SLAUGHTERHOUSE RULES
by Malik Isasis























So, the corporate media has decided they’ve built Obama up high enough on a pedestal to knock him down now. A whisper campaign by Hillary's surrogates has planted the idea that the corporate media hasn’t been tough on Obama. And on the night of the debate, Tim Russert acted as the meat-puppet shill he is and began race-baiting Obama by injecting Minister Louis Farrakhan of the Nation of Islam into the debate. Farrakhan an icon of hate for white punditry came out as a supporter for Obama. Russert all but demanded Obama denounce Farrakhan and everything that he stood for, although Obama had already denounced Farrakhan’s past rhetoric. Russert’s performance was like a comedian who has stayed on the stage for too long.

The white punditry, politicians and corporate media hate Farrakhan and use him to undermine anything involving the grievances of black folk. He is an easy target, like OJ Simpson, therefore a distraction. Farrakhan’s anti-Semitic rhetoric is just as ridiculous as the rightwing corporate evangelists Pat Robertson’s and Jerry Falwell’s blaming gays, liberals, ACLU, abortionists, and feminists for the Tsunami, Hurricane Katrina and the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 but somehow, they hang on to legitimacy and the corporate media is more than willing to give them a platform for the hate speech. And it just so happens that it is okay for Republican presidential candidate John McCain to court the late Jerry Farewell by speaking at his university in 2006. Will the corporate meat puppets use this against McCain? Probably, not.

The false narrative that the corporate media puts out is that Farrakhan has power. He has the minds and souls of millions of black folk, but you see that is only white supremacy thinking. Black folk don’t meet in a dark room and anoint leaders, actually it is the corporate media and government who take particular interests in Civil Rights activists and anoint them to the millions of black folk. So, once they anoint one, they can immediately begin to pin-the-tail-on-the-donkey of all of their hate. When the corporate media’s anointed black leader is humiliated, and discredited, he is used as a strawman to discredit the rest of the black population. It was done with Martin Luther King, Jr. Malcolm X, Jesse Jackson, and Al Sharpton. The latter two Civil Rights activists are still unable to live down their earlier missteps even as they have evolved. Again, white supremacy don’t allow growth, it is not in the interest of the corporate meat puppets to humanize, but demonize. This tactic has also been used internationally, against heads of states--it makes for easier subjugation.

Here are two articles on Farrakhan (1, 2). You come to your own conclusions on his worthiness of such attention.

Weight of Racism

Neocons, Repooblicans and the media whores they exploit would like us to believe that Farrakhan’s supposed racism is more destructive and is an immediate threat to the United States, or Israel—to white man, himself. Farrakhan does not have access to State resources to start wars, incarcerate those he hates, nor does he has access to the banking infrastructure to red line nor does he has access to any conglomerate media empires to promote endless propaganda. Lastly, none of the black people who are susceptible to Farrakhan’s message have access to the infrastructure to enforce his so-called racism.

If you were to invert the claims of the corporate shills and lobbyists, you’ll find the true culprits of racism.

Obama

Fox News is ODing on the Farrakhan narrative. The Flying Monkeys are making their shit bombs. Just as John Kerry in his 2004 was taken to the woodshed, the rightwing hate machine are beta-testing their attacks on Fox News. It’s just a matter of time before their narratives are falling out of the mouths of Tim Russert and the rest of the meat puppets at NBC, CNN, ABC and CBS.

If all else fails incite white fear.

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WHY THE WAR ON OBAMA
by Robert Parry, Consortium News



While some cynics still view Barack Obama’s appeal for “change” as empty rhetoric, it’s starting to dawn on Washington insiders that his ability to raise vast sums of money from nearly one million mostly small donors could shake the grip that special-interest money has long held over the U.S. government.

This spreading realization that Obama’s political movement might represent a more revolutionary change than previously understood is sparking a deepening resistance among defenders of the status quo – and prompting harsher attacks on Obama.

Right now, the front line for the Washington Establishment is Hillary Clinton’s struggling presidential campaign, which has been stunned by Obama’s political skills as well as his extraordinary ability to raise money over the Internet. Obama’s grassroots donations have negated Clinton’s prodigious fundraising advantage with big donors.

Powerful lobbies – from AIPAC to representatives of military and other industries – also are recognizing the value of keeping their dominance over campaign cash from getting diluted by Obama’s deep reservoir of small donors. It’s in their direct interest to dent Obama’s momentum and demoralize his rank-and-file supporters as soon as possible.

So, neoconservatives and other ideological movements – heavily dependent on grants from the same special interests – are now joining with the Clinton campaign to tear down Obama by depicting him as unpatriotic, un-vetted, possibly a “closet Muslim.”

On Feb. 25, the New York Times’ new neocon columnist William Kristol attacked Obama’s patriotism by citing the Illinois senator decision to stop wearing an American flag lapel pin because, Obama said, he saw how George W. Bush was exploiting the flag to stampede the nation toward war with Iraq.

“You know, the truth is that right after 9/11, I had a pin,” Obama said when asked about his lack of a flag pin in October 2007. “As we’re talking about the Iraq War, that became a substitute for I think true patriotism, which is speaking out on issues that are of importance to our national security, I decided I won’t wear that pin on my chest.”

In a column entitled “It’s All About Him,” Kristol mocked this explanation as an example of both Obama’s dubious claim to patriotism and his pomposity.

“Leaving aside the claim that ‘speaking out on issues’ constitutes true patriotism,” Kristol wrote. “What’s striking is that Obama couldn’t resist a grandiose explanation. … Moral vanity prevailed. He wanted to explain that he was too good – too patriotic! – to wear a flag pin on his chest.”

Kristol then turned on Michelle Obama for her comment about how excited she was by the public outpouring for political change that has surrounded her husband’s campaign: “For the first time in my adult lifetime, I’m really proud of my country,” she said.

Kristol wrote: “Can it really be the case that nothing the U.S. achieved since [the mid-1980s] has made her proud? Apparently.” [NYT, Feb. 25, 2008]

Clinton Money Woes

Meanwhile, the Clinton campaign – having burned through $130 million and needing a $5 million emergency loan from the Clintons’ personal finances – has gone hat in hand to some of the special interests with a strong stake in protecting the Washington status quo.

