Heh . . .this one is a real hoot:
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/06/30/sports/baseball/30pins.html
Cheney Pays Visit to Stadium
By TYLER KEPNER
Published: June 30, 2004
Vice President Dick Cheney spent about 20 minutes in Manager Joe Torre's office and in the clubhouse shaking hands with players before the Yankees beat the Boston Red Sox, 11-3, last night at Yankee Stadium.
Cheney studied the photographs inside and outside Torre's office and asked Yogi Berra, the Hall of Fame catcher, why he was playing the outfield in one picture. Cheney started watching the game from the private box of the Yankees' principal owner, George Steinbrenner, switched to a seat beside the Yankees' dugout for a few innings, then returned to Steinbrenner's box.
"I told him before the game I hope he brings us more good luck than he brings them," Torre said. "It's great any time a dignitary like that visits. It slaps you with pride."
During the singing of "God Bless America" in the seventh inning, an image of Cheney was shown on the scoreboard. It was greeted with booing, so the Yankees quickly removed the image.
Wednesday, June 30, 2004
Iraq is worse off than before the war began, GAO reports
By Seth Borenstein
Knight Ridder Newspapers
http://www.realcities.com/mld/krwashington/9041465.htm
WASHINGTON - In a few key areas - electricity, the judicial system and overall security the Iraq that America handed back to its residents Monday is worse off than before the war began last year, according to calculations in a new General Accounting Office report released Tuesday.
The 105-page report by Congress' investigative arm offers a bleak assessment of Iraq after 14 months of U.S. military occupation. Among its findings:
-In 13 of Iraq's 18 provinces, electricity was available fewer hours per day on average last month than before the war. Nearly 20 million of Iraq's 26 million people live in those provinces.
-Only $13.7 billion of the $58 billion pledged and allocated worldwide to rebuild Iraq has been spent, with another $10 billion about to be spent. The biggest chunk of that money has been used to run Iraq's ministry operations.
-The country's court system is more clogged than before the war, and judges are frequent targets of assassination attempts.
-The new Iraqi civil defense, police and overall security units are suffering from mass desertions, are poorly trained and ill-equipped.
-The number of what the now-disbanded Coalition Provisional Authority called significant insurgent attacks skyrocketed from 411 in February to 1,169 in May.
The report was released on the same day that the CPA's inspector general issued three reports that highlighted serious management difficulties at the CPA. The reports found that the CPA wasted millions of dollars at a Hilton resort hotel in Kuwait because it didn't have guidelines for who could stay there, lost track of how many employees it had in Iraq and didn't track reconstruction projects funded by international donors to ensure they didn't duplicate U.S. projects.
Both the GAO report and the CPA report said that the CPA was seriously understaffed for the gargantuan task of rebuilding Iraq. The GAO report suggested the agency needed three times more employees than what it had. The CPA report said the agency believed it had 1,196 employees, when it was authorized to have 2,117. But the inspector general said CPA's records were so disorganized that it couldn't verify its actual number of employees.
GAO Comptroller General David Walker blamed insurgent attacks for many of the problems in Iraq. "The unstable security environment has served to slow down our rebuilding and reconstruction efforts and it's going to be of critical importance to provide more stable security," Walker told Knight Ridder Newspapers in a telephone interview Tuesday.
"There are a number of significant questions that need to be asked and answered dealing with the transition (to self-sovereignty)," Walker said. "A lot has been accomplished and a lot remains to be done."
The GAO report is the first government assessment of conditions in Iraq at the end of the U.S. occupation. It outlined what it called "key challenges that will affect the political transition" in 10 specific areas.
The GAO gave a draft of the report to several different government agencies, but only the CPA offered a major comment: It said the report "was not sufficiently critical of the judicial reconstruction effort."
"The picture it paints of the facts on the ground is one that neither the CPA nor the Bush administration should be all that proud of," said Peter W. Singer, a national security scholar at the centrist Brookings Institution. "It finds a lot of problems and raises a lot of questions."
One of the biggest problems, Singer said, is that while money has been pledged and allocated, not much has been spent. The GAO report shows that very little of the promised international funds - most of which are in loans - has been spent or can't be tracked. The CPA's inspector general found the same thing.
"When we ask why are things not going the way we hoped for," Singer said, "the answer in part of this is that we haven't actually spent what we have in pocket."
He said the figures on electricity "make me want to cry."
Steven Susens, a spokesman for the Program Management Office, which oversees contractors rebuilding Iraq, conceded that many areas of Iraq have fewer hours of electricity now than they did before the war. But he said the report, based on data that's now more than a month old, understates current electrical production. He said some areas may have reduced electricity availability because antiquated distribution systems had been taken out of service so they could be rebuilt.
"It's a slow pace, but it's certainly growing as far as we're concerned," Susens said.
Danielle Pletka, the vice president of foreign and defense policy studies at the conservative American Enterprise Institute, said other issues are more important than the provision of services such as electricity. She noted that Iraqis no longer live in fear of Saddam Hussein.
"It's far better to live in the dark than it is to run the risk that your mother, father, brother, sister, husband or wife would be taken away never to be seen again," Pletka said.
Pletka pointed to a Pentagon slide presentation that detailed increases and improvement in telephone subscribers, water service, food, health care and schools in Iraq.
But Sen. Joseph Biden, D-Del., the ranking Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee that asked for the GAO report, said the report showed major problems.
"So while we've handed over political sovereignty, we haven't handed over practical capacity - that is, the ability for the Iraqis themselves to provide security, defend their borders, defeat the insurgency, deliver basic services, run a government and set the foundation for economic progress," Biden said in a written statement. "Until Iraqis can do all of that, it will be impossible for us to responsibly disengage from Iraq."
By Seth Borenstein
Knight Ridder Newspapers
http://www.realcities.com/mld/krwashington/9041465.htm
WASHINGTON - In a few key areas - electricity, the judicial system and overall security the Iraq that America handed back to its residents Monday is worse off than before the war began last year, according to calculations in a new General Accounting Office report released Tuesday.
The 105-page report by Congress' investigative arm offers a bleak assessment of Iraq after 14 months of U.S. military occupation. Among its findings:
-In 13 of Iraq's 18 provinces, electricity was available fewer hours per day on average last month than before the war. Nearly 20 million of Iraq's 26 million people live in those provinces.
-Only $13.7 billion of the $58 billion pledged and allocated worldwide to rebuild Iraq has been spent, with another $10 billion about to be spent. The biggest chunk of that money has been used to run Iraq's ministry operations.
-The country's court system is more clogged than before the war, and judges are frequent targets of assassination attempts.
-The new Iraqi civil defense, police and overall security units are suffering from mass desertions, are poorly trained and ill-equipped.
-The number of what the now-disbanded Coalition Provisional Authority called significant insurgent attacks skyrocketed from 411 in February to 1,169 in May.
The report was released on the same day that the CPA's inspector general issued three reports that highlighted serious management difficulties at the CPA. The reports found that the CPA wasted millions of dollars at a Hilton resort hotel in Kuwait because it didn't have guidelines for who could stay there, lost track of how many employees it had in Iraq and didn't track reconstruction projects funded by international donors to ensure they didn't duplicate U.S. projects.
