OutOfIraq

Iraq Town Halls

Bob Fertik — Sat, 22 Mar 2008 17:07:15 -0400

Co-sponsors and speakers:
Progressive Democrats of America
Gold Star Families for Peace
Win Without War
AfterDowningStreet
FireDogLake
Hip Hop Caucus
Cities for Peace
Velvet Revolution
The Nation
The Backbone Campaign
Brad Blog
Clout on Air America
Willie Nelson Peace Research
Voters for Peace
Code Pink
Democracy Cell Project
Veterans for Peace
Global Exchange
Liberty Tree
Filibuster for Peace
The Young Turks on Air America
United for Peace and Justice
Brave New Films
Declaration of Peace

Speakers:
Iraq Veterans Against the War

http://iraqtownhalls.com

In April, Congress will vote to give George W. Bush and Dick Cheney another $102 billion for Iraq - unless we finally persuade our Representatives to Just Say No.

One of the best ways to persuade a Representative is to hold a town hall meeting and fill the hall with people who care and are willing to speak passionately. (Another way is to turn out a crowd for a town hall that your Representative is already scheduled to attend.)

So we're asking YOU and the 500,000 members of Democrats.com to organize Iraq Town Halls in all 435 Congressional districts on any day in April.

Check for an Iraq Town Hall already being planned in your district: To do this, you must be registered and logged in on this website. Once you are, go to http://democrats.com/local and look for an Iraq Town Hall announcement below the "Congressional District" heading. If you see one, open it and post a comment below it offering to help, or contact the organizers in whatever way they have suggested (they may have posted a phone number or Email address).

Start organizing an Iraq Town Hall using the tools on this website: If there's nothing yet being planned in your district and you want to start talking with others about planning a possible town hall, or if you're ready to post an announcement of an Iraq Town Hall, please Email us at: iraqtownhall@democrats.com We will walk you through the steps involved. To get started on your own (it's really not that hard) CLICK HERE.

For tips on how to make your Iraq Town Hall a success, READ MORE.

Getting Organized:

Ask at least one reliable friend to help you organize this event.

Ask local organizations to take part.

Reserve a convenient hall or auditorium.

You should hold your event with or without your Representative, so you can call and ask about their availability before or after you pick a date. Weekends are the most likely times for them to be available. We recommend calling the District Office (not DC office) of your Representative (you can find the # here) and ask for the scheduler. If your Representative won't give you a date promptly, pick one yourself - and leave an empty seat on the stage for your Representative.

Invite key speakers. A number of organizations are making speakers available for these Iraq Town Halls. Here is a list.

Reach out to community to participate: here are some outreach ideas.

Make a 1-page flyer (or use this one) and post it in busy locations (coffee shops, supermarkets, libraries, post offices, etc.)

Post your event on every community calendar you can think of (internet, radio, newspaper, etc).

Email and/or call local reporters (TV, radio, newspaper, blogs) to personally invite them to attend.

An Agenda for Your Event:

Your agenda will depend on whether your Representative attends, what key speakers attend, what groups are involved, etc. Here are some ideas:

Be aware of how your Representative has voted in the past on funding the occupation.

Be aware of how much total money the Iraq Occupation is costing: http://3trillion.org

Be aware of exactly what you can ask Representatives and Senators to do.

Come early to set up and bring all the items you need.

Test the sound system to make sure it works.

Bring video cameras to record the event for Youtube.

Set up tables in the back for literature from your allies.

Set up a table and chairs on the stage with a readable sign for each speaker, including your Representative - whether (s)he attends or not.

On the podium, tape a sign with your Representative's name and DC phone number in large letters so everyone can add them to their cellphone.

Set up a card table at the door with several clipboards for sign-in sheets. Ask for name, zip, email, and cellphone for texting.

Bring a cash box for contributions.

Greet reporters at the door, thank them for coming, and invite them to sit in the front and interview the speakers.

After the speeches, ask everyone to call their Representative and leave a message with their name and address and a simple demand: vote NO on $102 billion more for Iraq.

Form a committee to keep up the pressure on your Representative through grassroots events like honkathons, ironing-board letter-writing, anti-war film showings, tables at community events, etc.

Make a plan to pass local resolutions in support of ending current wars, not starting new ones, impeachment, and indictment.

Show videos of the Winter Soldier testimony available at http://ivaw.org

Display and discuss the financial cost to your district of the occupation of Iraq. Find figures at http://costofwar.com and multiply by 6 to approximate the full cost as calculated by Joseph Stiglitz and Linda Bilmes in "The Three Trillion Dollar War."

_______

Please post this graphic link to http://iraqtownhalls.com on your site:

Return to: http://iraqtownhalls.com

When Will We Liberate the Iraqis?

davidswanson — Tue, 02 Dec 2008 15:28:16 -0500

By David Swanson

I know, I know, Bush liberated the Iraqis. But when will we liberate them from Bush's liberation? Well, ideally, the American people will rise up tomorrow and force Congress to cease funding the occupation and to vote an immediate and complete withdrawal with a veto-overriding supermajority, not to mention impeaching Bush and Cheney. I raise that possibility not so much because I've been drinking as because long-term movements for systemic reform require awareness of what we're missing. If we ever replace a Congress dominated by money, media, and parties with one loyal to us the people, it will be because we tragically realize what so very easily could have been.

In fact, Congress has an ideal excuse at the moment to end the war we've been electing it to end for years now. The U.N. authorization of the occupation expires on December 31st. Bush has negotiated a treaty with Iraq to authorize three more years of war. In Iraq, the parliament failed to approve the treaty with the two-thirds majority required by the Iraqi Constitution, but did pass it with a slim and corrupt majority against the overwhelming will of the Iraqi people. The result may be a rise in violence. And the approval was temporary and conditional. The Iraqi people will be allowed to reject the treaty in a public referendum in June. If they do, and if all parties take the language of the treaty seriously, the treaty will remain valid for 12 months from that date. The other possibility is that the treaty will be immediately canceled and we'll bring everyone home for the Fourth of July.

