Freetalk about USA culture: 25 new messages in 24 topics

The culture of the United States of America.

03/19/06 / 03/20/06 / 03/21/06 / 03/22/06 / 03/23/06 / 03/24/06 / 03/25/06 / 03/26/06 / 03/27/06 / 03/28/06 / 03/29/06 / 03/30/06 / 03/31/06 / 04/01/06 / 04/02/06 / 04/03/06 / 04/04/06 / 04/05/06 / 04/06/06 / 04/07/06 / 04/08/06 / 04/09/06 / 04/10/06 /

Monday, April 10, 2006

25 new messages in 24 topics - digest ==>Read...

soc.culture.usa
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa
soc.culture.usa@googlegroups.com

Today's topics:

* Immigration protests - 1 messages, 1 author
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/351caaf2d24ab436
* Godhra train arson suspect nabbed - 1 messages, 1 author
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/503d07be0b23759c
* Does America really want these shadowy law-breakers? - 1 messages, 1 author
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/da292fd09612c435
* Point Of Border - 1 messages, 1 author
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/f1067e1bde572e4b
* Motorola Biometrics Solution Will Help Protect Delaware Citizens with
Improved Identity Technology - 1 messages, 1 author
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/adf78d4cf71af080
* US Claims Iran Talks "Delayed" Until IRAQ Can "Participate" - 1 messages, 1
author
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/9b06a2d8559794a9
* Two million join protests as immigrant debate grips US - 1 messages, 1
author
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/360de7288156e170
* With One Filing, Prosecutor Puts Bush in Spotlight - 1 messages, 1 author
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/103fa4e25e1749bd
* Iraqi Troops Stand Up, Fall Down; US Back on Streets - 1 messages, 1 author
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/78122a98a3434cc6
* "Grandma in Iraq" Blog Ending; Author Outed as Mil.PR Flack - 1 messages, 1
author
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/90c52cdc7a44741f
* 3 US officers relieved of duty as Iraqi town mourns its dead - 1 messages, 1
author
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/444c7e3aaf3b2349
* Bush: The Law Means What I Say It Means - 1 messages, 1 author
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/6400afe6023ce4b5
* Katrina "recovery" plagued by bloat and waste: La. officials - 1 messages, 1
author
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/6ec6a9211be30678
* Immigration News Briefs - Apr 9, 2006 - 1 messages, 1 author
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/87901c8e6211fa8
* Hamas sees Israeli moves as declaration of war - 1 messages, 1 author
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/daefdb8ae3d9ef9f
* Weekly News Update #845 - Apr 9, 2006 - 1 messages, 1 author
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/71a711f1618367fd
* Brit Murdered by Israel: All in the Line of Duty - 1 messages, 1 author
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/43bbfd98cde91d0e
* Memo Paints Grim Picture of Life in Iraq - 1 messages, 1 author
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/50de0a310b0fbbc7
* Hersh Defends His Report on US Plotting Against Iran - 1 messages, 1 author
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/1696e7b8d41dc972
* US Intent on Toppling Iranian Govt - 1 messages, 1 author
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/4b4f349cb0ce9554
* Sides won't budge on Iraqi leadership - 1 messages, 1 author
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/cbf59417c12a51c1
* Now Yoga finds a place in Pakistani society - 2 messages, 2 authors
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/4e7124389d365093
* Phone-Jamming Records Point to White House - 1 messages, 1 author
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/448bcf7a176fc43d
* For God's sake!! - 1 messages, 1 author
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/6032b73b5ced69a2

==============================================================================
TOPIC: Immigration protests
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/351caaf2d24ab436
==============================================================================

== 1 of 1 ==
Date: Mon, Apr 10 2006 10:50 pm
From: "Rushtown"

These huge anti-new-immigration bill protests are having an opposite
effect than intended.
The reason for the new bill and it's large support is that there are
just far too many Mexicans in the US.
Even if they were a model minority like the Japanese--why would we want
them to exceed 50% of the population?

