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Bay Area United Against War Newsletter
Table of Contents:
A. EVENTS AND ACTIONS
B. VIDEOS
C. SPECIAL APPEALS AND ONGOING CAMPAIGNS
D. ARTICLES IN FULL
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A. EVENTS AND ACTIONS
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The Struggle Continues for Immigration Reform!
Local 2 UNITE HERE!
Wednesday, July 28th
4:00-6:00pm
New Federal Building
7th and Mission
Raise your voice to let the Federal Government know that it is time to take action and end the suffering of our immigrant workers and their families!
No to SB1070 in Arizona!
Yes to Dream Act! United American Family Act!
Yes to Immigration Reform!
************
We are always on the look out for committed volunteers to drive the hotel boycotts and reach out to the community. Let us learn together, and fight together. Join Local 2's awesome Boycott Team.
For volunteer opportunities, please contact:
Powell DeGange, pdegange@unitehere.org
415-864-8770 ext. 759
************
SIGN THE HOTEL BOYCOTT PLEDGE!
Click here:
https://spreadsheets.google.com/viewform?formkey=dE9US3YwVmZyZFpLcVFUOFozWk4tZEE6MA
Click here for details and figures showing why these corporations have no excuse not to provide hotel workers affordable quality health care:
https://docs.google.com/fileview?id=0BzaUbolMBN98NTZmZGU3MGUtM2NjMy00ZjgxLWFjYzgtYTcyOTRmZTA1NDgy&hl=en
WATCH A VIDEO OF THE BOYCOTT CAMPAIGN:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JVOzfbb08_0
UNITE HERE! Local 2 - Hotel Workers Struggle for a Contract in San Francisco
For a current list of boycotted hotels, please check our website
www.unitehere2.org
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Please Distribute Widely - Send to a Friend
Arab Film Festival Presents
The premiere of two powerful documentaries on the attacks on Gaza
GAZA'S WINTER
produced by Najwa Najjar
A variety of short films about Gaza and Operation Cast Lead, a collaboration of 12 International filmmakers.
GAZA-STROPHE, The Day After
directed by Samir Abdallah & Kheredine Mabrouk
"We bring back images of Palestine, this country which is more and more becoming metaphorical. We entered Gaza as soon as the ceasefire of the last war (December 2008-January 2009) was announced and discovered with our friends from the Palestinian Human Rights Centre, the extent of the gaza-strophe. In spite of all this, our Gazaoui friends offered us poems, songs and even jokes and stories to tell" -Samir Abdallah
Films will be followed by discussion with a distinguished panel:
Paul Larudee, Nadeen Elshorafa, and Jess Ghannam. Facilitator: Michel Shehadeh
Buy Tickets Now:
https://www.brownpapertickets.com/event/119164
Thursday, July 29th @ 7:00pm
Roxie Theatre, 3116 16th Street, San Francisco
Tickets: $9
After Event Party @ The Pork Store (Across from The Roxie)
Suggested Donation: $10 Students $15 Adults
Co-Sponsors: Al-Awda San Francisco, Middle East Children Alliance (MECA), Break the Silence and Mural Project, ANSWER Coalition, Arab Resource and Organizing Center, South Bay Mobilization, Culture and Conflict Forum, Free Palestine Movement, UC Berkeley Students for Justice in Palestine, Arab Cultural Community Center of Silicon Valley, Bay Area Labor Committee for Peace & Justice (LC4PJ), Palestine Youth Network, US Palestinian Community Network (SF Bay Area USPCN), International Jewish Anti-Zionist Network (IJAN), American Friend's Service Committee-SF, Free Palestine Alliance, Sunbula: Arab Feminists for Change, Jewish Voice for Peace, Southwest Asian and North African Bay Area Queers (SWANABAQ), Justice for Palestinians-San Jose, SOUL School of Liberty & Liberation...
If you are interested in becoming a co-sponsor, please email: gazaeducationalevent@arabfilmfestival.org
More info at http://arabfilmfestival.org/
A.N.S.W.E.R. Coalition
Act Now to Stop War & End Racism
http://www.ANSWERcoalition.org http://www.answersf.org
answer@answersf.org
2489 Mission St. Rm. 24
San Francisco: 415-821-6545
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Rally at Livermore Against Nuclear Weapons
Friday, August 6th, 8:00 A.M.
Meet at Vasco Rd. and Patterson Pass Rd., Livermore, CA.
Gathering to pledge to never again use nuclear weapons, on this 65th anniversary
of the U.S. bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Tri Valley CARES and other groups will rally near the West Gate of Lawrence Livermore Lab. Norman Solomon will speak. Call East Bay Peace Action at 925-443-7148 for more information.
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Progressive Film Festival Aug. 7-8
A fundraiser for the ANSWER Coalition
at ATA, 992 Valencia St. at 21st St., San Francisco
$6 admission for each screening
Light refreshments. Wheelchair accessible.
Sat. August 7
7pm - Maquilapolis (City of Factories)
Documenting the struggle of women workers in Tijuana.
“Many consider the U.S.-Mexico border to be ‘the laboratory of the future.’ In Maquilapolis the border is also the site where global capitalism is facing profound resistance. The maquiladora workers are neither helpless victims nor dupes of neo-liberal capitalism, but rather social actors in the full sense of the word” —Rosa-Linda Fregoso, UCSC
Carmen Durán works the graveyard shift at one of Tijuana’s 800 maquiladoras; she is one of millions of women around the world who labor for poverty level wages in the factories of transnational corporations. When the plant where Carmen worked for six years moved to Indonesia, they try to avoid paying the legally mandated severance pay to which they were entitled by law. Carmen becomes a promotora, a grassroots activist, challenging the usual illegal tactics of the powerful transnationals.
The filmmakers gave several women workers in Tijuana video cameras to make a record of their struggles, giving the film the intimate feel of video diaries. Spanish with English subtitles, 68min., 2006
8:30pm - 9 Star Hotel
A story of Palestinian workers struggling for survival under Israeli occupation.
This unflinching documentary follows Ahmed and Muhammad, two of the many Palestinians who illegally cross the border into the Israeli city of Modi’in in search of work. Together they share food, belongings and stories, and live under the constant threat of imprisonment from Israeli soldiers and police. With raw, handheld images, this disconcerting yet touching film documents friendship, nostalgia and the uncompromising urge to survive. 2007, 78min., Arabic and Hebrew with English subtitles.
Sun. August 8
Cuba: An African Odyssey
Documenting Cuba’s role in the African Liberation struggles of the 60’s & 70’s.
5pm - Part 1: Congo and Guinea Bissau
7:30pm - Part 2: Angola
In this ambitious and revealing documentary, Egyptian-French filmmaker Jihan El-Tahri traces the history of Cuban solidarity with African liberation movements in the 1960s and 70s. It begins in 1965 when Che Guevara led a group of Cuban revolutionary fighters in an unsuccessful attempt to support the struggle for true independence in the Congo. It then moves to Cuban’s role in the struggles against Portuguese/NATO colonialism in Guinea-Bissau and Angola.
Cuba: An African Odyssey combines remarkable archival footage—much of it never before seen in the U.S.—with an amazing cast of participants showing Cuba’s pivotal role in the liberation movements in Africa. Over 300,000 Cubans fought alongside African revolutionaries, one of many examples of Cuba’s true internationalism. Spanish and English with English subtitles, 2007, Part 1 - 130min., Part 2 - 60min.
If you cannot attend, but would like to make a much-needed donation to the ANSWER Coalition:
https://secure2.convio.net/pep/site/Donation?ACTION=SHOW_DONATION_OPTIONS&CAMPAIGN_ID=1443&JServSessionIdr004=q6a1fcbds2.app213b
A.N.S.W.E.R. Coalition
Act Now to Stop War & End Racism
http://www.ANSWERcoalition.org http://www.answersf.org
answer@answersf.org
2489 Mission St. Rm. 24
San Francisco: 415-821-6545
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SAVE THE DATE: JUSTICE FOR OSCAR GRANT -- SEPTEMBER 15, 2010
ILWU Local 10 Motion on the Verdict in the Oscar Grant Case
Whereas, Oscar Grant's killer, BART police officer Johannes Mehserle received a verdict of involuntary manslaughter on July 8, 2010; and
Whereas, video tapes show clearly that Oscar Grant was lying face down on the Fruitvale BART platform, waiting to be handcuffed with another cop's boot on his neck posing no threat when he was shot in the back and killed in cold blood by Mehserle; and
Whereas, this is just another example in a racist justice system where police officers go free for killing young black men; and
Whereas, the Contra Costa Times reports that police are holding a rally in Walnut Creek on July 19, 2010 to show support for the killer cop so his sentence will only be a slap on the wrist; and
Whereas; the ILWU has always stood for social justice;
Therefore be it resolved that the labor movement organize a mass protest rally September 15, 2010 with participation from community groups, civil rights organizations, civil liberties organizations and all who stand for social justice demand jail for killer cops.
THAT LOCAL 10 DELEGATES TO THE BAY AREA LABOR COUNCILS ARE DIRECTED TO RAISE THE ABOVE MOTION AT THEIR NEXT MEETING
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Education 4 the People!
October 7 Day of Action in Defense of Public Education - California
http://defendcapubliceducation.wordpress.com/
MORE THAN 100 activists from across California gathered in Los Angeles April 24 to debate next steps for the fight against the devastating cutbacks facing public education.
The main achievements of the conference were to set a date and location for the next statewide mass action-October 7-and for the next anti-cuts conference, which will happen October 16 at San Francisco State University. The other key outcome was the first steps toward the formation of an ad hoc volunteer coordinating committee to plan for the fall conference.
These decisions were a crucial step toward deepening and broadening the movement. For example, the fall conference will be the key venue for uniting activists from all sectors of public education, and especially from those schools and campuses which saw action on March 4, but which have yet to plug into the broader movement.
This will be crucial for extending the scope and increasing the strength of our movement, as well as for helping us strategize and prepare for what is certain to be a tough year ahead. Similarly, the fall mass action will be crucial to re-igniting the movement following the summer months.
http://defendcapubliceducation.wordpress.com/
Organizing for the next Statewide Public Education Mobilization Conference at SFSU on OCT 16th
Posted on May 24, 2010 by ooofireballooo
Organizing for the next Statewide Public Education Mobilization Conference
@ San Francisco State University on October 16th
MORE THAN 100 activists from across California gathered in Los Angeles April 24 to debate next steps for the fight against the devastating cutbacks facing public education.
The main achievements of the conference were to set a date and location for the next statewide mass action-October 7-and for the next anti-cuts conference, which will happen October 16 at San Francisco State University. The other key outcome was the first steps toward the formation of an ad hoc volunteer coordinating committee to plan for the fall conference.
These decisions were a crucial step toward deepening and broadening the movement. For example, the fall conference will be the key venue for uniting activists from all sectors of public education, and especially from those schools and campuses which saw action on March 4, but which have yet to plug into the broader movement.
This will be crucial for extending the scope and increasing the strength of our movement, as well as for helping us strategize and prepare for what is certain to be a tough year ahead. Similarly, the fall mass action will be crucial to re-igniting the movement following the summer months.
Proposal: Form a conference organizing listserve immediately!
Please join the google group today.
* Group home page: http://groups.google.com/group/fallconferencesfsu
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NOVEMBER 2010 - CONVERGE ON FORT BENNING, GEORGIA
November 18-21, 2010: Close the SOA and take a stand for justice in the Americas.
www.soaw.org/take-action/november-vigil
The November Vigil to Close the School of the Americas at the gates of Fort Benning, Georgia will be held from November 18-21, 2010. The annual vigil is always held close to the anniversary of the 1989 murders of Celina Ramos, her mother Elba and six Jesuit priests at a the University of Central America in El Salvador.
ORGANIZE YOUR COMMUNITY FOR THE 2010 VIGIL!
November 2010 will mark the 20th anniversary of the vigil that brings together religious communities, students, teachers, veterans, community organizers, musicians, puppetistas and many others. New layers of activists are joining the movement to close the SOA in large numbers, including numerous youth and students from multinational, working-class communities. The movement is strong thanks to the committed work of thousands of organizers and volunteers around the country. They raise funds, spread the word through posters and flyers, organize buses and other transportation to Georgia, and carry out all the work that is needed to make the November vigil a success. Together, we are strong!
VIGIL AND RALLY AT THE GATES, NONVIOLENT DIRECT ACTION, TEACH-IN, CONCERTS, WORKSHOPS AND A ANTI-MILITARIZATION ORGANIZERS CONFERENCE
There will be exciting additions to this year's vigil program. Besides the rally at the gates of Fort Benning, Georgia with inspiring speakers and amazing musicians from across the Americas, the four day convergence will also include an educational teach-in at the Columbus Convention Center, several evening concerts, workshops and for the first time, the Latin America Solidarity Coalition will stage a one-day Anti-Militarization Organizers Conference on Thursday, November 18, 2010.
SHUT DOWN THE SOA AND RESIST U.S. MILITARIZATION IN THE AMERICAS
Our work has unfortunately not gotten any easier and U.S. militarization in Latin America is accelerating. The SOA graduate led military coup in Honduras, the continuing repression against the Honduran pro-democracy resistance and the expansion of U.S. military bases in Colombia and Panama are grim examples of the ongoing threats of a U.S. foreign policy that is relying on the military to exert control over the people and the resources in the Americas. Join the people who are struggling for justice in Honduras, Colombia and throughout the Americas as we organize to push back.
Spread the word - Tell a friend about the November Vigil:
http://www.SOAW.org/tellafriend
For more information, visit:
www.SOAW.org.
See you at the gates of Fort Benning in November 2010
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B. VIDEOS:
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Innocence Lost: Ethan McCord recounts aftermath of Iraqi civilian massacre | UNPC 7/24/2010
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3ihPGtcHjNk&feature=player_embedded
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BP OIL SPILL HEALTH EMERGENCY! DIRE! MUST BE WATCHED! Corexit Being Sprayed From Coast Guard Planes!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1FxfYqnlQ50&feature=player_embedded
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BP SPRAYING POISONOUS GAS ON PEOPLE IN GULF! MUST SEE
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=exaGh3SWTLs&feature=player_embedded
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Papantonio: BP's Floating 3rd World Death Trap
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pUmkxR6TY_Y&feature=player_embedded
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Mexican kindergarten kids vs racist white minutemen
Little kids stand up for their parents after the minutemen go harass migrants at the Mexican Consulate in the city of Santa Ana.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z7YrkpKNB7M&feature=player_embedded
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HEALTH ALERT: Toxic Rain In Miami From Gulf Oil Leak, Plants & Trees Dying
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fSvHho90O3g
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Sarah Kruzan: Sentenced to Life Without Parole at Age 16
http://media.causes.com/595178?email=true
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Make A Living With My Own Two Hands/ Hell It's Part of Being Who I Am
by Abby Zimet
July 14, 2010
http://www.commondreams.org/further/2010/07/14
After two days of often emotional testimony from Gulf Coast residents, the White House oil spill commission heard Louisiana native, crawfisherman and singer-songwriter Drew Landry sing it like it is in a newly, sorrowfully minted lament for a way of life he fears has been destroyed. From "The BP Blues": "Kickin mud off up a crawfish hole/ barefooted with a fishin pole/ went to workin in the oil fields/ that's the only way to pay our bills..."
After the song, Landry told the hearing: "It feels like BP is in control of this deal, and the Coast Guard does what they want...More importantly, it feels like the people don't have a voice in this thing. It just sucks. Let's just do the right damn thing. It shouldn't be this hard. It shouldn't take a committee to listen to people."
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The Gulf 20 years from now
http://www.brasschecktv.com/page/895.html
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BPMakesMeSick.com
Tell President Obama to demand that BP stop blocking
clean-up workers from using life-saving respirators:
http://bpmakesmesick.com/
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"Corporations don't mind if we repeat history--it's cheaper that way." --Keith Olberman
Gulf's Human Health Crisis Explodes -- Countdown with Keith Olberman
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3036677//vp/38175715#38175715
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COREXIT is Eating Through Boats in the Gulf
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bLvNqlVNMh0&feature=player_embedded
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Gulf toxicologist: Shrimpers exposed to Corexit "bleeding from the rectum"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X1mI-DJII1U&feature=player_embedded
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BP Makes Me Sick
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-m5MeqlETpY
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Tar ball clean up in Cocoa Beach -- East Coast of Central Florida
http://www.myfoxorlando.com/dpp/news/brevard_news/070710-Cocoa-Beach-tar-balls
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Tar ball clean up in Cocoa Beach
Oil/Water samples from Gulf...VERY TOXIC
http://blog.alexanderhiggins.com/2010/07/08/independent-water-samples-of-the-bp-gulf-oil-spill-contradict-epa-samples-and-found-to-be-highly-toxic/
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YouTube - Obama admin bans press from filming BP oil spill areas in the Gulf
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WpJBsjKhRTo&feature=player_embedded#!
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Police State Canada
http://tv.globalresearch.ca/content/police-state-canada
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BP Death Clouds Already Onshore! Benzene-3400ppb Hyrdrogen Sulfide-1200ppb TOXIC AIR ALERT.flv
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dngpCYgKxZ0
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Kid with oil stuck on her! Destin Beach, Fl. June 23rd, 2010
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1QwsCHd7Lcg&feature=player_embedded#
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Is it raining oil
in Metro New Orleans?
River Ridge, LA
Just south of the airport
[The question mark isn't appropriate in this title. The video clearly shows that it's raining oil in River Ridge--no question about it...bw]
http://www.brasschecktv.com/page/874.html
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G20 Police Accused of Rape Threats, Strip-Searches
29 June 2010
http://readersupportednews.org/video/4-video/2323-g20-toronto-police-rape-threats-women-strip-searched
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BP Slick Covers Dolphins and Whales.mov
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pxDf-KkMCKQ
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Licence to Spill
Posted on 06.30.10
http://www.youandifilms.com/2010/06/licence-to-spill-full-report/
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Two Pensacola Beach Scenes: Dying Baby Dolphin and Ocean "Water Bubbling "...Like It's Got Acid In It. God Help Us All"
opednews.com
For OpEdNews: theWeb - Writer
Two scenes from Pensacola--one of a dying baby dolphin, the other of water bubbling like there's acid in it.
A dying, oil-covered baby dolphin is taken from Pensacola waters. It died shortly after being discovered.
http://www.youtube.com/user/pcolagregg
http://www.opednews.com/articles/Video-Pensacola-Ocean-Wa-by-the-web-100624-933.html
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THE SHORT FILM BP DOESN'T WANT YOU TO SEE ABOUT WHAT'S REALLY HAPPENING TO THE PEOPLE IN THE GULF
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xRl6-o8CpXA
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ROV films oil leak coming from rock cracks on seafloor.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b2RxIQP0IBU
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Oil Spill Threatens Native American "Water" Village
The town of Grand Bayou, Louisiana, has no streets and no cars, just water and boats. And now the Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico threatens the very existence of the Atakapa-Ishak Indians who live there. "We're facing the potential for cultural genocide," says one tribe member.
(c) 2010 National Geographic; videographer and field producer: Fritz Faerber
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2010/06/100608-us-oil-gulf-indians-video/
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Roger Waters - "We Shall Overcome" for Gaza
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vnMMHepfYVc
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Rachel Maddow: Disgraceful response to the oil itself
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26315908/#37563648
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It Ain't My Fault by Mos Def & Lenny Kravitz | stupidDOPE.com
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xnR1BrGgRVM
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Gulf Oil Spill?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zAHS5z6QKok
Dear Readers,
If you are wondering why an antiwar newsletter is giving full coverage to the oil spill, it's because:
(1) "Supplying the US army with oil is one of BP's biggest markets, and further exploration in the oil-rich Gulf of Mexico is part of its long-term strategy."*
(2) "The Senate on Thursday, [May 27, 2010] approved a nearly $60 billion measure to pay for continuing military operations in Afghanistan and Iraq..."**
The two are inextricably entwined and interdependent.
--Bonnie Weinstein
*The black hole at the bottom of the Gulf
No one seems to know the extent of the BP disaster
By David Randall and Margareta Pagano
Sunday, 23 May 2010
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/the-black-hole-at-the-bottom-of-the-gulf-1980693.html
**Senate Approves Nearly $60 Billion for Wars
By CARL HULSE
May 27, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/28/us/politics/28cong.html?ref=us
Watch BP Live Video Webcam Camera Feed of Gulf Oil Spill Here! (Update 7)
http://blog.alexanderhiggins.com/2010/05/20/live-video-feed-webcam-gulf-oil-spill/
What BP does not want you to see:
ABC News went underwater in the Gulf with Philippe Cousteau Jr., grandson of famous explorer Jacques Cousteau, and he described what he saw as "one of the most horrible things I've ever seen underwater."
Check out what BP does not want you to see. And please share this widely -- every American should see what's happening under the surface in the Gulf.
http://acp.repoweramerica.org/page/invite/oilspillvideo?source=sprd-fwd&utm_source=crm_email&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=oilspillvideo20100527&utm_content=link1
Live BP Gulf Oil Spill Webcam Video Reveals 5 Leaks
http://blog.alexanderhiggins.com/2010/05/24/live-bp-gulf-oil-spill-webcam-video-reveals-5-leaks/
Stop Shell Oil's Offshore Drilling Plans in the Arctic
http://www.thepetitionsite.com/takeaction/308597489?z00m=19844689
Sign the Petition to Ban Offshore Drilling Now!
http://na.oceana.org/en/stopthedrill?key=31522015
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C. SPECIAL APPEALS AND ONGOING CAMPAIGNS
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Please sign the petition to release Bradley Manning
http://www.petitiononline.com/manning1/petition.html (Click to sign here)
To: US Department of Defense; US Department of Justice
We, the Undersigned, call for justice for US Army PFC Bradley Manning, incarcerated without charge (as of 18 June 2010) at Camp Arifjan, Kuwait.
Media accounts state that Mr. Manning was arrested in late May for leaking the video of US Apache helicopter pilots killing innocent people and seriously wounding two children in Baghdad, including those who arrived to help the wounded, as well as potentially other material. The video was released by WikiLeaks under the name "Collateral Murder".
If these allegations are untrue, we call upon the US Department of Defense to release Mr. Manning immediately.
If these allegations ARE true, we ALSO call upon the US Department of Defense to release Mr. Manning immediately.
Simultaneously, we express our support for Mr. Manning in any case, and our admiration for his courage if he is, in fact, the person who disclosed the video. Like in the cases of Daniel Ellsberg, W. Mark Felt, Frank Serpico and countless other whistleblowers before, government demands for secrecy must yield to public knowledge and justice when government crime and corruption are being kept hidden.
Justice for Bradley Manning!
Sincerely,
The Undersigned:
http://www.petitiononline.com/mod_perl/signed.cgi?manning1
--
Zaineb Alani
http://www.thewordsthatcomeout.blogspot.com
http://www.tigresssmiles.blogspot.com
"Yesterday I lost a country. / I was in a hurry, / and didn't notice when it fell from me / like a broken branch from a forgetful tree. / Please, if anyone passes by / and stumbles across it, / perhaps in a suitcase / open to the sky, / or engraved on a rock / like a gaping wound, / ... / If anyone stumbles across it, / return it to me please. / Please return it, sir. / Please return it, madam. / It is my country . . . / I was in a hurry / when I lost it yesterday." -Dunya Mikhail, Iraqi poet
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Please forward widely...
