The Iraqi Book of Living and Dying

by Chris Mansel

O son of noble family
Burnt Iraqi children
Separated bone from skin
The American process of democracy moves slowly
As you move through the bardo
Hold close to your soul
As it may soon depart leaving your skin to endure
The acts of degenerates
And commissioned officers

O son of noble family
If you are re-born and are recruited by your children
To join the assault of the free world
Heed the teachings of the Buddha
And not the passions of your heart

O son of noble family
There is love for you on the soil of the United States
If you look for it

(See The Mansel Report: chrismansel.blogspot.com)

DEFRAUDING AMERICA: STRANGER THAN FICTION

JAZZMAN CHRONICLES: DISSEMINATE FREELY.
By Jack Random

When the Coalition Provisional Authority in Iraq failed to account for nine billion dollars in occupation expenditures, it was a little surprising how flippantly the White House discarded the matter. Like Kenny Boy Lay of Enron fame, the administrative warlords could not be bothered with details of accountability.

While the Bush administration does not consider nine billion dollars trivial when it comes to slashing social services, revelations regarding black budgets and “unsupported accounting entries” within various departments of government make it apparent that the individuals profiting from this accounting scheme consider nine billion little more than chump change.

The revelations begin with an estimated $40 billion in “black box” expenditures for intelligence (estimated by the Intelligence Resource Program). Given the most recent published budget of 26.7 billion in 1998, the estimate seems conservative in the post 911 environment. The current numbers are protected from public knowledge or congressional review with a rationale that the mere hint of an official sum would alert the world to our intentions – as if the world is not already alerted.

Forty billion dollars is roughly $150 for every man, woman and child in America yet, to the unknown overlords of secret wealth, it is the acorn of a mighty oak. Add to the total another 59.6 billion in unaccounted expenditures revealed in a partial audit of the Housing and Urban Development budget for the year 1999. Why the audit was left incomplete and uninvestigated by our fearless congressional leaders is left to the imagination.

Sixty billion dollars is a drop of water in an ocean of wealth and unworthy of investigation by a congress that finds more than enough time to stage public hearings on the burning issue of steroids in major league baseball (not to mention a 24-hour debate on the fate of an unfortunate woman in Florida).

A running total of one hundred billion dollars siphoned from public funds and shielded from public purview, is like a parking ticket to the apostles of holy capital.

Consider the official report of David Steensma, Acting Assistant Inspector General for auditing the Defense Department: $1.1 trillion (a trillion American = 1 followed by 12 zeroes) in “unsupported entries” for the fiscal year 2000.

Now we are talking real money, the kind of money that can topple governments, tip the balance of power, trigger recessions/depressions, and cripple a global economy, but even that is not the pinnacle of this mystifying story.

Catherine Austin Fitts, Assistant Secretary of Housing (HUD) under the first Bush administration, has estimated that four trillion dollars has been siphoned from government coffers by black budget operators whose identities are protected and whose operations will never be subject to government or public review.

As the Ayatollah Sistani might ask: What kind of a democracy is this?

According to Fitts (www.solari.com), whose academic, governmental and business credentials are impressive, this process of semi-official siphoning of taxpayer money began in the 1940’s when our government first granted secrecy to intelligence operations. It was secured under Ronald Reagan in the 1980’s when private corporations were contracted for government accounting. It was cemented in the aftermath of 911 by legislation erecting an impenetrable shroud around intelligence and their notorious secret operations.

Her observations and analysis lead to the inevitable conclusion that our economy is a house of cards, that it is largely founded on securities fraud and the relentless exploitation of the world’s resources, including our own.

One cannot help but wonder what will happen when the exploited nations of the world no longer believe in the false promise of a shared prosperity that does not exist – a theme soon to be promulgated by neoconservative icon Paul Wolfowitz at the head of the World Bank. One cannot help but wonder what will happen when it all comes crashing down.

America is like the addict whose addiction has advanced beyond redemption. We know it has gone too far. We know it has gone on too long yet we are powerless to alter the course.

Catherine Austin Fitts’ solution to the problem involves lifting the veil of secrecy and reversing the centralization of wealth. Economy should be controlled and accounted for at the local level. Her central point of advocacy is that we should vote with our money.

While I certainly agree, it is not enough. The magnitude of the problems we face as a nation can only begin to be addressed with a complete turnover of government personnel. As fictional character, Tony Soprano, might say: They’re all on the take. We cannot hope to avert disaster if we continue to rely on politicians whose best virtue is pandering to the issues of the day while the real problems of the nation go unattended.

The solution is to vote not only with our money but also with our brains when it comes to Election Day. Vote independent and third party. Vote Libertarian and Green. Vote against the corrupted machine (two parties controlled by the same interests). Refuse to believe it is beyond hope. Take the Independence Day Pledge: I will not vote for Democrats or Republicans. I will not contribute to their causes or candidates. I will vote my conscience every time.

In the year 2000, I published a work of fiction postulating the existence of a nefarious organization whose wealth and power was derived from securities fraud. Behind a veil of official secrecy, the organization was omnipotent and omnipresent, inviting small and independent businesses to either join or face extinction. Through extortion, fraud and bribery, they prospered at the expense of the poor and middle class.

When it all comes tumbling down and the truth is exposed for all to see, naked reality may be darker and stranger than fiction.

Jazz.

JACK RANDOM IS THE AUTHOR OF THE JAZZMAN CHRONICLES (CROW DOG PRESS) AND GHOST DANCE INSURRECTION (DRY BONES PRESS). HE WRITES FOR BUZZLE.COM.

I Don't Know by Van Eaton

things my father said to me, been putting me through the test
always walk a straight line son, I've been trying to do my best
sometimes i can't take it in, lord knows this world's gone wrong
i've been trying hard to let it all slide, and keep on keeping on.

now work it don’t come easy and oil has gone sky high
i would throw in the towel tomorrow, but i can't even afford to die

look man, what's the deal, i'm a native of this land
seems the king loves to steal, it's time we took a stand
rise up to this call my brothers, rise up for this fight
how did it ever become a crime to do what we know is right
i don’t know ........oh lord ....... i don’t know

some folks follow fashion, and some folks they're just slow
the preacher man done played his hand, now we face a long hard road
what is right and what is wrong, the line used to be so clear
don't talk about the sign of the times, the end is always near

i see it all around me, how can so many be so blind
they're easily led when things get tough, and fear keeps them in line

look man, what's the deal, i'm a native of this land
seems the king loves to steal, it's time we took a stand
rise up to this call my brothers, rise up for this fight
how did it ever become a crime to do what we know is right
i don’t know ........oh lord ....... i don’t know


Van 04-08-05

Mission Accomplished by James Wisniewski

(the day the Pope died)

It thunders and rains outside as I contemplate a dream
of my family attending my brother's funeral
(he was still alive in the dream).

