By William Fisher
With the billions of dollars appropriated by the U.S. for Iraqi reconstruction almost all spent, Japan, Australia and other nations in President George W. ush’s “coalition of the willing” are likely to be asked to shoulder much of the burden for funding the large number of unfinished projects.
Getting others to take up the slack is reportedly high on Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice’s agenda when she visits the Far East in March. Her trip, originally scheduled for this week, was postponed because of the current crisis in Israeli politics caused by Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s recent stroke.
The new initiative comes barely a month after President Bush appointed Rice to take over the leading role in supervising and coordinating the U.S. reconstruction program in Iraq. The American administration has signaled that it will not seek further funding for these efforts.
"The U.S. never intended to completely rebuild Iraq," Brig. Gen. William McCoy, the Army Corps of Engineers commander overseeing the work, told reporters at a recent news conference. In an interview, McCoy reportedly told The Washington Post, "This was just supposed to be a jump-start."
However, Gen. McCoy’s assertion seems to be at odds with previous administration statements. For example, in a speech on Aug. 8, 2003, President Bush said, "In a lot of places, the infrastructure is as good as it was at prewar levels, which is satisfactory, but it's not the ultimate aim. The ultimate aim is for the infrastructure to be the best in the region."
Relatively little of the $30 billion allocated for reconstruction since the
invasion remains to be spent, and spending authority is scheduled to run out in June 2007. A decision not to renew the reconstruction program leaves Iraq with tens of billions of dollars in unfinished projects, and an oil industry and electrical grid that have yet to return to pre-war production levels.
It also leaves the State Department with a mandate to provide a “focal point” for reconstruction efforts and to supervise and coordinate reconstruction programs not only in Iraq, but also in other countries emerging from civil strife. These include Afghanistan, but Bush Administration officials have announced they will henceforth rely more on the Afghan Government, NATO, and contractors from other countries.
Steven Aftergood, head of the Government Secrecy program of the Federation of American Scientists, told me the switch from the Pentagon to the State Department was “a belated recognition that existing policy on reconstruction and stabilization has been woefully inadequate."
That switch came in a little-noticed December 7 Presidential National Security Directive that said, “The Secretary of State shall coordinate and lead integrated United States Government efforts”, coordinating these efforts with the Secretary of Defense to ensure harmonization with any planned or ongoing U.S. military operations across the spectrum of conflict.”
The State Department will lead U.S. Government efforts to prevent countries at risk “from being used as a base of operations or safe haven for extremists, terrorists, organized crime groups, or others who pose a threat to U.S. foreign policy, security, or economic interests,” said the Bush directive.
Some administration observers say the switch from the Pentagon to the State Department was a product of increasing frustration with the pace of reconstruction work in Iraq. They also believe the cutoff in reconstruction funding is part of a new White House narrative that also includes reduction in the number of U.S. troops in Iraq before U.S. mid-term elections in November 2006, when the entire House of Representatives and a third of Senators will stand for reelection.
According to a report by the special inspector general for Iraq (IG), reconstruction officials cannot say how many planned projects they will complete, and there is no clear source for hundreds of millions of dollars a year needed to operate the projects that have been finished.
The IG’s report describes some progress but also a number of projects that have failed. For example, expensive electrical substations were built but not connected to the country's electrical grid.
Much of the reconstruction funding has been diverted to other projects. At least $2.5 billion earmarked for infrastructure and schools was diverted to building up a security force. Funds originally intended to repair the electricity grid and sewage and sanitation system were used to train special bomb squad units and a hostage rescue force. The U.S. has also shifted funds to build 10 new prisons to keep pace with the insurgency, and safe houses and armored cars for Iraqi judges.
Hundreds of millions of dollars from the reconstruction fund was also used to hold elections and for four changes of government, and establish a criminal justice system, including $128 million to examine several mass graves of Saddam Hussein’s alleged victims.
In addition to the diversion of funds to other types of projects, the reconstruction efforts have been plagued by substantial corruption and overcharging by contractors.
While 3,600 projects will be completed by the end of the year, the cost of security has eaten up as much as 25% of each project, according to the IG. A U.S. congressional report last October forecast that many reconstruction projects were unlikely to get off the ground because of security costs. Iraqi authorities estimate that 10 billion dollars are needed for the health sector alone, to build or rehabilitate and provide equipment for hospitals and clinics.
Production by Iraq's national electrical grid remains at 4,000 megawatts, 400 megawatts below pre-war levels, with the average Iraqi receiving less than 12 hours of power a day. Oil production, which according to the Pentagon's prewar planning was supposed to provide the funds for Iraqi reconstruction, also remains well below prewar levels. The shortfall has been attributed mainly to sabotage by insurgents. Iraq's refineries are currently producing approximately two million barrels of oil a day, compared with 2.6 million barrels on the eve of the invasion.
The ending of reconstruction funding appears to mark a change from a promise the president made in 2003 to provide Iraq with the best infrastructure in the region.
But just how far the U.S. intended to go in that process has always been murky. While President Bush gave the impression that Iraq was slated for a complete makeover, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld appeared less certain. He told the Senate Appropriations Committee in March 2003, “I don't believe that the United States has the responsibility for reconstruction, in a sense (reconstruction) funds can come from those various sources I mentioned: frozen assets, oil revenues and a variety of other things, including the Oil for Food, which has a very substantial number of billions of dollars in it.”
On the other hand, that view seems to contradict a report submitted the same year by the prime consulting contractor hired by the Pentagon to lay out the future of Iraq’s economy. The company, BearingPoint Inc. of McLean, Virginia, said, “The reconstruction of Iraq has begun. Not the reconstruction of vital public services such as water, electricity or public security, but rather the radical reconstruction of its entire economy.”
Clearly, this has not happened. And the Administration’s recent funding decision suggests it is not likely to happen any time soon.
And with many of Iraq’s key ministries in disarray and some dogged by persistent corruption, observers say it is doubtful that the country’s government will have either the resources or the expertise to manage the many remaining large-scale reconstruction projects.
Saturday, January 14, 2006
Friday, January 06, 2006
COORDINATE WHAT?
By William Fisher
Barely a month after appointing Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice to take over the leading role in supervising and coordinating the U.S. reconstruction program in Iraq, President George W. Bush announced he would not seek further funding for these efforts.
Relatively little of the $30 billion allocated for reconstruction since the
invasion remains to be spent, and spending authority is scheduled to run out
in June 2007. A decision not to renew the reconstruction program leaves Iraq
with tens of billions of dollars in unfinished projects, and an oil industry
and electrical grid that have yet to return to pre-war production levels.
It also leaves the State Department with mandates to provide a “focal point” for reconstruction efforts and the supervise and coordinate reconstruction programs not only in Iraq, but also in other countries that are emerging from civil strife. These include Afghanistan, but Bush Administration officials have announced they will henceforth rely more on the Afghan Government, NATO, and contractors from other countries.
The switch from the Pentagon to the State Department came in a little-noticed December 7 Presidential National Security Directive that said, “The Secretary of State shall coordinate and lead integrated United States Government efforts”, coordinating these efforts with the Secretary of Defense to ensure harmonization with any planned or ongoing U.S. military operations across the spectrum of conflict.”
The State Department will lead U.S. Government efforts to prevent countries at risk “from being used as a base of operations or safe haven for extremists, terrorists, organized crime groups, or others who pose a threat to U.S. foreign policy, security, or economic interests,” said the Bush directive.
Some administration observers say the switch from the Pentagon to the State Department was a product of increasing frustration with the pace of reconstruction work in Iraq. They also believe the cutoff in reconstruction funding is part of a new White House narrative that includes reduction in the number of U.S. troops in Iraq before U.S. mid-term elections in November 2006.
According to a report by the special inspector general for Iraq (IG), reconstruction officials cannot say how many planned projects they will complete, and there is no clear source for hundreds of millions of dollars a year needed to operate the projects that have been finished.
The IG’s report describes some progress but also an array of projects that have gone awry, sometimes astonishingly, like electrical substations that were built at great cost but never connected to the country's electrical grid. With more than 93 percent of the American money now committed to specific projects, it could become increasingly difficult to solve those problems.
Much of the reconstruction funding has been diverted to other projects. At least $2.5 billion earmarked for infrastructure and schools was diverted to building up a security force. Funds originally intended to repair the electricity grid and sewage and sanitation system were used to train special bomb squad units and a hostage rescue force. The US has shifted funds to build 10 new prisons to keep pace with the insurgency, and safe houses and armored cars for Iraqi judges.
In addition to the diversion of funds to other types of projects, the reconstruction efforts have been plagued by substantial corruption and overcharging by contractors.
Hundreds of millions of dollars from the reconstruction fund was also used to hold elections and for four changes of government, and establish a criminal justice system, including $128 million to examine several mass graves of Saddam's victims.
While 3,600 projects will be completed by the end of the year, the cost of security has eaten up as much as 25%-30% of each project, according to the IG. A U.S. congressional report last October forecast that many reconstruction projects were unlikely to get off the ground because of security costs.
Production on Iraq's national electrical grid remains at 4,000 megawatts, 400 megawatts below pre-war levels, with the average Iraqi receiving less than 12 hours of power a day. Oil production, which was supposed to provide the funds for Iraqi reconstruction, according to the Pentagon's prewar planning, also remains well below prewar levels. The shortfall has been attributed mainly to sabotage by insurgents. Iraq's refineries are currently producing approximately 1.1 million barrels of oil a day, compared with 2.6 million barrels on the eve of the invasion.
The ending of reconstruction funding appears to mark a change from a promise the president made in 2003 to provide Iraq with the best infrastructure in the region.
