BAUAW NEWSLETTER - SUNDAY, AUGUST 24, 2008

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NO ON PROPOSITION V! NO ON JROTC! NO MILITARY RECRUITMENT IN OUR SCHOOLS!

NEXT MEETING:
TUESDAY, AUGUST 26, 7:15 P.M.
Friends Meeting House
65 9th St, San Francisco (between Mission and Market Sts)
To RSVP or for additional information, please contact Alan Lessik at AFSC at 565.0201, x11 or alessik@afsc.org.

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(Please circulate)

No Military in our Schools-No on Prop. V and Marx in Soho Benefit

Dear all,

Below is Bay Area United Against War's paid ballot argument for a NO
vote on Proposition V, the pro-JROTC initiative on the ballot in San
Francisco this November. But this is only the beginning of our
campaign efforts to defeat this initiative.

We invite you to come to our benefit performance of the wonderful
Howard Zinn play, Marx in Soho. It is only one of the ways we are
trying to raise money to carry out our campaign to end military
recruitment in our schools and to defeat Proposition V.

Howard Zinn's MARX IN SOHO

Two Performances:

OAKLAND:
Thursday, August 28, 7-9:00 P.M.
High Street Church
1945 High Street (Corner of Courtland, 1/2 block from Foothill Blvd.)

SAN FRANCISCO:
Saturday, August 30, 7-9:00 P.M.
Noe Valley Ministry
1021 Sanchez Street (Near 23rd Street)

TICKETS ARE $20.00

You can get advance tickets to the play for $10.00 by emailing the
following address and leaving a name and how many tickets you would
like to reserve:

giobon@comcast.net

(Please indicate either Oakland or San Francisco, leave your name and how many tickets you want to reserve and simply pick your tickets up at the door the night of the performance.)

If you can't come to the play, please consider making a donation to
our campaign by sending a check to:

Bay Area United Against War
P.O. Box 318021
San Francisco, CA 94131-8021

We have no paid staff and rarely ask for donations but we feel this
campaign is of utmost importance not only for the children of the San
Francisco Unified School District, but what we do here will have
ramifications in school districts across the country.

In solidarity,

Bonnie Weinstein, for Bay Area United Against War

P.S., our ballot argument cost over $600.00 and we need to get out
posters and flyers, etc.

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Bay Area United Against War Paid Ballot Argument:

VOTE NO ON PROPOSITION V!

We don't want the schools used to recruit our children for the wars in
Iraq and Afghanistan.

1. JROTC doesn't teach students the realities of war:

a. They are likely to kill civilians.

b. They are more likely to die or return with devastating mental
and physical disabilities than earn college degrees.

2. Proposition V argues that students should have a "choice" to take
JROTC, but if they join the military they have no choice about killing
or dying.

3. JROTC is a military recruitment program. Keep the military out of
schools!

4. JROTC is NOT the way to keep kids away from gangs. There are
peaceful ways to keeps kids safe.

5. JROTC is NOT a leadership program. It teaches unquestioning
obedience in preparation for military service.

The School Board's decision to end JROTC has set a precedent for
communities nationwide. Don't allow it to be reversed.

Join parents everywhere trying to save their children from being sent
to fight these unjust and illegal wars!

We want funding for education, healthcare, the environment, and jobs,
not war! U.S. out of Iraq and Afghanistan now!

BAY AREA UNITED AGAINST WAR

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Bay Area United Against War Presents a Benefit Performance of:

Howard Zinn's MARX IN SOHO

Author of "A People's History of the United States," Howard Zinn,
humanizes the man behind the ideas in his one-man play. The premise of
the play is that Marx dies in 1883 but is able to see what happens on
Earth for the next 100 years and then comes back to talk about it.
Imagine what Karl Marx would have to say after 100 years of just being
able to watch...

Starring Veteran Actor: Jerry Levy

Charged with a mighty talent and a bottomless love of the play, Levy
has been teaching sociology at Marlboro College and has been acting
with the Actors' Theater of Brattleboro since he moved there from
Chicago in 1975.

Two Performances:

OAKLAND:
Thursday, August 28, 7-9:00 P.M.
High Street Church
1945 High Street (Corner of Courtland, 1/2 block from Foothill Blvd.)

SAN FRANCISCO:
Saturday, August 30, 7-9:00 P.M.
Noe Valley Ministry
1021 Sanchez Street (Near 23rd Street)

TICKETS ARE $20.00

You can get advance tickets to the play for $10.00 by emailing the
following address and leaving your name and how many tickets you would
like to reserve:

giobon@comcast.net

(Please indicate either Oakland or San Francisco, leave your name
and how many tickets you want to reserve and simply pick your
tickets up at the door the night of the performance.)

A special benefit for Bay Area United Against War's
Military counter-recruitment campaign.
P.O. Box 318021
S.F., CA 94131-8021
www.bauaw.org
LABOR DONATED

For more information about Jerry Levy and reviews of his performance go to:

http://www.levyarts.com/

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9th Annual "Power-to-the-Peaceful Festival"

Annual 9/11 Rally / March from the Panhandle through Golden Gate Park to
the "Power-to-the- Peaceful Festival"

Saturday, September 6, 2008

http://www.communitycurrency.org/events.html

Speedway Meadows
Golden Gate Park

Following the attacks of September 11th, the first "9/11 Truth Rally and March" took place in the Panhandle, marching up Haight Street and through Golden Gate Park to the "Power-to-the-Peaceful" Concert

Our rally begins at 10:00 am @ the Panhandle (between Oak and Fell at Ashbury)
11:00 am we begin our march up Ashbury to Haight, through Golden Gate Park to Speedway Meadows and to the Concert which lasts until 5:00 pm.

To endorse, speak, volunteer --- Contact Carol Brouillet @ 650-857-0927. We welcome all who are for 9/11 Truth, Impeachment, Peace, an End to War, Repeal of the Patriot Act, Military Commissions Act. Bring banners, signs, costumes, musical instruments, your humor, energy, messages. The Northern California 9/11 Truth Alliance will have a booth at the Concert and pass out literature to the thousands who come to the concert and support peace.

(Go to: http://www.communitycurrency.org/events.html
Here's our 9-11 Truth Rally / March webpage with photos and reports from years ago.)

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Labor Beat: National Assembly to End the War in Iraq and Afghanistan:
Highlights from the June 28-29, 2008 meeting in Cleveland, OH. In this 26-minute video, Labor Beat presents a sampling of the speeches and floor discussions from this important conference. Attended by over 400 people, the Assembly's main objective was to urge united and massive mobilizations in the spring to “Bring the Troops Home Now,” as well as supporting actions that build towards that date. To read the final action proposal and to learn other details, visit www.natassembly.org. Produced by Labor Beat. Labor Beat is a CAN TV Community Partner. Labor Beat is affiliated with IBEW 1220. Views expressed are those of the producer, not necessarily of IBEW. For info: mail@laborbeat.org,www.laborbeat.org. 312-226-3330. For other Labor Beat videos, visit Google Video or YouTube and search "Labor Beat".
http://blip.tv/file/1149437/

Open Letter to the U.S. Antiwar Movement

The following “Open letter to the U.S. Antiwar Movement” was adopted by the National Assembly to End the Iraq and Afghanistan Wars and Occupations on July 13, 2008. We urge antiwar organizations around the country to endorse the letter. Please send notice of endorsements to natassembly@aol.com

Dear Sisters and Brothers:

In the coming months, there will be a number of major actions mobilizing opponents of U.S. wars and occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan to demand “Bring the Troops Home Now!” These will include demonstrations at the Democratic and Republican Party conventions, pre-election mobilizations like those on October 11 in a number of cities and states, and the December 9-14 protest activities. All of these can and should be springboards for very large bi-coastal demonstrations in the spring.

Our movement faces this challenge: Will the spring actions be unified with all sections of the movement joining together to mobilize the largest possible outpouring on a given date? Or will different antiwar coalitions set different dates for actions that would be inherently competitive, the result being smaller and less powerful expressions of support for the movement’s “Out Now!” demand?

We appeal to all sections of the movement to speak up now and be heard on this critical question. We must not replicate the experience of recent years during which the divisions in the movement severely weakened it to the benefit of the warmakers and the detriment of the millions of victims of U.S. aggressions, interventions and occupations.

Send a message. Urge – the times demand it! – united action in the spring to ensure a turnout which will reflect the majority’s sentiments for peace. Ideally, all major forces in the antiwar movement would announce jointly, or at least on the same day, an agreed upon date for the spring demonstrations.

The National Assembly to End the Iraq and Afghanistan Wars and Occupations will be glad to participate in the process of selecting a date for spring actions that the entire movement can unite around. One way or another, let us make sure that comes spring we will march in the streets together, demanding that the occupations be ended, that all the troops and contractors be withdrawn immediately, and that all U.S. military bases be closed.

In solidarity and peace,

National Assembly to End the Iraq and Afghanistan Wars and Occupations

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OCTOBER 11, 2008 End the Wars in Iraq and Afghanistan Now!
http://oct11.org/

Dear Readers,

The date of October 11, 2008 was designated as a day of localized national actions against the war at the National Assembly to End the Wars in Iraq and Afghanistan this past June. Demonstrations are already being planned. Here is the call from the Greater Boston area--hopefully we can pull something together for October ll here in San Francisco.

In solidarity,

Bonnie Weinstein, Bay Area United Against War

Hi all,

Below is an outreach letter that will be going out to various organizational lists
and individuals all over the Greater Boston area. Please feel free to circulate
this letter as an example of what is happening in Boston as you seek support
for October 11 in your various localities.

Adelante (forward),
John Harris
Greater Boston Stop the Wars Coalition

Dear Friends,

March, 2008 ushered in the sixth year of war and occupation “without end” on Iraq . In an act of arrogance and impunity, Congress in a bipartisan vote approved another
$162 billion in funding for the wars on Iraq and Afghanistan . Stepped up threats against Iran and the increased likelihood of a U.S. troop “surge” into Afghanistan point to an imperative for action and an independent voice from the peace and justice movement.

In light of these developments, grass roots forces from around the country gathered together at the end of June for the National Assembly to End the Iraq War and Occupation in Cleveland, Ohio. At the conference an action plan for the months ahead was discussed and approved in a democratic vote. As part of this plan, over 95 percent voted in favor of supporting pre-election protests being organized in cities and localities around the country on October 11, 2008.

It was on October 11, 2002 that Congress approved the “ Iraq War Resolution” granting the Bush administration authorization to invade Iraq . The weeks ahead promise to be filled with debate as the election campaigns gear up. Instead of being spectators who watch the media pundits put their spin on the political pronouncements of the candidates, the October 11 protests present us with an opportunity to be engaged in injecting our agenda, the antiwar agenda, into the intensifying debate.

Please join us in an initial planning meeting as we prepare a Boston protest demanding the immediate and unconditional withdrawal of all occupation forces from Iraq and the closing of all military bases. All are invited. Looking forward to seeing you there.

