Friday, October 26, 2007

USA vs. Iran and Cubazuela

When w.Caesar should be gracefully entering his presidential lame duck status and thinking about who to pardon [whoops, he already got on that with Scooter Libby], he is instead feeding warm, bleeding horse meat to the dogs of war.

From today's Washington Post:

In approving far-reaching, new unilateral sanctions against Iran, President Bush signaled yesterday that he intends to pursue a strategy of gradually escalating financial, diplomatic and political pressure on Tehran, aimed not at starting a new war in the Middle East, his advisers said, but at preventing one. ...With yesterday's actions, which included the long-awaited designations of Iran's Revolutionary Guard Corps as a proliferator of weapons of mass destruction and of the elite Quds Force as a supporter of terrorism, Bush made clear that he is willing to seek such leverage even without the support of his European allies.

I seem to remember the rhetoric in late 2002. Iraq was developing weapons of mass destruction and that despite all the OCD midnight rifle barrel cleaning, w.Caesar only wanted peace, until the UN Security Council wouldn't sanction the US invasion plans making him invade with his ethereal Coalition of the Willing instead of Old Europe.

Life is rarely this simple: listen to politicians so that we can believe the opposite of what they say. w.Caesar is good for that.

Moving on to our own hemisphere, w.Caesar can't stand anti-neoliberal, democratically elected leftist governments in Latin America.

Responding to US Defense Secretary Robert Gates, who said that Hugo Chavez is a "threat to regional stability," Venezuelan Vice-President Jorge Rodriguez affirmed that Hugo Chavez is indeed a "tremendous threat" to the "empires of the world," and assured they would continue to be a "greater threat" as time goes on. "Of course he [Chavez] is a threat to the stability of the empires of the world, for those who consider themselves the world police, for those who think they have a right to invade countries and massively murder the population," replied the Venezuelan vice-president to a recent statement made by Robert Gates during a visit to El Salvador. ...

Gates then warned that Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez was mainly a "threat to the freedom and economic prosperity of the people of Venezuela." According to Gates, Chavez "has been very generous in offering their resources to people around the world, when perhaps these resources could be better used to alleviate some of the economic problems facing the people of Venezuela."


Gates should have said the word "rich" when he called Chavez a "threat to the freedom and economic prosperity of the rich people of Venezuela." Conveniently, Gates ignored all domestic economic and social reform in Venezuela.

I'm not entirely comfortable with Hugo Chavez's desire to have decree power. When he has such legislative support, I'm not sure it's necessary. The USA criticizes Venezuela as being dictatorial, despite its electoral unambiguity compared with Florida 2000 and Ohio 2004 and hundreds of other jurisdictions with Republican electoral fraud this decade. Add to this a steaming pile of soft fascism in the USA and we get a sense of US hypocrisy: w.Caesar's signing statements asserting which parts of legislation the executive branch will not obey, and this tasty list of Amnesty International's worries about the land of the free and the home of the brave that sounds quite a bit like Chile after 9.11.1973:
  • Secret detention
  • Enforced disappearance
  • Torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment
  • Outrages upon personal dignity, including humiliating treatment
  • Denial and restriction of habeas corpus
  • Indefinite detention without charge or trial
  • Prolonged incommunicado detention
  • Arbitrary detention
  • Unfair trial procedures
So then yesterday when w.Caesar warned the world that there will be a transition coming in Cuba [presumably when Castro dies], but Cubazuela responded assertively:

"He spoke like an imperialist and a colonialist," said Venezuelan parliamentarian Saul Ortega about Bush's statements. Ortega assured that the reaction to these threats will be increased unity among the people of Latin America. "In response we have to close ranks in defense of the principles of sovereignty and self-determination," he said.

Vice-foreign minister Rodolfo Sanz assured that the United States was making a mistake with their statements towards Cuba and maintained that the "times have changed."

"We aren't going to sit here with our arms crossed before some diabolic adventure," he said. Sanz assured that the Cuban people can count on support from nations like Venezuela, Bolivia, and Nicaragua, among others, stating that "Cuba is not alone."

The boldness of the Latin American political economic agenda in the last decade is a testament to the recovery of economic shock, terror and genocide visited upon them by Milton Friedman and his neoliberal storm troopers over the last 35 years. Naomi Klein's Shock Doctrine's final chapter talks about how when people or cultures rebuild their communities and name their oppressors when they recover from shock. This is the spirit in which Cubazuela has responded to w.Caesar's signaling of regime change in Cuba. Let's be honest. The US corporate interests in Cuba are legion. Cuba will become the next Haiti as Canada and the US have squashed hope into desperation there.

Words like diabolic, imperialist, colonialist, sovereignty, self-determination and the simple phrase--times have changed--indicate that a Grenada-style hemispheric military excursion into Cuba will not easily guarantee the Republicans' retention of the White House or a recovery of Congress.

Cuba is indeed not alone. The whole hemisphere is tilted against w.Caesar with the exception of business/media elites and the apolitical or ignorant, RRSP-hoarding, gadget-worshipping [dwindling numbers of the] middle class in NAFTAland and Latin American compradors.

And with the record oil profits that w.Caesar has facilitated as he helped oil pass $80 a barrel, he has ended up funding Venezuela's upgrading of its military.

Back to Naomi Klein, however, to follow her thesis: war is good for corporate profitability and the GDP. Peace impairs economic growth. So it might not even matter to the disaster/conflict capitalists that a war with Iran or Cubazuela is just, desirable or winnable. It's just another opportunity to bankrupt governments and shift public wealth to global corporations.

Luckily the other Naomi [Wolf] and thousands of others including sitdownfortheconstitution.org have started what will hopefully be a 54 week campaign for Americans to steal back their constitution.

The rest of our hemisphere better get on [not off!] our asses and support them in their attempt to stifle w.Caesar's soft fascism before it grows horns and starts sending Blackwater mercenaries into US streets. Oh, I forgot. It is already be too late for that since they've been in New Orleans.

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Monday, September 17, 2007

Crossing the 49th: Dangerous for the Majority of Canadians Now

Alison Bodine had it right when she explained the intimidation intent of the Canadian Border Services as they nabbed her the other day: "This was a bit of a test, to see what happens when they arrest someone who isn't agreeing with their current foreign policy."

Carrying literature opposing Canada's occupation of Afghanistan and an extremely threatening book of Ansel Adams photos, she was detained by Canadians. Her possessions were confiscated a few days ago when she was entering the country. When she returned to claim them, they arrested her with no intention of releasing her before her September 17th hearing. After a significant impromptu rally and her participating in radio interviews from jail, it appears the feds' red faces found the gumption to actually release her.

