March 31, 2005
Contest!
Not quite five months after a re-election victory that he claimed earned him political capital to spend, Bush's approval ratings are languishing in the mid-40 percent range and his Social Security plan for individual investment accounts seems to be winning few friends, either in Congress or among the general public.
Pick the correct date and hour at which "Homeland" Security will raise the terror-alert level from "Osama Who?" to "Duct-Tape-a-Go-Go" and win an autographed 8 X 10 glossy of Scott McClellan's anus!
Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, who is chairman of the Senate panel responsible for Social Security, said in an interview with The Washington Post: "I don't think [Bush] has made much progress on solving the solvency issue or what to do about personal accounts. It concerns me because as time goes on, I was hoping the President would be able to make my job easier. We are not hearing from the grass roots that, by golly, you guys in Congress have to work on this."
Well, golly, Chuck. Perhaps that's an indication that you need to get off your dimpled white ass and get busy doing something productive, like ... oh, golly, I dunno ... saving the motherfucking World from certain motherfucking doom:
Planet Earth stands on the cusp of disaster and people should no longer take it for granted that their children and grandchildren will survive in the environmentally degraded world of the 21st century. This is not the doom-laden talk of green activists but the considered opinion of 1,300 leading scientists from 95 countries who will today publish a detailed assessment of the state of the world at the start of the new millennium.
Doing something about it might not be as "easy" as reading the lines handed to you by the White House. But if you're looking for an easy job, maybe you should go stand guard over the Pope's feeding tube, or some shit.
Said Thomas Mann, an analyst at the Brookings Institution, "It matters what you're trying to sell. ... when you talk about Social Security, that's real, that's close, that's dear, that's something people care about."
Good point -- it helps explain the Administration's easy "sell" of Saddam's non-existent WMD programmes. After all, what the fuck do we care how many tens of thousands of A-rabs get buried under our bombs?
Posted by Eddie Tews at 11:20 AM
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Hours after a judge ordered that Terri Schiavo was not to be removed from her hospice, a team of state agents were en route to seize her and have her feeding tube reinserted -- but they stopped short when local police told them they would enforce the judge's order, The Miami Herald has learned.
This is what we need: local police telling Federal and/or State thugs to go fuck themselves. You'd think that the Republican party, the party of "small government", would agree. At a further remove, of course, we need the National Guard and U.S. military to tell George Bush to go fuck himself -- then we'll be rollin'!
March 26, 2005
More Like This, Please
Hours after a judge ordered that Terri Schiavo was not to be removed from her hospice, a team of state agents were en route to seize her and have her feeding tube reinserted -- but they stopped short when local police told them they would enforce the judge's order, The Miami Herald has learned.
This is what we need: local police telling Federal and/or State thugs to go fuck themselves. You'd think that the Republican party, the party of "small government", would agree. At a further remove, of course, we need the National Guard and U.S. military to tell George Bush to go fuck himself -- then we'll be rollin'!
Posted by Eddie Tews at 09:47 AM
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Dr Khalid ash-Shaykhli, a representative of the Iraqi Ministry of Health who was authorized to assess health conditions in al-Fallujah after the end of the major battles there, announced that the surveys and studies which a medical team did in al-Fallujah and subsequently reported to the Ministry confirm that US forces used substances that are internationally prohibited -- including mustard gas, nerve gas, and other burning chemicals -- in the course of its attacks on the city. [...]
"What I saw during our researches in al-Fallujah make me believe everything that has been said about that battle. I absolutely do not exclude their use of nuclear and chemical substances, since all forms of nature were wiped out in that city. I can even say that we found dozens, not to say hundreds, of stray dogs, cats, and birds that had perished as a result of those gasses."
March 22, 2005
Quote Of The Moment #0092
Dr Khalid ash-Shaykhli, a representative of the Iraqi Ministry of Health who was authorized to assess health conditions in al-Fallujah after the end of the major battles there, announced that the surveys and studies which a medical team did in al-Fallujah and subsequently reported to the Ministry confirm that US forces used substances that are internationally prohibited -- including mustard gas, nerve gas, and other burning chemicals -- in the course of its attacks on the city. [...]
"What I saw during our researches in al-Fallujah make me believe everything that has been said about that battle. I absolutely do not exclude their use of nuclear and chemical substances, since all forms of nature were wiped out in that city. I can even say that we found dozens, not to say hundreds, of stray dogs, cats, and birds that had perished as a result of those gasses."
Posted by Eddie Tews at 03:45 PM
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...but the War Resisters League's always-interesting chart detailing the apportionment of Federal tax dollars includes a listing of the Top-10 Pentagon contractors for 2004, as follows:
01. Lockheed Martin Corp. 02. Boeing Company 03. Northrop Grumman Corp. 04. General Dynamics Corp. 05. Raytheon Company 06. Halliburton Company 07. United Technologies Corp. 08. Science Applications Int. Corp. 09. Computer Sciences Corp. Humana Inc 10. Humana, Inc.
Interesting in itself. But the WRL chart also has a column listing 2001 contracts, if one were to calculate the difference in 2001 vs. 2004 contracts, these companies would be ranked as follows:
Total Net Gain 01. Halliburton Company ($7.6 Billion) 02. Northrop Grumman Corporation ($6.7 Billion) 03. Lockheed Martin Corporation ($6 Billion) 04. General Dynamics Corporation ($4.7 Billion) 05. The Boeing Company ($3.8 Billion) 06. Raytheon Company ($2.9 Billion) 07. Humana, Inc. ($2 Billion) 08. Computer Sciences Corporation ($1.6 Billion) 09. United Technologies Corporation ($1.3 Billion) 10. Science Applications International Corporation ($.8 Billion)
Percentage Gain 01. Halliburton Company (1900%) 02. Humana, Inc. (500%) 03. Computer Sciences Corporation (200%) 04. Northrop Grumman Corporation (129%) 05. General Dynamics Corporation (96%) 06. Raytheon Company (52%) 07. Science Applications International Corporation (47%) 08. Lockheed Martin Corporation (41%) 09. United Technologies Corporation (34%) 10. The Boeing Company (29%)
Again, it's probably just coincidental. No need to investigate further.
