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M. Collins: Forget the Torture Tapes
Tuesday, 1 January 2008, 11:39 am
Opinion: Michael Collins

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v474/autorank/001/CaravaggioEchoScoop.png
Caravaggio

Michael Collins
"Scoop" Independent News
http://www.scoop.co.nz/sections/comment.html
Washington, D.C.

There's a reflexive tendency to think the worst of the Bush-Cheney administration when scandals like the torture tapes emerge. This tendency is well justified.

This administration's defining moment was the Iraq invasion. Over time, it caused death to 1.2 million civilians and the injuries of 1.1 million noncombatants. Just last week we found out that there are now five million orphans in Iraq.

How can the administration and their enablers ever top that? Why shouldn't we expect the worst immediately when we hear yet another accusation of criminal or unethical conduct?

Destroying torture tapes pales by comparison to these tragedies, all a result of the illegal invasion:

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v474/autorank/001/IraqChartScoop.jpg
Opinion Research Group Sept. 2007
http://tinyurl.com/2xlygm
Iraqi anti corruption board Dec 15, 2007
http://tinyurl.com/2wcwsj|

Have you heard or read that 9% of Iraq's population is either dead or injured to date due to the 2003 invasion? This is rarely addressed by U.S. media or politicians.

The announcement that 19% of Iraq's population now consists of orphans hasn't hit mainstream media's radar yet. This shocker seems destined for the same fate as the death and injury figures.


Snuff Tapes and One Dead Terrorist Dominate Coverage

Odd isn't it? All this emphasis on the CIA's destruction of Abu Zubaydah torture tapes instead of the pervasive and ongoing human loss and suffering visited on Iraq by Bush and Cheney?

Let's take a quick look at the tape controversy and see if there's some relationship to the dismissal and denial of the infinitely larger outrage.

Abu Zubaydah was either a terrorist kingpin or a seriously disturbed individual with multiple personality traits. He either provided a wealth of information or he was a useless informant. His torture was conducted either with or without the full knowledge of Bush-Cheney. The destruction of the torture tapes was either approved by Bush-Cheney in advance or it became known to them after the fact. We're either seeing a major cover up or flawed White House public relations in the wake of Rove's departure.

By applying "the law of subsumption,"

http://ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=40613

BAQUBA, Dec 27 (IPS) - The Iraqi government announcement that monthly food rations will be cut by half has left many Iraqis asking how they can survive.

The government also wants to reduce the number of people depending on the rationing system by five million by June 2008.

Iraq's food rations system was introduced by the Saddam Hussein government in 1991 in response to the UN economic sanctions. Families were allotted basic foodstuffs monthly because the Iraqi Dinar and the economy collapsed.

The sanctions, imposed after Saddam Hussein ordered the invasion of Kuwait, were described as "genocidal" by Denis Halliday, then UN humanitarian coordinator in Iraq. Halliday quit his post in protest against the U.S.-backed sanctions.

The sanctions killed half a million Iraqi children, and as many adults, according to the UN. They brought malnutrition, disease, and lack of medicines. Iraqis became nearly completely reliant on food rations for survival. The programme has continued into the U.S.-led occupation.

But now the U.S.-backed Iraqi government has announced it will halve the essential items in the ration because of "insufficient funds and spiralling inflation."

The cuts, which are to be introduced in the beginning of 2008, have drawn widespread criticism. The Iraqi government is unable to supply the rations with several billion dollars at its disposal, whereas Saddam Hussein was able to maintain the programme with less than a billion dollars.

"In 2007, we asked for 3.2 billion dollars for rationing basic foodstuffs," Mohammed Hanoun, Iraq's chief of staff for the ministry of trade told al-Jazeera. "But since the prices of imported foodstuff doubled in the past year, we requested 7.2 billion dollars for this year. That request was denied."

The trade ministry is now preparing to slash the list of subsidised items by half to five basic food items, "namely flour, sugar, rice, oil, and infant milk," Hanoun said.

The imminent move will affect nearly 10 million people who depend on the rationing system. But it has already caused outrage in Baquba, 40 km northeast of Baghdad.

"The monthly food ration was the only help from the government," local grocer Ibrahim al-Ageely told IPS. "It was of great benefit for the families. The food ration consisted of two kilos of rice, sugar, soap, tea, detergent, wheat flour, lentils, chick-peas, and other items for every individual."

Another grocer said the food ration was the "life of all Iraqis; every month, Iraqis wait in queues to receive their food rations."