Since the majority of Canadians oppose our presence in Afghanistan, driving south then returning with literature critical of our mission there may land any of us in the pokey.

Border Services claim she was misrepresenting herself. Perhaps she was. Perhaps it was all just a misunderstanding. If it wasn't, it is intimidation...and a warning to us all to toe the line.

And after the agents provocateurs in Quebec last month, the establishment doesn't have a great deal of goodwill to waste here.

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Friday, August 31, 2007

Moving Past Complacency in Protest

Activists need some inspiration. Salutin's piece in the Globe today [see below] is key to reminding us of the necessity of a fight, not just a polite march through some streets to a park for a peaceful rally. That's important. However, the injustices seeping into the fabric of our rapidly decaying democracy need to be challenged radically, in part to wake up a complacent public distracted by Canadian Idol, iPhones and the fall TV line up.

Neglect of social, political and economic for First Nations, the creeping SPP and our recent success in outing the agent provocateurs at Montebello [though we still need an inquiry and a government to topple because of it] all should remind us of what is at stake.

Indeed, the success with the rock-carrying masked cops in Quebec should let us know that the anti-democratic elites running our country are desperate to undermine dissent.

Their desperation is our vindication of the importance of what they are doing and what we need to do to stop them.

Mild social change can be polite. But when elites are transforming our democracies into soft fascism, the stakes are incredibly higher. Perhaps the biggest indication of this is in the USA where habeas corpus has now been declared optional and the population is largely unaware of it and certainly too complacent to do anything about it.

George w.Caesar is not Jack Bauer. In the backs of too many people's minds, I think he is seen that way. This kind of complacency will be our undoing.

Salutin's piece is a welcome tonic.

A Canadian labour moment: Don't apologize, never placate
The Globe And Mail
Friday, August 31, 2007
Rick Salutin

Labour Day weekend, 2007.

Canadian labour had a good moment two weeks ago at the Montebello protest. Union leader Dave Coles denounced three undercover cops posing as anarchists and cradling rocks to give the protest a bad name. They retreated behind police lines, not a normal anarchist tactic. But he went a step too far for my taste, in shouting, "This is a peaceful demonstration." He sounded perhaps overeager to placate TV viewers or police or maybe the people who write editorials in places such as The Globe and Mail. To be sure, it was a peaceful protest, but radical movements such as labour have been most effective when they had a touch of menace.

Uh-oh, I'm having a Dave Coles moment. I don't mean they should be violent or threaten violence. But they need a sense of implacable determination that takes them beyond any desire to seem respectable. The best example is the movement for Indian independence led by Gandhi. He more or less invented non- violence as a political tactic. Yet, he didn't shun violence when it arose and, in cases, courted it. He wouldn't instigate or retaliate, but lots of bloodshed was involved. Here's 90-year-old Baji Mohammed, "one of India's last living freedom fighters," interviewed recently: "On August 25, 1942, we were all arrested and held. Nineteen people died on the spot in police firing ... Many died thereafter ... Over 300 were injured. More than a thousand were jailed ... Several were shot or executed. There were over a hundred shaheed (martyrs) ... " Others, such as Nelson Mandela, went to jail for causes that did involve armed resistance. But I'm saying the key is not violence, it's relentless determination.

A sense of commitment at any cost draws the attention of others, and sometimes their respect, especially if every normal recourse has failed, sometimes for centuries. I'm thinking of the case of Shawn Brant, the Mohawk leader who spoke eloquently for native protests that recently closed Highway 401 and the CN rail line. He was jailed and has twice been denied bail. In an eloquent plea of her own, his wife, Sue Collis, compared his situation to labour protests against Mike Harris in Ontario 11 years ago. Then, she says, "economic repercussions ... far surpassed" those of the recent one, "yet no labour leader was ever jailed, let alone charged." So why is Shawn Brant in jail? I'd say there was an implacability in his expression; he cut his opponents no moral slack. He didn't threaten, but he didn't try to mollify, either.

In its heyday, the labour movement had this kind of single-minded, almost stoic conviction. Its main weapon, the strike, was non-violent but aroused feelings comparable to those during war, toward scabs or bosses. In that frame of mind, there is no need felt to placate the other side and none at all for respectability. What would you want it for?

I think a society benefits from this kind of challenge. It clarifies choices and discourages endless avoidance. Sue Collis writes that, after the Mohawk blockades in June, polls showed "71 per cent of Canadians wanting actions on land claims and 41 per cent of Ontarians prepared to acknowledge rail blockades as justified." There's also a social loss when fierceness and passion vanish almost entirely from movements such as labour or the environment. I sympathize with the dismay of green veterans at the rise as a green icon of Al Gore - who couldn't even beat George Bush in his home state in 2000 or fight the battle of the Florida recount with bloody-mindedness, despite its dire implications.

Sue Collis writes that, after the second bail hearing, she found herself "contemplating the best way to tell my children that they would have to wait an unknown period of time before seeing their dad, and wondering how to explain ... why." From a very minimally comparable experience, I'd recommend playing them a Peter, Paul and Mary song: "Have you been to jail for justice? I want to shake your hand ..."

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Tuesday, August 28, 2007

Maybe John Edwards Has Been a Progressive Democrat All Along?

[Doesn't he look a little bit like early Elvis here?]:
I'd like to think he's been progressive all along. I'd like to think the 2004 run was a time when he had to be just the running mate.

But now that Edwards is sounding all anti-Republican-Lite and anti corporate cronyism, I can't help but think that the Hegelian dialectic of thesis-antithesis-synthesis is at play...from Dennis Kucinich.

Kucinich's messages of peace, multilateralism, progressive values and anti-graft...populist among a jaded American public...have been anointed by ABC's recent attempts to censor his airtime.

The messages are resonating and Edwards is sliding left to pull them to the media-designated top tier of candidates, perhaps only as a wedge to use against more establishment Democrats like Clinton and Obama.

Imitation may be the most sincere form of flattery, but not when you're running for president, I think.

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Monday, August 20, 2007

No to MexAmeriCanada: Vancouver Protests the SPP

Tearing up the Magna Carta

We are witnessing the dismantling of the Magna Carta with the North American Union, The Security and Prosperity Partnership [SPP] and the North American Competitiveness Council.

Almost 800 years ago we somehow wrestled the elites of the British monarchy to issue the Magna Carta, a bill of rights for humanity, optimistically anyway.

Business elites in government and the corporate world are now taking over, completely unapologetically, in an almost Taoist spin. The SPP, against which there was vigorous protest today across the country, is a secretly negotiated international agreement/treaty designed to harmonize and integrate the NAFTA countries. It is not being ratified by the "democratically" elected legislatures in the three countries, nor are citizens able to provide input into its design. There is no national election or referendum on our embrace of it.

