|
CounterPunch's
Scorching New History of a Decade of War
Order Now / Available in April
Today's
Stories
April
24 / 25, 2004
William
A. Cook
Tweedledee and Tweedledum: Kerry
and Bush Melt into One
Jeffrey
St. Clair
Stryking Out: a General, GM and the Army's Latest Tank
Robert
Fisk
A Warning to Those Who Dare Criticize Israel in the Land of Free
Speech
Ben
Tripp
October Surmise: a Case of Worst Scenarios
Nelson
Valdés
"Submit or Die": Iraq and the American Borg
Lucson
Pierre-Charles
Haiti's Return to the Future
Kurt
Nimmo
The CIA Killed Pat Tillman
Patrick
Cockburn
The Return of Saddam's Generals
Gary
Engler
Welcome to La Paz: a Vacation in Tear Gas
Greg
Weiher
Iraq is Utterly Unlike Vietnam...
Elaine
Cassel
Life on the Outside: a Review
Vanessa
Jones
Letter from Australia: Why an Independent Won Sydney
Jim
French
Agriculture's Bullied Market
April 23, 2004
Ron
Jacobs
The Only Solution is Immediate Withdrawal
Dave
Lindorff
Imagination Deficit Disorder
Mokhiber
/ Weissman
Contractors and Mercenaries: the Rising Corporate Military Monster
Norman
Solomon
Country Joe Band, 2004: "What Are We Fighting For?"
Cynthia
McKinney
All Things Are Not Equal: the Perils of Globalization
CounterPunch
Wire
A Bitch Called Wanda
Karyn
Strickler
Sierra Club, Inc.
Hammond
Guthrie
Yellow Caked in the Face
Paul
de Rooij
Graveyard of Justifications: Glossary
of the Iraqi Occupation
April 22, 2004
Patrick
Cockburn
When Terror Came to Basra: "I
Saw a Minibus of Children on Fire"
Tanya
Reinhart
The Wall Behind Disengagement
Lance
Selfa
Why is Kucinich Still in the Race?
Josh
Frank
Street Fighting Man? Kucinich's Pulled Punches
Sen.
Robert Byrd
Bush Owes America Answers on Iraq
William
S. Lind
Why We Get It Wrong
Mickey
Z.
Undoing the Latches
Robert
Jensen
Why They Fast: Remembering the Victims of the World Bank
John
L. Hess
The New York Times from 30,000 Feet
April
21, 2004
Gary
Leupp
Yeats on Iraq
Alfredo
Castro
Colombia's Forgotten Prisoners
Dr.
Susan Block
Bush's Taliban Drug Deal
William
A. Cook
George 1 to George 2
Jack
Random
Iraq and Vietnam
Jean-Guy
Allard
Alarcon Meets the Editors
Mike
Whitney
Charade in the Desert
Bill
Christison
Only Major Policies Changes Can
Help Washington Now
April 20, 2004
Dave
Lindorff
Bush and Kerry Share a Problem
Stan
Cox
Wal-Mart's Magic Numbers
Bruce
Anderson
On Listening to Air America
Joseph
Kalvoda
Czech Mate for Condi
Greg
Moses
Yesterday's Intelligence
Stan
Goff
The Democrats and Iraq
Website
of the Day
Santorum Happens
April 19, 2004
Kurt
Nimmo
The "Central Hand" of the
Resistance
Mike
Whitney
Bob Woodward's Imperial Trifles
Douglas
Valentine
52 Pick-Up and the 100-to-1
Rule
John
Chuckman
The Sharon Annex: Evil Does Often
Triumph
Doug
Giebel
Welcome to the Club
Rahul
Mahajan
Hospital Closings and War Crimes
April
16 / 18, 2004
Robert
Fisk
Bush Legitimizes Terror
Saul
Landau
Subverting Brazil and Cuba
Dave
Lindorff
Paying for War: $2,150 per Family
and Counting
Brandy
Baker
Fallujah's Collateral Damage
Mickey
Z.