According to an Oxfam International report released in July this year, "60 percent (of Iraqis) currently have access to rations through the government-run Public Distribution System (PDS), down from 96 percent in 2004."

The report said that "43 percent of Iraqis suffer from absolute poverty," and that according to some estimates over half the population are now without work. "Children are hit the hardest by the decline in living standards. Child malnutrition rates have risen from 19 percent before the U.S.-led invasion in 2003 to 28 percent now."

While salaries have increased since the invasion of March 2003, they have not kept pace with the dramatic increase in the prices of food and fuel.

"My salary is 280 dollars, and I have six children," 49-year-old secondary school teacher Ali Kadhim told IPS. "The increase in my salary was neutralised by an increase in the price of food. I cannot afford to buy the foodstuffs in addition to the other necessary expenses of life."

"The high increase in food prices led people to condemn the delays in the ration every month," Salah Kadhim, an employee in the directorate-general of health for Diyala province told IPS. "The jobless just cannot afford to buy food."

"The food ration still represents a big part of the domestic budget," Muneer Lafta, a 51-year-old employee at the health directorate told IPS. Without the ration, she said, families have to go to the market. Because Iraqi families are large, usually six to 12 people, shopping for food is simply unaffordable.

"I and my wife have five boys and six girls, so the ration costs a lot when it has to be bought," 55-year-old resident Khalaf Atiya told IPS. "I cannot afford food and also other expenses like study, clothes, doctors."

People in Baquba, living with violence and joblessness for long, are now preparing for this new twist.

"No security, no food, no electricity, no trade, no services. So life is good," said one resident, who would not give his name.

Many fear the food ration cuts can spark unrest. "The government will commit a big mistake, because providing enough food ration could compensate the government's mistakes in other fields like security," a local physician told IPS. "The Iraq will now feel that he, or she, is of no value to the government."

(*Ahmed, our correspondent in Iraq's Diyala province, works in close collaboration with Dahr Jamail, our U.S.-based specialist writer on Iraq who has reported extensively from Iraq and the Middle East) (END/2007)

(صوتك في عالم أسكتت فيه الصهيونية والحديد والنار صوت العدالة)

The Dialectic of Unity and Liberation in the Arab World

By Ibrahim Alloush

Translated by SR



Since the 1950s and 1960s arguments have raged in the Arab world over which should come first: unification or liberation? Must we unite the Arab Nation first in order to be able to achieve liberation? Or is liberation possible without unity, since the task of liberation is something so urgent that it cannot await Arab unity? Must we build our forces by and through a unified Arab state in the first place in order to be able to achieve the liberation of Palestine and other occupied Arab lands? Or are the two tasks simply separate from one another, efforts that can proceed side by side, with one not necessarily depending on the other?



The consensus regarding these questions is divided into two camps. One holds that unity must come before liberation, and the other believes in the priority of liberation over unity. Those who regarded liberation as coming before unity dove into political work within the individual Arab states. One obvious example of such an approach would be the dissolution of the Arab Nationalists’ Movement to form the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine in 1967. Those, on the other hand, who regarded unity as the precondition for liberation included some Arab regimes and political parties of Arab nationalist orientation. They authorized themselves to grant concessions on the Arab-Zionist front on the grounds that building a unified Arab state is their first priority.



In reality, contemporary Arab history gives us one of the most important examples of liberation without unity or a nationalist agenda: That is, the liberation of southern Lebanon in 2000. One could also add to that the partial liberation of the Gaza Strip. In both situations, liberation resulted from organized activity of Arab people on the ground without the involvement of any Arab regimes. Both were carried out by local forces that were not related to any nationalist agendas, but had, rather, local agendas. Other examples, such as Iraq, Somalia, Lebanon and Palestine undoubtedly prove that the creation and continuation of a popular armed resistance struggle is possible without the presence of a unified state. In addition, local forces may produce an effective resistance, create arenas for doing battle, even liberate a given part of the land, and pose serious obstacles to the American-Zionist enemy’s progress. Precisely this has occurred in the way the Iraqi resistance has paralyzed the “”Greater Middle East” initiative in the region. In these instances, the local resistance takes on a nationalist coloring, adopts a nationalist role, and consequently earns substantial support from the rest of the nation.

