BAUAW NEWSLETTER - THURSDAY, MAY 14, 2009

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KEVIN COOPER ALERT:

Dear all,

This morning's Chronicle has an opinion piece by Debra J. Saunders that is a smear on Kevin Cooper and the dissenting judges on the 9th circuit court. This follows closely on her smear on Mumia. (I wonder if she is a member of the Fraternal order of Police??)
Here's a key quote from today's piece:

"Cooper's lawyers have long argued that three white men killed the Ryens and Hughes - an argument Fletcher [the dissenting judge] repeated. But for Fletcher's scenario to work, a number of law enforcement officers would have had to engage in a complicated fraud to frame an innocent black man starting in 1983 and continuing as late as the DNA testing in 2002. If Fletcher is right, a lot of cops should be under investigation - then behind bars."

Indeed!

This piece must be answered. I wonder if Kevin's attorneys would do so.

Has anyone noticed if Saunders attacked Troy Davis too?

Carole Seligman, Bay Area United Against War

Kevin Cooper is guilty
Debra J. Saunders
Thursday, May 14, 2009
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/05/14/EDF517J2V4.DTL

[This is truly a horrible article by an author oblivious to the facts. Just read the Request denial publication at:

http://www.sbsun.com/news/ci_12346857

You will see proof of a consistent frame-up by police. Do the police plant evidence? ALL THE TIME--IT'S ROUTINE!!!...Bonnie Weinstein]

Appeals court denies Kevin Cooper request
Will Bigham, Staff Writer
Posted: 05/11/2009 06:57:04 PM PDT
http://www.sbsun.com/news/ci_12346857
Download: Request denial publication at:
http://www.sbsun.com/news/ci_12346857
(See article in full, no. 11, below)

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Bay Area United Against War Newsletter
Table of Contents:
A. EVENTS AND ACTIONS
B. SPECIAL APPEALS, VIDEOS AND ONGOING CAMPAIGNS
C. ARTICLES IN FULL

(If you would like to be added to the BAUAW list-serve and receive this newsletter via email, send your name (opitional) and email address to: bonnieweinstein@yahoo.com -- it's free. Please put "Add me to the list" in the subject line.)

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A. EVENTS AND ACTIONS

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DEAR FRIENDS, PLEASE JOIN US AT THE PANHANDLE AT FELL & MASONIC, FRI., 5/15 FROM 6 - 8 PM. WE WILL DISTRIBUTE INFORMATION RE: MILITARY SPENDING & THE IRAQ/AFGHANISTAN $84 BILLION SUPPLEMENTAL UNBELIEVEABLY, THE HOUSE APPROPRIATIONS COMMITTEE HAS ADDED $10 BILLION TO THE LATTER! THE VOTE IS VERY SOON.

NOW, A HALF MILLION PAKISTANIS ARE DISPLACED AS THE WAR EXPANDS; AFGHAN VILLAGERS LIVING IN FRAGILE MUD-BRICK HOMES ARE SUBJECT TO DRONE ATTACKS; AND, HALF A MILLION IN THE U.S.A. FACE LAYOFFS EACH MONTH.

LET'S SAY NO MORE! (SHOWING UP FOR 1/2 HR. OKAY).

kathy lipscomb
for the Iraq Moratorium Campaign

sfbay.iraqmoratorium@gmail.com

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End the Siege of Gaza! Rally in San Francisco on June 6
Solidarity Day on the 42nd Anniversary of Israel's seizure of Gaza
Support the Palestinian Right of Return! Stop U.S. Aid to Israel!
Saturday, June 6
12:00 noon
UN Plaza (7th and Market Sts.)

Saturday, June 6 marks the 42nd anniversary of the Israeli seizure of Gaza. Organizations and individuals in solidarity with the people of Palestine will be taking to the streets once again to demand: End the Siege of Gaza!

The world looked on in horror this past winter as Israel mercilessly starved and bombed the people of Gaza, killing around 1,200 Palestinians (at least a third of whom were children). The Arab world now refers to the dark days from the end of December to mid-January "The Gaza Massacre." Although the mainstream media no longer focuses on Gaza, the suffering continues there nonetheless. Using the pretext of combating terrorism, Israel has refused to allow in even one truckload of cement into Gaza. In other words, the city that was reduced to rubble still lies in rubble today. All these months later, people are still living in tents and are scarcely able to secure the necessities of life.