For instance, campaign finance director Jonathan Mantz met with donors from the American Israel Public Affairs Committee in a Washington hotel lobby when these pro-Israel AIPAC supporters were in town for other business, the Wall Street Journal reported on Feb. 14.

The approach made sense because these pro-Israeli lobbyists remain wary of Obama’s advocacy of high-level talks with Iran, his opposition to the Iraq War, and his skimpier record of supporting Israel when compared with Hillary Clinton or John McCain.

One former Israeli official told me that the Israeli government feels it can work with Obama, Clinton or McCain, but that the Israeli lobby in the United States is adamantly opposed to Obama, preferring Clinton because “they own her.” The ex-official said the lobby has some concern, too, with McCain because of his independent streak.

Like other powerful lobbies, AIPAC is threatened by Obama’s ability to raise large sums of money from everyday Americans, thus reducing the need of Washington politicians to hold out their tin cups to AIPAC’s legendary network of wealthy donors. [For details, see Consortiumnews.com’s “How Far Will the Clintons Go?”]

After having lost 11 consecutive contests, the Clinton campaign is now turning to what its “kitchen sink” strategy of throwing whatever it has at Obama.

Over the past few weeks, Clinton surrogates have been spreading rumors about Obama’s association with people with Arab names and contributions he has received from 1970s-era student radicals (though they’re now gray-haired, middle-class professionals). Some are packaging the attacks under the title, “The Obama Scandals.”

On Feb. 26, Internet gossip Matt Drudge reported that a Clinton staffer e-mailed a photo taken of Obama during a 2006 trip to Kenya when he was dressed in a turban and other traditional garb of a Somali Elder. That reinforced earlier rumors spread about Obama as a secret Muslim, though he has long belonged to a Christian church in Chicago.

Obama’s campaign manager David Plouffe denounced the Clinton campaign for circulating the photo with the goal of “shameful offensive fear-mongering.”

The Clinton campaign denied knowledge of how the photo was disseminated, but campaign manager Maggie Williams attacked the Obama campaign for overreacting. “If Barack Obama’s campaign wants to suggest that a photo of him wearing traditional Somali clothing is divisive, they should be ashamed,” she said.

Two Faces of Hillary

Sen. Clinton herself seemed torn between showing voters her softer side and releasing her inner combative persona.

At the end of a Texas debate on Feb. 21, Sen. Clinton extended her hand to Obama and expressed how “honored” she was to be on the same stage with him. But she soon switched tactics and launched harsh attacks on Obama.

On Feb. 23, reacting to flyers that the Obama campaign distributed in Ohio criticizing her positions on the North American Free Trade Agreement and the mandate included in her health insurance plan, Clinton rebuked her rival.

“Shame on you, Barack Obama,” Clinton shouted, before instructing him to “meet me in Ohio, and let’s have a debate about your tactics and your behavior in this campaign.”

To some observers, Clinton’s outburst had the look of an angry queen scolding a misbehaving servant boy, or a principal pulling a wayward student by the ear to the school office.

“Enough with the speeches and the big rallies and then using tactics right out of Karl Rove’s playbook,” she added, suggesting that the flyers contrasting the positions of the two rivals were somehow a novel or diabolical concept.

In reality, the Obama flyers were pretty standard stuff, more from the playbook of Tom Paine than Karl Rove. If Rove’s playbook were in use, the flyers would have claimed to come from a pro-Hillary group while advocating legalization of child pornography.

But the Clinton campaign was only warming up. On Feb. 24, during a stop in Rhode Island, Clinton mocked Obama’s speeches calling for change:

“Now, I could stand up here and say, ‘Let’s just get everybody together. Let’s get unified. The sky will open. The light will come down. Celestial choirs will be singing, and everyone will know we should do the right thing and the world will be perfect.”

Amid some chuckles from her supporters, Clinton added, “Maybe I’ve just lived a little long, but I have no illusions about how hard this is going to be. You are not going to wave a magic wand and the special interests disappear.”

Though this Clinton line of attack is popular among some of her backers – ridiculing the supposed naivety of Obama’s young supporters – Obama has never suggested that countering the entrenched special interests of Washington would be easy.

Obama’s argument has been that only an energized American public can elect representatives to bring about change and then the people must stay vigilant to make sure there is no backsliding.

While it’s true Obama doesn’t spell out all the difficulties ahead, his argument is at least as realistic as Clinton’s – that Republican obstructionism can be countered with “hard work.” That approach failed miserably when her initial health care plan collapsed in 1994 despite her strenuous efforts on its behalf.

More to the immediate point, however, Obama’s success in getting out from under the special-interest financial dependency may be the most significant political development of this election cycle.

That success also helps explain the emerging war on Obama – and the rising hysteria among Establishment figures about his surging candidacy.

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The Calm Before the Conflagration
by Chris Hedges, Truthdig
























The United States is funding and in many cases arming the three ethnic factions in Iraq—the Kurds, the Shiites and the Sunni Arabs. These factions rule over partitioned patches of Iraqi territory and brutally purge rival ethnic groups from their midst. Iraq no longer exists as a unified state. It is a series of heavily armed fiefdoms run by thugs, gangs, militias, radical Islamists and warlords who are often paid wages of $300 a month by the U.S. military. Iraq is Yugoslavia before the storm. It is a caldron of weapons, lawlessness, hate and criminality that is destined to implode. And the current U.S. policy, born of desperation and defeat, means that when Iraq goes up, the U.S. military will have to scurry like rats for cover.

The supporters of the war, from the Bush White House to Sen. John McCain, tout the surge as the magic solution. But the surge, which primarily deployed 30,000 troops in and around Baghdad, did little to thwart the sectarian violence. The decline in attacks began only when we bought off the Sunni Arabs. U.S. commanders in the bleak fall of 2006 had little choice. It was that or defeat. The steady rise in U.S. casualties, the massive car bombs that tore apart city squares in Baghdad and left hundreds dead, the brutal ethnic cleansing that was creating independent ethnic enclaves beyond our control throughout Iraq, the death squads that carried out mass executions and a central government that was as corrupt as it was impotent signaled catastrophic failure.

The United States cut a deal with its Sunni Arab enemies. It would pay the former insurgents. It would allow them to arm and form military units and give them control of their ethnic enclaves. The Sunni Arabs, in exchange, would halt attacks on U.S. troops. The Sunni Arabs agreed.