In Washington, D.C., in contrast, the Senate has chosen to ignore its Constitutional right and responsibility to approve or reject treaties, not to mention the responsibility of Congress to declare war, which renders unconstitutional any treaty authorizing three years of war. Congress could reject the treaty or at the very least approve it, but Congress is now a rubberstamp for a different president. So, rather than formally approving the treaty and asserting its continued existence, Congress will silently approve it and stick another dagger into its institutional reason for being.

Well, what about that incoming president? Military recruiters are already having some success in talking kids into signing up by claiming that the election of Obama means nobody else will be sent to Iraq. Many months of television and campaign propaganda convinced people that Obama would quickly and decisively end the war. People imagined they were voting against Bush, Cheney, and the occupation of Iraq, and for transformational change. Obama's website is at change.gov. In reality, of course, Obama's few specific policy commitments were for indiscernible change more than transformational. Obama promised to enlarge the world's largest ever military, to always be open to any military option including illegal aggressive strikes, and to escalate the occupation of Afghanistan. Before we voted for him he chose Joe Biden as his running mate, professed (as did John McCain) his intention to appoint Robert Gates as Secretary of "Defense," and proposed making Colin Powell part of his administration and Rahm Emanuel his chief of staff. We knew all of that.

But we also knew that Obama was promising, as he still is promising, to remove "1 to 2" brigades from Iraq every month, thereby removing them all in 16 months, by May 20, 2010, or -- as Obama's website puts it -- "the summer of 2010." The catch is that by "all" Obama has always said he meant all of the "combat troops." So, at some point over the course of his first 16 months in office, Obama would have to explain what a non-combat troop was, and those troops would be left as a "residual force … to conduct targeted counter-terrorism missions against al Qaeda in Iraq [without combat!] and protect American diplomatic and civilian personnel [and] … to train and support the Iraqi security forces as long as Iraqi leaders move toward political reconciliation and away from sectarianism."

Now, there is nothing in the new unconstitutional and possibly short-lived treaty to prevent Obama from sticking to his plan to withdraw most of the troops in 16 months. But there is language that he could claim weighed against that if he wanted to. And he has publicly supported the treaty. It reads, in part:

"The Government of Iraq requests the temporary assistance of the United States Forces for the purposes of supporting Iraq in its efforts to maintain security and stability in Iraq…."

We can't very well deny requested assistance, can we? Of course we can, legally, morally, and practically, but that doesn't mean Obama or Congress will do so in the absence of intense pressure from us. The treaty includes this key section:

"The United States recognizes the sovereign right of the Government of Iraq to request the departure of the United States Forces from Iraq at any time. The Government of Iraq recognizes the sovereign right of the United States to withdraw the United States Forces from Iraq at any time."

There is, however, something in the treaty -- or the so-called Status of Forces Agreement -- that would (if it survives and is honored and is not extended, etc.) prevent Obama from leaving his "residual force" in Iraq beyond the end of 2011. This treaty is not actually called a Status of Forces Agreement, but rather an "Agreement Between the United States and the Republic of Iraq on the Withdrawal of the United States Forces from Iraq…." That's the title of the thing, and it does what Bush swore he would never do: it sets a firm date for complete withdrawal:

"All the United States Forces shall withdraw from all Iraqi territory no later than December 31, 2011."

Nothing in the treaty would prevent an earlier withdrawal. All that would be needed to extend the occupation beyond the firm withdrawal date would be for the United States of America to violate a treaty. Aside from the role treaty violation played in the genocide of the native Americans, we violated the U.N. Charter when we first invaded Iraq, and we tossed out the Geneva Conventions and several other treaties when the Iraqis objected to the occupation.

The withdrawal agreement creates some other factors that may impact the question of withdrawal, and how those other sections of the agreement are enforced or violated may provide some indication of how much teeth the withdrawal clause has. U.S. forces are required to contract with Iraqi suppliers of materials and services "when their bids are competitive and constitute best value." What are the chances of that? Will staff changes at the Pentagon make such a thing imaginable? U.S. contractors and mercenaries are now subject to Iraqi law. They may even be charged (it's not clear) with crimes they have committed in the past. And U.S. troops are subject to Iraqi law if they are off-base and fail to claim to be on duty. Clearly the bigger concern here is the fate of criminal mercenaries, but that concern could be decisive if the mercenary companies pull out and the Pentagon decides it can't do without them. The United States is banned from detaining or arresting Iraqis and from searching Iraqi houses or other buildings except as approved by the Iraqi government, and those now detained by the United States will be arrested by Iraq or freed. In addition, U.S. "combat forces" must withdraw from all Iraqi cities, villages, and localities (and remain inside their bases outside of town) by June 30, 2009, the same date by which Iraqis will vote on the treaty.

Clearly much depends on the degree to which the Iraqi government acts independently from the United States government. Arguably it showed great independence in negotiating what was originally a treaty for permanent occupation into a treaty for withdrawal. But a majority of the Iraqi people would have preferred no treaty at all, and the tough positions staked out in the treaty are only tough if they are enforced. If the U.S. troops (and, as you may have gathered, this is a U.S. treaty, all pretense of a "coalition" having finally been abandoned) cease raiding homes and detaining people, and begin withdrawing from towns and cities, we may see a reduction in violence. If violence explodes in the coming days in reaction to the treaty, we may see that used (stupidly and self-defeatingly, but predictably) as an excuse not to withdraw.

