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Today's
Stories
August
20 / 21, 2005
Alexander
Cockburn
Can Cindy Sheehan End the War?
Saul
Landau
Terrorism Then and Now: Townley Talks
Greg
Moses
A Daytrip without Cindy
Fred
Gardner
Merck Gets Whacked
Martin
Smith
Rebellion in the Ranks: the Soldiers' Revolt in Vietnam
James
Petras
Suicide Bombers: the Sacred and the Profane
Dr.
Teresa Whitehurst
What de Menezes Didn't Know
Ben
Tripp
Moses on Top of Old Smokey
August
19, 2005
Alexander
Cockburn
A Short History of Meat, Part 4:
Cutting Up Mochie
Neve
Gordon
After the Withdrawal
Gary
Leupp
The Pandora's Box of Iraq's Constitution
William
S. Lind
Getting Swept
Vijay
Prashad
The Rosa Parks of the Anti-War Movement
Dave
Lindorff
Something Has Happened
Pat
Williams
Social Security and the American West
John
Pilger
Free Speech and the War on Terror
Elaine
Cassel
Judge Roberts and the Death Penalty
August
18, 2005
Alexander
Cockburn
A Short History of Meat, Part 3:
Vegetarians, Nazis for Animal Rights, Blitzkrieg of the Ungulates
Greg
Moses
Cindy, the Peace Train and the Little Ditch that Could
Ramzy
Baroud
Theatrics in Gaza: the Disengagement That Isn't
Joshua
Frank
Bush's Emotional Incapacities
Monica
Benderman
For Cindy: There's No Glory in Dying
Paul
Craig Roberts
Courthouse Jackboots: Corrupted Justice
August
17, 2005
Alexander
Cockburn
A Short History of Meat: Part Two,
the March to Porkopolis
Robert
Jensen
America's Good Germans?
Carl
G. Estabrook
News Notes from the Global War on Terrorism
Mike
Whitney
Greenspan and the Housing Bubble
Niranjan
Ramakrishnan
Shaming the Shameless
Norman
Solomon
Slurs, Lies and Innuendos: Blaming the Antiwar Messengers
Dave
Zirin
In Defense of Felipe Alou
Jennifer
Loewenstein
The Shame of It All: Watching the Gazan Fiasco
CounterPunch
Clarification
August
16, 2005
Greg
Moses
Mona in a Field of Crosses at Camp
Casey, Texas
Thomas
Larson
The Unmitigated Gall of Dinesh D'Souza
Diana
Barahona
Uneasy Standoff in Venezuela's Media Wars
Dave
Lindorff
The Inquirer's Minds Don't Want to Know
Rep.
Cynthia McKinney
A Letter to President Bush: Meet with Cindy Sheehan
Elisa
Salasin
Hitchens Slimes Cindy Sheehan
David
Krieger
Amazing Grace and Cindy
Alexander
Cockburn
A Short History of Meat: Part One,
Peter's Dream
Website
of the Day
Reclaiming Appalachia: a Mountain Takeover
August
15, 2005
Greg
Moses
Pilgrims of Protest in Crawford
Paul
Craig Roberts
Slouching Toward Armageddon?
Mike
Whitney
Failing in Iraq
Robert
Jensen
The Challenges We Face
CounterPunch
Wire
Judge Fines Voices in the Wilderness
$20,000 for Taking Medicine to Iraq; Voices Refuses to Pay
Norman
Solomon
Someone Tell Frank Rich the War Isn't Over
Kathleen
Christison
Camp David Redux: Anatomy of a
Frame-Up
August
13 / 14, 2005
Cockburn
/ St. Clair
When Down is Up: the "Stricken"
President
William
Blum
The al-Dubya Training Manual
Gary
Leupp
High Tide for the Neocons?
Jack
Z. Bratich
Secreting the News: Anonymous vs. Confidential Sources
Brian
Cloughley
The Ridiculous Rice
Ron
Jacobs
Klan Justice: Mississippi is Still Burning
John
Farley
"Beyond Chutzpah" Too Hot for Harvard Bookstore?
Dave
Lindorff
Making the World Safer...for Nukes
Tim
Wise
Animal Whites: PETA and the Politics of Putting Things in Perspective
J.L.
Chestnut, Jr.
There's Not One Real Liberal or Conservative in the Senate
John
Gershman
The Bolton Opportunity
Felice
Pace
Saving Northwest Forests: Time for a Fresh Look
Fred
Gardner
Feds Takeover Prosecution of Dustin Costa
David
Krieger
The Fable of the Emperor and the Grieving Mother
Roxanne
Dunbar-Ortiz
Being a Protestant Fundamentalist
Ben
Tripp
GWAT: a Tone Poem
Poets'
Basement
Reiss, Nettnin, Engel and Louise
August
12, 2005
Christopher
Brauchli
Courting God: Justice Sunday II
Greg
Moses
A Crawford Peace House Morning with
Cindy Sheehan
Ramzy
Baroud
Israel's Nuclear Puzzle
Norman
Solomon
Cindy Sheehan's Message: Repudiating Bush and Dean
Chris
Genovali
Why is a Canadian Politician Trying to End Protections for US
Grizzly Bears?
Chris
Floyd
Cheney and Halliburton, the Stench Gets Worse
Tariq
Ali
Blair's New Authoritarianism
August
11, 2005
Saul
Landau
Globalization and Its Discontents
Dave
Lindorff
Privatization will Harm Same Sex
Couples
Ralph
Nader
Dear Cindy Sheehan: May You Prevail
Where Others Have Failed
Talli
Nauman
Radioactive Border: the Hot Mounds of Samalayuca
Gary
Leupp
Politics of an Outing: Plame, Ledeen and Iran
Sharon
Smith
The New Anti-War Majority
Paul
Craig Roberts
Why is Cheney Lobbying for a Boost
in China's Nuclear Capability?