Both the GAO report and the CPA report said that the CPA was seriously understaffed for the gargantuan task of rebuilding Iraq. The GAO report suggested the agency needed three times more employees than what it had. The CPA report said the agency believed it had 1,196 employees, when it was authorized to have 2,117. But the inspector general said CPA's records were so disorganized that it couldn't verify its actual number of employees.
GAO Comptroller General David Walker blamed insurgent attacks for many of the problems in Iraq. "The unstable security environment has served to slow down our rebuilding and reconstruction efforts and it's going to be of critical importance to provide more stable security," Walker told Knight Ridder Newspapers in a telephone interview Tuesday.
"There are a number of significant questions that need to be asked and answered dealing with the transition (to self-sovereignty)," Walker said. "A lot has been accomplished and a lot remains to be done."
The GAO report is the first government assessment of conditions in Iraq at the end of the U.S. occupation. It outlined what it called "key challenges that will affect the political transition" in 10 specific areas.
The GAO gave a draft of the report to several different government agencies, but only the CPA offered a major comment: It said the report "was not sufficiently critical of the judicial reconstruction effort."
"The picture it paints of the facts on the ground is one that neither the CPA nor the Bush administration should be all that proud of," said Peter W. Singer, a national security scholar at the centrist Brookings Institution. "It finds a lot of problems and raises a lot of questions."
One of the biggest problems, Singer said, is that while money has been pledged and allocated, not much has been spent. The GAO report shows that very little of the promised international funds - most of which are in loans - has been spent or can't be tracked. The CPA's inspector general found the same thing.
"When we ask why are things not going the way we hoped for," Singer said, "the answer in part of this is that we haven't actually spent what we have in pocket."
He said the figures on electricity "make me want to cry."
Steven Susens, a spokesman for the Program Management Office, which oversees contractors rebuilding Iraq, conceded that many areas of Iraq have fewer hours of electricity now than they did before the war. But he said the report, based on data that's now more than a month old, understates current electrical production. He said some areas may have reduced electricity availability because antiquated distribution systems had been taken out of service so they could be rebuilt.
"It's a slow pace, but it's certainly growing as far as we're concerned," Susens said.
Danielle Pletka, the vice president of foreign and defense policy studies at the conservative American Enterprise Institute, said other issues are more important than the provision of services such as electricity. She noted that Iraqis no longer live in fear of Saddam Hussein.
"It's far better to live in the dark than it is to run the risk that your mother, father, brother, sister, husband or wife would be taken away never to be seen again," Pletka said.
Pletka pointed to a Pentagon slide presentation that detailed increases and improvement in telephone subscribers, water service, food, health care and schools in Iraq.
But Sen. Joseph Biden, D-Del., the ranking Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee that asked for the GAO report, said the report showed major problems.
"So while we've handed over political sovereignty, we haven't handed over practical capacity - that is, the ability for the Iraqis themselves to provide security, defend their borders, defeat the insurgency, deliver basic services, run a government and set the foundation for economic progress," Biden said in a written statement. "Until Iraqis can do all of that, it will be impossible for us to responsibly disengage from Iraq."
Wednesday, June 23, 2004
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/06/23/international/middleeast/23CND-NATI.html
U.S. Drops Effort to Gain Immunity for Its Troops
By WARREN HOGE
UNITED NATIONS, June 23 — The United States bowed to broad opposition on the Security Council today and announced that it was dropping its effort to gain immunity for its troops from prosecution by the International Criminal Court.
"The United States has decided not to proceed further with consideration and action on the draft at this time in order to avoid a prolonged and divisive debate," the deputy American ambassador, James B. Cunningham, said on emerging from the council.
The envoys from the 15-member council had spent the morning in closed session discussing a rewritten version of the American troop exemption resolution circulated among them Tuesday night to try to meet the widespread objections.
A resolution granting a year's exemption had passed the council the past two years, but this year the attempt to renew it ran into difficulties because of the prisoner abuse scandal in Iraq and a strong statement of opposition from Secretary General Kofi Annan.
The rare setback for American diplomacy at the United Nations came just two weeks after the Bush administration was praised in the world organization for demonstrating flexibility and a willingness to compromise in securing a unanimous vote on a resolution affirming the arrangements for the transfer of power in Iraq.
Ambassador Wang Guangya of China, a country that had supported the measure the past two years, said, "Clearly from the very beginning this year, China has been under pressure because of the scandals and the news coverage of the prisoner abuse, and it made it very difficult for my government to support it."
"My government," he added, "is under particular pressure not to give a blank check to the U.S. for the behavior of its forces."
Spain's ambassador, Juan Antonio Yáñez-Bernuevo, explained his country's opposition by saying, "For us, the essential thing is to remain faithful to the international criminal court, which we strongly support, and also to the United Nations charter and to respect the statement made by the secretary general last week, which had a powerful effect."
Last week Secretary General Annan called on the Security Council to turn back the American move, saying it was "of dubious judicial value" and particularly objectionable in the aftermath of the prisoner abuse cases in Iraq.
In his remarks, Mr. Annan said that passing the measure would discredit the council, the United Nations and the "primacy of the rule of law," and he appealed to the members to maintain the common purpose they had shown earlier this month in their unanimous vote on the Iraq resolution.
Mr. Yáñez-Bernuevo said that he regretted that the Americans had not mounted the same kind of diplomatic effort that secured the June 8 unanimous vote behind the resolution covering the arrangements for the June 30 transfer of power to Iraq and its aftermath.
"We would have liked to see a process as we saw in the Iraq resolution, a more collective effort that would have maintained the council's unity," he said. Instead, he said, "According to what we heard from the U.S., that was the last word, they could not go any further, there was no point in pursuing the matter."
Heraldo Muñoz of Chile said of Mr. Annan's statement: "It has a very important impact on many delegations. It certainly created a new context for the consideration of this resolution."
The Bush administration has said it needs the protection to prevent people from using the court to bring politically motivated war crimes prosecutions against Americans abroad.
Elaborating on that today, Mr. Cunningham noted that the United States was the "largest contributor to global security" and said, "When the United States voluntarily commits its armed forces to participate in peacekeeping missions around the world, we believe it is wholly inappropriate to subject them to a tribunal which cannot provide adequate guarantees of due process."
Asked if the United States would limit its participation in peacekeeping activities in the future — a threat it has made in past years when disagreement over the resolution has emerged — Mr. Cunningham said, "I'm not going to comment on that."
Addressing concerns about American military conduct abroad, he said, "The United States has a well-functioning system of military justice that will assure accountability."
Since the international court was created two years ago, the Bush administration has made bilateral agreements with 90 countries to exempt its troops, and Mr. Cunningham said that that effort would continue.
This year's draft resolution, introduced last month and then withdrawn in the face of objections, extended protection to American soldiers participating in United Nations-approved peacekeeping forces beyond the current expiration date of June 30.
That same day, next Wednesday, Iraq regains sovereignty and the predominantly American force there becomes a United Nations-mandated one. The United States had consequently been pressing hard for a vote before then.
