President Obama’s grand scheme to create the appearance of a public-private consensus around his business-friendly health care proposals, has flopped – for the moment. The White House-orchestrated public relations ploy [1] fell apart when industry leaders refused to corroborate Obama’s claim that they had agreed to reduce health care spending by $2 trillion dollars over ten years.
The charade began on Mothers’ Day with lavish presidential praise [2] for what was called an “historic” pledge from hospital owners, insurers, organized doctors, and the drug profiteers. “Senior administration officials” were described in the press as “hyperbolic, if not hyperventilated” over the “game-changer” industry concession.
The problem was: the story was mostly a White House invention. By Thursday, May 14, industry spokespersons were disassociating themselves [3] from Obama’s fictitious “breakthrough.” No concrete, numerical promises had been made. A spokesman for medical device manufacturers denied his industry had committed to any specific numbers. “There was no specific understanding” on slowing growth in health care costs, said David Nexon, only a “target over a ten-year period.”
Richard Pollack, a VP for the American Hospital Association, put it categorically. “The A.H.A. did not commit to support the ‘Obama health plan’ or budget.” He added, correctly, “No such reform plan exists at this time.”
the above is from glen ford's 'White House Health Care Ploy Backfires' (black agenda report) and it's funny because barack got punked.
flyboy's reading a nighty-night story right now and i have a feeling it will be 'no! mommy!' in a bit so i'm rushing tonight. from today's snapshot 'Ava filled in for Rebecca and covered' - thank you to ava. i was on the phone with c.i. yesterday morning and c.i. was telling me (when i mentioned that i had forgotten we had an engagement dinner) that 'i can do it or you can just take the night off' in terms of blogging. i didn't want c.i. to do it and while we were talking, ava said some thing and c.i. handed her the phone. so ava said she'd blog for me.
her plan was to do it this morning but she told me that she ended up doing it last night because they had an early start on a hearing this morning.
i really appreciate ava filling and say thank you big time.
we caught some of american idol tonight. not intentionally. fly boy was flipping channels and saw some 1 strumming some instrument in her lap and said, 'isn't that cyndi lauper?' i looked and it was. she was doing 'time after time' with 1 of the female contestants that had already been disqualified. so we stuck around long enough to watch cyndi lauper.
she really is a talent - remains 1. cyndi has more songs i'd like to hear on any given day than madonna. both emerged the same year and madonna became the 'hitmaker' but the bulk of her songs are so disposable.
that's all we saw. when the audience finished applauding cyndi, flyboy moved on over to cnn.
this is from media lens' 'BEHOLDEN TO THE BIG POWERS: ISRAEL, GAZA AND THE UN:'
On December 27, 2008, Israel launched Operation Cast Lead, a massive assault on Gaza. 22 days later, around 1,400 Palestinians, including over 300 children, and 13 Israelis were dead; about 5,000 Palestinians were wounded. Israeli forces bombed and shelled schools, medical centres, hospitals, ambulances, United Nations buildings (including UN schools), power plants, sewage plants, roads, bridges and civilian homes. This was described in much of the press as hitting "Hamas targets" (e.g. David Gardner, 'U.S. accused of white phosphorus against Taliban', Daily Mail, May 11, 2009).Earlier this month, the UN announced the results of an inquiry into attacks on its buildings and personnel in Gaza. It concluded that the Israeli Defence Forces (IDF) were:
"involved in varying degrees of negligence or recklessness with regard to United Nations premises and to the safety of United Nations staff and other civilians within those premises, with consequent deaths, injuries, and extensive physical damage and loss of property." (Donald Macintyre, 'UN retreats after Israel hits out at Gaza report', Independent, May 6, 2009)
Incidents for which Israel was held responsible by the UN inquiry included:
* The deaths of three young men killed by a single IDF missile strike at the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) Asma school in Gaza City.
* The firing of heavy mortar rounds into the UNRWA Jabalia school, injuring seven people sheltering in the school, killing up to 40 people in the immediate vicinity and injuring a further 50.
* Aerial bombing of the UNRWA Bureij health centre on the same day, causing the death of a patient, serious injuries to two other patients and injuries to nine of the health centre's employees.
* Artillery firing by the IDF into the UNRWA field office compound in Gaza city, combined with the use of white phosphorus, causing injuries and considerable damage to it and the surrounding buildings, and leading to the disruption of the UN's humanitarian operations in Gaza.
* Artillery firing by the IDF into the UNRWA Beit Lahia school, again with the use of white phosphorus, causing the deaths of two children, aged 5 and 7, and injuries to 13 others.
Contrary to Israeli claims, the UN inquiry found no evidence that "Hamas militants" had used UN property to attack Israel or Israeli forces. Indeed, the report demanded that the UN urge Israel to retract its allegations to that effect.
The inquiry's narrow remit was restricted to UN property and personnel; a key recommendation was that $11m compensation should be sought from Israel for damage to UN property in Gaza. But the final recommendation was that +all+ killings, injuries and damages in Gaza "should be investigated as part of an impartial inquiry mandated, and adequately resourced, to investigate allegations of violations of international humanitarian law." (Julian Borger, 'UN chief rejects further inquiry', Guardian, May 6, 2009)
the united nations loses such much authority and respect it could have by refusing to call out israel. i am aware the u.s. puts the pressure on; however, the u.n. could stand up. it refuses to. if it had ever stood up, the ongoing denial of a palestinian homeland would have ceased long ago.
i don't think we realize, when it's going on, what a difference stepping up could make. i think we get trapped in this ball of apathy that rolls and rolls, gathering ever more mass.
i also think we expect that some 1 else will speak out.
so when we don't grab the chance to do it ourselves, we really are asking for whatver policy to continue. when we can't put it on the line ourselves, we're encouraging it.
let's close with c.i.'s 'Iraq snapshot:'
Wednesday, May 20, 2009. Chaos and violence continue, closing statements are made in the Steven D. Green sentence hearing, the Senate Democratic Policy Committee talks KBR, and more.
Starting with the sentence hearing of Steven D. Green who was convicted two Thursdays ago in the gang-rape of 14-year-old Iraqi Abeer Qassim Hamza al-Janabi, her murder, the murder of her five-year-old sister and the murders of both of her parents. Since then, the jury has been hearing testimony they will weigh when determining his sentencing. Green could receive the death penalty; however, all 12 jurors would have to vote to sentence him to death. If that does not happen, he is facing life in prison. Two Thursdays ago the verdict was decided by the jury and only now is the jury being sent to deliberate Green's sentencing. Evan Bright reports this afternoon, "The jury went into deliberation less than five minutes ago." Prior to that, the prosecution and the defense made their closing statements. Bright notes, "Scott Wendelsdorf (D) finished his closing. 'America does. not. KILL. it's broken soldiers. SPARE this boy's life, SPARE HIM". Andrew Wolfson (Courier-Journal) reports that Brian Skaret gave the closing for the proseuction and noted, "This is a chance for you to say that our soldiers do not do this, that we are a good and decent people." AFP quotes Skared stating, "The victims in this case cry out for justice from their graves" and that he stated of the defense, "They've tried to make Mr Green a victim in this case."
That's today. Of yesterday's hearing, Evan Bright reports:
For the prosecution, Jim Lesousky called a single rebuttal witness, as previously predicted. Dr. Helen Mayberg, a clinical neurologist at Emory University, was called; Dr. Ruben Gur was also listening via muted phone so as to hear what her response to his testimony would be. Mayberg was called to respond to the testimony of Gur. She told the court of her medical degree from USC and of her certification in neurology. Her testimony did not last nearly as long as Gurs. She told the jury that "testing one person deemed possibly mentally disabled...against a control group of forty-one 'healthy' people, would not always produce accurate results." She told the court that she did not note the same variations within Green's MRI that Dr. Gur previously testified to the jury. She also testified that in Gur's study of the forty one "healthy" subjects, they were tested using MRI's of a 1.5 tesla strenth, as well as two other measurements/settings that were to equal or be set to "one;" she told the jury when Gur reviewed Green's MRI, he failed to notice that his MRI was given at a 3.0 tesla strength, and that the two other aformentioned settings were also different, meaning that Green's MRI would not have matched the control group results regardless. For the most part, the defense has been excellent, but if they've ever suffered a setback, this would be it.
"Today's hearing is a result of this committee's continuing investigation into the deaths of some US soldiers by the death of electrocution in Iraq," explained Senator Byron Dorgan who chaired this morning's Senate Democratic Policy Committee hearing "Rewarding Failure: Contractor Bonuses for Faulty Work in Iraq."
Senator Byron Dorgan: That investigation has led us to internal Pentagon documents showing that in 2007 and 2008, contractor KBR received bonuses of $83.4 million for work that, according to the Pentagon's own investigation, led to the electrocution deaths of US troops. Let me repeat that: The Pentagon gave bonuses of $83.4 million to KBR for work that resulted in the electrocution deaths of American soldiers.
Dorgan spoke of Ryan Maseth, a Green Beret and Army Ranger with the rank of Staff Sgt who died in Baghdad January 2, 2008 from taking a shower in KBR's 'safe' facilities. Dorgan noted that in the July hearing, "we obtained testimony that KBR had known of this very electrocuting hazard since at least February 10, 2007, 11 months before Ryan Maseth's death. In fact, the prior occupant of Staff Sgt Maseth's room was shocked in the same room four to five times between June and October 2007, in the very same shower were Ryan was killed. According to his sworn affidavit, each time this soldier was shocked, he submitted a work order to KBR." In fact, $34.4 million of KBR's $83.4 million in bonus pay was paid after Ryan Maseth was killed by their shoddy, cheap work and the military's investigation, as Dorgan noted, now lists the death as due to negligent homicide.
Participating on the committee this morning were Senators Dorgan, Robert Casey Jr.,Amy Klobuchar, Frank Lautenberg and Mark Udall. Testifying before the committee were Master Electrician Jim Childs, ex-KBR Master Electrician Eric Peters and ex-Chief of HQ Army Field Support command Charles Smith.
Lautenberg noted this was Dick Cheney's former company and that efforts under the previous administration for investigations were repeatedly blocked. From meals never served to burning vehicles because KBR didn't want to change the tires and much more, the 2.4 billion dollars KBR was paid was never to be questioned and "A hearing was refused." Lautenberg pointed out that Cheney held KBR stock options throughout all of this and that money -- even unaccounted money -- didn't matter and certainly the deaths of US soldiers from KBR's shoddy work didn't matter. Lautenberg stated these abuses and the refusal to investigate them never needed to happen again. Casey noted, in his opening statements, that no families should have to go through what Ryan Maseth's family has had to (and he applauded Cheryl Maseth's efforts to get the truth and to help others). Casey declared, "We're looking for accountability and we're trying to seek justice. And the only way we can have either is to arrive the truth." [Note: Those comments would seem to require an investigation into the torture crimes as well.] Casey wondered, "Why is it that any company that may have been directly responsible for the deaths of American fighting men and women, in any cicrumstance but especially in this circumstance, why should they be getting more contracts?"
Udall noted he would keep his opening remarks brief and did. We'll note this comment by him, "The only way forward is to hear the truth. That's the purpose of this hearing today."
Klobuchar explained, "It seems like every time we have these hearing on this subgect, there are some answers but mostly more questions." Kobuchar noted that when she attended the last hearing, she'd thought of her state's David Cedergren who had died in Iraq. And since then (in 2009, five years later) his parents had learned that it wasn't an accident, that Officer 3rd Class David A. Cedergren was electrocuted. She noted that his parents were first told his death was due to natural causes.
Senator Amy Kobuchar: And finally, late last year, over four years after his death, the US military acknowledged that the cause of David's death was electrocution. His cause is among 18 cases that have been discussed of electrocution that are being investigated as part of the Department of Defense Specials Investigator Inquiry.
Jim Childs went over his various and many qualifications and explained he went to work for Stanley Baker Hill in Iraq and was there for fifteen months. He explained that KBR built "roughly 90,000 buildings" in Iraq and that none of them were up to code which led KBR to insist they were using the British electrical code BS7671 but holding it to that code only results in more errors for KBR. "During my theater-wide inspections," Child explained, "I concluded that roughly 90 percent of the new construction buildings worked on by KBR were not properly wired. This means that over 70,000 buildings in Iraq were not up to code." KBR's shoddy work is not limited to Iraq, Childs explained, "While doing inspections in Afghanistan, I found the exact same code violations." Eric Peters than spoke.
Eric Peters: I went to Iraq in February 2009 and returned home in April 2009. After experiencing only two months of the KBR management culture and witnessing poor quality work at three separate bases, the Al Asad Airbase, Camp Striker and Camp Warrior, I decided that I could no longer be affiliated with KBR. Based on my personal observations at these three bases, at least fifty percent of the buildings KBR worked on were not properly wired. By the time I left, I concluded that KBR was not cappable of performing quality, legal electrical installations in Iraq. I worried every day that people would be seriously injured or killed by this defective work. I would be happy to return to Iraq to help our troops, but only under different circumstances with a different contractor.
The key passage in Charles Smith's opening remarks is probably the following:
Charles Smith: The army was aware of KBR's poor performance in Iraq from 2002 to 2008. There have been numerous government inspections and reports. The army, however, continued to give KBR high award fees. Those high award fees appear to have sent a message to KBR that performance did not really matter. Award fee boards and decisions are a communications tool between the government and the contractor. The contractor learns what is important to the government and will respond accordingly.
Dorgan said that KBR would claim that they they did their work effectively and properly "as they have [claimed] after all hearings." We'll note this exchange from the hearing:
Senator Byron Dorgan: Do any of you have any notion that we should be concerned about soldiers in Afghanistan? As you know the same contractor was doing work in Afghanistan. Is your sense that -- Now General [David] Petraeus sends in a blue ribbon task force to do all of this, right? I -- I -- you know, the thing is I've not heard General Petraeus say anything publicly about this. And if I were General Petraeus, I would be furious about soldiers being put at risk as a result of shoddy work. I mean just furious. But I've heard nothing at this point. My great concern is that what I have heard in most cases is the Pentagon really kind of saying 'There's not as much of a problem here as you think.' Sgt. Maseth's mother was originally told that he was probably electrocuted because he took a radio into the shower with him. The -- my colleague Senator Klobuchar has just described the experience of the family from Minnesota who for four years were told that he died of natural causes. Should we worry about the electirical work in Afghanistan as well as this point? Mr. Childs, what do you think?
