Observations on current events

The Politics of Revenge:

Whistle-Blowing Said to Be Factor in F.B.I. Firing
"A classified Justice Department investigation has concluded that a former F.B.I. translator at the center of a growing controversy was dismissed in part because she accused the bureau of ineptitude, and it found that the F.B.I. did not aggressively investigate her claims of espionage against a co-worker.
The Justice Department's inspector general concluded that the allegations by the translator, Sibel Edmonds, 'were at least a contributing factor in why the F.B.I. terminated her services,' and the F.B.I. is considering disciplinary action against some employees as a result, Robert S. Mueller III, director of the bureau, said in a letter last week to lawmakers. A copy of the letter was obtained by The New York Times..."


Iraq:

Robert Fisk: Iraq's Unreported War
"Iraq, we are told by Mr. Blair, is safer. It is not. US military reports clearly show much of the violence in Iraq is not revealed to journalists, and thus goes largely unreported. This account of the insurgency across Iraq over three days last week provides astonishing proof that Iraq under its new, American-appointed Prime Minister, has grown more dangerous and violent.
But even this is only a partial record of events. US casualties and dozens of Iraqi civilian deaths each day are not included in the reports. But here are the events, as recorded by the United States military on 20, 22 and 23 July. Few were publicly disclosed..."

Washington Post: CACI Defense Contracts Hazy on Civilian Authority
"Contracts released by the Defense Department raise new questions about whether civilian employees of CACI International Inc. supervised the interrogation of some prison detainees in Iraq.
The Pentagon provided copies of the Arlington company's government contracts to the Center for Public Integrity, which sought them under the Freedom of Information Act. The center, based in the District, made the documents public yesterday.
The $19.9 million contract for CACI to provide interrogators, awarded last August, calls for the civilian workers to 'provide oversight and other directed intelligence support to [military] screening and interrogation operations, with special emphasis on High-Value detainees.'
But the contract for interrogation services also says that CACI employees are to be 'directed by military authority' and that 'the contractor is responsible for providing supervision of all contractor personnel.'
The role played by CACI's civilian interrogators has been debated since one of them, Steven A. Stefanowicz, was implicated in an internal Army report on abuses at Abu Ghraib prison outside Baghdad. The report said Stefanowicz encouraged soldiers to set conditions for interrogations and 'clearly knew his instructions equated to physical abuse.' Stefanowicz's lawyer has said his client did nothing wrong.
Controversy also arose over the government's use of a contract intended to provide information technology services to hire the civilian interrogators..."


The November Election:

Paul Krugman: Triumph of the Trivial
"Under the headline 'Voters Want Specifics From Kerry,' The Washington Post recently quoted a voter demanding that John Kerry and John Edwards talk about 'what they plan on doing about health care for middle-income or lower-income people. I have to face the fact that I will never be able to have health insurance, the way things are now. And these millionaires don't seem to address that.'
Mr. Kerry proposes spending $650 billion extending health insurance to lower- and middle-income families. Whether you approve or not, you can't say he hasn't addressed the issue. Why hasn't this voter heard about it?"


The So-Called War on Terror:

NY Times: Homeland Security Given Data on Arab-Americans
"The Census Bureau has provided specially tabulated population statistics on Arab-Americans to the Department of Homeland Security, including detailed information on how many people of Arab backgrounds live in certain ZIP codes.
The assistance is legal, but civil liberties groups and Arab-American advocacy organizations say it is a dangerous breach of public trust and liken it to the Census Bureau's compilation of similar information about Japanese-Americans during World War II..."

The 9/11 Commission Report:

Ray McGovern: What Price Unanimity?
"The 567-page final report released Thursday by the 9/11 Commission provides a wealth of data - indeed, so much detail that it is easy to get lost in the trees and miss the forest. Comments by the ubiquitous commissioners over the weekend leave the impression either that they themselves have no window on the forest, or that they would like to keep the rest of us in the trees..."

Robert Scheer: An Excuse-Spouting Bush Is Busted by 9/11 Report
"Busted! Like a teenager whose beer bash is interrupted by his parents' early return home, President Bush's nearly three years of bragging about his 'war on terror' credentials has been exposed by the bipartisan 9/11 commission as nothing more than empty posturing..."


The November Election:

Paul Krugman: Fear of Fraud
"Some states, worried about the potential for abuse with voting machines that leave no paper trail, have banned their use this November. But Florida, which may well decide the presidential race, is not among those states, and last month state officials rejected a request to allow independent audits of the machines' integrity. A spokesman for Gov. Jeb Bush accused those seeking audits of trying to 'undermine voters' confidence,' and declared, 'The governor has every confidence in the Department of State and the Division of Elections.'
Should the public share that confidence? Consider the felon list.
Florida law denies the vote to convicted felons. In 2000 the state hired a firm to purge supposed felons from the list of registered voters; these voters were turned away from the polls. After the election, determined by 537 votes, it became clear that thousands of people had been wrongly disenfranchised. Since those misidentified as felons were disproportionately Democratic-leaning African-Americans, these errors may have put George W. Bush in the White House.
This year, Florida again hired a private company - Accenture, which recently got a homeland security contract worth up to $10 billion - to prepare a felon list. Remembering 2000, journalists sought copies. State officials stonewalled, but a judge eventually ordered the list released..."

Steve Weissman: Jesus, Jihadis, and the Red-State Blues
"In this week of John Kerry's nomination, we should all give President Bush his due. Iraq boils up in his face. Over half his fellow Americans now think his war wrong-footed, if not pig-headed. Spies and other professional observers openly confirm what a few of us amateurs warned from the start, that American troops in Iraq give bin Laden an unbeatable banner to recruit his suicidal Fools of God. And from within Washington's most secret places, loose lips let slip how Team Bush consistently misled the American people about everything from Saddam's weapons to how the United States tortures captives around the world while observing 'the spirit of the Geneva Conventions.' Yet the stalwart Mr. Bush soldiers on, bravely telling the same tall tales, now about Iran as well as Iraq.
Critics accuse him of lying: I fear worse. Either Mr. Bush still believes the intoxicating fables that Iraqi exiles fed to Cheney, Rumsfeld, and the neo-conservative crapologists, or else he feels no need to get facts straight as long as he does the Lord's Work. Having followed his 'higher Father' into a faith-based war in Iraq, the poor Prophet Bush now casts his eye across the Euphrates, waiting for Revelation and listening to Iranian expatriates, some of whom work with the shadowy spies of Gen. Sharon..."

LA Times: The Right Wing's Deep, Dark Secret
"Some hope for a Bush loss, and here's why..."


Spending Money We Don't Have:

AP: White House to Project Record Deficit
"The White House will project soon that this year's federal deficit will exceed $420 billion, congressional aides said, a record figure certain to ignite partisan warfare over President Bush's handling of the economy..."

The November Election:

The Miami Herald: Florida GOP Tries Again to Stop Black Voters
"Days after a Florida appeals court demanded that the state provide more help to felons who want their right to vote restored, Gov. Jeb Bush introduced a new policy that civil rights advocates say circumvents the will of the court and threatens to exclude tens of thousands of potential voters. Last week, the First District Court of Appeal in Tallahassee unanimously ruled that state prison officials must follow the law and provide newly released felons the necessary paperwork and assistance to get their full civil rights back. That would include a one-page application for a formal hearing before the Florida Clemency Board - the only way an estimated 85 percent of felons will ever get their rights restored. But instead of providing the application, Bush decided to scrap it altogether. On Wednesday, he announced that felons will now have to contact the Office of Executive Clemency when and if they want to apply for a hearing to have their rights restored...."


The First Admendment:

Michael Avery: Police Cage Free Speech in Boston
"Demonstrators who want to be within sight and sound of the delegates entering and leaving the Democratic National Convention at the Fleet Center in Boston this coming week will be forced to protest in a special 'demonstration zone' adjacent to the terminal where buses carrying the delegates will arrive. The zone is large enough only for 1000 persons to safely congregate and is bounded by two chain link fences separated by concrete highway barriers. The outermost fence is covered with black mesh that is designed to repel liquids. Much of the area is under an abandoned elevated train line. The zone is covered by another black net which is topped by razor wire. There will be no sanitary facilities in the zone and tables and chairs will not be permitted. There is no way for the demonstrators to pass written materials to the convention delegates..."


