MAX BLUMENTHAL

According to neocon hack Max Boot, Americans have been "spoiled" by previous low-casualty wars and should stop fussing about all their dead boys and girls in Iraq. On an historical scale, he claims, 800 dead is a low casualty rate. He also relies on the "a few" tactic to explain away the Abu Ghraib torture scandal; and with no evidence at all, remarks that it is "no My Lai." The fact that Boot has resorted to criticizing Americans for complaing about high casualties and torture is just another reflection of the fact that the GOP's Mighty Wurlitzer is almost out of tunes.
Fortunately, LA Times readers, particularly those who (unlike Boot) have seen combat didn't seem to agree with his screed.

Today, most Americans will probably have Iraq on their minds as they honor their war dead. I know I will, but in reflecting on Iraq I can't stop thinking about an obscure military disaster known as the Mayaguez Incident. To detail this incident, I now turn you over David Warsh of Economic Principals:

It was May 1975.

Two weeks earlier, Saigon had fallen to the North Vietnamese. The last Americans had staged an ignominious retreat from the roof of their embassy. President Gerald R. Ford, barely six months on the job in the wake of Richard Nixon's resignation, had declared that the war was "finished." He prepared to face the heat.

Whereupon the newly triumphant Khmer Rouge, intercepted the US merchant ship Mayaguez, steaming 60 miles off shore on its way to Thailand. They captured the ship and took its crew of 60 into custody. It was as it salt had been rubbed in a deep wound.

President Ford ordered an aircraft carrier, a destroyer and a Marine battalion landing team to the rescue. The US forces suffered a series of mishaps, including 23 commandos dead in a helicopter crash even before the operation began. Eventually the crew was rescued, but not before another Marine was killed, 50 wounded and 16 missing.

The incident was the first attempt to redress what already had become known as "Vietnam syndrome:" a lack of confidence in American military power so pervasive as to make it very difficult for American policy-makers to contemplate the use of force abroad. The mission was not a great public opinion success, but neither was it a fiasco, as had been an earlier attempt to rescue American prisoners of war from North Vietnam.

The White House chief of staff at the time: a hard-charging young executive named Donald Rumsfeld. His deputy: the 29-year-old Richard Cheney.

Within months, Rumsfeld and Cheney engineered a an administration shakeup designed to restore vigorous management to the American military establishment. Brent Scowcroft replaced Henry Kissinger as National Security Adviser. (Kissinger remained Secretary of State.)

Rumsfeld himself took over the Defense Department. Cheney became White House chief of staff. Named director of Central Intelligence was a former congressman from Texas named George H. W. Bush.

Warsh adds this important bit of insight to his reporting:

"For one thing, the men currently on the quarterdeck of American policy view the Second Gulf War as evolving in a more or less straight line from their initial response to the Mayaguez incident —trivial as that rescue operation against pirates now seems to have been."

Indeed, like the young men and women killed in Iraq, the soldiers of the Mayaguez Incident were tragically sacrificed to serve the over-zealous, self-serving agenda of Rumsfeld and Cheney. Today, they are back to haunt us.

Last week Bush granted a rare interview with a group of religious editors and writers including neocon culture warrior and Catholic leader Father Richard Neuhaus and Marvin Olasky (an informal advisor he called "Big Marvin Olasky"). Olasky, who publishes World Magazine, adapted extremist Christian Reconstructionist ideas to form the intellectual foundation of "compassionate conservativism."
Though Bush was his usual cagey self, the interview was much more informative than his incoherent press conferences, covering a broad array of subjects including Christian Zionism, the torture scandal and abortion. This is a must read, and much more informative than Bush's press conferences. Most notably:
--Bush says "...the job of a president is to help cultures change. The culture needs to be changed."
--Bush claims he "never apologized to the Arab world" for the Abu Ghraib torture scandal.
--He calls leaders of the Religious Right "extreme, radical people—who've got a deep desire to spread an ideology that is anti-women, anti-free thought, anti- art and science, you know, that couch their language in religious terms." Oh sorry! Um, Bush was talking about radical Islamists. My bad.
--Bush makes a transparent play for conservative Catholic votes, noting at least three times that he worked closely with Father Neuhaus on crafting the anti-gay marriage amendment (in the 2000 GOP primary, Republican Catholics overwhelmingly supported John McCain).
I was disappointed, however, that nobody bothered to ask Bush if he believes in Armageddon. I hope some brave reporter asks Bush this question before November.

Bush's selection of Iyad Alawi is looking more problematic by the day. First of all, the UN and Lakhdar Brahimi are pissed. This is from Islam Online:

In his initial statements, U.N. special envoy to Iraq Lakhdar Brahimi refused to discuss the selection of Allawi.
"I don't want to go back saying who is good and who is bad," he said.
But in a hint that the selection process had not gone exactly as planned, Brahimi added: "You know, sometimes people think I am a free agent out here, that I have a free hand to do whatever I want."

The Iraqi Governing Council's Shi'ite faction is not happy either. Apparently, Alawi strong armed his way into the top post by forming an alliance with Ahmed Chalabi to block the appointment of Hussain Shahristani, a popular technocrat with an independent streak and an admirable career. Shahristrani was the top choice of the UN.

First he justifies torture, now Alan Dershowitz has taken the case of David Appel, the businessman accused of bribing Ariel Sharon. Dershowitz told Ha'aretz he took the case because he was "astounded" that the Israeli police had eavesdropped on Appel before they arrested him. Dershowitz, according to Ha'aretz, "had never come across such Soviet-style police behavior." Appel is a mafia-like figure and has been under investigation for 20 years for offenses including an attempt to bribe a tax official, obstruction of justice, suspicious dealings with government companies, and suspicious dealings with Knesset members.

Israel tried Marwan Barghouti for terror-related charges and dealt him a harsh sentence. Nevertheless, it would not be surprising if he ends up leading negotiations with Israel in the future. After all, he's one of the only Palestinian political leaders likely to sign a negotiated settlement who commands a domestic constituency. As long as he's jailed though, the Israeli right and its American apologists can continue to claim there is no Palestinian negotiating partner.

It is well known Dick Cheney receives money from a Halliburton insurance policy covering an incurring legal costs from his relationship with the firm, but questions still linger about his role in arranging Iraq reconstruction contracts for his former firm. Time has a hot piece in its June 7th issue about an internal email revealing Cheney's role in arranging the lucrative "Restore Iraqi Oil" contract:

"But TIME has obtained an internal Pentagon e-mail sent by an Army Corps of Engineers official—whose name was blacked out by the Pentagon—that raises questions about Cheney's arm's-length policy toward his old employer. Dated March 5, 2003, the e-mail says "action" on a multibillion-dollar Halliburton contract was "coordinated" with Cheney's office. The e-mail says Douglas Feith, a high-ranking Pentagon hawk, got the "authority to execute RIO," or Restore Iraqi Oil, from his boss, who is Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz. RIO is one of several large contracts the U.S. awarded to Halliburton last year."

Andrew Cockburn provides a good overview in Salon of the career of "self-interested intriguer" Iyad Allawi, the Iraqi exile who has just been appointed Prime Minister of the Iraqi Governing Council by Bush and Co. Cockburn's reporting is especially strong on Allawi's ties to international intelligence agencies and his long-standing conflict and recent marriage of convenience with Chalabi.

