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in October
From AK Press
Today's
Stories
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
Recent Stories
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
The Great Alejandro Escavedo Needs Your Help!
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
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
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
Congratulations
to CounterPuncher Gilad Atzmon! BBC Names EXILE Top Jazz CD
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
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
13, 2003
The
Ninth Circle of Shell
Something
Killer
By ADAM ENGEL
After decades of Killing Hope all over the world,
you would think the American people would have watched the last
helicopters lifting reporters and refugees out of Saigon and
stopped to think long and hard. Then again, time is relative.
About fifteen minutes, half hour tops, of hard thinking is way
more than Boobus Americanus can handle before lunging for the
remote.
Bullshit $87 Billion to "rebuild"
a country we had no right to destroy in the first place!
Rebuild what for whom? (don't hold your
breath for museum exhibits featuring first edition cuneiform
tablets of the Enuma Elish or Code of Hammurabi). Oil of course--"everybody"
knows that. But who else? Everybody else, as long as they're
incorporated (it's not hard; I once incorporated myself to make
some extra cash on insider trading; also, it's the only way to
get The Law to recognize you as a person). If Halliburton and
Brown and Root build it, Disney, McDonalds, Starbucks, the Gap
and all the rest are sure to come. It's called "gentrification."
Used to be "urban renewal." Played the same game on
the Lower East Side of Manhattan. Wouldn't be surprised if Baghdad
becomes THE hot night-spot in 2013, despite the "criminal
element," which in this case wouldn't mean muggers or what
have you--though there'll be lots of drugs--but "terrorists"
and other unruly natives ready to spill their own blood (and
lots of ours) to get back their land. Their land, their country,
their history. That we seized by force. We beat them up and stole
their lunch money. Now we're gonna build a whole new cafeteria
that maybe some of them can work in, if they're qualified. One
day, after much struggle, boycotts, lunch-counter sit-ins, they
might even be allowed to eat in the cafeteria as well.
But why get all bent out of shape? It's
only "another thing." There are so many things. I'm
sure sweatshop workers in Vietnam, or Coffee Serfs in Central
America, or all those pain-in-the-ass poor people ruining the
quality of life all over this planet aren't giving much thought
to Iraq. Americans might, since everything from Healthcare and
Education to Veterans benefits (!!!) and Transportation is being
taken away from them and given to their "enemies" in
Iraq. But who cares what Americans think? Congress?
Bush: I need unlimited war powers.
Congress: Okay.
Bush: I need at least $87 Billion to
clean up the mess I made with my unlimited war powers.
Congress: Okay.
Bush: Get naked. Touch yourselves. Tell
me who you love.
Congress: Okay. Okay. Okay.
But while we can and should blame Republicans
and Democrats alike (very alike) for being either raging, blood-thirsty
Chicken Hawks or spineless, poll-sniffing lap-dogs, all our "elected
representatives," though they seldom represent us, sure
do care about what the folks at home think when decisions must
be made or elections won (stolen). They want to be liked. They
have to be liked; it's their job. It stands to reason that if
the greatest danger they face is being disliked, they sure aren't
going to risk taking a position that will make them unpopular
with their constituency. Hence, the Patriot Act, the annihilation
of Iraq and Afghanistan (remember them?), pledging allegiance
on the steps of the Capitol, and all the unspeakable depredations
they allow Bush Inc. to pull off on behalf of cronies and business
associates are the result of their fear of being disliked, either
directly, by people who actually follow what they say and do,
or indirectly, via the Media, which can poison an ambitious Senator's
persona before you can say "sound bite." The PACS and
Lobbyists may rule business-as-usual, but come election time,
allegedly, it's the voters these craven tax-suckers fear most.
If this is the case, then the responsibility
for the nightmare America has become might possibly lie with
the "American People," or a large percentage of them.
Our "democracy" is a laughingstock, true, but only
once the bums are in office and wrecking stuff at the behest
of corporate sponsors, PACS, the parents they can never impress,
etc. It's quite possible that the much ridiculed American people
are more powerful than they appear. If a Senator is afraid of
looking like he's "soft on terrorism" or "unpatriotic"
because he or she would rather not follow an unelected thug and
his band of gloomy sociopaths into the abyss, whose fault is
that? Could it be that they're afraid of the American people?
That all those flag-waving yahoos, whether they vote or not,
put the fear of god in them (which they passed like a hot potato
onto unsuspecting school children)?
True, less than half the people vote,
but you don't have to be a registered voter to scare a Congressman.
Waving a flag, draping your car or house in flags, talking shit
about cherished freedoms you no longer have or can say good-bye
to soon...these things make an impression. They infect the mood
of the country. Voters too don't want to appear "soft on
terrorism" or "unpatriotic," if only in their
own befuddled heads. Thus, in order to get elected by the half
of the population that votes, you have to appease not only them,
but the flag-wavers who help create a climate of fear, hatred,
jingoism, and overall dismay.
Again, who gets blamed for this? The
voters and non-voters, who form a kind of symbiosis of willful
ignorance, or the Representatives who serve them, on election
day, then bow before more sophisticated, moneyed masters?
We can scold The Media, but really, that's
like blaming a used-car salesman for selling you a lemon. You
knew the guy was a hustler, a liar, a fake, but you bought the
car anyway. Why? Only dealer in town? Go to another town, or
get together with other potential buyers, boycott the bastard,
and run him out of business. Nobody has to watch TV or read Corporate
Monopoly-owned newspapers. There are literally thousands of news
outlets on the internet, domestic and foreign, of all political
persuasions and points of view. So being an ignoramus is no excuse.