March 21, 2005
It's Probably Just A Coincidence...
...but the War Resisters League's always-interesting chart detailing the apportionment of Federal tax dollars includes a listing of the Top-10 Pentagon contractors for 2004, as follows:
01. Lockheed Martin Corp. 02. Boeing Company 03. Northrop Grumman Corp. 04. General Dynamics Corp. 05. Raytheon Company 06. Halliburton Company 07. United Technologies Corp. 08. Science Applications Int. Corp. 09. Computer Sciences Corp. Humana Inc 10. Humana, Inc.
Interesting in itself. But the WRL chart also has a column listing 2001 contracts, if one were to calculate the difference in 2001 vs. 2004 contracts, these companies would be ranked as follows:
Total Net Gain 01. Halliburton Company ($7.6 Billion) 02. Northrop Grumman Corporation ($6.7 Billion) 03. Lockheed Martin Corporation ($6 Billion) 04. General Dynamics Corporation ($4.7 Billion) 05. The Boeing Company ($3.8 Billion) 06. Raytheon Company ($2.9 Billion) 07. Humana, Inc. ($2 Billion) 08. Computer Sciences Corporation ($1.6 Billion) 09. United Technologies Corporation ($1.3 Billion) 10. Science Applications International Corporation ($.8 Billion)
Percentage Gain 01. Halliburton Company (1900%) 02. Humana, Inc. (500%) 03. Computer Sciences Corporation (200%) 04. Northrop Grumman Corporation (129%) 05. General Dynamics Corporation (96%) 06. Raytheon Company (52%) 07. Science Applications International Corporation (47%) 08. Lockheed Martin Corporation (41%) 09. United Technologies Corporation (34%) 10. The Boeing Company (29%)
Again, it's probably just coincidental. No need to investigate further.
Posted by Eddie Tews at 04:28 PM
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Our deepest national conviction is that every life is precious, because every life is the gift of a Creator who intended us to live in liberty and equality. -- George W. Bush, September 11, 2002
* * *
In cases like this one, where there are serious questions and substantial doubts, our society, our laws, and our courts should have a presumption in favor of life. -- George W. Bush, March 21, 2005
* * *
Mokhiber: Scott, last night, in an amicus brief filed before the U.S. Supreme Court, the Justice Department came down in favor of displaying the Ten Commandments at courthouses and statehouses around the country. My question is: does the President believe in Commandment Number Six -- thou shalt not kill -- as it applies to the U.S. invasion of Iraq?
Scott McLellan: Go ahead, next question.
* * *
Inference: the life of one caucasian woman -- in a vegetative state and kept alive by life-support for 15 years -- is more important than the lives of 100,000 (and counting) Iraqi niggers.
Conclusion: "Every life is precious" (but some lives are more precious than others).
"Every Life Is Precious" (But Some Lives Are More Precious Than Others)
Our deepest national conviction is that every life is precious, because every life is the gift of a Creator who intended us to live in liberty and equality. -- George W. Bush, September 11, 2002
In cases like this one, where there are serious questions and substantial doubts, our society, our laws, and our courts should have a presumption in favor of life. -- George W. Bush, March 21, 2005
Mokhiber: Scott, last night, in an amicus brief filed before the U.S. Supreme Court, the Justice Department came down in favor of displaying the Ten Commandments at courthouses and statehouses around the country. My question is: does the President believe in Commandment Number Six -- thou shalt not kill -- as it applies to the U.S. invasion of Iraq?
Scott McLellan: Go ahead, next question.
Inference: the life of one caucasian woman -- in a vegetative state and kept alive by life-support for 15 years -- is more important than the lives of 100,000 (and counting) Iraqi niggers.
Conclusion: "Every life is precious" (but some lives are more precious than others).
Posted by Eddie Tews at 03:36 PM
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The military is seeking to rebuild forces, adding temporarily 30,000 Army soldiers and 5,000 Marines. But the war isn't the only obstacle. Rising college attendance and an expanding job market are giving high school graduates more choices. "It's times like this when unemployment is reaching 5 percent that is a critical level" for undercutting recruitment, said Curtis L. Gilroy, director of accession policy for the Defense Department.
In other words, the Defense Department is confirming what many critics of the "Poverty Draft" have been saying: young people sign up for the military by and large not to "serve" their country, but because they've no financial alternatives.
So, same as it ever was: it's Class War. Out enemies are not the lower classes of other countries, they're the upper classes of this country.
Quote Of The Moment #0091
The military is seeking to rebuild forces, adding temporarily 30,000 Army soldiers and 5,000 Marines. But the war isn't the only obstacle. Rising college attendance and an expanding job market are giving high school graduates more choices. "It's times like this when unemployment is reaching 5 percent that is a critical level" for undercutting recruitment, said Curtis L. Gilroy, director of accession policy for the Defense Department.
In other words, the Defense Department is confirming what many critics of the "Poverty Draft" have been saying: young people sign up for the military by and large not to "serve" their country, but because they've no financial alternatives.
So, same as it ever was: it's Class War. Out enemies are not the lower classes of other countries, they're the upper classes of this country.
Posted by Eddie Tews at 09:33 AM
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Airports are pushing the federal government to spend $5 billion on a new luggage screening system that could more accurately check for bombs, speed up passenger lines and save taxpayers billions of dollars.
But the Bush administration has cut back drastically on funding the new system. It says airports should pay for it themselves. More than 50 airports want to install the new equipment but haven't received federal money, even though a government audit says the system could pay for itself in just over a year.