But can the whole Zionist program it the region – which includes its military presence, political weight, and imperialist backing – be defeated by local popular organizing alone, without a nationalist program? Furthermore, can the Arab nation as a whole rid itself of dependency (indirect occupation) without an Arab nationalist program? For example, could the Arabian Gulf countries rid themselves of the American military presence without a unified state that would protect Arab national security in the Arabian Gulf region? Also, is it possible for us to liberate the provinces of Iskandarun, Al-Ahwaz, and the islands of Abu Mousa and Greater and Lesser Tanb in the Gulf without a unified Arab state?



The fact is that the liberation of southern Lebanon differs qualitatively from the following events: Palestine’s liberation from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea; the Arab nation’s liberation from direct and indirect imperial hegemony; and the liberation of Arab lands from neighboring countries such as Ethiopia, Iran, Turkey and Spain. Local energies and capabilities are capable of achieving local goals for the benefit of the Arab nation and objectively can play an Arab nationalist role, that is, in terms of what they accomplish rather than because of any conscious Arab nationalist program. But, there is a huge difference between such cases of local liberation on the one hand, and liberation of the Arab nation and its territory from direct and indirect occupation.

Complete liberation in this sense is impossible to achieve without one united state and local liberation without a unified state will always remain incomplete, leaving the resistance politically or militarily blockaded, as in Lebanon and Gaza.



By “unified state” we do not mean that the entire Arab homeland has to be united before the program of liberation can be achieved. People who insist on this are like some of the alleged official representatives of Arab nationalism, towing the line of Arab regimes, who demand the creation of an Arab common market first and try in practice to evade their practical responsibilities under such an Arab nationalist program – specifically the task of confronting the Zionist-American occupations militarily. The unified state will only arise in the course of the bloody struggle with the Zionist-American enemy and its local stooges.



Therefore, what is meant by a unified state is the nucleus of a united state, which is imbued with a militant program, such as the state of Salah Ad-Din Al-Ayyubi (Saladin), established in northern Iraq and parts of Syria, Jordan and Egypt during the Crusades. That state was able to clutch the Crusader entity in a pincer and crush it. The unifying state is therefore the nucleus of comprehensive unity, and it simultaneously constitutes a liberation program. It is only when the liberation program becomes an Arab national program that liberation becomes possible. And it is only when the program of unification becomes a militant program that unity becomes possible. It is in this way that the dialectical relationship between unity and liberation can be put in its proper framework true liberation required an Arab nationalist nucleus and program, and unity cannot arise without a fighting program of military and mass liberation.


http://www.freearabvoice.org/arabi/maqa ... bWorld.htm (http://www.freearabvoice.org/arabi/maqalat/TheDialecticofUnityandLiberationintheArabWorld.htm)

http://ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=40613

Many fear the food ration cuts can spark unrest. "The government will commit a big mistake, because providing enough food ration could compensate the government's mistakes in other fields like security," a local physician told IPS. "The Iraq will now feel that he, or she, is of no value to the government."

(*Ahmed, our correspondent in Iraq's Diyala province, works in close collaboration with Dahr Jamail, our U.S.-based specialist writer on Iraq who has reported extensively from Iraq and the Middle East) (END/2007)

That's the happy new year of starvation. I noticed that when it came out http://tinyurl.com/ypnlh6
What a bunch of b.s. this all is. I wonder how many hostile people they've created, by their own works - the neocons and their flunkies - among the orphans, injured, loved ones (of the dead) and the starving.

The incompetence leads people to suspect that it's deliberate. I'm open minded on the latter, but I think this administration simply can't get any job done. The victory over Saddam was a GIVEN. Everybody knew that. The challenge was doing something with it (by their standards, by mine, the absolute requirement was not to invade). But guess what, as we all know, they blew it again.; If you and I owned a business and we had employees like this, it wouldn't matter what our differences were, we'd fire them immediately.

And look here, very intelligent response. Not as big as Anax's effort a few weeks ago, but some very fine people responding to this article over there http://tinyurl.com/yudape

So who do you like in Iowa;)

[quote="eattherich"](صوتك Ù

That's the happy new year of starvation. I noticed that when it came out http://tinyurl.com/ypnlh6
What a bunch of b.s. this all is. I wonder how many hostile people they've created, by their own works - the neocons and their flunkies - among the orphans, injured, loved ones (of the dead) and the starving.

