Peace and Justice Post

Source: War in Context.org

By Scott Horton, Harper’s, October 6, 2007

The Bush Justice Department does have an essential law enforcement mission, though sometimes it seems to behave much more like a criminal syndicate. It warmly embraces the crime of torture as a tool for collecting human intelligence notwithstanding both its manifest illegality and immorality and the uniform view of intelligence professionals that torture consistently produces corrupted, inherently unreliable information. In so doing of course it is engaged in a fairly primitive game of self-protection. It can’t acknowledge the fundamental criminality of its conduct, so it turns the Justice Department into its consigliere. Three different lawyers in the office of legal counsel have rendered formal opinions giving a stamp of approval to a universal crime. Indeed, this sort of legal dexterity now seems to be accepted as a rite of passage for “movement” lawyers—a fact which is very revealing of the new character of the “movement.” It has nothing to do with ideals, and everything to do with personal fidelity. In each of these cases, the opinion boils down to the fundamental principle of the authoritarian state, namely: if the Leader authorizes it, then it must be okay.

Complete article . . .

Middle East Online,

First Published 2007-10-06, Last Updated 2007-10-06 10:27:58

Williams: ‘The region is still a tinderbox’
Archbishop of Canterbury says Iraq war caused ‘terrible damage’ to whole Middle East.

LONDON – The Archbishop of Canterbury renewed his criticism of the Iraq war Friday, saying the conflict had done “terrible damage” to the whole of the Middle East.

Rowan Williams, the spiritual head of some 70 million Anglicans worldwide, also reportedly said that any further military action in the region against Iran or Syria would be “potentially murderous folly.”

His comments came after a visit to Armenia, Lebanon and Syria, where he met around 300 Iraqi Christian refugees at the Ma’aret Sednaya monastery in an encounter which he described as “heartbreaking and harrowing.”

“The events of the last few years have done terrible damage in the whole of this region and many people, I know, do not see the cost in human terms of the war which was unleashed,” he said in a statement released by his office.

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The Independent, October 8, 2007

By Andrew Buncombe and Omar Waraich in Islamabad

The depth of British and US involvement in the deal that helps General Pervez Musharraf retain office for another five years emerged yesterday when it was revealed the two countries have worked to secure a “safe return” to Pakistan for the woman he is poised to share power with.

British and American diplomats have met with leaders of a controversial political party long at odds with former prime minister Benazir Bhutto and encouraged it to show restraint when she returns to Karachi in 10 days’ time. The leadership of the MQM party – which this year was blamed for violence in the city which left 41 dead – has vowed to keep off the streets on her return.

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Counterpunch, October 6/7, 2007

“When the President Does It That Means It’s Not Illegal”

Are Presidents Entitled to Kill Foreigners?

By JAMES BOVARD

What is the common term for ordering soldiers to kill vast numbers of innocent people? A war crime.

But not when it is done on the command of the U.S. president.

Killing innocent foreigners seems to be a perk of the modern presidency–akin to the band’s playing “Hail to the Chief” when he enters the room.

Bush is revving up the war threats against Iran. Seymour Hersh reported in the current issue of the New Yorker that the administration is advancing plans to bomb many targets in Iran. British newspapers have confirmed that the Pentagon has a list of thousands of bombing targets. Hardly anyone claims that Iran poses a threat to the United States.

Yet few people in Washington seem to dispute the president’s right to attack Iran. It is as if the presidential whim is sufficient to justify blasting any foreign nation that does not kowtow to the commands of the U.S. government.

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The Washington Post, October 5, 2007

BAGHDAD, Oct. 4 — U.S. military reports from the scene of the Sept. 16 shooting incident involving the security firm Blackwater USA indicate that its guards opened fire without provocation and used excessive force against Iraqi civilians, according to a senior U.S. military official.

The reports came to light as an Interior Ministry official and five eyewitnesses described a second deadly shooting minutes after the incident in Nisoor Square. The same Blackwater security guards, after driving about 150 yards away from the square, fired into a crush of cars, killing one person and injuring two, the Iraqi official said.

The U.S. military reports appear to corroborate the Iraqi government’s contention that Blackwater was at fault in the shooting incident in Nisoor Square, in which hospital records say at least 14 people were killed and 18 were wounded.