"They are not without the resources to do some of these projects on their own," says Transportation Security Administration (TSA) associate administrator Tom Blank. He says airports could fund the projects by borrowing money and raising fees on airlines.
March 16, 2005
"We will act, whenever it is necessary, to protect the lives and the liberty of the American people."
Airports are pushing the federal government to spend $5 billion on a new luggage screening system that could more accurately check for bombs, speed up passenger lines and save taxpayers billions of dollars.
But the Bush administration has cut back drastically on funding the new system. It says airports should pay for it themselves. More than 50 airports want to install the new equipment but haven't received federal money, even though a government audit says the system could pay for itself in just over a year.
"They are not without the resources to do some of these projects on their own," says Transportation Security Administration (TSA) associate administrator Tom Blank. He says airports could fund the projects by borrowing money and raising fees on airlines.
Posted by Eddie Tews at 03:04 PM
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U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld has asked the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff to cut back military officer education during "stress periods" like the war in Iraq so more will be available for deployment. [...]
"Let's come up with some options how we might shorten professional military education or abbreviate it during stress periods," Rumsfeld wrote in a short memo marked "for official use only". It went only to Myers and Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel David Chu.
Rumsfeld's proposal is already meeting with resistance among the uniformed military.
* * *
A Granite Falls woman who was released from the Army Reserve after only a few months in uniform was shocked by a recent military mailgram telling her to report for duty next month for Operation Iraqi Freedom.
"I thought I was discharged and done," said Andrea DeGeus.
It wasn't so simple.
DeGeus' name was transferred into the Individual Ready Reserve, an administrative roster the Army plucks soldiers from during times of war.
DeGeus, 21, is now struggling to get her Army orders changed. Her biggest worry is 14 months old.
"My daughter. That's everything," DeGeus said, referring to Abby, her toddler.
* * *
As a general rule, 26-year-old National Guard members ought to be some of most physically fit people on the planet. For eight out of the nine years that Randi Airola served as a technician in the Army and Air National Guard, she met that description. Then, in March 1999, in a moment that would the mark beginning of the end of her honorable military service (and the start of a lifelong struggle), Airola received her fourth dose of a compulsory vaccine to prevent service members from contracting anthrax.
The anthrax vaccine given to service members requires six doses plus an annual booster shot. Airola had taken the shot before, so the slight lightheadedness she felt after leaving the doctor's office was nothing for her to get worked up over. The next day, though, while serving as honor guard at a funeral, she nearly passed out. She spent the rest of the week in bed, suffering from an immobilizing combination of muscle weakness, abdominal cramping, sore joints, and vertigo.
Over the coming months, her pain increased, growing so intense that even a daily dose of 16,000 milligrams of Motrin wouldn't offer enough relief to get her through the day. Civilian doctors were baffled by her condition, and though she missed 140 hours of work in a two-month span, she was denied any referral to see a military physician.
Officials in Airola's chain of command shrugged off the possibility that the anthrax vaccine may have been responsible for her condition, and in October 1999, she was ordered to take her fifth shot. She refused, and was honorably discharged in 2000. Not long after, she was diagnosed with Fibromyalgia.
* * *
A Kansas soldier who is on active duty in Iraq is also fighting for his home.
A bank is trying to foreclose on Sgt. Steve Welter's house in Osawatomie, which is illegal. It is a violation of a 64-year-old federal law to foreclose on a soldier's property while he or she is at war.
Welter has been fighting in Iraq since September. Meanwhile, Wells Fargo Home Mortgage is threatening to foreclose on the house where his wife and three children live.
* * *
Veterans account for nearly one-third of all homeless men in America, even though the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs says they comprise only 13 percent of adult males in the general population.
* * *
Tens of thousands of other veterans have returned from war only to find that they have to fight their own government to win the disability payments they're owed. A Knight Ridder investigation has found that injured soldiers who petition the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs for those payments are often doomed by lengthy delays, hurt by inconsistent rulings and failed by the veterans representatives who try to help them.
The investigation was based on interviews with veterans and their families from around the country and on a review of internal VA documents and computerized databases that had never been released to the public. Many of the records were made available only after Knight Ridder sued the agency in federal court.
* * *
And what about our soldiers? Terry Jemison of the Department of Veterans Affairs reported this week to the American Free Press that "Gulf-era veterans" now on medical disability since 1991 number 518,739, with only 7,035 reported wounded in Iraq in that same 14-year period.
This week the American Free Press dropped a "dirty bomb" on the Pentagon by reporting that eight out of 20 men who served in one unit in the 2003 U.S. military offensive in Iraq now have malignancies. That means that 40 percent of the soldiers in that unit have developed malignancies in just 16 months.
* * *
They're overmedicated, forced to talk about their mothers instead of Iraq, and have to fight for disability pay. Traumatized combat vets say the Army is failing them, and after a year following more than a dozen soldiers at Walter Reed Hospital, I believe them.
* * *
National Guardsmen and reservists who are injured on active duty face daunting and sometimes insurmountable hurdles to get medical care, soldiers and military officials told a congressional panel Thursday.
The troops described an Army bureaucracy that loses track of wounded reservists, drops medical coverage before some are healed and often inflicts hardships on families.
* * *
"I can take my animals to the veterinarian and get better treatment than my father got at the Dallas VA. They shouldn't do this to anybody, let alone someone who fights for their country."
* * *
Congressional investigators arequestioning whether the Veterans Affairs Department can adequately help troops who may return from Iraq and Afghanistan with post-traumatic stress disorder.
The agency said that so far it has treated 6,400 veterans of the Afghanistan and Iraq wars for the disorder and that overall, its health care system has provided such services for 244,000 veterans.
But the Government Accountability Office, in a report Wednesday, said it is not clear whether the VA can meet the demands for treatment from veterans of those two recent wars. Agency data for the 2004 budget year show that fewer than half of those using VA health care are screened for the disorder, according to the investigative arm of Congress.