People of conscience around the world continue to raise their voices in outrage at this crime against humanity, and in solidarity with our brothers and sisters in Gaza. We will also stand for all Palestinian people's inalienable right to return to their homes from which they were evicted. Let your voice be heard -- join us Saturday, June 6, at 12 noon at UN Plaza in San Francisco (7th and Market Sts.). There will be a joint action in Washington DC on June 6.

Sponsoring organizations include ANSWER Coalition (Act Now to Stop War & End Racism), Muslim American Society (MAS) Freedom, National Council of Arab Americans (NCA), Free Palestine Alliance (FPA), Al-Awda - Palestine Right of Return Coalition, American Muslims for Palestine (AMP) and more!

Contact us at 415-821-6545 or answer@answersf.org to endorse or volunteer!

The June 6 demonstration is a major undertaking and we can't do it without the support of the large number of people who are standing with Palestine. Please click this link right now to make a generous donation:

https://secure2.convio.net/pep/site/Donation?ACTION=SHOW_DONATION_OPTIONS&CAMPAIGN_ID=1443&JServSessionIdr010=5e0ldsoh91.app6a

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ATTEND THE JULY 10 NATIONAL ASSEMBLY CONFERENCE IN PITTSBURGH!
REGISTER FOR THE CONFERENCE and DOWNLOAD PRINTABLE BROCHURE (8.5 X 14) at:
https://natassembly.org/Home_Page.html
Dear Brothers and Sisters:

On behalf of the National Assembly to End the Iraq and Afghanistan Wars and Occupations, we are writing to invite you and members of your organization to attend a national antiwar conference to be held July 10-12, 2009 at La Roche College in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

The purpose of this conference is to bring together antiwar and social justice activists from across the country to discuss and decide what we can do together to end the wars, occupations, bombing attacks, threats and interventions that are taking place in the Middle East and beyond, which the U.S. government is conducting and promoting.

We believe that such a conference will be welcomed by the peoples of Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Palestine and Iran, who are the victims of these policies. It will also be welcomed by victims of the depression-type conditions in this country, with tens of millions losing jobs, homes, health care coverage and pensions, while trillions of dollars are spent bailing out Wall Street and the banks, waging expansionist wars and occupations, and funding the Pentagon's insatiable appetite.

This will be the National Assembly's second conference. The first was held in Cleveland last June and it was attended by over 400 people, including top leaders of the antiwar movement and activists from many states. After discussion and debate, attendees voted - on the basis of one person, one vote - to urge the movement to join together for united spring actions. The National Assembly endorsed and helped build the March actions in Washington D.C., San Francisco and Los Angeles, and the April actions in New York City.

We are all aware of the developments since our last conference - the election of a new administration in the U.S., the ongoing occupation of Iraq, the escalation in Afghanistan and Pakistan, the horrific Israeli bombing of Gaza, and the extreme peril of an additional war in the Middle East, this time against Iran. Given all this, it is crystal clear that a strong, united, independent antiwar movement is needed now more than ever. We urge you to help build such a movement by attending the July conference and sharing your ideas and proposals with other attendees regarding where the antiwar movement goes from here.

For more information, please visit the National Assembly's website at natassembly.org, email us at natassembly@aol.com, or call 216-736-4704. We will be glad to send you upon request brochures announcing the July conference (a copy is attached) and you can also register for the conference online. [Please be aware that La Roche College is making available private rooms with baths at a very reasonable rate, but will only guarantee them if reserved by June 25.]

Yours for peace, justice and unity,
National Assembly Administrative Body

Zaineb Alani, Author of The Words of an Iraqi War Survivor & More; Colia Clark, Chair, Richard Wright Centennial Committee, Grandmothers for Mumia Abu-Jamal; Greg Coleridge, Coordinator, Northeast Ohio Anti-War Coalition (NOAC) and Economic Justice and Empowerment Program Director, Northeast Ohio American Friends Service Committee (AFSC); Alan Dale, Iraq Peace Action Coalition (MN); Donna Dewitt, President, South Carolina AFL-CIO; Mike Ferner, President, Veterans for Peace; Jerry Gordon, Former National Co-Coordinator of the Vietnam-Era National Peace Action Coalition (NPAC) and Member, U.S. Labor Against the War Steering Committee; Jonathan Hutto, Navy Petty Officer, Author of Anti-War Soldier; Co-Founder of Appeal for Redress; Marilyn Levin, Coordinating Committee, Greater Boston United for Justice with Peace, Middle East Crisis Coalition; Jeff Mackler, Founder, San Francisco Mobilization for Peace, Jobs and Justice; Fred Mason, President, Maryland State and District of Columbia AFL-CIO and Co-Convenor, U.S. Labor Against the War; Mary Nichols-Rhodes, Progressive Democrats of America/Ohio Branch; Lynne Stewart, Lynne Stewart Organization/Long Time Attorney and Defender of Constitutional Rights [Bay Area United Against War also was represented at the founding conference and will be there again this year. Carole Seligman and I initiated the motion to include adding opposition to the War in Afghanistan to the demands and title of the National Assembly.