Though there were three abstentions in last year's vote and several more expected this year, American diplomats in May said they felt confident they could obtain support for a routine "technical rollover" of the measure.
Mr. Annan's appeal to Security Council unity, however, caused several nations to rethink their backing of the original resolution and of their reluctance to be seen as defying the United States. By Monday, 8 of the 15 countries let it be known that they would abstain — an outcome that would deny the United States the votes needed for passage.
Tuesday evening, American diplomats circulated a new version aimed at meeting a major objection — language in the original proposal that expressed the intention to renew the one-year exemption each July 1 for further 12-month periods "for as long as may be necessary."
Mr. Annan had protested that this clause served to perpetuate United Nations approval of what had been considered a temporary emergency departure from international law.
That paragraph had been eliminated in the new version, and new language was inserted that pledged that this request for a one-year exemption would be the final one.
That attempt to bridge the differences did not work, and Mr. Muñoz said that while he thought the United States decision had been "too rushed," it was probably the best one under the circumstances.
"Better not to present the draft resolution to a vote when the council appears to be divided," he said. "Better not to be divided after the consensus and the unity that we showed on Iraq."
Claudia D. Dikinis
http://starcats.com >^..^<
Political & Personal Astrology for a New Millennium
Madness takes its toll. Please have exact change.
Illegitimus non carborundum.
"Individuals have international duties which transcend the national obligations of obedience ... Therefore [individual citizens] have the duty to violate domestic laws to prevent crimes against peace and humanity from occurring.": The Nuremberg Tribunal 1945-1946.
U.S. Drops Effort to Gain Immunity for Its Troops
By WARREN HOGE
UNITED NATIONS, June 23 — The United States bowed to broad opposition on the Security Council today and announced that it was dropping its effort to gain immunity for its troops from prosecution by the International Criminal Court.
"The United States has decided not to proceed further with consideration and action on the draft at this time in order to avoid a prolonged and divisive debate," the deputy American ambassador, James B. Cunningham, said on emerging from the council.
The envoys from the 15-member council had spent the morning in closed session discussing a rewritten version of the American troop exemption resolution circulated among them Tuesday night to try to meet the widespread objections.
A resolution granting a year's exemption had passed the council the past two years, but this year the attempt to renew it ran into difficulties because of the prisoner abuse scandal in Iraq and a strong statement of opposition from Secretary General Kofi Annan.
The rare setback for American diplomacy at the United Nations came just two weeks after the Bush administration was praised in the world organization for demonstrating flexibility and a willingness to compromise in securing a unanimous vote on a resolution affirming the arrangements for the transfer of power in Iraq.
Ambassador Wang Guangya of China, a country that had supported the measure the past two years, said, "Clearly from the very beginning this year, China has been under pressure because of the scandals and the news coverage of the prisoner abuse, and it made it very difficult for my government to support it."
"My government," he added, "is under particular pressure not to give a blank check to the U.S. for the behavior of its forces."
Spain's ambassador, Juan Antonio Yáñez-Bernuevo, explained his country's opposition by saying, "For us, the essential thing is to remain faithful to the international criminal court, which we strongly support, and also to the United Nations charter and to respect the statement made by the secretary general last week, which had a powerful effect."
Last week Secretary General Annan called on the Security Council to turn back the American move, saying it was "of dubious judicial value" and particularly objectionable in the aftermath of the prisoner abuse cases in Iraq.
In his remarks, Mr. Annan said that passing the measure would discredit the council, the United Nations and the "primacy of the rule of law," and he appealed to the members to maintain the common purpose they had shown earlier this month in their unanimous vote on the Iraq resolution.
Mr. Yáñez-Bernuevo said that he regretted that the Americans had not mounted the same kind of diplomatic effort that secured the June 8 unanimous vote behind the resolution covering the arrangements for the June 30 transfer of power to Iraq and its aftermath.
"We would have liked to see a process as we saw in the Iraq resolution, a more collective effort that would have maintained the council's unity," he said. Instead, he said, "According to what we heard from the U.S., that was the last word, they could not go any further, there was no point in pursuing the matter."
Heraldo Muñoz of Chile said of Mr. Annan's statement: "It has a very important impact on many delegations. It certainly created a new context for the consideration of this resolution."
The Bush administration has said it needs the protection to prevent people from using the court to bring politically motivated war crimes prosecutions against Americans abroad.
Elaborating on that today, Mr. Cunningham noted that the United States was the "largest contributor to global security" and said, "When the United States voluntarily commits its armed forces to participate in peacekeeping missions around the world, we believe it is wholly inappropriate to subject them to a tribunal which cannot provide adequate guarantees of due process."
Asked if the United States would limit its participation in peacekeeping activities in the future — a threat it has made in past years when disagreement over the resolution has emerged — Mr. Cunningham said, "I'm not going to comment on that."
Addressing concerns about American military conduct abroad, he said, "The United States has a well-functioning system of military justice that will assure accountability."
Since the international court was created two years ago, the Bush administration has made bilateral agreements with 90 countries to exempt its troops, and Mr. Cunningham said that that effort would continue.
This year's draft resolution, introduced last month and then withdrawn in the face of objections, extended protection to American soldiers participating in United Nations-approved peacekeeping forces beyond the current expiration date of June 30.
That same day, next Wednesday, Iraq regains sovereignty and the predominantly American force there becomes a United Nations-mandated one. The United States had consequently been pressing hard for a vote before then.
Though there were three abstentions in last year's vote and several more expected this year, American diplomats in May said they felt confident they could obtain support for a routine "technical rollover" of the measure.
Mr. Annan's appeal to Security Council unity, however, caused several nations to rethink their backing of the original resolution and of their reluctance to be seen as defying the United States. By Monday, 8 of the 15 countries let it be known that they would abstain — an outcome that would deny the United States the votes needed for passage.
Tuesday evening, American diplomats circulated a new version aimed at meeting a major objection — language in the original proposal that expressed the intention to renew the one-year exemption each July 1 for further 12-month periods "for as long as may be necessary."
Mr. Annan had protested that this clause served to perpetuate United Nations approval of what had been considered a temporary emergency departure from international law.
That paragraph had been eliminated in the new version, and new language was inserted that pledged that this request for a one-year exemption would be the final one.
That attempt to bridge the differences did not work, and Mr. Muñoz said that while he thought the United States decision had been "too rushed," it was probably the best one under the circumstances.
"Better not to present the draft resolution to a vote when the council appears to be divided," he said. "Better not to be divided after the consensus and the unity that we showed on Iraq."
Claudia D. Dikinis
http://starcats.com >^..^<
Political & Personal Astrology for a New Millennium
Madness takes its toll. Please have exact change.
Illegitimus non carborundum.
"Individuals have international duties which transcend the national obligations of obedience ... Therefore [individual citizens] have the duty to violate domestic laws to prevent crimes against peace and humanity from occurring.": The Nuremberg Tribunal 1945-1946.