If veterans returning from combat do not have access to these services, "many mental health experts believe that the chance may be missed ... to lessen the severity of symptoms and improve the overall quality of life" for those with the disorder, the report said.
* * *
War may be hell, three veterans of the Iraq conflict told college students Monday, but coming home is no picnic either.
The three painted a bleak picture of a soldier's life in the war zone at a forum at Nassau Community College, saying troops still lack body armor, fly in decades-old helicopters and don't have enough Arabic-speaking interpreters to do their jobs effectively.
But they saved their harshest words for the conditions that soldiers face after returning home. They cited a lack of services and compassion -- both in Washington and among the general public -- for high rates of alcoholism, homelessness and untreated post-traumatic stress disorder among the recently returned troops.
* * *
According to advocates for the homeless, about 100 Iraq War vets are currently homeless, and they expect that number to increase dramatically if US troops stay in Iraq for several years, as Bush administration officials have admitted they will have to.
"Americans think the VA [the U.S. Veterans Administration] is wonderful, but that's a lot of crap," said Linda Boone, executive director of the National Coalition for the Homeless Veterans (NCHV) in Washington, DC. "The VA doesn't have enough resources to take care of our veterans, and Congress doesn't want to pay for them."
* * *
Gulf War veteran Melissa Sterry's voice shook as she told state lawmakers Thursday about the devastating illnesses she blames on her contact with depleted uranium ammunition and armor in Kuwait.
"On the outside, I look perfectly normal," said Sterry, a 42-year-old New Haven resident. "On the inside, my body is destroying itself."
Sterry told lawmakers about her chronic headaches, the pneumonia she suffers through three or four times a year, muscle spasms, chronic diarrhea, blood in her urine and stool and the three recorded heart attacks she has survived.
* * *
Dr. John Caulfield thought it had to be a mistake when the Army asked him to return to active duty. After all, he's 70 years old and had already retired -- twice. He left the Army in 1980 and private practice two years ago.
"My first reaction was disbelief," Caulfield said. "It never occurred to me that they would call a 70-year-old."
* * *
John Staresinich is a Purple Heart veteran who has slept in cracks in highway overpasses and abandoned cars, camped out in thin tents next to railroad tracks and fought off rats and bugs in Chinatown flophouses.
In December, he was diagnosed with severe combat-related post-traumatic stress disorder -- 32 years after returning from Vietnam -- and is now getting help from the federal Veterans Affairs in Chicago. He says it took more than a year of begging that agency.
"Soldiers from Iraq are going to come back with PTSD," said Staresinich, 54. "I hope they treat them sooner than they did me."
Fuck The Troops
U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld has asked the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff to cut back military officer education during "stress periods" like the war in Iraq so more will be available for deployment. [...]
"Let's come up with some options how we might shorten professional military education or abbreviate it during stress periods," Rumsfeld wrote in a short memo marked "for official use only". It went only to Myers and Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel David Chu.
Rumsfeld's proposal is already meeting with resistance among the uniformed military.
A Granite Falls woman who was released from the Army Reserve after only a few months in uniform was shocked by a recent military mailgram telling her to report for duty next month for Operation Iraqi Freedom.
"I thought I was discharged and done," said Andrea DeGeus.
It wasn't so simple.
DeGeus' name was transferred into the Individual Ready Reserve, an administrative roster the Army plucks soldiers from during times of war.
DeGeus, 21, is now struggling to get her Army orders changed. Her biggest worry is 14 months old.
"My daughter. That's everything," DeGeus said, referring to Abby, her toddler.
As a general rule, 26-year-old National Guard members ought to be some of most physically fit people on the planet. For eight out of the nine years that Randi Airola served as a technician in the Army and Air National Guard, she met that description. Then, in March 1999, in a moment that would the mark beginning of the end of her honorable military service (and the start of a lifelong struggle), Airola received her fourth dose of a compulsory vaccine to prevent service members from contracting anthrax.
The anthrax vaccine given to service members requires six doses plus an annual booster shot. Airola had taken the shot before, so the slight lightheadedness she felt after leaving the doctor's office was nothing for her to get worked up over. The next day, though, while serving as honor guard at a funeral, she nearly passed out. She spent the rest of the week in bed, suffering from an immobilizing combination of muscle weakness, abdominal cramping, sore joints, and vertigo.
Over the coming months, her pain increased, growing so intense that even a daily dose of 16,000 milligrams of Motrin wouldn't offer enough relief to get her through the day. Civilian doctors were baffled by her condition, and though she missed 140 hours of work in a two-month span, she was denied any referral to see a military physician.
Officials in Airola's chain of command shrugged off the possibility that the anthrax vaccine may have been responsible for her condition, and in October 1999, she was ordered to take her fifth shot. She refused, and was honorably discharged in 2000. Not long after, she was diagnosed with Fibromyalgia.
A Kansas soldier who is on active duty in Iraq is also fighting for his home.
A bank is trying to foreclose on Sgt. Steve Welter's house in Osawatomie, which is illegal. It is a violation of a 64-year-old federal law to foreclose on a soldier's property while he or she is at war.
Welter has been fighting in Iraq since September. Meanwhile, Wells Fargo Home Mortgage is threatening to foreclose on the house where his wife and three children live.
Veterans account for nearly one-third of all homeless men in America, even though the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs says they comprise only 13 percent of adult males in the general population.
Tens of thousands of other veterans have returned from war only to find that they have to fight their own government to win the disability payments they're owed. A Knight Ridder investigation has found that injured soldiers who petition the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs for those payments are often doomed by lengthy delays, hurt by inconsistent rulings and failed by the veterans representatives who try to help them.
The investigation was based on interviews with veterans and their families from around the country and on a review of internal VA documents and computerized databases that had never been released to the public. Many of the records were made available only after Knight Ridder sued the agency in federal court.
