Countries in Search of a Solution
Dave Riley
an Interview with Tariq Ali on the Iraq War
Lacey Phillabaum
Bush's Holy War in the Forests
Steve Niva
Israel's
Assassination Policy: the Trigger for Suicide Bombings?
Website of the Day
The Dean Deception
August 26, 2003
Robert Fisk
Smearing the Dead
David Lindorff
The
Great Oil Gouge: Burning Up that Tax Rebate
Sarmad S. Ali
Baghdad is Deadlier Than Ever: the View of an Iraqi Coroner
Christopher Brauchli
Bush Administration Equates Medical Pot Smokers with Segregationists
Juliana Fredman
Collective Punishment on the West Bank: Dialysis, Checkpoints
and a Palestinian Madonna
Larry Siems
Ghosts of Regime Changes Past in Guatemala
Elaine Cassel
Onward, Ashcroft Soldiers!
Saul Landau
Bush:
a Modern Ahab or a Toy Action Figure?
Congratulations
to CounterPuncher Gilad Atzmon! BBC Names EXILE Top Jazz CD
August 25, 2003
Kurt Nimmo
Israeli Outlaws in America
David Bacon
In Iraq, Labor Protest is a Crime
Thomas P. Healy
The Govs Come to Indy: Corps Welcome; Citizens Locked Out
Norman Madarasz
In an Elephant's Whirl: the US/Canada Relationship After the
Iraq Invasion
Salvador Peralta
The Politics of Focus Groups
Jack McCarthy
Who Killed Jancita Eagle Deer?
Uri Avnery
A Drug
for the Addict
August 23/24, 2003
Forrest Hylton
Rumsfeld
Does Bogota
Robert Fisk
The Cemetery at Basra
Veteran Intelligence Professionals for
Sanity
Insults to Intelligence
Andrew C. Long
Exile on Bliss Street: The Terrorist Threat and the English Professor
Jeremy Bigwood
The Toxic War on Drugs: Monsanto Weedkiller Linked to Powerful
Fungus
Jeffrey St. Clair
Forest
or Against Us: the Bush Doctor Calls on Oregon
Cynthia McKinney
Bring the Troops Home, Now!
David Krieger
So Many Deaths, So Few Answers: Approaching the Second Anniversary
of 9/11
Julie Hilden
A Constitutional Right to be a Human Shield
Dave Lindorff
Marketplace
Medicine
Standard Schaefer
Unholy Trinity: Falwell's Anti-Abortion Attack on Health and
Free Speech
Catherine Dong
Kucinich and FirstEnergy
José Tirado
History Hurts: Why Let the Dems Repeat It?
Ron Jacobs
Springsteen's America
Gavin Keeney
The Infernal Machine
Adam Engel
A Fan's Notations
William Mandel
Five Great Indie Films
Walt Brasch
An American Frog Fable
Poets' Basement
Reiss, Kearney, Guthrie, Albert and Alam
Website of the Weekend
The Hutton Inquiry
August 22, 2003
Carole Harper
Post-Sandinista
Nicaragua
John Chuckman
George Will: the Marquis of Mendacity
Richard Thieme
Operation Paperclip Revisited
Chris Floyd
Dubya Indemnity: Bush Barons Beyond the Reach of Law?
Issam Nashashibi
Palestinians
and the Right of Return: a Rigged Survey
Mary Walworth
Other People's Kids
Ron Jacobs
The
Darkening Tunnel
Website of the Day
Current Energy
August 21, 2003
Robert Fisk
The US
Needs to Blame Anyone But Locals for UN Bombing
Virginia Tilley
The Quisling Policies of the UN in Iraq: Toward a Permanent War?
Rep. Henry Waxman
Bush Owes the Public Some Serious Answers on Iraq
Ben Terrall
War Crimes and Punishment in Indonesia: Rapes, Murders and Slaps
on the Wrists
Elaine Cassel
Brother John Ashcroft's Traveling Patriot Salvation Show
Christopher Brauchli
Getting Gouged by Banks
Marjorie Cohn
Sergio Vieira de Mello: Victim of Terrorism or US Policy in Iraq?
Vicente Navarro
Media
Double Standards: The Case of Mr. Aznar, Friend of Bush
Website of the Day
The Intelligence Squad
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.