Indeed, Allawi represents the traditional continuum of intel between the CIA, Jordan, Britain's MI6 Turkey and Saudi Arabia. The high point of Allawi's relationship with these agencies -- in particular the CIA and the Arabs -- was a botched coup attempt in 1996 called DBACHILLES.

After mulling an Afghan-style covert operation to attack Saddam's Republican Guard and help split the rest of the Iraqi military from Saddam, which then Secretary of State James Baker ruled out because it would have shattered the coalition that fought the Gulf War, the CIA decided to go with a traditional military-style coup.

In 1994, the CIA threw its weight behind Alawi, who had publicly boasted that his contacts in Saddam's army had stolen radios in southern Iraq and were using them to communicate with dissident military officers. To internationalize the coup, James Baker served as a liaison to the Saudis and Jordan, writing in his memoirs that "All our Arab coalition partners believed that Saddam would be ousted by a coup within six to eight months."

Watching from the sidelines, Chalabi was skeptical of the plot. In 1995, Chalabi oversaw a failed coup plan in 1995 coordinated with then CIA-op Bob Baer, and he had falled out of the Clinton administration's favor. In fact, the CIA reportedly began monitoring his London bank accounts to make sure he wasn't embezzling their payments to the INC. According to the Washington Post, Chalabi went to George Tenet in 1996 to demand DBACHILLES be aborted. Alawi's operatives, he alleged, had been penetrated by Iraqi intelligence. When Tenet wouldn't listen, Chalabi went to Richard Perle, who unsuccessfully lobbied Tenet against the plot.

Apparently, Chalabi was on to something: the 1996 coup resulted in a bloodbath and hundreds of Alawi's men were slaughtered. According to Laurie Mylroie, writing in Daniel Pipes' Middle East Forum in 2001, one of Alawi's men was the cousin of the commander of Saddam's army helicopter division, which played a central role in repressing the uprisings of the 1990's. In the end, the CIA spent $100 million on all its coup plotting in Iraq.

According to Cockburn, Alawi mounted his latest coup in 2003, supplying British intelligence the notorious lie about Saddam's Domino pizza-like ability to deliver WMD's in 45 minutes. Alawi was also behind the ridiculous US decision to form Iraqi paramilitaries to hunt down foreign fighters and insurgents in late 2003. And he has recently declared, probably falsely, that Saddam has revealed to interrogators that he has billions stashed in foreign bank accounts.

Though US proconsul Paul Bremer selected Allawi to the Iraqi Governing Council, the two have had a major falling out over Bremer's decision to ban Baathists -- whom Chalabi compared to Nazis -- from participating in the new government or getting CPA jobs.

The question I hope to see answered, given all Allawi's past failings and his current friction with the CPA, is exactly what propelled him to Prime Minister. I offer this theory: the State Department and CIA have preferred Allawi over Chalabi for years, arguing that unlike Chalabi, Allawi actually has a domestic constituency (among Baath party members and former army dissidents). So the installation of Allawi is a result of State and CIA's vindication by Chalabi's demise and of Bush's dire need to isolate Ayatollah Al-Sistani with a secular alternative.

Where is Jesse Helms' left hand and why is Chalabi holding back a grin? 

Remember Alexandra Polier, the freelance journalist who right-wing rent boy Matt Drudge and Rupert Murdoch's British tabloid, Sun, falsely named as John Kerry's mistress? Remeber how Drudge claimed Polier's mother called Kerry "a sleazebag?" Though the story died months ago, Polier is back -- and this time she's on the attack.
New York Mag is soon to publish a story in which Polier tries to interview the first sleazebag to name her, Brian Flynn of the Sun. Flynn's reaction to her request pretty much tells it all. Here's an excerpt:

Afraid I would lose my temper, I asked my editor to call [Flynn] first. 'I was calling to ask you who your source was for your story which named Alex Polier as the intern in the Kerry story,' she asked.

"Ah, many people have asked me; it was a fantastic source," he said. "I broke that story to the world, you know!" he added proudly. "But your source was wrong," she pointed out. He paused, startled. "You've just ambushed me," he cried. "You've ambushed me!"

"I think you should speak to Alex," she said and passed me the phone.

"Hello," he said, sounding nervous.

"I'd like to talk to you. I'm writing a piece and have some questions."

"It's not a good time right now," he said. "Let's meet up next week."

"Why did you quote my mother when she wasn't even home?" I persisted.

"I really can't talk about this right now, Alex," he said.

When I finally tracked him down the following week, he was brusque and told me to go through The Sun's PR office. I asked him about my mother again, but he kept saying, "Sorry, Alex, proper channels." Reached in London, Lorna Carmichael, The Sun's PR manager, refused to comment. I went to Flynn's apartment, and spoke to his wife through the intercom. "Go away and leave us alone!" she cried. "He's not going to come down or speak to you."

 
Here's a great photo from of Wolfowitz on a tour "of the death house at Abu Ghraib" last summer. That's Karpinski behind him, Lane McCotter, the prison director in the foreground and Eric Schmitt, the Times reporter, all the way in the back. McCotter is a former director of the Utah Dept. of Corrections who was implicated in a string of prisoner abuse cases. It's interesting that he was selected by Ashcroft for his post in Iraq.

Ahmed Chalabi's daughter wrote this revealing piece in June, 2003 about an INC delegation travelling to Iran for "intensive talks" with Iranian officials. Here's the best part:
Iran in support of ‘regime change’ in Baghdad

The week-long meetings in Tehran were a compelling game of seduction between westernised liberal secularism (best personified by Kanan Makiya) and committed political Islam as represented by the Iranian officials who oversee the ‘Iraq file’.

The game was played out around elaborate lunches (with non-alcoholic beer) and late-night teas, offered by our hosts with quintessential Persian hospitality. The discussions were as fascinating as they were endless. There was surprise too, as our hosts listened politely to our frank advocacy of democracy in Iraq, blunt rejections of an Iranian-style government, and elaborate renditions of meetings with high-ranking US officials that reflected a good relationship with the Iraqi opposition.

As a witness to these meetings, and beyond the different strategic and tactical positions, I was struck by the sheer competence of both sides. These Iranian officials displayed a level of knowledge of Iraq and its problems that I could not imagine encountering in the most advanced western think-tanks.

Of course, Iran is both neighbour and (in the 1980-88 war) recent enemy. But the detailed understanding these officials had of Iraqi society also informed their firm commitment to supporting an end to Saddam. Despite the traditional anti-US rhetoric in Iran and its branding as part of the “Axis of Evil”, the Iranians’ readiness to back an Iraqi opposition in alliance with the US was palpable.

Check out Michael Ledeen's hilariously incoherent defense of Ahmed Chalabi in the National Review, in which he tries to refute the fact that Chalabi is an Iranian agent, and attacks a certain "notorious liar."
Like Judith Miller and Laurie Mylroie, Ledeen is on the Benador Associates' talent roster [scroll down].