The nearness of nature's retrieval taking
my good friend and next door neighbor.
Sixty seven, and we had joked around
the morning that he hit the ground, eyes closed,
never to open again.

Now his grandchildren peer over the balcony
waiting for the flute guy to come joke with them.

Lessons to be learned....

In his last days he told his wife,
"I've finally got my shed organized the way I want it"......

Mission accomplished.

-- James Wisniewski / aka, wZ

SACRED FLIGHT

It is the season of death and dying, death and dying,
death and dying…

The sun breaks through clouds of gloom
reminding us that we live on in grief and mourning,
through tears of sorrow, we live on in tribute and
in servitude to those who walked before,
whose gentle words and genteel manner
will comfort us no more.

What is sacred but that we most fear?

Nature is sacred as she wreaks havoc unmoved
by cries for mercy, immutable & Holy

God by any name, Almighty forces brought to bear
the more so by the myth of prayer
(and I believe in prayer)

Love, perhaps the greatest fear, trading places
in light and dark, lightning strikes and fills
the heart with horror…

Towers in the mind’s eye, symbols of the Great Terror
(the Phoenix) from dust to sacred art…

Life and its eternal foil
shuffling off this mortal coil
journeys to the endless night &
humankind’s most sacred fright

Goodnight, sweet Prince, &
flights of Angels sing thee to thy rest.

-- Random 4/2/05.

From There Outward by Jake Berry

(for Philip Lamantia and Robert Creeley, liberated)

There was a time
many years ago,
when I was a young child,
I did not write poetry.

In those days
my imagination lived me –
it overtook my body
and shaped it to every delightful and
mysterious purpose it could create.

I was imagination’s living form.
I had no mind, no self
I was motionless
until imagination stirred
some portion to song
(and every word was singing)
or dance
(and every movement was a dance).

Then I felt compelled
to make words.
So I wrote a poem,
then another and another
and people laughed
or made pleasant remarks.
And the girls were pleased
when I wrote for them –
those were kisses worth the poems.

But I recognized that
words failed imagination.
They were so carefully
reigned by books and teachers.
I had become imagination’s loss.

So I destroyed myself
and freed the constricted words.
I liberated them to
imagination’s tongue
and they once again
took their natural form
like a tree, or a sun, or a boy.
And people were confused.
they were afraid and turned away.

and I became serious,
a solid man.

I had to destroy myself
again and again
to liberate the words.

and speech was singing
and movement was dancing.

And today,
I hear the great poet’s death
and I think how lucky he is
to be nothing but
free imagination again,
to become pure poetry,
without a world of fools
that make us work
for what we already are.

Jake Berry 3.30.05

Passing by Chris Mansel

An epic of transition is death. The body is a vessel of incarceration. There are horrors in the skies that descend to us a web of illness we are drawn to even as we attempt escape. The disease on the ground, the emaciation of the air, draws us inside and therefore closes and seals the process of death. Somewhere between the skies and the earth, somewhere in the bardo do we appear as we really are, clear thoughts amidst a solution of matter both gray and dark. Death always reminds us of where we are going and then we start to think of where we have been. Georges Bataille wrote, "There is no better way to know death than to link it with some licentious image." Either way you look at it death is a continuing process that if captured in a display of DNA would be a round strand that circles endlessly in a poetic path, tragic and ethereal.

- Chris Mansel

A Portion of the Soul Carries the Heart

By Chris Mansel

America, above purpose, defines itself as the last toll on the road to democracy. It creates its own vision of an idea and betrays it as often as it recites it. Defying international law and reconsidering its reasons it invades and assumes the population's wealth. Natural resources, the acquiring of by force, are not listed in the constitution or in any of its amendments. Democracy wastes itself on the definition of morality and indecision. Defending its agenda on the basis of the rights of the wealthy democracy completely undermines the rights of the poor to earn a living and concentrates itself upon the furthering of its principles of the class warfare it defends so abundantly through a two party system that only falls in the path of the law when it forgets itself and rushes ahead without the payment of graft and favors. William Julius Mickle wrote, "The less criminal spirits animate bees, singing birds, and other innocent creatures; while those of deeper guilt become wolves or tigers." These wolves don't disguise themselves and they eat their prey in front of the young to remind those looking that if you have none they will still take what you don't have. The antidote to patience is not resolve, but action. Words define only what the memory will allow. Choice is the omnipresent wage that drives the open minded and cannot be assumed by anyone through force or by law. The ability to vote, to write in a vote, clarifies what the two party system might describe as an un-American activity. To not employ the television media for news is to off load the spin for the truth.

Wait! Pull Back! By Tom Stephens

Environmental Justice and the Practice of
Sacred Law and Traditional Wisdom by Indigenous Peoples
March 24, 2005

Earlier this month, on March 5, I had the pleasure of appearing on a panel at the Law Union of Ontario’s annual conference in Toronto. Another speaker was Kate Kempton of the Toronto law firm Olthuis Kleer Townshend. Kate’s discussion of what she has learned representing indigenous peoples regarding rebuilding sovereignty and self-determination holds profound lessons regarding environmental justice, which I will try to briefly summarize here.

Different World Views

The applicable world-view of “environmental law” in 21st century post-industrial society is linear, hierarchical, and based on dominance. This dominance permits and provokes subjugation of nature and peoples who hold nature as sacred and internal, and provokes creation and recognition of rights in individual and especially corporate property, in the form of precisely defined and carved-out parcels. These property rights, in turn, are valuable for purposes of commodification and exploitation of resources, primarily for their narrowly defined economic benefits. Environmental regulations and law are “linear,” in the sense that they assume a direct progression, from proposals and initiatives about resource exploitation and protection, to the outcomes of regulatory and legal proceedings. Interests, all themselves defined within boxes, are weighed and ostensibly “balanced” against each other, not with each other as a model of sharing would create. That ostensibly rational, linear, ahistorical and economistic model does not accurately describe the fundamental issues and values at stake in today’s world-reshaping and -defining conflicts over resources, sovereignty and environmental health and justice.

