UnArmed

Apologies

2003-07-24T10:28:00.000-04:00

Currently suffering: ABD syndrome (All But Dissertation)

Will be taking a short break from posting until I can get back on track.

Bush is a Coward. . .

2003-07-21T12:59:00.000-04:00

Jack Balkwill is the one who took his place in Vietnam, so he should know.

The New Age of Pre-emptive War

2003-07-21T10:57:00.000-04:00

Many fears are beginning to take shape as more data is collected from the North Korean border. Krypton 85, a gas emitted in the production of plutonium, has been detected in increasing levels, but not from NK’s existing plant. U.S. satellites monitoring the nuclear plant at Yongbyon have recorded data which suggests that the gasses blew across the Korean peninsula from an unidentified source.

Many officials believed that dictatorships and military governments would be taking on very new behaviour with America and the UK setting a precedent for pre-emptive war. North Korea, it seems, is ushering in the new age.

read more: NYTimes

Update: David Kelly

2003-07-21T10:21:00.000-04:00

In a concerted effort to deflect heat from Kelly's death, the Blair administration is laying full responsibility on the BBC. Labour MP Gerald Kaufman said: "None of this would have happened if it had not been for the BBC story. The BBC has behaved deplorably and there are serious implications for its future." The deplorable behaviour Kaufman is referring to, of course, is BBC's refusal to reveal an unnamed source. The 'implications' he speaks of, tighter gov't control. Even opposition Tories are implicating the BBC in Kelly's death suggesting that if the BBC had made a statement identifying Dr. Kelly that he would be alive today.

Defending Kelly's anonymity, however, former BBC editor Rob Liddle said: "It's an absolutely fundamental tenet. Who would trust any journalist if he caved in to pressure from the government to root out their source?"

More than being a matter of trust and accountability, I suspect that this has more to do with power. The BBC struck a major blow against the Labour party, severely damaging their integrity when they suggested that the governement was inflating evidence against Iraq. The government wants to know who the whistleblowers are -- by keeping sources anonymous the government is unable to directly attack the credibility of the source and is forced to confront accusations head on. This marks a decisive loss in the propaganda war.

Suggesting that it was the gov't and not the BBC who fuelled public interest and controversy over this issue, professor Alastair Hay, a friend of Dr. Kelly, said that "David was a bit like a Ping-Pong ball. The government was out to establish that it had integrity and it was going to do anything and everything to ensure that its integrity was not going to be called into question."

With the tragic end of Dr. Kelly, civil servants may be less inclined to speak to reporters

read more: Reuters

BBC Source Commits Suicide

2003-07-20T11:47:00.000-04:00

British scientist David Kelly, the BBC's source for inside information about the 'beefing up' of intelligence about Iraqi weapons, was found near his Oxfordshire home on Thursday with his wrists cut. He was 59 years old.

The BBC issued an apology saying that they were "profoundly sorry that his involvement as [their] source has ended so tragically."

PM Tony Blair took the news in stride saying that "You've got to have broad shoulders in this job...I've got them," in response to the question of whether he had contemplated resigning.

Kelly's family said that "events over recent weeks have made David's life intolerable." No doubt such controversy as between the British government and the BBC over WMD would have enormous pressure on someone like Mr. Kelly caught in the middle.

Nevertheless, the fact that the man allegedly responsible for so much turmoil in the government is now dead will be too tempting for some...conspiracy theorists will be coming out of the woodwork for this one.

Are We Being Lied To About Coalition Casualties In Iraq?

2003-07-19T17:46:00.000-04:00

If www.lunaville.org is correct in its assessment the current number of American casualties is three times the numbers published by the mainstream media.

Media has consistently reported since May 2nd that 33 US soldiers have been killed in Iraq. This, in fact, is the only the number of US soldiers killed in some form of combat. The actual numbers are in the mid-eighties. Sadly, many of those men and women accounted for in this discrepancy have died as a result of accidents - accidental explosions, vehicle accidents, helicopter crashes, and drownings. Six soldiers were even killed by what the military has vaguely described as "non-hostile" gunshots.

This bleak occupation is now having dire psychological effects on the men and women stationed in Iraq. With their tour of duty being extended, and daily facing the prospect of ambush or accident, some soldiers have begun to lose hope. Commanders now estimate that of the 85 deaths since May 2nd, approximately 5 of those were suicides.

I don't think Bush anticipated these losses (we all know that he believed coalition forces were going to be met with cheering and celebration) but how much sympathy could you expect from a man who went AWOL to avoid fulfilling his own tour of duty?

State-of-the-Union Address Ignores CIA Intel

2003-07-18T11:46:00.000-04:00

source: Globe and Mail

Allegedly, during the composition of the controvercial state-of-the-union address, there was a debate over how far information could be stretched and still remain close to the truth. This news comes from CIA Director George Tenet who testified at a closed meeting Wednesday about what went on behind the scenes. In that testimony Tenet was also said to have named the official responisble for doctoring the speech, though confidentiality requires that the names remain unpublished.

Senator Dick Durbin, present at Tenet's testimony, told Good Morning America that Tenet "told us who the person was who was insistent on putting this language in, which the CIA knew to be incredible, this language about uranium shipment from Africa."

Using dismissal tactics characteristic of the Bush Administration, White House spokesman Scott McClellan -- taking the "You're either with us..." tack -- said of Durbin's statements: "It's not surprising, coming from someone who was in a rather small minority in Congress who did not support the action we took."

Of course, McClellan would like us to forget the fact that Congress voted a majority favouring the invasion of Iraq on the assumption that the information presented to them was credible and that Saddam was in possession of WMD. Since this turned out to be a misconstrual of the facts (*ehem* blatant lie) majority support in Congress no longer holds any water.