August
10, 2005
Tim
Wise
Indian Mascots and White Rage
Ron
Jacobs
Rumsfeld's Delusions
Joshua
Frank
Dean and the PDA: Don't Believe the Hype
Cynthia
McKinney
The 9/11 Op-Ed the Atlanta Journal-Constitution Refuses to Run
Rick
Wilhelm
Peter Jennings, Excuse Maker for War and Empire
Stan
Goff
Homegrown Resistance
August
9, 2005
Mike
Ferner
What One Mom has to Say to Bush:
Cindy Sheehan in Dallas
Monica
Benderman
Is Being a Conscientious Objector
Now Criminal?
Mike
Marqusee
Making Excuses for Killing De
Menezes
Rep.
Cynthia McKinney
Strange Fruit and Tree-Shakers
Paul
Craig Roberts
Watching the US Economy Crumble
August
6-8, 2005
Alexander
Cockburn
How the British Destroyed India
Jason
Leopold
Halliburton and Iran: Still Doing
Business After All These Years?
Ray
McGovern
Iran, Truth-Tellers and the Devotees
of Preemption
David
Krieger
From Hiroshima to Humanity
Sharon
K. Weiner / Robert Jensen
From Hiroshima to Iraq and Back
Fred
Gardner
The Budtender's View of a Rip-Off
August
5, 2005
Bill
Christison
New NIE Report on Iran's Nukes
will Not Deter US's Posture of Extreme Aggressiveness
Paul
Craig Roberts
Kelo: a Supreme Assault on Personal
Liberty
Alexander
Cockburn
The Taj Mahal as Kitsch; the
Editor and the Water-Walking Guru
August
4, 2005
Tom
Barry
Inside Bush's "World Democracy
Movement"
Lila
Rajiva
John Bolton's New Internationalism
Greg
Moses
Bush Teaches Intelligent Design
in Prison
Alexander
Cockburn
Indian Journal: Why Indian Farmers
Kill Themselves
August
3, 2005
August
3, 2005
Alexander
Cockburn
Broken Arrows and Iran: a B-52 Pilot
Remembers
Paul
Craig Roberts
The Kelo Calamity: Money, Power and
Eminent Domaine
William
A. Cook
Innocent Victims: From Hiroshima to Lower Manhattan
Dave
Zirin
Bush's Texas Rangers: a Crackhouse for Juiced Players?
Dave
Lindorff
Court Packing and Worker Rights
José
Pertierra
Why Hamdi Isaac Yes and Posada
Carriles No?
August
2, 2005
Ramzi
Kysia
Disengagement and Diaspora: High Walls
and Razor Wire in the Hebron
William
A. Cook
Words Without Meaning: Torturing Bodies
and Language
Paul
Craig Roberts
When Armageddon Gets No Press
Mike
Whitney
Chertoff's Preemptive Crackdown: 600 Arrests, Only 76 Charged
Ron
Jacobs
Be a Hero: Demand That Johnny Come
Home
Norman
Madarsz
Before the Stun Gun: Jean Charles de Menezes, RIP
Tim
Wise
The Faulty Logic of "Terrorist"
Profiling
August
1, 2005
Virginia
Rodino
Why Bono and Geldof Got It Wrong:
War and Global Poverty are Linked
Diana
Barahona
Return to Venezuela: Land Reform
and Neighborhood Doctors
Joshua
Frank
Gitmo's Kangaroo Courts: First Torture Them, Then Rig Their Trials
Mike
Whitney
The Consolidation of Powers: Rubber Stamp Roberts
Norm
Dixon
The Worst Terror Attacks in History
Norman
Solomon
Operation Withdrawal Scam
James
Petras
The Corruption of Lula's Regime
July
30 / 31, 2005
Alexander
Cockburn
Lost Nuclear Warheads Now in Iran?
JoAnn
Wypijewski
Scenes and Silver Linings from Labor's
Crack-Up: a Special Report from Chicago
Sheldon
Rampton
War is Fun as Hell: the Video Games
Recruiters Play
Jack
Z. Bratich
Fingerprints of Power: a Summer of Double Super Secrecy
Greg
Moses
How to Cool Your Heels in Texas When It's Late July Across the
World
Jordan
Green
From Woolworth to Wal-Mart: Economics and the Race Divide in
a Southern City
Patrick
Cockburn
Getting Out of Iraq: 5,000 US Troops Have Gone AWOL
Brian
Cloughley
The Bush-Cheney Fixation on Iran
Justin
Taylor
Harry Potter and the War on Terror
Saul
Landau
Enhancements for the Imperial Life: Fashionism Takes Command!
John
Walsh
Dems Field Another Pro-War Candidate: Meet Hack the Hawk
Joshua
Frank
Color-Coded Justice: John Roberts's Racial Hang Up
Ron
Jacobs
Who Needs Feminism? We Have Condi Rice!
Fred
Gardner
The Ethan and Gavin Show
John
Chuckman
Friedman on Terrorism: the Dumbest Story Ever Written
Liaquat
Ali Khan
Lessons City Bombers Need to Learn from Newton and Donne
Remi
Kanazi
Annexing Justice in Palestine
Naveen
Jaganathan
The Gurgaon Riots Rock India
Richard
Heinberg
Where is the Hirsch Peak Oil Report?