How did a relatively small cabal of propagandists bang such a raucous drumbeat for war? Benador Associates -- the premier neocon pr firm.
While Benador books speaking engagements and TV spots for a who's who of neocon propagandists including James Woolsey, Kanan Makiya, Laurie Mylroie and Frank Gaffney, there has been only one journalist on its roster: Judith Miller. Miller is no longer listed as with Benador, but she was at one point a client.
For good background on Benador, read Brian Whitaker's analysis in the Guardian:

Many of the total war and creative destruction crowd get their ideas across to the public through an agency called Benador Associates, which arranges their TV appearances and speaking engagements, and helps to place their articles in newspapers.
The agency, which has offices in New York, London and Paris, is run by Eleana Benador, a Peruvian-born linguist. Since I last wrote about Ms Benador (US thinktanks give lessons in foreign policy World dispatch, August 19 2002), her business seems to have expanded remarkably.
She has added 10 more "experts" to her list of clients and, on February 13, hosted a free lunch for a question and answer session with the Pentagon's leading hardline adviser, Richard Perle.
In addition, she has started a mailing service, through which subscribers receive, free of charge, up to six daily articles. Anyone who wishes to monitor the developing thoughts of America's neo-conservatives, and can resist being offended by the content, will find a subscription informative.
Ms Benador has been busy networking on the political-social circuit, too. Although details are scarce, the website of Bob Guzzardi, a Pennsylvania property man and Israel enthusiast, shows photographs of a jolly party attended by Ms Benador along with Senator Joseph Lieberman, Representative Joseph Hoeffel, Daniel Pipes (the bete noire of American Muslims) and Reza Pahlavi, the pretender to the throne of Iran.

So much vitriol has been aimed at Judy Miller for getting pimped by Chalabi and then pimping the public I'm afraid Thomas Friedman has been forgotten. Not that Friedman relied on any Chalabi-supplied info, but one could make an argument that his war-mongering was more egregious -- and more influential -- than Miller's. After all, at least Miller tried to make a case based on evidence -- albeit false evidence. Friedman's case for war was that an American presence in Iraq would essentially break down "the wall in the Arab mind" and eliminate a perceived culture of terror (it would be hard to imagine Tom discussing "the wall in the African-American mind" or "the wall in the Hispanic mind" so routinely without getting fired).
Friedman relied almost exclusively on psychobabble, racially-tinged characterizations and cultural projections to build his case for war. And to maintain his standing as a liberal, he took token swipes Bush and Sharon for not brokering "peace" with Palestine -- as if peace in Palestine and Iraq are mutually exclusive. 770 plus dead US soldiers and tens of thousands of dead Iraqis later, Friedman wrote a pathetic mea culpa admitting he was wrong.
"I admit, I'm a little slow," he wrote. "Because I tried to think about something as deadly serious as Iraq, and the post- 9/11 world, in a nonpartisan fashion — as Joe Biden, John McCain and Dick Lugar did — I assumed the Bush officials were doing the same. I was wrong."
In other words, while Miller was seduced by the smooth-talking Chalabi, Friedman became enthralled with the bellicose rhetoric, hysterical claims and myopic vision of "the Bush officials." How is this guy still taken seriously?

This revealing letter from a Chalabi pal was passed on to me by a journalist friend who received it in a listserv email. The author, "Peg," thanks Harold Rhode, a longtime neocon Pentagon official who worked out of Doug Feith's office on the anti-Iraq intel crusade. Laura Rozen says she also received this letter, but in an email from Laurie Mylroie, the influential neocon conspiracy nut who at one point tried to link Saddam to the Oklahoma City bombing.

Iraq News, May 21, 2004
From an American Friend Who Witnessed the Humiliating Raid Against
Chalabi (With thanks to Harold Rhode)

Hi folks,

I wanted to let everyone know that I am safe in Iraq after what was a very eventful day yesterday. As most of you know, I work closely with Dr. Chalabi in Iraq, assisting the INC as a financial advisor.
Yesterday, as I was sitting in my nightshirt and shorts,getting ready to face the day, my guard came in and told me that Dr. Chalabi’s guards were being arrested. Yelling to my friend and housemate Francis, I raced over to Dr Chalabi’s house to find a confront-ation between the Iraqi Police (IP), guarded by the US military and advised by plain clothed “advisors” to the IP. 2 Americans demanding to know who was in charge of this operation, startled them. Suddenly some of the American “advisors” disappeared into their cars. The US military were fine - just obey-ing orders. After a back and forth with the IP and the US military, 1 unarmed IP was allowed inside to search for the persons forwhom they had warrants.
It is helpful to understand that these “warrants” are coming from a
special court established by Paul Bremer and reporting directly to him. The judge used to be a translator at the CPA Ministry of Justice and was imposed on the court by the CPA. His first charge was against Aras Kareem, the head of INC intelligence. According to the arrest warrant, he was charged with steal-ing 11 vehicles that belonged to the Ministry of Finance. Those 11 vehicles had been parked on INC property for protection and the MOF had taken the keys with them. The temporary offices of the MOF (its permanent building was damaged in the war) had no room for the vehicles.
The MOF sent a let-ter to the judge saying there was no basis for the charges. The judge threat-ened the MOF lawyer with imprisonment if the MOF did not withdraw the let-ter. He also refused to take the letter from Aras’s lawyer. Even yesterday, when they came to arrest several people (none of course were at Dr. Chala-bi’s house), their investigation was so poor that they did not even know the last names of the people they were trying to arrest. They tried to arrest 1 of Dr. Chalabi’s drivers just because his first name was
Kamaran - a common Kurdish name. It would be like going to an office
with a warrant to arrest Mike and arresting anyone with that first
name.
After the police left (with nothing) I went over to China House - the INC office - where this time there was no pretense of arresting
anyone.The plain-clothed American advisor without ID said they were
seizing the building. I asked to see the warrant but none was available and no one would admit to being in charge. Under the watchful eye of these advisors, the IP ransacked the off-ice, shooting Dr. Chalabi’s picture, overturning furniture, looting what they could carry off and spewing garbage everywhere. Dr. Chalabi had a group picture of his father - about 50 persons in total. The police had smashed the glass and punched a hole through the face of Dr. Chalabi’s father. We forget that Iraqis have long histories and long memories. That this police officer would recognize the face of Dr. Chalabi’s father in a sea of faces is illustrat-ive of the roots of the invasion of his office.
Paul Bremer’s imperious manner has resulted in a tremendous loss of
Am-erican and Iraqi lives. His subversion of Iraq’s nascent judicial system to sil-ence a political opponent not only undermines Iraqi democracy but ours as well. I am okay in Baghdad, but angry.

Peg

The 23-year-long campaign to free Maria Suarez, a human-trafficking victim who served a 23 year sentence after being falsely convicted of conspiring to murder the 68-year-old man who held her as a sex slave, is finally over. The painstaking campaign to free her was waged largely by her family: first generation immigrants from Mexico who took on the Davis administration, the Schwarzenegger administration and finally, the Bush administration -- and won.
For me, being part of this campaign, and getting to know Maria and her family, has been one of the most rewarding (and at times, painful) experiences of my life. There is nothing that can compare to the feeling of watching someone who has spent most of their life confined to a jail cell walk through a prison gate and into the arms of her family and friends. Driving Maria home was an incredible experience as well. For five minutes after we sped away from a mob of cameramen, reporters and screaming cops she sat in the back seat sobbing. But when we finally entered the busy center of Los Angeles, her eyes lit up with wonder. "What is that big truck?" she asked about a city bus. Maria literally had not seen the world for a quarter century! When we arrived at her sister's house, I realized it had also been that long since she had cooked a meal, pet a dog or shopped for a pair of clothes. At age 44, her life is just beginning. That afternoon, Maria and I sat on the porch waiting for the rest of her family to arrive. "I feel like a little child again," she said. "It's like a dream."
Read SF Chronicle reporter Elizabeth Fernandez's story on Maria's release. [And see my big, white forehead in the center-top area of the photo].  