Nevertheless, McClellan continued to comment saying "The whole idea that the threat posed by Saddam Hussein was not real was something that was never under debate previously. This is an attempt to continue to rewrite history" Whether or not this is the case Mr. Tenet was eventually blamed by Condoleezza Rice, and (last week) accepted responsibility for the inclusion of the faulty intelligence.

Senator Durbin, apparently ill-contented with Tenet's admission, argued that we should be more concerned with uncovering whoever it is in the Whitehouse "who was hell-bent on misleading the American people." "All roads lead back to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue," Durbin concluded.

Comments Error Fixed

2003-07-16T00:18:00.000-04:00

A previous error with the comments link has been fixed. Sorry for any inconvenience.

He's Either Incredibly Stupid...

2003-07-15T19:53:00.000-04:00

*cough*...so now Bush is telling us that the reason the US invaded Iraq is because Saddam didn't let UN inspectors into the country.

Responding to questions during a photo opportunity at the Whitehouse Bush said of Saddam: "we gave him a chance to allow the inspectors in, and he wouldn't let them in. And, therefore, after a reasonable request, we decided to remove him from power, along with other nations, so as to make sure he was not a threat to the United States and our friends and allies in the region."

This might explain why Bush was so opposed to giving the inspectors any more time...

read the official transcript

PEACE IN THE MIDDLE EAST?

2003-07-15T18:48:00.000-04:00

I thought I would harp on the whole prospect of a Palestinian state a bit more...

Blogger Martin Lindeskog at EGO, responding to a comment I left on one of his posts, pointed out that he has, on a number of occasions, criticized president Bush; at one particular time for saying:

"I can understand the deep anger and despair of the Palestinian people. For decades you've been treated as pawns in the Middle East conflict."

Lindeskog interprets this to be a statement of support for the creation of a new terrorist state. He calls it a terrorist state insofar as he feels, I presume, that the majority of Palestinians support Arafat and therefore terrorism as well. Lindeskog asks: "Why should Israel cave in to the demands by the terrorists? I don't think that you should negotiate with the enemy." He then lists a few well-written articles arguing against the creation of a Palestinian state -- the titles speak for themselves: "Don't Reward Terror with Palestinian State"; "Israel Has A Moral Right To Its Life: Why Reason and Justice are on Israel's Side".

I point these out because Lindeskog's approach is representative of countless others who are trying to understand what is happening in the Middle-East. Critics of the "peace plan" dismiss it as extortion: a land-for-peace deal that is immoral.

Brook and Schwartz, in the article linked to above, try to shock us by citing the death toll Israeli citizens: 400 Israeli civilians have died from terrorist attacks so far. Apparantly, on a per capita scale this amounts to six times the number of people claimed by the Sept. 11 attack. Making this comparison is undoubtedly designed to conjure up painful memories and incite us to try and magnify the emotion, but what is striking about the tally is that avoids making any comparisons with the suffering of Palestinians.

If you do a straight numbers comparison beginning about Sept 2000 you see a very different picture. Over the past two and a half years Israel has sufferred 814 deaths and approximately 5603 casualties (includes security forces). Palestinians, on the other hand, have sufferred 2412 deaths, and 23 212 total casualties, more than one quarter of which are caused by bomb fragments and shrapnel.

Rarely is it mentioned that the state of Israel was imposed on the Middle-East in 1948; rarely do we read that Palestinians have been living in exile since they were evicted from their homes to accomodate this imposition; and rarely do we read that they are now living in what amount to concentration camps policed and humiliated by Israeli soldiers. All that we hear are tales of bloodthirsty zealots who will not stop terrorizing Israel until they have bombed it from the face of the earth.

Reality, in fact, is far more benign: far from any desire to inflict terror on Israeli citizens, most Palestinians want what we all want: to earn a living, raise a family, celebrate holidays, and live to see their grandchildren. This may be a generalization, but it is a far more accurate and helpful stereotype than the assumption that all Palestinians are terrorists.

I wonder, how is a refusal to negotiate supposed to help end the killing?

BEMUSED

2003-07-15T11:24:00.000-04:00

What strange creatures we are
To be the only beast capable of wanton destruction
And yet to cry "foul" when Disease claims a child
Or old age subdues its victim
Indeed, whenever Nature imposes itself in a manner that does not comform
To the laws that Man has imposed on this World
We take, we consume, and lust for more
But mourn the loss of a Trinket!

BIG OIL KILLS

2003-07-12T14:27:00.000-04:00

Wasting energy and fuel has consequences more terrible than most of us imagine. We allow our cars to idle while we wait to pick up a friend or family member from work; we choose to drive to the grocery store instead of walk; we drive SUV's and sports cars which can consume four times as much fuel or more as smaller cars because we are obsessed with status. All the while we imagine the effects of such wasteage to be trivial, benign. But our choices have a trickle down effect that ends in blood. In many places in the world, Nigeria being a prominent example, oil has been the source of unimaginable suffering, and sometimes bitter conflict. Peaceful protests are stifled by military force --- the cries of the innocent unheard by those of us complicit in their torment.

Years ago, Royal Shell Nigeria (the same oil giant that now boldly splashes images of Shell employees working with indigenous peoples trying to preserve communities and endangered environments) was indirectly responsible for the execution of Ken Saro Wiwa and 8 others who were peacefully protesting for the rights of the Ogoni people who's lands, once used to hunt and grow crops, were covered by a thick crust of oil by products. The Nigerian goverment, supplied with funds and arms by Shell Nigeria, thought it best to violently crush any opposition to Shell's interests in Nigeria in order to keep the money flowing.