Jim Childs: As -- as -- in my role with Task Force SAFE I did go to Afghanistan and look at the electircal work in Afghanistan. Spent about a day over there, we went over there under direction of General David Petraeus through Task Force Safe to see how their electrical program was. They had the exact same electrical bonding and grounding mistakes that they had in Iraq. That had building that were dangerous because they were the exact same problems. And I stood there and witnessed new work being done by KBR that was one hundred percent against the National Electric Code that is clearly the code they are to use there in Afghanistan. And I do not know what direction has been taken to inspect over in Afghanistan.
On KBR's method of billing, Klobuchar asked Eric Peters if she had it right, that "KBR can charge the government for work that does not meet safety standards and then come back and charge the government again?"
Eric Peters: That's my understanding.
Senator Amy Klobuchar: So what we have going on here is they can charge for the work that didn't meet the standards because someone like you doesn't sign off and they charge again to repair the work that failed to meet the proper safety standards?
Eric Peters: That's correct. They would send somebody out and pay him the work done and it's not a complete job done so they'd have to send somebody else out at a different time to complete the job and do it again.
Senator Amy Klobuchar: And you think that's common with KBR?
Eric Peters: All over theater.
Senator Amy Klobuchar: Mr. Childs do you agree with that?
Jim Childs: Absolutely.
Senator Amy Klobuchar: In a sort of a broader view of this would be that what they're doing is that they're charging double and then they're getting bonuses for it. Would that be one to look at it?
Jim Childs: I believe that's correct.
Senator Amy Klobuchar: Mr. Smith, you said in your testimony that "the army provided perverse incentives to KBR by providing the company with substantial award fees without KBR having the required business systems and without performing quality work." Is that right?
Charles Smith: That's correct.
Senator Amy Klobuchar: And this is an example? What I'm talking about right here?
Charles Smith: That's part of the example.
We'll stop there. Yesterday's snapshot included the Senate Armed Services Committee hearing. Kat covered some suicide stats offered in the hearing offered by Pete Geren, Secretary of the Army:
Geren responded that the top 3 reasons were:1. shattered personal relationship (spouse/loved one) 2. work place humilitation/disappointment or financial problem 3. medical problem Characteristics include:* Younger than 25 * Male * White * By rifle or pistol He offered this grouping of thirds on suicide -- he's breaking down all the suicides into thirds: * 1/3 who commit suicide have never deployed * 1/3 commit suicide during a deployment * 1/3 commit suicide after a deployment
Ava filled in for Rebecca and covered Senator Jim Webb's questioning of General George Casey:
Senator Jim Webb: Your comments about dwell time being of your utmost concern. I recall the conversation that you and I had more than two years ago when you called me to tell me that the army was going to go to 15 month deployments with 12 months at home which I think is a .75 dwell time ratio and you will recall I expressed my strongest concern about that. As someone who had grown up in the military, as did you, and watched my father go through multiple deployments, someone who had served in Vietnam when the Marine Corps tour was 13 months and as someone who has had a son and son-in-law deploy as enlisted marines in extended tours in Iraq. Now, on the one hand, and I said this to Secretary of Defense last week and Admiral Mullen, I - I am very encouraged about programs that are in place to treat those whoa re experiencing emotional difficulties and stigma in the active forces and that sort of thing but I'm still concerned measure that could be taken and should be taken to prevent these sort of situations which was the basis really of my conversation with you two years ago, was the reason that I addressed the dwell time amendment twice in '07. If we are going to put greater discipline say into the procurement process - as has become a big focus -- maybe we should be putting the same sort of discipline in our combatant commanders' request for troops? That they're -- certainly one of the parameters in terms of troop availability or in terms of how we use troops is the stewardship that we all should feel about length of deployments versus time back here -- all of these things that you were talking about at the beginning [of this hearing] which I was talking about on the Senate floor a couple of years ago. Uhm, so what do you think about that? George Casey: Senator, I couldn't agree more. In fact, one of the points of discussion that I hoped to have in the quadrennial defense review is whether or not we need to move toward a capability based strategy versus a war plan strategy. As I said, we're organizing the army on a rotational cycle so that we provide a sustained level of capability to commanders but at a sustainable deployment cycle. Jim Webb: Well certainly rotational cycles should be on the table, when we're talking about the number of troops that should be deployed. You know -- George Casey: Absolutely. Jim Webb: -- that's something that you and I were discussing two years ago. You were saying, in your defense I will say, you were saying that you had to feed the strategy. When you went to the 15 month, 12 month, you had to feed the strategy. Your obligation to feed the strategy. General Petraeus comes and testifies and I asked him about the dwell time thing and he said, 'Well I just state my requirements' and, you know, there was sort of a disconnect in the middle. And it would seem to me, particularly in this transitional period, we ought to be taking a pretty, a pretty tough look at the well being of the force as a component in terms of how we're using them to deploy in Afghanistan. George Casey: I agree with you and I'm not articulating it well, I don't think. But once you have arranged the force into bins for the rotational cycle, that's what's available to the country. And it's available at a sustainable deployment cycle to the families and the soldiers and it's a strategy that's constrained by means which all strategies should be, rather than strategy driving requirements. Jim Webb: I think you and I, we are rushing to agree on this but at same time the difficult really is that there seems to be such a deference to a combat commander, and there should be something of a deference, but there seems to be such a deference when they say "I need 30,000 troops" rather than where this decision is now being made this is going to be going on for a long time and how are we going to protect the health and our long term sustainability in terms of feeding these troops. Webb also gave him a chance to clear up his comments made to Senator Joe Lieberman:Jim Webb: . . . when you said you had a lot of units that are 1.5 dwell time ratio right now. Army wide with the troops actually deployed, what is the ratio in dwell time right now? George Casey: We're between 1.3 and 1.5 is the average.
In Iraq today a Baghdad car bombing garners the bulk of attention. BBC reports that the bombing took place "near a popular restaurant in Shula, a poor, crowded mainly Shia neighbourhood." Sahar Issa and Jack Dolan (McClatchy Newspapers) add that the bom "went off at 7:30 p.m. outside a restaurant and ice cream parlor". Mohammed Abbas and Matthew Jones (Reuters) note the death toll is 35 with seventy-two injured. Iran's Press TV notes, "Police say the death toll is expected to rise as some of the wounded are in critical conditions." The Telegraph of London offers the context that today's bombing "was the biggest bombing since April 29 when more than 50 people -- again in mostly Shiite districts of the capital -- were killed in a wave of near-simultaneous bombings."
Meanwhile, Jack Dolan (McClatchy Newspapers) reports, "For the first time since modern Iraq was founded in the 1920s, a sitting government minister has been questioned publicly about corruption allegations, in this case about skimming millions of dollars from a national food-distribution program while ordinary Iraqis went hungry. The parliamentary grilling of Trade Minister Abdul Falah al Sudany ran live Saturday and Sunday on state television, and everyone in Baghdad seems to have been watching." Earlier this month, Natalia Antelava (BBC) reports Sabah Mohammed al-Sudani, brother of Trade Minister Abd Falah al-Sudani (CIA spelling, also spelled Abed al-Falah al-Sudani and Abdel Falah al-Sudani), was arrested Saturday [May 9th] after he and his brother "vanished in late April as they were about to be arrested." Trade Minister al-Sudani was born in Iraq but lived elsewhere. He is one component of the government of exiles the US has installed in Iraq. His official bio includes:-Ph.D in Biochemistry, Swansea University , Wales, UK,1981 - Researcher at the Biochemistry Department, Swansea University,Wales,UK - Member of the British Royal Society of Biological Sciences - Defending strategic analyzer and political editor, Al-A'alam weekly magazine London,UK - Founding member of the Islamic House in London,UK - President and member of the Muslims Youth Association, London ,UK,1986 - Former President of Orient Center for Studies ,London,UK - Member of Iraq National Assembly,2005 - Minister of Education of the Republic of Iraq,(2005-2006) - Member of Iraqi Parliament,2006
Natalia Antelava (BBC) explains that he's "accused of making millions by selling the food aid to traders instead of giving it away." Alsumaria notes, "After more than 100 lawmakers signed on revoking the confidence vote of Trade Minister Abdul Fallah Al Sudani, the confidence vote session will be held a week after submitting the request to the Parliamentary presidency committee which will take the decision by a small majority." Like Nouri al-Maliki, al-Sudani is an exile. Like Nouri, he's a member of the Dawa party. He heads the ministry Nouri put him in charge of.
In other reported violence . . .
Bombings?
Sahar Issa (McClatchy Newspapers) reports a Baghdad roadside bombing which damaged a US military convoy vehicle and a Mosul bombing late Tuesday which wounded four people.
Shootings?
Sahar Issa (McClatchy Newspapers) reports 1 person shot dead in Mosul
Corpses?
Sahar Issa (McClatchy Newspapers) reports 1 corpse discovered in Mosul ("stabbed many times").
Yesterday Chris Hedges and Laila Al-Arian, authors of Collateral Damage: America's War Against Iraqi Civilians, were guests on Flashpoints (show is archived at link and at KPFA). We'll try to note the interview tomorrow. Friday, Hedges and Al-Arian will be speaking at MLK Auditorium (MLK Middle School) in Berkeley and ticket prices are twelve to fifteen dollars. The event starts at seven p.m. On yesterday's inteview, Laila points out that the Iraq War has become the forgotten war.
World Can't Wait notes:
On Wednesday, May 13, Barack Obama reversed his previously announced position, and said that he would move to block the release of some 2000 photos documenting U.S. military personnel torturing prisoners in Iraq and Afghanistan. According to the New York Times, the blocked photos are of U.S. prisoners in Iraq and Afghanistan, and include depictions of "Abu Ghraib-style" torture, along with photos taken by military criminal investigators--in some cases supposedly documenting allegations of abuse, as well as autopsy photos of prisoners who were killed while in custody.
Anthony D. Romero, executive director of the ACLU--the group that sued to make the photos public--said the volume of photos shows that "It is no longer tenable to blame abuse on a few bad apples. These were policies set at the highest levels."
Obama said he would not release the photos because "the most direct consequence of releasing them, I believe, would be to further inflame anti-American opinion and to put our troops in greater danger."
What does it mean to cover up evidence of horrific war crimes because knowledge of those crimes would "inflame anti-American opinion?" And what is the responsibility of people living in the United States, right now, when great crimes, committed in their name, are being covered up?
World Can't Wait on the same topic. This is their earlier text statement, "Thursday MAY 28 National Day of Resistance to U.S. TORTURE!:"
On or by May 28, the Obama administration is being forced to release 2000 photos of detainee abuse in US facilities from 2001-2006. The Abu Ghraib photos, released in 2004 only because a solider was horrified over the torture, brought an international storm of protest against the US torture state. The new photos, including many from Bagram, where the detention facilities have just been doubled to hold 60,000 Afganis, will show that US torture was widespread, sustained, and systemic, not an "aberration," but an integral part of the "global war on terror."
Weeks after 4 more torture memos revealed the detail with which George Bush's lawyers managed the torture of individual detainees, calls to prosecute those responsible -- from the White House principals, to the legal torture team, to the CIA agents who tortured -- have met objections from Washington. Cheney and the open advocates of torture scream that they must be able to use "harsh methods" to win the global war on terror. The Obama administration, after deciding to continue indefinite detention, CIA rendition, and Bush's executive powers, says prosecution would stop them from "moving forward." Democratic party leader Nancy Pelosi knew about the torture and waterboarding since 2002, saying and doing nothing to stop it..
It's up to the people to act! World Can't Wait and other groups are planning non-violent civil resistance protests, programs digging into the substance of the charges, waterboarding and rendition re-enactments, and film showings in communities around the country to demand prosecution of the Bush era war criminals. More information, listings, posters, flyers & background on the war criminals at warcriminalswatch.org.
Wherever the Bush era war criminals are appearing this month, raise the cry "Torture is a War Crime! Prosecute!"
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5/20/2009
5/19/2009
Jim Webb on dwell time
Ava here. Rebecca's off tonight for a family function. I said I would grab it. Wally, C.I., Kat and I attended the Senate Armed Services Committee today. C.I. covers it in depth in the snapshot, Kat's grabbing Saxby Chambliss and since Kat was grabbing a section, I grabbed Jim Webb.
Jim Webb is the Senator from Virginia. I do not see eye to eye with him on every issue but he is a strong advocate for veterans and he is also one of the senators who can really dig in. A lot can't. A lot act like high school students who goofed off and are shocked by a pop quiz. Joe Lieberman, whom I never agree with, is someone who generally has done some work before he showed up for the hearing. Barack Obama was the least prepared. That's why, for example, in April 2008, when he was questioning General David Petraeus and US Ambassador to Iraq Ryan Crocker, he had to repeatedly go over his time. He was stumbling around trying to ask something, trying to grab a soundbyte since all the cameras were present. It was very obvious that he was unprepared. His buddy Clair MacHack is another senator who breezes into a hearing completely unprepared and thinks she's bluffing her way through but it's very obvious that she's done no work. That's why they have a staff.
I don't think most people grasp that it was Congressional staff that exposed labor abuses in Congress a few decades back. Congressional staffers are supposed to be working. They're supposed to be researching. Maybe Clair's do but she's too busy thinking up
Senator Jim Webb: Your comments about dwell time being of your utmost concern. I recall the conversation that you and I had more than two years ago when you called me to tell me that the army was going to go to 15 month deployments with 12 months at home which I think is a .75 dwell time ratio and you will recall I expressed my strongest concern about that. As someone who had grown up in the military, as did you, and watched my father go through multiple deployments, someone who had served in Vietnam when the Marine Corps tour was 13 months and as someone who has had a son and son-in-law deploy as enlisted marines in extended tours in Iraq. Now, on the one hand, and I said this to Secretary of Defense last week and Admiral Mullen, I - I am very encouraged about programs that are in place to treat those whoa re experiencing emotional difficulties and stigma in the active forces and that sort of thing but I'm still concerned measure that could be taken and should be taken to prevent these sort of situations which was the basis really of my conversation with you two years ago, was the reason that I addressed the dwell time amendment twice in '07. If we are going to put greater discipline say into the procurement process - as has become a big focus -- maybe we should be putting the same sort of discipline in our combatant commanders' request for troops? That they're -- certainly one of the parameters in terms of troop availability or in terms of how we use troops is the stewardship that we all should feel about length of deployments versus time back here -- all of these things that you were talking about at the beginning [of this hearing] which I was talking about on the Senate floor a couple of years ago. Uhm, so what do you think about that?
George Casey: Senator, I couldn't agree more. In fact, one of the points of discussion that I hoped to have in the quadrennial defense review is whether or not we need to move toward a capability based strategy versus a war plan strategy. As I said, we're organizing the army on a rotational cycle so that we provide a sustained level of capability to commanders but at a sustainable deployment cycle.
