Category Archives: Iraq War

Ron Paul reasoning, wisdom from Solomon, and the coming credit apocalypse

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From Reason:

Why some libertarians don’t want to join the Ron Paul revolution.

Brian Doherty | July 27, 2007

“But some Ron Paul Revolutionaries insist that the mainstream media are putrid corpses in brackish water, and conventional polls are for losers who still answer their landlines. Paul’s support—by more postmodern measures—continues to grow. He’s still the king of meetup.com, which does generate real-world crowds, and even real-world food drives. He’s also the political king of YouTube (22,157 subscribers). We won’t find out for months if these netroots measures mean anything in electoral terms. And that’s just fine for a thrifty message-oriented candidate, who psychically benefits from running (and builds up more fundraising resources for any future effort) even if he fails utterly with vote totals.

This past Sunday he hit a political respectability jackpot, with a long, thorough, serious, and critical-but-respectful profile in the New York Times Magazine. Most of the Ron Paul press tells, however questioningly, of a politician dedicated to severely limited government that doesn’t want to interfere in our personal lives, doesn’t want to investigate us and control us, wants to abolish the income tax, and wants to bring troops home and dedicate our military only to actual national defense—a politician against the federal drug war, against the Patriot Act, against regulating the Internet, and for habeas corpus.

One prominent version of Libertarian Ron Paul Anxiety comes via noted and respected anarcho-legal theorist Randy Barnett in The Wall Street Journal. Barnett has decades of hardcore libertarian movement credentials behind him and is one of Lysander Spooner‘s biggest fans. (Spooner, the 19th century individualist anarchist, famously declared the state to be of inherently lower moral merit than a highway bandit.) But the mild obstetrician, family man, and experienced legislator Ron Paul is too radical for Barnett in one respect—the respect that is key to most of Paul’s traction to begin with: hisconsistent, no-compromise, get-out-now stance against the war in Iraq.

Barnett is eager to dissociate libertarianism writ large from Paul’s anti-Iraq War stance, claiming that many libertarians are concerned that Americans may get the misleading impression that all libertarians oppose the Iraq war—as Ron Paul does—and even that libertarianism itself dictates opposition to this war. It would be a shame, he suggests, if this misinterpretation inhibited a wider acceptance of the libertarian principles that would promote the general welfare of the American people.

This is doubly curious. First, because opposition to non-defensive war traditionally is a core libertarian principle (to begin with, since it inherently involves mass murder and property destruction aimed at people who have not harmed the people imposing the harm) and is, in fact, the position of the vast majority of self-identified libertarians. Second, why would one worry that libertarianism can be damaged by an association with an idea that is in fact immensely popular? And, to boot, a popular position in which Paul has unique credibility for being right, and right from the beginning, unlike pretty much every other candidate…….

…..Libertarians leery of Paul should ask themselves (while bearing in mind that of course no one, certainly no libertarian, is under any obligation to support or advocate or vote for any politician ever): Have we ever seen a national political figure better in libertarian terms—better on taxes, on drugs, on spending, on federalism, on foreign policy, on civil liberties? And for the pragmatic, cosmopolitan, mainstream libertarian: Why is Ron Paul the place where making the non-existent best the enemy of the good becomes the right thing to do?

Senior Editor Brian Doherty is author of This is Burning Man and Radicals for Capitalism: A Freewheeling History of the Modern American Libertarian Movement.

Comment:

And a bit more here on the truly a-pauling reason:

Says Norman Solomon (hat tip to Dandelionsalad):

“On Iraq policy, in Washington, the differences between Republicans and Democrats — and between the media’s war boosters and opponents — are often significant. Yet they’re apt to mask the emergence of a general formula that could gain wide support from the political and media establishment.

The formula’s details and timelines are up for grabs. But there’s not a single “major” candidate for president willing to call for withdrawal of all U.S. forces — not just “combat” troops — from Iraq, or willing to call for a complete halt to U.S. bombing of that country.

Those candidates know that powerful elites in this country just don’t want to give up the leverage of an ongoing U.S. military presence in Iraq, with its enormous reserves of oil and geopolitical value. It’s a good bet that American media and political powerhouses would fix the wagon of any presidential campaign that truly advocated an end to the U.S. war in — and on — Iraq.

The disconnect between public opinion and elite opinion has led to reverse perceptions of a crisis of democracy. As war continues, some are appalled at the absence of democracy while others are frightened by the potential of it. From the grassroots, the scarcity of democracy is transparent and outrageous. For elites, unleashed democracy could jeopardize the priorities of the military-industrial-media complex.”

Now what would those priorities be and what crisis could the M-I-M complex be staving off?

Via the Daily Paul, here is Robert Prechter (in Elliot Wave Theorist) explaining why he is “Beyond Bearish“:

“But there is a much more important event for believers in perpetual inflation to explain: the trend of yields from bonds and utility stocks. In the 1970s, prices of bonds and utility stocks were falling, and yields on bonds and utility stocks were rising, because of the onslaught of inflation. But in the past 25 years bond and utility stock prices have gone up, and yields on bonds and utility stocks (see Figures 2 [not shown] and 3) have gone down. Once again, this situation is contrary to claims that we are experiencing a replay of the inflationary 19?teens or 1970s. Those investing on an inflation theme cannot explain these graphs. But there is a precedent for this time. It is 1928?1929, when bond and utility yields bottomed and prices topped (see Figure 4) in an environment of expanding credit and a stock market boom. The Dow Jones Utility Average was the last of the Dow averages to peak in 1929, and today it is deeply into wave (5) and therefore near the end of its entire bull market. All these juxtaposed market behaviors make sense only in our context of a terminating credit bubble. This one is just a whole lot bigger than any other in history.

Some economic historians blame rising interest rates into 1929 for the crash that ensued. Those who do must acknowledge that the Fed’s interest rate today is at almost exactly the same level it was then, having risen steadily?and in fact way more in percentage terms?since 2003. So even on this score the setup is the same as it was 1929. Remember also that in 1926 the Florida land boom collapsed. In the current cycle, house prices nationwide topped out in 2005, two years ago. So maybe it’s 1928 now instead of 1929. But that’s a small quibble compared to the erroneous idea that we are enjoying a perpetually inflationary goldilocks economy with perpetually rising investment prices….”

Good genocides and bad…..

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Explaining the intricacies of humanitarian intervention, a post by Lenin’s Tomb from March of this year that still holds good.

“Since 2003, according to UN estimates, some 200,000 have been killed in the Darfur region of Sudan in a brutal ethnic-cleansing campaign and another 2 million have been turned into refugees.

How would you know this? Well, if you lived in New York City, at least, you could hardly take a subway ride without seeing an ad that reads: “400,000 dead. Millions uniting to save Darfur.” The New York Times has also regularly featured full-page ads describing the “genocide” in Darfur and calling for intervention there under “a chain of command allowing necessary and timely military action without approval from distant political or civilian personnel.”

In those same years, according to the best estimate available, the British medical journal The Lancet’s door-to-door study of Iraqi deaths, approximately 655,000 Iraqis had died in war, occupation, and civil strife between March 2003 and June 2006. (The study offers a low-end possible figure on deaths of 392,000 and a high-end figure of 943,000.) But you could travel coast to coast without seeing the equivalents of the billboards, subway placards, full-page newspaper ads, or the like for the Iraqi dead. And you certainly won’t see, as in the case of Darfur, celebrities on Good Morning America talking about their commitment to stopping “genocide” in Iraq.

Why is it that we are counting and thinking about the Sudanese dead as part of a high-profile, celebrity-driven campaign to “Save Darfur,” yet Iraqi deaths still go effectively uncounted, and rarely seem to provoke moral outrage, let alone public campaigns to end the killing? And why are the numbers of killed in Darfur cited without any question, while the numbers of Iraqi dead, unless pitifully low-ball figures, are instantly challenged — or dismissed?”

Iraq War Mongering: psychologists “brand” the war..