Max
Watts
Francis Ona, the Napoleon of Mekamui
Ben
Tripp
Write Your Own Editorial!
Poets'
Basement
Whalen & Engel, Landau, Albert and Krieger
July
29, 2005
Cockburn
/ St. Clair
Who's the Real Martyr? Judy Miller or Jim DeFede?
P.
Sainath
The Class War in Gurgaon
Niranjan
Ramakrishnan
How the West Was Lost: CAFTA
and the Disassembling of America
Dave
Lindorff
Marvelous Marvin Bush
J.L.
Chestnut, Jr.
America's Racist Inventory: Oppression
Breeds Violence
Pat
Williams
Giving Away the Last Best Place
Norman
Solomon
In Praise of Kevin Benderman: a Moral
Leader of the Nation Goes to Prison
Sen.
Russ Feingold
The Bad News About the Energy Bill
July
28, 2005
Paul
Craig Roberts
Departing Iraq
William
S. Lind
The Duke of Alba and George W. Bush
Gilad
Atzmon
Blair the Camera Man
Joshua
Frank
Passing CAFTA: Blame the Democrats
Lila
Rajiva
Vision Mumbai Submerged
Amina
Mire
Pigmentation and Empire: the Emerging
Skin-Whitening Industry
Website
of the Day
Gateway to Underground News
July
27, 2005
Roger
Morris
The Source Beyond Rove: Condoleezza
Rice at the Center of the Plame Scandal
Gary
Leupp
Is Iran Being Set Up?
Paul
Craig Roberts
US Falling Behind Across the Board
Jackie
Corr
Class War on the Ruby River: the Billionaire with His Foot in
His Mouth
Mike
Whitney
The Coming End of the Housing Bubble
Dave
Zirin
Why Lance Armstrong Must Break with Bush
Christopher
Bradley
Why I Have Trouble Reading the News
Norman
Solomon
Thomas Friedman, Liberal Sadist?
Website
of the Day
Stormin' Norman
July
26, 2005
Suren
Pillay
The Enemy Within: When the "Other"
is One of "Us"
JoAnn
Wypijewski
Fission and Fizzle in Chicago: SEIU and
Teamsters Quit the AFL
Patrick
Cockburn
Iraq: the Unwinnable War
David
Anderson
When the Greatest Outrage is the Lack of Outrage: NYC's Subway
Searches
Joshua
Frank
Hillary Clinton: Outflanking Bush from the Right
Lenni
Brenner
Biography as Wish-Fulfillment: Jefferson, Hitchens and Atheism
David
Swanson
Nuking Native Land
July
25, 2005
Paul
Craig Roberts
China-Mart Takes Over
M.
Shahid Alam
Terrorism: America Defines Its Targets
Uri
Avnery
March of the Orange Shirts
Stan
Cox
Kreationism in Kansas
Norman
Solomon
"Wagging the Puppy"
Ramzy
Baroud
London Bombings: Barbaric, But Not
Unexpected
Mickey
Z.
No Gun Ri: 55 Years Later
Website
of the Day
The Birth of a Hummingbird in 15 Images
July
23 / 24, 2005
Alexander
Cockburn
Islamo-Anarchs or Islamo-Fascists?
Tariq
Ali
The War Comes Home
Robert
Fisk
Something Happened
Dave
Lindorff
Return of the Academic Witch Hunts
Ricardo
Alarcón
Kidnapping in Miami: the UN, the US and the Cuban 5
Col.
Dan Smith
Living in a Twilight Zone: Troop Strength,
Recruitment and the Draft
Brian
Cloughley
The Pentagon's China Hypocrisy
Kevin
Zeese
Growing Republican Opposition to Iraq War
Bill
Quigley
Harrowing Hours in Haiti
Fred
Gardner
The Reverberations of Raich
Rep.
Ron Paul
The Patriot Act is a Threat to Liberty
Joshua
Frank
Framing Abortion: Gonadal Politics and the Democrats
Shivali
Tukdeo
Project Mumbai Makeover: Casualties of Development
Gilad
Atzmon
Blair's "Evil Ideology"
James
Petras
Baghdad: Barbarism and Civilization (a Fiction)
Ben
Tripp
When Being American Was Fun
Poets'
Basement
Krieger, Louise, Buknatski, Albert and Engel
Website
of the Weekend
Remember the West Memphis 3
July
22, 2005
Heather
Gray
Home Grown Axis of Evil: Corp. Agribusiness,
the Occupation of Iraq and the Dred Scott Decision
David
Domke
The American Press and Credibility
Lance
Selfa
Battle of the Insiders: No Heroes in the Plame Leak Scandal
JoAnn
Wypijewski
Is This Really an "Insurgency"
to Shake Up the Labor Movement?
July
21, 2005
Rose
Ann DeMoro
The Top 10 Problems with the "Crisis"
in the Labor Movement
William
Blum
London: Another Casualty in the War on Terror
J.L.
Chestnut, Jr.
Whites Need to Learn Something: Dixie is Everywhere
Christopher
Brauchli
Strange Affairs: Liberals and Alberto
Gonzales
Joshua
Frank
Plame Blame Game: the 5 Ws
Brian
Concannon, Jr.
Haiti's Elections: Time for a Reality Check
Patrick
Cockburn
The True, Terrible State of Iraq
and the Link to London
Website
of the Day
Who Blew Up the Murrah Building?
