Saturday, September 26, 2020

That deep corruption in Iraq

 

Protests continue in Iraq.  Almost a year of protests in Iraq, in fact, a few days from one full year of protesting.  The protesters have been targeted, threatened, wounded and killed.  But they have continued to protest.  They have raised awareness, made demands and brought down prime minister Adel Abdul Mahdi -- the US CIA's personal choice for prime minister since 2006.  

Mustafa al-Kadhimi is the current prime minister and he's promised a lot.  Some of his friends in the press -- he's a former journalist -- pretend like he's delivered a great deal since May 7th (when he became prime minister) but that's not really true.  Take early elections.  He's promised them.  His words say that they will take place on June 6th.


Those are lovely words -- with an emphasis on words.


There's still no election law and there's no push for it.  There's no movement on this issue.  


Even if there were movement, not everyone feels Mustafa's efforts or 'efforts' are enough.  Hayder al-Shakeri (ALJAZEERA) points out:

While some have welcomed the announcement, many Iraqis are worried holding yet another election without major reforms, especially to laws that guide the electoral process, will not result in a free, fair and transparent vote in which independent candidates or new political forces would actually stand a chance.

In 2003, Iraqis were told they would be allowed to decide their own destiny. In 2005, a constitution was drafted which was supposed to lay the foundations of a democratic regime and citizens were finally allowed to vote in free elections, thus putting an end to authoritarian rule and injustice. Or so they thought.

However, what many Iraqis did not know at the time was the ethno-sectarian muhasasa system installed in Iraq by the United States and its allies would lead to the entrenchment of a corrupt political elite which itself would start abusing power.

The system, which divides cabinet and parliamentary seats along sectarian lines, was set up to supposedly accommodate historically marginalised groups. However, this system ended up allowing sectarian parties to entrench themselves and distribute among their elite government positions and state resources.

The parliamentary elections that have taken place since 2005 have not brought about the necessary change in power. Instead, they have only served to bring illusory legitimacy to a political elite that is increasingly corrupt, detached from the general population, and unaccountable.

The lack of change on the political scene, the deteriorating socioeconomic conditions in the country, and the growing record of electoral violations have left Iraqis disillusioned with the electoral process. The 2018 parliamentary vote saw the lowest turnout since 2005 – 44 percent. If there is no radical change in the political set-up of the country and relevant laws, the election planned for 2021 will probably see an even lower turnout.

When the Iraqi protests erupted in October 2019, one of the main demands quickly became the passing of legislation to curb the power of establishment parties and the de-politicisation of the Independent High Electoral Commission (IHEC) in order to allow for fair competition at the polls. But changes that have been made are inadequate while existing laws have too many loopholes or are too difficult to enforce to guarantee fair elections.

In December 2019, the parliament voted to amend the electoral law which now allows voters to choose individual candidates rather than party lists and establishes voting on a district, rather than provincial level. Although the amended law was meant to curb the power of establishment parties, protesters and experts have already criticised it for its dysfunctionality and loopholes.

For example, the borders of the electoral districts will be decided by the same powerful parties the law is supposed to weaken. They can draw the district map in such a way as to maintain ethno-sectarian divisions and maximise their votes.


They didn't protest to re-elect people to carry out the same problems and abuses.



Meanwhile Omar Sattar insists at AL-MONITOR:


Since he took office in May, Iraqi Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi has made a series of changes in senior and sensitive security positions to improve the security institutions’ performance. The moves have raised concerns in various political blocs that see these changes as strengthening Kadhimi's power.

Among the most prominent changes was the reinstatement of Lt. Gen. Abdul-Wahab al-Saadi — who had been dismissed in 2019 by Prime Minister Adel Abdul Mahdi — to lead the counterterrorism agency. Kadhimi also appointed former Interior Minister Qasim al-Araji as national security adviser, replacing Popular Mobilization Units (PMU) head Faleh al-Fayadh. Fayadh also was replaced as head of the National Security Agency by Gen. Abdul-Ghani al-Asadi, a former commander of the antiterrorism agency.