If everyone jumped off a bridge, would you? What if you were an Iraqi detainee and US soldiers pushed you off the bridge?
It's still not clear how many Iraqis drowned.

Trent Lott's been awful quiet since his demotion. Here he is in Jackson, Miss'ippi talking about torturing Iraqi prisoners:

"Nothing wrong with holding a dog up there unless it ate him," Lott said. "(They just) scared him with the dog."
Lott was reminded that at least one prisoner had died at the hands of his captors after a beating.
"This is not Sunday school," he said. "This is interrogation. This is rough stuff."

Well, if Strom Thurmond were president, we wouldn't be having all the problems we have today, would we?

"We must not be sentimental," [Iraqi Governing Council Chief] Ghazi Mashal Ajil al-Yawer told reporters. "Torture has taken place in every vault in Iraq. As the Governing Council, we do not agree with demolishing it and the matter will be left for the transitional government" which takes office Jan. 30. He called the idea of destroying the prison "a waste of resources."
How will Bush replace this guy?

I don't know if enough attention has been given to this statement by John Ashcroft during his announcement of a "major" terror threat on Tuesday:

"The Madrid railway bombings were perceived by Osama bin Laden and al-Qaeda to have advanced their cause. Al-Qaeda may perceive that a large-scale attack in the United States this summer or fall would lead to similar consequences."

Is he saying Al Qaeda plans to attack us to shake our faith in the War President and affect the course of the election?
The lack of details on the threat only added to the political tone of Ashcroft's announcement. I was fortunate enough to catch clips of a press conference by a visibly irritated LAPD counter terrorism czar John Miller on my local Fox affiliate's news report Tuesday evening. If I remember correctly, according to Miller:
--He was NOT notified of the threat by the FBI or CIA in advance of Ashcroft's press conference.
--An unnamed "senior intelligence official" is the source of the threat report.
--Many of the suspected Al-Qaeda operatives cited by Ashcroft have been in the US for years.
--This telling statement by Miller has appeared in news reports since the conference: "We would be foolhardy to ignore those [Ashcroft's] statements, but I think it would be irresponsible to panic."
Though I get the sense Americans are getting hip to Bush's fear-mongering, I hope this new threat alert won't cause a wave in racial profiling and hate crimes this spring and summer like the one we witnessed after 9/11. LA's ABC affiliate accompanied its report on Ashcroft's alert with this hysterical warning:

"Be aware that the face of Al-Qaida may be changing. Terrorists now may be in their late 20's or early 30's and may be traveling with families. Al-Qaida is seeking recruits who can pass as Europeans, but also trying to recruit North Africans and anyone who has newly coverted to Islam."

Translation: Only venture out of your home to get McDonald's Griddle Cakes, greet Reggie the Registration Rig or shoot the 7-11 clerk up the street who is actually a Sikh. 

I've been wondering how Bush found the 7 Iraqi amputees for his brilliant photo-op.
According to an AP article posted on the Bush campaign website, legendary octagenarian Houston TV personality Marvin Zindler "helped arrange for their surgeries and publicized their story."
After Zindler heard about the Iraqi amputees from a documentary filmmaker, he put Bush in touch with his plastic surgeon, Joe Agris, who has operated on Zindler 30 times (that's right, 30 times!). Agris agreed to fit the Iraqis with new hands.
Though Zindler is regarded as a "champion of the underdog" for his investigative reporting on Houston TV news, he donated $1000 to Bush/Cheney 2000 and dropped a cool $2000 on Bush's 2004 campaign last summer.
At the photo-op, Bush honored Zindler along with the Iraqis.

A leading surgical authority and forensic expert say it is "highly probable that Berg had died some time prior to his decapitation. A factor in this was an apparent lack of the 'massive" arterial' bleeding such an act initiates."

Five days into the 1973 Arab-Israeli war, with the superpowers on the brink of confrontation, President Nixon was too drunk to discuss the crisis with the British prime minister, according to newly released transcripts of tape recordings.

This was leaked to me today by a figure known only as "Grassy Knoll:"
REPUBLICAN NATIONAL COMMITTEE CONVENTION SCHEDULE: NYC 2004
6:00 PM Opening Prayer led by the Reverend Jerry Falwell
6:30 PM Pledge of Allegiance
6:35 PM Burning of Bill of Rights (excluding Second Amendment)
6:45 PM Salute to the Coalition of the Willing
6:46 PM Seminar #1: Getting your kid a military deferment
7:30 PM First Presidential Beer Bong
7:35 PM Serve Freedom Fries
7:40 PM EPA Address #1: Mercury, "It's what's for dinner."
8:00 PM Vote on which country to invade next
8:10 PM Call EMTs to revive Rush Limbaugh
8:15 PM John Ashcroft Lecture: "The Homos are after your children"
8:30 PM Round table discussion on reproductive rights (MEN only)
8:50 PM Seminar #2 Corporations: The government of the future
9:05 PM Second Presidential Beer Bong
9:10 PM EPA Address #2 "Trees: The real cause of forest fires"
9:30 PM Break for secret meetings
10:00 PM Second prayer led by Cal Thomas
10:15 PM Lecture by Karl Rove: Doublespeak made easy
10:30 PM Rumsfeld demonstration of how to squint and talk macho
10:35 PM Bush demonstration of trademark 'deer in headlights' stare
10:40 PM John Ashcroft demonstrates new mandatory kevlar chastity belt
10:45 PM Clarence Thomas reads list of black Republicans
10:46 PM Third Presidential Beer Bong
10:50 PM Seminar #3 "Education: a drain on our nation's economy"
11:10 PM Hilary Clinton Pinata
11:20 PM Second Lecture by John Ashcroft: "Evolutionists: The dangerous new cult"
11:30 PM Call EMTs to revive Rush Limbaugh again
11:35 PM Blame Clinton
11:40 PM Laura serves milk and cookies
11:50 PM Closing Prayer led by Jesus Himself
12: 00PM Nomination of George W. Bush as Holy Supreme Planetary Master of ALL

Check out Al Gore's speech yesterday in New York, which extended far beyond the narrow realm of politics:

One of the clearest indications of the impending loss of intimacy with one's soul is the failure to recognize the existence of a soul in those over whom power is exercised, especially if the helpless come to be treated as animals, and degraded. We also know - and not just from De Sade and Freud - the psychological proximity between sexual depravity and other people's pain. It has been especially shocking and awful to see these paired evils perpetrated so crudely and cruelly in the name of America.

I've got to hand it to Bush. His photo-op with 7 Iraqi amputees may be his most creative one yet. And helping them get $50,000 prosthetic hands was a nice humanitarian gesture. But now that I've got a copy of Bush's proposed budget for 2005 handy, I notice that he has cut $50 million from the Veterans Affairs prosthetic research budget. That's hypocrisy. Hands down.
And would it be reasonable to assume more wounded soldiers returning from Iraq will be fitted with cheap hook-limbs instead of the advanced prostheses they need? I hope not.
[Correction: I've been informed by a reader that the prosthetic hands for the Iraqi amputees were donated, and contrary to what the Seattle Post reported, they were not $25,000, but $50,000. I've checked that and it is seems right. So I've changed the title of this post from "Bush Buys..." to "Bush Arranges..." and changed the dollar figure. See my explanation above of exactly how the photo-op was arranged.]

The right-wing hysteria over "judicial activism" has gone so far a few GOP backbenchers in the House introduced a bill to allow Congress to reverse the judgements of the Supreme Court. Since the Rehnquist court is unlikely to approve of gay marriage anytime soon, this bill seems either a warning to liberal federal appeals courts or a symbolic rebuke to the Court's ruling last year that homosexuals have the legal right to have sex.