Lynne Stewart Sentenced to Ten Years in Prison
By Jeff Mackler
(Jeff Mackler is the West Coast Director of the Lynne Stewart Defense Committee.)
The full force of the U.S. criminal "justice" system came down on innocent political prisoner, 30-year veteran human rights attorney and radical political activist Lynne Stewart today, July 15, 2010.
In an obviously pre-prepared one hour and twenty minute technical tour de force designed to give legitimacy to a reactionary ruling Federal District Court John Koeltl, who in 2005 sentenced Stewart to 28 months in prison following her frame-up trial and jury conviction on four counts of "conspiracy to aid and abet terrorism," re-sentenced Stewart to 120 months or ten years. Koeltl recommended that Stewart serve her sentence in Danbury, Connecticut's minimum security prison. A final decision will be made by the Bureau of Prisons.
Stewart will remain in Manhattan's Metropolitan Correctional Center for 60 days to prepare an appeal.
The jam-packed New York Federal District Court chamber observers where Koeltl held forth let our a gasp of pain and anguish as Lynne's family and friends were stunned - tears flowing down the stricken and somber faces of many. A magnificent Stewart, ever the political fighter and organizer was able to say to her supporters that she felt badly because she had "let them down," a reference to the massive outpouring of solidarity and defiance that was the prime characteristic of Lynne's long fight for freedom.
Judge Koeltl was ordered to revisit his relatively short sentence when it was overturned by a two-judge majority of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. Judges Robert D. Sack and Guido Calabresi ruled that Koeltl's sentence was flawed because he had declined to determine whether Stewart committed perjury when she testified at her trial that she believed that she was effectively operating under a "bubble" protecting her from prosecution when she issued a press release on behalf of her also framed-up client, the blind Sheik Omar Abdel Rachman. Rachman was falsely charged with conspiracy to damage New York state buildings.
Dissenting Judge John M. Walker, who called Stewart's sentence, "breathtakingly low" in view of Stewart's "extraordinarily severe criminal conduct" deemed the Second Circuit's majority opinion "substantively unreasonable." Walker essentially sought to impose or demand a 30-year sentence.
The three-judge panel on Dec. 20, 2009 followed its initial ruling with even tougher language demanding that Koeltl revisit his treatment of the "terrorism enhancement" aspects of the law. A cowardly Koeltl, who didn't need this argument to dramatically increase Stewart's sentence, asserted that he had already taken it under consideration in his original deliberations.
Government prosecutors, who in 2005 sought a 30-year sentence, had submitted a 155-page memorandum arguing in support of a 15-30 year sentence. Their arguments demonstrated how twisted logic coupled with vindictive and lying government officials routinely turn the victim into the criminal.
Stewart's attorneys countered with a detailed brief recounting the facts of the case and demonstrating that Stewart's actions in defense of her client were well within the realm of past practice and accepted procedures. They argued that Koeltl properly exercised his discretion in determining that, while the terrorism enhancement provisions of the "law" had to be taken into consideration, the 30-year-prison term associated with it was "dramatically unreasonable," "overstated the seriousness" of Stewart's conduct" and had already been factored into Koeltl's decision.
Stewart's attorneys also argued convincingly in their brief that the Special Administrative Measure (SAM) that Stewart was convicted of violating by releasing a statement from her client to the media was well within the established practice of Stewart's experienced and mentoring co-counsels- former U.S. Attorney General Ramsey Clark and past American Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee president Abdeen Jabarra. Both had issued similar statements to the media with no government reprisal. Clark was an observer in Koeltl's courtroom. When he testified in support of Lynne during her trial one overzealous prosecutor suggested that he too be subject to the conspiracy charges. The more discreet team of government lawyers quietly dropped the matter.
At worst, in such matters, government officials refuse defense attorneys client visiting rights until an agreement on a contested interpretation of a SAM is reached. This was the case with Stewart and her visiting rights were eventually restored with no punishment or further action. Indeed, when the matter was brought to then Attorney General Janet Reno, the government declined to prosecute or otherwise take any action against Stewart.
But Koeltl, who had essentially accepted this view in his original sentence, reversed himself entirely and proceeded in his erudite-sounding new rendition of the law to repeatedly charge Stewart with multiple acts of perjury regarding her statements on the SAM during her trial.
Koeltl took the occasion to lecture Stewart regarding the first words she uttered in front of a bevy of media outlets when she joyfully alighted from the courthouse following the judge's original 28-month sentence. Said Stewart at that time, "I can do 28 months standing on my head." A few moments earlier Stewart, with nothing but a plastic bag containing a toothbrush, toothpaste and her various medications, had stood before Koeltl, who had been asked by the government to sentence her to a 30-year term, effectively a death sentence for Lynne, aged 70, a diabetic and recovering breast cancer victim in less than excellent health.
Koeltl dutifully followed the lead of the Second Circuit judges, who feigned outrage that Stewart could possibly appear joyful that her life was spared despite 28 months in prison. Koeltl insisted that Stewart's remark was essentially contemptuous of his sentence and insufficient to convince Stewart of the seriousness of her "crime." Lynne's defense was that while she fully understood that 28 months behind bars, separating from her "family, friends and comrades," as she proudly stated, was a harsh penalty, she was nevertheless "relieved" that she would not die in prison. Koeltl needed a legal brick to throw at Lynne's head and ignored her humanity, honesty and deep feeling of relief when she expressed it to a crowd of two thousand friends, supporters and a good portion of the nation's media.
The same Judge Koeltl who stated in 2005, when he rendered the 28-month jail term, that Lynne was "a credit to her profession and to the nation," clearly heard the voice of institutionalized hate and cruelty and responded in according with its unstated code. "Show no mercy! Thou shall not dissent without grave punishment" in capitalist America.
Lynne was convicted in the post-911 generated climate of political hysteria. Bush appointee, Attorney General John Ashcroft, decided to make an example of her aimed at warning future attorneys that the mere act of defending anyone whom the government charged with "conspiracy to aid and abet terrorism," could trigger terrible consequences.
On July 15 Judge Koeltl made the decision of his career. Known for his meticulous preparation in such matters, and already having enraged the powers that be with his "light" sentence of Stewart, he bent full tilt to the reactionary political pressures exerted on him by the court hierarchy. He had the option to stand tall and reaffirm his original decision. The "law" allowed him to do so. He could have permitted Lynne to leave prison in less than two years, recover her health, and lead a productive life. His massively extended sentence, unless overturned, will likely lead to Lynne's demise behind bars - a brilliant and dedicated fighter sacrificed on the alter of an intolerant class-biased system of repression and war.
Courage is a rare quality in the capitalist judiciary. For every defiant decision made, usually driven by a change in the political climate and pressed forward by the rise of mass social protest movements, there are thousands and more of political appointees that affirm the status quo, including its punishment of all who struggle to challenge capitalist prerogatives and power.
Lynne Stewart stands tall among the latter. We can only hope that the winds of change that are stirring the consciousness of millions today in the context of an American capitalism in economic and moral crisis keeps the movement for her freedom alive and well. The fight is not over! What we do now remains critical. Lynne's expected appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court cannot be written off as absurd and hopeless. What we do collectively to free her and all political prisoners and to fight for freedom and justice on every front counts for everything!
Write to Lynne at:
Lynne Stewart 53504-054
MCC-NY 2-S
150 Park Row
New York, NY 10007
For further information call Lynne's husband, Ralph Poynter, leader of the Lynne Stewart Defense Committee
718-789-0558 or 917-853-9759
Send contributions payable to:
Lynne Stewart Organization
1070 Dean Street
Brooklyn, New York, 11216
---
Listen to Lynne Stewart event, that took place July 8, 2010 at Judson Memorial Church
Excerpts include: Mumia Abu Jamal, Ralph Poynter, Ramsey Clark, Juanita
Young, Fred Hampton Jr., Raging Grannies, Ralph Schoenman
http://www.takingaimradio.com/shows/audio.html
And check out this article (link) too!
http://www.baltimorechronicle.com/2010/062210Lendman.shtml
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Requesting Your Support
By Dahr Jamail
July 12th, 2010
Dear Readers:
This morning we hired a flight out to the well site where the Deepwater Horizon sank. This environmental crime scene is now littered with boats and relief wells flailing to stop the flow of oil that has been gushing into the Gulf of Mexico for almost 3 months. Tomorrow, we are hiring a boat to take us to some of the most devastated coastline, which is still smeared in oil, causing harm to uncountable ecosystems and wildlife.
I have been on the Gulf Coast of Louisiana for two weeks now, and together with my partner, Erika Blumenfeld, we have brought you stories and photographs that document and archive the human and environmental impact of the historic and horrific disaster that is the BP oil catastrophe.
In our story, Fending For Themselves, we wrote about the growing crisis of the Pointe-au-Chien Indian Tribe being displaced by the encroaching oil, and showed you images of their dying marshlands.
We produced an original photo essay for Truthout, Mitigating Annihilation, which clearly depicts the futility of the booming efforts, and the resulting destruction of the local and migratory bird rookeries, along with South Louisiana's fragile and endangered coastline.
Our most recent post, Hell Has Come To South Louisiana, articulates the desperate situation of the shrimpers and fisher-folk whose livelihood that spans generations is threatened by extinction.
The complexity and breadth of this continued crisis is beyond what we could have imagined, and our questions have led us to dynamic and impassioned interviews with environmental philosophers, activists, scientists, sociologists, riverkeepers, bayoukeepers, indigenous tribes, and fisher people.
As a freelance team, we could not have produced this important work without your generous support. We are deeply grateful to those who were able to contribute to our efforts thus far.
Our work here is just beginning, and with so much of our investigation requiring that we be out in the field, I am humbly appealing for your continued support to help us extend our reporting, so that we may continue to bring you the unfolding events of this devastating issue that clearly effects us all.
Please support our work in the Gulf Coast by making a donation. There are several ways you can donate:
If you would like to make a tax-deductible donation, International Media Project (IMP) is providing fiscal sponsorship to Dahr Jamail.
Checks for tax-deductible donations should be made out to "International Media Project." please write"Dahr Jamail" in the memo line and mail to:
International Media Project/Dahr Jamail
1714 Franklin St.
#100-251
Oakland, CA 94612
Online, you can use Paypal to donate HERE.
Donations can also be mailed to:
Dahr Jamail
P.O. Box 970
Marfa, TX 79843
Direct links to our pieces produced thus far:
Living on a dying delta
http://dahrjamailiraq.com/living-on-a-dying-delta
Fending For Themselves
http://dahrjamailiraq.com/fending-for-themselves
No Free Press for BP Oil Disaster
http://ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=52082
Mitigating Annihilation
http://www.truth-out.org/mitigating-annihilation61145
Hell Has Come to South Louisiana
http://dahrjamailiraq.com/hell-has-come-to-south-louisiana
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HE WAS MURDERED!
HE WAS MURDERED!
HE WAS MURDERED!
HE WAS MURDERED!
RIP Oscar!
DEMAND JUSTICE FOR OSCAR GRANT
Victory for movement, but justice still needs to be won
Calling on all supporters of justice for Oscar Grant and opponents of racist police brutality:
The jury verdict is not justice for Oscar Grant - it is up to the new movement to use its power to win real justice. THIS IS THE TIME TO ACT.
DEMAND:
The maximum sentence for killer cop Johannes Mehserle.
Jail Officers Pirone and Domenici, the two police who were accomplices to murder.
Disarm and disband the BART Police.
Provide massive funding to Oakland for education and jobs for Oakland's black, Latina/o, Asian, and poor and working-class white youth.
Stop police/ICE racial profiling of Latina/o, black, Asian, and other minority youth with and without papers.
Furthermore, we call on Oakland Mayor Dellums and other governmental authorities in Oakland to declare that this verdict does not render justice to Oscar Grant and to act on the demands of the movement.
If you haven't already done so yet, join the JUSTICE FOR OSCAR GRANT ACTION PAGE on Facebook at: http://www.causes.com/causes/188135
BAMN STATEMENT:
Oscar Grant Verdict Is Victory for the Movement,
But Justice for Oscar Grant Still Needs to Be Won
Today's [THURSDAY, JULY 8, 2010] conviction of Johannes Mehserle is a victory for the movement. Despite all the foot-dragging and machinations of the police, the justice system, the government, and the politicians, the movement secured the first conviction of a California police officer for the killing of a black man. This victory is important and provides some greater protection for black and Latina/o youth. However, this verdict does NOT constitute justice for Oscar Grant.
Tens of millions of people around the world saw the videotape and know that Oscar Grant was murdered in cold blood by Johannes Mehserle. And yet, because of the failure of the prosecutor's office to fight the change in venue, and because of the pro-police bias of the judge, the jury was deprived of even being able to consider convicting Mehserle of first-degree murder. The Los Angeles county jury which heard that case did not include a single black juror.
BAMN salutes the new civil rights movement for this victory. However, achieving justice for Oscar Grant requires that the movement continue to build and grow in determination, drawing in millions more black, Latina/o and other youth.
BAMN also salutes Wanda Johnson, Oscar Grant's mother, for refusing to accept a civil settlement and for fighting to achieve justice for her son. We pledge to Wanda Johnson, Oscar's daughter Tatiana, her mother, and all family and friends that we will not rest until we achieve justice for Oscar.
We call on the movement to maintain the fight for justice for Oscar Grant by raising and fighting to win the following demands:
The maximum sentence for killer cop Johannes Mehserle.
Jail Officers Pirone and Domenici, the two police who were accomplices to murder.
Disarm and disband the BART Police.
Provide massive funding to Oakland for education and jobs for Oakland's black, Latina/o, Asian, and poor and working-class white youth.
Stop police/ICE racial profiling of Latina/o, black, Asian, and other minority youth with and without papers.
Furthermore, we call on Oakland Mayor Dellums and other governmental authorities in Oakland to declare that this verdict does not render justice to Oscar Grant and to act on the demands of the movement.
Coalition to Defend Affirmative Action, Integration, and Immigrant Rights and Fight for Equality By Any Means Necessary (BAMN)
(510) 502-9072 begin_of_the_skype_highlighting (510) 502-9072 end_of_the_skype_highlighting letters@bamn.com BAMN.com
--
Ronald Cruz
BAMN Organizer, www.BAMN.com
& Civil Rights Attorney
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SOME GOOD NEWS FOR TROY ANTHONY DAVIS - INNOCENT MAN ON DEATH ROW:
http://www.troyanthonydavis.org/call-to-action.html
Georgia: Witnesses in Murder Case Recant
By SHAILA DEWAN
June 23, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/24/us/24brfs-WITNESSESINM_BRF.html?ref=us
In an unusual hearing ordered by the Supreme Court that began in Savannah on Wednesday, several witnesses said they had concocted testimony that Troy Anthony Davis killed a police officer, Mark MacPhail, in 1989. Last August, the Supreme Court ordered a federal district court to determine if new evidence "clearly establishes" Mr. Davis's innocence, its first order in an "actual innocence" petition from a state prisoner in nearly 50 years, according to Justice Antonin Scalia, who dissented. Seven of the witnesses who testified against Mr. Davis at his trial have recanted, and some have implicated the chief informer in the case. Mr. Davis's execution has been stayed three times.
For more info: www.iamtroy.com | www.justicefortroy.org | troy@aiusa.org Savannah Branch NAACP: 912-233-4161
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Mumia Abu-Jamal - Legal Update
June 9, 2010
Robert R. Bryan, Lead counsel for Mumia Abu-Jamal
Law Offices of Robert R. Bryan
2088 Union Street, Suite 4
San Francisco, California 94123-4117
www.MumiaLegalDefense.org
Dear All:
There are significant developments on various fronts in the coordinated legal campaign to save & free Mumia Abu-Jamal. The complex court proceedings are moving forward at a fast pace. Mumia's life is on the line.
Court Developments: We are engaged in pivotal litigation in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit, Philadelphia. At stake is whether Mumia will be executed or granted a new jury trial on the question of the death penalty. Two years ago we won on that issue, with the federal court finding that the trial judge misled the jury thereby rendering the proceedings constitutionally unfair. Then in January 2010 the U.S. Supreme Court vacated that ruling based upon its decision in another case, & ordered that the case be again reviewed by the Court of Appeals.
The prosecution continues its obsession to kill my client, regardless of the truth as to what happened at the time of the 1981 police shooting. Its opening brief was filed April 26. Our initial brief will be submitted on July 28. At issue is the death penalty.
In separate litigation, we are awaiting a decision in the Pennsylvania Supreme Court on prosecutorial abuses, having completed all briefing in April. The focus is on ballistics.
Petition for President Barack Obama: It is crucial for people to sign the petition for President Barack Obama, Mumia Abu-Jamal & the Global Abolition of the Death Penalty, which was initially in 10 languages (Swahili & Turkish have since been added). This is the only petition approved by Mumia & me, & is a vital part of the legal effort to save his life. Please sign the petition & circulate its link:
www.MumiaLegalDefense.org
Nearly 22,000 people from around the globe have signed. These include: Bishop Desmond Tutu, South Africa (Nobel Peace Prize); Günter Grass, Germany (Nobel Prize in Literature); Danielle Mitterrand, Paris (former First Lady of France); Fatima Bhutto, Pakistan (writer); Colin Firth (Academy Award Best-Actor nominee), Noam Chomsky, MIT (philosopher & author); Ed Asner (actor); Mike Farrell (actor); & Michael Radford (director of the Oscar winning film Il Postino); Robert Meeropol (son of Julius & Ethel Rosenberg, executed in 1953); Fatima Bhutto, Pakistan (writer); Noam Chomsky, MIT (philosopher & author); Ed Asner (actor); Mike Farrell (actor); Michael Radford (director of the Oscar winning film Il Postino); members of the European Parliament; members of the German Bundestag; European Association of Lawyers for Democracy & World Human Rights; Reporters Without Borders, Paris.
European Parliament; Rosa Luxemburg Conference; World Congress Against the Death Penalty; Geneva Human Rights Film Festival: We began the year with a major address to the annual Rosa Luxemburg Conference in Berlin, Germany, sponsored by the newspaper junge Welt. The large auditorium was filled with a standing-room audience. Mumia joined me by telephone. We announced the launching of the online petition, Mumia Abu-Jamal & the Global Abolition of the Death Penalty.
A large audience on the concluding night of the World Congress Against the Death Penalty in Geneva, Switzerland, February 25, heard Mumia by telephone. He spoke as a symbolic representative of the over 20,000 men, women & children on death rows around the world. The call came as a surprise, since we thought it had been canceled. Mumia's comments from inside his death-row cell brought to reality the horror of daily life in which death is a common denominator. During an earlier panel discussion I spoke of racism in capital cases around the globe with the case of Mumia as a prime example. A day before the Congress on February 23, I talked at the Geneva Human Rights Film Festival on the power of films in fighting the death penalty & saving Mumia.
On March 2 in the European Parliament, Brussels, Belgium, members Søren Søndergaard (Denmark) & Sabine Lösing (Germany) announced the beginning of a campaign to save Mumia & end executions. They were joined by Sabine Kebir, the noted German author & PEN member, Nicole Bryan, & me. We discussed the online petition which helps not only Mumia, but all the condemned around the globe.
Donations for Mumia's Legal Defense & Online Petition: The complex litigation & investigation that is being pursued on behalf of Mumia is enormously expensive. We are in both the federal & state courts on the issue of the death penalty, prosecutorial wrongdoing, etc. Mumia's life is on the line.
How to Help: For information on how to help, both through donations & signing the Obama petition, please go to Mumia's legal defense website: www.MumiaLegalDefense.org .
Conclusion: Mumia remains on death row under a death judgment. He is in greater danger than at any time since his arrest 28 years ago. The prosecution is pursuing his execution. I win cases, & will not let them kill my client. He must be free.
Yours very truly,
Robert
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Robert R. Bryan
Law Offices of Robert R. Bryan
2088 Union Street, Suite 4
San Francisco, California 94123-4117
Lead counsel for Mumia Abu-Jamal
www.MumiaLegalDefense.org
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Lynne Stewart and the Guantanamo Lawyers: Same Fact Patterns, Same Opponent, Different Endings?
Lynne Stewart will be re-sentenced sometime in July, in NYC.
By Ralph Poynter
(Ralph Poynter is the Life partner of Lynne Stewart. He is presently dedicated 24/7 to her defense, as well as other causes.)
Ralph.Poynter@yahoo.com
In the Spring of 2002, Lynne Stewart was arrested by the FBI, at her home in Brooklyn, for materially aiding terrorism by virtue of making a public press release to Reuters on behalf of her client, Sheik Abdel Omar Rahman of Egypt. This was done after she had signed a Special Administrative Measure issued by the Bureau of Prisons not permitting her to communicate with the media, on his behalf.
In 2006, a number of attorneys appointed and working pro bono for detainees at Guantanamo were discovered to be acting in a manner that disobeyed a Federal Judge's protective court order. The adversary in both cases was the United States Department of Justice. The results in each case were very different.
In March of 2010, a right wing group "Keep America Safe" led by Lynne Cheney, hoping to dilute Guantanamo representation and impugn the reputations and careers of the volunteer lawyers, launched a campaign. Initially they attacked the right of the detainees to be represented at all. This was met with a massive denouncement by Press, other media, Civil rights organizations ,and rightly so, as being a threat to the Constitution and particularly the Sixth Amendment right to counsel.
A second attack on the Gitmo lawyers was made in the Wall Street Journal of March 16. This has been totally ignored in the media and by civil and human rights groups. This latter revelation about the violations, by these lawyers, of the Judge's protective orders and was revealed via litigation and the Freedom of Information Act. These pro bono lawyers serving clients assigned to them at Gitmo used privileged attorney client mail to send banned materials. They carried in news report of US failures in Afghanistan and Iraq . One lawyer drew a map of the prison. Another delivered lists to his client of all the suspects held there. They placed on the internet a facsimile of the badges worn by the Guards. Some lawyers "provided news outlets with 'interviews' of their clients using questions provided in advance by the news organizations." When a partner at one of the large Wall Street law firms sent in multiple copies of an Amnesty International brochure, which her client was to distribute to other prisoners, she was relieved from her representation and barred by the Military Commander from visiting her client.
This case is significant to interpret not because of the right wing line to punish these lawyers and manipulate their corporate clients to stop patronizing such "wayward" firms. Instead it is significant because, Lynne Stewart, a left wing progressive lawyer who had dedicated her thirty year career to defending the poor, the despised, the political prisoner and those ensnared by reason of race, gender, ethnicity, religion , who was dealt with by the same Department of Justice, in such a draconian fashion, confirms our deepest suspicions that she was targeted for prosecution and punishment because of who she is and who she represented so ably and not because of any misdeed.
Let me be very clear, I am not saying that the Gitmo lawyers acted in any "criminal" manner. The great tradition of the defense bar is to be able to make crucial decisions for and with the client without interference by the adversary Government.
I believe that they were acting as zealous attorneys trying to establish rapport and trust with their clients. That said, the moment the Department of Defense and the Department of Justice tried to remove Julia Tarver Mason from her client, the playing field tilted. Ms Tarver Mason was not led out of her home in handcuffs to the full glare of publicity. There was no press conference. The Attorney General did not go on the David Letterman show to gloat about the latest strike in the War on Terror, the purge of the Gitmo lawyer...NO.
Instead an "armada" of corporate lawyers went to Court against the Government. They, in the terms of the litigation trade, papered the US District Courthouse in Washington D.C. They brought to bear the full force of their Money and Power-- derived from the corporate world--and in 2006 "settled" the case with the government, restoring their clients to Guantanamo without any punishment at all, not to say any Indictment. Lynne Stewart, without corporate connections and coming from a working class background, was tried and convicted for issuing, on behalf of her client, a public press release to Reuters. There was no injury, no harm, no attacks, no deaths.