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Thanks to a reader for this tip:

“The key to boosting the image and effectiveness of U.S. military operations around the world involves “shaping” both the product and the marketplace, and then establishing a new identity that places what you are selling in a positive light, said clinical psychologist Todd C. Helmus, the author of “Enlisting Madison Avenue: The Marketing Approach to Earning Popular Support in Theaters of Operation.” The 211-page study, for which the U.S. Joint Forces Command paid the Rand Corp. $400,000, was released this week.Helmus and his co-authors concluded that the “force” brand, which the United States peddled for the first few years of the occupation, was doomed from the start and has lost ground to enemies’ competing brands. While not abandoning the more aggressive elements of warfare, the report suggested, a more attractive brand for the Iraqi people might have been “We will help you….”

More here at MSNBC.

The military – a means? Or an end….

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Proposed U.S. military spending for FY 2008 is larger than military spending by all of the other nations in the world combined. At $141.7 billion, this year’s proposed spending on the Iraq war is larger than the military budgets of China and Russia combined. Total U.S. military spending for FY2008 is roughly ten times the military budget of the second largest military spending country in the world, China. Proposed U.S. military spending is larger than the combined gross domestic products (GDP) of all 47 countries in sub-Saharan Africa. The FY 2008 military budget proposal is more than 30 times higher than all spending on State Department operations and non-military foreign aid combined. The FY 2008 military budget is over 120 times higher than the roughly $5 billion per year the U.S. government spends on combating global warming. The FY 2008 military spending represents 58 cents out of every dollar spent by the U.S. government on discretionary programs: education, health, housing assistance, international affairs, natural resources and environment, justice, veterans’ benefits, science and space, transportation, training/employment and social services, economic development, and several more items.[2]

The Don In Denial – What did Rumsfeld know and when did he know it?

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In an interview with reporter Seymour Hersh, (“The General’s Report,” New Yorker, June 17, 2007), Major-General Taguba confirms what those who’ve followed the Abu Ghraib scandal have known from the start. Donald Rumsfeld and others in the chain of command knew all about it. They knew the details. But they deliberately kept what they knew under wraps and lied through their teeth about it to the house and senate.

Taguba was no hero to them. He was the guy who ratted out the military. That’s why – as Hersh’s interview confirms – they sent him to a dead-end job that ended his career.

It was only the threat of exposure by Hersh’s New Yorker story and a CBS broadcast at the end of April 2004 that forced their hands. Even then, Rumsfeld and his partners in crime – especially, General Richard Myers and Undersecretary of Defense, Stephen Cambone – shucked off responsibility, insisting that they’d been informed only in the vaguest terms.

Taguba’s revelation calls their bluff. It puts the gold seal of credibility on what’s easily proved from the record – Rumsfeld, Myers and Cambone engaged in a cover-up.

Look at the conflicting testimony at the two Senate hearings held on May 7 and May 11, 2004. Look at the previous reports to the Department of Defense about abuse — not just the report submitted by Taguba, and not just at Abu Ghraib, but reports going back to 2002. Reports that describe abuse all over Iraq and in Afghanistan. From the International Red Cross, from Human Rights Watch, from other human rights groups, from journalists, from American officials, from Iraqis — all clear, well documented, consistent. All immensely credible.

Even without Taguba’s definitive statements, does anyone really believe that the bosses didn’t know what was going on?

Here’s a timeline of the abuse (and the complaints) compiled from a Human Rights Watch timeline and from other reports (it’s by no means exhaustive):

December 25, 2002 – A Washington Post report on torture at Bagram, Afghanistan

December 27 – Human Rights Watch asks President Bush to investigate WP story

January 14, 2003 – Directors of several human rights groups write to Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz to publicly condemn use of torture

January 31 – Human rights groups write to President Bush to condemn torture and provide guidelines for interrogations.

February 5 – Human rights groups meet with White House Counsel Haynes to urge guidelines. Haynes writes back (in April) ruling out torture but sidestepping on the issue of cruel and degrading practices

February- March – various US officials admit that torture and rendition are being practiced

March onward – Oral and written complaints made by Red Cross

June 2 – Senator Leahy writes to National Security Advisor Condoleeza Rice about torture allegations and urges clear guidelines (Haynes later responds to Leahy, abjuring cruel treatment and affirming Convention Against Torture guidelines)

June 24 – Human rights groups write to Rice

August – An International Red Cross complaint is made to the “highest level of the Coalition forces” (this is according to the IRC February Report). Officially, the highest level would be then head of the Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA), Paul Bremer – who reports directly to the Secretary of Defense, i.e. to Rumsfeld.

August 28 – Investigation into Umm Qasr (Iraq) abuse

October 19 – Eight marine reservists charged with abuse

November 12 – International Red Cross report issued

November 17 – Human rights groups write to White House Counsel Haynes

November 18 – Deputy General Counsel of the DOD reaffirms that earlier statements of DOD about torture are binding to the whole executive branch

December 23 – Brigadier-General Karpinski (in charge of AG) replies to the November International Red Cross Report

December 27 – Human Rights Watch writes to President Bush

December 29 – Case of abuse at Camp Bucca (Iraq) in May is investigated and closed

January 6, 2004 – Three reservists discharged for abuse

January 12 – Human rights groups write to Rumsfeld

January 13 – Sgt. Joseph M. Darby of the US Army’s 372nd Military Police Company downloads pictures from a computer that turn out to be photographs of graphic abuse at Abu Ghraib prison near Baghdad. He turns them in to his superiors.

January 15 – Details of Abu Ghraib abuse (including forced nudity and sex torture and including torture of women and children deemed too sensitive for public display) were emailed to senior Pentagon officials, including General Craddock and Vice-Admiral Keating, director of the Joint Staff of the JCS.

January 16 – DOD brief numbered 04-01-43 (only 4 lines in length) from Baghdad states that an investigation has been initiated into “reported incidents of abuse at a Coalition Forces detention facility.” The release of more detail is not possible, it says, because that could hamper an (note this phrase, please) ongoing investigation which was in its initial stages.

January 18-19 – 320th Military Police (MP) suspended Brigadier General Karpinski (one-star general) suspended.

Late January – General Abizaid (head of Central Command) tasks Lieutenant General Sanchez (a three-star general, army commander in Iraq and Taguba’s boss) to investigate further. Rumsfeld claims he alerted President and senior officials

January 31 – Major-General Taguba (a two-star general) begins investigation

February 6 – Taguba submits report

February 10 – Human Rights Watch and several rights groups write to Rumsfeld describing abuse and asking how many detainees were being held.

Early February – Two more investigations begin (into training of reservists and detention practices elsewhere in Afghanistan and Iraq)

February – Another International Red Cross report on abuse is delivered to the CPA (highest authority in Iraq).

Match 8 – Human Rights Watch report on abuse in Afghanistan comes out

March 9 – Taguba presents his report to commanders. Criticizes Major-General Miller for advocating use of Military Intelligence (MI) in interrogations (Gitmoization strategy).

March 20 – Major-General Kimmitt tells reporters that 6 military personnel have been charged with criminal offenses

Late March-April – Miller (commander of Guantanamo) brought from Guantanamo to head Abu Ghraib.

April – Investigation number five (into gathering of military intelligence) begins

April 28 – Rumsfeld and Myers brief 35-40 senators on Iraq in classified session, hours before CBS 60 Minutes II expose without mentioning Abu Ghraib. Myers claims he did not know about the photos until just before the CBS show.

April 28 – CBS expose of Abu Ghraib

May 1 – Taguba report approved by Defense Department.

May 3 – Human Rights Watch and other groups write to Rice that abuse is widespread, systemic and illegal, according to the army’s own investigation.

May 4 – Armed Services Committee receives Taguba report.

May 6 – Taguba meets Rumsfeld who denies having received his report.

May 7 – Armed Services Committee Hearings

May 10 – President is shown a representative sample of photos, supposedly for the first time.