Iraq:

Scott Ritter: Saddam's People Are Winning the War
"The battle for Iraq's sovereign future is a battle for the hearts and minds of the Iraqi people. As things stand, it appears that victory will go to the side most in tune with the reality of the Iraqi society of today: the leaders of the anti-U.S. resistance. Iyad Allawi's government was recently installed by the U.S.-led Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) to counter a Baathist nationalism that ceased to exist nearly a decade ago. In the aftermath of the first Gulf War, Saddam Hussein's regime shifted toward an amalgam of Islamic fundamentalism, tribalism and nationalism that more accurately reflected the political reality of Iraq. Thanks to his meticulous planning and foresight, Saddam's lieutenants are now running the Iraqi resistance, including the Islamist groups..."

Robert Fisk: Bush Administration 'Came To Steal from Iraq'


Funding the School of the Americas:

LA Weekly: Teaching Torture
"Remember how congressional leaders on both sides of the aisle deplored the torture of prisoners at Abu Ghraib as 'un-American'? Last Thursday, however, the House quietly passed a renewed appropriation that keeps open the U.S.'s most infamous torture-teaching institution, known as the School of the Americas (SOA), where the illegal physical and psychological abuse of prisoners of the kind the world condemned at Abu Ghraib and worse has been routinely taught for years..."


Late Justice in Mexico?

NY Times: A Former President of Mexico Charged With 1971 Killings
"A special prosecutor filed charges on Friday against a former president and other officials in the killings of student protesters 33 years ago, reopening a dark and divisive episode that was a turning point in Mexico's struggle for democracy.
The prosecutor, Ignacio Carrillo Prieto, filed evidence against former President Luis Echeverría, his top aides and high-ranking military officials in the killings of at least 25 protesters who were attacked with clubs and chains by shock troops as they marched peacefully through Mexico City on June 10, 1971."


The Environment:

Amanda Griscom: The Great EPA Crackdown Fantasy: "All the talk of pending EPA enforcement actions is just that - election-year talk. It may fool voters, but Bush's big campaign contributors won't lose any sleep."

The 9/11 Commission Report:

I would not go as far as Mr. Clarke in praising the apolitical character (the members were, after all, appointed by both parties) of the 9/11 Commission, but the recommendations it makes will challenge Washington to overcome politics in the pursuit of national security. Only time will tell if the policticans can get out of the way of their own self-interest to protect the country.

Richard Clarke: Honorable Commission, Toothless Report
"Americans owe the 9/11 commission a deep debt for its extensive exposition of the facts surrounding the World Trade Center and Pentagon attacks. Yet, because the commission had a goal of creating a unanimous report from a bipartisan group, it softened the edges and left it to the public to draw many conclusions.
Among the obvious truths that were documented but unarticulated were the facts that the Bush administration did little on terrorism before 9/11, and that by invading Iraq the administration has left us less safe as a nation..."


The Oil Politics of Venezuela:

NY Times: Oil, Venezuela's Lifeblood, Is Now Its Social Currency, Too
"In recent months a large part of the earnings from the Venezuelan oil company have been channeled to pay for a social revolution, including adult education classes, left, long promised by President Hugo Chávez."

Foreign / Military / Energy Policy:

How novel would it be actually have the honesty to identify those items in the DoD budget that are fully related to petroleum-protection activities? Such honesty would be the first step in replacing the funding of these activities with fuel-consumption taxes, thereby freeing up our Federal income taxes to fund other priorities. Thus, an income tax cut would be offset by an increase in consumption taxes, with no net increase in taxation. This would bring the added benefit of encourageing people to use less petroleum. The trucking industry will be kept from complaining by giving tax-advantaged status to domestically produced biodiesel.

Reuters: Congress Clears Final $416 Billion Defense Bill

What The 9/11 Commission Report Doesn't Say:

Marjorie Cohn: The 9/11 Report Misses the Point

Oil over Human Rights ?

allAfrica.com - Oil Driving U.S. Move On Sudan

Accountable to Whom?

BBC: US admits 'bounty hunter' contact
"The US military has admitted it detained an Afghan man handed over by a US citizen accused of running a freelance counter-terrorism operation."

The timing of these new revalations, right along with the Final Report of the 9/11 Commission, makes one wonder. Perhaps we're not supposed to notice?

BBC: US army reveals more jail abuse:
"The US military has found 94 cases of confirmed or alleged abuse of prisoners by its troops in Iraq and Afghanistan, a Senate hearing has been told."

Civil Liberties:

ACLU: 9/11 Commission Report Takes on Patriot Act, Government Secrecy; ACLU Outlines Civil Liberties Problems With Cabinet-Level Spymaster
"The official 9/11 Commission report, released today, takes aim at the USA Patriot Act and the excessive amount of official secrecy in the Bush administration.
'Regarding civil liberties, the 9/11 Commission report essentially says that the Justice Department and White House have not made a compelling case for either the administration's obsession with secrecy or its Patriot Act,' said Anthony D. Romero, ACLU Executive Director. 'This bipartisan report should serve as a wake-up call for Congress that it must maintain the sunsets in the Patriot Act.'
As the report states on page 394, 'The burden of proof for retaining a particular governmental power should be on the executive, to explain (a) that the power actually materially enhances security and (b) that there is adequate supervision of the executive's use of the powers to ensure protection of civil liberties. If the power is granted, there must be adequate guidelines and oversight to properly confine its use.'..."

The November Election:

Detroit Free Press: Democrats blast GOP lawmaker's 'suppress the Detroit vote' remark
"Democrats on Wednesday denounced a Republican lawmaker quoted in a newspaper as saying the GOP would fare poorly in this year's elections if it failed to 'suppress the Detroit vote.'
State Rep. John Pappageorge, R-Troy, acknowledged using 'a bad choice of words' but said his remark shouldn't be construed as racist.
Pappageorge, 73, was quoted in July 16 editions of the Detroit Free Press as saying, 'If we do not suppress the Detroit vote, we're going to have a tough time in this election.'
'I'm extremely disappointed in my colleague,' state Sen. Buzz Thomas, D-Detroit, told reporters Wednesday during a conference call. 'That's quite clearly code that they don't want black people to vote in this election.'..."

Politics & Taxes:

The Hill: Bush balks at 2-year deal=The Hill.com=
"Capitol Hill Republicans were astonished yesterday by a White House decision to demand a five-year extension of tax cuts rather than accept a two-year compromise reached by House and Senate leaders that would probably clear Congress in a snap.
Several conservative Republicans said even the two-year extension would be a political win for President Bush, and many questioned a hard-line White House tactic that risked sinking a deal. The tax bill would extend an increase in the child tax credit, tax relief for married couples and the expanded 10 percent tax bracket.
Speculation centered on the upcoming party conventions, where President Bush might want to highlight a confrontation with the Democrats with a tough, partisan vote on a large tax cut in the Senate.
'They want to embarrass Democrats,' said Sen. Max Baucus (D-Mont.), saying the administration wanted to cast the issue as: 'They want more, and Democrats don’t want more, and blame Democrats.'
Republican and Democratic aides said the compromise on $80 billion of tax cuts could pass in a day if the White House dropped its opposition. But by press time the administration had not relented, prompting concern that the issue would wait until the fall..."

Business Ethics:

The New York Times: Basic Training Doesn't Guard Against Insurance Pitch to G.I.'s
"...Insurance agents have made misleading pitches to 'captive' audiences like the ones at Fort Benning. They have posed as counselors on veterans benefits and independent financial advisers. And they have solicited soldiers in their barracks or while they were on duty, violations of Defense Department regulations.
The Pentagon has been aware of practices like these since the Vietnam War; investigations have even cited specific companies and agents. But because of industry lobbying, Congressional pressure, weak enforcement and the Pentagon's ineffective oversight, almost no action has been taken to sanction those responsible or to better protect those who are vulnerable, The Times has found.
And the problem has only intensified since the beginning of the Iraq war, say military employees who monitor insurance agents. With the death toll rising in Iraq, interest in insurance among the troops has surged, making the war a selling opportunity for many agents, they said.
The military market includes hundreds of thousands of men and women, many of them young and financially unsophisticated, all of them trained to trust leadership, obey orders and show loyalty to comrades..."

The Center for Public Integrity: Gimme Shelter (From Taxes)
"U.S. oil and gas companies have at least 882 subsidiaries located in oil-free tax havens such as the Cayman Islands, Bermuda, and even the tiny European principality of Liechtenstein, a Center for Public Integrity investigation has found..."