Friday, June 11, 2004
U.S. Wrongly Reported Drop in World Terrorism in 2003
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/06/11/politics/11terr.html
Published: June 11, 2004
WASHINGTON, June 10 - The State Department acknowledged Thursday that it was wrong in reporting that terrorism declined worldwide last year, a finding the Bush administration had pointed to as evidence of its success in countering terror.
Instead, the number of incidents and the toll in victims increased sharply, the department said. Statements by senior administration officials claiming success were based "on the facts as we had them at the time; the facts that we had were wrong," Richard A. Boucher, the State Department spokesman, said.
When the report was issued April 29, senior administration officials used it as evidence that the war was being won. J. Cofer Black, coordinator of the State Department's Counterterrorism Office, cited the 190 acts of terrorism in 2003, down from 198 in 2002, as "good news" and predicted the trend would continue. Richard L. Armitage, the deputy secretary of state, said at the time, "You will find in these pages clear evidence that we are prevailing in the fight." His office did not respond Thursday to a request for a statement on disclosures that some of the findings were inaccurate. The erroneous report, titled "Patterns of Global Terrorism," said that attacks declined last year to the lowest level in 34 years and dropped 45 percent since 2001, Mr. Bush's first year as president, when 346 attacks occurred.
Among the mistakes, Mr. Boucher said, was that only part of 2003 was taken into account.
Secretary of State Colin L. Powell said Thursday that the errors were partly the result of new procedures for collecting data. "I can assure you it had nothing to do with putting out anything but the most honest, accurate information we can," Mr. Powell said said.
"Errors crept in that, frankly, we did not catch here," he said of the report, which showed a decline in the number of attacks worldwide in 2003.
Representative Henry A. Waxman, Democrat of California, said this week that the administration had refused to address his contention that the findings were manipulated for political purposes. Mr. Waxman wrote to Mr. Powell in May asking for an explanation.
Mr. Boucher said the department was preparing a reply. "We wanted to make sure that we give the congressman the best and most accurate picture of what we know and what's going on as we can," he said.
"When we are sure we have the new facts, the right facts, we will prepare an appropriate analysis and give you our assessment at that moment," Mr. Boucher said.
He said the errors began to become apparent in early May. "We got phone calls from people who were going through our report and who said to themselves, as we should have said to ourselves: 'This doesn't feel right. This doesn't look right.' And who started asking us questions," he said.
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/06/11/politics/11terr.html
Published: June 11, 2004
WASHINGTON, June 10 - The State Department acknowledged Thursday that it was wrong in reporting that terrorism declined worldwide last year, a finding the Bush administration had pointed to as evidence of its success in countering terror.
Instead, the number of incidents and the toll in victims increased sharply, the department said. Statements by senior administration officials claiming success were based "on the facts as we had them at the time; the facts that we had were wrong," Richard A. Boucher, the State Department spokesman, said.
When the report was issued April 29, senior administration officials used it as evidence that the war was being won. J. Cofer Black, coordinator of the State Department's Counterterrorism Office, cited the 190 acts of terrorism in 2003, down from 198 in 2002, as "good news" and predicted the trend would continue. Richard L. Armitage, the deputy secretary of state, said at the time, "You will find in these pages clear evidence that we are prevailing in the fight." His office did not respond Thursday to a request for a statement on disclosures that some of the findings were inaccurate. The erroneous report, titled "Patterns of Global Terrorism," said that attacks declined last year to the lowest level in 34 years and dropped 45 percent since 2001, Mr. Bush's first year as president, when 346 attacks occurred.
Among the mistakes, Mr. Boucher said, was that only part of 2003 was taken into account.
Secretary of State Colin L. Powell said Thursday that the errors were partly the result of new procedures for collecting data. "I can assure you it had nothing to do with putting out anything but the most honest, accurate information we can," Mr. Powell said said.
"Errors crept in that, frankly, we did not catch here," he said of the report, which showed a decline in the number of attacks worldwide in 2003.
Representative Henry A. Waxman, Democrat of California, said this week that the administration had refused to address his contention that the findings were manipulated for political purposes. Mr. Waxman wrote to Mr. Powell in May asking for an explanation.
Mr. Boucher said the department was preparing a reply. "We wanted to make sure that we give the congressman the best and most accurate picture of what we know and what's going on as we can," he said.
"When we are sure we have the new facts, the right facts, we will prepare an appropriate analysis and give you our assessment at that moment," Mr. Boucher said.
He said the errors began to become apparent in early May. "We got phone calls from people who were going through our report and who said to themselves, as we should have said to ourselves: 'This doesn't feel right. This doesn't look right.' And who started asking us questions," he said.
Thursday, June 10, 2004
Rumsfeld 'told officers to take gloves off with Lindh'
By Andrew Buncombe in Washington and Anne Penketh
10 June 2004
John Walker Lindh, the so-called American Taliban, was stripped naked and tied to a stretcher during interrogation after the office of Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld ordered intelligence officers to "take the gloves off" when questioning him.
Mr Rumsfeld's legal counsel instructed the officers to push the limits when questioning Lindh, captured in Afghanistan with Taliban and al-Qa'ida forces in late 2001. The treatment of Lindh appears to foreshadow the abuse of Iraqi prisoners at Abu Ghraib.
The details of Lindh's interrogation confirm claims made by his lawyer, Tony West, that when he was captured by Northern Alliance forces and handed to CIA operatives near the northern Afghan city of Mazar-i-Sharif, he asked for a lawyer. Not only was he refused a lawyer and not advised of his rights, but his interrogators were told to get tough to obtain "actionable" intelligence in the pursuit of Osama bin Laden.
Documents seen by the Los Angeles Times, show that when an US Army intelligence officer started to question Lindh he was given instructions that the "Secretary of Defence's counsel has authorised him to 'take the gloves off' and asked whatever he wanted". The documents show that in the early stages, Lindh's responses were cabled to Washington every hour.
Though Lindh initially pleaded not guilty, he later admitted reduced charges and was sentenced to 20 years. He and his lawyers also agreed to drop claims that he had been tortured by US personnel.
A Defence Department spokesperson said the Pentagon "refused to speculate on the exact intent of the statement" from Mr Rumsfeld's office. "Department officials stress that all interrogation policies and procedures demand humane treatment of personnel in their custody," said the spokesperson.
The documents are the latest evidence to emerge revealing the efforts of the Bush administration to sidestep international laws and treaties when dealing with prisoners after the 11 September attacks. Critics say they show the abuses at Abu Ghraib were part of a deliberately pursued and systematic approach for dealing with prisoners without affording them their rights contained within the Geneva Conventions.
A memo this week revealed that in March 2003, administration lawyers concluded that President George Bush had the authority under executive privilege to order any sort of torture or interrogation of prisoners.
Yesterday, Congresswoman Jane Harman of California, the senior Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, said the views the memo contained were "antithetical to American laws and values". She added: "This memo argues that the President is not bound by criminal laws in the context of his role as Commander-in-Chief during war; that the President may be above the law. This is a concept of executive authority that was discarded at Runnymede in the 13th century and has absolutely no place in our constitutional system."
The Attorney General, John Ashcroft, has refused to provide copies of the internal memos on the questioning of prisoners. "This administration rejects torture," Mr Ashcroft said. "I don't think it's productive, let alone justified."