July
20, 2005
Cockburn
/ St. Clair
Judge Roberts: Business as Usual
Roxanne
Dunbar-Ortiz
Red Christmas
Ray
McGovern
Did Dick Finger Valerie?: the Hand
of Cheney
Chris
Floyd
Judge Dread: John Roberts and the "Enemy
Combatants"
Uri
Avnery
"Silence is Filth"
Dave
Lindorff
Westmoreland's Body Count Goes Up
by One
Norman
Solomon
Gen. Westmoreland's Death Wish
Bill
Quigley
Travels in Haiti with a Wanted Priest
July
19, 2005
Tariq
Ali
An Isolated Regime
John
Ross
Jihad Meets G-8
Davey
D.
More
Clear Channel Censorship: "Don't F--K Around with Tha Police"
Greg
Weiher
Muzzling Saddam: the Old Bait-and-Switch
in Iraqi Jurisprudence
Brian
McKinlay
An "Arse Licker" Goes to Washington: John Howard's
Grand Tour
Norman
Solomon
Nukes for India; Threats for Iran
Dave
Lindorff
Get Back to Where We Once Belonged
Bill
Christison
Bush's Itinerary: First Stop Syria,
Next Stop Iran
Joshua
Frank
Laura's Justice?: Meet Edith Brown
Clement
July
18, 2005
Joshua
Frank
An Interview with Ward Churchill
M.
Shahid Alam
A Muslim Problem: Did Thomas Friedman
Flunk History?
Jude
Wanniski
Memo to Patrick Fitzgerald
Ron
Jacobs
A Weekend to Stop the War
Mike
Whitney
The Straight Line Between Falluja and King's Cross Station
William
MacDougall
From "Bring It On" to "London Can Take It"
Seth
Sandronsky
Temporary Recovery: New Frontiers in Labor Flexibility
Richard
Lichtman
The Consolations of George Lakoff
Paul
Craig Roberts
Can Congressional Republicans End
Bush's Wars?
Website
of the Weekend
Novels of the Neo-Cons
July
15 / 17, 2005
Alexander
Cockburn
Don't You Dare Call It Treason
Jeffrey
St. Clair
Sticky Fingers: the Making of Halliburton
Paul
Craig Roberts
Economic Treason
Harry
Browne
"What They Do to Us, They Will
Do to You": Shell Oil in Mayo, Ireland
Uri
Davis, Ilan Pappe and Tamar Yaron
A Warning from Israel
Andrew
Rubin
End of the Enlightenment: an Open Letter to Stephen Plaut
Patrick
Cockburn
Iraq's Ghost Battalions
J.L.
Chestnut, Jr.
Changes in Selma: Standing Up to Racism in the South
Fred
Gardner
A Professional Bust
Christopher
Brauchli
An Olympic Feat: How to "Double" Aid with No New Money
Chris
Floyd
The Great Iraq Oil Giveaway
Ben
Tripp
The Dark Incontinent
Col.
Dan Smith
General Abizaid, I'm Glad You Asked
Jason
Leopold
What Did Rove Say and When Did He
Say It?
Jack
Random
Miller Time
Norman
Solomon
War and Venture Capitalism
George
Ochenski
Liberate Montana's Rivers: Come One, Come All!
Website
of the Weekend
Vote for CounterPuncher David Vest
July
14, 2005
Jeffrey
St. Clair
Sticky Fingers: the Making of Halliburton
Subcomandante
Marcos
This is What Will Do and How We Shall Do It: the Sixth Declaration
of the Selva Lacandona
Dave
Lindorff
No More Moral Relativism: the US is a Terrorist State
Joshua
Frank
Rove Agency: Liberals and the CIA
Jude
Wanniski
Those 8 Black Pages: What's the Real Story on Karl Rove?
Dave
Zirin
Storming the Castle
Kevin
Zeese
Exit Strategy: Within Reach?
Robert
Jensen
War Myths and the Press
Reza
Fiyouzat
A Worldwide Call to Free Akbar Ganji
Carol
Norris
Governor Paranoid: Schwarzenegger Comes Unhinged
Website
of the Day
Nate Osborn: Heroic Human Rights Activist and CounterPuncher
July
13, 2005
Brian
Cloughley
Cold Blooded Murders in Iraq
George
Galloway
We Can't Separate the London Bombings
from the Political Backdrop
Carlos
Fierro
A Supreme Waste of Time
Sarah
Knopp
Hate on the Border
Norman
Solomon
"Isolated Pockets of Problems": the Fake Optimism of
Washington's Warriors
Mickey
Z.
Water on the Brain
Jim
Minick
The Right Tree in the Right Place
Pat
Williams
American Indian Education for All
Andrew
N. Rubin
Life Behind the Wall: "We are
No Longer Able to See the Sun Set"
Website
of the Day
"London's Burning": the Mikey Mix
July
12, 2005
Laith
al-Saud
Voices of Resistance: an Interview with
Dr. Mohammed al-Obaidi of Iraq's Peoples' Struggle Movement
Kara
N. Tina
"This is How We Do It": Report
from the Gleneagles Battlefield
William
A. Cook
The London Bombings: Why Has It Come to This?
Jack
Bratich
2 Live Cruise: Tom Cruise v. Big Pharma
Amina
Mire
The Problem with Speaking in the Name of Others
Dick
J. Reavis
Lessons from the Christian Jihadists:
the Virtues of Burning Crosses and Colored Smoke
Kevin
Zeese
Depleted Uranium: States Take Action to Protect Their Vets
Paul
Craig Roberts
No-Think Nation
Website
of the Day
Coke Gags Indian Artist
July
9 / 11, 2005
Alexander
Cockburn
After the Bombings
Uri
Avnery
War of the Colors in Israel
Sheldon
Rampton
Blaming Galloway: Rhetoric vs. Reality
in London
Bill
Christison
Hiroshima's 60th Anniversary and Nukes in Iran: an Opportunity
or Just More Hand-wringing from the Peace Movement?