In his column last Saturday, Joe Conason highlighted the legal arguments that justified the Bush adminstration's obliteration of the Geneva Convention and in effect encouraged self-avowed heterosexual soldiers to sexually molest chained, hooded Iraqi prisoners.

In adding to Conason's discussion, I want to point out what in my view was Bush's initial attack on both domestic and international laws governing prisoner treatment. To make a long story short, in August, 2002 the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals -- the same court that struck down the Violence Against Women Act and sought to overturn Miranda rights in the 1990's -- ruled that Yaser Esam Hamdi, an American citizen captured and "interrogated" in Afghanistan, could be detained indefinitely without charges as an "enemy combatant."

The inspiration for the judges' ruling was a memo written and delivered to them by Michael Mobbs, a special advisor to Douglas Feith on detainee issues and a charter member of the neocon cabal. The memo's key charge, that Hamdi "affiliated with a Taliban military unit and received weapons training," is a clear example of inadmissible hearsay since Mobbs had never witnessed Hamdi in action on the battlefield. However, the 4th circuit's three judge panel accepted his claim on its face because according to judge J. Harvie Wilkinson,

"...the political branches are best positioned to comprehend this global war in its full context and it is the President who has been charged to use force against those nations, organizations, or persons he determines were responsible for the September 11 terrorist attacks."

In other words, just trust Bush.

The most absurd element of the 4th circuit panel's ruling was that two of its judges, Wilkinson and Michael Luttig, are Federalist Society activists on Bush's short list for a Supreme Court nomination. Clearly a ruling against Mobbs' declaration would have been a ruling against their own ambitions.

For his part, Luttig has one of the most bizarre legal careers of any Supreme Court hopeful. In 1994, Luttig's father was murdered in a botched carjacking by Napoleon Beazley, a 17-year-old African American football star and honor roll student. As the Toronto Star reported, "Michael Luttig moved his office, clerks and all, back to his hometown of Tyler [Texas] for Beazley's trial. He helped prosecutors shape a strategy of questioning prospective jurors that resulted in the all-white jury." Toward the end of the trial, Luttig made a tearful statement pleading for Beazley's execution. After he got what he asked for, one of the jurors he helped select told a defence investigator preparing Beazley's appeal: "That nigger got what he deserved." If that doesn't take the cake for judicial activism, I don't know what does.

Luttig has progressed from putting minors to death to putting Americans in jail indefinitely without charges. Luttig and Wilkinson's ruling on the Hamdi case set the legal precedent for John Ashcroft's capture and detention of Muslim-American lawyer Brandon Mayfield as an uncharged material witness in the Madrid bombings. After being exonerated this week, Mayfield said he was the victim of "sneak-and-peek" raids, in which government agents raided his home without notifying him. Of course, "sneak-and-peaks" are authorized by the Patriot Act, which was written by Federalist Society members Viet Dinh and John Yoo.

What would be the political consequences for Bush if the public learned that instead of falling off a bike as he claimed, he fell off a pricey, un-macho electric scooter? What about a scooter that was recalled last year because it was judged unsafe at any speed? These pictures were taken by a papparazzi at Kennebunkport last summer. That's Daddy trailing young Bush on the right and Laura catching him on the left. Sorry, I couldn't enlarge them without losing quality. 

Arizona Diamondbacks owner Jerry Colangelo has paid $1.5 million to the 3 million member Presidential Prayer Team to pray for Bush's re-election and against gay marriage. Go Cubs!

Following up on news that Ahmed Chalabi's INC was actually a front for Iranian intelligence, it is now known that Chalabi maintained a $36,000 a month office in Iran at US taxpayer's expense.
Now I wonder if Iranian intelligence gave Christopher Hitchens that much-needed liver transplant in exchange for his services.
And let's not forget Chalabi was the Times' Judith Miller's main source on WMD's as she banged the drumbeat for war. Sad.

"I've been covering Chalabi for about 10 years, and have done most of the stories about him for our paper, including the long takeout we recently did on him. He has provided most of the front page exclusives on WMD to our paper."
--internal email from Judith Miller to John Burns, 5/04

If you've seen the latest polls, Bush has much more to recover from than falling off his tricycle. Besides the CBS poll showing him plunging toward the Thirties, a poll from the Washington Post shows support for total troop withdrawal at 40%, up 7% from last month. Another interesting finding is that 58% of independents and 25% of Republicans dissaprove of Bush. Republican dissaproval is up a whopping 8% from last month. I'm going to get some pretzels now and get ready for the big Bush speech.
 

This story takes place at New Mexico's largest public high school, where free speech is just another word for nothing left to lose:
"In March 2003, a teenage girl named Courtney presented one of her poems before an audience at Barnes & Noble bookstore in Albuquerque, then read the poem live on the school's closed-circuit television channel.
A school military liaison and the high school principal accused the girl of being "un-American" because she criticized the war in Iraq and the Bush administration's failure to give substance to its "No child left behind" education policy.
The girl's mother, also a teacher, was ordered by the principal to destroy the child's poetry. The mother refused and may lose her job.
Bill Nevins was suspended for not censoring the poetry of his students. Remember, there is no obscenity to be found in any of the poetry. He was later fired by the principal.
After firing Nevins and terminating the teaching and reading of poetry in the school, the principal and the military liaison read a poem of their own as they raised the flag outside the school. When the principal had the flag at full staff, he applauded the action he'd taken in concert with the military liaison.
Then to all students and faculty who did not share his political opinions, the principal shouted: 'Shut your faces...'"

From May 23rd edition of British daily News Interactive:

MOBILE phones fitted with digital cameras have been banned in US army installations in Iraq on orders from Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, The Business newspaper reported today.
Quoting a Pentagon source, the paper said the US Defence Department believes that some of the damning photos of US soldiers abusing Iraqis at Abu Ghraib prison near Baghdad were taken with camera phones.
"Digital cameras, camcorders and cellphones with cameras have been prohibited in military compounds in Iraq," it said, adding that a "total ban throughout the US military" is in the works.

While it's well known a majority of Israelis support Sharon's Gaza pullout plan, a new poll of 504 Israelis (including Israeli Arabs) conducted by Shvakim Panorama for Israel Radio's "Another Matter" program on May 19, 2004, suggests widespread consent for the IDF's morally repugnant actions in Rafah this week. Note: Shinui is a centrist, secular party.
Do you support the IDF operation in Rafah?
Total: Yes 57.9% No 25.5% Other 16.6%
Vote Shinui: Yes 75.2% No 14.9% Other 9.9%
Do you support the razing of Palestinian houses in Rafah in order to widen
the Philadelphi Corridor?
Yes 61.3% No 33.3% Other 5.4%
Vote Shinui: Yes 69.8% No 20.2% Other 9.9%
Do you support the prime minister's disengagement plan? [IMRA: no mention
if old plan or the various revised plans being mentioned by the media]
Total: Yes 60.2% No 25.0% Other 14.8%
Likud members: Yes 48.2% No 37.7% Other 14.1%
Findings of another poll conducted by the Israeli Democracy Institute two months ago are cause for both optimism and worry about Israel's future. Here are a few of the poll's findings:
--A whopping 27% of all Israeli teenagers do not think they will remain in Israel.
--4 of 5 respondents are proud to be Israeli.
--43% of the teens support either refusal to serve in the territories or refusal to eject settlers, compared with 25% of those aged 18 and older.
--60% of teens and 58% of adults support a "strong leader" to head the country "instead of all the debates and laws."
I would argue that to suggest the Israelis' consent for Sharon's disgusting military overreaction in Gaza -- as evidenced in poll #1 -- is somehow a sign of their moral bankrupcy or cynicism ignores poll #2, which paints an extraordinary portrait of Israel's political complexity and societal contradictions, one that is rarely acknowledged by Israel's critics in the Arab world or advanced by its hard-core supporters in the US, both of whom tend to discuss the country in simplistic, monocultural terms.

