From Information Clearing House:
We got it wrong, says former torturer
By Tim Shipman
06/10/07
"SMH"
Washington -- A FORMER US Army torturer has described the traumatic effects of American interrogation techniques in Iraq - on their victims and on the perpetrators themselves.
Tony Lagouranis said he conducted mock executions, forced men and boys into agonising stress positions, kept suspects awake for weeks on end, used dogs to terrify prisoners and subjected others to hypothermia.
But he said he was deeply scarred by the realisation that what he did had contributed to the plight of US forces in Iraq.
Mr Lagouranis, 37, said he suffered nightmares and anxiety attacks after returning to Chicago, where he works as a pub doorman.
Between January 2004 and January 2005, first at Abu Ghraib prison and then in Mosul, in northern Babil province, he tortured suspects, most of whom he said were innocent. He realised he had entered a moral dungeon when he found himself reading a Holocaust memoir, hoping to pick up torture tips from the Nazis.
[click link below to continue reading]
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article17860.htm
Wrap...
Sunday, June 10, 2007
Hafetz and Gen Powell on torture....
From truthout.org :
Jonathan Hafetz
Let Torture Into Court
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/061007E.shtml
"Should federal courts hear claims alleging torture by US officials? They should indeed. Denying a federal forum for torture claims does not merely undermine the United States' commitment to a universally condemned practice. It also weakens the institutional role of the courts as a check on executive power and tarnishes their reputation as guarantors of individual rights," says Jonathan Hafetz.
******************************
Powell: Close Guantanamo Now, Restore Habeas
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/061007F.shtml
This morning on NBC's Meet the Press, General Colin Powell strongly condemned the US prison at Guantanamo Bay, calling it "a major problem for America's perception" and charging, "if it was up to me, I would close Guantanamo - not tomorrow, this afternoon."
[click links above to continue reading each article]
Wrap...
Jonathan Hafetz
Let Torture Into Court
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/061007E.shtml
"Should federal courts hear claims alleging torture by US officials? They should indeed. Denying a federal forum for torture claims does not merely undermine the United States' commitment to a universally condemned practice. It also weakens the institutional role of the courts as a check on executive power and tarnishes their reputation as guarantors of individual rights," says Jonathan Hafetz.
******************************
Powell: Close Guantanamo Now, Restore Habeas
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/061007F.shtml
This morning on NBC's Meet the Press, General Colin Powell strongly condemned the US prison at Guantanamo Bay, calling it "a major problem for America's perception" and charging, "if it was up to me, I would close Guantanamo - not tomorrow, this afternoon."
[click links above to continue reading each article]
Wrap...
Saturday, June 09, 2007
Fred Thompson: Corporation bought & paid for...
From David Sirota:
http://www.workingassetsblog.com/2007/06/what_else_should_we_expect_fro.html{http://www.workingassetsblog.com/2007/06/what_else_should_we_expect_fro.html}
What Else Should We Expect From a Lifelong K Street Lobbyist?
By David Sirota
USA Today this week finally broke the national media silence about the one-third of Fred Thompson's life that he spent as a high-paid corporate lobbyist in Washington, D.C. Thompson's campaign, which is being run by his fellow K Street lobbyists, responded by saying only that being a K Street lobbyist "is an honorable endeavor that goes back to the beginnings of this republic."
I love this pathetic attempt to liken corporate lobbying right up there on the "honorable"scale with George Washington heroically crossing the Delaware. What's funny is that you could say a lot of things "go back to the beginningof this republic." Prostitution, as just one example, "goes back to the beginning of this republic." But that doesn't mean you want a prostitute - sexual or corporate - running the nation.
Not surprisingly, the National Association of Manufacturers has a post on its blog trumpeting Thompson's first major policy declaration: His decision to make enacting new corporate tax breaks the centerpiece of his campaign.
Here's what he declared on CNBC: "We have, you know-if you include state taxes-the highest corporate tax rate in the world. That makes us less competitive. All those things have to be looked at. And all those-especially as far as the corporate tax rate is concerned, need to be clearly reduced."
The claim that America has "the highest corporate tax rate in the world," of course, is a lie handed to Thompson from corporate-backed front groups like the Cato Institute.
Here's what I documented in my book Hostile Takeover: "Groups like the Cato Institute and Americans for Tax Reform, which are funded by some of America's wealthiest corporations, have for years pushed to eliminate all corporate taxes. They claim 'the federal government takes 35 percent' of corporate income for taxes, that such a rate is the fourth highest in the industrialized world, and therefore oppresses U.S. companies and hurts the economy.
Yes, it is true, the official corporate tax rate in America is 35 percent. It is also true, however, that because of lax enforcement, loopholes and evasion, most corporations never come close to paying that rate.
As the Government Accountability Office reported in 2004, 94 percent of corporations pay less than 5 percent of their income in taxes, and corporate tax payments are at their second lowest level in 60 years -lower than in every other industrialized country other than Iceland."
But then, why should we expect a lifelong corporate lobbyist like Thompson to push anything other than more corporate tax breaks? That's what he's been getting paid a nice fat paycheck to do most of his life. And no record-setting deficit or lack of funds for protective equipment for our soldiers in harms way is going to stop him from pushing to get his corporate cronies as many giveaways as possible.
Wrap...
http://www.workingassetsblog.com/2007/06/what_else_should_we_expect_fro.html{http://www.workingassetsblog.com/2007/06/what_else_should_we_expect_fro.html}
What Else Should We Expect From a Lifelong K Street Lobbyist?
By David Sirota
USA Today this week finally broke the national media silence about the one-third of Fred Thompson's life that he spent as a high-paid corporate lobbyist in Washington, D.C. Thompson's campaign, which is being run by his fellow K Street lobbyists, responded by saying only that being a K Street lobbyist "is an honorable endeavor that goes back to the beginnings of this republic."
I love this pathetic attempt to liken corporate lobbying right up there on the "honorable"scale with George Washington heroically crossing the Delaware. What's funny is that you could say a lot of things "go back to the beginningof this republic." Prostitution, as just one example, "goes back to the beginning of this republic." But that doesn't mean you want a prostitute - sexual or corporate - running the nation.
Not surprisingly, the National Association of Manufacturers has a post on its blog trumpeting Thompson's first major policy declaration: His decision to make enacting new corporate tax breaks the centerpiece of his campaign.
Here's what he declared on CNBC: "We have, you know-if you include state taxes-the highest corporate tax rate in the world. That makes us less competitive. All those things have to be looked at. And all those-especially as far as the corporate tax rate is concerned, need to be clearly reduced."
The claim that America has "the highest corporate tax rate in the world," of course, is a lie handed to Thompson from corporate-backed front groups like the Cato Institute.
Here's what I documented in my book Hostile Takeover: "Groups like the Cato Institute and Americans for Tax Reform, which are funded by some of America's wealthiest corporations, have for years pushed to eliminate all corporate taxes. They claim 'the federal government takes 35 percent' of corporate income for taxes, that such a rate is the fourth highest in the industrialized world, and therefore oppresses U.S. companies and hurts the economy.
Yes, it is true, the official corporate tax rate in America is 35 percent. It is also true, however, that because of lax enforcement, loopholes and evasion, most corporations never come close to paying that rate.
As the Government Accountability Office reported in 2004, 94 percent of corporations pay less than 5 percent of their income in taxes, and corporate tax payments are at their second lowest level in 60 years -lower than in every other industrialized country other than Iceland."
But then, why should we expect a lifelong corporate lobbyist like Thompson to push anything other than more corporate tax breaks? That's what he's been getting paid a nice fat paycheck to do most of his life. And no record-setting deficit or lack of funds for protective equipment for our soldiers in harms way is going to stop him from pushing to get his corporate cronies as many giveaways as possible.
Wrap...
Friday, June 08, 2007
Clintons' Secret Trade Deal with Columbia...
From David Sirota:
SECRET TRADE DEAL: Can the Clinton Machine Get Congress to Deliver Another NAFTA?
Can the Clinton machine deliver another NAFTA? That is the question in Washington on trade these days, as dynamic similar to the NAFTA debate begins to take shape.
The Colombian government, which has been tied to paramilitary gangs that execute union organizers, is spending lavishly to enlist top Clinton administration officials - including Hillary Clinton's top campaign strategist and President Clinton himself - to pressure Democrats on Capitol Hill to pass the Colombian Free Trade Agreement - an agreement that is part of the bigger secret deal.
This campaign is being backed up by a wide array of businesses such as Wal-Mart and Citigroup.
To date, the legislative language of the secret trade deal has still not been released - but that hasn't stopped the furious efforts to build a coalition of Clinton administration officials-turned-lobbyists, a handful of top Democrats in Congress and corporate interests to ram the secret deal through Congress.
To see today's full report, go to:
http://www.workingassetsblog.com/2007/06/secret_trade_deal_day_29_can_t.html{http://www.workingassetsblog.com/2007/06/secret_trade_deal_day_29_can_t.html}
If you have trouble with the link above, please go to:
http://www.workingassetsblog.com/sirota
{http://www.workingassetsblog.com/sirota}
Wrap...
SECRET TRADE DEAL: Can the Clinton Machine Get Congress to Deliver Another NAFTA?
Can the Clinton machine deliver another NAFTA? That is the question in Washington on trade these days, as dynamic similar to the NAFTA debate begins to take shape.
The Colombian government, which has been tied to paramilitary gangs that execute union organizers, is spending lavishly to enlist top Clinton administration officials - including Hillary Clinton's top campaign strategist and President Clinton himself - to pressure Democrats on Capitol Hill to pass the Colombian Free Trade Agreement - an agreement that is part of the bigger secret deal.