==============================================================================
TOPIC: Godhra train arson suspect nabbed
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/503d07be0b23759c
==============================================================================

== 1 of 1 ==
Date: Mon, Apr 10 2006 11:04 pm
From: "Mirza Ghalib"

Notwithstanding a prostitute justice Banerjee's report commissioned
by his pimp, Lalu Yadav, Gujarat is slowly but surely getting
the criminals behind bars.
================================================
GODHRA TRAIN CARNAGE ACCUSED ARRESTED

Press Trust of India
Posted online: Monday, April 10, 2006 at 1639 hours IST

Ahmedabad, April 10: One person was arrested on Monday
in connection with the Sabarmati Express train carnage in
February 2002, from Godhra town.

The accused, identified as Shaukat, is alleged to be one of
the core group members who had set ablaze the S-6 coach
of the train on February 27, 2002, police said.

Police have so far arrested more than 100 persons,
mostly Muslims of Ghanchi community of Godhra town,
while 19 more were absconding.

Shaukat, who had been absconding since the carnage,
was nabbed from the town after police got a tip-off about
his whereabouts.

The special investigation team of Gujarat police has also
claimed to have arrested the main conspirator of the train
carnage, a Godhra-based cleric named Maulana Hussain Umarji.

The SIT is still on the hunt for two of the members of the
core group, Salim Panwala and Farouk Bhana, who are
still on the run.

Fifty nine passengers, mostly karsevaks, returning from
Ayodhya, were killed on board the S-6 coach after it was
allegedly pelted with stones and torched just outside the
Godhra railway station in Panchmahals district.

==============================================================================
TOPIC: Does America really want these shadowy law-breakers?
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/da292fd09612c435
==============================================================================

== 1 of 1 ==
Date: Tues, Apr 11 2006 6:11 am
From: "George"

<beachshark1@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:1144610274.787904.115440@v46g2000cwv.googlegroups.com...
> Before we jump to conclusions whether permanently keeping these
> illegals is a good thing... shouldn't we find out if they'll vote
> Republican first?

Bhwhahahahahahaha!!!

George

==============================================================================
TOPIC: Point Of Border
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/f1067e1bde572e4b
==============================================================================

== 1 of 1 ==
Date: Mon, Apr 10 2006 11:14 pm
From: biff01@gmail.com

I've noticed that much, probably most, are describing the marches as
being for "immigrant rights". Turning your demands into "rights" is a
useful rhetorical trick to make them non-negotiable and indeed
non-opposable; if you disagree with them, you're depriving them of
their "rights".

In fact, only citizens have a right to be in the country. Legal
immigrants have been extended a privilege, they are not exercising a
right. Illegal immigrants are criminals who have broken the law.

I wish Mr. Maxwell good luck and good speed.

http://www.NumbersUSA.com
http://www.FAIRus.org

==============================================================================
TOPIC: Motorola Biometrics Solution Will Help Protect Delaware Citizens with
Improved Identity Technology
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/adf78d4cf71af080
==============================================================================

== 1 of 1 ==
Date: Mon, Apr 10 2006 11:15 pm
From: technology_post@yahoo.com

Motorola, Inc. (NYSE: MOT) has been awarded a contract by the Delaware
State Police to deploy Motorola's latest generation multi-biometric
identification system, the Motorola Printrak Biometric Identification
Solution (Printrak BIS).

Read More detail
http://technology-post.com/tech/?p=638

==============================================================================
TOPIC: US Claims Iran Talks "Delayed" Until IRAQ Can "Participate"
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/9b06a2d8559794a9
==============================================================================

== 1 of 1 ==
Date: Tues, Apr 11 2006 1:24 am
From: NY.Transfer.News@blythe.org

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

US Claims Iran Talks "Delayed" Until IRAQ Can "Participate"

Via NY Transfer News Collective * All the News that Doesn't Fit

San Francisco Chronicle - Apr 10, 2006
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2006/04/10/MNG0AI6KPN1.DTL

U.S. delays talks with Iran until Iraq can participate

Wait may be long as Iraqi factions struggle over prime minister

by Jonathan Finer, Naseer Nouri, Washington Post

Baghdad -- With politicians deadlocked over who will be Iraq's next prime
minister, U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad said Sunday that planned talks
with Iranian officials over Iraq-related issues would be delayed until a
government is formed.

"We do not want to give the impression that the United States is sitting
with Iran to decide about the Iraqi government. The Iraqis will decide
that," Khalilzad told Fox News Sunday.