I want to apologize to anyone who has tried to comment and been blocked. I've just changed my site's default settings so unregistered users can now comment.
I am eager to read your thoughts!

Adel Nakhla, an Egyptian-American who worked as a translator for Titan at Abu Ghraib, is a Moonie whose resume is posted on a website of Sun Myung Moon's Unification Church.
Nakhla is named as a suspect in the Taguba report on Abu Ghraib abuses (see annex 25/26). In one of the more well known photos of prisoner torture, Nakhla is depicted towering over a pile of nude prisoners with his hand on one prisoner's neck.
Sun Myung Moon is famous for prescribing bizarre sexual practices to his followers including a "Three Day ceremony" that begins with the woman-on-top position and ends with both partners
"wip[ing] their sexual areas with the Holy Handkerchief."
Moon and the Unification Church enjoy close ties with the current Bush administration and routinely hammed it up with papa Bush.
I guess we shouldn't expect the Washington Times to do any reporting on Nakhla.

This beautiful painting by Ron DiCianni of the post-apocalyptic school of art will look perfect on the wall of your S&M dungeon. 

Cuba's completely unreliable state-published daily, Granma International, is posting new, exclusive photos of British soldiers raping Iraqi women.
Who can believe these are real, though? They look like a Vivid Video outtake. If they're truly fake, it's beyond sick that a newspaper --albeit a state propaganda rag -- would resort to a pornographic fabrication to discredit Bush and Blair, who have already been discredited.
But if the photos are real, why haven't they been published here?

If this doesn't raise questions about how the Bush family's financial interests have dictated US foreign policy, I don't know what will:
The Treasury Department has fined Riggs Bank in DC $25 million for violating money laundering laws. This stems from an investigation into Riggs' failure to report bank accounts used to finance terrorism. One of those accounts belongs to Princess Haifa al-Faisal, the wife of Saudi ambassador Prince Bandar al-Sultan. According to the Washington Post, she may have used a Riggs account to donate money to a charity that then gave some of it to the Sept. 11 terrorists.
The CEO of Riggs' investment arm is Jonathan Bush, George W. Bush's uncle.
Jonathan Bush is a Bush "pioneer" because he donated over $100,000 to the Bush 2000 campaign.
The federal investigation into Riggs also centered on whether US oil companies had used the bank as a conduit for bribes to Equatorial Guinea's dictator, Teodoro Obiang. I find it interesting that despite Obiang's record as torturer and mass murderer, Bush has courted him as a major ally. From MSNBC, July 2001:

"Last September [2000], President Bush held an unusual audience at the White House for 10 West African heads of state, including some of the most notorious dictators on the continent.
Among them was Teodoro Obiang Nguema, the leader of Equatorial Guinea, where the United States has also recently opened a new consulate. “He’s one of the worst dictators in Africa,” Gary says. The coastal country is believed to have about 4 billion barrels of oil reserves; U.S.-based ChevronTexaco is the main foreign player, but ExxonMobil and Triton are also deeply involved, making the United States the biggest investor in Equatorial Guinea."

This angle has been reported by a select few good reporters, but I wanted to ram it home.

Props to the NY Times for its story on Saudi manipulation of British publishers. Apparently, deep pocketed Saudis including businessman Khalid bin Mahfouz, an alleged financier of Al Qaeda, have successfully prevented the publication of Craig Unger's "House of Bush, House of Saud" in England by threatening Secker & Warburg (a subsidiary of Random House) with a libel suit.
The Times should follow up by exploring the Saudis' involvement in Disney's refusal to distribute Michael Moore's "Fahrenheit 9/11." According to those who have seen the film, which recently was awarded top prize at Cannes, Moore goes into great detail about Bush's special relationship with the Saudis and the Carlyle Group.
Let's flashback to 1994. Disney has made its most ambitious investment in over 20 years in Euro Disney. Parisians are too busy making love in the afternoon and watching Inspector Clouseau cartoons to give a rat's ass about a hick theme park full of giant, castrated mice. Euro Disney founders.
In steps Prince Ali-Walid Bin Talal of the House of Saud with a bailout package: he agrees to supply Euro Disney enough money to recoup its losses in exchange for a 24% stake in the company. Two years later, his stake reduces to 17% as part of the deal, but Euro Disney remains a collosal flop. On the verge of bankrupcy by 2003, Disney has to call on Bin Talal again for another bailout. The terms of this deal, I assume, will be as favorable to Bin Talal as those of the initial deal.
With Disney facing a 20% decline in its shares over the past five years and CEO Michael Eisner forced to resign his title after a no-confidence vote from shareholders, the last thing Roy Disney needs is a backlash from one of his major shareholders. This goes a long way towards explaining Disney's actions against Moore, much further than their explanation that they don't want to anger Jeb Bush.
I will have a mini-exclusive on vicious libel threats from religious extremists and chickenshit publishers later. Keep it locked right here.

Judge Roy Moore will be speaking today at the Alaska state GOP convention along with Sen. Lisa Murkowski and Bush Agriculture Secretary (and former Monsanto lobbyist) Anne Veneman. Perhaps they will convince Moore not run on the Constitution Party ticket as the right-wing Ralph Nader. I hope not.
Read Fred Clarkson's analysis of Moore's rising influence in the GOP.

Do not operate heavy machinery after listening to this.

The best report from Rafah I've seen so far is from Amira Hass of Ha'aretz. Hass, a daughter of Holocaust survivors, is the only full-time Jewish journalist to have lived among the Palestinians (Gaza in 1993, Ramallah in 1997).
By the way, though the IDF has left Rafah proper, BBC radio is reporting that they still surround the camp poised for another attack.

2003 National Humanities Medal winner, Rumsfeld hagiographer and neoconservative beauty queen Midge Decter has never been so lucid:

"We're not in the Middle East to bring sweetness and light to the world. We're there to get something we and our friends in Europe depend on. Namely, oil."
--Decter on the Warren Olney show, 89.9, Los Angeles, 5/21/04

Why is FOX news anchor Neil Cavuto a wing-nut? Is it conviction? Or is that the dweebwad who got stuffed in gym lockers by the jocks in high school finally gets to sit at the grown up table with the most powerful frat-jock in the world?

"This is a highly classified area, but I have to say that all you need to know is there was a 'before 9/11 and there was an 'after 9/11.' After 9/11, the gloves come off."
--Bush's counter-terrorism czar Cofer Black on prisoner treatment at a September, 2002 hearing of House and Senate intelligence committees.  