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B. SPECIAL APPEALS, VIDEOS AND ONGOING CAMPAIGNS

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BAY AREA UNITED AGAINST WAR
OPEN LETTER TO THE SAN FRANCISCO BOARD OF EDUCATION MEMBERS

Congratulations to Jane Kim, Kim-Shree Maufas and Sandra Fewer for standing strong to prevent our kids from more of the following:

Counseling Was Ordered for Soldier in Iraq Shooting
By JAMES DAO and LIZETTE ALVAREZ
May 13, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/13/world/middleeast/13shoot.html?ref=us
(see Article in Full no. 13 below)

The rest of you can hold yourselves responsible for what is bound to happen to some of our children JROTC is now training. The military is not a game. JROTC is not a game. The blood, death, rape, murder, destruction is ongoing in Iraq, Afghanistan and now Pakistan! The U.S. military is turning our children into cold-blooded murderers. JROTC is their fake introduction into military life--as if it's all about achievement ribbons, awards and fatherly encouragement for advancement!

You four--Rachel Norton, Hydra Mendoza, Norman Yee and Jill Wynns--the blood will be on your hands. Real blood; real guns; real bombs; real lives from a fake PE program run, owned and operated by the U.S. military--the military that Martin Luther King coined, "the greatest purveyor of violence in the world!"

We will not stop our fight against military presence--in all it's forms--preying on our children in our schools.

Sincerely,

Bonnie Weinstein,

Bay Area United Against War, bauaw.org

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Zombie Bank
http://www.songlyricsatoz.com/video_nmKWJMENMxE.html

I got my money in a zombie bank, a zombie bank, a zombie bank.
I got my money in a zombie bank.
They're dead but they just don't know it.
I check my balance and there's money there.
And yet Paul Krugman says the cupboard's bare.
And all the tellers have a zombie stare.
They're dead but they just don't know it.

My money's in a bank that doesn't lend, doesn't spend.
It's all pretend.
They flunked the stress test. They've reached the end.
They're dead by they just don't know it.

They're too big to fail.
They're too big for jail.
They're sucking money on a breathtaking scale.
Do the math. Do the monster math.
Zombie bank, zombie bank.
I've got my money in a zombie bank.
They're dead but they just don't know it.

- Tom Chapin

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Alert: This could be it for Troy Davis
Global Day of Action for Troy Davis
Tuesday, May 19, 2009
http://www.amnestyusa.org/death-penalty/troy-davis-finality-over-fairness/sign-up-for-the-day-of-action-for-troy-davis/page.do?id=1011672&ICID=A0904A4&tr=y&auid=4803928

While news channels across the country are consumed with counting up to President Obama's first 100 days in office, Troy Davis has been counting down his last 30 days before a new execution date could be set. Help make these extra days count.
On May 19th help save Troy Davis by putting together any activity, event or creative action that calls attention to his case.

The 30-day stay issued by the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals expires on May 15th.

So now is the time for us to organize to save the life of Troy Anthony Davis. We're asking everybody to come out strong on May 19th - a day marked in human rights calendars across the world as the Global Day of Action for Troy Davis.

Whether you're holding a "Text TROY to 90999" sign on a busy street or organizing your local Amnesty chapter to hold a public demonstration or vigil, we need everybody to contribute their time on May 19th to make sure that the state of Georgia does not kill a man who may well be innocent. Register your Global Day of Action for Troy Davis activity or event now.

We know that time is short for organizing public events, but an execution date could be set as early as late May, so it is essential that action be taken soon. It's also really important that we get an accurate count of how many events and activities are taking place on May 19th, so we can share this information with officials in Georgia. Our emails and phone calls have gone a long way in buying Troy some much-needed time, but now we've got to take our action to the streets.

We appreciate the tens of thousands of you who have stood in Troy's corner while heart-stopping scenes have unfolded. On three separate occasions, Troy has been scheduled for execution. And on three separate occasions, his life was saved within a short period of time, even minutes, of his scheduled execution date.