Obama always hedged his campaign promise with the intention to allow his military commanders to change his plans. This makes it rather unfortunate that Obama appears likely to keep the same commanders in place in Iraq and at the top of the Pentagon, people who have already opposed his plan. Obama and some of his loyal supporters cheer for his appointees when they approve of them but claim that appointees make absolutely no difference in policy when they disapprove of them. This would be funny were it not for the fact that they rightly disapprove of almost all of them.

For six months or so, the Obama vs. Clinton primary contest was one of the top stories in the news. Obama won because of his limited and inconsistent opposition to the war and Clinton's refusal to even express regret for having voted to let Bush invade. Obama also opposed telecom immunity while Clinton supported it. After he'd won, they both voted counter to their statements. He's now making her his Secretary of State (if the Senate unconstitutionally confirms one of its own to take a position the salary for which was raised during her current term), and the bulk of Obama's top staff and cabinet are going to be people who worked for her husband.

While people were told they were voting for major changes and for peace, the 153 members of the House and Senate who voted against invading Iraq were excluded from any lists of individuals under consideration for any positions in the Obama administration. Did not a single one of them qualify as a Washington insider with good managerial skills? Was it necessary to pick the most pro-war Democrats from the Senate and the House for Vice President and Chief of Staff? Would no one else do? Even if you had to go with an Indiscernible Change candidate for Secretary of "Defense," did it have to be the very same individual who had worked for Bush? Didn't most people who wanted Transformational Change consider serving Bush a crime? Did your National Security Advisor have to be a board member of both Boeing AND Chevron? Wouldn't one or the other have been sufficient "pragmatic" and "insider" credentials?

In announcing the new team, Obama and his nominees produced some excellent, but completely vague, rhetoric. If Obama wanted to reassure me and all of the other active citizens of the United States who have the gall to still express their opinions, he could announce his firm commitment to stick to the 16-month timetable and to combine it with honoring the Bush-Iraq treaty for complete withdrawal. In other words: every single troop and mercenary out by May 20, 2010, and no residual forces. Or better yet, Congress could legislate it. That would be change I could believe in. It's also change I can work for, and if -- and only if -- we all work for it, it will happen.

As Congress Lay Dying

davidswanson — Mon, 01 Dec 2008 13:47:01 -0500

By David Swanson

The debate among progressive activists and commentators in recent weeks has tended to range from the leave-Obama-alone-and-he'll-fix-everything position to the stage-a-protest-at-Obama's-house-for-the-next-month position, including numerous stances in between those extremes. What all these positions share is acceptance of the incredible shift of power from Congress to the White House that we have seen in just the last eight years. It is in these concluding moments of the Bush-Cheney era that Congress's coffin is being constructed just outside our window, and I'm afraid that the peace and justice movement is picking flowers to bring to the funeral.

Congress is corrupted by money, media, and parties, and it has chosen its impotence. We've replaced a disastrous president with one who can't help but be in at least some ways dramatically better. Why in the world would we distract ourselves with worrying about Congress? The frightening reason is this: if we leave all power in the hands of the president, sooner or later all power will belong to someone even worse than Bush. The hopeful reason is this: the only possible path to truly transformative democratic change lies in re-empowering and reforming Congress. It may take some of us a few more months to consider the possibility of that. It may take us generations to prove it. The authors of the U.S. Constitution were closer to grasping it than we are.

Congress was supposed to write every law. The president can now ignore laws at his or her whim and rewrite new laws with signing statements. Congress was supposed to have the exclusive power to begin wars and the power to end wars. The president now does both and even negotiates treaties authorizing war without even obtaining Senate authorization of the treaties. Congress was supposed to raise and spend every dime. Now the White House simply invents or borrows trillions of dollars and gives it away without any pretense of authorization or oversight. The Iraq "Status of Forces Agreement" and the ongoing Wall Street "bailout" are eleventh hour nails in Congress's coffin.

What if the peace movement had not played dead for six months because there was an election coming, but instead had put some fraction of the time and energy and resources that went into the election into demanding that Congress not permit a treaty with Iraq without Congressional approval, and demanding a rejection of any treaty that extended the occupation? We're occupying and terrorizing a nation in the name of spreading democracy, yet that nation's legislature insisted on the right to vote and on the right of the nation's people to vote next summer on the new withdrawal agreement. This is the same model followed as we impose new "missile defense" bases on eastern Europe: those who have a voice are our president and the legislatures of our imperial outposts, but not our own legislature, much less the residents of the "homeland."

What if we learned that over $8.4 trillion was being looted from our grandchildren and given to some of those who least need it, and reacted appropriately? That much money could have been spent differently. Our government could have given almost $30,000 to every man, woman, and child in the country. Would you invest a thousand dollars in time and travel to lobby Congress to take back its power and our money, in exchange for taking a $30,000 check home? There's no reason we can't do that this month and have a much merrier holiday season. All that's required is that enough of us remember that Congress still exists and that our role is to tell it what to do. Washington, D.C., is on most maps; I'll meet on you the hill where the big white dome is.

Only one nail remains to be hammered home, and we may never again hear from the first branch of our late republic. Both James Madison and George Mason wanted the impeachment power placed in the Constitution in case a president ever pardoned someone for a crime he was in any way involved with, much less a crime he authorized, much less the crime of obstructing an investigation into a crime committed by the president, much less a direct self-pardon. I didn't go to law school, but anyone who did who argues that the pardon power includes the right to commit the same offense the impeachment power was created to counter deserves their money back.