The U.S. is currently spending hundreds of millions of dollars to pay the monthly salaries of some 600,000 armed fighters in the three rival ethnic camps in Iraq. These fighters—Shiite, Kurd and Sunni Arab—are not only antagonistic but deeply unreliable allies. The Sunni Arab militias have replaced central government officials, including police, and taken over local administration and security in the pockets of Iraq under their control. They have no loyalty outside of their own ethnic community. Once the money runs out, or once they feel strong enough to make a thrust for power, the civil war in Iraq will accelerate with deadly speed. The tactic of money-for-peace failed in Afghanistan. The U.S. doled out funds and weapons to tribal groups in Afghanistan to buy their loyalty, but when the payments and weapons shipments ceased, the tribal groups headed back into the embrace of the Taliban.

The Sunni Arab militias are known by a variety of names: the Iraqi Security Volunteers (ISVs), neighborhood watch groups, Concerned Local Citizens, Critical Infrastructure Security. The militias call themselves “sahwas" ("sahwa" being the Arabic word for awakening). There are now 80,000 militia fighters, nearly all Sunni Arabs, paid by the United States to control their squalid patches of Iraq. They are expected to reach 100,000. The Sunni Arab militias have more fighters under arms than the Shiite Mahdi Army and are about half the size of the feeble Iraqi army. The Sunni Awakening groups, which fly a yellow satin flag, are forming a political party.

The Sunni Arab militias, though they have ended attacks on U.S. forces, detest the Shiite-Kurdish government of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and abhor the presence of U.S. troops on Iraqi soil. They take the money and the support with clenched teeth because with it they are able to build a renegade Sunni army, a third force inside Iraq, which they believe will make it possible to overthrow the central government. The Sunni Arabs, who make up about 40 percent of Iraq’s population, held most positions of power under Saddam Hussein. They dominated Iraq’s old officer corps. They made up its elite units, including the Republic Guard divisions and the Special Forces regiments. They controlled the intelligence agencies. There are several hundred thousand well-trained Sunni Arabs who lack only an organizational structure. We have now made the formation of this structure possible. These militias are the foundation for a deadlier insurgent force, one that will dwarf anything the United States faced in the past. The U.S. is arming, funding and equipping its own assassins.

There have been isolated clashes that point to a looming conflagration. A Shiite-dominated unit of the regular army in the late summer of 2007 attacked a strong Sunni Arab force west of Baghdad. U.S. troops thrust themselves between the two factions. The enraged Shiites, thwarted in their attack, kidnapped relatives of the commander of the Sunni Arab force, and American negotiators had to plead frantically for their release. There have been scattered incidents like this one throughout Iraq.

If the U.S. begins, as promised, to withdraw troops, it will be harder to keep these antagonistic factions apart. The cease-fire by the radical Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, extended a few days ago, could collapse. And if that happens, a civil war, unlike anything U.S. forces have experienced in Iraq, will begin. Such a conflagration, with the potential to draw in neighboring states and lead to the dismemberment of Iraq, would be the final chapter of the worst foreign policy blunder in American history.

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12 STEPS
By Malik Isasis






















One of my contemporaries and favorite bloggers, The Field Negro refers to people obsessed with Barack Obama as “Obamaholics”. Well, Field: My name is Malik Isasis, and I’m an Obamaholic. My Obamaholism started seemingly, upon watching him speak at the 2004 Democratic National Convention for John Kerry. It quietly and slowly began to grow after his announcement to run. 22 states, 1,318 delegates, 2,145,097 votes, and 10 straight victories later, Barack has become a full-blown addiction.

Hyperbole aside, I’ve been speaking with my friends here in Seattle and New York and all but one (she’s a Hillary fan) are Obama supporters and have been avid supporters. Two of my friends are delegates and caucused for Obama in Washington. Yet, another is lobbying the local Democratic Party to go to Denver for the 2008 Democratic National Convention.

Haters

Folks like Paul Bagala a CNN pundit, NY Times columnist Paul Krugman and other Hillary political surrogates have accused, or confused excitement over Obama’s candidacy and his subsequent success as a cult (see here, too).

One of the things that Bush has bequeathed to the American people during his eight years was unrelenting fear. The side effect of this unrelenting fear was an inoculation to it. Hillary and Bill along with their surrogates in a haze of desperation are trying to tap into a vein and inject fear of Obama’s inexperience. The politics of fear have played out, and the Clintons are playing themselves with this tactic.

McCain’s and Clinton’s attack messages are parroting one another as they pile on the hopemonger who espouses the end of fear politicking to bully and manipulate the populace.

The Feign

I probably won’t get to watch the debate between Hilary and Obama tonight (February 21, 2008 on CNN) because none of my friends or family has cablevision, nor does their snootiness allow them to watch television. No cable, no television. I’ve been getting my political fix watching news clips on the internets.

As my vacation draws to an end, I’m fighting to stay in the moment and enjoy the 60 degree weather here in Seattle in the dead of winter, but my mind frequently wanders back to New York where I can enjoy watching political news and writing. These thoughts remind me of the old adage that an addiction is always one’s first lover, everything else is secondary. See you in New York.

Go Obama!

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ESCAPE FROM NEW YORK
by Malik Isasis



















I'm at the airport just minutes before my flight, 55 minutes to be exact and my olfactory glands are still offended by a tall woman who stood before me in line, removing her shoes. She wore those fluffy UGG boots without socks and upon slipping them off her feet, the smell of corn chips and exotic French cheeses wafted about. I immediately stepped back to let the folks know behind me in the crowded line that it wasn't I who feet smelled of corn chips.

I'm on a one-week retreat back to my hometown, Seattle, Washington. It is a much-needed trip after having lived two months in a hellish mouse-infested apartment. Two months ago I moved into a nice apartment, or what I thought was a nice apartment.

One night while writing, I saw out the corners of my eyes what looked like a small shadow dart across the floor of my bedroom. "Naw, it can't be," I thought. This went on for a few days until finally the mouse ran across my feet as I sat at my desk writing; traumatized, I immediately talked to friends about my situation and they laughed. "Welcome to New York" was the sentiment. Check out the sympathy from one friend, here. I told my landlord and he said he'd take care of it.

He never did, but I'll get to that later.