And despite the international outcry over the prisoner abuse cases, US forces will continue to be responsible for running two Iraqi prisons where "security detainees" are held, after the handover to a "sovereign" Iraqi government.
A senior British official said in London that the US military would continue to be responsible for up to 2,000 "fairly hard-core" prisoners at Abu Ghraib and at another jail in southern Iraq. The exact number of such prisoners, deemed a threat to Iraqi safety and security, is not known because although the Americans let many inmates out of Abu Ghraib, many others have been arrested.
Britain is pressing for Iraqis to help run the top-security prisons, but details are still to be worked out. The US military is also holding Saddam Hussein, and other former regime members inside Iraq. They are to be tried by a special Iraqi tribunal starting in the autumn.
A Jordanian lawyer who claims that he is acting for Saddam says that the former Iraqi leader was also tortured during interrogation.
By Andrew Buncombe in Washington and Anne Penketh
10 June 2004
John Walker Lindh, the so-called American Taliban, was stripped naked and tied to a stretcher during interrogation after the office of Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld ordered intelligence officers to "take the gloves off" when questioning him.
Mr Rumsfeld's legal counsel instructed the officers to push the limits when questioning Lindh, captured in Afghanistan with Taliban and al-Qa'ida forces in late 2001. The treatment of Lindh appears to foreshadow the abuse of Iraqi prisoners at Abu Ghraib.
The details of Lindh's interrogation confirm claims made by his lawyer, Tony West, that when he was captured by Northern Alliance forces and handed to CIA operatives near the northern Afghan city of Mazar-i-Sharif, he asked for a lawyer. Not only was he refused a lawyer and not advised of his rights, but his interrogators were told to get tough to obtain "actionable" intelligence in the pursuit of Osama bin Laden.
Documents seen by the Los Angeles Times, show that when an US Army intelligence officer started to question Lindh he was given instructions that the "Secretary of Defence's counsel has authorised him to 'take the gloves off' and asked whatever he wanted". The documents show that in the early stages, Lindh's responses were cabled to Washington every hour.
Though Lindh initially pleaded not guilty, he later admitted reduced charges and was sentenced to 20 years. He and his lawyers also agreed to drop claims that he had been tortured by US personnel.
A Defence Department spokesperson said the Pentagon "refused to speculate on the exact intent of the statement" from Mr Rumsfeld's office. "Department officials stress that all interrogation policies and procedures demand humane treatment of personnel in their custody," said the spokesperson.
The documents are the latest evidence to emerge revealing the efforts of the Bush administration to sidestep international laws and treaties when dealing with prisoners after the 11 September attacks. Critics say they show the abuses at Abu Ghraib were part of a deliberately pursued and systematic approach for dealing with prisoners without affording them their rights contained within the Geneva Conventions.
A memo this week revealed that in March 2003, administration lawyers concluded that President George Bush had the authority under executive privilege to order any sort of torture or interrogation of prisoners.
Yesterday, Congresswoman Jane Harman of California, the senior Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, said the views the memo contained were "antithetical to American laws and values". She added: "This memo argues that the President is not bound by criminal laws in the context of his role as Commander-in-Chief during war; that the President may be above the law. This is a concept of executive authority that was discarded at Runnymede in the 13th century and has absolutely no place in our constitutional system."
The Attorney General, John Ashcroft, has refused to provide copies of the internal memos on the questioning of prisoners. "This administration rejects torture," Mr Ashcroft said. "I don't think it's productive, let alone justified."
And despite the international outcry over the prisoner abuse cases, US forces will continue to be responsible for running two Iraqi prisons where "security detainees" are held, after the handover to a "sovereign" Iraqi government.
A senior British official said in London that the US military would continue to be responsible for up to 2,000 "fairly hard-core" prisoners at Abu Ghraib and at another jail in southern Iraq. The exact number of such prisoners, deemed a threat to Iraqi safety and security, is not known because although the Americans let many inmates out of Abu Ghraib, many others have been arrested.
Britain is pressing for Iraqis to help run the top-security prisons, but details are still to be worked out. The US military is also holding Saddam Hussein, and other former regime members inside Iraq. They are to be tried by a special Iraqi tribunal starting in the autumn.
A Jordanian lawyer who claims that he is acting for Saddam says that the former Iraqi leader was also tortured during interrogation.
Saturday, June 05, 2004
A time to weep
In a commencement address to the New School University on May 21, Theodore Sorensen, special counsel to President Kennedy, laments "the loss of this country's goodness and therefore its greatness."
http://www.salon.com/opinion/feature/2004/06/04/sorensen/
June 4, 2004
As a Nebraska émigré, I am proud to be made an honorary doctor of laws by another Nebraska émigré, President Kerrey ... at an institution founded by still another, Alvin Johnson.
Considering the unhealthy state of our laws today, they probably could use another doctor.
My reciprocal obligation is to make a speech.
This is not a speech. Two weeks ago I set aside the speech I prepared. This is a cry from the heart, a lamentation for the loss of this country's goodness and therefore its greatness.
Future historians studying the decline and fall of America will mark this as the time the tide began to turn -- toward a mean-spirited mediocrity in place of a noble beacon.
For me the final blow was American guards laughing over the naked, helpless bodies of abused prisoners in Iraq. "There is a time to laugh," the Bible tells us, "and a time to weep." Today I weep for the country I love, the country I proudly served, the country to which my four grandparents sailed over a century ago with hopes for a new land of peace and freedom. I cannot remain silent when that country is in the deepest trouble of my lifetime.
I am not talking only about the prison abuse scandal -- that stench will someday subside. Nor am I referring only to the Iraq war -- that too will pass -- nor to any one political leader or party. This is no time for politics as usual, in which no one responsible admits responsibility, no one genuinely apologizes, no one resigns, and everyone else is blamed.
The damage done to this country by its own misconduct in the last few months and years, to its very heart and soul, is far greater and longer lasting than any damage that any terrorist could possibly inflict upon us.
The stain on our credibility, our reputation for decency and integrity, will not quickly wash away.
Last week, a family friend of an accused American guard in Iraq recited the atrocities inflicted by our enemies on Americans, and asked: "Must we be held to a different standard?" My answer is yes. Not only because others expect it. We must hold ourselves to a different standard. Not only because God demands it, but because it serves our security.
Our greatest strength has long been not merely our military might but our moral authority. Our surest protection against assault from abroad has been not all our guards, gates and guns, or even our two oceans, but our essential goodness as a people. Our richest asset has been not our material wealth but our values.
We were world leaders once -- helping found the United Nations, the Marshall Plan, NATO, and programs like Food for Peace, international human rights and international environmental standards. The world admired not only the bravery of our Marine Corps but also the idealism of our Peace Corps.
Our word was as good as our gold. At the start of the Cuban missile crisis, former Secretary of State Dean Acheson, President Kennedy's special envoy to brief French President de Gaulle, offered to document our case by having the actual pictures of Soviet nuclear missiles in Cuba brought in. "No," shrugged the usually difficult de Gaulle: "The word of the president of the United States is good enough for me."
