Israel is assassinating Iranian nuclear scientists as part of its efforts to disrupt the Islamist regime’s illicit weapons program, the Daily Telegraph on Tuesday quoted Western intelligence sources as saying. … The paper also quoted United States intelligence sources as saying Israel is using sabotage, front companies and double agents to disrupt the Islamist republic’s illicit weapons program [...]]]>
Another example of Israeli exceptionalism:

Israel is assassinating Iranian nuclear scientists as part of its efforts to disrupt the Islamist regime’s illicit weapons program, the Daily Telegraph on Tuesday quoted Western intelligence sources as saying.
…
The paper also quoted United States intelligence sources as saying Israel is using sabotage, front companies and double agents to disrupt the Islamist republic’s illicit weapons program as an alternative to direct military strikes.

The British daily said Israel’s Mossad espionage agency was rumored to be behind the death of Ardeshire Hassanpour, a top nuclear scientist at Iran’s Isfahan uranium plant, who died in mysterious circumstances from a reported “gas poisoning” in 2007.

Other recent deaths of important figures in the procurement and enrichment process in Iran and Europe have been the result of Israeli “hits”, intended to deprive Tehran of key technical skills at the head of the program, according to analysts.

…[T]he new U.S. administration is unlikely to sanction an air attack on Iran’s nuclear installations and that President Barack Obama’s offer to extend a hand of peace to Tehran puts any direct military action beyond reach for now.
…
“Disruption is designed to slow progress on the program, done in such a way that they don’t realize what’s happening. You are never going to stop it,” a former CIA officer on Iran told the newspaper.

“The goal is delay, delay, delay until you can come up with some other solution or approach. We certainly don’t want the current Iranian government to have those weapons. It’s a good policy, short of taking them out militarily, which probably carries unacceptable risks,” the official said.

Can you imagine the outcry if Saddam Hussein had poisoned scientists working at Los Alamos, or if Kim Jong Il had ordered the kidnapping of South Korean nuclear physicists? We would consider either an overt act of war.

A few imprecise and rarely fatal rockets that are barely more than toys when measured against the U.S.-funded Israeli arsenal are shot out of Gaza, the Israelis go batshit and kill 1,500 civilians, and the U.S. government calls it justified self-defense. The worldwide intelligence consensus is that Iran’s nuclear weapons program ceased in 2003, but Israeli extrajudicial assassinations of Iranian scientists is met with less than a shrug. “You are never going to stop it.” Funny how that’s never our attitude when it’s an Arab or a Muslim claiming self-defense.

Is it any wonder the whole of the Arab world despises Israel, and considers the U.S. position as an “honest broker” in any Israel/Palestine peace process to be a sick joke?

It’s time for another exciting episode of “May I have a question or two?”

I’m teaching a course using five popular culture films that deal with issues of social justice.

I need some stimulating discussion questions. It doesn’t matter whether or not you’ve seen the movie. The discussion should focus on the broad issue(s).

This one addresses the struggle to retain civil liberties [...]]]>

It’s time for another exciting episode of “May I have a question or two?”

I’m teaching a course using five popular culture films that deal with issues of social justice.

I need some stimulating discussion questions.
It doesn’t matter whether or not you’ve seen the movie.
The discussion should focus on the broad issue(s).

This one addresses the struggle to retain civil liberties in the face of wartime security threats.

The next film is ….                 Go here to continue reading

My note to Pelosi ….

Quoting: Pelosi: US must stand strongly with Israel Published: 12.28.08, 03:13 / Israel News …Speaker of the US House of [...]]]>

Just read this from Judith Shattuck, the Washington State Coordinator of the Progressive Democrats of America. Nice to be reminded there are many others that see what I see, think what I think and feel what I feel:

My note to Pelosi ….