One characteristic of the dominant, linear world-view that distorts our perceptions and our decisions regarding our relationship to nature involves putting the environment in a box, separated from issues of cultural and economic survival. Under this view, “more” is “better,” including more exploitation of the environment by dominant economic and cultural forces. The false ideological and psychological “box,” separating the environmental from the socio-economic and from self-identity, blinds us to the permanent and irreversibly damaging consequences that more exploitation of a rapidly diminishing resource base threaten for us all. In our time, the “line” that symbolizes this world-view depicts us, through the transnational corporate forces of dominance and hierarchy, patriarchy and white supremacy, driving ourselves to the end of the line (lines end in “dead ends”), and off the edge of the cliff of social, ecological, economic and civilizational survival.

The contrasting indigenous world-view, symbolized by the circle, in which our environment, humans and our culture are embedded within and intrinsically sharing with each other, is the basis of indigenous sacred and traditional law and wisdom and, at its best, also of environmental justice. Kate Kempton has an indigenous client/associate who describes her practice, in his language of Cree, as “ses-qua”, or “Wait! Pull back!” That is what we must do to meet the fundamental environmental justice challenges of the 21st century, by recognizing and consistently acting upon the interrelationship between our environment and our cultural and economic survival. Such practices and philosophies encountered our natural resources in their spectacular fullness millennia ago, they established ways of living on sacred ground in peace and justice, and they continue to safeguard a remnant that remains subject to their jurisdiction today. When will we ever learn?

Change or Die

Trying to protect the essential environmental interests and fundamental human rights of indigenous peoples, and other people of color and low-income people, within the dominant, hierarchical and linear framework of what we know as “environmental law,” is like trying to fit a big round ball into a small square box. It is bound to fail. And because of the huge global issues at stake in today’s world regarding environmental health and human survival, if we continue to pursue this failed strategy, we will eventually fail ecologically, socially, economically, and as a matter of human survival. No amount of scientific regulation or careful legal or administrative weighing of data will change this stark reality.

Unlike the line, the circle never ends (it has no end points), yielding a very different and much more authentic version of cherished human “freedom.” This is potentially the basis of a different, more holistic, sustainable, fair, and potentially successful environmental law. Only within a sacred (and truly democratic) circle is it possible to see how things weighed in dollar amounts do not always outweigh things that are beloved, irreplaceable, unique, invaluable, and necessary for survival; to effectively assert rights, power, and control over vital interests, without falling into the trap of dominance and subjugation that denies them to others; to implement sustainability on individual, local, state/provincial and national/ international levels. On all these levels, dominance systematically threatens human and ecological survival today. Therefore we have to implement alternatives to dominance. Both to preserve material survival of the environment, and to establish justice among humans, we urgently have to implement alternatives. To continue with unfettered exploitation, with the illusion of the separate environmental “box” and the potential for infinite “growth,” is a death sentence for both humans and our cultures.

We urgently have to remember the sacred wisdom of our childhood, that (in Kate Kempton’s words) what we “need” is not the same thing as what we “want.” And what we think we want, in the world of lines, is not what we really need – for identity, survival, and happiness. We need to say “wait,” to “pull back,” and “we need to take this whole assembly of lines apart” in order to provide both a human future for our children and a natural future for our world. The long-overdue recognition that environmental justice must become an integral part of the public policy of democratic governments around the world, and that environmental racism and disproportionate exposure to environmental contamination and risk must be opposed and eliminated, is just one necessary step on this sacred road.

Tom Stephens, lebensbaum4@earthlink.net, would like to express his appreciation to Kate Kempton, KKempton@OKTLaw.com, for her review and editorial assistance with this essay.

SUMMER SOLDIERS AGAINST THE WAR

JAZZMAN CHRONICLES: DISSEMINATE FREELY.

WHY THE EQUIVOCATORS ARE WRONG
By Jack Random

[Summary: In these trying times, the ranks of the antiwar movement are missing some of their most prominent members. The equivocators, whose passion for the cause has seemingly waned, are in some ways more damaging than rightwing ideologues.]

Something was missing from the antiwar rally at City Plaza in San Francisco. Two years after the war began, nearly two months after an election in Iraq made the purple finger a symbol of freedom, the proud statue of Simon Bolivar looked out over a sea of protesters and no one of notoriety looked back.

Where was the Hollywood contingent? Where were the high-profile champions of the Green Party? Where were the members of Congress? Perhaps some attended rallies in other parts of the country but they were not here. Having been at every major rally since before the war, I can attest that the absence of star power was a first. Perhaps it is unfair to charge the famous of abandoning the cause for lack of a mass audience but it is a thought that must have crossed more than a few of our minds.

Those of us who marched and gathered to declare our renewed resolve should be proud that we have stood the challenge. Those who accuse us now of obstinacy, of refusing to accept the glory of war simply because it is sponsored by a president we despise, are the same individuals who gave up the cause at Shock and Awe. They include comedian-turned-pundit Bill Maher, Senators Hillary Clinton, Dianne Feinstein and John Kerry. They are the ultimate equivocators (who never tire of criticizing the equivocations of others) such as MS/NBC’s Chris Matthews and fellow soft-baller Tim Russert. They include virtually everyone who has been allowed to wear the hat of an antiwar spokesperson before the mainstream media cameras, with the notable exceptions of Amy Goodman and Katrina vanden Heuvel.

In the winter of 1776, when the independence of this nation was very much in doubt, citizen Tom Paine etched his most famous words by campfire on the head of a drum: These are the times that try men’s souls. The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of their country; but he that stands it now, deserves the love and thanks of man and woman.

Perhaps we should perceive the evolution of events as positive. When the authorities were afraid of us, they branded us traitors and threatened to slap us in jail or ship us off to foreign lands that have no sense of humanitarian restraint. Now, they only accuse us of obstinacy and poor manners.

We are so filled with hatred for George W. Bush that we cannot admit that anything he says or does is right and honorable. Strangely, it is a familiar appeal and one that has been sounded to justify the actions of the last several administrations. It is a particularly vexing accusation because it appeals to the public without having to rely on reason. They have invented their own opposition and when events do not play out as the pseudo opposition predicted, they claim victory over themselves.