But just how far the U.S. intended to go in that process has always been murky. For example, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld told the Senate Appropriations Committee in March 2003, “I don't believe that the United States has the responsibility for reconstruction, in a sense…[Reconstruction] funds can come from those various sources I mentioned: frozen assets, oil revenues and a variety of other things, including the Oil for Food, which has a very substantial number of billions of dollars in it.”
On the other hand, that view seems to contradict a 2003 report from the consulting contractor hired by the Pentagon to lay out the future of Iraq’s economy. The company, BearingPoint Inc. of McLean, Virginia, said, "It should be clearly understood that the efforts undertaken will be designed to establish the basic legal framework for a functioning market economy; taking appropriate advantage of the unique opportunity for rapid progress in this area presented by the current configuration of political circumstances. Reforms are envisioned in the areas of fiscal reform, financial sector reform, trade, legal and regulatory, and privatization."
The report added, “The reconstruction of Iraq has begun. Not the reconstruction of vital public services such as water, electricity or public security, but rather the radical reconstruction of its entire economy.”
Clearly, this has not happened. And the president’s recent funding decision suggests it is not likely to happen any time soon.
With many of Iraq’s key ministries in disarray and some dogged by persistent corruption it is doubtful that the current government infrastructure will be competent to manage the many remaining large-scale reconstruction projects.
Barely a month after appointing Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice to take over the leading role in supervising and coordinating the U.S. reconstruction program in Iraq, President George W. Bush announced he would not seek further funding for these efforts.
Relatively little of the $30 billion allocated for reconstruction since the
invasion remains to be spent, and spending authority is scheduled to run out
in June 2007. A decision not to renew the reconstruction program leaves Iraq
with tens of billions of dollars in unfinished projects, and an oil industry
and electrical grid that have yet to return to pre-war production levels.
It also leaves the State Department with mandates to provide a “focal point” for reconstruction efforts and the supervise and coordinate reconstruction programs not only in Iraq, but also in other countries that are emerging from civil strife. These include Afghanistan, but Bush Administration officials have announced they will henceforth rely more on the Afghan Government, NATO, and contractors from other countries.
The switch from the Pentagon to the State Department came in a little-noticed December 7 Presidential National Security Directive that said, “The Secretary of State shall coordinate and lead integrated United States Government efforts”, coordinating these efforts with the Secretary of Defense to ensure harmonization with any planned or ongoing U.S. military operations across the spectrum of conflict.”
The State Department will lead U.S. Government efforts to prevent countries at risk “from being used as a base of operations or safe haven for extremists, terrorists, organized crime groups, or others who pose a threat to U.S. foreign policy, security, or economic interests,” said the Bush directive.
Some administration observers say the switch from the Pentagon to the State Department was a product of increasing frustration with the pace of reconstruction work in Iraq. They also believe the cutoff in reconstruction funding is part of a new White House narrative that includes reduction in the number of U.S. troops in Iraq before U.S. mid-term elections in November 2006.
According to a report by the special inspector general for Iraq (IG), reconstruction officials cannot say how many planned projects they will complete, and there is no clear source for hundreds of millions of dollars a year needed to operate the projects that have been finished.
The IG’s report describes some progress but also an array of projects that have gone awry, sometimes astonishingly, like electrical substations that were built at great cost but never connected to the country's electrical grid. With more than 93 percent of the American money now committed to specific projects, it could become increasingly difficult to solve those problems.
Much of the reconstruction funding has been diverted to other projects. At least $2.5 billion earmarked for infrastructure and schools was diverted to building up a security force. Funds originally intended to repair the electricity grid and sewage and sanitation system were used to train special bomb squad units and a hostage rescue force. The US has shifted funds to build 10 new prisons to keep pace with the insurgency, and safe houses and armored cars for Iraqi judges.
In addition to the diversion of funds to other types of projects, the reconstruction efforts have been plagued by substantial corruption and overcharging by contractors.
Hundreds of millions of dollars from the reconstruction fund was also used to hold elections and for four changes of government, and establish a criminal justice system, including $128 million to examine several mass graves of Saddam's victims.
While 3,600 projects will be completed by the end of the year, the cost of security has eaten up as much as 25%-30% of each project, according to the IG. A U.S. congressional report last October forecast that many reconstruction projects were unlikely to get off the ground because of security costs.
Production on Iraq's national electrical grid remains at 4,000 megawatts, 400 megawatts below pre-war levels, with the average Iraqi receiving less than 12 hours of power a day. Oil production, which was supposed to provide the funds for Iraqi reconstruction, according to the Pentagon's prewar planning, also remains well below prewar levels. The shortfall has been attributed mainly to sabotage by insurgents. Iraq's refineries are currently producing approximately 1.1 million barrels of oil a day, compared with 2.6 million barrels on the eve of the invasion.
The ending of reconstruction funding appears to mark a change from a promise the president made in 2003 to provide Iraq with the best infrastructure in the region.
But just how far the U.S. intended to go in that process has always been murky. For example, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld told the Senate Appropriations Committee in March 2003, “I don't believe that the United States has the responsibility for reconstruction, in a sense…[Reconstruction] funds can come from those various sources I mentioned: frozen assets, oil revenues and a variety of other things, including the Oil for Food, which has a very substantial number of billions of dollars in it.”
On the other hand, that view seems to contradict a 2003 report from the consulting contractor hired by the Pentagon to lay out the future of Iraq’s economy. The company, BearingPoint Inc. of McLean, Virginia, said, "It should be clearly understood that the efforts undertaken will be designed to establish the basic legal framework for a functioning market economy; taking appropriate advantage of the unique opportunity for rapid progress in this area presented by the current configuration of political circumstances. Reforms are envisioned in the areas of fiscal reform, financial sector reform, trade, legal and regulatory, and privatization."
The report added, “The reconstruction of Iraq has begun. Not the reconstruction of vital public services such as water, electricity or public security, but rather the radical reconstruction of its entire economy.”
Clearly, this has not happened. And the president’s recent funding decision suggests it is not likely to happen any time soon.
With many of Iraq’s key ministries in disarray and some dogged by persistent corruption it is doubtful that the current government infrastructure will be competent to manage the many remaining large-scale reconstruction projects.
DOBSON’S CHOICE
By William Fisher
The news stories chosen as the top ten of 2005 by members of the
“righteous-wing” of the Republican Party offers significant insight into what U.S. religious conservatives consider most important.
The nominations came from readers of CitizenLink, a web page of Dr. James Dobson’s “Focus on the Family”. Dobson’s organization has become one of the most influential conservative voices in shaping a wide range of U.S. policies. Dr. Dobson is known to be close to the Bush White House, particularly to the president’s chief political advisor, Karl Rove.
Close to a third of respondents nominated the Terri Schiavo case as their number one choice. Editors of the website explained the story this way:
“The disabled Florida woman, whose tragic story moved and motivated
pro-lifers nationwide, passed away in March after 14 days without food and water -- a death sentence imposed by court order. Even Congress, which worked late into the night to pass unprecedented legislation that could have saved Schiavo, was unable in the end to blunt the efforts of her estranged husband -- who battled in court for years to have his wife's nutrition and hydration suspended, even though she was not brain dead, only disabled.”
Trailing by only a few percentage points was what the website called the “Supreme Court Shakeup”, explaining to readers, “After more than a decade with the same roster of justices, the highest court in the land underwent major changes. Associate Justice Sandra Day O'Connor announced her retirement July; Chief Justice William Rehnquist passed away in September. In their place, President Bush nominated two judges deemed by family advocates to be precisely the kind of "strict constructionists" the court desperately needs: new Chief Justice John Roberts and associate justice nominee Samuel Alito (tapped after Bush's original choice, White House counsel Harriet Miers, withdrew her nomination in the wake of criticism from many pro-family groups.)”
The third top nominee was “The battle for marriage”. The organization said, “There were several victories, and a few disappointments, in the fight to preserve traditional marriage. On the upside, voters in Kansas and Texas came out in record numbers to overwhelmingly approve marriage amendments in their state -- and four other states passed measures to put such amendments before voters in 2006. In California, meanwhile, the Legislature passed a bill to allow same-sex marriages, but Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger promptly vetoed it. On the downside, Connecticut passed a civil-unions law and a federal district court struck down Nebraska 's marriage amendment, claiming it was unconstitutional, a decision that underscored the need for a federal marriage amendment.”
But not all Christian leaders agree. Rev. Tim Smith of the year-old Christian Alliance of Jacksonville, Florida, called the Dobson list “a wonderful window into the vacuous worldview of American fundamentalism, its petty peeves and prejudices collected for all to see.”
“Apart from Katrina, there is hardly a matter of substance on the list,” he told IPS, asking, “Where on this list are the dead of the Iraq war and the tens of billions sunk into that money pit? Can one imagine a war being left off the top ten stories of the year in 1943, 1953 or 1968? Where is the story of the traitor discovered in the White House or any of the other scandals involving the GOP, which these people brought to power? They cry a river over a couple of slabs of marble that the Supreme Court took down and get fighting mad when Macy's wishes people "Happy Holidays, " but why isn't the slaughter of hundreds of thousands of Christians in Darfur on their radar?”
He added, “I think Jesus said something about straining on gnats while swallowing a camel that might apply here.”