Congressman Jerrold Nadler and Senator Russ Feingold and several good columnists and even some ordinarily awful editorial boards have spoken against the possibility of Bush pardoning crimes he authorized, but these voices have all falsely conceded that Bush can do this if he chooses before asking him not to. He cannot, and Congress is not powerless to stop him. House Members should sign onto Nadler's resolution to raise awareness of the issue (http://democrats.com/nadler-pardons ) but should not stop there. Congress members should pursue impeachment immediately for the commutation of Libby's sentence, pass a bill criminalizing the pardoning of crimes the president authorized or committed, if necessary pass of a bill to propose amending the Constitution to clarify that obvious point, and join with courts and the president elect in announcing that any such pardons will not be honored.

Congress contracted its potentially fatal illness in May 2006 when Nancy Pelosi stripped the impeachment power out of the Constitution, and has since then been bed-ridden. Nearly six years of Republican rubber-stampism had weakened both houses. Decades of power drift had created huge vulnerabilities, but the last two years have been a breaking point. Rather than impeaching, Congress members pretended to investigate known and possible crimes. When subpoenas were rejected and even witnesses who appeared refused to answer questions, Congress did not imprison anyone (as it indisputably has the power to do), but pointlessly asked the executive branch to enforce its subpoenas. In January, the Justice Department might honor such requests, but Congress appears poised to retract them and encourage us all to forget they ever existed.

Congress has grown unpleasant in its illness, and many will not lament its passing, but democratic representation will die with it. We will be very sorry to see it go, even if we won't know what we've lost till it's gone.

Iraq is Our War in January

RDillon — Fri, 28 Nov 2008 00:35:40 -0500

While it was a hot topic in the Democratic primary, the Iraq War seemed to fall off the table in the final months of the Presidential campaign. In retrospect, this huge blunder by the outgoing Bush Administration has been a bottomless pit for American taxpayer dollars. It has been a huge strain on our National Guard and military, and has taken longer than it took the Allies to defeat the Axis powers after America entered WWII. To add insult to injury, it has not done one thing to bring the murderer of thousands of Americans, Osama bin Laden to justice.

As Democrats now that we will control the White House and Congress even though George W. Bush started this irresponsible fiasco, it will essentially become our war. Soon enough, the decisions on that conflict will be upon the shoulders of our leadership.

As we have all seen although violence has dropped, American taxpayers have bought themselves a never ending mess in Iraq. Worse yet, I think they expect us to hang around a while:

Iraq's Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki on Thursday finally got the broad consensus he sought on the Status of Forces Agreement with the U.S. - 149 of the 198 lawmakers present in the 275-member National Assembly gave their support to a deal that allows American forces to remain in Iraq until the end of 2011.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/time/20081127/wl_time/08599186266000

They also gave this disappointing assessment of what the blood and labor of our soldiers, and our hundreds of billions of dollars have bought:

But Iraq's legislators also put the prime minister on notice: "We want to tell Maliki that we are building a new democracy, and that we're not ready anymore to let the power be in one man's hands, no matter who he is," said Abdel-Bari al-Zebari, a Kurdish lawmaker.

The wide parliamentary approval for the Status of Forces Agreement (SOFA) opens the final chapter of U.S military involvement in Iraq, setting a firm deadline for withdrawal. The vote, and the divisive deliberations leading up to it, may also mark the beginning of a new season of political conflict in Baghdad, as politicians seek to redistribute power away from the increasingly autocratic prime minister and towards the president and the parliament.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/time/20081127/wl_time/08599186266000

Imagine that!! It seems President Bush and "Shotgun" Cheney have been wasting our money, and the blood of our military on setting up a petty dictator, who is standing in the way of democracy, hence our exit from that country.

Is this the "success" that we have been hearing about the surge??

Ah, but a ray of hope in the dark:

Maliki's Shi'ite and Kurdish allies backed the pact, which requires that U.S troops redeploy out of Iraqi towns and cities to bases in the countryside by June of next year, and completely withdraw by the end of 2011. The Sunni Tawafuk bloc also gave it the nod, after securing concessions on its demands for an amnesty for detainees in U.S custody, and for the holding of a referendum on the security pact next July. A 'no' vote in that referendum could torpedo the deal, and give Washington one year's notice to leave, effectively bringing forward the U.S withdrawal date to the middle of 2010.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/time/20081127/wl_time/08599186266000

That gives me an idea. Why don't we bundle up all the lobbyists in Washington for the bailout money, then tell them if they go to Iraq and convince Iraqi politicians to vote no and torpedo that deal, they can have some bailout money? I would much prefer having our troops home in a year, and it would give the Iraqis one last chance to see failed Bush Democracy in action.

We have been hearing for a long time now how successful the surge has been. With our failing economy, we simply can't afford to keep funding George W. Bush's mistakes. We definately don't need to be wasting young American lives and spending untold hundreds of billions for the next three years.

It is time that Maliki stands down and allows the election of a real chief executive in that country that doesn't aspire to be an autocrat. It is time that the Iraqi country exercises its own Democracy with its own legislative and truly exectutive branches. We have done all we could to spearhead Democracy in Iraq, but it is not up to us whether it will succeed or not. That fate lies within the Iraqi people themselves.

We have our own country to worry about now. Our economy has crashed, and Wall St. is lining up for bailout money like buzzards swarming a fresh carcass. Now more than ever, we are going to have to use our resources to shore up our own economy and infrastructure. We need to use our National Guard for disasters here, and bring our troops home until they are needed to fight real conflicts.

I am hopeful that when we sign our names to this mess, we will clean it up and not leave it to rot in the sun like our predecessors. I am hopeful that soon we will be rid of Bush's folly and the centerpiece of his failed legacy that has cost America so much.

The time is way past due.