This disturbing interview was printed this week in the German magazine Der Spiegel and translated for me by a friend in Berlin. It's not 100% word for word, but you will get the gist.
LAST FRIDAY SPIEGEL TV REPORTER HELMAR BUECHEL INTERVIEWED THE IRAQI ABID HAMED ABID, WHO WITNESSED HOW HIS FELLOW PRISONER ASAD ABDUL KARIM ABDUL JALIL DIED AFTER BEING TORTURED BY AMERICAN SOLDIERS ON THE US MILITARY BASE. THE TEXT VERSION IS SLIGHTLY SHORTENED FROM THE TV VERSION.
Interviewee Abid: I can't remember the date, I was already in prison for 25 days... They brought 3 people on that day, Asad was one of them... I was the last one in the row, he stood next to me, I asked him where he came from. He said his family came from Dulab... we warned him to stop talking, talking brings immediate punishment and beating. They picked him up and put him in a single cell. on the second day they began to interrogate him. it was always the same, they began by two days of sleep deprivation... normally you can get some sleep, but those being interrogated aren't allowed to sleep at all.
On the third day the interrogation begain. They pick you up and keep you all day, the following night and another day. Then one is dragged back. When you're picked up you can still walk, but when you come back, you;re dragged on the floor.
When they brought Asad back to his single cell it already seemed like a funeral. It was normal, that anyone who did something wrong would be mistreated the entire day. They let us stand the entire day, sprinkled us with water, or put us in chains. Or they would handcuff our hands behind our backs and tie our feet together, so that you could only lie on the floor on your stomach. And when someone kicks you, you turn like a carousel. And you were always being sprinkled with water and kicked - for an hour, two or three. As long as they felt like it. Then they might leave you alone for a while, so that you can recover somewhat, and then they would begin again. They did that especially with those they were getting ready to interrogate.
Did you see it with your own eyes?
Yes with my own eyes... there are no walls there, only wire fencing between the prisoners. And it was all being done right next to us.
Who was involved? How many soldiers and officers?
I couldn't differentiate soldiers from officers. They all looked the same to me. But there were a lot. The interrogators were 10 to 15. They came and picked the prisoner up. And not only Asad. Asad is only the one who died. Many others were tortured.
Can you describe how the torturers looked? Do you know any names?
When you look at Americans they all look alike. You can;t tell the difference between them. Of course we don;'t know the names either. They pick the people up, torture them for a day, a night, and another day, and then bring them back from the interrogation.,
Were the interrogators Americans?
Yes, they were Americans.
What was the worst torture that you saw?
THat was the torture that we couldn't see directly, but we got to recognize the marks on the bodies, like when the people only had their pants on and water was poured on them. That's how I saw that Asad's entire left side was full of black and blue marks (hematoma), totally red and blue. I was standing right across from him. I was'nt the only one who felt sorry for him. All the prisoners suffered with him, they saw how he looked. Some people came back from the torture and pissed pure blood. That went on for seven or eight days before they were taken away.
Did you see how Assad died?
Yes. Asad couldn't even sit after the torture. They came, sat him upright, and he kept falling over. The single cells had doors with bars. Asad was tied up with handcuffs, and they stood him up, and chained his handcuffed hands to the bars so that he would remain standing. But his body was already too weak. He fought against it until his soul finally left his body and he died.
part 2
For how long was Assad tortured?
About six or seven days. Then he died.
How did the soldiers react to Asad's death?
They got scared after he died. A delegation came and photographers. They suddenly handled the rest of the prisoners better.
What happened to the body?
The body remained under a blanket from 6 am, when he died, until the afternoon. Then they got a sack, put the body in, and took it away.
Were others tortured too?
They didn't torture me. But they tortured many. With the same method. We saw it with our own eyes. But only Asad was chained to the gitter. And he died. Because he couldn't stand anymore.
How many did they torture?
Once they picked up six at one time. They didn't let them sleep and then they interrogated them the entire day, the entire night, and on the next day. They left walking, and were brought back dragged on the floor. We turned them over, and saw that their entire bodies were full of bruises, black and red.
What kind of instruments did they use? Do you know anything about knives, sticks, or the use of electricity?
When they picked up someone for interrogation they took him alone. The interrogations were conducted separately. we couldn't see that. They were there alone. As far as the beatings and torture from the guards is concerned: they got orders to separate certain persons from the others. These were not called by name, but by number. They were thrown on the floor with their hands handcuffed behind their heads and weren't allowed to sleep for two days. Beginning at midnight, when we others were allowed to sleep, they were beaten, water was poured on them, and held firmly with their stomachs on the ground. That is the ugliest way. And there was another thing: They took scarves and tore them in two or three strips. They then turned these strips and used them as gags, whereby two people pulled with all their might on the ends, so that later the bottom side of the face got welts that looked like burn marks. The eyes popped out of their sockets when this was being done.
We know from other people that the Americans took photos. Do you know if they also did it in this case?
Yes. Lots of them took photographs. Even when they punished someone they took pictures. The soldier stood next to the person being punished and they would be photographed together.
So there are photographs?
Yes, they have photos, and they know that they do. They interrogated me about Asad's death. They received information that I knew something about his death, and that's why they interrogated me. I told them the same thing (as this) when they interrogated me.
Did you have the impressions that the Americans enjoyed their behavior? Why did they do it?
When they picked people up to interrogate, there must have been an incentive for it. There is something about them that we don't recognize.
how many soldiers were involved? Where they white or black?
The blacks were mostly guards, and theones who guarded over us during the day. For instance, if somebody fell asleep, they would immediately shake him awake and he had to kneel for a quarter or half an hour. If he moved, the punishment would be changed, he would then, for example, be handcuffed or gagged.
How many soldiers were there on the day Asad died?
About four. Four came to him. He was totally exhausted from the torture during the interrogation. He couldn't eat anymore because of his wounds, and probably was bleeding internally.
These four, can you describe them?
They were white. But about the blacks: they were severe with us when they guarded us. But I never saw anyone black pick someone up for interrogation. During the interrogations there were no blacks. The interrogators were white. Exclusively.
Was Asad's death investigated by the Americans?
Yes. A commission came. They picked up one of the prisoners and asked him questions. He said he didn't know anything, but someone near him knew. That was me. Then they asked me questions for two days. Four and a half hours on the first day, only about Asad. They said: we only came to ask about the death of Assad. There is no connection to anything else. I reported the facts to them, like I'm doing now. From the moment they began to torture Asad until the moment of his death. There was a high General there, and I told him all that.
Do you know the General's name?
No, I don't know it.
The interview was conducted by Spiegel TV reporter Helmar Buechel in Dulab, three car hours northwest of Baghdad. Translation and editorial work in Berlin: Achmed Khammas and Yassin Musharbash.

At at April 26th preliminary hearing for Specialist Charles Graner, a ringleader of the torture at Abu Ghraib, three witnesses were called to testify. One was Lt. Col. Steven L. Jordan, a military intelligence officer who directed the Joint Interrogation and Debriefing Center at Abu Ghraib. At the hearing,Jordan pleaded the military equivalent of the 5th amendment, suggesting that he may have done more than just witnessed the torture.
Jordan is a chaplain affiliated with the Assembly of God, America's largest Pentecostal congregation. According to the Oak Creek Assembly of God's publication, Jordan served as a chaplain at Fort Jackson, South Carolina in early 2003.
A little background: Assembly of God members are known as "charismatic" because they speak in tongues and allow themselves to be "taken by the Holy Spirit." The most prominent Assembly of God member is John Ashcroft, whose father, the late R. John Ashcroft is one of America's most revered Pentecostal preachers.

The May, 2002 edition of "Defend America," the DoD's newletter about the War on Terror published by Armed Forces Press Service, features a startling profile of Stefanowicz's mother, Jean Campbell.