Khalilzad and other U.S. officials have repeatedly accused Iran of meddling
in Iraqi affairs by supporting militias and insurgent groups. Iran has
denied such charges. Mutual agreement to hold talks in Baghdad came last
month, as international pressure intensified on Iran to end its nuclear
program.

The completion of Iraq's new government could be weeks away. Efforts to form
a Cabinet representative of all Iraqi factions -- which U.S. officials have
warned is essential to bringing calm to the country -- have stalled amid
mounting opposition to Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari, who was nominated
by Iraq's Shiite Muslim governing coalition to retain his post.

The Shiite alliance Sunday named a three-member panel to gauge support for
al-Jaafari, in what some lawmakers described as a last-ditch effort to
prevent the bloc from fracturing.

The panel -- made up of Jawad al-Maliki, from al-Jaafari's Dawa party; Humam
Hamoudi, from the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq; and
Hussain Shahristani, an independent -- was tasked with surveying Sunni Arab
and ethnic Kurdish political parties, who have refused to join a government
led by al-Jaafari. The Kurds said late Sunday that their rejection of
al-Jaafari was final.

Several Shiite leaders have also called on al-Jaafari, who won the bloc's
nomination by a single vote, to step aside. So far, he has refused.

The panel is expected to report its findings to the alliance today, which
could then hold a new vote to choose a nominee or turn the question over to
the new legislature. Adnan Pachachi, the interim parliamentary speaker, said
Sunday that he would convene a session of the body in the coming days, which
some lawmakers said signaled an agreement could soon be reached.

Separately, leaders condemned remarks made Saturday by Egyptian President
Hosni Mubarak, who said the first loyalty of Iraq's Shiite majority was to
Iran and that Iraq was mired in a civil war.

Al-Jaafari, who spent years in exile in Tehran, denied a civil war was under
way and said Mubarak had taken a stab at Shiite "patriotism and
civilization."

Meanwhile, in a pre-dawn raid Sunday, clashes erupted when U.S. forces
surrounded a suspected safe house and nearby tent on the northern outskirts
of Baghdad. After being fired upon, troops gunned down five suspected
insurgents, and three others were killed in an air strike.

Also Sunday, kidnappers threatened to kill two German engineers seized by
gunmen in January in northern Iraq unless prisoners held by U.S. forces are
freed. Thomas Nitzschke and Rene Braeunlich were shown in a video posted
Sunday on the Web pleading for help. German Chancellor Angela Merkel said
her government was "doing everything in our power to save the lives of the
hostages."

The turmoil across this country stands in sharp contrast to the euphoria
that swept many areas of Iraq when Saddam Hussein's government collapsed
during the U.S.-led invasion three years ago. "Freedom Day" has been
declared a national holiday, although the day was not celebrated in Fallujah
and other parts of insurgent-impacted Anbar province.

In other news, the three-star Marine Corps general who was the military's
top operations officer before the invasion of Iraq expressed regret, in an
essay published Sunday, that he did not more energetically question those
who had ordered the nation to war.

Retired Lt. Gen. Gregory Newbold also called for replacing Defense Secretary
Donald Rumsfeld and "many others unwilling to fundamentally change their
approach." He is the third retired senior officer in recent weeks to demand
that Rumsfeld step down.

In the essay, in this week's issue of Time magazine, Newbold wrote, "I now
regret that I did not more openly challenge those who were determined to
invade a country whose actions were peripheral to the real threat -- al
Qaeda."

[The New York Times and Associated Press contributed to this report.]

*
================================================================
NY Transfer News Collective * A Service of Blythe Systems
Since 1985 - Information for the Rest of Us
339 Lafayette St., New York, NY 10012 http://www.blythe.org
List Archives: http://olm.blythe-systems.com/pipermail/nytr/
Subscribe: http://olm.blythe-systems.com/mailman/listinfo/nytr
================================================================

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.4.2 (GNU/Linux)

iD8DBQFEO0rRiz2i76ou9wQRAn/4AJ9nLoL1HasSCGAwISmmNc1kSmLRyQCePnV2
RXCO5fW5+96yK8cY6y4zTU4=
=u2Bk
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

==============================================================================
TOPIC: Two million join protests as immigrant debate grips US
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/360de7288156e170
==============================================================================