Elsewhere, about the same time, a village chief and his two sons were dragged before a horrified community and set on fire by the military to send an important message: economic interests trump human rights.

Oil companies love military dicatorshipts: they are able to maintain control. . .and 8 years after the execution of peaceful Ogoni activist Ken Saro Wiwa, little has changed in Nigeria

find out more here

Africa's HIV Babies Given Hope

2003-07-11T11:43:00.000-04:00

in Globe and Mail

**UPDATED - see bottom**

"Johannesburg — For Stephanie Jones, the babies offer proof — 300 of them born during the past 18 months at Coronation Hospital in a rough area of Johannesburg.

All of their mothers are HIV-positive, but the babies were given the drug nevirapine at birth, and today fewer than 9 per cent of them appear to have the virus that causes AIDS. Without treatment, about 25 per cent of babies born to HIV-positive mothers have the virus.

"There's this sense when you talk about HIV, that 'Oh, there's nothing we can do.' But there is so much you can do for an HIV-infected person," Dr. Jones, a gentle, unassuming 27-year-old, said yesterday, soon after U.S. President George W. Bush left her city on his tour of Africa."

read more . . .

. . . of course, a year's dose of nevirapine costs about US $5700.00 which makes it absolutely necessary that governments and NGO's step in to provide the necessary assistance. For example, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation has helped Botswana to adopt Africa's most aggressive approach to dealing with the epidemic by providing funding to cover the cost of providing drugs to every infected person.

"Getting kids into treatment makes such a huge difference in the quality of their lives, and it's so frustrating, you know it's out there and you could be doing it," Dr. Jones said about the antiretrovirals that keep HIV-positive people healthy. The only challenge, she finds, is to make the drugs accessible.

"You can take away the hopelessness," she said.

*new*
In the Globe article linked to above, President Bush reportedly promised millions in new aid to Botswana (a portion of the 15 billion allocated for Africa) which desperately needs it to combat the AIDS epidemic. I thought, for once, here was an act which did not appear to be undermined by some form of treachery. Now it seems that the new funding will go, not to the purchase of more medicines, but to cover the increasing cost of the AIDS medicines which is being driven up by patent hyperprotections that the Bush Administration simultaneously promised to the pharmaceutical companies.
It's brilliant really: Bush concedes to the activist communities by offering further aid to Africa which acts as a funnel to redirect American tax dollars into the hands of the drug companies.

read more . . .

SOUNDING OFF

2003-07-10T12:33:00.000-04:00

Yesterday the BBC quoted Donald Rumsfeld saying that "the coalition did not act in Iraq because we had discovered dramatic new evidence of Iraq's pursuit of weapons of mass destruction. We acted because we saw the evidence in a dramatic new light - through the prism of our experience on 9/11."

He continued saying that "the fact that the facts change from time to time with respect to specifics does not surprise me or shock me at all; it is all to be expected. It is part of the intelligence world we live in."

Yet in constructing the case for war against Iraq in November of 2002 Rumsfeld said in frustration: "There's no debate in the world as to whether they have those weapons. We all know that. A trained ape knows that."
Sure enough, after the UN reported that they "have found no evidence that Iraq has revived its nuclear weapons program since the elimination of the program in the 1990s” Rumsfeld said (addressing the US Senate) “I don’t believe anyone that I know in the administration ever said that Iraq had nuclear weapons.”

I don't know what's worse: that politicians have stopped employing any tact whatsoever in delivering their lies, or that people are actually buying this garbage!

read the lies here

2003-07-10T11:31:00.000-04:00

A Dose of Irony

Today's issue of the National Post reports that the U.S. has been putting pressure on South Africa's president Mbeki for "failing to publicly condemn Mr. Mugabe's abuse of the rule of law, murder of political opponents, harassment of independent judges and electoral fraud."

Forget Nigerian amnesty. If America truly sets the standard for the rest of the world it would seem that all President Mugabe needs to do is deny each of these allegations, grant massive tax breaks to the existing wealthy and political allies, and start a war against a more notorious criminal. In no time public polls will be publishing record highs in public support for his administration.

2003-07-09T17:37:00.000-04:00

America's Political Lies

...yeah! what he said!

2003-07-09T09:51:00.000-04:00

BUSH'S STAGED PHOTO-OP INCITES ANGER IN AFRICA

In a resounding moment comparable to the fall of the Berlin Wall, President Bush took bold and revolutionary steps toward a new world order yesterday by condemning the American slave trade. . .

*cough*

Or maybe this was all just a clever bid to diffuse Harare's accusations that the American stance against Mugabe is "driven by racism". If that was the case, then his efforts would have been better helped had he not herded local residents into detainment before delivering his speech.

Bush came to Goree to tour the red-brick Slave House, where Africans were kept in shackles before being shipped across a perilous sea to a lifetime of servitude.

[There] he gave an eloquent speech about the horrors of slavery, standing at a podium under a sizzling sun near a red-stone museum, topped by cannon pointing out to the sea.

But not before residents of Goree, had been taken to a football ground on the other side of the island early in the morning and held there until Bush had departed, around midday.

"It's slavery all over again," fumed one father-of-four, who did not want to give his name. "It's humiliating. The island was deserted."