Kadhimi appointed Gen. Arqan Watout as the manager of the intelligence department protecting public facilities and figures. Also, former Defense Minister Khalid al-Obeidi was appointed as head of the operations center in the Iraqi National Intelligence Service; Maj. Gen. Maan al-Saad was appointed as commander of the air force, succeeding Lt. Gen. Jabbar Kadhim; and Maj. Gen. Hamid al-Zuhairi was placed in charge of protecting public facilities. 

A source close to Kadhimi told Al-Monitor, “Kadhimi seeks to save the security institutions from political and partisan conflicts and to develop their capabilities by appointing competent leaders."



Those are sweet words, Oma.  But the words I'm not finding in your column, Omar, are these: "Mustafa, the man I'm writing about, is a former columnist and editor at AL-MONITOR."  Kind of sad that you left those words out.

And until AL-MONITOR can start being truthful with its readers, all the easy and soft coverage of Mustafa will be seen as the garbage and nonsense it truly is.



Oh, well, at least Iraq has President Barham Salih, right?  As the United Nations notes, he addressed them this week:

“If we have defeated the terrorists militarily, the war is far from won,” the President told the Assembly’s annual debate, being held virtually this year due to the coronavirus pandemic. Indeed, he said, Iraq’s war against terrorism was continuing.  

Mr. Salih warned against underestimating the danger of terrorism and stressed the all too real possibilities “of its return and the reorganization of its ranks”, and added that “any complacency, or preoccupation with conflicts in the region, will be an outlet for the return of these deadly groups.” 

Rampant corruption  

He went on to denounce the “rampant corruption and interference” that had harmed his country’s national sovereignty. Such acts would also impede Iraq’s efforts to combat terrorism and extremism. 

Mr. Salih stressed the need to isolate the corrupt elements involved in capital flight. Faced with the scourge of corruption, the President called for the creation of an international coalition on the model of the coalition against terrorism. 

He further urged the international community to stand with Iraq so that the crimes committed against the Yazidis, including the crimes of genocide, do not happen again. He detailed his recent meeting with Yazidi women, during which they told him of “the indescribable suffering” they continue to endure. 


Rampant corruption is a problem.  Especially corruption that leads to arresting journalists. Maybe crooked Salih could speak about that?  On the day he addressed the UN, The Committee To Protect Journalists issued the following:

New York, September 23, 2020 – Kurdish authorities in Iraq should immediately release journalist Bahroz Jaafer, drop all charges against him, and allow the press to cover and write critically about politicians without fear of detention or legal action, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today.

Yesterday, police arrested Jaafer, a columnist for the independent news website Peyser Press, in the northeastern Iraqi Kurdish city of Sulaymaniyah and transferred him to the Azmar police station, where he remains in detention, according to news reports and a statement by the Metro Center for Journalists’ Rights and Advocacy, a local press freedom group.

Authorities charged Jaafer with criminal defamation, according to the Metro Center. If tried and convicted under Article 433 of Iraq’s penal code, Jaafer could face up to one year in jail and a fine of up to 100 dinars (about 8 US cents).

The arrest was sparked by a defamation complaint filed by the lawyer of Iraqi President Barham Salih, in response to a column by Jaafer criticizing the president, according to those reports.

“Iraqi authorities should develop a thicker skin and stop resorting to the criminal code to stifle critical reporting and commentary,” said CPJ’s Middle East and North Africa representative, Ignacio Miguel Delgado. “Iraqi President Salih should immediately drop the defamation complaint against journalist Bahroz Jaafer, and local authorities should release him unconditionally.”

On August 29, Jaafer published a column titled “How much longer will the president be driving the wrong side?” in which he criticized Salih, also an ethnic Kurd, for allegedly failing to support Iraqi Kurdistan amid disputes with the national government over land, oil, and the autonomous region’s budget.

Karwan Anwar, head of the Sulaymaniyah branch of the government-funded Kurdistan Journalists’ Syndicate, told local broadcaster Rudaw that Jaafer, a member of the syndicate, is required to remain in detention until a hearing scheduled for September 30, unless he is granted bail beforehand.