Yet that same Department of Justice that dealt so favorably and capitulated to the Gitmo corporate lawyers, wants to sentence Lynne Stewart to thirty (30) YEARS in prison. It is the equivalent of asking for a death sentence since she is 70 years old.
This vast disparity in treatment between Lynne and the Gitmo lawyers reveals the deep contradictions of the system ---those who derive power from rich and potent corporations, those whose day to day work maintains and increases that power--are treated differently. Is it because the Corporate Power is intertwined with Government Power???
Lynne Stewart deserves Justice... equal justice under law. Her present sentence of 28 months incarceration (she is in Federal Prison) should at least be maintained, if not made equal to the punishment that was meted out to the Gitmo lawyers. The thirty year sentence, assiduously pursued by DOJ under both Bush and Obama, is an obscenity and an affront to fundamental fairness. They wanted to make her career and dedication to individual clients, a warning, to the defense bar that the Government can arrest any lawyer on any pretext. The sharp contrasts between the cases of Lynne and the Gitmo lawyers just confirm that she is getting a raw deal--one that should be protested actively, visibly and with the full force of our righteous resistance.
Write to Lynne:
Lynne Stewart 53504-054
MCC-NY
150 Park Row
New York, New York 10007
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Bernadette McAliskey Quote on Zionists:
"The root cause of conflict in the Middle East is the very nature of the state of Israel. It is a facist state. It is a international bully, which exists not to protect the rights of the Jewish people but to perpetuate a belief of Zionist supremacy. It debases the victims of the holocaust by its own strategy for extermination of Palestine and Palestinians and has become the image and likeness of its own worst enemy, the Third Reich.
"Anyone challenging their position, their crazed self-image is entitled, in the fascist construction of their thinking, to be wiped out. Every humanitarian becomes a terrorist? How long is the reality of the danger Israel poses to world peace going to be denied by the Western powers who created this monster?"
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POEM ON WHAT ISRAEL DOES NOT ALLOW INTO GAZA - FROM THE IRISH TIMES / CARDOMAN AS A BIOLOGICAL WARFARE WEAPON
[ The poem does not mention that the popular herb cardamom is banned from importation into Gaza. Israel probably fears that cardamom can be used as a biological weapon. Rockets with cardamom filled projectiles landing in Israel could cause Israeli soldiers 'guarding' the border to succumb to pangs of hunger, leave their posts to go get something eat, and leave Israel defenseless. - Howard Keylor]
Richard Tillinghast is an American poet who lives in Co Tipperary. He is the author of eight books of poetry, the latest of which is Selected Poems (Dedalus Press, 2010 ), as well as several works of non-fiction
*
No tinned meat is allowed, no tomato paste,
no clothing, no shoes, no notebooks.
These will be stored in our warehouses at Kerem Shalom
until further notice.
Bananas, apples, and persimmons are allowed into Gaza,
peaches and dates, and now macaroni
(after the American Senator's visit).
These are vital for daily sustenance.
But no apricots, no plums, no grapes, no avocados, no jam.
These are luxuries and are not allowed.
Paper for textbooks is not allowed.
The terrorists could use it to print seditious material.
And why do you need textbooks
now that your schools are rubble?
No steel is allowed, no building supplies, no plastic pipe.
These the terrorists could use to launch rockets
against us.
Pumpkins and carrots you may have, but no delicacies,
no cherries, no pomegranates, no watermelon, no onions,
no chocolate.
We have a list of three dozen items that are allowed,
but we are not obliged to disclose its contents.
This is the decision arrived at
by Colonel Levi, Colonel Rosenzweig, and Colonel Segal.
Our motto:
'No prosperity, no development, no humanitarian crisis.'
You may fish in the Mediterranean,
but only as far as three km from shore.
Beyond that and we open fire.
It is a great pity the waters are polluted
twenty million gallons of raw sewage dumped into the sea every day
is the figure given.
Our rockets struck the sewage treatments plants,
and at this point spare parts to repair them are not allowed.
As long as Hamas threatens us,
no cement is allowed, no glass, no medical equipment.
We are watching you from our pilotless drones
as you cook your sparse meals over open fires
and bed down
in the ruins of houses destroyed by tank shells.
And if your children can't sleep,
missing the ones who were killed in our incursion,
or cry out in the night, or wet their beds
in your makeshift refugee tents,
or scream, feeling pain in their amputated limbs -
that's the price you pay for harbouring terrorists.
God gave us this land.
A land without a people for a people without a land.
--
Greta Berlin, Co-Founder
+357 99 18 72 75
witnessgaza.com
www.freegaza.org
http://www.flickr.com/photos/freegaza
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Please sign the petition to stop the execution of Mumia Abu-Jamal and
and forward it to all your lists.
"Mumia Abu-Jamal and The Global Abolition of the Death Penalty"
http://www.petitiononline.com/Mumialaw/petition.html
(A Life In the Balance - The Case of Mumia Abu-Jamal, at 34, Amnesty Int'l, 2000; www. Amnesty.org/en/library/info/AMR51/001/2000.)
[Note: This petition is approved by Mumia Abu-Jamal and his lead attorney, Robert R. Bryan, San Francisco (E-mail: MumiaLegalDefense@gmail.com; Website: www.MumiaLegalDefense.org).]
Committee To Save Mumia Abu-Jamal
P.O. Box 2012
New York, NY 10159-2012
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Donations for Mumia's Legal Defense in the U.S. Our legal effort is the front line of the battle for Mumia's freedom and life. His legal defense needs help. The costs are substantial for our litigation in the U.S. Supreme Court and at the state level. To help, please make your checks payable to the National Lawyers Guild Foundation indicate "Mumia" on the bottom left). All donations are tax deductible under the Internal Revenue Code, section 501c)3), and should be mailed to:
It is outrageous and a violation of human rights that Mumia remains in prison and on death row. His life hangs in the balance. My career has been marked by successfully representing people facing death in murder cases. I will not rest until we win Mumia's case. Justice requires no less.
With best wishes,
Robert R. Bryan
Lead counsel for Mumia Abu-Jamal
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Short Video About Al-Awda's Work
The following link is to a short video which provides an overview of Al-Awda's work since the founding of our organization in 2000. This video was first shown on Saturday May 23, 2009 at the fundraising banquet of the 7th Annual Int'l Al-Awda Convention in Anaheim California. It was produced from footage collected over the past nine years.
Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kTiAkbB5uC0&eurl
Support Al-Awda, a Great Organization and Cause!
Al-Awda, The Palestine Right to Return Coalition, depends on your financial support to carry out its work.
To submit your tax-deductible donation to support our work, go to
http://www.al-awda.org/donate.html and follow the simple instructions.
Thank you for your generosity!
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KEVIN COOPER IS INNOCENT!
FLASHPOINTS Interview with Innocent San Quentin Death Row Inmate
Kevin Cooper -- Aired Monday, May 18,2009
http://www.flashpoints.net/#GOOGLE_SEARCH_ENGINE
To learn more about Kevin Cooper go to:
savekevincooper.org
LINKS
San Francisco Chronicle article on the recent ruling:
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/05/13/BAM517J8T3.DTL
Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruling and dissent:
http://www.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/opinions/2009/05/11/05-99004o.pdf
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COURAGE TO RESIST!
Support the troops who refuse to fight!
http://www.couragetoresist.org/x/
Donate:
http://www.couragetoresist.org/x/content/view/21/57/
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D. ARTICLES IN FULL
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1) In 2008's Downturn, Some Managed to Eke Out Millions
By FLOYD NORRIS
July 23, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/24/business/economy/24charts.html?ref=business
2) Federal Report Faults Banks on Huge Bonuses
"With the financial system on the verge of collapse in late 2008, a group of troubled banks doled out more than $2 billion in bonuses and other payments to their highest earners"
By ERIC DASH
July 22, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/23/business/23pay.html?ref=business
3) What Happens Next?
by: Dahr Jamail and Erika Blumenfeld
Friday 23 July 2010
[Please visit this site to see Erika Blumenfeld's beautiful photographs...bw]
http://www.truth-out.org/what-happens-next61633
4) Tension Among Officials Grows as Storm Nears
By LIZ ROBBINS and CAMPBELL ROBERTSON
July 23, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/24/us/24spill.html?hp
5) Britain Plans to Decentralize National Health Care
"This would result in a further loss of jobs, health care unions say, and also open the door to further privatization of the service."
By SARAH LYALL
July 24, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/25/world/europe/25britain.html?ref=world
6) Oil Giant Fined for Shipping Sludge to Ivory Coast
By MARLISE SIMONS
July 23, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/24/world/europe/24trafigura.html?ref=world
7) E.P.A. Considers Risks of Gas Extraction
"The culprit, these people argued, was hydraulic fracturing, a method of extracting natural gas that involves blasting underground rock with a cocktail of water, sand and chemicals." [Check out the HBO Documentary, "Gasland," it's all about what fracking does to the environment and the people who live in it. Among other horrors, it shows water from someone's kitchen faucet catching on fire when lit by a Bic lighter as it pours out. It's airing on HBO this summer...bw]
By TOM ZELLER Jr.
July 23, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/24/business/energy-environment/24gas.html?ref=us
8) Scientists Confirm Underwater Plumes Are From Spill
By JOHN COLLINS RUDOLF
July 23, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/24/science/earth/24plume.html?ref=us
9) School Chief Dismisses 241 Teachers in Washington
By TAMAR LEWIN
July 23, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/24/education/24teachers.html?ref=education
10) How Profits, Stocks Can Rise as Economy Stumbles
"Corporate margins, or profits per sale, are hovering near 12 percent now, by one measure -- tantalizingly close to a half-century high. ...It's an old story, really. Companies cut workers in a downturn, and squeeze more out of those remaining."
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
July 25, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2010/07/25/business/AP-US-Wall-Street-Week-Ahead.html?hp
11) Where Oysters Grew on Trees
By ROWAN JACOBSEN and MICHAEL BECK
July 24, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/25/opinion/25jacobsen.html
12) The War: A Trillion Can Be Cheap
"...the annual cost today is $1.1 million per man or woman in uniform in Afghanistan versus an adjusted $67,000 per year for troops in World War II and $132,000 in Vietnam."
By ELISABETH BUMILLER
July 24, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/25/weekinreview/25bumiller.html?ref=world
13) Daring to Pose a Challenge to the Oil Culture
"We are constantly told, 'You have to adapt to coastal land loss, you have to adapt because of the oil leak, you have to adapt to the new situation,' " she said. "When is our government going to adapt to new energy sources that aren't harmful to our environment and the people who depend upon the environment?"
By AMY HARMON
July 24, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/25/us/25voices.html?ref=us
14) Reports Detail Pornography Investigation
"A federal investigation has accused dozens of military officials and defense contractors, including some with top-level security clearances, of buying and downloading child pornography on private or government computers."
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
July 24, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/25/us/25porn.html?ref=us\
15) Toxic legacy of US assault on Fallujah 'worse than Hiroshima'
The shocking rates of infant mortality and cancer in Iraqi city raise new questions about battle
"Dramatic increases in infant mortality, cancer and leukaemia in the Iraqi city of Fallujah, which was bombarded by US Marines in 2004, exceed those reported by survivors of the atomic bombs that were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945, according to a new study."
By Patrick Cockburn
Saturday, 24 July 2010
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/toxic-legacy-of-us-assault-on-fallujah-worse-than-hiroshima-2034065.html
16) BP Hides Use of Black Prison Labor For Oil Gusher Cleanup
"She describes a shipping container that sits at the turn-off for the Venice Boat Harbor, advertising 'Jails to Go.' Such containers work as contract labor housing for work release prisoners, with bunks inside, bars on the windows, and deadbolts on the doors."
Posted by Jan Frel on @ 11:49 am
http://blogs.alternet.org/speakeasy/2010/07/23/bp-hides-use-of-black-prison-labor-for-oil-gusher-cleanup/
17) BP's Hiring of Prison Labor Cleanup Scrutinized
Democracynow.org
July 23, 2010
http://www.democracynow.org/2010/7/23/headlines#3
18) BP denies 'buying silence' of oil spill scientists
Oil giant says it is just keeping company data confidential, as it faces 200 federal civil lawsuits over spill
"Cary Nelson, president of the American Association of University Professors, criticised the contract. He told the BBC: 'This is really one huge corporation trying to buy faculty silence in a comprehensive way.'"
Mark Tran
guardian.co.uk, Friday 23 July 2010 10.27 BST
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/jul/23/bp-oil-spill-scientists-silence
19) Who Cooked the Planet?
By PAUL KRUGMAN
July 25, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/26/opinion/26krugman.html?hp
20) Israel's Fingerprints Surface
The Hariri Assassination
By RANNIE AMIRI
July 23 - 25, 2010
http://counterpunch.org/amiri07232010.html
21) View Is Bleaker Than Official Portrayal of War in Afghanistan
This article was written and reported by C. J. Chivers, Carlotta Gall, Andrew W. Lehren, Mark Mazzetti, Jane Perlez, and Eric Schmitt, with contributions from Jacob Harris and Alan McLean.
July 25, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/26/world/asia/26warlogs.html?hp
22) Afghan Officials Report 52 Civilians Dead in NATO Strike
By RICHARD A. OPPEL Jr. and TAIMOOR SHAH
July 26, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/27/world/asia/27afghan.html?hp
23) In Disclosing Secret Documents, WikiLeaks Seeks 'Transparency'
By ERIC SCHMITT
July 25, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/26/world/26wiki.html?pagewanted=all
24) Industries Find Surging Profits in Deeper Cuts
By NELSON D. SCHWARTZ
July 25, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/26/business/economy/26earnings.html?ref=us
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1) In 2008's Downturn, Some Managed to Eke Out Millions
By FLOYD NORRIS
July 23, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/24/business/economy/24charts.html?ref=business
Even in a bad year, some people can get very lucky.
A newly released report by the Internal Revenue Service shows that, for Americans as a group, total income fell at the fastest pace in decades in 2008, and that the number of tax returns reporting at least $1 million in income plunged by 22 percent as the Great Recession took hold.
But even with all the bad news, there were still 13,480 tax returns that reported income of more than $10 million in the year.
Among them were 462 returns that reported some income from gambling. Their total income from that source was $2.6 billion, for an average of $5.6 million per return.
The report, based on a survey of tax returns for 2008, states that Americans reported $8.4 trillion in total income, down 4.6 percent from the previous year. After considering inflation, the real decline was 8.4 percent, the sharpest decline in total American income since at least 1990.
That decline was largely caused by falls in investment income and sharp drops in capital gains. Despite the recession, total wage and salary income in the United States rose by 1.9 percent in 2008, the I.R.S. said. But after adjusting for inflation, that became a decline of 1.9 percent. The real decline in wage and salary incomes was also the largest since 1990, which was as far back as the I.R.S. report covered.
For some Americans, that decline was partly offset by the availability of unemployment insurance benefits. The number of tax returns reporting such benefits was 9.5 million, up 25 percent from the year before, and the total of reported unemployment benefits was $43.7 billion, up 48 percent.
Most of those benefits were reported on tax returns showing total income of less than $40,000 a year, and 90 percent of it was reported on returns that showed total income under $100,000.
The number of tax returns that reported at least $1 million in annual income fell by 22 percent, to 321,294, while the subset of that group reporting at least $10 million in income was 36 percent smaller.
On the other end of the spectrum, the number of tax returns on which taxpayers reported negative income - because their realized losses were greater than their total income - leaped 31 percent, to 2.5 million.
The report reflects the number of tax returns, not the number of people. Most returns are filed by individuals, but nearly a third are joint returns filed by married couples.
While there were fewer returns reporting $1 million incomes, they collectively still reported income of $1.08 trillion. Those returns accounted for just 0.2 percent of the returns filed, but reported taking in 13 percent of all income.
That proportion was down from 16.1 percent in 2007, however, and was the lowest since 2004, reflecting the impact of the collapse in asset values on those who owned the most assets.
The I.R.S. disclosure of combined tax return information for the wealthiest taxpayers - those with annual incomes of $10 million or more - provides glimpses into the lives of the super-rich.
Some of them, it turns out, know what it is like to stand in line at the unemployment office. Seventeen of those returns included income from unemployment benefits, averaging $5,765 each. The service had not broken out that detail in previous years.
Of those tax returns of $10 million or more, 20 reported receiving alimony payments, averaging about $5 million, while 455 reported paying alimony averaging $455,588.
Most people in that rarefied group are there because of their investments, not their work. Of the $400 billion in income reported on those 13,480 returns, only 19 percent of it came from wages and salaries, much less than came from capital gains, even in such a bad year for stocks.
It turns out that there were fewer superlucky people in 2008 as well. In the previous year, 546 returns showing total income of at least $10 million reported gambling income, and those returns showed average gambling income of $6.6 million.
Floyd Norris comments on finance and economics on his blog at nytimes.com/norris.
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2) Federal Report Faults Banks on Huge Bonuses
"With the financial system on the verge of collapse in late 2008, a group of troubled banks doled out more than $2 billion in bonuses and other payments to their highest earners"
By ERIC DASH
July 22, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/23/business/23pay.html?ref=business
With the financial system on the verge of collapse in late 2008, a group of troubled banks doled out more than $2 billion in bonuses and other payments to their highest earners. Now, the federal authority on banker pay says that nearly 80 percent of that sum was unmerited.
In a report to be released on Friday, Kenneth R. Feinberg, the Obama administration's special master for executive compensation, is expected to name 17 financial companies that made questionable payouts totaling $1.58 billion immediately after accepting billions of dollars of taxpayer aid, according to two government officials with knowledge of his findings who requested anonymity because of the sensitivity of the report.
The group includes Wall Street giants like Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan Chase and the American International Group as well as small lenders like Boston Private Financial Holdings. Mr. Feinberg's report points to companies that he says paid eye-popping amounts or used haphazard criteria for awarding bonuses, the people with knowledge of his findings said, and he has singled out Citigroup as the biggest offender.
Even so, Mr. Feinberg has very limited power to reclaim any money. He can use his status as President Obama's point man on pay to jawbone the companies into reimbursing the government, but he has no legal authority to claw back excessive payouts.
Mr. Feinberg's political leverage has been weakened by the banks' speedy repayment of their bailout funds. Eleven of the 17 companies that received criticism in the report have repaid the government with interest, so they have no outstanding obligations to reimburse.
As a result, Mr. Feinberg will merely propose that the banks voluntarily adopt a "brake provision" that would allow their boards to nullify or alter any bonus payouts or employment contracts in the event of a future financial crisis. All 17 companies have told Mr. Feinberg that they will consider adopting the provision, though none has committed to do so.
Mr. Feinberg is expected to call the payouts ill advised but not unlawful or contrary to the public interest, the people with knowledge of his report said.
On Wall Street, meanwhile, profits and pay have already rebounded. Goldman Sachs is on pace to hand out an average of $544,000 per worker in salary and bonuses, though many could earn several times that amount. JPMorgan Chase's investment bank is on track to pay its workers, on average, about $425,000, while the average Morgan Stanley employee could collect about $260,000.
If the second half of 2010 plays out like the first half, Wall Street bonuses will be paid out at about the same level as last year and similar to 2007 levels, when the crisis had just started to unfold.
"It's healthier than I would have ever expected a year ago," said Alan Johnson, a longtime compensation consultant who specializes in financial services.
Mr. Feinberg was named last month as the independent administrator for claims tied to the BP oil spill, making it likely that the release of his findings on the financial firms will be his final act as the overseer of banker pay.
The review, mandated by the 2009 economic stimulus bill, broadened the scope of Mr. Feinberg's duties to include examining the pay packages of top earners at 419 companies that accepted bailout funds. However, it did not give him the power to demand changes to the compensation arrangements, as he did in each of the last two years at seven companies that received multiple bailouts.
Mr. Feinberg spent five months reviewing compensation paid to each company's 25 highest earners between October 2008, when the first bailouts were dispensed, and February 2009, when the stimulus bill took effect. He narrowed his scrutiny to about 600 executives at 17 banks, with payouts totaling $2.03 billion.
Mr. Feinberg's criteria for identifying the worst offenders were large payouts, in aggregate or to specific individuals; overly generous exit packages; or a failure to provide clear performance criteria or other rationale for extra pay.
Mr. Feinberg then approached each of the 17 companies with his proposed remedy during conference calls over the last two weeks. The 11 companies that have fully repaid their bailout money are American Express, Bank of America, Bank of New York Mellon, Boston Private, Capital One Financial, Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan, Morgan Stanley, PNC Financial, US Bancorp and Wells Fargo.
The six companies that have not fully repaid their bailout funds are A.I.G, Citigroup, the CIT Group, M&T Bank, Regions Financial and SunTrust Banks.
Among the banks that have not fully repaid the government, Citigroup was identified by Mr. Feinberg as having the most egregious compensation packages during the bailout period, according to officials with knowledge of his report. The bank handed out several hundred million dollars in pay in 2008 as it struggled to stay afloat.
Roughly two-thirds of the outsize payouts were from bonuses awarded to Andrew Hall and another trader who were part of the bank's Phibro energy trading unit. Citigroup sold that business to Occidental Petroleum last fall, under pressure from Mr. Feinberg, after the disclosure that Mr. Hall had received a $100 million payout.
Mr. Feinberg is not expected to name individual executives who received the highest awards.
His review is among several compensation initiatives scrutinizing banker pay. In June, the Federal Reserve ordered about two dozen of the biggest banks to address several pay practices that, even after the crisis, it said encouraged excessive risk-taking.
European banking regulators introduced tough new standards for bonus payments earlier this month. And the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation is developing a plan that would partly tie bank insurance premiums to the perceived risk of their executive pay packages. That proposal could be reviewed by the agency's board as early as next month.
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3) What Happens Next?
by: Dahr Jamail and Erika Blumenfeld
Friday 23 July 2010
[Please visit this site to see Erika Blumenfeld's beautiful photographs...bw]
http://www.truth-out.org/what-happens-next61633
Recently we met with Captain Louis Skrmetta who runs Ship Island Excursions out of Gulfport, Mississippi. His father Pete came to the US from Croatia in 1904, and began working as an oyster fisherman, now an endangered endeavor. From that background arose the family business of ferrying people out to West Ship Island, which is part of the Gulf Islands National Seashore, about an hours boat ride south of Gulfport.
"Normally you see a couple of hundred boats out here," Captain Louis tells us as we take in the beautiful view from the wheelhouse of his ship. "But now you can't fish. You can get a ticket now just for having fishing gear on your boat."
The Gulf Islands are considered a Gulf Coast treasure. These sparkling blue waters, white sand beaches, and fertile coastal marshes were designated a National Seashore in 1971 to protect the wildlife, barrier islands, and archeological sites along the Gulf of Mexico. They are home to fiddler crab, shrimp, flounder, oysters, blue crab, brown pelicans, osprey, great blue heron, raccoon, loggerhead sea turtle, Florida Pompano, shark, and hundreds of species of birds and fish. And now they are being oiled. All this life, along with the humans like Captain Louis who love this area and are deeply rooted to it, are in jeopardy.
"Normally we take out full boats this time of year," Captain Louis explains while steering us southwards, "That means 500 people per load." He shows the days totals, which are 93 from this morning's load, and 128 on the boat right now. If it weren't for several fraternity groups on board, he says, "We'd be looking at 20-30 people."