The Left Attacks from the Right
Bruce
Jackson
The Bush Press Conference: Gott Mit
Uns
Norman
Solomon
How the "NewsHour" Changed
History
Alexander
Cockburn
Bush, Kerry and Empire
April
15, 2004
Greg
Moses
Follow the Families, Not the Script
Virginia
Tilley
The Carnage According to Gen. Kimmitt:
Just Change the Channel
Ron
Jacobs
They Coulda Been Champions of the
World: Hurricane Carter and Ron Kovic
Michael
Neumann
A Happy Compromise: Hate Crimes
Reporting in the Toronto Globe and Mail
April
14, 2004
Tom
Reeves
Return to Haiti: an American Learning
Zone
Reza
Fiyouzat
Japan and Iraq
Ron
Jacobs
What Bush Really Said
Diane
Christian
The Real Passion
April 10 /
12, 2004
Alexander Cockburn
The
Greatest Radical Journalist of His Age
Patrick Cockburn
Ambush, Kidnap, Murder: Another Day in "Post War" Iraq
Ellen Cantarow
Health Under Siege on the West Bank
Tariq Ali
Iraqi
Resistance: a New Phase
Werther
Pseudoconservatism Revisited: When God is Pro War & Other
Delicacies
Robert Fisk
Bush's War Lords to Their Critics: "Just Shut Up"
Gary Leupp
Indian Wars, Vietnam and Orientalist Fantasy
Ron Jacobs
The Iranian Revolution, Cont.
Jorge Mariscal
Perils of the Bootstrap
Phil Gasper
Defying Stereotypes About Death Row
Dave Zirin
Bringing the Black Freedom Struggle Into Sports: an Interview
with Lee Evans
Brandy Baker
The Revolution is Playing at a Theater Near You
Mickey Z.
Underground Music is Free Media: an Interview with Twiin
Ali Tonak
Get Ready for the Million Worker March
Harry Browne
Asking the Wrong Question About Richard Clarke & 9/11
Gideon Samet
The Sharonizing of America
Conn Hallinan
Remote Control Warriors
Website of
the Weekend
Taboo
Tunes
April 9, 2004
Robert Fisk
This
War's Simple Truth: Iraqis Do Not Want Us
John L. Hess
The
Non-Confessions of a Warrior Princess: Condi on the Stand
Niranjan Ramakrishnan
Condoleezza's Condescensions
Christopher Brauchli
Holes in the Sky: Bush's Crazed Missile Defense Plan
Don Santina
Forget the Alamo!: Glorifying the Fight for Slavery in Texas
William S. Lind
The 4G Warfare Seminar, Cont.
Bill Christison
9/11
Commission is Bush's New Lapdog
Website of the Day
What We've Done to Fallujah
April 8,
2004
Wayne Madsen
Rice
(and the Record) Proves It: Bush Knew, But Failed to Act
Kurt Nimmo
Will
Bush Flatten Fallajuh?
Patrick Cockburn
Guided
Missile; Misguided War
Laura Flanders
Steamed
Rice
Larry Everest
What Condi Rice is Hiding
Adam Federman
Sacred Capitalism Hits Russia
M. Junaid Alam
The Iraqi Intifada Begins
Norman Solomon
The Quest for a Monopoly on Violence
Douglas Valentine
Echoes
of Vietnam: Phoenix, Assassination and Blowback in Iraq
Website of the Day
Xispas: Chicano Art, Culture and Politics
April 7, 2004
Alexander Cockburn
Those
Pulitzers!
Sen. Robert
Byrd
Deeper
into the Mouth of Hell: We Must Find the Exit from Iraq
Ron Jacobs
Tet
in Iraq: Closer to the Cosmic Disaster?
Patrick Cockburn
Battles
Across Iraq: US Death Toll Mounts
Kathy Kelly
Pacification: Worth the Price?
Sonali Kolhatkar
What Are You Doing About Afghanistan?
Rahul Mahajan
Report from Baghdad: Opening the Gates of Hell
Robert Fisk
US Airlifts Saddam to Qatar
Mike Whitney
America Out of Iraq, Now!