Robert
Fisk
Blair's Alliance with Bush Bombed
Stephen
Winspear
Collateral Damage in London?
Saul
Landau
Mission Accomplished: Iraq is Broken
Behrooz
Ghamari
Thomas Friedman's Muslim Problem
Karl
Beitel
False Promises and Real Debt Relief
Brian
Concannon, Jr.
Throwing Gasoline on Haiti's Fires
Fred
Gardner
Sentencing Season
John
Whitlow
And What Does the Market Say?
Niranjan
Ramakrishnan
The London Blasts: Who's Being Transformed, Them or Us?
Lila
Rajiva
Witches and Bastards
Laura
Carlsen
CAFTA: Deepening the Inequities
Jackie
Corr
Ted Turner and Jiminy Cricket
Dave
Lindorff
"My Brother Went Over There Gung Ho; Now He's Just Bitter"
N.
D. Jayaprakash
Why the CIA Tried to Kill Chou En Lai at the Bandung Conference
Seth
Sandronsky
Meet the "Truth Tour": Rightwing Radio Hosts Go to
Iraq
Norman
Madarasz
The Choking of Brazil's Worker Party
Ben
Tripp
The Inevitability of George W. Bush
Poets'
Basement
Louise, Albert, Landau, Davies and Engel
Website
of the Weekend
The Mother of All Enemies Lists
July
8, 2005
Paul
Craig Roberts
Blowback Hits Britain: Londoners
Pay Heavy Price for Blair's Deception
Tariq
Ali
The London Bombings: Why They Happened
Monica
Benderman
One Soldier's Fight to Legalize Morality
Rick
Jahnkow
Beyond Opt-Out: the Counter-Recruitment Movement
Christopher
Brauchli
Dear Vet: If You Want to Eat While You Recuperate, You Gotta
Pay Extra
Kim
Peterson
Bombs in the Underground: Terror Begats Terror
Joshua
Frank
Leakers and Liars: Inching Toward Indictments?
Norman
Solomon
Messages from the Carnage
Website
of the Day
An Interview with Ray McGovern
July
7, 2005
Cockburn
/ St. Clair
Judy Miller: the Luckiest Martyr
John
Walsh
More Hawkish Than Bush: Dems in Full
Battle Cry
Mike
Marqusee
Message from London
Gilad
Atzmon
London's Burning
Nicole
Colson
Showdown at the Supreme Court
Jack
Random
Judith Miller, Anti-Hero
Norman
Solomon
Judith Miller, Drum Majorette for
War
Len
Colodny
Is Bob Woodward Still Protecting Al Haig?
Cockburn
/ St. Clair
Judy Miller: the Luckiest Martyr
Hot Stories
Alexander Cockburn
Behold,
the Head of a Neo-Con!
Subcomandante
Marcos
The
Death Train of the WTO
Norman Finkelstein
Hitchens
as Model Apostate
Steve Niva
Israel's
Assassination Policy: the Trigger for Suicide Bombings?
Dardagan,
Slobodo and Williams
CounterPunch Exclusive:
20,000 Wounded Iraqi Civilians
Steve
J.B.
Prison Bitch
Sheldon
Rampton and John Stauber
True Lies: the Use of Propaganda
in the Iraq War
Wendell
Berry
Small Destructions Add Up
CounterPunch
Wire
WMD: Who Said What When
Cindy
Corrie
A Mother's Day Talk: the Daughter
I Can't Hear From
Gore Vidal
The
Erosion of the American Dream
Francis Boyle
Impeach
Bush: A Draft Resolution
Click
Here for More Stories.
|
Weekend Edition
August 20 / 21, 2005
CounterPunch Diary
Can Cindy Sheehan
End the War?
By
ALEXANDER COCKBURN
You can tell in five-minutes channel
surfing how Cindy Sheehan frightens the pro-war crowd. One bereaved
mom from Vacaville, camped outside Bush's home in Crawford, reproaching
the vacationing President for sending her son to a pointless
death in Iraq has got the hellhounds of the right barking in
venomous unison.
Christopher Hitchens attacked
Cindy Sheehan, of course. Called her a LaRouchie! Why? No reason
given. He obviously reckons "LaRouchie" is one of those
let-her-deny-it slurs, like "anti-Semite". Let's suppose
Hitchens was writing in similarly nasty terms about Hitchens.
He'd probably remember that in 1999 Edward Jay Epstein publicly
recalled a dinner in the Royalton Hotel in New York where Epstein
said Hitchens had doubted the Holocaust was quite what it's cracked
up to be. In Epstein's memory Hitchens belittled the idea that
six million Jews died, said the number was much less.
So, under Hitchens' rules
of polemical engagement, was does that make Hitchens? A holocaust
denier, a guy who has Faurisson and David Irving's books under
his pillow. A Jew hater, or if you believe his sudden discovery
(privately denied by his own brother on at least one occasion)
at a mature age that his mother was Jewish a Jewish self-hater.
Of course Hitchens revels in Cindy Sheehan's denial that she
said in an email that her son died in a war for Israel. Hitchens
writes that this denial makes her "a shifty fantasist".
What would Hitchens, who's an on-the-record admirer ("a
great historian") of the work of Nazi chronicler David Irving
say about Hitchens' shifty denial of Epstein's recollection?
What fun he would have with the witnesses the panic-stricken
Hitchens, well aware that "holocaust denier" is not
part of the resume of a Vanity Fair columnist, hastily mustered
for his defense, a woman and a man present at that famous dinner
in the Royalton. One his close friend, Anna Wintour, the present
editor of Vogue and the other, Brian McNally, a longtime friend
and business associate.