No one in the antiwar movement declared that either Arabs or Muslims were incapable of achieving democracy. No one in the antiwar movement said that an election could not be held under conditions of Marshall Law. No one in the antiwar movement has opposed democracy anywhere in the world – not in the Ukraine, not in Iran, Lebanon, Iraq or Ohio.

We are accused of working backwards from our disdain for the president to a blanket distrust of his policies. I accuse the accusers of working backwards from their need to placate the president, along with the corporate masters who sign their paychecks. Are we allowed to consider the president’s history? Are we allowed to consider the Bush Doctrine of foreign policy? Are we permitted to acknowledge the Bush administration’s betrayal of democracy in Haiti, Venezuela, Pakistan or the Philippines? I accuse our detractors of closing their eyes to those truths that do not fit the mold of their appeasement.

The equivocators point to France as an example of appropriate reticence and reserve. Indeed, I point to the Gold Coast and Port-au-Prince and demand that the French take Jacques Chirac down for his betrayals.

The equivocators point to NATO as a model of dispassionate cooperation. I point to Italy, Spain, Poland and Ukraine. Everywhere democracy springs up, support for the war declines. There are few in the Ukraine that are thanking George Bush for democracy and fewer in Washington thanking Viktor Yushchenko for making good his promise to withdraw from Iraq. In Lebanon, given the history of western involvement, there is as much or more concern about America’s role in internal affairs as that of Syria. It is no secret that intelligence operations have resumed in Lebanon and it is not beyond contemplating that the assassination of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri was a CIA operation designed to destabilize Lebanon and damage relations with Syria.

Will the equivocators concede that there is, at this juncture, no democracy in Iraq? Will they admit that without sovereignty elections are little more than a show? Will they admit that the administration has shown little interest in Latin American or African democracy? Will they admit that America’s attraction to Middle Eastern “democracy” is grounded in the thick, black fluid that rests beneath Arabic feet? Will they concede that thus far we have accomplished nothing more than media events and press releases designed to create an illusion of democracy while the people remain powerless? Will they admit that we have sacrificed fifteen hundred American soldiers, $200 billion, and roughly 125,000 Iraqis [1] for a photo op to justify an ongoing theft? If Iraq is a democracy, then who controls the oil? This is the question that divides the fools from the liars, the equivocators from the lords of avarice.

When we have sacrificed another thousand or two soldiers, another 50,000 Arab lives, when the draft is reinstated, when we establish permanent bases for permanent war on the Arabian peninsula, when we defy the expressed will of the people to withdraw our forces, when we refuse to nullify the contracts of an occupier, then it will be our turn to order crow for your suppers.

Will you be so kind as to swallow? You are worse than the warlords who believe in this crusade for the obvious reason: the Iraqis have what we covet. You are worse because you allow them to get away with it on the pretense of virtue. You are worse because you know better – or would if you allowed yourself to pursue the truth beyond comfortable conclusions. You are worse because you have abandoned the cause without cause. You ride the waves of popular opinion without honor or shame and expect to be welcomed at every table.

You are the sunshine patriots and summer soldiers who possess no convictions, who harbor no loyalties, and in the end you will have earned neither the love nor the thanks of man, woman or nation.

Jazz.

1) Extrapolated from the only objective estimate of Iraqi casualties to date, that of the British medical journal Lancet.

JACK RANDOM IS THE AUTHOR OF THE JAZZMAN CHRONICLES (CROW DOG PRESS) AND GHOST DANCE INSURRECTION (DRY BONES PRESS). SEE ALSO WWW.BUZZLE.COM.

CONGRESS AT THE PLATE

JAZZMAN CHRONICLES: DISSEMINATE FREELY.
GRANDSTANDING POLITICIANS & BASEBALL
By Jack Random

The grandstand is filling up long before the first pitch. The smell of fresh cut grass and hope springs eternal. The game comes back to Washington and Washington, hungry for a winning ticket in a season of despair, comes back to the game. Leading off is Tom Davis (R-VA), Chairman of the House Government Reform Committee, backed up by Henry “Smoke and Mirrors” Waxman (D-CA) with the heavy-hitting Senator from Arizona waiting in the wings.

Baseball starts early this year with a circle of politicians eager to score a little face time at the expense of the grand old game. Some of these grandstanders have ambitions that would make Caesar blush. One in particular seems to have one eye trained to the camera light at all times and rarely misses an opportunity to take center stage.

The biggest hotdogs in baseball are bratwurst and polish sausage. The biggest hotdog in Washington is without peer: Perpetual candidate John McCain.

Here is an issue with the potential to transcend ideology. Left-right, Republican or Democrat, any politician who believes, in a time of war and record deficits, in a time of bizarre climate and runaway energy prices, at a time of neglect for America’s workers, at a time of crumbling economic infrastructures, at a time of crushing trade deficits and a declining dollar, at a time of rapidly changing international alliances, it is in fact a good time to turn our attention to the problem of baseball records and asterisks, they deserve our united scorn and a pledge of eternal opposition.

As Congressman Paul Kanjorski (D-PA) said, “Maybe I’ve missed something, but is this the most important issue in the United States today? It doesn’t warrant a committee hearing, no less the issuing of subpoenas.”

Lest anyone take seriously this drivel about protecting our children from the scourge of steroids, the problem of steroid abuse in baseball is solved. With the new testing program and a well-publicized Witch Hunt, there was next to no one on steroids in 2004 and there will be fewer still in 2005. Minor league abuse was eliminated several seasons ago and every high school athlete knows: Steroid usage is the surest way to be banished from the road to professional baseball. Even the hint of steroid use will end a young prospect’s career.

Our children are not at risk. What our elected leaders might concern themselves with is a culture that believes that all our problems (including a sagging slugging percentage) have a pharmaceutical solution. That, however, would require taking on an industry that provides substantial funding to political campaigns on both sides of the aisle.

There are few things worse in the world of sport than pretending to be a champion when you are only a chump. Pretending to be a hero when, in fact, you are nothing but a grandstander reaching for glory where none is to be found and willing to harm those who have done no harm is far worse than any crime of an accused ball player.

Thus far, no one has been able to find a solution to the problem of a politician’s unquenchable thirst for publicity. My recommendation: Give them each a gun and send them down to the border they like to talk so much about. Let them each take a cameraman and an embedded reporter so they feel useful and appreciated. Let there be no bullets in the gun. Let there be no film in the camera and no tape in the recorder. The longer we can keep them there the better off we will all be.