This campaign is being backed up by a wide array of businesses such as Wal-Mart and Citigroup.
To date, the legislative language of the secret trade deal has still not been released - but that hasn't stopped the furious efforts to build a coalition of Clinton administration officials-turned-lobbyists, a handful of top Democrats in Congress and corporate interests to ram the secret deal through Congress.
To see today's full report, go to:
http://www.workingassetsblog.com/2007/06/secret_trade_deal_day_29_can_t.html{http://www.workingassetsblog.com/2007/06/secret_trade_deal_day_29_can_t.html}
If you have trouble with the link above, please go to:
http://www.workingassetsblog.com/sirota
{http://www.workingassetsblog.com/sirota}
Wrap...
Drought in 1/3 of USA to Alabama Senate brawl....
From American Progress:
"Drought, a fixture in much of the West for nearly a decade, now covers more than one-third of the continental USA. And it's spreading," USA Today reports. "As summer starts, half the nation is either abnormally dry or in outright drought from prolonged lack of rain that could lead to water shortages."
G-8 countries backed down yesterday from their strong global warming stance, instead embracing President Bush's proposal to move toward unspecified "substantial cuts" in carbon emissions. The "agreement says the G-8 countries will 'seriously' consider cutting emissions in half by 2050, but it sets no mandatory goals for all."
"Senior House Democrats threatened Thursday to issue subpoenas to obtain secret legal opinions" and other Justice Department documents related to the NSA's warrantless domestic surveillance program, "the most aggressive action yet by Congress in its oversight of the...program."
"Turkey is stepping up its presence along its border with Iraq to levels not seen in years in an effort to root out Kurdish separatist guerrillas who take refuge in northern Iraq. That means that as the American military struggles to control the violence in central Iraq, a second conflict could spill across its northern border."
4: Number of U.S. deaths in Iraq per day in June, with a total of 23 deaths in the first six days of the month. The total death toll for American forces is now 3504.
"Consumer confidence tumbled to a 10-month low" in the face of "nagging worries about gasoline prices, if the yearlong housing slump will worsen and drag down home prices further and whether the economy will, in fact, snap out of its sluggish spell."
"Governors from eight U.S. states on Thursday protested to Congress about possible legislation that they claim will limit their efforts to cut automobile and small-truck emissions. If passed as written in draft form, the legislation would wipe out California's landmark effort to cut auto and light-truck greenhouse gas emissions by as much as 30 percent by 2030."
"While the Government Accountability Office (GAO) contended with controversy surrounding a pay-for-performance system that denied nearly 17 percent of its employees cost-of-living increases last year, 72 senior executives and senior-level employees received bonuses totaling more than $900,000 in fiscal year 2006."
And finally: Yesterday in the Alabama Senate, "harsh words" led to "a punch being thrown" between Sens. Charles Bishop (R) and Lowell Barron (D). "Bishop said he punched Barron after the senator called him a 'son of a b*tch.' ... Bishop said he regretted throwing the punch because ‘that’s not the way grown men solve their problems,’ but he said he would not immediately apologize to Barron." (Watch video HERE.)
Wrap...
"Drought, a fixture in much of the West for nearly a decade, now covers more than one-third of the continental USA. And it's spreading," USA Today reports. "As summer starts, half the nation is either abnormally dry or in outright drought from prolonged lack of rain that could lead to water shortages."
G-8 countries backed down yesterday from their strong global warming stance, instead embracing President Bush's proposal to move toward unspecified "substantial cuts" in carbon emissions. The "agreement says the G-8 countries will 'seriously' consider cutting emissions in half by 2050, but it sets no mandatory goals for all."
"Senior House Democrats threatened Thursday to issue subpoenas to obtain secret legal opinions" and other Justice Department documents related to the NSA's warrantless domestic surveillance program, "the most aggressive action yet by Congress in its oversight of the...program."
"Turkey is stepping up its presence along its border with Iraq to levels not seen in years in an effort to root out Kurdish separatist guerrillas who take refuge in northern Iraq. That means that as the American military struggles to control the violence in central Iraq, a second conflict could spill across its northern border."
4: Number of U.S. deaths in Iraq per day in June, with a total of 23 deaths in the first six days of the month. The total death toll for American forces is now 3504.
"Consumer confidence tumbled to a 10-month low" in the face of "nagging worries about gasoline prices, if the yearlong housing slump will worsen and drag down home prices further and whether the economy will, in fact, snap out of its sluggish spell."
"Governors from eight U.S. states on Thursday protested to Congress about possible legislation that they claim will limit their efforts to cut automobile and small-truck emissions. If passed as written in draft form, the legislation would wipe out California's landmark effort to cut auto and light-truck greenhouse gas emissions by as much as 30 percent by 2030."
"While the Government Accountability Office (GAO) contended with controversy surrounding a pay-for-performance system that denied nearly 17 percent of its employees cost-of-living increases last year, 72 senior executives and senior-level employees received bonuses totaling more than $900,000 in fiscal year 2006."
And finally: Yesterday in the Alabama Senate, "harsh words" led to "a punch being thrown" between Sens. Charles Bishop (R) and Lowell Barron (D). "Bishop said he punched Barron after the senator called him a 'son of a b*tch.' ... Bishop said he regretted throwing the punch because ‘that’s not the way grown men solve their problems,’ but he said he would not immediately apologize to Barron." (Watch video HERE.)
Wrap...
Blackwater USA's perfect timing....
From truthout.org:
Blackwater Sues Slain Employees' Families to Silence Them
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/060807C.shtml
After filing its suit against the dead men's estates, Blackwater demanded that its claim and the families' existing lawsuit be handled in private arbitration. By suing the families in arbitration, Blackwater has attempted to move the examination of their wrongful conduct outside the eye of the public and away from a jury. This comes at the same time Congress is investigating Blackwater.
Wrap...
Blackwater Sues Slain Employees' Families to Silence Them
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/060807C.shtml
After filing its suit against the dead men's estates, Blackwater demanded that its claim and the families' existing lawsuit be handled in private arbitration. By suing the families in arbitration, Blackwater has attempted to move the examination of their wrongful conduct outside the eye of the public and away from a jury. This comes at the same time Congress is investigating Blackwater.
Wrap...
Thursday, June 07, 2007
70% of intel spending goes to contractors at NSA...
From Secrecy News:
NSA REPORTS HUGE GROWTH IN CONTRACTOR BASE
The industrial base of contractors in industry seeking to do business with the National Security Agency has mushroomed in recent years, according to an NSA acquisition official. In 2001, only 140 contractors were eligible to compete for NSA contracts. Today, there are six thousand such contractors, said Deborah Walker of the NSA.
She spoke at a contractor conference sponsored by the Defense Intelligence Agency last month. The number of contractor facilities cleared by the NSA has grown from 41 in 2002 to 1265 in 2006, according to a chart that she presented in her talk.The result is an increase in competitiveness and improved communication with industry, Ms. Walker indicated.
"Partnerships with industry [are]vital to mission success," she said.
See "Acquisition Resource Center," presentation by Deborah Walker, National Security Agency, May 2007, Unclassified/FOUO:
http://www.fas.org/irp/nsa/walker.pdf
Contractors now consume as much as 70% of U.S. intelligence spending, reported Tim Shorrock in Salon last week.
Wrap...
NSA REPORTS HUGE GROWTH IN CONTRACTOR BASE
The industrial base of contractors in industry seeking to do business with the National Security Agency has mushroomed in recent years, according to an NSA acquisition official. In 2001, only 140 contractors were eligible to compete for NSA contracts. Today, there are six thousand such contractors, said Deborah Walker of the NSA.
She spoke at a contractor conference sponsored by the Defense Intelligence Agency last month. The number of contractor facilities cleared by the NSA has grown from 41 in 2002 to 1265 in 2006, according to a chart that she presented in her talk.The result is an increase in competitiveness and improved communication with industry, Ms. Walker indicated.
"Partnerships with industry [are]vital to mission success," she said.
See "Acquisition Resource Center," presentation by Deborah Walker, National Security Agency, May 2007, Unclassified/FOUO:
http://www.fas.org/irp/nsa/walker.pdf
Contractors now consume as much as 70% of U.S. intelligence spending, reported Tim Shorrock in Salon last week.
Wrap...
Wednesday, June 06, 2007
Impeaching Cheney...Let's get on with it...
From Atlanta Progressive News:
BREAKING: Five US Reps Support Cheney Impeachment
By Matthew Cardinale, News Editor, Atlanta Progressive News (June 06, 2007)
(APN) ATLANTA – US Rep. Yvette Clarke (D-NY) has become the fifth total co-sponsor of US Rep. Dennis Kucinich’s (D-OH) bill to impeach Vice President of the United States Dick Cheney, Atlanta Progressive News has learned. In addition to Kucinich, the additional three Members of Congress who have signed on to H. Res 333 are US Rep. Janice Schakowsky (D-IL), William Lacy Clay (D-MO), and Albert Wynn (D-MD).
"This Administration has continued to erode the trust of the American people and enough is simply enough," stated US Rep. Clarke in a press release issued first to Atlanta Progressive News.
"H.Res. 333 was introduced to the House of Representatives by Rep. Dennis Kucinich of Ohio on April 24, 2007, and asserts that the vice president manipulated intelligence to make the case for going to war with Iraq, falsified a connection between Iraq and al-Qaeda, and has threatened aggression against Iran," US Rep. Clarke says.
"When the American people voted on November 7th, they asked for a change in direction by electing the Democratic party in the House and Senate. I have heard the loud cries of my constituents, and they want accountability. My support of HRes 333 reflects the voices of the residents of central Brooklyn."
