Iraq

From Molly Gibbs

The Iraq Memorial to Life (IMtL) is being born because your organization—and so many other organizations like yours—have been working hard for peace.

A powerful visual image of gravestones, on the National Mall in DC, will move Americans to end senseless death!

Thousands of memorial markers, carefully arranged will powerfully bring home the full extent of Iraqi deaths to the American public and its legislators. The grieving that has long been a daily part of Iraqi life will be memorialized in your town, and spread outward, community by community, as the display moves across the country. Reactions to both regional and national displays will bring attention to the human suffering caused by the Iraq war.

Tomgram: Body Count Nation
The Ponzi Scheme Presidency
Bush's Legacy of Destruction
By Tom Engelhardt | TomDispatch.com

It wasn't, of course, that no one had been counting. The President, as we know from Washington Post reporter Bob Woodward, had long been keeping "'his own personal scorecard for the [global] war [on terror]' in the form of photographs with brief biographies and personality sketches of those judged to be the world's most dangerous terrorists -- each ready to be crossed out by the President as his forces took them down." And the military had been counting bodies as well, but as the possibility of victory disappeared into the charnel houses of Iraq and Afghanistan, the Pentagon and the president finally gave in. While this did not stoke an antiwar movement, it represented a tacit admission of policy collapse, a kind of surrender. It was as close as an administration which never owned up to error could come to admitting that two more disastrous wars had been added to a string of military failures in the truncated American Century.

By Ron Moore, DC Special Interests Examiner

Opponents of the Employee Free Choice Act can take solace in the fact that the U.S. liberation of the Iraqi people did not include the freedom to organize. Since 2003, dozens of union activists trying to build a new labor movement for Iraq have been kidnapped and killed. The most infamous instance was the brutal murder of union leader Hadi Saleh, gunned down in Baghdad in January 2005. He had just returned with other Iraqi labor leaders from the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC) World Congress in Miyazaki, Japan, the first time Iraqi unions had ever participated in this gathering of the world’s trade unions. These assassinations and kidnappings are ongoing. No Iraqi labor federation is immune, and no Iraqi workplace is safe.

Now the General Federation of Workers' Councils and Unions in Iraq is planning to hold an International Labor Conference in Iraq February 13-14, 2009.READ THE REST.

By SINAN SALAHEDDIN, AP

Iraq, the holder of the world's third-largest oil reserves, has opened nearly 90 percent of its reserves to international oil companies for development in two major bidding rounds this year as the war-plagued country tries to raise money amid falling oil prices.

Iraq, with at least 115 billion barrels in reserves, plans to add 4 million to 4.5 million barrels a day to its current 2.4 million barrels per day capacity over the next four to six years as it tries to rebuild its infrastructure and develop its economy.

On Wednesday, Oil Minister Hussein al-Shahristani kicked off the country's second postwar bidding round, naming 11 oil and gas fields or groups of fields as eligible for development proposals.

"We kicked off this round in response to the country's need to increase its crude production to increase its hard-currency income in light of sinking world oil prices," al-Shahristani told a news conference.

by Linda Milazzo

I don't believe in god. I never have. I don't believe in religions. I study them, but I don't practice them. I try to understand them to be sensitive to the beliefs and traditions of others, and to attempt to appreciate the motivations behind religious thought and deed. But they are irrelevant to living my life.

Long ago as a freshman at CUNY's Queens College I was introduced to Taoism. Taoism began in ancient China as a religion, then morphed into a dogma free/deity free philosophy. Since my late teens I've tried hard to apply MY understanding of my Tao to my life. I have the freedom to choose my own path and not judge the paths of others. But since I have freedom of opinion, I fall prey to judge. I try not to. But I do.

Through the Tao, I'm both a peacemaker and a warrior since Taoism couples with the art of self-defense. I understand my right to protect myself when needed, and to protect the defenseless when they need me. Since I'm by nature protective, it suits my sensibilities to aid the weak, where I fancy myself absurdly as inordinately strong.

By REUTERS

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - The U.S. military took a step toward pulling combat troops from Iraqi cities on Saturday, moving out of a Baghdad base that Iraqi officials said would be dismantled and converted back into a shopping mall.

It was the first U.S. military base to be handed over to Iraq since U.S. forces came under Iraqi authority on January 1 in step with a new bilateral security pact.

The pact, which replaced a U.N. mandate, requires Iraqi authorization for U.S. military operations, gives U.S. forces until mid-2009 to pull combat troops out of Iraq's towns and cities, and until 2011 to withdraw completely.

