I Hate The War

In a week of big news on Iraq, it was natural the US press might overlook some but, it can be argued, they overlooked pretty much everything.


They did manage to cover the Tikrit prison assualt.  But, unless their names were  Ali A. Nabhan and Sam Dagher (Wall St. Journal), there's really not much that can be pointed to with pride as they all avoided the issue of the death penalty and the amnesty bill despite the fact that the escapees are said to be death row inmates.  

The New York Times and Tim Arango can puff their chests with pride for reporting that the White House is negotiating with Nouri's government to send US troops back into Iraq.   That does pass for pride these days, reporting that in the 15th paragraph of a story.


Once upon a time, say during the Clinton era, they'd be savaged for that.  But we're now in an era where the press is more in the bag than they were immediately after 9-11 so Tim gets credit for it.  Especially when compared to Tom.  Tom Hayden wrote six paragraphs about Tim Arango's 15th paragraph. 


Or rather about one sentence.  The sentence after the one explaining negotiations were taking place.  Tom apparently missed that sentence.  Which is why Nation readers have no idea that there are negotiations taking place to send US troops back into Iraq even as Nouri barnstorms the country insisting he removed all US troops from Iraq.


Then there was Michael R. Gordon and Bernard Trinor's new book The Endgame.  Has a book co-written by Gordon ever been so sparsely covered?


Those foreign policy and national security types who did manage to find the book had high praise for it.   But somehow the media overall wasn't.


How does that happen?  Oh, that's right. Gordon and Trinor mistakenly believed that when writing about foreign policy choices, you could evaluate them, critique them.  Not in the La La Land the media's decided to live in to protect Barack Obama. 


No criticism must ever crease the brow of the Christ-child.  So it was decreed in 2008, so it remains. 


The spinning and whoring for Barack means that Iraq must never be discussed honestly, in that there is US media agreement.




It's over, I'm done writing songs about love
There's a war going on
So I'm holding my gun with a strap and a glove
And I'm writing a song about war
And it goes
Na na na na na na na
I hate the war
Na na na na na na na
I hate the war
Na na na na na na na
I hate the war
Oh oh oh oh
-- "I Hate The War" (written by Greg Goldberg, on The Ballet's Mattachine!)


The number of US service members the Dept of Defense states died in the Iraq War is [PDF format warning] 4488.



The e-mail address for this site is common_ills@yahoo.com.


iraq
i hate the war
the ballet

Odds and Ends of Iraq

It's pretty sad that Nouri's Iraq can't even provide food security.  This week it's been one story after another of food issues, food that someone paid for but was spoiled or bad.


On top of that, there is the issue Al Mada reported Thursday, the poultry sector in Iraq is suffering from lack of funds, lack of vaccines, lack of everything.  If you could eat oil, this wouldn't be a problem, but you can't eat oil.  All Iraq News notes 25 tons of rottem meet has been seized in Anbar -- this meat will at least be returned and not sold to the Iraqi people.

And September winds down and October gears up which means what in Iraq?  The yearly cholera outbreak.  Alsumaria reports 15 recorded cases in the last few days.  You probably haven't seen any US reports on that either.

It's as though US news consumers get a completely different view of Iraq.


Goodwill's not being built up currently in/for Iraq.  Not because some don't try.  For example,  AKnews notes Miss Kurdistan Shene Aziz Ako took place in the World Tourism Day.  World Touris Day is a UN sponsored event and the theme this year (the event was Thursday) was "Tourism & Sustainable Energy: Powering Sustainable Developement." However, that sort of goodwill ambassador gesture falls apart in a country where the leader would snub their northern neighbor.   Thursday AKnews reported Nouri al-Malik had refused the invitation from Turkey's Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan to visit Turkey.  Ayad al-Tamimi (Al Mada) reports that State of Law MP Yassin Mahjeed is stating Nouri refused the invite because Turkey's granted asylum to Iraqi Vice President Tareq al-Hashemi.  (Nouri heads the State of Law political slate).


It's really amazing to grasp that these things are covered by the Iraqi press but ignored by the American press when Iraqis face so much difficulty and danger in reporting.  For example,  Sunday Al Rafidayn reported two Diyala TV journalists finally released after they had been imprisoned by Nouri's federal police. 

This is an odds & ends entry.  Two more entries are planned but there was a ton of stuff in the public e-mail account that I have tried to work in (including the earlier entries today).   (And there will be a long break between this entry and the next two -- I'm at a charity function right now -- non-political -- and am about to speak.)  Finally, David Bacon's latest book is Illegal People -- How Globalization Creates Migration and Criminalizes Immigrants (Beacon Press) which won the CLR James Award.We'll close with this from Bacon's "The Bloody Price of Colombia's Free Trade Agreement" (Truthout):

Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos has restarted talks with the country's main guerilla group, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), for which he's received laudatory press outside of the country, and a more cautious response inside it. The government and FARC representatives hold their first meeting October 8 in Oslo. London's Financial Times called Santos "a strategic thinker with canny political antennas"' and praised him for establishing "business friendly policies" leading to economic growth fueled by rising foreign investment.
Colombia's key business friendly policy has been the negotiation of a free trade agreement with the United States, begun by Santos' predecessor, Alvaro Uribe. In May, U.S. President Barack Obama gave Colombia a clean bill of health, and allowed the U.S.-Colombia Free Trade Agreement to go into effect. Opening Colombia to foreign corporations and investment, however, has had a bloody price, paid by its union leaders, farmers and social movement activists. Uribe and Santos promised the treaty signalled an end to the killings, but attacks on movement leaders continue nonetheless.
Before it was signed, businesses operating in Colombia (including such U.S. corporations as Exxon and Drummond Coal) already had duty-free access to the U.S. market for most goods. When the agreement went into effect, U.S. exporters of manufactured goods and agricultural products gained duty-free access to the market in Colombia. U.S. miners lost jobs when Drummond Coal began supplying the generating stations of Alabama Power with Colombian coal. Now Colombian farmers and workers are suffering the same displacing fate as U.S. exports flood Colombia. In addition to opening the Colombian market, the agreement also facilitates investment in large mines and other mega projects, leading to the uprooting of rural communities, and the privatization of public services.

The consequences of these neoliberal policies have been devastating for many sections of Colombian society, from AfroColombian communities to trade unionists. In January three Afro-Colombian organizations joined with the Washington Office on Latin America to write to the U.S. Congress, outlining the dangers their communities face in the province of Cauca.

The e-mail address for this site is common_ills@yahoo.com.

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Didhard Mparo explains the mineworkers issues

This is another item on the Mineworkers in South Africa.  Click here for the repost of the Miners Demands.

Mineworkers Declaration, issued on the 22^nd September 2012 at the 1^st Conference- Forward to Socialist Action, Windhoek

The Namibian working class, especially us mineworkers, have been following the events at Marikana over the past few weeks, with undivided attention.

We noted the workers’ struggle for better wages and conditions; the arrogant rejection of their demands by the mine bosses; the treacherous reluctance of the trade union leaders to really fight for the workers; the severe brutality of the police (SAP) against the workers; the silence od the socalled democratically elected government; the false labelling and attempts to criminalise the striking workers; the terrible hardship and poverty of the producers of the wealth of South Africa (namely, the workers) and the stinking riches of the parasites, the mine bosses, who live from the labour of the workers.

Further, we also take note of our own trade union leaders who have up to now, not uttered even a single word about the Marikana massacre; the absence of the trade union (leaders) from the protest at the SA embassy which was held in solidarity with the Marikana workers on the 23^rd August 2012.

Further, we want to express our admiration of the Marikana workers who, despite the death of their comrades, the intimidation of the police and the state, persevered and continued with the strike and today have achieved a victory over the parasites, the mine bosses.

Therefore, we declare in Windhoek today, at this historic first Socialist conference, that we as the Namibian mineworkers will embark on a determined fight to strengthen the links between all mineworkers across Southern Africa. We declare here in Windhoek today that ‘an injury to one is an injury to all’.

We declare here in Windhoek today, the 22^nd Sept 2012, at this first Socialist Conference, organised by the Marxist Study Group, that the demands of the Marikana mineworkers are now no longer only that of the workers in Marikana, but they have become the demands of each and every mineworker across Southern Africa.

Didhard Mparo

For workers at Weatherly Copper Smelter, Ojihase and Matchless mines, Namibia

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Deklarasie van mynwerkers, uitgereik te Windhoek op die 22September 2012, by die 1ste Konferensie, - Voorts met Sosialism-, die volgende.

Die werkersklas van Namibië , veral ons die mynwerkers, het die afgelope paar weke met ʼn onverdeelde aandag die gebeure wat op Marikana plaasgevind het , gevolg.

Ons het kennis geneem van die werkers se stryd om beter lone en werksomstangighede; die arrogante verwerping van hul eise deur die mynbase; die verraadelike huiwering van die vakbondleiers om daadwerklik vir die werkers te veg; die brutale geweld van die SAP teen die werkers; die stilswye van die “demokratiese verkose regering “; die naamskending en poging om die stakende werkers te kriminiseer; die naakte ellende en armoede van die produseerders van die rykdom van Suid-Afrika (die werkers) en die stinkende weelde van die parasiete van die arbeid van die werkers, die myn base.

Voorts, het ons ook kennis geneem van ons eie vakbondleiers wat tot op hede nog nie n word gerep het oor die Marikana geweld; die afwesigheid van die vakbonde by die solidariteit-demonstrasie by die Suid Afrikaanse ambassade in solidariteit met die Marikana werkers op 23 Augustus 2012.

Voorts, wil ons hiermee ons bewondering uitspreek teenoor die Marikana werkers wat ten spyte van die dood van hul kamarade, die intimidasie van die polisie en staat deurgedruk het met die staking en vandag met n oorwinning spog teen die parasitiese mynbase.

Derhalwe, verklaar ons vandag hier in Windhoek by hierdie historiese eerste Sosialistiese konferensie dat ons as namibiese mynwerkers onverpoosd sal veg vir die versterking van bande van mynwerkers regoor die suider afrikaanse sub-kontinent. Ons verklaar vandag hier in Windoek dat “n injury to one is an injury to all”.

Ons verklaar hier in Windhoek, op 22 September 2012, by hierdie eerste Sosialistiese Konferensie gereel deur die Marxistiese Studie Groep, dat die eise van die Marikana werkers nie net die eise van die Marikana werkers is nie maar het nou die eise geword van ieder en elke mynwerker regoor die suider afrikaanse subkomtinent.

Voorts met Werkers Solidariteit!!

Didhard Mparo

Verteenwoordiger van 3 myne se werkers