== 1 of 1 ==
Date: Tues, Apr 11 2006 1:24 am
From: NY.Transfer.News@blythe.org

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

Two million join protests as immigrant debate grips US

Via NY Transfer News Collective * All the News that Doesn't Fit

The Independent - Apr 11, 2006
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/americas/article356985.ece

Two million join protests as immigrant debate grips US

By Andrew Gumbel in Los Angeles and Andrew Buncombe in Washington

The unprecedented wave of immigrants' rights protests sweeping the United
States reached a new high yesterday as an estimated two million people took
to the streets in 140 different cities around the country an extraordinary
mobilisation many supporters are likening to a second civil rights movement.

The National Day of Action took many forms including a consumer boycott by
immigrants and labour stoppages. Probably the biggest demonstration took
place along the National Mall in Washington where many tens of thousands
gathered on a brilliant spring afternoon to listen to speeches urging unity
and proclaiming the Hispanic community's love of its adopted nation.
Thousands were waving flags. Some were of Latin American countries, but the
overwhelming majority waved the Stars and Stripes.

"They want to have a law to make all us criminals," said Celerino Lopez, a
construction worker from Oaxaca, Mexico. He and his wife crossed the desert
to enter the US illegally nine years ago. He said there were no jobs or
opportunities at home.

"We come here to work, we are not terrorists. I want my child to learn
English and to get a job," he said.

The demonstration took place just yards from the Capitol, where Senators
last week failed to reach agreement on wide-ranging immigration reform that
might have offered a way for the nation's estimated 12 million undocumented
immigrants to achieve legal recognition and greater security.

Politicians from both major parties have been blindsided by the protests,
whose size and passion caught everyone off guard. Two weeks ago, Los Angeles
saw the biggest protest in its history as half a million people took to the
streets. On Sunday, up to half a million marched through the centre of
Dallas, while smaller protests rocked such unlikely outposts of immigrant
activism as Des Moines, Iowa, and Boise, Idaho.

The immigrants have reacted first and foremost to draconian legislation
proposed by radical Republicans in the House of Representatives to
criminalise anyone in the country without proper residency papers and to
build a military fence along 700 miles of the 2,000-mile US-Mexico border.

But there is also a deeper feeling that in a nation of immigrants it is
wrong for millions of people, whose labour is essential to the service
economy, to live in the shadows, many of the woefully underpaid and at
constant risk of exploitation or abrupt termination. "They are trying to
make us criminals but we are not," said Kary Garcia, 17, a high school
student whose parents brought her to the US seven years ago from Mexico
City. "We do the jobs Americans don't want. We do the hard jobs."

Illegal immigrants pay thousands of dollars for the chance of a new life.
One Salvadorian man, Roberto, said he paid $13,000 (£7,500) to smugglers two
years ago to bring him and his son. "It took one month. Train, bus,
everything," he said.

The protest movement has split Republicans, with radicals sticking to their
aggressively anti-immigrant agenda while moderates including President
George Bush have appealed for a compromise that would end the unregulated
inflow of migrants across the Mexican border and establish a framework
recognising the realities of the US labour market.

The Democrats, meanwhile, have largely failed to seize on the issue
appearing more afraid of the large number of Americans who don't think
immigrants should be cut any slack.

The protests have already pushed the Senate in a more progressive direction.
A package that would give most, if not all, illegal immigrants a path to
residency and citizenship, establish a guest worker programme and beef up
security on the border came close to approval before being scuppered at the
last moment.

"Neither party can afford to shrug off or ignore the surging street rallies
materialising before their eyes," said Marc Cooper, a border specialist at
the University of Southern California's Institute for Justice and
Journalism. "They can all do the math. While the 'illegals' can't vote, they
have millions of cousins, uncles and even children who can and will."

