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Showing posts from May, 2007

Ruth Bader Ginsburg: the lone woman

Linda Greenhouse has an excellent article posted just now on Ruth Bader Ginsburg and the Supreme Court. It's called Oral Dissents Give Justice a New Voice . Professor Liu said that when he read the dissent on Tuesday, it occurred to him that in recounting the workplace travails of the plaintiff, Lilly M. Ledbetter, Justice Ginsburg was also telling a version of her own story. “Here she is, the one woman of a nine-member body, describing the get-along imperative and the desire not to make waves felt by the one woman among 16 men,” Professor Liu said. “It’s as if after 15 years on the court, she’s finally voicing some complaints of her own .” :: The case Professor Liu is referring to, of course, is Ledbetter v Goodyear Tire and Rubber Co. , ably analyzed at that link by Dailykos's Adam B. I'd like to start a discussion here of a broader point, using the influence of the Greenhouse piece and Adam's analysis...but also by hearkening back to three pieces I wrote at the time

Pre-war National Intelligence Council documents available online

Washington Post writers Walter Pincus and Karen De Young detailed last Saturday that new pre-war documents released by a Senate Intelligence Panel show that the consensus view of US intelligence agencies was that a US invasion of Iraq would "be likely to spark violent sectarian divides and provide al-Qaeda with new opportunities in Iraq and Afghanistan" and "'result in a surge of political Islam and increased funding for terrorist groups" in the Muslim world." From the Post: In addition to portraying a terrorist nexus between Iraq and al-Qaeda that did not exist , the Democrats said, the Bush administration "also kept from the American people . . . the sobering intelligence assessments it received at the time" -- that an Iraq war could allow al-Qaeda "to establish the presence in Iraq and opportunity to strike at Americans it did not have prior to the invasion." Most of the information in the report was drawn from two lengthy assessment

Permanent Bases in Iraq: the silence of the Democrats

If the bipartisan push for a Hydrocarbon Law written to benefit United States oil companies is one under reported , if not taboo , story in the press and Congress regarding the United States occupation of Iraq, another taboo topic is that of permanent, or enduring, bases in Iraq. In September, 2005 I cited this April 2003 New York Times report : The United States is planning a long-term military relationship with the emerging government of Iraq, one that would grant the Pentagon access to military bases and project American influence into the heart of the unsettled region , senior Bush administration officials say. American military officials, in interviews this week, spoke of maintaining perhaps four bases in Iraq that could be used in the future: one at the international airport just outside Baghdad; another at Tallil, near Nasiriya in the south; the third at an isolated airstrip called H-1 in the western desert, along the old oil pipeline that runs to Jordan; and the last at the B

Staff Sgt. David Safstrom: voices from Iraq

From a must-read New York Times article by Michael Kamber: Staff Sgt. David Safstrom does not regret his previous tours in Iraq, not even a difficult second stint when two comrades were killed while trying to capture insurgents. “In Mosul, in 2003, it felt like we were making the city a better place,” he said. “There was no sectarian violence, Saddam was gone, we were tracking down the bad guys. It felt awesome.” But now on his third deployment in Iraq, he is no longer a believer in the mission. The pivotal moment came, he says, this February when soldiers killed a man setting a roadside bomb. When they searched the bomber’s body, they found identification showing him to be a sergeant in the Iraqi Army. “I thought: ‘What are we doing here? Why are we still here?’ ” said Sergeant Safstrom, a member of Delta Company of the First Battalion, 325th Airborne Infantry, 82nd Airborne Division. “ We’re helping guys that are trying to kill us. We help them in the day. They turn around at nig

International Institute for Strategic Studies: report on the Baghdad Surge

The British-run International Institute for Strategic Studies which calls itself the "world's leading authority on military conflict" has produced a significant document (May, 2007) on the Petraeus Plan for Iraq called: "the Baghdad Surge." This report is perhaps the clearest, most succinct public account of current United States strategy in Iraq. It is a key document for understanding the emerging work of the Joint Campaign Plan Redesign Team and the Joint Strategic Assessment Team in Iraq. For purposes of this article, I am going to discuss what I see as the three significant and newsworthy inferences that one can draw from the report itself. First, US policy in Iraq is on a collision course with Moqtada al-Sadr . This conflict is a core, if not particularly publicly acknowledged, component of the Petraeus Surge policy: To be successful, US forces will, over the summer, need to enter Moqtada al-Sadr’s east Baghdad stronghold, Sadr City . This slum, negle