Saturday, August 9, 3:00 PM
Encuentro 5
33 Harrison Avenue, 5th Floor
Boston (in Chinatown )

In Peace and Solidarity,

Marilyn Levin
*Arlington/Lexington United for Justice with Peace, New England United

Liam Madden
*IVAW – Boston Chapter

Suren Moodliar
Mass Global Action

Ann Glick
Newton Dialogues for Peace

Nate Goldshlag
Smedley D. Butler Brigade, Chapter 9 Veterans for Peace

Paul Shannon
American Friends Service Committee

John Harris
Greater Boston Stop the Wars Coalition

* Organization for identification purposes only

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A.N.S.W.E.R.Calendar of Upcoming Anti-war Events
-- August 25-28 in Denver: Protest the Democratic National Convention
-- September 1-4 in St. Paul: Protest the Republican Convention
-- January 20, 2009: Bring the Anti-War Movement to Inauguration Day in D.C.

January 20, 2009: Join thousands to demand "Bring the troops home now!"

The ANSWER Coalition will be in the streets on Saturday August 16 in Los Angeles to demand an immediate withdrawal of all occupation forces from Irag and Afghanistan and end to all threats and sanctions against Iran.

On January 20, 2009, when the next president proceeds up Pennsylvania Avenue he will see thousands of people carrying signs that say US Out of Iraq Now!, US Out of Afghanistan Now!, and Stop the Threats Against Iran! As in Vietnam it will be the people in the streets and not the politicians who can make the difference.

On March 20, 2008, in response to a civil rights lawsuit brought against the National Park Service by the Partnership for Civil Justice on behalf of the ANSWER Coalition, a Federal Court ruled for ANSWER and determined that the government had discriminated against those who brought an anti-war message to the 2005 Inauguration. The court barred the government from continuing its illegal practices on Inauguration Day.

The Democratic and Republican Parties have made it clear that they intend to maintain the occupation of Iraq, the war in Afghanistan, and threaten a new war against Iran.

Both Parties are completely committed to fund Israel’s on-going war against the Palestinian people. Both are committed to spending $600 billion each year so that the Pentagon can maintain 700 military bases in 130 countries.

On this the third anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, we are helping to build a nationwide movement to support working-class communities that are being devastated while the country’s resources are devoted to war and empire for for the sake of transnational banks and corporations.

Join us in Denver on Aug. 25-28 at the Democratic Convention, in St. Paul at the Republican Convention between Sept. 1 and Sept. 4. And help organize bus and car caravans for January 20, 2009, Inauguration Day, so that whoever is elected president will see on Pennsylvania Avenue that the people want an immediate end to the war in Iraq and Afghanistan and to halt the threats against Iran.

From Iraq to New Orleans, Fund Peoples Needs Not the War Machine!

Calendar of Events:

-- August 25-28 in Denver: Protest the Democratic National Convention
-- September 1-4 in St. Paul: Protest the Republican Convention
-- January 20, 2009: Bring the Anti-War Movement to Inauguration Day in D.C.

We cannot carry out these actions withour your help. Please take a moment right now to make an urgently needed donation by clicking this link:

https://secure2.convio.net/pep/site/Donation?ACTION=SHOW_DONATION_OPTIONS&CAMPAIGN_ID=1121&JServSessionIdr011=23sri803b1.app2a

A.N.S.W.E.R. Coalition
http://www.answercoalition.org/
info@internationalanswer.org
National Office in Washington DC: 202-544-3389
New York City: 212-694-8720
Los Angeles: 213-251-1025
San Francisco: 415-821-6545
Chicago: 773-463-0311

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ARTICLES IN FULL:

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1) Afghanistan on Fire
Editorial
August 21, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/21/opinion/21thu1.html?hp

2) Exiting Iraq, Petraeus Says Gains Are Fragile
By DEXTER FILKINS
August 21, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/21/world/middleeast/21general.html?ref=world

3) New Guidelines Would Give F.B.I. Broader Powers
By ERIC LICHTBLAU
August 21, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/21/washington/21fbi.html?ref=us

4) Rabbis Debate Kosher Ethics at Meat Plant
By JULIA PRESTON
August 23, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/23/us/23kosher.html?ref=us

5)Soldier Who Deserted to Canada Draws 15-Month Term
By DAN FROSCH
August 23, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/23/us/23resist.html?ref=us

6) U.S. and Global Economies Slipping in Unison
By PETER S. GOODMAN
August 24, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/24/business/24global.html?hp

7) Afghan Leader Assails Airstrike He Says Killed 95
By CARLOTTA GALL
August 24, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/24/world/asia/24afghan.html?hp

8) Inflation Delivers a Blow to Vietnam’s Spirits
By SETH MYDANS
August 24, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/24/world/asia/24viet.html?ref=world

9) Vetted Judges More Likely to Reject Asylum Bids
By CHARLIE SAVAGE
August 24, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/24/washington/24judges.html?ref=us

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1) Afghanistan on Fire
Editorial
August 21, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/21/opinion/21thu1.html?hp

The news out of Afghanistan is truly alarming. This week, Taliban forces staged two of their most complex and audacious attacks of the war. Nearly 100 insurgents killed 10 French paratroopers in an attack near Kabul. At least 10 suicide bombers mounted a coordinated assault on one of America’s largest military bases, wounding three American and six Afghan soldiers. An earlier attack at the base killed 12 Afghan workers.

The number of United States and NATO casualties is mounting so quickly, that unless something happens soon this could be the deadliest year of the Afghan war. Kabul, the seat of Afghanistan’s pro-Western government, is increasingly besieged. And Taliban and foreign Qaeda fighters are consolidating control over an expanding swath of territory sprawling across both sides of the porous Afghanistan-Pakistan border.

Let us be clear about why this is so dangerous. The more territory the Taliban controls, the more money it can raise from narcotics and black-market activities to mount an even fiercer challenge against the foundering civilian governments in Kabul and Islamabad. And the more territory the Taliban controls, the more freedom Al Qaeda will have to mount new terrorist operations against this country and others.

There is no more time to waste. Unless the United States, NATO and its central Asian allies move quickly, they could lose this war. The following steps need to be taken in the coming weeks.

Washington must finally make clear to Pakistan’s leaders the mortal threat they face. The Army must turn its attention from India to the fight against the Taliban. Civilian leaders must realize that there can be no separate peace with the extremists. Sending American troops or warplanes into Pakistani territory will only feed anti-American furies. That should be the job of Pakistan’s army, with intelligence help and carefully monitored financial support from the United States.

More American ground troops will have to be sent to Afghanistan. The Pentagon’s over-reliance on airstrikes — which have led to high levels of civilian casualties — has dangerously antagonized the Afghan population. This may require an accelerated timetable for shifting American forces from Iraq, where the security situation has grown somewhat less desperate.

NATO also needs to step up its military effort. With Russia threatening to redraw the post-Soviet map of Europe, this is not time for NATO to forfeit its military credibility by losing a war. Europe does not have a lot of available ground troops either. But it needs to send its best ones to Afghanistan and let them fight.

Afghanistan’s president, Hamid Karzai, must rein in his government’s rampant corruption that has all but driven his people into the hands of the Taliban and criminal warlords. The international community needs to provide more — and more carefully monitored — resources to build up Afghanistan’s security forces and administrative capacity and accelerate rural development.

These investments will take time to pay off. But seven years have already been wasted, and unless such efforts begin now there will be no safe exit from Afghanistan for the foreseeable future.

Afghanistan’s war is not a sideshow. It is the principal military confrontation between America and NATO and the forces responsible for 9/11 and later deadly terrorist attacks on European soil. Washington, NATO and the governments of Pakistan and Afghanistan must stop fighting it like a holding action and develop a strategy to win. Otherwise, we will all lose.

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2) Exiting Iraq, Petraeus Says Gains Are Fragile
By DEXTER FILKINS
August 21, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/21/world/middleeast/21general.html?ref=world

BAGHDAD — In the final days of his campaign to bring Iraq under control, Gen. David H. Petraeus sat in his office at the American Embassy here looking drawn, exhausted, and more than a few years older than when he took command 18 months ago.

More than once as he spoke of his tenure, the general stopped to cough. An intensely energetic man who prides himself on besting young recruits in tests of strength and endurance, General Petraeus, 55, said Monday that he had been forced to scale back his punishing daily workouts to three a week.

“There is not much in the tank at the end of the day,” he said.

Yet for all the signs of fatigue, General Petraeus is preparing to leave Iraq a remarkably safer place than it was when he arrived. Violence has plummeted from its apocalyptic peaks, Iraqi leaders are asserting themselves, and streets that once seemed dead are flourishing with life. The worst, for now, has been averted.

And so in the general’s exhaustion comes the glimmer of hope, and also a caveat: Iraq has indeed stepped back from self-destruction, General Petraeus said, but the gains are tenuous and unlikely to survive without an American effort that outlasts his tenure. By the time he leaves for the United States next month to assume overall command of American forces in the Middle East and Afghanistan, he will have spent a total of 48 months in Iraq since the war began.

“I don’t know that it was a death spiral, but I mean it was a pretty dire situation,” General Petraeus said, referring to the situation upon his arrival here as the senior commander in Iraq in February 2007. “There have been very substantial gains at this point. Don’t take any of this to imply that we think we’re anywhere near finished.”

“It’s not durable yet. It’s not self-sustaining,” he added. “You know — touch wood — there is still a lot of work to be done.”

His run as commander coincided with the “surge” of American combat forces into Baghdad, in what amounted to a last, desperate gamble to bring the country under control.

The arrival of the 30,000 extra soldiers, deployed to Baghdad’s neighborhoods around the clock, allowed the Americans to exploit a series of momentous events that had begun to unfold at roughly the same time: the splintering of Moktada al-Sadr’s militia, the Mahdi Army; the growing competence of the Iraqi Army; and most important, the about-face by leaders of the country’s Sunni minority, who suddenly stopped opposing the Americans and joined with them against Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia and other local extremist groups.

The surge, clearly, has worked, at least for now: violence, measured in the number of attacks against Americans and Iraqis each week, has dropped by 80 percent in the country since early 2007, according to figures the general provided. Civilian deaths, which peaked at more than 100 a day in late 2006, have also plunged. Car and suicide bombings, which stoked sectarian violence, have fallen from a total of 130 in March 2007 to fewer than 40 last month. In July, fewer Americans were killed in Iraq — 13 — than in any month since the war began.

The result, now visible in the streets, is a calm unlike any the country has seen since the American invasion toppled Saddam Hussein in April 2003. The signs — Iraqi families flooding into parks at sundown, merchants throwing open long-shuttered shops — are stunning to anyone who witnessed the country’s implosion in 2005 and 2006.

General Petraeus declined to discuss the kind of American troop levels he thinks would be needed to ensure that the positive trends become permanent. Indeed, the way ahead in Iraq seems anything but clear, with many arrangements that are keeping the peace — like 100,000 Sunni gunmen, many of them former insurgents, on the government payroll at $25 million a month — extremely fragile. A collapse of the peace is not difficult to imagine.

The question of America’s continued commitment is likely to be taken up immediately by the new president, whoever he is, when he moves into the White House in January. General Petraeus suggested he had some details in mind, but did not think them appropriate to discuss publicly. “I can,” he said, “but I won’t.”

“The only statement I think somebody in a position like this can responsibly make is that it obviously depends on the conditions and how much risk one is willing to take,” General Petraeus said, referring to the next president.

