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EXCLUSIVE! HOW THE FBI SPIED ON EDWARD SAID First look at secret files: How G-Men kept Said under surveillance from 1971. David Price traces years of snooping on US's best known Palestinian Bush says 30,000 dead in Iraq but real number caused by 2003 US attack is AT LEAST 180,000, maybe twice that as Andrew Cockburn digs out the real numbers Is the US Constitution worth saving? Hmmm, maybe ... New York Times takes a year to make up its mind. Cockburn and St Clair on NYT and NSA ... CounterPunch Online is read by millions of viewers each month! But remember, we are funded solely by the subscribers to the print edition of CounterPunch. Please support this website by buying a subscription to our newsletter, which contains fresh material you won't find anywhere else, or by making a donation for the online edition. Remember contributions are tax-deductible. Click here to make a donation. If you find our site useful please: Subscribe Now! or write CounterPunch, PO BOX 228, Petrolia, CA 95558 |
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December 30,2005 T.W. Croft Website of
the Day December 29, 2005 Norman Solomon Missy Comley
Beattie Dave Zirin Kevin Zeese Derrick O'Keefe Sam Bahour Macdonald Stainsby Bill &
Kathleen Christison Website of the Day December 28, 2005 Jeffrey St.
Clair Lila Rajiva Amira Hass Joshua Frank David Swanson Richard Thieme Paul Craig
Roberts Website of the Day
December 27, 2005 Evan Jones Uri Avnery Mike Whitney Gideon Levy David Swanson Norman Solomon
December 26, 2005 Lawrence R.
Velvel Lance Olsen Ben Terrall Scott Boehm Charlie Ehlen Tom Kerr
December 24/25, 2005 Aleander Cockburn James Petras Ralph Nader Lila Rajiva Fred Gardner Ron Jacobs Dave Lindorff Gary Leupp Saul Landau John Chuckman Dr. Susan Block St. Clair / Vest / Pollack
/ Donnelly Poets' Basement Website of the Weekend
December 23, 2005 John Ross Chris Floyd Lawrence Mishel
/ Ross Eisenbrey Joanne Mariner Eric Johnson-Debaufre Ray McGovern J. L. Chestnut,
Jr. Website of
the Day
December 22, 2005 Ingmar Lee Elisa Salasin Christopher
Brauchli Robin Blackburn Evelyn Pringle Amira Hass Francis A.
Boyle Stew Albert Website of
the Day
December 21, 2005 Paul Craig
Roberts Lila Rajiva Joshua Frank Dave Zirin Ramzy Baroud Sonia Nettnin Ben Saul Jonathan Cronin Patrick Cockburn Website of
the Day
December 20, 2005 Jackie Corr Earl Ofari
Hutchinson Michael Donnelly Gian Paulo
Accardo Pierre Tristam Norman Solomon Sen. Robert Byrd Dave Lindorff Website of the Day
December 19, 2005 Mike Marqusee Gary Leupp Ron Jacobs John Blair Gideon Levy Kevin Zeese Missy Comley Beattie Don Santina Website of the Day
December 17 / 18, 2005 Cockburn /
St. Clair Gabriel Kolko Susan Alcorn Werther Ralph Nader Patrick Cockburn Fred Gardner Dave Lindorff Ned Sublette Lee Sustar Jason Leopold Laura Carlsen Jeff White Ray McGovern Chris Floyd William Loren Katz Rose Miriam
Elizalde Greg Moses Heather Gray Alison Weir St Clair /
Walker / Pollack Poets' Basement Website of
the Day
December 16, 2005 Tom Kerr Mark Engler John Bomar Patrick Cockburn Pierre Tristam William S. Lind Cyril Neville Robert Jensen Saul Landau Website
December 15, 2005 Oren Ben-Dor Stan Cox Joshua Frank Ben Terrall Patrick Cockburn Monica Benderman Walter A. Davis Vijay Prashad Website of
the Day
Patrick Cockburn Paul Craig
Roberts Lawrence R. Velvel Wayne Garcia John Sugg Gary Leupp Ray McGovern Alan Maass April Hurley, MD Kevin Alexander
Gray
December 13, 2005 Stephen T.
Banko, III Patrick Cockburn Laura Carlsen Karl Grossman Niranjan Ramakrishnan Kevin Zeese Norman Solomon Michael G.
Smith Stew Albert Bob Dylan Phil Gasper Website of
the Day
December 12, 2005 Paul Craig
Roberts Lawrence R.