Like all the other businesses that rely on the Gulf for their livelihood, Captain Louis is fixated on the oil disaster. He points south and says, "There's a huge vortex of oil swirling around out there just off the shelf in the deeper water, and each storm will keep pushing the oil up here, so we'll have a never ending supply."
He points to clean-up boats that are buzzing around nearby Cat Island, and tells us how that island has been hit by oil, as has his beloved Ship Island. He has been hired by the US Environmental Services, who chartered one of his boats to transport clean-up crews to Ship Island where they walk around digging tar balls out of the beaches. "That's helping us some," he says, trying to explain how, for now, his business is staying afloat. He, like other Gulf-dependent businesses, has no idea what will happen when that contract ends, or when the oil will stop gushing from the Macondo well.
As we near the island, Captain Louis tells us of how when a couple of weeks ago when the islands were hit with a particularly heavy load of oil, they found an oiled pelican. "We called BP's number, both me and a park ranger, to report it. The next day I was out with passengers and the bird was still there." Fortunately, a local reporter was on his ship that day and filmed the bird. "The next day we had 20 rangers out here. But the thing is, we here in Mississippi had 70 days to prepare for this thing, because it took longer to arrive here than over in Louisiana. But our illustrious governor, Haley Barbour, keeps downplaying this thing. But we know how Haley works, "If you want it, you pay Haley, and you get it."
A little about Barbour from sourcewatch:
"Barbour is the Republican Governor of Mississippi. He was formerly a tobacco industry lobbyist based in Washington, D.C. His lobbying firm made $17,150/month plus expenses from R.J. Reynolds in 2000. Barbour won the Mississippi gubernatorial election on November 4, 2003, in part on a pledge to keep Mississippi's state flag design intact, which contains a miniature representation of the Confederate battle flag. While campaigning, he also appeared at a fund-raiser sponsored by the Conservative Citizen's Council. The CCC is a modern-day version of the White Citizen's Councils that fought racial integration throughout the South in the 1950s and 60s."
Barbour, an errand-boy for the oil and gas industry, said this when the first giant rafts of oil began washing ashore on the coast of Mississippi and the Gulf Islands: "We have had a few tar balls but we have had tar balls every year, as a natural product of the Gulf of Mexico. 250,000 to 750,000 barrels of oil seep into the Gulf of Mexico through the floor every year. So, tar balls are no big deal."
Captain Louis later explained to me how their "illustrious governor" had tried to drill for oil and gas all around the Gulf Islands National Seashore by sneaking legislation into a Tsunami Relief bill.
As we travel further east along the Gulf coast, I am seeing that it is common knowledge that the so-called Vessels of Opportunity program set up by BP where they hire local fishermen and workers to use their boats for oil recovery, is a bit of a joke, as well as about as effective as a train wreck.
"BP is leasing 15' boats with 50 horsepower motors, and paying them $1600 a day to run around in circles," Captain Louis says while pointing to a few off our bow that appear to be doing just that. Last week Erika and I saw some of this down south of Venice, Louisiana on a boat trip - a few guys hanging out in their airboat, wearing the bright orange vests required by BP, and their hard hats, lounging in the shade, drifting about.
As we near the dock of Ship Island, Captain Louis concludes his discussion about Big Oil with this: "I want to see us get completely off oil and transition into something else. Something safe. Something renewable. But the oil companies don't want change. The Mississippi Sound used to be one of the most fertile fishing areas anywhere. And now look what we are having to deal with. We're worried how long this will last. 300 million liters of oil in the water column. Where will it go? What happens now? The ecology of the Mississippi Sound...it's an estuary for shrimp, mullet, crab, flounder, and all these things are part of our culture and youth. And now it's never going to be the same again."
Captain Louis expertly guides the ship towards the pier, where we are tied off. His family has had the concession with the National Park Service here since 1971, to be the ferry, long after his father, who began the business, began taking people out to this island in 1926. Captain Louis is carrying on a family legacy.
He walks with us along the boardwalk onto the island. I'm taken by the beauty - a bull shark chases mullet near the pier, seagulls call overhead, green marsh grass rises out of white sand, and in other places out of shallow pools to sway in the winds.
"I'm worried about hurricanes," Captain Louis says when he sees us taking in the beautiful marsh in the middle of the small island, "What's the action plan for when a hurricane dumps oil all over this marsh?"
He goes on to explain his deep concern about how his very livelihood is threatened. "This is a family operation, and how we've survived all these years. It's a tough way to make a living, and we've survived hurricanes, but this is gonna be a tough one. Who's going to want to come out here? We've never had to deal with this, it's a whole new experience. The charter boats are all wiped out. What's going to happen? It's scary. Everybody is working for BP now, so what happens next?"
Another common thread of my experience here is being amidst so much raw natural beauty and wonderfully warm people whilst simultaneously processing this growing catastrophe. The island is so beautiful I am taken aback.
Yet as we near the southern shore, the unnaturalness of the oil response effort jolts me back into the catastrophe end of the spectrum of this experience. An oil clean up crew is shoveling tar balls into bags just down the beach, their foremen drive past us in their little motorized carts, and a newly erected platform stands offshore - as a staging area for oil response vessels.
A sign is posted by the National Park Service warns visitors: "Leave the area if you experience difficulty breathing or any other symptoms. If needed, contact your doctor." If residents of the Gulf Coast region were really given this warning, en masse, by the federal government, most of the population of southeast Louisiana would already be evacuated.
Captain Louis takes Erika further down the beach where she photographs tar balls that are contrasted with the purity of the white sands they contaminate
I talk with one of the National Park Service lifeguard's of the area, Matt Fields. He points to a tugboat anchored off shore. "That's a spray down boat," he informs, "It sprays off skimmers coming back in. So where's that oil go?"
He looks at me and holds up his hands, and we both shake our heads. "The oil disaster has killed the numbers of people that come here," he adds, "We used to have well over 1,000 every day, now we count in the dozens."
We don't stay too long on the island before we're back in the wheelhouse with Captain Louis heading back for Gulfport. He talks more about the oil industry, corruption, politics, and Haley Barbour. "We must end our dependence on oil, but the oil industry is literally fighting change," he says, "There is no question this type of oil disaster will happen again. But isn't it enough incentive to introduce change when the entire regional seafood industry has been destroyed? As oil keeps coming in here in this shallow water and mixing with the sediment, this'll be a disaster area. What happens then with these fish and shrimp nurseries?"
As we pull back into dock, Captain Louis calls over his friend Tony Smith. Tony, 66-years-old, is a fisherman who has been making the trip to Ship Island with Captain Louis on a near-daily basis. "I used to come out here 4-5 days a week to fish," he explains, "I'd feed my family, and Captain Louis' family, and a lot of these other folks."
Nobody is allowed to fish now, as oil is dominant and has, of course, already contaminated the food chain. "This is unbelievable and the worst is yet to come," says Tony as we are being tied up to the dock, "I've gone all over Mississippi looking for a place to fish, but haven't found it."
Tony is worried that all the rainwater is contaminated, he's worried about the fish, and all the sheen that he keeps seeing come into his area. Like most everyone we meet, he is, of course, angry at those who caused his life to crumble. "The worse this gets," he says, "The worse it seems people with a little power seem to mess it up even worse."
He tells me he isn't going to give up, that he's going to keep fighting, because, "It's what we do. Hell, we still have people down here still fighting the Civil War."
I watch him look out into the Mississippi Sound, to the barrier islands, at our boat, then at me, before he says, "I haven't fished since they shut these waters down. I've got a freezer full of fish, but once that's gone, I'm afraid that's it."
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4) Tension Among Officials Grows as Storm Nears
By LIZ ROBBINS and CAMPBELL ROBERTSON
July 23, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/24/us/24spill.html?hp
BELLE CHASSE, La. - Tropical Depression Bonnie, which is heading swiftly into the Gulf of Mexico and churning toward southeast Louisiana, is not expected to be a particularly strong storm.
But it has already whipped up tension and mistrust that had been simmering between local officials on one side and the BP and Coast Guard officials in command of the oil spill response on the other.
Federal and BP officials have hammered out a storm plan with local governments that includes evacuating people and moving response equipment out of coastal parishes to higher ground.
The Coast Guard said it was concerned about safeguarding the equipment to avoid any damage from the storm.
But local officials saw the move as a sign that it was going to withdraw equipment permanently, and they have fought bitterly to keep it. One parish president, Kevin Davis of St. Tammany, ordered the arrest of anyone who moved oil-protection barges out of his parish waters.
Billy Nungesser, the president of Plaquemines Parish, where the storm is due to hit first, threatened to blow out the tires of trucks carting away protective boom. Mr. Nungesser claimed he was joking, but he still drew a call of reprimand from the F.B.I.
By late Thursday, compromises had been ironed out, and the equipment remained in the parishes. But the episode presaged a bigger test: what happens if an actual hurricane comes barreling through?
"You've got a real issue of trusting anybody's word," said Mr. Davis, who spent seven hours on Thursday in heated meetings with members of the response command. Under normal circumstances, hurricane evacuations are enormously complicated operations.
The huge oil response effort has only multiplied the complexity, involving nearly 42,000 more people across five states, some not from the region; roughly 4,000 more boats; untold numbers of vehicles; and an oil-water mix that could be blown farther inland. To regional emergency directors versed in storm planning, the response has added another layer of command - and potential problems.
"At the end of the day, it's my job and the parish president's job to look out for what's best for residents of St. Charles Parish," said Scott Whelchel, the director of emergency preparedness for a parish that lies on the southwestern banks of Lake Pontchartrain. "The simple fact is, I wasn't elected to take care of BP's equipment."
The unified area command plan calls for BP and the Coast Guard to evacuate people and equipment from the well site as many as 120 hours before a hurricane, and from the ground about 70 hours before the storm.
Already, a drill rig that was working on a relief well, which is considered the ultimate way to seal the well, has begun to disconnect to leave the area.
Thad W. Allen, the retired Coast Guard admiral who leads the federal response effort, said on Friday that a seismic monitoring ship and the ships operating undersea robots near the well would remain as long as possible.
But if they are forced to evacuate, aerial and satellite reconnaissance would be used to keep track of the shut-in well.
So far, for this storm, the evacuations of coastal residents have been minimal.
On Thursday, Gov. Bobby Jindal declared a state of emergency, and several coastal parishes followed. Plaquemines Parish called for a voluntary evacuation of its residents near the coast on Friday, even as the Coast Guard and BP started moving personnel and equipment to higher ground from a site in Venice.
Rear Adm. Paul F. Zukunft of the Coast Guard, who is the federal on-scene coordinator, said he understood the frustration in the parishes.
"My objective is to save their way of life, protect it and recover as much of the oil as possible," Admiral Zukunft said. "I am listening to their concerns."
But emergency officials remain skeptical of the plans and the questions they raise about the logistics of the evacuation.
"I'm not saying we can't do it," Lt. Col. Jerry Sneed, the New Orleans director of homeland security and emergency management, said in an interview this week. "It's just a huge added burden."
This type of two-pronged evacuation is further complicated by the presence of the oil itself.
Colonel Sneed said he was frustrated that his repeated requests for training in hazardous materials for first responders, who could encounter oil in flooded city streets, had been turned down.
A BP spokesman, John Curry, cautioning that the decision came from the joint command, said Colonel Sneed's request was denied because "it was not related to the spill." Mr. Curry added that BP had given $75 million to each state to use as necessary for such training.
Most of the anger from parish officials seems to be directed at BP, especially this week. Mr. Nungesser said that a meeting scheduled Wednesday between BP and local officials to discuss concerns was canceled by BP with only a half-hour's notice.
"What I read between the lines was that we're finished here," said Mr. Davis of St. Tammany.
A BP spokesman said that Doug Suttles, the chief operating officer, wanted to attend but received the invitation too late to change his schedule.
Coast Guard officials denied that the storm plans had anything to do with reducing response personnel. "Absolutely not," Admiral Zukunft said. "We'll be back Monday with a full-court press."
At a news conference outside the Plaquemines Parish Office of Emergency Management, Mr. Jindal said that he had received assurances from the Coast Guard that the equipment would be back. "Some parish presidents are happier than they were yesterday, but they're still not thrilled," he said.
State and federal officials have been involved in streamlining the plan, now in its fourth version.
Mike Womack, the Mississippi Emergency Management Agency director, had to point out a significant problem in an earlier draft of the plan, which originally had BP and Coast Guard evacuating its vehicles to a staging area in Hattiesburg that was at the intersection of the state's main evacuation routes.
Mr. Womack said he was particularly concerned about the many independent contractors working from BP who were not familiar with hurricanes.
For all the headaches the approaching storm has caused so far, it has at least provided officials an opportunity to prepare for possible bigger storms.
For months, Michelle Tassin, the homeland security and emergency preparedness director for Plaquemines, said she told officials in the joint command that there would be smaller storms requiring smaller-scale evacuation of equipment and personnel.
On Thursday, Ms. Tassin finally received approval to have some equipment relocated to a staging area at the northern end of the parish rather than a place miles to the north. As frustrated as she was at the last-minute timing, she was glad the changes were in place for later.
"On the best days," said Mayor Mitch Landrieu of New Orleans, who dealt with several hurricanes as lieutenant governor, "these are very complicated operations to implement. Yesterday, as difficult as it was, gave us the opportunity to think through these things."
Clifford Krauss contributed reporting from Houston.
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5) Britain Plans to Decentralize National Health Care
"This would result in a further loss of jobs, health care unions say, and also open the door to further privatization of the service."
By SARAH LYALL
July 24, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/25/world/europe/25britain.html?ref=world
LONDON - Perhaps the only consistent thing about Britain's socialized health care system is that it is in a perpetual state of flux, its structure constantly changing as governments search for the elusive formula that will deliver the best care for the cheapest price while costs and demand escalate.
Even as the new coalition government said it would make enormous cuts in the public sector, it initially promised to leave health care alone. But in one of its most surprising moves so far, it has done the opposite, proposing what would be the most radical reorganization of the National Health Service, as the system is called, since its inception in 1948.
Practical details of the plan are still sketchy. But its aim is clear: to shift control of England's $160 billion annual health budget from a centralized bureaucracy to doctors at the local level. Under the plan, $100 billion to $125 billion a year would be meted out to general practitioners, who would use the money to buy services from hospitals and other health care providers.
The plan would also shrink the bureaucratic apparatus, in keeping with the government's goal to effect $30 billion in "efficiency savings" in the health budget by 2014 and to reduce administrative costs by 45 percent. Tens of thousands of jobs would be lost because layers of bureaucracy would be abolished.
In a document, or white paper, outlining the plan, the government admitted that the changes would "cause significant disruption and loss of jobs." But it said: "The current architecture of the health system has developed piecemeal, involves duplication and is unwieldy. Liberating the N.H.S., and putting power in the hands of patients and clinicians, means we will be able to effect a radical simplification, and remove layers of management."
The health secretary, Andrew Lansley, also promised to put more power in the hands of patients. Currently, how and where patients are treated, and by whom, is largely determined by decisions made by 150 entities known as primary care trusts - all of which would be abolished under the plan, with some of those choices going to patients. It would also abolish many current government-set targets, like limits on how long patients have to wait for treatment.
The plan, with many elements that need legislative approval to be enacted, applies only to England; other parts of Britain have separate systems.
The government announced the proposals this month. Reactions to them range from pleased to highly skeptical.
Many critics say that the plans are far too ambitious, particularly in the short period of time allotted, and they doubt that general practitioners are the right people to decide how the health care budget should be spent. Currently, the 150 primary care trusts make most of those decisions. Under the proposals, general practitioners would band together in regional consortia to buy services from hospitals and other providers.
It is likely that many such groups would have to spend money to hire outside managers to manage their budgets and negotiate with the providers, thus canceling out some of the savings.
David Furness, head of strategic development at the Social Market Foundation, a study group, said that under the plan, every general practitioner in London would, in effect, be responsible for a $3.4 million budget.
"It's like getting your waiter to manage a restaurant," Mr. Furness said. "The government is saying that G.P.'s know what the patient wants, just the way a waiter knows what you want to eat. But a waiter isn't necessarily any good at ordering stock, managing the premises, talking to the chef - why would they be? They're waiters."
But advocacy groups for general practitioners welcomed the proposals.
"One of the great attractions of this is that it will be able to focus on what local people need," said Prof. Steve Field, chairman of the Royal College of General Practitioners, which represents about 40,000 of the 50,000 general practitioners in the country. "This is about clinicians taking responsibility for making these decisions."
Dr. Richard Vautrey, deputy chairman of the general practitioner committee at the British Medical Association, said general practitioners had long felt there were "far too many bureaucratic hurdles to leap" in the system, impeding communication. "In many places, the communication between G.P.'s and consultants in hospitals has become fragmented and distant," he said.
The plan would also require all National Health Service hospitals to become "foundation trusts," enterprises that are independent of health service control and accountable to an independent regulator (some hospitals currently operate in this fashion). This would result in a further loss of jobs, health care unions say, and also open the door to further privatization of the service.
The government has promised that the new plan will not affect patient care and that the health care budget will not be cut. But some experts say those assertions are misleading. The previous government, controlled by the Labour Party, poured money into the health service - the budget is now about three times what it was when Labour took over, in 1997 - but the increases have stopped. The government has said the budget will continue to rise in real terms for the next five years, but it is unlikely that the increases will keep up with the rising costs of care and the demands of an aging population.
"The real mistake that is being made by the health secretary is to drive through an ideologically determined program of reorganization which is motivated by the principle of efficiency savings," said Robin Durie, a senior lecturer in politics at the University of Exeter. "History shows clearly that quality will suffer as a consequence."
Dr. Durie added, "The gulf between the rhetoric of the white paper and the technicalities of what is involved in the various elements of the overall reorganization being proposed is just extraordinary."
For example, he asked, how will the government make good on its promise to give patients more choice - a promise that seems to require a degree of administrative oversight - while cutting so many managers from the system?
"How will the delivery of all this choice be funded?" Dr. Durie asked. "And how will the management of the delivery of choice be funded?"
Dr. Vautrey said the country needed to have a "mature debate about what the N.H.S. can and cannot afford."
He said: "It is a sign of the mixed messages that government sends out. They talk about choice and competition and increased patient expectations at the same time as they tell the service they need to cut costs and refer less and prescribe less. People need to understand that while the needs of everyone may be met, their wants will be limited."
As they prepare for the change, many doctors are wondering whether it will be permanent this time around.
"Many of our colleagues have seen this cycle of change repeatedly," Dr. Vautrey said. "Many would look at previous reorganizations and compare it to this one and wonder how long the current change will last before the next one comes along."
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6) Oil Giant Fined for Shipping Sludge to Ivory Coast
By MARLISE SIMONS
July 23, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/24/world/europe/24trafigura.html?ref=world
A Dutch court on Friday imposed the maximum fine of 1 million Euros, or $1.28 million, on the oil trading company Trafigura for illegally exporting highly toxic sludge that ended up dumped in Ivory Coast. The stinking waste was eventually linked to the deaths of 16 people and thousands of illnesses in 2006.
The court also found the company guilty of covering up the hazardous nature of the waste when it first tried to unload its unusually toxic slops, which included high levels of caustic soda, sulfur compounds and hydrogen sulfide, in the port of Amsterdam. The nauseating sludge was pumped back on board after the company balked at treatment costs, and the ship, the Probo Koala, left with its load.
The ship then headed to Ivory Coast, where the sludge was dumped in several areas of Abidjan, the capital.
Trafigura has denied wrongdoing, but in separate settlements it paid $200 million to the Ivory Coast for clean-up and $50 million to close to 30,000 victims and their families. The ruling of the Amsterdam court marks the first time Trafigura has been criminally convicted in the sludge scandal. Another criminal lawsuit in the case is still before a court in The Hague.
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7) E.P.A. Considers Risks of Gas Extraction
"The culprit, these people argued, was hydraulic fracturing, a method of extracting natural gas that involves blasting underground rock with a cocktail of water, sand and chemicals." [Check out the HBO Documentary, "Gasland," it's all about what fracking does to the environment and the people who live in it. Among other horrors, it shows water from someone's kitchen faucet catching on fire when lit by a Bic lighter as it pours out. It's airing on HBO this summer...bw]
By TOM ZELLER Jr.
July 23, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/24/business/energy-environment/24gas.html?ref=us
CANONSBURG, Pa. - The streams of people came to the public meeting here armed with stories of yellowed and foul-smelling well water, deformed livestock, poisoned fish and itchy skin. One resident invoked the 1968 zombie thriller "Night of the Living Dead," which, as it happens, was filmed just an hour away from this southwestern corner of Pennsylvania.
The culprit, these people argued, was hydraulic fracturing, a method of extracting natural gas that involves blasting underground rock with a cocktail of water, sand and chemicals.
Gas companies countered that the horror stories described in Pennsylvania and at other meetings held recently in Texas and Colorado are either fictions or not the companies' fault. More regulation, the industry warned, would kill jobs and stifle production of gas, which the companies consider a clean-burning fuel the nation desperately needs.
Just as the Gulf of Mexico is the battleground for the future of offshore oil drilling, Pennsylvania is at the center of the battle over hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, which promises to open up huge swaths of land for natural gas extraction, but whose environmental risks are still uncertain. Natural gas accounts for roughly a quarter of all energy used in the United States, and that fraction is expected to grow as the nation weans itself from dirtier sources like coal and oil.
The Environmental Protection Agency has been on a listening tour, soliciting advice from all sides on how to shape a forthcoming $1.9 million study of hydraulic fracturing's effect on groundwater.
With the steep environmental costs of fossil fuel extraction apparent on beaches from Texas to Florida - and revelations that industry shortcuts and regulatory negligence may have contributed to the BP catastrophe in the gulf - gas prospectors are finding a cold reception for their assertions that their drilling practices are safe.
"The industry has argued there are no documented cases of hydraulic fracturing contaminating groundwater," said Dencil Backus, a resident of nearby Mt. Pleasant Township, at Thursday night's hearing. "Our experience in southwestern Pennsylvania suggests that this cannot possibly be true."
Matt Pitzarella, a spokesman for Range Resources, a Texas-based natural gas producer, acknowledged that the gulf spill had increased public concern about any sort of drilling activity. "However, when people can review the facts, void of the strong emotions the gulf elicits, they can see the stark contrast between high-risk, deep offshore oil drilling and much safer, much lower risk onshore natural gas development," he said by e-mail.
In this part of the country, the potentially enormous natural gas play of the Marcellus Shale has many residents lining up to lease their land to gas prospectors. Estimates vary on the precise size of the Marcellus Shale, which stretches from West Virginia across much of Pennsylvania and eastern Ohio and into the Southern Tier of New York. But by any estimate, the gas deposit is huge - perhaps as much as 500 trillion cubic feet. (New York State uses a little over 1.1 trillion cubic feet of natural gas each year.)
An industry-financed study published this week suggested that as much as $6 billion in government revenue and up to 280,000 jobs could be at stake in the Marcellus Shale region.
Fracking has been around for decades, and it is an increasingly prominent tool in the effort to unlock previously unreachable gas reserves. The oil and gas industry estimates that 90 percent of the more than 450,000 operating gas wells in the United States rely on hydraulic fracturing.
Roughly 99.5 percent of the fluids typically used in fracking, the industry says, are just water and sand, with trace amounts of chemical thickeners, lubricants and other compounds added to help the process along. The cocktail is injected thousands of feet below the water table and, the industry argues, can't possibly be responsible for growing complaints of spoiled streams and wells. But critics say that the relationship between fracking fluids and groundwater contamination has never been thoroughly studied - and that proving a link has been made more difficult by oil and gas companies that have jealously guarded as trade secrets the exact chemical ingredients used at each well.