The November Election:

Paul Krugman: The Arabian Candidate
"...let's imagine an update [to the 'The Manchurian Candidate']- not the remake with Denzel Washington, which I haven't seen, but my own version. This time the enemies would be Islamic fanatics, who install as their puppet president a demagogue who poses as the nation's defender against terrorist evildoers.
The Arabian candidate wouldn't openly help terrorists. Instead, he would serve their cause while pretending to be their enemy.
After an attack, he would strike back at the terrorist base, a necessary action to preserve his image of toughness, but botch the follow-up, allowing the terrorist leaders to escape. Once the public's attention shifted, he would systematically squander the military victory: committing too few soldiers, reneging on promises of economic aid. Soon, warlords would once again rule most of the country, the heroin trade would be booming, and terrorist allies would make a comeback.
Meanwhile, he would lead America into a war against a country that posed no imminent threat. He would insinuate, without saying anything literally false, that it was somehow responsible for the terrorist attack. This unnecessary war would alienate our allies and tie down a large part of our military. At the same time, the Arabian candidate would neglect the pursuit of those who attacked us, and do nothing about regimes that really shelter anti-American terrorists and really are building nuclear weapons..."

The Capital Times Editorial:Not-so-Curious George


Iraq:

Robert Fisk: The Crisis of Information in Baghdad


The Environment:

The Portsmouth Herald: Republicans blast President Bush on environment
"One of the Environmental Protection Agency's earliest leaders, flanked by Republican state politicians, blasted the president's record on the environment Monday during a news conference organized by an anti-Bush environmental group. Russell Train, a Republican, was the EPA's second chief under presidents Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford. But he said Bush's record is so dismal he's casting his presidential vote for Democrat John Kerry in November. 'It's almost as if the motto of the administration in power today in Washington is not environmental protection, but polluter protection,' he said. 'I find this deeply disturbing.'..."

Business Ethics:

Reuters: Halliburton Subpoenaed Over Unit's Iran Work
"A U.S. grand jury issued a subpoena to Halliburton Co. seeking information about its Cayman Islands unit's work in Iran, where it is illegal for U.S. companies to operate, Halliburton said on Monday..."


Iraq:

William River Pitt: Torturing Children
"A German TV magazine called 'Report Mainz' recently aired accusations from the International Red Cross, to the effect that over 100 children are imprisoned in U.S.- controlled detention centers, including Abu Ghraib. 'Between January and May of this year, we've registered 107 children, during 19 visits in 6 different detention locations,' said Red Cross representative Florian Westphal in the report.
The report also outlined eyewitness testimony of the abuse of these children. Staff Sergeant Samuel Provance, who was stationed at Abu Ghraib, said that interrogating officers had gotten their hands on a 15 or 16 year old girl. Military police only stopped the interrogation when the girl was half undressed. A separate incident described a 16 year old being soaked with water, driven through the cold, smeared with mud, and then presented before his weeping father, who was also a prisoner.
Seymour Hersh, the New Yorker reporter who first broke the story of torture at Abu Ghraib, recently spoke at an ACLU convention. He has seen the pictures and the videotapes the American media has not yet shown. 'The boys were sodomized with the cameras rolling, and the worst part is the soundtrack, of the boys shrieking,' said Hersh. 'And this is your government at war.'
Hersh described the prison scene as, 'a series of massive crimes, criminal activity by the president and the vice president, by this administration anyway,' and that there has been, 'a massive amount of criminal wrongdoing that was covered up at the highest command out there, and higher.'..."

Stars & Stripes: Keane: U.S. 'seduced by Iraqi exiles,' didn’t plan properly for insurgency
"U.S. war planners failed to prepare for the insurgency that arose after major combat operations in Iraq because they were 'seduced by Iraqi exiles' who predicted a joyous reception for U.S. troops, one of the Army's senior architects of the campaign said Thursday.
In testimony Thursday before the House Armed Services Committee, Army Gen. Jack Keane, who retired last fall after a final posting as acting Army chief of staff, offered an unusually frank account of mistakes made in planning for the Iraq war..."

Newsday: Kay Criticizes Bush, Blair on Iraq Intel
"President Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair should have realized before going to war that intelligence on Iraqi weapons was weak and did not indicate Saddam Hussein posed a danger to the West, America's former chief weapons inspector in Iraq said Sunday.
David Kay resigned from the CIA in January and his conclusion then that Iraq did not have stockpiles of forbidden weapons caused serious problems for both Bush and Blair, undercutting their main justification for war. He told Britain's ITV network that Bush and Blair 'should have been able to tell before the war that the evidence did not exist for drawing the conclusion that Iraq presented a clear, present and imminent threat on the basis of existing weapons of mass destruction.'
'That was not something that required a war,' he said..."


Religion & Tolerance:

Nicholas Kristof: Jesus and Jihad
"If a Muslim were to write an Islamic version of 'Glorious Appearing' and publish it in Saudi Arabia, jubilantly describing a massacre of millions of non-Muslims by God, we would have a fit. We have quite properly linked the fundamentalist religious tracts of Islam with the intolerance they nurture, and it's time to remove the motes from our own eyes..."


The November Election:

Greg Palast: Black Americans Discovered By Democratic Party - Kerry Mentions the 'D' Word
"On Thursday afternoon, Kerry landed at the NAACP convention, stepped off his slow-moving campaign boat and announced that he was exploring for one million missing Black voters.
Let me explain -- because the New York Times won't. In the 2000 elections, 1.9 million ballots were cast which were never counted --'spoiled' is the technical term. Ballots don't spoil because they are left out of the fridge. There's always a technical reason: a stray mark, or my favorite, from Gadsden County, Florida, writing in Al Gore's name instead of checking a box..."

First, two of its neighbors, now Iran itself:

Sunday Herald: Regime change in Iran now in Bush's sights
"President George Bush has promised that if re-elected in November he will make regime change in Iran his new target.
Bush named Iran as part of the Axis of Evil along with North Korea and Iraq almost three years ago. A US government official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said that military action would not be overt in changing Iran, but rather that the US would work to stir revolts in the country and hope to topple the current conservative religious leadership.
The official said: 'If George Bush is re-elected there will be much more intervention in the internal affairs of Iran.'
The Iranian government announced this weekend that it had successfully eradicated all al-Qaeda cells operating in the country, but the statement comes as leaked reports from the US September 11 Commission show definite links between Iran and the September 11 terrorists.
The final report from the cross-party inquiry, which is examining the origins of the September 11 attacks, is believed to contain concrete evidence of contacts between al-Qaeda and Iran.
Time magazine reports that at least eight of the hijackers, who lived in the US for months before the attacks, passed through Iran between October 2000 and February 2001 apparently with help from the Iranian authorities..."

Iraq:

Sidney Morning Herald:
Iyad Allawi shot inmates in cold blood, say witnesses
"Iyad Allawi, the new Prime Minister of Iraq, pulled a pistol and executed as many as six suspected insurgents at a Baghdad police station, just days before Washington handed control of the country to his interim government, according to two people who allege they witnessed the killings..."

AFP: Senior Sunni cleric calls for holy war against US forces in Iraq

The Independent (UK) - The Damning Evidence
"Government witnesses knew September dossier was unsafe - but did not tell Hutton... Crucial doubts about Iraq's ability to produce chemical weapons were withheld from two inquiries which examined the Government's case for war..."

The Independent (UK) - Attorney General warned Blair on legality of war
"Tony Blair was warned before the Iraq war by the Attorney General, Lord Goldsmith, that a UN court could rule Britain's invasion unlawful, The Independent on Sunday has learnt.
The warning was in Lord Goldsmith's so far undisclosed legal opinion from 7 March last year, less than two weeks before the conflict began. Fearing that the International Court of Justice could rule it was illegal to go to war without the express authority of the UN Security Council, the Attorney General put senior barristers and international legal experts on standby to help to prepare the Government's defence if needed, legal sources said..."

Robert Fisk: Why Iraq's Booksellers Want the Freedom to Censor


Campaign Finance, DeLay Style:

AP: Enron E - Mail a Window on Political Money
"In only a few e-mails, Enron employees laid bare the reality of politics: the money trail from companies seeking favors from lawmakers with the power to grant them.
The e-mails circulated among Enron officials in 2000 and 2001, before the collapse of the Houston energy company, are under review by the House ethics committee, which is considering whether to investigate the fund-raising activities of the No. 2 leader in the House, Rep. Tom DeLay, R-Texas..."