Velvel Jessica Stewart George Bisharat Nate Mezmer Earl Ofari
Hutchinson Alison Weir Seth Sandronsky Patrick Cockburn Website of
the Day
Alexander Cockburn Landau / Hassen Ralph Nader Linn Washington, Jr Bill Christison Mike Ferner Elizabeth Schulte Neve Gordon / Yigal Bronner Linda S. Heard Ingmar Lee Ray McGovern John Chuckman John Ryan Dick J. Reavis Christopher
Brauchli Behzad Yaghmaian Aseem Shrivastava John Ross Ben Tripp St. Clair / Pollack / Vest
/ Despair Poets' Basement Website of the Week
December 9, 2005 Linn Washington,
Jr. Dave Zirin
/ Mike Stark Patrick Cockburn Alexander Cockburn Lila Rajiva Gary Leupp Jason Leopold Bruce K. Gagnon Andrew Cockburn Website of the Day
December 8, 2005 Kathy Kelly James Petras William S.
Lind Laura Carlsen Justin Akers Thomas Graham, Jr Norman Solomon Tariq Ali /
Robin Blackburn Website of
the Day
December 7, 2005 John Ryan Gary Leupp Fran Quigley Jeremy Brecher
/ Brendan Smith Joshua Frank William W.
Morgan Dave Lindorff Patrick Cockburn Harold Pinter Website of
the Day
December 6, 2005 Ron Jacobs Patrick Cockburn Yifat Susskind Mike Whitney Pat Williams Paul Craig
Roberts Website of
the Day
December 5, 2005 John Walsh Brian Cloughley Mokhiber /
Weissman Robert Jensen Norman Solomon Peter Rost, MD Lila Rajiva Website of the Day
Alexander Cockburn Lawrence R.
Velvel Rev. William Alberts Saul Landau Ralph Nader Paul Craig
Roberts Mike Whitney Allan Lichtman Dave Lindorff Brian Concannon,
Jr. Fred Gardner Manuel Garcia,
Jr. Carol Wolman St. Clair /
Vest / Walker / Pollack Poets' Basement Website of
the Weekend
December 2, 2005 Stan Goff Mike Ferner Christopher Brauchli Niranjan Ramakrishnan Manuel Talens Peter Phillips J.L. Chestnut,
Jr. Website of
the Day
December 1, 2005 John Walsh,
MD Ron Jacobs Jenna Orkin Joshua Frank Tiffany Ten
Eyck Missy Comley Beattie Eli Stephens Elaine Cassel Website of
the Day
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December 30, 2005 Meanwhile, Down in Haiti...The Chickens are Coming Home to RoostBy BRIAN CONCANNON, Jr. Haiti's Judicial and Executive Branches are both getting what they deserve this holiday season- each other. After 22 months of close collaboration to trample Haiti's Constitution and democracy, they have now turned their destructive energies on each other. The Cour de Cassation (Supreme Court) outraged Interim Prime Minister Gerard Latortue on December 8 by decreeing that Dumarsais Simeus was wrongfully disqualified from the upcoming Presidential elections. Latortue retaliated the next day by firing five of the Cour's justices, replacing them with henchmen. The judiciary went on strike, which has shut down the justice system for four weeks. It is a measure of how far Haiti has strayed from constitutional rule since the February 2004 coup d'etat that both sides in this dispute are wrong. The Cour de Cassation wrongly reinstated Simeus' illegal candidacy not once, but twice. Simeus cannot be President because the Constitution requires Presidential candidates to have lived in the country for the last five years, and to have never taken foreign citizenship. Mr. Simeus readily concedes in media interviews that he resides in Southlake Texas and has obtained U.S. citizenship. The Cour de Cassation could not go so far as to ignore the Constitution's plain prohibitions, but it came close. Instead of saying that the citizenship and residency bars do not apply, the Justices ruled that they had no evidence of Simeus' U.S. residency and citizenship- unlike the dozens of journalists who have asked him. Prime Minister Latortue's objection to the Cour's decision is right, but he is the wrong man to make it. The same residency requirement applies to Presidents and Prime Ministers alike, and Mr. Latortue lived in Boca Raton Florida for years before being illegally installed as Prime Minister by the U.S. and Haitian elites in March 2004. The Constitution requires an interim government to hold elections within 90 days from taking office, but Latortue will have 700 days in office, at the very least. Latortue's response to the Cour's decision is equally wrong. As in the U.S., justices in Haiti can only be removed through specific procedures, for duly established wrongdoing or permanent physical or mental incapacity. Latortue did not even give lip service to any of these procedures, he just fired the justices. Later his aides claimed that the justices were old and needed to be retired, but the Constitution does not recognize that claim. The justice system's expressed outrage at the executive branch's interference was justified in principle, but disingenuous coming from a judiciary that had loyally backed Mr. Latortue's attacks on the rule of law for almost two years. The courts have