This is the height of arrogance, and people are mostly in the dark, thanks to highly concentrated corporate media that fails to exercise its free press responsibilities by ignoring much criticism and playing down its threats to democracy and sovereignty.

With rallies across the country, at times up to 250 people marched and rallied in Vancouver in a coordinated effort to educate the largely oblivious pedestrians surrounding them about the SPP and its threat to democracy.

The North American Union, or Security and Prosperity Partnership, moved one step closer to its anti-democratic formation today as Prime Sinister Stephen Harper decided to not receive an anti-SPP petition with over 10,000 signatures:

The Council of Canadians is demanding that the Harper government cease all SPP talks until the agreement is brought before parliament and the public.

“If they are unwilling to accept paper petitions, how credible is the claim that leaders will view or hear, through video feed, the message of protesters outside the summit?”

I have no faith that the "Three Amigos" will respect democracy. In fact, Mexico's Fox wasn't an original amigo as he preceded the newly "elected" Calderon and Paul Martin was Canada's first friendly representative to this cabal. This is a strong indication of how similar the Liberals and Conservatives are in selling out democracy.

Even the moniker "Three Amigos" has the happy benefit of painting the trio as a group of benign beer buddies shooting pool, having some good clean fun. Maybe watching some NASCAR, perhaps.

So as the Amigos of MexAmeriCanada meet to rubber stamp what their ministers have been hacking together for months now, all in secret with no legislative oversight or sanctioning, we get the odd happy, grinning, hand-shaking announcements from the goodfellas now and then.

Meanwhile, the toxic, parasitical plague virus that is capitalism is Borg-ifying North America with the massive North American SuperCorridor, a quarter-mile wide stretch of movement from Mexico to Canada containing car, truck, rail, data, oil and water transportation. Resistance is futile. You will become one with the Borg. It will be a secure zone like behind the metal detectors at airports and it will convert the pathetic 20th-century attempts at efficient transportation into a highly assimilated movement system. Click to see the images in their full glory!


The top point of the highway is Winnipeg, which will extend north to Churchill and West to Vancouver. And oh, do they have plans from the Winnipeg node. Note the flourish of movement out west and to the Asia-Pacific. This is special because the recent treaty signed between BC and the Tsawwassen First Nation allows land to be sucked out of the Agricultural Land Reserve for parking intermodal containers at DeltaPort.

And Churchill allows us to go polar to trade with Asia.

The Face of Vancouver Protest

The almost 200 marchers flowed through downtown Vancouver late this afternoon from Canada Place to the Robson Street steps of the Vancouver Art Gallery, stopping and blocking key intersections for up to 15 minutes for speeches and chants. The occasional burst of horns lasted only 20-30 seconds at most.



Speeches in intersections reflected how much the SPP is becoming a focal point for broad social protest. First Nations activists, anti-imperialists, Marxists, socialists, civil society advocacy groups, nationalist groups and scores of individuals came together to reject various elements that the SPP is entrenching in our new North American Union.

The march took a winding tour of some of the corporations who now belong to the NACC's Corporate Legislature: Manulife, Scotia Bank, Bell Canada.

They stopped at the Canadian Forces Recruitment Centre to protest our military partnership with US imperialism, smearing red paint on the sidewalk, walls and windows, laying symbolic corpses, and posting large stickers. When protesters and police came too close to each other at times, dueling video cameras from members of each side appeared to document each other.




Some semblance of democracy still exists in Canada, albeit over 2,000 kilometres away from Montebello as Vancouver city policy on bikes and in cars blocked traffic while the protest occupied streets. They also blocked the entrance to the CF Recruitment Centre and other targets of protest, all the while filming elements of the protest and taking notes like the mostly non-corporate media present.

The march ended at the Art Gallery with the Raging Grannies, the Carnival Band, representatives from MAWO, StopWar.ca, and the Council of Canadians supporting a garish effigy of George w.Caesar dangling a Stephen Harper puppet behind a security barricade.

Signs reflected the general mood of the rally: "SPP is Treason", "Stop the North American Union, We'd Rather Be Canadian, Eh!", "Harper=Sellout".

While corporate, government and media elites in North America continue to smooth over the neoliberal globalizing western imperialism introducing us to a well-marketed Soft Fascism, the hundreds of millions of North Americans need to get aware, educated and mobilized.

The Canada-US Free Trade Agreement ended up being the subject of the 1998 federal election. The federal Liberals seized power in 1993 on a promise to not sign NAFTA. They did anyway. MAI died in the late 1990s because citizen groups objected to corporate rights trumping democracies. The lesson? Democracy is bad for business.

After the MAI, though, the corporate neo-feudalists just got craftier by negotiating these agreements in secret, often under the cover of post-9/11 hysteria, ignored legislative ratification and began to alter our whole social, economic and political landscape regardless of citizens' thoughts.

Democracy is something to fight for, something wrestle away from the grasp of the government, media and corporate elites whose 21st century neoliberal, neo-feudal imperial agenda is now marching almost effortlessly over the dying corpse of our democratic institutions. If we don't fight for our democracy, perhaps we deserve to have it euthanized while we're watching American Idol and checking out the best price on plasma TVs at Future Shop.

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Friday, July 20, 2007

Revolt, then Dance

It's one thing to try to stop a "peaceful" country like Canada from continuing its imperial designs in Afghanistan [let alone Haiti].

It's another thing to see traction in your efforts.

Our beloved Prime Sinister Harper recently squeaked out "Canada's New Government"'s backtrack on occupying Afghanistan to virtually no media fanfare.

The thing to do when you want to change the world is to support community. Revolting against oligarchic tyranny is on behalf of authentic democracy and community and social capital.

This is why after a day of civil advocacy and protest it is important to go to someone's home, have a pot luck dinner and a kitchen party, get some people playing music and dance until dawn.

A revolution without dancing is not worth having.

So this weekend, MAWO is having its 3rd annual Hip Hop Festival Against War and Occupation. Saturday in Surrey. Sunday in East Van. This brings the revolution to otherwise sleeping bedroom-community suburbs.


The 8mb poster is here.

I like my poetry. I like my music. I see hip-hop as a vehicle for transforming lives through art and politics. Its power is immense. I cannot fathom its depths. When I was asked to endorse this event, it was an easy yes. I happened to be around for part of the show last year and I saw its effect in a several block radius. Almost mezmerizing.

To know social and political change is to know optimism. To see that as this decade of 9/11 hysteria winds down, sanity is threating to lift its head out of the sand. Having a dance festival to celebrate political gains and agitate for more recovery from tyranny is welcome, necessary and something perhaps containing the power to end the rain in the lower mainland so we can maybe enjoy some summer.