What a truly disgusting sack
of shit Hitchens is. A guy who called Sid Blumenthal one of his
best friends and then tried to have him thrown into prison for
perjury; a guy who waited till his friend Edward Said was on
his death bed before attacking him in the Atlantic Monthly; a
guy who knows perfectly well the role Israel plays in US policy
but who does not scruple to flail Cindy Sheehan as a LaRouchie
and anti-Semite because, maybe, she dared mention the word Israel.
She lost a son? Hitchens (who should perhaps be careful on the
topic of sending children off to die) says that's of scant account,
and no reason why we should take her seriously. Then he brays
about the horrors let loose in Iraq if the troops come home,
with no mention of how the invasion he worked for has already
unleashed them.
From Hitchens to Bill O'Reilly,
who has a voice as soft as soap in a shower stall when it comes
to whispering lewdly down the phone to a female employee about
loofah-uses, but who howls about Sheehan's low character in her
refusal to pay federal taxes that might put more money the Pentagon's
way.
Listening to O'Reilly and even
mainstream pundits, you'd think tax-resistance was a fresh and
terrible arrival on the shores of American protest, instead of
a form of resistance as old as the Republic.
But the notion that tax-resistance
somehow marginalizes Sheehan as an "extremist" does
highlight an important point. The aim of any serious anti-war
protest is to force a government to quit fighting, pull the troops
out, come home right now.
But Sheehan is castigated in
the press, by mainstream liberals as well as mad-dog rightists,
for not leaving any wriggle-room on this central point. She says,
Bring the troops home right now.
How many people echo that straightforward
demand? Millions of ordinary Americans around 34 per cent
certainly do, if we are to believe the numbers in polls
that also give Bush an approval rating of only 34 per cent for
his conduct of the war.
But to be effective the opinion
of ordinary people has to be harnessed into a powerful political
movement that offers energetic leadership.
Here the picture is dismayingly
cloudy. MoveOn.org, has used Sheehan's siege of Bush as springboard
to mount supportive anti-war vigils. But what exactly is MoveOn
calling for, in terms of ending the war?
Go to the website of the Win
Without War coalition, of which MoveOn is a member along with
groups ranging from the Sierra Club, to National Organization
of women to the Methodists, Unitarians and Quakers and youll
find a mush-mouth statement about "a gradual, phased decrease
in numbers rather than augmenting the size of the force",
plus other familiar boilerplate about how the UN Security Council
"should authorize and encourage the creation of an international
stabilization force to assist the Iraqi authorities with security
and training of Iraqi forces."
This leisurely agenda doesn't
add up to anti-war leadership. After all, Gen. George Casey,
the US commander in Iraq, talks bluntly about "some fairly
substantial reductions" to start next spring.
It's no secret why MoveOn and
Win Without War are so timid. Square in their field of vision
is the Democratic Party whose high-profile congressional leaders
such as Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden are calling for more troops
to be shipped out to Iraq. Push comes to shove, most of the Win
Without War coalition members won't get more than half a beat
out of step with the Democrats.
Serious resistance, of the
sort Sheehan calls for, has to throw the threat of popular sanction
over both Democrats as well as Republicans. What leadership is
available for this task? The obvious candidate is the United
for Peace and Justice coalition, which mounted the huge anti-war
protests of 2003 and which has been conducting peace actions
ever since.
But as it organizes its upcoming
September 24-26 rallies in Washington DC UFPJ seems to be turning
its back on the rich opportunities for mainstream organizing
offered by Sheehan and the nerveless platform of Win Without
War, preferring to dilute the Out of Iraq message with cumbersome
left agendas written by ultras from the casting couch of the
Life of Brian.
Anyone can go on a vigil. It
only costs the price of a candle and a solemn expression. The
price of entry into serious antiwar organizing at the crucial
moment is steeper. It requires political nerve. A substantial
coalition has to lead the way, pointed to by Sheehan, with the
slogan Bring Them Home Now.
What truly frightens governments
is mutiny or the threat of mutiny. It was soldiers shooting their
officers and sailors pushing planes off air craft carriers that
prompted the Pentagon to run up the white flag in Vietnam. Along
that same spectrum is draft resistance, and the refusal to go
to war. Already that's had an effect. The Pentagon says the reserve
system is in ruins.
Gold Star moms like Cindy Sheehan
could be leading sit-ins at military recruitment offices across
the country and in the home district congressional offices of
Democrats and Republicans. How about Cindy Sheehan moving Camp
Casey from Crawford to Hillary Clinton's offices in Washington
or New York. Only this time the demand would not be for a meeting
but for a reversal of HRC's pro war position which has her putting
up a bill to increase US forces overall by 90,000. One of the
greatest achievements of the antiwar movement in Viertnam era
was to make it untenable for a Democrat, LBJ, to run again for
the presidency, or for Hubert Humphrey to run and win on a prowar
platform. Question, would the MoveOn operation take the slightest
interest in any vigils outside HRC's offices, or those of any
other prominent Democrat? Of course not.
Cindy Sheehan frightens the
right and stirs them to venom, and she frightens the Democrats
too, because she's so clear. Contrast the timeline of Sheehan
as against that of even a relatively decent Democrat like Russ
Feingold. Feingold calls for a start to withdrawal from Iraq
maybe sixteen months from now. How many dead troops and new Gold
Star moms can you fit into that calendar. A thousand or more?
Sheehan's Out Now call should be the bright-line test for any
antiwar spokesperson.