Instead, General Petraeus looked mostly back. Dressed in his combat green-and-tan fatigues and boots, and swigging on a plastic bottle full of instant tea, he gave an account that did not lack for drama.

When he arrived 18 months ago, the American project in Iraq, then led by General George W. Casey Jr. and Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad, was in serious trouble, with sectarian violence spiraling across the country. The day when Iraqi forces could take over and allow the Americans to leave seemed more distant than ever. A sectarian and ethnic division of the country loomed.

“The fact is that General Casey and Zal Khalilzad signed an assessment in December, early December of 2006, that said the strategy is failing,” General Petraeus said.

Violence, indeed, had reached anarchic levels: By February 2007, Sunni and Shiite insurgents were carrying out close to 1,500 attacks against Iraqis and Americans each week, and each month were killing as many as 2,500 civilians, who were often the victims of hideous, sectarian-driven slayings. In Baghdad alone, 40 to 50 people were being kidnapped each day. The Iraqi security forces, charged with keeping order, were carrying out some of the most egregious acts of crime and sectarian killings.

The crisis gave an opening to a handful of senior officers and military policy analysts in Washington to push for an American-heavy strategy of putting troops in Iraqi neighborhoods around the clock — which had not been done on a large scale — while isolating and attacking the main catalysts of the sectarian violence.

General Petraeus, with other commanders, like then-Col. H. R. McMaster, had for years been pushing the Army to change its focus from killing the enemy to helping ordinary Iraqis cope with insurgents — the essence of modern counterinsurgency strategy.

The “surge,” ordered by President Bush in early 2007, sparked a vociferous debate in the United States. While General Petraeus and his deputy, Lt. Gen. Raymond T. Odierno, were confident about their chances of success, they realized that with Iraq disintegrating and the American public turning against a longer commitment, the surge would probably be the military’s last chance to get things right.

As fresh troops arrived, the generals began deploying them across Baghdad, mostly in small outposts called joint security stations. The stations were seen as the key to securing the capital; for the first time, Americans could credibly promise that they would protect Iraqi civilians from the insurgents. The extra troops also allowed American commanders to initiate a series of offensives last year against the strongholds of Al Qaeda of Mesopotamia and other Sunni extremist groups in and outside of Baghdad and then, in 2008, against the Mahdi Army, the Shiite militia.

“We started putting joint security stations right in the heart of Al Qaeda’s areas,” General Petraeus said.

At first, the surge was accompanied by a rise in American deaths. The three deadliest months for American soldiers in five and a half years of war came from April through June last year, as the added soldiers took to the streets. In those three months, 331 Americans soldiers and marines died. “We said it was going to get harder before it got easier,” General Petraeus said. “And it did. We took very tough casualties.”

For years, he said, the Americans and the Iraqi government had been locked in what he described as a “downward spiral”; as the violence raged, ordinary Iraqis were often too frightened to cooperate with either the Iraqi security officers or American troops. Good intelligence was thus hard to come by, which meant that military operations often missed their marks. The insurgents were free to intimidate, threaten and kill civilians, government officials or anyone who refused to do their bidding.

It was the spectacular bombings, like the destruction of the Askariya shrine in Samarra in 2006, which prompted ordinary Iraqi Shiites to accept the protection of militias like the Mahdi Army. Those militias, in turn, began carrying out massacres of their own, against Sunni civilians in their own neighborhood.

Dismantling Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia, General Petraeus said, took away the rationale for the Mahdi Army. “As the Al Qaeda threat is gradually degraded, the reason for the militia is no longer there,” he said. That, in turn, helped civilians in both communities who wanted to join the government or cooperate with the security forces. And that allowed the Shiite-dominated government of Nuri Kamal al-Maliki to purge the ranks of the state security services of sectarian killers, and finally take on Mr. Sadr’s militia.

All good, General Petraeus suggested, as long as it lasts.

“You’re either spiraling downward,” he said, “or you’re spiraling upward.”

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3) New Guidelines Would Give F.B.I. Broader Powers
By ERIC LICHTBLAU
August 21, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/21/washington/21fbi.html?ref=us

WASHINGTON — A Justice Department plan would loosen restrictions on the Federal Bureau of Investigation to allow agents to open a national security or criminal investigation against someone without any clear basis for suspicion, Democratic lawmakers briefed on the details said Wednesday.

The plan, which could be made public next month, has already generated intense interest and speculation. Little is known about its precise language, but civil liberties advocates say they fear it could give the government even broader license to open terrorism investigations.

Congressional staff members got a glimpse of some of the details in closed briefings this month, and four Democratic senators told Attorney General Michael B. Mukasey in a letter on Wednesday that they were troubled by what they heard.

The senators said the new guidelines would allow the F.B.I. to open an investigation of an American, conduct surveillance, pry into private records and take other investigative steps “without any basis for suspicion.” The plan “might permit an innocent American to be subjected to such intrusive surveillance based in part on race, ethnicity, national origin, religion, or on protected First Amendment activities,” the letter said. It was signed by Russ Feingold of Wisconsin, Richard J. Durbin of Illinois, Edward M. Kennedy of Massachusetts and Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island.

As the end of the Bush administration nears, the White House has been seeking to formalize in law and regulation some of the aggressive counterterrorism steps it has already taken in practice since the Sept. 11 attacks.

Congress overhauled the federal wiretapping law in July, for instance, and President Bush issued an executive order this month ratifying new roles for intelligence agencies. Other pending changes would also authorize greater sharing of intelligence information with the local police, a major push in the last seven years.

The Justice Department is already expecting criticism over the F.B.I. guidelines. In an effort to pre-empt critics, Mr. Mukasey gave a speech last week in Portland, Ore., describing the unfinished plan as an effort to “integrate more completely and harmonize the standards that apply to the F.B.I.’s activities.” Differing standards, he said, have caused confusion for field agents.

Mr. Mukasey emphasized that the F.B.I. would still need a “valid purpose” for an investigation, and that it could not be “simply based on somebody’s race, religion, or exercise of First Amendment rights.”

Rather than expanding government power, he said, “this document clarifies the rules by which the F.B.I. conducts its intelligence mission.”

In 2002, John Ashcroft, then the attorney general, allowed F.B.I. agents to visit public sites like mosques or monitor Web sites in the course of national security investigations. The next year, Mr. Bush issued guidelines allowing officials to use ethnicity or race in “narrow” circumstances to detect a terrorist threat.

The Democratic senators said the draft plan appeared to allow the F.B.I. to go even further in collecting information on Americans connected to “foreign intelligence” without any factual predicate. They also said there appeared to be few constraints on how the information would be shared with other agencies.

Michael German, a lawyer with the American Civil Liberties Union and a former F.B.I. agent, said the plan appeared to open the door still further to the use of data-mining profiles in tracking terrorism.

“This seems to be based on the idea that the government can take a bunch of data and create a profile that can be used to identify future bad guys,” he said. “But that has not been demonstrated to be true anywhere else.”

The Justice Department said Wednesday that in light of requests from members of Congress for more information, Mr. Mukasey would agree not to sign the new guidelines before a Sept. 17 Congressional hearing.

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4) Rabbis Debate Kosher Ethics at Meat Plant
By JULIA PRESTON
August 23, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/23/us/23kosher.html?ref=us

An immigration raid at the nation’s largest kosher meatpacking plant has opened a wide rift among Jewish leaders over the company’s ethical conduct and led to new interest in a campaign to create wage and safety standards for workers producing kosher food.

The Agriprocessors Inc. plant in Postville, Iowa, lost about half its work force when 389 illegal immigrants were detained there in May, causing shortages of kosher meat and poultry in butcher shops and supermarkets across the country.

Immigrants caught in the raid told labor investigators of unpaid overtime, lax safety measures and under-age workers at the plant. Their stories have troubled many kosher consumers and given impetus to a campaign known as Hekhsher Tzedek (which means “justice certification” in Hebrew) to create an additional seal of approval for kosher-certified products, indicating that the producers met certain standards for the treatment of workers.

“People want kosher food that is produced in an appropriate manner according to both ritual law and ethical law,” said Rabbi Morris J. Allen of Mendota Heights, Minn., who is leading the effort backed by the United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism, representing the synagogues of the Conservative movement, and the Rabbinical Assembly, the organization of Conservative rabbis.

But while Rabbi Allen and others have criticized Agriprocessors, some Orthodox Jewish leaders rallied to the company’s defense. After touring the Postville plant on July 31, a delegation of 20 Orthodox rabbis, including leaders of kosher certification organizations from the United States and Canada, concluded Agriprocessors was “an A-1 place,” said Rabbi Pesach Lerner, vice president of the National Council of Young Israel, an Orthodox group.

“An old medieval plant we didn’t see,” said Rabbi Lerner, who organized the trip. “We saw a Cadillac with top-of-the-line machinery and a heavy emphasis on safety, security and health.”

A spokesman for the company, Menachem Lubinsky, said it had been unfairly singled out for labor violations that were unproven accusations. Mr. Lubinsky told The Jewish Week newspaper that Agriprocessors was facing a “Dreyfus trial in the media,” referring to the case of a Jewish military officer in France who was unfairly tried for treason in the late 19th century.

Agriprocessors managers, at first stunned by the immigration raid, have since gone on the offensive, revising management practices and hiring lawyers and public relations advisers in an effort to rebuild the company’s reputation, especially among Jewish consumers.

The Postville plant has been owned since 1987 by Aaron Rubashkin and his family, Lubavitch Hasidic Jews who built the company from a Brooklyn butcher shop into a kosher meat giant controlling more than 60 percent of the market, with annual kosher sales of more than $80 million, according to analysts’ estimates.

Agriprocessors specializes in glatt kosher beef, the highest kosher certification that is reserved for meat from animals with smooth lungs bearing no lesions. The shortages after the raid highlighted the company’s dominance in the kosher meat market, with brands like Aaron’s Best, Shor Harbor and David’s.

Kosher experts said that Mr. Rubashkin and his son Sholom, until recently the chief executive in Postville, had vastly extended the distribution of kosher products across the United States by selling them to major supermarkets along with nonkosher beef.

But workers at the Postville plant had long complained of forced overtime, frequent accidents and extortion by floor supervisors who sold jobs for cash. Their complaints were amplified after the raid, when nearly 300 illegal immigrant workers, most from Guatemala, were criminally prosecuted, with most sentenced to five months in prison followed by deportation.

On Aug. 5, Iowa labor authorities said they had found 57 cases of under-age workers employed at the plant, and they called on the state attorney general to bring criminal charges against Agriprocessors for “egregious violations” of the state’s child labor laws.

On Friday, the Iowa labor department announced 31 citations against Agriprocessors for safety violations and proposed $101,000 in fines. Kerry Koonce, the department’s spokeswoman, said 21 violations were serious and 6 were repeat offenses cited earlier this year by authorities, which the company had agreed to correct.

The violations, found in inspections that began on July 8, included inadequately shielded meat-cutting saws and improper storage of compressed gas cylinders — “a very high number for one inspection,” Ms. Koonce said. One repeat violation was a hole large enough for a worker to fall through in the plant floor, she said.

Mr. Lubinsky, the spokesman, said Agriprocessors was not aware of under-age workers in its plant and had moved swiftly to fire four workers under 18 who were discovered by managers. In a statement on Friday, the company said all of the safety issues identified by Iowa inspectors in July were remedied within days. The company denied that it had failed to correct any earlier violations.