Each time, those last minute stays came after people like you turned out by the thousands to rally in his defense. It was no coincidence. Troy's sister and long-time Amnesty activist, Martina Correia, has acknowledged Amnesty's powerful role in saving her brother's life each of those times.

Now here we are again with the clock winding down. While we can see little opportunity for legal recourse or second chances, we know that your advocacy has a strong record of making amazing things happen.

When we first introduced you to Troy Davis in early 2007, few people outside of Georgia knew about the injustice taking place. In the past two years, countless people have come to see Troy's case as a prime example of why the death penalty must be abolished - the risk of executing someone for a crime they did not commit is just too high.

We are serious when we say that we need everyone to support Troy Davis on May 19th by organizing their own event or awareness-raising activity.

After all, if you had 30 days left to fight for your life, wouldn't you want to know that you had thousands standing in your corner?

In Solidarity,

Sue Gunawardena-Vaughn
Director, Death Penalty Abolition Campaign
Amnesty International USA

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Snoutbreak '09 - The Last 100 Days
http://www.alternet.org/blogs/healthwellness/138768/jon_stewart_slams_media_swine_flu_fear_mongering_/

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Free Ehren Watada!
For more backfround on Lt. Ehren Watada, go to:
http://www.couragetoresist.org/x/content/view/702/1/

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C. ARTICLES IN FULL

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1) Homeownership Losses Are Greatest Among Minorities, Report Finds
By JOHN LELAND
May 13, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/13/us/13homeowner.html?ref=us

2) Formaldehyde Linked to Cancer Death
By RONI CARYN RABIN
May 13, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/13/health/13cancer.html?ref=us

3) Out-of-Wedlock Birthrates Are Soaring, U.S. Reports
By GARDINER HARRIS
May 13, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/13/health/13mothers.html?ref=health

4) New Commander for Afghanistan
Editorial
May 14, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/14/opinion/14thu1.html?adxnnl=1&adxnnlx=1242328087-nkVQPxyfeL1Q8HWe30kzxg

5) Jump in Food Costs Drives Up Prices
By JACK HEALY
May 15, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/15/business/economy/15econ.html?hp

6) Scouts Train to Fight Terrorists, and More
By JENNIFER STEINHAUER
May 14, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/14/us/14explorers.html?ref=us

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1) Homeownership Losses Are Greatest Among Minorities, Report Finds
By JOHN LELAND
May 13, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/13/us/13homeowner.html?ref=us

After a decade of growth, the gains made in homeownership by African-Americans and native-born Latinos have been eroding faster in the economic downturn than those of whites, according to a report issued Tuesday by the Pew Hispanic Center.

The report also suggests that the gains for minority groups, achieved from 1995 to 2004, were disproportionately tied to relaxed lending standards and subprime loans.

An exception to the reversal of homeownership gains, the research shows, can be found among foreign-born Latinos, whose rate of ownership, while low, has stalled during the downturn but has not fallen.

After peaking at 69 percent in 2004, the rate of homeownership for all American households declined to 67.8 percent in 2008. For African-American households, it fell to 47.5 percent in 2008 from 49.4 percent in 2004. Latinos, native and foreign-born together, had a longer period of growth, with homeownership rising until 2006, to 49.8 percent, before falling to 48.9 percent last year. Homeownership for native-born Latinos fell to 53.6 percent from a high of 56.2 percent in 2005.

The decline among whites was more modest, to 74.9 percent last year from 76.1 percent in 2004.

So was the decline among immigrants, to 52.9 percent last year from 53.3 percent in 2006. Latino immigrants, who have the lowest rate of homeownership among the groups studied, did not lose any ground, remaining at the high of 44.7 percent they reached in 2007.

The numbers are a reflection that immigrants today have typically been living in the country longer than immigrants of the past, said Rakesh Kochhar, associate director of research for the Pew Hispanic Center, a project of the nonprofit Pew Research Center. The longer immigrants are here, the more secure they tend to become. Among foreign-born Hispanics, "the force of assimilation into homeownership is strong," even during a downturn, Mr. Kochhar said.

The decline in homeownership among other groups, he said, reflects both high foreclosure rates and lower rates of home buying.

Even with the decline, the rate for all groups together remains higher than before the boom, with nearly 68 percent of American households owning homes last year, up from 64 percent in 1994.

The gaps between white and minority households remain significant, however, with homeownership rates for Asians (59.1 percent), blacks (47.5 percent) and Latinos (48.9 percent) well below the 74.9 percent among whites.