The Media: Watchdog or Lapdog?

Orville Schell: Why the Press Failed
"When, on May 26, 2004, the editors of the New York Times published a mea culpa for the paper's one-sided reporting on weapons of mass destruction and the Iraq war, they admitted to 'a number of instances of coverage that was not as rigorous as it should have been.' They also commented that they had since come to 'wish we had been more aggressive in re-examining claims' made by the Bush Administration. But we are still left to wonder why the Times, like many other major media outlets in this country, was so lacking in skepticism toward administration rationales for war? How could such a poorly thought through policy, based on spurious exile intelligence sources, have been so blithely accepted, even embraced, by so many members of the media? In short, what happened to the press's vaunted role, so carefully spelled out by the Founding Fathers, as a skeptical "watchdog" over government?"

Iraq:

AP: Bremer May Testify on Iraq Prisoner Abuse
"Despite a number of hearings and media revelations in the months since the abuse scandal broke, questions linger about the extent of wrongdoing at U.S. military prisons, how it happened and who should be held accountable.
Before the Senate goes into recess next week, Warner wants Bremer to testify at a public hearing. Warner spoke to reporters after his committee had a private, classified briefing on the status of several Defense Department investigations into abuse stand. He gave no further details on what new allegations came up during the briefing. But just this week, the Red Cross said the United States might be hiding detainees in lockups around the world that the group's representatives have not visited. The Pentagon denies the charge. The CIA has declined comment on whether it may be holding terrorism suspects at foreign locations..."

Robert Fisk: Rebels Try to Isolate 'Puppets'


Groupthink on Pre-War Intelligence:

Barbara Ehrenreich: All Together Now


The November Election:

NY Times Editorial: Onward G.O.P. Soldiers
"The Bush-Cheney campaign is buttonholing Christian churches nationwide to serve as virtual party precincts in the Republican drive to turn out voters in November. The campaign has sent congregation volunteers marching orders - a schedule of 22 'duties,' beginning with the submission of local church membership directories to party headquarters, the better to compare them with voter registration lists.
The Bush team maintains that this ham-handed proselytizing is legal and somehow nonpartisan. That is hard to comprehend, given that other 'duties' for pro-Bush volunteers include lobbying congregation groups to talk up the Bush-Cheney ticket and producing 'voters' guides' on hot issues. Ministers are being pressed to create registration drives and speak out about 'all Christians needing to vote.'
Churches have been a favorite campaign stop for political candidates throughout the nation's history. But this crude initiative crosses the line that separates organized religion from organized political parties. Last month, after Republican workers began soliciting hundreds of 'friendly congregations' in the swing state of Pennsylvania, the Internal Revenue Service sent out a blunt warning to political leaders that they could cost churches their tax-exempt status by enlisting them in transparent partisanship.
The Bush team's strategy disrespects religion as much as it does democratic ideals. Churchgoers are entitled to a little sanctuary from politicians."

Pre-War Intelligence:

NY Times: Bush and C.I.A. Won't Release Paper on Prewar Intelligence
"The White House and the Central Intelligence Agency have refused to give the Senate Intelligence Committee a one-page summary of prewar intelligence in Iraq prepared for President Bush that contains few of the qualifiers and none of the dissents spelled out in longer intelligence reviews, according to Congressional officials. Senate Democrats claim that the document could help clear up exactly what intelligence agencies told Mr. Bush about Iraq's illicit weapons. The administration and the C.I.A. say the White House is protected by executive privilege, and Republicans on the committee dismissed the Democrats' argument that the summary was significant..."

Ray McGovern: Corrupted Intelligence
"...The Washington Times lead story on July 10 began: 'Flawed intelligence led the United States to invade Iraq was the fault of the US intelligence community...a report by the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence concluded yesterday.' From the other end of the political spectrum, David Corn of The Nation led his own report with, 'The United States went to war on the basis of false claims.'
Not so. This is precisely the spin that the Bush administration wants to give to the Senate report; i. e., that the president was misled; that his decision for war was based on spurious intelligence about non-existent weapons of mass destruction.
But the president’s decision for war had little to do with intelligence on Iraqi weapons of mass destruction. It had everything to do with the administration’s determination to gain control of strategic, oil-rich Iraq, implant an enduring military presence there, and — not incidentally — eliminate any possible threat from Iraq to Israel’s security.
These, of course, are not the reasons given to justify placing U.S. troops in harm's way, but even the most circumspect senior officials have had unguarded moments of candor. For example, when asked in May 2003 why North Korea was being treated differently from Iraq, Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz responded, 'Let’s look at it simply…The country (Iraq) swims on a sea of oil.'
And basking in the glory of 'Mission Accomplished' shortly after Baghdad had been taken, Wolfowitz admitted that the focus on weapons of mass destruction to justify the attack on Iraq was 'for bureaucratic reasons.' It was, he added, 'the one reason everyone could agree on' — meaning, of course, the one that could successfully sell the war to Congress and the American people.
The Israel factor? In another moment of unusual candor—this one before the war—Philip Zelikow, a member of the President’s Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board from 2001 to 2003 (and now executive director of the 9/11 commission), pointed to the danger that Iraq posed to Israel as 'the unstated threat—a threat that dare not speak its name…because it is not a popular sell'..."

Robert Scheer: Fact of the Matter Is That Facts Didn't Matter

NY Times: Chalabi Informant Deleted from Senate Iraq Report


War Profiteering in the So-Called War on Terror:

LA Times: Advocates of War Now Profit From Iraq's Reconstruction
"In the months and years leading up to the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq, they marched together in the vanguard of those who advocated war. As lobbyists, public relations counselors and confidential advisors to senior federal officials, they warned against Iraqi weapons of mass destruction, praised exiled leader Ahmad Chalabi, and argued that toppling Saddam Hussein was a matter of national security and moral duty. Now, as fighting continues in Iraq, they are collecting tens of thousands of dollars in fees for helping business clients pursue federal contracts and other financial opportunities in Iraq. For instance, a former Senate aide who helped get U.S. funds for anti-Hussein exiles who are now active in Iraqi affairs has a $175,000 deal to advise Romania on winning business in Iraq and other matters..."


The November Election:

AP: Report: Touchscreen Voting Flawed in Florida

Steve Weissman: Whose Coup in America?

William Rivers Pitt: Only Cowards Cancel Elections

NY Times: Antiwar Group Says Its Ad Is Rejected by Clear Channel


Iraq:

Robert Fisk: A History Lesson in Iraq

Business Ethics:

The Washington PostGE Lobbyists Mold Tax Bill
"No company in the nation had more to lose than General Electric Co. when the World Trade Organization decreed in 2002 that U.S. tax laws violated international treaties. The multinational conglomerate was saving hundreds of millions of dollars a year in taxes from the export subsidies that the United States had to discard. But in a two-year campaign, fueled as much by brains as political brawn, GE has shaped the legislation that would replace the old export-promotion law in ways that would allow it to save as much, if not more, in taxes, according to both GE lobbyists and congressional aides. In pursuing its financial interest, the company may also have turned the U.S. corporate tax code away from domestic manufacturing and toward expansion of operations abroad..."

The So-Called War on Terror:

ABC News (AUS) - US has secret prisons
"The United States is holding terrorism suspects in more than two dozen detention centres worldwide, about half of which operate in total secrecy, according to a new human rights report...
...[The director of the group's US law and security program, Deborah Pearlstein] says multiple sources report US detention centres in, among other places, Kohat in Pakistan near the border with Afghanistan, on the Indian Ocean island of Diego Garcia and at Al Jafr prison in Jordan, where the group said the CIA had an interrogation facility..."

Your Media: Watchdog or Lapdog?

The Guardian (UK) - Murdoch accused over TV news 'bias' in new documentary 'Outfoxed'
"The documentary, a fast-paced montage of clips from the channel and interviews with former employees and media experts, portrays a television news station where editorial positions are handed down from on high in a daily briefing note and presenters are encouraged to accentuate points that might be helpful to the Bush administration. According to a former Fox contributor, one such note concerning presentation of the latest news from Iraq said: 'Remember when you're writing about this, it's all good. Don't write about the number of dead ... Keep it positive. Emphasise all the good we're doing.'..."