Several other concerns linger over fracking, as well as other aspects of gas drilling - including the design and integrity of well casings and the transport and potential spilling of chemicals and the millions of gallons of water required for just one fracking job.
The recent string of accidents in the oil and gas industries - including the gulf spill and a blowout last month at a gas field in Clearfield County, Pa., that spewed gas and wastewater for 16 hours - has unnerved residents and regulators.
"There is extraordinary economic potential associated with the development of Marcellus Shale resources," said Representative Joe Sestak, Democrat of Pennsylvania, in a statement Friday announcing $1 million for a federal study of water use impacts in the Delaware Water Basin. However, "there is also great risk." He said, "One way to ensure proper development is to understand the potential impacts."
Amy Mall, a senior policy analyst with the Natural Resources Defense Council, said the scrutiny was long overdue. "I think it's all helping to shine a spotlight on this entire industry," she said. "Corners are sometimes cut, and regulations simply aren't strong enough."
Fears of fracking's impact on water supplies prompted regulators overseeing the Delaware Water Basin to curtail gas exploration until the effects could be more closely studied. New York State lawmakers are contemplating a moratorium.
At the national level, in addition to the E.P.A. study, a Congressional investigation of gas drilling and fracturing, led by House Energy and Commerce Committee, intensified last week with demands sent to several companies for details on their operations - particularly how they handled the slurry of water and chemicals that flowed back from deep within a well.
A renewed, if unlikely, push is also under way to pass federal legislation that would undo an exemption introduced under the Bush administration that critics say freed hydraulic fracturing from regulation under the Safe Drinking Water Act.
Last month, Wyoming introduced some of the nation's toughest rules governing fracturing, including provisions that require companies to disclose the ingredients in their fracturing fluids to state regulators - though specifically not to the public.
Gas drillers, responding to the increased scrutiny and eyeing the expansive and lucrative new gas plays in Appalachia, are redoubling their efforts to stave off federal oversight, in some cases by softening their rigid positions on fracking-fluid disclosure. Last week, Range Resources went so far as to announce its intent to disclose the contents of its fracking fluids to Pennsylvania regulators and to publish them on the company's Web site.
"We should have done this a long time ago," said Mr. Pitzarella, the Range spokesman. "There are probably no health risks with the concentrations that we're utilizing. But if someone has that concern, then it's real and you have to address it."
Environmental groups welcomed that, but said that clear and broad federal jurisdiction would still be needed.
"Any one accident might not be on the scale of the Deepwater Horizon disaster," said Ms. Mall. "But accidents are happening all the time, and there's no regime in place that broadly protects the health of communities and the surrounding environment where drilling is being done."
That was a common theme at the meeting Thursday night.
"I can take you right now to my neighbors who have lost their water supplies," Mr. Backus said to the handful of E.P.A. regulators on hand. "I can take you also to places where spills have killed fish and other aquatic life."
"Corporations have no conscience," he added. "The E.P.A. must give them that conscience."
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8) Scientists Confirm Underwater Plumes Are From Spill
By JOHN COLLINS RUDOLF
July 23, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/24/science/earth/24plume.html?ref=us
Florida researchers said Friday that they had for the first time conclusively linked vast plumes of microscopic oil droplets drifting in the Gulf of Mexico to the Deepwater Horizon disaster.
The scientists, from the University of South Florida, matched samples taken from the plumes with oil from the leaking well provided by BP. The findings were the first direct confirmation that the plumes were linked to the spill, although federal scientists had said there was overwhelming circumstantial evidence tying them to BP's well.
The discovery of the plumes several weeks into the oil leak alarmed scientists, who feared that clouds of oil particles could wreak havoc on marine life far below the surface. Plumes have been detected as far as 50 miles from the wellhead, although oil concentrations at those distances are extremely low, about 750 parts per billion.
This is well below the level considered acutely toxic for fish and marine organisms, but could still affect eggs and larvae, the scientists fear.
"There are a lot of things that are potentially at risk," said David Hollander, an oceanographer with the University of South Florida who is studying the plumes. "There's not a lot known of the toxic effects of oil on organisms living in deeper waters."
The announcement by the Florida researchers came as federal scientists released their own report on the oil formations. The multiagency report describes the presence of large plumes of microscopic oil droplets within several miles of the wellhead at a depth of 3,280 to 4,265 feet. Oil concentrations there are as high as 10 parts per million, or the equivalent of one tablespoon of oil in 130 gallons of water.
The plumes closest to the well may be concentrated enough to pose a threat to nearby deepwater coral reefs, which host a diversity of ocean life, said Steve Murawski, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's chief scientist for the spill response. "We know that even low concentrations can be harmful to the eggs and larvae of the deep coral," he said.
The federal report also described a drop in dissolved oxygen levels in deep water near the well, which it said probably resulted from the rapid reproduction of oil-eating microbes. Yet the reduction did not signal conditions that could cause a die-off in sea life, the report concluded.
The ultimate impact of the oil plumes on sea life in the gulf remains open to debate. A plume has been found near DeSoto Canyon, an underwater valley south of the Florida Panhandle where ocean currents push nutrient-rich water up onto the continental shelf. Some scientists fear that oil, even in the low concentrations found in the plumes, could be driven into the shelf's life-rich shallow waters and cause harm.
"It's almost an express route up there," Dr. Hollander said. "That's what raises the concerns of the biologists."
Yet federal scientists say they believe that the oil concentrations in the deepwater plumes are too low to have much of an effect on the gulf's commercially valuable fisheries.
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9) School Chief Dismisses 241 Teachers in Washington
By TAMAR LEWIN
July 23, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/24/education/24teachers.html?ref=education
Michelle Rhee, the reform-minded chancellor who took over the District of Columbia public schools three years ago, on Friday fired 241 teachers, or 5 percent of the district's total. All but a few of those dismissed had received the lowest rating under a new evaluation system that for the first time held them accountable for their students' standardized test scores.
"Every child in a District of Columbia public school has a right to a highly effective teacher - in every classroom, of every school, of every neighborhood, of every ward, in this city," the chancellor said in a statement. "That is our commitment."
All told, the district terminated 302 employees - 226 for poor performance, and 76 for other problems like not having the licensing required by the No Child Left Behind act. Besides the 241 teachers, those dismissed were librarians, counselors, custodians and other employees.
An additional 737 employees were put on notice that they had been rated "minimally effective," the second-lowest category, and would have one year to improve their performance or be fired.
In the years before Ms. Rhee took over the district, almost all the teachers had high performance ratings and almost none were fired, but students, on average, had low achievement levels.
George Parker, the president of the Washington Teachers' Union, said the union would challenge the firings. The union has taken issue with the evaluation system Ms. Rhee used, saying that it was designed more for punishing teachers than helping them improve.
Randi Weingarten, the president of the American Federation of Teachers, also criticized the evaluation system and what she called the chancellor's "destructive cycle of hire, fire, repeat."
"Evaluations should include a component of student learning, of course, but there also has to be teacher development and support," Ms. Weingarten said. "It can't just be a 'gotcha' system, like the one in D.C."
As part of the Obama administration's focus on teacher effectiveness, Education Secretary Arne Duncan has pushed states to develop evaluation and pay models that link teacher ratings to their students' test scores. States that use such models get points that increase their chances of winning part of the department's $3.4 billion Race to the Top grant pool.
Since becoming chancellor in June 2007, Ms. Rhee has been intent on controlling how teachers in the district - known for a long history of low-performing schools - are managed, paid and, if necessary, fired.
Friday's dismissals were not the chancellor's first. In the 2007-8 school year, a district spokesman said, 79 teachers were fired for poor performance, and in 2008-9, 96 were. Also, after hiring more than 500 new teachers in the spring and summer of 2009, Ms. Rhee laid off 266 educators in the fall, citing budget problems. The union has filed suit challenging those dismissals.
Last month, the teachers' union and the District Council approved a contract that weakened teachers' seniority protection, in return for 20 percent raises and bonuses of $20,000 to $30,000 for teachers who meet certain standards, including rising test scores.
Only 16 percent of the teachers evaluated were rated in the top category, "highly effective."
A spokesman for the district said that starting the new school year with a full complement of teachers would not be a problem because a pool of several hundred applicants had already been screened.
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10) How Profits, Stocks Can Rise as Economy Stumbles
"Corporate margins, or profits per sale, are hovering near 12 percent now, by one measure -- tantalizingly close to a half-century high. ...It's an old story, really. Companies cut workers in a downturn, and squeeze more out of those remaining."
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
July 25, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2010/07/25/business/AP-US-Wall-Street-Week-Ahead.html?hp
Filed at 1:01 p.m. ET
NEW YORK (AP) -- With earnings season in full swing, bulls and bears are combing through reports to arm themselves in what's become the mother of all stock market debates: Does the recovery gain steam, sending shares aloft? Or does it remain sluggish, or even stall, and push them down further?
A third possibility: Maybe the economy doesn't matter so much.
Larry Hatheway, an economist at UBS, says economic growth means companies selling more things. But he thinks that is not as important as it used to be to generating the profits needed to send stocks higher. That's because U.S. firms have mastered the art of pulling more and more money from each dollar of sales.
One gauge of that success: Corporate margins, or profits per sale, are hovering near 12 percent now, by one measure -- tantalizingly close to a half-century high.
''As long as we don't fall into another recession, it's a good time to make money,'' says Hatheway, who's bullish on stocks. ''We're able to squeeze more profits out of sales than we were twenty or thirty years ago.''
Though just a third of companies in the Standard & Poor's 500 have reported quarterly earnings results so far, the picture is impressive. Profits are booming. Eight out of ten companies have beat earnings expectations, according to Thomson Reuters. The average jump in profits is 33 percent.
It's an old story, really. Companies cut workers in a downturn, and squeeze more out of those remaining. And so profitability rises smartly -- only to fall again in the recovery as sales and payrolls rise once more.
But Hatheway says margins will stay high for a while yet because the forces that pushed them there aren't going away anytime soon.
He says high unemployment is likely to stick around longer than in typical recoveries. And while that's bad for the economy, it's good for margins. ''Firms can pick good employees and dictate compensation,'' he says.
U.S. companies also have learned to squeeze more from their equipment and factories, not just their workers, he says. They kept their spending on such things low even before the recession. They feared a repeat of the booming 1990s when they spent wildly on equipment like telecommunications gear -- only to discover they didn't need all of it.
Hatheway says globalization has helped, too. Companies outsource much work abroad and draw supplies from numerous sources now as trade has boomed, which helps keep costs down. Growth abroad has boosted exports, too. That makes the fate of U.S. profits, and margins, less tied to U.S. growth.
The result: Though profit margins will rise and fall as they always have done, the highs and the lows are higher, Hatheway says. He defines margins as total U.S. corporate profit divided by the country's gross domestic product.
''I see lows now of maybe 9 percent,'' he says, a point or two higher than margins during most of the 70s and 80s. He adds that falling margins are ''far in the future'' -- perhaps four years away.
Not everyone is convinced.
Legendary investor Jeremy Grantham, the Boston money manager who called the housing bust years ago, has been telling investors for months now that profit margins will fall from their perch, sending stocks tumbling. Andrew Smithers of London researcher Smithers & Co. wrote a report warning of the same. John Hussman of the Hussman Funds wrote this month that investors buying stocks on the belief that fat margins will last are destined to ''walk themselves over a cliff.''
''The dark side of margins is that they're going to have to come down,'' says Claus Vistesen, an economist at the University of Hull in England. He adds, ominously, ''And the market hasn't fully priced this.''
Hatheway, for his part, isn't backing down.
''If you give me slow growth and high unemployment, I can give you high earnings,'' he says. ''The stock market is not the economy.''
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11) Where Oysters Grew on Trees
By ROWAN JACOBSEN and MICHAEL BECK
July 24, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/25/opinion/25jacobsen.html
NOT long after the first European explorers encountered the Gulf of Mexico, word filtered back to the Continent that along this warm, exotic coastline, oysters grew on trees.
This caught the European imagination. Imagine a place so abundant that the oysters grow on trees! There was even a kernel of truth to it: the trees in question were mangroves, and in Florida oysters indeed did grow on their roots in the tidal zone. More often, the oysters thrived at the margins of the seemingly limitless marshes that stretched to the horizon, perched between sea and sky.
There was also a second, more important truth underpinning this tale: the gulf really was a paradise of abundance. Where else do you have a river the size of the Mississippi draining a region as fertile as the Midwestern heartland into a well-enclosed body of water as warm as the Gulf of Mexico? This is why the gulf has continued, despite the damage we have done to it, to produce marine life at astonishing rates. With its bounteous populations of mollusks, shrimp and finfish, the gulf holds one of the best supplies of health food on the planet and has been a natural engine of prosperity.
Key to the gulf's productivity are its marshes, the nurseries of the sea. Fed by the regular supply of sediment washed over them by the Mississippi and its distributaries, the marshes have built up over 5,000 years into the vast network of estuaries we know today. Tucked safely into its marshes, sea-grass meadows, oyster reefs and other critical habitats form the base of the marine food chain.
We think of fish as living throughout the oceans, but most of the action happens close to shore where the food is. Indeed, 97 percent of the commercial catch of fish species in the gulf depends on its estuaries and their nursery habitats for survival. To take just one example, the gulf's famous shrimp - which account for 73 percent of the nation's total harvest and hundreds of millions of dollars in dockside revenue alone - lay their eggs in the open gulf, but then their hatched larvae head for the estuaries, where they live in salt marshes until they are ready to return to the open water as adults. No salt marshes, no shrimp. No estuaries, no fish.
The animal most responsible for maintaining the integrity of these estuaries is the oyster, which provides much more than New Orleans's most delectable appetizer. Oysters occur in great abundance in the gulf's shallow coastal waters. By gluing themselves to each other's shells, they create reefs - much like coral reefs - that literally hold the coastal ecosystem together.
Oyster reefs form a living breakwater that protects the soft marsh shorelines from erosion and storm damage. They also serve as the condominiums of the sea, providing intricate habitats and hiding places for many small and juvenile creatures at the foundation of the gulf food web. Studies show that the commercial value of the gulf's oysters (more than $60 million dollars per year, about 67 percent of the nation's total) is easily surpassed by the commercial value of the fish that need these reefs.
There are few other places on earth still like this. Worldwide, 85 percent of oyster reefs have been lost. They are the single most imperiled marine habitat. The oyster reefs of the gulf are not merely the best in the nation; they are the best in the world, a global treasure. Yet some 50 percent to 90 percent of the gulf's oyster reefs have been lost, and that was before BP's oil spill.
The marshes, too, are in sharp decline. The Mississippi River levee system, completed after the Great Flood of 1927, helped control flooding by shunting much of the river's water deep into the gulf, but it also robbed the marshes of the sediments they need to replenish themselves. The thousands of miles of canals dug through the wetlands by the oil industry in its search for new reservoirs further eroded the marshes. A football field of land disappears into the gulf every half hour. The fastest-shrinking area is the Barataria-Terrebonne estuary, west of the Mississippi River Delta, which has been hit hard with oil from the Deepwater Horizon.
Paradoxically, before the oil spill, scientists had come to a consensus that the only place on earth offering a realistic opportunity for oyster reef restoration on a scale that could support a truly sustainable fishery was the Gulf of Mexico. But there had never been the political will for such a project. Now that the spill has brought such attention to the Gulf Coast, perhaps we can agree to the kind of national response that has been needed for so long.
Just cleaning up the spill will not be sufficient. Federal, state and local governments have written many plans for restoration of the gulf, beginning even before Hurricane Katrina, but none were intended to do more than slow the losses. We should get off the defensive and come up with a winning vision of coastal restoration.
The work would start in the Mississippi River Delta, where we need to re-engineer levees to divert a portion of water flow so that the valuable sediment can spill out of it. When done properly, such diversions can be carefully controlled to have little impact on shipping or flood control.
It's a tremendous undertaking, though: large-scale marsh restoration requires scores of barge and backhoe operators, as well as engineers, to create the diversions, distribute the sediment, grade the marsh banks, and maximize the inlets and channels that make a healthy, productive marsh. (What matters to estuarine creatures like shrimp is not the total area of the marsh - shrimp can't travel inland - but rather the amount of habitat on the marsh's edge.)
As for the oyster reefs, we need to think of them as an investment: rebuild the natural capital and harvest only the yearly interest, leaving the principal untouched. Crews will be needed to load and haul oyster shells and to manufacture artificial reef blocks that create the base of new reefs. Many of these workers, and the small-business owners who will support the effort, would be the same people whose jobs have been destroyed by the spill.
An example of such oyster reef restoration began April 5 off Mobile, Ala. A $2.9 million grant that was part of the Obama administration's stimulus package is paying for the creation of 1.5 miles of oyster reefs, which will protect 30 acres of sea-grass beds and two miles of shoreline. The project has already created 35 jobs, as workers fabricated concrete and steel frameworks to serve as the foundation of the new reefs, then carried the new material by barge and put it in place, along with many tons of oyster shells, at the project site.
How much would it cost to do this on an ecosystem-wide scale? Before Hurricane Katrina, the initial price tag for restoring the Mississippi River Delta was $17 billion, and given the damage of the storm and oil spill, it would be vastly more expensive today. But in the long run, the benefits would outweigh the tremendous outlay.
And the spill gives us some new options for financing the project. The White House and Congress are considering increasing the fees paid into the Oil Spill Liability Trust Fund by all oil companies on each barrel of oil produced in or imported to the United States. As of now, money from the fund is used to cover only direct damages and cleanup costs, not past damage associated with the extraction and shipping of natural resources. Any increases in the fees should also include provisions to support a long-term coastal restoration fund.
It would be the kind of smart government intervention that creates jobs, lifts the economy and improves quality of life. The long-suffering people of the Gulf Coast deserve no less.
Rowan Jacobsen is the author of "The Living Shore: Rediscovering a Lost World" and the forthcoming book "A Shadow on the Gulf." Michael Beck is a senior scientist with the Nature Conservancy.
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12) The War: A Trillion Can Be Cheap
"...the annual cost today is $1.1 million per man or woman in uniform in Afghanistan versus an adjusted $67,000 per year for troops in World War II and $132,000 in Vietnam."
By ELISABETH BUMILLER
July 24, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/25/weekinreview/25bumiller.html?ref=world
WASHINGTON - Like everything else, war is a lot more expensive than it used to be.
The conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan have cost Americans a staggering $1 trillion to date, second only in inflation-adjusted dollars to the $4 trillion price tag for World War II, when the United States put 16 million men and women into uniform and fought on three continents.
Sticker shock is the inevitable first reaction to the latest statistics on the costs of all major United States wars since the American Revolution, compiled by the Congressional Research Service and released late last month, and the figures promise to play into intensifying political and economic pressures to restrain the Pentagon budget.
Still, 21st-century technology is an obvious explanation for why two relatively small (although long) wars in developing societies like Iraq and Afghanistan are so expensive. As Stephen Daggett, a specialist in defense policy and budgets, writes in the Congressional Research Service report, in the Revolutionary War "the most sophisticated weaponry was a 36-gun frigate that is hardly comparable to a modern $3.5 billion destroyer."
A second look at the numbers shows another story underneath. In 2008, the peak year so far of war spending for Iraq and Afghanistan, the costs amounted to only 1.2 percent of America's gross domestic product. During the peak year of spending on World War II, 1945, the costs came to nearly 36 percent of G.D.P.
The reason is the immense growth, and seemingly limitless credit, of the United States economy over the last 65 years, as compared to the sacrifice and unity required to wring $4 trillion from a much smaller economy to wage the earlier war. To some historians, the difference is troubling.
"The army is at war, but the country is not," said David M. Kennedy, the Stanford University historian. "We have managed to create and field an armed force that can engage in very, very lethal warfare without the society in whose name it fights breaking a sweat." The result, he said, is "a moral hazard for the political leadership to resort to force in the knowledge that civil society will not be deeply disturbed."
A corollary is that taxes have not been raised to pay for Iraq and Afghanistan - the first time that has happened in an American war since the Revolution, when there was not yet a country to impose them. Rightly or wrongly, that has further cut American civilians off from the two wars on the opposite side of the world.
Before the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, "Americans were called upon by their leaders to pay higher taxes during a war, and grumbling or not grumbling, they did it," said Robert D. Hormats, the under secretary of state for economic, energy and agricultural affairs and the author of "The Price of Liberty: Paying for America's Wars."
In terms of costs per warrior, the current wars appear to be the most expensive ever, according to Todd Harrison, a senior fellow for defense budget studies at the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments. Working independently of the Pentagon and of the Congressional study, and using computations based on the number of troops committed to the actual conduct of war at any one time, he estimates that the annual cost today is $1.1 million per man or woman in uniform in Afghanistan versus an adjusted $67,000 per year for troops in World War II and $132,000 in Vietnam.
Although technology is the driving factor, along with the logistical expense of moving equipment over the treacherous and landlocked Afghan terrain, costs per soldier have also risen because of the price of maintaining a better-trained and higher-paid force. "We're not just pulling random guys off the street and sending them off to war like we did in the past," Mr. Harrison said.
A last story in the numbers: A quick calculation shows that the United States has been at war for 47 of its 230 years, or 20 percent of its history. Put another way, Americans have been at war one year out of every five.
"You know, it's a surprise to me that it's that high," said Mr. Daggett, who has focused on the cost, not length, of wars. "You think of war as not being the usual state."
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13) Daring to Pose a Challenge to the Oil Culture
"We are constantly told, 'You have to adapt to coastal land loss, you have to adapt because of the oil leak, you have to adapt to the new situation,' " she said. "When is our government going to adapt to new energy sources that aren't harmful to our environment and the people who depend upon the environment?"
By AMY HARMON
July 24, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/25/us/25voices.html?ref=us
DULAC, La. - In this region so threatened by the BP oil spill, it has often seemed to residents that the only thing worse than losing tens of thousands of seafood industry jobs would be to lose their other major job source: the oil industry.
Gov. Bobby Jindal, a Republican, has called the Obama administration's moratorium on offshore drilling "a second man-made disaster"; fishermen mourn the destruction of their way of life and defend Big Oil in the same breath; environmentalists call for restoring the battered coastline, not changing the national energy policy.
So when Patty Whitney, a community organizer here in Terrebonne Parish, asked a question at a recent conference about the state of the Louisiana coast, it was all she could do to keep her voice from shaking.
"We are constantly told, 'You have to adapt to coastal land loss, you have to adapt because of the oil leak, you have to adapt to the new situation,' " she said. "When is our government going to adapt to new energy sources that aren't harmful to our environment and the people who depend upon the environment?"
On the stage, the panel of engineers and environmental policy makers looked at one another. "Who would like to take that question?" the moderator asked.
The conference was financed by the state and by private donors - including the oil conglomerate ConocoPhillips, one of the region's biggest landowners.
"You must be very brave," another attendee, a professor at a local university, told Ms. Whitney during the break.
"Or very dumb," she replied.
Born and raised in Houma, one of a family of 10, Ms. Whitney, 58, has long considered herself a closet radical when it comes to oil. Her mission at the grass-roots interfaith group Bisco is to help the disparate and largely disenfranchised groups in this region - African-Americans, Cajuns, American Indians - develop a political voice. As such, she has tried to keep her own mostly to herself.