Sam Hamod
Bush, Pandora's Box and the Tiger
April 6,
2004
C.G. Estabrook
Mercenaries
and Occupiers
William Blum
The
Anti-Empire Report: the Israel Lobby
Col. Dan Smith
The
Language of Disbelief: 1.3 Billion Still Live in War Zones
Dr. Bulent Gokay
The Coming Islamic Republic of Iraq?
Lynn Landes
Faking Democracy: Americans Don't Vote; Machines Do
Sheila Samples
What Would Royko Write?
Jason Leopold
Condi's Blind Spot: Rice Never Mentioned al-Qaeda
Mickey Z.
A Reality Show with No End in Sight
Robert Fisk
Iraq on the Brink of Anarchy
April 5, 2004
John Farrell
Lessons
from El Salvador and Iraq
Robert Fisk
Bloodbath
a Bad Omen for Bush
Gary Leupp
Shiites Say No: Another "Nightmare
Scenario"
April 3 / 4, 2004
Alexander Cockburn
Anti-Depressants
a Problem? We're Shocked
Jeffrey St. Clair
How Neil Bush Succeeded in Business
Without Really Trying
Gary Leupp
On Jefferson, Diderot and the Political Uses of God
Lawrence Davidson
Orwell and Kafka in Israel / Palestine
Frederick B.
Hudson
Condi Rice: the Family Retainer
Phillip Cryan
The Magic of Coca-Cola: Colombian Workers, Civil Rights and Advertising
Dave Zirin
Lester Speaks: an Interview with Lester "Red" Rodney
Ben Tripp
Talking Dirty: Obscene But Not Heard
Bruce Anderson
Phony Liberals and Fake Concern for the Homeless
Bill Fletcher, Jr.
Justice and Legitimacy in Haiti
Mark Scaramella
Do You Have What It Takes to Be Sec. of Defense? Take the Rumsfeld
Quiz
Sharon Smith
Do Most Iraqis Really Want the US to Stay?
Rick Giombetti
Melissa Ann Rowland: a Witch for Our Time
Nader/Kerry
Quandary
Stephen Gowans
Communists
for Capitalism?
Frank Bardacke / Doug Lummis
Support Nader; Dump Bush: an Election Manifesto
Mickey Z
Turn ON
Saul Landau
Kerry: a Less Dangerous Imperialist?
Richard Oxman
Nader and/or Death?
Poets' Basement
Holt, LaMorticella, Davies, Albert and Tripp
Website of the Weekend
Missing
April 2, 2004
Dave Lindorff
Barbaric
Relativism: the Press and Fallujah
Kurt Nimmo
Wherever
Bush Goes, Osama is Bound to Follow
Emma Miller
The
Role of the West in the Rwandan Genocide
Dr. Susan Block
Same
Sex Marriages: Just Say "No" to Prohibition
Norman Solomon
Media Strategy Memo for George & Dick
Sacha Guney
The Meaning of the Elections in Turkey
Christopher
Brauchli
The
Disturbing Case of Cpt. Yee
Website of the Day
Mercenaries, Inc.
April 1, 2004
Ron Jacobs
Dying in Vain in Iraq
Harry Browne
No Smoke, Plenty of Fire: Ireland's Pubs Go Smokefree
Chris Floyd
Towel Boy: Bush Hits Workers with Chemical Weapons
Nicole Colson
Inside America's Concentration Camp: Tortured at Guantanamo
Charles Arthur
Haiti's Army Cracks Down on Workers
Laura Flanders
Elaine
Chao: a First Daughter for the First Son
March 31, 2004
M. Junaid Alam
Israel:
Suicide Nation?
John L. Hess
Condi
Under Oath: But What About the NYTs Reporters?