Quoting: Pelosi: US must stand strongly with Israel Published: 12.28.08, 03:13 / Israel News …Speaker of the US House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi issued a statement concerning the Israeli operation in Gaza in which she wrote that “When Israel is attacked, the United States must continue to stand strongly with its friend and democratic ally.” According to Pelosi, “Peace between Israelis and Palestinians cannot result from daily barrages of rocket and mortar fire from Hamas-controlled Gaza. Hamas and its supporters must understand that Gaza cannot and will not be allowed to be a sanctuary for attacks on Israel.” (Yitzhak Benhorin, Washington) …

Ms. Pelosi,

All I can say is, your statement is appalling. Quite literally, upon reading this statement I (A.) lost my stomach, and (B.) cried. Get a CLUE. The world will not allow apartheid nor extermination to continue. America must ragain its moral leadership. Israel has found a way to rid itself of the Palestinian problem and is exercising the solution…extermination and removal. Israel has created it’s own Auschwitz in Gaza. You make me puke. I have never spoken so bluntly and sharply to an elected official, and fellow Democrat. I am known for my forbearance and my insistence upon respectful dialogue. But, your unbelievable nonsense is all I can take. You don’t deserve my deference or my respect. Mark my words, you and your ilk will be swept aside in short order. The people have spoken their desire for change. The world watched and celebrated in anticipation of change. If you (and the Obama administration) don’t heed the call for peace, justice, and moral, responsible leadership, it will be unfortunate.

Judith Shattuck

www.youtube.com/watch?v=cydRpiFI4fc

Now how do we get rid of these elected leaders again when most of us blindly vote the party incumbent over the person?  We need a campaign system that levels the playing field and enables more candidates to challenge incumbents and win.  One of the ways this is done is by voluntarily (until Buckley v. Valeo is overturned) equalizing the funds available to all qualified candidates.  Sound familiar?

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As Aziz Huq wrote in his piece published at truthout yesterday, the financial meltdown currently being experienced on Wall Street and in the Federal Treasury may be the start of unwinding another complicated and ill-considered U.S. investment strategy: our military presence in almost every country on earth.

Even before the mid-September unraveling began, international creditor goodwill toward the “sole superpower” and its fiscal [...]]]>

As Aziz Huq wrote in his piece published at truthout yesterday, the financial meltdown currently being experienced on Wall Street and in the Federal Treasury may be the start of unwinding another complicated and ill-considered U.S. investment strategy: our military presence in almost every country on earth.

Even before the mid-September unraveling began, international creditor goodwill toward the “sole superpower” and its fiscal overreach seemed to be evaporating fast. Asian investors, for instance, were quick to evince “unprecedented” skepticism about U.S. assets in the opening moments of the crisis…

Since September, however, the same sovereign wealth funds have proved skittish indeed about helping U.S. financial outfits, thus eliminating another possible resource for responding to credit shortfalls.

At some point, tighter global credit conditions are sure to significantly constrain America’s freedom of action internationally. After all, Chinese and East Asian investors, to offer but one example, are now quite capable of reining in, and even undermining, the federal government (if they choose to), rather than vice versa.

The United States has always prized individualism, and in the beginning, this extended to avoiding “foreign entanglements” as well, as George Washington warned against in his farewell address. But the expansion across the North American continent not only provided the impetus for excluding other nations from our land- and resource-rich prize, but also granted the U.S. the wealth necessary to defend this prize and to project our power first in the Western hemisphere with the Monroe Doctrine, and then across the Pacific with Manifest Destiny, and finally, after World War II and with the advent of the Cold War, into the many places abandoned by the imperial powers of Europe and Japan. Our alliance with Israel brought further military “investment” in the Middle East; the fall of the Soviet Union opened up Eastern Europe to U.S. troops; and after September 11 the Bush Administration expanded our presence into almost every other vacant spot on the map. Currently, the U.S. military has bases or troops in more than 150 countries.

Power may be the ultimate aphrodisiac, as Henry Kissinger famously quipped; but the man himself is living proof that power is also a gateway drug to an addiction only satisfied by more, and greater, power.

The U.S. military budget for fiscal 2009 – which does not include the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, as these continue to be “emergency expenditures” despite the fact that each has now surpassed World War II in duration – is $515 billion dollars, a breathtaking amount considering that it is only for a single year, and that U.S. military expenditures seem to know no direction but “up.” Only Social Security takes more from the U.S. Treasury, and military spending absorbs more tax dollars than Education, Transportation, Veterans, Justice, Natural Resources, Environment, Agriculture, Foreign Affairs, Community Development, Science and Technology, and Government Administration combined.

Is this really the best use of our resources, in a world where we spend more on our military than all of the other nations on the planet – again – combined, and when we are falling behind the rest of the industrialized world in areas as critical as education, infant mortality, and the availability of health care?

On the same day that Aziz Huq published his piece about the inevitable contraction of the American empire, Barrons published a bullish article on the near-term prospects for defense-related stocks, even under an Obama administration:

“It doesn’t really matter” who wins the presidency since both candidates are making defense a priority, says Thomas Nyheim, portfolio manager at Christiana Bank & Trust.