Eight months later, President Kennedy could say at American University: "The world knows that America will never start a war. This generation of Americans has had enough of war and hate ... we want to build a world of peace where the weak are secure and the strong are just."
Our founding fathers believed this country could be a beacon of light to the world, a model of democratic and humanitarian progress. We were. We prevailed in the Cold War because we inspired millions struggling for freedom in far corners of the Soviet empire. I have been in countries where children and avenues were named for Lincoln, Jefferson, Franklin Roosevelt and John F. Kennedy. We were respected, not reviled, because we respected man's aspirations for peace and justice. This was the country to which foreign leaders sent not only their goods to be sold but their sons and daughters to be educated. In the 1930s, when Jewish and other scholars were driven out of Europe, their preferred destination -- even for those on the far left -- was not the Communist citadel in Moscow but the New School here in New York.
What has happened to our country? We have been in wars before, without resorting to sexual humiliation as torture, without blocking the Red Cross, without insulting and deceiving our allies and the U.N., without betraying our traditional values, without imitating our adversaries, without blackening our name around the world.
Last year when asked on short notice to speak to a European audience and inquiring what topic I should address, the chairman said: "Tell us about the good America, the America when Kennedy was in the White House." "It is still a good America," I replied. "The American people still believe in peace, human rights and justice; they are still a generous, fair-minded, open-minded people."
Today some political figures argue that merely to report, much less to protest, the crimes against humanity committed by a few of our own inadequately trained forces in the fog of war, is to aid the enemy or excuse its atrocities. But Americans know that such self-censorship does not enhance our security. Attempts to justify or defend our illegal acts as nothing more than pranks or no worse than the crimes of our enemies, only further muddies our moral image. Thirty years ago, America's war in Vietnam became a hopeless military quagmire; today our war in Iraq has become a senseless moral swamp.
No military victory can endure unless the victor occupies the high moral ground. Surely America, the land of the free, could not lose the high moral ground invading Iraq, a country ruled by terror, torture and tyranny -- but we did.
Instead of isolating Saddam Hussein -- politically, economically, diplomatically, much as we succeeded in isolating Gadhafi, Marcos, Mobutu and a host of other dictators over the years -- we have isolated ourselves. We are increasingly alone in a dangerous world in which millions who once respected us now hate us.
Not only Muslims. Every international survey shows our global standing at an all-time low. Even our transatlantic alliance has not yet recovered from its worst crisis in history. Our friends in Western Europe were willing to accept Uncle Sam as class president, but not as class bully once he forgot JFK's advice that "civility is not a sign of weakness."
All this is rationalized as part of the war on terror. But abusing prisoners in Iraq, denying detainees their legal rights in Guantánamo -- even American citizens -- misleading the world at large about Saddam's ready stockpiles of mass destruction and involvement with al-Qaida at 9/11, did not advance by one millimeter our efforts to end the threat of another terrorist attack upon us. On the contrary, our conduct invites and incites new attacks and new recruits to attack us.
The decline in our reputation adds to the decline in our security. We keep losing old friends and making new enemies -- not a formula for success. We have not yet rounded up Osama bin Laden or most of the al-Qaida and Taliban leaders or the anthrax mailer. "The world is large," wrote John Boyle O'Reilly, in one of President Kennedy's favorite poems, "when its weary leagues two loving hearts divide, but the world is small when your enemy is loose on the other side." Today our enemies are still loose on the other side of the world, and we are still vulnerable to attack.
True, we have not lost either war we chose or lost too much of our wealth. But we have lost something worse -- our good name for truth and justice. To paraphrase Shakespeare: "He who steals our nation's purse, steals trash. 'Twas ours, 'tis his, and has been slave to thousands. But he that filches our good name ... makes us poor indeed."
No American wants us to lose a war. Among our enemies are those who, if they could, would fundamentally change our way of life, restricting our freedom of religion by exalting one faith over others, ignoring international law and the opinions of mankind, and trampling on the rights of those who are different, deprived or disliked. To the extent that our nation voluntarily treads those same paths in the name of security, the terrorists win and we are the losers.
We are no longer the world's leaders on matters of international law and peace. After we stopped listening to others, they stopped listening to us. A nation without credibility and moral authority cannot lead, because no one will follow.
Paradoxically, the charges against us in the court of world opinion are contradictory. We are deemed by many to be dangerously aggressive, a threat to world peace. You may regard that as ridiculously unwarranted, no matter how often international surveys show that attitude to be spreading. But remember the old axiom: "No matter how good you feel, if four friends tell you you're drunk, you'd better lie down."
Yet we are also charged not so much with intervention as indifference -- indifference toward the suffering of millions of our fellow inhabitants of this planet who do not enjoy the freedom, the opportunity, the health and wealth and security that we enjoy; indifference to the countless deaths of children and other civilians in unnecessary wars, countless because we usually do not bother to count them; indifference to the centuries of humiliation endured previously in silence by the Arab and Islamic worlds.
The good news, to relieve all this gloom, is that a democracy is inherently self-correcting. Here, the people are sovereign. Inept political leaders can be replaced. Foolish policies can be changed. Disastrous mistakes can be reversed.
When, in 1941, the Japanese Air Force was able to inflict widespread death and destruction on our naval and air forces in Hawaii because they were not on alert, those military officials most responsible for ignoring advance intelligence were summarily dismissed.
When, in the late 1940s, we faced a global Cold War against another system of ideological fanatics certain that their authoritarian values would eventually rule the world, we prevailed in time. We prevailed because we exercised patience as well as vigilance, self-restraint as well as self-defense, and reached out to moderates and modernists, to democrats and dissidents, within that closed system. We can do that again. We can reach out to moderates and modernists in Islam, proud of its long traditions of dialogue, learning, charity and peace.
Some among us scoff that the war on jihadist terror is a war between civilization and chaos. But they forget that there were Islamic universities and observatories long before we had railroads.
So do not despair. In this country, the people are sovereign. If we can but tear the blindfold of self-deception from our eyes and loosen the gag of self-denial from our voices, we can restore our country to greatness. In particular, you -- the class of 2004 -- have the wisdom and energy to do it. Start soon.
In the words of the ancient Hebrews:
"The day is short, and the work is great, and the laborers are sluggish, but the reward is much, and the Master is urgent."
___________________
Claudia D. Dikinis
http://starcats.com >^..^<
Political & Personal Astrology for a New Millennium
Madness takes its toll. Please have exact change.
Illegitimus non carborundum.
"Individuals have international duties which transcend the national obligations of obedience ... Therefore [individual citizens] have the duty to violate domestic laws to prevent crimes against peace and humanity from occurring.": The Nuremberg Tribunal 1945-1946.
In a commencement address to the New School University on May 21, Theodore Sorensen, special counsel to President Kennedy, laments "the loss of this country's goodness and therefore its greatness."
http://www.salon.com/opinion/feature/2004/06/04/sorensen/
June 4, 2004
As a Nebraska émigré, I am proud to be made an honorary doctor of laws by another Nebraska émigré, President Kerrey ... at an institution founded by still another, Alvin Johnson.