* read the rest here

2003-07-06T20:21:00.000-04:00

US and the ICC cont'd

In Hulsman's article (below) about the US's opposition to ratifying the ICC treaty the conclusion ran as follows:

"The United States has proposed a reasonable compromise--placing the U.N. Security Council, as the ultimate authorizing body, in a position to determine whether ICC investigation of U.N. peacekeepers is appropriate. If other nations truly believe the international system can enforce justice through the ICC, they should not object to giving the international institution charged with protecting international peace a say in cases that come before it."

I can only imagine Hulsman snickering as he wrote these words. The Bush administration has made it abundantly clear that it is prepared to disregard the UN whenever it becomes apparant that the UN will not dutifully follow along with American policy. How are we supposed to believe that the US genuinely desires for the UN to act as the "ultimate authorizing body" when they ever so recently engaged in a smear campaign depicting the UN as irrelevant? The only thing reasonable about this proposed compromise is the obvious manner in which the US is going about its underhanded business: the reason that they wish to see the UN as the "ultimate authorizing body" is to ensure that they can wield their VETO in all its glory.

2003-07-04T17:38:00.000-04:00

US and the ICC

The ICC (International Criminal Court) poses an interesting problem to national governments: if a government chooses to ratify the ICC treaty then its citizens and officials can be taken before the international court for crimes against humanity, that is, war crimes, torture and so on. Previously, and this is still the case for those countries which have not ratified the treaty, perpetrators of atrocities could kill with immunity basically by granting themselves amnesty in another country. The ICC, with its universal jurisdiction, is designed to curb that problem.

While this seems like an effective solution, the U.S. sees itself in a tight spot. They feel that if they were to ratify the treaty that they would be making themselves vulnerable to their enemies insofar as U.S. officials could be brought before the court for carrying out activities that they now conduct with impunity. President Bill Clinton, for example, might find himself before the court orchestrating something as innocent as the destruction of the water distribution system in Iraq, condemning hundreds of thousands to disease, starvation and death. It is conceivable that someone might also take issue with Bush junior's illegal war and send him before the court. Clearly this is unacceptable...

The following articles represent a cross-section of the arguments both for and against the U.S. ratifying the ICC treaty:

"Trials for 'Enemies of All Mankind'? Count the U.S. Out"
Reed Brody - L.A. Times
**related article

The Right Way To End the ICC Impasse
by John C. Hulsman, Ph.D. and Brett D. Schaefer
--Hulsman and Schaefer clearly articulate the reasons supporting America's opposition to the ICC.

U.S. should ratify International Criminal Court
Dr. Andy Knight
--Dr. Knight discusses why the US should ratify the ICC treaty given its professed moral stance on crimes against humanity, and he explains why the US has nothing to fear from the ICC.

2003-06-29T23:06:00.000-04:00

Bush's Bogus War
*Paul Knox comments on justifying the means...*

War Based On Lies
*Rhonda Hauben exposes the duplicity*

2003-06-29T12:59:00.000-04:00

Ignorance Fuels Arrogance

Since the US decided to take another crack at killing Saddam I have read hundreds of comments like this:

â€¦They wonder why the US acts unilaterally? Imagine if world bitchiness with the US could result in something more serious than merely getting kicked off the UN human rights committee. Many international laws and conventions (Kyoto, Geneva) only provide a means for weak nations and nongovernment organizations (NGO's) to manipulate the strong (read US), often at the expense of the greater good. Take the Geneva Convention. The US is the only combatant that ever really follows it. Yet the International Red Cross (IRC) and Amnesty deign to check up on Camp X-ray. Hey IRC, where were you when Hitler was killing people in his camps by the millions. More timely question: What about Fidel just across the island from X-ray? Ever check out any of the prison conditions in the workers paradise? Hell, I'll bet the denizens of X-ray eat better than most of Castro's subjects. Thank God the current President is not so enamored with the concept of forfeiting US sovereignty to a bunch of Euroweenie mandarins and NGO radicals.

OK, so letâ€™s ignore the fact that the US took two years to join the fight against Hitler. (Weâ€™re all very gratefulâ€¦thanks for coming out) But where the hell does the average American get the idea that the US is the only combatant to comply with the Geneva Convention??? Is this a case of collective amnesia?! What about the 79 million litres of Agent Orange that the US spread over Vietnam? Yeah, itâ€™s a herbicide, but these 79 million litres just happened to be contaminated by dioxins which are highly toxic chlorinated hydrocarbons potent enough to have effects when dispersed in just a few parts per trillion â€“ 170 KILOS of dioxins were mixed in with the herbicideâ€¦the largest dioxin release in history.

And letâ€™s not forget Clintonâ€™s brilliant plan known as the â€œDesecration of the Water Systemâ€�. The idea in this post-war offensive was to destroy Iraqâ€™s complicated water filtration and distribution infrastructure and turn the people of Iraq against their leader. What it accomplished instead was the revival of polio and typhoid from their previous extinction, and the elevation of diarrhea to the number one spot for infant mortality.

More recently, one might want to take issue with the fact that high-ranking Iraqi soldiers have been turned over to countries like Pakistan and Jordan for interrogation. Jordan, of course, is well known for much more â€˜persuasiveâ€™ methods of gathering intelligence than the US and so this becomes a case of complicity.

While weâ€™re on the topic of complicity, we canâ€™t forget the prestigious â€œSchool of the Americasâ€� where Latin Americans are trained in combat, counter-insurgency and counter-narcotics. Included in the SOAâ€™s 60 000 graduates are notorious dictators: Manuel Noriega, Omar Torrijos, Leopoldo Galtieri, Roberto Viola, Juan Velasco Alvarado, Guillermo Rodriguez, and Hugo Banzer Suarez. These men, with the help of US trained militia, carried out some of the worst human rights abuses in Latin America.