I urge you to find the blocks of free time in your life this weekend, then find those you love and don't see enough of and find your way to one of the venues. And if you have something against or hesitant about hip-hop, open your mind to its power to affect the 21st century in ways that folk music may have reflected in the 1960s.

Wear comfortable dancing shoes.

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Wednesday, July 11, 2007

Police States 'R Us

A 25 km security perimeter is fascinating, as is turning away cars with more than 5 people in them.

But forcing a public centre to not rent space for a public meeting is astonishing.

Essentially, the right to free public association is arbitrarily over.

This is the context in which the new North American Union is being negotiated. Democracy and transparency and civil rights as variables. Welcome to the New World Order.


MEDIA RELEASE
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
July 11, 2007

RCMP, U.S. Army block public forum on the Security and Prosperity Partnership

The Council of Canadians has been told it will not be allowed to rent a municipal community centre for a public forum it had planned to coincide with the next Security and Prosperity Partnership (SPP) summit in Montebello, Quebec on August 20 and 21.

The Municipality of Papineauville, which is about six kilometres from Montebello, has informed the Council of Canadians that the RCMP, the Sûreté du Québec (SQ) and the U.S. Army will not allow the municipality to rent the Centre Communautaire de Papineauville for a public forum on Sunday August 19, on the eve of the so-called Security and Prosperity Partnership Leaders Summit.

“It is deplorable that we are being prevented from bringing together a panel of writers, academics and parliamentarians to share their concerns about the Security and Prosperity Partnership with Canadians,” said Brent Patterson, director of organizing with the Council of Canadians. “Meanwhile, six kilometres away, corporate leaders from the United States, Mexico and Canada will have unimpeded access to our political leaders.”

As well as being shut out of Papineauville, the Council of Canadians has been told that the RCMP and the SQ will be enforcing a 25-kilometre security perimeter around the Chateau Montebello, where Stephen Harper will meet with George W. Bush and Felipe Calderón on August 20 and 21. According to officials in Montebello, there will be checkpoints at Thurso and Hawkesbury, and vehicles carrying more than five people will be turned back.

Founded in 1985, the Council of Canadians is Canada’s largest citizens’ organization, with members and chapters across the country. The organization works to protect Canadian independence by promoting progressive policies on fair trade, clean water, safe food, public health care, and other issues of social and economic concern to Canadians.

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Monday, June 25, 2007

Harper: Canada to Leave Afghanistan in 2009...You Missed it, Right?

Well, after a weekend to thoroughly digest Prime Sinister Harper's speech to mark the end of Canada's sad and waning 39th parliament, I feel moved to grumble about something he didn't bother to mention formally and officially.

I was going to talk about how he frames taxation as slavery from which we need emancipation, despite all the rich social, educational and health services we receive and largely take for granted: "Largely as a result of our tax reductions in budget 2006, tax freedom day arrived Wednesday, four days earlier than last year."

Instead I want to comment on what he said in a rare moment when he stooped to speak to the press. So many emails from the PMO describe Harper's upcoming schedule. "Photo op only" has become scripture.

So instead of in a formal political speech to end the session of parliament, Harper, on a Friday at the end of the week's new cycle, mutters that Canada will leave Afghanistan in 2009.

Huh? I kid you not:

Prime Minister Stephen Harper, who once insisted that Canadian troops will stay in Afghanistan until the job is done, now says the military mission will end in February, 2009, unless the opposition agrees it should be extended.

The acceptance that the mission's lifespan may be limited comes as the Prime Minister faces growing opposition to Canada's combat role in the Afghan south - a decline in support that has been particularly pronounced in Quebec.

"This mission will end in February, 2009," Mr. Harper said yesterday at a rare House of Commons news conference held to mark the end of the spring sitting.


Isn't this major news? The most significant Canadian military mission in decades, the most controversial episode of Canadian imperialism will end because Harper said quietly that we'll stay past 2009 only if all parties in parliament agree.

The NDP is opposed to our presence. Unless they see the light of imperialism in the next dozen or so months, our support for our troops will be supporting them home.

The Globe and Mail covered it on Saturday. Thanks.

But the volitional decision to end our occupation of Afghanistan and cease our imperial agenda there was not plastered all over the front pages of the Sunday and Monday morning papers.

This is a major victory for sanity in Canada. It is also a major reversal of Harper's militarism in the face of growing national opposition to the stupidity of what we have been trying to convince ourselves we could do there.

And Harper's embarrassment over his decision to radically change his entire war prime minister image made him squeak it out on a Friday afternoon in Ottawa in front of reporters, for whom he holds shocking and tremendous disdain.

Thank God for Harper that they haven't skewered him for it. Lucky man.

Maybe Harper's American Idol speech ending "God Bless Canada" has returned to save him from having to blush over changing his over-inflated sense of his military legacy.

The poor fool.

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Sunday, June 24, 2007

Who Wants To Be An Amerikan?

There is a fantastic short film by the Vancouver Film School called “Who Wants to Be an Amerikan?



Someone commented thusly:

“Ive been following this video since it first went on YouTube, and every time i see someone say something along the lines of "this video attack/ makes fun of/ is against the united states" someone asks "why do you think that?". funny thing is, nobody ever responds. im very curious how anyone thinks this attacks america could someone give me a real answer?”

I think it attacks America because it tells the truth that America[tm] is a marketing concept. Disneyland, the Cosby Show, American Idol. The idea of mom, apple pie and lemonade. It's surreal, not real. It also minimizes what a lot of Americans think America is: An awesome place. But it is really a myth covering a reality of 2 centuries of military and economic imperialism, domestic racism, xenophobia, soft fascism, poverty and shattered dreams.

The whole totalitarian game show thing is a separate commentary, I think, on totalitarianism that is somehow reaffirmed by the comment on the postcard about people being more important than places. And America is a place where his father left his family and the son was willing to leave his mother.

And I guess this does relate to America in that lots of Americans love America though they cannot explain why in the face of 40 million without health care, institutionalized racism and segregation still in practice, rampant poverty in the face of obscene wealth and millions who don't know the names of their neighbours in their cookie cutter suburbs.

It's a movie that tells truths that are uncomfortable for many Americans to think, let alone understand.

So many cannot say why it attacks America because they aren't stepping back to look at how their country looks to others outside and inside the nation.

And as a Canadian, I think even without carrying a myth like America, we carry our own myths of superiority to America, but we suffer from similar isolation as well as similar neglect of others' true material, social, emotional and psychological needs.

This is a wonderful film. Challenging, and beautiful.

