The Ratio

Its pretty bad when Egypt treats the US like the new Syria, or the new Egypt!

Guantanamo: New "Reverse Rendition" Case
29 Mar 2005 14:55:08 GMT
Source: Human Rights Watch

(New York, March 30, 2005) – A Yemeni businessman captured in Egypt was handed over to U.S. authorities and "disappeared" for more than a year and a half before being sent to Guantanamo Bay Naval Base in Cuba, Human Rights Watch said today. In a new briefing, Human Rights Watch today released details of the previously unreported case of 'Abd al-Salam 'Ali al-Hila, a Yemeni terror suspect initially detained in Cairo by Egyptian authorities in 2002 and currently held at Guantanamo.

While considerable attention has been paid recently to U.S. renditions of suspects to third countries, the al-Hila case is new evidence of the reverse: foreign authorities picking up suspects in non-combat and non-battlefield situations and handing them over to the United States without basic protections afforded to criminal suspects...

US officials continue to mouth platitudes about their commitment to human rights and rejection of torture as a matter of course, and yet reports of this sort of thing are becoming so commonplace that the reality must be blatantly evident for most of the world. Maybe its just another reality tv show for Americans. You don't get upset when Josh bumps Tricia from "The Bachelor" so why raise a fuss when so-and-so dissapears for two years...

Tags: Reverse Rendition

There is an online petition to remove DeLay that everyone should sign! ....I've been trying to think of who could play DeLay in the bio-pic that should be made. Its hard to think of anyone who could balance the mendacity, corruptness, and banality of The Hammer. Any suggestions...?

Tags: DeLay

Stop Torture Now

Andrew Wimmer and Mark Chmiel issue A Call for Direct Action

Tags: Torture

Amazingly enoegh Thomas Friedman has a new piece that doesn't make me sputter and gag. (he does start to creep into american exceptionalism territory but I choose to ignore that in order not to spoil the moment)

Tags: Friedman

Juan Cole has an interesting post pointing out the similarities between Islamic Fundies and Republican Christian Fundies in the context of the Schiavo Case. I've felt for a long time that the Christian Fundies and the Islamic Fundies have more in common than they have differences, but thats not anything you don't know already I'm sure. It just highlights the extent to which "Culture of Life" talk is a cover for good old-fashioned Theocracy. I know I'm just stating the obvious but where is the concern for the living in the "Culture of Life." Are they really concerned about fetuses or about imposing their religion and ultimately the dominion of their religion over the world.

Tags: dominion

It seems the way has been opened for drilling in ANWR. Bush and his oily friends must be wetting themselves, they've been fantasizing about this day forever. Three Democratic Senators helped make it possible, 2 from Hawaii which seems to be a case of big oil money greasing the wheels, and Mary L. Landrieu of Louisiana. This last I find perversely funny on several levels. One because I think we all have this stereotype of the Louisiana politician in the pocket of Big Oil, and two because I've lived in Louisiana and I know what an environmental disaster it is.

Tags: ANWR

Bush Picks Wolfowitz for New World Bank President
Along with the Bolton nomination to the UN post, this is being greeted as a big FU to the international community and especially the Europeans. Could this spark a rebellion? This from 50 Years is Enough Network

50 YEARS IS ENOUGH: U.S. NETWORK FOR GLOBAL ECONOMIC JUSTICE

For Immediate Release
March 16, 2005 – 12:30 pm EST
Contact: Njoki Njoroge Njehu – 202-746-4318 (mobile)
Soren Ambrose – 202-285-5836 (mobile)
Office – 202-IMF-BANK (463-2265)

WOLFOWITZ TO WORLD BANK?! – CRITICS AMAZED
Maybe Worst Possible Choice; Global Opposition to Selection
"The Ball is in the Europeans' Court"

Two hours ago, President Bush announced his nomination of Paul Wolfowitz, currently Assistant Secretary of Defense, to be the next President of the World Bank. The U.S., by tradition, nominates the World Bank President. Although the Bank’s Board of Governors must approve it, no nomination has ever been rejected.

"Paul Wolfowitz is the most controversial choice Bush could have made," said Njoki Njoroge Njehu, Director of the 50 Years Is Enough Network. "As the most prominent advocate of imposing the U.S.'s will on the world – the architect of the disastrous invasion and occupation of Iraq – this appointment signals to developing countries that the U.S. is just as serious about imposing its will on borrowers from the World Bank as on the countries of the Middle East. Coming on the heels of the nomination of John Bolton as Ambassador to the U.N., it reveals the contempt this Administration has for the international community."

"The 50 Years Is Enough Network opposes this nomination," Njehu continued, "and urges people around the world, and especially in Europe, to contact their government officials to insist that the nomination be defeated. Once again, just as with Iraq, President Bush may be proving his campaign promise to be 'a uniter, not a divider': the world will unite against this choice. The ball really is in the Europeans’ court now."