Jim Webb: Well certainly rotational cycles should be on the table, when we're talking about the number of troops that should be deployed. You know --
George Casey: Absolutely.
Jim Webb: -- that's something that you and I were discussing two years ago. You were saying, in your defense I will say, you were saying that you had to feed the strategy. When you went to the 15 month, 12 month, you had to feed the strategy. Your obligation to feed the strategy. General Petraeus comes and testifies and I asked him about the dwell time thing and he said, 'Well I just state my requirements' and, you know, there was sort of a disconnect in the middle. And it would seem to me, particularly in this transitional period, we ought to be taking a pretty, a pretty tough look at the well being of the force as a component in terms of how we're using them to deploy in Afghanistan.
George Casey: I agree with you and I'm not articulating it well, I don't think. But once you have arranged the force into bins for the rotational cycle, that's what's available to the country. And it's available at a sustainable deployment cycle to the families and the soldiers and it's a strategy that's constrained by means which all strategies should be, rather than strategy driving requirements.
Jim Webb: I think you and I, we are rushing to agree on this but at same time the difficult really is that there seems to be such a deference to a combat commander, and there should be something of a deference, but there seems to be such a deference when they say "I need 30,000 troops" rather than where this decision is now being made this is going to be going on for a long time and how are we going to protect the health and our long term sustainability in terms of feeding these troops.
Webb also gave him a chance to clear up his comments made to Senator Joe Lieberman:
Jim Webb: . . . when you said you had a lot of units that are 1.5 dwell time ratio right now. Army wide with the troops actually deployed, what is the ratio in dwell time right now?
George Casey: We're between 1.3 and 1.5 is the average.
And that's it from me. C.I.'s got all the news in the "Iraq snapshot:"
Tuesday, May 19, 2009. Chaos and violence continue, Steven D. Green's War Crimes sentencing hearing continues, the US Senate bends over backwards to add even more money to the bloated army budget, Iraqi refugees seek refuge in a church attempting to get asylum, and more.
Starting with Steven D. Green who was convicted two Thursdays ago in the gang-rape of 14-year-old Iraqi Abeer Qassim Hamza al-Janabi, her murder, the murder of her five-year-old sister and the murders of both of her parents. Since then, the jury has been hearing testimony they will weigh when determining his sentencing. Green could receive the death penalty; however, all 12 jurors would have to vote to sentence him to death. If that does not happen, he is facing life in prison. The hearing resumed yesterday and continued today. Evan Bright reports, "Just heard testimony from Dr. Helen Mayberg in contrast to the testimony of Dr. Ruben Gur. Basically said that Gur screwed up his MRI." Gur screwed up his MRI? He certainly screwed up his testimony on the MRI last week: "Gur was an 'expert.' Another reason not to waste the jury's time with 'experts'." Brett Barrouquere (AP) reports Dr. Mayberg was the prosecution's witness and that she stated Gur screwed up the MRI because the scan was not consistent with the scans he compared them to (a control group to establish a baseline for normal versus brain injury): "He [Green] was done differently. It's not big surprise that there are some areas that look different."
Bright also reports the "Court is adjourned for the day. Both sides rest with opening statements to be heard tomorrow, Wednesday May 20th. Blog later tonight." On yesterday's proceedings, Evan Bright had a post at The Huffington Post. Yesterday the hearing resumed (picking up from last Thursday) and Dave Alsup (CNN) noted, "Patty Ruth, a Texas elementary school principal, told a civilian jury about Green's childhood as a reader who loved to be hugged by relatives. 'I do not know how we got to this spot,' Ruth said in emotional testimony. 'I do not know how this happened'." The defense better hope the jury has a better grasp than Patty Ruth or Green will receive the death penalty. AP's Brett Barrouquere adds, "Ruth's testimony in the penalty phase of Green's trial came as the ex-soldier's father, John Green, and an uncle looked on in court." At his website, Evan Bright noted yesterday, "Tuesday(tomorrow): Remaining defense witnesses, if there are any, followed by the Prosecution's one rebuttal witness(an expert/specialist of some kind). There is a "50/50" chance that we will hear closing statements tomorrow, Pat Bouldin allegedly said. If not tomorrow, expect to hear them on Wednesday."
"Our army is stretched by this long war," declared the Secretary of the Army Pete Geren today to the Senate Armed Services Committee this morning when reading from his prepared, opening statement. The hearing was one where . . . Begs? The army begs for money? That implies that the Congress puts them through a song and dance. The Congress just hands out of rounds of applause. As, in fact, they did at the start of the hearing, shortly after Ranking Committee Member Senator John McCain took time to note his "policy differences" with General George Casey Jr. . . . right before praising him. The army doesn't beg. It's more like the Congress is overly generous parents and Geren and Casey show up with report cards explaining why Bs and Cs are amazing grades worthy of the really big bucks.
There's never an indication, in any of the hearings, that any member of Congress has perused the budget request coming before it. Today Senators Levin and McCain both raised the issue of the Army's Future Combat Systems eight manned ground vehicles. McCain noted, for example, the cost overruns that immediately had a $90 billion dollar project increase to $120 billion. And if you half-listened you might think, "That's the Congress at work!" But, reality, Sec of Defense Robert Gates already removed that from the budget. So what you had were some 'tough' moves and questions about . . . something not in the budget. About something Robert Gates had pointed out was wasteful.
Despite the economic crisis that's facing the country, no member of Congress ever says, "Let's take a look at this item . . ." It just doesn't happen. And didn't today. They were happy to show boat on an example that wasn't in the budget and McCain, in fact, used the bulk of his six minutes in the first round -- what a Maverick! -- to explore this project . . . no longer in the budget. This project . . . removed by Gates. But did anyone on the committee find a waste in the actual budget? That would require them using their staff to examine the budget and none do. "I'm sorry to belabor the point," insisted McCain . . . after doing just that and then going on to prattle about "but I really believe that -- if you look at the submitted budgets there are going to be decreases in procurement over time and it makes these cost overruns which are bad even worse." Well when does the Congress review the submitted budgets . . . as opposed to items not actually in the budget?
They applaud. They offer praise. And all the time they're spending the people's money. Without offering any oversight. The White House will likely soon introduce their "Social Security needs fixing" propaganda. Congress will not stop to applaud the American people. Congress will not sing the American people's praises (though US House Rep Adam Smith might again call the American people "paranoid" in an open session). Congress will rush to cut this and that and insists that cuts must be made. But when the generals do their money shine, Congress just grins and applauds . . . and freely tosses out the tax payers' dollars as if they were their own to keep the war machine rolling. As Chris Hedges' "The Disease of Permanent War" (Information Clearing House) observes:
In "Pentagon Capitalism" Seymour Mellman described the defense industry as viral. Defense and military industries in permanent war, he wrote, trash economies. They are able to upend priorities. They redirect government expenditures towards their huge military projects and starve domestic investment in the name of national security. We produce sophisticated fighter jets, while Boeing is unable to finish its new commercial plane on schedule and our automotive industry goes bankrupt. We sink money into research and development of weapons systems and neglect renewable energy technologies to fight global warming. Universities are flooded with defense-related cash and grants, and struggle to find money for environmental studies. This is the disease of permanent war.
"I am going to put the balance of my statement in the record," said Senator Carl Levin, chair of the Armed Services Committee, "because we have votes at 10:00 this morning so that means that we have even less time than usual." Levin's statement can be found here and he stopped reading from it after "I also note the presence of several non-commissioned officers behind our witnesses; we look forward to their introduction." If you thought his stopping so soon would indicate a sense of urgency, you were wrong. There was time for many more rounds of applause and many more jokes. (Including ones about the "rakish" Senator Daniel Akaka.)
For a change, General Casey had rehearsed his opening statement (as evidenced by his not referring to it during his opening and his relying on it only occasionally throughout). "Chairman," Casey began, "last year, I think you'll recall, in my testimony I said that the army was out of balance. That we were so weighed down by our current commitments that we couldn't do the things we know we need to do to sustain this all volunteer force and the strategic flexibility to do other things. I can tell you that we have made progress over the last year in putting ourselves back in balance but we're not out of the woods yet." Of course not. Were the army out of the woods then the monies requested wouldn't be 'necessities' and 'urgently needed,' right?
As they ask for ever more money and insist is so needed because the military is so stretched, any reasonable person would, at some point, start to ask, "Well instead of throwing even more money at it each year, why don't we start pulling these overseas troops and bringing them back home?" If you spend more money than you have on clothes one week, you probably should consider not buying any in the following weeks. But for the military, every day is buy a fun frock day. And the Congress is more than happy to keep shelling out Americans' money instead of pointing out that the United States could save a great deal of money by ending the military 'adventures' in Iraq and Afghanistan (and elsewhere).
In strength targets for 2012 so that gives us a big lift
Casey: One of the reasons it gives us a lift is because it allows us to begin coming off of stop-loss this year. And several months ago the Secretary of the Defense announced the plan where the reserve component would begin deploying units without stop-loss in August, the National Guard in September, and the active force in January of 2010. This puts us on track to achieve our goal of being able to deploy our modular formations without stop-loss by 2011. The second key objective was to increase the time our soldiers spend at home. And I will tell you, after two years in this job, I am more and more convinced that this is the single most important element of putting ourselves back in balance. It's important from several perspectives. One is so that the soldiers have time to recover from these repeated combat deployments. What we're seeing across the force are the cumulative effect of repeated deployments. Secondly, it gives them a more stable preparation time for the next mission. When you're only home for a year, you're barely had time to take your leave before you're preparing to go back again. And third, it gives soldiers time to begin training for other things to do things beyond the regular warfare training that they're doing for Iraq and Afghanistan. Now I will tell you back in 2007, that I didn't think we would quite get to one year back, two years out by 2011. With the president's draw down plan, if it's executed as has been laid out, we will actually do a little better than that. So I am quite hopeful that if we execute that plan, we will make a big difference here in putting us back in balance.
Stop-loss is included because we have focused on that. And because so many in the press wanted to get Gates announcement wrong. For example, this was written by a reporter back when Gates made his announcement: "Stop loss now can be dropped in part because the U.S. signed a status of forces agreement with Iraq late last year that calls for a U.S. withdrawal by the end of 2011." What? That never made sense. Stop loss was supposed to be over by the start of 2011 at the lastest. But goodness weren't there a lot of Miss Cleos and Barack Whores in the media. Ann Scott Tyson's "Army to Phase Out 'Stop-Loss' Practice" (Washington Post) was one of the few 'reports' that actually qualified as reporting. Casey made it clear that it was meeting their target goals that was allowing them to meet the stop-loss goals that Gates set last March.
Dwell time is included because it's important and because Casey's statements were apparently too honest and required that the army rush out a scrub version of his comments. This is what Casey said:
Now I will tell you back in 2007, that I didn't think we would quite get to one year back, two years out by 2011. With the president's draw down plan, if it's executed as has been laid out, we will actually do a little better than that. So I am quite hopeful that if we execute that plan, we will make a big difference here in putting us back in balance.
This is what the army's press release claims he stated:
In 2007, based on what I thought the force structure would be over the next four years. I thought we wouldn't get quite to one year out, two years back by 2011. If we execute the president's Iraq drawdown plan, and I have no reason to doubt we will, we will actually do better and actually get to the 1/2 or even better ratio -- we have to do that.
That is not what he stated. Maybe he should have read his prepared statement word for word? The army maintains this quote is from his prepared statement). What you had, before the committee, was a general offering testimony and being much less of lackey than our press corps. Casey's actual comments re: the 'plan' were accurate. Why the army felt the need to rush in with statements that were not made goes to a frantic worry on the part of someone. "I have no reason to doubt we will"? That's hilarious. The closest Casey came to the topic again was during his exchange with Senator Susan Collins and, no, he didn't say it then either. He did say, in response to Collins' concern that the dwell time targets would not be met "if we didn't execute that plan. I would say that Secretary Gates has left the door open to go back and reconsider building those three brigades that were left out -- that will not build now if the situation in the future looks like that was not a good decision so the door is open for us to do that." For them to build three brigades if the draw down does not take place or if it starts and it's decided to stop it.
Staying with dwell time, we'll note the following exchange between Casey and independent (no declared political party) Senator Joe Lieberman on dwell time.
Joe Lieberman: And your goal for the army for dwell time would be what?
George Casey: My short term goal for '11 is 1 year out, 2 years back. I would like to ultimately get the army to the point where it was one year out, three years back for the active force and one year out, five years back for the Guard and Reserves.
Joe Lieberman: Okay, so by the fiscal year beginning October 1, 2010, which would be fiscal year eleven, you'd like to see us get to one year out, two years back? Is that right?
George Casey: That is correct, senator.
Joe Lieberman: Okay. And what are the numbers now, just to have it on the record? What's the dwell time now?
George Casey: Right now we're -- for the active force, we're sitting right between 1 to 1.5 and a little less.
Joe Lieberman: Right. Okay so well below -- well below. And am I correct that we expect for the rest of this year to have to increase deployments? In other words, the path we're on in Afghanistan and Iraq together, the net effect will be an increase in deployments out for the remainder of this year?
George Casey: Correct Senator, by about 10,000 before we start to come down.
Joe Lieberman: Okay. And that's a significant number. So in that sense, there'll be more pressure on dwell time from now until the end of the year just because of the suppy and demand you talked about. As I understand it -- incidentally to say something very briefly, I think you're so right when you say that dwell time is a key because it is so clear that you and we are trying our best and, I think, doing better at the quality of life of the people in our army and their families housing, benefits, etc, etc. But if the supply of the army is less than the demand for the army then this critical factor of how long our soldiers are going to be home simply can't go up. And from the point of view -- a military point of view -- retraining, etc. rest and of course for the human element of being with their families. Now I understand that we're in a very unusual moment here which is that because recruitment is going so well and re-enlistments are so high that the authorized strength of the army is 547,000-plus. We actually have an army now that's about 549,000. Is that correct?
George Casey: It is and actually senator for this year, '09, that we're in for a few more months, it's actually 532,000.
Joe Lieberman: Yeah, it's 532,000 authorized plus the waiver of about 3% so it takes up to 547 we've got more than that now.
That's included for the numbers and for dwell time. Lieberman's proposing funding approximately $400,000 million to allow 2% to remain in the military through the end of the year. Remember, they never worry about shaving the bills the tax payers pay, they just trying to find ways to add more to the bill. Over and over.