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Tuesday, May 08, 2007

Canada Races to the Bottom with Pesticides

The Four Horsemen of Structural Adjustment in the global neoliberal world of 21st century corporate neofeudalism are free trade, free capital flows, and government deregulation and privatization. They are the most insidious elements of the pathetic and discredited Washington Consensus development model: neoliberal toadie and current w.Caesar Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson has declared that neoliberalism has not reduced poverty in our hemisphere. Despite this, neoliberalism marches on, and not just in destroying lives in the majority world.

But that doesn't stop minority world countries like Canada from seeking harmonization with its master, the US. Our government regulations on pesticide limits are "too high" because they are higher than someone else's.

Government regulation is bad. If some state has lower regulations, we should all meet their level. Ideally, no regulation is best. Let the market god take care of us all. I sprinkle DDT and Thalidomide on my Mini Wheats[tm] each morning.

But below we read of the necessity of lowering our regulations because that's an inherent good. So much for the race to the bottom being just majority world nations wooing global capital with lower wages and environmental standards, and better union busting. Now we've joined the race.

By the way, a "trade irritant" is an excuse in neoliberal-land for one nation to spank another because the other isn't being as free a trader.

Canada boosts pesticide limit
More residue to be allowed on fruit, vegetables to match U.S. levels; current strict rules pose a 'trade irritant'

Kelly Patterson
CanWest News Service

Tuesday, May 08, 2007

OTTAWA -- Canada is set to raise its limits on pesticide residues on fruit and vegetables for hundreds of products.

The move is part of an effort to harmonize Canadian pesticide rules with those of the United States, which allows higher residue levels for 40 per cent of the pesticides it regulates.

Differences in residue limits, which apply both to domestic and imported food, pose a potential "trade irritant," said Richard Aucoin, chief registrar of the Pest Management Regulatory Agency, which sets Canada's pesticide rules.

However, Canada will only raise its limits "where this poses no risks," he stressed.

U.S. pesticide residue limits are often higher because their warmer climate means they are plagued by more pests, Aucoin said.

Canadian caps are higher in only 10 per cent of cases, he explained, adding these may be lowered under the harmonization plan. Aucoin said Canada won't be raising its limits for all of the cases where its rules are stricter, but "will likely be asked to raise them" for cases now being identified as priorities by growers.

The agency is reviewing its limits on a case-by-case basis, he said.

But Canada should never lower its standards in the name of harmonization, said David Boyd, an environmental lawyer and author of a 2006 study of international pesticide regulations.

"We should look to equal or surpass the best in the world, not only measure ourselves against the U.S.," where regulations are weaker than in jurisdictions such as the European Union, he said.

Canadian regulators and their U.S. counterparts have been working to harmonize their pesticide regulations since 1996, as part of the North American Free Trade Agreement.

Now the effort is being fast-tracked as an initiative under the Security and Prosperity Partnership, a wide-ranging plan to streamline regulatory and security protocols across North America.

The SPP's 2006 report identified stricter residue limits as "barriers to trade."

Boyd's report, published by the B.C.-based David Suzuki Foundation, raised concerns about the levels of pesticide residue allowed both in the U.S. and Canada.

Comparing 40 U.S. limits with those set by Canada, the European Union, Australia and the World Health Organization, he found the U.S. had the weakest rules for more than half of the pesticide uses studied.

In some cases the differences were dramatic: The U.S. allows 50 times more vinclozolin on cherries as the E.U., and 100 times as much lindane on pineapples.

Canada fared no better: For permethrin on leaf lettuce and spinach, the Canadian and U.S. limit was 400 times higher than in Europe, and the Canadian cap on methoxychlor was 1,400 times the European limit.

Both countries also allow pesticides that have been banned not only in Europe but also in some developing countries, Boyd noted.

Methamidophos, for example, is permitted in Canada but banned in Indonesia and other developing nations, he found.

The pesticide is now being re-evaluated in Canada.

Aucoin said residue limits are set according to exacting standards in Canada, adding that differences in ecosystems and patterns of use can account for the variation from country to country.

Raising the limits "will not change the amount of pesticides coming into the country," he said, noting the residue levels on imported produce are usually well below even the Canadian limits.

"The trend in both Canada and the U.S. is to use less, not more," he said, explaining the high cost of bug-killers has prompted farmers to cut back.

The Canadian Food Inspection Agency, which monitors residue levels, has found "a relatively small number of violations" of Canada's maximum levels in recent years, he said.

But Boyd's study also raises questions about Canada's monitoring system.

He noted the federal food inspection agency found residues in only 10 per cent of the produce it tested in 2004-05. In the same period, U.S. regulators found residues in 76 per cent of the fresh fruit and vegetables they tested.

British officials found pesticides in 40 per cent of their produce in 2006.

In the cases of Canada and the U.S., less than one per cent of the residues exceeded the legal limits.

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Friday, April 06, 2007

More "Support the Troops" Brainwashing on CanWest Global

I'm glad I "support our troops" because if I didn't, maybe I'd be a threat to the free world or something. And since I'm not as talented as the 22 Minutes folks who quite effectively ridicule [see "I support our troops"] all the rhetorical sheep claiming to support the troops, let me just say that disagreeing with government policy in Afghanistan/Haiti/wherever does not mean I hope our soldiers there get slaughtered. Unless you're intellectually stunted, I mean.

So here is a domestic news story with a military angle. A farmer has a legitimate disagreement with the government regarding his neighbour, a military base.

It has nothing to do with Canadian imperialism in Afghanistan or the creep of Soft Fascism up from w.Caesar land. It has to do with ditches.

And in the end, the reporter, thank god, lets us know that the farmer still supports the troops. I suppose the alternative would be that because of a ditch problem, he hopes the Taliban slaughter all Canadians in Afghanistan, kill all literate female Afghans, blow up more North American corporate and military imperial landmarks, outlaw anything other than radical Islam and invade and occupy Canada because they hate our freedom. Or something.

The effect of the "support our troops" lunacy is to separate us from them: those who support the soldiers from those who wish them all to die. No. Not at all. The job of that phrase being used in the corporate media and government is to make sure that anyone who questions the government policy of the current and previous political party taking part in the Afghan debacle is seen as someone who wishes the troops to all die. The troops are employees of our government, following orders to go here or there and do this or that, not forcing now 3 prime ministers at gun point or anything to send the Canadian Forces somewhere.

The illogic is astounding. But the continued use of this phrase is part of the Soft Fascism creep of the truly evil people in our country.

And the fact that it goes largely unchecked in our country means they are winning. Its smooth inclusion in this issue that is totally unrelated to Canada's presence in Afghanistan, is part of the brainwashing of corporate media.