Fernando Suarez
del Solar
A
Year Since My Son's Death in Iraq
Sofia Perez
Spain's
U-Turn on Iraq is Real Democracy in Action
David Vest
Stick 'Em Up: Put Cheney and Bush Under Oath
Tanya Reinhart
As in Tiannamen Square: Justice and the Yassin Assassination
Mike Whitney
Time to Dump the Pledge
Donald Kaul
Martha Stewart's Lesson: Never Talk to the FBI
Milt Bearden
Mired in the Tracks of Alexander the Great
Marjorie Cohn
The
Illegal Coup in Haiti: How the Kidnapping of Aristide Violated
US and International Law
Website of the Day
New Pentagon Papers Dropped at DC Starbucks
Hot Stories
Alexander Cockburn
Behold,
the Head of a Neo-Con!
Subcomandante
Marcos
The
Death Train of the WTO
Norman Finkelstein
Hitchens
as Model Apostate
Steve Niva
Israel's
Assassination Policy: the Trigger for Suicide Bombings?
Dardagan,
Slobodo and Williams
CounterPunch Exclusive:
20,000 Wounded Iraqi Civilians
Steve
J.B.
Prison Bitch
Sheldon
Rampton and John Stauber
True Lies: the Use of Propaganda
in the Iraq War
Wendell
Berry
Small Destructions Add Up
CounterPunch
Wire
WMD: Who Said What When
Cindy
Corrie
A Mother's Day Talk: the Daughter
I Can't Hear From
Gore Vidal
The
Erosion of the American Dream
Francis Boyle
Impeach
Bush: A Draft Resolution
Click
Here for More Stories.
|
Weekend
Edition
April 24 / 25, 2004
Idiots and Warm
Fuzzies
Does Anybody
Know Anything?
By MARK SCARAMELLA
Washington politicians are fond of saying
nothing could have been done to prevent the 911 terrorist attacks.
This would be comparable to an aircraft maintenance superintendent
ignoring a letter from the safety office saying that there had
been random observations of failures to follow proper maintenance
procedure, then saying after a maintenance-related plane crash,
"No one could have predicted that a screw installed backwards
could have caused the landing gear to stick."
Maybe not that particular screw
in that spot. But what did the superintendent do about the safety
office letter? If that superintendent said, "Oh, ok. Thanks
for the info" -- as it appears both Democrats and Republicans
have done with terrorist warnings since the early 90s -- some
butts would be seriously and publicly kicked.
But no butts are being kicked.
And the only new things coming out of the 9-11 Whitewash, er,
Commission, are goofball aphorisms.
Fox News covered all the glaring
clues missed by the so-called "intelligence" agencies
as far back as May of 2002. Shortly thereafter Time Magazine
covered Richard Clarke's "revelations" and a lot more
in an extensive cover story called "Could 9/11 Have Been
Prevented?" Nevertheless, the press is acting like the 9-11
Commission hearings are "news."
Here's Fox News's Carl Cameron
quoting Bush's press secretary Ari Fleischer in May of 2002:
"The president was aware that bin Laden, of course, as previous
administrations have well known, that bin Laden was determined
to strike the United States. In fact, the label on the president's
presidential daily briefing was 'Bin Laden Determined to Strike
the United States'."
And here's Time Magazine's
Michael Elliott in August of 2002: "the heading on Slide
14 of [Clarke's] Powerpoint presentation [to Condoleeza Rice]
reads, 'Response to al Qaeda: Roll back.' Clarke's proposals
called for the 'breakup' of al-Qaeda cells and the arrest of
their personnel. The financial support for its terrorist activities
would be systematically attacked, its assets frozen, its funding
from fake charities stopped. Nations where al-Qaeda was causing
trouble -- Uzbekistan, the Philippines, Yemen -- would be given
aid to fight the terrorists. Most important, Clarke wanted to
see a dramatic increase in covert action in Afghanistan to 'eliminate
the sanctuary' where al-Qaeda had its terrorist training camps
and bin Laden was being protected by the radical Islamic Taliban
regime."
Just two quick examples, out
of many.
So Ms. Rice et al should have
known, as the Clinton administration should have known, and acted
accordingly. But they didn't do anything. And there was a predictable
disaster.
Thomas Pickard, the FBI's Acting
Director pre-9/11, testified that he told his field agents about
the "threat spike" in the summer of 2001, when "something
spectacular," according to federal officials, was about
to happen. But most of these agents told the 9/11 Commission
staff they didn't know about the increased threats. The agent
in charge of terrorism in the Washington field office, according
to the Commission, "was neither aware in the summer of 2001
of an increased threat, nor did his squad take any special steps
or actions."