Congresswoman Clarke replaced US Rep. Major Owens (D-NY), who retired at the end of the 109th Session. US Rep. Owens had been one of the early supporters of Conyers's bill, H Res 635, which would have created a Select Committee to look into the possible grounds for impeaching President Bush.
Congresswoman Clarke is her own woman and "does not follow the crowd," her spokesperson said, adding that constituents had regularly lobbied her to co-sponsor this bill.
"Vice President Dick Cheney is the architect of the Administration's deception about the war. Cheney persistently and deliberately deceived the Congress and the American people about the existence of Weapons of Mass Destruction and the alleged link between Saddam Hussein and the attack on September 11th. There should be a serious dialogue about the conduct of this Administration. Cheney should be held accountable for purposely misleading the American people. Despite the obvious lack of success on the ground, Vice President Cheney continued a barrage of propaganda claiming that we were winning the war and successfully rebuilding Iraq which is patently false. His statements and representations about the situation in Iraq amount to malfeasance for which he should be taken to task," said Wynn in a press release prepared for Atlanta Progressive News.
Impeachment activist Tracie Stern of Atlanta World Can't Wait said the new co-sponsorships are exciting, but at the same time, the case for impeachment is so clear that these Members of Congress are actually just doing their duty.
Those Members who do not co-sponsor H Res 333 are enabling the Bush Adminstration, Stern said, adding "People need to step on to the stage of history."
"At the urging of my constituents in Missouri's 1st Congressional District, and from Americans across the country, I cosponsored Congressman Kucinich's resolution regarding the impeachment of the Vice President because I believe that Mr. Cheney deliberately manipulated the intelligence process to deceive the Congress of the United States and the American people. That deception has resulted in a tragic, unnecessary war that has already cost the lives of over 3,300 brave Americans and has cost the taxpayers over $400 billion. The arrogant abuse of power and the complete disregard for the truth needs to stop," US Rep. Clay said in a statement prepared for Atlanta Progressive News.
US Rep. Schakowsky (D-IL) recently told The Daily Northwestern college newspaper that Cheney misled the public by "intentionally manipulating intelligence in order to launch an elective war against Iraq. I believe it is crucial that the U.S. House of Representatives investigate the vice president's actions to determine if he should be impeached for lying to the American people to justify the war in Iraq."
Missing in action was US Rep. John Lewis (D-GA) who had told WAOK radio in December 2005 he would sign a bill of impeachment of President Bush should it come across his desk [crimes committed by Bush would equally apply to Cheney in this case]. Of course, Lewis did not cosponsor US Rep. Cynthia McKinney’s (D-GA) bill filed at the end of the last Session which would have impeached Bush either.
Other MIAs include US Rep. Maxine Waters (D-CA) who recently made comments that she thought impeaching Cheney was a good idea, as reported by AfterDowningStreet.org [Waters’s Office has not returned a call seeking comment]; and US Rep. Keith Ellison (D-MN), who supported impeachment in the Minnesota legislature and campaigned for US Congress on the issue. This list could go on.
The new cosponsorships on Kucinich’s bill are significant for a number of reasons. First, it shows there is more than one Member of Congress willing to entertain real accountability for the Bush Administration, despite the insistence of US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) that impeachment is off the table.
Also, this bill is calling for actual Articles of Impeachment for Cheney, unlike the last bill which not only was related to Mr. Bush, but created an investigative committee to look into possible impeachment rather than providing for actual possible impeachment.
Therefore, cosponsorships on H Res 333 have even more weight than those which were listed on H Res 635 last Session.
Also, since the time of H Res 635, Democrats have taken control of both the US House and Senate. Thus, impeachment is even more a real possibility on account of having the potential Democratic support for the bill, even though most Democrats currently aren’t rushing to impeach Bush.
Because Democrats are now the Majority in Congress, we also now know that Bush refuses to be accountable to Congress, particularly on the US Invasion of Iraq. Bush has now vetoed historic legislation to attach funding for the Occupation with a deadline for withdrawal. Thus, it is now even more clear that traditional oversight mechanisms will not be effective.
The House Judiciary Committee told APN there are no plans to have hearings on impeachment of Cheney or anyone else at this time.
"It’s not at this time on the Committee’s immediate agenda," Conyers’s spokesperson said.
"Once its referred it has to be on the Committee’s agenda for the Committee to take it up," they said.
"In order to move a bill you have to have hearings scheduled on it," they said.
When asked by APN if Conyers taking impeachment "off the table" meant based on present information or whether it was complete abdication of a constitutional mechanism no matter what information comes forward, "All we can speak to is the present time," the spokesperson said, adding it would be unwise to speculate about the future.
"I don’t think it’s prejudging," they said.
The 39 total co-sponsors of H Res. 635 were US Rep. Neil Abercrombie (D-HI), Rep. Tammy Baldwin (D-WI), Rep. Michael Capuano (D-MA), Rep. Lois Capps (D-CA), Rep. William Lacy Clay (D-MO), Rep. John Conyers (D-MI), Rep. Danny Davis (D-IL), Rep. Sam Farr (D-CA), Rep. Chaka Fattah (D-PA), Rep. Bob Filner (D-CA), Rep. Maurice Hinchey (D-NY), Rep. Mike Honda (D-CA), Rep. Jackson, Jr., (D-IL), Rep. Sheila Jackson-Lee (D-TX), Rep. Barbara Lee (D-CA), Rep. John Lewis (D-GA), Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-NY), Rep. Betty McCollum (D-MN), Rep. Jim McDermott (D-WA), Rep. Cynthia McKinney (D-GA), Rep. Gwen Moore (D-WI), Rep. Jerrold Nadler (D-NY), Rep. James Oberstar (D-MN), Rep. John Olver (D-MA), Rep. Major Owens (D-NY), Rep. Donald Payne (D-NJ), Rep. Charles Rangel (D-NY), Rep. Steve Rothman (D-NJ), Rep. Martin Sabo (D-MN), Rep. Bernie Sanders (I-VT), Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-IL), Rep. Hilda Solis (D-CA), Rep. Fortney Pete Stark (D-CA), Rep. John Tierney (D-MA), Rep. Nydia Velazquez (D-NY), Rep. Maxine Waters (D-CA), Dianne Watson (D-CA), Rep. Lynn Woolsey (D-CA), and Rep. David Wu (D-OR).
It was largely viewed that US Rep. Conyers, the original sponsor of H Res 635, did not re-file his bill out of respect to Pelosi and his desire to be appointed Chair of the Judiciary Committee. Moreover, several Members of Congress have stated that they have followed in Conyers’s steps in choosing not to introduce similar bills of their own.
About the author:
Matthew Cardinale is the News Editor of Atlanta Progressive News and may be reached at matthew@atlantaprogressivenews.com.
Syndication policy:
This article may be reprinted in full at no cost where Atlanta Progressive News is credited.
Wrap...
BREAKING: Five US Reps Support Cheney Impeachment
By Matthew Cardinale, News Editor, Atlanta Progressive News (June 06, 2007)
(APN) ATLANTA – US Rep. Yvette Clarke (D-NY) has become the fifth total co-sponsor of US Rep. Dennis Kucinich’s (D-OH) bill to impeach Vice President of the United States Dick Cheney, Atlanta Progressive News has learned. In addition to Kucinich, the additional three Members of Congress who have signed on to H. Res 333 are US Rep. Janice Schakowsky (D-IL), William Lacy Clay (D-MO), and Albert Wynn (D-MD).
"This Administration has continued to erode the trust of the American people and enough is simply enough," stated US Rep. Clarke in a press release issued first to Atlanta Progressive News.
"H.Res. 333 was introduced to the House of Representatives by Rep. Dennis Kucinich of Ohio on April 24, 2007, and asserts that the vice president manipulated intelligence to make the case for going to war with Iraq, falsified a connection between Iraq and al-Qaeda, and has threatened aggression against Iran," US Rep. Clarke says.
"When the American people voted on November 7th, they asked for a change in direction by electing the Democratic party in the House and Senate. I have heard the loud cries of my constituents, and they want accountability. My support of HRes 333 reflects the voices of the residents of central Brooklyn."
Congresswoman Clarke replaced US Rep. Major Owens (D-NY), who retired at the end of the 109th Session. US Rep. Owens had been one of the early supporters of Conyers's bill, H Res 635, which would have created a Select Committee to look into the possible grounds for impeaching President Bush.
Congresswoman Clarke is her own woman and "does not follow the crowd," her spokesperson said, adding that constituents had regularly lobbied her to co-sponsor this bill.
"Vice President Dick Cheney is the architect of the Administration's deception about the war. Cheney persistently and deliberately deceived the Congress and the American people about the existence of Weapons of Mass Destruction and the alleged link between Saddam Hussein and the attack on September 11th. There should be a serious dialogue about the conduct of this Administration. Cheney should be held accountable for purposely misleading the American people. Despite the obvious lack of success on the ground, Vice President Cheney continued a barrage of propaganda claiming that we were winning the war and successfully rebuilding Iraq which is patently false. His statements and representations about the situation in Iraq amount to malfeasance for which he should be taken to task," said Wynn in a press release prepared for Atlanta Progressive News.
Impeachment activist Tracie Stern of Atlanta World Can't Wait said the new co-sponsorships are exciting, but at the same time, the case for impeachment is so clear that these Members of Congress are actually just doing their duty.
Those Members who do not co-sponsor H Res 333 are enabling the Bush Adminstration, Stern said, adding "People need to step on to the stage of history."
