War Is A Crime .org

By LA Times

Another member of the Army "kill team" accused of killing unarmed Afghan civilians for sport pleaded guilty and was sentenced to seven years in prison Friday for the murder of a 15-year-old villager in southern Afghanistan.

"You aimed a fully loaded squad automatic weapon at a child that stood 15 feet away," Lt. Col. Kwasi Hawks, who presided over the case at Joint Base Lewis-McChord in Washington state, said at the conclusion of Pfc. Andrew Holmes' tearful courtroom confession.

"The remorse and regret I feel is the most overwhelming emotion that I have ever endured," Holmes, 21, said of the 2010 incident, according to the Seattle Times.

Five members of the former 5th Stryker Brigade have faced murder charges in connection with what military prosecutors say were staged attacks on Afghan villagers. In the attacks, prosecutors say, U.S. soldiers fired volleys of guns and grenades at innocent people and then planted weapons to make it look as though the victims had shot first.

  AIPAC's Ugly Agenda: by Stephen Lendman

AIPAC is an unregistered foreign agent representing Israel. Edward Said once called it "the most powerful and feared lobby in Washington."

Calling itself "America's Pro-Israel Lobby," it's represented Israeli interests since founded in 1953. In 1963, it was incorporated as a division of the American Zionist Council (AZC), its precursor.

  Netanyahu and Obama Spurn Peace - by Stephen Lendman

As a belligerent modern-day Sparta, Israel is a pariah state. Netanyahu exceeds the worst of Ariel Sharon. 

His government is Israel's worst ever. His majority Knesset allies are rogue, racist criminals, operating outside international law.

MIC50.org

MIC at 50 – Charlottesville, VA,   September 16-18, 2011

Coleman Smith and Clare Hanrahan of New South Network of War Resisters

Militarism is killing us. It is waging a war on the Earth and the devastation wrought is far beyond what can be presented here. We are not academics; we’re activists and organizers who care deeply about our homeland in the Southern US, the region where we live and work, and the most militarized region in the country. We have limited most of our report to the Southeast US and a special place we refer to as Atomic Appalachia. Like Middle Earth in a Tolkien story, Atomic Appalachia is a little known part of our region squeezed in between the Central and Southern Appalachians. It is a region where the impact of militarism is especially evident.

(Thanks to activists Laura Leigh and Marilyn Wargo)

World Can't Wait is sponsoring Kim Schultz' complete production of "No Place Called Home."

The Honorable Barack Obama
President of the United States
The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, N.W.
Washington, D.C. 20500

Dear Mr. President:

We are writing to urge you to honor our nation’s commitments and bring all of our troops home from Iraq by December 31, 2011.

In 2008 the U.S. and Iraqi governments entered into a Status of Forces Agreement requiring the complete withdrawal of all U.S. troops by the end of this year. As President you reaffirmed your commitment to this agreement in your speech at Camp Lejeune on February 27, 2009 declaring: “I intend to remove all U.S. troops from Iraq by the end of 2011. We will complete this transition to Iraqi responsibility, and we will bring our troops home with the honor that they have earned.” Americans and Iraqis overwhelmingly support this plan.

We are deeply troubled by recent reports that indicate your Administration is making plans to leave thousands of U.S. troops deployed in Iraq indefinitely. We are also troubled by the extraordinary buildup of private military contractors and untold numbers of intelligence operatives in Iraq. This level of continued U.S. operations in Iraq is unsustainable and unwise particularly in light of the challenges facing our nation. Mr. President the future of Iraq depends upon the Iraqi people, not the U.S. military.

Mr. President, we have lost too many American lives and wasted too many American resources in Iraq. Now is the time to bring all of our brave men and women in uniform home, as promised.

Sincerely,

American Friends Service Committee
Center for International Policy
Council for a Livable World
Friends Committee on National Legislation
Just Foreign Policy
Military Families Speak Out
MoveOn
NETWORK, A National Catholic Social Justice Lobby
Peace Action
Peace Action West
The Shalom Center
United for Peace and Justice
United Methodist Church, General Board of Church and Society
U.S. Labor Against the War
Win Without War
Women’s Action for New Directions

Source.