The Iraqi president’s media office did not immediately reply to CPJ’s request for comment sent via messaging app. Dindar Zebari, the Kurdish regional government’s coordinator for international advocacy, did not immediately reply to CPJ’s emailed request for comment.



Salih needs to go.   PUK trash, that's all he is.  The entire PUK is not trash.  They have many fine members.  But their top leadership has been trash.  That especially includes Jalal Talabani and Hero Talabani.  Jalal is dead, thankfully.  He screwed over the country and did so because of Joe Biden.  Iraq was in a  recarious situation and thug Nouri al-Maliki was making things worse.  Joe Biden had led on The Erbil Agreement that gave Nouri a second term after the Iraqi voters said no.  That legal contract was only agreed to by party leaders due to concessions made to them -- a national security position for Ayad Allawi, Article 140 of the Iraqi Constitution being implemented finally (the Kurds want control of oil-rich Kirkuk as does the Baghdad-based government), etc.  Nouri used the contract to get a second term and then announces through his spokesperson that he won't follow it because it's illegal -- announces that after he has used it to get the second term.  

As we noted in real time, the Iraqi people trusted in the ballot box and were let down.  Now they turned to their leaders.  Amar al-Hakim, Ayad Allawi, Mostada al-Sadr, the Barzanis, etc got together and gave Nouri an ultimatum -- implement The Erbil Agreement or be ousted by a no-confidence vote. This was a completely legal move.  And Moqtada did everything to give Nouri an out -- he publicly warned him repeatedly.  Nouri wouldn't listen.  Per the Constitution, they got signatures calling for a no-confidence vote.  Per the Constitution, they turned them over to the president of Iraq.  That was Jalal Talabani.  Per Joe Biden, Jalal refused to follow the Constitution and read them in a session of Parliament.  Instead, Jalal created the power of calling signers and intimidating them into saying they wouldn't sign it today.  Who cares what they would do or not, they did.  They signed.  End of story.  But Jalal was a whore who danced that fat ass for money and Joe was slidings ones in Jalal's g-string.

Jalal disgraced the Iraqi people and disgraced his own family.  So what did he do that May?  He fled to Germany announcing he had to have life-threatening surgery.  Turns out, it was knee surgery.

But karma is always out there.  Seven months later, during an argument with Nouri, Jalal had a major stroke and had to go to Germany for a real emergency.  It would keep him in Germany for a year-and-a-half.  He was unable to speak or to move.  But his wife Hero lied to the Iraqi people, she had him posed for photos (WEEKEND AT BERNIES was how Arabic media reacted to those obviously posed photos).  Why?  So the whorish family could hold onto the presidency.

Jalal couldn't make a decision, he couldn't move his body, he couldn't speak.  

Per the Constitution, he was supposed to step down.  But Hero -- hell, the whole Talabani family -- lied to the Iraqi people.

That's the trash that is the PUK leadership.  And that trash is why they fell -- after pretending Jalal could move and speak -- from one of the two main parties in the KRG to a distant third with the newly formed (and CIA-backed) Goran (Change) Party taking second place.

If the PUK is going to continue, it needs to address the corruption at the top.  That's Salih, that's the entire Talabani family.

The following sites updated (plus Mike's "THE BOYS" -- he posted that earlier today and has posted a Jimmy Dore video since):


 





#TheJimmyDoreShow What OBAMA Got Away With.

 