"At the urging of my constituents in Missouri's 1st Congressional District, and from Americans across the country, I cosponsored Congressman Kucinich's resolution regarding the impeachment of the Vice President because I believe that Mr. Cheney deliberately manipulated the intelligence process to deceive the Congress of the United States and the American people. That deception has resulted in a tragic, unnecessary war that has already cost the lives of over 3,300 brave Americans and has cost the taxpayers over $400 billion. The arrogant abuse of power and the complete disregard for the truth needs to stop," US Rep. Clay said in a statement prepared for Atlanta Progressive News.
US Rep. Schakowsky (D-IL) recently told The Daily Northwestern college newspaper that Cheney misled the public by "intentionally manipulating intelligence in order to launch an elective war against Iraq. I believe it is crucial that the U.S. House of Representatives investigate the vice president's actions to determine if he should be impeached for lying to the American people to justify the war in Iraq."
Missing in action was US Rep. John Lewis (D-GA) who had told WAOK radio in December 2005 he would sign a bill of impeachment of President Bush should it come across his desk [crimes committed by Bush would equally apply to Cheney in this case]. Of course, Lewis did not cosponsor US Rep. Cynthia McKinney’s (D-GA) bill filed at the end of the last Session which would have impeached Bush either.
Other MIAs include US Rep. Maxine Waters (D-CA) who recently made comments that she thought impeaching Cheney was a good idea, as reported by AfterDowningStreet.org [Waters’s Office has not returned a call seeking comment]; and US Rep. Keith Ellison (D-MN), who supported impeachment in the Minnesota legislature and campaigned for US Congress on the issue. This list could go on.
The new cosponsorships on Kucinich’s bill are significant for a number of reasons. First, it shows there is more than one Member of Congress willing to entertain real accountability for the Bush Administration, despite the insistence of US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) that impeachment is off the table.
Also, this bill is calling for actual Articles of Impeachment for Cheney, unlike the last bill which not only was related to Mr. Bush, but created an investigative committee to look into possible impeachment rather than providing for actual possible impeachment.
Therefore, cosponsorships on H Res 333 have even more weight than those which were listed on H Res 635 last Session.
Also, since the time of H Res 635, Democrats have taken control of both the US House and Senate. Thus, impeachment is even more a real possibility on account of having the potential Democratic support for the bill, even though most Democrats currently aren’t rushing to impeach Bush.
Because Democrats are now the Majority in Congress, we also now know that Bush refuses to be accountable to Congress, particularly on the US Invasion of Iraq. Bush has now vetoed historic legislation to attach funding for the Occupation with a deadline for withdrawal. Thus, it is now even more clear that traditional oversight mechanisms will not be effective.
The House Judiciary Committee told APN there are no plans to have hearings on impeachment of Cheney or anyone else at this time.
"It’s not at this time on the Committee’s immediate agenda," Conyers’s spokesperson said.
"Once its referred it has to be on the Committee’s agenda for the Committee to take it up," they said.
"In order to move a bill you have to have hearings scheduled on it," they said.
When asked by APN if Conyers taking impeachment "off the table" meant based on present information or whether it was complete abdication of a constitutional mechanism no matter what information comes forward, "All we can speak to is the present time," the spokesperson said, adding it would be unwise to speculate about the future.
"I don’t think it’s prejudging," they said.
The 39 total co-sponsors of H Res. 635 were US Rep. Neil Abercrombie (D-HI), Rep. Tammy Baldwin (D-WI), Rep. Michael Capuano (D-MA), Rep. Lois Capps (D-CA), Rep. William Lacy Clay (D-MO), Rep. John Conyers (D-MI), Rep. Danny Davis (D-IL), Rep. Sam Farr (D-CA), Rep. Chaka Fattah (D-PA), Rep. Bob Filner (D-CA), Rep. Maurice Hinchey (D-NY), Rep. Mike Honda (D-CA), Rep. Jackson, Jr., (D-IL), Rep. Sheila Jackson-Lee (D-TX), Rep. Barbara Lee (D-CA), Rep. John Lewis (D-GA), Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-NY), Rep. Betty McCollum (D-MN), Rep. Jim McDermott (D-WA), Rep. Cynthia McKinney (D-GA), Rep. Gwen Moore (D-WI), Rep. Jerrold Nadler (D-NY), Rep. James Oberstar (D-MN), Rep. John Olver (D-MA), Rep. Major Owens (D-NY), Rep. Donald Payne (D-NJ), Rep. Charles Rangel (D-NY), Rep. Steve Rothman (D-NJ), Rep. Martin Sabo (D-MN), Rep. Bernie Sanders (I-VT), Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-IL), Rep. Hilda Solis (D-CA), Rep. Fortney Pete Stark (D-CA), Rep. John Tierney (D-MA), Rep. Nydia Velazquez (D-NY), Rep. Maxine Waters (D-CA), Dianne Watson (D-CA), Rep. Lynn Woolsey (D-CA), and Rep. David Wu (D-OR).
It was largely viewed that US Rep. Conyers, the original sponsor of H Res 635, did not re-file his bill out of respect to Pelosi and his desire to be appointed Chair of the Judiciary Committee. Moreover, several Members of Congress have stated that they have followed in Conyers’s steps in choosing not to introduce similar bills of their own.
About the author:
Matthew Cardinale is the News Editor of Atlanta Progressive News and may be reached at matthew@atlantaprogressivenews.com.
Syndication policy:
This article may be reprinted in full at no cost where Atlanta Progressive News is credited.
Wrap...
From Out of Iraq to English/Boston accent...
From American Progress:
Think Fast
A bipartisan group of senators, including "several conservative Republicans," introduced legislation Tuesday to use the Iraq Study Group's recommendations "as the foundation for future U.S. policy in Iraq." The bill aims to "begin the withdrawal of U.S. combat brigades by early 2008 if certain benchmarks are met."
Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) has approved a proposal that would allow an independent outside panel to decide which ethics complaints merit investigation by the House ethics committee. "This is gigantic," said Sarah Dufendach of the watchdog group Common Cause. "If they really do this, it will be a very serious step forward."
The House oversight committee is expanding its investigation "into ties between jailed GOP lobbyist Jack Abramoff and the White House and have contacted several Abramoff associates recently about testifying to Congress."
"The United States will refuse to agree to targets and timetables for cutting greenhouse gases" at G8 summit, President Bush's science adviser reiterated yesterday. "At this point in time we are not prepared to adopt that proposal," James Connaughton told reporters.
Iraq and Afghanistan "have overstretched the U.S. foreign service, damaging its staffers' morale and threatening its performance around the world," diplomats' advocates charge. They say the State Dept. needs 1,100 new foreign service officers "simply to restore the capabilities it had" when Condoleezza Rice took her post in 2005.
Yesterday, the House unanimously passed a resolution calling on China to "act consistently with the Olympic standard of preserving human dignity in Darfur, Sudan and around the world." It urges China to "stop selling Sudan arms and suspend economic cooperation with Sudan until Sudan 'stops its attacks on civilians' in Darfur."
"Oman and Iran girded for heavy flooding and winds today as the strongest cyclone ever recorded by scientists in the northwestern Arabian Sea began to hit coastlines that have little experience with such powerful storms."
Ignoring a veto threat, a House spending committee yesterday approved a homeland security bill that includes "about $50 million more for customs and border protection than Bush sought and $2 billion more than his February request for security preparedness and disaster relief."
And finally: Does David Hyde Pierce's (best known as Niles on the television show "Frasier") accent in the new Tony-nominated show "Curtains" sound familiar? Pierce said he based his "highly acclaimed Boston accent" on Rep. Edward Markey (D-MA). "It sort of comes from almost an English accent -- you lose your R's and your A's get a little bent," said Pierce. Markey's reaction? "He sounds like me, but I don't know if that is good or bad."
Wrap...
Think Fast
A bipartisan group of senators, including "several conservative Republicans," introduced legislation Tuesday to use the Iraq Study Group's recommendations "as the foundation for future U.S. policy in Iraq." The bill aims to "begin the withdrawal of U.S. combat brigades by early 2008 if certain benchmarks are met."
Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) has approved a proposal that would allow an independent outside panel to decide which ethics complaints merit investigation by the House ethics committee. "This is gigantic," said Sarah Dufendach of the watchdog group Common Cause. "If they really do this, it will be a very serious step forward."
The House oversight committee is expanding its investigation "into ties between jailed GOP lobbyist Jack Abramoff and the White House and have contacted several Abramoff associates recently about testifying to Congress."
"The United States will refuse to agree to targets and timetables for cutting greenhouse gases" at G8 summit, President Bush's science adviser reiterated yesterday. "At this point in time we are not prepared to adopt that proposal," James Connaughton told reporters.
Iraq and Afghanistan "have overstretched the U.S. foreign service, damaging its staffers' morale and threatening its performance around the world," diplomats' advocates charge. They say the State Dept. needs 1,100 new foreign service officers "simply to restore the capabilities it had" when Condoleezza Rice took her post in 2005.
Yesterday, the House unanimously passed a resolution calling on China to "act consistently with the Olympic standard of preserving human dignity in Darfur, Sudan and around the world." It urges China to "stop selling Sudan arms and suspend economic cooperation with Sudan until Sudan 'stops its attacks on civilians' in Darfur."
"Oman and Iran girded for heavy flooding and winds today as the strongest cyclone ever recorded by scientists in the northwestern Arabian Sea began to hit coastlines that have little experience with such powerful storms."
Ignoring a veto threat, a House spending committee yesterday approved a homeland security bill that includes "about $50 million more for customs and border protection than Bush sought and $2 billion more than his February request for security preparedness and disaster relief."
And finally: Does David Hyde Pierce's (best known as Niles on the television show "Frasier") accent in the new Tony-nominated show "Curtains" sound familiar? Pierce said he based his "highly acclaimed Boston accent" on Rep. Edward Markey (D-MA). "It sort of comes from almost an English accent -- you lose your R's and your A's get a little bent," said Pierce. Markey's reaction? "He sounds like me, but I don't know if that is good or bad."