Iraq Passes U.S. Withdrawal Agreement

davidswanson — Thu, 27 Nov 2008 09:54:50 -0500

By David Swanson
The Iraqi Parliament has approved a treaty with the United States or rather its government or rather its lameduck president, although its lameduck president has already made clear his intention to "interpret" it to mean whatever the heck he wants, meaning that the new president will be free to do that or not as he and his progressive supporters or he and his neocon advisors see fit.
AFP reports:

The vote came after a flurry of last-minute negotiations in which the main Sunni parties secured a package of political reforms from the government and a commitment to hold a referendum on the pact in the middle of next year. Should the Iraqi government decide to cancel the pact after the referendum it would have to give Washington one year's notice, meaning that troops would be allowed to remain in the country only until the middle of 2010.

So, that could get the United States out of Iraq in a year and a half, or about the timeframe Obama promised anyway, except perhaps more completely than in Obama's original plan. Or the United States and Iraq could simply agree to get out faster or more slowly; nothing is carved in stone.
The curious thing, of course, about this brutal mission to continue imposing our system of democracy on Iraq by staying and killing for additional years is that their parliament voted, and our Congress covered its ears, closed its eyes, and hummed. Their media covered the ongoing negotiations, while ours watched Sarah Palin pardon turkeys. Their people will get to vote on the fate of their country, while ours only got to vote for the guy who wanted Robert Gates to be Secretary of "Defense" or the other guy who preferred Robert Gates for that job.
What would happen if the American people got to vote or had people in Washington actually represent them on Iraq, on Paulson's Plunder, or on defunding all such madness and paying instead for green jobs, schools, and things we can actually use? Maybe there's something we can learn from Iraq. Oddly nodoby's requested an occupation of Iraqi troops to help "teach" us.

You’re Scaring Me, Obama: Let the Bush Years Die

Heather Wokusch — Fri, 21 Nov 2008 00:39:34 -0500

To be honest, Obama, you lost me when you voted for the PATRIOT Act reauthorization in 2006. You lost me again when you voted for the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) amendment in 2008. And you lost me every single time you voted for yet more war funding.

Don't even get me started on your vote for the $700 billion Wall Street bailout.

I cast a ballot for you in November, but I just can't share in this moment of collective euphoria over your election.

So, if your transition team really wants feedback on "where President-Elect Obama should lead this country," here's a Top Five list:

1. Dump the Bush Doctrine and don’t start more wars

You've made it clear that the US has to "take out Osama bin Laden and his lieutenants if we have them in our sights" and you’ve argued for "more resources and more troops to finish the fight against the terrorists who actually attacked us on 9/11."

What exactly does that mean?

Take troops out of Iraq and shove them into Afghanistan? Further destabilize Pakistan?

The whole idea of preemptive war (a.k.a. the Bush Doctrine) has no place in a civilized society and must be laid to rest, along with those sacrificed in Bush's military adventurism these past eight years.

Yet your approach to preemptive war, Mr. Obama, is nuanced at best.

During the January 2008 Democratic presidential debate, you said that if the US had "actionable intelligence" and Pakistan didn’t "take on Al Qaida in their territory," then "I would strike." You added, " And that's the flaw of the Bush doctrine. It wasn't that he went after those who attacked America. It was that he went after those who didn't."

No, the flaw of the Bush Doctrine is that it's just plain wrong. We've learned that the hard way.

2. Ditch the warmongers

What's with all of the hawks in your new administration?

You presented yourself as a peace candidate and then chose Joe Biden as your VP. Yes, he brought in the white male vote, but he also backed the invasions and occupations of Afghanistan and Iraq.

Just last month Biden warned that if you were elected, there would be "an international crisis, a generated crisis, to test the mettle of this guy." He said that you would make some "incredibly tough decisions" that could alienate the Democratic base, because if decisions are "popular, they're probably not sound."

In other words, a popular decision, one that the majority of the people wants, is probably not a good decision. Democracy to Biden…

And then there's Robert Gates, widely rumored to be staying on as your Defense Secretary. Questions about Gates’ role in Iran-Contra, not to mention his skewing of intelligence about Russia, still linger.

But especially disturbing is his recent push for beefing up the US nuclear arsenal: "As long as other nations have or seek nuclear weapons – and can potentially threaten us, our allies and friends – then we must have a deterrent capacity that makes it clear that challenging the United States in the nuclear arena, or with weapons of mass destruction, could result in an overwhelming, catastrophic response."

Let's get this straight: if other nations are even imagined to "seek" nuclear weapons, that "could result in an overwhelming, catastrophic response" from the US.

Obama, you've often insisted on taking "no options off the table" in dealing with Iran. How does Gates' proposal for the preemptive use of nuclear weapons factor in there?

While we're on the topic of warmongers in your midst… Rahm Emanuel as Chief of Staff? Yet another hawk, hell-bent on Iran and enamored with nuclear weapons.

And now we've got Clinton as Secretary of State.

Why is it that none of the 23 senators and 133 House Reps who voted against the war in Iraq are even on a short-list for these critical posts?

3. Close Guantanamo – and the whole system of secret prisons

Shutting down Gitmo is said to be a priority for your new administration. Terrific.

But what about Bagram? What about the other CIA "black site" secret prisons set up in Afghanistan, Thailand, Eastern Europe and elsewhere? What about the CIA torture flights? Will those end too?

Closing Gitmo also raises questions over how "high value" defendants will be handled. Your administration is reportedly considering setting up an alternative court system to deal with sensitive cases. But what safeguards will be in place to be sure that this new system won't degenerate into kangaroo courts, like Bush's military commissions?

It's a disturbing signal that you’ve appointed John Brennan, who has supported extraordinary rendition and warrantless wiretapping, to help review intelligence agencies for your administration. As former CIA and State Department analyst Mel Goodman noted, Brennan "sat there at [former CIA Director George] Tenet's knee when they passed judgment on torture and abuse, on extraordinary renditions, on black sites, on secret prisons. He was part of all of that decision making."

And this is who will help lead us out of this mess?