  The Irvine 11: Guilty of Being Muslims in America - by Stephen Lendman

Post-9/11, America targeted Muslims ruthlessly for political advantage. Law-abiding citizens discovered they're living here at the wrong time. 

Police state repression endangers growing millions, including Muslims for their faith, ethnicity, and forthrightness to confront injustice no one should tolerate.

From Stop The War Coalition

"Who are the terrorists? Are we the terrorists? Or are they the terrorists?" said Tony Bennett, when asked about 9/11. Just as with the Dixie Chicks, Michael Moore, Bill Maher, and others before him, this triggered an avalanche of bigotted hatred in the right-wing media and on the Internet, including death threats. Filmmaker Michael Moore faced the same barrage of bile after his Oscar acceptance speech. In this video Moore defends his and Tony Bennett's right to voice an opinion on 9/11.

 

Like Michael Moore, Tony Bennett has always opposed the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. He has been a lifelong supporter of progressive causes. In the 1960s, he marched shoulder to shoulder with Martin Luther King in the fight for black civil rights. He is pictured here with Martin Luther King and the singer and civil rights' activist Harry Belafonte.

  No Peace or Justice in Our Time with Netanyahu - by Stephen Lendman

Like his Washington paymaster/partner, Netanyahu deplores peace. Initiating talks never worked before and won't now.

Speaking privately at the Clinton Global Initiative conference in New York, Bill Clinton said Netanyahu lost interest because Palestine has a president he controls, and normalizing relations with the Arab world is within reach.

By Ron Ridenour

While Obama publicly pressured Israel to make concessions to the Palestinians over settlements, he secretly sold Jerusalem deep-penetrating bombs it had long sought. Eli Lake previews an exclusive story appearing in Monday's Newsweek.

READ MORE.

The MIC50.org conference was so packed with speakers that a lot of wonderful things just couldn't fit.  We turned away dozens of great speakers and other opportunities.  Our cup runneth over.

We also had an artist donate two beautiful original paintings for us to auction off as a set together, and we never managed to hold the auction.  So, the auction will be happening online between now and October 3rd.  Submit your bids, and the highest bid will be regularly posted on this page.

Click for larger image:
These are two original paintings created for the MIC50.org conference by Ted Millich.  The two characters are Chinese, separately 'harmony' and 'balance,' together they mean 'peace.' Harmony, with the enclosed loop on the right, usually goes to the left or above the character that looks more like a big cross. The notations inside the characters also signify peace in a variety of ways.

The paintings are about 15" high.

Your donation will fund further work for peace, including the publication of the forthcoming MIC50.org book.

MIC50.org

By Bunnatine Hayes Greenhouse

MIC50.org

By  Bruce E. Levine

Remarks delivered at http://MIC50.org conference.

I want to begin by explaining how a clinical psychologist ends up giving the final talk at a conference on the military-industrial complex.

Actually, for many years now, I’ve been writing and speaking about—and fighting against—another industrial complex, the pharmaceutical-industrial complex, specifically the psycho-pharmaceutical-industrial complex.

All these industrial complexes are painful similar in their revolving doors of employment. So, for example, the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) is the leading government agency on mental health and funds research. People at the NIMH who have has been friendly to drug companies have been rewarded by drug companies with a high-paying job after they leave NIMH. And just about every influential mental health institution takes money from drug companies. The National Alliance for the Mentally Ill, a consumer group, takes millions of dollars from drug companies, and so does the American Psychiatric Association, which is the professional organization of America’s psychiatrists.

The American Psychiatric Association publishes the official diagnostic manual for the mental health profession. It’s called the DSM. They’re up to the DSM-4 revision, and they’re working on the DSM-5. Each revision gets larger and larger. When I was watching Eugene Jarecki’s documentary about the military-industrial complex, Why We Fight, I remember Chalmers Johnson saying, “I guarantee you when war becomes that profitable, you are going to see more of it.” Same is true in my profession. The more profitable mental illness has become, the more you are seeing of it.