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.4.2 (GNU/Linux)

iD8DBQFEO0rSiz2i76ou9wQRAovuAJ46pSVDdRkhROwc1c9y7KRo6ehrwwCcDHdZ
eyVIzT6agYeuaLJQdSxppDA=
=o7MH
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

==============================================================================
TOPIC: With One Filing, Prosecutor Puts Bush in Spotlight
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/103fa4e25e1749bd
==============================================================================

== 1 of 1 ==
Date: Tues, Apr 11 2006 1:24 am
From: NY.Transfer.News@blythe.org

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

With One Filing, Prosecutor Puts Bush in Spotlight

Via NY Transfer News Collective * All the News that Doesn't Fit

The New York Times - April 11, 2006
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/04/11/washington/11leak.html

White House Memo

With One Filing, Prosecutor Puts Bush in Spotlight

By DAVID E. SANGER and DAVID JOHNSTON

WASHINGTON, April 10 From the early days of the C.I.A. leak investigation
in 2003, the Bush White House has insisted there was no effort to discredit
Joseph C. Wilson IV, the man who emerged as the most damaging critic of the
administration's case that Saddam Hussein was seeking to build nuclear
weapons.

But now White House officials, and specifically President Bush and Vice
President Dick Cheney, have been pitched back into the center of the nearly
three-year controversy, this time because of a prosecutor's court filing in
the case that asserts there was "a strong desire by many, including multiple
people in the White House," to undermine Mr. Wilson.

The new assertions by the special prosecutor, Patrick J. Fitzgerald, have
put administration officials on the spot in a way they have not been for
months, as attention in the leak case seems to be shifting away from the
White House to the pretrial procedural skirmishing in the perjury and
obstruction charges against Mr. Cheney's former chief of staff, I. Lewis
Libby Jr.

Mr. Fitzgerald's filing talks not of an effort to level with Americans but
of "a plan to discredit, punish or seek revenge against Mr. Wilson." It
concludes, "It is hard to conceive of what evidence there could be that
would disprove the existence of White House efforts to 'punish Wilson.' "

With more filings expected from Mr. Fitzgerald, the prosecutor's work has
the potential to keep the focus on Mr. Bush and Mr. Cheney at a time when
the president is struggling with his lowest approval ratings since he took
office.

Even on Monday, Mr. Bush found himself in an uncomfortable spot during an
appearance at a Johns Hopkins University campus in Washington, when a
student asked him to address Mr. Fitzgerald's assertion that the White House
was seeking to retaliate against Mr. Wilson.

Mr. Bush stumbled as he began his response before settling on an answer that
sidestepped the question. He said he had ordered the formal declassification
of the 2002 National Intelligence Estimate on Iraq in July 2003 because "it
was important for people to get a better sense for why I was saying what I
was saying in my speeches" about Iraq's efforts to reconstitute its weapons
program.

Mr. Bush said nothing about the earlier, informal authorization that Mr.
Fitzgerald's court filing revealed. The prosecutor described testimony from
Mr. Libby, who said Mr. Bush had told Mr. Cheney that it was permissible to
reveal some information from the intelligence estimate, which described Mr.
Hussein's efforts to acquire uranium.

But on Monday, Mr. Bush was not talking about that. "You're just going to
have to let Mr. Fitzgerald complete his case, and I hope you understand
that," Mr. Bush said. "It's a serious legal matter that we've got to be
careful in making public statements about it."

Every prosecutor strives not just to prove a case, but also to tell a
compelling story. It is now clear that Mr. Fitzgerald's account of what was
happening in the White House in the summer of 2003 is very different from
the Bush administration's narrative, which suggested that Mr. Wilson was
seen as a minor figure whose criticisms could be answered by disclosing the
underlying intelligence upon which Mr. Bush relied.

It turned out that much of the information about Mr. Hussein's search for
uranium was questionable at best, and that it became the subject of dispute
almost as soon as it was included in the 2002 National Intelligence Estimate
on Iraq.

The answer to the question of whose recounting of events is correct Mr.
Bush's or Mr. Fitzgerald's may not be known for months or years, if ever.
But it seems there will be more clues, including some about the
conversations between Mr. Bush and Mr. Cheney.

Mr. Fitzgerald said he was preparing to turn over to Mr. Libby 1,400 pages
of handwritten notes some presumably in Mr. Libby's own hand that could
shed light on two very different efforts at getting out the White House
story.

One effort the July 18 declassification of the major conclusions of the
intelligence estimate was taking place in public, while another, Mr.
Fitzgerald argues, was happening in secret, with only Mr. Bush, Mr. Cheney
and Mr. Libby involved.