And what about our soldiers? Terry Jemison of the Department of Veterans Affairs reported this week to the American Free Press that "Gulf-era veterans" now on medical disability since 1991 number 518,739, with only 7,035 reported wounded in Iraq in that same 14-year period.
This week the American Free Press dropped a "dirty bomb" on the Pentagon by reporting that eight out of 20 men who served in one unit in the 2003 U.S. military offensive in Iraq now have malignancies. That means that 40 percent of the soldiers in that unit have developed malignancies in just 16 months.
They're overmedicated, forced to talk about their mothers instead of Iraq, and have to fight for disability pay. Traumatized combat vets say the Army is failing them, and after a year following more than a dozen soldiers at Walter Reed Hospital, I believe them.
National Guardsmen and reservists who are injured on active duty face daunting and sometimes insurmountable hurdles to get medical care, soldiers and military officials told a congressional panel Thursday.
The troops described an Army bureaucracy that loses track of wounded reservists, drops medical coverage before some are healed and often inflicts hardships on families.
"I can take my animals to the veterinarian and get better treatment than my father got at the Dallas VA. They shouldn't do this to anybody, let alone someone who fights for their country."
Congressional investigators are
The agency said that so far it has treated 6,400 veterans of the Afghanistan and Iraq wars for the disorder and that overall, its health care system has provided such services for 244,000 veterans.
But the Government Accountability Office, in a report Wednesday, said it is not clear whether the VA can meet the demands for treatment from veterans of those two recent wars. Agency data for the 2004 budget year show that fewer than half of those using VA health care are screened for the disorder, according to the investigative arm of Congress.
If veterans returning from combat do not have access to these services, "many mental health experts believe that the chance may be missed ... to lessen the severity of symptoms and improve the overall quality of life" for those with the disorder, the report said.
War may be hell, three veterans of the Iraq conflict told college students Monday, but coming home is no picnic either.
The three painted a bleak picture of a soldier's life in the war zone at a forum at Nassau Community College, saying troops still lack body armor, fly in decades-old helicopters and don't have enough Arabic-speaking interpreters to do their jobs effectively.
But they saved their harshest words for the conditions that soldiers face after returning home. They cited a lack of services and compassion -- both in Washington and among the general public -- for high rates of alcoholism, homelessness and untreated post-traumatic stress disorder among the recently returned troops.
According to advocates for the homeless, about 100 Iraq War vets are currently homeless, and they expect that number to increase dramatically if US troops stay in Iraq for several years, as Bush administration officials have admitted they will have to.
"Americans think the VA [the U.S. Veterans Administration] is wonderful, but that's a lot of crap," said Linda Boone, executive director of the National Coalition for the Homeless Veterans (NCHV) in Washington, DC. "The VA doesn't have enough resources to take care of our veterans, and Congress doesn't want to pay for them."
Gulf War veteran Melissa Sterry's voice shook as she told state lawmakers Thursday about the devastating illnesses she blames on her contact with depleted uranium ammunition and armor in Kuwait.
"On the outside, I look perfectly normal," said Sterry, a 42-year-old New Haven resident. "On the inside, my body is destroying itself."
Sterry told lawmakers about her chronic headaches, the pneumonia she suffers through three or four times a year, muscle spasms, chronic diarrhea, blood in her urine and stool and the three recorded heart attacks she has survived.
Dr. John Caulfield thought it had to be a mistake when the Army asked him to return to active duty. After all, he's 70 years old and had already retired -- twice. He left the Army in 1980 and private practice two years ago.
"My first reaction was disbelief," Caulfield said. "It never occurred to me that they would call a 70-year-old."
John Staresinich is a Purple Heart veteran who has slept in cracks in highway overpasses and abandoned cars, camped out in thin tents next to railroad tracks and fought off rats and bugs in Chinatown flophouses.
In December, he was diagnosed with severe combat-related post-traumatic stress disorder -- 32 years after returning from Vietnam -- and is now getting help from the federal Veterans Affairs in Chicago. He says it took more than a year of begging that agency.
"Soldiers from Iraq are going to come back with PTSD," said Staresinich, 54. "I hope they treat them sooner than they did me."
Posted by Eddie Tews at 10:46 AM
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If you listen to the presidential debates, you can’t figure out what they’re saying, and that’s on purpose. The last debate was supposed to be about domestic issues. The New York Times commented that Kerry didn’t make any hint about possible government involvement in health care programs because that position has, in their words, "no political support". Well, according to the most recent polls, 80% of the population thinks that the government ought to guarantee health care for everyone, and furthermore regard it as a moral obligation. That tells you something about people’s values. But there's "no political support".
Why? Because the pharmaceutical industry is opposed, the financial institutions are opposed, the insurance industry is opposed, so there's "no political support". It doesn’t matter if 80% of the population regard it as a moral obligation: that doesn’t count as political support.
March 13, 2005
Quote Of The Moment #0090
If you listen to the presidential debates, you can’t figure out what they’re saying, and that’s on purpose. The last debate was supposed to be about domestic issues. The New York Times commented that Kerry didn’t make any hint about possible government involvement in health care programs because that position has, in their words, "no political support". Well, according to the most recent polls, 80% of the population thinks that the government ought to guarantee health care for everyone, and furthermore regard it as a moral obligation. That tells you something about people’s values. But there's "no political support".
Why? Because the pharmaceutical industry is opposed, the financial institutions are opposed, the insurance industry is opposed, so there's "no political support". It doesn’t matter if 80% of the population regard it as a moral obligation: that doesn’t count as political support.
Posted by Eddie Tews at 04:45 PM
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A boy no older than 11 was among the children held by the Army at Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison, the former U.S. commander of the facility told a general investigating abuses at the prison.
March 11, 2005
They Hate Us For Our Freedoms
A boy no older than 11 was among the children held by the Army at Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison, the former U.S. commander of the facility told a general investigating abuses at the prison.