I tried making peace with having a mouse, or as I would discover, mice. I even gave him a name: Jerry but Jerry and his family left turd droppings all over the kitchen cabinets. I stopped cooking and eating at home. I decided that it was time to take action against Jerry and Co. I sat out glue traps. Jerry was smart, very smart. It took two weeks before I caught Jerry.

If you’ve ever caught a mouse using glue traps, you’d probably find it an awful sight. They struggle and the more they do, the more they get stuck. It’s actually grotesque. A quick death is probably more ‘humane’.

After Jerry

Did you know mice are the third most successful mammals, ever? Of course behind its cousin the rat and humans. They breed a new litter every five weeks. Every night I began seeing little shadows darting out of corners and under doors. So, I named them as well, Titiana, Luke, Jesse, and Bart…I killed them all.

This idea that I could live with them was spurred on by the thought of having to look for another apartment. Apartment searching in New York feels like job searching, or Internet dating—it’s kind of a pain in the ass, time-consuming and cumbersome. I put it off.

It wasn’t until late one night that I was asleep and I felt something crawling up my legs. I jumped up like a cat and the mouse fell onto the mattress and scurried off under the heater vent. Again, I was traumatized. I slept horribly in a chair, upright the rest of the night. The next morning I immediately called my landlord.

“I’m moving out.”
“Oh, no—you don’t have to do that.” He said.
“But, I do because a mouse climbed up my leg last night in bed.”
“I’m coming over to deal with the problem, don’t worry about it.”

The previous night I received a phone call from a potential landlord who told me I got the apartment I wanted. This apartment was clean, and I inspected the crevices for mice droppings--I found none. I didn’t do this with the former apartment.

“I found another apartment and I’m moving out tomorrow.” I said.
“I’m sorry to hear that.” He said.

The Retreat

People are starting to board the plane so I’ll make this quick. Postings will be erratic until next week. I’m going home to enjoy the fresh air, and beautiful mountains. It is a much-needed respite from New York.

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I’ll Huff and I’ll Puff and I’ll Blow Your House Down
by Malik Isasis
























Ah, the Republican Party. Remember them? A bunch of lemmings who lead from the top down, mesmerize by power for the sake of power, self-indulgent fear mongers, imperialists, corporate pirates with a penchant for collapsing under the weight of pure unadulterated incompetence once every generation.

Drama Queens

The Republican Party although still very dangerous, seems like a shadow of them old selves. On February 14, 2008, Bush as usual whined and tried to bully the passage of a bill. This time the bill was the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), which passed the Senate but failed in the House. Chicken Little stated that the U.S. could face attacks that would make 9/11 pale by comparison. In what appeared to be a choreographed performance, House Republicans staged a walkout when House Democrats voted to hold two of Bush’s cabinet members in contempt for refusing to testify in an ongoing investigation, rather than voting on Bush’s request to make FISA permanent.

The Republicans walked out onto the steps in front of a readied mic. Not a detail was left out on their spontaneity. The walkout by the Republicans and Bush’s poor governance through bullying, fear mongering and whining looked pathetic. The statute of limitations on using 9/11 as a reference to get your way has run out, right Giuliani? The country has moved on, yet the Republicans are performing their tired act before an empty room.

The Peter Principle

The modern Republican Party overrun with neocons, and religious fanatics has made the party an unsustainable movement. The country needs more than Laissez faire tax cuts, fear and Jesus to remain a viable power in the world. Maybe it’s their political DNA, which tends toward fascism upon reaching the pinnacles of power. What is clear though, is throughout the 20th century; the Republicans have wrought disaster after disaster. During the 1920s there were three consecutive Republican Presidencies: Warren Harding (1920-1923), Calvin Coolidge (1923-1929) and Herbert Hoover (1929-1933). Nothing like the stock market crash and The Great Depression to warm the cockal of the heart.

It’s the Peter Principle, which theorizes that a person will be promoted to the highest level of his/or her competence and eventually advance to a level of incompetence. The modern Republican Party implodes every other generation under its own ineptitude and rises like the Phoenix, only to repeat the same mistakes.

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2008 Report: Democracy Charade Undermines Rights
United States Events of 2007
by Human Rights Watch























Bush administration resistance to scrutiny of its counterterrorism policies and past abuses continues to be a major obstacle to human rights improvement in the United States. Despite some efforts in Congress to change practices violating basic human rights, there was no evident progress concerning the treatment of so-called enemy combatants, including those held at Guantánamo Bay, or the use of secret detention facilities.

Domestically, undocumented migrant workers faced an increased risk of detention, and other non-citizens were blocked from vindicating their rights in court. Persons convicted of crimes faced harsh sentencing policies and in some cases abusive conditions in US prisons.

Racial discrimination again emerged as a prominent issue in 2007, when six African-American high school students in Jena, Louisiana, were charged as adults with a range of serious crimes for the 2006 beating of a white student. The case sparked protests and the charges were widely viewed as excessive and discriminatory, especially as compared with the treatment of white Jena youths involved in other incidents.

Guantanamo Bay, Indefinite Detention, and Military Commissions

The Department of Defense released over 100 detainees from Guantanamo Bay in 2007, but about 305 remained at this writing. Most of these men have been held without charge for six years. Over a dozen Chinese Uighurs, and likely several more individuals of other nationalities, were long ago cleared for release yet remain incarcerated at Guantanamo. The government acknowledges the Uighurs likely would be ill-treated if returned to China.

In other cases, the United States, in violation of its international obligations, has repatriated detainees without any meaningful or independent assessment of the risk of torture or abuse they faced upon return. In such cases the US has claimed that “diplomatic assurances”—or promises of humane treatment—from the receiving government were sufficient protection against abuse, despite compelling evidence to the contrary.

In December 2005 Congress passed the Detainee Treatment Act, preventing Guantanamo detainees from bringing future habeas corpus petitions to challenge the lawfulness of their detention or any mistreatment. In September 2006 the Military Commissions Act made these provisions retroactive and extended them to all detained non-citizen “unlawful enemy combatants.” After the November 2006 congressional elections, legislation that would have lifted the habeas-stripping provisions passed the Senate, but fell short of the 60 votes needed to overcome a filibuster. The Supreme Court agreed to review the constitutionality of the habeas-stripping provisions, with a decision expected by mid-2008.