Last week's court filing has already led the White House to acknowledge,
over the weekend, that Mr. Bush ordered the selective disclosure of parts of
the intelligence estimate sometime in late June or early July. But
administration officials insist that Mr. Bush played a somewhat passive role
and did so without selecting Mr. Libby, or anyone else, to tell the story
piecemeal to a small number of reporters.

But in one of those odd twists in the unpredictable world of news leaks,
neither of the reporters Mr. Libby met, Bob Woodward of The Washington Post
or Judith Miller, then of The New York Times, reported a word of it under
their own bylines. In fact, other reporters working on the story were
talking to senior officials who were warning that the uranium information in
the intelligence estimate was dubious at best.

Mr. Fitzgerald did not identify who took part in the White House effort to
argue otherwise, but the evidence he has cited so far shows that Mr.
Cheney's office was the epicenter of concern about Mr. Wilson, the former
ambassador sent to Niger by the C.I.A. to determine what deal, if any, Mr.
Hussein had struck there.

Throughout the spring and early summer of 2003, Mr. Fitzgerald concluded,
the former ambassador had become an irritant to the administration, raising
doubts about the truthfulness of assertions made publicly by Mr. Bush in
his State of the Union address in January of that year that Iraq might
have sought uranium in Africa to further its nuclear ambitions.

Mr. Wilson's criticisms culminated in a July 6, 2003, Op-Ed article in The
Times in which he voiced the same doubts for the first time on the record.
He cited as his evidence his 2002 trip to Niger, instigated, he said,
because of questions raised by Mr. Cheney's office.

Mr. Wilson's article, Mr. Fitzgerald said in the filing, "was viewed in the
Office of the Vice President as a direct attack on the credibility of the
vice president (and the president) on a matter of signal importance: the
rationale for the war in Iraq."

Mr. Fitzgerald suggested that the White House effort was a "plan" to
undermine Mr. Wilson.

"Disclosing the belief that Mr. Wilson's wife sent him on the Niger trip was
one way for defendant to contradict the assertion that the vice president
had done so, while at the same time undercutting Mr. Wilson's credibility if
Mr. Wilson were perceived to have received the assignment on account of
nepotism," Mr. Fitzgerald's filing said.

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.4.2 (GNU/Linux)

iD8DBQFEO0rSiz2i76ou9wQRAm8EAKCs98UcZe55tYctt3Hk0nZZ5GIhxgCcDntM
wG9FdJZS3muWh8gaoIybzgA=
=z6aT
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

==============================================================================
TOPIC: Iraqi Troops Stand Up, Fall Down; US Back on Streets
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/78122a98a3434cc6
==============================================================================

== 1 of 1 ==
Date: Tues, Apr 11 2006 1:24 am
From: NY.Transfer.News@blythe.org

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

Iraqi Troops Stand Up, Fall Down; US Back on Streets

Via NY Transfer News Collective * All the News that Doesn't Fit

AP via MSNBC - Apr 10, 2006
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/12257226/from/RSS/

American troops back on patrol in Baghdad

Return is tacit admission that Iraqi troops
can't halt sectarian killing alone

The Associated Press
Updated: 8:08 p.m. ET April 10, 2006

BAGHDAD, Iraq - American soldiers have again hit the streets of dangerous
neighborhoods in western Baghdad that had been handed over to Iraqi forces,
trying to keep a lid on sectarian attacks that have raged since the February
bombing of a Shiite shrine in Samarra.

The U.S. military has refocused its mission to confront death squads that
have tortured and killed hundreds, a tacit acknowledgment that Iraqi troops
have not been able to control violence between Shiites and Sunnis on their
own.

Iraqi security forces can control large acts, but you cant be everywhere
at once. Its like serious crime in the U.S. How do you prevent someone in
Houston from going into someones house? said Capt. Matt Brown of Eau
Claire, Wis.

Fewer attacks are now directed against Americans, soldiers say. At the same
time, the number of Iraqis found slain, apparently in tit-for-tat killings
by Shiite and Sunni extremists, has sharply increased in western
neighborhoods like Shula and Ghazaliyah.

A testy relationship

The return of more U.S. forces to the area just over a month after they left
has tested relationships with Iraqi soldiers, however.