It's time to read 1984 and Brave New World again, eh.

=====

Farmer takes government to court; [GLOBAL NATIONAL Edition]
KEVIN NEWMAN. Global News Transcripts. Toronto, Ont.: Apr 5, 2007. pg. 1

KEVIN NEWMAN: They're known as Canada's elite fighting force - highly trained, deployed in a moment's notice with stealth and deadly force. Tonight, an update on a story that we first brought you two years ago. A farmer from the Ottawa valley who dared do battle with Canada's commandos, and won, kind of. Here's Peter Harris.

RON MAYHEW (Farmer): Starting all over again.

PETER HARRIS (Reporter): Ron Mayhew found out the hard way, how difficult it could be to take on Canada's elite fighting force, JTF2.

MAYHEW: Everybody around here thought it was the RCMP musical ride moving in here beside us. Thats what we were told.

HARRIS: He'd owned this land since 1984. In the early 1990s, Canada's secret military unit, Joint Task Force 2 moved in next door.

MAYHEW: I have no idea how it escalated the way it did. I just don't understand it. It makes no sense to me. You're being watched there now, too.

HARRIS: Ten years ago, the government came on to his property and dug these two trenches. Hundreds of metres long, because they had water problems on their land. It's like a creek.

MAYHEW: Well, it's about four feet deep. Five feet deep along here they dug.

HARRIS: And this digging led to piles of clay on his land where he hoped to grow vegetables.

MAYHEW: This is just grey subsoil, grey clay. And when they dug it out, they took it and spread it over, or at least, oh was it twenty, twenty-five feet.

HARRIS: After years of promises and threats to take his land, and nobody cleaning up these ditches, Ron Mayhew took the government to court.

MAYHEW: Well, they jerk you around, I guess. They keep jerking you around and jerking you around. Finally I said, well, partly because of my age, I said I can't continue this on much longer. I want to leave something for my kids.

HARRIS: They finally settled, enough to cover his costs, to repair the land and fill in the ditches that have been left for so long.

MAYHEW: There's the finality about it. That chapter is done and now we can go on and do repairs, do what we have to do, and enough to do what I wanted to do ten years ago.

HARRIS: Despite his fight against the government, he still supports the troops, but is glad this fight is finally over. In Ottawa, this is Global National's Peter Harris reporting.

NEWMAN: And that's Global National for Thursday. I'm Kevin Newman. Local news is next on most Global stations.

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Friday, February 02, 2007

Women: Staying Unequal to Preserve Marital Peace

This is in response to Lidia Lovric who writes for the province. The article
I'm responding to [see below] showed up in today's paper.

Having read Lidia Lovric's previous neo-conservative anti-feminist articles,
it is clear that the implication of her most recent article, "A woman
president is OK, but is the White House Ready for a 'First-Man'?" is that
women should sacrifice their success for the sake of preserving peace in the
household. Because our society allegedly raises men to be insecure, selfish
and unable to be supportive of strong and successful women, women should
continue to occupy subservient roles so as to not threaten their men. Like
most of Lovric's articles, this is disempowering to women and discourages
women from seeking success outside the home 'for the sake of the family' and
societal relations as a whole. The implication of Lovric's article should be
that our society needs to do a better job of celebrating women's successes
and chastizing men for being uncomfortable with it.

Furthermore, Lovric's husband's responses to her prodding about what his
level of comfort would be with her earning more money should be an
indication that he views her position in the home as being less threatening
likely because he views it as less significant than his contributions;
Otherwise, he wouldn't be threatened. This is supported by his remark that
if she earned more than him he could stay at home, implying that staying at
home is easier than working for a wage. Unfortunately, the reason men are so
supportive of women staying at home is because they do not perceive their
role as being as important as men's in the workforce, and thus this is why
it does not threaten them.


============

A woman president is OK, but is the White House ready for a 'First Man'?

Lydia Lovric

Friday, February 02, 2007

When Laura Bush concludes her term as First Lady, it's quite possible that the White House will experience a little role reversal.

With Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton announcing her bid for the 2008 presidency, husband Bill is being touted as America's first probable "First Man."

"I'll do whatever I'm asked to do," said the ex-president in a recent New York Post article. "I am very proud of my wife. So is her daughter. I wish her well."

Although the former president appears to be supportive of his wife's presidential bid, one must wonder how Bill would truly feel if Hillary becomes the most powerful person in the world.

While most couples can't really relate to life in the White House, more and more husbands are finding themselves married to highly successful women with greater income levels or loftier titles. But is it a blow to the male ego?

Political correctness dictates that men today should graciously celebrate the achievements of their partner. Yet, I believe most men still like to wear the pants in the family.

When I questioned my husband about how he would feel if I earned more money than him, he hesitantly asked, "How much more?"

"Double," I replied.

At first, he said it wouldn't be a problem, and joked about whether he would be able to stay home. When prodded further, he admitted that, yes, it likely would bother him a little. I suspect most men feel this way.

This is not to say that men would not be proud of or happy about a wife's success, only that, if their own achievements failed to measure up, some would feel like "less of a man."

Relationships where the female earns considerably more money are likely fraught with problems, whether the couple admits it or not.

Consider the following hugely successful women: Oprah Winfrey, Martha Stewart and Kim Campbell. All have had tremendous careers. Their success on the homefront, however, has been less than stellar.

It's difficult to pinpoint what exactly contributed to the breakdown of their personal relationships. But bruised egos are plausible culprits.

One exception: Women who earn their wealth and fame through modelling, acting or singing. I think it's easier for a husband to deal with this success, because the rest of the world regards such stars as being grossly overpaid and incredibly lucky.

A woman who has conquered the corporate world, broken down barriers in politics or contributed greatly to science or medicine is far more intimidating.

To be sure, there are a handful of men able to live happily in the shadow of their formidable wives. But I believe they're in the minority.

Most men today still expect to be the breadwinner.

They're OK with the missus earning some dough as well. But when she brings home a giant baguette and he brings crumbs, well, it's bound to create a bit of tension.

Lydia Lovric can be reached through her website: www. lydialovric.com

© The Vancouver Province 2007

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Friday, September 15, 2006

A Few Truths

A delightfully eerie piece about American military propaganda is engaging minds at Alternet.org right now. It is called "Rumsfeld's Fake News Flop in Iraq" and is reprinted below. I have a mere few reactions:

Osama bin Laden is America's Emmanuel Goldstein from Orwell's 1984. Not wanted, dead or alive. The longer he is at large, the longer the fear-mongering continues.

w.Caesar can remain so optimistic about the prospects for success in Iraq because his reality is a construct of his beliefs. "Greeted as liberators" has merely been delayed. He believes they will prevail, so the rest of our realities have relatively less sway over him. He is the resolute decision maker. He decides reality in a Philip K. Dick kind of way.