In June a federal appellate court ruled that these same habeas-stripping provisions could not be applied to Ali Saleh Kahlah al-Marri, a Qatari in the US on a student visa, whom the US administration had declared an “enemy combatant” just weeks before his trial for financial fraud and giving false statements. Having already spent four years in solitary confinement in a military brig in South Carolina, al-Marri’s only outside contact has been with his lawyers, who had to sue in US court for access to him. The appeals court ruled that al-Marri could not be stripped of his right to bring a habeas challenge to his detention and ordered the government to either charge him in federal court or release him. At this writing, the order was stayed pending appeal.

Congress authorized a new system of military commissions in 2006 after the US Supreme Court in Hamdan v. Rumsfeld declared unlawful the military commissions set up in 2001 by the Bush administration to try non-citizens accused of terrorism. While these new commissions, which are entirely separate from the federal court system, address some of the concerns of the old commissions, they still fall far short of the due process standards provided by federal courts. For example, statements obtained through “cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment” prior to December 30, 2005, are admissible so long as a judge finds that they are probative and “reliable.” The ad hoc nature of the process raises further fair trial concerns.

Australian David Hicks, whose plea agreement in March 2007 makes him the only Guantanamo detainee to be convicted of a criminal offense, was scheduled to be released from custody in Australia in December, upon completion of his nine-month sentence.

To date only three other Guantanamo detainees had been charged under the commissions: Salim Hamdan, Omar Khadr, and Mohamed Jawad. Both Khadr and Jawad were juveniles—15 and 17, respectively—when they were first brought to Guantanamo close to six years ago. The Bush administration has said that it ultimately plans to try up to 80 Guantanamo detainees before the commissions.

Torture Policy

Over the past two years, Congress and the courts have repudiated the Bush administration’s authorization of abusive interrogation techniques that amount to torture. In response the Pentagon announced new rules applicable to all interrogations carried out by the United States armed forces and disavowed many abusive techniques. The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), however, contends that it is not bound by these rules, and the administration has gone to great lengths to justify the CIA’s continued use of certain techniques banned for use by the military. According to an October 2007 New York Times article, the Department of Justice issued legal memoranda in 2005 that authorized the use of waterboarding (simulated drowning), head slapping, and exposure to frigid temperatures, and ruled that neither these techniques, nor any other techniques being employed by the CIA, violated the then-pending legislation prohibiting cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment. In October 2007 the Bush administration’s candidate for attorney general, Michael Mukasey, refused to repudiate waterboarding as a form of torture in his confirmation hearings.

In July 2007 the administration issued an executive order providing legal authorization for the so-called “CIA program” in which detainees are held incommunicado and subject to reportedly abusive interrogations. Michael McConnell, Director of National Intelligence, said on July 22, 2007 that he “would not want a US citizen to go through the process” of being subjected to some of the techniques approved for use by the CIA.

Secret Prisons

In April 2007 the Department of Defense announced the transfer to Guantanamo of another detainee who was previously held in CIA custody, suggesting that secret prisons (temporarily closed after President Bush’s admission that they existed in 2006) were up and running again. Human Rights Watch has identified 39 other people we believe were held in secret prisons; administration officials have indicated the total number to be about 100. Under international law those persons remain unlawfully “disappeared” until the United States can account for them. In July President Bush issued an executive order providing authorization for this “CIA program,” despite the patent illegality of incommunicado detention under international law.

Accountability for Detainee and Civilian Abuse

Despite a number of official investigations into abuse of detainees in US custody in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Guantanamo Bay, the United States has done little to hold those involved accountable. Prosecutions of military personnel have focused almost exclusively on low-ranking personnel, and no one has been charged under the doctrine of command responsibility. Over a dozen cases referred to the Department of Justice for prosecution by the military and others have been sitting idle for years. No CIA agents have been prosecuted for abuse, and only one civilian contractor has faced criminal charges.

On September 16, 2007, a convoy of contractors from the Blackwater security firm fired into a crowded street in Baghdad, killing at least 17 civilians. This incident has galvanized international attention to the effective immunity from prosecution under Iraqi and US law enjoyed by many of the almost 180,000 contractors supporting US operations in Iraq. At this writing, legislation expanding federal jurisdiction over felonies committed by contractors overseas was pending before Congress.

Khaled el-Masri, a German citizen arbitrarily arrested and transferred by the US to Afghanistan, where he was beaten and held incommunicado for several months, and Maher Arar, a dual Canadian-Syrian citizen secretly detained and sent by the US to Syria, where he was tortured and imprisoned for 10 months, brought lawsuits against the US challenging their mistreatment. US courts have dismissed both cases, accepting the administration’s position that the courts should not review the government’s actions. El-Masri asked the Supreme Court in 2007 to review the dismissal of his case, but the court declined to do so.

Denial of Refugee Protection

US law allows authorities to deny refugee protection to people believed to have associated with or provided “material support” to any armed group. The broad terms of the law have led authorities to deny rights to persons who fit the refugee definition under international law, including rape victims forced into domestic servitude by rebel groups. In 2007 the administration began to issue a small number of waivers to prevent innocent civilians from being barred as terrorists. Over 3,000 refugees—mostly from Burma—and a handful of asylum seekers have benefited, but implementation has been slow, the administration’s waiver authority is limited, and families have been separated as a result. Legislation that would expand the waiver authority was pending before Congress at this writing.

Incarceration

There are more than 2.2 million persons in US prisons and jails, an increase of 500 percent from 30 years ago. A June 2007 report by the Justice Department’s Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS) found that the incarcerated population continued to grow in 2006, experiencing its largest one-year increase in six years. The United States now has both the largest incarcerated population and the highest per capita incarceration rate in the world, with a rate five times that of England and Wales, seven times that of Canada, and more than 10 times that of Japan.

The burden of incarceration falls disproportionately on members of racial and ethnic minorities. Black men are incarcerated at 6.5 times the rate of white men, and 11.7 percent of all black males age 25 to 29 are in prison or jail. The US government failed to explain or address these rates in its 2007 report to the United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, hearings on which are expected in February 2008.

As the prison population grows, so does the challenge of providing adequate medical and mental health care. A September 2006 BJS report found that more than half of all prisoners—and nearly three-quarters of all female prisoners—suffer from a mental health problem such as major depression or a psychotic disorder.