Become a Premium Member: https://jimmydorecomedy.com/join Go to a Live Show: https://jimmydorecomedy.com/tour Subscribe to Our Newsletter: https://mailchi.mp/jimmydorecomedy/yt... LIVESTREAM & LIVE SHOW ANNOUNCEMENTS: Email: https://mailchi.mp/jimmydorecomedy/yt... Twitter: https://twitter.com/jimmy_dore Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/JimmyDoreShow Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thejimmydor... WATCH / LISTEN FREE: Videos: https://jimmydorecomedy.com/watch Podcasts: https://jimmydorecomedy.com/podcasts (Also available on iTunes, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, or your favorite podcast player.) ACCESS TO FULL REPLAYABLE LIVESTREAMS: Become a Premium Member: https://jimmydorecomedy.com/join SUPPORT THE JIMMY DORE SHOW: Make a Donation: https://jimmydorecomedy.com/donate Buy Official Merch (Tees, Sweatshirts, Hats, Bags): https://jimmydorecomedy.com/store DOWNLOAD OUR MOBILE APP: App Store: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/jimmy-d... Google Play: https://play.google.com/store/apps/de... Jimmy Dore on Twitter: https://twitter.com/Jimmy_Dore Stef Zamorano on Twitter: https://twitter.com/miserablelib Edited by Koki Miyazaki About The Jimmy Dore Show: #TheJimmyDoreShow is a hilarious and irreverent take on news, politics and culture featuring Jimmy Dore, a professional stand up comedian, author and podcaster. With over 5 million downloads on iTunes, the show is also broadcast on KPFK stations throughout the country.






Kevin Gosztola Interviews Pentagon Papers Whistleblower Daniel Ellsberg On Assange Extradition Trial

 

Shadowproof managing editor Kevin Gosztola interviews Pentagon Papers Daniel Ellsberg, who testified during the second week of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange's extradition trial. Gosztola draws a parallel between Ellsberg's case and the mental health evidence that was presented by the defense in the third week. He has Ellsberg comment on the questions he received from lead prosecutor James Lewis. Later in the interview, Ellsberg addresses the U.S. Espionage Act, how far the Trump Justice Department thinks they can go in prosecuting Assange, and how the law was deployed against him. Gosztola and Ellsberg conclude with some discussion on the political nature of this unprecedented prosecution.










#AmericanSniper #TheHurtLocker Is There An Iraq War Genre?


Listen to our podcast go deeper on Iraq War Films: https://bit.ly/3ctSY1e World War Two movies are a genre by themselves. Same with Vietnam war films. But why is it much harder to point out what the Iraq War genre is? Let’s take a look at some prominent films about the American military in the Middle East and see if we can find out just what makes an Iraq War movie. Twitter: https://bit.ly/2JPgFT2 Patreon: http://bit.ly/1UaO9MU #IraqWar #AmericanSniper #TheHurtLocker


 





The Left Is No Longer ANTI-WAR, What Changed To Flip Their Position??

 

Tim, Ian, and guest Cassandra Fairbanks (@CassandraRules on Twitter) discuss what events catalyzed the left's shift to being the pro-war party. Merch - teespring.com/stores/timcast-2 Podcast available on iTunes and Spotify, coming soon to all podcast platforms!



What Trump and Biden Should Have Done in War on Vietnam

 

What Trump and Biden Should Have Done in War on Vietnam
By David Swanson
https://davidswanson.org/what-trump-and-biden-should-have-done-in-war-on-vietnam/

Donald Trump and Joe Biden were athletes who got deferments and dubious medical-based exemptions to participating in the mass slaughter of Vietnamese, Laotian, and Cambodian men, women, and children.

The common criticism of one or the other of them, based on partisan loyalty, is that he should have participated in mass murder. Questioning this notion results, most often, in ad hominem attacks against the questioner: but you weren’t there, you can’t know what you would have done, etc.

But we know what thousands of young men did: they refused to go. Many chose not to use available deferments, preferring to refuse to go.

On October 8th, you’ll be able to screen online the film The Boys Who Said No.

Why would people risk 5 years in prison to take a stand against mass murder?

Were they all losers and suckers, as Trump might claim?

Watch the movie and see what you think. Listen to them speaking for themselves. They made a conscious and deliberate moral choice, and articulated it clearly and persuasively. It was a publicly knowable option that Trump and Biden chose not to take.

Dan Ellsberg visited a draft resister in prison and was inspired if not shamed into releasing the Pentagon Papers. Neither Trump nor Biden seems to have been moved in any way.

A young man in the film who could have failed a physical, just like Trump and Biden, chose instead to refuse the draft, explaining that he wasn’t dodging anything, he was confronting it.