New
Deal Photography
My remarks in my Indian series
about the failures of New Deal
photography elicited a couple of interesting letters:
Dear Mr. Cockburn:
Thanks for your article, Why Indian Farmers Kill Themselves;
Why Lange's Photographs are Phony.
No doubt the role of FSA photographers was to create images which
would in turn be used to sell Roosevelt's New Deal. As you rightly
point out, most of the images portray people as victims rather
than agents of change. Staughton Lynd (author of We Are All Leaders)
and others have pointed out how New Deal legislation was used
to quiet down the unruly masses.
Remember John L. Lewis' promise
of industrial peace in return for passage of the Wagner Act?
However, it's questionable whether Lange or Walker Evans had
much to say when it came to selecting specific images.
As I understand it, exposed
film was shipped to Washington for processing and editorial decisions.
The head of the project, Roy Stryker was known for taking a
hole punch to negatives he didn't like.
Also please don't lump all of the 1930's documentarians together.
Check out the work of the Film and Photo
League or Paul Strand's film, Native Land, which subverted popular
commercial news reel forms and
encouraged militant labor activism. Leo Hurwitz also worked
on the film which was narrated by Paul Robeson.
Cheers,
Greg Boozell
gboozell@juno.com
And from Aidan Wilde:
Dear Alex,
You write: "The American
documentarists of the 30s opted for cartoon stereotypes, preferring
the easier and less seditious task of presenting migrants as
inert victims. You can see from her contact sheet that Dorothea
Lange chose the most beaten-down image of the famous migrant
mother. It was Lange, so the contact sheets show, who herded
children around the woman (actually 100 per cent Cherokee) to
make it look as though she was burdened with a vast brood and
who passed over more animated images of the same woman."
Hey! This seems a bit harsh,
bro. Whether or not it would have helped the cause of the migrant
workers at the time to have chosen more cheerful photographs
from her contact sheets, I don't know. Could she have just been
mistaken about what would be most effective as propaganda?
Dorothea Lange went to Ireland
in the 50s and took a lot of photos in Ennis, where my father
is from. My dad's brother was the town photographer: he worked
for the Clare Champion. He helped Lange a lot while she was there,
both with her equipment and with finding subjects for her. Lange
definitely posed her shots, and didn't always want to take them
as the subjects would have preferred. For example, she would
try to stop people from changing into their Sunday best for her,
as most people wished to. But she wasn't strong-arming them.
She took a picture of my grand-aunt, which appeared in Life magazine
at the time, very much within the limits of what my aunt preferred
(behind the counter of her shop on Market Street). And Lange
stayed in touch with my aunt by letter for many years afterward.
Seems well-meant enough to give her the benefit of the doubt.
A lot of these photographs were collected into a book by Gerry
Mullins about 10 years ago. They're fantastic, and I'm sure you
(Alex) would find them interesting. She recorded important stuff,
like the coop, sporting events, the market day, etc.
Best,
Aidan Wylde
My remarks about the appalling
consequences of British rule in India drew a couple of letters
of rebuke. For some reason, people shy away from the obvious
purpose of empires which is to conquer territory and then plunder
it.
Here's an extract from a polite
letter, ambling to the defense of the Raj and replete with all
the usual claptrap, conclusively rebutted by Palme Dutt, about
Malthusian pressure. By the end of it you'll see that the British
somehow established empire and the rule of plunder and rapine
in India . By accident and because they were worried about France!
On India itself, it is unwise
to blame the British for everything; Malthusian logic did indeed
play a large part in the 19th century. The thing is, the real
troubles inflicted by "the British" in the 18th century
were mostly the result of British INaction, while individual
British took advantage of their opportunities for individual
gain and the costs to the British were externalised to yet other
British. They were practising local Indian methods on a large
scale - "loot" is in fact an Indian word. These things
stopped with Macaulay's reforms.
However, as you point out,
many Indian handicrafts were destroyed and people were driven
into agriculture and penury. But this is misleading. The same
thing I described above applied; what counted was the Malthusian
limit of how much food resources were in place. They were not
being displaced for cash crops, except opium. So the end of handicrafts
was not in fact responsible for famine, just for moving the advantage
away from townsfolk. (I'm not trying to justify but to explain.)
You'll get more sense from a reading of then current understanding,
in Nassau Senior's work on wages. Maintaining handicrafts wouldn't
have affected the level of suffering, only who did the suffering.
Any harm that was done - apart from promoting population growth
with less war - was actually done by cash crops like opium and
tea, and by dislocation causing failure of distribution (but
things like irrigation, roads and railways also offset this,
perhaps even overcame it).
And, of course, the British
were caught themselves at least as much as the Earls of Atholl.
British rule and conquest in India was in large part strategically
defensive, heading off the French. Indian revisionist history
frequently omits this, neglecting that the British were in fact
the least worst on offer. It was actually the French who initiated
an aggressive policy in India!
I hope you find this of interest.
Yours sincerely,
P.M. Lawrence
My remarks on the great Indian
rebellion of 1857 (cockburn06102005.html)
also met with rebuke:
Dear Mr. Cockburn,
I found it odd to read your
recent article in which you discuss the Rebellion of 1857-59.