Finally, a step in the right direction:

The Independent (UK) - US moves to cut off aid to Uzbekistan
"Uzbekistan, whose leader famously had a jailed opponent boiled to death, is to lose the bulk of its American aid because of its human rights abuses, prompting calls for Britain and the European Union to follow suit. The United States plans to take the unprecedented step of cutting all military aid and some economic assistance, worth $18m a year, to punish the central Asian state for its harsh policies aimed at stamping out political dissent...
...The US has been criticised for allowing its military agenda to appear to be driving relations with Uzbekistan rather than issues of democratisation and reform, which has only encouraged Mr Karimov to continue to ride roughshod over human rights. Britain's ambassador to Uzbekistan, Craig Murray, has been in the forefront of attacks on Mr Karimov. Mr Murray, who has been censured by the Foreign office for his public criticisms of Mr Karimov, has publicly highlighted the contradiction between US support for the Uzbek regime and its invasion of Iraq for similar human rights abuses."

The Failure of Prewar Intelligence:

The Guardian (UK) - The selection trail
"The Senate investigation of pre-war intelligence repeated the mistakes it was designed to address"

In Europe:

The Independent (UK) - Woman arrested for inventing racist attack
"A young woman who claimed to have been the victim of a horrific anti-Semitic attack on a suburban train near Paris was arrested last night after admitting she had invented the entire episode..."

AIDS and the US Pharma Industry:

The Guardian (UK) - France accuses US of Aids blackmail
"America was yesterday accused by France of blackmailing developing countries into giving up their right to produce cheap drugs for Aids victims.
In a move that may strain already tense relations between the two countries, the French president, Jacques Chirac, said there existed a real problem of favourable trade deals being dangled before poor nations in return for those countries halting production of life-saving generic drugs.
These cheap drugs compete with identical but more expensive patented varieties made by the world's largest pharmaceutical companies.
'Making certain countries drop these measures in the framework of bilateral trade negotiations would be tantamount to blackmail, since what is the point of starting treatment without any guarantee of having quality and affordable drugs in the long term?' Mr Chirac wrote in a statement that was read to the International Aids conference in Bangkok yesterday..."

Intelligence Failure:

Doubts on Informant Deleted in Senate Text
"Among the passages deleted from the public version of the Senate Intelligence Committee's report on Iraq is a detailed assessment that casts doubt on the credibility of an Iraqi defector whose claims about Iraq's mobile biological weapons laboratories have been discredited, according to government officials. His name was kept secret because he is still working for British intelligence, they said..."

Misleading Congress on the Cost of Medicare Legislation:

NY Times Editorial: The Foster Affair
"If subverting informed decision-making were illegal, Thomas Scully, the Bush administration's former top Medicare official, would be in trouble. The Health and Human Services Department reported last week that before the vote on the huge Medicare reform bill last November, Mr. Scully threatened to fire the agency's chief actuary, Richard Foster, if he released estimates to Congress showing that the bill could cost as much as 50 percent more than the White House had let on.
But the report said that Mr. Scully had broken no law. Moreover, because he is no longer with Medicare - he now lobbies for drug companies - he faces no disciplinary action. The Bush administration would no doubt love to have the issue end there. But Congress should not allow that. Ordinary citizens and their representatives have a right to be informed about public policy. The White House cannot continue to get away with treating Congress as some pesky organization with which it needn't share information..."

Enron & House Majority Leader Tom DeLay:

Paul Krugman: Machine at Work
"If Enron hadn't collapsed, we might still have only circumstantial evidence that energy companies artificially drove up prices during California's electricity crisis. Because of that collapse, we have direct evidence in the form of the now-infamous Enron tapes - although the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission and the Justice Department tried to prevent their release.
Now, e-mail and other Enron documents are revealing why Tom DeLay, the House majority leader, is one of the most powerful men in America..."

The Feds on Health: more patented drugs are the solution, not diet, or exercise:

NY Times: Experts Set a Lower Low for Cholesterol Levels

The Envionment:

NY Times: Bush Seeks Shift in Logging Rules
"The Bush administration on Monday proposed scuttling a rule from the Clinton administration that put nearly 60 million acres of national forest largely off limits to logging, mining or other development in favor of a new system that would leave it to governors to seek greater - or fewer - strictures on road construction in forests..."

The November Election:

The question here, is if these plans become the first step in a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Newsweek: Election Day Worries
"American counterterrorism officials, citing what they call 'alarming' intelligence about a possible Qaeda strike inside the United States this fall, are reviewing a proposal that could allow for the postponement of the November presidential election in the event of such an attack, NEWSWEEK has learned.
The prospect that Al Qaeda might seek to disrupt the U.S. election was a major factor behind last week's terror warning by Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge. Ridge and other counterterrorism officials concede they have no intel about any specific plots. But the success of March's Madrid railway bombings in influencing the Spanish elections—as well as intercepted 'chatter' among Qaeda operatives—has led analysts to conclude 'they want to interfere with the elections,' says one official.
As a result, sources tell NEWSWEEK, Ridge's department last week asked the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel to analyze what legal steps would be needed to permit the postponement of the election were an attack to take place..."

Reuters: U.S. Mulling How to Delay Nov. Vote in Case of Attack

AP: Voting official seeks process for canceling Election Day over terrorism

William Rivers Pitt: The Push

Some Good News for Florida Voters:

The Miami Herald: State drops felon-voter list
"Florida election officials conceded an enormous mistake Saturday and abandoned the controversial list the state was using to remove convicted felons from the voter rolls.
After defending the list against mounting criticism as late as Friday evening, the state made an about-face. The reason: a flaw in a database that failed to capture most felons who classified themselves as Hispanic.
Secretary of State Glenda Hood announced at 1 p.m. Saturday that an ''unintentional and unforeseen discrepancy . . . related to Hispanic classification'' had forced the agency to eliminate the entire list from further consideration this year.
The announcement was an embarrassment for top state officials from Gov. Jeb Bush down, and it was enthusiastically lauded by voting rights advocates -- and those on the list..."

DeLay & Corporate Money in State Elections:

Washington Post: DeLay's corporate fundraising investigated
"In May 2001, Enron's top lobbyists in Washington advised the company chairman that then-House Majority Whip Tom DeLay (R-Tex.) was pressing for a $100,000 contribution to his political action committee, in addition to the $250,000 the company had already pledged to the Republican Party that year. DeLay requested that the new donation come from 'a combination of corporate and personal money from Enron's executives,' with the understanding that it would be partly spent on 'the redistricting effort in Texas,' said the e-mail to Kenneth L. Lay from lobbyists Rick Shapiro and Linda Robertson. The e-mail, which surfaced in a subsequent federal probe of Houston-based Enron, is one of at least a dozen documents obtained by The Washington Post that show DeLay and his associates directed money from corporations and Washington lobbyists to Republican campaign coffers in Texas in 2001 and 2002 as part of a plan to redraw the state's congressional districts..."

Iraq:

AP: Iraq Insurgency Larger Than Thought
"Contrary to U.S. government claims, the insurgency in Iraq is led by well-armed Sunnis angry about losing power, not foreign fighters, and is far larger than previously thought, American military officials say. The officials told The Associated Press the guerrillas can call on loyalists to boost their forces to as high as 20,000 and have enough popular support among nationalist Iraqis angered by the presence of U.S. troops that they cannot be militarily defeated..."

Pre-War Intelligence:

LA Times: CIA Was Warned About Defector's Unreliability
"The only American who met a now-discredited Iraqi defector codenamed 'Curveball' repeatedly warned the CIA before the war that the Baghdad engineer appeared to be an alcoholic and that his dramatic claims that Saddam Hussein had built a secret fleet of mobile germ weapons factories were not reliable. In response, the deputy director of the CIA's Iraqi weapons of mass destruction task force - part of the agency's counter-proliferation unit - suggested in a Feb. 4, 2003, e-mail that such doubts were not welcome at the intelligence agency..."

The So-Called War on Terror:

LA Times: Pentagon Reportedly Aimed to Hold Detainees in Secret
"Despite pledging yearly reviews for all prisoners held by the U.S. military at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, Pentagon officials tentatively agreed during a high-level meeting last month to deny that process to some detainees and to keep their existence secret 'for intelligence reasons,' senior defense officials said Thursday.
Under the proposal, some prisoners would in effect be kept off public records and away from the scrutiny of lawyers and judges..."