A low-level Agriprocessors floor supervisor pleaded guilty this week to criminal immigration charges, the only manager convicted to date. Higher managers remain under criminal investigation.

The Agriprocessors raid in May fueled a fundamental debate between the Orthodox and Conservative movements of Judaism. The Orthodox, who include the majority of Jews who keep kosher, adhere to a strict interpretation of Jewish law, while the Conservative movement has a more liberal interpretation emphasizing social justice. Among Conservative Jews, a minority observe kosher laws strictly.

Rabbi Allen said the Hekhsher Tzedek campaign grew out of his efforts to promote kosher practice in his synagogue, and his participation in a Jewish commission of inquiry that went to Postville after an article in 2006 in The Forward, the weekly Jewish newspaper, about conditions there. The commission’s report found “significant issues of concern, including health and safety.”

Since then a rift has grown between Rabbi Allen’s group and Agriprocessors and its supporters. Several rabbis supporting the Hekhsher Tzedek campaign joined a protest at the Postville plant in July.

Last month, a New York public relations firm representing Agriprocessors, 5W Public Relations, posted fake blog comments under Rabbi Allen’s name on FailedMessiah.com, a Web site that is fiercely critical of the Rubashkins, and on the Web site of JTA, the Jewish news agency. Shmarya Rosenberg, who runs FailedMessiah.com, traced the fraudulent comments on his site to a 5W address. JTA reported that one false posting in Rabbi Allen’s name came from an address belonging to a 5W executive, Juda Engelmayer.

The postings seemed intended to discredit Rabbi Allen by making him appear to use crude, arrogant language. In a statement, 5W confirmed that the postings came from its offices but said that they had been made by an intern without approval.

The Hekhsher Tzedek campaign has broadened its ambitions beyond Agriprocessors, hoping to see its “God Housekeeping Seal” adopted by kosher food producers nationwide. On Aug. 1, the campaign unveiled proposed “social justice criteria” for the seal, including standards for wages and benefits, worker safety, animal welfare and environmental protection.

In coming days, the two Conservative Jewish organizations behind the campaign will send out a mailing calling on rabbis to preach about it during Rosh Hashana, the Jewish New Year.

Rabbi Allen said the campaign was not seeking to change ancient kosher dietary laws, which are traditionally administered by Orthodox Jews. “We are not revising, we are enhancing,” he said.

But some Orthodox leaders predicted that the campaign would be spurned by Orthodox Jews. Rabbi Avi Shafran of Agudath Israel, a national Orthodox group, warned that the Hekhsher Tzedek was likely to backfire by raising the price of kosher food.

The campaign’s leaders appear “not so much interested in ensuring fair treatment of employees and the like as they are in redefining the very concept of kashrut” (the Hebrew word referring to kosher laws and practice), Rabbi Shafran said. “That, in our view, is deeply troubling.”

Meanwhile, the negative news from Agriprocessors spurred Orthodox leaders to action. David Eliezrie, a California rabbi who joined the trip to Postville, called the delegation “the New York Yankees of rabbis.” Aaron Troodler, another delegation member, said Agriprocessors had paid for the rabbis’ travel.

They saw changes that Agriprocessors had made since the raid, according to the report of their trip. They met with James Martin, a former federal prosecutor recently hired as a compliance officer, and were told of a toll-free hot line he set up for confidential worker complaints.

Workers interviewed on video by Yair Hoffman, a delegation member, said Agriprocessors now pays a starting wage of $10 an hour, up from $7.25 before the raid. Jacobson Staffing, an outside company that has taken charge of hiring, has enrolled the company in E-Verify, a federal program devised to block illegal immigrants from getting jobs.

After the three-hour tour, the rabbis issued an unqualified endorsement. They said they did not intend to delve into conditions before the raid or address the plight of the immigrant workers caught in the raid.

“I have no firsthand knowledge of what went on before,” Rabbi Lerner said. “But if you take away preraid, you’ve got to say it’s a wonderful situation now.”

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5)Soldier Who Deserted to Canada Draws 15-Month Term
By DAN FROSCH
August 23, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/23/us/23resist.html?ref=us

DENVER — An American soldier who fled to Canada rather than fight in Iraq pleaded guilty to a desertion charge Friday and was sentenced by an Army judge to 15 months in a military prison.

The soldier, Pfc. Robin Long, 25, of Boise, Idaho, who left his unit in 2005 on grounds of moral opposition to the war, will also be dishonorably discharged and demoted to private E-1, the Army’s lowest rank.

Private Long was initially charged with desertion with intent to shirk hazardous duty, which could have carried a five-year sentence. The plea he entered Friday, in a court-martial hearing at Fort Carson, Colo., was to a lesser charge, desertion with intent to remain away permanently.

Mr. Long’s civilian lawyer, James M. Branum, said after the hearing that he would appeal the sentence.

“I felt he doesn’t deserve a day in prison,” Mr. Branum said. “Any jail time is unjust.”

Mr. Branum added that “he may have committed an illegal action, but morally he was right, and it meant a lot for him to say that to the Army.”

Karen Linne, a Fort Carson spokeswoman, said the Army had no comment.

Private Long, who enlisted in 2003, left his tank unit in April 2005 after learning that it was bound for Iraq. He fled to Nelson, British Columbia, a town that has become a haven of sorts for American soldiers who have deserted because of opposition to the war.

Private Long was deported by the Canadian authorities in July after his application for refugee status was denied. He is believed to be the first American serviceman seeking haven to be returned to the United States by Canada since the Vietnam War.

Jeff Paterson of Courage to Resist, a group that supports military members who have publicly refused to fight in Iraq, said about 200 American troops had fled to Canada because of moral objections to the war. About 40 troops who left their units after refusing to fight in Iraq have been sentenced to military prisons as a result, Mr. Paterson said.

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6) U.S. and Global Economies Slipping in Unison
By PETER S. GOODMAN
August 24, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/24/business/24global.html?hp

Economic trouble has spread far beyond the United States to major countries in Europe and Asia, threatening American businesses with the loss of foreign sales and investment that have become increasingly vital to their sustenance.

Only a few months ago, some economists still offered hope that robust expansion could continue in much of the world even as the United States slowed. Foreign investment was expected to keep replenishing American banks still bleeding from their disastrous bets on real estate and to provide money for companies looking to expand. Overseas demand for American goods and services was supposed to continue compensating for waning demand in the States.

Now, high energy prices, financial systems crippled by fear, and the decline of trading partners have combined to choke growth in many major economies. The International Monetary Fund expects global growth to slow significantly through the end of this year, dipping to 4.1 percent from 5 percent in 2007.

“The global economy is in a tough spot, caught between sharply slowing demand in many advanced economies and rising inflation everywhere,” the I.M.F. declared last month in its official World Economic Outlook.

All this means that economic troubles in the United States could intensify into the presidential election season and beyond. It could also make it harder for financial companies like Lehman Brothers — which has been seeking fresh investment in South Korea — and the government-backed mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to attract much-needed capital from abroad.

As the United States and many other large economies slip in unison, the reality of integrated markets is being underscored: just as globalization spreads prosperity — linking cotton farmers in Texas to textile mills in China — the same forces spread hurt when times go bad.

“The slowdown has reached such a wide range of countries that they’re now feeding on one another,” said Alan Ruskin, chief international strategist at RBS Greenwich Capital.

The impact of the downturn is reflected by the experience of the Vermeer Corporation in Pella, Iowa. The company, which manufactures farming and construction equipment, has become accustomed to looking abroad for growth as the real estate bust in the United States has crimped purchases of its gear by American home builders. Its overseas sales have doubled in the last five years as a percentage of its total business and now make up nearly a third of its revenue, the company’s senior director of international sales, Steve Heap, said.

But in recent months, even as growth has continued over all, some parts of the world have sunk into malaise.

“The U.K. has been really soft for the last six months,” Mr. Heap said. “Western Europe overall has been flat. We’ve not seen the growth we’ve seen in the last few years.”

Many other major economies are either stagnant or shrinking as well. Japan, whose fortunes are tethered to exports, saw its economy contract at a 2.4 percent annual rate from April through June after accounting for inflation. Germany, another export power, slid at a 2 percent clip. France and Italy slipped slightly.

Spain and the United Kingdom — both grappling with hangovers from their own real estate binges — were both flat amid talk that they have already slipped into recession. The festivity of easy money has given way to recriminations over bad loans, unemployment and inflation.

“The year 2009 in Europe is going to look significantly worse than 2008,” said Marco Annunziata, chief economist at the Italian bank UniCredit.

Even China and India, whose swift growth has occasioned talk of a new global order, have been cooling in recent months, though still expanding at rates that would bring envy in nearly any other land.

“We had buoyant world growth for a few years,” said William R. Cline, a senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics in Washington. “It was too hot not to cool down, as the song goes.”

There is a potentially significant upside to the downturn under way: it could knock down rising prices for food and energy, which have been driven higher by swelling demand in a swiftly expanding world economy.

The chairman of the Federal Reserve, Ben S. Bernanke, has been betting on that very scenario as he has rejected calls for higher interest rates to suffocate inflation.

The recent drop in commodity prices, combined with “a pace of growth that is likely to fall short of potential for a time, should lead inflation to moderate later this year and next year,” Mr. Bernanke said Friday at the Fed’s annual economic symposium in Jackson Hole, Wyo.

Still, concern centers on the possibility that slowing global growth could hurt sales of American goods and services overseas. Exports have been a conspicuous bright spot in an economy colored by falling home prices and declining consumer spending.

The dollar has been strengthening against many currencies in recent weeks — not because of a newfound belief in American prospects, economists say, but because investors are edging out of markets that are weakening, like Britain and other parts of Europe, sending down the pound and the euro.

“It’s the rest of the world going down, not the United States going up,” said Kenneth S. Rogoff, a former chief economist at the International Monetary Fund and now a professor at Harvard.

A stronger dollar makes American goods more expensive on world markets. If the dollar keeps strengthening, it could pinch sales.

“Exports have been sort of holding us out of the graveyard,” said Martin N. Baily, a former chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers in the Clinton administration, and now a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution in Washington. “That may begin to peter out a little bit if the dollar continues to climb.”

Some economists argue that the dollar’s recent strengthening is a correction after six years of declines that have sapped it of one-fourth of its value against the currencies of major trading partners. Others maintain that the dollar has further to fall, noting that the United States remains on the short of end of a lopsided balance of trade, with imports outstripping exports by nearly $800 billion at the end of last year.

Regardless of the dollar’s value, sales of American goods may be eroded by a more decisive force: a global loss of appetite for goods. “If the rest of the world economy slows, the demand just isn’t going to be there,” Mr. Ruskin said.

That could be painful for American companies that rely on overseas markets. In 2001, large American companies that disclosed foreign revenues logged about a third of their sales abroad, according to an analysis by Howard Silverblatt, senior index analyst at Standard & Poor’s. By last year, the foreign take had climbed to 46 percent. Europe made up 29 percent of the total.

Some American businesses say it is too early to worry about a global downturn.