You've criticized the use of torture, yet reportedly will not bring criminal charges against those who authorized or conducted torture during the Bush years. Your administration doesn't see it as politically expedient, and Bush might give "preemptive" pardons anyway.

But can we really end this dark chapter in our nation's history without even an investigation? A Truth Commission, perhaps? Providing blanket immunity to all low-level and senior government officials won’t prevent possible war crimes from happening again. Quite the opposite.

4. Expose Bush & Co., and ditch the national surveillance state

Speaking of war crimes, how about Bush, Cheney and the rest? You'll soon be given access to Bush-era secret orders and opinions authorizing everything from surveillance to detention. You'll no doubt rescind many, to great fanfare, but what about sharing this evidence of Bush-year excesses with the public?

Yes, Bush could file a lawsuit and invoke executive privilege, but it's worth the fight. The only other option is shielding Bush & Co., similar to how you will reportedly shield those government officials involved in torture. But the public deserves to know. And if Bush administration officials violated the law, they should be prosecuted.

Now, back to your vote for both the PATRIOT Act reauthorization in 2006 and the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act amendment in 2008. These and other rollbacks in domestic civil liberties under Bush are inexcusable and must be addressed. We'll be waiting for you to do that.

5. Choose Main Street (not Wall Street)

Just this month you promised Americans that they can "turn the page on policies that have put the greed and irresponsibility of Wall Street before the hard work and sacrifice of folks on Main Street."

Yet, as Bloomberg notes, "almost half the people" on your Transition Economic Advisory Board "have held fiduciary positions at companies that, to one degree or another, either fried their financial statements, helped send the world into an economic tailspin, or both."

This includes, for example, Anne Mulcahy and Richard Parsons, both of whom were Fannie Mae directors when the company fudged accounting rules. Ditto for another of your team members, William Daley.

Mulcahy and Parsons additionally held executive posts when their companies (Xerox Corp. and Time Warner Inc., respectively) got busted for accounting fraud by the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Also on your team is Richard Rubin, who as Bloomberg notes, was "chairman of Citigroup Inc.'s executive committee when the bank pushed bogus analyst research, helped Enron Corp. cook its books, and got caught baking its own. He was a director from 2000 to 2006 at Ford Motor Co., which also committed accounting fouls and now is begging Uncle Sam for Citigroup-style bailout cash."

The list of questionable appointees to your Transitional Economic Advisory Board goes on and on, begging the question: Is this really the best you could come up with? How about Joseph Stiglitz, Sheila Bair, Nouriel Roubini or James K. Galbraith, for starters? Someone who represents labor?

Meanwhile, we're stuck with this nasty bailout bill – which you voted for.

Others, such as Sen. Russ Feingold (D-WI), realized the bill's problems and voted against it. Feingold said that the Wall Street bailout legislation, "fails to reform the flawed regulatory structure that permitted this crisis to arise in the first place. And it doesn’t do enough to address the root cause of the credit market collapse, namely the housing crisis. Taxpayers deserve a plan that puts their concerns ahead of those who got us into this mess."

Feingold was right.

In short, Mr. President-elect, you promised "Change we can believe in," but across the board it's looking a lot more like "Business as usual."

Oh yeah...Remembering the War and Other National and Global Crises

dlindorff — Thu, 20 Nov 2008 13:25:56 -0500

By Dave Lindorff

The ongoing and deepening global economic crisis, to which Barack
Obama owes his presidential election victory, is no small thing, to be
sure. It also presents us on the left with a lot of openings to press
for progressive change.

We saw how the Republican attempt to derail Obama by labeling him a
“socialist” actually backfired—especially when people were reminded
that a fundamental premise of socialism is “income redistribution,” in
which some of the wealth of the rich is taken away through taxation,
and transferred through federal programs to those who are less wealthy.
Joe the Plumber was outraged, but when most Americans who were having
trouble paying for gas or making their next mortgage payment, or who
were worried that their jobs might be about to vanish, thought about
that for longer than a sound-bite, it turns out that, not surprisingly,
they decided socialism and redistribution didn’t sound like a bad or
scary idea at all.

The same can be said of labor unions. In good times, many Americans
have bought the argument that unions are just out to grab dues payments
from their paychecks. But as job security vanishes and wages languish,
people are waking up to the idea that they are simply expendable
“inputs” to employers, and that a union can help them stand up to
abusive, uncaring management. Republican propaganda about the sanctity
of “secret ballot” union elections—ironic given the GOP’s simultaneous
assault all over the country on the right to vote—fell on deaf ears.

Government itself, long a dirty word thanks to years of
conservative propaganda, aped and spread through the corporate media,
is coming back into favor, now that people see that they cannot count
on either themselves or their employers to pull them through hard
times. The idea that government can step in with things like extended
unemployment insurance benefits, food stamps, and even renegotiated
mortgages, makes people who once mocked “big government” view things a
little differently.

But this unprecedented economic crisis also poses dangers.

Because we are so obsessed with the ongoing collapse of the economy
and the gathering storm of debt, unemployment and loss of retirement
savings that it entails, it’s easy for all of us to lose sight of other
crises that demand our urgent attention and action.

Chief among these are the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and the growing threat of climate change.

The wars are not going away on their own. The Iraq puppet
government of Nouri al Maliki is close to approving a deadline for the
removal of US troops from Iraq by the end of 2011. That is more than
three years from now—nearly as long as the US was involved in World War
II! It’s longer, even, than the absurd 16 months that Obama said it
would take for him to end the US war and occupation of Iraq during his
campaign, which was bad enough. (In the case of Afghanistan, it
represents a decade of war—as long as the Vietnam War!) The danger is
that Obama will allow that status of troops agreement with Iraq to
become his timetable for withdrawal. We have to say “No!” The Iraq War
must be ended immediately.