Geren and Casey submitted [PDF format warning] "A Statement On The Posture Of The United States Army 2009." This 20 page 'greeting' wasn't put together by Hallmark. "Looking ahead, we see an era of persistent conflict," it cheerfully informs in the opening letter and, on page one of the report, they elaborate that not only will it be persistent, it will be "more ambiguous and unpredicatable than in the past." That's due, they assert, to such factors as globalization (Barack and Thomas Friedman rush to object) which "has increased interdependence and prosperity in man parts of the world. It also has led to greater disparities in wealth which set conditions that can foster conflict"; technology; population growth; increasing demand for resources and more. Increasing demand for resources? Who ever heard of a country going to war for resources? Name one country that ever went to war for resources, just one that -- Oh, yeah. But don't we all pretend like resource wars never happen? Or that they only took place in the distant past?
In the hearing, there were a few moments on Iraq. Senator Jack Reed asked about it in terms of the drawing down of some forces.
Jack Reed: How does this work in Iraq? As you pull out brigade combat teams, you no longer have that brigade structure. You'll have embeded training teams that won't be operating with their brigades -- they'll be with Iraqi brigades. That's a different sort of species?
George Casey: You're right senator. As the draw down comes it will be a mix of units that have external teams and then units that have their own teams and then that will gradually to the six advise and assist brigades that will be remaining 2010 and they'll be organized as I said.
George Casey must have been on Red Bull. The general's never been so animated in hearing. He offered the trademark Diana Ross & the Surpremes "Stop In The Name Of Love" gesture (before you break the bank? think it over, think it over) frequently and also, on the above quote, he did this sort of Bela Lugosi meets "Tiny Bubbles" repetitive move with both hands. Kat's planning on covering an exchange between Senator Saxby Chambliss and Geren when she posts at her site tonight.
Monday, May 11th, Sgt John M. Russell appears to have shot five US service members in Baghdad at a stress clinic. The five killed were Charles K. Springle, Michael Edward Yates, Christian Bueno-Galdos, Matthew Houseal and Jacob Barton. If you're wondering, the hearing had gone on for over sixty minutes before the shooting was brought up. Senator Kay Hagan noted the late Charles K. Springle, how he was a heatlh care provider and asked, "What are you doing to be sure a situation like that doesn't happen again?" Casey replied, "We -- uh -- that is being -- is being studied and the lessons learned from that will be circulated widely throughout the army. There's several ongoing investigations that will inform us about -- about it was a tragic incident." Hagen was told "every brigade has a behavioral health care professional that works with the commander". In other news on the shooting, Richard Tompkins (UPI) reports that Russell is now at camp Arifjan in Kuwait "for futher questioning and legal processing." Tompkins notes Russell has been "charged with five counts of murder and one of aggravated assault."
The draw down was mentioned, alluded to and assumed by the bulk of the US senators throughout the hearing. Rod Nordland (New York Times) has already raised issues about the realities of that 'binding' Status Of Forces Agreement. Today Jane Arraf (Christian Science Monitor -- link is text but there's also a brief audio from Arraf) joins him reporting:
On a map of Baghdad, the US Army's Forward Operating Base Falcon is clearly within city limits.
Except that Iraqi and American military officials have decided it's not. As the June 30 deadline for US soldiers to be out of Iraqi cities approaches, there are no plans to relocate the roughly 3,000 American troops who help maintain security in south Baghdad along what were the fault lines in the sectarian war.
"We and the Iraqis decided it wasn't in the city," says a US military official. The base on the southern outskirts of Baghdad's Rasheed district is an example of the fluidity of the Status of Forces Agreement (SOFA) agreed to late last year, which orders all US combat forces out of Iraqi cities, towns, and villages by June 30.
"We consider the security agreement a living document," says a senior US commander. With six weeks to go, US and Iraqi commanders are sitting down in joint security committees to determine how they can comply with the decree that all US combat forces withdraw from populated areas by the end of June and still maintain the requirement to assist Iraq in fighting the insurgency and maintaining security and stability.
Two reporters reporting truthfully. Staying with the subject of reporters, yesterday's snapshot noted Sahar S. Gabriel, an Iraqi journalist who worked for the New York Times and is now a refugee in the US, writing about her search for employment. Today another Iraqi journalist for the Times who is now a refugee in the US, Mudhafar al-Husseini, writes at the Committee to Protect Journalists about navigating the United States:
With this new lesson, I flew from Atlanta to Denver on my way to Tucson . I felt very lucky because a lot of people offered to help me settle in. Many of these people are current and former employees of The New York Times who had heard about my story through Erica. She tried her best to help me because she knew what I was going through in Baghdad. She was like a mother to me and for some reason, I felt like a son to her--that's why I could open up with her and tell her my stories. I confided in her, and she could sense the sorrow--the sorrow of my lost youth--just by looking into my eyes when we were working together in Baghdad . She just knew that I was forced to accept my life in Iraq ; the main goal of this life was to survive your day.
I arrived at the Tucson airport and my new American family was waiting for me there. Lew Serviss, a former senior editor at The New York Times and a professor at the University of Arizona 's School of Journalism, and his wife, Naomi, a freelance journalist, were to become like my parents in America . I felt as though I had known them for a long time. They overwhelmed me with their kindness; I felt like a little child between them. Ford Burkhart, a former New York Times foreign desk editor, is like a godfather to me because he has wisdom and kindness at the same time. He even held up a sign when I walked out of the airport gate that said "Welcome Mudhafar" spelled in Arabic. Aram Mohammed, a young Iraqi who works with the International Rescue Committee is my case worker, was also there to greet me. He's only been in the U.S. a few years himself.
When I was told in Baghdad that I was approved to go to America and specifically to Tucson , I quietly sneaked onto one of the computers in the Times newsroom to Google this city that I'd never heard of before. The first thing I saw was the saguaro cactus, which I had seen only in movies or cartoons. I was surprised when I saw them standing outside the airport as if they were petrified humans--giant green forms with arms that seemed to beckon. "Can this be real?" I said to myself, as I examined the cactus and thought of the ones in the cartoons. It was one of the funniest moments I'd had in a long time.
Meanwhile Alsumaria reports, "Around 30 Iraqi asylum seekers who sought refugee in a church in Copenhagen moved on Sunday to another church in a district crowded by Iraqi refugees in protest to an agreement reached last Thursday between Denmark and Iraq to repatriate refugees whom asylum applications were rejected."
Turning to Iraq. Ernesto Londono (Washington Post) covers the 'economic downturn' for Iraq and potential concerns that result. This one is probably the most telling:U.S. officials say they fear the budget crunch will prevent the Iraqi government from keeping billions of dollars' worth of U.S.-donated equipment in working condition, representing a potentially colossal loss for a key American investment.Not a lot of sympathy for Iraq's corrupt government which has spent billions in the last month on weapons. While al-Maliki & company bemoan their financial woes, Carl Motished (Times of London) notes "squabbling Baghdad politicians" could be part of a group to derail and $8 billion (in US dollars) "investment by Pearl Petroleum in Kurdish Iraq". Motished observes, "There is jealousy in Baghdad over the upstart Kurdish regional government's success in developing an independent oil industry. Baghdad initially blustered over exploration licences for tiny foreign explorers in Kurdistan, arguing that the Kurds were giving away too much oil profit to foreigners." Meanwhile IRIN reports on more apparent corruption:A new survey by the Ministry of Planning and Development Cooperation of 120,000 families which had qualified for state food handouts in 15 of Iraq's 18 provinces, found that 18 percent of families had not received the nine-item food ration for 13 months; 31.5 percent for 7-12 months; 14.5 percent for 4-6 months; 22 percent for 2-3 months and 14.5 percent for one month.The survey also revealed concerns about the quality of food items: 16 percent of the surveyed families said the ration items in April were bad, 45 percent said they acceptable, while 29 percent said they were good.Top on the list of bad items was tea, followed by rice, flour and sugar, the survey found.
Bombings?
AFP notes a Taji roadside bombing which claimed 2 lives, a Jarf Skha roadside bombing which injured one "local Sahwa chief". Hussein Kadhim (McClatchy Newspapers) report a missile attack on the Green Zone today
Shootings?
AFP notes the US military stated today that a US soldier killed 1 Iraqi civilian at a checkpoint over a failure to stop. The US military statement reads: "MOSUL, Iraq -- An Iraqi civilian was killed in an escalation of force incident with U.S. Coalition forces in the neighborhood of Al Dawasa, Mosul, Iraq, May 18. The vehicle drove through a joint traffic control point conducted by Coalition forces and members of the Iraqi Emergency Response Brigade and continued toward the parked Coalition vehicles. Coalition forces signaled for the vehicle to stop. The vehicle continued its approach, forcing CF to fire at it, killing the driver. The vehicle struck one of the Coalition vehicles. Coalition forces cordoned the area after the incident and a local ambulance transported the body to the Mosul General hospital."
Jeremy Scahill was a guest (briefly) on Democracy Now! (link has text, audio and video) today and he addressed the issue of torture. We'll note an excerpt and I'm deleting Jeremy's praise for Scott Horoton. Journalists (Schahill) are general studies major and they'd do well to stick to what they know. Scott Horton is not a Constitutional Law expert. In fact, he would have been laughed out the first semester of Constitutional Law (and I would have been the first to point and laugh at him). He does not teach Constitutional Law at Columbia where he's a lecturer-in-law. Marjorie Cohn (whom we no longer highlight after she went bat s**t nuts following Keith Olbermann's meme on Hillary) is a Constitutional Law expert. Michael Ratner is another Constitutional Law expert. Every attorney is not and Scott Horton's expertise is not Constitutional Law. Anyone who took even one semester of Constitutional Law would grasp that. Journalists need to try sticking to the facts. Scotty is Council of/for/from Foreign Relations and that doesn't trouble Jeremy but it would have troubled Amy's audience if they'd been informed of it. (Scotty's also the topic of Stan's post from yesterday. Stan and Mike have had it with Little Scotty and that's nothing compared to the members of Congress who no longer rush to hear from the 'crazy.') Repeating: Scott Horton is not a Constitutional Law expert. Stick to the facts, Jeremy.
AMY GOODMAN: Well, describe what you call as this "little known military thug squad."
JEREMY SCAHILL: When the Bush administration established the US prison camp at Guantanamo, of course, we know well that they set up a system where detainees were going to be systematically tortured. And, of course, Nancy Pelosi and other Democrats were briefed on this program, despite what they're saying right now.
And while much of the focus has been on the tactical use of torture at Guantanamo, almost no attention had been paid to a parallel force that was torturing prisoners in a variety of ways, including waterboarding them, and that is this riot squad of sorts that you referred to called the Immediate Reaction Force. The prisoners and their lawyers at Guantanamo call it the "Extreme Repression Force."
And basically what this is is a thug squad that is used to mercilessly punish prisoners who show the slightest bit of resistance or who do things that technically they're not supposed to do, infractions like having two Styrofoam cups in their cell instead of one. Guards will call in this goon squad. They come in with their Darth Vader outfits, and they literally gang-beat prisoners. There are five men, generally, that are sent in. Each of them is assigned to one body part of the prisoner: the head, the left arm, the right arm, the left leg, the right leg. They go in, and they hogtie the prisoner, sometimes leaving them hogtied for hours on end. They douse them with chemical agents. They have put their heads in toilets and flushed the toilets repeatedly. They have urinated on the heads of prisoners. They've squeezed their testicles in the course of restraining them. They've taken the feces from one prisoner and smeared it in the face of another prisoner. And while Barack Obama, almost immediately upon taking office, issued an executive order saying he was going to close down Guantanamo within a year and that he was going to respect the Geneva Convention while his administration reviewed Guantanamo, this force has continued to operate and torture prisoners under the Obama administration. In fact, in February of this year, about a month after Obama was inaugurated, there were sixteen prisoners on a hunger strike at Guantanamo. The Immediate Response -- or Immediate Reaction Force was used to go in and violently shove massive tubes down their noses into their stomachs. And what the IRF teams, as they're called -- when they beat someone, it's called IRF-ing, or to be IRF-ed up by these teams. They would use no anesthetics or any painkillers, shove this massive tube by force down their nose into their stomach and then yank it out. Some prisoners have described this as torture, torture, torture. And many have passed out from the sheer pain of this operation. This force has received almost no scrutiny in the US Congress or the US media and operates at this moment.
AMY GOODMAN: How do you know about this?
JEREMY SCAHILL: Well, I discovered these teams, because I've been covering the investigation being done by Judge Baltasar Garzon in Spain into the Bush torture system. What's interesting is that the most aggressive investigation at this point into the Bush war crimes is being done an ocean away in Madrid. And I came across a story of a prisoner named Omar Deghayes, and he is one of the four people that is cited directly in the Spanish investigation as having been tortured by the United States. He's originally Libyan, is a British resident and is one of the subjects of Baltasar Garzon's investigation. Omar Deghayes was repeatedly IRF-ed, was repeatedly abused by one of these squads. And so, when I came across this reference to this team that he was referring to in his testimony, I started to look into it and realized that there has been a multi-year pattern of abuse on the part of this team. And yet, the only time when it's really made any kind of a flash in the corporate media was when a US soldier, a young guy named Sean Baker, who was a Gulf War vet, was participating in a training exercise in Guantanamo in January of 2003, where he was ordered, he says, by his superiors to dress up in an orange jumpsuit and play the part of a restive or combative detainee at Guantanamo. He was told that the team that was going to come in to handle him knew that he was a US soldier, knew that it was a training drill, and he was given a word, a codeword, "red," that when he said it, the beating was supposed to stop, or the subduing of him was supposed to stop. When he was in the cell, the team comes in. He describes them just mercilessly beating him, and he's yelling out "Red!" and they continue to beat him, even after he then said, "I'm a US soldier! I'm a US soldier!" He describes how one of his fellow soldiers continued to beat him. That young man, Sean Baker, has permanent brain damage, suffers from multiple seizures, and had actually sued Rumsfeld and other officials because of his treatment. So you had a flash, a moment in time in 2005, where this case came to public light, because of this lawsuit brought by a US soldier.
[. . .]
And let's be clear here, you read the New York Times today, and you realize that despite Obama's rhetoric about how he's going to reform the military tribunal system, we understand that it's all cosmetic changes. The fact is, torture continues at Guantanamo. The place has not shut down. Interestingly, Ari Fleischer, the former propaganda chief for the Bush administration, said the other day, quite clearly, that he doesn't believe Obama, in any universe, is going to be able to shut down Guantanamo in a year. So, Amy, as far as I can tell from this in-depth investigation, we see the status quo alive and well, and it's very, very damaging to the US Constitution, international law and the lives of these prisoners who remain in legal limbo.