Leave the game alone.

Jazz.

SEE ALSO: IN DEFENSE OF BARRY BONDS (WWW.DISSIDENTVOICE.COM).

NYC ANTIWAR RESOLUTION

WHEREAS: March 19 is the second anniversary of the beginning of the war against Iraq, and

WHEREAS: Peace loving people in New York City and throughout the region will gather in Central Park, as people in cities across the country and the world will be marking that date with protest;

WHEREAS: President Bush is asking Congress to approve $82 billion more for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan on top of the $200 billion that has already been taken from the lives of working and poor people to pay for the last two years of war;

WHEREAS: President Bush's 2006 proposed budget constitutes the most violent assault in 25 years on the programs that New York City as well as other cities and communities across the country depend on;

WHEREAS: These proposed cuts in desperately needed aid for education, healthcare, housing, veterans, as well as for the homeless and hungry; and whereas the continuation of the war and occupation in Iraq that these proposed cuts will in part pay for will cause grave harm to the people of New York City;

The New York City Council calls on President George Bush and on Congress to:

WITHDRAW ALL U.S. TROOPS FROM IRAQ NOW and NOT CUT THE PROGRAMS THAT CITIES AND COMMUNITIES DEPEND ON.

Robber Barons Revisited

By John Griffin
[Submitted by Anna Pages]

Although I'm a military veteran and patriotic to a degree, the Bush Administration has proven to be thugs, robbing the American Middle Class of everything they've worked for by looking the other way while jobs are exported to such places as Mexico, India, China, and South Korea by the millions while basic customer services have been for the most part turned over to elevator musicians and recorded voices. John Quarterman, Bonnie Cole, Sherry Love & I saw it coming, Republican money machine in disguise as a Christian coalition running roughshod over anyone & anything in their path to controlling wealth and international power. Now the good ole boy middle of the road folks who once had "schoolgirl crushes" on the Bush Administration are finally catching on that there's trouble in paradise and beyond. I'm not sure when a new American Revolution begins, but as a "health caring" deficit-laden nation, we're up to our ass in alligators, nearly bankrupt, and environmentally cattywhompas. All legislation to improve the status quo has been bought by priveleged investors betting on hedge fund appropriations.

Perhaps the next generation will be miracle workers.
(Either that or temporary workers in trailer parks.)

I'm just hoping Jesus will hurry on back and
straighten out this big mess of a world we're in.

Still counting money in Alphaville while it lasts.

- - - John G.
Corporate Road Warrior

When in doubt just take a look
at very real and valid statistics:

costofwar.com

Ex-Marine Says Public Version of Saddam Capture Fiction

United Press International

A former U.S. Marine who participated in capturing ousted Iraqi President Saddam Hussein said the public version of his capture was fabricated.

Ex-Sgt. Nadim Abou Rabeh, of Lebanese descent, was quoted in the Saudi daily al-Medina Wednesday as saying Saddam was actually captured Friday, Dec. 12, 2003, and not the day after, as announced by the U.S. Army.

"I was among the 20-man unit, including eight of Arab descent, who searched for Saddam for three days in the area of Dour near Tikrit, and we found him in a modest home in a small village and not in a hole as announced," Abou Rabeh said.

"We captured him after fierce resistance during which a Marine of Sudanese origin was killed," he said.

He said Saddam himself fired at them with a gun from the window of a room on the second floor.

Then they shouted at him in Arabic: "You have to surrender. ... There is no point in resisting."

"Later on, a military production team fabricated the film of Saddam's capture in a hole, which was in fact a deserted well," Abou Rabeh said.

Abou Rabeh was interviewed in Lebanon.

[Submitted by Chris Mansel.]

Obiter Dictum (Ward Churchill)

By Chris Mansel

[Editor's Note: Ward Churchill & The Threshold of Influence is posted on the Albion Monitor. See http://www.albionmonitor.com.]

Of Ward Churchill Jack Random writes, "I would dearly love to say that Ward Churchill is not important, that it is the principle of free speech, the essence of a democratic society, and the foundation of academic excellence, that is at stake here, but I simply do not believe it. Ward Churchill is important. His is a singular and distinct voice in American society and, if it is lost, we are all impoverished. His crime is not that he misspoke or that he spoke out of turn, too loudly and too proudly, but that he dared to say what many thought. Moreover, the sentence he committed to paper on September 12, 2001, would never have garnered any significant attention had not the writer crossed a threshold of influence." How right he is. When a man or woman in this country is afraid to stand up and say what he or she feels, state their opinion then all is lost. Democracy will cease to exist, another form of government will evolve, and many in the opposition will die. If you think that sounds just a bit absurd then read the history of Guatemala, Serbia, Poland, just to name a few.

Ward Churchill may have chosen too strong a representation in using the word, Eichmann, but in all sincerity, he was right to a degree. Many of those who work in the technology and money markets are contributing to acts of terrorism whether they know it or not. They do compete to find brand new ways of inciting terror and launder money. If a bank is discovered to be washing money for a drug cartel they don’t arrest everyone who works for the bank, they arrest the higher ups in the company and hold them accountable. Can you imagine the man who mops and buffs the floor being in on the crime with the president and board of the bank? No, you cannot but you might easily make the case that a few mid-level positions in the bank were either asked or told to look the other way. It is doubtful that their names will appear in the indictments. Are they just as guilty? Yes.

The events of September 11 were horrific and stirred a nation into two separate directions. The first was anger and an insistence to attack those who would attack us but the second was much more disturbing. Few elected officials called for caution and in this tense restraint of panic sweeping changes were made under the nose of those that serve in Washington by bills such as the Patriot Act. To use the events of the worst attack ever on this country to push your agenda is just as bad or worse than the attacks. Politicians for years have rushed to have their photos taken at the scene of a fire, at the slaughter of innocent civilians and the events of September 11. It’s despicable and it reeks of a total uncaring and self-preservation that says everything about the sincerity and dignity of that official. Most of the contents in the Patriot Act sought new restrictions over domestic surveillance. Let the shoplifter keep their prize and punish the employee for letting him get away.