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Information Clearing House

By William Blum

10/02/07 “ICH” — — I used to give thought to what historical time and place I would like to have lived in. Europe in the 1930s was usually my first choice. As the war clouds darkened, I’d be surrounded by intrigue, spies omnipresent, matters of life and death pressing down, the opportunity to be courageous and principled. I pictured myself helping desperate people escape to America. It was real Hollywood stuff; think “Casablanca”. And when the Spanish Republic fell to Franco and his fascist forces, aided by the German and Italian fascists (while the United States and Britain stood aside, when not actually aiding the fascists), everything in my imaginary scenario would have heightened — the fate of Europe hung in the balance. Then the Nazis marched into Austria, then Czechoslovakia, then Poland … one could have devoted one’s life to working against all this, trying to hold back the fascist tide; what could be more thrilling, more noble?

Miracle of miracles, miracle of time machines, I’m actually living in this imagined period, watching as the Bush fascists march into Afghanistan, bombing it into a “failed state”; then Iraq: death, destruction, and utterly ruined lives for 24 million human beings; threatening more of the same endless night of hell for the people of Iran; overthrowing Jean-Bertrand Aristide in Haiti; bombing helpless refugees in Somalia; relentless attempts to destabilize and punish Cuba, Venezuela, Bolivia, Nicaragua, Gaza, and other non-believers in the empire’s god-given mission. Sadly, my most common reaction to this real-life scenario, daily in fact, is less heroic and more feeling scared or depressed; not for myself personally but for our one and only world. The news every day, which I consume in large portions, slashes away at my joie de vivre; it’s not just the horror stories of American military power run amok abroad and the injustices of the ever-expanding police state at home, but all the lies and stupidity which drive me up the wall. I’m constantly changing stations, turning the TV or radio off, turning the newspaper page, to escape the words of the King of Lies and the King of Stupidity — those two twisted creatures who happen to occupy the same humanoid body — and a hundred minions.

Continued . . .

This Can’t Be Happening! Fri, 10/05/2007

By Dave Lindorff

President Bush says America “doesn’t torture people.”

He has said this before. The last time it was when Congress had been confronted with the atrocities at the US military-run Abu Ghraib prison in Baghdad, and was passing legislation that would outlaw torture.

That was when we learned for the first time about the president’s unique and un-Constitutional practice of issuing a “signing statement” upon signing a bill into law, declaring quietly that since he is commander in chief in the so-called “war” on terror, he doesn’t have to enact laws passed by Congress. He issued one of those little addenda to the torture bill, recall, in which he said he wouldn’t be bound by it.

At the same time, he assured Congress and all Americans that he was repulsed by torture, and that America would never torture.

Turns out that was a flat-out lie. At the urging of über-President Dick Cheney, Bush’s new Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, in 2005, wrote up a memo authorizing all the worst torture abuses—simulated drowning, slapping around and sleep deprivation, for example—which Congress had specifically banned.

Keep reading . . .

The New York Times

By SHERYL GAY STOLBERG

Published: October 6, 2007

WASHINGTON, Oct. 5 — President Bush, reacting to a Congressional uproar over the disclosure of secret Justice Department legal opinions permitting the harsh interrogation of terrorism suspects, defended the methods on Friday, declaring, “This government does not torture people.”

Ron Edmonds/Associated Press

President Bush addressed reporters in the Oval Office Friday on the economy, then discussed the C.I.A.’s questioning of detainees. “This government does not torture people,” he said.

The remarks, Mr. Bush’s first public comments on the memorandums, came at a hastily arranged Oval Office appearance before reporters. It was billed as a talk on the economy, but after heralding new job statistics, Mr. Bush shifted course to a subject he does not often publicly discuss: a once-secret Central Intelligence Agency program to detain and interrogate high-profile terror suspects.

“I have put this program in place for a reason, and that is to better protect the American people,” the president said, without mentioning the C.I.A. by name. “And when we find somebody who may have information regarding a potential attack on America, you bet we’re going to detain them, and you bet we’re going to question them, because the American people expect us to find out information — actionable intelligence so we can help protect them. That’s our job.”

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