I noted Jeremy this morning and noted he needs to stick to the facts on Nancy Pelosi. Three community members e-mailed about a take he has on Bill Clinton. That's largely rooted in the facts and his intrepretation is his call. You can disagree with it or not. But if he's allowing Bill Fletcher Jr. to identify Bill Clinton as a "neo liberalist," it is required -- according to journalism guidelines -- that Bill Fletcher Jr.'s politics be identified. They never are. But CounterSpin will always put Bill on to screech about alleged modern day "McCarthyism!" Fletch, if you're going to label your opponents, you need to fess up to your own politics. (Hint, Bill Fletcher Jr. is not a Democrat. Nothing wrong with that but don't hide in a political closet while hissing at others.)
Bill Fletcher Jr.'s Dream Lover Barack Obama launched another attack on abortion rights yesterday. Sunsara Taylor (World Can't Wait) notes:
When it comes to abortion, there is ONLY ONE moral question: Will women be fully emancipated human beings in control of their lives and reproduction OR will we be forced to submit to patriarchal male authority and to breed against our will.
A woman who cannot decide for herself, without any shame, judgment or restrictions, when and whether she chooses to have a child, has no more freedom than a slave.
The movement to forcibly deny women the right to abortion and to birth control is a movement to enslave women. With its aims, its methods, and its morality, there can be no compromise.
At her site, Susan (Random Thoughts) notes World Socialist Web Site's insightful commentary on Barack's attack:
Instead, in what has become this administration's standard operating procedure, Obama opted for an approach that was as spineless as it was reactionary. The central premise of his speech was that the views of those who would deny citizens their democratic rights are no less deserving of respect than those who seek to secure and defend those rights. He approached the issue of abortion as if this legal right should be perpetually subject to negotiation between those who seek to exercise their rights and those who would deny women the protection of the law.
Obama's indifferent attitude toward the defense of democratic rights was not confined to the issue of abortion. In a statement whose reactionary implications grows clearer with each reading, Obama declared: "The soldier and the lawyer may both love this country with equal passion, and yet reach very different conclusions on the specific steps needed to protect us from harm. The gay activist and the evangelical pastor may both deplore the ravages of HIV/AIDS, but find themselves unable to bridge the cultural divide that might unite their efforts. Those who speak out against stem cell research may be rooted in an admirable conviction about the sacredness of life, but so are the parents of a child with juvenile diabetes who are convinced that their son's or daughter's hardships can be relieved."
What is Obama's point? That the general who favors martial law "to protect us from harm" has a view that is as legitimate as that of the lawyer who defends the Bill of Rights? That the views of the evangelical pastor whose hateful sermons encourage anti-gay discrimination are to be seen as a valuable contribution to the national discourse? And, finally, that some sort of common ground should be found between those who oppose stem cell research and those whose children may die because of such reactionary efforts? Why is opposition to stem cell research, rooted in ignorance and hostility to science, being praised by the president as "an admirable conviction about the sacredness of life"?
On the issue of abortion itself, Obama tacitly implied that women who undergo this procedure are engaged in disreputable activity, and that the moral high ground is held by the opponents of abortion. He declared: "Let's honor the conscience of those who disagree with abortion, and draft a sensible conscience clause, and make sure that all of our health care policies are grounded not only in sound science, but also in clear ethics, as well as respect for the equality of women."
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Jim Webb is the Senator from Virginia. I do not see eye to eye with him on every issue but he is a strong advocate for veterans and he is also one of the senators who can really dig in. A lot can't. A lot act like high school students who goofed off and are shocked by a pop quiz. Joe Lieberman, whom I never agree with, is someone who generally has done some work before he showed up for the hearing. Barack Obama was the least prepared. That's why, for example, in April 2008, when he was questioning General David Petraeus and US Ambassador to Iraq Ryan Crocker, he had to repeatedly go over his time. He was stumbling around trying to ask something, trying to grab a soundbyte since all the cameras were present. It was very obvious that he was unprepared. His buddy Clair MacHack is another senator who breezes into a hearing completely unprepared and thinks she's bluffing her way through but it's very obvious that she's done no work. That's why they have a staff.
I don't think most people grasp that it was Congressional staff that exposed labor abuses in Congress a few decades back. Congressional staffers are supposed to be working. They're supposed to be researching. Maybe Clair's do but she's too busy thinking up
Senator Jim Webb: Your comments about dwell time being of your utmost concern. I recall the conversation that you and I had more than two years ago when you called me to tell me that the army was going to go to 15 month deployments with 12 months at home which I think is a .75 dwell time ratio and you will recall I expressed my strongest concern about that. As someone who had grown up in the military, as did you, and watched my father go through multiple deployments, someone who had served in Vietnam when the Marine Corps tour was 13 months and as someone who has had a son and son-in-law deploy as enlisted marines in extended tours in Iraq. Now, on the one hand, and I said this to Secretary of Defense last week and Admiral Mullen, I - I am very encouraged about programs that are in place to treat those whoa re experiencing emotional difficulties and stigma in the active forces and that sort of thing but I'm still concerned measure that could be taken and should be taken to prevent these sort of situations which was the basis really of my conversation with you two years ago, was the reason that I addressed the dwell time amendment twice in '07. If we are going to put greater discipline say into the procurement process - as has become a big focus -- maybe we should be putting the same sort of discipline in our combatant commanders' request for troops? That they're -- certainly one of the parameters in terms of troop availability or in terms of how we use troops is the stewardship that we all should feel about length of deployments versus time back here -- all of these things that you were talking about at the beginning [of this hearing] which I was talking about on the Senate floor a couple of years ago. Uhm, so what do you think about that?
George Casey: Senator, I couldn't agree more. In fact, one of the points of discussion that I hoped to have in the quadrennial defense review is whether or not we need to move toward a capability based strategy versus a war plan strategy. As I said, we're organizing the army on a rotational cycle so that we provide a sustained level of capability to commanders but at a sustainable deployment cycle.
Jim Webb: Well certainly rotational cycles should be on the table, when we're talking about the number of troops that should be deployed. You know --
George Casey: Absolutely.
Jim Webb: -- that's something that you and I were discussing two years ago. You were saying, in your defense I will say, you were saying that you had to feed the strategy. When you went to the 15 month, 12 month, you had to feed the strategy. Your obligation to feed the strategy. General Petraeus comes and testifies and I asked him about the dwell time thing and he said, 'Well I just state my requirements' and, you know, there was sort of a disconnect in the middle. And it would seem to me, particularly in this transitional period, we ought to be taking a pretty, a pretty tough look at the well being of the force as a component in terms of how we're using them to deploy in Afghanistan.
George Casey: I agree with you and I'm not articulating it well, I don't think. But once you have arranged the force into bins for the rotational cycle, that's what's available to the country. And it's available at a sustainable deployment cycle to the families and the soldiers and it's a strategy that's constrained by means which all strategies should be, rather than strategy driving requirements.
Jim Webb: I think you and I, we are rushing to agree on this but at same time the difficult really is that there seems to be such a deference to a combat commander, and there should be something of a deference, but there seems to be such a deference when they say "I need 30,000 troops" rather than where this decision is now being made this is going to be going on for a long time and how are we going to protect the health and our long term sustainability in terms of feeding these troops.
Webb also gave him a chance to clear up his comments made to Senator Joe Lieberman:
Jim Webb: . . . when you said you had a lot of units that are 1.5 dwell time ratio right now. Army wide with the troops actually deployed, what is the ratio in dwell time right now?
George Casey: We're between 1.3 and 1.5 is the average.
And that's it from me. C.I.'s got all the news in the "Iraq snapshot:"
Tuesday, May 19, 2009. Chaos and violence continue, Steven D. Green's War Crimes sentencing hearing continues, the US Senate bends over backwards to add even more money to the bloated army budget, Iraqi refugees seek refuge in a church attempting to get asylum, and more.
Starting with Steven D. Green who was convicted two Thursdays ago in the gang-rape of 14-year-old Iraqi Abeer Qassim Hamza al-Janabi, her murder, the murder of her five-year-old sister and the murders of both of her parents. Since then, the jury has been hearing testimony they will weigh when determining his sentencing. Green could receive the death penalty; however, all 12 jurors would have to vote to sentence him to death. If that does not happen, he is facing life in prison. The hearing resumed yesterday and continued today. Evan Bright reports, "Just heard testimony from Dr. Helen Mayberg in contrast to the testimony of Dr. Ruben Gur. Basically said that Gur screwed up his MRI." Gur screwed up his MRI? He certainly screwed up his testimony on the MRI last week: "Gur was an 'expert.' Another reason not to waste the jury's time with 'experts'." Brett Barrouquere (AP) reports Dr. Mayberg was the prosecution's witness and that she stated Gur screwed up the MRI because the scan was not consistent with the scans he compared them to (a control group to establish a baseline for normal versus brain injury): "He [Green] was done differently. It's not big surprise that there are some areas that look different."
Bright also reports the "Court is adjourned for the day. Both sides rest with opening statements to be heard tomorrow, Wednesday May 20th. Blog later tonight." On yesterday's proceedings, Evan Bright had a post at The Huffington Post. Yesterday the hearing resumed (picking up from last Thursday) and Dave Alsup (CNN) noted, "Patty Ruth, a Texas elementary school principal, told a civilian jury about Green's childhood as a reader who loved to be hugged by relatives. 'I do not know how we got to this spot,' Ruth said in emotional testimony. 'I do not know how this happened'." The defense better hope the jury has a better grasp than Patty Ruth or Green will receive the death penalty. AP's Brett Barrouquere adds, "Ruth's testimony in the penalty phase of Green's trial came as the ex-soldier's father, John Green, and an uncle looked on in court." At his website, Evan Bright noted yesterday, "Tuesday(tomorrow): Remaining defense witnesses, if there are any, followed by the Prosecution's one rebuttal witness(an expert/specialist of some kind). There is a "50/50" chance that we will hear closing statements tomorrow, Pat Bouldin allegedly said. If not tomorrow, expect to hear them on Wednesday."
"Our army is stretched by this long war," declared the Secretary of the Army Pete Geren today to the Senate Armed Services Committee this morning when reading from his prepared, opening statement. The hearing was one where . . . Begs? The army begs for money? That implies that the Congress puts them through a song and dance. The Congress just hands out of rounds of applause. As, in fact, they did at the start of the hearing, shortly after Ranking Committee Member Senator John McCain took time to note his "policy differences" with General George Casey Jr. . . . right before praising him. The army doesn't beg. It's more like the Congress is overly generous parents and Geren and Casey show up with report cards explaining why Bs and Cs are amazing grades worthy of the really big bucks.
There's never an indication, in any of the hearings, that any member of Congress has perused the budget request coming before it. Today Senators Levin and McCain both raised the issue of the Army's Future Combat Systems eight manned ground vehicles. McCain noted, for example, the cost overruns that immediately had a $90 billion dollar project increase to $120 billion. And if you half-listened you might think, "That's the Congress at work!" But, reality, Sec of Defense Robert Gates already removed that from the budget. So what you had were some 'tough' moves and questions about . . . something not in the budget. About something Robert Gates had pointed out was wasteful.
Despite the economic crisis that's facing the country, no member of Congress ever says, "Let's take a look at this item . . ." It just doesn't happen. And didn't today. They were happy to show boat on an example that wasn't in the budget and McCain, in fact, used the bulk of his six minutes in the first round -- what a Maverick! -- to explore this project . . . no longer in the budget. This project . . . removed by Gates. But did anyone on the committee find a waste in the actual budget? That would require them using their staff to examine the budget and none do. "I'm sorry to belabor the point," insisted McCain . . . after doing just that and then going on to prattle about "but I really believe that -- if you look at the submitted budgets there are going to be decreases in procurement over time and it makes these cost overruns which are bad even worse." Well when does the Congress review the submitted budgets . . . as opposed to items not actually in the budget?
They applaud. They offer praise. And all the time they're spending the people's money. Without offering any oversight. The White House will likely soon introduce their "Social Security needs fixing" propaganda. Congress will not stop to applaud the American people. Congress will not sing the American people's praises (though US House Rep Adam Smith might again call the American people "paranoid" in an open session). Congress will rush to cut this and that and insists that cuts must be made. But when the generals do their money shine, Congress just grins and applauds . . . and freely tosses out the tax payers' dollars as if they were their own to keep the war machine rolling. As Chris Hedges' "The Disease of Permanent War" (Information Clearing House) observes:
In "Pentagon Capitalism" Seymour Mellman described the defense industry as viral. Defense and military industries in permanent war, he wrote, trash economies. They are able to upend priorities. They redirect government expenditures towards their huge military projects and starve domestic investment in the name of national security. We produce sophisticated fighter jets, while Boeing is unable to finish its new commercial plane on schedule and our automotive industry goes bankrupt. We sink money into research and development of weapons systems and neglect renewable energy technologies to fight global warming. Universities are flooded with defense-related cash and grants, and struggle to find money for environmental studies. This is the disease of permanent war.
"I am going to put the balance of my statement in the record," said Senator Carl Levin, chair of the Armed Services Committee, "because we have votes at 10:00 this morning so that means that we have even less time than usual." Levin's statement can be found here and he stopped reading from it after "I also note the presence of several non-commissioned officers behind our witnesses; we look forward to their introduction." If you thought his stopping so soon would indicate a sense of urgency, you were wrong. There was time for many more rounds of applause and many more jokes. (Including ones about the "rakish" Senator Daniel Akaka.)
For a change, General Casey had rehearsed his opening statement (as evidenced by his not referring to it during his opening and his relying on it only occasionally throughout). "Chairman," Casey began, "last year, I think you'll recall, in my testimony I said that the army was out of balance. That we were so weighed down by our current commitments that we couldn't do the things we know we need to do to sustain this all volunteer force and the strategic flexibility to do other things. I can tell you that we have made progress over the last year in putting ourselves back in balance but we're not out of the woods yet." Of course not. Were the army out of the woods then the monies requested wouldn't be 'necessities' and 'urgently needed,' right?
As they ask for ever more money and insist is so needed because the military is so stretched, any reasonable person would, at some point, start to ask, "Well instead of throwing even more money at it each year, why don't we start pulling these overseas troops and bringing them back home?" If you spend more money than you have on clothes one week, you probably should consider not buying any in the following weeks. But for the military, every day is buy a fun frock day. And the Congress is more than happy to keep shelling out Americans' money instead of pointing out that the United States could save a great deal of money by ending the military 'adventures' in Iraq and Afghanistan (and elsewhere).