The incompetence leads people to suspect that it's deliberate. I'm open minded on the latter, but I think this administration simply can't get any job done. The victory over Saddam was a GIVEN. Everybody knew that. The challenge was doing something with it (by their standards, by mine, the absolute requirement was not to invade). But guess what, as we all know, they blew it again.; If you and I owned a business and we had employees like this, it wouldn't matter what our differences were, we'd fire them immediately.

And look here, very intelligent response. Not as big as Anax's effort a few weeks ago, but some very fine people responding to this article over there http://tinyurl.com/yudape

So who do you like in Iowa;)

So what's different about the PC you typed this reply on than the one you used to put up the OP? Was the OP typed on a different computer?

I ask this because of your format problem with apostrophes and quotations when you put up a new post (although I and Mike are happy to fix the matter, it remains an odd curiosity).

Cheers

Thanks for keeping this in the forefront.

No matter how well one knows the numbers and no matter how many times you see them they are still staggering.

I'm wondering at this point how many Iraqis have died at the hands of the United States since GHW Bushes invasion right through the Clinton years and the most recent US massacre in Mesopotamia.

The number of deaths directly related to US acts in Iraq over the last 15 or so years must be over 5 million.

Certain figures such as how many died prematurely due to attrition are simply unknowable.

No end in sight.

Thanks for keeping this in the forefront.

No matter how well one knows the numbers and no matter how many times you see them they are still staggering.

I'm wondering at this point how many Iraqis have died at the hands of the United States since GHW Bushes invasion right through the Clinton years and the most recent US massacre in Mesopotamia.

The number of deaths directly related to US acts in Iraq over the last 15 or so years must be over 5 million.

Certain figures such as how many died prematurely due to attrition are simply unknowable.

No end in sight.

Well geez, Chlamor, it IS the cradle of Civilization.

Heh.

That's the happy new year of starvation. I noticed that when it came out http://tinyurl.com/ypnlh6
What a bunch of b.s. this all is. I wonder how many hostile people they've created, by their own works - the neocons and their flunkies - among the orphans, injured, loved ones (of the dead) and the starving.

The incompetence leads people to suspect that it's deliberate. I'm open minded on the latter, but I think this administration simply can't get any job done. The victory over Saddam was a GIVEN. Everybody knew that. The challenge was doing something with it (by their standards, by mine, the absolute requirement was not to invade). But guess what, as we all know, they blew it again.; If you and I owned a business and we had employees like this, it wouldn't matter what our differences were, we'd fire them immediately.

And look here, very intelligent response. Not as big as Anax's effort a few weeks ago, but some very fine people responding to this article over there http://tinyurl.com/yudape

So who do you like in Iowa;)

So what's different about the PC you typed this reply on than the one you used to put up the OP? Was the OP typed on a different computer?

I ask this because of your format problem with apostrophes and quotations when you put up a new post (although I and Mike are happy to fix the matter, it remains an odd curiosity).

Cheers

PC's. I used the default settings for the longest time. Firefox and IE versions that I have don't show the distortion. Then I found out about it and switched Word to the straight quote/apostrophes. I had to send something in for publication, switched back, and forgot to get rid of the fancy stuff for this post. I type directly into this service so I use your defaults. When I upload, it carries whatever I'm posting. This is a very annoying problem, totally and I regret causing you the inconvenience. Let me know if it happens (since I don't see it) and I'll fix it myself, no problemo. It's probably an easy fix to get these .php and other sites to automatically convert but nooooo.... doesn't happen. Thanks for asking.

Thanks for keeping this in the forefront.

No matter how well one knows the numbers and no matter how many times you see them they are still staggering.

I'm wondering at this point how many Iraqis have died at the hands of the United States since GHW Bushes invasion right through the Clinton years and the most recent US massacre in Mesopotamia.

The number of deaths directly related to US acts in Iraq over the last 15 or so years must be over 5 million.

Certain figures such as how many died prematurely due to attrition are simply unknowable.

No end in sight.

There's just no reason to have any patience with killing. There's no place for people who use killing as part of policy, not any more. The level of death and injury in Iraq is about that of Viet Nam, proportionately. Both are a scandal, at least. But the 5,000,000 orphans is so over the top.

I plan to revisit this as often as I can. I'd put the death figures in two/three articles but when I saw 5 million (4 million is the low figure) and NOTHING in terms of coverage here, I though "fuck it."

Check out what peoplesvoice.org did with the picture (new one) http://tinyurl.com/yswmjn

Do you know anything about the people who run this. Looks like they're out of Italy. http://www.uruknet.info/

Happy New Year!