In an essay entitled, True History, Jack Random writes, "The greatness of our country and the greatest hope is that there are those who have broken free from the bindings of our indoctrination and declared themselves free. These individuals have discovered the greater truth that where one falsehood lies it is often accompanied by many others. They have uncovered the lies of manifest destiny and equal opportunity. They uncovered the lies of blind justice and the moral imperative to war. They have uncovered the lies of American sovereignty, American democracy, American superiority, and they have discovered the underlying truth: We are a nation born of great ideals yet we have failed to live up to them." Failure to live up to those ideals can be the conclusion of a great noble idea. To protect the people of the United States should not come at the price of liberty and freedom. If it does then we’re facing the wrong end of the barrel of the gun.

- Chris Mansel

SEE http://themanselreport.blogspot.com/

A BLACK HILLS FOOTNOTE

Hey Jack Random,

Reading your post "The Wounds from Wounded Knee" (http://www.counterpunch.org/random02262005.html), I thought you might like to know a small footnote in the Paha Sapa/Black Hills story. Once upon a university...

Back in 1988-89 i was t.a.-ing a big intro. anthropology class at Tufts (near Boston), and the department received a letter out of the blue. Eventually they handed it to me: introducing Phil Stevens, nuclear engineer and Indian Chief, ready to make a presentation on the pending Bradley Bill (U.S. Senate) and the Black Hills mineral rights. No fee, and he would pay for his own plane fare and room at the Marriott. Interested?

At the same time it happened that I was advising an undergrad anthro. student at Harvard: Judy Rabinowitz, daughter of a progressive judge and with Native American heritage herself. Judy, check out this letter, who is this guy in the fancy dance outfit? She sent me to the Harvard American Indian Law Students Association, in the person of Steve Emery. Steve said, yeah we know the guy, he's a shill trying to sell out the sacred lands, but go ahead and invite him, then say there will also be a student presentation, and our group will invite a speaker from the other side, Mr. Gerald Clifford of the Oglala-Lakhota Black Hills Steering Committee. But hey, it's gonna cost something to fly Gerald here, how can we raise the money? I suggested a benefit concert, and Steve said he could sing and play Hokha Wichasha (Lakhota music), let's try. So we rented a church hall in Harvard Square for 80 bucks and I postered all around, advertising Steve paired with Nurudafina, a good friend of mine who plays and teaches Afrocuban rumba in the Boston area. Sliding scale. About 10 paying customers showed up, and we ended the evening dancing in a circle with Gerald. (I have a tape, and man, Steve can sing, and talk too.) When everyone left, the hat contained about 80 bucks; I gave the whole thing to Steve (and defaulted on the church--they didn't fuss too much). Steve suggested we should keep a video record of the forum the next day, and one of the non-paying customers promised to bring a video camera. I borrowed another handycam from a classmate just in case.

Three nights later at Tufts, the department had reserved the main hall in the diplomacy school, and when our team arrived, there in the front row sat Dr. Jean Mayer (college president, Republican, now late) and some "cigar store" stereotype in red makeup and the full Hollywood regalia. I introduced Stevens to the audience (mostly comprising the students in that intro. class), then announced a cultural presentation before the Chief's special talk and slide show.

Steve took the stage with a big drum in hand.

"Before we begin, everyone stand for the Lakhota National Anthem..."

Wow, with the first notes everybody's hair was already on end.

He followed right up with a welcome song to Gerald, but before handing over the stage, said he had a short folk story: about the Duck People. One day, the Fox came by and told them he had a new drum to play, but in order to dance to it you have to close your eyes. So they did, but as each dancing Duck Person passed the Fox, he'd grab it by the neck and stuff it into his gunny sack. Then the next one and the next one until... as Steve illustrated Fox's actions, each time he'd swing his big right arm a little closer to Stevens' delicately coiffed head. ...until a little Baby Duck disobeyed the rules and opened up his eyes. Hey everyone, the Fox is killing all of us! So they chased the fox away. Don't dance with your eyes closed.

Then Gerald Clifford gave a basic intro to law and politics on the res, and described how Stevens was not the first outsider to tell different stories depending on who was listening, or to throw around lots of cash to rig the votes and sell off resources like uranium.

Lastly Stevens got up, his voice not so firm as before, and ran through a slick slide show: self-promotion, Stars & Stripes, nukes for energy independence from those Arab Sheikhs, blah blah blah, but his heart wasn't in it for sure.

With the last slide, questions please? The hall erupted in recriminations, accusations, and order rapidly broke down, class dismissed. One student (fellow Italo-American, sad to say) stands up and calls me a damn commie. I reply that at least I'm no Bluecoat like Stevens. Mayer hustles Stevens out of the room. The End (almost). Not bad educational value for one evening, total cost 80 bucks, not a dime from the university. Some nice term papers came out of it too, if I remember.

Epilogue: theory meets praxis. One of the two videos (not mine) came out pretty good and Steve arranged for it to be seen in Rosebud and elsewhere back home. Stevens' cover is thereby blown and his anti-Bradley operation fades away. Probably more to that part of the story, but anyway there was feedback/blowback/other unintended consequences from the p.r. job. Not that anyone had been dancing with their eyes closed...

Next spring, Steve Emery graduated and drove his van back west. I heard from him indirectly once or twice before disappearing into my dissertation (on Southern Nigerian languages). Years later while browsing in a 1960's photo book about Lakhota culture, Steve's Picture jumps off the page: a skinny teenager, caption: "well known, up and coming singer" or words to that effect. No kidding.

Just a small footnote in a very long story.

Best regards,

Victor Manfredi

United Native America on Ward Churchill

United Native America
02, 27, 05
American Indian Professor Ward Churchill
On to Wisconsin UV Whitewater

Mike Graham founder of United Native America, attended professor Ward Churchill's speaking event at the University of Hawaii on February 22, 2005. His group was invited by faculty members sponsoring Ward Churchill.

The Honolulu Star Bulletin newspaper stated in their report that Professor Ward Churchill said he was not Native American, this was a misquote of what Churchill actually said. Graham having a front row seat at the Churchill event states what Churchill did say, Churchill said I'm not Native American "I'm Indian. "

A retraction is being issued from the Star Bulletin newspaper concerning their misquote of Ward Churchill. United Native America is outraged over the way some national media people are reporting on the Churchill issue. Ann Coulter a talking head reporter for the Republican Party and Bill O'Reilly are attacking the American Indian community in their zealous attempt to have Churchill fired.

Ann Coulter press release "The Little Injun That Could" stated that "Churchill should pack up his teepee and hit the trail of tears." Ann Coulter's statement clearly dehumanizes the loss of lives of over five thousand Indian men, women and children! The trail of tears is just one of many hundreds of  9-11's Indians had to endure because of U.S.  Policy's against their race.