In strength targets for 2012 so that gives us a big lift
Casey: One of the reasons it gives us a lift is because it allows us to begin coming off of stop-loss this year. And several months ago the Secretary of the Defense announced the plan where the reserve component would begin deploying units without stop-loss in August, the National Guard in September, and the active force in January of 2010. This puts us on track to achieve our goal of being able to deploy our modular formations without stop-loss by 2011. The second key objective was to increase the time our soldiers spend at home. And I will tell you, after two years in this job, I am more and more convinced that this is the single most important element of putting ourselves back in balance. It's important from several perspectives. One is so that the soldiers have time to recover from these repeated combat deployments. What we're seeing across the force are the cumulative effect of repeated deployments. Secondly, it gives them a more stable preparation time for the next mission. When you're only home for a year, you're barely had time to take your leave before you're preparing to go back again. And third, it gives soldiers time to begin training for other things to do things beyond the regular warfare training that they're doing for Iraq and Afghanistan. Now I will tell you back in 2007, that I didn't think we would quite get to one year back, two years out by 2011. With the president's draw down plan, if it's executed as has been laid out, we will actually do a little better than that. So I am quite hopeful that if we execute that plan, we will make a big difference here in putting us back in balance.
Stop-loss is included because we have focused on that. And because so many in the press wanted to get Gates announcement wrong. For example, this was written by a reporter back when Gates made his announcement: "Stop loss now can be dropped in part because the U.S. signed a status of forces agreement with Iraq late last year that calls for a U.S. withdrawal by the end of 2011." What? That never made sense. Stop loss was supposed to be over by the start of 2011 at the lastest. But goodness weren't there a lot of Miss Cleos and Barack Whores in the media. Ann Scott Tyson's "Army to Phase Out 'Stop-Loss' Practice" (Washington Post) was one of the few 'reports' that actually qualified as reporting. Casey made it clear that it was meeting their target goals that was allowing them to meet the stop-loss goals that Gates set last March.
Dwell time is included because it's important and because Casey's statements were apparently too honest and required that the army rush out a scrub version of his comments. This is what Casey said:
Now I will tell you back in 2007, that I didn't think we would quite get to one year back, two years out by 2011. With the president's draw down plan, if it's executed as has been laid out, we will actually do a little better than that. So I am quite hopeful that if we execute that plan, we will make a big difference here in putting us back in balance.
This is what the army's press release claims he stated:
In 2007, based on what I thought the force structure would be over the next four years. I thought we wouldn't get quite to one year out, two years back by 2011. If we execute the president's Iraq drawdown plan, and I have no reason to doubt we will, we will actually do better and actually get to the 1/2 or even better ratio -- we have to do that.
That is not what he stated. Maybe he should have read his prepared statement word for word? The army maintains this quote is from his prepared statement). What you had, before the committee, was a general offering testimony and being much less of lackey than our press corps. Casey's actual comments re: the 'plan' were accurate. Why the army felt the need to rush in with statements that were not made goes to a frantic worry on the part of someone. "I have no reason to doubt we will"? That's hilarious. The closest Casey came to the topic again was during his exchange with Senator Susan Collins and, no, he didn't say it then either. He did say, in response to Collins' concern that the dwell time targets would not be met "if we didn't execute that plan. I would say that Secretary Gates has left the door open to go back and reconsider building those three brigades that were left out -- that will not build now if the situation in the future looks like that was not a good decision so the door is open for us to do that." For them to build three brigades if the draw down does not take place or if it starts and it's decided to stop it.
Staying with dwell time, we'll note the following exchange between Casey and independent (no declared political party) Senator Joe Lieberman on dwell time.
Joe Lieberman: And your goal for the army for dwell time would be what?
George Casey: My short term goal for '11 is 1 year out, 2 years back. I would like to ultimately get the army to the point where it was one year out, three years back for the active force and one year out, five years back for the Guard and Reserves.
Joe Lieberman: Okay, so by the fiscal year beginning October 1, 2010, which would be fiscal year eleven, you'd like to see us get to one year out, two years back? Is that right?
George Casey: That is correct, senator.
Joe Lieberman: Okay. And what are the numbers now, just to have it on the record? What's the dwell time now?
George Casey: Right now we're -- for the active force, we're sitting right between 1 to 1.5 and a little less.
Joe Lieberman: Right. Okay so well below -- well below. And am I correct that we expect for the rest of this year to have to increase deployments? In other words, the path we're on in Afghanistan and Iraq together, the net effect will be an increase in deployments out for the remainder of this year?
George Casey: Correct Senator, by about 10,000 before we start to come down.
Joe Lieberman: Okay. And that's a significant number. So in that sense, there'll be more pressure on dwell time from now until the end of the year just because of the suppy and demand you talked about. As I understand it -- incidentally to say something very briefly, I think you're so right when you say that dwell time is a key because it is so clear that you and we are trying our best and, I think, doing better at the quality of life of the people in our army and their families housing, benefits, etc, etc. But if the supply of the army is less than the demand for the army then this critical factor of how long our soldiers are going to be home simply can't go up. And from the point of view -- a military point of view -- retraining, etc. rest and of course for the human element of being with their families. Now I understand that we're in a very unusual moment here which is that because recruitment is going so well and re-enlistments are so high that the authorized strength of the army is 547,000-plus. We actually have an army now that's about 549,000. Is that correct?
George Casey: It is and actually senator for this year, '09, that we're in for a few more months, it's actually 532,000.
Joe Lieberman: Yeah, it's 532,000 authorized plus the waiver of about 3% so it takes up to 547 we've got more than that now.
That's included for the numbers and for dwell time. Lieberman's proposing funding approximately $400,000 million to allow 2% to remain in the military through the end of the year. Remember, they never worry about shaving the bills the tax payers pay, they just trying to find ways to add more to the bill. Over and over.
Geren and Casey submitted [PDF format warning] "A Statement On The Posture Of The United States Army 2009." This 20 page 'greeting' wasn't put together by Hallmark. "Looking ahead, we see an era of persistent conflict," it cheerfully informs in the opening letter and, on page one of the report, they elaborate that not only will it be persistent, it will be "more ambiguous and unpredicatable than in the past." That's due, they assert, to such factors as globalization (Barack and Thomas Friedman rush to object) which "has increased interdependence and prosperity in man parts of the world. It also has led to greater disparities in wealth which set conditions that can foster conflict"; technology; population growth; increasing demand for resources and more. Increasing demand for resources? Who ever heard of a country going to war for resources? Name one country that ever went to war for resources, just one that -- Oh, yeah. But don't we all pretend like resource wars never happen? Or that they only took place in the distant past?
In the hearing, there were a few moments on Iraq. Senator Jack Reed asked about it in terms of the drawing down of some forces.
Jack Reed: How does this work in Iraq? As you pull out brigade combat teams, you no longer have that brigade structure. You'll have embeded training teams that won't be operating with their brigades -- they'll be with Iraqi brigades. That's a different sort of species?
George Casey: You're right senator. As the draw down comes it will be a mix of units that have external teams and then units that have their own teams and then that will gradually to the six advise and assist brigades that will be remaining 2010 and they'll be organized as I said.
George Casey must have been on Red Bull. The general's never been so animated in hearing. He offered the trademark Diana Ross & the Surpremes "Stop In The Name Of Love" gesture (before you break the bank? think it over, think it over) frequently and also, on the above quote, he did this sort of Bela Lugosi meets "Tiny Bubbles" repetitive move with both hands. Kat's planning on covering an exchange between Senator Saxby Chambliss and Geren when she posts at her site tonight.
Monday, May 11th, Sgt John M. Russell appears to have shot five US service members in Baghdad at a stress clinic. The five killed were Charles K. Springle, Michael Edward Yates, Christian Bueno-Galdos, Matthew Houseal and Jacob Barton. If you're wondering, the hearing had gone on for over sixty minutes before the shooting was brought up. Senator Kay Hagan noted the late Charles K. Springle, how he was a heatlh care provider and asked, "What are you doing to be sure a situation like that doesn't happen again?" Casey replied, "We -- uh -- that is being -- is being studied and the lessons learned from that will be circulated widely throughout the army. There's several ongoing investigations that will inform us about -- about it was a tragic incident." Hagen was told "every brigade has a behavioral health care professional that works with the commander". In other news on the shooting, Richard Tompkins (UPI) reports that Russell is now at camp Arifjan in Kuwait "for futher questioning and legal processing." Tompkins notes Russell has been "charged with five counts of murder and one of aggravated assault."
The draw down was mentioned, alluded to and assumed by the bulk of the US senators throughout the hearing. Rod Nordland (New York Times) has already raised issues about the realities of that 'binding' Status Of Forces Agreement. Today Jane Arraf (Christian Science Monitor -- link is text but there's also a brief audio from Arraf) joins him reporting:
On a map of Baghdad, the US Army's Forward Operating Base Falcon is clearly within city limits.
Except that Iraqi and American military officials have decided it's not. As the June 30 deadline for US soldiers to be out of Iraqi cities approaches, there are no plans to relocate the roughly 3,000 American troops who help maintain security in south Baghdad along what were the fault lines in the sectarian war.
"We and the Iraqis decided it wasn't in the city," says a US military official. The base on the southern outskirts of Baghdad's Rasheed district is an example of the fluidity of the Status of Forces Agreement (SOFA) agreed to late last year, which orders all US combat forces out of Iraqi cities, towns, and villages by June 30.
"We consider the security agreement a living document," says a senior US commander. With six weeks to go, US and Iraqi commanders are sitting down in joint security committees to determine how they can comply with the decree that all US combat forces withdraw from populated areas by the end of June and still maintain the requirement to assist Iraq in fighting the insurgency and maintaining security and stability.
Two reporters reporting truthfully. Staying with the subject of reporters, yesterday's snapshot noted Sahar S. Gabriel, an Iraqi journalist who worked for the New York Times and is now a refugee in the US, writing about her search for employment. Today another Iraqi journalist for the Times who is now a refugee in the US, Mudhafar al-Husseini, writes at the Committee to Protect Journalists about navigating the United States:
With this new lesson, I flew from Atlanta to Denver on my way to Tucson . I felt very lucky because a lot of people offered to help me settle in. Many of these people are current and former employees of The New York Times who had heard about my story through Erica. She tried her best to help me because she knew what I was going through in Baghdad. She was like a mother to me and for some reason, I felt like a son to her--that's why I could open up with her and tell her my stories. I confided in her, and she could sense the sorrow--the sorrow of my lost youth--just by looking into my eyes when we were working together in Baghdad . She just knew that I was forced to accept my life in Iraq ; the main goal of this life was to survive your day.
I arrived at the Tucson airport and my new American family was waiting for me there. Lew Serviss, a former senior editor at The New York Times and a professor at the University of Arizona 's School of Journalism, and his wife, Naomi, a freelance journalist, were to become like my parents in America . I felt as though I had known them for a long time. They overwhelmed me with their kindness; I felt like a little child between them. Ford Burkhart, a former New York Times foreign desk editor, is like a godfather to me because he has wisdom and kindness at the same time. He even held up a sign when I walked out of the airport gate that said "Welcome Mudhafar" spelled in Arabic. Aram Mohammed, a young Iraqi who works with the International Rescue Committee is my case worker, was also there to greet me. He's only been in the U.S. a few years himself.
When I was told in Baghdad that I was approved to go to America and specifically to Tucson , I quietly sneaked onto one of the computers in the Times newsroom to Google this city that I'd never heard of before. The first thing I saw was the saguaro cactus, which I had seen only in movies or cartoons. I was surprised when I saw them standing outside the airport as if they were petrified humans--giant green forms with arms that seemed to beckon. "Can this be real?" I said to myself, as I examined the cactus and thought of the ones in the cartoons. It was one of the funniest moments I'd had in a long time.
Meanwhile Alsumaria reports, "Around 30 Iraqi asylum seekers who sought refugee in a church in Copenhagen moved on Sunday to another church in a district crowded by Iraqi refugees in protest to an agreement reached last Thursday between Denmark and Iraq to repatriate refugees whom asylum applications were rejected."
Turning to Iraq. Ernesto Londono (Washington Post) covers the 'economic downturn' for Iraq and potential concerns that result. This one is probably the most telling:U.S. officials say they fear the budget crunch will prevent the Iraqi government from keeping billions of dollars' worth of U.S.-donated equipment in working condition, representing a potentially colossal loss for a key American investment.Not a lot of sympathy for Iraq's corrupt government which has spent billions in the last month on weapons. While al-Maliki & company bemoan their financial woes, Carl Motished (Times of London) notes "squabbling Baghdad politicians" could be part of a group to derail and $8 billion (in US dollars) "investment by Pearl Petroleum in Kurdish Iraq". Motished observes, "There is jealousy in Baghdad over the upstart Kurdish regional government's success in developing an independent oil industry. Baghdad initially blustered over exploration licences for tiny foreign explorers in Kurdistan, arguing that the Kurds were giving away too much oil profit to foreigners." Meanwhile IRIN reports on more apparent corruption:A new survey by the Ministry of Planning and Development Cooperation of 120,000 families which had qualified for state food handouts in 15 of Iraq's 18 provinces, found that 18 percent of families had not received the nine-item food ration for 13 months; 31.5 percent for 7-12 months; 14.5 percent for 4-6 months; 22 percent for 2-3 months and 14.5 percent for one month.The survey also revealed concerns about the quality of food items: 16 percent of the surveyed families said the ration items in April were bad, 45 percent said they acceptable, while 29 percent said they were good.Top on the list of bad items was tea, followed by rice, flour and sugar, the survey found.
Bombings?
AFP notes a Taji roadside bombing which claimed 2 lives, a Jarf Skha roadside bombing which injured one "local Sahwa chief". Hussein Kadhim (McClatchy Newspapers) report a missile attack on the Green Zone today
Shootings?
AFP notes the US military stated today that a US soldier killed 1 Iraqi civilian at a checkpoint over a failure to stop. The US military statement reads: "MOSUL, Iraq -- An Iraqi civilian was killed in an escalation of force incident with U.S. Coalition forces in the neighborhood of Al Dawasa, Mosul, Iraq, May 18. The vehicle drove through a joint traffic control point conducted by Coalition forces and members of the Iraqi Emergency Response Brigade and continued toward the parked Coalition vehicles. Coalition forces signaled for the vehicle to stop. The vehicle continued its approach, forcing CF to fire at it, killing the driver. The vehicle struck one of the Coalition vehicles. Coalition forces cordoned the area after the incident and a local ambulance transported the body to the Mosul General hospital."