Draft refusal was often inspired by the courageous nonviolent activism of the Civil Rights Movement — a movement critically birthed by nonviolent actions against segregation within prisons taken by resisters to World War II. Many in the movement for peace and justice at the time of the American War, as the Vietnamese call it, opposed both racism and war. SNCC promoted draft refusal, and was denounced for it by most of the civil rights groups. SNCC produced a comic book to promote it anyway.

The risk in refusing induction was real. The average prison sentence was three years. Yet the number of people refusing induction grew year by year during the war. The movement to resist the draft overwhelmed the courts. People were not convicted or not indicted as a result of their numbers. 570,000 resisted or evaded. 200,000 formally refused. 20,000 were indicted. 8,000 were convicted. 4,001 were sent to prison.

The Boys Who Said No shortchanges other parts of the peace movement, but does a terrific job on draft refusal, with footage from the time of actions taken and reasons why, of flyering young men outside draft offices, of the impact that had, of the minds changed, of those who refused induction at the last possible moment, of rallies with the burning of draft cards, of blocking buses full of inductees, of the significance of public figures like Muhammad Ali, Joan Baez, and Benjamin Spock, of the actions taken by the Berrigans.

This is an important story well told. Watch it.

But do not draw the wrong lessons.

The film mentions U.S. deaths but not Vietnamese. That’s inexcusable. The U.S. dead were 1.6% of the dead. A 2008 study by Harvard Medical School and the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation at the University of Washington estimated 3.8 million violent war deaths, combat and civilian, north and south, during the years of U.S. involvement in Vietnam. The civilian deaths outnumbered the combat deaths, amounting to about two-thirds of total deaths. The wounded were in much higher numbers, and judging by South Vietnamese hospital records, one-third were women and one-quarter children under age 13. U.S. casualties included 58,000 killed and 153,303 wounded, plus 2,489 missing. The 3.8 million out of a population of 40 million is nearly a 10% loss. War spilled into neighboring countries. Refugee crises ensued. Environmental damage and delayed deaths, often due to Agent Orange, continue to this day. The figures above do not include Laotian and Cambodian deaths, or the deaths of Vietnamese, Laotians, Cambodians, and Americans later from war-related injuries or war-related suicides.

The film does not comment on the draft or Selective Service today or the moves to expand draft registration to women. But many advocates for peace wrongheadedly support the draft as a supposed path to peace. Although a big part of the peace movement they remember was resistance to the draft, they believe the draft inspired the peace movement which helped end the war.

Not only do they tend not to mention that the focus on draft resistance may have contributed to the shift from ground war to air war, which resulted in more deaths, not fewer, but they also tend not to mention the massive scale of the war that was facilitated by the draft.

I am very well convinced that the peace movement shortened and ended the war on Vietnam, not to mention removing a president from office, helping to pass other progressive legislation, educating the public, communicating to the world that there was decency hiding in the United States, and — oh, by the way — ending the draft. And I have zero doubt that the draft had helped to build the peace movement. But the draft did not contribute to ending the war before that war had done far more damage than has any war since with the possible exception of war in Congo.

We can cheer for the draft ending the war, but four million Vietnamese lay dead, along with Laotians, Cambodians, and over 50,000 U.S. troops. And as the war ended, the dying continued. Many more U.S. troops came home and killed themselves than had died in the war. Children are still born deformed by Agent Orange and other poisons used. Children are still ripped apart by explosives left behind. If you add up numerous wars in numerous nations, the United States has inflicted death and suffering on the Middle East to equal or surpass that in Vietnam, but none of the wars has used anything like as many U.S. troops as were used in Vietnam. If the U.S. government had wanted a draft and believed it could get away with starting one, it would have. If anything, the lack of a draft has restrained the killing. The U.S. military would add a draft to its existing billion-dollar recruitment efforts, not replace one with the other. And the far greater concentration of wealth and power now than in 1973 pretty well assures that the children of the super-elite would not be conscripted.

The military draft has not been used in the United States since 1973. The draft machinery has remained in place, costing the federal government about $25 million a year. Males over 18 have been required to register for the draft since 1940 (except between 1947 and 1948, and between 1975 and 1980) and still are today, with no option to register as conscientious objectors or to choose peaceful productive public service. The only reason for keeping Selective Service in place is because the draft might be started up again. While most states’ governments claim that making voter registration automatic would be too much trouble, they have made draft registration automatic for men. This suggests which registration is seen as a priority.