Reliable reports from Europe suggest that the World Bank Executive Directors from that region and some government officials are very opposed to Wolfowitz’s nomination. When rumors of the choice first arose two weeks ago, most World Bank watchers concluded that they must be mischievous jokes, and some European officials may have concluded likewise.

The European countries together form a substantial enough bloc to reject the U.S. action. Doing so, however, would spotlight the absurdly anti-democratic way in which the heads of the international financial institutions are chosen. While the institutions insist that borrowers institute "good governance," the President of the World Bank is chosen in a secret process by the U.S. and the Managing Director of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) is chosen in a messier, largely secret process by the countries of Western Europe. The U.S. was careful not to interfere with the choice of Rodrigo Rato of Spain as head of the IMF last year, and likely expects the same deference from the Europeans now.

"The Bright Side"

If Wolfowitz does become President of the World Bank, it could have some positive effects. Soren Ambrose, Senior Policy Analyst with the 50 Years Is Enough Network noted, "If confirm, we would no longer have to work so hard to convince people that the World Bank is an instrument of U.S. foreign and economic policy. Wolfowitz has no experience in development, just a fierce ideological dedication to hard-core neo-liberal economics and U.S. domination. With Wolfowitz in place, the Bank's masterful spinners of noble rhetoric will be unable to persuade anyone that the institution is really working for the benefit of the poor. We'll finally be able to use the word 'imperialism' about Bank policy without raising eyebrows."

"In other words," said Ambrose, "between exposing the true dangers of the lack of democracy at the World Bank and putting the most visible symbol of U.S. imperialism in the most prominent position in international development, President Bush will accomplish more in de-legitimizing the World Bank than any other single action ever could."


##################
50 Years Is Enough: U.S. Network for Global Economic Justice http://www.50years.org

Tags: World Bank

There is a good piece at Counterpunch about the admininstration machinations over Lebanon/Syria/Iran. I agree with the central point that the Bushies underlying strategy is to make demands on the targets that are impossible to meet, forcing their own hand so to speak, and this time (they hope) dragging Europe in with them.

Worldwide protests are planned for this Saturday to mark the 2nd Anniversary of the invasion of Iraq. Find an event in your vicinity here or here or maybe here.

Tags: March 19

From Howard Kurtz:

In an interview, Fox's executive daytime producer, Jerry Burke, says: "I encourage the anchors to be themselves. I'm certainly not going to step in and censor an anchor on any issue. . . . You don't want to look at a cookie-cutter, force-feeding of the same items hour after hour. I think that's part of the success of the channel, not treating our anchors like drones. They're, number one, Americans, and number two, human beings, as well as journalists."

From the Financial Times: Venezuela restocks its arsenal

"It's an orgy of corruption," said Roger Pardo-Maurer, deputy assistant secretary for western hemisphere affairs at the US Department of Defense.

Mr Chávez responded last month that the US had no moral authority to make such complaints because it "lied" about the existence of weapons of mass destruction as the principal justification for the invasion of Iraq.

Given the recent history of no bid contracts, unaccounted for funds, etc... these kind of statements coming from the DOD are pretty hard to swallow. Then again, this is pretty much standard operating procedure, just smile and say whatever "needs" to be said and hope nobody notices the hypocrisy and mendacity.

There's been a fair amount of discussion lately about just how close to fascism the US has descended and one argument against calling our present system fascism is the relative lack of overtly rascist organized activities such as the KKK in the 20's etc... The point has some validity but I wonder just how integral rascism is to fascism. Couldn't the role of rascism be filled by religious or cultural hatred and division. Maybe something like this: Jihad Watch.

Here's part of what they claim to be about:

Because the West is facing a concerted effort by Islamic jihadists, the motives and goals of whom are largely ignored by the Western media, to destroy the West and bring it forcibly into the Islamic world -- and to commit violence to that end even while their overall goal remains out of reach. That effort goes under the general rubric of jihad.

Who made these guys the defenders of the West? Does Michael Jackson belong to the West?

Looking for a certain ratio
Someone must have left it underneath the carpet
Looking up and down the radio
Oh, oh, nothing there this time
Looking for a certain ratio
Someone said they saw it parking in a car lot
Looking up and down the radio
Oh, oh, nothing there this time
Going back down to the rodeo
Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, here we go!

We are the table the captain’s table
let’s get it understood Let’s get it understood
We are the losers we are the cruisers
let’s get it understood Let’s get it understood
We are the diners the final diners
let’s get it understood Let’s get it understood
Most of us are tinkers, some of us tailors
And we’ve got candlesticks and lots of cocktail sticks
We saw the lovers the modern lovers and they looked very good
They looked as if they could
We are the neighbours the nosy neighbours we think just like you would
We think just like you should.

Brian Eno, The True Wheel

I have no idea what these words actually mean, or if they are even supposed to mean anything besides being a plug for The Modern Lovers. I do remember reading an interview with Eno many years ago in which he boasted that he chose the words for his lyrics purely for their sound not their meaning. At any rate this song has always appealed to me for what it suggests and evokes, and since a name for this blog was proving elusive...

Tags: Eno