"I learned that the FBI
didn't know what it had," testified former attorney general
Janet Reno. "Sometimes I thought we had made progress, but
then we'd find something else that we didn't know we didn't haveS
I quickly learned the FBI didn't know what it had. The right
hand didn't know what the left hand was doing."
Commissioner Richard Ben-Veniste
rephrased it: "Not only did the FBI not know what it knew,
it didn't know what it didn't know."
I can see a somber 911 Commission
recommendation like, "We believe that the FBI should institute
procedures and systems which will ensure that the agency not
only knows what it knows but that it also knows at least some
of what it doesn't know, and further that systems are in place
to permit agents to know that there are things that are not known
or not known entirely."
FBI reply: "OK. However,
the cost of such a system is unknown, perhaps in the hundreds
of billions."
Here's a bipartisan exchange
between two of our most highly articulate and esteemed dunderheads
from Senate's Government Oversight Committee in 2003 (from the
congressional record).
Democratic Senator Charles
Schumer: "So, let me get that straight again. In the trenches,
in the Minneapolis office or somewhere else, before 9/11, if
they punched in the word 'aviation' or 'flight school' -- not
a name, because you said it was different for a name -- could
they get every EC report that mentioned aviation and flight school?"
FBI Director Mueller: "It
is my -- and I am not sufficiently expertise in our computer
systems. It is my -- if you put in 'airline,' you may well be
able to pick up those -- well, actually, I'm not -- can you excuse
me just a second?
Schumer: "Sure."
Mueller: "This gets into
the technology. I do not believe it can be done, because I do
not believe there is full text retrieval, Number 1. And secondly,
there was a system in place at the time of blocking certain cases
from searches, not necessarily from headquarters, but searches
from around the country as the part and parcel of the security
provisions, so that there are certain -- for instance, the Phoenix
EC at the Phoenix EC was uploaded on the computer. There are
only a limited number of people that could see it."
Schumer: "Right."
Mueller: "A limited number
of people who would be able to do the search of it..."
Schumer: "Right."
Mueller: "... to pull
up flight school."
Schumer: "That's a different
issue, but was the technology there that if you punched in certain
words that you can see every report that mention those?"
Mueller: "I do not believe
that is the case, but I am not sufficiently technologically astute
to be able say that..."
Schumer: "Right."
Mueller: "Swith assuredness."
Schumer: "Right."
Mueller: "We are -- the
one thing that I do know is that you have to put in the specific
-- if I put in Mueller, it has to be M-U-E-L-L- E-R. It will
come up M-U-E-L-L-E--R, but what we will not pull is M- U-L-L-E-R,
M-I-L-L-E-R or other variations of it."
Schumer: "You know, that's
even -- that's a little different. But..."
Mueller: "Yes."
Schumer: "...I mean, every
day, every one of us goes on our computer and does searches of
certain words, and..."
Mueller: "We may have
had..."
Schumer: "... it's not
very difficult to do. And I'm just -- I guess what I would ask
you is, how was it -- I mean, because I think is important for
-- I am trying..."
Mueller: "I think we are
way behind the curve. I have said it from the first day."
Schumer: "But how was
it we were so far behind the curve that it was almost laughable?
What was wrong? That's not something dealing with information
-- well, maybe it is. Maybe it deals with turf in its most fundamental
way, but it just makes my jaw drop to think that on 9/11 or on
9/10 the kind of technology that's available to most school kids
and certainly every small business in this country wasn't available
to the FBI."
* *
*
Right. Sure. Yeah. Ok. Uh-huh.
Fortunately, Senator Schumer didn't ask Director Mueller how
he would search for "al-Zarqhawi."
Mueller didn't offer and Schumer
didn't ask for any follow up report on the question of computerized
searches.
The point is that this is
what passes for high level discussion of subjects which the principles
themselves consider to be critical to the nation's security.