Ann Coulter in her report "Not Crazy Horse Just Crazy" attacked Ward Churchill over his comments of comparing Indian reservations to the equivalent of Nazi concentration camps. Ann Coulter fired back at him by stating "I forgot Auschwitz had a casino." This statement by Ann Coulter goes to the heart of the Republican party's stand against Indians economic well being. Republican party members across our country use every tactic at their disposal to hinder or stop legislation that would bring economic relief to the Indian community. Ann Coulter is obviously uneducated and oblivious to true documented history of Indians in America.

Bill O'Reilly attacks Ward Churchill by trying to link Indian nations with casino's to Wisconsin's Democrat Governor Jim Doyle for his silence on the issue of  professor Ward Churchill. Bill O'Reilly had former republican Wisconsin Governor Scott McCallum on his fox News TV show this past week trying to connect the dots that Indian casino money played a major role in electing Jim Doyle as state governor. Former governor Scott McCullum told Bill O'Reilly that he was also offered money from state Indian tribes as was Jim Doyle, the tribes money was offered at the end of the election and really played no part in who won the governor's race.

Bill O'Reilly, Ann Coulter and the republican party need to get off the Indians back! Bill O'Reilly's infamous words are, "the buck stops here, the no spin zone" It's obvious that O'Reilly, Ann Coulter and the republican party are very worried about how many bucks Indian's are making today and how their spending their money. Their riding across America acting like Custer, warning the American people that the Indian's are coming. Their heads are spinning faster than Linda Blaire in the Exorcist.

It's true American history that Indians endured a for real holocaust over U.S. policy against them. Indians in America today stand united with all Americans in defending their true homeland against foreign and domestic enemies. The manor in how America came about as we know it today concerning Indians should never happen again in mans history. Today all Americans are in the same boat in defending our country. 

Ann Coulter web page:
http://www.anncoulter.org/cgi-local/archives.cgi

United Native America web site:
http://www.unitednativeamerica.com/main.html

Mike L. Graham, member Oklahoma Cherokee Nation
Founder United Native America
www.UnitedNativeAmerica.com

Re: Wounded Knee

Sir,
I read with interest your article posted in Counterpunch, as well as your exchange with Mr. Brook. Mr. Brook sounds a little like the type of person who sits in the audience of a daytime TV talk show and becomes foam-at-the-mouth angry at whatever topic is under discussion.
This is our land. Period. Far as I know there's no statute of limitations on genocide. Like you, I wonder when a crime is no longer a crime. I sometimes make the analogy of a car thief giving a stolen car to his son. Does that make it no longer stolen ? Should the victim then cease legal address because the original malefactor is no longer in posession of the stolen property ?
I entertain no serious belief that the non-Indians are gonna pack their bags and head back to Europe-Asia-wherever, but I certainly do support our people in their struggles everywhere. I take so much pride in my race that I refuse to cite statistics of victimhood, it makes me feel helpless.
With that said, I resent people making " Get over it" statements. Mr. Brook has no sympathy for my people, that's fine. I haven't asked for it and don't expect it. But it's very annoying to hear the horrors of colonialism reduced to "Get over it".
Regards,
Joe Osorio
Quechan
Oakland

[Editor's Note: The CounterPunch article was posted 2/26/05; the exchange with Mr. Brook is posted below.]

RE: THE WOUNDS OF WOUNDED KNEE

A FRANK INTERCHANGE: GREG BROOK VS. JACK RANDOM

[Editor’s Note: A reader’s response to the commentary “The Wounds of Wounded Knee” posted on CounterPunch 2/26/05 triggered the following interchange.]

GREG BROOK 2/26/05 at 10:16 am:

Subject: Wake up

Your essay about Wounded Knee was another example of self-imposed guilt that no rational person would take part in. What's done is done. Native Americans do not have any sort of "birth right" to the Americas simply because their ancestors lived there, just like you don't have any sort of birth right to Europe or wherever your ancestors were from. The land belongs to the people who were born to it. People have been living on American soil for generations and had nothing to do with its stealing. Telling them that it is isn't really their land is like telling the Palestinians that none of Palestine is really their land because it used to belong to the Jews about 2,000 years ago, or telling all of the Hispanic Cubans to get lost because [they’re] on conquered land, or the Mexican Hispanics or any other of a hundred displaced and reconquered peoples/terroritories. Native Americans aren't still stewing over Wounded Knee, so speak for yourself and stop pretending like you speak for them, because no one is owed an apology for something that wasn't done to them, wasn't done by anyone living today, and to state the opposite is pure arrogance. Grow up.

RANDOM RESPONSE 2/26/05 at 12:05 pm:

In all sincerity, the quickest way to short circuit reasoned discourse is to punctuate your argument with personal insult. You are clearly a rationale person with a distinct point of view so please take it as a constructive criticism: Your case would be more persuasive without the last two words.

That said, I would offer the following points of contention:

> However I might feel personally, I do realize that giving the nation back to the Indians is not on the table. Does it follow that the indigenous peoples have forfeited equal justice under the law? Given the terms of the Fort Laramie Treaty, that is precisely what is at stake in the land of the Lakota. Moreover, the mismanagement of BIA funds is the finding of a court of law, the resolution of which is pending the government's refusal to comply with a court order.

> There is a world of difference between ancestors who left the land of their birth and those who were dispossessed.

> You must have miswrote when you stated: "The land belongs to the people who were born to it." As Crazy Horse said, "My land is where my people lay buried." I couldn't agree more.

> I'm not asking for guilt, only for justice and the nation's misdeeds (genocide) are a part of the equation.

> Where do you draw the line of accountability? A hundred years? Fifty years? Twenty years? It seems an arbitrary delineation.

> Are you sure about your history? Were not the Palestinians there as well?

> Did I give the impression that I was speaking for anyone but myself? I am not.

> Apologies are neither called for nor particularly important: It is a matter of justice.

> Arrogance? I'm afraid I don't see it.

I do wish to thank you for taking the time to to set down your thoughts and forward them. Despite our disagreement, I appreciate the interchange.

Peace,
Random

P.S. With your permission, I may wish to post this exchange on my site.

GREG BROOK 2/26/05 at 1:01 pm:

"There is a world of difference between ancestors who left the land of their birth and those who were dispossessed."