Posted by Eddie Tews at 08:44 AM
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• Hunger in the U.S. increased 24% in 1999-2003, affecting 3.9 million households and 9.6 million individuals, according to the U.S. Department ofAgriculture. Food "insecurity" also increased, affecting 13 million households (Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, 12/20/04).
• More than 51 million people rely on Medicaid fortheir health care, and over 43 million did not have health insurance for the entire year in 200 (Families USA, 2004).
• The Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program budget, at a time of sharply rising fuel prices, can only serve 17% of the 30 million eligible households (Coalition on Human Needs, 11/24/04).
• One billion children around the world lack the shelter, water, sanitation, schooling, health care, and food needed for successful development (UNICEF Annual Report, 12/9/04).
• In sub-Saharan Africa, the HIV/AIDS pandemic has already left 12 million orphans, and continuing high death rates among young adults may cause the labor forces in the worst affected countries to contract 30% to 40% by 2015.
• 150,000 African children die each month from preventable and treatable malaria (Jeffery Sachs, Washington Post, 1/17/05).
• The U.S. ranks last among 22 developed countries in the amount of overseas development assistance it provides as a percentage of GDP (0.15%) (Washington Post, 1/15/05).
• If the developed world increased its development aid to just 0.5% of GDP, millions of lives could be saved from preventable and treatable diseases; the number of people experiencing extreme poverty around the world could be cut in half. This would cost the U.S. about $60 billion per year, less than it is now spending on the war in Iraq each year and a fraction of what it spends on its military (Jeffery Sachs, Washington Post, 1/17/05).
Compiled in the Friends Committe on National Legislation's February 2005 Washington Newsletter.
* * *
Changes made in the Housing Voucher Program have amounted to over $1.66 billion in cuts. Could it be a coincidence that an equal amount of $1.6 billion was added to the homeland security budget, and an almost matching amount of $1.2 billion was added to the army's Comanche helicopter program at just the same time the HUD budget was cut?
March 10, 2005
Guns Or Butter
• Hunger in the U.S. increased 24% in 1999-2003, affecting 3.9 million households and 9.6 million individuals, according to the U.S. Department ofAgriculture. Food "insecurity" also increased, affecting 13 million households (Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, 12/20/04).
• More than 51 million people rely on Medicaid fortheir health care, and over 43 million did not have health insurance for the entire year in 200 (Families USA, 2004).
• The Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program budget, at a time of sharply rising fuel prices, can only serve 17% of the 30 million eligible households (Coalition on Human Needs, 11/24/04).
• One billion children around the world lack the shelter, water, sanitation, schooling, health care, and food needed for successful development (UNICEF Annual Report, 12/9/04).
• In sub-Saharan Africa, the HIV/AIDS pandemic has already left 12 million orphans, and continuing high death rates among young adults may cause the labor forces in the worst affected countries to contract 30% to 40% by 2015.
• 150,000 African children die each month from preventable and treatable malaria (Jeffery Sachs, Washington Post, 1/17/05).
• The U.S. ranks last among 22 developed countries in the amount of overseas development assistance it provides as a percentage of GDP (0.15%) (Washington Post, 1/15/05).
• If the developed world increased its development aid to just 0.5% of GDP, millions of lives could be saved from preventable and treatable diseases; the number of people experiencing extreme poverty around the world could be cut in half. This would cost the U.S. about $60 billion per year, less than it is now spending on the war in Iraq each year and a fraction of what it spends on its military (Jeffery Sachs, Washington Post, 1/17/05).
Compiled in the Friends Committe on National Legislation's February 2005 Washington Newsletter.
Changes made in the Housing Voucher Program have amounted to over $1.66 billion in cuts. Could it be a coincidence that an equal amount of $1.6 billion was added to the homeland security budget, and an almost matching amount of $1.2 billion was added to the army's Comanche helicopter program at just the same time the HUD budget was cut?
Posted by Eddie Tews at 04:10 PM
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One of these two women...
...or both of these two women?
Which Would You Rather Were Your Mommy:
One of these two women...
...or both of these two women?
Posted by Eddie Tews at 03:43 PM
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Tokyo, 1945
The attack, coming a month after a similar raid on Dresden, Germany, brought the mass incineration of civilians to a new level in a conflict already characterized by unprecedented bloodshed.
The official death toll was some 83,000, but historians generally agree that victims unaccounted for bring the figure to around 100,000 -- overwhelmingly civilians. It is widely considered to be the most devastating air raid in history.
* * *
Fallujah, 2005
Living conditions in the city remain poor, with electricity sporadic, municipal water available only a few hours a day, and the city's general hospital located outside areas open to residents, meaning they have to pass through checkpoints to reach it, the UN said.
Residents returning in December said the city was unfit even for animals. Hundreds of buildings were destroyed by the offensive.
In Tokyo, on a single night, the U.S. military killed -- guessing, here -- ten times as many civilians as have been killed by all combined acts of "retail" terrorism (i.e., of the al-Qaeda / PLO / IRA / ETA variety) in World history.
One night. According to Robert McNamara in The Fog Of War, there were many more cities than just Tokyo that were firebombed.
But it's still a mere drop in the bucket compared with the "man-made mega-deaths of the 20th Century" -- which accrued primarily "For Reasons of State".
So if we're to conduct a "War" on an "ism", shouldn't terrorism be one of the lower priorities? How about let's conduct a "War" on Statism/Nationalism, and/or Capitalism/Imperialism/Colonialism.
Once we've accomplished that, we could turn our attention to the small-time players.
March 09, 2005
The More Things Change
Tokyo, 1945
The attack, coming a month after a similar raid on Dresden, Germany, brought the mass incineration of civilians to a new level in a conflict already characterized by unprecedented bloodshed.