He is overweight defense in part because “a lot of the projects that are on the books have three-year, five-year and 10-year life for their contracts.”

Many defense stocks are hovering near decade-low valuations. Yet, the industry’s annual earnings are expected to climb in the double-digits for the next few years.

In post-9/11 America, “it is political suicide” to even cut a dollar from the defense budget” given the threat of terrorism and increasing geopolitical strife, says Scott Sacknoff, manager of the Spade Defense Index.

The U.S. needs to upgrade and replace military equipment that is either decades old or battered from fighting simultaneous wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

These realities make the overall defense budget fairly bulletproof.

Time will tell.

The last four decades have seen U.S. citizens pulling back, intellectually, from any involvement in the world other than military; our focus has become increasingly parochial, and infamously shallow. This has been nowhere more evident than in our elections, which have been influenced far more by John Kerry’s windsurfing and Bush’s beer-buddy persona than the critical issues now crashing around our ears.

But this latest crisis seems to have woken us from our reverie; we are out of the poppy field and looking critically, if also fearfully, at the issues and the candidates for the first time in decades. September 11 could not keep us sane for more than a few news cycles, but the threat to our livelihoods, our homes, our bank and retirement accounts have proved a stronger antidote to the ether of American Idol and Fox News.

If absolute power corrupts absolutely, perhaps the weakening of the absolute power of Wall Street (and the waning appeal of T-Bills worldwide) will force us to look realistically at our position in the world, and come to terms with our deep national need for global dominance.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=PI7z44NCMFw

This Saturday it is happening. Sign up here

Hi all!

We are excited about the upcoming Vancouver Peace and Justice Fair on Saturday, September 13th at Esther Short Park!   We hope you are planning to come!

How can you help and be part of this cool day?    There are 3 main ways:

1.  If you are part of a group that works for peace and [...]]]>


From Kay Ellison of Vancouver for Peace:

Hi all!

We are excited about the upcoming Vancouver Peace and Justice Fair on Saturday, September 13th at Esther Short Park!   We hope you are planning to come!

How can you help and be part of this cool day?    There are 3 main ways:

1.  If you are part of a group that works for peace and justice, why not ask them to participate in the fair?   Perhaps you have already signed up.  There are over 40 groups already signed up who will be there with tables and information about their groups!  See who has already signed up by looking at the website under the tab:  Reserve a Space.  The form to send in can be printed from our website www.vancouverpeaceandjusticefair.org

2.  Volunteer to help on the day of the fair.   We need people to be at the headquarters table, at the children’s area, put up and take down sandwich board signs, “traffic” directors, the Vancouver for Peace table, and even as reenactors of people of peace.  Contact  Kay Ellison with the times you are interested in doing any of this.  We need help a few people at a time from 7:30-6:30.

3.  Last, we need posters put up all over town!  We have some colored 11 x 17 posters already, and also have where you can download and print posters on our website:  11 x 17, letter size, and small ones that are 4 to a page.  See our website www.vancouverpeaceandjusticefair.org to print a poster!

Looking forward to hearing from you, and seeing you at the fair !   Kay Ellison

No? Maybe just a little preemptive strike, then?

Bush has made me so gun-shy that even Obama’s Pax Americana talk is starting to scare me:

This is the moment when we must defeat terror and dry up the well of extremism that supports it. This threat is real and we cannot shrink from our responsibility to combat it. If we could create NATO [...]]]>

No? Maybe just a little preemptive strike, then?

Bush has made me so gun-shy that even Obama’s Pax Americana talk is starting to scare me:

This is the moment when we must defeat terror and dry up the well of extremism that supports it. This threat is real and we cannot shrink from our responsibility to combat it. If we could create NATO to face down the Soviet Union, we can join in a new and global partnership to dismantle the networks that have struck in Madrid and Amman; in London and Bali; in Washington and New York. If we could win a battle of ideas against the communists, we can stand with the vast majority of Muslims who reject the extremism that leads to hate instead of hope.

This is the moment when we must renew our resolve to rout the terrorists who threaten our security in Afghanistan, and the traffickers who sell drugs on your streets. No one welcomes war. I recognize the enormous difficulties in Afghanistan. But my country and yours have a stake in seeing that NATO’s first mission beyond Europe’s borders is a success. For the people of Afghanistan, and for our shared security, the work must be done. America cannot do this alone. The Afghan people need our troops and your troops; our support and your support to defeat the Taliban and al Qaeda, to develop their economy, and to help them rebuild their nation. We have too much at stake to turn back now.

