Month: February 2007

This past Tuesday, in Fairbanks, Alaska, nine people entered the office of Senator Ted Stevens to deliver their “emphatic request” that the Senator vote against supplemental funding for the war and then began reading the names of Iraqis and U.S. people who had died because of this war. They separated the names of U.S. troops … Continue reading “Do Something Good”

There may have been a period when all roads led to Rome, but for the Palestinian people, all roads lead to checkpoints. The latest checkpoint Palestinians find themselves at is not manned by Israel but rather the ostensible mediator of the Israeli-Palestinian peace process, the Quartet (which is comprised of the US, Russia, the European … Continue reading “All Roads Lead to Checkpoints”

I hope President George Bush will not be so stupid as to allow the Israelis to push him into an attack on Iran. Based on his past performance, however, I’m not sure what he will do. Washington today is so riddled with intellectual dishonesty, you have to take what officials say with a large dose … Continue reading “Fear Stupid Acts”

When President Bush the Junior first rode into town with his vigilante entourage, North Korea was still a signatory to the Treaty on Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons and had made all NPT proscribed materials, facilities and activities subject to International Atomic Energy Agency safeguards. More importantly, North Korea was adhering – as best the IAEA … Continue reading “Yet Another Famous Victory”

The scene: a military checkpoint deep in Palestinian territory in the West Bank. A tall, thin elderly man, walking stick in hand, makes a detour past the line of Palestinians, many of them young men, waiting obediently behind concrete barriers for permission from an Israeli soldier to leave one Palestinian area, the city of Nablus, … Continue reading “Apartheid Looks Like This”

Updated at 12:45 p.m. EST, Feb. 24, 2007 At least 41 Iraqis were reported dead today, most of them were found dumped in several cities throughout the country. Another 26 people were wounded. Fridays are relatively quiet because it is the Muslin prayer day and many journalists take the day off. Three American soldiers were … Continue reading “Friday: 3 GIs, 41 Iraqis Killed; 26 Iraqis, 1 Briton Wounded”

In their whining, complaining, often maudlin closing arguments, Scooter Libby’s defense counsel averred that the prosecution had “cast a dark cloud over the White House” – as if that was, in itself, a bad thing, and, in the current context, a very bad thing. Leading prosecutor Patrick J. Fitzgerald, in his rebuttal, was quick to … Continue reading “Dark Clouds
Over the White House”

The international news media is flooded with images of a woman in a pink headscarf recounting a shattering experience of rape by members of the Iraqi National Police. Most of the coverage has focused on her taboo-breaking decision to speak publicly about the assault, but has ignored the context for understanding­and combating­sexual violence by Iraqi … Continue reading “Iraqi Police Commit Rape – ­Armed, Trained, and Funded by the US”

A crazy woman stalks the streets near Afghanistan’s parliament. When a warlord’s rocket killed her family during the early 1990s she lost her mind. Now she moves between the cars and people looking for it, another of the living dead trapped in her own private hell. She’s always around there somewhere: in front of the … Continue reading “In Afghanistan, Death Comes Cheap”

A majority of the governing party in Congress voted to repudiate the commander-in-chief in war. The Senate Minority Leader complained that the proposed resolution opposing the mission while supporting the troops sent “a dangerous, duplicitous message.” A leading supporter of the president declared: “to support it would be a vote in favor of cutting our … Continue reading “The War Lobby Abandons the Troops”