America complies with the Geneva Convention? It makes you wonder what's being taught in American history.

2003-06-26T10:48:00.000-04:00

ZIMBABWE: The Kettle Calling The Pot . . . Racist?!

Notwithstanding the horrifying attrocities being carried out in Zimbabwe, I don't see how the current political interchange between the Harare and American governments could be any more comical: a patently racist government accusing the American leadership of racist motivations, and an illegitimate president accusing another of illegitimacy.

excerpt - Reuters: Zimbabwe is facing a severe economic crisis that critics blame on government mismanagement, Mugabe's seizures of white-owned farms for black resettlement and his alleged rigging of his re-election last year.

Neighboring states led by South Africa favor diplomacy to resolve Zimbabwe's woes, but Washington and London have openly criticized Mugabe and called for a transition unity government with the opposition Movement for Democratic Change.

The United States has taken a hard line against Mugabe since the presidential elections, trying to isolate his government internationally. Bush, who will visit Senegal, South Africa, Botswana, Uganda and Nigeria from July 7-12, has said Mugabe is not a legitimate leader.

The Harare government says Bush's stance is unjustified, driven by racism and by Washington's natural support for Zimbabwe's former colonial power Britain in fighting Mugabe over his seizures of white farms.

read the rest here

2003-06-25T10:40:00.000-04:00

Blair aide testifies today. . .

2003-06-25T10:09:00.000-04:00

Dodgy Language
Canadian lawyer Karen Selick comments on an abuse of the term "human dignity" in Ontario courts (Globe & Mail, Comment/06/25). The term is intentionally vague, and designed to curry support where it may not have beem forthcoming by appealing to individual sentiment. After all, everyone has a positive concept of human dignity. The problem, though, is that not everyone agrees, and one person's dignity may be another's disgrace. Of course, Selick is talking about the Canadian decision to allow same sex marriages, but flagrant abuses of language abound in virtually every medium of communication.

Correcting misuse is a monstrous task but a worthy one. I propose that we begin with "terrorism" and "weapons of mass destruction".

On The Hook
Excerpt from P. Krugman, NY Times/06.24: "some commentators have suggested that Mr. Bush should be let off the hook as long as there is some interpretation of his prewar statements that is technically true. Really? We're not talking about a business dispute that hinges on the fine print of the contract; we're talking about the most solemn decision a nation can make. . .Republicans shy away from confronting the administration's dishonest case for war, because they don't want to face the implications."

read the rest here: http://www.commondreams.org/views03/0624-04.htm

2003-06-23T11:33:00.000-04:00

Israeli vengeance hurts peace process
*Assassination of Palestinian militant earns Israel rebuke from U.S. While a truce between Hamas and Israel seems to be a necessary prerequisite for peace in the Middle East, Israeli PM is determined to lay waste to Hamas. Truce is not enough, Israeli officials say. Palestinian authorities must go beyond mere condemnation, and dismantle the militant organizations. More signs of trouble came when Sharon approved the expansion of settlements saying that settlement building "isn't part of the road map", recanting promises to stop development and dismantle existing settlements.

UK - "dodgy dossier"
**Top Blair aide Alastair Campbell to testify about WMD . . . stay tuned**

2003-06-21T14:52:00.000-04:00

NOTE TO READERS
This site is experiencing some extreme growing pains. That is to say, the host (not naming names...but you can find the button) insists on periodically erasing code in the template and exchanging regular text in the posts for html thereby seriously screwing with the layout of this page. Two posts have had to be deleted for this reason. Please allow some time for to get everything sorted out and running smoothly.

2003-06-21T14:42:00.000-04:00

Friday, June 20, 2003
"FRIENDLY FIRE NOT CRIMINAL"

Friendly fire is a brutal fact of war, but it is not criminal. Being a Canadian I naturally gravitated to sentiments of frustration and resentment at the news that the two U.S. pilots responsible for the deaths of four Canadians in April of 2002 would be getting off with only minor punishments. Losing a month's pay seems like a cheap price to pay for taking the lives of four men from their families. My frustration was not helped by the stereotype of trigger-happy American fighter pilots that had slowly entrenched itself in my mind after watching movies like Top Gun and such as I was growing up. Last night in conversation I even found myself resorting to these stereotypes to justify my opinion about what the proper punishment should be: "They were glory hunting," I argued. "They completely disregarded the consequences of their actions." Many Canadians share these sentiments; they have been printed in our papers; and echoed in conversation. But this couldn't be farther from the truth.

After detecting surface fire Major Schmidt radioed that he was "rolling in, in self-defence." He next requested permission from the AWACS on patrol in the area to use his 20mm cannon. His patrol leader, Maj. William Umbach, suggested that they confirm that the target were not friendlies before attacking at which point the two pilots surveyed their target with nightvision. Scanners did not pick up the signal that usually tells pilots that they have locked on to a friendly target. Before releasing his laser-guided bomb, Major Schmidt said: "I've got some men on a road and it looks like a piece of artillery firing at us." "Boss Man copies," came the reply from AWACS. Seeking confirmation that he had not killed a friendly Schmidt asked AWACS "can you confirm that they were shooting at us?" "You're cleared, self defence," came the response. The pilots wanted to know that they had done the right thing.

Major Schmidt ended up killing four Canadians and injuring eight others; he made some serious mistakes, but it is difficult to say with certainty that he had done the wrong thing. If you consider the fact that the pilots had not been informed of friendlies in the area, let alone friendlies conducting live fire exercises, and also the fact that AWACS had supported the strike, the picture no longer seems to fit the Top Gun fighter-jock stereotype. The problem is systemic, and if you're going to punish the pilots then there seems to be cause to punish others who were involved in the breakdown -- whoever it was who neglected to inform the pilots of the firing exercises for example.