Jeremy Scahill was a guest (briefly) on Democracy Now! (link has text, audio and video) today and he addressed the issue of torture. We'll note an excerpt and I'm deleting Jeremy's praise for Scott Horoton. Journalists (Schahill) are general studies major and they'd do well to stick to what they know. Scott Horton is not a Constitutional Law expert. In fact, he would have been laughed out the first semester of Constitutional Law (and I would have been the first to point and laugh at him). He does not teach Constitutional Law at Columbia where he's a lecturer-in-law. Marjorie Cohn (whom we no longer highlight after she went bat s**t nuts following Keith Olbermann's meme on Hillary) is a Constitutional Law expert. Michael Ratner is another Constitutional Law expert. Every attorney is not and Scott Horton's expertise is not Constitutional Law. Anyone who took even one semester of Constitutional Law would grasp that. Journalists need to try sticking to the facts. Scotty is Council of/for/from Foreign Relations and that doesn't trouble Jeremy but it would have troubled Amy's audience if they'd been informed of it. (Scotty's also the topic of Stan's post from yesterday. Stan and Mike have had it with Little Scotty and that's nothing compared to the members of Congress who no longer rush to hear from the 'crazy.') Repeating: Scott Horton is not a Constitutional Law expert. Stick to the facts, Jeremy.
AMY GOODMAN: Well, describe what you call as this "little known military thug squad."
JEREMY SCAHILL: When the Bush administration established the US prison camp at Guantanamo, of course, we know well that they set up a system where detainees were going to be systematically tortured. And, of course, Nancy Pelosi and other Democrats were briefed on this program, despite what they're saying right now.
And while much of the focus has been on the tactical use of torture at Guantanamo, almost no attention had been paid to a parallel force that was torturing prisoners in a variety of ways, including waterboarding them, and that is this riot squad of sorts that you referred to called the Immediate Reaction Force. The prisoners and their lawyers at Guantanamo call it the "Extreme Repression Force."
And basically what this is is a thug squad that is used to mercilessly punish prisoners who show the slightest bit of resistance or who do things that technically they're not supposed to do, infractions like having two Styrofoam cups in their cell instead of one. Guards will call in this goon squad. They come in with their Darth Vader outfits, and they literally gang-beat prisoners. There are five men, generally, that are sent in. Each of them is assigned to one body part of the prisoner: the head, the left arm, the right arm, the left leg, the right leg. They go in, and they hogtie the prisoner, sometimes leaving them hogtied for hours on end. They douse them with chemical agents. They have put their heads in toilets and flushed the toilets repeatedly. They have urinated on the heads of prisoners. They've squeezed their testicles in the course of restraining them. They've taken the feces from one prisoner and smeared it in the face of another prisoner. And while Barack Obama, almost immediately upon taking office, issued an executive order saying he was going to close down Guantanamo within a year and that he was going to respect the Geneva Convention while his administration reviewed Guantanamo, this force has continued to operate and torture prisoners under the Obama administration. In fact, in February of this year, about a month after Obama was inaugurated, there were sixteen prisoners on a hunger strike at Guantanamo. The Immediate Response -- or Immediate Reaction Force was used to go in and violently shove massive tubes down their noses into their stomachs. And what the IRF teams, as they're called -- when they beat someone, it's called IRF-ing, or to be IRF-ed up by these teams. They would use no anesthetics or any painkillers, shove this massive tube by force down their nose into their stomach and then yank it out. Some prisoners have described this as torture, torture, torture. And many have passed out from the sheer pain of this operation. This force has received almost no scrutiny in the US Congress or the US media and operates at this moment.
AMY GOODMAN: How do you know about this?
JEREMY SCAHILL: Well, I discovered these teams, because I've been covering the investigation being done by Judge Baltasar Garzon in Spain into the Bush torture system. What's interesting is that the most aggressive investigation at this point into the Bush war crimes is being done an ocean away in Madrid. And I came across a story of a prisoner named Omar Deghayes, and he is one of the four people that is cited directly in the Spanish investigation as having been tortured by the United States. He's originally Libyan, is a British resident and is one of the subjects of Baltasar Garzon's investigation. Omar Deghayes was repeatedly IRF-ed, was repeatedly abused by one of these squads. And so, when I came across this reference to this team that he was referring to in his testimony, I started to look into it and realized that there has been a multi-year pattern of abuse on the part of this team. And yet, the only time when it's really made any kind of a flash in the corporate media was when a US soldier, a young guy named Sean Baker, who was a Gulf War vet, was participating in a training exercise in Guantanamo in January of 2003, where he was ordered, he says, by his superiors to dress up in an orange jumpsuit and play the part of a restive or combative detainee at Guantanamo. He was told that the team that was going to come in to handle him knew that he was a US soldier, knew that it was a training drill, and he was given a word, a codeword, "red," that when he said it, the beating was supposed to stop, or the subduing of him was supposed to stop. When he was in the cell, the team comes in. He describes them just mercilessly beating him, and he's yelling out "Red!" and they continue to beat him, even after he then said, "I'm a US soldier! I'm a US soldier!" He describes how one of his fellow soldiers continued to beat him. That young man, Sean Baker, has permanent brain damage, suffers from multiple seizures, and had actually sued Rumsfeld and other officials because of his treatment. So you had a flash, a moment in time in 2005, where this case came to public light, because of this lawsuit brought by a US soldier.
[. . .]
And let's be clear here, you read the New York Times today, and you realize that despite Obama's rhetoric about how he's going to reform the military tribunal system, we understand that it's all cosmetic changes. The fact is, torture continues at Guantanamo. The place has not shut down. Interestingly, Ari Fleischer, the former propaganda chief for the Bush administration, said the other day, quite clearly, that he doesn't believe Obama, in any universe, is going to be able to shut down Guantanamo in a year. So, Amy, as far as I can tell from this in-depth investigation, we see the status quo alive and well, and it's very, very damaging to the US Constitution, international law and the lives of these prisoners who remain in legal limbo.
I noted Jeremy this morning and noted he needs to stick to the facts on Nancy Pelosi. Three community members e-mailed about a take he has on Bill Clinton. That's largely rooted in the facts and his intrepretation is his call. You can disagree with it or not. But if he's allowing Bill Fletcher Jr. to identify Bill Clinton as a "neo liberalist," it is required -- according to journalism guidelines -- that Bill Fletcher Jr.'s politics be identified. They never are. But CounterSpin will always put Bill on to screech about alleged modern day "McCarthyism!" Fletch, if you're going to label your opponents, you need to fess up to your own politics. (Hint, Bill Fletcher Jr. is not a Democrat. Nothing wrong with that but don't hide in a political closet while hissing at others.)
Bill Fletcher Jr.'s Dream Lover Barack Obama launched another attack on abortion rights yesterday. Sunsara Taylor (World Can't Wait) notes:
When it comes to abortion, there is ONLY ONE moral question: Will women be fully emancipated human beings in control of their lives and reproduction OR will we be forced to submit to patriarchal male authority and to breed against our will.
A woman who cannot decide for herself, without any shame, judgment or restrictions, when and whether she chooses to have a child, has no more freedom than a slave.
The movement to forcibly deny women the right to abortion and to birth control is a movement to enslave women. With its aims, its methods, and its morality, there can be no compromise.
At her site, Susan (Random Thoughts) notes World Socialist Web Site's insightful commentary on Barack's attack:
Instead, in what has become this administration's standard operating procedure, Obama opted for an approach that was as spineless as it was reactionary. The central premise of his speech was that the views of those who would deny citizens their democratic rights are no less deserving of respect than those who seek to secure and defend those rights. He approached the issue of abortion as if this legal right should be perpetually subject to negotiation between those who seek to exercise their rights and those who would deny women the protection of the law.
Obama's indifferent attitude toward the defense of democratic rights was not confined to the issue of abortion. In a statement whose reactionary implications grows clearer with each reading, Obama declared: "The soldier and the lawyer may both love this country with equal passion, and yet reach very different conclusions on the specific steps needed to protect us from harm. The gay activist and the evangelical pastor may both deplore the ravages of HIV/AIDS, but find themselves unable to bridge the cultural divide that might unite their efforts. Those who speak out against stem cell research may be rooted in an admirable conviction about the sacredness of life, but so are the parents of a child with juvenile diabetes who are convinced that their son's or daughter's hardships can be relieved."
What is Obama's point? That the general who favors martial law "to protect us from harm" has a view that is as legitimate as that of the lawyer who defends the Bill of Rights? That the views of the evangelical pastor whose hateful sermons encourage anti-gay discrimination are to be seen as a valuable contribution to the national discourse? And, finally, that some sort of common ground should be found between those who oppose stem cell research and those whose children may die because of such reactionary efforts? Why is opposition to stem cell research, rooted in ignorance and hostility to science, being praised by the president as "an admirable conviction about the sacredness of life"?
On the issue of abortion itself, Obama tacitly implied that women who undergo this procedure are engaged in disreputable activity, and that the moral high ground is held by the opponents of abortion. He declared: "Let's honor the conscience of those who disagree with abortion, and draft a sensible conscience clause, and make sure that all of our health care policies are grounded not only in sound science, but also in clear ethics, as well as respect for the equality of women."
iraq
evan brightsteven d. green brett barrouqueredave alsupcnn
the washington postann scott tyson
alsumariachris hedges
mcclatchy newspapershussein kadhimjane arraf
ernesto londono
democracy nowjeremy scahill
sunsara taylor
kats kornermikey likes itoh boy it never ends
5/18/2009
sunsara taylor, isaiah
last night, Isaiah's The World Today Just Nuts "The Cult of St. Barack Hold Feet to the Fire" went up and it tickles me each time i look at it. i am so proud he is our community cartoonist.
this is from sunsara taylor's 'On Abortion, Obama and Notre Dame: No “Common Ground” With Fascists and Women-Haters! Abortion on Demand and Without Apology!' (world can't wait):
When it comes to abortion, there is ONLY ONE moral question: Will women be fully emancipated human beings in control of their lives and reproduction OR will we be forced to submit to patriarchal male authority and to breed against our will?
A woman who cannot decide for herself, without any shame, judgment or restrictions, when and whether she chooses to have a child, has no more freedom than a slave.
The movement to forcibly deny women the right to abortion and to birth control is a movement to enslave women. With its aims, its methods, and its morality, there can be no compromise.
we need to be screaming our heads off about the attacks on abortion rights.
we need to grasp that the assault on women, by the democratic party, did not begin last year. it began in 2004.
there has been a steady chipping away at women's rights, women's equality and, sad to say, it's been by the democratic party. the same 1 that gloria steinem can't call out. over and over.
and when abortion is gone, what then?
i'll be fine.
i'm asking what happens to other women?
and what do the sexist go after next?
next?
we know it will be birth control.
after that?
it's always something.
you either push back or it is 1 assault after another.
here's ap's brett on the steven d. green trial.
i hope you notice that.
brett.
he's male.
and there's evan bright.
he's male.
and there's dave alsup.
he's male.
the people reporting on this trial are men. where are the women?
where are the women talking about this trial?
it's the same as with abortion rights.
we're being failed because we are failing ourselves.
i can't pretty it up for you. i'm not gloria steinem.
and the time has long passed for prettying it up.
let's close with c.i.'s 'Iraq snapshot:'
Monday, May 18, 2009. Chaos and violence continue, al-Maliki airs the latest in his thugs' taped 'confessions,' tensions escalate in northern Iraq, questions about counter-insurgency rattle the cage, Steven D. Green's sentencing hearing continues and someone's not showing (besides the media), and more.
Starting with the War Crimes trial. Steven D. Green was convicted two Thursdays ago in the gang-rape of 14-year-old Iraqi Abeer Qassim Hamza al-Janabi, her murder, the murder of her five-year-old sister and the murders of both of her parents. Since then, the jury has been hearing testimony they will weigh when determining his sentencing. Green could receive the death penalty; however, all 12 jurors would have to vote to sentence him to death. If that does not happen, he is facing life in prison. No testimony was heard on Friday. The hearing resumed today and Evan Bright reports that the witnesses included "Noah Galloway again & Roman Catholic Deacon Peter Houck & Steven Green's aunt, Patti Ruth." And he reports that, contrary to rumors two weeks ago, "Green's mother, will - not -be testifying because she 'is moving out this week and has plans for a going away party'." Of the aunt's testimony, he reports:
The final witness to testify today was Patricia Ruth, Steven's aunt, and sister to John Green, Steven's dad. Her daughter is Suzi Woolsey, who testified last Thursday. She spoke of Roxanne being a flamboyant and outgoing person who "lived in her own world." She contrasted in that she herself was "strict" on her children, whereas Roxanne was "the opposite" with hers. "She wanted her children to be individuals and live an unstructured life," she told the jury. She said that as a child, Steven was "always the kid who wanted to know 'why?,' and he was also very hyper active. He was like having a squirrel loose in the house." When Pat Bouldin asked if she still loved Green, she had to retrieve tissues for her tears before answering, "I'm like a second mother to him, he's my Stevie...(pauses)...you can't just...stop loving someone, that you've always loved." She paused and thought for a moment before going on, "I don't know, I don't know how we got to spot...I don't know, we did not send a rapist and a murderer to Iraq."
Brett Barrouquere (AP) reports that the defense is expected to finish calling witnesses to the stand either Tuesday or Wednesday and that the jury will begin determining the sentence on Wednesday. CNN's Dave Alsop notes of Green, "He is a lanky 24-year-old. He looks lean, like he could grow a little more. Not really a man, but too old to be called a boy. Regardless, he is a convicted murder, rapist, and conspirator. The orange prison coveralls make him look a bit taller. The jury never sees Green in the fluorescent jumpsuit. Inside the federal courthouse there is a change of clothes." Sean Pavey (Party for Socialism and LIberation) observes, "Many in Madmuhiya were angry at the fact that the ex-soldier would be tried in the United States and not in Iraq. This fact, compounded with years of criminal occupation, has led most to doubt that Green will receive a just punishment." Evan Bright reported in depth on Thursday's proceedings in which a social worker gave some details of Green's life:
She spoke of Roxanne's relationship with Doug. "She made Doug a best friend, and a confidant," she said. This occurred more so during the periods of time when Roxanne lacked a significant male friend or boyfriend or husband. "She turned Doug into a substitute male...which gives that male too much power. She shared too much with him. She empowered him as the enforcer of the house, she put him in charge." Doug was also extremely abusive. "Doug was mentally, physically, and emotionally abusive to Steve and Danielle." The court has already heard testimony about Danielle taking three trips to the emergency room due to injuries suffered from Doug, something I left out of the blog previously. "Roxanne felt that Steve deserved Doug's abuse." She talked about Roxanne actually missing Steve's graduation from basic training. She ended by talking about the end result. "The accumulation of tumultuous events in his life made him into Steven Green."