We’re all familiar with the argument behind peace activists’ demand for the draft, the argument that Congressman Charles Rangel made when proposing to start up a draft some years back. U.S. wars, while killing almost exclusively innocent foreigners, also kill and injure and traumatize thousands of U.S. troops drawn disproportionately from among those lacking viable educational and career alternatives. A fair draft, rather than a poverty draft, would send — if not modern-day Donald Trumps, Dick Cheneys, George W. Bushes, or Bill Clintons and Joe Bidens — at least some offspring of relatively powerful people to war. And that would create opposition, and that opposition would end the war. That’s the argument in a nutshell. I think this is sincere but misguided.

History doesn’t bear it out. The drafts in the U.S. civil war (both sides), the two world wars, and the war on Korea did not end those wars, despite being much larger and in some cases fairer than the draft during the American war on Vietnam. Those drafts were despised and protested, but they took lives; they did not save lives. The very idea of a draft was widely considered an outrageous assault on basic rights and liberties even before any of these drafts. In fact, a draft proposal was successfully argued down in Congress by denouncing it as unconstitutional, despite the fact that the guy who had actually written most of the Constitution was also the president who was proposing to create the draft. Said Congressman Daniel Webster on the House floor at the time (1814): “The administration asserts the right to fill the ranks of the regular army by compulsion…Is this, sir, consistent with the character of a free government? Is this civil liberty? Is this the real character of our Constitution? No, sir, indeed it is not…Where is it written in the Constitution, in what article or section is it contained, that you may take children from their parents, and parents from their children, and compel them to fight the battles of any war, in which the folly or the wickedness of government may engage it? Under what concealment has this power lain hidden, which now for the first time comes forth, with a tremendous and baleful aspect, to trample down and destroy the dearest rights of personal liberty?” When the draft came to be accepted as an emergency wartime measure during the civil and first world wars, it never would have been tolerated during peacetime. (And it’s still not anywhere to be found in the Constitution.) Only since 1940 (and under a new law in ’48), when FDR was still working on manipulating the United States into World War II, and during the subsequent 75 years of permanent wartime has “selective service” registration gone on uninterrupted for decades. The United States had an active draft from 1940 to 1973. It didn’t stop any wars. The active draft ended in ’73, but the War on Vietnam continued until ’75. The draft machine is part of a culture of war that makes kindergarteners pledge allegiance to a flag and 18-year-old males sign up to express their willingness to go off and kill people as part of some unspecified future government project. The government already knows your Social Security number, sex, and age. The purpose of draft registration is in great part war normalization.

People bled for this. When voting rights are threatened, when elections are corrupted, and even when we are admonished to hold our noses and vote for one or another of the god-awful candidates regularly placed before us, what are we reminded of? People bled for this. People risked their lives and lost their lives. People faced fire hoses and dogs. People went to jail. That’s right. And that’s why we should continue the struggle for fair and open and verifiable elections. But what do you think people did for the right not to be drafted into war? They risked their lives and lost their lives. They were hung up by their wrists. They were starved and beaten and poisoned. Eugene Debs, hero of Senator Bernie Sanders, went to prison for speaking against the draft. What would Debs make of the idea of peace activists supporting a draft in order to stir up more peace activism? I doubt he’d be able to speak through his tears.

Don’t underestimate support for a draft. The United States has a much greater population than do most countries of people who say they are ready to support wars and even of people who say they would be willing to fight a war. Forty-four percent of U.S. Americans now tell Gallup polling that they “would” fight in a war. Why aren’t they now fighting in one? That’s an excellent question, but one answer could be: Because there’s no draft. What if millions of young men in this country, having grown up in a culture absolutely saturated in militarism, are told it’s their duty to join a war? You saw how many joined without a draft between September 12, 2001, and 2003. Is combining those misguided motivations with a direct order from the “commander in chief” (whom many civilians already refer to in those terms) really what we want to experiment with? To protect the world from war?!