May 10 – ASC receives classified annexes of Taguba report.

May 11 – ASC Hearings. Taguba testifies about his report.

Here’s the interesting bit. Originally slated to speak at the Senate Hearings in the morning panel, Taguba is later pushed into the afternoon, with Undersecretary of Defense Cambone speaking in the morning, instead. Cambone’s testimony sets a framework that entirely undercuts Taguba’s.

Accidental – or deliberate?

While Taguba’s report showed that it was Miller’s Gitmoization policy that laid the groundwork for the torture, Cambone’s testimony attempted to erect a firewall between Gitmo and Abu Ghraib.

What for? Because Cambone didn’t want people to see the Bush administration’s loose standards on torture as having having set off the abuse. The administration treated Gitmo prisoners as terrorists.  Their  fingerprints were all over interrogations there, as the ACLU file on Gitmo shows.

AG had to be kept apart from Gitmo, at all costs.
So, that’s why we have Cambone arguing that while Miller might have been called from Gitmo to shake up intelligence gathering in Iraq, he didn’t really call the shots at AG. Oh no. He just made suggestions. It was Karpinski’s fault, not Miller’s.

And Cambone also did his best to keep the focus off the single more dangerous aspect of the Abu Ghraib abuse — the involvement of the CIA, intelligence contractors and special forces.

Why? Again, to protect Rumsfeld and himself. Because central to Rumsfeld’s New Model Army is the outsourcing (privatization) of intelligence, so that it’s no longer under congressional supervision. And part of that process is the extensive use of special ops, special forces and private contractors. The very people up to their necks in abuse in Iraq.

Special forces are all over the place now – from the appointment of Chief of Staff Peter Schoomaker, a member of Delta Forces, whose appointment was the first time a special forces commander had controlled the military, to the appointment of Civilian Assistant Secretary for Special Operations, Thomas O’Connell, late of the Phoenix Program in Vietnam, and the involvement of Cambone himself, a ballistic missile hawk, and of “Jerry” Boykin, the special ops loose canon whose idea it was to Gitmoize in the first place.

And that’s why when Taguba turned in his incriminating report, Rumsfeld and Cambone could only see it as the old- style military turning on his new model army.

So we know why he’s no hero to them.

But here’s what the Donald and his merry men still have to explain:

Question One:

Taguba says he submitted more than a dozen copies of his report through “several channels” at the Pentagon and to Central Command at Tampa, Florida. He also “spent
weeks” briefing senior military officials on the report, he says. Not one of them, except General Schoomaker (who complimented him), seems to have read it. Some said they didn’t, so as to avoid getting involved.

This is the report of a general who was tasked by no less than CENTCOM chief General Abizaid to write it, but no one read the thing?

According to Taguba, Rumsfeld’s words to him on May 6 were: “Here I am, just a Secretary of Defense, and we have not seen a copy of your report. I have not seen the photographs, and I have to testify to Congress tomorrow and talk about this.”

OK. Let’s say the dozen or more copies got lost somehow wending their way up through that perilous chain of command. Let’s say Taguba is too low on the pole for the mighty defense secretary to pay attention to.

What about the general in charge of Iraq, Ricardo Sanchez? Mightn’t he at least reside close enough to the rarefied air of Mount Pentagonus to warrant attention? Apparently not.

Sanchez was cc’d on January 20, 2004 that the allegations of torture were true and that there were more than a hundred photos to back them up. Nonetheless, Rumsfeld says Sanchez didn’t breathe a word about it to him.

My, my. What Victorian reticence they practice in the halls of power.

But, get this, Rumsfeld also admitted at the May 7 hearings that he spoke “everyday” to Sanchez. And Sanchez, we know, received a Red Cross report on prisoner abuse as far back as August 2003. Specific abuses at AG were known to his underling Karpinksi by December 2003. That’s thesame Karpinksi who was directly under Sanchez and who was fired by Sanchez in January. For what, if not for the torture scandal?

Repeat – Rumsfeld and Sanchez spoke every day. Rumsfeld, Myers, Abizaid and Sanchez spoke to each other every day; according to Rumsfeld, several times. Rumsfeld briefed the President with Myers present every other day. And somewhere in late January or early February at a meeting at which General Pace, Myers’ deputy, was sitting in for him, the President was also informed.

But none of them heard anything about Abu Ghraib? Not a whisper. How credible is that? If they didn’t, what would that make them? Incompetent or liars. Which is it, Mr. Rumsfeld?

“The President didn’t know, and you [representatives] didn’t know, and I didn’t know,” claims Rumsfeld, who says he didn’t want to interfere with the report working its way up the chain of command.

Oh – so, are we to believe that between the heads up to the president in late January and the April 28 CBS story, the president was not told anything more?

Yet, Myers admitted to the Senate hearing on May 7 that people “inside our building” knew about the photos. Then how could the president not know? And if Myers himself hadn’t seen the photos, how come he squashed their publication until Hersh’s story forced them into public view? How did he know they were too explosive for CBS?

Telepathy?

Question Two:

Said Rumsfeld on May 7, the problem was only “one dimensional”; he couldn’t foresee the kind of damage that “hundreds or however many of these things there are” would do.
On May 11, Cambone added: “Until the pictures began appearing in the press, Sir, I had not sense of that scope and scale.”

But here are some of the details Taguba says were sent to the military high command in January — “descriptions of the sexual humiliation of a father with his son, who were both detainees,” “of an Iraqi woman detainee baring her breasts,” and of “a video of a male American soldier in uniform sodomizing a female detainee” – only a few of many (about 300) images, some still held in secrecy

Rape, sodomy, child abuse. Captured on CD’s and audio-tapes. Short of performance art, how much more multidimensional would things have needed to get, Secretary, for you and your colleagues to have figured out that what was going on was in violation of US and international law?

Question Three:

Miller’s the guy whose Gitmoization strategy at AG in the fall of 2003 led to the torture, according to Taguba’s own investigation. What’s he doing being put in charge of the business just after Taguba’s report comes out? Rumsfeld can’t pretend he didn’t know that. Because Miller met with him just before going to Iraq.

And why was Taguba carted off to a dead-end job if the army liked what he did?

Wasn’t that a direct contradiction of the findings of the report? Wasn’t that transfer as way of giving the finger to Taguba and every human rights group and critic of the torture policy?

Question Four:

At the May 7 hearings, General Myers suggested that the military had from the start briefed the press in detail (Rumsfeld said it “told the whole world”). The record shows that that’s a fib. The wording of the brief in January is noticeably terse and lacking in detail, especially in the context of two years of mounting abuses.

Looks more like the army brass were trying their best to keep the scandal under wraps till it blew up in their faces. If they were happy with Taguba’s report, why did they approve it only on May 1, when it was completed on February 6 — a whole three months earlier?

What took so long?

Especially since no one seems to have read it in the first place.

Ron Paul on Immigration.. and a critic on Paul

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“I mmigration reform should start with improving our border protection, yet it was reported last week that the federal government has approved the recruitment of 120 of our best trained Border Patrol agents to go to Iraq to train Iraqis how to better defend their borders! This comes at a time when the National Guard troops participating in Operation Jump Start are being removed from border protection duties in Arizona, New Mexico, and Texas and preparing to deploy to Iraq and Afghanistan! It is an outrage and it will result in our borders being more vulnerable to illegal entry, including by terrorists.”

More here.

Poor Ron Paul. Does he think rationality, sincerity, erudition, and plainspeaking are things people want?

The mob – in any class – likes to be told it’s always right. It disguises its self interest in high-sounding palaver. And that’s invariably the case whenever you turn away from some attempt (feeble, no doubt) at rationality and law to pure brute interest-group politics.