Other issues Dr. Dobson’s readers rated as important included:
(Bad news): Failure to establish an “xxx domain” for pornographic Web sites;
(Good news): Defeat of a hate-crimes amendment extending special protections to homosexuals; the agreement among 14 Senate "moderates" to “allow a handful of blocked nominees to receive up-or-down confirmation votes -- in exchange for leaving the filibuster on the table for liberals to use again in "extraordinary" circumstances”;
(Bad news): New Air Force Academy guidelines that told the chaplains to “stop sharing their faith with cadets”, stopped short of banning all public prayer and worship, but limited it to ‘brief, nonsectarian prayer’ at special ceremonies”;
(Bad news): The Supreme court's rulings on a pair of cases involving public display of the Ten Commandments “failed to set a national standard for what's constitutional and what isn't” and created “further confusion about what forms of religious expression are allowable”;
(Good news): The “battle for Christmas” and the attention paid by the mainstream media to local governments and major retailers banishing "Merry Christmas" on the grounds that it's not "inclusive" enough;
(Good news): Hurricanes and the Christian response – “Christian ministries and everyday believers were indispensable to the recovery process”.
CitizenLink summed up its findings by noting that “2005 was a whirlwind year
for pro-family causes is the very definition of understatement. From the courts to the Congress, from public policy to the public square, the 365 days of the past 12 months were filled with miraculous victories and heartbreaking defeats for Christian Americans who advocate for righteousness.”
In contrast, the website of another major religious group, The Sojourners, listed its own 2005 achievements. These included:
Participating in the G-8 Summit, where it helped convene a religious forum with more than 50 prominent Christian leaders from the U.S. and the U.K. and pressed senior U.S. and British officials to cancel of 100% of the debt owed by 18 of the world's most impoverished countries and double foreign assistance to sub-Saharan Africa;
Campaigning at the U.N. World Summit for “breaking the silence on the tragic deaths of 30,000 children daily due to poverty-related causes.” The campaign successfully pressed the U.S. government to meet its commitments toward achieving the Millennium Development Goals by 2015;
Standing up for people most affected by “misguided spending priorities” by generating 100,000 calls and e-mails to Congress to influence political leaders, the media, and other faith groups to speak out against “cutting billions of dollars in health care, child care, food stamps, and student loans”;
Mobilizing members to sign a “Katrina Pledge”, containing “both a personal and political commitment to rebuild the devastated region while also reordering our national agenda to prioritize the needs of people living in poverty”;
Sending more than 50,000 e-mails to Congress and the president opposing privatization of the Social Security system;
Working to organize five interfaith worship services targeting Washington, D.C.'s key media and policymaking institutions to generate pressure to end the crisis in Darfur;
Mobilizing more than 900 vigils “to count the deadly human and political cost” of the Iraq war;
Urging Congress to support the successful efforts of Sen. John McCain, Republican of Arizona, to prohibit torture of prisoners held by the U.S.
Speaking out against “attempts by the religious right to hijack Christianity for their own agenda” and cautioning Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, Republican of Tennessee, not to “play the faith card by telling people of faith that we must align ourselves with one narrow set of policies."
The news stories chosen as the top ten of 2005 by members of the
“righteous-wing” of the Republican Party offers significant insight into what U.S. religious conservatives consider most important.
The nominations came from readers of CitizenLink, a web page of Dr. James Dobson’s “Focus on the Family”. Dobson’s organization has become one of the most influential conservative voices in shaping a wide range of U.S. policies. Dr. Dobson is known to be close to the Bush White House, particularly to the president’s chief political advisor, Karl Rove.
Close to a third of respondents nominated the Terri Schiavo case as their number one choice. Editors of the website explained the story this way:
“The disabled Florida woman, whose tragic story moved and motivated
pro-lifers nationwide, passed away in March after 14 days without food and water -- a death sentence imposed by court order. Even Congress, which worked late into the night to pass unprecedented legislation that could have saved Schiavo, was unable in the end to blunt the efforts of her estranged husband -- who battled in court for years to have his wife's nutrition and hydration suspended, even though she was not brain dead, only disabled.”
Trailing by only a few percentage points was what the website called the “Supreme Court Shakeup”, explaining to readers, “After more than a decade with the same roster of justices, the highest court in the land underwent major changes. Associate Justice Sandra Day O'Connor announced her retirement July; Chief Justice William Rehnquist passed away in September. In their place, President Bush nominated two judges deemed by family advocates to be precisely the kind of "strict constructionists" the court desperately needs: new Chief Justice John Roberts and associate justice nominee Samuel Alito (tapped after Bush's original choice, White House counsel Harriet Miers, withdrew her nomination in the wake of criticism from many pro-family groups.)”
The third top nominee was “The battle for marriage”. The organization said, “There were several victories, and a few disappointments, in the fight to preserve traditional marriage. On the upside, voters in Kansas and Texas came out in record numbers to overwhelmingly approve marriage amendments in their state -- and four other states passed measures to put such amendments before voters in 2006. In California, meanwhile, the Legislature passed a bill to allow same-sex marriages, but Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger promptly vetoed it. On the downside, Connecticut passed a civil-unions law and a federal district court struck down Nebraska 's marriage amendment, claiming it was unconstitutional, a decision that underscored the need for a federal marriage amendment.”
But not all Christian leaders agree. Rev. Tim Smith of the year-old Christian Alliance of Jacksonville, Florida, called the Dobson list “a wonderful window into the vacuous worldview of American fundamentalism, its petty peeves and prejudices collected for all to see.”
“Apart from Katrina, there is hardly a matter of substance on the list,” he told IPS, asking, “Where on this list are the dead of the Iraq war and the tens of billions sunk into that money pit? Can one imagine a war being left off the top ten stories of the year in 1943, 1953 or 1968? Where is the story of the traitor discovered in the White House or any of the other scandals involving the GOP, which these people brought to power? They cry a river over a couple of slabs of marble that the Supreme Court took down and get fighting mad when Macy's wishes people "Happy Holidays, " but why isn't the slaughter of hundreds of thousands of Christians in Darfur on their radar?”
He added, “I think Jesus said something about straining on gnats while swallowing a camel that might apply here.”
Other issues Dr. Dobson’s readers rated as important included:
(Bad news): Failure to establish an “xxx domain” for pornographic Web sites;
(Good news): Defeat of a hate-crimes amendment extending special protections to homosexuals; the agreement among 14 Senate "moderates" to “allow a handful of blocked nominees to receive up-or-down confirmation votes -- in exchange for leaving the filibuster on the table for liberals to use again in "extraordinary" circumstances”;
(Bad news): New Air Force Academy guidelines that told the chaplains to “stop sharing their faith with cadets”, stopped short of banning all public prayer and worship, but limited it to ‘brief, nonsectarian prayer’ at special ceremonies”;
(Bad news): The Supreme court's rulings on a pair of cases involving public display of the Ten Commandments “failed to set a national standard for what's constitutional and what isn't” and created “further confusion about what forms of religious expression are allowable”;
(Good news): The “battle for Christmas” and the attention paid by the mainstream media to local governments and major retailers banishing "Merry Christmas" on the grounds that it's not "inclusive" enough;
(Good news): Hurricanes and the Christian response – “Christian ministries and everyday believers were indispensable to the recovery process”.
CitizenLink summed up its findings by noting that “2005 was a whirlwind year
for pro-family causes is the very definition of understatement. From the courts to the Congress, from public policy to the public square, the 365 days of the past 12 months were filled with miraculous victories and heartbreaking defeats for Christian Americans who advocate for righteousness.”
In contrast, the website of another major religious group, The Sojourners, listed its own 2005 achievements. These included:
Participating in the G-8 Summit, where it helped convene a religious forum with more than 50 prominent Christian leaders from the U.S. and the U.K. and pressed senior U.S. and British officials to cancel of 100% of the debt owed by 18 of the world's most impoverished countries and double foreign assistance to sub-Saharan Africa;
Campaigning at the U.N. World Summit for “breaking the silence on the tragic deaths of 30,000 children daily due to poverty-related causes.” The campaign successfully pressed the U.S. government to meet its commitments toward achieving the Millennium Development Goals by 2015;
Standing up for people most affected by “misguided spending priorities” by generating 100,000 calls and e-mails to Congress to influence political leaders, the media, and other faith groups to speak out against “cutting billions of dollars in health care, child care, food stamps, and student loans”;
Mobilizing members to sign a “Katrina Pledge”, containing “both a personal and political commitment to rebuild the devastated region while also reordering our national agenda to prioritize the needs of people living in poverty”;
Sending more than 50,000 e-mails to Congress and the president opposing privatization of the Social Security system;
Working to organize five interfaith worship services targeting Washington, D.C.'s key media and policymaking institutions to generate pressure to end the crisis in Darfur;
Mobilizing more than 900 vigils “to count the deadly human and political cost” of the Iraq war;
Urging Congress to support the successful efforts of Sen. John McCain, Republican of Arizona, to prohibit torture of prisoners held by the U.S.
Speaking out against “attempts by the religious right to hijack Christianity for their own agenda” and cautioning Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, Republican of Tennessee, not to “play the faith card by telling people of faith that we must align ourselves with one narrow set of policies."
Wednesday, January 04, 2006
On Father's Day, Send Your Cards to Tom Instead of George
By Jason Miller
Our history books tell us that George Washington was the father of the abomination America has become. Many around the world, including some Americans, have written off the possibility that the United States is capable of acting with morality and sanity. Yet hope remains on the horizon for our country. Harvey Kaye's Thomas Paine and the Promise of America rekindled my fading belief in the United States as a potential home to true freedom and justice. Thomas Paine's spirit burns as an intense beacon lighting the way toward his envisioned "asylum for mankind". Paine, in contrast to Washington, is the intellectual father of an America which does not yet exist, but is still very possible.
Washington epitomized the aristocracy which has dominated our nation both socially and politically since its inception. It is time for the cultural descendents of Thomas Paine--the poor and the working class---to awaken from our slumber and lay claim to our share of the wealth and power in the United States. In so doing, we can remake this nation in the image that Paine envisaged:
When it shall be said in any country in the world, "My poor are happy; neither ignorance nor distress is to be found among them; my jails are empty of prisoners, my streets of beggars; the aged are not in want,
the taxes are not oppressive; the rational world is my friend, because I am a friend of happiness": when these things can be said, then may that country boast its constitution and its government."