Wrap...
Tuesday, June 05, 2007
Sheesh! Dems should have seen this one coming!
From the Sacramento Bee:
GOP seeks to expel Jefferson from House
Republicans moved Tuesday to seek Rep. William J. Jefferson's expulsion from the House, a day after the Louisiana Democrat was indicted on charges of receiving more than $500,000 in bribes....(more)
Wrap....
GOP seeks to expel Jefferson from House
Republicans moved Tuesday to seek Rep. William J. Jefferson's expulsion from the House, a day after the Louisiana Democrat was indicted on charges of receiving more than $500,000 in bribes....(more)
Wrap....
Monday, June 04, 2007
Farmers screwed...Big Ag gets ALL the $$$$....
From In These Times:
> June 4, 2007
Whose Subsidy Is It Anyway?
Farmers take the heat, but Big Ag reaps the farm bill benefits
By David Moberg
The farm bill, which Congress will likely vote on this fall, will affect environmental, consumer, industrial, trade and anti-poverty policies as well as the prices and subsidies farmers receive for producing commodity crops such as corn, wheat and soybeans. Legislators are now conducting hearings and readying proposals, but the outcome is “more up in the air than it has been in 30 to 40 years,” says senior policy analyst Dennis Olson at the Minneapolis-based Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy. A small opening exists for a new progressive farm policy based on some old principles.
The winners
Conventional wisdom says that the villains in farm policy are American farmers, who have in recent years collected about $20 billion a year in subsidies. But the government provides the subsidies because commodity prices have been so low that most farmers would have gone bankrupt without them. And prices have been low because legislators have written farm policy to drive those prices down to aid big business rather than farmers—or anyone else.
“The important thing for policymakers and the public to be clear on is that the people who get checks written for them under the farm bill are generally not the beneficiaries of those programs,” says Timothy Wise, deputy director of the Global Development and Environment Institute at Tufts University. “So the obvious question is: ‘Who benefited?’”
Consider for a moment Big Chicken—not the tacky 56-foot high tourist attraction near Marietta, Ga., but the industry that turns out more than 16 million tons of poultry each year. Once highly diversified, with nearly every farm producing chickens, the industry is now highly concentrated: The top four processors, led by giant Tyson Foods, control more than 56 percent of production.
Tyson and other giants have consolidated their power by purchasing chicken feed for, well, chicken feed. As soybean and corn prices dropped 21 percent and 32 percent, respectively, after the passage of the 1996 farm bill, the chicken industry effectively collected a subsidy of $1.25 billion a year, according to Tufts researchers Elanor Starmer, Aimee Witteman and Wise. The subsidy—worth $2.59 billion to Tyson from 1997 to 2005—represents the savings for the industry compared to paying for the full cost of producing the grain in its feed.
The cheap, subsidized grain also gave big factory farm operations an edge over diversified family farmers. By feeding animals their own grain rather than buying government-subsidized grain on the market, these farmers have to pay the full cost of producing grain they feed to their livestock. Politically, however, it remains “hard for farmers to make the case that they’re not the welfare cases,” says National Family Farm Coalition Executive Director Katherine Ozer, “but it’s Tyson and Cargill that are the real welfare cases.”
Big Chicken is not alone. International grain traders (like Cargill), industrial users of food and fiber products (ranging from the biggest users, the livestock and meat industry, to processors like Archer Daniels Midland and the vast array of junk food manufacturers), and the corporate producers of seed, fertilizers, equipment and other farm inputs all profit from overproduction and low commodity prices. Even after a long history of consolidation, tens of thousands of independent farm operators still must compete with highly concentrated agribusiness corporations that have the power to set both prices of products sold to farmers and prices paid for farmers’ products.
“You’re talking about a huge savings in a huge industry that never is getting a subsidy check written to it,” says Wise. Until biofuel demand recently drove up prices, most farmers sold corn or soybeans for less than it cost to produce. Government subsidies covered only some of their financial loss, and many had to take jobs off the farm to make up for their farm losses.
Grain traders then sold that corn and soybeans abroad at below-cost prices. Such dumping drives millions of peasants off their land. The displaced peasants flood urban labor markets and thus depress wages. Their exodus from the land also fuels waves of immigration to more developed countries, including the United States—where many get low-wage jobs processing chicken.
http://www.inthesetimes.com/article/3190/whose_subsidy_is_it_anyway/
[Click link above to continue reading]
Wrap...
> June 4, 2007
Whose Subsidy Is It Anyway?
Farmers take the heat, but Big Ag reaps the farm bill benefits
By David Moberg
The farm bill, which Congress will likely vote on this fall, will affect environmental, consumer, industrial, trade and anti-poverty policies as well as the prices and subsidies farmers receive for producing commodity crops such as corn, wheat and soybeans. Legislators are now conducting hearings and readying proposals, but the outcome is “more up in the air than it has been in 30 to 40 years,” says senior policy analyst Dennis Olson at the Minneapolis-based Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy. A small opening exists for a new progressive farm policy based on some old principles.
The winners
Conventional wisdom says that the villains in farm policy are American farmers, who have in recent years collected about $20 billion a year in subsidies. But the government provides the subsidies because commodity prices have been so low that most farmers would have gone bankrupt without them. And prices have been low because legislators have written farm policy to drive those prices down to aid big business rather than farmers—or anyone else.
“The important thing for policymakers and the public to be clear on is that the people who get checks written for them under the farm bill are generally not the beneficiaries of those programs,” says Timothy Wise, deputy director of the Global Development and Environment Institute at Tufts University. “So the obvious question is: ‘Who benefited?’”
Consider for a moment Big Chicken—not the tacky 56-foot high tourist attraction near Marietta, Ga., but the industry that turns out more than 16 million tons of poultry each year. Once highly diversified, with nearly every farm producing chickens, the industry is now highly concentrated: The top four processors, led by giant Tyson Foods, control more than 56 percent of production.
Tyson and other giants have consolidated their power by purchasing chicken feed for, well, chicken feed. As soybean and corn prices dropped 21 percent and 32 percent, respectively, after the passage of the 1996 farm bill, the chicken industry effectively collected a subsidy of $1.25 billion a year, according to Tufts researchers Elanor Starmer, Aimee Witteman and Wise. The subsidy—worth $2.59 billion to Tyson from 1997 to 2005—represents the savings for the industry compared to paying for the full cost of producing the grain in its feed.
The cheap, subsidized grain also gave big factory farm operations an edge over diversified family farmers. By feeding animals their own grain rather than buying government-subsidized grain on the market, these farmers have to pay the full cost of producing grain they feed to their livestock. Politically, however, it remains “hard for farmers to make the case that they’re not the welfare cases,” says National Family Farm Coalition Executive Director Katherine Ozer, “but it’s Tyson and Cargill that are the real welfare cases.”
Big Chicken is not alone. International grain traders (like Cargill), industrial users of food and fiber products (ranging from the biggest users, the livestock and meat industry, to processors like Archer Daniels Midland and the vast array of junk food manufacturers), and the corporate producers of seed, fertilizers, equipment and other farm inputs all profit from overproduction and low commodity prices. Even after a long history of consolidation, tens of thousands of independent farm operators still must compete with highly concentrated agribusiness corporations that have the power to set both prices of products sold to farmers and prices paid for farmers’ products.
“You’re talking about a huge savings in a huge industry that never is getting a subsidy check written to it,” says Wise. Until biofuel demand recently drove up prices, most farmers sold corn or soybeans for less than it cost to produce. Government subsidies covered only some of their financial loss, and many had to take jobs off the farm to make up for their farm losses.
Grain traders then sold that corn and soybeans abroad at below-cost prices. Such dumping drives millions of peasants off their land. The displaced peasants flood urban labor markets and thus depress wages. Their exodus from the land also fuels waves of immigration to more developed countries, including the United States—where many get low-wage jobs processing chicken.
http://www.inthesetimes.com/article/3190/whose_subsidy_is_it_anyway/
[Click link above to continue reading]
Wrap...
From G8 to Affleck & DeLay....
From American Progress:
Think Fast:
"The protests in Europe started even before President Bush's scheduled departure Monday morning for an eight-day visit to six countries, including the G-8 summit in Germany. Over the weekend, demonstrators in Germany were out protesting many issues, but Bush and Iraq are near the top of their list."
"House Oversight and Government Reform Committee staffers appear close to an agreement that would limit the number of e-mails the panel will demand from the Republican National Committee as part of an investigation of political presentations given to federal agencies."
War critics in Congress "plan a summer of repeated Iraq-related votes" designed to force Bush supporters "to abandon the White House before the fall." The votes will be linked to expanded local campaigns to pressure members in their own states. "Our job is to go into the congressional districts of members and create a political environment that is toxic," said Tom Matzzie of Americans Against Escalation in Iraq.
A legal battle with global implications begins tomorrow with the Guantanamo Bay arraignment of Omar Ahmed Khadr, accused of killing a U.S. soldier with a grenade in 2002. "A range of legal experts describe as the first child fighter in decades to face war-crimes charges."
"After promising unprecedented openness regarding Congress' pork barrel practices, House Democrats are moving in the opposite direction as they draw up spending bills for the upcoming budget year." Democrats are sidestepping their own rules and adding earmarks when it is "too late for critics to effectively challenge them."
More than four years into the Iraq war, the Defense Department "has formed a task force comprised of military and federal law enforcement agencies" to "investigate contract fraud and public corruption related to Iraq reconstruction."