In California a federal judge found that medical care in the state’s prisons violated the US Constitution’s prohibition on cruel and unusual punishment. In 2006 the judge appointed a receiver to oversee prison medical care, stripping that function from the state government. In September 2007 the receiver issued a report finding that 15 percent of California prisoner deaths were either preventable or possibly preventable.

Enacted by the US Congress in 1996, the Prison Litigation Reform Act (PLRA) creates a variety of obstacles for prisoners seeking to challenge their conditions of confinement or otherwise vindicate their rights in court. In January 2007 the US Supreme Court issued a decision overturning some particularly restrictive interpretations of the PLRA by lower federal courts.

The Death Penalty and Juvenile Life without Parole

State governments executed 42 prisoners between January and October 2007, bringing the total number of men and women executed in the United States to 1099 since 1977. Almost all were killed by lethal injection; one was electrocuted.

With growing evidence that lethal injection may be a very painful way to die, executions in many states were halted in 2007. In September 2007 the US Supreme Court agreed to consider the constitutionality of lethal injection in the case of two Kentucky death row prisoners claiming that lethal injection amounts to cruel and unusual punishment. Lethal injections in the US are expected to decrease substantially until the court issues its decision sometime in 2008.

In 2007 Human Rights Watch revised upward, from 2,225 to at least 2,380, our estimate of the number of US prisoners serving sentences of life without parole for crimes committed when they were under 18. The number of such prisoners in the rest of world combined is eight. Efforts at reforming this excessively punitive sentence for young offenders continued in several states across the country, including in Michigan and California.

Women’s Rights

Women’s rights in the United States suffered major setbacks at the Supreme Court in 2007. One court decision severely restricted challenges to unequal pay (women earn only 77 cents for every dollar earned by men), another upheld the exclusion of in-home care workers from certain federal wage and overtime protections (89 percent of such workers are women), and a third upheld a ban on a medically approved late-term abortion method, adding to existing regulatory and financial obstacles to safe abortion.

The US continues to channel its international assistance toward programs that compromise sexual and reproductive health and rights. In 2007, a significant portion of US funding for HIV/AIDS prevention continued to be earmarked for programs that promote abstinence until marriage, regardless of whether such programs were likely to be effective and without sufficient regard for abuses that put women, even those who abstain until marriage, at high risk for HIV.

In a positive step, the Senate in 2007 approved a bill that would overturn the “global gag rule”—a series of restrictions on what recipients of US reproductive health aid can do and say on abortion. At this writing, it remained unclear whether the bill would become law.

Jena

In August 2006 an African-American high school student in Jena, Louisiana, challenged the de facto racial segregation of his school’s grounds by asking permission to sit under the “white tree” on campus. The next day three nooses hung from the tree. School authorities responded inadequately, further stoking racial tensions. In December 2006 six African-American youth at the high school beat up a white youth, who suffered a concussion and other injuries. The six youth were charged as adults with a range of serious crimes including attempted murder, spurring a nationwide outcry over what were seen as excessive, racially discriminatory charges. In September 2007 an appeals court vacated the conviction for aggravated battery of the first of the six to be tried, Mychal Bell; the prosecutor said he would appeal the ruling.

Sex Offenders

In a 2007 report, No Easy Answers, Human Rights Watch found that, as currently conceived, many sex offender registry laws do little to prevent sexual violence and violate fundamental human rights. Offenders on publicly available registries find it difficult to obtain or keep employment and housing. Some have been murdered and many are harassed by strangers who find their information online. Residency restrictions lead to homelessness and transience for some convicted sex offenders, which interfere with their effective tracking, monitoring, and supervision by law enforcement officers; this in turn may make repeat offenses more likely.

Sex offender laws ignore the full reality of sexual violence in the US. Child safety advocates question the focus in current law on “stranger danger” and already convicted offenders because more than 90 percent of child sexual abuse is committed by someone the child knows and trusts. Authoritative studies show that three out of four sex offenders do not re-offend within 15 years of release from prison and 87 percent of sex crimes are committed by individuals without a previous conviction for a sex offense.

Rights of Non-Citizens

Immigration reform legislation continued to be stymied in 2007 by disagreements among lawmakers on whether or how to regularize the status of millions of undocumented migrant workers. According to the US Census, there were 37.5 million non-citizens living in the United States in 2006.

State and local governments passed at least 182 laws in 2007 limiting access to public benefits and state-issued identification cards, or punishing landlords or employers for doing business with undocumented workers. Many of these laws were found unconstitutional or temporarily halted by courts. Federal immigration authorities stepped up workplace raids in California, Nevada, New Mexico, New York, and elsewhere, splitting many families and leading to mistaken arrests and transfers of migrants to detention centers in remote locations far from their legal counsel.

A 2007 Human Rights Watch report, Forced Apart, found that non-citizens who have lived in the country for decades, including lawful permanent residents, have been summarily deported after criminal convictions, even for minor crimes. In fact, 64 percent of the non-citizens deported in 2005 were deported for non-violent crimes such as drug possession or theft. The deportations occur after the non-citizen has finished serving his or her sentence.

According to US Citizenship and Immigration Services, 672,593 non-citizens were deported for crimes between 1997 and 2005. Human Rights Watch estimates that at least 1.6 million spouses and children, many of whom are US citizens, were separated from their family members as a result. US law gives immigration judges no opportunity to balance the individual’s crime against his or her family relationships, other connections to the United States such as military service or economic ties, or likelihood of persecution in the country of origin.

Deportation and workplace raids are enforcement measures that US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) authorities combine with the daily detention of some 28,000 non-citizens. Endemic problems in detention facilities continued in 2007, including deaths in custody, inadequate medical care, inappropriate and punitive housing for non-citizen children, interference with access to counsel and to family members, and prolonged detention.

The death in July 2007 of Victoria Arellano, a 23-year-old transgender detainee, in US immigration custody is an extreme, but not surprising, example of the suffering experienced by immigration detainees with HIV/AIDS. The US fails to ensure that detainees with HIV/AIDS receive medical care that complies with recognized standards for correctional health care. Medical care in facilities operated or supervised by ICE is delayed, interrupted, and inconsistent to an extent that endangers the health and lives of many detainees.

Lawsuits, congressional hearings, and proceedings before the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights have brought increased scrutiny to detention of non-citizen children, though generally not improved conditions. In one notable exception, lawyers in Texas won a settlement that improved conditions and ensured the release of dozens of children.

