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New Special "Serving Two Flags" Edition of CounterPunch

Inside the Neo-Cons: Wolfowitz, Perle, Feith and the Internal Security Problem at the Pentagon by Stephen Green; O'Neill, Oil and Bush by Alexander Cockburn; My Corporation Tis of Thee: The Stryker, The General and the Lobbyist by Jeffrey St. Clair; A Southern Africa Sojourn by Lawrence Reichard; The Kiev Con: Exposing David Duke's Illusory Doctorate; CounterPunch Online is read by 70,000 visitors each day, but we are funded solely by the subscribers to the print edition of CounterPunch. Please support this website by buying a subscription to our newsletter, which contains fresh material you won't find anywhere else, or by making a donation for the online edition. Remember contributions are tax-deductible. Click here to make a (tax deductible) donation. If you find our site useful please: Subscribe Now!

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Today's Stories

February 23, 2004

Neve Gordon
Israel's Apartheid Wall on Trial at The Hague

Kurt Nimmo
Richard Perle, Executioner: "Heads Should Roll"

Jonathan Franklin
US Soldier Seeks Refugee Status in Canada

Al Krebs
The Liberal "Intelligentsia" v. Nader

Josh Frank
Nader's Nadir? Not a Chance

Bruce Jackson
Nader, Another View: "He's as Evil as Bush"

Gary Leupp
A Misguided Attack, The Passion, Rabbit Lerner and the Gospels


February 20 / 22, 2004

Cockburn / St. Clair
Kerry: He's Peaking Already!

Derek Seidman
Chasing Judith Miller from the Stage: Watch Her Run!

Ghada Karmi
Sharon is not the Problem

Vanessa Jones
This Week in Redfern, a Boy Dies, Chased by Cops

Ben Granby
Anatomy of a Night Raid on Balad, Iraq

John Holt
An Air That Kills: Greed, Apathy, Dead People

Saul Landau
Entry from a White House Diary

Tom Jackson
Why They Couldn't Wait to Invade Iraq

Frederick B. Hudson
Slave Power and the Constitution: Jefferson, Slaves, Haiti and Hypocrisy

Roger Burbach
Argentina Fights Back

Kate Doyle
Lessons on Justice from Guatemala

Mike Whitney
Operation Enduring Misery: the Afghanistan Debacle

Greg Moses
What Gives Texas A&M the Right to Trample the Civil Rights Act?

David Krieger
US Elections: an Opportunity to Debate Nuclear Weapons

Sam Bahour
Palestinian Issue Riddles Bush's Budget

David Grenier
You Could Get 10 Years in Prison Just for Reading This

Charles Sullivan
Corporatism vs. Single Party Politics

Poet's Basement
Hilda White, Larry Kearney & Stew Albert

Website of the Weekend
The Rumsfeld Fighting Technique

 

 

February 19, 2004

Cecilie Surasky
Anti-Semitism at the World Social Forum? That's Not What I Saw

Ray McGovern
Iraq Hawks and Deceptive Intelligence: Did They Really Think They'd Get Away With It?

Tariq Ali
How Far Will Bush Go in Iraq?

Ralph Nader
Whither the Nation?

Wayne Madsen
Would Kerry Purge the Neo-Cons?

Norman Solomon
The Collapse of Dean's Cyber-Bubble

Christopher Brauchli
Cheney, Halliburton and the NYT

Mike Whitney
Bush's Iraq Strategy: "I Hope They Kill Each Other"

Lewis Carroll
Bush the Mighty Helmsman from Yale

Website of the Day
Sex Toy Horoscope

 

February 18, 2004

William Wilgus
Bush: AWOL and Dereliction of Duty

William Blum
Mush-Minded Liberals

Dave Lindorff
Bush's China Syndrome

Greg Weiher
Why is Kerry Getting a Pass?

Mike Griffin
Killing the Messenger: the AFL-CIO's Attack on Harry Kelber

Mark Hand
Kerry Tells Peace Movement to "Move On"

 

February 17, 2004

Mike Ferner
The Countryside Murders in Iraq

Mokhiber / Weissman
Corporation as Psychopath

Marjorie Cohn
DrakeGate: a Victory for Free Speech

Kurt Nimmo
Bush's Endgame: a Review of Chalmers Johnson's "Sorrows of Empire"

Greg Bates
Nader Ambush: a New Low for The Nation

Ximena Ortiz
A Bush Doctrine, of Sorts

Gary Leupp
Whatever Happened to Gen. Khazraji?