Intelligence Failure or Deliberate Deception?

NY Times: Report Says Key Assertions Leading to War Were Wrong
"In a long-awaited report that goes to the heart of President Bush's rationale for going to war and is certain to intensify political debate on Iraq, the committee said that prewar assessments of Saddam Hussein's supposed arsenal of chemical and biological weapons, and his desire to have nuclear weapons, were wildly off the mark.
'Today, we know these assessments were wrong, and as our inquiry will show, they were also unreasonable and largely unsupported by the available intelligence,' Senator Pat Roberts, the Kansas Republican who heads the panel, said at a briefing on the 511-page report. The report zeroed in on the crucial October 2002 national intelligence estimate in which analysts concluded that Iraq already had chemical and biological weapons and was reconstituting its nuclear program. 'Now, these are very emphatic statements,' Mr. Roberts said. 'Simply put, they were not supported by the intelligence which the community supplied to the committee.'...
...[Sen. John D. Rockefeller:] 'The fact is that the administration at all levels, and to some extent us, used bad information to bolster its case for war. And we in Congress would not have authorized that war — we would NOT have authorized that war — with 75 votes if we knew what we know now'..."

Full text of the report is here as a PDF.

Israel / Palestine

NY Times: World Court Says Israeli Barrier Violates International Law
"Thomas Buergenthal, an American, was the only dissenter among the 15 judges..."
Hardly a surprise.

Nukes and the Environment:

Court Deals Blow to Effort to Bury Nuclear Waste in Nevada: "The government's 17-year effort to bury nuclear waste at Yucca Mountain in Nevada suffered a significant setback today when a federal appeals court said that the rules on radiation leaks could not be limited to the site's first 10,000 years, as the Environmental Protection Agency had decided. The Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, ruling in a case brought by the State of Nevada and environmental groups, did not say what the planning period should be, but it quoted a National Academy of Sciences report that said a million years was possible. A 1992 law that committed the country to burying the waste required the government to follow the advice of the National Academy, the court ruled..."

The November Election:

Paul Krugman: Health Versus Wealth

Kenny-Boy & W:

Greg Palast: GIVE IT BACK, GEORGE: THE LAY LOOT THAT BOUGHT THE WHITE HOUSE
"OK now, Mr. President, give it back - the millions stuffed in the pockets of the Republican campaign kitty stolen from his Enron retirees. And what else did Ken Lay buy with the money stolen from California electricity customers? Answer: the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission. Just before George Bush moved to Washington, Kenny-Boy handed his hand-picked president-to-be the name of the man Ken wanted as Chairman of the commission charged with investigating Enron's thievery. In a heartbeat, George Bush appointed Ken's boy, Pat Wood..."

The So-Called War on Terror:

The New Republic: July Surprise?
"This spring, the administration significantly increased its pressure on Pakistan to kill or capture Osama bin Laden, his deputy, Ayman Al Zawahiri, or the Taliban's Mullah Mohammed Omar, all of whom are believed to be hiding in the lawless tribal areas of Pakistan. A succession of high-level American officials--from outgoing CIA Director George Tenet to Secretary of State Colin Powell to Assistant Secretary of State Christina Rocca to State Department counterterrorism chief Cofer Black to a top CIA South Asia official--have visited Pakistan in recent months to urge General Pervez Musharraf's government to do more in the war on terrorism. In April, Zalmay Khalilzad, the American ambassador to Afghanistan, publicly chided the Pakistanis for providing a 'sanctuary' for Al Qaeda and Taliban forces crossing the Afghan border. 'The problem has not been solved and needs to be solved, the sooner the better,' he said. This public pressure would be appropriate, even laudable, had it not been accompanied by an unseemly private insistence that the Pakistanis deliver these high-value targets (HVTs) before Americans go to the polls in November..."

NY Times: Effort to Curb Scope of Antiterrorism Law Falls Short
"An effort to bar the government from demanding records from libraries and booksellers in some terrorism investigations fell one vote short of passage in the House on Thursday after a late burst of lobbying prompted nine Republicans to switch their votes. The vote, a 210 to 210 deadlock, amounted to a referendum on the antiterrorism law known as the USA Patriot Act and reflected deep divisions in Congress over whether the law undercuts civil liberties. Under House rules, the tie vote meant the measure was defeated. The outcome led to angry recriminations from House Democrats, who accused Republicans of 'vote-rigging' by holding the vote open for an extra 23 minutes to get enough colleagues to switch votes..."

The Long Arm of the Law Catches Up With Kenny Boy:

William Rivers Pitt: Kenny-Boy and George

Iraq:

Steve Weissman: Will Rummy Rat on Saddam?

LA Times: Pentagon Deputy's Probes in Iraq Weren't Authorized, Officials Say
"A senior Defense Department official conducted unauthorized investigations of Iraq reconstruction efforts and used their results to push for lucrative contracts for friends and their business clients, according to current and former Pentagon officials and documents..."

Picking Judges:

Knight-Ridder: Senate votes to confirm controversial judicial nominee
"The Senate voted 51-46 Tuesday to confirm President Bush's appointment to a federal judgeship of an Arkansas attorney who's written publicly that married women must be subordinate to their husbands..."

The So-Called War on Terror:

The Independent (UK) - Saudis freed Britons in a secret swap of prisoners
"Six Britons convicted on terrorism charges in Saudi Arabia were released last year as part of a secret three-way deal in which the US set free a number of Saudi prisoners being held at Guantanamo Bay. The deal was brokered to obtain Saudi support for the invasion of Iraq.
Diplomatic and intelligence sources have confirmed to The Independent that the Britons, convicted of a fatal car-bombing, were released last August after the US returned five Saudi prisoners, at least two of whom were believed to have trained in al-Qa'ida camps.
At the time, the release of the Saudis was opposed by the Pentagon and the CIA. But the joint releases were subsequently presented as diplomatic triumphs by both the British and Saudi governments..."

Iraq:

The Independent (UK) - Legality of Iraq occupation 'flawed'
"The senior Foreign Office lawyer who resigned after ministers ignored her advice that the war in Iraq was illegal has issued a damning legal critique of the occupation, claiming that the alleged abuse of prisoners 'could amount to war crimes'.
In her first newspaper interview since her resignation, Elizabeth Wilmshurst, the former deputy legal adviser to the Foreign Office, said that the basis for going to war should always be based on 'facts' rather than an 'assertion' about an 'imminent threat'. Ms Wilmshurst said 'it could be alleged that the use of force in Iraq was aggression' while 'the kinds of abusive treatment of Iraqi prisoners that have been alleged could amount to war crimes'..."

Financial Times: Former British Ambassador to UN: No WMD Stockpiles in Iraq

Le Monde (F) - Spicer's Irresistible Ascension in Baghdad's Security Eldorado
"There are some people at least for whom Iraq is an Eldorado, a promised land. While Iraqis and Americans are trapped by violence, political mistakes and impasses, an army without the name weaves its web. Private security companies have about 20,000 "soldiers" in Iraq, paid 5 to 20 times what soldiers make in their national armies..."

Washington D.C.:

Rep. Henry Waxman: Free Pass From Congress
"In the past four years there has been an abrupt reversal in Congress's approach to oversight. During the Clinton administration, Congress spent millions of tax dollars probing alleged White House wrongdoing. There was no accusation too minor to explore, no demand on the administration too intrusive to make..."

The Register (UK) - Hatch's Induce Act comes under fire
"US Congressman Rick Boucher took up arms against the Inducing Infringement of Copyrights Act bill, being brought before Congress right now, in a website interview at Inside Digital Media this week...
...'I will work against this act. It is very poorly defined and it could target just about anyone. Even a university giving its students broadband access, could, under the current wording, be construed as inducing a copyright breach.'
'Anyone making ANY kind of recording device, even an innocent recorder that has many other fair uses, could be in breach of this law just for making that technology available. Frankly there is no need for the statute at all.'"