Something is Very Rotten in Denmark
I have written reams about the social and political ills of our ailing nation, which have risen to disturbing heights under the Bush Regime. Given the courageous defiance of tyranny displayed in the American Revolution and the noble principles embedded in our Constitution, it is virtually inconceivable that our King George II could make King George III look like a "Bush-league" tyrant. Yet he has managed such a feat.
Consider the following:
1. Over 100,000 innocent Iraqi civilians and over 2,000 US military personnel are dead as a result of our illegal, imperial occupation of Iraq
2. The "Gulag of Our Times", including Guantanamo Bay, Abu Gharib, "secret" CIA prisons, and the extraordinary rendition program (before you write the prisoners of the Gulag off as "terrorists", remember, the crucial issues are due process and justice....most of those in custody have not even been charged with a crime, let alone had a trial. You could be next!)
3. The rise of Social Darwinism which has led to tax cuts for the rich, corporate welfare, and the diversion of our tax dollars from social programs to benefit humanity to an obscene war machine (which catalyzed the Diaspora in New Orleans).
4. The frightening attacks on Habeas Corpus and Posse Comitatus.
5. Wiretapping and eavesdropping by "Big Brother"
6. Increasingly unregulated corporations running roughshod over consumers and the environment (just keep telling yourself that big corporations have your best interests "at heart" and that Global Warming is a myth)
7. Continued unflinching support for the state terrorists in Israel who are committing a form of genocide against the Palestinians
8. A widening wealth gap, an unconscionable concentration of wealth in the hands of 1% of the populace, 45 million Americans without health insurance, one million homeless Americans, and 13% of Americans living below poverty level
9. Neocolonial policies which perpetuate corporate America's capacity to exploit the people and resources of other nations (i.e. Bolivia)
10. A declared policy of attaining global domination
11. Flagrant violations of international law
12. An Orwellian "Patriot Act" which violates four of the ten Amendments in the original Bill of Rights
Newsflash: The American Revolution Is Still Happening
While a fair number of Americans still suffer from the delusion that we are a benevolent superpower, painful realities poking us in the eye scream otherwise. Thankfully, Harvey Kaye's book awoke me to the fact that the dreams and ideals embodied by some of our Founding Fathers, particularly Thomas Paine, are not dead. The fact that America has evolved into a nation ruled by corrupt, bloated plutocrats is not a reason to despair. Our Constitution is more than "just a goddamned piece of paper". It is the embodiment of true freedom and a mechanism for the preservation of the rights of all members of society. As Kaye's tome chronicles the life and times of Thomas Paine, and the impact of Paine throughout the history of our nation, Kaye reveals some powerful aspects of America which transcend the sewer in which we are mired. The America Paine visualized has been a work in progress from the beginning. Despite the regression we have suffered in recent times, the "Promise of America" is not dead.
Paine's words remind us that while the ongoing Revolution is daunting, it is well worth the effort and risk:
"Tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered. Yet we have this consolation with us: That the harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph. What we obtain too cheap, we esteem too lightly. 'Tis dearness only that gives everything its value."
Kaye's book has inspired me as I continue my writing and activism on behalf of global social justice, economic justice, human rights, and intellectual freedom. The true value of this book is that it is that it serves as a reminder that America can still rise to Paine's aspirations. Throughout our history, champions for the down-trodden have sacrificed their blood, sweat, tears, and even their lives to progress toward the goal of conquering the tyranny of America's plutocracy. The Populists, Progressives, Women's Suffragists, Abolitionists, Anarchists, Wobblies, Socialists, and members of the civil rights and anti-war movements were each influenced by Thomas Paine in some fashion.
Who Was Thomas Paine?
According to Professor Kaye's depictions, Thomas Paine, a British immigrant to the American colonies prior to the Revolutionary War, was the common man incarnate (who happened to have some uncommon gifts). Born in Thetford, England in 1837 to a Quaker father and an Anglican mother, Paine grew up in an environment of severe social and economic inequality. His Quaker father forged young Paine's deep suspicion of state and religious authority. At thirteen, his parents withdrew him from school so that he could learn his father's trade of corset or stay making. The local economy prevented him from making his living in this field, so in 1756 Paine became a privateer on a mercenary vessel called the King of Prussia. An avid reader and student, two years later he found himself in London where he often attended lectures by self taught, working class dissidents. In London, he learned the philosophy of John Locke and the art of rhetoric. He opened his own business as a stay maker and was married in 1759. Sadly, his wife and baby died in child-birth shortly thereafter.
Over time, Paine developed a reputation as a formidable debater and "wordsmith". Thomas Clio Rickman, Paine's long-time friend, said of Paine:
He was tenacious of his opinions, which were bold, acute, and independent, and which he maintained with ardour, elegance, and argument.
After a second marriage, which did not last, and a stint as an excise officer, Paine utilized his friendship with Benjamin Franklin to emigrate to the American colonies in 1774. Fortunately for the colonists, according to Kaye, "he had acquired skills and knowledge, tested his courage and intellect, made friends and contacts, and developed an intolerance of hypocrisy, injustice, and inequality along with a budding sense of working people's political potential."
January 10, 1776 marks an intellectual watershed for the American Revolution. It was on that day that Paine's unsigned pamphlet called Common Sense began circulating the streets of Philadelphia. His scathing critique of Great Britain's government and compelling argument for the colonies to break ties with their imperial master ignited a revolutionary flame throughout the fledgling nation.
By December 4, 1776, the colonies had declared their independence and the American army was dogged by defeat and hopelessness. Thomas Paine responded with another powerful dose of writing. The American Crisis buoyed sagging spirits and reinvigorated the colonists as they fought to forge a sovereign nation. Paine spurred on his fellow revolutionaries with this opening line:
THESE are the times that try men's souls: The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of his country but he that stands it NOW, deserves the love and thanks of man and woman.
Having done his part to spark and perpetuate the American Revolution, remaining true to the way he defined himself ("my country is the world, and my religion is to do good..."), Paine left America in 1782 to return to England. There he continued to wage the battle for the common man by publishing The Rights of Man, which supported the French Revolution and decried monarchy. Charged by the British government with seditious libel, Paine fled to Paris. He became a French citizen and became involved in politics. When he opposed the execution of Louis XVI, he was imprisoned and sentenced to death. It was from his cell that he penned The Age of Reason, which incurred the wrath of many Christians because of its exposure of the contradictions, untruths, and immoralities contained in the Bible. Despite his professed Deism, Paine's memory is dogged to this day with charges of atheism.
James Monroe managed to secure a stay of execution and freedom for Paine. In 1802 he returned to America to discover that The Age of Reason had ruined his reputation with many Americans. Paine's stubborn commitment to the working class, human rights, spiritual freedom, and reason had cost him dearly. He died in New York in 1809, poverty-stricken and a pariah.
Which Father Knew Best? The Answer Depends on Your "Pedigree"
Thomas Paine and the Promise of America by Harvey Kaye (a professor of history at the University of Wisconsin at Green Bay), serves as a powerful reminder that the American Revolution may not have started without Common Sense or may have failed without The American Crisis. It also reminds us that the ongoing American social and political revolution (which has advanced the rights of women, minorities, workers, the poor, farmers, and consumers) embodies the spirit of Thomas Paine rather than that of those Founding Fathers who were wealthy aristocrats, owned slaves, opposed the Bill of Rights, and limited the inclusion of the "common people" in the nation's power structure.
With the advent of the Bush Regimes (both I and II), an amoral plutocracy (or Miscreant Dynasty) has seized virtually absolute power in our nation. While most of our presidents have represented America's aristocracy first and foremost, virtually all of them advanced the cause of the poor and working class to some degree. Bush I and II and their myriad criminal accomplices, including Rove, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, Rice and a host of plutocrats quietly working behind the scenes, have hijacked the America that Thomas Paine had foreseen. Meanwhile, a majority of Americans (largely pacified by consumerism, popular culture, and propaganda) have stood idly by as unwitting victims and accomplices.
A nation is an abstraction, a complex and intricate set of dynamics involving many people and processes. It is in a constant state of flux and is not easily definable. However, in recent history, generally speaking, the United States has morphed into a social and political cesspool viewed contemptuously by most of the world. We have strayed woefully far from the "Promise of America", but as Kaye's powerful analysis of Thomas Paine and his impact on the evolution of our nation reveals, it is not too late to fulfill that promise. George Washington is the father of a country ruled by the wealthy elite. The spirit of Thomas Paine is poised to become the father of a nation ruled by all Americans. It is time that "We the People" adopt a new father and wrest the power away from a group of narcissistic, avaricious malefactors who are the enemies of humanity.
As Sinclair Lewis warned in It Can't Happen Here, tyranny can arise in highly unexpected places. And it has. If enough of us join together, exhibit fortitude and patience, and take action, we can put an end to this nightmare. For a motivational jump-start and an awakening to what America was meant to be (and still can be), I highly recommend Thomas Paine and the Promise of America by Harvey Kaye.
Jason Miller is a 39 year old activist writer with a degree in liberal arts. When he is not spending time with his wife and three sons, researching, or writing, he is working as a loan counselor. He is a member of Amnesty International and an avid supporter of Oxfam International. He welcomes responses at willpowerful@hotmail.com or comments on his blog, Thomas Paine's Corner, at http://civillibertarian.blogspot.com/.