Like previous studies, the report found that blacks and Hispanics were more than twice as likely to have subprime mortgages as white homeowners, even among borrowers with comparable incomes. In 2006, the last year of heavy subprime lending, 17.5 percent of white home buyers took subprime loans, compared with 44.9 percent for Hispanics and 52.8 percent for blacks.

These loans, which typically require little or no down payment and are meant for borrowers with low credit scores, made homeownership possible for many black and Hispanic families during the boom years, but also led to high rates of foreclosure.

"Basically, that gap was closed on poor loans that never should have been made and wound up harming folks and their neighborhoods," said Kevin Stein, associate director of the California Reinvestment Coalition, an organization of nonprofit housing groups.

African-Americans and Latinos remain more likely than whites to be turned down for mortgages, with 26.1 percent of applications from Hispanics rejected in 2007, 30.4 percent of applications from blacks and 12.1 percent of applications from whites.

Though there were no figures available on the race or ethnicity of homeowners in foreclosure, the researchers found that counties with high concentrations of immigrants had particularly high foreclosure rates.

But the research did not suggest that high rates of immigration on their own caused high levels of foreclosure, Mr. Kochhar said. High unemployment, falling home prices, subprime loans and high ratios of debt to income all contributed.

Enrique Lopez, a Miami real estate agent, said that with the tightening of credit, his Hispanic clients had had a harder time getting mortgages than non-Hispanics, in part because they had lower credit scores.

Mr. Lopez, a member of the National Association of Hispanic Real Estate Professionals, said, "There are people we work with that make enough money, and we can't put them in homes."

Carmen Gentile contributed reporting.

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2) Formaldehyde Linked to Cancer Death
By RONI CARYN RABIN
May 13, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/13/health/13cancer.html?ref=us

Factory workers exposed to high levels of formaldehyde were more likely to die of cancers of the blood and lymphatic system than workers with low-level exposures, according to a study by researchers at the National Cancer Institute.

But the risk of dying of these cancers diminished over time after the exposure stopped, said Laura E. Beane Freeman, lead author of the study, which was published online Tuesday in The Journal of the National Cancer Institute.

The research looked at some 14,000 deaths among 25,619 workers, most of them white men, who began working before 1966 at 10 plants that produced formaldehyde and formaldehyde resin.

In the four ensuing decades, the researchers found, workers with the highest peak exposures to formaldehyde had a 37 percent greater risk of death from all blood and lymphatic cancers combined than those with lower peak exposures.

That is a lower risk of death from these cancers than was found in the same group of workers 10 years ago, when their risk was 50 percent higher than that of workers with lower exposure levels. The difference between the rates then and now indicates that this risk diminishes as time passes after exposure has ended.

"You usually don't develop cancer right away - there's a latency period," Dr. Freeman said. "Then, after you're not exposed to whatever it is - after people stop smoking for a while, for example - the risk returns down to that of the base-line population."

The exposure had ended by 1980 for a vast majority of the workers, who had either retired or moved to desk jobs. The researchers tracked cancer deaths among them through 2004.

Responding to the study, the Formaldehyde Council, a trade group, noted that it did not clearly establish a cause-and-effect relationship between formaldehyde and cancer. The council, which also pointed out that the government regulates the product, called for "a full scientific review of the health effects of formaldehyde" by the National Academy of Sciences.

Formaldehyde is widely used in manufacturing and as a preservative and disinfectant, although workplace exposures have decreased over time because of tighter regulations. The chemical has long been suspected of playing a role in the unusual number of leukemia deaths among pathologists and embalmers, who are periodically exposed to high levels.

Indeed, formaldehyde is also associated with nasopharyngeal cancer, a disease of the upper part of the throat, behind the nose, and has been classified as a human carcinogen by the International Agency for Research on Cancer.

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3) Out-of-Wedlock Birthrates Are Soaring, U.S. Reports
By GARDINER HARRIS
May 13, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/13/health/13mothers.html?ref=health

WASHINGTON - Unmarried mothers gave birth to 4 out of every 10 babies born in the United States in 2007, a share that is increasing rapidly both here and abroad, according to government figures released Wednesday.

Before 1970, most unmarried mothers were teenagers. But in recent years the birthrate among unmarried women in their 20s and 30s has soared - rising 34 percent since 2002, for example, in women ages 30 to 34. In 2007, women in their 20s had 60 percent of all babies born out of wedlock, teenagers had 23 percent and women 30 and older had 17 percent.