routinely freed convicted mass murderers who support the government, while holding government critics indefinitely on absolutely no evidence. Fr. Gerard Jean-Juste, for example, was arrested without a warrant in October, 2004. When the government could produce no evidence against him, a courageous judge, Judge Fleury, ordered him released. The Minister of Justice then forced Judge Fleury off the bench, with the support of the Trial Court's Chief Judge, and without complaint from the Cour de Cassation's judges, or even ANAMAH, the Haitian judges' association. Judge Fleury was replaced by another judge, Judge Peres, who was head of ANAMAH, and active in the anti-Lavalas opposition before the coup. Fr. Jean-Juste was re-arrested in July, again without a warrant. The case was given to Judge Peres, who has obediently held Fr. Gerry in prison for five months now despite a complete lack of evidence. This "pre-trial" detention may be a death sentence- Fr. Jean-Juste has just been diagnosed with leukemia. The kind of leukemia he likely has can be treated, but not in Haiti's prisons. Amnesty International, the UN Human Rights Commission, 45 members of the U.S. Congress and human rights groups all over the world have criticized the injustice of Fr. Jean-Juste's persecution. Not one member of the Haitian judiciary has spoken against it, at least in public. The Cour de Cassation itself led the charge in dismantling the Raboteau massacre case, the centerpiece of the fight to establish the rule of law under Haiti's elected governments. The case had been heralded as a landmark in the fight against impunity by the UN and human rights groups when the trial concluded in November 2000. Those convicted appealed at the time, which they had the right to do, but the Cour refused to rule on the case, which it had no right to do. The massacre victims smelled a rat as 2001 turned to 2002 and 2003, without any action- they feared that the court was dragging its feet, keeping the case technically open until it could be reversed by a government sympathetic to the convicts. The foot-dragging was amply rewarded in March 2004, when Chief Justice Boniface Alexandre was named Interim President (although Prime Minister Latortue has all the power). The rat was pulled from the Justices' robes last summer, when they threw out the Raboteau trial on the grounds that the case was inappropriately sent to a jury. This decision was unjustified and outrageous- the justices themselves had approved sending the case to the jury in 1999, and the defendants never even objected. But no one in the judiciary complained. There is no satisfaction in seeing Haiti's two remaining branches of government getting what they deserve, because the real burden of this dispute falls, as always on the poor. The judges and ministers may be truly outraged, but they are not spending their lives Haiti's prisons, under conditions that a U.S. court has likened to a slave ship. Almost everyone in jail in Haiti is poor- in a justice system where money talks, the well-off quickly walk. Ninety-five percent of them have never been convicted of a crime. Their hopes for justice were always slim, but with the courts shut down for four weeks, their hopes are now none. All of this bodes poorly as elections in Haiti- currently scheduled for January 8, but certain to be postponed for the fifth time- approach. The electoral law gives the Cour de Cassation the last word on most electoral disputes. The electoral preparations by the unconstitutional Provisional Electoral Council have so far been consistently mismanaged and biased in favor of Mr. Latortue's allies, so the actual voting will undoubtedly generate disputes. The disputes will go to a Court which had lost most of its credibility even before it became stacked with Latortue's henchmen. In its current state, the Cour will have neither the ability nor willingness to curb the Interim Government's most blatant electoral abuses. That, in the end, may be the whole point. Brian Concannon Jr., Esq. directs the Institute for Justice
and Democracy in Haiti, www.ijdh.org,
and is a former OAS Elections Observer and UN Human Rights Observer
in Haiti.
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from CounterPunch Books! The Case Against Israel By Michael Neumann  Grand Theft Pentagon: Tales of Greed and Profiteering in the War on Terror by Jeffrey St. Clair                            Sick of sit-on-the-Fence speakers, tongue-tied and timid? CounterPunch Editors Alexander Cockburn and Jeffrey St Clair are available to speak forcefully on ALL the burning issues, as are other CounterPunchers seasoned in stump oratory. Call CounterPunch Speakers Bureau, 1-800-840-3683. Or email beckyg@counterpunch.org. |