Sen. John Kerry
"The Cause of Israel is the Cause of America"

Steve Perry
Kerry 1, Drudge 0


February 16, 2004

James Johnston
Huddling with the Cheeseheads in a NASCAR World

Sara Eltantawi
To Wear the Hijab or Not

Bruce Anderson
Kevin Cooper and the Midnight Needle

Elaine Cassel
Feds on Campus: the Drake Subpoenas

Rahul Mahajan
Bush, Is the Tide Finally Turning?

Kevin Cooper
The Ritual of Death

Stan Cox
Goodbye, Howard Dean

Larry David
My War

Steve Perry
Bush and the Guard: the Cover-Up's the Thing

Website of the Day
Prison Patriots: Help This Vital Film Get Made


February 14/15, 2004

Alexander Cockburn
Milk Bars, Hollywood and the March of Empires

Jeffrey St. Clair
Oil Grab in the Arctic

William A. Cook
Faith-Based Fanatics

Stan Goff
Beloved Haiti

Dave Marsh / Lee Ballinger
Rock, Rap & the Election

Hughes / Weiher
Tupac, the Patriot Act and Me

Michael Colby
Bush v. Kerry: the Power Elite's Dream Ballot

Mickey Z.
Michael Moore's Lesser Party: the General and the Lieutenant

Josh Frank
Dean's Demise No Big Loss for the Left

Peter Wolson
The Politics of Narcissism

William James Martin
Clean Break with the Road Map

Daniel Estulin
Religious Extremism in Africa

Standard Schaefer
The Privatization of Culture: an Interview with Michael Hudson

Dave Zirin
Maurice Clarett Gets Off the Plantation

Tracy McLellan
Oprah's Birthday Greedfest

Poets' Basement
Holt, LaMorticella, Guthrie, Subiet and Albert

Website of the Weekend
Progressives Scorecard: Where Do the Dems Rank on the Issues That Matter?


February 13, 2004

Alan Maass
Kevin Cooper's Fight to Live

Karyn Strickler
McCarthyism in the Sierra Club

Annie Higgins
On a Street in America

Adam Federman
Democratic Snipers Target Nader

Mike Whitney
George W. Faces the Nation

Brian Cloughley
Our Imperial Leader Has Spoken

Website of the Day
Lying Action Figure Doll

 

February 12, 2004

Ray McGovern
George Tenet's Spin Cycle

Robert Jensen
Bush's Nuclear Hypocrisy

Saul Landau
Elegy to the Salton Sea

February 11, 2004

Cockburn / St. Clair
Hail, Kerry: Senator Facing-Both-Ways

Steve Perry
Bush v. Bush?

 

February 10, 2004

Kurt Nimmo
Inquisition in Iowa

Ron Jacobs
Politics and the Beatles: Don't You Know You Can Count Me Out (In)

Elizabeth Schulte
The Many Faces of John Kerry

Mickey Z
Meet the Oxmans: "The Rich Shouldn't Sleep at Night Either"

 

 

February 9, 2004

Michael Donnelly
Will Skull and Bones Really Change CEOs? Inside John Kerry's Closet

Chris Floyd
Smells Like Team Spirit: the Bush B-Boys Replay Their Greatest Hits

Bill Christison
What's Wrong with the CIA?

Dr. Susan Block
Janet Jackson's Mammary Moment: Boob Tube Super Bowl

 

February 7/8, 2004

Kathleen Christison
Offending Valerie: Dealing with Jewish Self-Absorption

Jeff Ballinger
No Sweat Shopping

Dave Lindorff
Spray and Pray in Iraq: a Marine in Transit

Alexander Cockburn
McNamara: the Sequel

February 6, 2004

Ron Jacobs
Are the Kurds in the Way?