Right, and that's unfortunate, however you seem to be missing the word of critical importance here: ANCESTORS. It doesn't matter where your ANCESTORS were displaced from, since that has no bearing on who you are or where you grew up. My ancestors were forced to flee Ireland because of British oppression and apathy towards the potato famine, which is arguably equal to being dispossessed, yet I don't rant on about how the British owe me reparations, nor has the Irish government ever done the same, nor do I hold some insane belief that I own a little crop of land in some corner of Ireland.

You must have miswrote when you stated: "The land belongs to the people who were born to it." As Crazy Horse said, "My land is where my people lay buried." I couldn't agree more."

Our ancestors are buried in Africa from generally 10 - 20 thousand years ago, does that give us a right to African land. Tell me, when was the last time you brushed up on your Zulu? No one has a right to claim that because their ancestors are buried in a certain land that it is theirs. You offer no reasonable argument, you simply say it is.

"I'm not asking for guilt, only for justice and the nation's misdeeds (genocide) are a part of the equation."

I take it you are one of the cult followers of the belief that the Native American people were purposely "massacred". Indeed, there were many massacres. However, if you truly believe that 15 million (Yes the actual number of Native Americans living in North America was 15 million not 10 million, you should conduct better research) Native Americans were exterminated by lethal force, then you must not have gone to college. Disease wiped them out. Yes, their land was robbed, congratulations on knowing something so fundamental about American history that it would qualify you for a second grader's student of the month award (indeed the other 99% of America is ignorant of this because they teach us in school that Native Americans left on a flying saucer). The only argument you can put up that they were "genocided" as it were, is the [fictitious] rant forwarded by Ward Churchill about American soldiers purposely giving infected blankets to Native Americans, which has been discounted by credited sources across the academic board.

"Where do you draw the line of accountability? A hundred years? Fifty years? Twenty years? It seems an arbitrary delineation."

I found this question particularly odd. Aren't you supposed to be the one who answers this? What is your proposal? That every civilization [in] history suddenly be held to account for the mistakes of its ancestors? That Italy step up for the misdeeds of the Roman Empire? That Turkey step up for the Hittites? How about Mongolia [paying] reparations for Ghengis Khan's rampages? Japan for Korean and Chinese colonization? England for half the planet? While we're at it, let's loot the Vatican's banks because those sons-of-bitches launched the crusades and set up the Inquisition.

To answer your question though, in order to be rational, you HAVE to draw the line somewhere, and I personally say 80 years seems an appropriate time. I don't care how arbitrary that number is, you HAVE to set some number or you can't just start randomly deciding who deserves this and who deserves that. I personally supported reparations to the Japanese-Americans wrongfully interred in camps during WWII because when they were paid many of them were still alive and their children certainly were (and of course that was a monetary transaction and they weren't asking for half the West Coast).

"Are you sure about your history? Were not the Palestinians there as well?"

Yes, there were no Palestinians. Everyone living in Israel was either a Pagan Roman or a Jewish Israelite. In 33 AD the Jews were finally massacred and the temple destroyed, and in the years afterward Semitic Animists began to drift in in nomadic tribes until the coming of Islam centuries later. So yes, the Jews were there first.

RANDOM RESPONSE 2/26/05 at 2:23 pm:

There is a concept in rhetoric known as bird walking. Your argument runs all over the map and each step takes you further from the point.

What is your point? That Native Americans do not deserve reparations but interned Japanese Americans and Holocaust victims do? That indigenous peoples do not deserve equal justice under the law because the original crimes predate an arbitrary line of delineation? How about the crimes of the last eighty years? That Native American genocide was an accidental manifestation of European destiny (and not official US policy for some forty years: "Nits make fleas.") and therefore all crimes must be deleted from the national conscience?

No mention of John Graham, Leonard Peltier, [the Fort Laramie Treaty], BIA mismanagement (very deliberate), or Wounded Knee? Apparently, your pool of knowledge is limited after all. By the way, even a second grade teacher knows that early estimates of native populations vary widely. My source is Native American History (Ballantine Books 1996) by that famous radical Judith Nies. What's yours?

As a conservative once said to me, "You have acquitted yourself well." I say the same to you. You rant with the best of them.

Meantime, permission to post your comments? Yes? No?

Peace,
Random

GREG BROOK 2/26/05 at 3:25 pm:

Post away, since you didn't actually answer any of my points. Regarding the mismanagement of Native American funds, I have no interest in that and if it is true then yes, they deserve reparations, but only for that, because that has happened recently in history according to you, and is still happening. Perhaps you should answer my question if you want to continue pretending that you are the one who isn't drawing an arbitrary line in the middle of history: how far back is too far? When do we stop going back into history trying to "make right" the wrongs of the past? If you're going back a full two and a half to four centuries, then should we also set right all of the other wrongs committed by all the peoples all across the world in that time span? Should we go even further? Should the Church take financial responsibility for the crusades? Should all of the countries of North/South America pay reparations to their respective Indigenous populations, and Australia? Should all of the whites be forced to leave Africa? Where do you personally draw the line, because you have obviously drawn it somewhere, and why?

RANDOM'S LAST COMMENT: Justice has no bounds. Estimates of BIA mismanagement include 5.8 billion in uncollected funds from oil and gas extraction since 1979. The BIA admits 1.97 billion in “unreconciled transactions.” Meantime, free Leonard Peltier, give the Black Hills back to the Lakota and we’ll call it a good beginning. Let the reader decide.

JAKE'S DOCTOR

Capital
(Went to See the Doctor)

$150
the price of admission
to see the good Dr. R
just on the other side
of that thin wall

I had $80 in my pocket
to cover the day's half-hour

but, No, she said
we need the 150,
that's the deductible

I said, I'll pay it off
a little at a time
say, $25 a month
you can add a finance charge

"I'll have to ask 'Her,'" she said
and she walked away behind a wall
where the omniscient 'Her'
could not be seen or heard

She came back with "No."
so 'Her' had declared
(though I never heard a word)
it was 150 today, right now,
or I'd not see the doctor

That impenetrable wall
That thin thread of hope

I offered every penny
in my bank account
all $120 of it

No, again, said Invisible 'Her'
and that was the end of it

I guess without cash up front
you might as well be dead

Oh, that'll cost you, too
The undertaker said


Jake Berry 2.25.05