Considering the unhealthy state of our laws today, they probably could use another doctor.
My reciprocal obligation is to make a speech.
This is not a speech. Two weeks ago I set aside the speech I prepared. This is a cry from the heart, a lamentation for the loss of this country's goodness and therefore its greatness.
Future historians studying the decline and fall of America will mark this as the time the tide began to turn -- toward a mean-spirited mediocrity in place of a noble beacon.
For me the final blow was American guards laughing over the naked, helpless bodies of abused prisoners in Iraq. "There is a time to laugh," the Bible tells us, "and a time to weep." Today I weep for the country I love, the country I proudly served, the country to which my four grandparents sailed over a century ago with hopes for a new land of peace and freedom. I cannot remain silent when that country is in the deepest trouble of my lifetime.
I am not talking only about the prison abuse scandal -- that stench will someday subside. Nor am I referring only to the Iraq war -- that too will pass -- nor to any one political leader or party. This is no time for politics as usual, in which no one responsible admits responsibility, no one genuinely apologizes, no one resigns, and everyone else is blamed.
The damage done to this country by its own misconduct in the last few months and years, to its very heart and soul, is far greater and longer lasting than any damage that any terrorist could possibly inflict upon us.
The stain on our credibility, our reputation for decency and integrity, will not quickly wash away.
Last week, a family friend of an accused American guard in Iraq recited the atrocities inflicted by our enemies on Americans, and asked: "Must we be held to a different standard?" My answer is yes. Not only because others expect it. We must hold ourselves to a different standard. Not only because God demands it, but because it serves our security.
Our greatest strength has long been not merely our military might but our moral authority. Our surest protection against assault from abroad has been not all our guards, gates and guns, or even our two oceans, but our essential goodness as a people. Our richest asset has been not our material wealth but our values.
We were world leaders once -- helping found the United Nations, the Marshall Plan, NATO, and programs like Food for Peace, international human rights and international environmental standards. The world admired not only the bravery of our Marine Corps but also the idealism of our Peace Corps.
Our word was as good as our gold. At the start of the Cuban missile crisis, former Secretary of State Dean Acheson, President Kennedy's special envoy to brief French President de Gaulle, offered to document our case by having the actual pictures of Soviet nuclear missiles in Cuba brought in. "No," shrugged the usually difficult de Gaulle: "The word of the president of the United States is good enough for me."
Eight months later, President Kennedy could say at American University: "The world knows that America will never start a war. This generation of Americans has had enough of war and hate ... we want to build a world of peace where the weak are secure and the strong are just."
Our founding fathers believed this country could be a beacon of light to the world, a model of democratic and humanitarian progress. We were. We prevailed in the Cold War because we inspired millions struggling for freedom in far corners of the Soviet empire. I have been in countries where children and avenues were named for Lincoln, Jefferson, Franklin Roosevelt and John F. Kennedy. We were respected, not reviled, because we respected man's aspirations for peace and justice. This was the country to which foreign leaders sent not only their goods to be sold but their sons and daughters to be educated. In the 1930s, when Jewish and other scholars were driven out of Europe, their preferred destination -- even for those on the far left -- was not the Communist citadel in Moscow but the New School here in New York.
What has happened to our country? We have been in wars before, without resorting to sexual humiliation as torture, without blocking the Red Cross, without insulting and deceiving our allies and the U.N., without betraying our traditional values, without imitating our adversaries, without blackening our name around the world.
Last year when asked on short notice to speak to a European audience and inquiring what topic I should address, the chairman said: "Tell us about the good America, the America when Kennedy was in the White House." "It is still a good America," I replied. "The American people still believe in peace, human rights and justice; they are still a generous, fair-minded, open-minded people."
Today some political figures argue that merely to report, much less to protest, the crimes against humanity committed by a few of our own inadequately trained forces in the fog of war, is to aid the enemy or excuse its atrocities. But Americans know that such self-censorship does not enhance our security. Attempts to justify or defend our illegal acts as nothing more than pranks or no worse than the crimes of our enemies, only further muddies our moral image. Thirty years ago, America's war in Vietnam became a hopeless military quagmire; today our war in Iraq has become a senseless moral swamp.
No military victory can endure unless the victor occupies the high moral ground. Surely America, the land of the free, could not lose the high moral ground invading Iraq, a country ruled by terror, torture and tyranny -- but we did.
Instead of isolating Saddam Hussein -- politically, economically, diplomatically, much as we succeeded in isolating Gadhafi, Marcos, Mobutu and a host of other dictators over the years -- we have isolated ourselves. We are increasingly alone in a dangerous world in which millions who once respected us now hate us.
Not only Muslims. Every international survey shows our global standing at an all-time low. Even our transatlantic alliance has not yet recovered from its worst crisis in history. Our friends in Western Europe were willing to accept Uncle Sam as class president, but not as class bully once he forgot JFK's advice that "civility is not a sign of weakness."
All this is rationalized as part of the war on terror. But abusing prisoners in Iraq, denying detainees their legal rights in Guantánamo -- even American citizens -- misleading the world at large about Saddam's ready stockpiles of mass destruction and involvement with al-Qaida at 9/11, did not advance by one millimeter our efforts to end the threat of another terrorist attack upon us. On the contrary, our conduct invites and incites new attacks and new recruits to attack us.
The decline in our reputation adds to the decline in our security. We keep losing old friends and making new enemies -- not a formula for success. We have not yet rounded up Osama bin Laden or most of the al-Qaida and Taliban leaders or the anthrax mailer. "The world is large," wrote John Boyle O'Reilly, in one of President Kennedy's favorite poems, "when its weary leagues two loving hearts divide, but the world is small when your enemy is loose on the other side." Today our enemies are still loose on the other side of the world, and we are still vulnerable to attack.
True, we have not lost either war we chose or lost too much of our wealth. But we have lost something worse -- our good name for truth and justice. To paraphrase Shakespeare: "He who steals our nation's purse, steals trash. 'Twas ours, 'tis his, and has been slave to thousands. But he that filches our good name ... makes us poor indeed."
No American wants us to lose a war. Among our enemies are those who, if they could, would fundamentally change our way of life, restricting our freedom of religion by exalting one faith over others, ignoring international law and the opinions of mankind, and trampling on the rights of those who are different, deprived or disliked. To the extent that our nation voluntarily treads those same paths in the name of security, the terrorists win and we are the losers.
We are no longer the world's leaders on matters of international law and peace. After we stopped listening to others, they stopped listening to us. A nation without credibility and moral authority cannot lead, because no one will follow.
Paradoxically, the charges against us in the court of world opinion are contradictory. We are deemed by many to be dangerously aggressive, a threat to world peace. You may regard that as ridiculously unwarranted, no matter how often international surveys show that attitude to be spreading. But remember the old axiom: "No matter how good you feel, if four friends tell you you're drunk, you'd better lie down."