The same end awaits every foot-loose republic – it turns into an empire of cacaphonous voices, each more strident, self-righteous and ignorant than the next. Each so sure that any one who contradicts his self-serving image of reality is as much a charlatan as he is:

One of those who can always find logs, even redwood forests, in other people’s eyes but never one speck – not the tiniest sub-atomic antiparticle – in their own eyeballs speaks up against the Pauline menace:

The Ron Paul that Ron Paul doesn”t want you to know
By Richard Searcy. Staff Writer
Atlanta Progressive News
May 25, 2007

“Republican Presidential candidate Congressman Ron Paul is making a name for himself by emerging as an antiwar republican in the 2008 race for the White House. While those of us who oppose the mindless war in Iraq welcome all voices of opposition, there are some troubling questions arising about Mr. Paul.

Paul has been consistent in his opposition to the war, but he hasn”t been very vocal or visible about that opposition. Most Americans knew nothing about Mr. Paul before this election season or had no idea thatsuch an animal as an antiwar Republican even existed….”

The letter goes on with even more ghastly logic, but I will stop there. There is only so much you can take at one sitting.

Anti-interventionism was not only the quintessential Republican tradition until Mr. Buckley took over the party and turned it into the All-Soviet Committee for Infinite Expansion into the Known Universe, it is the expressly designated constitutionally-defined role for the Federal government envisioned by Messrs. Jefferson and Madison.

That Mr. Searcy doesn’t know this is proof of his own limitations and not that of conservatives or libertarians – or for that matter, Republicans.

Not that Ron Paul has been silent either, as a glance at his archive will tell you. The media has, yes. For obvious reasons. And some people would sooner have the Middle East blown to smithereens and this country bankrupted than make common cause with a white male Republican who doesn’t fit their stereotype of a frothing redneck who chews glass and sacrifices babies by moonlight behind his double-wide.

So much for the opposition to the war in this country. It is bound up so completely and utterly in short-sighted unctuous self- interest that it is incapable for a nanosecond of reaching out generously to any one except someone made in its own insular – yes, despite all the lip-service to diversity, insular – image.

Ron Paul has apologized for the remarks that so offended the ayatollahs on the left.

 

But when are the ayatollahs going to start apologizing for their uninformed, divisive rhetoric, their incessant class-warfare, their male-bashing, anti-Christian diatribes, for the power politics that, fooling no one except themselves, they disguise as solicitude for humanity?

When?

But go and read Ron Paul’s archive. That will be the best antidote for this kind of know-nothing hatchet job.

 

 

The Texan People Trust – Ron Paul In His Own Words

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The ONLY Pro-Constitution Antiwar candidate in his own words (I sent this piece to a couple of sites early this morning):

Updated version (6/1) – I altered this so as to make it less of a political endorsement:

The Texan People Trust: The Only PRO-CONSTITUTION ANTIWAR Candidate
In His Own Words

What’s behind the recent swell of support for Congressman Ron Paul?
Supporters point out a number of refreshing differences in the maverick Texan, who has the blogs a-buzz. In no particular order, they are –

20. NOT A CHICKEN HAWK. Unlike Dick Cheney, George Bush and Donald Rumsfeld, Paul served in Vietnam for duty…not booty. He knows the costs – when they’re worth paying and when they’re not. That alone makes him credible to many people as an antiwar candidate.
“As an Air Force officer serving from 1963-1968, I heard the same agonizing pleas from the American people. These pleas were met with the same excuses about why we could not change a deeply flawed policy and rethink the war in Vietnam. That bloody conflict, also undeclared and unconstitutional, seems to have taught us little despite the horrific costs.”

— “We Just Marched In (So We Can Just March Out),” April 17, 2007

“Why is it that those who never wore a uniform and are confident that they won’t have to personally fight this war are more anxious for this war than our generals?”

— “Questions That Won’t Be Asked About Iraq,” September 10, 2002

19. HAS FOUGHT FOR SOMETHING – for human life. As a medical doctor, he can actually do something besides shuffle paper and grease palms, which makes him an all but extinct species in the Beltway jungle. And while his training puts him squarely in the science-based community, he’s also a genuinely religious man who has the trust of social conservatives. Many people would rather hear hard science from a principled individual like Ron Paul than soft twaddle from front men for vested interests. They see him as both a strong libertarian and a social conservative and wonder if he just might be the person to shape the issues in a way that’s rational and sensitive to rights.
“The bottom line is that mental health issues are a matter for parents, children, and their doctors, not government…..It is important to understand that powerful interests, namely federal bureaucrats and pharmaceutical lobbies, are behind the push for mental health screening in schools. There is no end to the bureaucratic appetite to run our lives, and the pharmaceutical industry is eager to sell psychotropic drugs to millions of new customers in American schools. Only tremendous public opposition will suffice to overcome the lobbying and bureaucratic power behind the president’s New Freedom Commission.”

— “Don’t Let Congress Fund Orwellian Psychiatric Screening of Kids,” January 31, 2005


18. KNOWS OPEN BORDERS DON’T MIX WITH WARFARE-WELFARE
Supporters claim that Paul is no ideologue who lets doctrinaire libertarianism trump considerations of law and ethics. His position on immigration, for instance, is not the usual “open borders” mantra of many soi-disant free traders:

“We’re often told that immigrants do the jobs Americans won’t do, and sometimes this is true. But in many instances illegal immigrants simply increase the supply of labor in a community, which lowers wages.”

“The Immigration Question,” April 4, 2006.

“… immigration may be the sleeper issue that decides the 2008 presidential election.”

“More importantly, we should expect immigrants to learn about and respect our political and legal traditions, which are rooted in liberty and constitutionally limited government.

Our most important task is to focus on effectively patrolling our borders. With our virtually unguarded borders, almost any determined individual – including a potential terrorist – can enter the United States. Unfortunately, the federal government seems more intent upon guarding the borders of other nations than our own. We are still patrolling Korea’s border after some 50 years, yet ours are more porous than ever.”

— “Immigration and the Welfare Stare,” August 9, 2005.
This is not xenophobia – it’s common sense in most countries in the world.

17. UNDERSTANDS THE NEED TO REIGN IN THE EXECUTIVE. Critics of our out-of-control Caesar can take heart from Paul. He is very clear on the importance of the separation of powers and the need for checks and balances in the government and he’s spoken out time and again for strengthening the power of Congress.

“…why not try something novel, like having Congress act as an independent and equal branch of government? Restore the principle of the separation of powers, so that we can perform our duty to provide checks and balances on an executive branch (and an accommodating judiciary) that spies on Americans, glorifies the welfare state, fights undeclared wars, and enormously increases the national debt. Congress was not meant to be a rubber stamp. It’s time for a new direction.”

— “Searching For a New Direction,” January 19, 2006.

He’s also stood up against corrupt federal programs like the “war on drugs”:

“We have promoted a foolish and very expensive domestic war on drugs for more than 30 years. It has done no good whatsoever. I doubt our Republic can survive a 30-year period of trying to figure out how to win this guerilla war against terrorism.”

“The drug war encourages violence. Government violence against nonviolent users is notorious and has led to the unnecessary prison overpopulation. Innocent taxpayers are forced to pay for all this so-called justice. Our eradication project through spraying around the world, from Colombia to Afghanistan, breeds resentment because normal crops and good land can be severely damaged. Local populations perceive that the efforts and the profiteering remain somehow beneficial to our own agenda in these various countries.”

— “War on Terror? It’s as Bad as the War on Drugs,” October 30, 2001.

16. GETS VOLUNTARY SELF DEFENSE not only in the constitution but in Anglo-American political history. Ron Paul, say supporters, really understands what some eastern elites don’t – how central the second amendment is to the notion of a self -reliant, vigilant population. Especially now, the right to arms may be the only safeguard for citizens who don’t trust the police to protect them. That includes minorities who’ve been on the receiving end of police brutality.

“Gun control historically serves as a gateway to tyranny. Tyrants from Hitler to Mao to Stalin have sought to disarm their own citizens, for the simple reason that unarmed people are easier to control. Our Founders, having just expelled the British army, knew that the right to bear arms serves as the guardian of every other right. This is the principle so often ignored by both sides in the gun control debate. Only armed citizens can resist tyrannical government.”