Much of the increase in unmarried births has occurred among parents who are living together but are not married, cohabitation arrangements that tend to be less stable than marriages, studies show.

The pattern has been particularly pronounced among Hispanic women, climbing 20 percent from 2002 to 2006, the most recent year for which racial breakdowns are available. Eleven percent of unmarried Hispanic women had a baby in 2006, compared with 7 percent of unmarried black women and 3 percent of unmarried white women, according to government data drawn from birth certificates.

Titled "Changing Patterns of Nonmarital Childbearing in the United States," the report was released by the National Center for Health Statistics, part of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Out-of-wedlock births are also rising in much of the industrialized world: in Iceland, 66 percent of children are born to unmarried mothers; in Sweden, the share is 55 percent. (In other societies, though, the phenomenon remains rare - just 2 percent in Japan, for example.)

But experts say the increases in the United States are of greater concern because couples in many other countries tend to be more stable and government support for children is often higher.

"In Sweden, you see very little variation in the outcome of children based on marital status. Everybody does fairly well," said Wendy Manning, a professor of sociology at Bowling Green State University in Ohio. "In the U.S., there's much more disparity."

Children born out of wedlock in the United States tend to have poorer health and educational outcomes than those born to married women, but that may be because unmarried mothers tend to share those problems.

Decades ago, pregnant women often married before giving birth. But the odds of separation and divorce in unions driven by pregnancy are relatively high. So when a woman gets pregnant, are children better off if their parents marry, cohabitate or do neither? That question is still unresolved, Dr. Manning said.

Some experts speculate that marriage or cohabitation cements financial and emotional bonds between children and fathers that survive divorce or separation, improving outcomes for children. But since familial instability is often damaging to children, they may be better off with mothers who never cohabitate or marry than with those who form unions that are later broken.

"There is no consensus on those questions," Dr. Manning said.

In an enduring mystery, birthrates for unmarried women in the United States stabilized between 1995 and 2002 and declined among unmarried teenagers and black women. But after 2002, the overall birthrate among unmarried women resumed its steady climb. In 1940, just 3.8 percent of births were to unmarried women.

The District of Columbia and Mississippi had the highest rates of out-of-wedlock births in 2007: 59 percent and 54 percent, respectively. The lowest rate, 20 percent, was in Utah. In New York, the rate was 41 percent; in New Jersey, 34 percent; and in Connecticut, 35 percent. Sarah S. Brown, chief executive of the National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy, a nonprofit advocacy group, said sex and pregnancy were handled far too cavalierly in the United States, where rates of unplanned pregnancies, births and abortions are far higher than those of other industrialized nations.

"These trends may meet the needs of young adults," she said, "but it's far from clear that it's helpful for children."

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4) New Commander for Afghanistan
Editorial
May 14, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/14/opinion/14thu1.html?adxnnl=1&adxnnlx=1242328087-nkVQPxyfeL1Q8HWe30kzxg

The war in Afghanistan is not going well. And President Obama has the right to choose his own top commander. We hope that his decision this week to fire Gen. David McKiernan and replace him with Lt. Gen. Stanley McChrystal means that the president and his team have come up with a strategy that will combine aggressive counterinsurgency tactics with economic development. That is the only chance for turning around a must-win war that America isn't winning.

We also hope that General McChrystal, who is an expert in special operations, will do a better job at limiting the number of civilian casualties that are helping to drive more Afghans into the Taliban camp.

Continued Taliban gains would bring even greater suffering to the Afghan people. It would also mean wider sanctuaries for terrorists plotting attacks against the United States and Europe and even greater instability in Pakistan. General McChrystal, a hard-driving and talented officer, impressed his superiors during his five years running Special Operations commando missions in Afghanistan and Iraq. That's a strong résumé. But other qualities are needed as well.

Success in Afghanistan will also require effective training for the Afghan Army and police forces so they can stand on their own, strengthened local institutions and an effort to rein in the officially condoned corruption and drug trafficking that have turned so many Afghans against their own national and local governments. And it will require skillful diplomacy with other NATO generals to ensure the best use of tens of thousands of allied troops in Afghanistan and with Pakistani military leaders who must do a lot more to deny cross-border sanctuaries and infiltration routes to Taliban fighters.

General McKiernan does not deserve the blame for the dismal military situation in Afghanistan. The Taliban had been gaining ground long before he took charge, in large measure because the Bush administration - focused on its misguided war in Iraq - failed for so many years to invest adequate troops, resources or attention to the Afghan fight.