I'm not sure why we're so shocked at PSYOPs being pointed domestically--and I pick it up in Canada too through the dominating American media and Canadian sycophantic replicants. The enemy is one who confronts the agenda. Many enemies are domestic or living among allied countries. In this light, there is nothing wrong with treating the subversives [or cut-and-runners] as they treat their beloved Islamofascists.

Neil Postman's writing about edutainment tracks the increasing difficulty North American teachers are having developing functional critical thinking skills among students. When the government itself is assaulting the minds of its citizenry with PSYOPs, it is that much harder to facilitate a process whereby the public can evaluate the messages we are bombarded with, particularly from government, the corporate feudalists and corporate media.

Burson-Marsteller is the devil's publicist.

Again, we should not be so shocked that exporting a perverted sense of democracy to Iraq includes planted truth-truncated and one-sided news reports: "'The planted stories were "basically factual,' U.S. officials told the Los Angeles Times, although they admitted that they presented only one side of events and omitted information that might reflect poorly on the U.S. or Iraqi governments." North American media continues to imply their objectivity, yet the censorship and bias from such corporate concentration is intolerable.

Soft fascists are threatened by a free press. Hard fascists simply quash it. 1984 was about a totalitarian state controlling information. And to follow Neil Postman's lead here, Brave New World is all about convincing people they don't want to read anyway.

=====



The following is an excerpt from The Best War Ever: Lies, Damned Lies, and the Mess in Iraq by Sheldon Rampton and John Stauber (Tarcher, 2006).

The danger of negative news, according to President Bush, is that it may undermine morale and support for the war, as Americans "look at the violence they see each night on their television screens and they wonder how I can remain so optimistic about the prospects of success in Iraq." But propaganda itself is a danger to the nation, as the United States has long recognized, both in theory and in law. In 1948, Congress, concerned by what it had seen propaganda do to Hitler's Germany, passed the Smith-Mundt Act, a law that forbids domestic dissemination of U.S. government materials intended for foreign audiences.

The law is so strict that programming from Voice of America, the government's overseas news service, may not be broadcast to domestic audiences. Legislators were concerned that giving any U.S. administration access to the government's tools for influencing opinion overseas would undermine the democratic process at home. Since 1951, this concern has also been expressed in the appropriations acts passed each year by Congress, which include language that stipulates, "No part of any appropriation contained in this or any other Act shall be used for publicity or propaganda purposes within the United States not heretofore authorized by Congress."

Economic and media globalization, however, have shrunk the planet in ways that blur the distinction between foreign and domestic propaganda. This has been acknowledged in the U.S. Defense Department's Information Operations Roadmap, a 74-page document approved in 2003 by Donald Rumsfeld. It noted that "information intended for foreign audiences, including public diplomacy and PSYOP [psychological operations], increasingly is consumed by our domestic audience and vice-versa. PSYOP messages disseminated to any audience... will often be replayed by the news media for much larger audiences, including the American public."

This ought to be of particular concern to Americans because the Pentagon's doctrine for psychological operations specifically contemplates "actions to convey and (or) deny selected information and indicators to foreign audiences to influence their emotions, motives, and objective reasoning. ... In various ways, perception management combines truth projection, operations security, cover, and deception, and psyops."

An example of a psyops operation that used "deception" in Iraq occurred during the 2004 preparations for the U.S. military assault on Fallujah, which had become a stronghold for insurgents. On October 14, a spokesman for the marines appeared on CNN and announced that the long-awaited military campaign to retake Fallujah had begun. In fact, the announcement was a deliberate falsehood. The announcement on CNN was intended to trick the insurgents so that U.S. commanders could see how they would react to the real offensive, which would not begin until three weeks later. In giving this bit of false information to CNN, however, the marines were not merely reaching a "foreign audience" but also Americans who watch CNN.

Much of the U.S. propaganda effort, however, is aimed not at tactical deception of enemy combatants but at influencing morale and support for the war in the United States. The Office of Media Outreach, a taxpayer-funded arm of the Department of Defense, has offered government-subsidized trips to Iraq for radio talk-show hosts. "Virtually all expenses are being picked up by the U.S. government, with the exception of broadcasters providing their own means of broadcasting or delivering their content," reported Billboard magazine's Radio Monitor website.

Office of Media Outreach activities included hosting "Operation Truth," a one-week tour of Iraq by right-wing talk-show hosts, organized by Russo Marsh & Rogers, a Republican PR firm based in California that sponsors a conservative advocacy group called Move America Forward. The purpose of the "Truth Tour," they reported on the Move America Forward website, was "to report the good news on Operation Iraqi Freedom you're not hearing from the old line news media... to get the news straight from our troops serving in Operation Iraqi Freedom, including the positive developments and successes they are achieving." Even before the trip began, however, the radio talkers' take on Iraq was already decided. "The war is being won, if not already won, I think," said tour participant Buzz Patterson in a predeparture interview with Fox News. "[Iraq] is stabilized and we want the soldiers themselves to tell the story."

In September 2004, the U.S. military circulated a request for proposals, inviting private public relations firms to apply for a contract to perform an "aggressive" PR and advertising push inside Iraq to include weekly reports on Iraqi public opinion, production of news releases, video news, the training of Iraqis to serve as spokesmen, and creation of a "rebuttal cell" that would monitor all media throughout Iraq, "immediately and effectively responding to reports that unfairly target the Coalition or Coalition interests."

According to the request for proposals, "Recent polls suggest support for the Coalition is falling and more and more Iraqis are questioning Coalition resolve, intentions, and effectiveness. It is essential to the success of the Coalition and the future of Iraq that the Coalition gain widespread Iraqi acceptance of its core themes and messages."

The contract, valued initially at $5.4 million, went to Iraqex, a newly formed company based in Washington, D.C., that was set up specifically to provide services in Iraq. Not long thereafter, Iraqex changed its name to the Lincoln Group. Its success in winning the contract "is something of a mystery," the New York Times would report a year later, since the "two men who ran the small business had no background in public relations or the media."

They were: Christian Bailey, a 30-year-old businessman from England, and Paige Craig, a 31-year-old former marine intelligence officer. Before taking the PR job in Iraq, they had racked up a string of short-lived businesses such as Express Action, an Internet-based shipping company that raised $14 million in startup financing during the dot-com boom but disappeared within two years; or Motion Power, an attempt to invent a shoe that would generate electrical power.45 Bailey had also been active with Lead21, a fund-raising and networking operation for young Republicans.