In Iraq, Sam Dagher (New York Times) sketches the continued rise of tensions in northern Iraq -- what "American officials have long feared" if they flare up into armed conflict -- as the Kurds are, in the eyes of the newly Sunni dominant provincial government, attempting to expand their territory and as, in the Kurds' eyes, they are under assault from the new provincial government as well as the central government out of Baghdad. Dagher reviews multiple incidents in recent days where mobility has been vastly limited -- even for the governor of the province -- as a result of these tension and Dagher notes, "The American military has played down the significance of the recent Kurdish actions." Nada Bakri (Washington Post) adds, "For U.S. officials, Mosul and the province [Nineveh] rival even Kirkuk, the long-disputed oil-rich city along the same frontier, in volatility." Tim Cocks (Reuters) observes, "In Nineveh province, the most violent corner of Iraq today, Kurds have refused to participate in a new Arab-led provincial government, and several Kurdish towns vow they will not respect the new government in the war-shattered provincial seat, Mosul." Alsumaria notes, "In a step seen as an escalation of the dispute between the central and Kurdish governments over the control of oil resources, Oil Minister Hussein Al Shahristani rejected Kurdistan oil export plan." As the tensions mount, Jacques Clement (AFP) reports that the country will conduct a census and this will include Kirkuk. Kirkuk was supposed to have a census and a referendum by the end of 2007 according to Iraq's Constitution.
Meanwhile Aseel Kami, Muhanad Mohammed, Mohammed Abbas and Alison Williams (Reuters) report that Iraq will hold national elections January 30th. Yes, these are the elections which were supposed to be held in December. Yes, these are the elections that Barack's used as his excuse for breaking his promise to withdraw one brigade a month from Iraq. (He made that promise in a debate . . . after Hillary Clinton had made the promise immediately before him.) AFP adds that Khalid al-Attiya, Deputy Speaker of Parliament, confirms that the date will be January 30th and notes that December 15, 2005 was when Parliamentary elections were last held.
The elections will create their own set of tensions (and rumors -- allegedly Nouri al-Maliki and his Dawa party have just broken with the Shi'ite bloc because allegedly they see it as a drag and think it will allow them to spin themselves as 'for all of Iraq'). Tensions continue between Turkey and Iraq with Turkey bombing northern Iraq. Hurriyet reports that Nouri is claiming that "cooperation and mutual understanding" between Iraq and Turkey are the key to resolving the issue of the PKK. Uh, no, Nouri. The PKK, identified as a terrorist organization by the US, the European Union, Turkey and Nouri among others, is a group of Kurds who believe in an independent, Kurdish controlled region of Turkey. Turkey and Iraq can cooperate fully. The PKK has little to no interest in that. They want an independent region in Turkey. While al-Maliki fluttered far from reality, Turkish President Abdullah Gul seemed more grounded yesterday when he addressed the topic in Damascus. Todays Zaman reports he stated the 'Kurdish question will be resolved by improving Turkey's democratic standards". Yonca Poyraz Dogan (Today's Zaman) interviewed Iter Turkmen -- politician and diplomats whose many posts and offices included Minister of Foreign Affairs from 1980 to 1983 -- about the statements made by Gul:
Yonca Poyraz Dogan: Were you expecting the president of Turkey to say that the country's most important problem is the Kurdish question?
Iter Turkmen: Yes. I would have expected it because he is a realist, and I very much appreciate the way he approaches the Turkey's difficult problems. He showed his pragmatism and realism with what he did to bring about normalization in Turkish-Armenian relations, for instance. It came to me as no surprise. I think it is the greatest failure of the Turkish Republic that it has not already found a settlement to this problem.
Yonca Poyraz Dogan: This issue has come onto the agenda of the government and the public many times in the past. However, the discussion stops after a while and promises are forgotten. Is there anything different about the current period?
Iter Turkmen: Yes, there is something different this time, because measures have been taken; TRT Ses [a state-run Kurdish-language television station] has been established. It is an important step. It is not exactly what the Kurds want, since they want their own television stations and there are some legal impediments to this at the present time. In addition to the president's approach, we have the discussion going on at the level of the civil society. In addition, the chief of general staff [Gen. İlker Başbuğ] contributed to that.
Yonca Poyraz Dogan: What did he really say about the Kurdish issue in his recent address?
Iter Turkmen: First of all, he underlined the importance of taking measures that will enable some of the PKK members to come down from the mountains.
Yonca Poyraz Dogan: Non-military measures?
Iter Turkmen: Non-military measures. He did not advocate a new law, but he said the present law could be implemented in a better way. The other thing he underlined was what he called the "people of Turkey," not the "Turkish people," meaning that there are grounds for different identities in the nation. This is the first time we heard something like that from the military. All these signs indicate that we are making some progress, at least in our minds, and that we are approaching the problem in a different manner, considering that we made terrible mistakes in the past.
Staying on the subject of those labeled terrorists, since April 23rd al-Maliki's band of bozos haven't been able to stop insisting that they captured the mythical Abu Omar al-Bagdadi. When asked, US officials (military and civilians) have taken a pass and usually fallen back on US General Ray Odierno's line that they have not seen al-Baghdadi. They still haven't met with him but all of Iraq's seen the prisoner -- whatever his name is. Al Jazeera notes, "The video released Monday appeared to show the same person as the photographs released after al-Baghdadi's reported arrest." Robert Woodward (Reuters) provides quotes from the 'confession' which is a joke. On the one hand, this person claims that he took orders from members (presumably high ranking ones) in the Ba'ath Party and on the other that the plan was move Iraq into "creating the core of an Islamic state." The Ba'ath Party was a secular party. Why would they have any interest in creating an Islamic state? Why? Well they wouldn't but Nouri might have an interest in promoting this lie. In fact, he's promoted it over. Coup! Ba'ath Party trying to take over! Usama Redha and Liz Sly (Los Angeles Times) observe, "Many are skeptical about the claim that the man is Baghdadi because similar past claims by authorities have turned out to be false. The U.S. military says it cannot confirm the man's identity, and a man claiming to be Baghdadi posted an audiotape on a jihadi website last week insisting that he is still free." What's really amazing is that these show-confessions are reported as normal when they're anything but. The press is fully aware that 'confessions' often result from torture in Iraq. (Often? We're being kind.) Regardless of the means by which this nonsense is arrived at, this broadcasting of confessions needs to be called out. This has been going on all along and the only thing that will stop it is when the world makes a point of letting Nouri know how much of a monster this continued practice makes him look like.
Just as it's amazing to watch the press treat the airing of confessions by people with no legal counsel, it's equally amazing to watch the press treat counter-insurgency as the Holy Grail -- non-Monty Python division. The RAND Corporation's Celeste Ward wrote "Countering the Military's Latest Fad" (Washington Post) which is not a call to arms to dismantle counter-insurgency programs. Even so, paragraphs like the following were upsetting to some:
Counterinsurgency doctrine is on the verge of becoming an unquestioned orthodoxy, a far-reaching remedy for America's security challenges. But this would be a serious mistake. Not all future wars will involve insurgencies. Not even all internal conflicts in unstable states -- which can feature civil wars, resource battles or simple lawlessness -- include insurgencies. Yet COIN is the new coin of the realm, often considered the inevitable approach to fighting instability in foreign lands. Now the Pentagon is shifting its budget and seeking to "rebalance" U.S. military power in order to institutionalize counterinsurgency doctrine. Clearly some of these capabilities are needed, but like many useful concepts that gain currency in Washington, counterinsurgency risks being taken too far, distracting us from other threats, challenges and strategic debates.
Just merely questioning if counter-insurgency could be used everywhere was enough to earn a rebuke from Thomas E. Ricks who pronounces the column "dumb." Dumb? One would think she'd asked the American people to think whether counter-insurgency should be used at all -- a question that needs to be asked. The American NAZIS (and Australians in America) behind this program are not being asked to explain their actions anymore than the doctors helping torture prisoners at the start of this decade were. We know how that turned out and this will turn out even worse because counter-insurgency works on an even larger scale. But no one must question counter-insurgency, apparently, not even so mild a question as "Should it be used every where?" (The appropriate question is whether it should be used at all?)
Let's stay with the topic and bring in something else. How do you waste an hour of radio? Play a fool opposite foolish guests. Connect the Dots with Lila Garrett (KPFK) today found Garrett repeatedly mentioning counter-insurgency, never defining what it is and sticking with what supporters say it does as opposed to what history tells us that it does. Lila Garrett didn't intend to promote counter-insurgency but that's what her actions did. And, as the Shangri-Las once said, "That's called sad." Equally so Gareth Porter who tossed around turns like "manipulable" to explain why Barack's acting like a War Hawk. Barack's a War Hawk because he chooses to be. He's not being manipulated. He knows what is going on in Afghanistan (and Iraq), he is not confused. He is not being forced into doing a damn thing. Gareth Porter needs to put on a wig and a dress and start introducing himself as Elizabeth Edawards; however, when she tells her crazy tales of how John Edwards was "manipulable" into an affair, most of us just roll our eyes and look the other way. Gareth Porter would do well to grasp that he is not Mrs. Barack Obama and that it's really insulting to Barack to suggest that he (Barack) is so stupid he doesn't know what he's doing and is "manipulable" by the Pentagon because he is uninformed on "foreign policy." Gareth, grow up. Really. Barack chose his tuturs in foreign policy four years ago and chief among them is Samantha Power. The War Hawk. Why does Barack do what he does? Because he wants to. Who did he get his information from? Samantha Power. He's a War Hawk, she's a War Hawk. That's why they connected. That's why he then hooked up with Dennis Ross and Sarah Sewall. None of his decisions are surprising. They go to whom he sought out for foreign policy advice when he got into the Senate. Repeating, WHEN HE GOT INTO THE SENATE. It's too damn bad, Gareth, that you and the other Panhandle Media types didn't bother to do your damn job. It's too bad that all of you are too damn scared to take on Sammy Power. At some point you'll either grow a spine or learn to cheerlead all of these wars. Until then quit acting like Barack's your husband and you're the cheated on spouse. It's so pathetic, it's not even humorous. Between Gareth's Stand By Your Man moments and Lila's refusal to explore counter-insurgency despite repeatedly bringing it up, Connect the Dots was a complete waste of time. Including Marcy just starting her campaign and already putting both feet in her mouth as she postulated that maybe -- MAYBE -- Barack needed to be pushed a little. Way to wow 'em, Marcy. Why don't you just beg people to vote for Jane Harmen. It was an hour of idiocy. In the real world, Dahr Jamail takes on the myth of the 'kindly' Human Terrain Systems:The military's benign description specifies that HTS will "improve the military's ability to understand the highly complex local social-cultural environment in the areas where they are deployed." Proponents of the program go as far as to claim that its goal is to help the military save lives. Those who know better, like US Army Lt. Col. Gian Gentile, will tell you, "Don't fool yourself, these Human Terrain Teams, whether they want to acknowledge it or not, in a generalized and subtle way, do at some point contribute to the collective knowledge of a commander, which allows him to target and kill the enemy in the Civil War in Iraq." The two highest ethical principles of anthropology are protection of the interests of studied populations, and their safety. All anthropological studies consequently are premised on the consent of the subject society. Clearly, the HTS anthropologists have thrown these ethical guidelines out the window. They are to anthropology what state stenographers like Judith Miller and John Burns are to journalism. I consulted David Price, author of "Anthropological Intelligence: The Deployment and Neglect of American Anthropology in the Second World War" and a contributor to the Counter-Counterinsurgency Manual, a forthcoming work of the Network of Concerned Anthropologists, of which he is a member.According to Price, "HTS presents real ethical problems for anthropologists, because the demands of the military in situations of occupation put anthropologists in positions undermining their fundamental ethical loyalties to those they study. Moreover, it presents political problems that link anthropology to a disciplinary past where anthropologists were complicit in assisting in colonial conquests. Those selling HTS to the military have misrepresented what culture is and have downplayed the difficulties of using culture to bring about change, much less conquest. There is a certain dishonesty in pretending that anthropologists possess some sort of magic beans of culture, and that if only occupiers had better cultural knowledge, or made the right pay-offs, then occupied people would fall in line and stop resisting foreign invaders. Culture is being presented as if it were a variable in a linear equation, and if only HTS teams could collect the right data variables and present troops with the right information conquest could be entered in the equation. Life and culture doesn't work that way; occupied people know they are occupied, and while cultural knowledge can ease an occupation, historically it has almost never led to conquest - but even if it could, anthropology would irreparably damage itself if it became nothing more than a tool of occupations and conquest."
Sahar Issa and Hussein Kadhim (McClatchy Newspapers) report a Baghdad roadside bombing which left two people injured, a Kirkuk roadside bombing which claimed 1 life and left two people wounded and a Basra roadside bombing which left the son of "a high ranking officer" injured as well as "one of his colleagues". On the Basra bombing, Reuters states 1 "police lieutenant-colnoel" was killed -- he would be the high ranking officer -- while his son and two police officers were injured.
Saturday the US military announced: "CONTINGENCY OPERATING BASE BASRA, Iraq -- A Multi-National Division- South Soldier was killed in action today in southern Iraq. The name of the deceased is being withheld pending notification of next of kin and release by the Department of Defense. The incident is under investigation." The announcement brings to 4296 the number of US service members killed in the Iraq War since the start of the illegal war. That's four from the 4300 mark.
Sahar S. Gabriel was an Iraqi correspondent for the New York Times. She is one of the very few Iraqis to be accepted as a refugee in the United States. At the Times' Baghdad Bureau Blog earlier this month, she wrote about the difficulties she has in her job search:
It's no news that refugees are not quite the hot commodity here, although everyone in America came from somewhere else at some point. It would seem only logical to create some vacancies for new people, since they escaped their original country in search of new people, since they escaped their original country in search of a new beginning. [. . .]
Job applications are another story. I feel like I'm applying for the CIA. A detailed description of your job history, education, skills and three references if not more. I flash back to Baghdad where I applied for my first job with a short one paragrah resume.
And Elizabeth DiNovella (The Progressive) covers the topic of Iraqi refugees today and notes:
Conditions for Iraqis in Damascus and Amman are difficult. They are living in rented accommodations, for the most part. They are not able to work legally and often have trouble getting their children into schools. They have been living off of their savings for several years but now funds are running low.
iraq
evan brightsteven d. green
brett barrouqueredave alsupcnn
the new york timessam dagherthe washington postnada bakri
aseel kamimuhanad mohammedmohammed abbasallison williams
the los angeles timesliz slyusama redha
dahr jamail
sahar s. gabriel
elizabeth dinovella
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