Yet we are also charged not so much with intervention as indifference -- indifference toward the suffering of millions of our fellow inhabitants of this planet who do not enjoy the freedom, the opportunity, the health and wealth and security that we enjoy; indifference to the countless deaths of children and other civilians in unnecessary wars, countless because we usually do not bother to count them; indifference to the centuries of humiliation endured previously in silence by the Arab and Islamic worlds.
The good news, to relieve all this gloom, is that a democracy is inherently self-correcting. Here, the people are sovereign. Inept political leaders can be replaced. Foolish policies can be changed. Disastrous mistakes can be reversed.
When, in 1941, the Japanese Air Force was able to inflict widespread death and destruction on our naval and air forces in Hawaii because they were not on alert, those military officials most responsible for ignoring advance intelligence were summarily dismissed.
When, in the late 1940s, we faced a global Cold War against another system of ideological fanatics certain that their authoritarian values would eventually rule the world, we prevailed in time. We prevailed because we exercised patience as well as vigilance, self-restraint as well as self-defense, and reached out to moderates and modernists, to democrats and dissidents, within that closed system. We can do that again. We can reach out to moderates and modernists in Islam, proud of its long traditions of dialogue, learning, charity and peace.
Some among us scoff that the war on jihadist terror is a war between civilization and chaos. But they forget that there were Islamic universities and observatories long before we had railroads.
So do not despair. In this country, the people are sovereign. If we can but tear the blindfold of self-deception from our eyes and loosen the gag of self-denial from our voices, we can restore our country to greatness. In particular, you -- the class of 2004 -- have the wisdom and energy to do it. Start soon.
In the words of the ancient Hebrews:
"The day is short, and the work is great, and the laborers are sluggish, but the reward is much, and the Master is urgent."
___________________
Claudia D. Dikinis
http://starcats.com >^..^<
Political & Personal Astrology for a New Millennium
Madness takes its toll. Please have exact change.
Illegitimus non carborundum.
"Individuals have international duties which transcend the national obligations of obedience ... Therefore [individual citizens] have the duty to violate domestic laws to prevent crimes against peace and humanity from occurring.": The Nuremberg Tribunal 1945-1946.
Wednesday, June 02, 2004
Bush, Atty Powwow Over CIA Leak
WASHINGTON, June 2, 2004
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/06/02/politics/main620810.shtml
President Bush has consulted an outside lawyer in case he needs to retain him in the grand jury investigation of who leaked the name of a covert CIA operative last year, the White House said Wednesday.
There was no indication that Bush is a target of the leak investigation, but the president has decided that in the event he needs an attorney's advice, "he would retain him," White House spokeswoman Claire Buchan said.
The lawyer is Jim Sharp, Buchan said, confirming a report by CBS Chief White House Correspondent John Roberts.
"The president has said that everyone should cooperate in this matter and that would include himself," the spokeswoman said.
She deflected questions about whether Bush had been asked to appear before a grand jury in the case.
In an exceptionally secretive process, Roberts reports, a federal grand jury has been hearing testimony since January from dozens of administration and government officials. The probe is aiming to pin down the source of the leak that identified Valerie Plame, wife of former ambassador Joe Wilson, as an undercover CIA agent.
Wilson charges that Plame's cover was blown as payback for his challenge to President Bush's claim in last year's State of the Union address that Saddam Hussein was actively shopping for uranium to build a bomb.
"Saddam Hussein has been trying to buy uranium from Africa," Mr. Bush said in the Jan. 28, 2003 address.
Wilson has pointed fingers at the Vice President's office -- and the President's political director Karl Rove -- in a recent book claiming Rove told a reporter that "Wilson's wife is fair game."
The Justice department assigned a special team of investigators to the case last fall. It demanded thousands of e-mails and other correspondence from the White House -- and has either interviewed or brought before the grand jury several high ranking officials.
Sources tell CBS News President Bush has retained Washington Attorney Jim Sharp to represent him in the Wilson case.
Mr. Bush has repeatedly stated that he has no tolerance for such leaks -- but he has expressed doubts the investigation will find ever find answers.
"I have no idea if we'll find out who the leaker is … partially because your industry is good at protecting the leaker," he said in the past, referring to the media.
So far, no one is suggesting that President Bush had anything to do with the leak or even knew about it until it became public. But the fact that he has retained outside counsel in the event the grand jury comes calling has elevated this investigation to the highest levels.
Claudia D. Dikinis
http://starcats.com >^..^<
Political & Personal Astrology for a New Millennium
Madness takes its toll. Please have exact change.
Illegitimus non carborundum.
"Individuals have international duties which transcend the national obligations of obedience ... Therefore [individual citizens] have the duty to violate domestic laws to prevent crimes against peace and humanity from occurring.": The Nuremberg Tribunal 1945-1946.
WASHINGTON, June 2, 2004
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/06/02/politics/main620810.shtml
President Bush has consulted an outside lawyer in case he needs to retain him in the grand jury investigation of who leaked the name of a covert CIA operative last year, the White House said Wednesday.
There was no indication that Bush is a target of the leak investigation, but the president has decided that in the event he needs an attorney's advice, "he would retain him," White House spokeswoman Claire Buchan said.
The lawyer is Jim Sharp, Buchan said, confirming a report by CBS Chief White House Correspondent John Roberts.
"The president has said that everyone should cooperate in this matter and that would include himself," the spokeswoman said.
She deflected questions about whether Bush had been asked to appear before a grand jury in the case.
In an exceptionally secretive process, Roberts reports, a federal grand jury has been hearing testimony since January from dozens of administration and government officials. The probe is aiming to pin down the source of the leak that identified Valerie Plame, wife of former ambassador Joe Wilson, as an undercover CIA agent.
Wilson charges that Plame's cover was blown as payback for his challenge to President Bush's claim in last year's State of the Union address that Saddam Hussein was actively shopping for uranium to build a bomb.
"Saddam Hussein has been trying to buy uranium from Africa," Mr. Bush said in the Jan. 28, 2003 address.
Wilson has pointed fingers at the Vice President's office -- and the President's political director Karl Rove -- in a recent book claiming Rove told a reporter that "Wilson's wife is fair game."
The Justice department assigned a special team of investigators to the case last fall. It demanded thousands of e-mails and other correspondence from the White House -- and has either interviewed or brought before the grand jury several high ranking officials.
Sources tell CBS News President Bush has retained Washington Attorney Jim Sharp to represent him in the Wilson case.
Mr. Bush has repeatedly stated that he has no tolerance for such leaks -- but he has expressed doubts the investigation will find ever find answers.
"I have no idea if we'll find out who the leaker is … partially because your industry is good at protecting the leaker," he said in the past, referring to the media.
So far, no one is suggesting that President Bush had anything to do with the leak or even knew about it until it became public. But the fact that he has retained outside counsel in the event the grand jury comes calling has elevated this investigation to the highest levels.
Claudia D. Dikinis
http://starcats.com >^..^<
Political & Personal Astrology for a New Millennium
Madness takes its toll. Please have exact change.
Illegitimus non carborundum.
"Individuals have international duties which transcend the national obligations of obedience ... Therefore [individual citizens] have the duty to violate domestic laws to prevent crimes against peace and humanity from occurring.": The Nuremberg Tribunal 1945-1946.
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