**many apologies--the remainder of this entry was deleted by an error on the blogspot server; regular text was converted to html and ruined the layout of the rest of the weblog so it had to be deleted. unfortunately the blog was composed on blogspot and therefore not saved...i may or may not get the chance to rewrite it**

2003-06-21T14:26:00.000-04:00

WORTH A READ

Iraq Commons Hearings
*evidence provided by ex-cab. ministers Cook and Short concerning Blair's use of 'evidence' of WMD in Iraq*

Naomi Klein's most recent "Unlabelled"
*Bush vs. NGOs*

Iraq Update
*20 Important Questions about the state of affairs in Iraq*

Truth vs. Truthfulness
*Doug Saunders takes a look at contemporary reporting: 'based on a true story'*

2003-06-18T03:05:00.000-04:00

“Ethics? What Ethics?”

Yesterday, (June 17th) the American Medical Association (AMA) approved the cloning of human beings for medical research. In a statement posted on their website the AMA announced that they had approved "recommendations by its Council on Ethical and Judicial Affairs (CEJA) that cloning for biomedical research is consistent with medical ethics." The implication in such a statement is, of course, that human cloning for research is morally acceptable. However, we need not accept this conclusion. Alternatively it suggests that the AMA's code of ethics could use some serious revamping.

Harvesting human embryos is just one of a few suggested methods for gathering the stem cells required for research. Adult stem cells can be harvested from living tissue (the skin or organs) without infringing on the sort of ethical issues human cloning calls to mind. The problem with adult stem cells, however, is that their function is fixed. Adult stem cells taken from the lung, for example, are only able to develop into lung tissue. This makes them less than ideal for experimental research. But it has also been suggested that totipotent stem cells--cells which can grow into any type of human tissue--can be harvested from the umbilical cord. If so, this practice would equally avoid the ethical problems involved with human cloning. As it turns out, it just happens to be cheaper to harvest the stem cells from cloned human embryos. There is ample research in this area provided by the existing work in in vitro fertilization, and researchers are familiar with the practice of cloning embryos. But cheaper and easier choices do not always translate into ethical and moral choices.

Some time ago, just after Advanced Cell Technology Inc. announced its breakthrough in human cloning research in 2001, I wrote an article for a newspaper which began with a quote from Jurassic Park. At one point actor Jeff Goldbloom remarks: your scientists were so preoccupied with whether or not they could, that they never stopped to consider whether or not they should!” Despite AMA’s conclusion that cloning conforms to their ethical standards, we are once again confronted with the question of whether or not we ought to conduct such research. The issues, of course, remain the same: many pro-life advocates have argued that once the process of life has begun, regardless of how it was induced in the lab, you are dealing in the realm of potentiality, and that potentiality is entirely human and therefore not to be trifled with. Advocates of the policy, on the other hand, typically incite the idea of the greater good suggesting that the potential benefits of cloning research far outweigh the cost. And once again we are hearing rumours of miraculous cures for AIDS, cancer, and all types of debilitating conditions. As always, such talk should be taken with a grain of salt.
There is also the matter of the AMA’s cloning policy conflicting with the existing ban in the United States. Last year the Bush Administration’s managed to push the Senate into accepting a bill which banned all types of cloning, therapeutic and reproductive alike. At the time, W. Bush said that “Anything other than a total ban on human cloning would be unethical.” ‘Why’, you ask? Because “research cloning would contradict the most fundamental principle of medical ethics – that no human life should be exploited or extinguished for the benefit of another.” (Whitehouse address, April 11, 02) How is it, I wonder, that the AMA missed that part?

2003-06-17T16:00:00.000-04:00

ALL IN A DAY:

Reuters, the NYTimes, and the Financial Post published as their top stories that Tony Blair is under increased pressure to provide evidence of WMD; warring Liberian gov't signs a cease fire with rebels and agrees to peace talks; U.S. envoy John Wolf meets with Palestinians to try to curb opposition to the peace plan; Microsoft takes a legal stand against spam mail; and France cracks down on Iranian terrorism

What did Canada's national paper The Globe & Mail place as it's largest story? Alberta city councillor Darlene Heatherington insisting at a news conference that she isn't crazy. Great!

Now I understand that the Canadian public isn't interested in reading, day after day, about political strife in other countries. But seriously, what relevance does some woman's drug induced romp around Vegas have to a national audience? You want to tell us about the increased risk of technology in vehicles? fine. You want to tell us about the rising dollar, government abuses of taxpayer's money, elections, referendums, environmental hazards, job losses, whatever? Good. But splashing the gritty details of some woman's personal life over the front page? This sort of garbage belongs in the tabloids.

2003-06-16T11:26:00.000-04:00

THEY JUST WON'T QUIT

The Iraqis just wont give up fighting. Sunday saw a U.S. military convoy ambushed by a small resistance group which lead to several injuries but no deaths. More extensive operations have been renewed in the north where it is believed that leaders of the Iraqi opposition are organizing their forces. Now with more than 40 American soldiers killed since the U.S. "won" the war, and with five major resistance groups growing stronger by the day, U.S. officials are more rigorously entertaining the possibility that Saddam may still be alive.
That Saddam survived the war and is now secretly rallying his forces is not necessarily the best explanation, however (though it has happened in the past). More likely is it that U.S. troops are encountering anti-occupation forces who see American occupation as an insult and violation of their homeland. This is to say nothing of an allegiance to Saddam.
In spite of all of the political disappearances that were splashed all over the media before and during the war the Globe and Mail recently quoted one Iraqi arrested by Americans during this period of heightened anxiety saying: "I'm 60 years old and I have nothing to do with all this," Mr. Mohammed said. "Even Saddam never did a thing like this to us. We got rid of one problem and now we're having a bigger one." Some Iraqis may want democracy, but they want the U.S. out. V.P. Dick Cheney's comment "I really do believe that we will be greeted as liberators" is starting to sound like a bad joke.