To be perfectly honest, they were a little (angry) that we came back into
their sector, said 1st Lt. John Ford of Houston. Its getting to a point
where they dont want or need us. Its unfortunate because we have a lot of
assets to bring to the table.

After an initial few days of tension, life appears to have pressed on as
normally as possible in these areas, soldiers say. Shops are open and
pedestrians crowd market streets but bodies have also steadily appeared
during their patrols.

Its random. Youll see them on major roads and on alleys, Brown said of
the some 30 bodies that his unit has found. On March 8, 18 strangled men
were found stuffed inside an abandoned minibus in a nearby neighborhood.

Since early March, Brown and soldiers from the 1st Squadron, 71st Cavalry
have conducted daily foot and vehicle patrols that usually last 12 hours per
day.

Its not that our combat power is necessary. Its just adding to the
perception of security. It puts the people at ease, Brown said.

Soldiers express doubts

Other soldiers expressed doubts that the bolstered U.S. presence could
contain the recent surge of violence.

I think were reaching the point of diminishing returns on U.S. patrols in
our area, said 1st Lt. Paul Tanghe of Minneapolis. Its not going to stop
until the people in that house, that house, and that one want it to stop.
.. You definitely get the sense that there are some people who dont want
it to stop.

A dull thud was heard in the distance as Tanghe spoke during the patrol
Friday through Shula, where support is strong for Shiite militiamen loyal to
hardline cleric Muqtada al-Sadr.

Minutes later, Tanghes troops heard that suicide bombers had attacked a
nearby Shiite mosque. Iraqi officials later said 85 people were killed.

A cultural thing

Whatever limitations the U.S. troops have in controlling the violence, they
expressed concern that Iraqi troops were still not up to the task. Some said
Iraqi soldiers tend to cluster around checkpoints rather than walking
regular beats through neighborhoods.

I think its a cultural thing, whereas were used to working 8-10 hours a
day ... theyre used to working 4-5 hours per day, Ford said.

Earlier this year, areas of western Baghdad were testament to the U.S.
strategy of handing over security responsibility. Iraqi soldiers manned
checkpoints while American troops carefully kept their distance.

The shift in U.S. strategy is temporary, a result of sectarian attacks
unleashed by the Feb. 22 bombing of a major Shiite shrine in Samarra, 60
miles north of the capital.

Eventually, U.S. troops said they expected to return to support missions,
leaving Iraqi troops in charge once again.

Recalling another civil war

But some were not assured that the situation would improve. Tanghe likened
the situation to the strife between pro- and anti-slavery forces in Kansas
and western Missouri before the outbreak of the Civil War in 1861.

I think a more appropriate analogy might be Bleeding Kansas, where there
is a general atmosphere of lawlessness where anything goes and everybody is
free to act on any impulse they may have, unless you happen to be in the
presence of American or Iraqi security forces, Tanghe said.

Its going to be violent once we leave. Once we hand it over to the Iraqi
security forces, (insurgents) are going to test them. Its going to be
bloody, Tanghe said.

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.4.2 (GNU/Linux)

iD8DBQFEO0rSiz2i76ou9wQRAio1AJ9uYpTw+qo5SJ57nEKbdz+E6hUUYgCgkWOS
s1AVd2mSebrIuDf2mlwz5KE=
=oX+0
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

==============================================================================
TOPIC: "Grandma in Iraq" Blog Ending; Author Outed as Mil.PR Flack
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/90c52cdc7a44741f
==============================================================================

== 1 of 1 ==
Date: Tues, Apr 11 2006 1:24 am
From: NY.Transfer.News@blythe.org

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

"Grandma in Iraq" Blog Ending; Author Outed as Mil.PR Flack

Via NY Transfer News Collective * All the News that Doesn't Fit

Editor and Publisher - Apr 10, 2006
http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1002314514

Controversial "Grandma In Iraq" Blog Ending, But Not Why You'd Think

By Joe Strupp

NEW YORK--The Cincinannti Enquirer's controversial "Grandma In Iraq"
blog, which had drawn criticism because it was being written by a
military spokeswoman who had not fully disclosed her identity until
last week, will end, the paper's Web site revealed.