“When I see the headlines, I worry, but when I look at my order book, I stop worrying,” said James W. Griffith, president and chief executive of the Timken Company, a Canton, Ohio, manufacturer of industrial bearings and power transmission equipment with operations in 27 countries.

Roughly half of Timken’s bearing business is overseas, cushioning the company against the loss of sales in the American auto industry — a trend Mr. Griffith says he is confident will continue.

“When China decides they want to build a car, somebody runs a steel mill with coal and iron ore out of Australia, and they mine it with Caterpillar dump trucks which are full of Timken bearings,” Mr. Griffith said. “What is driving our success is the globalization of markets.”

Still, the transformation of foreign shores from a refuge for American business into a source of anxiety is a testament to how swiftly trouble can proliferate in the global economy.

India’s customer service call centers — heavily dependent on American demand — are now girding for cuts.

In China, the pace of growth has dipped from an annual rate exceeding 12 percent as recently as last year to something closer to 9 or 10 percent, according to most economists.

China’s leaders have become concerned about flagging exports, recently altering priorities from seeking to squelch inflation to instead sustaining economic growth. The government is easing restrictions on bank lending, which were imposed to put the brakes on the economy.

When China makes fewer computers, it needs fewer computer chips forged in Taiwan and designed in the United States. It needs less steel, and so less iron ore from Brazil and Australia. Which means those countries need less construction equipment made in Germany, Japan or Ohio.

“The global slowdown is going to create some headwind for the United States,” said Stephen Jen, an economist at Morgan Stanley in London.

Keith Bradsher, Carter Dougherty and Heather Timmons contributed reporting.

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7) Afghan Leader Assails Airstrike He Says Killed 95
By CARLOTTA GALL
August 24, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/24/world/asia/24afghan.html?hp

KABUL, Afghanistan — President Hamid Karzai strongly condemned on Saturday a coalition airstrike that he said killed up to 95 Afghans — including 50 children — in a village in western Afghanistan on Friday, and said his government would be announcing measures to prevent the loss of civilian life in the future.

Government officials who traveled to the village of Azizabad in Herat Province on Saturday said the death toll had risen to 95 from 76, making it one of the deadliest airstrikes on civilians in nearly seven years of war.

The American military said Saturday it was investigating the attack.

The Karzai government has expressed outrage over recent airstrikes that have led to civilian deaths, as popular support for the coalition presence in Afghanistan dwindles. The tension comes at a delicate time for the American-led coalition, which is facing a resurgent Taliban with a perceived shortage of troops, leading it to rely more on air power to battle militants.

Mr. Karzai also denounced the coalition after an airstrike on July 6 killed 27 people in a wedding party — most of them women and children, including the bride — in eastern Afghanistan.

Mr. Karzai’s spokesman, Homayun Hamidzada, said civilians, including children, were brought to a provincial hospital in the town of Jalalabad. The American military is still investigating that attack; it has not acknowledged that civilians had been killed.

Mr. Hamidzada said civilian casualties had been declining over the past several months but that the recent airstrikes had reversed that trend. He said requests to American forces for greater care concerning civilian casualties had had little effect. The coalition has said it does all it can to prevent civilian deaths.

“This puts us in a very difficult position,” said a government official, who asked not to be identified because of the delicacy of the matter. “It provides propaganda to the Taliban, and if they don’t take responsibility, it actually helps the Taliban.”

The Afghan official said the government would demand broader, strategic-level cooperation on military operations. There have also been calls among members of the Afghan Parliament and Western analysts to put Special Forces, which often call in airstrikes, under stricter constraints.

The account of Friday’s airstrike by Afghan officials conflicted with that of the United States military, which said that coalition forces had come under attack in Azizabad, a village in the Shindand District of Herat Province, and had called in an airstrike that killed 25 militants, including a Taliban leader, Mullah Sadiq, and five civilians.

After the Afghan government said Friday that more than 70 civilians had been killed, Maj. Gen. Jeffrey J. Schloesser, the commander of coalition forces, ordered an investigation into the episode, the public affairs officer, First Lt. Richard K. Ulsh, said.

“Coalition forces are aware of allegations that the engagement in the Shindand District of Herat Province Friday may have resulted in civilian casualties,” a statement issued from Bagram air base said. “All allegations of civilian casualties are taken very seriously. Coalition forces make every effort to prevent the injury or loss of innocent lives. An investigation has been directed.”

Col. Rauf Ahmadi, a spokesman for the police chief of the western region, denied that there were any Taliban in the village at the time of the strikes. “There were no Taliban,” he said by telephone. “There is no evidence to show there were Taliban there that night,” he said.

The dead included 50 children, 19 women and 26 men, Colonel Ahmadi said.

A presidential aide who declined to be identified said that the Interior Ministry and the Afghan intelligence agency had reported from the region that there were no Taliban present in the village that night. The Afghan National Army, whose commandos called in the airstrike along with American Special Forces trainers, were unable to clarify their original claim, he said.

A spokesman for the Afghan Army declined to comment on Saturday.

A tribal elder from the region who helped bury the dead, Haji Tor Jan Noorzai, said people in the village were gathered in memory of a man who was anti-Taliban and was killed last year, and that tribal enemies of the family had given out false information.

“It is quite obvious, the Americans bombed the area due to wrong information,” he said by telephone. “I am 100 percent confident that someone gave the information due to a tribal dispute. The Americans are foreigners and they do not understand. These people they killed were enemies of the Taliban.”

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8) Inflation Delivers a Blow to Vietnam’s Spirits
By SETH MYDANS
August 24, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/24/world/asia/24viet.html?ref=world

HANOI, Vietnam — Even the ghosts are suffering from inflation in Vietnam this year.

August is the month when Buddhists ply the hungry ghosts of the dead with food and wine and cigarettes and honor them with paper offerings that represent the good things in life: cars, houses, motorbikes, stereo sets, fancy suits.

But like everything else in Vietnam, these brightly colored offerings have risen steeply in price, and shopkeepers say people are buying fewer gifts to burn for the dead.

With inflation rising to 27 percent last month — the highest in Asia — and food prices 74 percent above those a year ago, Vietnam is suffering its first serious downturn since it moved from a command economy to an open market nearly two decades ago.

Last month the government raised the price of gasoline by 31 percent to an all-time high of 19,000 dong ($1.19) per liter (or roughly $4.50 a gallon). Diesel and kerosene prices rose still higher. The country’s fledgling stock market, which had been booming a year ago, has fallen in volume by 95 percent and is at a virtual standstill.

Squeezed on all sides, people are cutting back on food, limiting travel, looking for second jobs, delaying major purchases and waiting for the cost of a wedding to go down before marrying.

Some village women who traveled to Hanoi to sell special homemade candies for the hungry ghost festival say they have not earned enough this year to return home.

Given this slowdown, Vietnam, Asia’s youngest tiger, which had been growing by about 8 percent a year for the past decade, is scaling back its plans for growth and economic development.

Last month the Asian Development Bank forecast that growth would slow to 6.5 percent this year. Some economists say even that figure is probably too high. Trade and current-account deficits have widened.

The mood in Vietnam, after years of upward mobility, is tense, said Kim N. B. Ninh, the Asia Foundation’s country representative.

“I think people are pessimistic,” she said. “You sense a tougher environment, a more restricted environment, a more pessimistic environment. It’s a moment of turmoil, I think.”

Some are losing confidence in the ability of the government to manage the economy. And rumors of price increases have caused panic buying of fuel and rice.

“The government seems confused about how to deal with the difficulties, and they have been making some mistakes in running the economy,” said a young lawyer who spoke on condition of anonymity when criticizing the government.

In part, economists say, Vietnam is suffering from the worldwide economic downturn and from high inflation that has spread through Southeast Asia.

But they say the problems are also self-inflicted, the result of an overheated economy as Vietnam raced forward with inadequate safeguards. Too much capital, particularly from foreign investment, has collided with bottlenecks in infrastructure and capacity.

The education system, meanwhile, has produced too few skilled and semiskilled workers for Vietnam to move up quickly into more complex manufacturing industries.

Hundreds of strikes at the factories that have been engines of Vietnam’s growth are some of the sharpest signs of discontent.

Some of the factory workers who are leading Vietnam’s rise from poverty are returning to the countryside, according to the local press, unable to sustain an urban life on a factory wage.

“Some people who have been moving from rural areas to seek jobs in industrial zones are deciding that it is not worth it, and people are moving home,” said Ben Wilkinson, associate director of the Vietnam program at the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard.

After a steep reduction in the poverty rate from 58 percent of the population in 1993 to around 15 percent last year, some people — including those who had bought their first motorbike or cellphone — are slipping back below the poverty line.

Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung told the National Assembly in May that the number of households going hungry had doubled in one year.

Everywhere they turn these days, people in Vietnam see higher prices.

A shoeshine has gone up to 25 cents from 19 cents; a good haircut to $1.87 from $1.25; a tiny cup of tea on the street to 6 cents from 3 cents; a one-time-use raincoat to 37 cents from 12 cents; a massage to $6.25 from $4.37.

Also, it now costs 12 cents to park your motorbike on the sidewalk, and if you get a flat tire, it costs 12 cents to get it pumped, double the prices of a few months ago.

The costs of housing and construction materials have risen by 24 percent. High fuel prices have forced some fishermen to keep their boats onshore, and the government has stepped in to subsidize them.

As the local currency, the dong, drops in value, people say they are moving their money into dollar bank accounts, making Vietnam one of the few places in the world today where people are buying dollars.

Nguyen Minh Phong, an expert on inflation with the Institute of Socioeconomic Development Research who invests in real estate on the side, said his personal woe was that he had 13 brothers and sisters who missed the real estate bubble and now came to him for loans.

In the long term, most economists agree, Vietnam will continue the transformation it began in the early 1990s with a new policy of economic restructuring called “doi moi” decreed in 1986.

Private enterprise was encouraged, agriculture was freed from government controls, hyperinflation was tamed and Vietnam became, like China, a largely capitalist nation under the control of a Communist government.

Foreign investment boomed as new regulations and tax laws were introduced, business laws were formulated and capital market reforms were put in place. The changes were consolidated with membership in the World Trade Organization in 2006.

Many of these changes have been painful and controversial, but Vietnam’s leaders, with their ambitious targets for growth, are in a hurry to surpass their neighbors and to become, as they put it, a modern and prosperous nation.

With a growing population of more than 80 million — three-fourths of whom are under the age of 35 — this is a nation looking into the future, with ever dimmer memories of its wartime past.

In the past, when strict Communism ruled, religion was banned, and the ghosts of the ancestors languished uncared for and unappeased.

Religion returned to Vietnam along with free commerce. The two have flourished in tandem, and now they are feeling the pinch of inflation together.

“It’s terrible right now,” said Dinh Vu Hung, 54, who sells paper offerings for the dead in the Ancient Quarter of Hanoi.

“We make these beautiful things, but the prices have gone up and fewer people are buying them. It’s not just us, though. It’s the whole country.”

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9) Vetted Judges More Likely to Reject Asylum Bids
By CHARLIE SAVAGE
August 24, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/24/washington/24judges.html?ref=us

WASHINGTON — Immigrants seeking asylum in the United States have been disproportionately rejected by judges whom the Bush administration chose using a conservative political litmus test, according to an analysis of Justice Department data.