W.M.D. Intelligence - Now the Other Shoe Drops

NY Times: C.I.A. Held Back Iraqi Arms Data, U.S. Officials Say
"The Central Intelligence Agency was told by relatives of Iraqi scientists before the war that Baghdad's programs to develop unconventional weapons had been abandoned, but the C.I.A. failed to give that information to President Bush, even as he publicly warned of the threat posed by Saddam Hussein's illicit weapons, according to government officials.
The existence of a secret prewar C.I.A. operation to debrief relatives of Iraqi scientists - and the agency's failure to give their statements to the president and other policymakers - has been uncovered by the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence. The panel has been investigating the government's handling of prewar intelligence on Iraq's unconventional weapons and plans to release a wide-ranging report this week on the first phase of its inquiry. The report is expected to contain a scathing indictment of the C.I.A. and its leaders for failing to recognize that the evidence they had collected did not justify their assessment that Mr. Hussein had illicit weapons..."

The So-Called War on Terror:

NY Times Editorial: Ill-Serving Those Who Serve
"The Pentagon's decision to press 5,600 honorably discharged soldiers back into service, mainly in Iraq and Afghanistan, is the latest example of President Bush's refusal to face the true costs of pre-emptive war. As with other stopgap measures to paper over the poor planning of the invasion and occupation of Iraq, this one demands more from those who have already given the most: volunteer soldiers and their families. And because this call-up comes uncomfortably close to conscription, it highlights more than other emergency deployments the callousness of the administration's failure to budget for an adequate number of ground troops..."

Psy-Ops in the Iraq War:

LA Times: Army Stage-Managed Fall of Hussein Statue
"The Army's internal study of the war in Iraq criticizes some efforts by its own psychological operations units, but one spur-of-the-moment effort last year produced the most memorable image of the invasion.
As the Iraqi regime was collapsing on April 9, 2003, Marines converged on Firdos Square in central Baghdad, site of an enormous statue of Saddam Hussein. It was a Marine colonel - not joyous Iraqi civilians, as was widely assumed from the TV images - who decided to topple the statue, the Army report said. And it was a quick-thinking Army psychological operations team that made it appear to be a spontaneous Iraqi undertaking.
After the colonel - who was not named in the report - selected the statue as a 'target of opportunity,' the psychological team used loudspeakers to encourage Iraqi civilians to assist, according to an account by a unit member..."

The Economy:

Paul Krugman: Bye-Bye, Bush Boom
"When does optimism - the Bush campaign's favorite word these days - become an inability to face facts? On Friday, President Bush insisted that a seriously disappointing jobs report, which fell far short of the pre-announcement hype, was good news: 'We're witnessing steady growth, steady growth. And that's important. We don't need boom-or-bust-type growth.'
But Mr. Bush has already presided over a bust. For the first time since 1932, employment is lower in the summer of a presidential election year than it was on the previous Inauguration Day. Americans badly need a boom to make up the lost ground. And we're not getting it.
When March's numbers came in much better than expected, I cautioned readers not to make too much of one good month. Similarly, we shouldn't make too much of June's disappointment. The question is whether, taking a longer perspective, the economy is performing well. And the answer is no.
If you want a single number that tells the story, it's the percentage of adults who have jobs. When Mr. Bush took office, that number stood at 64.4. By last August it had fallen to 62.2 percent. In June, the number was 62.3. That is, during Mr. Bush's first 30 months, the job situation deteriorated drastically. Last summer it stabilized, and since then it may have improved slightly. But jobs are still very scarce, with little relief in sight.
Bush campaign ads boast that 1.5 million jobs were added in the last 10 months, as if that were a remarkable achievement. It isn't..."

The War on Civil Liberties:

NY Times: You've Got Mail (and Court Says Others Can Read It)
"When everything is working right, an e-mail message appears to zip instantaneously from the sender to the recipient's inbox. But in reality, most messages make several momentary stops as they are processed by various computers en route to their destination.
Those short stops may make no difference to the users, but they make an enormous difference to the privacy that e-mail is accorded under federal law. Last week a federal appeals court in Boston ruled that federal wiretap laws do not apply to e-mail messages if they are stored, even for a millisecond, on the computers of the Internet providers that process them - meaning that it can be legal for the government or others to read such messages without a court order.
The ruling was a surprise to many people, because in 1986 Congress specifically amended the wiretap laws to incorporate new technologies like e-mail..."

Doctor to the Power Addict:

NY Times: Doctor Is Dropped From Cheney's Medical Team
"Vice President Dick Cheney's personal doctor, who four years ago declared Mr. Cheney 'up to the task of the most sensitive public office' despite a history of heart disease, was battling an addiction to prescription drugs at the time and has recently been dropped from the vice president's medical team, according to officials at the hospital where he practiced. The doctor, Gary Malakoff of George Washington University Medical Center, had treated Mr. Cheney since 1995 and been a prominent spokesman on the vice president's health..."

Iraq:

Sunday Telegraph (UK) - Rumsfeld gave go-ahead for Abu Ghraib tactics, says general in charge
"The former head of the Abu Ghraib prison in Baghdad has for the first time accused the American Secretary of Defence, Donald Rumsfeld, of directly authorising Guantanamo Bay-style interrogation tactics.
Brig-Gen Janis Karpinski, who commanded the 800th Military Police Brigade, which is at the centre of the Abu Ghraib prisoner-abuse scandal, said that documents yet to be released by the Pentagon would show that Mr Rumsfeld personally approved the introduction of harsher conditions of detention in Iraq..."

The interview mentioned in the above story.

BBC: Israeli interrogators 'in Iraq':
"The US officer at the heart of the Abu Ghraib prison scandal says she has evidence that Israelis helped to interrogate Iraqis at another facility. Brig Gen Janis Karpinski told the BBC she met an Israeli working as an interrogator at a secret intelligence centre in Baghdad. A BBC reporter says it is the first time a senior US officer has suggested Israelis worked with the coalition.
The Israeli foreign ministry said the reports were completely untrue..."

Robert Fisk: So This is What They Call the New, 'Free' Iraq
"Americans hold Saddam Hussein. Americans ran the court in which he appeared. Americans censored the tapes of the hearing. Who do you think is running the country?"

King George and W.

Stephen Shalom: A King George quiz for July 4th

Greg Palast: Insurgents Attack King George - Iraq sovereignty: New Puppets on Old Strings

Business Ethics:

The New York Review of Books: The Truth About the Drug Companies

Voting in Florida:

Miami Herald: Florida Purges Valid Black Voters
"More than 2,100 Florida voters - many of them black Democrats -could be wrongly barred from voting in November because Tallahassee elections officials included them on a list of felons potentially ineligible to vote, a Herald investigation has found.
A Florida Division of Elections database lists more than 47,000 people the department said may be ineligible to vote because of felony records. The state is directing local elections offices to check the list and scrub felons from voter rolls.
But a Herald review shows that at least 2,119 of those names - including 547 in South Florida - shouldn't be on the list because their rights to vote were formally restored through the state's clemency process..."

Iraq:

Robert Fisk: U.S. Censors Saddam Coverage

Bush and Environmental Quality:

Sharon Lerner: Charlie Tuna: Unsafe At Any Speed
"The EPA and two doctors' groups have issued strong warnings about the dangers of eating mercury-laced fish. Then why is the White House working to loosen restrictions on mercury emissions from coal-burning power plants?"

Venezuela, the Oil State that Doesn't Bow to Bush:

Saul Landau: Buzz words and Venezuela
"For the white elite Chavez represents ugliness. The man with Indian and African features has committed the unpardonable sin: redistributing wealth. He increased the percentage of the budget that goes toward public health (8%) and education, although still not up to the level of developed countries. He also stopped subsidizing private schools where the wealthy send their kids.
Chavez received 59% of the vote in the 2000 presidential election by campaigning against the IMF model that has devastated the third world. He shares this anti neo-liberal view with President Nelson Kirchner of Argentina, Lula of Brazil and Bolivian peasant leader Evo Morales. Chavez stopped the privatization steamroller that would have delivered Venezuela’s social security funds to private brokers and the state’s universities to education entrepreneurs..."

The War on Civil Liberties, A.K.A. The War On Terror:

Washington Post Editorial: Derail E-Mail Snooping
"Imagine that your friendly local mail carrier, before delivering a letter for you, decides to steam it open and read its contents. An outrageous and illegal infringement on your privacy, obviously. But a federal appeals court in Boston has just permitted an Internet service provider to engage in exactly this kind of snooping when the message is sent in cyberspace rather than by snail mail. This ruling is an unnecessarily cramped parsing of a law that Congress meant to guard, not eviscerate, the privacy of communications. The Justice Department, whose prosecution of the ISP executive was thrown out by the appeals court, should seek a review of the ruling. If that doesn't work -- if the federal wiretapping law has been outpaced by the technology it was supposed to regulate -- Congress should quickly step in to fix the glitch..."