Our history books tell us that George Washington was the father of the abomination America has become. Many around the world, including some Americans, have written off the possibility that the United States is capable of acting with morality and sanity. Yet hope remains on the horizon for our country. Harvey Kaye's Thomas Paine and the Promise of America rekindled my fading belief in the United States as a potential home to true freedom and justice. Thomas Paine's spirit burns as an intense beacon lighting the way toward his envisioned "asylum for mankind". Paine, in contrast to Washington, is the intellectual father of an America which does not yet exist, but is still very possible.
Washington epitomized the aristocracy which has dominated our nation both socially and politically since its inception. It is time for the cultural descendents of Thomas Paine--the poor and the working class---to awaken from our slumber and lay claim to our share of the wealth and power in the United States. In so doing, we can remake this nation in the image that Paine envisaged:
When it shall be said in any country in the world, "My poor are happy; neither ignorance nor distress is to be found among them; my jails are empty of prisoners, my streets of beggars; the aged are not in want,
the taxes are not oppressive; the rational world is my friend, because I am a friend of happiness": when these things can be said, then may that country boast its constitution and its government."
Something is Very Rotten in Denmark
I have written reams about the social and political ills of our ailing nation, which have risen to disturbing heights under the Bush Regime. Given the courageous defiance of tyranny displayed in the American Revolution and the noble principles embedded in our Constitution, it is virtually inconceivable that our King George II could make King George III look like a "Bush-league" tyrant. Yet he has managed such a feat.
Consider the following:
1. Over 100,000 innocent Iraqi civilians and over 2,000 US military personnel are dead as a result of our illegal, imperial occupation of Iraq
2. The "Gulag of Our Times", including Guantanamo Bay, Abu Gharib, "secret" CIA prisons, and the extraordinary rendition program (before you write the prisoners of the Gulag off as "terrorists", remember, the crucial issues are due process and justice....most of those in custody have not even been charged with a crime, let alone had a trial. You could be next!)
3. The rise of Social Darwinism which has led to tax cuts for the rich, corporate welfare, and the diversion of our tax dollars from social programs to benefit humanity to an obscene war machine (which catalyzed the Diaspora in New Orleans).
4. The frightening attacks on Habeas Corpus and Posse Comitatus.
5. Wiretapping and eavesdropping by "Big Brother"
6. Increasingly unregulated corporations running roughshod over consumers and the environment (just keep telling yourself that big corporations have your best interests "at heart" and that Global Warming is a myth)
7. Continued unflinching support for the state terrorists in Israel who are committing a form of genocide against the Palestinians
8. A widening wealth gap, an unconscionable concentration of wealth in the hands of 1% of the populace, 45 million Americans without health insurance, one million homeless Americans, and 13% of Americans living below poverty level
9. Neocolonial policies which perpetuate corporate America's capacity to exploit the people and resources of other nations (i.e. Bolivia)
10. A declared policy of attaining global domination
11. Flagrant violations of international law
12. An Orwellian "Patriot Act" which violates four of the ten Amendments in the original Bill of Rights
Newsflash: The American Revolution Is Still Happening
While a fair number of Americans still suffer from the delusion that we are a benevolent superpower, painful realities poking us in the eye scream otherwise. Thankfully, Harvey Kaye's book awoke me to the fact that the dreams and ideals embodied by some of our Founding Fathers, particularly Thomas Paine, are not dead. The fact that America has evolved into a nation ruled by corrupt, bloated plutocrats is not a reason to despair. Our Constitution is more than "just a goddamned piece of paper". It is the embodiment of true freedom and a mechanism for the preservation of the rights of all members of society. As Kaye's tome chronicles the life and times of Thomas Paine, and the impact of Paine throughout the history of our nation, Kaye reveals some powerful aspects of America which transcend the sewer in which we are mired. The America Paine visualized has been a work in progress from the beginning. Despite the regression we have suffered in recent times, the "Promise of America" is not dead.
Paine's words remind us that while the ongoing Revolution is daunting, it is well worth the effort and risk:
"Tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered. Yet we have this consolation with us: That the harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph. What we obtain too cheap, we esteem too lightly. 'Tis dearness only that gives everything its value."
Kaye's book has inspired me as I continue my writing and activism on behalf of global social justice, economic justice, human rights, and intellectual freedom. The true value of this book is that it is that it serves as a reminder that America can still rise to Paine's aspirations. Throughout our history, champions for the down-trodden have sacrificed their blood, sweat, tears, and even their lives to progress toward the goal of conquering the tyranny of America's plutocracy. The Populists, Progressives, Women's Suffragists, Abolitionists, Anarchists, Wobblies, Socialists, and members of the civil rights and anti-war movements were each influenced by Thomas Paine in some fashion.
Who Was Thomas Paine?
According to Professor Kaye's depictions, Thomas Paine, a British immigrant to the American colonies prior to the Revolutionary War, was the common man incarnate (who happened to have some uncommon gifts). Born in Thetford, England in 1837 to a Quaker father and an Anglican mother, Paine grew up in an environment of severe social and economic inequality. His Quaker father forged young Paine's deep suspicion of state and religious authority. At thirteen, his parents withdrew him from school so that he could learn his father's trade of corset or stay making. The local economy prevented him from making his living in this field, so in 1756 Paine became a privateer on a mercenary vessel called the King of Prussia. An avid reader and student, two years later he found himself in London where he often attended lectures by self taught, working class dissidents. In London, he learned the philosophy of John Locke and the art of rhetoric. He opened his own business as a stay maker and was married in 1759. Sadly, his wife and baby died in child-birth shortly thereafter.
Over time, Paine developed a reputation as a formidable debater and "wordsmith". Thomas Clio Rickman, Paine's long-time friend, said of Paine:
He was tenacious of his opinions, which were bold, acute, and independent, and which he maintained with ardour, elegance, and argument.
After a second marriage, which did not last, and a stint as an excise officer, Paine utilized his friendship with Benjamin Franklin to emigrate to the American colonies in 1774. Fortunately for the colonists, according to Kaye, "he had acquired skills and knowledge, tested his courage and intellect, made friends and contacts, and developed an intolerance of hypocrisy, injustice, and inequality along with a budding sense of working people's political potential."
January 10, 1776 marks an intellectual watershed for the American Revolution. It was on that day that Paine's unsigned pamphlet called Common Sense began circulating the streets of Philadelphia. His scathing critique of Great Britain's government and compelling argument for the colonies to break ties with their imperial master ignited a revolutionary flame throughout the fledgling nation.
By December 4, 1776, the colonies had declared their independence and the American army was dogged by defeat and hopelessness. Thomas Paine responded with another powerful dose of writing. The American Crisis buoyed sagging spirits and reinvigorated the colonists as they fought to forge a sovereign nation. Paine spurred on his fellow revolutionaries with this opening line:
THESE are the times that try men's souls: The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of his country but he that stands it NOW, deserves the love and thanks of man and woman.
Having done his part to spark and perpetuate the American Revolution, remaining true to the way he defined himself ("my country is the world, and my religion is to do good..."), Paine left America in 1782 to return to England. There he continued to wage the battle for the common man by publishing The Rights of Man, which supported the French Revolution and decried monarchy. Charged by the British government with seditious libel, Paine fled to Paris. He became a French citizen and became involved in politics. When he opposed the execution of Louis XVI, he was imprisoned and sentenced to death. It was from his cell that he penned The Age of Reason, which incurred the wrath of many Christians because of its exposure of the contradictions, untruths, and immoralities contained in the Bible. Despite his professed Deism, Paine's memory is dogged to this day with charges of atheism.
James Monroe managed to secure a stay of execution and freedom for Paine. In 1802 he returned to America to discover that The Age of Reason had ruined his reputation with many Americans. Paine's stubborn commitment to the working class, human rights, spiritual freedom, and reason had cost him dearly. He died in New York in 1809, poverty-stricken and a pariah.
Which Father Knew Best? The Answer Depends on Your "Pedigree"
Thomas Paine and the Promise of America by Harvey Kaye (a professor of history at the University of Wisconsin at Green Bay), serves as a powerful reminder that the American Revolution may not have started without Common Sense or may have failed without The American Crisis. It also reminds us that the ongoing American social and political revolution (which has advanced the rights of women, minorities, workers, the poor, farmers, and consumers) embodies the spirit of Thomas Paine rather than that of those Founding Fathers who were wealthy aristocrats, owned slaves, opposed the Bill of Rights, and limited the inclusion of the "common people" in the nation's power structure.
With the advent of the Bush Regimes (both I and II), an amoral plutocracy (or Miscreant Dynasty) has seized virtually absolute power in our nation. While most of our presidents have represented America's aristocracy first and foremost, virtually all of them advanced the cause of the poor and working class to some degree. Bush I and II and their myriad criminal accomplices, including Rove, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, Rice and a host of plutocrats quietly working behind the scenes, have hijacked the America that Thomas Paine had foreseen. Meanwhile, a majority of Americans (largely pacified by consumerism, popular culture, and propaganda) have stood idly by as unwitting victims and accomplices.
A nation is an abstraction, a complex and intricate set of dynamics involving many people and processes. It is in a constant state of flux and is not easily definable. However, in recent history, generally speaking, the United States has morphed into a social and political cesspool viewed contemptuously by most of the world. We have strayed woefully far from the "Promise of America", but as Kaye's powerful analysis of Thomas Paine and his impact on the evolution of our nation reveals, it is not too late to fulfill that promise. George Washington is the father of a country ruled by the wealthy elite. The spirit of Thomas Paine is poised to become the father of a nation ruled by all Americans. It is time that "We the People" adopt a new father and wrest the power away from a group of narcissistic, avaricious malefactors who are the enemies of humanity.
As Sinclair Lewis warned in It Can't Happen Here, tyranny can arise in highly unexpected places. And it has. If enough of us join together, exhibit fortitude and patience, and take action, we can put an end to this nightmare. For a motivational jump-start and an awakening to what America was meant to be (and still can be), I highly recommend Thomas Paine and the Promise of America by Harvey Kaye.