The analysis suggests that the effects of a patronage-style selection process for immigration judges — used for three years before it was abandoned as illegal — are still being felt by scores of immigrants whose fates are determined by the judges installed in that period.

The data focuses on 16 judges who were vetted for political affiliation before being hired and have since ruled on at least 100 cases each.

Comparison of their records to others in the same cities shows that as a group they ruled against asylum-seekers significantly more often than colleagues who were appointed, as the law requires, under politically neutral rules.

Critics of the politicization of the immigration bench say it is not enough that in 2007 the department stopped using illegal hiring procedures. The fact that many of the politically selected judges remain in power, they say, continues to undermine the perceived fairness of hearings for immigrants fighting deportation.

The immigration court “is now the seat of individuals who were appointed illegally, and that means that in the minds of many people the court symbolizes illegality,” said Bruce Einhorn, a Pepperdine University law professor who was an immigration judge from 1990 until he retired last year.

Peter A. Carr, a Justice Department spokesman, wrote in an e-mailed response to questions, “The fact that the process was flawed does not mean that the immigration judges selected through that process are unfit to serve.”

The Bush administration has been accused by Democrats and other critics of improperly bringing politics into the business of federal agencies like the Environmental Protection Agency, the General Services Administration and, most notably, the Justice Department, which has been reeling under accusations that officials sought to politicize the apparatus of law enforcement.

This summer, the department’s inspector general released two scathing reports confirming that for several years administration officials illegally took political affiliation into account when hiring recent law school graduates, summer associates, some assistant prosecutors and immigration judges.

The report covering the selection of immigration judges primarily blamed Kyle Sampson, a former top aide to the attorney general, and two former White House liaisons to the department, Monica M. Goodling and Jan Williams, for the practice.

When vetting applicants, for example, Ms. Goodling asked them questions about their political beliefs and researched their campaign contributions. She also conducted Internet searches of their names and words like “asylum,” “immigrant” and “border,” as well as partisan terms, like abortion, Iraq, gay and the names of political figures, to determine their views, the report said. But it presented no evidence that her efforts were connected to any official policy goal of restricting asylum.

The White House has said it never ordered political hiring of civil servants.

The Justice Department employs more than 200 immigration judges in more than 50 courts around the country. They conduct hearings for noncitizens asking not to be deported, including asylum-seekers who say they fear religious or political persecution.

Although called “judges,” the hearing examiners are not confirmed by the Senate for life; they are covered by federal civil-service laws, which stipulate that they must be hired on the basis of merit under politically neutral criteria. But in early 2004, political appointees took control of hiring the judges away from career professionals and essentially began treating the positions — which carry salaries of $104,300 to $158,500 — as patronage jobs. They screened out liberals and Democrats, while steering openings to White House-vetted “Bush loyalists” and other job-seekers vouched for by Republican political appointees.

Among the judges selected were a member of the 2000 Bush-Cheney Florida recount team, people who worked for Republican lawmakers and a former Republican state official in Illinois backed by Karl Rove, at the time the White House political adviser.

In 2007, after the Civil Division questioned the legality of the process, the administration changed back to a nonpolitical selection method handled by career professionals.

But in the interim 31 immigration judges had been appointed by the flawed process. The Justice Department did not challenge a list of those judges submitted by The New York Times.

Of that group, 28 remain judges, two left during a probationary period, and one was recently promoted by Attorney General Michael B. Mukasey to the Board of Immigration Appeals, the panel that hears appeals of rulings.

The inspector general’s report did not evaluate how the politically selected judges have used their power. The additional data comes from Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse, a research group at Syracuse University that has analyzed Justice Department records from the 2002 fiscal year to 2007 and profiled immigration judges.

Of the 31 politically selected judges, 16 compiled enough of a record to allow statistical analysis. Nine rejected applicants at a significantly higher rate than other local colleagues, while three were more lenient. Four others decided cases in line with the local averages, an analysis by The Times showed.

And when asylum denial rates of all judges across the nation were ranked in comparison to their local peers, 8 of the 16 scored above the 70th percentile — meaning they have been among the judges least likely to grant asylum.

Together, these 16 judges handled 5,031 cases and had a combined denial rate of 66.3 percent — 6.6 percentage points greater than their collective peers. This translates into an extra 157 asylum cases that resulted in denial.

In Houston, for example, Judge Chris Brisack denied asylum in 90.7 percent of his cases, while other judges in that city averaged a 79.1 percent denial rate. Judge Brisack, a former Republican county chairman who also works in the oil business, did not return a call.

Garry Malphrus, the judge later elevated to the Board of Immigration Appeals, denied asylum 66.9 percent of the time, compared with an average denial rate of 58.3 percent among other judges at his court in Arlington, Va. Judge Malphrus, a former associate director of the White House Domestic Policy Council, did not return a call.

The highest gap belonged to Judge Earle Wilson. He worked first in Miami, where he denied 88.1 percent of asylum requests — 9.8 percentage points higher than the local average. He then moved to Orlando, where his denial rate was 80.3 percent — 29.2 percentage points higher than peers.

Judge Wilson, who previously worked in the Office of Immigration Litigation at the Justice Department, said he was not allowed to give interviews.

Still, there were exceptions. Three of the politically selected judges granted asylum significantly more frequently than peers. Most notably, Judge Glen Bower of Chicago denied only 16 percent of asylum requests — 47 percentage points lower than the city average. Judge Bower, the applicant backed by Mr. Rove, did not return a call.

The analysis excluded judges for whom insufficient data was available to produce meaningful results.

Charles H. Kuck, the president of the American Immigration Lawyers Association, said all the judges, regardless of their qualifications, should reapply for their jobs alongside other applicants.

“Any judge who was appointed through a process that was not impartial should step down and go through the process again to make sure they should be reappointed,” Mr. Kuck said.

But Glenn Fine, the Justice Department inspector general, said at a July 30 Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on his investigation that “it would be difficult if not impossible” to decide whether a sitting judge was qualified.

Mr. Fine also noted that the judges could not be fired because they were now protected by civil-service statutes — the same laws violated when they were selected.

At that hearing, Senator Sheldon Whitehouse, Democrat of Rhode Island, expressed frustration about the lack of remedies.

“The so-called ‘loyal Bushies’ that they stuffed into these positions will also have gotten away with it and will be there essentially indefinitely, protected by civil-service protections that they don’t deserve,” Mr. Whitehouse said.

Stephen H. Legomsky, an immigration law professor at Washington University in St. Louis, said the attorney general should reassign the judges to nonadjudicatory positions at the same pay, which would not violate civil-service rules.

Dana Marks, an immigration judge in San Francisco and the president of the judges’ union, said her organization opposed reassigning its new members.

“We are confident that many of the people hired under this process are excellent judges,” said Judge Marks, who was appointed in 1987, “and should not be penalized for having been hired under a process that they had no control over at the time, that some of them may not even have known was irregular or inappropriate.”

Temporarily reducing the number of judges might exacerbate an already crushing caseload.

Already, several immigration lawyers said they were considering invoking constitutional due-process rights to ask for new hearings for clients turned down by the politically selected judges, although people who have already been deported would most likely be ineligible for that.

Several law professors said they doubted such a potentially disruptive request would prevail. But regardless, they said, the recent disclosures have further tarnished the image of the immigration courts.

Last year, an academic study of 140,000 decisions over four years found sharp differences in the outcome of cases involving immigrants of the same nationality, even among judges in the same city.

The authors of the study, called “Refugee Roulette,” concluded that the facts of a case may be less important in determining whether someone is deported than which judge hears the case.

Nina Bernstein and Robert Gebeloff contributed reporting.

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LINKS AND VERY SHORT STORIES

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Texas: Militant Ordered to Stand Trial
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
A federal appeals court ordered a Cuban militant, Luis Posada Carriles, to stand trial in El Paso on immigration fraud charges. A three-judge panel of the United States Circuit Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, in New Orleans, ruled that Mr. Posada, 80, an anti-Castro militant, should stand trial on charges that he lied to federal authorities in his 2005 bid to become an American citizen. The criminal case had been dismissed last year when a federal district judge in El Paso, Kathleen Cardone, ruled that the government engaged in trickery and deceit by using a naturalization interview to build its case against Mr. Posada. Felipe Millan, one of Mr. Posada’s lawyers in El Paso, said Mr. Posada’s legal team was reviewing the decision and would decide on a course of action afterward.
August 15, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/15/us/15brfs-MILITANTORDE_BRF.html?ref=us

Canada: Rioting in Montreal
By IAN AUSTEN
World Briefing | The Americas
Three police officers were injured, one shot in the leg, during rioting in Montreal that erupted late Sunday in response to the killing of an 18-year-old by the police the day before. A fire station, fire trucks, cars and about 20 shops were vandalized or set ablaze. An ambulance worker was also injured. About 500 riot police officers quelled the violence.
August 12, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/12/world/americas/12briefs-RIOTINGINMON_BRF.html?ref=world

Arizona: Court Allows Fake Snow Opposed by Tribes
By RANDAL C. ARCHIBOLD
National Briefing | Southwest
A federal appeals court has ruled that a ski resort’s plan to use recycled wastewater for making snow would not violate the religious freedom of Indian groups who had claimed that the practice would be blasphemous to a mountain they hold sacred. The United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, ruling in a lawsuit against the Arizona Snowbowl near Flagstaff that was filed by 13 tribes and the Sierra Club, overturned a ruling by a smaller panel of the court that said the plan would violate the Religious Freedom Restoration Act. The 1993 act is intended to ensure that government actions do not infringe on religious freedom. Lawyers for the tribes and the Sierra Club said they expected to appeal the decision to the Supreme Court.
August 9, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/09/us/09brfs-COURTALLOWSF_BRF.html?ref=us

Bolivia: Tin Miners Die in Clashes
By REUTERS
World Briefing | The Americas
At least two miners were killed and many more were injured Tuesday in clashes between the police and workers at the country’s largest tin mine, Huanuni, local radio reported. The violence erupted when police officers clashed with groups of striking miners who had blocked a road, Interior Minister Alfredo Rada said. The strike is in support of a drive by a labor federation for higher pensions and a lowering of the retirement age to 55.
August 6, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/06/world/americas/06briefs-TINMINERSDIE_BRF.html?ref=world

Proposed Kosher Certification Rules
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Conservative Jewish leaders are seeking to protect workers and the environment at kosher food plants like the one raided this spring in Iowa. They issued draft guidelines for a kosher certification program meant as a supplement to the traditional certification process that measures compliance with Jewish dietary law. The proposed “hekhsher tzedek,” or “certificate of righteousness,” would be awarded to companies that pay fair wages, ensure workplace safety, follow government environmental regulations and treat animals humanely, among other proposed criteria. Support for the idea has been fueled by controversies at Agriprocessors Inc. in Postville, Iowa, the nation’s largest kosher meatpacking plant. In May, immigration officials raided the plant, arresting nearly 400 workers.
August 1, 2008
National Briefing | Immigration
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/01/us/01brfs-PROPOSEDKOSH_BRF.html?ref=us&pagewanted=print

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GENERAL ANNOUNCEMENTS AND INFORMATION

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12 year old Ossetian girl tells the truth about Georgia.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5idQm8YyJs4

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SAN FRANCISCO IS A SANCTUARY CITY! STOP THE MIGRA-ICE RAIDS!