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CRACKPOTS FOR CRACKPOTS
by Malik Isasis
















Aside from leaving a terrible shit stain on the country, Bush has in the last 7 years spoiled his rabid right wing, crackpots with militarism, tax cuts, political appointees, corporate giveaways and fear-based governance. For the Republicans, the chickens have come home to roost.

John McCain the presumptive Republican presidential nominee has the right wing flock flapping as if they were suffering from bird flu over his conservative credentials. Make no doubt about it, McCaine is as conservative as they come with a 82.6 voting record over his 24 years in the senate, but this is not enough for the floaters like radio talk show hosts Rush Limbaugh, Laura Ingram and Ann Coulter. On February 7, 2008 John “The Maverick” McCain slid on the kneepads at the Conservative Political Action Committee just to show he’s not above giving a little head to get ahead.

At the CPAC McCain was booed, yet he continues to lobby for bottom of the barrel, backward-looking 33% of the population.

The 33%

The neocons’ propaganda machine has created a simple narrative, not simple in the pejorative sense, but simple in a brilliant way. The neocons’ fictional narrative folds neatly into America’s white supremacy values. It is in this brilliant strategy that the Republicans are able to get people to vote against their own interests.

The neocon narrative tells Evangelicals that their moral and religious values are superior, beyond reproach—they are the moral compass of America, the corporate media coddles this folklore by persistently referring to this voting block as “Values Voters” (see here) If they are Value Voters what does that make the rest of us?

There is an interesting dichotomy with the 33% in which the corporate media glosses over, take for example, the abortion and the culture of life propaganda; some voters vote Republican on abortion alone. The same voters are supporting the Occupation in Iraq, which has killed hundreds of thousands of innocent men, women and children.

John “The Maverick” McCain is twisting himself into a pretzel to become as primitive as the 33%. His catering to the religiosity of the 33% right wing ideology is shameful, and he’s shameless.

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Puffing up John McCain, POW
by Ted Rall, Ted Rall


















“A proven leader, and a man of integrity,” the New York Post called John McCain in its editorial endorsement. “A naval aviator shot down over North Vietnam and held as a POW, McCain knew that freedom was his for the taking. All he had to do was denounce his country. He refused–and, as a consequence, suffered years of unrelenting torture.”

This standard summary of McCain’s five and a half years in the Hanoi Hilton, repeated in thousands of media accounts during his 2000 campaign and again this election year, is the founding myth of his political career. The tale of John McCain, War Hero prompts a lot of people turned off by his politics–liberals and traditional conservatives alike–to support him. Who cares that he “doesn’t really understand economics”? He’s got a great story to tell.

Scratch the surface of McCain’s captivity narrative, however, and a funny thing happens: his heroism blows away like the rust from a vintage POW bracelet.

In the fall of 1967 McCain was flying bombing runs over North Vietnam from the U.S.S. Oriskany, an aircraft carrier in the South China Sea. On October 26, the 31-year-old pilot was part of a 20-plane squadron assigned to destroy infrastructure in the North Vietnamese capital. He flew his A-4 Skyhawk over downtown Hanoi toward his target, a power plant. As he pulled up after releasing his bombs, his fighter jet was hit by a surface-to-air missile. A wing came off. McCain’s plane plunged into Truc Bach Lake.

Mai Van On, a 50-year-old resident of Hanoi, watched the crash and left the safety of his air-raid shelter to rescue him. Other Vietnamese tried to stop him. “Why do you want to go out and rescue our enemy?” they yelled. Ignoring his countrymen, On grabbed a pole and swam to the spot where McCain’s plane had gone down in 16 feet of water. McCain had managed to free himself from the wrecked plane but was stuck underwater, ensnared by his parachute. On used his pole to untangle the ropes and pull the semi-conscious pilot to the surface. McCain was in bad shape, having broken his arm and a leg in several places.

McCain is lucky the locals didn’t finish him off. U.S. bombs had killed hundreds of thousands of Vietnamese civilians, many in Hanoi. Ultimately between one and two million innocents would be shredded, impaled, blown to bits and dissolved by American bombs. Now that one of their tormentors had fallen into their hands, they had a rare chance to get even. “About 40 people were standing there,” On later recalled. “They were about to rush him with their fists and stones. I asked them not to kill him. He was beaten for a while before I could stop them.” He was turned over to local policemen, who transferred him to the military.

What if one of the hijackers who destroyed the World Trade Center had somehow crash-landed in the Hudson River? How long would he have lasted? Would anyone have risked his life to rescue him?

An impolite question: If a war is immoral, can those who fight in it–even those who demonstrate courage–be heroes? If the answer is yes, was Reagan wrong to honor the SS buried at Bitburg? No less than Iraq, Vietnam was an undeclared, illegal war of aggression that did nothing to keep America safe. Tens of millions of Americans felt that way. Millions marched against the war; tens of thousands of young men fled the country to avoid the draft. McCain, on the other hand, volunteered.

McCain knew that what he was doing was wrong. Three months before he fell into that Hanoi lake, he barely survived when his fellow sailors accidentally fired a missile at his plane while it was getting ready to take off from his ship. The blast set off bombs and ordnance across the deck of the aircraft carrier. The conflagration, which took 24 hours to bring under control, killed 132 sailors. A few days later, a shaken McCain told a New York Times reporter in Saigon: “Now that I’ve seen what the bombs and the napalm did to the people on our ship, I’m not so sure that I want to drop any more of that stuff on North Vietnam.”

Yet he did.

“I am a war criminal,” McCain said on “60 Minutes” in 1997. “I bombed innocent women and children.” Although it came too late to save the Vietnamese he’d killed 30 years earlier, it was a brave statement. Nevertheless, he smiles agreeably as he hears himself described as a “war hero” as he arrives at rallies in a bus marked “No Surrender.”

McCain’s tragic flaw: He knows the right thing. He often sets out to do the right thing. But he doesn’t follow through. We saw McCain’s weak character in 2000, when the Bush campaign defeated him in the crucial South Carolina primary by smearing his family. Placing his presidential ambitions first, he swallowed his pride, set aside his honor, and campaigned for Bush against Al Gore. It came up again in 2005, when McCain used his POW experience as a POW to convince Congress to pass, and Bush to sign, a law outlawing torture of detainees at Guantánamo and other camps. But when Bush issued one of his infamous “signing statements” giving himself the right to continue torturing–in effect, negating McCain’s law–he remained silent, sucking up to Bush again.