Jason Miller is a 39 year old activist writer with a degree in liberal arts. When he is not spending time with his wife and three sons, researching, or writing, he is working as a loan counselor. He is a member of Amnesty International and an avid supporter of Oxfam International. He welcomes responses at willpowerful@hotmail.com or comments on his blog, Thomas Paine's Corner, at http://civillibertarian.blogspot.com/.
Monday, January 02, 2006
THE UNITER AT YEAR-END
By William Fisher
My editors, as well as many friends around the world, have been urging me to write something about how I think about George W. Bush as 2005 ends and a new year begins.
I was reluctant because I have been reading dozens of year-enders on this subject, and wondering if I had anything to add.
What I have to add is not exactly new. Many others have expressed similar views. To which I will now add my own perspective.
As I thought about our president, I wondered: Do I hate him? Do I think he is a liar? Do I think he is a provincial and poorly informed scion of a privileged family? Do I think he embarrasses our country by mangling the English language? Do I think he has placed unnecessary and unproductive restrictions on our liberties? Do I think his promise of a more “compassionate conservatism” was merely an election-year slogan? Do I think he is an incompetent manager of our affairs of State?
The answer to all of the above is either “No” or “We don’t know yet”.
But the more I pondered the question, the stronger grew one overwhelming feeling: Profound disappointment.
I am sad for George W. Bush. The instant those planes flew into the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, the president was presented with an opportunity few presidents have enjoyed.
It was the opportunity to unite our country. On September 11, 2001, GWB could have asked the American people to “pay any price” – and we would have done it.
Not since Pearl Harbor has any other president held the unity of the nation in his hands.
I found myself thinking of Franklin Roosevelt in the days after Japan attacked us. The American people were asked to make real sacrifices, and we made them. We sacrificed our drafted men and women in uniform. We sacrificed our appetites to food rationing. We held scrap metal drives, rubber drives, paper drives. We bought War Bonds, though this was not by any means the most efficient way to raise money for the war effort. We even sacrificed, at least temporarily, our strong views about FDR’s ever-closer relationships to big business because they were the folks who had to build the tanks and the ammo and the planes that could win the war.
In short, FDR connected all of us to the war effort. And we all rose to the challenge.
When Lyndon Johnson failed to learn FDR’s lessons, his Vietnam project collapsed. Looking back at those days, it seems unthinkable that any American president would ever again believe he could win a war absent the support of ordinary people.
But that is what President Bush did.
He told us we were engaged in a “Global War on Terror”, but he didn’t ask us to sacrifice anything to help win it. On the contrary, our wealthiest people reaped large tax cuts while the divide between our rich and our poor became a chasm.
Still, we were all behind the president when he attacked the Taliban in Afghanistan. We thought that action was necessary and justified: They were the folks who killed almost 3,000 of us – more than we lost at Pearl Harbor – and we felt vindicated when that effort succeeded.
Yet the vast majority of ordinary Americans weren’t really connected, even to that war we all supported. The connected people were our men and women in uniform and their families. The rest of us rejoiced, but we sacrificed nothing because we were never asked.
Then came the sharp left turn into Iraq – a war promoted on dubious evidence by people who routinely denounced “nation building” and whose motivations remain murky to this day.
That’s when the president began slowly to lose popular support. What is now left of that support is crumbling. Most of us were happy when Saddam Hussein’s regime fell. But some of us, even in the early days of the Iraq war, believed that war to be unwinnable. Now, most of us have come to believe that our subsequent prosecution of the war exposed the embarrassing incompetence of our military to understand that there are no military avenues to nation-building.
And today, as in the past, the American people think of the war as something we watch on our TV sets. We are not personally invested. We are increasingly disconnected. The president hasn’t really talked to his people – until his plummeting poll numbers scared the pants off his advisors. So we still have difficulty understanding why there were no weapons of mass destruction, why we were not greeted as “liberators”, and why most Iraqis want us out of their country.
The opportunity of 9/11 is gone. Missed. Bullhorn in hand, hardhat on head, standing in the ruins of Ground Zero, George W. Bush had every chance of bringing our country together – remember, even before 9/11, how he told us he would be a “uniter”? Well, he blew it.
It is much too early to write the history of the Bush years. But, regardless of how our Iraq adventure ends, my guess is that the Bush presidency will be remembered as one that left us divided, diverted, and uncertain of our country’s future and its role in the world.
It will take a generation of yet-unknown leadership to bring us together.
That’s why I’m disappointed. That’s why I feel such a deep sense of sadness and loss for our president.
My editors, as well as many friends around the world, have been urging me to write something about how I think about George W. Bush as 2005 ends and a new year begins.
I was reluctant because I have been reading dozens of year-enders on this subject, and wondering if I had anything to add.
What I have to add is not exactly new. Many others have expressed similar views. To which I will now add my own perspective.
As I thought about our president, I wondered: Do I hate him? Do I think he is a liar? Do I think he is a provincial and poorly informed scion of a privileged family? Do I think he embarrasses our country by mangling the English language? Do I think he has placed unnecessary and unproductive restrictions on our liberties? Do I think his promise of a more “compassionate conservatism” was merely an election-year slogan? Do I think he is an incompetent manager of our affairs of State?
The answer to all of the above is either “No” or “We don’t know yet”.
But the more I pondered the question, the stronger grew one overwhelming feeling: Profound disappointment.
I am sad for George W. Bush. The instant those planes flew into the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, the president was presented with an opportunity few presidents have enjoyed.
It was the opportunity to unite our country. On September 11, 2001, GWB could have asked the American people to “pay any price” – and we would have done it.
Not since Pearl Harbor has any other president held the unity of the nation in his hands.
I found myself thinking of Franklin Roosevelt in the days after Japan attacked us. The American people were asked to make real sacrifices, and we made them. We sacrificed our drafted men and women in uniform. We sacrificed our appetites to food rationing. We held scrap metal drives, rubber drives, paper drives. We bought War Bonds, though this was not by any means the most efficient way to raise money for the war effort. We even sacrificed, at least temporarily, our strong views about FDR’s ever-closer relationships to big business because they were the folks who had to build the tanks and the ammo and the planes that could win the war.
In short, FDR connected all of us to the war effort. And we all rose to the challenge.
When Lyndon Johnson failed to learn FDR’s lessons, his Vietnam project collapsed. Looking back at those days, it seems unthinkable that any American president would ever again believe he could win a war absent the support of ordinary people.
But that is what President Bush did.
He told us we were engaged in a “Global War on Terror”, but he didn’t ask us to sacrifice anything to help win it. On the contrary, our wealthiest people reaped large tax cuts while the divide between our rich and our poor became a chasm.
Still, we were all behind the president when he attacked the Taliban in Afghanistan. We thought that action was necessary and justified: They were the folks who killed almost 3,000 of us – more than we lost at Pearl Harbor – and we felt vindicated when that effort succeeded.
Yet the vast majority of ordinary Americans weren’t really connected, even to that war we all supported. The connected people were our men and women in uniform and their families. The rest of us rejoiced, but we sacrificed nothing because we were never asked.
Then came the sharp left turn into Iraq – a war promoted on dubious evidence by people who routinely denounced “nation building” and whose motivations remain murky to this day.
That’s when the president began slowly to lose popular support. What is now left of that support is crumbling. Most of us were happy when Saddam Hussein’s regime fell. But some of us, even in the early days of the Iraq war, believed that war to be unwinnable. Now, most of us have come to believe that our subsequent prosecution of the war exposed the embarrassing incompetence of our military to understand that there are no military avenues to nation-building.
And today, as in the past, the American people think of the war as something we watch on our TV sets. We are not personally invested. We are increasingly disconnected. The president hasn’t really talked to his people – until his plummeting poll numbers scared the pants off his advisors. So we still have difficulty understanding why there were no weapons of mass destruction, why we were not greeted as “liberators”, and why most Iraqis want us out of their country.
The opportunity of 9/11 is gone. Missed. Bullhorn in hand, hardhat on head, standing in the ruins of Ground Zero, George W. Bush had every chance of bringing our country together – remember, even before 9/11, how he told us he would be a “uniter”? Well, he blew it.
It is much too early to write the history of the Bush years. But, regardless of how our Iraq adventure ends, my guess is that the Bush presidency will be remembered as one that left us divided, diverted, and uncertain of our country’s future and its role in the world.
It will take a generation of yet-unknown leadership to bring us together.
That’s why I’m disappointed. That’s why I feel such a deep sense of sadness and loss for our president.
Sunday, January 01, 2006
A mixed year for a valiant Arab people
By Rami G. Khouri
A look back at eventful 2005 in the Middle East shows three broad and significant developments in historical terms, related to the citizen, the state and the foreign powers that intervened in the region. Important changes are underway at all three of these levels of identity discernable today, though we need not predict where they will lead.
The most positive development has seen the citizen in many Arab countries start to rebel against the many indignities and inequities that he or she has endured in silence for decades - mostly variations of abuse of power by unelected, unaccountable elites from their own country or abroad. In Lebanon and Palestine, large-scale popular resistance and opposition were expressed, respectively, to Syrian domination and Israeli occupation.The citizenry's rebellion in other Arab lands primarily took the form of small vanguard groups of democratic activists who openly but peacefully challenged the state's monopoly on power (in Syria, Egypt, Bahrain, and Morocco), or mainstream Islamist parties that challenged the ruling elite through democratic elections to Parliament or to local councils (in Palestine, Egypt, or Lebanon).