— “The D.C. Gun Ban,” March 12, 2007

In the same spirit Paul also opposes the draft, which allows the privileged and powerful to forcibly deploy less privileged young men as cannon fodder.

“I believe wholeheartedly that an all-volunteer military is not only sufficient for national defense, but also preferable. It is time to abolish the Selective Service System and resign military conscription to the dustbin of American history. Five hundred million dollars have been wasted on Selective Service since 1979, money that could have been returned to taxpayers or spent to improve the lives of our nation’s veterans.”

— “Rethinking the Draft,” November 28, 2006

15. SUPPORTS DECENTRALIZATION CONSISTENTLY by supporting national sovereignty against transnational organizations manipulated by global elites. The same principle leads him to support the states against the Fed – and turns power back to local communities and people, instead of bureaucrats.

“The superhighway proposal is not the result of free market demand, but rather an extension of government-managed trade schemes like NAFTA that benefit politically connected interests.”

“This will require coordinated federal and state eminent domain actions on an unprecedented scale, as literally millions of people and businesses could be displaced. The loss of whole communities is almost certain, as planners cannot wind the highway around every quaint town, historic building, or senior citizen apartment for thousands of miles.”

“The ultimate goal is not simply a superhighway, but an integrated North American Union — complete with a currency, a cross-national bureaucracy, and virtually borderless travel within the Union. Like the European Union, a North American Union would represent another step toward the abolition of national sovereignty altogether . . .”

— “The NAFTA Superhighway,” October 30, 2006.

“All federal aid for Katrina should have been distributed as directly as possible to local communities, rather than through wasteful middlemen like FEMA and Homeland Security.”

— “Katrina Relief Six Months Later,” February 21, 2006.
That’s also why Paul is against a national ID:

“This legislation imposes federal standards in a federal bill, and it creates a federalized ID regardless of whether the ID itself is still stamped with the name of your state. It is just a matter of time until those who refuse to carry the new licenses will be denied the ability to drive or board an airplane. Domestic travel restrictions are the hallmark of authoritarian states, not free republics.”

— “The Worst Way to Fight Terror,” October 9, 2004.

To more and more people, increased decentralization is beginning to look like the only way to allow less central but polarizing social issues to take a back seat to the two-headed monster we face today — war and economic recession.

And, contrary to the way a largely hostile media has painted it, Paul’s pro-life position is only opposed to Federal funding of abortions and stem-cell research. Nothing stops the states or private entities from funding either. That’s a constitutionally sound argument that allows different points of view to flourish without allowing any of them to tyrannize the others.

In response, critics of Paul argue that federal funding alone allows science and research to develop and cite the Internet as an example. They’re wrong. It was not at the Defense Department but at a European research organization that Tim Berners-Lee created his browser-editor. And aside from that factual inaccuracy, the argument itself is illogical. Because some innovations have come out of government funding, it doesn’t follow that all research could only have come out of it. In fact, the opposite might be true. The Internet could as well have developed sooner and better at the state level and with private backing. Dollar for dollar, federal funding for all sorts of things – from NASA to cancer research – has been shown to be either grossly ineffectual or not needed.

14. KNOWS THE TWO-PARTY SYSTEM IS BROKEN and supports opening up the electoral process to more candidates from the grass roots:

“The two items I will be introducing on Tuesday embrace rather than disgrace the first amendment. The first is called the Voter Freedom Act of 1997. It will prohibit states from erecting excessive ballot access barriers to candidates for federal office. The Constitution gives Congress the authority to control federal elections, and I firmly believe that the more voices participating, the more likely it is that the entrenched, out-of-touch, Washington establishment will be swept to the side.”

“Another part of this vital process is opening the debates. So the second piece of legislation I am putting forward is the Debate Freedom Act of 1997……My legislation simply requires that if a candidate accepts the federal funding for his or her election, then that candidate can only participate in debates to which all candidates who qualify for federal funding – whether they take it or not – are invited to participate.”

— “If someone accepts federal cash, then they must follow rules taxpayers set and deserve,” September 15, 1997

13. WILL DECREASE TAXES and eliminate the bureaucracy strangling small businesses that create jobs and wealth. Supporters point out that in Paul’s lexicon wealth doesn’t mean the paper-jive of money-sharpers on Wall Street. It’s hard work, innovation and savings.

They also find hope in Paul’s sensitivity to the privacy issues involved with the IRS. He has publicly stated his concerns about the IRS using strong-arm tactics with citizens – and elected representatives – for political reasons.

“Imagine that you have taken a position contrary to the official dictates of the government in your nation. Instead of simply facing criticism from opposing political sides, you find your life turned upside-down; every aspect of your life is closely scrutinized. Without warning, your life savings are seized, your personal, private records divulged far and wide.
Suddenly, how willing are you to continue holding your views?”

“The answer is not to simply revise the code, or to make the IRS more independent, or to have an added layer of judicial review, the answer is to fundamentally change the way we collect taxes in this nation. The nonsensical body of law which governs the IRS is too far removed from sanity to be saved. And the graduated income tax system is neither fair, economically sound, moral nor useful.

“In my mind, the jury is still out on whether a flat tax or a national sales tax is the absolute best way to go (my main goal is for lower taxes, across-the-board), but both will go a long way toward eliminating the politically powerful weapon known as the IRS.”

— “Fear of IRS misplaced, the real problem is the system,” April 20, 1997.

12. BACKS SOUND MONEY Unlike other politicians with little sense of financial responsibility, Paul’s been speaking out for years against the destruction of the dollar. It’s one reason he’s popular. He’s been one of the very few who’ve spoken out again the cheap credit destroying savings and retirement money, pushing up the cost of living and devastating US standing in the international economy.

” I must diagnose an illness before I can treat a patient. In the current instance the diagnoses indicates that the squeeze of the middle class is caused not by low wages, but rather by increased costs resulting from central planning. And the key pillars of our current central-planning regime can be found in tax and monetary policies.

The fact that government creates money out of thin air must be addressed, because it is the entire reason why costs of living increase and standards of living decline….. Again, there is only one reason why prices are rising instead of falling. Because the government, through its credit-creation mechanism, is engaged in a sort of price controls, it is in fact following a policy that eventuates in price inflation as well as recession. Plus, this credit creation is at the heart of recent instability in the markets, thus threatening retirement security.”

— “Answering the Middle Class Squeeze,” March 27, 2000

“The biggest rip-off of all – the paper money system that is morally and economically equivalent to counterfeiting – is never questioned. It is the deceptive tool for transferring billions from the unsuspecting poor and middle-class to the special interest rich. And in the process, the deficit-propelled budget process supports the spending demands of all the special interests – left and right, welfare and warfare – while delaying payment to another day and sometimes even to another generation.”

—— “Searching for a New Direction,” January 19, 2006.
11 UNDERSTANDS THE REAL REASON WHY THE POOR ARE BEING SQUEEZED.

His supporters also think that Paul is the only one willing to tackle the real reason low-wage earners are taking it in the neck. Instead of pandering with price and wage controls, he strikes at the root:

“Our tax burden is at its highest peacetime levels. This means wage earners are being squeezed by the cost of government as well as the cost of living. Had Congress not stopped the Clinton-Gore tax on BTU’s, (which they called an economic stimulus package), fuel prices would be significantly higher than they are right now. This points to why government is not the answer.

Increases in costs of living are a real problem, especially for those at the lower end of the wage scale. Those costs will continue to rise if we allow central planning to continue, but the solution to central planning is freedom, not grant further control over wages to government.”

— “Answering the Middle Class Squeeze,” March 27, 2000

10. STANDS UP FOR CIVIL LIBERTIES AND PRIVACY.

“The Freedom and Privacy Restoration Act also contains a blanket prohibition on the use of identifiers to “investigate, monitor, oversee, or otherwise regulate” American citizens. Mr. Chairman, prohibiting the Federal Government from using standard identifiers will ensure that American liberty is protected from the “surveillance state.” Allowing the federal government to use standard identifiers to oversee private transactions present tremendous potential for abuse of civil liberties by unscrupulous government officials.