It presents a picture that Indian military historians of the
period have been trying to dispell--one of great masses of Indians
being defeated by the scratch (and ficticiously all-white) forces
of the Raj. In fact, they argue that the Rebellion never put
very large forces in the field, was badly led and badly coordinated,
and never sparked all that much of a mass uprising among the
people, who were, as peopled usually are in such situations,
sitting on the fence and waiting to see which side to hop down
on. If "millions" had forcefully risen up, the British
would have lost. The fact is the rebels stumbled, while the British
(scared shitless as you rightly point out) responded with manic
energy, disgusting brutality, and grabbed the initiative, thus
forestalling what would have been, if it spread far and deep,
an untenable situation for the colonial power. Worse from your
perspective, the Rebellion could never have been put down at
a price the British could pay without the help of Company troops
that stayed loyal to the British. Your tale may stir the heart
of the Indian nationalist and those who pine for Che, but it
doesn't look all that much like history.
Overall, though, I think Counterpunch
is excellent.
Yours very truly,
James Levy, Ph.D.
Hofstra University
To which I replied:
Dear Dr Levy,
Of course the peasant uprisings
were not always well led and the British had at least one leader
with powers of initiative. But I find your note glib, in that
you offer a paper tiger or two and then triumphantly shoot them.
Who on earth talks of "all-white forces" of the Raj?A
nd who does not know that the Risings were put down by "loyal"
Company troops. I spent a lot of my childhood reading Henty,
who honored such "sepoys' as did all such Imperial fiction.
I'm not too impressed with most of the Indian military historians
I read, many of whom sometimes perhaps with tenure track
considerations to the fore still deferentially refer to
the 57 risings as "mutiny". Your general position
reminds me of Foster's History of Ireland which sidles up to
the matter of the Famine of 1845-7 by mumbling that there wasn't
really a Famine, as opposed to lots of little or not so little
famines stretching back through the 19th century; also of E.P.
Thompson's phrase, when he talks of rescuing eighteenth and nineteenth
century struggles in England by working people from "the
vast condescension of history".
Your intended jab with the
use of Che's name gives the whole game away. I suppose that's
meant to evoke a chortle, of the sort requested each day of its
readers by the editors of the Wall Street Journal's editorial
page. Take as a whole, Guevara's career stands up rather well,
I would have thought, whether in Cuba or in the African intervention.
Best,
Alexander Cockburn
Dr Levy replied:
Dear Mr. Cockburn,
As an American living in America
I find that my students and many Profs imagine "Indians"
and "British" the way they imagine "cowboys"
and "Indians", so pointing out the overlaps wasn't
meant in a condescending way, just as a matter of record. I think
Fidel's military support of the Angolan government was entirely
justified and a huge blow to the racist South African regime
that has hardly be acknowledged here (I'm no ally of the WSJ's
Op-Ed on that score), but I do find Che's agrarian escapade in
Bolivia a bit of a joke. You can attribute this to New York snobbery
and a Menshevik turn of mind. More to the point, I distrust quasi-mythical
pasts, whether they be a fraudulent Raj, Manifest Destiny, The
Promised Land, or the noble sons of toil.
Paul Levy
And I answered
Dr L, it seems to me that these
days the quasi myths on active service are mostly those buttressing
imperial self esteem. best Alex C
But of course I should have
added that Menshevism ,exiled from the Soviet Union, finally
flowered in the US in the form of the Neo-Cons, whose menshevik
/ Trotskyist antecedents were once excavated very will by Don
Will of Chapman U.
But I do hang my head at one
undoubted error.
Mr. Cockburn has otherwise
excellent reporting skills but he has been misled by his toddyman.
It's very possible that the toddyman does not know the alcoholic
content of his product, but it is impossible in his setting to
produce 12% alcohol in 12 hours. Also, there are no known yeasts
that can create 24% alcohol in 24 hours, as most yeast are alcohol
intolerant above 18%. Some Japanese sake strains can tolerate
20%. 24% alcohol content can only be achieved by "fortifying"
with ethanol (such as in Port) or through distillation.
Commonly, given the ambient
temperatures, Indian palm toddy takes about 4 days to ferment
to approximately 15% alcohol - which is in the range of a tablewine.
The use of indigenous organisms and the hot climate do ensure
to create a very short "shelf life".
I realize this is really a
small thing in the grand scheme of it all. Keep up the good work.
Michael Ramsey
Teaching Lab Manager
Department of Viticulture and Enology
1023 Wickson Hall
University of Cailfornia, Davis
95616
How could I have written such
nonsense about the toddy fermentation rates, given that I ferment
apple juice into hard cider every year and even now have a five
gallon carboy I hope the first of several popping
away despite a mostly lousy apple crop this year owing to the
big June rains here in northern California. I put it down to
errors in translation from Malayalam, the language of Kerala
and a journalist too busy making notes to think what he was writing.
Coca Cola
Defeated in Plachimada
And to end on a bright note.
Back in April here I wrote about
the battle of the people of Plachimada against the Coca Cola
bottling plant that destroyed their water supplies. This saga
has ended in victory. (At least for now. As David Brower said,
When we win, it's a reprieve. When they win, it's forever.) Here's
a report from The Hindu, sent me by Sainath, this last Friday:
The Kerala State Pollution
Control Board on Friday ordered stoppage of production at the
Palachimada unit of the Coca-Cola Company in Palakkad district
for failure to comply with pollution control norms.The Board
observed that the presence of cadmium in its sludge was 400 to
600 times above the permissible limit. The company offered no
explanation regarding the source of cadmium.
The company, it said, had also
failed to fulfil satisfactorily the directive of the Monitoring
Committee deputed by the Supreme Court to distribute water to
the local population. It also did not carry out the directive,
given by the Board and the Committee, to set up modern facilities
for purifying the liquid effluents from the plant. The unit had
been asked to set up treatment facilities that used reverse osmosis
or similar process.The company had been served show-cause notice
by the Board on July 1. It was asked to explain why the renewal
of consent to operate sought by the company should not be refus |