Troops Levels: deja vu ad nauseum

November 18th, 2005 in the immediate aftermath of the defeat of the measure by Representative John Murtha calling for withdrawal from Iraq, NBC reported that General George Casey had presented a "withdrawal plan" to the Pentagon: Pentagon and U.S. military officials tell NBC News the plan calls for the substantial withdrawal of more than 60,000 troops from Iraq . The plan was drafted by Gen. John Abizaid and Gen. George Casey, the two top U.S. commanders of the war. Today, in the aftermath of Congress passing legislation giving George Bush yet another blank check extension funding the US occupation of Iraq we read a report from David Sanger in the New York Times that: The Bush administration is developing what are described as concepts for reducing American combat forces in Iraq by as much as half next year , according to senior administration officials in the midst of the internal debate. It is the first indication that growing political pressure is forcing the White Hou

the Joint Campaign Plan Redesign Team: the Petraeus/Crocker plan

United States Ambassador to Iraq Ryan Crocker and General David H. Petraeus have been selected by the Bush Administration to chair the Joint Campaign Plan Redesign Team (a name so boring and cumbersome that it was surely intended to create a ' hey, nothing to see here, move along ' effect.) Most of what is publicly known about this project, which is due to conclude its reporting May 31st, comes from this May 23rd Washington Post Article by Ann Scott Tyson: Top U.S. commanders and diplomats in Iraq are completing a far-reaching campaign plan for a new U.S. strategy, laying out military and political goals and endorsing the selective removal of hardened sectarian actors from Iraq's security forces and government. The classified plan, scheduled to be finished by May 31, is a joint effort between Gen. David H. Petraeus, the senior American general in Iraq, and U.S. Ambassador Ryan Crocker.[...] The overarching aim of the plan, which sets goals for the end of this year and the

David R. Irvine: the cancer of Abu Ghraib

From a must-read editorial in the Salt Lake Tribune by David Irvine, a retired brigadier general who taught prisoner of war interrogation and military law for 18 years for the Sixth United States Army Intelligence School: In the three years since the cancerous photographs at Abu Ghraib came to light, the Army's acceptance of and resort to torture have made combat service in Iraq that much more dangerous for our forces there . We cannot claim Geneva Convention protection for our own troops because we have ourselves abandoned the Geneva protection due the Iraqis. The president and vice president have repeatedly denied that America tortures prisoners, but they choose their words carefully when they refuse to explain or deny the use of "unconventional" interrogation techniques which, by any reasonable definition, amount to torture . Recently, a group of retired flag officers began quietly meeting with the 2008 presidential candidates in an effort to help the candidates u

Maj. General William Caldwell: Torture Rooms

CNN reports: Coalition forces in Iraq have recently uncovered what they call "torture rooms" operated by Sunnis on Sunnis in Anbar province, a military commander said Wednesday. Maj. Gen. William Caldwell in an interview on CNN's "The Situation Room" and in an earlier press briefing, said 17 kidnapped Iraqis had been found in two hideouts. He said one of the tortured people was a 13-year-old boy, who "literally had been tortured, electrocuted, whipped, beat by these al Qaeda terrorists." He said freed people told troops that one or two captives had died during the torture sessions, and the remaining captives expected to be ransomed off to their families, with the funds going to support the al Qaeda insurgency. "This is the nature of the enemy that the Iraqi people are facing here in Iraq," Caldwell said. General Caldwell might have mentioned the torture rooms located in Iraq's Interior Ministry as well. From the UK Independent : Behind

Ryan Crocker: United States Ambassador to Iraq

Ryan Clark Crocker, the current United States Ambassador to Iraq , is somewhat of an enigma: a US Ambassador who has been working the Middle East for decades but about whom we don't know that much, especially regarding key issues that relate directly to his current service in Baghdad. This profile will discuss what is known of Crocker's co-authorship of the "Perfect Storm Memo" which warned of the danger of the current quagmire in Iraq before the US invasion (and may have supplied some of the source material for Colin Powell's famous line about the "Pottery Barn Rule"). It will also examine Crocker's current participation in the Joint Campaign Plan Redesign Team and survey the public record of Crocker's career, thinking and experience leading up to his confirmation as Ambassador to Iraq. According to the NYT , Ambassador Crocker is: One of the State Department’s most experienced Middle East hands, Mr. Crocker, 57, has already served as ambassad