Changes at the level of states were largely negative this year, the most troubling one being the continued fragmentation of 20th-century sovereign Arab states into much more brittle collections of ethnic, religious and tribal groups. The most common new trend I encountered throughout the 12 different Arab countries I visited this year - without exception - was the tendency to analyze each country in tribal rather than national terms. Iraq, Syria, Jordan, Lebanon, Egypt, Sudan, Bahrain, Yemen, Saudi Arabia and most other Arab lands are now routinely seen through the prism of Shiites, Sunnis, Kurds, Alawites, Druze, Palestinians, Darfurians, Turkmen, and assorted Christian groups such as Maronites, Copts or Greek Orthodox.
The Arab state is in the midst of being fractured, retribalized and redefined into much smaller configurations. Three principal causes of this process would seem to be: the largely incompetent, often brutal rule practiced by the reining Sunni Arab-dominated power elites during the past half century, a clear Israeli penchant for weakening Arab states and promoting the emergence of smaller, weaker minorities with whom it can engage to its advantage (as it has done for years with Kurds in Iraq and some right-wing groups in Lebanon), and, the current American formalization of ethnic politics in Iraq as a possible model for the entire region.
This leads to the third important trend that has defined the Middle East this year, but without clear indications of whether the end results will be positive or negative for the people of the region. This is the stepped up international direct engagement in the internal affairs of countries, including Arab states, Iran and Turkey. (Sorry, a small but necessary aside: peculiarly, and running against the dominant trend, foreign intervention tends to vanish when it comes to intervening in the policies and conduct of the Israeli government, even when Israeli actions are explicitly and repeatedly condemned by the international community through respectable institutions such as the World Court and the United Nations Security Council. A thought for the cold months of early 2006: if freedom and democracy are universal values, and should be spread around the world by diplomatic muscle and occasional force, if necessary, does the same apply to the rule of law, and the state of Israel?).
The enduring exception of Israel aside, the international community's intervention inside the Middle East this year has been striking for its audacity, but imprecise in its legitimacy and consequences. I would identify four dominant patterns of such intervention.
The first was the essentially unilateral American brute use of force, with window-dressing hangers-on, as happened in Iraq. We will need more time to discover if this epic intervention proves to be valiant or catastrophic for the people of Iraq and the region. The second was the multilateral, diplomatic, patient, focused, consensus-driven UN Security Council-based approach used in Lebanon to pressure Syria after the murder of Rafik Hariri last February. A variation on this deliberate approach is also being used to engage Iran on its nuclear plans.
The third form of foreign intervention was the painstaking, step-by-step prodding of domestic institutional and legal reforms of Arab societies championed by the European Union since 1995, and more recently in a slightly more inept form by the U.S.-dominated G-8 group of industrial nations. Gains have been thin to date. The fourth, and most intriguing, intervention technique, also dominated by the U.S., was the pressure exerted on individual countries over specific issues, using a combination of public statements by American senior officials and private warnings and cajoling. The best examples of this were the quests to push forward electoral reform and expanded voting in Egypt and Kuwait. Activists in both countries say privately that Washington's pressure played an important role in pushing these two Arab systems to evolve somewhat.
The cumulative lesson from this year's three political trends, it seems, is that under certain conditions there is indeed a middle ground where Arabs and Westerners can meet and work together for common political goals. Indigenous Arab
activists and those behind external diplomatic efforts can fortify each other if they jointly define a common set of goals that respond to reasonable demands on both sides; and if they anchor the entire process of change in legal and political legitimacy, whether in the UN, in international law, or in negotiated accords.
My hunch is that the good trends of the past year, including citizen activism and small steps to democracy, tend to result from sensible cooperation between Arabs and Westerners; conversely, the bad news from Iraq, Palestine, Sudan and aspects of the Lebanese situation usually reflects the consequences of unilateralism, gangsterism, and militarism. Why Israel consistently gets a free ride from all this remains more than intriguing; it often also drives some of the resentment that translates into extremism and violence throughout this region. Some grad student in Belgium should look into this for us this year.
Happy New Year to all, especially to my fellow average Arab citizens, whose stoicism, heroism and impregnable humanity remain the defining characteristic of these troubled but valiant lands.
This aticle appeared in the Daily Star newspaper in Beirut. It is reprinted with permission. Rami Khouri's work is distributed by Agence Global.
A look back at eventful 2005 in the Middle East shows three broad and significant developments in historical terms, related to the citizen, the state and the foreign powers that intervened in the region. Important changes are underway at all three of these levels of identity discernable today, though we need not predict where they will lead.
The most positive development has seen the citizen in many Arab countries start to rebel against the many indignities and inequities that he or she has endured in silence for decades - mostly variations of abuse of power by unelected, unaccountable elites from their own country or abroad. In Lebanon and Palestine, large-scale popular resistance and opposition were expressed, respectively, to Syrian domination and Israeli occupation.The citizenry's rebellion in other Arab lands primarily took the form of small vanguard groups of democratic activists who openly but peacefully challenged the state's monopoly on power (in Syria, Egypt, Bahrain, and Morocco), or mainstream Islamist parties that challenged the ruling elite through democratic elections to Parliament or to local councils (in Palestine, Egypt, or Lebanon).
Changes at the level of states were largely negative this year, the most troubling one being the continued fragmentation of 20th-century sovereign Arab states into much more brittle collections of ethnic, religious and tribal groups. The most common new trend I encountered throughout the 12 different Arab countries I visited this year - without exception - was the tendency to analyze each country in tribal rather than national terms. Iraq, Syria, Jordan, Lebanon, Egypt, Sudan, Bahrain, Yemen, Saudi Arabia and most other Arab lands are now routinely seen through the prism of Shiites, Sunnis, Kurds, Alawites, Druze, Palestinians, Darfurians, Turkmen, and assorted Christian groups such as Maronites, Copts or Greek Orthodox.
The Arab state is in the midst of being fractured, retribalized and redefined into much smaller configurations. Three principal causes of this process would seem to be: the largely incompetent, often brutal rule practiced by the reining Sunni Arab-dominated power elites during the past half century, a clear Israeli penchant for weakening Arab states and promoting the emergence of smaller, weaker minorities with whom it can engage to its advantage (as it has done for years with Kurds in Iraq and some right-wing groups in Lebanon), and, the current American formalization of ethnic politics in Iraq as a possible model for the entire region.
This leads to the third important trend that has defined the Middle East this year, but without clear indications of whether the end results will be positive or negative for the people of the region. This is the stepped up international direct engagement in the internal affairs of countries, including Arab states, Iran and Turkey. (Sorry, a small but necessary aside: peculiarly, and running against the dominant trend, foreign intervention tends to vanish when it comes to intervening in the policies and conduct of the Israeli government, even when Israeli actions are explicitly and repeatedly condemned by the international community through respectable institutions such as the World Court and the United Nations Security Council. A thought for the cold months of early 2006: if freedom and democracy are universal values, and should be spread around the world by diplomatic muscle and occasional force, if necessary, does the same apply to the rule of law, and the state of Israel?).
The enduring exception of Israel aside, the international community's intervention inside the Middle East this year has been striking for its audacity, but imprecise in its legitimacy and consequences. I would identify four dominant patterns of such intervention.
The first was the essentially unilateral American brute use of force, with window-dressing hangers-on, as happened in Iraq. We will need more time to discover if this epic intervention proves to be valiant or catastrophic for the people of Iraq and the region. The second was the multilateral, diplomatic, patient, focused, consensus-driven UN Security Council-based approach used in Lebanon to pressure Syria after the murder of Rafik Hariri last February. A variation on this deliberate approach is also being used to engage Iran on its nuclear plans.
The third form of foreign intervention was the painstaking, step-by-step prodding of domestic institutional and legal reforms of Arab societies championed by the European Union since 1995, and more recently in a slightly more inept form by the U.S.-dominated G-8 group of industrial nations. Gains have been thin to date. The fourth, and most intriguing, intervention technique, also dominated by the U.S., was the pressure exerted on individual countries over specific issues, using a combination of public statements by American senior officials and private warnings and cajoling. The best examples of this were the quests to push forward electoral reform and expanded voting in Egypt and Kuwait. Activists in both countries say privately that Washington's pressure played an important role in pushing these two Arab systems to evolve somewhat.
The cumulative lesson from this year's three political trends, it seems, is that under certain conditions there is indeed a middle ground where Arabs and Westerners can meet and work together for common political goals. Indigenous Arab
activists and those behind external diplomatic efforts can fortify each other if they jointly define a common set of goals that respond to reasonable demands on both sides; and if they anchor the entire process of change in legal and political legitimacy, whether in the UN, in international law, or in negotiated accords.
My hunch is that the good trends of the past year, including citizen activism and small steps to democracy, tend to result from sensible cooperation between Arabs and Westerners; conversely, the bad news from Iraq, Palestine, Sudan and aspects of the Lebanese situation usually reflects the consequences of unilateralism, gangsterism, and militarism. Why Israel consistently gets a free ride from all this remains more than intriguing; it often also drives some of the resentment that translates into extremism and violence throughout this region. Some grad student in Belgium should look into this for us this year.
Happy New Year to all, especially to my fellow average Arab citizens, whose stoicism, heroism and impregnable humanity remain the defining characteristic of these troubled but valiant lands.
This aticle appeared in the Daily Star newspaper in Beirut. It is reprinted with permission. Rami Khouri's work is distributed by Agence Global.
THE STATE DEPARTMENT’S MIXED MESSAGES
By William Fisher
Amidst undenied charges that the Pentagon is paying Iraqi journalists to write “good news” stories about the country’s progress, Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice has announced a new international exchange program for journalists named for famed broadcaster Edward R. Murrow and emphasizing “the democratic principles that guided Mr. Murrow's practice of his craft: integrity and ethics and courage and social responsibility”.