2003-06-16T03:49:00.000-04:00

Bush's Post Facto Justification

President Bush's recent troubles justifying his war against Iraq stand as yet another example of history repeating itself. President Bush and his predecessor Lincoln both received heavy criticism for premising their cases for war on shaky technical grounds which never really panned out. History has it that Lincoln tried to curry support for the Civil War by offering a rather bogus interpretation of the constitutional rights of secession; in Dubya's case it was "weapons of mass destruction".

As a university teaching assistant I have heard a lot of creative excuses (from those students who muster up enough courage not to wet themselves at the prospect of confronting their TA). Having just emerged from their highschool cucoons and still reaking of foul excuses like "I left my assignment on the bus", and “my computer wouldn’t print”, I feel that it is partially my duty to break these students of this nasty habit. I am, nevertheless, quite patient about it. It was only after spending 45 minutes or so defending minor grammatical corrections to a student (which did not even cost them any marks) that I finally let loose and barked: "Look, if you want a better mark then write me a better essay." Half of the line-up disappeared. Rumour has it that future employers won’t tolerate petty excuses either, and I propose that none of us accept them from our leaders.
Lincoln’s Civil War started off as the War for Asymmetrical Federalism (whatever the hell that means). But with human losses exceeding half a million, Lincoln’s justifications began to fall apart, and it was only after the fact, that is after the war, that he was able to turn the war into a powerful struggle for human rights.
Bush now finds himself in a similar pickle. Before the war the American public and the world were assured that, without a doubt, Iraq was in possession of weapons of mass destruction. The Secretary of Defense even went so far as to say that they knew where the WMD were! Now, after months of continuous fearmongering, years of endless inspections, invasion, capture, and a thorough scouring of the country, nothing seems to be panning out. Even the “mobile-labs” that Bush referred to time and again as “weapons of mass destruction” turned out to be weather balloon platforms.
Thus far, however, Dubya has managed to evade direct fire by clouding the matter with morality. The picture that is being painted for us now is one in which the war attains justification on humanitarian grounds–the freedom of the oppressed Iraqi people–as opposed to being a matter of national (and international) security.
Some people are insisting that if Bush had been upfront about these humanitarian goals from the beginning that he still would have had their support. It is not too late, some also say, to give this war proper justification. I, for one, think that it is a bit late for that. War is a serious matter and if you’re going to send your sons and daughters to fight and die for a cause then you bloody well give them the right reasons.
Before the invasion a Whitehouse spokesperson stated on national television that “there is no question that we have evidence and information that Iraq has weapons of mass destruction, biological and chemical,” which the Secretary of Defense backed up saying: “We know where they are, they are in the area around Tikrit and Baghdad.” “Show me the money” has been the resounding response. To abandon the justifying (or damning as the case may be) force of the presence of WMD to pursue the moral high ground, as Lincoln did, may give this second war in Iraq a higher cause, but it is also to admit that the evidence submitted as grounds for war was questionable at best, and perhaps insufficient to warrant invasion.

2003-06-13T10:27:00.000-04:00

"Tit-for-Tat"

Well, if my delivered newspaper is casting things in an accurate light (and I hold many reservations about this) then it certainly looks like Bush's precious roadmap is going to Hamas in a hand basket. Or, at least Hamas is who we are incited to blame anyways. Surprisingly, I've encountered a number of blurbs from people complaining that the news is committing a grave error by casting the acts perpetrated by militant Palestinians and the ever-retaliating Israeli military in equal light. That is to say, some people are really pissed that big-media is not lambasting Palestinians and lauding Israeli efforts to cope with the terrorism. Take, for example, Lileks most recent bleat on the matter. At one part he says:

"The top-of-the-hour radio news played today's news just as you’d expect - everything shoved through the tit-for-tat template. Israel attempts to take out a terror leader; Hamas “responds” with a bombing. As if they’re equal. As if targeting the car that ferries around some murderous SOB is the same as sending a blissed-out teenager to blow nails and screws through the flesh of afternoon commuters so he can bury himself in the heaving bosom of the heavenly whorehouse. Cycle of violence, don't you know."