Leadership Change at the CIA:

Ray McGovern: Cheney Cat's Paw, Porter Goss, as CIA Director?
"There is, thankfully, a remnant of CIA professionals who still put objective analysis above political correctness and career advancement. Just when they thought there were no indignities left for them to suffer, they are shuddering again at press reports that Rep. Porter Goss (R-FL) may soon be their new boss.
That possibility conjures up a painful flashback for those of us who served as CIA analysts when Richard Nixon was president. Chalk it up to our naiveté, but we were taken aback when swashbuckling James Schlesinger, who followed Richard Helms as CIA director, announced on arrival, 'I am here to see that you guys don't screw Richard Nixon!' To underscore his point, Schlesinger told us he would be reporting directly to White House political adviser Bob Haldeman (Nixon's Karl Rove) and not to National Security Adviser Henry Kissinger.
No doubt Goss would be more discreet in showing his hand, but his appointment as director would be the ultimate in politicization. He has long shown himself to be under the spell of Vice President Dick Cheney, and would likely report primarily to him and to White House political adviser Karl Rove rather than to National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice.
Goss would almost certainly follow lame-duck director George Tenet's practice of reading to the president in the morning and become an integral part of the 'White House team.' The team-membership phenomenon is particularly disquieting.
If the failure-prone experience of the past few years has told us anything, it is that being a 'team member' in good standing is the kiss of death for the CIA director's primary role of 'telling it like it is' to the president and his senior advisers. It was a painful moment of truth when former Speaker Newt..."

Iraq:

Robert Fisk: Saddam: Confused? Shadow of His Old Self? Hardly

The So-Called War On Terror:

LA Times: CIA Felt Pressure to Alter Iraq Data, Author Says
"In the wake of the Sept. 11 attacks, CIA analysts were ordered repeatedly to redo intelligence assessments concluded that Al Qaeda had no operational ties to Iraq, according to a veteran CIA counter-terrorism official who has written a book that is sharply critical of the decision to go to war with Iraq.
Agency analysts never altered their conclusions, but saw the pressure to revisit their work as a clear indication that Bush administration officials were seeking a different answer regarding Iraq and Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, the CIA officer said in an interview with The Times..."

LA Times: Pentagon Alerted to Trouble in Ranks
"The Pentagon was warned repeatedly going back a decade that it was accepting military recruits with criminal histories and was too lenient with those already in uniform who exhibited violent or other troubling behavior.
Six studies prepared over 10 years by an outside expert at the Pentagon's request found that too little was being done to discipline lawbreakers in uniform or even identify problem recruits..."

Robert Fisk: 'Time for Bread and Circuses'
"Now it is time for bread and circuses. Keep the people distracted. Show them Saddam. Remind them what it used to be like. Make them grateful. Make Saddam pay. Show his face once more across the world so that his victims will think about the past, not the present. Charge him. Before the full majesty of Iraq's new 'democratic' law. And may George Bush win the next American election..."

NY Times: Ex-Occupation Aide Sees No Dent in 'Saddamists'
"More than a year of intensive efforts by the American military and the Central Intelligence Agency to destroy the insurgency in Iraq has failed to reduce the number of 'hard-core Saddamists' seeking to destroy the interim Iraqi government, a former senior official of the just-dissolved American-led occupation authority said in an interview on Thursday.
The senior official, speaking with a small group of reporters near the White House, said he was repeatedly 'disappointed we haven't had better insight into the command and control of the insurgents...' "

The Guardian (UK) - US sidles up to well-oiled autocracy
"President Aliyev junior launched a brutal crackdown on the political opposition immediately after his election, arresting hundreds and torturing many, according to human rights activists. Yet this month, with pictures from the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq undermining Washington's ability to criticise similar practices elsewhere, the Pentagon forged ahead with plans to increase its presence in the Caspian state.
US officials cite the important strategic and logistical role that the key state in the Caucasus, on the border with Iran, can play in the 'war on terror'. They are also open about the need to protect the £2bn oil pipeline set to carry a million barrels of Caspian oil daily to Turkey and the American market by late next year.
Washington is increasing to 50 the number of military advisers who are training Azerbaijani troops, while doubling its annual military aid package next year to nearly £13m. One European diplomat said the US was developing a 'permanent military presence by stealth'..."

George W. Bush's Critics:

Paul Krugman: Moore's Public Service
"And for all its flaws, 'Fahrenheit 9/11' performs an essential service. It would be a better movie if it didn't promote a few unproven conspiracy theories, but those theories aren't the reason why millions of people who aren't die-hard Bush-haters are flocking to see it. These people see the film to learn true stories they should have heard elsewhere, but didn't. Mr. Moore may not be considered respectable, but his film is a hit because the respectable media haven't been doing their job..."

The Economy:

If one wants to get a better picture of the employment situation than the one that the 'official unemployment rate' suggests, one really ought to count those workers who have given up looking for work. Similarly, those who are grossly under-employed should be counted in some way. They have, of necessity, settled for any employment after an unfruitful search for employment that would actually exploit their skills. When workers settle for less than they were earning previously, it reflects a downward pressure on wages, otherwise know as a depression. Has anyone dared to utter the 'D' word in the media?

NY Times: After Months of Gains, U.S. Job Growth Slows Sharply in June
"The American economy created far fewer jobs in June than it had in recent months, the Labor Department reported this morning, offering the first real reason to worry about the economic recovery in many months.
The economy added just 112,000 jobs last month, less than half the average monthly gain of the first five months of 2004 and far below what forecasters had expected. The unemployment rate held steady at 5.6 percent.
Perhaps most worrisome, average wages for production workers - about 80 percent of the workforce - grew more slowly in June than they had at any previous point this year and have increased considerably less than inflation has over the last year..."

Corporate Waste, Fraud & Abuse of Taxpayer Dollars:

NBC News: New Halliburton waste alleged
"The Pentagon has already awarded Halliburton Co., the controversial military contractor, deals worth up to $18 billion for its work in Iraq. But now former Halliburton insiders have come forward with new allegations of massive waste of taxpayer money.
Marie deYoung, a former Army chaplain who worked for Halliburton, was so upset by attacks on the company she e-mailed the CEO in December with a strategy on how to fight the 'political slurs.' But today, after five months inside Halliburton's operation in Kuwait, deYoung has radically changed her opinion. 'It's just a gravy train,' she said.
DeYoung audited accounts for Halliburton's subsidiary KBR. She claims there was no effort to hold down costs because all costs were passed on directly to taxpayers. She repeatedly complained to superiors of waste and fraud. The company's response, according to deYoung was: 'We can be as dumb and stupid as we want in the first year of a war, nobody's going to care.'
DeYoung produced documents detailing alleged waste even on routine services: $50,000 a month for soda, at $45 a case; $1 million a month to clean clothes - or $100 for each 15-pound bag of laundry..."

The So-Called War on Terror:

AP: Army Recalling 5, 674 Who Left Service
"For the first time in more than a decade, the Army is forcing thousands of former soldiers back into uniform, a reflection of the strain on the service of long campaigns in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Army officials on Wednesday announced that 5,674 former soldiers -- mostly people who recently left the service and have up-to-date skills in military policing, engineering, logistics, medicine or transportation -- will be assigned to National Guard and Reserve units that are scheduled to deploy to Iraq or Afghanistan. The first notifications are to be received July 6...."

LA Times Editorial: It's Called Democracy
"What gives the government the right to arrest you and imprison you indefinitely without offering a reason or opportunity to appeal? The answer, in the United States, is: Nothing gives the government that right. It is hard to see what is left of American freedom if the government has the authority to make anyone on its soil - citizen or noncitizen - disappear and then rule that no one can do anything about it.
Or so we once thought. But the Bush administration - whose convoluted memos on defining torture now rank with Bill Clinton's definition of sex - says Congress gave it exactly this power. And when was that? Soon after Sept. 11, 2001, Congress passed a two-line resolution authorizing the use of military force against 'nations, organizations or persons' engaged in terrorism. We would like to hear from any member who intended by this vote to repeal the Bill of Rights..."