Of the mercenaries involved in the torture at Abu Ghraib, perhaps the most is known about Steve Stefanowicz, a former Navy reservist who took up work with the private contractor CACI shortly after 9/11.
According to the Australian, Stefanowicz lived in Adelaide, Australia for 18 months until 10/01, when CACI hired him. Though he has been named in the Taguba report as a ringleader of the torture, he remains in Iraq. Two weeks ago, he wrote an email to an Australian friend stating:

"It's safe to say I've seen enough for a lifetime here in Iraq and it's definitely time to come home."

Just after 9/11, Stefanowicz was quoted in an Adelaide newpapers as saying,

"It was one of the most incredible and most devastating things I have ever seen," he said. "I have been in constant contact with my family and friends in the US and the mood was very solemn and quiet. But this is progressing into anger."

I have more coming on this character in a minute.

I am going to be focusing on Rafah extensively as the IDF continues to ruin people's lives on behalf on messianic settlers. Here is a report from B'tselem, an Israeli human rights group run mostly by women, including many Jewish-Americans who made Aaliyah (immigrated to Israel):

"Early yesterday morning, IDF snipers took up positions on the roofs of
houses adjacent to the home of the Hasuna family in the Tel a-Sultan
neighborhood in Rafah.

Around 9:30 AM, an IDF bulldozer began demolishing the family’s house
without warning. Khaider Hasuna told B’Tselem: “They started
demolishing the room that we were sitting in. My wife and I were screaming and
our children were terrified. We took the children and went out to the
yard. I saw a tank about twenty meters east of my house. The tank
began to open fire rapidly toward the house.”

Hasuna and his family ran back into their house, and hid in the
bathroom. Several minutes later, they ventured out again, climbed a ladder
and jumped over the fence around the house and ran to the house of their
neighbor, the al-Bardawil family, where they have been staying since."

Rick Perlstein opens with a leaked memo about Elliot Abrams' meeting with the Apostolic Congress, a leading Christian Zionist organization, and navigates us through the web of hard-core messianic nuts who are currently driving US-Israel policy. If you want to understand why the Bush adminstration so enthusiastically supports the most reactionary of Israel's policies, you must know who Tim Goeglin, Helen Freedman, Benny Elon and Ronn Torrassian are. A must read.

Read my friend Roberto Lovato's utterly fascinating piece on Samuel Huntington, who has cast Latino-immigrants as the latest barbarian horde threatening "American" identity. Here's a snippet:

"Huntington's 1968 classic, "Political Order in Changing Societies," has for many years been a textbook for developing world authoritarian leaders. Another of his books, "The Soldier and the State" was and still is required reading in national security theory for numerous military leaders, including those of the Salvadoran military. That's the same Salvadoran military that brought my Salvadoran college students in the United States their most vivid recollections of their home country: Dante-esque mounds of body parts and ground littered with the dead bodies of national security practice.

How has political-military scientist Huntington suddenly come to view Latinos as "The single most immediate and most serious challenge to America's traditional identity"?

In search of answers I went to the Bronx County Historical Society, also on Bainbridge, not far from the formerly middle class projects that once housed the Huntingtons..."

I'm sure the news surrounding today's raid on Ahmed Chalabi's home in Iraq will get weirder and weirder in the coming days. Chalabi has blamed "Baathists" for the raid, which is like Michael Jackson blaming his recent arrest for touching little boys where it doesn't feel right on racism even though he isn't black anymore.
The raid is Bush's parting shot, a probable response to Chalabi's public upbraiding of Lakhtar Brahimi and the UN. Funny how fast people fall from grace -- only months ago Chalabi was sitting behind Laura Bush at the State of the Union address.
Still, I can't understand why Bush didn't cut Chalabi off after the Defense Intelligence Estimate revealed late last year that he. was providing the Pentagon with false information. Somehow, Chalabi continued receiving $340,000 a month from the Pentagon for more false info. One guy who is partly responsible for this debacle is neocon Cambone, who was one of the first to review the Defense Intelligence Estimate.
Another angle: In his salon.com piece "How Chalabi Conned the Neocons," John Dizard reveals Chalabi's ties to the Iranians and how he was planning a Shi'ite power grab in Iraq. From the Dizard story:

"Ahmed Chalabi is a treacherous, spineless turncoat," says L. Marc Zell, a former law partner of Douglas Feith, now the undersecretary of defense for policy, and a former friend and supporter of Chalabi and his aspirations to lead Iraq. "He had one set of friends before he was in power, and now he's got another."

Though you probably already have, read my old man's piece in today's Guardian/Salon.com about Gen. William Boykin, the theocratic general who was sent to "Gitmoize" Abu Ghraib. Boykin has a fascinating personal history and this article is perhaps the most detailed account. I was amazed to learn that Boykin is a colleague of Norvell De Atkine (who I discussed here yesterday) at the JFK School of Special Warfare at Fort Bragg:

"As the head of the Special Warfare Center and School at Fort Bragg, N.C., Boykin invited Southern Baptist ministers for prayer meetings that would be highlighted by demonstrations of Special Forces hand-to-hand combat and guided tours of the "Shoot House" and "Snake Room."

The article also contains some interesting info on Stephen Cambone's relationship with the military, which I hope to go into later today.

Elvin Jones, original drummer of the John Coltrane Quartet, is one guy who has made my life more bearable. A giant among men is gone.

"It was the same feeling, in front of a large audience or no one at all. Music was our sole purpose."
--Elvin Jones on the John Coltrane Quartet

"They're shellllling us now..."

One of the things that struck me most about Seymour Hersh's article "The Gray Zone" is the notion that the neocon cabal's interest in applying sexual humiliatiation tactics on Arab prisoners has intellectual origins. Hersh cites a book by Hungarian Jewish author Raphael Patai as the major inspiration of the tactics prescribed for extracting info from Iraqi detainees:

"The notion that Arabs are particularly vulnerable to sexual humiliation became a talking point among pro-war Washington conservatives in the months before the March, 2003, invasion of Iraq. One book that was frequently cited was “The Arab Mind,” a study of Arab culture and psychology, first published in 1973, by Raphael Patai, a cultural anthropologist who taught at, among other universities, Columbia and Princeton, and who died in 1996. The book includes a twenty-five-page chapter on Arabs and sex, depicting sex as a taboo vested with shame and repression. “The segregation of the sexes, the veiling of the women . . . and all the other minute rules that govern and restrict contact between men and women, have the effect of making sex a prime mental preoccupation in the Arab world,” Patai wrote. Homosexual activity, “or any indication of homosexual leanings, as with all other expressions of sexuality, is never given any publicity. These are private affairs and remain in private.” The Patai book, an academic told me, was “the bible of the neocons on Arab behavior.” In their discussions, he said, two themes emerged—“one, that Arabs only understand force and, two, that the biggest weakness of Arabs is shame and humiliation.”

While Patai is an interesting character whose work now deserves greater analysis and attention, I am more interested in the co-author of "The Arab Mind," Norvell De Atkine. De Atkine is a former Army officer who heads the JFK School of Special Warfare's Middle East department, which is essentially a university for US Special Forces and PSYOP specialists. Psychologists at JFK have performed some of the military's most extensive studies on the effects of stress and trauma on soldiers and interrogation subjects For his part, De Atkine has trained Navy Seals and officers from allied countries like Turkey in the JFK school's counterinsurgency programs an