So, lots of my activism really starts with embarrassment with my own profession. One of the things that I became initially embarrassed by was its patholologizing and medicating normal human behavior in order to make a buck. They turned shyness into “avoidant personality disorder,” and turned temper tantrums of three-year olds into “pediatric bipolar disorder” and now give them heavy-duty antipsychotic drugs. What especially troubled me has been the increasing pathologizing of stubbornness, resistance, rebellion, and anti-authoritarianism, especially in children and teenagers.

by WALTER BRASCH 

A former managing editor for the online newspaper, OpEdNews, has sued the city of Philadelphia and eight of its police officers for violating her Constitutional rights.

Cheryl Biren-Wright, Pennsauken, N.J., charges the defendants with violating her 1st, 4th, and 14th amendment rights. The civil action, filed in the U.S. District Court, Philadelphia, is based upon her arrest during a peaceful protest Sept. 12, 2009, at the Army Experience Center (AEC) in the Franklin Mills Mall.

  Resuming Peace Process Hypocrisy to Subvert Palestinian Statehood - by Stephen Lendman

On September 20, London Guardian writer Chris McGreal headlined, "Palestinian statehood: plan emerges to avoid UN showdown," saying:

  State-Sponsored Murder: Official US Policy - by Stephen Lendman

Georgia's September 21 cold-blooded murder of Troy Anthony Davis symbolizes what's wrong with America. 

Notably, the system at all levels is hopelessly corrupted and broken. The only option is tearing it down and starting over.

So says World Can't Wait's call to Drive Out the Bush Regime, circulated in 2005.

We could add to it: your government enforces systematic practice of mass incarceration, "stop and frisk" procedures applied to Black and Latino people, and racist application of the death penalty.

BEIJING (AP) -- China's fast growing demand for aircraft has become a strong influence on how Boeing Co. designs and markets its newest planes, one of the company's executives said Wednesday.

Ihssane Mounir also said Boeing welcomes future competition from China's state-owned COMAC, which is developing a pair of passenger jets, but warned the commercial aircraft business could be punishing.

"It needs a lot of money, it needs a lot of patience, and the learning curve is tough," Mounir, senior vice president of sales and marketing for greater China and Korea, told The Associated Press.

"How many PRT [Provincial Reconstruction Team] staff members does it take to screw in a light bulb? One to hire a contractor who fails to complete the job and two to write the press release in the dark."

A FOB is a Forward Operating Base, and the Fobbits who live in them have their own brand of sad SNAFU humor, enough to fill many volumes and constituting, in my opinion, the silver lining of our wars. The above bit is taken from Peter Van Buren's new book "We Meant Well." The author has been in the U.S. Foreign Service for 23 years, working in Taiwan, Japan, Korea, the U.K., Hong Kong, and -- from 2009 to 2010 -- in Iraq. The book is about Iraq.

Of the 70 who've signed this letter to the Super Congress there might be two or three I'd trust to fight for it as far as I could throw them, but it is an accomplishment these days to speak any bit of humane truth aloud.  So read this letter and go forth and speak likewise.

PDF

By Linn Washington, Jr.

London -– Hearing hard-core Republicans applaud the use of the death penalty during a recent televised forum for GOP presidential candidates incensed Sara Callaway, an African-American living in London for the past 25-years.

“It was like a declaration of war against all of us committed to justice,” said Callaway, one of over two hundred people who gathered outside the U.S. Embassy in London’s upscale Mayfair section for a silent, candle-lit vigil protesting the execution of U.S. death row inmate Troy Davis.

By Dave Lindorff

There is a whole rogues’ gallery of charlatans, cowards, racists and liars involved in the 22-year lynching of Troy Davis, the black man who whose life was summarily terminated by the state of Georgia and by the United States of America last night, but one of them, Chatham County Superior Court Judge Penny Freesmann, will have a special place of honor in the growing pantheon of criminal jurists who have overseen the execution of innocent men in the course of America’s bloody legal history.