McCain’s North Vietnamese captors demanded that he confess to war crimes. “Every two hours,” according to a 2007 profile in the Arizona Republic, “one guard would hold McCain while two others beat him. They kept it up for four days…His right leg, injured when he was shot down, was horribly swollen. A guard yanked him to his feet and threw him down. His left arm smashed against a bucket and broke again.”

McCain later recalled that he was at the point of suicide. But he was no Jean Moulin, the French Resistance leader who refused to talk under torture, and killed himself. According to “The Nightingale’s Song,” a book by Robert Timberg, “[McCain] looked at the louvered cell window high above his head, then at the small stool in the room.” He took off his dark blue prison shirt, rolled it like a rope, draped one end over his shoulder near his neck, began feeding the other end through the louvers.” He was too slow. A guard entered and pulled him away from the window.

I’ve never been tortured. I have no idea what I’d do. Of course, I’d like to think that I could resist or at least commit suicide before giving up information. Odds are, however, that I’d crack. Most people do. And so did McCain. “I am a black criminal and I have performed the deeds of an air pirate,” McCain wrote in his confession. “I almost died and the Vietnamese people saved my life, thanks to the doctors.”

It wasn’t the first time McCain broke under pressure. After his capture, wrote the Republic, “He was placed in a cell and told he would not receive any medical treatment until he gave military information. McCain refused and was beaten unconscious. On the fourth day, two guards entered McCain’s cell. One pulled back the blanket to reveal McCain’s injured knee. ‘It was about the size, shape and color of a football,’ McCain recalled. Fearful of blood poisoning that would lead to death, McCain told his captors he would talk if they took him to a hospital.”

McCain has always been truthful about his behavior as a POW, but he has been more than willing to allow others to lie on his behalf. “A proven leader, and a man of integrity,” The New York Post says, and he’s happy to take it. “All he had to do was denounce his country. He refused…” Not really. He did denounce his country. But he didn’t demand a retraction.

It’s the old tragic flaw: McCain knows what he ought to do. He starts to do the right thing. But John McCain is a weak man who puts his career goals first.

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YES, HE CAN
by Malik Isasis























On Super Tuesday I pulled the lever for Barack Obama. In New York City there are booths you walk into and you literally pull the lever. As I looked over the ballot, the placement of the names seemed curious. Hillary Clinton’s name was first followed by three Republican candidates, followed by Barack Obama.

“Where’s Barack?” I asked the poll worker.
“Right here sugah.” The poll worker pointed out.
“Wow, that’s strange.” I said.
“Yeah, I know.” The poll worker said.

Several friends of mine found the same thing and had the same general feelings. How come Hillary’s and Barack’s names weren’t place next to one another? Why were Republican candidates’ names placed between the two Democrats? Who knows whether or not it made a difference?

Why Not Hillary?

Just on principle alone, I don’t want 28 years of Bushes and Clintons in the White House. Hillary has claimed experience using her 8 years as First Lady and her 8 years as a Senator. During her 16 years in Washington, Hillary has had enumerable opportunities to create change in Washington. Instead, she has opted to become part of the political failures of Washington—voting and often collaborating with Bush and the Republicans on occupation, war, torture and domestic spying. She is not change but one of the chief architects of the systemic failures of the Democratic Party.

She would also carry on with Bush’s policy of not speaking with world leaders deemed the enemy.

Why Barack

If Obama were elected president, the very next day, the whole world looks at the United States differently. It would be an opportunity for the United States to come back into the world community. Barack Obama would also talk to world leaders. Imagine, diplomacy.

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DREAM ON, DREAMERS
by Maliha Masood, Matrix Contributor



Imagine a war that you did not start and do not understand, but which you must fight. Imagine jubilant freedom fighters morphed into blood thirsty terrorists. Imagine pleasing your countrymen as well the country that wants them dead. Imagine a nation whose political chaos has marred from its cultural richness and physical beauty. Imagine then Pakistan as the world’s most frustrated and misunderstood hotspot.

Surely the P in Pakistan ought to stand for Paradox. Addressing Pakistani Paradoxes in a wise and astute manner is the job of politicians and policy makers. In terms of American foreign policy toward Pakistan, there are no clear answers or solutions, only careful planning and strategizing goals, which the United States, regardless of leadership, must keep in mind at all times. So what can be done?
First and foremost, do not strap aid. The gravity of the situation in Pakistan demands an increase, not a decrease in U.S. counterterrorism aid and training, including increasing intelligence and security collaboration, and the immediate delivery of much-needed equipment and hardware.

Secondly, get off the election bandwagon. The U.S. supports elections, but is not quite ready for a Pakistan without Musharraf. That’s a tough one to negotiate. Consider the likely consequences and then decide where to place your bets. And remember, this is not Monte Carlo, but a very imperfect region of the world where logic and reason are in short supply. What you need to win is counter intuitiveness, a certain go against the grain lone ranger philosophy. And here is why.
Holding Musharraf accountable to credible elections as a way of easing political pressure and revitalizing rule of law will not wipe out the very real threat of domestic terrorism that Pakistan faces today. If anything, elections will goad local political and religious power structures into bolstering their constituents determined to replace the Pakistani nation-state with extremist, closed minded, anti-Western values.

Elections will also foment ethnic strife amongst millions of Sindhis, Baluchis, and Pashtuns, giving them license to square up grievances against the Punjabi majority dominating key positions in government and business. Many of the disenfranchised ethnic groups have found refuge in separatist militant organizations. Opposition members posing as viable alternatives to Musharraf have no track record of success, other than a constant plea toward free and fair elections, which are serving a dubious purpose in the case of Pakistan.

The U.S. needs to look for internal gain over external props. Letting go of the election issue is a step in the right direction. It does not mean that democracy cannot flourish in Pakistan. It simply means that democracy in Pakistan will not bring about the desired results that occur in other parts of the world. The United States’ security objectives will be best achieved in a politically stable Pakistan and the only way to make that happen for now is with continued military support. For Pakistanis and bleeding heart liberals to brush that aside as anti-democratic is to be living in a dreamland. And we all know that dreams are not quite the stuff of reality.



Maliha Masood is a native of Karachi Pakistan. She lives and works in Seattle, WA.

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