I am sure I need not remind the members of this Committee of the sad history of government officials of both parties using personal information contained in IRS or FBI files against their political enemies. Imagine the potential for abuse if an unscrupulous government official is able to access one’s complete medical, credit, and employment history by simply typing the citizens’ “uniform identifier” into a database.”

— Statement of Ron Paul on the Freedom and Privacy Restoration Act (HR 220), May 18, 2000

“This legislation gives authority to the Secretary of Homeland Security to expand required information on driver’s licenses, potentially including such biometric information as retina scans, finger prints, DNA information, and even Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) radio tracking technology. Including such technology as RFID would mean that the federal government, as well as the governments of Canada and Mexico, would know where Americans are at all time of the day and night.

There are no limits on what happens to the database of sensitive information on Americans once it leaves the United States for Canada and Mexico – or perhaps other countries. Who is to stop a corrupt foreign government official from selling or giving this information to human traffickers or even terrorists? Will this uncertainty make us feel safer?”

— HR 418- A National ID Bill Masquerading as Immigration Reform, February 9, 2005


9. KNOWS CURRENT ENTITLEMENT PROGRAMS ARE BANKRUPT and has the technical savvy to deal with healthcare, where government interference has already created a disaster.

“Those future obligations (of entitlements) put our real debt figure at roughly fifty trillion dollars- a staggering sum that is about as large as the total household net worth of the entire United States. Your share of this fifty trillion amounts to about $175,000.
….. If present trends continue, by 2040 the entire federal budget will be consumed by Social Security and Medicare alone. The only options for balancing the budget would be cutting total federal spending by about 60%, or doubling federal taxes. To close the long-term entitlement gap, the U.S. economy would have to grow by double digits every year for the next 75 years.”

— “The Coming Entitlement Meltdown,” March 5, 2007

The problems with our health-care system are not the result of too little government intervention, but rather too much. Contrary to the claims of many advocates of increased government regulation of health care, rising costs and red tape do not represent market failure. Rather, they represent the failure of government policies that have destroyed the health care market.”

“As a greater amount of government and corporate money has been used to pay medical bills, costs have risen artificially out of the range of most individuals. Only true competition assures that the consumer gets the best deal at the best price possible by putting pressure on the providers. Patients are better served by having options and choices, not new federal bureaucracies and limitations on legal remedies.”

— “Diagnosing Our Health Care Woes,” September 25, 2006.


8. OPPOSES CORPORATE SUBSIDIES that distort the market and burden tax payers, like the bailout of international speculators with tax payer money in the Mexican and Asian crises in the 1990s.

“But many investors today are eager to embrace the philosophy of free-market economics when it comes to making money and keeping their profits, but at the first sign of those investments going sour, they want the government to socialize their losses at the expense of the taxpayers.

And since these investors have also heavily “invested” in American politics, it is easy for the politicians to use your money to help them out. After all, it is very easy to be generous with other people’s money.”

“President opts to use taxpayer fund to bail out wealthy investors,” December 29, 1997

“For a long time I have advocated getting rid of the Export-Import Bank. It is unconstitutional for the federal government, using your money, to be subsidizing the risky business ventures of corporations. And often, these ventures involve giving large sums of money and aid to oppressive foreign governments, like China……..Subsidizing big corporations is unconstitutional and violative of the laws of free-market economics, no matter what Congress calls the mechanism. Those who are addicted to corporate welfare have no need to worry; USEX will be doing the same thing as Ex-Im.”

— “US shouldn’t cast stones with Religious Persecution,” October 6, 1997

7. OPPOSES THE NEO-LIBERAL GLOBALIST AGENDA and the charade of aid that funds foreign dictators. He also understands the dangers of national armies in the service of global international bodies, a position firmly rooted in the ideas of Madison and Jefferson — and firmly contrary to the delusional “liberventionism” of today’s humanitarian bombers who fancy themselves global Supermen.

“Neither, of course, does the Constitution allow us to subsidize foreign governments through such taxpayer-supported entities as the World Bank, the World Trade Organization, OPIC, Ex-Im/USEX or any number of other vehicles through which the U.S. Congress sends foreign aid to a large number of countries (including those who engage in religious persecution). It is time we stopped both policing the world, and funding the totalitarian thugs of planet.”

” It is ironic that the same federal government which killed innocent children at Waco for their parents “odd” religious beliefs, now proclaims itself ready to judge the world’s nations on their religious tolerance.”

— “US shouldn’t cast stones with religious persecution,” October 6, 1997

6. WILLING TO LOOK FOR OIL IN OTHER PLACES besides the Middle East. Fans point out that he’s not a crony capitalist, either. Paul isn’t piped at the umbilicus to energy companies or in bed with oil executives, unlike our current crop of carbon-dating fossils.

“Yes, we need Middle Eastern oil, but we can reduce our need by exploring domestic sources. We should rid ourselves of the notion that we are at the mercy of the oil-producing countries- as the world’s largest oil consumer, their wealth depends on our business.”

— “Our Incoherent Foreign Policy Fuels Middle East Turmoil,” December 3, 2002 l

5. BELIEVES THE US GOVERNMENT SHOULD GOVERN THE US, not the World. Wow. What a revolutionary idea.

“We should stop the endless game of playing faction against faction, and recognize that buying allies doesn’t work. We should curtail the heavy militarization of the area by ending our disastrous foreign aid payments. We should stop propping up dictators and putting band-aids on festering problems. We should understand that our political and military involvement in the region creates far more problems that it solves. All Americans will benefit, both in terms of their safety and their pocketbooks, if we pursue a coherent, neutral foreign policy of non-interventionism, free trade, and self-determination in the Middle East.”

— “Our Incoherent Foreign Policy Fuels Middle East Turmoil,” December 3, 2002

“The best reason to oppose interventionism is that people die, needlessly, on both sides. We have suffered over 20,000 American casualties in Iraq already, and Iraq civilian deaths probably number over 100,000 by all reasonable accounts. The next best reason is that the rule of law is undermined, especially when military interventions are carried out without a declaration of war. Whenever a war is ongoing, civil liberties are under attack at home. The current war in Iraq and the misnamed war on terror have created an environment here at home that affords little constitutional protection of our citizen’s rights. Extreme nationalism is common during wars. Signs of this are now apparent.”

—“Iran: The Next Neo-Con Target,” April 5, 2006

4. STANDS UP TO BIG BROTHER.

Another reason for civil libertarians to cheer Ron Paul is his position on legislation like the Hate Crimes Bill. For opposing it, he’s been tarred by zealots as a closet bigot. But Paul – unlike his opponents – seems to be long-sighted enough to understand that the danger of creating a category of thought-crimes far outweighs any extra protection it might seem to afford the vulnerable in the short-term. Eventually, hate crime laws are frighteningly liable to be misused and only end up making political protest or the expression of religious conscience impossible.

“It’s also disconcerting to hear the subtle or not-so-subtle threats against free speech. Since the FCC regulates airwaves and grants broadcast licenses, we’re told it’s proper for government to forbid certain kinds of insulting or offensive speech in the name of racial and social tolerance. Never mind the 1st Amendment, which states unequivocally that, “Congress shall make NO law.”

— “Government and Racism,” April 16, 2007

Paul’s also made it clear that he’s against regulation of the Internet, one of the last remaining forums for free speech, especially on political matters, and one of the few places you can get independent news. People are rightly afraid of what would happen if that freedom disappeared too.

“I trust the Internet a lot more, and I trust the freedom of expression. And that’s why we should never interfere with the Internet. That’s why I’ve never voted to regulate the Internet.”