Rice added, “We all know that the bedrock pillar of a free society is a free press and that it is crucial for the foundation of any democracy.”
The new initiative -- The Edward R. Murrow Journalism Program -- is a partnership of the State Department’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs, the non-partisan Aspen Institute, and the journalism schools of six American universities. It will invite up to 100 international media professionals to visit leading journalism schools in the U.S., “honing their skills, sharing ideas, and gaining first-hand understanding of American society and democratic institutions,” the Institute said.
The goal, it said, “is not only to inform the journalists about the United States, but also to promote journalistic freedom and excellence around the world.”
Edward R. Murrow is best known for his radio reporting from London during World War Two, and later for exposing on television the demagoguery of Wisconsin Senator Joseph McCarthy, whose communist-hunting in the 1950s led to his censure by the senate.
Unveiling the program, Secretary Rice said, “The Department of State is determined to forge partnerships with our private sector so that Americans of all stripes, all traditions, all ethnic groups and also all walks of life might be able to help to carry the story of democratic progress and the progress of liberty.”
Announcement of the new program was strangely juxtaposed with the furor surrounding recent disclosures that the Pentagon hired a contractor, a PR firm called The Lincoln Group, to pay Iraqi journalists to publish articles written by the U.S. military that put a positive spin on developments in Iraq. The published articles do not identify the U.S. military as the source.
Earlier this week, The Washington Post newspaper reported that U.S. Marines, frustrated by the coverage they were receiving from the mainstream news media, had invited a retired soldier who writes a weblog, or blog, about the military to travel to Iraq to cover the war from the front lines.
The blogger, Bill Roggio, a computer technician from New Jersey, raised more than $30,000 from his online readers to pay for airfare, technical equipment and body armor. A few weeks later, he was posting dispatches from a remote outpost in western Anbar province, a hotbed of Iraq's insurgency.
Roggio told the Washington Post in an email, "I was disenchanted with the
reporting on the war in Iraq and the greater war on terror and felt there
was much to the conflict that was missed." Roggio, who is currently stationed
with Marines along the Syrian border, said, “What is often seen as an attempt at balanced reporting results in underreporting of the military's success and strategy and an overemphasis on the strategically minor success of the jihadists
or insurgents."
After military officials in Baghdad said Roggio could not be issued media credentials unless he was affiliated with an organization, the American
Enterprise Institute, a conservative-leaning research organization in
Washington, offered him an affiliation. His weblog is called "The Fourth Rail" (http://www.billroggio.com).
At the same time, The Post disclosed that the U.S. military has paid to place favorable coverage on television stations in three Iraqi cities, according to an Army spokesman.
The military, he told the newspaper, has given one of the stations about $35,000 in equipment, is building a new facility for $300,000 and pays $600 a week for a weekly program that focuses positively on U.S. efforts in Iraq.
The Post said a local U.S. Army National Guard commander “acknowledged that his officers ‘suggest’ stories to the station and review the content of the program in a weekly meeting before it is aired. Though the commander, a lieutenant colonel whose name is being withheld because he is based in the same area, denied that payments were made to the station, the Iraqi television producer said his staff got $1,000 a month from the military. It does not disclose any financial
relationship to viewers.” There was no explanation of the discrepancy between
that amount and the figure of $600 per week, the Post added.
The State Department’s new international journalism program may have to confront the same issue. Geoffrey Cowan of the University of Southern California (USC) said, “Democracy cannot work without the free flow of information and ideas that is made possible through an independent and effective press.” He said, “All of our schools expect the international journalists to learn from our courses — and we all expect our students to learn from our visitors.”
In addition to USC, the journalism schools involved in the new program are the University of Kentucky, the University of Minnesota, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, the University of Oklahoma, and the University of Texas at Austin.
As part of the Murrow program, the Institute is planning a major symposium in April featuring prominent working reporters, commentators, editors and columnists discussing practical and ethical issues inherent in the journalistic process. It will also include key government spokespeople, who will discuss the relationship between media and government. Among the themes of the symposium will be the importance of diversity of opinion, an informed public, and challenges facing journalists around the world.
But one observer sees the Iraq “payola” issue and the new Murrow program as “an example of the difference between democracy in theory and practice.” Prof. Beau Grosscup of the University of California at Chico, told IPS, “The same people who set up a program to promote 'independent journalism' are the same folks who defend funding public relations firms, conservative think tank connected jingoist individuals and embedded journalists as 'independent' media. It's all about public relations and media control. Joesph Goebbels would be proud.”
Numerous opinion polls in Iraq and elsewhere in the Middle East have reported that people are skeptical of U.S. motives and tactics because of what they perceive is a discrepancy between what America says and what it does. The juxtaposition of Pentagon payola and journalism training in ethics and freedom of expression is likely only to muddy the water further.
Amidst undenied charges that the Pentagon is paying Iraqi journalists to write “good news” stories about the country’s progress, Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice has announced a new international exchange program for journalists named for famed broadcaster Edward R. Murrow and emphasizing “the democratic principles that guided Mr. Murrow's practice of his craft: integrity and ethics and courage and social responsibility”.
Rice added, “We all know that the bedrock pillar of a free society is a free press and that it is crucial for the foundation of any democracy.”
The new initiative -- The Edward R. Murrow Journalism Program -- is a partnership of the State Department’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs, the non-partisan Aspen Institute, and the journalism schools of six American universities. It will invite up to 100 international media professionals to visit leading journalism schools in the U.S., “honing their skills, sharing ideas, and gaining first-hand understanding of American society and democratic institutions,” the Institute said.
The goal, it said, “is not only to inform the journalists about the United States, but also to promote journalistic freedom and excellence around the world.”
Edward R. Murrow is best known for his radio reporting from London during World War Two, and later for exposing on television the demagoguery of Wisconsin Senator Joseph McCarthy, whose communist-hunting in the 1950s led to his censure by the senate.
Unveiling the program, Secretary Rice said, “The Department of State is determined to forge partnerships with our private sector so that Americans of all stripes, all traditions, all ethnic groups and also all walks of life might be able to help to carry the story of democratic progress and the progress of liberty.”
Announcement of the new program was strangely juxtaposed with the furor surrounding recent disclosures that the Pentagon hired a contractor, a PR firm called The Lincoln Group, to pay Iraqi journalists to publish articles written by the U.S. military that put a positive spin on developments in Iraq. The published articles do not identify the U.S. military as the source.
Earlier this week, The Washington Post newspaper reported that U.S. Marines, frustrated by the coverage they were receiving from the mainstream news media, had invited a retired soldier who writes a weblog, or blog, about the military to travel to Iraq to cover the war from the front lines.
The blogger, Bill Roggio, a computer technician from New Jersey, raised more than $30,000 from his online readers to pay for airfare, technical equipment and body armor. A few weeks later, he was posting dispatches from a remote outpost in western Anbar province, a hotbed of Iraq's insurgency.
Roggio told the Washington Post in an email, "I was disenchanted with the
reporting on the war in Iraq and the greater war on terror and felt there
was much to the conflict that was missed." Roggio, who is currently stationed
with Marines along the Syrian border, said, “What is often seen as an attempt at balanced reporting results in underreporting of the military's success and strategy and an overemphasis on the strategically minor success of the jihadists
or insurgents."
After military officials in Baghdad said Roggio could not be issued media credentials unless he was affiliated with an organization, the American
Enterprise Institute, a conservative-leaning research organization in
Washington, offered him an affiliation. His weblog is called "The Fourth Rail" (http://www.billroggio.com).
At the same time, The Post disclosed that the U.S. military has paid to place favorable coverage on television stations in three Iraqi cities, according to an Army spokesman.
The military, he told the newspaper, has given one of the stations about $35,000 in equipment, is building a new facility for $300,000 and pays $600 a week for a weekly program that focuses positively on U.S. efforts in Iraq.
The Post said a local U.S. Army National Guard commander “acknowledged that his officers ‘suggest’ stories to the station and review the content of the program in a weekly meeting before it is aired. Though the commander, a lieutenant colonel whose name is being withheld because he is based in the same area, denied that payments were made to the station, the Iraqi television producer said his staff got $1,000 a month from the military. It does not disclose any financial
relationship to viewers.” There was no explanation of the discrepancy between
that amount and the figure of $600 per week, the Post added.
The State Department’s new international journalism program may have to confront the same issue. Geoffrey Cowan of the University of Southern California (USC) said, “Democracy cannot work without the free flow of information and ideas that is made possible through an independent and effective press.” He said, “All of our schools expect the international journalists to learn from our courses — and we all expect our students to learn from our visitors.”
In addition to USC, the journalism schools involved in the new program are the University of Kentucky, the University of Minnesota, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, the University of Oklahoma, and the University of Texas at Austin.
As part of the Murrow program, the Institute is planning a major symposium in April featuring prominent working reporters, commentators, editors and columnists discussing practical and ethical issues inherent in the journalistic process. It will also include key government spokespeople, who will discuss the relationship between media and government. Among the themes of the symposium will be the importance of diversity of opinion, an informed public, and challenges facing journalists around the world.
But one observer sees the Iraq “payola” issue and the new Murrow program as “an example of the difference between democracy in theory and practice.” Prof. Beau Grosscup of the University of California at Chico, told IPS, “The same people who set up a program to promote 'independent journalism' are the same folks who defend funding public relations firms, conservative think tank connected jingoist individuals and embedded journalists as 'independent' media. It's all about public relations and media control. Joesph Goebbels would be proud.”
Numerous opinion polls in Iraq and elsewhere in the Middle East have reported that people are skeptical of U.S. motives and tactics because of what they perceive is a discrepancy between what America says and what it does. The juxtaposition of Pentagon payola and journalism training in ethics and freedom of expression is likely only to muddy the water further.
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