The Senate architects of a "delicate immigration compromise are increasingly convinced that they will hold together this week to pass an overhaul of the nation's immigration laws, with momentum building behind one unifying theme: Today's immigration system is too broken to go unaddressed."
Due to the growing climate crisis, The Weather Channel "has seen its primary subject turn into a hot-button issue," and "has decided not to tread gingerly," covering climate change and related science. "If The Weather Channel isn't talking about climate change and global warming, who is?" a network executive said.
The Philadelphia Inquirer editorial argues that "expanding coal isn't a smart choice for America right now. Although cheap and plentiful, it's dirty. Its environmental byproducts outweigh its benefits." It also criticizes "a bipartisan group of coal-state lawmakers wants to grant billions in taxpayer subsidies to turn coal into liquid fuel to power cars, trucks and airplanes." Find out more on coal-to-liquid fuels HERE.And finally: Last week at a conference, a colleague of actor
Ben Affleck asked former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay if he'd sign a copy of 'No Retreat, No Surrender' for the Hollywood actor." Even though Affleck is outspoken on liberal issues, DeLay admitted that he is a big fan of Affleck's 1995 film "Mallrats." DeLay’s inscription to Affleck: "Ben and Jen -- Loved you in Mallrats, this book is kind of like that. Keep the Faith -- Tom DeLay."
Wrap...
Think Fast:
"The protests in Europe started even before President Bush's scheduled departure Monday morning for an eight-day visit to six countries, including the G-8 summit in Germany. Over the weekend, demonstrators in Germany were out protesting many issues, but Bush and Iraq are near the top of their list."
"House Oversight and Government Reform Committee staffers appear close to an agreement that would limit the number of e-mails the panel will demand from the Republican National Committee as part of an investigation of political presentations given to federal agencies."
War critics in Congress "plan a summer of repeated Iraq-related votes" designed to force Bush supporters "to abandon the White House before the fall." The votes will be linked to expanded local campaigns to pressure members in their own states. "Our job is to go into the congressional districts of members and create a political environment that is toxic," said Tom Matzzie of Americans Against Escalation in Iraq.
A legal battle with global implications begins tomorrow with the Guantanamo Bay arraignment of Omar Ahmed Khadr, accused of killing a U.S. soldier with a grenade in 2002. "A range of legal experts describe as the first child fighter in decades to face war-crimes charges."
"After promising unprecedented openness regarding Congress' pork barrel practices, House Democrats are moving in the opposite direction as they draw up spending bills for the upcoming budget year." Democrats are sidestepping their own rules and adding earmarks when it is "too late for critics to effectively challenge them."
More than four years into the Iraq war, the Defense Department "has formed a task force comprised of military and federal law enforcement agencies" to "investigate contract fraud and public corruption related to Iraq reconstruction."
The Senate architects of a "delicate immigration compromise are increasingly convinced that they will hold together this week to pass an overhaul of the nation's immigration laws, with momentum building behind one unifying theme: Today's immigration system is too broken to go unaddressed."
Due to the growing climate crisis, The Weather Channel "has seen its primary subject turn into a hot-button issue," and "has decided not to tread gingerly," covering climate change and related science. "If The Weather Channel isn't talking about climate change and global warming, who is?" a network executive said.
The Philadelphia Inquirer editorial argues that "expanding coal isn't a smart choice for America right now. Although cheap and plentiful, it's dirty. Its environmental byproducts outweigh its benefits." It also criticizes "a bipartisan group of coal-state lawmakers wants to grant billions in taxpayer subsidies to turn coal into liquid fuel to power cars, trucks and airplanes." Find out more on coal-to-liquid fuels HERE.And finally: Last week at a conference, a colleague of actor
Ben Affleck asked former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay if he'd sign a copy of 'No Retreat, No Surrender' for the Hollywood actor." Even though Affleck is outspoken on liberal issues, DeLay admitted that he is a big fan of Affleck's 1995 film "Mallrats." DeLay’s inscription to Affleck: "Ben and Jen -- Loved you in Mallrats, this book is kind of like that. Keep the Faith -- Tom DeLay."
Wrap...
Machine turns water into fire! Amazing!
From NBC San Diego Newsroom:
Fla. Man Invents Machine To Turn Water Into Fire
Man's Invention Stroke Of Luck
POSTED: 11:10 am PDT May 29, 2007
UPDATED: 10:36 am PDT June 1, 2007
SANIBEL ISLAND, Fla. -- A Florida man may have accidentally invented a machine that could help solve the gasoline and energy crisis plaguing the U.S., television station WPBF reported.
Sanibel Island resident John Kanzius is a former broadcast executive from Pennsylvania who wondered if his background in physics and radio could come in handy in treating the disease from which he suffers: cancer.
Kanzius, 63, invented a machine that emits radio waves in an attempt to kill cancerous cells while leaving normal cells intact. While testing his machine, he noticed that his invention had other unexpected abilities.
Filling a test tube with salt water from a canal in his back yard, Kanzius placed the tube and a paper towel in the machine and turned it on. Suddenly, the paper towel ignited, lighting up the tube like it was a wax candle.
"Pretty neat, huh?" Kanzius asked.
Kanzius performed the experiment without the paper towel and got the same result -- the salt water was actually burning.
Kanzius said he showed the experiment to a handful of scientists across the country who claim they are baffled at watching salt water ignite.
Kanzius said the flame created from his machine reaches a temperature of around 3,000 degrees Fahrenheit. He said a chemist told him that the immense heat created from the machine breaks down the hydrogen-oxygen bond in the water, igniting the hydrogen.
"You could take plain salt water out of the sea, put it in containers and produce a violent flame that could heat generators that make electricity, or provide other forms of energy," Kanzius said.
He said engineers are currently experimenting with him in Erie, Pa. in an attempt to harness the energy. They've built an engine that, when placed on top of the flame, chugged along for two minutes, Kanzius told WPBF.
Kanzius admits all the excitement surrounding a new possible energy source was a stroke of luck. Someone who witnessed his work on the cancer front asked him if perhaps the machine could be used for desalinization.
"This was an experiment to see if I could heat salt water, and instead of heat, I got fire," Kanzius said.
Kanzius said he hoped that his invention could one day solve a lot of the world's energy problems.
"If I were to be bold enough, I think one day you could power an automobile with this, eventually," Kanzius said.
Distributed by Internet Broadcasting.
Wrap...
Fla. Man Invents Machine To Turn Water Into Fire
Man's Invention Stroke Of Luck
POSTED: 11:10 am PDT May 29, 2007
UPDATED: 10:36 am PDT June 1, 2007
SANIBEL ISLAND, Fla. -- A Florida man may have accidentally invented a machine that could help solve the gasoline and energy crisis plaguing the U.S., television station WPBF reported.
Sanibel Island resident John Kanzius is a former broadcast executive from Pennsylvania who wondered if his background in physics and radio could come in handy in treating the disease from which he suffers: cancer.
Kanzius, 63, invented a machine that emits radio waves in an attempt to kill cancerous cells while leaving normal cells intact. While testing his machine, he noticed that his invention had other unexpected abilities.
Filling a test tube with salt water from a canal in his back yard, Kanzius placed the tube and a paper towel in the machine and turned it on. Suddenly, the paper towel ignited, lighting up the tube like it was a wax candle.
"Pretty neat, huh?" Kanzius asked.
Kanzius performed the experiment without the paper towel and got the same result -- the salt water was actually burning.
Kanzius said he showed the experiment to a handful of scientists across the country who claim they are baffled at watching salt water ignite.
Kanzius said the flame created from his machine reaches a temperature of around 3,000 degrees Fahrenheit. He said a chemist told him that the immense heat created from the machine breaks down the hydrogen-oxygen bond in the water, igniting the hydrogen.
"You could take plain salt water out of the sea, put it in containers and produce a violent flame that could heat generators that make electricity, or provide other forms of energy," Kanzius said.
He said engineers are currently experimenting with him in Erie, Pa. in an attempt to harness the energy. They've built an engine that, when placed on top of the flame, chugged along for two minutes, Kanzius told WPBF.
Kanzius admits all the excitement surrounding a new possible energy source was a stroke of luck. Someone who witnessed his work on the cancer front asked him if perhaps the machine could be used for desalinization.
"This was an experiment to see if I could heat salt water, and instead of heat, I got fire," Kanzius said.
Kanzius said he hoped that his invention could one day solve a lot of the world's energy problems.
"If I were to be bold enough, I think one day you could power an automobile with this, eventually," Kanzius said.
Distributed by Internet Broadcasting.
Wrap...
Friday, June 01, 2007
The torture techniques we use..the source...
From American Progress:
HUMAN RIGHTS -- PENTAGON 'MIGRATED' SOVIET COLD WAR TORTURE TECHNIQUES TO GUANTANAMO, IRAQ:
Survival, Evasion, Resistance, and Escape (SERE) is a program designed to train U.S. soldiers to withstand torture if they are ever captured as prisoners of war. Developed during the Cold War, U.S. solders are subjected to techniques based "on how the Soviet Union and its allies were believed to treat prisoners," including "prolonged use of stress positions, exposure to heat and cold, sleep deprivation and even waterboarding."
A recently declassified investigation from the Department of Defense's Inspector General confirms "how the military training was 'reverse engineered' for use by American interrogators," training them on more "effective" ways to elicit information.
"On at least two occasions, the JTF-170 (interrogators) requested that Joint Personnel Recovery Agency (the agency conducting SERE training) instructors be sent to Guantanamo to instruct interrogators in SERE counterresistance interrogation techniques," the report noted.
Those practices also migrated to Iraq:
"In September 2003...Joint Personnel Recovery Agency sent an interrogation assessment team to Iraq to provide advice and assistance to the task force interrogation mission." Because the techniques were so extreme, several intelligence officers "vehemently objected to the use of the techniques, but their protests were ignored."