Afghanistan, meanwhile, is in a meltdown, and every day that US
forces operate there, the opposition to US occupation grows, simply
strengthening the Taliban. Similarly, the more the US tries to attack
Taliban and Al Qaeda forces in neighboring Pakistan, the more
opposition grows to the US in Pakistan. If we opponents of the war
allow Obama to go ahead with his plans for a larger US military force
in Afghanistan, we will end up with an even bigger and wider war in the
Middle East and Asia, with more terrorist recruits, and with whatever
remains of US funds for important domestic initiatives swallowed up by
the Pentagon and the secret intelligence budget.

Let me put this simply: Nothing progressive that has been proposed
by the Obama campaign can be achieved while the US is engaged in these
two criminal wars. No health care reform, no increase in education
loans, no early childhood education, no public works jobs programs,
Nothing.

And then there is climate change. The Obama campaign promised to
finally end eight years of a new Dark Ages, when government simply
denied science or actively attacked science, and to start taking
serious action to reduce America’s role in spewing out carbon into the
atmosphere. But you don’t hear much about that anymore. That’s because
reducing America’s carbon footprint costs serious money—money for
research into non-carbon energy sources, money for a power transmission
system to serve wind generation farms, money to develop a new
generation of non-polluting vehicles and to rebuild light rail and
inter-city rail systems. And once again, with the economy in a crisis,
and with the two wars sucking up all available tax revenues that aren’t
being given away to banks and Wall Street financial firms and insurance
companies, none of that is going to happen either, unless we demand it.

Meanwhile, while the progressive folks who put their all into the
Obama campaign are reveling in his and their Election Night success,
and are now taking a breather, the forces of darkness that control the
Democratic Party (think Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, Chuck Schumer, Rahm
Emanuel and the whole Democratic Leadership Council), are grabbing
control of the new administration, filling the incoming Obama cabinet
with carryover hacks from the Clinton administration, even including
the Clintons themselves, and, in some cases, the outgoing Bush
administration).

This is, in other words, no time to sit back and relax, reveling in
the admittedly hard-to-believe prospect of an African-American moving
into the White House. It is a time for action and then more action.

When Barack Obama makes that dramatic walk from his Inauguration
Day speech at the Capitol building to the White House, the streets need
to be lined with protestors holding up signs calling for an immediate
end to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

When the new Congress tries to vote for a $50 –billion or
$150-billion bail-out of the US auto industry, we need to be packing
the halls shouting it down. That money should be going only into
development of zero-emission automobiles, and it should be in the form
of voting-share equity in those companies.

Here, for what it’s worth, are my top 10 demands for action by the new Democratic government iin Washington:

1. US forces out of Iraq and Afghanistan. Immediately! Shift the
funds saved to reconstruction aid for those two countries and to
veterans benefits, with any extra savings going to help fund education
in poor school districts in the US.

2. Slash military spending by closing most or all overseas military
bases, by dramatically reducing nuclear forces to near zero, by
reducing the number of men and women in uniform, and by closing bases
in the US. Savings should go to shoring up the Social Security and
Medicare Trust Fund.

3. Open up the secret intelligence budget, currently running at over
$40 billion a year, and cut it, for starters, by half. Savings should
also go to the Social Security and Medicare Trust Fund. (Along the way,
ban all spying on Americans, and revive the Foreign Intelligence
Surveillance Act in full as originally written.)

4. Break up the banking and automobile industry, as well as any
other industry in which any player is so large it is able to extort
money out of the government by threatening that its failure would cause
a national economic crisis. “Too big to fail” needs to mean “too big to
be permitted to exist.”

5. Join the Kyoto Treaty, and pledge to immediately begin a campaign
to reduce US carbon emissions by 80 percent by 2050 or better, 2030.
Establish a crash national research program to develop carbon-free
energy sources, and provide funding for households to convert to
passive geo-thermal heating and cooling systems. Funds can come from
the unused $350-billion portion of the Paulson/Bernacke Wall Street
bailout fund. (Talk about a job-creation program, not to mention a big
whack at imported oil!)

6. Pass the Employer Free Choice Act, requiring employers to
recognize a labor union wherever a majority of the workers have signed
cards saying they want a union, and requiring those employers to
negotiate and reach an initial contract agreement within 90 days, or
under mandatory mediation.

7. Reassert the Constitutionally mandated authority of Congress by
rescinding all Bush/Cheney-era signing statements and executive orders
and declaring them, by Presidental declaration and by Joint Resolution
of the Congress, to have been invalid and unconstitutional.

8. Order the US Justice Department to investigate the actions of the
prior administration and, where crimes are discovered, to prosecute
offenders, up to and including the former president, to the full extent
of the law. This would include obstruction of justice, abuse of power,
commission of war crimes, conspiracy, fraud, bribery, war profiteering
and criminal negligence.

9. Appoint Ralph Nader as new chairman of the Federal Communications
Commission, with a powerful mandate take the necessary steps to restore
competition and fairness to the nation’s media. (My pet proposal:
Establish a government loan fund to allow workers at failing newspapers
to buy their publications from the owners and to operate them as
employee-owned enterprises, on a tax-free basis.)