But that is not easy for a Southerner with a gift of gab, a self-taught historian and a mother of three who takes umbrage at how the sugar companies, the fur companies and the oil companies have each come to the region and extracted its bounty.
"America needs oil, Patty," a brother who is an engineer for an oil company told her at a recent family gathering.
"Then let them drill," she retorted. "Let them drill in Yellowstone Park, in the Grand Canyon, in Puget Sound, off Martha's Vineyard. Let them mess up their own places instead of just drilling in my beautiful Louisiana."
And the spill, whose scope is still unknown, has prompted snippets of surprising conversations on the subject, even as the Senate on Thursday scrapped plans to take up a major climate change bill. Someone in church heard Ms. Whitney talking about the benefits of wind power the other week and signaled his agreement. Same with a woman in one of her community organizing networks.
"It's at the point where people would consider talking about it, where before it was close to blasphemy," Ms. Whitney said. "Me personally, I really and truly think the time is here, that even though it's radical for this area, the idea of developing an alternative energy policy has come."
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14) Reports Detail Pornography Investigation
"A federal investigation has accused dozens of military officials and defense contractors, including some with top-level security clearances, of buying and downloading child pornography on private or government computers."
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
July 24, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/25/us/25porn.html?ref=us
WASHINGTON (AP) - A federal investigation has accused dozens of military officials and defense contractors, including some with top-level security clearances, of buying and downloading child pornography on private or government computers.
The Pentagon on Friday released investigative reports spanning almost a decade that implicated people working with agencies handling some of the nation's most closely guarded secrets, including the National Security Agency.
Defense workers who bought child pornography put the Department of Defense, "the military and national security at risk by compromising computer systems, military installations and security clearances," a 2007 investigative report said.
The suspects also put the Defense Department "at risk of blackmail, bribery and threats," one report added.
The Boston Globe disclosed the results of the investigations on Friday.
Several suspects were convicted and sentenced to prison terms of about five years and ordered to pay hefty fines, including one of $150,000. But several others identified by investigators were never prosecuted.
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15) Toxic legacy of US assault on Fallujah 'worse than Hiroshima'
The shocking rates of infant mortality and cancer in Iraqi city raise new questions about battle
"Dramatic increases in infant mortality, cancer and leukaemia in the Iraqi city of Fallujah, which was bombarded by US Marines in 2004, exceed those reported by survivors of the atomic bombs that were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945, according to a new study."
By Patrick Cockburn
Saturday, 24 July 2010
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/toxic-legacy-of-us-assault-on-fallujah-worse-than-hiroshima-2034065.html
Dramatic increases in infant mortality, cancer and leukaemia in the Iraqi city of Fallujah, which was bombarded by US Marines in 2004, exceed those reported by survivors of the atomic bombs that were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945, according to a new study.
Iraqi doctors in Fallujah have complained since 2005 of being overwhelmed by the number of babies with serious birth defects, ranging from a girl born with two heads to paralysis of the lower limbs. They said they were also seeing far more cancers than they did before the battle for Fallujah between US troops and insurgents.
Their claims have been supported by a survey showing a four-fold increase in all cancers and a 12-fold increase in childhood cancer in under-14s. Infant mortality in the city is more than four times higher than in neighbouring Jordan and eight times higher than in Kuwait.
Dr Chris Busby, a visiting professor at the University of Ulster and one of the authors of the survey of 4,800 individuals in Fallujah, said it is difficult to pin down the exact cause of the cancers and birth defects. He added that "to produce an effect like this, some very major mutagenic exposure must have occurred in 2004 when the attacks happened".
US Marines first besieged and bombarded Fallujah, 30 miles west of Baghdad, in April 2004 after four employees of the American security company Blackwater were killed and their bodies burned. After an eight-month stand-off, the Marines stormed the city in November using artillery and aerial bombing against rebel positions. US forces later admitted that they had employed white phosphorus as well as other munitions.
In the assault US commanders largely treated Fallujah as a free-fire zone to try to reduce casualties among their own troops. British officers were appalled by the lack of concern for civilian casualties. "During preparatory operations in the November 2004 Fallujah clearance operation, on one night over 40 155mm artillery rounds were fired into a small sector of the city," recalled Brigadier Nigel Aylwin-Foster, a British commander serving with the American forces in Baghdad.
He added that the US commander who ordered this devastating use of firepower did not consider it significant enough to mention it in his daily report to the US general in command. Dr Busby says that while he cannot identify the type of armaments used by the Marines, the extent of genetic damage suffered by inhabitants suggests the use of uranium in some form. He said: "My guess is that they used a new weapon against buildings to break through walls and kill those inside."
The survey was carried out by a team of 11 researchers in January and February this year who visited 711 houses in Fallujah. A questionnaire was filled in by householders giving details of cancers, birth outcomes and infant mortality. Hitherto the Iraqi government has been loath to respond to complaints from civilians about damage to their health during military operations.
Researchers were initially regarded with some suspicion by locals, particularly after a Baghdad television station broadcast a report saying a survey was being carried out by terrorists and anybody conducting it or answering questions would be arrested. Those organising the survey subsequently arranged to be accompanied by a person of standing in the community to allay suspicions.
The study, entitled "Cancer, Infant Mortality and Birth Sex-Ratio in Fallujah, Iraq 2005-2009", is by Dr Busby, Malak Hamdan and Entesar Ariabi, and concludes that anecdotal evidence of a sharp rise in cancer and congenital birth defects is correct. Infant mortality was found to be 80 per 1,000 births compared to 19 in Egypt, 17 in Jordan and 9.7 in Kuwait. The report says that the types of cancer are "similar to that in the Hiroshima survivors who were exposed to ionising radiation from the bomb and uranium in the fallout".
Researchers found a 38-fold increase in leukaemia, a ten-fold increase in female breast cancer and significant increases in lymphoma and brain tumours in adults. At Hiroshima survivors showed a 17-fold increase in leukaemia, but in Fallujah Dr Busby says what is striking is not only the greater prevalence of cancer but the speed with which it was affecting people.
Of particular significance was the finding that the sex ratio between newborn boys and girls had changed. In a normal population this is 1,050 boys born to 1,000 girls, but for those born from 2005 there was an 18 per cent drop in male births, so the ratio was 850 males to 1,000 females. The sex-ratio is an indicator of genetic damage that affects boys more than girls. A similar change in the sex-ratio was discovered after Hiroshima.
The US cut back on its use of firepower in Iraq from 2007 because of the anger it provoked among civilians. But at the same time there has been a decline in healthcare and sanitary conditions in Iraq since 2003. The impact of war on civilians was more severe in Fallujah than anywhere else in Iraq because the city continued to be blockaded and cut off from the rest of the country long after 2004. War damage was only slowly repaired and people from the city were frightened to go to hospitals in Baghdad because of military checkpoints on the road into the capital.
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16) BP Hides Use of Black Prison Labor For Oil Gusher Cleanup
"She describes a shipping container that sits at the turn-off for the Venice Boat Harbor, advertising 'Jails to Go.' Such containers work as contract labor housing for work release prisoners, with bunks inside, bars on the windows, and deadbolts on the doors."
Posted by Jan Frel on @ 11:49 am
http://blogs.alternet.org/speakeasy/2010/07/23/bp-hides-use-of-black-prison-labor-for-oil-gusher-cleanup/
Fascinating post from DailyKos by Patriot Daily News Clearinghouse:
When the BP oil gusher mess first began, BP hired prison labor in order to reap tax benefits instead of hiring coastal residents whose livelihoods crashed with the explosion of the wellhead. When the community expressed their outrage, BP did not stop the practice of using prison labor. No, apparently BP simply tried to literally cover-up the use of prison labor by changing the clothing worn by the inmates to give the appearance of a civilian workforce. Big surprise.
According to The Nation article, during the first few days of this cleanup, cleanup workers for Louisiana beaches wore "scarlet pants and white t-shirts with the words 'Inmate Labor' printed in large red block letters." This is how coastal residents learned that BP hired prison labor rather than them. After community outrage was expressed at public meetings, the "outfits disappeared overnight."
However, Abe Louise Young, author of the article in The Nation, was not convinced that BP had actually stopped using prison labor in Grand Isle, Louisiana because "nine out of ten residents are white, [but] the cleanup workers are almost exclusively African-American men." Ben Jealous, the president of NAACP, also demanded to know "why black people were over-represented in 'the most physically difficult, lowest paying jobs, with the most significant exposure to toxins.'"
So, was BP still using prison labor? Federal and state officials did not know, but said to Young: "They were all stumped. Were inmates doing shore protection or oil cleanup work? They had no idea. In fact, they said, they'd like to know-would I call them if I found out?"
The answer is yes, BP just changed their work attire to hide the fact of a prison work force:
"I got an answer one evening earlier this month, when I drove up the gravel driveway of the Lafourche Parish Work Release Center jail, just off Highway 90, halfway between New Orleans and Houma. Men were returning from a long day of shoveling oil-soaked sand into black trash bags in the sweltering heat. Wearing BP shirts, jeans and rubber boots (nothing identifying them as inmates), they arrived back at the jail in unmarked white vans, looking dog tired."
The inmates really can't make a voluntary choice to perform dangerous work that might ruin their health. "Although the dangers of mixed oil and dispersant exposure are largely unknown, the chemicals in crude oil can damage every system in the body, as well as cell structures and DNA." Inmates don't have the option to "pick and choose their work assignments" and can face repercussions for rejecting a job, including the loss of earned good time. Thus, inmates face the dilemma of protecting their health by refusing this work or staying longer in prison.
When Young tried to find out how many of the 20,000 prisoners "housed outside of state prisons" were performing BP spill work, an official with the Louisiana Department of Corrections (DOC) tried to discourage Young from pursuing this inquiry. Prison officials were also not helpful, one warden refused to discuss the issue, stating: "You want me to lose my job?"
Some government officials did provide confirmation of the prison labor force. "A lieutenant in the Plaquemines Parish Sheriff's Office told me that three crews of inmates were sandbagging in Buras, Louisiana in case oil hit there." In early May, Gov. Jindal sent out a press release "heralding the training of eighty inmates for "cleaning of oil-impacted wildlife recovered from coastal areas." And, a warden with one work release center confirmed that 18 prisoners were "currently assigned to oil spill work."
"Also a member of Critical Resistance New Orleans, Keller says, it is 'common knowledge' that prisoners are doing cleanup. 'If you talk to anyone working on the beach they'll tell you, yes, prisoners are working here.' She describes a shipping container that sits at the turn-off for the Venice Boat Harbor, advertising 'Jails to Go.' Such containers work as contract labor housing for work release prisoners, with bunks inside, bars on the windows, and deadbolts on the doors."
Naturally, there is a money angle. BP benefits from the use of a cheap labor force that is easily silenced and also the bounty of tax credits and a partial "kickback" of wages paid:
"The advantage for private companies is that trustees are covered under Work Opportunity Tax Credit, a holdover from Bush's Welfare to Work legislation that rewards private-sector employers for hiring risky 'target groups.' Businesses earn a tax credit of $2,400 for every work release inmate they hire. On top of that, they can earn back up to 40 percent of the wages they pay annually to 'target group workers.'"
Yet, who will provide or pay for health care of prisoners now and down the road if the prisoners become ill?:
"Prisoners are already subject to well-documented health care deprivations while incarcerated, and are unlikely to have health insurance after release. Work release positions are covered by Worker's Compensation insurance, but pursuing claims long after exposure could be a Kafkaesque task. Besides, there is currently no system for tracking the medical impact of oil and dispersant exposure in cleanup workers or affected communities."
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17) BP's Hiring of Prison Labor Cleanup Scrutinized
Democracynow.org
July 23, 2010
http://www.democracynow.org/2010/7/23/headlines#3
The Nation magazine has revealed new details about how BP is receiving tax credits by relying on cheap or free prison labor to help clean up the Gulf spill. BP's reliance on prison labor has been criticized by many in the region since the disaster has left so many people out of work. But the hiring of prison labor has apparently been financially beneficial for BP. Each new prisoner hired by BP comes with a tax credit of $2,400. On top of that, BP may earn back up to 40 percent of the wages they pay to prisoners. Prison workers are required to work up to twelve hours a day, six days a week, and are liable to lose earned good time if they refuse the job. Inmates are also forbidden to talk to the public or media. It is unclear how many prisoners are working on the cleanup, in part because they now wear unidentifiable clothing. In the days after the spill, prison workers were seen wearing scarlet pants and white T-shirts with the words "Inmate Labor" printed in large red block letters.
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18) BP denies 'buying silence' of oil spill scientists
Oil giant says it is just keeping company data confidential, as it faces 200 federal civil lawsuits over spill
"Cary Nelson, president of the American Association of University Professors, criticised the contract. He told the BBC: 'This is really one huge corporation trying to buy faculty silence in a comprehensive way.'"
Mark Tran
guardian.co.uk, Friday 23 July 2010 10.27 BST
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/jul/23/bp-oil-spill-scientists-silence
BP has rejected accusations of muzzling the scientists and academics it has hired to help fight hundreds of lawsuits relating to the Gulf of Mexico oil spill.
The American Association of University Professors claims the oil giant is seeking to "buy the silence" of the scientific community in its fight against litigation.
But BP says it is only protecting confidential information and is not trying to prevent the discussion of scientific data.
A copy of the contract issued by BP to scientists, obtained by the BBC, says they cannot publish the research they conduct for BP or speak about the data for at least three years, or until the government gives the final approval to the company's restoration plan for the gulf.
It also states that scientists may perform research for other agencies only so long as it does not conflict with the work they are doing for BP, and that they must take instructions from lawyers offering the contracts and other in-house counsel at the oil company.
Cary Nelson, president of the American Association of University Professors, criticised the contract. He told the BBC: "This is really one huge corporation trying to buy faculty silence in a comprehensive way."
Bob Shipp, head of marine sciences at the University of South Alabama and one of the scientists approached by BP's lawyers, said the company wanted to hire his whole department.
"They contacted me and said we would like to have your department interact to develop the best restoration plan possible after this oil spill," he said. "We laid the ground rules - that any research we did, we would have to take total control of the data, transparency and the freedom to make those data available to other scientists and subject to peer review. They left and we never heard back from them."
BP said that it had hired a number of experts to help with the lawsuits, as well as a number of national and local scientists with expertise in the resources of the gulf of Mexico to help in restoration work.
"These scientists are helping us collect and understand data about the impacts of the oil spill on the natural resources and to plan for restoration of those resources," BP said.
"As is customary, we have asked these experts (more than a dozen) to treat information from BP counsel as confidential. However, BP does not take the position that environmental data are confidential.
"Moreover, BP does not place restrictions on academics speaking about scientific data."
Seven federal judges next week will meet attorneys in Boise, Idaho, to try and decide whether or how to consolidate more than 200 federal civil lawsuits filed by a range of claimants, from fishermen to injured rig workers, oil-rig owner Transocean and other contractors tied to the spill.
The judges will consider two key questions: where the cases will be heard and who will preside over them.
The lawsuits range from civil racketeering and personal-injury suits to claims from out-of-work shrimpers and owners of now-vacant hotels on the gulf shore.
The cost of the spill to BP has already exceeded $3.1bn (£2bn), and the company has pledged some of its assets as security to the US government while it builds up a promised $20bn compensation fund. Analysts at Goldman Sachs estimate the final bill for the disaster caused by the explosion on the Deepwater Horizon rig, which killed 11 workers, could run to $70bn.
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19) Who Cooked the Planet?
By PAUL KRUGMAN
July 25, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/26/opinion/26krugman.html?hp
Never say that the gods lack a sense of humor. I bet they're still chuckling on Olympus over the decision to make the first half of 2010 - the year in which all hope of action to limit climate change died - the hottest such stretch on record.
Of course, you can't infer trends in global temperatures from one year's experience. But ignoring that fact has long been one of the favorite tricks of climate-change deniers: they point to an unusually warm year in the past, and say "See, the planet has been cooling, not warming, since 1998!" Actually, 2005, not 1998, was the warmest year to date - but the point is that the record-breaking temperatures we're currently experiencing have made a nonsense argument even more nonsensical; at this point it doesn't work even on its own terms.
But will any of the deniers say "O.K., I guess I was wrong," and support climate action? No. And the planet will continue to cook.
So why didn't climate-change legislation get through the Senate? Let's talk first about what didn't cause the failure, because there have been many attempts to blame the wrong people.
First of all, we didn't fail to act because of legitimate doubts about the science. Every piece of valid evidence - long-term temperature averages that smooth out year-to-year fluctuations, Arctic sea ice volume, melting of glaciers, the ratio of record highs to record lows - points to a continuing, and quite possibly accelerating, rise in global temperatures.
Nor is this evidence tainted by scientific misbehavior. You've probably heard about the accusations leveled against climate researchers - allegations of fabricated data, the supposedly damning e-mail messages of "Climategate," and so on. What you may not have heard, because it has received much less publicity, is that every one of these supposed scandals was eventually unmasked as a fraud concocted by opponents of climate action, then bought into by many in the news media. You don't believe such things can happen? Think Shirley Sherrod.
Did reasonable concerns about the economic impact of climate legislation block action? No. It has always been funny, in a gallows humor sort of way, to watch conservatives who laud the limitless power and flexibility of markets turn around and insist that the economy would collapse if we were to put a price on carbon. All serious estimates suggest that we could phase in limits on greenhouse gas emissions with at most a small impact on the economy's growth rate.
So it wasn't the science, the scientists, or the economics that killed action on climate change. What was it?
The answer is, the usual suspects: greed and cowardice.
If you want to understand opposition to climate action, follow the money. The economy as a whole wouldn't be significantly hurt if we put a price on carbon, but certain industries - above all, the coal and oil industries - would. And those industries have mounted a huge disinformation campaign to protect their bottom lines.
Look at the scientists who question the consensus on climate change; look at the organizations pushing fake scandals; look at the think tanks claiming that any effort to limit emissions would cripple the economy. Again and again, you'll find that they're on the receiving end of a pipeline of funding that starts with big energy companies, like Exxon Mobil, which has spent tens of millions of dollars promoting climate-change denial, or Koch Industries, which has been sponsoring anti-environmental organizations for two decades.
Or look at the politicians who have been most vociferously opposed to climate action. Where do they get much of their campaign money? You already know the answer.
By itself, however, greed wouldn't have triumphed. It needed the aid of cowardice - above all, the cowardice of politicians who know how big a threat global warming poses, who supported action in the past, but who deserted their posts at the crucial moment.
There are a number of such climate cowards, but let me single out one in particular: Senator John McCain.
There was a time when Mr. McCain was considered a friend of the environment. Back in 2003 he burnished his maverick image by co-sponsoring legislation that would have created a cap-and-trade system for greenhouse gas emissions. He reaffirmed support for such a system during his presidential campaign, and things might look very different now if he had continued to back climate action once his opponent was in the White House. But he didn't - and it's hard to see his switch as anything other than the act of a man willing to sacrifice his principles, and humanity's future, for the sake of a few years added to his political career.
Alas, Mr. McCain wasn't alone; and there will be no climate bill. Greed, aided by cowardice, has triumphed. And the whole world will pay the price.
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20) Israel's Fingerprints Surface
The Hariri Assassination
By RANNIE AMIRI
July 23 - 25, 2010
http://counterpunch.org/amiri07232010.html
In the Middle East, the link between political machinations, espionage and assassination is either clear as day, or clear as mud.
As for the yet unsolved case of the February 2005 murder of Lebanese Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri, mud might be giving way to daylight.
A crackdown on Israeli spy rings operating in Lebanon has resulted in more than 70 arrests over the past 18 months. Included among them are four high-ranking Lebanese Army and General Security officers-one having spied for the Mossad since 1984.
A significant breakthrough in the ongoing investigation occurred in late June and culminated in the arrest of Charbel Qazzi, head of transmission and broadcasting at Alfa, one of Lebanon's two state-owned mobile service providers.
According to the Lebanese daily As-Safir, Qazzi confessed to installing computer programs and planting electronic chips in Alfa transmitters. These could then be used by Israeli intelligence to monitor communications, locate and target individuals for assassination, and potentially deploy viruses capable of erasing recorded information in the contact lines. Qazzi's collaboration with Israel reportedly dates back 14 years.
On July 12, a second arrest at Alfa was made. Tarek al-Raba'a, an engineer and partner of Qazzi, was apprehended on charges of spying for Israel and compromising national security. A few days later, a third Alfa employee was similarly detained.
Israel has refused to comment on the arrests. Nevertheless, their apparent ability to have penetrated Lebanon's military and telecommunication sectors has rattled the country and urgently raised security concerns.
What does any of this have to do with the Hariri assassination?
Outside the obvious deleterious ramifications of high-ranking Lebanese military officers working for Israel, the very legitimacy of the Special Tribunal for Lebanon (STL) is now in question. The STL is the U.N.-sanctioned body tasked with prosecuting those responsible for the assassination of the late prime minister. On Feb. 14, 2005, 1,000 kg of explosives detonated near Hariri's passing motorcade, killing him and 21 others.
It is believed the STL will issue indictments in the matter as early as September-relying heavily on phone recordings and mobile transmissions to do so.
According to the AFP, "A preliminary report by the U.N. investigating team said it had collected data from mobile phone calls made the day of Hariri's murder as evidence."
The National likewise reported, "The international inquiry, which could present indictments or findings as soon as September, according to unverified media reports, used extensive phone records to draw conclusions into a conspiracy to kill Hariri, widely blamed on Syria and its Lebanese allies ..."
In a July 16 televised speech, Hezbollah Secretary-General Sayyid Hassan Nasrallah speculated the STL would use information gleaned from Israeli-compromised communications to falsely implicate the group in the prime minister's murder:
"Some are counting in their analysis of the (STL) indictment on witnesses, some of whom turned out to be fake, and on the telecommunications networks which were infiltrated by spies who can change and manipulate data.
"Before the (2006) war, these spies gave important information to the Israeli enemy and based on this information, Israel bombed buildings, homes, factories and institutions. Many martyrs died and many others were wounded. These spies are partners in the killings, the crimes, the threats and the displacement."
Nasrallah called the STL's manipulation an "Israeli project" meant to "create an uproar in Lebanon."
Indeed, in May 2008 Lebanon experienced a taste of this. At the height of an 18-month stalemate over the formation of a national unity government under then Prime Minister Fouad Siniora, his cabinet's decision to unilaterally declare Hezbollah's fixed-line communication system illegal pushed the country to the brink of civil war.
Recognizing the value their secure lines of communication had in combating the July 2006 Israeli invasion and suspecting that state-owned telecoms might be compromised, Hezbollah resisted Siniora's plans to have its network dismantled. Their men swept through West Beirut and put a quick end to the government's plan. Two years later, their suspicions appear to have been vindicated.
Opposition MP and Free Patriotic Movement head Michel Aoun has already warned Nasrallah that the STL will likely indict "uncontrolled" Hezbollah members to be followed by "... Lebanese-Lebanese and Lebanese-Palestinian tension, and by an Israeli war on Lebanon."
Giving credence to Nasrallah and Aoun's assertions, Commander in Chief of the Israel Defense Forces Gabi Ashkenazi, predicted "with lots of wishes" that the situation in Lebanon would deteriorate in September after the STL indicts Hezbollah for Hariri's assassination.
Ashkenazi's gleeful, prescient testimony to the Knesset's Foreign Affairs Committee betrays what Israel hopes the fallout from the STL's report will be: fomentation of civil strife and discord among Lebanon's sectarian groups, generally divided into pro- and anti-Syria factions. Ashkenazi anticipates this to happen, of course, because he knows Israel's unfettered access to critical phone records will have framed Hezbollah for the crime.