Despite calling itself a "sanctuary city", S.F. politicians are permitting the harrassment of undocumented immigrants and allowing the MIGRA-ICE police to enter the jail facilities.

We will picket any store that cooperates with the MIGRA or reports undocumented brothers and sisters. We demand AMNESTY without conditions!

BRIGADES AGAINST THE RAIDS
project of BARRIO UNIDO
(415)431-9925

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Canada: American Deserter Must Leave
By IAN AUSTEN
August 14, 2008
World Briefing | Americas
Jeremy Hinzman, a deserter from the United States Army, was ordered Wednesday to leave Canada by Sept. 23. Mr. Hinzman, a member of the 82nd Airborne Division, left the Army for Canada in January 2004 and later became the first deserter to formally seek refuge there from the war in Iraq. He has been unable to obtain permanent immigrant status, and in November, the Supreme Court of Canada declined to hear an appeal of his case. Vanessa Barrasa, a spokeswoman for the Canada Border Services Agency, said Mr. Hinzman, above, had been ordered to leave voluntarily. In July, another American deserter was removed from Canada by border officials after being arrested. Although the Conservative government of Prime Minister Stephen Harper has not backed the Iraq war, it has shown little sympathy for American deserters, a significant change from the Vietnam War era.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/14/world/americas/14briefs-canada.html?ref=world

Iraq War resister Robin Long jailed, facing three years in Army stockade

Free Robin Long now!
Support GI resistance!

Soldier Who Deserted to Canada Draws 15-Month Term
By DAN FROSCH
August 23, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/23/us/23resist.html?ref=us

What you can do now to support Robin

1. Donate to Robin's legal defense

Online: http://couragetoresist.org/robinlong

By mail: Make checks out to “Courage to Resist / IHC” and note “Robin Long” in the memo field. Mail to:

Courage to Resist
484 Lake Park Ave #41
Oakland CA 94610

Courage to Resist is committed to covering Robin’s legal and related defense expenses. Thank you for helping make that possible.

Also: You are also welcome to contribute directly to Robin’s legal expenses via his civilian lawyer James Branum. Visit girightslawyer.com, select "Pay Online via PayPal" (lower left), and in the comments field note “Robin Long”. Note that this type of donation is not tax-deductible.

2. Send letters of support to Robin

Robin Long, CJC
2739 East Las Vegas
Colorado Springs CO 80906

Robin’s pre-trial confinement has been outsourced by Fort Carson military authorities to the local county jail.

Robin is allowed to receive hand-written or typed letters only. Do NOT include postage stamps, drawings, stickers, copied photos or print articles. Robin cannot receive packages of any type (with the book exception as described below).

3. Send Robin a money order for commissary items

Anything Robin gets (postage stamps, toothbrush, shirts, paper, snacks, supplements, etc.) must be ordered through the commissary. Each inmate has an account to which friends may make deposits. To do so, a money order in U.S. funds must be sent to the address above made out to "Robin Long, EPSO". The sender’s name must be written on the money order.

4. Send Robin a book

Robin is allowed to receive books which are ordered online and sent directly to him at the county jail from Amazon.com or Barnes and Noble. These two companies know the procedure to follow for delivering books for inmates.

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Yet Another Insult: Mumia Abu-Jamal Denied Full-Court Hearing by 3rd Circuit
& Other News on Mumia

This mailing sent by the Labor Action Committee To Free Mumia Abu-Jamal

PLEASE FORWARD AND DISTRIBUTE WIDELY

1. Mumia Abu-Jamal Denied Full-Court Hearing by 3rd Circuit
2. Upcoming Events for Mumia
3. New Book on the framing of Mumia

1. MUMIA DENIED AGAIN -- Adding to its already rigged, discriminatory record with yet another insult to the world's most famous political prisoner, the federal court for the 3rd Circuit in Philadelphia has refused to give Mumia Abu-Jamal an en banc, or full court, hearing. This follows the rejection last March by a 3-judge panel of the court, of what is likely Mumia's last federal appeal.

The denial of an en banc hearing by the 3rd Circuit, upholding it's denial of the appeal, is just the latest episode in an incredible year of shoving the overwhelming evidence of Mumia's innocence under a rock. Earlier in the year, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court also rejected Jamal's most recent state appeal. Taken together, state and federal courts in 2008 have rejected or refused to hear all the following points raised by Mumia's defense:

1. The state's key witness, Cynthia White, was pressured by police to lie on the stand in order to convict Mumia, according to her own admission to a confidant (other witnesses agreed she wasn't on the scene at all)

2. A hospital "confession" supposedly made by Mumia was manufactured by police. The false confession was another key part of the state's wholly-manufactured "case."

3. The 1995 appeals court judge, Albert Sabo--the same racist who presided at Mumia's original trial in 1982, where he said, "I'm gonna help 'em fry the n....r"--was prejudiced against him. This fact was affirmed even by Philadelphia's conservative newspapers at the time.

4. The prosecutor prejudiced the jury against inn ocence until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt, by using a slimy tactic already rejected by the courts. But the prosecutor was upheld in Mumia's case!

5. The jury was racially skewed when the prosecution excluded most blacks from the jury, a practice banned by law, but, again, upheld against Mumia!

All of these defense claims were proven and true. But for the courts, these denials were just this year’s trampling on the evidence! Other evidence dismissed or ignored over the years include: hit-man Arnold Beverly said back in the 1990s that he, not Mumia, killed the slain police officer (Faulkner). Beverly passed a lie detector test and was willing to testify, but he got no hearing in US courts! Also, Veronica Jones, who saw two men run from the scene just after the shooting, was coerced by police to lie at the 1982 trial, helping to convict Mumia. But when she admitted this lie and told the truth on appeal in 1996, she was dismissed by prosecutor-in-robes Albert Sabo in 1996 as "not credible!" (She continues to support Mumia, and is writing a book on her experiences.) And William Singletary, the one witness who saw the whole thing and had no reason to lie, and who affirmed that someone else did the shooting, said that Mumia only arriv ed on the scene AFTER the officer was shot. His testimony has been rejected by the courts on flimsy grounds. And the list goes on.

FOR THE COURTS, INNOCENCE IS NO DEFENSE! And if you're a black revolutionary like Mumia the fix is in big-time. Illusions in Mumia getting a "new trial" out of this racist, rigged, kangaroo-court system have been dealt a harsh blow by the 3rd Circuit. We need to build a mass movement, and labor action, to free Mumia now!

2. UPCOMING EVENTS FOR MUMIA --

SAN FRANCISCO BAY AREA -- Speaking Tour by J Patrick O'Connor, the author of THE FRAMING OF MUMIA ABU-JAMAL, in the first week of October 2008, sponsored by the Mobilization To Free Mumia. Contributing to this tour, the Labor Action Committee To Free Mumia will hold a public meeting with O'Connor on Friday October 3rd, place to be announced. San Francisco, South Bay and other East Bay venues to be announced. Contact the Mobilization at 510 268-9429, or the LAC at 510 763-2347, for more information.

3. NEW BOOK ON MUMIA

Efficiently and Methodically Framed--Mumia is innocent! That is the conclusion of THE FRAMING OF MUMIA ABU-JAMAL, by J Patrick O'Connor (Lawrence Hill Books), published earlier this year. The author is a former UPI reporter who took an interest in Mumia's case. He is now the editor of Crime Magazine (www.crimemagazine.com).

O'Connor offers a fresh perspective, and delivers a clear and convincing breakdown on perhaps the most notorious frame-up since Sacco and Vanzetti. THE FRAMING OF MUMIA ABU-JAMAL is based on a thorough analysis of the 1982 trial and the 1995-97 appeals hearings, as well as previous writings on this case, and research on the MOVE organization (with which Mumia identifies), and the history of racist police brutality in Philadelphia.

While leaving some of the evidence of Mumia's innocence unconsidered or disregarded, this book nevertheless makes clear that there is a veritable mountain of evidence--most of it deliberately squashed by the courts--that shows that Mumia was blatantly and deliberately framed by corrupt cops and courts, who "fixed" this case against him from the beginning. This is a case not just of police corruption, or a racist lynching, though it is both. The courts are in this just as deep as the cops, and it reaches to the top of the equally corrupt political system.

"This book is the first to convincingly show how the Philadelphia Police Department and District Attorney's Office efficiently and methodically framed [Mumia Abu-Jamal]." (from the book jacket)

The Labor Action Committee To Free Mumia Abu-Jamal has a limited number of THE FRAMING ordered from the publisher at a discount. We sold our first order of this book, and are now able to offer it at a lower price. $12 covers shipping. Send payment to us at our address below:

The Labor Action Committee To Free Mumia Abu-Jamal
PO Box 16222 • Oakland CA 94610 • 510.763.2347
www.laboractionmumia.org • LACFreeMumia@aol.com

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Sami Al-Arian Subjected to Worst Prison Conditions since Florida
Despite grant of bail, government continues to hold him
Dr. Al-Arian handcuffed

Hanover, VA - July 27, 2008 -

More than two weeks after being granted bond by a federal judge, Sami Al-Arian is still being held in prison. In fact, Dr. Al-Arian is now being subjected to the worst treatment by prison officials since his stay in Coleman Federal Penitentiary in Florida three years ago.

On July 12th, Judge Leonie Brinkema pronounced that Dr. Al-Arian was not a danger to the community nor a flight risk, and accordingly granted him bail before his scheduled August 13th trial. Nevertheless, the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) invoked the jurisdiction it has held over Dr. Al-Arian since his official sentence ended last April to keep him from leaving prison. The ICE is ostensibly holding Dr. Al-Arian to complete deportation procedures but, given that Dr. Al-Arian's trial will take place in less than three weeks, it would seem somewhat unlikely that the ICE will follow through with such procedures in the near future.

Not content to merely keep Dr. Al-Arian from enjoying even a very limited stint of freedom, the government is using all available means to try to psychologically break him. Instead of keeping him in a prison close to the Washington DC area where his two oldest children live, the ICE has moved him to Pamunkey Regional Jail in Hanover, VA, more than one hundred miles from the capital. Regardless, even when Dr. Al-Arian was relatively close to his children, they were repeatedly denied visitation requests.

More critically, this distance makes it extremely difficult for Dr. Al-Arian to meet with his attorneys in the final weeks before his upcoming trial. This is the same tactic employed by the government in 2005 to try to prevent Dr. Al-Arian from being able to prepare a full defense.

Pamunkey Regional Jail has imposed a 23-hour lock-down on Dr. Al-Arian and has placed him in complete isolation, despite promises from the ICE that he would be kept with the general inmate population. Furthermore, the guards who transported him were abusive, shackling and handcuffing him behind his back for the 2.5-hour drive, callously disregarding the fact that his wrist had been badly injured only a few days ago. Although he was in great pain throughout the trip, guards refused to loosen the handcuffs.

At the very moment when Dr. Al-Arian should be enjoying a brief interlude of freedom after five grueling years of imprisonment, the government has once again brazenly manipulated the justice system to deliver this cruel slap in the face of not only Dr. Al-Arian, but of all people of conscience.

Make a Difference! Call Today!

Call Now!