Brigadier-General Robin Swan, deputy commander of U.S. forces in Baghdad, said the handover of Forward Operating Base Callahan in northern Baghdad was "tremendously significant."

"By June 30th, combat formations are out of the cities. This was a major forward operating base, with 600 soldiers ... three short weeks ago," he told Reuters.

DECAYED

By Bruce Ackerman and Oona Hathaway, The Daily Beast

The Bush administration's infatuation with presidential power has finally pushed the country over a constitutional precipice. As of New Year's Day, ongoing combat in Iraq is illegal under US law.

In authorizing an invasion in 2002, Congress did not give President Bush a blank check. It explicitly limited the use of force to two purposes: to “defend the national security of the US from the threat posed by Iraq” and “enforce all relevant UN Security Council resolutions.”

By Ernesto Londoño, Washington Post

BAGHDAD, Dec. 31 -- The walls of the majestic Republican Palace in Baghdad's Green Zone have been stripped bare. The vaults that secured American cash and classified documents are gone, and the cement blast walls that protected the front entrance were taken down this week. The U.S. military dining facility inside what was once the American Embassy served its last meal New Year's Eve.

"This is the end of the world as we know it," said Sgt. 1st Class Patrick McDonald, 47, who co-authored a guide to historic sites in the Green Zone. "It's not like everyone is shredding documents and fleeing Saigon. But we are stepping away from a building."

By Dennis Loo

Yesterday the NYT's Bob Herbert wrote an Op-Ed ("Add Up the Damage") about Bush in which he called for "a great hue and cry — a loud, collective angry howl, demonstrations with signs and bullhorns and fiery speeches — over the damage he’s done to this country."

The column received, by my reckoning, an exceptional response in online comments, about twice the norm for Op-Eds that I have seen, and recommendations for Editor's Selections multiple times greater than the norm.

The most recommended, by 1463 readers, was the following:

Mr. Herbert,

You wrote:

The Bush administration specialized in deceit. How else could you get the public (and a feckless Congress) to go along with an invasion of Iraq as an absolutely essential response to the Sept. 11 attacks, when Iraq had had nothing to do with the Sept. 11 attacks?

From Al Jazeera

Iraq's Central Criminal Court has delayed the trial of an Iraqi journalist who threw his shoes at George W Bush during a press conference in Baghdad.

A court spokesman said on Tuesday the postponement was agreed following an appeal by the journalist's lawyers.

The spokesman said a new trial date would be set in due course, pending a higher court ruling on the charges against the journalist.

Muntazer al-Zaidi, a 29-year-old reporter working for the Iraqi Al-Baghdadia television channel, gained international fame after hurling his footwear at Bush during his farewell visit to Iraq on December 14.

Grave insult

As well as throwing his shoes at the US leader - something that is considered to be a grave insult in the Arab world - al-Zaidi shouted: "It is the farewell kiss, you dog."

By Brian Stelter, New York Times

Quietly, as the United States presidential election and its aftermath have dominated the news, America's three broadcast network news divisions have stopped sending full-time correspondents to Iraq.

"The war has gone on longer than a lot of news organizations' ability or appetite to cover it," said Jane Arraf, a former Baghdad bureau chief for CNN who has remained in Iraq as a contract reporter for The Christian Science Monitor.

Joseph Angotti, a former vice president of NBC News, said he could not recall any other time when all three major broadcast networks lacked correspondents in an active war zone that involved United States forces.

Except, of course, in Afghanistan, where about 30,000 Americans are stationed, and where until recently no American television network, broadcast or cable, maintained a full-time bureau.

There will be a vigil Tues. Dec. 30 from 4:30-6:30 pm to protest the Israeli Siege of Palestinians (over 350 Palestinians have been killed, over 1,000 wounded in 3 days) in Gaza. The local vigil will be at the corner of City Hall Ave and St. Paul's Blvd (where the usual peace vigil is organized by Catholic Workers) in downtown Norfolk.

PLEASE COME. During this season of the Moslem New Year, also Kwanzaa, Hannukah, Christmas, and the New Year Holiday, join us in solidarity for those who struggle this week. Please spread the word and COME!

If you have questions about directions or anything email me at choppe4@gmail.com .

By AFP

WASHINGTON (AFP) — US activists on Monday urged Baghdad to release the Iraqi journalist who threw his shoes at US President George W. Bush, insisting that his gesture was meant to insult, not harm the US leader.