Shortly before the commencement of war in Iraq, he set up shop in Iraq, offering "tailored intelligence services" for "government clients faced with critical intelligence challenges." In its various incarnations, Iraqex/Lincoln dabbled in real estate, published a short-lived online business publication called the Iraq Business Journal, and tried its hand at exporting scrap metal, manufacturing construction materials, and providing logistics for U.S. forces before finally striking gold with the Pentagon PR contract.

Lincoln partnered initially with the Rendon Group, a public relations firm that had already played a major role in leading the U.S. into war through its work for Ahmed Chalabi and his Iraqi National Congress. A few weeks later, Rendon dropped out of the project and left Lincoln in charge. Lincoln hired another Washington-based public relations firm as a subcontractor -- BKSH & Associates, headed by Republican political strategist Charles R. Black, Jr. BKSH is a subsidiary of Burson-Marsteller, a PR firm whose previous experience in Iraq also included work for Chalabi and the Iraqi National Congress. Other Pentagon contracts for public relations work were awarded to SYColeman Inc. of Arlington, Virginia, and Science Applications International Corporation. All totaled, the PR contracts added up to $300 million over a five-year period.

On November 30, 2005 -- the same day that Bush gave his "Plan for Victory" speech to naval cadets -- taxpayers got their first glimpse at what was being done with their money. The Los Angeles Times reported that the U.S. military was "secretly paying Iraqi newspapers to publish stories written by American troops in an effort to burnish the image of the U.S. mission in Iraq. The articles, written by U.S. military 'information operations' troops, are translated into Arabic and placed in Baghdad newspapers."

In an effort to mask any connection with the military, the Pentagon had employed the Lincoln Group to translate and place the stories. When delivering the stories to media outlets in Baghdad, Lincoln's staff and subcontractors had sometimes posed as freelance reporters or advertising executives. The amounts paid ranged from $50 to $2,000 per story placed. All told, the Lincoln Group had planted more than one thousand stories in the Iraqi and Arab press. The U.S. Army also went directly into the journalism business itself, launching a publication called Baghdad Now, with articles written by some of its Iraqi translators, who received training in journalism from a sergeant in the First Armored Division's Public Affairs Office. The U.S. also founded and financed the Baghdad Press Club, ostensibly a gathering place for Iraqi journalists. In December 2005, however, it was revealed that the military had also been using the press club to pay journalists for writing stories favorable to the U.S. and the occupation. For each story they wrote and placed in an Iraqi newspaper, they received $25, or $45 if the story ran with photos.

The planted stories were "basically factual," U.S. officials told the Los Angeles Times, although they admitted that they presented only one side of events and omitted information that might reflect poorly on the U.S. or Iraqi governments. Actually, though, concealing the fact that the stories were written and paid for by the United States was itself a form of deception. Concealment of sponsorship, in fact, is the very standard by which the U.S. Government Accountability Office defines propaganda. In a 1988 report that has served as a standard ever since, the GAO stated, "Our decisions have defined covert propaganda as materials such as editorials or other articles prepared by an agency or its contractors at the behest of the agency and circulated as the ostensible position of parties outside the agency. ... A critical element of covert propaganda is the concealment of the agency's role in sponsoring such material."

"In the very process of preventing misinformation from another side, they are creating misinformation through a process that disguises the source for information that is going out," said John J. Schulz, the dean of Boston University's College of Communications. "You can't be creating a model for democracy while subverting one of its core principles, a free independent press." When the program was exposed, government officials responded with contradictory statements. The White House denied any knowledge of the program, and Donald Rumsfeld said at first that it was "troubling." General Peter Pace, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said he was "concerned." In Iraq, however, a military spokesman said the program was "an important part of countering misinformation in the news by insurgents." A couple of months later, Rumsfeld claimed that the pay-for-praise operation had been shut down. "When we heard about it, we said, 'Gee, that's not what we ought to be doing' and told the people down there. ... They stopped doing that," Rumsfeld told interviewer Charlie Rose during an appearance on public television. However, he said, "It wasn't anything terrible that happened," and he argued that U.S. media exposure of the program was unfortunate because it would have a "chilling effect" on "anyone involved in public affairs in the military," preventing them from doing "anything that the media thinks is not exactly the way we do it in America."

The problem, in other words, was not that the United States was running a covert propaganda operation. The problem was that there were still independent journalists in the United States capable of straying from the script. Even more unfortunately for Rumsfeld, those same journalists happened to notice that he was not telling the truth when he said the program had been shut down. Four days after his interview with Charlie Rose, Rumsfeld was forced to admit that he had been "mistaken" and that the program was merely "under review." A couple of weeks later General George Casey, the top U.S. commander in Iraq, said the military's review had found that it was acting "within our authorities and responsibilities" in paying to place stories in the press, and that it had no plans to stop.

It is difficult to imagine that Rumsfeld and other White House officials were as naive as they pretended to be when they denied knowledge of the Lincoln Group's activities, since Lincoln's work was closely coordinated with the Pentagon's psychological operations unit, a 1,200-person organization based in Fort Bragg, North Carolina, whose media center was so large that the New York Times called it "the envy of any global communications company." The Pentagon had spent $57.6 million on contracts to the Rendon Group and Lincoln Group -- an amount that "is more than the annual newsroom budget allotted to most American newsrooms to cover all the news from everywhere for an entire year," observed Paul McLeary, a politics and media reporter for the Columbia Journalism Review. Spending on that scale, he added, "sure sounds like well-financed policy to us -- and a well-coordinated one as well -- and not one hatched by low-level officials who never let their bosses at the White House in on what they were doing."

Interviews with Lincoln Group employees also undercut the claim that their work was some kind of rogue operation. "In clandestine parlance, Lincoln Group was a 'cutout' -- a third party -- that would provide the military with plausible deniability," said a former Lincoln Group employee in an interview with the Los Angeles Times. "To attribute products to [the military] would defeat the entire purpose," he said. "Hence, no product by Lincoln Group ever said 'Made in the U.S.A.'"

Another former Lincoln employee openly scoffed at the program on grounds that it was having no effect on Iraqi public opinion: "In my own estimation, this stuff has absolutely no effect, and it's a total waste of money. Every Iraqi can read right through it."

The question, then, is who was believing it? Just who was the United States really fooling? The answer is that it was mostly fooling itself.

Reprinted with the permission of Tarcher/Penguin. Copyright © 2006.

Sheldon Rampton and John Stauber are the authors of, most recently, The Best War Ever: Lies, Damned Lies, and the Mess in Iraq by Sheldon Rampton and John Stauber (Tarcher, 2006). Stauber is the founder and director of the Center for Media & Democracy. Rampton is the founder of the website SourceWatch.org.

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