Israel's agents and operatives in Lebanon and its infiltration of a telecom network have been exposed. At the very least, the STL must recognize that evidence of alleged Hezbollah involvement in Hariri's death (a group that historically enjoyed good ties with the late premier) is wholly tainted and likely doctored.
The arrest of Qazzi and al-Raba'a in the breakup of Israeli spy rings should prompt the STL to shift its focus to the only regional player that has benefited from Hariri's murder; one that will continue to do so if and when their designs to implicate Hezbollah are realized.
It is time to look at Tel Aviv.
Rannie Amiri is an independent Middle East commentator.
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21) View Is Bleaker Than Official Portrayal of War in Afghanistan
This article was written and reported by C. J. Chivers, Carlotta Gall, Andrew W. Lehren, Mark Mazzetti, Jane Perlez, and Eric Schmitt, with contributions from Jacob Harris and Alan McLean.
July 25, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/26/world/asia/26warlogs.html?hp
A six-year archive of classified military documents made public on Sunday offers an unvarnished, ground-level picture of the war in Afghanistan that is in many respects more grim than the official portrayal.
The secret documents, released on the Internet by an organization called WikiLeaks, are a daily diary of an American-led force often starved for resources and attention as it struggled against an insurgency that grew larger, better coordinated and more deadly each year.
The New York Times, the British newspaper The Guardian and the German magazine Der Spiegel were given access to the voluminous records several weeks ago on the condition that they not report on the material before Sunday.
The documents - some 92,000 reports spanning parts of two administrations from January 2004 through December 2009 - illustrate in mosaic detail why, after the United States has spent almost $300 billion on the war in Afghanistan, the Taliban are stronger than at any time since 2001.
As the new American commander in Afghanistan, Gen. David H. Petraeus, tries to reverse the lagging war effort, the documents sketch a war hamstrung by an Afghan government, police force and army of questionable loyalty and competence, and by a Pakistani military that appears at best uncooperative and at worst to work from the shadows as an unspoken ally of the very insurgent forces the American-led coalition is trying to defeat.
The material comes to light as Congress and the public grow increasingly skeptical of the deepening involvement in Afghanistan and its chances for success as next year's deadline to begin withdrawing troops looms.
The archive is a vivid reminder that the Afghan conflict until recently was a second-class war, with money, troops and attention lavished on Iraq while soldiers and Marines lamented that the Afghans they were training were not being paid.
The reports - usually spare summaries but sometimes detailed narratives - shed light on some elements of the war that have been largely hidden from the public eye:
• The Taliban have used portable heat-seeking missiles against allied aircraft, a fact that has not been publicly disclosed by the military. This type of weapon helped the Afghan mujahedeen defeat the Soviet occupation in the 1980s.
• Secret commando units like Task Force 373 - a classified group of Army and Navy special operatives - work from a "capture/kill list" of about 70 top insurgent commanders. These missions, which have been stepped up under the Obama administration, claim notable successes, but have sometimes gone wrong, killing civilians and stoking Afghan resentment.
• The military employs more and more drone aircraft to survey the battlefield and strike targets in Afghanistan, although their performance is less impressive than officially portrayed. Some crash or collide, forcing American troops to undertake risky retrieval missions before the Taliban can claim the drone's weaponry.
• The Central Intelligence Agency has expanded paramilitary operations inside Afghanistan. The units launch ambushes, order airstrikes and conduct night raids. From 2001 to 2008, the C.I.A. paid the budget of Afghanistan's spy agency and ran it as a virtual subsidiary.
Over all, the documents do not contradict official accounts of the war. But in some cases the documents show that the American military made misleading public statements - attributing the downing of a helicopter to conventional weapons instead of heat-seeking missiles or giving Afghans credit for missions carried out by Special Operations commandos.
White House officials vigorously denied that the Obama administration had presented a misleading portrait of the war in Afghanistan.
"On Dec. 1, 2009, President Obama announced a new strategy with a substantial increase in resources for Afghanistan, and increased focus on Al Qaeda and Taliban safe-havens in Pakistan, precisely because of the grave situation that had developed over several years," said Gen. James L. Jones, White House national security adviser, in a statement released Sunday.
"We know that serious challenges lie ahead, but if Afghanistan is permitted to slide backwards, we will again face a threat from violent extremist groups like Al Qaeda who will have more space to plot and train," the statement said.
General Jones also decried the decision by WikiLeaks to make the documents public, saying that the United States "strongly condemns the disclosure of classified information by individuals and organizations which could put the lives of Americans and our partners at risk, and threaten our national security.""
"WikiLeaks made no effort to contact us about these documents - the United States government learned from news organizations that these documents would be posted," General Jones said.
The archive is clearly an incomplete record of the war. It is missing many references to seminal events and does not include more highly classified information. The documents also do not cover events in 2010, when the influx of more troops into Afghanistan began and a new counterinsurgency strategy took hold.
They suggest that the military's internal assessments of the prospects for winning over the Afghan public, especially in the early days, were often optimistic, even naïve.
There are fleeting - even taunting - reminders of how the war began in the occasional references to the elusive Osama bin Laden. In some reports he is said to be attending meetings in Quetta, Pakistan. His money man is said to be flying from Iran to North Korea to buy weapons. Mr. bin Laden has supposedly ordered a suicide attack against the Afghan president, Hamid Karzai. These reports all seem secondhand at best.
The reports portray a resilient, canny insurgency that has bled American forces through a war of small cuts. The insurgents set the war's pace, usually fighting on ground of their own choosing and then slipping away.
Sabotage and trickery have been weapons every bit as potent as small arms, mortars or suicide bombers. So has Taliban intimidation of Afghan officials and civilians - applied with pinpoint pressure through threats, charm, violence, money, religious fervor and populist appeals.
FEB. 19, 2008 | ZABUL PROVINCE Intelligence Summary: Officer Threatened
An Afghan National Army brigade commander working in southern Afghanistan received a phone call from a Taliban mullah named Ezat, one brief report said. "Mullah Ezat told the ANA CDR to surrender and offered him $100,000(US) to quit working for the Afghan Army," the report said. "Ezat also stated that he knows where the ANA CDR is from and knows his family." Read the Document »
MAY 9, 2009 | KUNAR PROVINCE Intelligence Summary: Taliban Recruiter
A Taliban commander, Mullah Juma Khan, delivered a eulogy at the funeral of a slain insurgent. He played on the crowd's emotions, according to the report: "Juma cried while telling the people an unnamed woman and her baby were killed while the woman was nursing the baby." Finally he made his pitch: "Juma then told the people they needed to be angry at CF [Coalition Force] and ANSF [Afghan National Security Forces] for causing this tragedy" and "invited everyone who wants to fight to join the fighters who traveled with him." Read the Document »
The insurgents use a network of spies, double agents, collaborators and informers - anything to undercut coalition forces and the effort to build a credible and effective Afghan government capable of delivering security and services.
The reports repeatedly describe instances when the insurgents have been seen wearing government uniforms, and other times when they have roamed the country or appeared for battle in the very Ford Ranger pickup trucks that the United States had provided the Afghan Army and police force.
NOV. 20, 2006 | KABUL Incident Report: Insurgent Subterfuge
After capturing four pickup trucks from the Afghan National Army, the Taliban took them to Kabul to be used in suicide bombings. "They intend to use the pick-up trucks to target ANA compounds, ISAF and GOA convoys, as well as ranking GOA and ISAF officials," said a report, referring to coalition forces and the government of Afghanistan. "The four trucks were also accompanied by an unknown quantity of ANA uniforms to facilitate carrying out the attacks." Read the Document:
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/world/26warlogs.html#report/776FDEDF-2219-0B3F-9F4F9BDBC810F3F7
The Taliban's use of heat-seeking missiles has not been publicly disclosed - indeed, the military has issued statements that these internal records contradict.
In the form known as a Stinger, such weapons were provided to a previous generation of Afghan insurgents by the United States, and helped drive out the Soviets. The reports suggest that the Taliban's use of these missiles has been neither common nor especially effective; usually the missiles missed.
MAY 30, 2007 | HELMAND PROVINCE Incident Report: Downed Helicopter
An American CH-47 transport helicopter was struck by what witnesses described as a portable heat-seeking surface-to-air missile after taking off from a landing zone.
The helicopter, the initial report said, "was engaged and struck with a Missile ... shortly after crossing over the Helmand River. The missile struck the aircraft in the left engine. The impact of the missile projected the aft end of the aircraft up as it burst into flames followed immediately by a nose dive into the crash site with no survivors."
The crash killed seven soldiers: five Americans, a Briton and a Canadian.
Multiple witnesses saw a smoke trail behind the missile as it rushed toward the helicopter. The smoke trail was an important indicator. Rocket-propelled grenades do not leave them. Heat-seeking missiles do. The crew of other helicopters reported the downing as a surface-to-air missile strike. But that was not what a NATO spokesman told Reuters.
"Clearly, there were enemy fighters in the area," said the spokesman, Maj. John Thomas. "It's not impossible for small-arms fire to bring down a helicopter."
The reports paint a disheartening picture of the Afghan police and soldiers at the center of the American exit strategy.
The Pentagon is spending billions to train the Afghan forces to secure the country. But the police have proved to be an especially risky investment and are often described as distrusted, even loathed, by Afghan civilians. The reports recount episodes of police brutality, corruption petty and large, extortion and kidnapping. Some police officers defect to the Taliban. Others are accused of collaborating with insurgents, arms smugglers and highway bandits. Afghan police officers defect with trucks or weapons, items captured during successful ambushes or raids.
MARCH 10, 2008 | PAKTIA PROVINCE Investigation Report: Extortion by the Police
This report captured the circular and frustrating effort by an American investigator to stop Afghan police officers at a checkpoint from extorting payments from motorists. After a line of drivers described how they were pressed to pay bribes, the American investigator and the local police detained the accused checkpoint police officers.
"While waiting," the investigator wrote, "I asked the seven patrolmen we detained to sit and relax while we sorted through a problem without ever mentioning why they were being detained. Three of the patrolmen responded by saying that they had only taken money from the truck drivers to buy fuel for their generator."
Two days later when the American followed up, he was told by police officers that the case had been dropped because the witness reports had all been lost. Read the Document:
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/world/26warlogs.html#report/97C78307-EB11-4DE8-98AF-A23E9A58EF82
One report documented the detention of a military base worker trying to leave the base with GPS units hidden under his clothes and taped to his leg. Another described the case of a police chief in Zurmat, in Paktia Province, who was accused of falsely reporting that his officers had been in a firefight so he could receive thousands of rounds of new ammunition, which he sold in a bazaar.
Coalition trainers report that episodes of cruelty by the Afghan police undermine the effort to build a credible security force to take over when the allies leave.
OCT. 11, 2009 | BALKH PROVINCE Incident Report: Brutal Police Chief
This report began with an account of Afghan soldiers and police officers harassing and beating local civilians for refusing to cooperate in a search. It then related the story of a district police commander who forced himself on a 16-year-old girl. When a civilian complained, the report continued, "The district commander ordered his bodyguard to open fire on the AC [Afghan civilian]. The bodyguard refused, at which time the district commander shot [the bodyguard] in front of the AC."
Rivalries and friction between the largest Afghan security services - the police and the army - are evident in a number of reports. Sometimes the tensions erupted in outright clashes, as was recorded in the following report from last December that was described as an "enemy action." The "enemy" in this case was the Afghan National Security Force.
DEC. 4, 2009 | ORUZGAN PROVINCE Incident Report: Police and Army Rivalry
A car accident turned deadly when an argument broke out between the police and the Afghan National Army. "The argument escalated and ANA & ANP started to shoot at each other," a report said.
An Afghan soldier and three Afghan police officers were wounded in the shootout. One civilian was killed and six others were wounded by gunfire. Read the Document:
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/world/26warlogs.html#report/160f064c-8fea-477f-a7a2-763d240bb92d
One sign of the weakness of the police is that in places they have been replaced by tribal warlords who are charged - informally but surely - with providing the security the government cannot. Often the warlords operate above the law.
NOV. 22, 2009 | KANDAHAR PROVINCE Incident Report: Illegal Checkpoint
A private security convoy, ferrying fuel from Kandahar to Oruzgan, was stopped by what was thought to be 100 insurgents armed with assault rifles and PK machine guns, a report said.
It turned out the convoy had been halted by "the local Chief of Police," who was "demanding $2000-$3000 per truck" as a kind of toll. The chief, said the report, from NATO headquarters in Southern Afghanistan, "states he needs the money to run his operation."
The chief was not actually a police chief. He was Matiullah Khan, a warlord and an American-backed ally of President Karzai who was arguably Oruzgan's most powerful man. He had a contract, the Ministry of Interior said, to protect the road so NATO's supply convoys could drive on it, but he had apparently decided to extort money from the convoys himself.
Late in the day, Mr. Matiullah, after many interventions, changed his mind. The report said that friendly forces "report that the COMPASS convoy is moving again and did not pay the fee required."
The documents show how the best intentions of Americans to help rebuild Afghanistan through provincial reconstruction teams ran up against a bewildering array of problems - from corruption to cultural misunderstandings - as they tried to win over the public by helping repair dams and bridges, build schools and train local authorities.
A series of reports from 2005 to 2008 chart the frustrations of one of the first such teams, assigned to Gardez, in Paktia Province.
NOV. 28, 2006 | PAKTIA PROVINCE Civil Affairs Report: Orphanage Opens
An American civil affairs officer could barely contain her enthusiasm as she spoke at a ribbon-cutting ceremony for a new orphanage, built with money from the American military.
The officer said a friend had given her a leather jacket to present to "someone special," the report noted. She chose the orphanage's director. "The commander stated that she could think of no one more deserving then someone who cared for orphans," it said.
The civil affairs team handed out blankets, coats, scarves and toys. The governor even gave money from his own pocket. "All speeches were very positive," the report concluded. Read the Document:
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/world/26warlogs.html#report/64C3FAC9-D3E2-427A-BC80-DF768ADBD4C8
DEC. 20, 2006 | PAKTIA PROVINCE Civil Affairs Report: Not Many Orphans
The team dropped by to check on the orphanage. "We found very few orphans living there and could not find most of the HA [humanitarian assistance] we had given them," the report noted.
The team raised the issue with the governor of Paktia, who said he was also concerned and suspected that the money he had donated had not reached the children. He visited the orphanage himself. Only 30 children were there; the director had claimed to have 102. Read the Document:
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/world/26warlogs.html#report/5872B755-ABF0-4FE6-9A88-C7CDCC75414E
OCT. 16, 2007 | PAKTIA PROVINCE Civil Affairs Report: An Empty Orphanage
Nearly a year after the opening of the orphanage, the Americans returned for a visit. "There are currently no orphans at the facility due to the Holiday. (Note: orphans are defined as having no father, but may still have mother and a family structure that will have them home for holidays.)" Read the Document:
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/world/26warlogs.html#report/C9F47B7A-1656-4C2E-813E-D69C5B598925
FEB. 25, 2007 | PAKTIA PROVINCE District Report: Lack of Resources
As the Taliban insurgency strengthened, the lack of a government presence in the more remote districts - and the government's inability to provide security or resources even to its own officials - is evident in the reports.
An official from Dand Wa Patan, a small sliver of a district along the border with Pakistan, so urgently wanted to talk to the members of the American team that he traveled three and a half hours by taxi - he had no car - to meet them.
"He explained that the enemy had changed their tactics in the area and were no longer fighting from the mountains, no longer sending rockets toward his compound and other areas," the report noted. "He stated that the enemy focus was on direct action and that his family was a primary target."
Ten days earlier the Taliban crept up to the wall of his family compound and blew up one of the security towers, the report said. His son lost his legs in the explosion.
He pleaded for more police officers, weapons and ammunition. He also wanted a car so he could drive around the district he was supposed to oversee.
But the Americans' situation was not much better. For months the reports show how a third - or even a half - of the team's vehicles were out of service, awaiting spare parts.
NOV. 15, 2006 | PAKTIA PROVINCE Civil Affairs Report: Local Corruption
For a while the civil affairs team worked closely with the provincial governor, described as "very charismatic." Yet both he and the team are hampered by corrupt, negligent and antagonistic officials.
The provincial chief of police is described in one report as "the axel of corruption."
"He makes every effort to openly and blatantly take money from the ANP troopers and the officers," one sympathetic officer told the Americans.
Other officers are more clever. One forged rosters, to collect pay for imaginary police officers. A second set up illegal checkpoints to collects tolls around Gardez. Still another stole food and uniforms, leaving his soldiers underfed and ill equipped for the winter.
The governor, meanwhile, was all but trapped. Such animosity developed between him and a senior security official that the governor could not leave his office for weeks at a time, fearing for his life. Finally, the corrupt officials were replaced. But it took months.
SEPT. 24, 2007 | PAKTIA PROVINCE Civil Affairs Report: The Cost of Corruption
Their meetings with Afghan district officials gave the American civil affairs officers unique insights into local opinions. Sometimes, the Afghan officials were brutally honest in their assessments.
In one case, provincial council officials visited the Americans at their base in Gardez to report threats - the Taliban had tossed a grenade into their office compound and were prowling the hills. Then the officials began a tirade.
"The people of Afghanistan keep loosing their trust in the government because of the high amount of corrupted government officials," the report quoted them as saying. "The general view of the Afghans is that the current government is worst than the Taliban."
"The corrupted government officials are a new concept brought to Afghanistan by the AMERICANS," the oldest member of the group told the civil affairs team.
In conclusion, the civil affairs officer who wrote the report warned, "The people will support the Anti-Coalition forces and the security condition will degenerate." He recommended a public information program to educate Afghans about democracy. Read the Document »
The reports also evoke the rivalries and tensions that swirl within the presidential palace between President Karzai's circle and the warlords.
OCT. 16, 2006 | KABUL Intelligence Summary: Political Intrigue
In a short but heated meeting at the presidential palace, the Kabul police chief, Brig. Gen. Mir Amanullah Gozar, angrily refuted accusations made publicly by Jamil Karzai that he was corrupt and lacked professional experience. The report of the meeting identified Jamil Karzai as the president's brother; he is in fact a cousin.
General Gozar "said that if Jamil were not the president's Brother he would kidnap, torture, and kill him," the report said. He added that he was aware of plans by the American-led coalition to remove him from his post.
He threatened the president, saying that if he were replaced he would reveal "allegations about Karzai having been a drug trader and supporter of the Pakistan-led insurgency in Afghanistan," presumably a reference to Mr. Karzai's former links with the Taliban.
Incident by incident, the reports resemble a police blotter of the myriad ways Afghan civilians were killed - not just in airstrikes but in ones and twos - in shootings on the roads or in the villages, in misunderstandings or in a cross-fire, or in chaotic moments when Afghan drivers ventured too close to convoys and checkpoints.
The dead, the reports repeatedly indicate, were not suicide bombers or insurgents, and many of the cases were not reported to the public at the time. The toll of the war - reflected in mounting civilian casualties - left the Americans seeking cooperation and support from an Afghan population that grew steadily more exhausted, resentful, fearful and alienated.
From the war's outset, airstrikes that killed civilians in large numbers seized international attention, including the aerial bombardment of a convoy on its way to attend President Karzai's inauguration in 2001. An airstrike in Azizabad, in western Afghanistan, killed as many as 92 people in August 2008. In May 2009, another strike killed 147 Afghan civilians.
SEPT. 3, 2009 | KUNDUZ PROVINCE Incident Report: Mistaken Airstrike
This report, filed about the activities of a Joint Terminal Attack Controller team, which is responsible for communication from the ground and guiding pilots during surveillance missions and airstrikes, offers a glimpse into one of the bloodiest mistakes in 2009.
It began with a report from the police command saying that "2X FUEL TRUCKS WERE STOLEN BY UNK NUMBER OF INS" and that the insurgents planned to cross the Kunduz River with their prizes. It was nighttime, and the river crossing was not illuminated. Soon, the report noted, the "JTAC OBSERVED KDZ RIVER AND REPORTED THAT IT DISCOVERED THE TRUCKS AS WELL AS UP TO 70 INS" at "THE FORD ON THE RIVER. THE TRUCKS WERE STUCK IN THE MUD." How the JTAC team was observing the trucks was not clear, but many aircraft have infrared video cameras that can send a live feed to a computer monitor on the ground.
According to the report, a German commander of the provincial reconstruction team "LINKED UP WITH JTAC AND, AFTER ENSURING THAT NO CIVILIANS WERE IN THE VICINITY," he "AUTHORIZED AN AIRSTRIKE." An F-15 then dropped two 500-pound guided bombs. The initial report said that "56X INS KIA [insurgents killed in action] (CONFIRMED) AND 14X INS FLEEING IN NE DIRECTION. THE 2X FUEL TRUCKS WERE ALSO DESTROYED."
The initial report was wrong. The trucks had been abandoned, and a crowd of civilians milled around them, removing fuel. How the commander and the JTAC had ensured "that no civilians were in the area," as the report said, was not explained.
The first sign of the mistake documented in the initial report appeared the next day, when another report said that at "0900 hrs International Media reported that US airstrike had killed 60 civilians in Kunduz. The media are reporting that Taliban did steal the trucks and had invited civilians in the area to take fuel." Read the Document:
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/world/26warlogs.html#report/826B488C-EA6F-A132-511610DB68C2EDBD
The reports show that the smaller incidents were just as insidious and alienating, turning Afghans who had once welcomed Americans as liberators against the war.
MARCH 5, 2007 | GHAZNI PROVINCE Incident Report: Checkpoint Danger
Afghan police officers shot a local driver who tried to speed through their checkpoint on a country road in Ghazni Province south of Kabul. The police had set up a temporary checkpoint on the highway just outside the main town in the district of Ab Band.
"A car approached the check point at a high rate of speed," the report said. All the police officers fled the checkpoint except one. As the car passed the checkpoint it knocked down the lone policeman. He fired at the vehicle, apparently thinking that it was a suicide car bomber.
"The driver of the vehicle was killed," the report said. "No IED [improvised explosive device] was found and vehicle was destroyed."
The police officer was detained in the provincial capital, Ghazni, and questioned. He was then released. The American mentoring the police concluded in his assessment that the policeman's use of force was appropriate. Rather than acknowledging the public hostility such episodes often engender, the report found a benefit: it suggested that the shooting would make Afghans take greater care at checkpoints in the future.
"Effects on the populace clearly identify the importance of stopping at checkpoints," the report concluded. Read the Document:
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/world/26warlogs.html#report/A1733389-DE1A-4AD2-948B-D6773D75A586
MARCH 21, 2007 | PAKTIKA PROVINCE Incident Report: A Deaf Man Is Shot
Members of a C.I.A. paramilitary unit moved into the village of Malekshay in Paktika Province close to the border with Pakistan when they saw an Afghan running away at the sight of their convoy, one report recounted. Members of the unit shot him in the ankle, and medics treated him at the scene. The unit had followed military procedure - first shouting at the man, then firing warning shots and only after that shooting to wound, the report said.
Yet elders in the village told the unit that the man, Shum Khan, was deaf and mute and that he had fled from the convoy out of nervousness. Mr. Khan was "unable to hear the warnings or warning shots. Ran out of fear and confusion," the report concludes. The unit handed over supplies in compensation. Read the Document:
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/world/26warlogs.html#report/0B4F081B-E448-4722-9E52-EA10DE4E0153
The reports reveal several instances of allied forces accidentally firing on one another or on Afghan forces in the fog of war, often with tragic consequences.