I like Lileks writing style. It's controvercial. . .get's your feathers in a ruffle. But the fact that he is American and expressing these thoughts explains a lot. Terror is a sensitive issue for our southerly neighbours at the moment, but it wasn't always this way.
That said, the horror of killing 16 innocent people in coldblood is unspeakable. I don't understand it, I never will understand it. Nor do I understand the cycle of violence that is being reinforced by these attacks. I think it is impossible to decode, entrenched as it is, and we do not have the luxury of assigning blame to whomever cast the first stone. The violence is unequally balanced, that is true. But that is true of all conflict.
The fact of the matter is that right now Palestinians are living in what basically amount to concentration camps. They were evicted from their homes and are constantly humiliated and kept in abject poverty by checkpoints which routinely prevent them from getting to work. Additionally, despite living in these camps for decades now, they have had neither the funds nor the equipment to set up proper sewage systems and so rivers of excrement flow endlessly through the make-shift troughs running between their homes. On top of that many Palestinian towns have access to water only 2 days a week because the new Israeli settlements have commandeered their water towers and installed military posts around them. How sick is it that Palestinian mothers must watch their newborn children die from dehydration while the children in these settlements are cooling themselves off in swimming pools?
Yes, the violence is unequal. Hamas are bloodthirsty murderers. But you must not harbour the illusion that this conflict is perpetrated by the Palestinians alone. If indeed there were no Palestinian resistance, peace would not be the happy result. More likely Israel would push deeper into what is left of Palestinian territory, establishing new settlements closer and closer to the Mediterranean coast that they covet so dearly. The bottom line is to make life so miserable for the Palestinians that anyone who wants a normal life will eventually leave. This is a form of terrorism that does not expose itself by blasting its way through the flesh of innocent bystanders, but creeps along so slowly and so deeply in the lives of its victims that it escapes public attention.
My point here is not to justify the violence--it's disgusting and I wish it would all stop. Rather, my point is that coverage of the conflict between Israel and Palestine rarely conforms to a tit-for-tat framework. If you're bored and looking for something to do, try finding an article in the Western establishment media which depicts Israel as aggressor.

2003-06-12T19:48:00.000-04:00

Here is the latest of my rejected attempts at journalism . . . (it is a response to yet another writer who, tired of the endless debate about the lack of justification for Bush's war, thinks that we should brush it all aside, thank Bush et al for doing such a wonderful job, and move on with our lives). I would have provided a link had the newspaper archived the article on their website. Alas, we are not so lucky.

"Apologies required"

President Bush and Prime Minister Tony Blair are ‘under fire’ for failing to provide proof that weapons of mass destruction (WMD) existed in Iraq. And critical opponents of the war certainly are eager to point this out. But the call for (parliamentary) investigation is not a malicious retaliation for some personal offense caused by coalition forces winning a war which did not have their approval. The deeper issue is trust. And opponents of the war are not the only ones demanding proof; not everyone who supported the war feels that the matter is closed just because the allies won.
More grave are the legal implications which could, depending on the severity of the conclusions drawn by investigators, induce a series of resignations and possibly even serve as grounds for an impeachment. These are serious concerns which cannot be brushed aside simply because Bush and Blair, in their pursuit of the ‘greater good’, showed ‘political courage when lesser men held back. The demand for proper justification of the evidence supplied by coalition intelligence agencies must be honoured. And, if that’s not possible, it must be decided whether the real intention was to deceive in order to curry support, or if there was a critical breakdown in intelligence gathering. Still, many defendants of the war are trying a different tack.
Proponents of the war typically draw our attention to the fact that Saddam was a nasty man (as is the case in your June 7th editorial “No apologies required”). We are reminded that he carried out inexplicable atrocities against the Kurdish people, ‘disappeared’ those who opposed the Baath party, and hoarded profits that his citizens desperately needed to survive. So far, we are all in agreement. But according to international law, this does not, by itself, justify an invasion. The mandate of the UN specifically prohibits uninvited intervention in a country’s domestic affairs.
Stronger is the argument that Iraq was already guilty under UN Security Council resolution 1441 which demanded documented proof of their disarmament. The onus was therefore on Iraq (not the U.S.) to exonerate themselves, and Hussein’s non-compliance in this regard was taken by coalition forces to suggest the concealment of WMD. Bolstered perhaps by Hussein’s stubbornly defiant behaviour, Hans Blix’s team sustained reports of a suspected 10 000 or so litres of anthrax right up to the moments preceding actual invasion. But the UN’s promise to send troops in resolution 1441 was based on Hussein and his WMD posing an immanent threat to the U.S. and other countries and the shortage of evidence backing these claims vitiated UN conviction. Not even Kuwait or Iran felt Iraq to be an immanent threat.
And lest we forget, international law actually prohibits regime change (unless, of course, the government in question is guilty of aggression outside of its borders). No country or coalition may depose a government simply because they don’t like the leader. The reason for this is obvious: there is an implicit danger that a superpower (like the US) might get it in mind to change any and all regimes that do not share the same political ideology. Little chance that might happen, but . . . didn’t someone say something about Syria? It is also interesting to note here that the willful coercion or oppression by political and or military means to enforce a regime change falls under the U.S.’s own definition of terrorism, but take that as an aside.
Invariably, the next argument tries to make the point that the UN is a defunct organization (like its predecessor the League of Nations) and that if any order is to be maintained at an international level you need someone who is willing to act. OK, so let me get this straight. The U.S. was justified in disregarding the UN and going to war because, well, Iraq was disregarding the UN? If the point of attacking Iraq was that they failed to adhere to UN resolutions then it only seems fair that we should all be obedient. In fact, given the U.S.’s derision of the UN, it is hard to see the sense in pursuing justification from an organization that you blatantly disregard.
One could go on and on about the mysterious evidence that supposedly tied Saddam to various terrorist networks like al Queda. And it could be endlessly debated whether the Iraqi threat was in fact immanent, or whether there was any threat at all. But the point in “No apologies required” was, if I may, that we should all stop quibbling about whether or not the war was justified, or whether Bush and Blair were abusing intelligence, and just thank them for doing a good job (getting rid of Hussein).
As the matter stands, I suspect that no one, either for or against the war, would say that the deposition of a murderous tyrant is a bad thing. But the ends do not always justify the means, and if it is true that the British Prime Minister or the U.S. President have either falsified or exaggerated evidence to curry support for the invasion, then we have to seriously consider the credibility of these institutions, not pat them on the back. After all, aren’t trust and truth integral to the functioning of our democracy? But don’t be disheartened. They have found a couple of trucks.