Sen. Carl Levin (D-MI) said he found the Pentagon report "very troubling" would hold hearings on how the SERE training methods "migrated" into Iraq and Guantanamo as the basis for interrogation. "They were put to a purpose that was never intended," he said.
Wrap...
HUMAN RIGHTS -- PENTAGON 'MIGRATED' SOVIET COLD WAR TORTURE TECHNIQUES TO GUANTANAMO, IRAQ:
Survival, Evasion, Resistance, and Escape (SERE) is a program designed to train U.S. soldiers to withstand torture if they are ever captured as prisoners of war. Developed during the Cold War, U.S. solders are subjected to techniques based "on how the Soviet Union and its allies were believed to treat prisoners," including "prolonged use of stress positions, exposure to heat and cold, sleep deprivation and even waterboarding."
A recently declassified investigation from the Department of Defense's Inspector General confirms "how the military training was 'reverse engineered' for use by American interrogators," training them on more "effective" ways to elicit information.
"On at least two occasions, the JTF-170 (interrogators) requested that Joint Personnel Recovery Agency (the agency conducting SERE training) instructors be sent to Guantanamo to instruct interrogators in SERE counterresistance interrogation techniques," the report noted.
Those practices also migrated to Iraq:
"In September 2003...Joint Personnel Recovery Agency sent an interrogation assessment team to Iraq to provide advice and assistance to the task force interrogation mission." Because the techniques were so extreme, several intelligence officers "vehemently objected to the use of the techniques, but their protests were ignored."
Sen. Carl Levin (D-MI) said he found the Pentagon report "very troubling" would hold hearings on how the SERE training methods "migrated" into Iraq and Guantanamo as the basis for interrogation. "They were put to a purpose that was never intended," he said.
Wrap...
One good and honorable Senator: Barbara Boxer...
From Sen Barbara Boxer:
Thank you for contacting me about the war in Iraq . I appreciate hearing from you on the most important issue facing our nation today.
In March and in April, I voted for emergency spending legislation that would have fully funded our troops in Iraq but also changed their mission to a sound one - one that would have taken our troops out of the middle of a civil war and put them into a support role, training Iraqi soldiers and police and protecting U.S. security interests in the region.
However, President Bush would not agree to that. On May 1, 2007, the President vetoed an emergency spending bill that combined full funding for our troops with a new focus on diplomacy, a requirement to begin redeploying American forces by October 1, and a mandate for the Iraqi government to seek a political solution to the civil war in Iraq .
The spending bill that came after President Bush's veto did nothing more than maintain the status quo with a few words about benchmarks. On May 24, I voted against an emergency spending bill that allows the President to continue his one-man show in Iraq . I voted no because I believe that Congress must make it clear to the President that our commitment in Iraq cannot be open-ended and that it is time to start working to bring our troops home. We need to redeploy our troops out of Iraq as part of a sorely needed new policy, one that emphasizes diplomatic and political methods - not military strategies - as the best way of bringing stability to Iraq.
Since American forces went into Iraq in March 2003, more than 3,400 of our troops have been killed. Of those, 21 percent have been from California or based in California . Over 25,000 more have been wounded. Countless numbers of Iraqis have been killed, victims of an intensifying civil war. Furthermore, the first half of 2007 has already been deadlier than any six-month peri od since the war began more than four years ago.
Please be assured that I will continue doing all I can to see that Congress acts boldly to bring this tragic and ill-fated war to an end. Once again, thank you for your letter and for caring deeply about this critical matter.
Barbara Boxer
United States Senator
Please visit my website at
http://boxer.senate.gov
Wrap...
Thank you for contacting me about the war in Iraq . I appreciate hearing from you on the most important issue facing our nation today.
In March and in April, I voted for emergency spending legislation that would have fully funded our troops in Iraq but also changed their mission to a sound one - one that would have taken our troops out of the middle of a civil war and put them into a support role, training Iraqi soldiers and police and protecting U.S. security interests in the region.
However, President Bush would not agree to that. On May 1, 2007, the President vetoed an emergency spending bill that combined full funding for our troops with a new focus on diplomacy, a requirement to begin redeploying American forces by October 1, and a mandate for the Iraqi government to seek a political solution to the civil war in Iraq .
The spending bill that came after President Bush's veto did nothing more than maintain the status quo with a few words about benchmarks. On May 24, I voted against an emergency spending bill that allows the President to continue his one-man show in Iraq . I voted no because I believe that Congress must make it clear to the President that our commitment in Iraq cannot be open-ended and that it is time to start working to bring our troops home. We need to redeploy our troops out of Iraq as part of a sorely needed new policy, one that emphasizes diplomatic and political methods - not military strategies - as the best way of bringing stability to Iraq.
Since American forces went into Iraq in March 2003, more than 3,400 of our troops have been killed. Of those, 21 percent have been from California or based in California . Over 25,000 more have been wounded. Countless numbers of Iraqis have been killed, victims of an intensifying civil war. Furthermore, the first half of 2007 has already been deadlier than any six-month peri od since the war began more than four years ago.
Please be assured that I will continue doing all I can to see that Congress acts boldly to bring this tragic and ill-fated war to an end. Once again, thank you for your letter and for caring deeply about this critical matter.
Barbara Boxer
United States Senator
Please visit my website at
http://boxer.senate.gov
Wrap...
BushCo's secret visitors....So what are they hiding?
From NBC San Diego Newsroom:
Bush, Cheney Want Visitor Logs Secret
Over the past year, lawyers for President Bush and Vice President Cheney have directed the Secret Service to maintain the confidentiality of visitor entry and exit logs. More Details
Wrap...
Bush, Cheney Want Visitor Logs Secret
Over the past year, lawyers for President Bush and Vice President Cheney have directed the Secret Service to maintain the confidentiality of visitor entry and exit logs. More Details
Wrap...
On the matter of torture....
From The Village Voice:
Give Me Liberty
Dark Secrets at the Front
Prisoners and interrogators are both brutalized in a war that changes who we are.
by Nat Hentoff
May 30th, 2007 11:27 AM
In February 2006, then–Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld warned that our wars against terrorism "could last for decades." Speaking at the National Press Club in Washington, he said of the multiplying enemy: "Compelled by a militant ideology that celebrates murder and suicide with no territory to defend, with little to lose, they will either succeed in changing our way of life, or we will succeed in changing theirs."
With a seemingly endless supply of suicide bombers in Iraq, the enemy certainly hasn't changed its way of life. However—as the world has witnessed—there's plenty of evidence that we've changed ours—namely, in America's professed values about how we treat our prisoners, euphemistically marginalized as "detainees."
Colin Powell, after his many years of military service, said that American forces using torture on prisoners has been an "innovation." And on May 7 of this year, General David Petraeus—now commanding our "surge" in Iraq, emphasized: "It's time to adhere to American values. We must not sink to the level of our enemies." That reminded me of John McCain admonishing the president and Cheney about brutalizing our prisoners: "We are Americans; our values are not those of the terrorists."
McCain finally got a law passed barring "cruel and inhuman treatment" of prisoners, but he later voted for the Military Commissions Act of 2006 that barred those we hold as terrorism suspects from going into our courts to speak of their "conditions of confinement"—including "coercive interrogations" permitted by the Military Commissions Act.
What caused the new alarm by General Petraeus about sinking to the level of the enemy is a startling official report from the Office of the Surgeon General, United States Army Medical Command. Dated November 17, 2006, the report—encompassing several years of research in the field, including repeated surveys—has found that:
[click the link below to continue reading]
http://www.villagevoice.com/news/0722,hentoff,76819,6.html
Wrap....
Give Me Liberty
Dark Secrets at the Front
Prisoners and interrogators are both brutalized in a war that changes who we are.
by Nat Hentoff
May 30th, 2007 11:27 AM
In February 2006, then–Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld warned that our wars against terrorism "could last for decades." Speaking at the National Press Club in Washington, he said of the multiplying enemy: "Compelled by a militant ideology that celebrates murder and suicide with no territory to defend, with little to lose, they will either succeed in changing our way of life, or we will succeed in changing theirs."
With a seemingly endless supply of suicide bombers in Iraq, the enemy certainly hasn't changed its way of life. However—as the world has witnessed—there's plenty of evidence that we've changed ours—namely, in America's professed values about how we treat our prisoners, euphemistically marginalized as "detainees."
Colin Powell, after his many years of military service, said that American forces using torture on prisoners has been an "innovation." And on May 7 of this year, General David Petraeus—now commanding our "surge" in Iraq, emphasized: "It's time to adhere to American values. We must not sink to the level of our enemies." That reminded me of John McCain admonishing the president and Cheney about brutalizing our prisoners: "We are Americans; our values are not those of the terrorists."
McCain finally got a law passed barring "cruel and inhuman treatment" of prisoners, but he later voted for the Military Commissions Act of 2006 that barred those we hold as terrorism suspects from going into our courts to speak of their "conditions of confinement"—including "coercive interrogations" permitted by the Military Commissions Act.
What caused the new alarm by General Petraeus about sinking to the level of the enemy is a startling official report from the Office of the Surgeon General, United States Army Medical Command. Dated November 17, 2006, the report—encompassing several years of research in the field, including repeated surveys—has found that:
[click the link below to continue reading]
http://www.villagevoice.com/news/0722,hentoff,76819,6.html
Wrap....
Thursday, May 31, 2007
Prying books out of the cold hands of the CIA...
From Publishers Lunch:
Plame and S&S Sue CIAAs we begin the convention where Valerie Plame Wilson is scheduled to address atendees, she and Simon & Schuster have filed suit in NY Federal District Court against the CIA, alleging that they are "unconstitutionally interfering with the publication of Ms. Wilson's memoir, Fair Game by classifying public domain information."