APRIL 6, 2006 | HELMAND PROVINCE Incident Report: Friendly Fire
A British Army convoy driving at night in southern Afghanistan suddenly came under small-arms fire. One of the British trucks rolled over. The British troops split into two groups, pulled back from the clash and called in airstrikes from American A-10 attack planes. After several confusing minutes, commanders realized that the Afghan police had attacked the British troops, mistaking them for Taliban fighters. One Afghan police officer was killed and 12 others were wounded.
The shifting tactics of the Americans can be seen as well in the reports, as the war strategy veered from freely using force to trying to minimize civilian casualties. But as the documents make clear, each approach has its frustrations for the American effort.
Strict new rules of engagement, imposed in 2009, minimized the use of airstrikes after some had killed civilians and turned Afghans against the war. But the rules also prompted anger from American troops and their families. The troops felt that their lives were not sufficiently valued because they had to justify every request for air or artillery support, making it easier for the Taliban to fight.
OCT. 1, 2008 | KUNAR PROVINCE Incident Report: Barrage
In the days when field commanders had a freer hand, an infantry company commander observed an Afghan with a two-way radio who was monitoring the company's activities. Warning of "IMMINENT THREAT," the commander said he would "destroy" the man and his equipment - in other words, kill him. A short while later, a 155-millimeter artillery piece at a forward operating base in the nearby Pech Valley began firing high-explosive rounds - 24 in all.
NOV. 13, 2009 | HELMAND PROVINCE Incident Report: Escalation of Force
As the rules tightened, the reports picked up a tone that at times seemed lawyerly. Many make reference, even in pitched fights, to troops using weapons in accordance with "ROE Card A" - which guides actions of self-defense rather than attacks or offensive acts. This report described an Apache helicopter firing warning shots after coming under fire. Its reaction was described as "an escalation of force."
The helicopter pilots reported that insurgents "engaged with SAF [surface-to-air fire]"and that "INTEL suggested they were going to be fired upon again during their extraction."
The helicopters "fired 40x 30mm warning shots to deter any further engagement."
The report included the information that now is common to incident reports in which Western forces fire. "The terrain was considered rurally open and there were no CIV PID IVO [civilians positively identified in the vicinity of ] the target within reasonable certainty. There was no damage to infrastructure. BDA [battle damage assessment] recording conducted by AH-64 Gun Tape. No follow up required. The next higher command was consulted. The enemy engaged presented, in the opinion of the ground forces, an imminent threat. Engagement is under ROE Card A. Higher HQ have been informed." Read the Document:
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/world/26warlogs.html#report/11376369-c651-4bda-b7fd-48314d73dfa5
The reports show in previously unknown detail the omnipresence of drones in Afghanistan, the Air Force's missile-toting Predators and Reapers that hunt militants. The military's use of drones in Afghanistan has rapidly expanded in the past few years; the United States Air Force now flies about 20 Predator and Reaper aircraft a day - nearly twice as many as a year ago - over vast stretches of hostile Afghan territory. Allies like Britain and Germany fly their own fleets.
The incident reports chronicle the wide variety of missions these aircraft carry out: taking photographs, scooping up electronic transmissions, relaying images of running battles to field headquarters, attacking militants with bombs and missiles. And they also reveal the extent that armed drones are being used to support American Special Operations missions.
Documents in the Afghan archive capture the strange nature of the drone war in Afghanistan: missile-firing robots killing shovel-wielding insurgents, a remote-controlled war against a low-tech but resilient insurgency.
DEC. 9, 2008 | KANDAHAR PROVINCE Incident Report: Predator Attack
Early one winter evening in southern Afghanistan, an Air Force Predator drone spotted a group of insurgents suspected of planting roadside bombs along a roadway less than two miles from Forward Operating Base Hutal, an American outpost.
Unlike the drones the C.I.A. operated covertly across the border in Pakistan, this aircraft was one of nearly a dozen military drones patrolling vast stretches of hostile Afghan territory on any given day.
Within minutes after identifying the militants, the Predator unleashed a Hellfire missile, all but evaporating one of the figures digging in the dark.
When ground troops reached the crater caused by the missile, costing $60,000, all that was left was a shovel and a crowbar. Read the Document:
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/world/26warlogs.html#report/1E14FD20-BDAF-AB87-DE6E883CDDB45042
SEPT. 13, 2009 | BADAKHSHAN PROVINCE Incident Report: A Lost Drone
Flying over southern Afghanistan on a combat mission, one of the Air Force's premier armed drones, a Reaper, went rogue.
Equipped with advanced radar and sophisticated cameras, as well as Hellfire missiles and 500-pound bombs, the Reaper had lost its satellite link to a pilot who was remotely steering the drone from a base in the United States.
Again and again, the pilot struggled to regain control of the drone. Again and again, no response. The reports reveal that the military in Afghanistan lost many of the tiny five-pound surveillance drones with names like Raven and Desert Hawk that troops tossed out like model airplanes to peer around the next hill. But they had never before lost one of the Reapers, with its 66-foot wingspan.
As a last resort, commanders ordered an Air Force F-15E Strike Eagle fighter jet to shoot down the $13 million aircraft before it soared unguided into neighboring Tajikistan.
Ground controllers picked an unpopulated area over northern Afghanistan and the jet fired a Sidewinder missile, destroying the Reaper's turbo-prop engine. Suddenly, the satellite link was restored, but it was too late to salvage the flight. At 5:30 a.m., controllers steered it into a remote mountainside for a final fiery landing. Read the Document:
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/world/26warlogs.html#report/97AF499B-848B-4FCC-9C0F-8D520A860F13
As the Afghanistan war took priority under the Obama administration, more Special Operations forces were shifted from Iraq to conduct secret missions. The C.I.A.'s own paramilitary operations inside Afghanistan grew in tandem - as did the agency's close collaboration with Afghanistan's own spy agency.
Usually, such teams conducted night operations aimed at top Taliban commanders and militants on the "capture/kill" list. While individual commandos have displayed great courage, the missions can end in calamity as well as success. The expanding special operations have stoked particular resentment among Afghans - for their lack of coordination with local forces, the civilian casualties they frequently inflicted and the lack of accountability.
JUNE 17, 2007 | PAKTIKA PROVINCE INCIDENT REPORT: Botched Night Raid
Shortly after five American rockets destroyed a compound in Paktika Province, helicopter-borne commandos from Task Force 373 - a classified Special Operations unit of Army Delta Force operatives and members of the Navy Seals - arrived to finish the job.
The mission was to capture or kill Abu Laith al-Libi, a top commander for Al Qaeda, who was believed to be hiding at the scene of the strike.
But Mr. Libi was not there. Instead, the Special Operations troops found a group of men suspected of being militants and their children. Seven of the children had been killed by the rocket attack.
Some of the men tried to flee the Americans, and six were quickly killed by encircling helicopters. After the rest were taken as detainees, the commandos found one child still alive in the rubble, and performed CPR for 20 minutes.
Word of the attack spread a wave of anger across the region, forcing the local governor to meet with village elders to defuse the situation.
American military officials drew up a list of "talking points" for the governor, pointing out that the target had been a senior Qaeda commander, that there had been no indications that women and children would be present and that a nearby mosque had not been damaged.
After the meeting, the governor reported that local residents were in shock, but that he had "pressed the Talking Points." He even "added a few of his own that followed in line with our current story."
The attack was caused by the "presence of hoodlums," the governor told the people. It was a tragedy that children had been killed, he said, but "it could have been prevented had the people exposed the presence of insurgents in the area."
He promised that the families would be compensated for their loss.
Mr. Libi was killed the following year by a C.I.A. drone strike. Read the Document:
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/world/26warlogs.html#report/15A27543-B022-4736-AC31-71006B18794E
APRIL 6, 2008 | NURISTAN PROVINCE Incident Report: A Raging Firefight
As they scrambled up the rocks toward a cluster of mud compounds perched high over the remote Shok Valley, a small group of American Green Berets and Afghan troops, known as Task Force Bushmaster, were confronted with a hail of gunfire from inside the insurgent stronghold.
They were there to capture senior members of the Hezb-e-Islami Gulbuddin militant group, part of a mission that the military had dubbed Operation Commando Wrath.
But what they soon discovered on that remote, snowy hilltop was that they were vastly outnumbered by a militant force of hundreds of fighters. Reinforcements were hours away.
A firefight raged for nearly seven hours, with sniper fire pinning down the Green Berets on a 60-foot rock ledge for much of that time.
Casualties mounted. By midmorning, nearly half of the Americans were wounded, but the militants directed their gunfire on the arriving medevac helicopters, preventing them from landing.
"TF Bushmaster reports they are combat ineffective and request reinforcement at this time."
For a time, radio contact was lost.
Air Force jets arrived at the scene and began pummeling the compounds with 2,000-pound bombs, but the militants continued to advance down the mountain toward the pinned-down group.
The task force reported that there were " 50-100 insurgents moving to reinforce against Bushmaster elements from the SW."
Carrying wounded Americans shot in the pelvis, arm and legs - as well as two dead Afghans - the group made its way down toward the valley floor. Eventually, the helicopters were able to arrive to evacuate the dead and wounded.
Ten members of the Green Berets would receive Silver Stars for their actions during the battle, the highest number given to Special Forces soldiers for a single battle since the Vietnam War. By Army estimates, 150 to 200 militants were killed in the battle. Read the Document:
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/world/26warlogs.html#report/E374DDDA-1C8A-4AE9-AE57-BFF57AE4FD7C
MARCH 8, 2008 | BAGRAM AIR BASE Meeting Report: A Plea for Help
Toward the end of a long meeting with top American military commanders, during which he delivered a briefing about the security situation in eastern Afghanistan, corruption in the government and Pakistan's fecklessness in hunting down militants, Afghanistan's top spy laid out his problem.
Amrullah Saleh, then director of the National Directorate of Security, told the Americans that the C.I.A. would no longer be handling his spy service's budget. For years, the C.I.A. had essentially run the N.D.S. as a subsidiary, but by 2009 the Afghan government was preparing to take charge of the agency's budget.
Mr. Saleh estimated that with the C.I.A. no longer bankrolling the Afghan spies, he could be facing a budget cut of 30 percent.
So he made a request. With the budget squeeze coming, Mr. Saleh asked the Americans for any AK-47s and ammunition they could spare.
If they had any spare boots, he would also take those, he said. Read the Document:
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/world/26warlogs.html#report/BE841896-FBA8-46CE-9E03-33D851927585
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22) Afghan Officials Report 52 Civilians Dead in NATO Strike
By RICHARD A. OPPEL Jr. and TAIMOOR SHAH
July 26, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/27/world/asia/27afghan.html?hp
KABUL, Afghanistan - In what could be the one of the most serious cases of civilian casualties in nine years of war, top Afghan officials said Monday that 52 people had been killed in a remote region of Helmand Province on Friday when a rocket slammed into a house where women and children had gathered to take shelter from fighting between NATO troops and militants.
President Hamid Karzai condemned the attack as "both morally and humanly unacceptable."
Speaking by telephone from Rigi, the stricken village, a witness, Mohammed Usman, 57, said he helped pull the mangled bodies of 17 children and 7 women from the rubble.
"They have ruined us, and they have killed small children and innocent women," he said. "God will never forgive them." The Karzai government said that its information came from its own intelligence service. American military officials cast the account as premature but did not deny it.
"Any speculation at this point of alleged civilian casualties in Rigi village is completely unfounded," said Rear Adm. Gregory Smith, director of communications for the American and NATO military coalition. "We are conducting a thorough joint investigation with our Afghan partners and will report any and all findings when known."
Another military spokesman, Lt. Col. Todd Breasseale, added, "If the government of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan has something that has been determined by means other than the joint Afghan/NATO investigation, we are unaware of it."
If the Afghan government's account is accurate, it would mean the largest number of civilians killed in any attack since September 2009, when more than 100 people died after a bomb strike called in by the German military in Kunduz Province.
The controversy could pose an extraordinary challenge to the new American and NATO commander, Gen. David H. Petraeus, just three weeks after taking charge. Civilian casualties have enraged local populations, undermined counterinsurgency efforts in some areas and caused retaliatory attacks by infuriated relatives of the dead, leading to more American deaths.
It also comes after the publication of a trove of tens of thousands of secret military field reports that underscore the prevalence of civilian casualties in the conflict.
Residents in Helmand recounted that on Friday, an American military force in Sangin District, which in recent years has been one of the deadliest areas for NATO troops, engaged Taliban militants in an intense firefight in two remote villages. Taliban fighters warned residents to leave, and many fled to Rigi, which has only a half-dozen homes.
Women and children from about eight families were packed into one home, while many of the men took shelter in the forest around the village. About 4:30 p.m. they heard the first of two powerful explosions that blanketed Rigi in smoke as military aircraft flew overhead, the villagers said.
"They targeted an area which we believed was safer, but in one hit they killed over 50 people," said Abdul Samad Jan, 25. "Most of them were children and women, and I have lost my relatives as well."
Accounts of the attack come as General Petraeus and his aides weigh whether to changes the rules that govern how much force troops can use to defend themselves and to attack suspected enemy targets.
Last summer, Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal ordered troops to use more caution to avoid harming civilians, an effort to win more popular Afghan support. But his directive eventually drew strong criticism from many troops and families of service members who believed soldiers and Marines did not have what they needed to protect themselves.
Senior military commanders have said they believe no troops have been denied close air support, and the United Nations and other groups have praised the McChrystal rules for reducing deaths from airstrikes and night raids. Now, General Petraeus, who took command after General McChrystal was fired for derogatory remarks he and members of his staff made about Obama administration officials to a magazine reporter, is deciding whether to alter the rules.
Some military officials say they do not expect substantial changes, which, if true, could further erode support for the war in the United States - even as Karzai officials continue to press the American-led NATO coalition to do more to reduce civilian deaths.
Richard A. Oppel Jr. reported from Kabul, and Taimoor Shah from Kandahar, Afghanistan. Sangar Rahimi contributed reporting from Kabul.
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23) In Disclosing Secret Documents, WikiLeaks Seeks 'Transparency'
By ERIC SCHMITT
July 25, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/26/world/26wiki.html?pagewanted=all
WikiLeaks.org, the online organization that posted tens of thousands of classified military field reports about the Afghan war on Sunday, says its goal in disclosing secret documents is to reveal "unethical behavior" by governments and corporations.
Since it was founded in December 2006, WikiLeaks has exposed internal memos about the dumping of toxic material off the African coast, the membership rolls of a racist British party, and the American military's manual for operating its prison in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba.
"We believe that transparency in government activities leads to reduced corruption, better government and stronger democracies," the organization's Web site says. "All governments can benefit from increased scrutiny by the world community, as well as their own people. We believe this scrutiny requires information."
The trove of war reports posted Sunday dwarfs the scope and volume of documents that the organization has made public in the past.
In a telephone interview from London, the organization's founder, Julian Assange, said the documents would reveal broader and more pervasive levels of violence in Afghanistan than the military or the news media had previously reported. "It shows not only the severe incidents but the general squalor of war, from the death of individual children to major operations that kill hundreds," he said.
WikiLeaks withheld some 15,000 documents from release until its technicians could redact names of individuals in the reports whose safety could be jeopardized.
WikiLeaks' critics range from the military, which says it jeopardizes operations, to some open government advocates who say the organization is endangering the privacy rights of others in favor of self promotion.
Steven Aftergood, head of the project on government secrecy at the Federation of American Scientists, in his blog posting on June 28 accused WikiLeaks of "information vandalism" with no regard for privacy or social usefulness. "WikiLeaks must be counted among the enemies of open society because it does not respect the rule of law nor does it honor the rights of individuals," he wrote.
The release of the data comes nearly three weeks after new charges were filed against an American soldier in Iraq who had been arrested on charges of leaking a video of a deadly American helicopter attack in Baghdad in 2007 that killed 12 people, including a reporter and photographer from the news agency Reuters. He was also charged with downloading more than 150,000 highly classified diplomatic cables.
WikiLeaks made public a 38-minute video of the helicopter attack as well as a 17-minute edited version that it called "Collateral Murder." The abridged version drew criticism for failing to make clear that the attacks happened during clashes in a Baghdad neighborhood and that one of the men fired on by the helicopter was carrying a rocket-propelled grenade.
WikiLeaks has also made public a cable entitled "Reykjavik13," about the banking crisis in Iceland, which was cited in the criminal charges against the soldier, Pfc. Bradley E. Manning, 22, an Army intelligence analyst. In keeping with its policy to protect the anonymity of its sources, WikiLeaks has not acknowledged receiving the cables or video from Private Manning. In the telephone interview, Mr. Assange, an Australian activist, refused to say whether the war reports came from Private Manning. But Mr. Assange said that WikiLeaks had offered to help pay for Private Manning's legal counsel or provide lawyers to defend him.
Adrian Lamo, a computer hacker who earlier this year traded instant messages with Private Manning, said the soldier claimed he had leaked the cables and video to WikiLeaks. Mr. Lamo, who in 2004 pleaded guilty to hacking into the internal computer system of The New York Times, said he turned in Private Manning to the authorities for national security reasons. Private Manning, who served with the Second Brigade of the 10th Mountain Division, based at Contingency Operating Station Hammer east of Baghdad, was arrested in May after the military authorities said that he had revealed his activities in online chats with Mr. Lamo.
Investigators now believe that Private Manning exploited a loophole in Defense Department security to copy thousands of files onto compact discs over a six-month period.
WikiLeaks has a core group of about half a dozen full-time volunteers, and there are 800 to 1,000 people whom the group can call on for expertise in areas like encryption, programming and writing news releases.
Mr. Assange, 39, said the site operated from servers in several countries, including Sweden and Belgium, where laws provided more protection for its disclosures.
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24) Industries Find Surging Profits in Deeper Cuts
By NELSON D. SCHWARTZ
July 25, 2010
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/26/business/economy/26earnings.html?ref=us
By most measures, Harley-Davidson has been having a rough ride.
Motorcycle sales are falling in 2010, as they have for each of the last three years. The company does not expect a turnaround anytime soon.
But despite that drought, Harley's profits are rising - soaring, in fact. Last week, Harley reported a $71 million profit in the second quarter, more than triple what it earned a year ago.
This seeming contradiction - falling sales and rising profits - is one reason the mood on Wall Street is so much more buoyant than in households, where pessimism runs deep and joblessness shows few signs of easing.
Many companies are focusing on cost-cutting to keep profits growing, but the benefits are mostly going to shareholders instead of the broader economy, as management conserves cash rather than bolstering hiring and production. Harley, for example, has announced plans to cut 1,400 to 1,600 more jobs by the end of next year. That is on top of 2,000 job cuts last year - more than a fifth of its work force.
As companies this month report earnings for the second quarter, news of healthy profits has helped the stock market - the Standard & Poor's 500-stock index is up 7 percent for July - but the source of those gains raises deep questions about the sustainability of the growth, as well as the fate of more than 14 million unemployed workers hoping to rejoin the work force as the economy recovers.
"Because of high unemployment, management is using its leverage to get more hours out of workers," said Robert C. Pozen, a senior lecturer at Harvard Business School and the former president of Fidelity Investments. "What's worrisome is that American business has gotten used to being a lot leaner, and it could take a while before they start hiring again."
And some of those businesses, including Harley-Davidson, are preparing for a future where they can prosper even if sales do not recover. Harley's goal is to permanently be in a position to generate strong profits on a lower revenue base.
In some ways, the ability to raise profits in the face of declining sales is a triumph of productivity that makes the United States more globally competitive. The problem is that companies are not investing those earnings, instead letting cash pile up to levels not reached in nearly half a century.
"As long as corporations are reinvesting, the economy can grow," said Ethan Harris, chief economist at Bank of America Merrill Lynch. "But if they're taking those profits and saving them, rather than buying new equipment, it hurts overall growth. The longer this goes on, the more you worry about income being diverted to a sector that's not spending."
"There's no question that there is an income shift going on in the economy," Mr. Harris added. "Companies are squeezing their labor costs to build profits."
The trend is hardly limited to Harley. Giants like General Electric and JPMorgan Chase, as well as smaller companies like Hasbro, the toymaker, all improved their bottom lines despite slowing sales in the second quarter. Among the S.& P. 500 companies that have reported second-quarter results, more than one in 10 had higher profits on lower sales, nearly twice the number in a typical quarter before the recession, according to Thomson Reuters.
"Whole industries are operating at new levels of profitability," said David J. Kostin, chief United States equity strategist at Goldman Sachs. "In the downturn, companies managed to maintain higher profit margins than ever before."
Profit margins - the percentage of revenue left over after expenses - crumble in most recessions, as overall sales fall but fixed costs like infrastructure, commodities and rent remain the same. In 2002, during the recession that followed the bursting of the technology bubble in addition to the Sept. 11 attacks, margins sank to 4.7 percent. Although the most recent downturn was far more severe, profit margins bottomed out at 5.9 percent in 2009 and quickly rebounded. By next year, analysts expect margins to hit 8.9 percent, a record high.
The difference this time is that companies wrung more savings out of their work forces, said Neal Soss, chief economist for Credit Suisse in New York. In fact, while wages and salaries have barely budged from recession lows, profits have staged a vigorous recovery, jumping 40 percent between late 2008 and the first quarter of 2010.
Harley-Davidson's profit gain last quarter was helped by a turnaround in its financing unit, as well as more efficient production, but the company is still cutting.
Harley has warned union employees at its Milwaukee factory that it would move production elsewhere in the United States if they did not agree to more flexible work rules and tens of millions in cost-saving measures.
Even if sales do improve, a surge in hiring is unlikely.
"The last thing we're worried about is when are we going to have to add more capacity, because what we're really doing is reconfiguring our entire operational system for greater flexibility," Keith Wandell, the company's chief executive, said on a conference call with analysts last week.
Harley's evolution is part of longer-term shift in American manufacturing, said Rod Lache, an analyst with Deutsche Bank.
At Ford, revenue in its North American operations is down by $20 billion since 2005, but instead of a loss like it had that year, the unit is expected to earn more than $5 billion in 2010. In large part, that is because Ford has shrunk its North American work force by nearly 50 percent over the last five years.
"These companies have cracked the code of a successful industrial turnaround," Mr. Lache said. "They're shrinking the business to a size that's defendable, and growing off that lower base."
To be sure, sales are rising for many companies, albeit at a much slower pace than the increase in profits. Among the 175 companies in the S.& P. 500 that have reported earnings for the second quarter, revenues rose 6.9 percent on average while profits jumped 42.3 percent, according to Thomson Reuters.
Still, even at corporations where both the top and bottom lines are expanding, the focus remains on keeping profits high, not rebuilding work forces decimated by the recession.
When Alcoa reported a turnaround this month in profits and a 22 percent jump in revenue, its chief financial officer, Charles D. McLane Jr., assured investors that it was not eager to recall the 37,000 workers let go since late 2008. "We have a tight focus on spending as market activity increases, operating more effectively and minimizing rehires where possible," he said. "We're not only holding headcount levels, but are also driving restructuring this quarter that will result in further reductions."
Michael E. Belwood, a spokesman for Alcoa, said more than 17,500 of the former workers were employed at units Alcoa has since sold, but added that the company "had to be resized to match the realities of the recession."
"We're keeping a close eye on costs because there is still uncertainty about the stability of this recovery," he said.
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