The supposedly non-existent peace movement is quite real. Yes, of course, all movements were bigger in the 1960s and they did a great deal of good, and I’d willingly die to bring back that level of positive engagement. But the notion that there has been no peace movement without the draft is false. The strongest peace movement the United States has seen was probably that of the 1920s and 1930s. The peace movements since 1973 have restrained the nukes, resisted the wars, prevented a number of wars, and moved many in the United States further along the path toward supporting war abolition. Public pressure blocked the United Nations from supporting recent wars, including the 2003 attack on Iraq, and made supporting that war such a badge of shame that it has kept Hillary Clinton out of the White House at least twice so far. It also resulted in concern in 2013 among members of Congress that if they backed the bombing of Syria they’d been seen as having backed “another Iraq.” Public pressure was critical in preventing a war on Iran in 2007 and 2015. There are many ways to build the movement. You can elect a Republican president to multiply the ranks of the peace movement. But should you? (This was tried in 2016 and failed miserably.) You can play on people’s bigotry and depict opposition to a particular war or weapons system as nationalistic and macho, part of preparation for other better wars. But should you? You can draft millions of young men off to war and probably see some new resisters materialize. But should you? Have we really given making the honest case for ending war on moral, economic, humanitarian, environmental, and civil liberties grounds a fair try?

We build a movement to end war by building a movement to end war. The surest way we have of reducing and then ending militarism, and the racism and materialism with which it is interwoven, is to work for the end of war. By seeking to make wars bloody enough for the aggressor that he stops aggressing, we would essentially be moving in the same direction as we already have by turning public opinion against wars in which U.S. troops die. I understand that there might be more concern over wealthier troops and greater numbers of troops. But if you can open people’s eyes to the lives of gays and lesbians and transgendered people, if you can open people’s hearts to the injustices facing African Americans murdered by police, if you can bring people to care about the other species dying off from human pollution, surely you can also bring them even further along than they’ve already come in caring about the lives of U.S. troops not in their families — and perhaps even about the lives of the non-Americans who make up the vast majority of those killed by U.S. warmaking. One result of the progress already made toward caring about U.S. deaths has been greater use of robotic drones. We need to be building opposition to war because it is the mass murder of beautiful human beings who are not in the United States and could never be drafted by the United States. A war in which no Americans die is just as much a horror as one in which they do. That understanding will end war.

The right movement advances us in the right direction. Pushing to end the draft will expose those who favor it and increase opposition to their war mongering. It will involve young people, including young men who do not want to register for the draft and young women who do not want to be required to start doing so. A movement is headed in the right direction if even a compromise is progress. A compromise with a movement demanding a draft would be a small draft. That would almost certainly not work any of the magic intended, but would increase the killing. A compromise with a movement to end the draft might be the ability to register for non-military service or as a conscientious objector. That would be a step forward. We might develop out of that new models of heroism and sacrifice, new nonviolent sources of solidarity and meaning, new members of a movement in favor of substituting civilized alternatives for the whole institution of war.

The war mongers want the draft too. It’s not only a certain section of peace activists who want the draft. So do the true war mongers. The selective service tested its systems at the height of the occupation of Iraq, preparing for a draft if needed. Various powerful figures in D.C. have proposed that a draft would be more fair, not because they think the fairness would end the warmaking but because they think the draft would be tolerated. Now, what happens if they decide they really want it? Should it be left available to them? Shouldn’t they at least have to recreate the selective service first, and to do so up against the concerted opposition of a public facing an imminent draft? Imagine if the United States joins the civilized world in making college free. Recruitment will be devastated. The poverty draft will suffer a major blow. The actual draft will look very desirable to the Pentagon. They may try more robots, more hiring of mercenaries, and more promises of citizenship to immigrants. We need to be focused on cutting off those angles, as well as on in fact making college free.

Take away the poverty draft too. The unfairness of the poverty draft is not grounds for a larger unfairness. It needs to be ended too. It needs to be ended by opening up opportunities to everyone, including free quality education, job prospects, life prospects. Isn’t the proper solution to troops being stop-lossed not adding more troops but waging less war?