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September
10, 2003
Cancun
Reality Show
Make
Or Break Meet for WTO: Will It Turn Into a Tropical Seattle?
By JOHN ROSS
CANCUN QUINTANA ROO.
The fifth ministerial meeting of the World Trade
Organization (WTO) upcoming in this Caribbean tourist paradise
September 10th-14th will be a make or break session for that
beleaguered champion of the corporate globalization of the world's
economies. With 146 member nations on hand, most of them grouped
as 'poor' or 'developing' and united in their resistance to the
edicts of the big power blocs like the Quad (U.S., Canada, UE,
and Japan), and tens of thousands of demonstrators banging on
the gates of the swank Cancun hotel zone, the prospects for a
tropical Seattle have organizers and the host country fretting.
Three levels of Mexican police led by
the crack Federal Preventative Police (PFP) plus elements of
the military and reportedly, in open violation of national sovereignty,
U.S. anti-terrorism units, will lock down sea, air, and land
routes around the meeting site and try to keep the protesters
at bay.
Precedent for confrontation was set during
a February 2001 World Economic Council Cancun roadshow when police
brutally beat Mexican "globalphobes" into the sand
during a speech by President Vicente Fox. Fox will open the WTO
huddle along with U.N. secretary-general Kofi Annan.
Like many recent sites of high-profile
global conclaves, the WTO meeting will take place on an isolated
strip of beachfront hotels that have been sealed off for weeks
in anticipation of the conference. Separated from the city of
Cancun by a causeway, the hotel zone is accessed by a single
avenue fronted on one side by the luxury hotels and on the other
by a lagoon with an active crocodile population.
Weather conditions for this high-end
trade summit are not comforting either. The WTO will meet as
the local hurricane season is reaching its peak and Cancun has
been repeatedly ravaged by such disturbances--most rudely on
September 14th 1988 when "Gilbert" wrecked the hotel
zone.
Cancun, which appropriately enough translates
to "nest of snakes" in Yucatan Maya, is a congruent
stage for this global clambake. The resort city, which first
took off in the 1970s and is now the fastest-growing urban entity
in the country, did not even exist before international entrepreneurs
dredged sparkling white sand from the Caribbean and converted
rough limestone outcroppings into some of the most photogenic
beaches in the world. Then the transnationals moved in and contracted
thousands of Mayan Indian laborers to build the hotels, some
of them replicas of Mayan temples.
For the past 30 years, global travel
moguls have been flying in pre-paid package tour customers to
fill the hotels to near capacity. Spring break, when tens of
thousands of U.S. college students fly in to guzzle Margueritas
and barf on public thoroughfares is a particularly high season.
Meanwhile, the hotel maids and construction
workers have settled in "regions" carved from the jungle
out by the international airport which feature unpaved streets,
oozing sewage, no electricity, and bad water to compensate them
for the "privilege" of serving the tourists. Most are
Mayans from rural Quintana Roo state and the surrounding Yucatan
peninsula who have descended upon this government-designated
"pole of development" to support their families back
in the villages--the migration has seriously disrupted the social
fabric in Yucatan Mayan communities.
In other words, Cancun is an apt metaphor
for the way Globalization impacts the third world..
The WTO's Cancun junta is conceived of
as the crown jewel of the so-called Doha or "development"
round of trade negotiations supposedly designed to bridge the
gap between the rich north and the impoverished south. Two years
ago, the WTO convened in far-off Doha Qatar, now the site of
the U.S. Central Command's Iraqi operation, after its 1999 fracaso
in Seattle when the anti-globalization movement first erupted
and the poorer nations revolted against the hegemony of the Quad.
Globalization had a full head of steam until it was derailed
in Seattle and it has been a bumpy haul to get enthusiasm back
on track.
Doha was seen as a way to recoup and
reconcile differences between poor and developing nations and
the first world. The negotiations have focused on four themes--agriculture,
intellectual property "rights", tariffs on manufactured
goods (textiles), and preferential treatment for the have-not
countries. No agreements were reached by the March 31st deadline
for the Cancun agenda, and Pascal Lamay, the European Union commerce
minister, is gloomy about prospects for breaking the logjam in
Cancun. "Given the weaknesses in the world economy, failure
to reach agreement will have significant negative impacts for
the future" Lamay told reporters last week in Brussels.