The official death toll was some 83,000, but historians generally agree that victims unaccounted for bring the figure to around 100,000 -- overwhelmingly civilians. It is widely considered to be the most devastating air raid in history.
Fallujah, 2005
Living conditions in the city remain poor, with electricity sporadic, municipal water available only a few hours a day, and the city's general hospital located outside areas open to residents, meaning they have to pass through checkpoints to reach it, the UN said.
Residents returning in December said the city was unfit even for animals. Hundreds of buildings were destroyed by the offensive.
In Tokyo, on a single night, the U.S. military killed -- guessing, here -- ten times as many civilians as have been killed by all combined acts of "retail" terrorism (i.e., of the al-Qaeda / PLO / IRA / ETA variety) in World history.
One night. According to Robert McNamara in The Fog Of War, there were many more cities than just Tokyo that were firebombed.
But it's still a mere drop in the bucket compared with the "man-made mega-deaths of the 20th Century" -- which accrued primarily "For Reasons of State".
So if we're to conduct a "War" on an "ism", shouldn't terrorism be one of the lower priorities? How about let's conduct a "War" on Statism/Nationalism, and/or Capitalism/Imperialism/Colonialism.
Once we've accomplished that, we could turn our attention to the small-time players.
Posted by Eddie Tews at 09:22 PM
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Attorney General Alberto Gonzales said yesterday that before the United States hands over terror suspects to foreign governments, it receives assurances that they won't be tortured. But he acknowledged that once a transfer occurs, the United States has little control.
Er, isn't that the sole remaining (if retroactive) justification for the invasion of Iraq: in taking down the brutal, murderous, torturing tyrant we "liberated" the "brave people of Iraq"? Sounds like we have more than "little" control over those that choose to torture their own people, doesn't it?
Huhn, I wonder (and this is merely thinking out loud here) if there could be other factors determining which tyrants we choose to take down? Oil, clearly, isn't one of them -- Donald H. Rumsfeld said so himself.
But seeing as Iraqi democracy has already spread its wings, maybe it's time we got our ass in the gear and got busy on spreading some more freedom before people begin to wonder we've ulterior motives.
March 08, 2005
There's Yet Some "Freedom" To Be "Spread"
Attorney General Alberto Gonzales said yesterday that before the United States hands over terror suspects to foreign governments, it receives assurances that they won't be tortured. But he acknowledged that once a transfer occurs, the United States has little control.
Er, isn't that the sole remaining (if retroactive) justification for the invasion of Iraq: in taking down the brutal, murderous, torturing tyrant we "liberated" the "brave people of Iraq"? Sounds like we have more than "little" control over those that choose to torture their own people, doesn't it?
Huhn, I wonder (and this is merely thinking out loud here) if there could be other factors determining which tyrants we choose to take down? Oil, clearly, isn't one of them -- Donald H. Rumsfeld said so himself.
But seeing as Iraqi democracy has already spread its wings, maybe it's time we got our ass in the gear and got busy on spreading some more freedom before people begin to wonder we've ulterior motives.
Posted by Eddie Tews at 07:01 PM
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March 04, 2005
What Sensible Human Person Wouldn't Want To Live On This Street?
Posted by Eddie Tews at 12:44 PM
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Russia will develop missiles impervious to any defense, Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov said yesterday in an apparent allusion the U.S. missile-defense system now under development.
* * *
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice yesterday told Canadian diplomats of her disappointment over Ottawa's decision to opt out of a U.S.-led anti-ballistic missile shield program.
Now God damn it, why can't the rest of the world just sit back and take its fucking medicine, like we expect it to?
Update, 3/4/05: China accused the United States yesterday of using double-standards to judge human rights in other countries, adding to a growing list of nations suggesting the government that produced the Abu Ghraib prison abuses has no business commenting on what happens elsewhere.
The report lambasted the Pentagon for "wanton slaughters" abroad, belittled American elections as awash in special-interest cash, and accused U.S. courts of deep-seated racial bias.
Some may, of course, argue that "Red China" is not a "friend" of the United States. But the U.S. continually grants China MFN trade status, and imports from China as though there were no tomorrow. China, in turn, does its part in helping to prop up the U.S. economy by taking on billions of dollars in U.S. debt.
March 03, 2005
With Friends Like These
Russia will develop missiles impervious to any defense, Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov said yesterday in an apparent allusion the U.S. missile-defense system now under development.
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice yesterday told Canadian diplomats of her disappointment over Ottawa's decision to opt out of a U.S.-led anti-ballistic missile shield program.
Now God damn it, why can't the rest of the world just sit back and take its fucking medicine, like we expect it to?
Update, 3/4/05: China accused the United States yesterday of using double-standards to judge human rights in other countries, adding to a growing list of nations suggesting the government that produced the Abu Ghraib prison abuses has no business commenting on what happens elsewhere.
The report lambasted the Pentagon for "wanton slaughters" abroad, belittled American elections as awash in special-interest cash, and accused U.S. courts of deep-seated racial bias.
Some may, of course, argue that "Red China" is not a "friend" of the United States. But the U.S. continually grants China MFN trade status, and imports from China as though there were no tomorrow. China, in turn, does its part in helping to prop up the U.S. economy by taking on billions of dollars in U.S. debt.
Posted by Eddie Tews at 06:02 PM
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The World Trade Organization on Thursday upheld a ruling condemning government help for cotton producers in the United States, saying that many U.S. programs include illegal export subsidies or domestic payments that are higher than permitted by WTO rules.
The WTO appeals body rejected a U.S. attempt to overturn a September 2004 ruling by an independent panel of trade experts, which acted on a complaint from Brazil.
Brazil had alleged that the United States kept its place as the planet's second-largest cotton grower and largest exporter because the U.S. government paid $12.5 billion in subsidies to American farmers between August 1999 and July 2003.
The United States had insisted that its payments to farmers are within permitted levels, claiming many are not subsidies as defined by WTO.