There’s also the danger of the path begun with expansion of draft registration to women leading next to compulsory short-term “national service” for all. This might even be done with military and non-military options, though one can imagine what the struggle would look like to try to give the non-military servitude — excuse me, service — the same compensation and benefits as the military.

I recommend that we actually find common ground to what little extent it exists with those who say that we should treasure women so much that we would never send them off to kill or die. Then we should work to expand that admirable outlook to include men too. Can’t we treasure men that much?

We should help find young women and men career prospects outside the machinery of death. Help create the universal right to free college. Repair the unfairness of the poverty draft and the stop-lossing of troops by giving young people alternatives and ending the wars. When we end the poverty draft and the actual draft, when we actually deny the military the troops it needs to wage war, and when we create a culture that views murder as wrong even when engaged in on a large scale and even when all the deaths are foreign, and even when women are equally involved in the killing, then we’ll actually get rid of war, not just acquire the ability to stop each war four million deaths into it.

We need a movement with women and men from around the world to create a global treaty banning all military conscription for all people.

We need a movement to abolish sexism, racism, environmental destruction, mass incarceration, poverty, illiteracy, and war.

##

--

David Swanson is an author, activist, journalist, and radio host. He is executive director of WorldBeyondWar.org and campaign coordinator for RootsAction.org. Swanson's books include War Is A Lie. He blogs at DavidSwanson.org and WarIsACrime.org. He hosts Talk Nation Radio. He is a 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019 Nobel Peace Prize Nominee.

Follow him on Twitter: @davidcnswanson and FaceBook.

Help support DavidSwanson.org, WarIsACrime.org, and TalkNationRadio.org by clicking here: http://davidswanson.org/donate.

Sign up for these emails at https://actionnetwork.org/forms/articles-from-david-swanson.









Kevin Alexander Gray on Do Black Lives Matter to the Democratic Party? - Excerpt

 

That's from 2015, RISING UP WITH SONALI,  but still pertinent.  Kevin Alexander Gray speaks with Sonali Kolhatkar whose "Democrats Mock the GOP for Denying Climate Science, But They are Still Addicted to Fossil Fuel Funders" was published at COUNTERPUNCH earlier this week.


 






If our voices weren’t so powerful, they wouldn’t try so hard to deny them.

 

Friend,

We need all hands on deck to protect ourselves and our communities. One of the ways we do that is by voting for officials who plan to protect Black, Brown and poor lives, protect the environment, and fight climate change.

In 2020, more than ever, we must work to make sure none of us gets left behind.

That’s why we are focusing the 2020 Respect My Vote! campaign on mobilizing the vote across the nation, starting with in five key states: Florida, Georgia, Michigan, North Carolina, and Virginia. We are hosting 10 virtual events focused on voter registration and getting out the vote through Election Day.

Pulling off digital voter registration events isn’t cheap--can you chip in $X today to register voters in Florida, Georgia, Michigan, North Carolina and Virginia?

DONATE NOW

Breonna Taylor should still be alive. George Floyd should still be alive. 200,000 who died of the Rona should still be alive. This year we engage in one of the most challenging election years in American history, but it’s also a year where we have the power to decide its outcome.1

Hip Hop Caucus fights for policies that build our communities up, that protect our lives and our health, that save our planet, and that are fair, equal, and just. Voting is one of the most critical ways to exercise our power. When we align voting with speaking out, marching, advocating for policy, and coming together in community, we can affect change in the laws and systems that govern our society.

This year, we leave no voter behind, as we mobilize for a safer planet and future for all of us.

Chip in to register voters and make our voices heard come Election Day!

For Future Generations,

Rev. Yearwood
Founder & President
Hip Hop Caucus

P.S. Join us virtually to discuss what’s at risk in this election and what we can do to make the world witness our power and influence when Black and Brown vote: https://respectmyvote.com/2020-tour/

https://www.american.edu/spa/ccps/upload/black-swing-voter-fact-sheet-final-7-29.pdf

Hip Hop Caucus

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