Negotiations are snarled around two key
issues: U.S.-U.E. agricultural subsidies, and pharmaceutical
industry patents on vital drugs for AIDS, Tuberculosis, Malaria,
and 20 other life-threatening diseases.
Since Doha, U.S. president George W.
Bush, who raises millions in campaign contributions from pharmaceutical
giants, has been adamant about not relinquishing patent rights
to allow poor nations cheap access to such medications. The Bush
position, which clearly places profits above the lives of millions
of poor people, has painted the WTO into a bad image corner and
this August, the White House had a sudden change of heart.
In an effort to grease the skids for
Cancun and infuse the World Trade Organization with a more 'humanitarian'
glow, the U.S. is now offering a complicated protocol that will
permit drug makers in developing nations like India and Brazil
to manufacture and sell generic versions of expensive life-saving
drugs to the world's poorest 27 nations.
On the other hand, less poor countries
like Mexico are being pressured into pledging that they will
not "exploit" the patent exception--except in cases
of a "national epidemic emergency" as defined by the
WTO and its powerful Committee of Experts (whose members are
largely drawn from transnational corporations.)
"It will be interesting to see how
the Mexican government explains to dying third world AIDS patients
why they are still paying first world prices to stay alive"
writes prominent Mexican anti-globalization activist Sylvia Ribiero.
Oxfam, a significant player in the NGO community, describes the
U.S. offer, which is expected to be ratified at Cancun, as "20
pages of clauses no one can understand."
But if agreement is imminent on drug
patents, agriculture will not be so easy to unknot. The sticking
point is the enormous subsidies Quad nations shell out to their
farmers. The disparities north and south of the Mexican border
are illustrative: U.S. farmers receive per capita $21,000 hand-outs
a year from their department of agriculture; Mexicans $700 if
they fall under the government's purview. $10 billion in subsidies
to U.S .corn farmers enables them to dump their grain in Mexico
at 20% below cost, and, affirms a recent Oxfam study "Dumping
Across Borders", is driving Mexican campesinos off their
land and into the immigration stream.
Of 6,000.000 tons of U.S.-Canadian corn
that Mexico imports each year under that beacon of globalization,
the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), 4,000,000 are
thought to be transgenic, presenting a palpable threat to the
germ plasma of the oldest corn culture on earth.
But U.S. subsidies pale when compared
to the U.E. which expends $2.50 USD daily to keep a single cow
grazing in a pasture. The Japanese pay-outs are even more grotesque--$7.50
per cow. Most of the world's population barely survives on $1
to $2 a day.
A recent Iowa State University study
reveals that radical readjustment of first world agricultural
subsidies and tariffs would transfer $60 billion each year to
poor exporters--more than the total amount invested by donor
countries in third world development. Nonetheless, high subsidies
are a political hot potato in the Quad nations--two years ago,
in defiance of international trends, George W. Bush jumped aid
by 80% to big U.S. farmers, a move which provoked Mexico to file
a dumping claim with the WTO.
On the heels of the drug "agreement:
(if that's what it was), Washington and the European Union struck
a deal on limiting subsidies on all agricultural products--but
not eliminating them as had been demanded by poor and developing
countries. The accord, which makes no mention of dumping or preferential
treatment for fragile one-crop economies has not flown well in
the south and pessimism about reaching consensus in Cancun reigns.
Professor John Odell, a University of Southern California professor
who writes extensively on arcane WTO matters, even calculates
that disaffected poor and developing nations could walk out on
the session if their concerns are not addressed, crippling the
Doha round whose centerpiece is agriculture, and even dooming
the WTO.
Similarly, U.S. trade rep Robert Zoellick,
known in the trade as 'the father of NAFTA', who is heading a
700-member delegation to the talks, has indicated that Washington
is prepared to go it alone if consensus fails in Cancun.
While Mexico's anti-globalization movement
is not large (a recent Pew Institute survey indicates 51% acceptance
for global commerce here), it has a strong and combative campesino
movement that has been much in motion recently on the issue of
NAFTA-related dumping, and 10,000 farmers are expected to take
to the Cancun streets during the WTO reality show. Principal
organizers include the National Union of Autonomous Regional
Organizations (UNORCA),which groups together 4000 independent
farmers' groups, and is organizing Mayan campesinos from Quintana
Roo and the Yucatan to storm the WTO meet.