10. Enact a national health care program that provides health
insurance for every person in America. My choice here would be a
single-payer system—essentially an expansion of Medicare to cover
everyone, funded by progressive taxation. Failing that, a system in
which the government has an insurance program operating in competition
with the private sector, should eventually lead to a single-payer plan.
One idea: dispatch a public-citizen commission to Canada to study the
Canadian health system and report back to Congress and the White House
in 90 days.
_____________
DAVE LINDORFF is a Philadelphia-based journalist and columnist. His
latest book is “The Case for Impeachment” (St. Martin’s Press, 2006).
His work is available at www.thiscantbehappening.net

Ann Wright, David Swanson, and Body of War in Lynchburg, Va.

davidswanson — Sun, 16 Nov 2008 16:39:11 -0500

WHAT: Ann Wright and David Swanson speaking prior to screening of "Body of War," Phil Donahue's documentary about a veteran of the occupation of Iraq

WHERE: Starlight Cafe
511 5th ST.
Lynchburg, VA 24504

WHEN: 7 p.m., Wednesday, November 19, 2008

Copies of Wright's book, "DISSENT: Voices of Conscience: Government Insiders Speak Out Against the War in Iraq," will be available for purchase.
http://www.voicesofconscience.com

During the run-up to war in Iraq, Army Colonel (Ret.) and diplomat Ann Wright resigned her State Department post. She was one among dozens of government insiders and active-duty military personnel who leaked documents, spoke out, resigned, or refused to deploy in protest of government actions they felt were illegal. In "Dissent: Voices of Conscience," Ann Wright and Susan Dixon tell the stories of these men and women, who risked careers, reputations, and even freedom out of loyalty to the Constitution and the rule of law.

Video about Wright's book:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=2Ei6SmAEwEU

David Swanson holds a master's degree in philosophy from the University of Virginia. He has worked as a newspaper reporter and as a communications director, with jobs including press secretary for Dennis Kucinich's 2004 presidential campaign, media coordinator for the International Labor Communications Association, and three years as communications coordinator for ACORN, the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now. Swanson is Co-Founder of AfterDowningStreet.org and Washington Director of Democrats.com, a board member of Progressive Democrats of America, the Backbone Campaign, and Voters for Peace, and a member of the legislative working group of United for Peace and Justice.
http://davidswanson.org

Body of War is an intimate and transformational feature documentary about the true face of war today. Meet Tomas Young, 25 years old, paralyzed from a bullet to his spine - wounded after serving in Iraq for less than a week. Body of War is Tomas' coming home story as he evolves into a new person, coming to terms with his disability and finding his own unique and passionate voice against the war. The film is produced and directed by Phil Donahue and Ellen Spiro, and features two original songs by Eddie Vedder. Body of War is a naked and honest portrayal of what it's like inside the body, heart and soul of this extraordinary and heroic young man.
http://www.bodyofwar.com

Dead at DOJ / Obama at White House

davidswanson — Tue, 11 Nov 2008 06:51:04 -0500

Dozens of protesters have gathered outside the Department of Justice to urge indictment and trial of the US President and Vice President.... Report and video from PressTV.

Celebrating Resisters on Veterans' Day

davidswanson — Sat, 08 Nov 2008 01:08:33 -0500

By David Swanson

November 11th is Veterans' Day in the United States and Remembrance Day, Armistice Day, or Poppy Day in various other countries. It was on a November 11th that World War I ended. But November 11th is also a Catholic holiday that long predates World War I: the Feast of Saint Martin, celebrated in honor of a man who supposedly died on November 11, in the year 397.

The two holidays seem to have merged into one militaristic glorification of warfare. Saint Martin is considered a military man. The military order of Saint Martin is a medal awarded by the U.S. Army Quartermasters Corps. As a military hero and a saint, one might easily assume that Martin was killed on that long past November 11th. In reality, Martin was the first non-martyr to be made a Catholic saint. But by making him a saint, the church was able to make us assume he was a martyr. Martyrs and veterans can be celebrated to glorify wars and are therefore quite valuable, whether real or not.

In reality we tend to neglect veterans, deny them health care and education, refuse them the treatment they need to deal with the hell they’ve been through, and walk well clear of them when we see them living homeless in the park. But in our collective imagination, we love to glorify veterans, and even more so those who die in war.

The odd thing about St. Martin is that he had a much better chance than most to die in war. He refused to carry a weapon and commited himself to walking into battle unarmed. His life was spared only because of a truce between the opposing armies. Martin died a natural death at age 81. Martin was not a veteran, not a follower of generals, not a supporter of a nation right-or-wrong, not a man willing to kill or injure other men in war. Martin was a conscientious objector, a war resister.

This Tuesday we should celebrate those who resist. Here are some of their stories:
http://couragetoresist.org/x/content/blogcategory/39/86

This Tuesday we should listen to real veterans telling us what they have been through and why nobody should ever be put through it again. Here are some of their stories:
http://ivaw.org/wintersoldier

This Tuesday we should all, every single one of us, ask our newly elected congress members to swiftly and fully end the occupation of Iraq.

This Tuesday we should ask president-elect Barack Obama to include in his cabinet men and women who, unlike Joe Biden and Rahm Emanuel, were wise enough to oppose the invasion of Iraq:
http://change.gov/page/s/contact

This Tuesday we should visit our local recruiting stations and block their doors with signs that read "When every veteran has a job, a home, and health care, you can have another recruit, but not a moment sooner."

Martin is the patron saint of beggars, appropriately enough. But how appropriate is it that we leave poor and desperate so many whom we have earlier subjected to the worst possible abuses, even while glorifying their caricatures in order to entice more young men and women to participate in the absolutely senseless creation of hell on earth?

Read about Martin in "Nonviolence: Twenty-Five Lessons from a Dangerous Idea," by Mark Kurlansky.

Sing this November 11th:

If you love this land of the free
Bring 'em home, bring 'em home
Bring them back from overseas
Bring 'em home, bring 'em home

It will make the politicians sad, I know
Bring 'em home, bring 'em home
They wanna tangle with their foe
Bring 'em home, bring 'em home

They wanna test their grand theories
Bring 'em home, bring 'em home
With the blood of you and me
Bring 'em home, bring 'em home

Now we'll give no more brave young lives
Bring 'em home, bring 'em home
For the gleam in someone's eyes
Bring 'em home, bring 'em home