* * *
Oxfam estimates that U.S. dumping caused losses of almost $400 million between 2001 and 2003 for poor African cotton-producing countries, where more than 10 million people depend directly on the crop. A typical small-scale West African cotton producer makes less than $400 a year on his crop. Two million cotton farmers in Mali were recently pressured to accept a further price drop of 25 percent -- many of them will not now be able to cover their production costs.
The majority (78 percent) of U.S. cotton subsidies benefit the largest 10 percent of cotton producers. Loopholes in the subsidy rules allow industrial-sized farms to collect payments in excess of $1 million, while smaller farmers in the U.S. and abroad are driven out of farming by low commodity prices and high land costs.
The case has implications beyond cotton. "This case raises deep questions about the entire U.S. subsidy system. U.S. subsidies have distorted global markets, failed to save small US farmers, and promoted environmental damage. The U.S. should see this ruling as an opportunity for reform," [Oxfam's Celine] Charveriat said.
I'm telling you people, the day draws nigh that the Bush Administration will declare the WTO "anachronistic" (to choose a word that Madeleine Albright once used to describe Security Council resolutions concerning the Israel-Palestine issue), and abandon the agreement altogether.
And as the Bush Administration continues to isolate this country from the rest of the World, the day draws nigh that its citizens will be forced to -- gasp! -- learn how to live upon the country's own human and natural resources, rather than stealing from the rest of the World. Will we be up to the task?
Update, 3/4/05: The trade judges rejected an appeal by the U.S., which now will have to bring its subsidies into line with the rules." [Emphasis added.] Quelle horreur! Isn't it a bitch to be forced into following the rules which you yourself established, and which you expect the rest of the world to follow?
Of course, it remains to be seen whether the U.S. will indeed comply with the ruling. But, unlike recent Supreme Court rulings not in its favour -- which the Bush Administration more less ignores -- this ruling may actually have some fangs: if the U.S. doesn't, then the rest of the world will presumably be given the go-ahead to enact its own subsidies, or to dis-allow U.S. agricultural imports altogether.
Free Market Miracle #0016
The World Trade Organization on Thursday upheld a ruling condemning government help for cotton producers in the United States, saying that many U.S. programs include illegal export subsidies or domestic payments that are higher than permitted by WTO rules.
The WTO appeals body rejected a U.S. attempt to overturn a September 2004 ruling by an independent panel of trade experts, which acted on a complaint from Brazil.
Brazil had alleged that the United States kept its place as the planet's second-largest cotton grower and largest exporter because the U.S. government paid $12.5 billion in subsidies to American farmers between August 1999 and July 2003.
The United States had insisted that its payments to farmers are within permitted levels, claiming many are not subsidies as defined by WTO.
Oxfam estimates that U.S. dumping caused losses of almost $400 million between 2001 and 2003 for poor African cotton-producing countries, where more than 10 million people depend directly on the crop. A typical small-scale West African cotton producer makes less than $400 a year on his crop. Two million cotton farmers in Mali were recently pressured to accept a further price drop of 25 percent -- many of them will not now be able to cover their production costs.
The majority (78 percent) of U.S. cotton subsidies benefit the largest 10 percent of cotton producers. Loopholes in the subsidy rules allow industrial-sized farms to collect payments in excess of $1 million, while smaller farmers in the U.S. and abroad are driven out of farming by low commodity prices and high land costs.
The case has implications beyond cotton. "This case raises deep questions about the entire U.S. subsidy system. U.S. subsidies have distorted global markets, failed to save small US farmers, and promoted environmental damage. The U.S. should see this ruling as an opportunity for reform," [Oxfam's Celine] Charveriat said.
I'm telling you people, the day draws nigh that the Bush Administration will declare the WTO "anachronistic" (to choose a word that Madeleine Albright once used to describe Security Council resolutions concerning the Israel-Palestine issue), and abandon the agreement altogether.
And as the Bush Administration continues to isolate this country from the rest of the World, the day draws nigh that its citizens will be forced to -- gasp! -- learn how to live upon the country's own human and natural resources, rather than stealing from the rest of the World. Will we be up to the task?
Update, 3/4/05: The trade judges rejected an appeal by the U.S., which now will have to bring its subsidies into line with the rules." [Emphasis added.] Quelle horreur! Isn't it a bitch to be forced into following the rules which you yourself established, and which you expect the rest of the world to follow?
Of course, it remains to be seen whether the U.S. will indeed comply with the ruling. But, unlike recent Supreme Court rulings not in its favour -- which the Bush Administration more less ignores -- this ruling may actually have some fangs: if the U.S. doesn't, then the rest of the world will presumably be given the go-ahead to enact its own subsidies, or to dis-allow U.S. agricultural imports altogether.
Posted by Eddie Tews at 10:24 AM
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The mysterious death of a third soldier with North Carolina ties is raising questions. All three died from flu-like symptoms after returning from overseas deployments. [...]
Garton's family has questions, too. His wife said while Garton was in Iraq, he treated someone exposed to depleted uranium. Garton's father wonders if that had something to do with his death.
"He went through 16 months of hell and he came back and they didn't do nothing for him," he said.
WRAL called Fort Bragg, the Department of the Army and some congressional offices. At this point, it does not appear that anyone is investigating the deaths or trying to determine if there is a common cause.
March 02, 2005
Gulf War II "Syndrome"?
The mysterious death of a third soldier with North Carolina ties is raising questions. All three died from flu-like symptoms after returning from overseas deployments. [...]
Garton's family has questions, too. His wife said while Garton was in Iraq, he treated someone exposed to depleted uranium. Garton's father wonders if that had something to do with his death.
"He went through 16 months of hell and he came back and they didn't do nothing for him," he said.
WRAL called Fort Bragg, the Department of the Army and some congressional offices. At this point, it does not appear that anyone is investigating the deaths or trying to determine if there is a common cause.