Joanne Mariner
Anita Bryant's Legacy

Saul Landau
Happiness and Botox

Kurt Nimmo
Horror Non-fiction: A How-To Guide from Perle and Frum

Niranjan Ramakrishnan
The Real Intelligence Failure: Our Own

 

 

February 5, 2004

Benjamin Shepard
Turning NYC into a Patriot Act Free Zone

Khury Petersen-Smith
A Report from Occupied Iraq: "We Don't Want Army USA"

Mokhiber / Weissman
The 10 Worst Corporations of 2003

Teresa Josette
The Exeuctioner's Pslam? Christian Nation? Yeah, Right

David Krieger
Why Dr. King's Message on Vietnam is Relevant to Iraq

Christopher Brauchli
Monkey Business: Of Recess and Evolution in Georgia Schools

Norman Solomon
The Deadly Lies of Reliable Sources

Cockburn / St. Clair
Presenting President Edwards!

 

 

February 4, 2004

Brian McKinlay
Bush's Australian Deputy: Howard's Last Round Up?

Mark Gaffney
Ariel Sharon's Favorite Senator: Ron Wyden and Israel

Judith Brown
Palestine and the Media

Frederick B. Hudson
Moseley-Braun and the Butcher: Campaign for Justice or Big Oil's Junta?

Kurt Nimmo
Bush's Independent Commission: Exonerating the Spooks

M. Junaid Alam
Philly School Workers Fight for Fair Contract

Fran Shor
Whose Boob Tube?

Kevin Cooper
This is Not My Execution and I Will Not Claim It

 

 

 

February 3, 2004

Alan Maass
The Dems' New Mantra: What They Really Mean by "Electability"

Nick Halfinger
How the Other Half Lives: Embedded in Iraq

Rahul Mahajan
Our True Intelligence Failure

Neve Gordon
The Only Democracy in the Middle East?

Laura Carlsen
Mexico: Two Anniversaries; Two Futures

Terry Lodge
An Open Letter to Michael Powell from the Boobs & Body Parts Fairness Campaign

Hammond Guthrie
Investigating the Meaningless

Website of the Day
Waging Peace

 

 

February 2, 2004

Gary Leupp
The Buddhist Nun in Tom Ridge's Jail

Justin E.H. Smith
The Manners of Their Deaths: Capital Punishment in a Smoke-Free Environment

Tom Wright
The Prosecution of Captain Yee

Winslow Wheeler
Inside the Bush Defense Budget

Lee Ballinger
Janet Jackson's Naked Truth

Leonard Pitts, Jr
For Blacks, the Game of Justice is Rigged

Jeffrey St. Clair
The Hollow Candidate:
The Trouble with Howard Dean

Website of the Day
Resistance: In the Eye of the American Hegemon

 


Jan. 31 / Feb 1, 2004

Paul de Rooij
For Whom the Death Tolls: Deliberate Undercounting of Coalition Fatalities

Bernard Chazelle
Bush's Desolate Imperium

Jack Heyman
Bushfires on the Docks

Christopher Reed
Broken Ballots

Michael Donnelly
An Urgent Plea to Progressives: Don't Give in to Fear

Rob Eshelman
The Subtle War

Lee Sustar
Palestine and the Anti-War Movement

George Bisharat
Right of Return

Ray McGovern
Nothing to Preempt

Brian Cloughley
Enron's Beady-Eyed Sharks

Conn Hallinan
Nepal, Bush & Real WMDs

Kurt Nimmo
The Murderous Lies of the Neo-Cons

Phillip Cryan
Media at the Monterrey Summit

Christopher Brauchli
A Speech for Those Who Don't Read

John Holt
War in the Great White North

Mickey Z.
Clueless in America: When Mikey Met Wesley

Mark Scaramella
The High Cost of Throwing Away the Key

Tariq Ali
Farewell, Munif

Ben Tripp
Waiter! The Reality Check, Please

Poets' Basement
LaMorticella, Guthrie, Thomas and Albert

 


January 30, 2004

Saul Landau
Cuba High on Neo-Con Hit List

Michael Donnelly
Bush's Second Front: The War in the Woods

Elaine Cassel
Worse Than Jacko: Child Abuse at Gitmo

David Vest
More Halliburton News, Brought to You by Halliburton

Mike Whitney
The Kay Report: Still Defending Aggression

David Miller
The Hutton Whitewash

Sam Husseini
How Many People Must Die Because of This "Mistake", Senator Kerry?


January 29, 2004

Patricia Nelson Limerick
John Ehrlichman, Environmentalist

Ron Jacobs
Homeland Security and "Legalized" Immigration

Rahul Mahajan
New Hampshire v. Iraq

Greg Weiher
Bush Calls for Preemptive Strike on Moon and Mars

Norman Solomon
The State of the Media Union

Cockburn / St. Clair
Does NH Mean Anything?