Keith Olbermann: we have been betrayed

Keith Olbermann : Who among us will stop this war-this War of Lies? To he or she, fall the figurative keys to the nation. To all the others-presidents and majority leaders and candidates and rank-and-file Congressmen and Senators of either party-there is only blame… for this shameful, and bi-partisan, betrayal. - Transcript C&L Tags: Keith Olberman Iraq

Dennis Kucinich on the Hydrocarbon Law

This blurb from the Hill sums up the state of Congressional oversight of the role of US oil companies in Iraq : Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-Ohio), a fervent Iraq war opponent and dark horse presidential candidate, claimed an hour of floor time Wednesday to criticize Iraq’s hydrocarbon law. Kucinich argued that the proposed law would privatize Iraqi oil. [snip] “We must not be a party to any attempt by multi-national oil companies to take over Iraq’s oil resources,” he said. His declarations went largely ignored. No one sought to intervene, and when he was done, the House quickly moved to a non-controversial bill revising the boundaries of The Carl Sandburg Home National Historic Site . State of the debate. Actually, the Iraq hydrocarbon law is an active subject of concern almost everywhere else in the world (including the board rooms of major US oil corporations) except the floor of the United States House of Representatives. Tags: Tags: Iraq Oil Production Sharing Agreements Hydroca

No Blank Check for Iraq

Tell Congress: No Blank Check for Iraq . Tags: Move On Iraq Supplemental

an observation

" Both sides are in a position where neither can do something without the other. That's the reality ," said House Majority Leader Steny H. Hoyer (D-Md.) Hundreds of thousands of grassroots, reform-minded Democrats did not give their dollars, their time and their tears to win majorities in both Houses of Congress in 2006 so that Steny Hoyer could define the limits of the possible in Washington D.C. in 2007. That's another reality. Tags: Steny Hoyer grassroots netroots

House Democrats back off lobbying reform

From an article on lobbying reform by Jim Snyder in today's the Hill: [A]s the House prepares to take up a lobbying reform bill tomorrow, a number of outside groups are disappointed that the strictest measures appear likely to be left to the campaign trail. “There is great concern as to what is going to be approved on the floor,” Craig Holman of Public Citizen’s Congress Watch said. “ It’s starting to look like the House isn’t really serious about lobbying reform .” The reform package is missing three main components, reformers say: a longer cooling-off period between the transition from lawmaker to lobbyist, new disclosure of grassroots “Astroturf” campaigns, and more information on how much money a lobbyist “bundles” for candidates. None of those three issues survived as part of the main bill . This is exhibit B in the currently widening gap between Democrats in Congress and reform-oriented folks in the grassroots who helped put them in the majority. You know what exhibit A

Paul Fusco and Michael Kamber: photo essays

Here are two photo essays with audio commentaries from the photographers themselves. Paul Fusco's photo essay is an exploration of the Chernobyl disaster through photographs of children suffering from cancers in the region nearby. (Caution: this photo essay contains very strong content.) I wrote in a comment at Majikthise , where I first became aware of this work, that it was the most powerful experience I'd had brought to me yet on a computer screen. Putting aside questions of the evidential meaning of Fusco's project, it is a profound example of witness. The photography is extraordinary and moving. The power of Fusco's observation and his clear commitment to convey the humanity of his subjects in stark and honest terms are, quite simply, startling. This is work on the level of Diane Arbus or Eugene Richards. Michael Kamber is a photographer working for the New York Times in Iraq. Here he tells the story of a patrol he participated in ...a patrol which suffered four

Jim Jarmusch: Stranger than Paradise

One of the best indie movies ever made. It just gets better with age. Tags: Jim Jarmusch 80s Indie

the human diet in the news

Food is in the news. Nina Planck's NYT op/ed Death by Veganism and the sagas of both Governor Ted Kulongoski and Congressman Tim Ryan trying to live within a food stamp budget for one week highlight some basic questions about the human diet and who eats what in our society. There's a reason this stuff is in the air, I think. We know something is off kilter...from the related epidemics of childhood obesity and diabetes to folks revisiting some of basic questions about things like who does the cooking and where does our food come from . Given that, I think Nina Planck makes a good, balanced point and one that rebuts some popular, yet dangerous, notions within the health food movement. In that light, I'd like to make a simple, albeit unpopular, point that I think pretty much all nutritionists would agree on. Refined and processed sugars are not part of the original human diet and, by most definitions of the term, aren't really nutritious . Simply put, when we eat t