Last April, your calls to the Hampton Roads Regional Jail pressured prison officials to stop their abuse of Dr. Al-Arian after only a few days.
Friends, we are asking you to make a difference again by calling:

Pamunkey Regional Jail: (804) 365-6400 (press 0 then ask to speak to the Superintendent's office). Ask why Dr. Al-Arian has been put under a 23-hour lockdown, despite the fact that a federal judge has clearly and unambiguously pronounced that he is not a danger to anyone and that, on the contrary, he should be allowed bail before his trial.

- If you do not reach the superintendent personally, leave a message on the answering machine. Call back every day until you do speak to the superintendent directly.
- Be polite but firm.

- After calling, click here to let us know you called.

Don't forget: your calls DO make a difference.

FORWARD TO ALL YOUR FRIENDS!

Write to Dr. Al-Arian

For those of you interested in sending personal letters of support to Dr. Al-Arian:

If you would like to write to Dr. Al-Arian, his new
address is:

Dr. Sami Al-Arian
Pamunkey Regional Jail
P.O. Box 485
Hanover, VA 23069

Email Tampa Bay Coalition for Justice and Peace: tampabayjustice@yahoo.com

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Video: The Carbon Connection -- The human impact of carbon trading

[This is an eye-opening and important video for all who are interested in our environment...bw]

Two communities affected by one new global market – the trade in carbon
dioxide. In Scotland, a town has been polluted by oil and chemical
companies since the 1940s. In Brazil, local people's water and land is
being swallowed up by destructive monoculture eucalyptus tree
plantations. Both communities now share a new threat.

As part of the deal to reduce greenhouse gases that cause dangerous
climate change, major polluters can now buy carbon credits that allow
them to pay someone else to reduce emissions instead of cutting their
own pollution. What this means for those living next to the oil industry
in Scotland is the continuation of pollution caused by their toxic
neighbours. Meanwhile in Brazil, the schemes that generate carbon
credits give an injection of cash for more planting of the damaging
eucalyptus plantations.

40 minutes | PAL/NTSC | English/Spanish/Portuguese subtitles.The Carbon Connection is a Fenceline Films presentation in partnership with the Transnational Institute Environmental Justice Project and Carbon Trade Watch, the Alert Against the Green Desert Movement, FASE-ES, and the Community Training and Development Unit.

Watch at http://links.org.au/node/575

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Torture
On the Waterboard
How does it feel to be “aggressively interrogated”? Christopher Hitchens found out for himself, submitting to a brutal waterboarding session in an effort to understand the human cost of America’s use of harsh tactics at Guantánamo and elsewhere. VF.com has the footage. Related: “Believe Me, It’s Torture,” from the August 2008 issue.
http://www.vanityfair.com/politics/features/video/2008/hitchens_video200808

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Alison Bodine defense Committee
Lift the Two-year Ban
http://alisonbodine.blogspot.com/

Watch the Sept 28 Video on Alison's Case!
http://alisonbodine.blogspot.com/2007/10/blog-post.html

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The Girl Who Silenced the World at the UN!
Born and raised in Vancouver, Severn Suzuki has been working on environmental and social justice issues since kindergarten. At age 9, she and some friends started the Environmental Children's Organization (ECO), a small group of children committed to learning and teaching other kids about environmental issues. They traveled to 1992's UN Earth Summit, where 12 year-old Severn gave this powerful speech that deeply affected (and silenced) some of the most prominent world leaders. The speech had such an impact that she has become a frequent invitee to many U.N. conferences.
[Note: the text of her speech is also available at this site...bw]
http://www.karmatube.org/videos.php?id=433

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MINIATURE EARTH
http://www.miniature-earth.com/me_english.htm

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"Dear Canada: Let U.S. war resisters stay!"
http://www.couragetoresist.org/x/content/view/499/89/

Russell Means Speaking at the Transform Columbus Day Rally
"If voting could do anything it would be illegal!"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_8Lri1-6aoY

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Stop the Termination or the Cherokee Nation
http://groups.msn.com/BayAreaIndianCalendar/activismissues.msnw?action=get_message&mview=1&ID_Message=5580

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We Didn't Start the Fire
http://yeli.us/Flash/Fire.html

I Can't Take it No More
http://lefti.blogspot.com/2007_11_01_archive.html#9214483115237950361

The Art of Mental Warfare
http://artofmentalwarfare.com/pog/artofmentalwarfarecom-the-warning/

MONEY AS DEBT
http://video. google.com/ videoplay? docid=-905047436 2583451279
http://www.moneyasd ebt.net/

UNCONSTITUTIONAL
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=6582099850410121223&pr=goog-sl

IRAQ FOR SALE
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-6621486727392146155

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Port of Olympia Anti-Militarization Action Nov. 2007
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SOkn2Fg7R8w

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"They have a new gimmick every year. They're going to take one of their boys, black boys, and put him in the cabinet so he can walk around Washington with a cigar. Fire on one end and fool on the other end. And because his immediate personal problem will have been solved he will be the one to tell our people: 'Look how much progress we're making. I'm in Washington, D.C., I can have tea in the White House. I'm your spokesman, I'm your leader.' While our people are still living in Harlem in the slums. Still receiving the worst form of education.

"But how many sitting here right now feel that they could [laughs] truly identify with a struggle that was designed to eliminate the basic causes that create the conditions that exist? Not very many. They can jive, but when it comes to identifying yourself with a struggle that is not endorsed by the power structure, that is not acceptable, that the ground rules are not laid down by the society in which you live, in which you are struggling against, you can't identify with that, you step back.

"It's easy to become a satellite today without even realizing it. This country can seduce God. Yes, it has that seductive power of economic dollarism. You can cut out colonialism, imperialism and all other kind of ism, but it's hard for you to cut that dollarism. When they drop those dollars on you, you'll fold though."

—MALCOLM X, 1965
http://www.accuracy.org/newsrelease.php?articleId=987

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A little gem:
Michael Moore Faces Off With Stephen Colbert [VIDEO]
http://www.alternet.org/blogs/video/57492/

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LAPD vs. Immigrants (Video)
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/qws/ff/qr?term=lapd&Submit=S&Go.x=0&Go.y=0&Go=Search&st=s

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Dr. Julia Hare at the SOBA 2007
http://mysite.verizon.net/vzeo9ewi/proudtobeblack2/

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"We are far from that stage today in our era of the absolute
lie; the complete and totalitarian lie, spread by the
monopolies of press and radio to imprison social
consciousness." December 1936, "In 'Socialist' Norway,"
by Leon Trotsky: “Leon Trotsky in Norway” was transcribed
for the Internet by Per I. Matheson [References from
original translation removed]
http://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/1936/12/nor.htm

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Wealth Inequality Charts
http://www.faireconomy.org/research/wealth_charts.html

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MALCOLM X: Oxford University Debate
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dmzaaf-9aHQ

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"There comes a times when silence is betrayal."
--Martin Luther King

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YouTube clip of Che before the UN in 1964
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CtATT8GXkWg&mode=related&search

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The Wealthiest Americans Ever
NYT Interactive chart
JULY 15, 2007
http://www.nytimes.com/ref/business/20070715_GILDED_GRAPHIC.html

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New Orleans After the Flood -- A Photo Gallery
http://www.dissentmagazine.org/article/?article=795
This email was sent to you as a service, by Roland Sheppard.
Visit my website at: http://web.mac.com/rolandgarret

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[For some levity...Hans Groiner plays Monk
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=51bsCRv6kI0
...bw]

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Which country should we invade next?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q3g_zqz3VjY

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My Favorite Mutiny, The Coup
http://www.myspace.com/thecoupmusic

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Michael Moore- The Awful Truth
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xeOaTpYl8mE

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Morse v. Frederick Supreme Court arguments
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n_LsGoDWC0o

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Free Speech 4 Students Rally - Media Montage
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RfCjfod8yuw

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'My son lived a worthwhile life'
In April 2003, 21-year old Tom Hurndall was shot in the head
in Gaza by an Israeli soldier as he tried to save the lives of three
small children. Nine months later, he died, having never
recovered consciousness. Emine Saner talks to his mother
Jocelyn about her grief, her fight to make the Israeli army
accountable for his death and the book she has written
in his memory.
Monday March 26, 2007
The Guardian
http://www.guardian.co.uk/israel/Story/0,,2042968,00.html

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Introducing...................the Apple iRack
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o-KWYYIY4jQ

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"A War Budget Leaves Every Child Behind."
[A T-shirt worn by some teachers at Roosevelt High School
in L.A. as part of their campaign to rid the school of military
recruiters and JROTC--see Article in Full item number 4, below...bw]

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"200 million children in the world sleep in the streets today.
Not one of them is Cuban."
(A sign in Havana)
Venceremos
View sign at bottom of page at:
http://www.cubasolidarity.net/index.html
[Thanks to Norma Harrison for sending this...bw]

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FIGHTBACK! A Collection of Socialist Essays
By Sylvia Weinstein
http://www.walterlippmann.com/sylvia-weinstein-fightback-intro.html

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[The Scab
"After God had finished the rattlesnake, the toad,
and the vampire, he had some awful substance left with
which he made a scab."
"A scab is a two-legged animal with a corkscrew soul,
a water brain, a combination backbone of jelly and glue.
Where others have hearts, he carries a tumor of rotten
principles." "When a scab comes down the street,
men turn their backs and angels weep in heaven, and
the devil shuts the gates of hell to keep him out."
"No man (or woman) has a right to scab so long as there
is a pool of water to drown his carcass in,
or a rope long enough to hang his body with.
Judas was a gentleman compared with a scab.
For betraying his master, he had character enough
to hang himself." A scab has not.
"Esau sold his birthright for a mess of pottage.
Judas sold his Savior for thirty pieces of silver.
Benedict Arnold sold his country for a promise of
a commision in the british army."
The scab sells his birthright, country, his wife,
his children and his fellowmen for an unfulfilled
promise from his employer.
Esau was a traitor to himself; Judas was a traitor
to his God; Benedict Arnold was a traitor to his country;
a scab is a traitor to his God, his country,
his family and his class."
Author --- Jack London (1876-1916)...Roland Sheppard
http://web.mac.com/rolandgarret]

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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

"Award-Winning Writer/Filmmaker Donald L. Vasicek Launches New Sand
Creek Massacre Website"

May 21, 2008 -- CENTENNIAL, CO -- Award-winning filmmaker, Donald L.
Vasicek, has launched a new Sand Creek Massacre website. Titled,
"The Sand Creek Massacre", the site contains in depth witness
accounts of the massacre, the award-winning Sand Creek Massacre
trailer for viewing, the award-winning Sand Creek Massacre
documentary short for viewing, the story of the Sand Creek Massacre,
and a Shop to purchase Sand Creek Massacre DVD's and lesson
plans including the award-winning documentary film/educational DVD.

Vasicek, a board member of The American Indian Genocide Museum
(www.aigenom.com)in Houston, Texas, said, "The website was launched
to inform, to educate, and to provide educators, historians, students
and all others the accessibility to the Sand Creek Massacre story."

The link/URL to the website is sandcreekmassacre.net.
###

Contact:
Donald L. Vasicek
Olympus Films+, LLC
http://www.donvasicek.com
dvasicek@earthlink.net