Nevertheless the 9-11 Commissioners
repeatedly say that they are "not trying to place blame."
Of course not! They're part of the political class that didn't
know anything and didn't do anything. Are they going to blame
themselves and their friends?
Instead of knowledge or action,
however, we get a lot of touchy-feely hand-wringing about 9/11.
Even the supposedly "tough" president who supposedly
abhors the "feel your pain" liberalism of Bill Clinton,
seems to have been infected with a bad case of the warm fuzzies.
In the President's latest press conference words like sad, angry,
feel, grieve, disappointed, concerned, happy, believe...were
dribbled throughout.
"Some of the debate really
centers around the fact that people don't believe Iraq can be
free, that if you're Muslim or perhaps brown skinned, you can't
be self-governing and free. I strongly disagree with that. I
reject that because I believe freedom is the deepest need of
every human soul.
"You know, I just -- I'm
sure something will pop into my head here in the midst of this
press conference with all the pressure of trying to come up with
an answer, but it hadn't yet.
"People needed to come
together to work. And therefore, empty words would embolden the
actions of those who are willing to kill indiscriminately.
"I happen to believe we'll
find out the truth on the weapons.
"I was very clear about
what I believed.
"And of course that concerns
me. All those reports concern me.
"Look, I can understand
why people in my administration are anguished over the fact that
people lost their life. I feel the same way. I mean, I'm sick
when I think about the death that took place on that day.
"I plan on telling the
American people that I've got a plan to win the war on terror.
And I believe they'll stay with me.
"I'm of the belief that
we'll find out the truth on the weapons.
"I believe so strongly
in the power of freedom.
"I also have this belief,
strong belief, that freedom is not this country's gift to the
world. Freedom is the Almighty's gift to every man and woman
in this world.
"If I tried to fine-tune
my messages based upon polls, I think I'd be pretty ineffective.
I know I would be disappointed in myself.
"I feel strongly about
what we're doing. I feel strongly it's the course this administration
is taking will make America more secure and the world more free
and, therefore, the world more peaceful. It's a conviction that's
deep in my soul.
"I hope today you've got
a sense of my conviction about what we're doing."
* *
*
Who cares what the president
believes, hopes, or is concerned about? The chief executive isn't
supposed to sound like a Miss America contestant.
Whatever America's problems
are, goofballs, idiots and warm-fuzzies in high places are not
going to solve them.
Mark Scaramella is the managing editor of the Anderson Valley Advertiser.
He can be reached at: themaj@pacific.net
Weekend
Edition Features for April 3 / 4, 2004
Alexander Cockburn
Anti-Depressants
a Problem? We're Shocked
Jeffrey St. Clair
How Neil Bush Succeeded in Business
Without Really Trying
Gary Leupp
On Jefferson, Diderot and the Political Uses of God
Lawrence Davidson
Orwell and Kafka in Israel / Palestine
Frederick B.
Hudson
Condi Rice: the Family Retainer
Phillip Cryan
The Magic of Coca-Cola: Colombian Workers, Civil Rights and Advertising
Dave Zirin
Lester Speaks: an Interview with Lester "Red" Rodney
Ben Tripp
Talking Dirty: Obscene But Not Heard
Bruce Anderson
Phony Liberals and Fake Concern for the Homeless
Bill Fletcher, Jr.
Justice and Legitimacy in Haiti
Mark Scaramella
Do You Have What It Takes to Be Sec. of Defense? Take the Rumsfeld
Quiz
Sharon Smith
Do Most Iraqis Really Want the US to Stay?
Rick Giombetti
Melissa Ann Rowland: a Witch for Our Time
Nader/Kerry
Quandary
Stephen Gowans
Communists
for Capitalism?
Frank Bardacke / Doug Lummis
Support Nader; Dump Bush: an Election Manifesto
Mickey Z
Turn ON
Saul Landau
Kerry: a Less Dangerous Imperialist?
Richard Oxman
Nader and/or Death?
Poets' Basement
Holt, LaMorticella, Davies, Albert and Tripp
Website of the Weekend
Missing
|