 

January 28, 2004

Kathy Kelly
Bearing Witness Against Teachers of Torture and Assassination

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 


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February 24, 2004

Rally the Mob!

The One Thing Bush Does Best

By GREG MOSES

Stirring a crowd is one thing. Mob politics is another. Today with his announcement that he intends to pass a Constitutional Amendment against gay and lesbian marriage, President Bush reminds us what a mob monger he is.

"I'm a uniter, not a divider," promised candidate George W. during the election of 2000, but his most effective political initiatives reveal that his most sinister political talent is to rally us against them, whoever they are.

That is why so few politicians voted against the Patriot Acts or the wars. When Bush brought these issues to the table, he did so with his singular genius for relegating the opposition into an intolerable world apart.

Now he attempts to do the same thing with gay and lesbian marriage. "If you dare to vote against this prohibition you will be counted among the forces of darkness, and we will bury your political future." That is the tone that Bush is able to strike, even if he never quite puts it that way. He has a talent for raising a mob with code words that mask naked power with righteousness.

The unforgiving tone of Bush leadership is an eerie echo of the religious fundamentalism that he purports to oppose in global politics. Even his most conservative allies, such as James K. Glassman, of the American Enterprise Institute, recognize that today's "defense of marriage" initiative is a political invitation to energize the fundamentalists at home.

Faith-based agitation in Massachusetts, for instance, has helped to shift public opinion ten points in the direction of intolerance, reports Frank Philips of the Boston Globe. And this is Catholic, northern fundamentalism, not Protestant southern. So you ain't seen nothin' yet.

The Boston Globe story gives us another disturbing detail by reporting that the popular mood in this case demands majority rule rather than court consideration when it comes to these crucial issues of civil rights. But appeals to majority rule have usually been bad news in the history of civil rights.

Beginning with the Bill of Rights, and going all the way up to the "Defense of Congressional Pay" (Amendment Number 27), Constitutional Amendments have been put in place to protect the relatively powerless against the state and majority rule. In the case of the Congressional Pay amendment, two consecutive votes of Congress are demanded, and why? Because when you get leaders like George Bush in office, mob fervor is liable to sweep reason away.

We might demand for the American people the same protection the Congress has arranged for itself. Two consecutive votes of Congress, with an election intervening.

Only once has a Constitutional amendment been passed by a majority in order to put a minority "in its place." That was the mis-guided Prohibition amendment, the only one to be repealed.

With the call for a Constitutional amendment to ban gay and lesbian marriage, President Bush summons a new American mob, panders to fundamentalism, and reverses the tradition of constitutional amendments, initiated by the Bill of Rights. George Bush is a political animal with his back against the wall. And he has made us in his image, into a nation of claws and teeth.

Greg Moses writes for the Texas Civil Rights Review. He can be reached at: gmosesx@prodigy.net

Weekend Edition Features for February 20 / 22, 2004

Cockburn / St. Clair
Kerry: He's Peaking Already!

Derek Seidman
Chasing Judith Miller from the Stage: Watch Her Run!

Ghada Karmi
Sharon is not the Problem

Vanessa Jones
This Week in Redfern, a Boy Dies, Chased by Cops

Ben Granby
Anatomy of a Night Raid on Balad, Iraq

John Holt
An Air That Kills: Greed, Apathy, Dead People

Saul Landau
Entry from a White House Diary

Tom Jackson
Why They Couldn't Wait to Invade Iraq

Frederick B. Hudson
Slave Power and the Constitution: Jefferson, Slaves, Haiti and Hypocrisy

Roger Burbach
Argentina Fights Back

Kate Doyle
Lessons on Justice from Guatemala

Mike Whitney
Operation Enduring Misery: the Afghanistan Debacle

Greg Moses
What Gives Texas A&M the Right to Trample the Civil Rights Act?

David Krieger
US Elections: an Opportunity to Debate Nuclear Weapons

Sam Bahour
Palestinian Issue Riddles Bush's Budget

David Grenier
You Could Get 10 Years in Prison Just for Reading This

Charles Sullivan
Corporatism vs. Single Party Politics

Poet's Basement
Hilda White, Larry Kearney & Stew Albert

Website of the Weekend
The Rumsfeld Fighting Technique

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