Instead of the world’s policeman, why don’t we try a few decades as the world’s Shriner clown? We can pick up all the shit our military has dropped over the last hundred years as it has paraded through countries that caused us no harm. We could build a few hospitals, entertain the people, and never kill or maim a soul.

We may think such a role is beneath us, but just think about all those old guys bellydancing down Main Street in their fezzes: they may look ridiculous, but they do a lot of good. And they clean up after themselves.

We could reduce our expenditures on military hardware and personnel so that we have only twice or three times what the next largest national military has, instead of ten times our nearest competitor. And we could use the “peace dividend” that results to retire our massive and unprecedented national debt, rebuild the dollar, pay reparations to the Iraqis and help get their country truly back on track, and reduce the amount of hatred and anger the world feels for the U.S.

Domestically, we could fully fund the care and education of our returning veterans and still have money left over for universal single-payer healthcare, free college education for all qualifying citizens, and the biggest infrastructure construction and rebuilding investment since the Great Depression.

We could invest in green technologies and wean ourselves off fossil fuels within ten years.

We could reduce green house emissions and invest in reforestation projects around the globe to trap decades of the carbon that we have released into our atmosphere.

But, with talk like Obama’s in Berlin, it looks like we’ll stay in the Big Stick business whether Obama wins or loses.

And that’s is something we should all grieve. Because while we do have the power to be the world’s policeman, with a change of motivation from fear and nationalism to compassion and humanism, we could build a global commonwealth of true freedom: political, social and economic.

But being the world’s policeman makes us feel much better about our national penis size – and keeps the GEs and Halliburtons of the world fat and greedy – so rational change is unlikely.

And that is the type of terrorism we should be fighting.

THE ILWU West Coast longshore workers have voted to “stop work to protest the US war and occupation on Iraq and Afghanistan on May Day 2008,” the ILWU said. All 29 ports on the U.S. West Coast are to be shut down for eight hours.

The longshore workers [...]]]> As a person who works in the maritime industry, which is pretty conservative, this is cool*:

THE ILWU West Coast longshore workers have voted to “stop work to protest the US war and occupation on Iraq and Afghanistan on May Day 2008,” the ILWU said. All 29 ports on the U.S. West Coast are to be shut down for eight hours.

The longshore workers also called on the AFL-CIO, Change To Win (CTW) and other labor organizations to join them in action on May Day “against the war and to commemorate the International Workers Holiday.”

*don’t tell my boss I said that.

[The Caliph of Baghdad] built, on the other side of the [...]]]> Sometimes to find hope for the future we have to look to the past. In the excellent book Jewish Travellers, you can read the travelogue of Rabbi Benjamin ben Jonah of Tudela in Navarre, the most famous of Jewish travellers in the late Middle Ages. He finished the travels he describes in 1173:

[The Caliph of Baghdad] built, on the other side of the river, on the banks of an arm of the Euphrates which there borders the city, a hospital consisting of blocks of houses and hospices for the sick poor who come to be healed. Here there are about sixty physicians’ stores which are provided from the Caliph’s house with drugs and whatever else may be required. Every sick man who comes is maintained at the Caliph’s expense and is medically treated. Here is a building which is called Dar-al-Maristan, where they keep charge of the demented people… Whilst they abide there, they are provided with food from the house of the Caliph, and when their reason is restored they are dismissed and each one of them goes to his house and his home. Money is given to those that have stayed in the hospices on their return to their homes. Every month the officers of the Caliph inquire and investigate whether they have regained their reason, in which case they are discharged. All this the Caliph does out of charity to those that come to the city of Baghdad, whether they be sick or insane. The Caliph is a righteous man, and all his actions are for good.

FUCK BUSH.

This year, I’m most grateful for the successful treatment of my father-in-law’s prostate cancer, which caught us all by surprise back in February when an x-ray to diagnose L.’s hip pain revealed what his annual PSA tests had not. (Some of the rarer and more aggressive forms of prostate cancer do not raise the PSA above the normal range until they have metastasized.)

Click here to view the embedded video.

Marion also just pointed out this video of Olympia port protesters stopping another military cargo truck this morning.

Click here to view the embedded video.

These videos make me proud to be an American.