— “California Republican debate transcript,” May 7, 2007

3. IS RIGHT ABOUT TERRORISM:

Unlike most of our reps, Paul look like he actually reads what US intelligence (and just about every other intelligence service in the world) has been saying about terrorism for years:

“Consider Saudi Arabia, the native home of most of the September 11th hijackers. The Saudis, unlike the Iraqis, have proven connections to al Qaeda. Saudi charities have funneled money to Islamic terrorist groups. Yet the administration insists on calling Saudi Arabia a “good partner in the war on terror.” Why? Because the U.S. has a long standing relationship with the Saudi royal family, and a long history of commercial interests relating to Saudi oil. So successive administrations continue to treat the Saudis as something they are not: a reliable and honest friend in the Middle East.

The same is true of Pakistan, where General Musharaf seized power by force in a 1999 coup. The Clinton administration quickly accepted his new leadership as legitimate, to the dismay of India and many Muslim Pakistanis. Since 9/11, we have showered Pakistan with millions in foreign aid, ostensibly in exchange for Musharaf’s allegiance against al Qaeda. Yet has our new ally rewarded our support? Hardly. The Pakistanis almost certainly have harbored bin Laden in their remote mountains, and show little interest in pursuing him or allowing anyone else to pursue him. Pakistan has signed peace agreements with Taliban leaders, and by some accounts bin Laden is a folk hero to many Pakistanis.”

— “Hypocrisy in the Middle East,” Feb 26, 2007

2. IS RIGHT ABOUT THE IRAQ WAR

There’s a refreshing moral clarity about the man, say his supporters. Horses go before carts, he insists, in his revolutionary way.

“What is the moral argument for attacking a nation that has not initiated aggression against us, and could not if it wanted?”
“Why are we taking precious military and intelligence resources away from tracking down those who did attack the United States- and who may again attack the United States- and using them to invade countries that have not attacked the United States?”
“Was former CIA counter-terrorism chief Vincent Cannistraro wrong when he recently said there is no confirmed evidence of Iraq’s links to terrorism?”
“Is it not true that the CIA has concluded there is no evidence that a Prague meeting between 9/11 hijacker Atta and Iraqi intelligence took place?”
“Where does the Constitution grant us permission to wage war for any reason other than self-defense?”
” Is it not true that a war against Iraq rejects the sentiments of the time-honored Treaty of Westphalia, nearly 400 years ago, that countries should never go into another for the purpose of regime change?”
” Is it not true that the more civilized a society is, the less likely disagreements will be settled by war?”
” Is it not true that since World War II Congress has not declared war and- not coincidentally- we have not since then had a clear-cut victory?”

— “Questions That Won’t Be Asked About Iraq,” September 10, 2002

1. IS RIGHT ABOUT THE BILL OF RIGHTS

Ron Paul’s appeal may ultimately lie in his vision of the country. His America is a modest, self-limiting Constitutional Republic that tends its own garden– not the jack-booted empire of the neo-conservatives. And in search of that vision, he’s consistently defended the Bill of Rights against an arrogant executive and supine Congress who’ve sold them out to jack up their own power at home and abroad:

“It is with the complicity of Congress that we have become a nation of pre-emptive war, secret military tribunals, torture, rejection of habeas corpus, warrantless searches, undue government secrecy, extraordinary renditions, and uncontrolled spying on the American people. Fighting over there has nothing to do with preserving freedoms here at home.”

— “Getting Iraq War Funding Wrong Again,” May 1, 2007

“It is clear, however, that the Patriot Act expands the government’s ability to monitor us. The Act eases federal rules for search warrants in some cases; allows expanded wiretaps and Internet monitoring; allows secret “sneak and peek” searches; and even permits federal agents to examine library and bookstore records. On these grounds alone it should be soundly rejected.”

— “Trust Us, We’re the Government,” August 26, 2003.
“We shuld remember that Iran, like Iraq, is a third-world nation without a significant military. Nothing in history hints that she is likely to invade a neighboring country, let alone do anything to America or Israel. I am concerned, however, that a contrived Gulf of Tonkin-type incident may occur to gain popular support for an attack on Iran.”

— “The Irrelevance of Military Victory,” January 16, 2007.

Psychologists helped frame US torture techniques

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Details of the declassified Inspector General’s Report on how the torture at Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo was taught through a program that was framed in league with the psychology profession, in this article by psychologist and activist, Stephen Soldz:

“As part of the SERE program, trainees are subjected to abuse, including sleep deprivation, sexual and cultural humiliation, and, in some instances, waterboarding, described by one SERE graduate thus:
“[Y]ou are strapped to a board, a washcloth or other article covers your face, and water is continuously poured, depriving you of air, and suffocating you until it is removed, and/or inducing you to ingest water. We were carefully monitored (although how they determined these limits is beyond me), but it was a most unpleasant experience, and its threat alone was sufficient to induce compliance, unless one was so deprived of water that it would be an unintentional means to nourishment.”

More at his blog, “Psyche, Science and Society,” which has plenty of information on how the mind sciences are deployed in the services of the state. Put that next to the information we have about programs like TeenScreen and TMAP, and it should be clear that the sciences are not immune to the temptations of power and money.

We know we liive in a propaganda state. Now we know the extent to which the state is willing to employ science against any population, even its own. Several of the tortured detainees were American whistle-blowers who had alerted authorities to corruption in the military.

President Cheney Approves Israeli Plans to Strike Iran

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“There is a race currently underway between different flanks of the administration to determine the future course of US-Iran policy,” writes Washington insider Steven C. Clemens on his Washington Note blog. “On one flank are the diplomats, and on the other is Vice President Cheney’s team and acolytes — who populate quite a wide swath throughout the American national security bureaucracy.” This is “worrisome” because the “person in the Bush administration who most wants a hot conflict with Iran is Vice President Cheney.”Clemens cites a Cheney aide as indicating “that Cheney himself is frustrated with President Bush and believes, much like Richard Perle, that Bush is making a disastrous mistake” by supporting the diplomatic approach to Iran apparently favored by the State Department. So Cheney plans to deploy an “end run strategy” around the president (who’s more swayed at present by Condi Rice’s “realists” than Cheney’s neocons) if his flank doesn’t prevail and Bush resists the demand of the neocons and the AIPAC lobby for a bloody showdown.

“The thinking on Cheney’s team is to collude with Israel, nudging Israel at some key moment in the ongoing standoff between Iran’s nuclear activities and international frustration over this to mount a small-scale conventional strike against Natanz using cruise missiles This strategycould be expected to trigger a sufficient Iranian counter-strike against US forces in the Gulfas to compel Bush to forgo the diplomatic track that the administration realists are advocating and engage in another war.”

This is the most frightening piece I’ve read some time, along with Justin Raimondo’s latest column on antiwar.com that draws upon it. Raimondo citing a recent CNN interview with Seymour Hersh links Cheney and Deputy National Security Advisor Elliott Abrams (the most powerful neocon presently in the administration) to U.S. support for the Sunni Fatah al Islam militia in Lebanon as a means to weaken Hizbollah. “George W. Bush,” he declares, “is totally out of the loop” in what Raimondo calls “the Cheney administration.”

More from Gary Leupp.

B’nai Brith Shuts Down Peace Activists in Canada

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My earlier post, reworked as an article at Dissident Voice:
Chris Cook of the University of Victoria Gorilla Radio (GO-rilla, as in, our furry friends… or cousins…..or descendants, depending on your evolutionary perspective and level of optimism about the human race) writes:

“For American readers who value and feel protected by the 1st Amendment (right to free speech), it may seem strange that a country would enshrine in law the opposite condition; but Hate Crime legislation in this country is widely supported. Canada is an ethnically, and politically diverse country, consisting of minority populations from the world over, and it was deemed fair-minded to ensure all are protected from the “tyranny of the majority.” But it’s a double-edged sword, making possible an abuse of the statutes, allowing an equally odious tyranny, the stifling of dissent and criticism by a dedicated minority.”