Note: TJ Waters had a hard time getting his book, Class 11, away from the CIA too.
Wrap...
Plame and S&S Sue CIAAs we begin the convention where Valerie Plame Wilson is scheduled to address atendees, she and Simon & Schuster have filed suit in NY Federal District Court against the CIA, alleging that they are "unconstitutionally interfering with the publication of Ms. Wilson's memoir, Fair Game by classifying public domain information."
Note: TJ Waters had a hard time getting his book, Class 11, away from the CIA too.
Wrap...
From ugly DeMint to Blackberry bruises....
From American Progress:
Sen. Jim DeMint (R-SC) blames U.S. troop deaths on Congress's Iraq debate. "Al-Qaida knows that we've got a lot of wimps in Congress," DeMint said at a luncheon Tuesday. "I believe a lot of the casualties can be laid at the feet of all the talk in Congress about how we've got to get out, we've got to cut and run." He later added that while Iraq has "gone badly and it's a mess, it would have been worse if we hadn't gone in."
"The United States is among the least peaceful nations in the world, ranking 96th between Yemen and Iran, according to an index of 121 countries." Iraq ranks last.
President Bush "is under pressure from European allies to give ground on climate change at next week's meeting of the world's richest countries, but policy experts say prospects for a breakthrough are slim."
"Twenty months after its depleted ranks of soldiers and airmen were pressed into service for Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, the Louisiana National Guard still lacks hundreds of military troop trucks that can handle high water as it faces a new storm season that begins Friday." The culprit, they say, is Iraq.
The Supreme Court ruling this week "in favor of an Alabama employer that had underpaid a female employee for years" is effectively "gutting a key part of the Civil Rights Act," The New York Times writes. "Fortunately, Congress can amend the law to undo this damaging decision." House Education and Labor Committee chairman George Miller (D-CA) and others have announced plans to do just that.
Global warming is shrinking the Great Lakes, New Scientist reports. "Lake Superior, the largest body of fresh water in the world by surface area, is experiencing its lowest water levels since the record set in 1926."
"A NATO helicopter on a night mission crashed late yesterday in southern Afghanistan, killing all seven service members aboard in what officials believe was a coordinated attack in an area known for aggressive Taliban fighting."
"A Sunni police chief praised by U.S. forces for clearing his city of insurgents has been arrested following an investigation into alleged murder, corruption and crimes against the Iraqi people, the U.S. military said Wednesday."
And finally: The World Bank Blackberry bruise. "After his introduction as the U.S. pick to lead the World Bank, Robert Zoellick said he had to turn off his BlackBerry. He wears the device on his belt, and typically keeps it on vibrate. 'I'm getting bruises,' he said, pointing to it. 'I've never had so many emails.'"
Wrap...
Sen. Jim DeMint (R-SC) blames U.S. troop deaths on Congress's Iraq debate. "Al-Qaida knows that we've got a lot of wimps in Congress," DeMint said at a luncheon Tuesday. "I believe a lot of the casualties can be laid at the feet of all the talk in Congress about how we've got to get out, we've got to cut and run." He later added that while Iraq has "gone badly and it's a mess, it would have been worse if we hadn't gone in."
"The United States is among the least peaceful nations in the world, ranking 96th between Yemen and Iran, according to an index of 121 countries." Iraq ranks last.
President Bush "is under pressure from European allies to give ground on climate change at next week's meeting of the world's richest countries, but policy experts say prospects for a breakthrough are slim."
"Twenty months after its depleted ranks of soldiers and airmen were pressed into service for Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, the Louisiana National Guard still lacks hundreds of military troop trucks that can handle high water as it faces a new storm season that begins Friday." The culprit, they say, is Iraq.
The Supreme Court ruling this week "in favor of an Alabama employer that had underpaid a female employee for years" is effectively "gutting a key part of the Civil Rights Act," The New York Times writes. "Fortunately, Congress can amend the law to undo this damaging decision." House Education and Labor Committee chairman George Miller (D-CA) and others have announced plans to do just that.
Global warming is shrinking the Great Lakes, New Scientist reports. "Lake Superior, the largest body of fresh water in the world by surface area, is experiencing its lowest water levels since the record set in 1926."
"A NATO helicopter on a night mission crashed late yesterday in southern Afghanistan, killing all seven service members aboard in what officials believe was a coordinated attack in an area known for aggressive Taliban fighting."
"A Sunni police chief praised by U.S. forces for clearing his city of insurgents has been arrested following an investigation into alleged murder, corruption and crimes against the Iraqi people, the U.S. military said Wednesday."
And finally: The World Bank Blackberry bruise. "After his introduction as the U.S. pick to lead the World Bank, Robert Zoellick said he had to turn off his BlackBerry. He wears the device on his belt, and typically keeps it on vibrate. 'I'm getting bruises,' he said, pointing to it. 'I've never had so many emails.'"
Wrap...
BushCo LOVES TORTURE!!!
From The Christian Science Monitor:
Daily Update > Terrorism & Security
posted May 31, 2007 at 1:10 p.m. EDT
White House nears completion of new torture guidelines
Critics say administration's endorsement of 'enhanced interrogation' is 'immoral,' draw comparisons to Nazi war crimes.
By Arthur Bright csmonitor.com
The White House is close to completing a new set of guidelines on the use of "enhanced interrogative techniques" by US agents, even as critics say such techniques are "immoral," "amateurish," and "indistinguishable" from Nazi war crimes.
The New York Times reports that the administration is preparing "secret new rules governing interrogations."
The Bush administration is nearing completion of a long-delayed executive order that will set new rules for interrogations by the Central Intelligence Agency. The order is expected to ban the harshest techniques used in the past, including the simulated drowning tactic known as waterboarding, but to authorize some methods that go beyond those allowed in the military by the Army Field Manual.
The Times writes that President Bush has claimed the broader techniques are needed to fight terrorism, and in the recent Republican presidential debate, candidates made similar suggestions about the necessity of harsh interrogation.
Critics, however, say that the Bush administration's policy regarding torture is "immoral." Philip Zelikow, a former advisor to Condoleezza Rice and the executive director of the 9/11 Commission, said in a lecture last month (PDF) at the Houston Journal of International Law that in 2002, the United States made "careful, deliberate choices to place extreme physical pressure on captives, with accompanying psychological effects," and that the administration's "policy guidelines devolved into legal guidelines, which were to do everything you can, so long as it is not punishable as a crime under American law."
Brilliant lawyers worked hard on how they could then construe the limits of vague, untested laws. They were operating so close to the frontiers of our law that, within only a couple of years, the Department of Justice eventually felt obliged to offer a second legal opinion, rewriting their original views of the subject. The policy results are imaginable and will someday become more fully known.
My point, though, is not to debate the delineation of the legal frontier. That focus obscures the core of the issue. The core of the issue, for legal policy, is this: What is moral – not, what is legal? What is cost-beneficial? ...
My own view is that the cool, carefully considered, methodical, prolonged, and repeated subjection of captives to physical torment, and the accompanying psychological terror, is immoral. I offer no opinion as to whether such conduct is a federal crime; merely that it is immoral.
http://www.csmonitor.com/2007/0531/p99s01-duts.html?s=mesdu
[click above link to continue reading]
Wrap...
Daily Update > Terrorism & Security
posted May 31, 2007 at 1:10 p.m. EDT
White House nears completion of new torture guidelines
Critics say administration's endorsement of 'enhanced interrogation' is 'immoral,' draw comparisons to Nazi war crimes.
By Arthur Bright csmonitor.com
The White House is close to completing a new set of guidelines on the use of "enhanced interrogative techniques" by US agents, even as critics say such techniques are "immoral," "amateurish," and "indistinguishable" from Nazi war crimes.
The New York Times reports that the administration is preparing "secret new rules governing interrogations."
The Bush administration is nearing completion of a long-delayed executive order that will set new rules for interrogations by the Central Intelligence Agency. The order is expected to ban the harshest techniques used in the past, including the simulated drowning tactic known as waterboarding, but to authorize some methods that go beyond those allowed in the military by the Army Field Manual.
The Times writes that President Bush has claimed the broader techniques are needed to fight terrorism, and in the recent Republican presidential debate, candidates made similar suggestions about the necessity of harsh interrogation.
Critics, however, say that the Bush administration's policy regarding torture is "immoral." Philip Zelikow, a former advisor to Condoleezza Rice and the executive director of the 9/11 Commission, said in a lecture last month (PDF) at the Houston Journal of International Law that in 2002, the United States made "careful, deliberate choices to place extreme physical pressure on captives, with accompanying psychological effects," and that the administration's "policy guidelines devolved into legal guidelines, which were to do everything you can, so long as it is not punishable as a crime under American law."
Brilliant lawyers worked hard on how they could then construe the limits of vague, untested laws. They were operating so close to the frontiers of our law that, within only a couple of years, the Department of Justice eventually felt obliged to offer a second legal opinion, rewriting their original views of the subject. The policy results are imaginable and will someday become more fully known.
My point, though, is not to debate the delineation of the legal frontier. That focus obscures the core of the issue. The core of the issue, for legal policy, is this: What is moral – not, what is legal? What is cost-beneficial? ...
My own view is that the cool, carefully considered, methodical, prolonged, and repeated subjection of captives to physical torment, and the accompanying psychological terror, is immoral. I offer no opinion as to whether such conduct is a federal crime; merely that it is immoral.
http://www.csmonitor.com/2007/0531/p99s01-duts.html?s=mesdu
[click above link to continue reading]
Wrap...
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