Also on hand will be Via Campesina, an
international coalition of farmers from 70 distinct nations that
represents a constituency of 100,000,000 farmers and their families.
Among Via Campesina contingents that will be in evidence in Cancun
are Brazil's Sem Terras or landless farmers, and campesino organizations
from several close-by Central American countries. The farmers
are expected to be joined by urban workers--the National Workers
Union (UNT) will caravan to Cancun from Mexico City.
Major concentrations are set for September
10th during the opening round and the 13th, a day of international
action against the WTO and the U.S. invasion of Iraq. Campesino
organizers have repeatedly vowed their determination to reach
the heavily-protected hotel zone.
With 50 international forums ranging
in focus from alternative media to fishing to Iraq, a visit by
the Greenpeace "Rainbow Warrior", many marches and
"casarolas" on the daily docket, a fair trade fair,
plus abundant cultural happenings, the Cancun anti-global gathering
will be a full spectrum rainbow. World Beat anti-global superstar
Manu Chao is rumored to be on his way.
Chao is said to be one of 60 dangerous
globalphobes included on a Mexican government watch list recently
revealed by the daily Reforma. Also in the rogues gallery (whose
existence is denied by the Fox administration): the mild-mannered
Noam Chomsky, Jose Bove, the charismatic French goat farmer (a
French judge has barred him from leaving his country), the California
spiritual feminist leader Starhawk, and John Sellers (the Ruckus
Society) and Kevin Danaher (Global Exchange), the architects
of Seattle. Also singled out: Lucca Casparini, leader of the
"Monos Blancos" (White Overalls) and veteran of many
European campaigns, the ultra-left students from the General
Strike Council at the National University (UNAM), and the machete-wielding
farmers of San Salvador Atenco.
Although the Fox government officially
"welcomes" the protests, it is charging foreign activists
$100 for a special visa to attend. Cancun municipal authorities
expect a $35 million USD windfall from the WTO conclave.
Violence is always a side-bar to global
protest and Cancun will not lack for its anarchist Black Bloc--the
Carlo Giuliani Brigade, named for the Italian activist killed
by police during the Genoa G-8 protests two summers ago--the
brigade, led by Mexican punks, includes veterans of the Cancun
clashes at the World Economic Forum.
The White Overalls ("Tutti Bianchis'),
who in 2001 accompanied the Zapatista Army of National Liberation
(EZLN) up to Mexico City from Chiapas, has also made it clear
that it considers the WTO an illegitimate organization and will
not respect restricted zones.
Whether the Zapatistas, whose 1996 "InterGalatica"
forum in the Lacandon jungle sewed the seeds of Seattle, will
put in an appearance is uncertain. At the recent inauguration
of their "Caracol" centers in the highlands of Chiapas,
the rebels insisted their "word" would be heard in
Cancun--but whether it will be accompanied by their bodies is
anyone's guess. With the moral authority the EZLN has cultivated
over the past ten years on the Mexican and international Left,
the Zapatistas may be the only leadership force that can mediate
with those who insist on violent confrontation in Cancun.
John Ross
will be covering the inside and outside of the Cancun clambake.
Stay tuned for the highlights.
Weekend
Edition Features for Sept. 1 / 7, 2003
Neve Gordon
Strategic
Abuse: Outsourcing Human Rights Violations
Gary Leupp
Shiites
Humiliate Bush
Saul Landau
Fidel
and The Prince
Denis Halliday
Of Sanctions and Bombings: the UN Failed the People of Iraq
John Feffer
Hexangonal Headache: N. Korea Talks Were a Disaster
Ron Jacobs
The Stage of History
M. Shahid Alam
Pakistan "Recognizes" Israel
Laura Carlson
The Militarization of the Americas
Elaine Cassel
The Forgotten Prisoners of Guantanamo
James T. Phillips
The Mumbo-Jumbo War
Bill Glahn
RIAA Watch: Slumlords of the Internet
Walter A. Davis
Living in Death's Dream Kingdom
Adam Engel
Midnight's Inner Children
Poets' Basement
Stein, Guthrie and Albert
Book of the Weekend
It Became Necessary to Destroy the Planet in Order to Save It
by Khalil Bendib
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