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Coming in October From Common Courage Press   Today's Stories Ron Jacobs The Darkening Tunnel   Recent Stories 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   August 20, 2003 Robert Fisk Now No One Is Safe in Iraq Caoimhe Butterly Life and Death on the Frontlines of Baghdad Kurt Nimmo UN Bombing: Act of Terrorism or Guerrilla War? Michael Egan Revisiting the Paranoid Style in the Dark Ramzi Kysia Peace is not an Abstract Idea Steven Higgs NPR and the NAFTA Highway John L. Hess A Downside Day Edward Said The Imperial Bluster of Tom Delay Jason Leopold Gridlock at Path 15: the California Blackouts were the "Wake Up Call" Website of the Day Ashcroft's Patriotic Hype   August 19, 2003 Jeffrey St. Clair Blackouts Happen Gary Leupp "Our Patch": Australia v. the Evil Doers of the South Pacific Sean Donahue Uribe's Cruel Model: Colombia Moves Toward Totalitarianism Matt Martin Bush's Credibility Problem on Missile Defense Juliana Fredman Recipe for the Destruction of a Hudna John Ross Fox Government's Attack on Mexican Basques Sasan Fayazmanesh What Kermit Roosevelt Didn't Say Website of the Day Tom Delay's Dual Loyalities   August 18, 2003 Uri Avnery Hero in War and Peace Stan Goff The Volunteer Military and the Wicked Adventure Cathy Breen Baghdad on the Hudson Michael Kimaid Fight the Power (Companies)! Jason Leopold The California Rip-Off Revisited: Arnold, Milken and Ken Lay Matt Siegfried The Bush Administration in Context Elaine Cassel At Last, A Judge Who Acts Like a Judge Alexander Cockburn Judy Miller's War Harvey Wasserman The Legacy of Blackout Pete Wilson Website of the Day Fire Griles!   Congratulations to CounterPuncher Gilad Atzmon! BBC Names EXILE Top Jazz CD   August 16 / 17, 2003 Flavia Alaya Bastille New Jersey Jeffrey St. Clair War Pimps Saul Landau The Legacy of Moncada: the Cuban Revolution at 50 Brian Cloughley What Has Happened to the US Army in Iraq? William S. Lind Coffins for the Crews: How Not to Use Light Armored Vehicles Col. Dan Smith Time for Straight Talk Wenonah Hauter Which Electric System Do We Want? David Lindorff Where's Arnold When We Need Him? Harvey Wasserman This Grid Should Not Exist Don Moniak "Unusual Events" at Nuclear Power Plants: a Timeline for August 14, 2003 David Vest Rolling Blackout Revue Merlin Chowkwanyun An Interview with Sherman Austin Adam Engel The Loneliest Number Poets' Basement Guthrie, Hamod & Albert Book of the Weekend Powerplay by Sharon Beder   August 14, 2003 Peter Phillips Inside Bohemian Grove: Where US Power Elites Party Brian Cloughley Charlie Wilson and Pakistan: the Strange Congressman Behind the CIA's Most Expensive War Linville and Ruder Tyson Strike Draws the Line Jim Lobe Bush Administration Divided Over Iran Ramzy Baroud Sharon Freezes the Road Map Tom Turnipseed Blowback in Iraq Gary Leupp Condi's Speech: From Birgmingham to Baghdad, Imperialism's Freedom Ride Website of the Day Tony Benn's Greatest Hits August 13, 2003 Joanne Mariner A Wall of Separation Through the Heart Donald Worster The Heavy Cost of Empire Standard Schaefer Experimental Casinos: DARPA and the War Economy Elaine Cassel Murderous Errors: Executing the Innocent Ralph Nader Make the Recall Count Alexander Cockburn Ted Honderich Hit with "Anti-Semitism" Slur Website of the Day Defending Yourself Against DirectTV Lawsuits: 9000 and Counting   August 12, 2003   Ron Jacobs Revisionist History: the Bush Administration, Civil Rights and Iraq Josh Frank Dean's Constitutional Hang-Up Wayne Madsen What's a Fifth Columnist? Well, Someone Like Hitchens Ray McGovern Relax, It Was All a Pack of Lies Wendy Brinker Hubris in the White House Website of the Day Black Mustache   Hot Stories 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

August 23, 2003 Five Great Movies Current Indie Films Worth Seeing By WILLIAM MANDEL 1) "The Cuckoo," a humanist, pacifist, feminist, indigenist film about a Soviet soldier, his Finnish enemy, and a Lapp woman who takes them both in, when they have each escaped sentences of execution by their respective armies. None of them speaks a language either of the others can understand. There is no preaching by any of them about anything. But when a Russian writer or director wants to be humanist, no one of any other nationality can hold a candle to him. 2) "Camp," not a documentary but filmed in an actual summer camp for would-be theater and other performers in their teens and younger. As performers they are so extraordinary that I think the casting directors (plural) deserve Oscars. But the film is about adolescents. There isn't a single false touch. 3) "Whale Rider," Maori actors depicting their culture. A lead character is as confident that nothing has changed in 2,000 years as the Israeli settlers I'd seen the previous week at the SF Jewish Film Festival, so it takes a miracle to provide a happy ending, which is about as realistic as if Jonah's whale landed on the beach in Tel Aviv enabling him to provide a solution to the Palestine crisis. Nonetheless, a highly worthwhile film. 4) "Winged Migration." French documentary. Shot all over the world. Birds is wonderful. Their matching steps in courting dances equal any pas de deux of any ballet company, and I've been watching the world's best ballet companies for over seventy years. 5) "Step into Liquid." Awful title for the surfing film to end all surfing films. Documentary. Splendid because it does not limit itself to the beauty and unbelievable athleticism of the greatest surfers. It shows duffers on Lake Michigan who just enjoy, and does not make fun of them. It shows stupendous female surfers who differ from men in that the latter are out not to fall off their boards under any circumstances, while the women are out to have fun. Three Irish-Americans introduce surfing to Ireland, and do good by bringing Protestant kids down from the North to surf with Catholics. A professional in Southern California and his buddies regularly assist a teen-ager who broke his back surfing a couple of years ago but still loves the sport. A teen-age girl in Santa Cruz understands that her father's insistence on surfing several thousand consecutive days, "sun,rain, or tonsillitis," simply is his life. In short, genuinely a film about human beings, not simply the sport that entrances them. Photography unparalleled and hard to believe. William Mandel can be reached at: wmmmandel@earthlink.net Weekend Edition Features for August 16 / 17, 2003 Flavia Alaya Bastille New Jersey Jeffrey St. Clair War Pimps Saul Landau The Legacy of Moncada: the Cuban Revolution at 50 Brian Cloughley What Has Happened to the US Army in Iraq? William S. Lind Coffins for the Crews: How Not to Use Light Armored Vehicles Col. Dan Smith Time for Straight Talk Wenonah Hauter Which Electric System Do We Want? David Lindorff Where's Arnold When We Need Him? Harvey Wasserman This Grid Should Not Exist Don Moniak "Unusual Events" at Nuclear Power Plants: a Timeline for August 14, 2003 David Vest Rolling Blackout Revue Merlin Chowkwanyun An Interview with Sherman Austin Adam Engel The Loneliest Number Poets' Basement Guthrie, Hamod & Albert Book of the Weekend Powerplay by Sharon Beder     Keep CounterPunch Alive: Make a Tax-Deductible Donation Today Online! home / subscribe / about us / books / archives / search / links /