"This was a form of insult... If he had wanted to hurt George Bush, he would have chosen a different weapon," Medea Benjamin of the Codepink peace activism group told AFP at a rally of about a dozen people outside the Iraqi consulate in Washington.

Zaidi, 29, threw his shoes at Bush during the US president's surprise visit to Iraq on December 14, an action considered a grave insult in the Arab world.

He is due to appear in court in Baghdad on Wednesday on charges of "aggression against a foreign head of state during an official visit," an offense which could see him go to jail for up to 15 years.

By Dave Lindorff

Vice President Dick Cheney has cultivated the image of a serious tough guy, with his grim, scowling vissage, his dismissive "So?" comments when things go badly, his unrepentant defense of torture, including waterboarding, and his brash statements confirming that he approved the interrogation measures that clearly violated US criminal statutes and the Geneva Conventions.

But it appears we willl in a few days get to discover whether Cheney really is a tough guy, or whether he is in truth just the same corpulent, self-centered hypocrite and gutless coward that he was back in the 1960s when, despite being a vocal backer of the Vietnam War, he ducked the draft not once but five times by arranging for student and marriage deferments, which he later defended by saying he had "other priorities" than serving his country.

Top Ten Myths about Iraq, 2008
by Juan Cole | Informed Comment

1. Iraqis are safer because of Bush's War. In fact, conditions of insecurity have helped created both an internal and external refugee problem:

' At least 4.2 million Iraqis were displaced. These included 2.2 million who were displaced within Iraq and some 2 million refugees, mostly in Syria (around 1.4 million) and Jordan (around half a million). In the last months of the year both these neighbouring states, struggling to meet the health, education and other needs of the Iraqi refugees already present, introduced visa requirements that impeded the entry of Iraqis seeking refuge. Within Iraq, most governorates barred entry to Iraqis fleeing sectarian violence elsewhere.'

US Iraq Casualties Rise to 70,231
by Michael Munk | MichaelMunk.com

US military occupation forces in Iraq suffered 29 combat casualties in the eight days ending Dec.24 as the official casualty total rose to at least 70,262. The total includes 34,305 dead and wounded from what the Pentagon classifies as "hostile" causes and more than 35,957 dead and medically evacuated (as of Dec. 6, 2008) from "non-hostile" causes.*

The actual total is over 90,000 because the Pentagon chooses not to count as "Iraq casualties" the more than 20,000 veterans whose injuries-mainly brain trauma from explosions--were diagnosed only after they had left Iraq..**

How a shoe put the boot to Bush's Iraq legacy
By Olivia Ward | The Star.com

It was the thud heard around the world.

Just hours after Iraqi journalist Muntadhar al-Zeidi tossed his footwear at U.S. President George W. Bush, who was making a farewell appearance in Baghdad, the other shoe dropped.

Thousands of Iraqis poured out their support for the angry gesture, al-Zeidi's backers plunged the parliament into bitter controversy, and Bush's insistence that his "surge" of increased U.S. troops had put the country on the road to peace and progress rang hollow.

A Disturbing Night in Iraq: Witnessing the Abuse of 'Insurgent' Prisoners
By Tim King | Salem-News.com

Note: This report is 3 months old, but is re-published for its' first hand account of US treatment of Iraqi detainees. ~Chip :)

This story was written in the early days of September, 2008; about the night that I encountered questionable treatment of Iraqi prisoners, while flying in a U.S. Army CH-47 helicopter from Fallujah, to Balad, Iraq.

I have delayed publishing it, but more revelations today about the authorized torture and abuse of prisoners in Iraq by Bush Administration officials caused us to make the decision to release this.

By Daphne Eviatar, The Washington Independent

Blackwater case shines light on status force agreement loophole.

Earlier this month, the Department of Justice announced to great fanfare that it had indicted five guards employed by the private security firm Blackwater Worldwide for their role in a Baghdad shooting that left 17 Iraqis dead last year. A sixth guard had pled guilty to manslaughter and weapons violations.

But lawyers for the five men indicted in the first case of its kind appear to have a strong defense, regardless of the circumstances of the shooting: private security guards contracting with the Department of State may not be subject to American law. And despite a new Status of Forces Agreement negotiated between the United States and the Iraqi government that would seem to make future contractors subject to Iraqi law, guards like the Blackwater men hired by the State Department may glide through a large loophole in that new agreement as well.