Unless you're a willful ignoramus, in which case you'll follow
whatever instructions are barked by the telly so long as you
don't have to think. But willful ignorance can be a crime itself.
Like willfully ignoring Auschwitz or Guantanamo Bay.
Of course, there's another possibility,
horrifying to contemplate: maybe millions, perhaps tens of millions
of Americans are just plain mean, selfish, frustrated, blood-thirsty
clowns. You can joke all you want about our "un-elected
President," for Gore did win the popular vote. But it was
hardly a landslide. Fifty-million people voted for George Bush.
Fifty million people who knew about his record as a criminal,
a thug, a dim-bulb who flickered but never shined at any time
during the 2000 campaign; they knew about the shady business
connections, the fact that this man failed in everything he ever
attempted in life except his stunning success at vacating Texas's
Death Row.
The Terror began and ended on the morning
of September 11, 2001. However, the Reign of Terror began later
that evening and continues. The litany of self-inflicted domestic
wounds, from budget cuts in favor of increased "defense"
spending, to reactionary attacks on all things "un-American,"
particularly the Bill of Rights, to a seemingly deliberate neglect
of education, the environment, healthcare, workers rights (for
those who have work) is breathtaking. How can a people allow
itself to be so abused? Is this some kind of nation-wide S&M
game, or has Uncle Sam exchanged his tri-color tuxedo for a hair-shirt?
We are indeed vicious, war-like savages,
morally bankrupt, cowardly, corrupt. But you see, that was part
of Saddam's plan. First, in 1991, he provoked the U.S. into a
massive slaughter of his people (he was/is a ruthless monster,
no doubt about that). Boy did we have fun watching those smart
bombs on TV, then gloating over the box scores the next day:
250 Americans killed (not all in combat) versus a whopping 100,000
Iraqis. After enticing Bush I to set The Beast loose, the cunning
Saddam, recognizing our taste for blood (takes one to know one)
built castles while we starved Iraq's children. Drunk with Super
Power, we went in for the kill, another major attack against
a beaten, helpless "foe." By letting Iraq become such
an easy target for our aggression, a weak, hopeless punching
bag for the Superest Power on earth, Saddam turned every one
of us into a murderer or a murderer's accomplice. He re-created
us in his image.
Now comes the clincher: we didn't even
win. Sure, Iraqis are dying by the thousands, but who cares?
We've been killing them for over a decade, they're used to it.
But we're losing at least two Americans a day, and the longer
we stay, the worse it's gonna get. And let's not forget about
the money! That $87 Billion is merely a down payment. There'll
be no improvements in education, infrastructure, the power grid,
or anything else--in the U.S. All the tax money Americans fork
over to the IRS is going straight to Iraq. Now, if the money
were going for reparations after all the damage we've done, it
might be excusable in some way (though we should have considered
the price tag in lives and treasure before fucking with a country
that posed absolutely no threat to "our way of life"
in the first place). But George Bush Junior wouldn't give 87
cents, much less $87 Billion to turn a small mid-eastern train-wreck
into a thriving "democracy." No, that money's going
to Dubya's oil pals and all the other corporations that make
this world such a pleasant place to be. But still, with all these
terrorists running around blowing stuff up, Iraq is no place
anyone's gonna want to do business. Might have to round up the
natives and smoke 'em all. Or at least manage them in camps and
ghettos, like the Israelis do with those pesky Palestinians.
So Saddam was indeed a threat to the
United States after all. He managed to bankrupt us morally, intellectually,
and financially, and the real war has only just begun, for getting
rid of him was the easy part. Now we have to take out the Iraqi
people. But I have faith in the greed and endurance of the American
public. They're not gonna blow hundreds, possibly thousands of
young American lives and tens, possibly hundreds of billions
of dollars without a fight. "Someday this war's going to
end," said Colonel Kilgore, ruefully, in Francis Ford Coppola's
timeless Christmas classic, "Apocalypse Now."
It might take some time, but when this
war does end, and we've solved the problem of the, uh, Human
Element, Iraq's gonna be THE commercial hot-spot. Paris, New
York, London have all seen better days. Baghdad is going to be
the place to be for the hip, the rich, the beautiful, not to
mention arty expatriates, pot-bellied vacationers and tourists
greased head to toe with Coppertone 30. Who knows, it might even
replace Miami as the college crowd's preferred party destination
at Spring Break. I hear the interim dictatorship is already talking
to MTV.
If you're smart and have faith in America
(you're not un-patriotic, are you?) you'll start investing now.
Just think: when the oil's flowing like the river Styx, and the
natives have been pacified, you'll be sipping a Pina Colada in
your VERY OWN RESTAURANT. "Cafe Purgatory." Or maybe
"The Ninth Circle of Shell." Still plenty of time to
use that American ingenuity to think up a catchy name. Something
to capture the imaginations of vacationers and hipster expatriates
alike. Something killer.
Adam Engel
awoke from he Nightmare of History only to be attacked in his
own bed by a rabid, saber-toothed Future. Luckily he keeps a
can of pepper spray and a blackjack on his night-table, beside
the Morphine Sulfate. Unfortunately his attacker got away. If
you see a dazed Future with blurry red eyes and a large welt
on its forehead, please report to: bartleby.samsa@verizon.net.
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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