General McKiernan publicly argued that many more American troops were needed. He was right, and more are on the way. But that apparently wasn't enough for either Defense Secretary Robert Gates or for the top American regional commander, Gen. David Petraeus.

The challenges now fall to General McChrystal, whose impressive military reputation rests in part on such stunning exploits as the capture of Saddam Hussein and the location and killing of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the leader of Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia. Both were carried out by special forces under his command.

Less impressively, some of his commando units were implicated in abusive interrogations of Iraqi prisoners. And it was General McChrystal who approved the falsified report that covered up the 2004 friendly-fire death of Cpl. Pat Tillman in Afghanistan.

These issues came at the time of his confirmation last year for his present job as director of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Before confirming him in his new command, senators must assure themselves that he has learned the hard lessons from these mistakes and will insist on lawful treatment of detainees and candid military reporting.

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5) Jump in Food Costs Drives Up Prices
By JACK HEALY
May 15, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/15/business/economy/15econ.html?hp

Wholesale prices in the United States rose slightly in April, the government reported on Thursday, as falling oil and gasoline prices leveled off and food prices rose the most in a year.

The Labor Department reported that prices received by producers of finished goods rose 0.3 percent last month, further discounting the prospect that the economy was veering into a vicious cycle of lower prices and lower wages known as deflation.

But for some economists, the prospect of rising energy and food prices at a time of deep unemployment and shrinking wages raised concerns that strapped consumers could see their cost of living rise even as the job market continued to get worse.

Although falling producer and consumer prices raised fears about deflation last year as the recession deepened and the financial crisis broke, the end of $4-a-gallon gas and lower heating and energy costs effectively put billions of dollars into consumers' pockets.

"There's this squeeze going on," John E. Silvia, chief economist at Wachovia Corporation, said. "We still have job losses. We still have a lot of pressure. And now you're going to tell me that a lot of these basic commodities are rising? People's real income is going to get squeezed."

The price index for intermediate goods fell 0.5 percent while the price for crude goods rose 3 percent because of rising food and energy prices.

Wholesale and consumer prices have stabilized somewhat this year, although producer prices are down 3.7 percent from last April. The Federal Reserve said it was concerned about anemically low inflation, but expected that inflation would run at a rate of 0.3 percent to 1 percent this year.

Much of the increase in producer prices in April was the result of a 1.5 percent jump in food prices. Egg prices rose sharply while prices for beef, coffee, vegetables and fresh fruit also increased.

Gasoline prices rose 2.6 percent, reflecting the end of a plunge in crude oil prices after rounds of production cuts by the OPEC cartel and a plateau in demand for oil and gasoline. Crude prices have risen from their recent lows of $33 a barrel to almost $60, and gasoline prices have ticked up to nearly $2.30 a gallon, according to AAA, the automobile club.

The so-called core Producer Price Index, which excludes food and energy prices, rose 0.1 percent after staying flat a month earlier.

Also on Thursday, the Labor Department reported that first-time claims for unemployment rose more than expected last week, to 637,000 from a revised 605,000 the week before. Much of the increase was to the result of layoffs in the automobile industry, which is shrinking rapidly as it tries to stay afloat.

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6) Scouts Train to Fight Terrorists, and More
By JENNIFER STEINHAUER
May 14, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/14/us/14explorers.html?ref=us

IMPERIAL, Calif. - Ten minutes into arrant mayhem in this town near the Mexican border, and the gunman, a disgruntled Iraq war veteran, has already taken out two people, one slumped in his desk, the other covered in blood on the floor.

The responding officers - eight teenage boys and girls, the youngest 14 - face tripwire, a thin cloud of poisonous gas and loud shots - BAM! BAM! - fired from behind a flimsy wall. They move quickly, pellet guns drawn and masks affixed.

"United States Border Patrol! Put your hands up!" screams one in a voice cracking with adolescent determination as the suspect is subdued.

It is all quite a step up from the square knot.

The Explorers program, a coeducational affiliate of the Boy Scouts of America that began 60 years ago, is training thousands of young people in skills used to confront terrorism, illegal immigration and escalating border violence - an intense ratcheting up of one of the group's longtime missions to prepare youths for more traditional jobs as police officers and firefighters.

"This is about being a true-blooded American guy and girl," said A. J. Lowenthal, a sheriff's deputy here in Imperial County, whose life clock, he says, is set around the Explorers events he helps run. "It fits right in with the honor and bravery of the Boy Scouts."