Cook’s problem is that one edge of this sword just fell on a web-site he edits, the Peace, Earth & Justice News (PEJ.org), “a non-profit, all-volunteer, non-hierarchical media organization” based in Victoria whose mission (as described in its Constitution) is to report on “climate change and other environmental issues, war and peace in the Middle East, Afghanistan and elsewhere, and human rights and other matters of social justice.”

PEJ has been operating since 1996 and is owned by the small (annual budget of a few hundred dollars and volunteer staff), non-profit Prometheus Institute, British Columbia, where Cook was a senior editor until February this year.

On May 17 PEJ publisher Alan Rycroft received a letter from the Canadian Human Rights Commission, signed by the deputy secretary general Richard Tardiff, claiming that PEJ had violated Canadian law by posting anti-Semitic material, according to a complaint filed with its legal department by Harry Abrams, a Victoria businessman and British Columbia representative for the League for Human Rights of B’nai Brith, Canada, which joins him in the complaint.

PEJ publishes materials from activists around the world, including some who have published on American websites like Counterpunch, Dissident Voice, and Lew Rockwell. It is an alternative paper that by definition carries news not covered in the mainstream press and those stories are naturally controversial, often criticizing the actions of powerful entities, including governments. Naturally, that includes the Canadian government. And naturally, also, the Israeli government.

As soon as PEJ received the letter, it removed from its web-site the eighteen articles that Harry Abrams alleges were anti-Semitic.

PEJ did this as a matter of courtesy to Abrams and to show goodwill, according to Joan Russow, one of the directors, pending the outcome of an inquiry by the Canadian Human Rights Commission. PEJ does not endorse articles or comments published on it, to begin with. But, PEJ is, in addition, expressly non-discriminatory. As Dr. Russow, said in a letter to Mr. Abrams on December 31, 2006:

“Anti-Semitism and other prejudicial materials are not allowed on our site – after all PEJ News exists to promote equality and freedom for all – we are the Peace, Earth & Justice News. To the best of our knowledge no anti-Semitic or hate material is on PEJ.org.”

Indeed, it was she who invited Mr. Abrams (in December 2006) to inspect the articles on the site and see if anything was anti-Semitic, including comments from the public.

The Canadian Jewish Congress (CJC) whose “General Expectations of Canada” (as posted on the web, “CJC Brief to DFAIT on UN Human Rights Commission,” Feb 19, 2004 ) is not nearly as objective or non-discriminatory.

The CJC tells Canada’s Jewish citizens to take “constructive interventions against resolutions or motions” made in Canada that:

1.blame only Israel and its policies for the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

2. indict Israel’s legitimate counter-terrorism measures with no reference to or condemnation of Palestinian terrorism.

3. deny or undermine Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish state in the Middle East (my emphasis).

4. employ existentially threatening language such as referring to Israel as a “racist” or “apartheid” state and apply terms such as [“genocide”(?)], or “ethnic cleansing” to the conflict.

5. are based upon inaccurate media information or Palestinian Authority propaganda.

6. predetermine the outcome of direct, bilateral negotiations in keeping with UN Resolution 242 and 338 or circumvent such a process.

At the same time, Canada’s delegates must support and encourage efforts at the UNCHR that:

1. will ensure a comprehensive accounting of international human rights situations such that grievous international human rights issues are not ignored or soft-pedalled [sic] as a result of a politicized, anti-Israel agenda.

2. highlight the crippling impact of continuing Palestinian terrorism – which has been explicitly legitimized in the CHR resolutions – on the peace process and on attempts to establish a true human rights regime in the Middle East.

3. draw attention to the deficiencies within the Palestinian Authority regarding human rights and the building of a viable civil society for the Palestinian people.”

And B’nai Brith’s positions are even more partisan than this.

Thus it is that Anita Bromberg, in-house legal counsel for B’nai Brith, Canada, has joined Mr. Abrams in the complaint against PEJ’s peace activism, because, she says, the articles “are virulently anti-Israel to the point that they meet the criteria of crossing the line of legitimate criticism of the state straight into anti-Semitism.”

What, according to the complaint, is anti-Semitic?

“The idea that Israel has no right to exist or that Israel is an apartheid state,” says Mr. Abrams. Also, any comparison of Zionists to Nazis.

Were there such articles? In the context of the ongoing Israeli-Palestinian conflict and the war in Lebanon, several pieces did compare Israeli policy with Nazi persecution of Jews. One, by Chris Cook, “We Should Nuke Israel,” for instance, was a parody of a column in The Toronto Sun proposing a tactical strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities. Cook simply replaced the word “Iran” with “Israel,” “Amadinejad” with “Olmert,” “Muslim” with “Jew” and tagged the following paragraph at the end, ironically recommending that the article be acted upon by the Human Rights Commission:

“This amazingly ignorant, hateful, and frankly criminal article has been redacted. “Israel” appears where the murderous and racist author, Michael Coren originally wrote “Iran.” Likewise other slight alterations have been performed. There is, in what remains of this country Canada, hate crime legislation. Unlike Mr. Coren’s, and his Toronto Sun publisher’s heroes in the United States, Canadian media is expected to live up to certain standards. Promoting hatred and proposing the destruction of human life fail miserably to live up to the expected, and legislated, mandates for publishers. I recommend those offended by Mr. Coren’s modest proposal write the Sun, Coren, and the CRTC. Mr. Coren can be reached here”

Now, that’s strong language admittedly. But why, we wonder, does the Canadian Human Rights Commission not also write a letter to the columnist in Toronto Sun, which proposed a real nuclear hit on Iran with a straight face. Why instead attack a column written in transparent satire in response to the former? Are the human rights of Iranians – or of Palestinians – less worthy of attention than the human rights of Israelis?

By the way, in the US, words such as “genocide” and “ethnic cleansing” have been applied to the torture at Abu Ghraib in academic and law journals, such as Gonzaga University 10 Gonz. J. Int’l L. 370 (2007). If torture of prisoners in Iraq can be described in this way without American human rights activists objecting, it’s hard to see why the killing and dispossession of the civilian population in Palestine shouldn’t be called ethnic cleansing or genocide.

And, would the CHRC also rush so zealously to investigate on behalf of an organization that claimed Canada – or the U.S. – was a Christian country?

After the letter was received at PEJ and the offending articles removed, Ingmar Lee, one of PEJ’s editors posted a piece by a scholar, Shaheed Alam, one that just appeared in Counter Punch and other sites, and makes a scholarly criticism of Jewish exceptionalism as “inseparable from Israeli exceptionalism and Israeli history” (“Chosenness and Israeli Exceptionalism”) in a manner no different from and more measured that any number of dissections of American exceptionalism and some forms of Christian fundamentalism, which PEJ has also published.

The fact that it has shows clearly that PEJ was, in this instance, simply following its mission of attacking injustice wherever it finds it and defending human rights, no matter whose. Its criticism of Israel as a race-based state was simply part of its universal secular defense of human rights.

But defending universal secular human rights, which by the way, is policy in the State Department, turns out now to be the promotion of “ongoing hatred affecting persons identifiable as Jews and/or as citizens of Israel,” for in his complaint, Harry Abrams and B’nai Brith state that Abrams has “reasonable grounds for believing that I have been discriminated against.”‘
The only trouble with that statement is that the criticism in the articles is directed at the policies of the state of Israel, not at Mr. Abrams personally.

Should we conclude that Mr. Abrams sees himself as indistinguishable from the Israeli government? Or that B’nai Brith’s interest in human rights is indistinguishable from the vested interests of the Israeli government?

So far, Canada’s Globe and Mail, which published the story on May 24, has also published PEJ’s vigorous characterization of the charges as “calumnies.” But for how long?

Yesterday, Ingmar Lee was forced to resign as editor of PEJ for the bad judgment of publishing Alam’s article after the complaint was received, because the article is “slanderous to all Jews,” uses the word Zionist as a “slander,” like Nazi, and may be a “hate crime” under Canadian law (in the words of PEJ publisher, Rycroft).

A semantic question: Is it also a slander to refer to Nazis as “Nazis”?