The training, which leaders say is not intended to be applied outside the simulated Explorer setting, can involve chasing down illegal border crossers as well as more dangerous situations that include facing down terrorists and taking out "active shooters," like those who bring gunfire and death to college campuses. In a simulation here of a raid on a marijuana field, several Explorers were instructed on how to quiet an obstreperous lookout.

"Put him on his face and put a knee in his back," a Border Patrol agent explained. "I guarantee that he'll shut up."

One participant, Felix Arce, 16, said he liked "the discipline of the program," which was something he said his life was lacking. "I want to be a lawyer, and this teaches you about how crimes are committed," he said.

Cathy Noriego, also 16, said she was attracted by the guns. The group uses compressed-air guns - known as airsoft guns, which fire tiny plastic pellets - in the training exercises, and sometimes they shoot real guns on a closed range.

"I like shooting them," Cathy said. "I like the sound they make. It gets me excited."

If there are critics of the content or purpose of the law enforcement training, they have not made themselves known to the Explorers' national organization in Irving, Tex., or to the volunteers here on the ground, national officials and local leaders said. That said, the Explorers have faced problems over the years. There have been numerous cases over the last three decades in which police officers supervising Explorers have been charged, in civil and criminal cases, with sexually abusing them.

Several years ago, two University of Nebraska criminal justice professors published a study that found at least a dozen cases of sexual abuse involving police officers over the last decade. Adult Explorer leaders are now required to take an online training program on sexual misconduct.

Many law enforcement officials, particularly those who work for the rapidly growing Border Patrol, part of the Homeland Security Department, have helped shape the program's focus and see it as preparing the Explorers as potential employees. The Explorer posts are attached to various agencies, including the Federal Bureau of Investigation and local police and fire departments, that sponsor them much the way churches sponsor Boy Scout troops.

"Our end goal is to create more agents," said April McKee, a senior Border Patrol agent and mentor at the session here.

Membership in the Explorers has been overseen since 1998 by an affiliate of the Boy Scouts called Learning for Life, which offers 12 career-related programs, including those focused on aviation, medicine and the sciences.

But the more than 2,000 law enforcement posts across the country are the Explorers' most popular, accounting for 35,000 of the group's 145,000 members, said John Anthony, national director of Learning for Life. Since the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, and the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, many posts have taken on an emphasis of fighting terrorism and other less conventional threats.

"Before it was more about the basics," said Johnny Longoria, a Border Patrol agent here. "But now our emphasis is on terrorism, illegal entry, drugs and human smuggling."

The law enforcement posts are restricted to those ages 14 to 21 who have a C average, but there seems to be some wiggle room. "I will take them at 13 and a half," Deputy Lowenthal said. "I would rather take a kid than possibly lose a kid."

The law enforcement programs are highly decentralized, and each post is run in a way that reflects the culture of its sponsoring agency and region. Most have weekly meetings in which the children work on their law-enforcement techniques in preparing for competitions. Weekends are often spent on service projects.

Just as there are soccer moms, there are Explorers dads, who attend the competitions, man the hamburger grill and donate their land for the simulated marijuana field raids. In their training, the would-be law-enforcement officers do not mess around, as revealed at a recent competition on the state fairgrounds here, where a Ferris wheel sat next to the police cars set up for a felony investigation.

Their hearts pounding, Explorers moved down alleys where there were hidden paper targets of people pointing guns, and made split-second decisions about when to shoot. In rescuing hostages from a bus taken over by terrorists, a baby-faced young girl screamed, "Separate your feet!" as she moved to handcuff her suspect.

In a competition in Arizona that he did not oversee, Deputy Lowenthal said, one role-player wore traditional Arab dress. "If we're looking at 9/11 and what a Middle Eastern terrorist would be like," he said, "then maybe your role-player would look like that. I don't know, would you call that politically incorrect?"

Authenticity seems to be the goal. Imperial County, in Southern California, is the poorest in the state, and the local economy revolves largely around the criminal justice system. In addition to the sheriff and local police departments, there are two state prisons and a large Border Patrol and immigration enforcement presence.

"My uncle was a sheriff's deputy," said Alexandra Sanchez, 17, who joined the Explorers when she was 13. Alexandra's police uniform was baggy on her lithe frame, her airsoft gun slung carefully to the side. She wants to be a coroner.

"I like the idea of having law enforcement work with medicine," she said. "This is a great program for me."

And then she was off to another bus hijacking.

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