Tom Callinan, Enquirer editor and a supporter of the blog, wrote in
his own blog item this weekend that the Web page, which had posted
items since last September, would stop. He said the recent controversy
did not spark the shutdown, noting that the blogger, Public Affairs
Officer Suzanne Fournier, was leaving the war zone.

"It appears Grandma in Iraq's deployment is ending, so her blog will
as well," Callinan wrote on Saturday in a posting on his own blog at
www.cincinnati.com. The posting offered no specifics on when the blog
would stop, or further information on where Fournier would relocate.
The editor went on to defend the blog, but agreed that the Web site's
failure to disclose Fournier's public affairs link until last week was
a mistake.

"Yes, we fumbled in not invasively disclaiming her role as a public
relations officer with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and we fixed
that when it was pointed out," he wrote. "No, she wasn't paid by us
for her blog, which provided readers an inside look at her experiences
over there. And she claims no superiors approved the work done on her
time.

"No, there's no cover-up in the questions about whom and how her blog
originated. I'm not inclined to point fingers at the past. Whatever
was done, by whomever, was well-intentioned," he added. "It just
wasn't thought through completely and I wasn't paying enough attention
to the blog world. The bottom line is that since last summer we have
reorganized responsibilities for Cincinnati.com and I am responsible
for content on the site, along with Chris Graves, our online editor.
I've been making news decisions -- and taking shots for them -- for 30
years now. It's OK.

"And yes, I suspect the debate will continue about whether
Cincinnati.com should have hosted her blog. If you care to continue to
debate please make me the target of your venom, not Grandma - or that
public relations officer if you'd prefer to address her as such," he
wrote. "How about let's look at our dabbling in citizen journalism
from a broader perspective? We're discussing the concept a lot these
days. While The Enquirer has done some work with interactive voices
online, most of our readers who care to share their views are limited
to traditional platforms - letters to the editor, story suggestions,
and news releases. But as we look to the future, we're exploring new
territory."

Callinan did not immediately return calls seeking comment Monday,
while Fournier has yet to respond to several E&P requests.

The existence of the blog had sparked mixed reactions both in and out
of the newspaper. Some opponents contended that, even with a
disclosure of her military ties, the blogger's placement on the site
shared by the newspaper gave the wrong impression of the paper's
editorial balance. Fournier tended to focus on positive elements
coming out of Iraq, boasting about new school facilities, a new
firehouse, road and sewer improvements, and even a Super Bowl party.

Supporters had said that it was one of the few places where readers
could get a good report on the "positive" happenings in Iraq. Comments
to the blog ran about even with supporters and opponents, according to
editors.

Fournier's last entry, posted on Thursday, described road improvements
in one Iraqi village that were being overseen by U.S. officials. Since
that posting, more than 70 comments have been sent in by readers and
posted. They range from the message contending, "This blog is a sham,"
to a supporter declaring, "I love this blog! You go girl!"

So far, however, Fournier, who had defended herself in several
postings last week, has yet to write about the blog's ending or her
own future.

[Joe Strupp is a senior editor at E&P.]

(c) 2006 VNU eMedia Inc. All rights reserved.

*
================================================================
NY Transfer News Collective * A Service of Blythe Systems
Since 1985 - Information for the Rest of Us
339 Lafayette St., New York, NY 10012 http://www.blythe.org
List Archives: http://olm.blythe-systems.com/pipermail/nytr/
Subscribe: http://olm.blythe-systems.com/mailman/listinfo/nytr
================================================================

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.4.2 (GNU/Linux)

iD8DBQFEO0rSiz2i76ou9wQRAvrDAJ4lPAZKuDOO8nGtVNw92gZUoM6ingCeImMe
xZl2PYaRwdMUndu1sb1PtLo=
=w5hQ
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

==============================================================================
TOPIC: 3 US officers relieved of duty as Iraqi town mourns its dead
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/444c7e3aaf3b2349
==============================================================================

== 1 of 1 ==
Date: Tues, Apr 11 2006 1:24 am
From: NY.Transfer.News@blythe.org

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

3 US officers relieved of duty as Iraqi town mourns its dead

Via NY Transfer News Collective * All the News that Doesn't Fit

Knight Ridder - Apr 8, 2006
http://www.realcities.com/mld/krwashington/14298263.htm

3 U.S. commanders relieved of duty as Iraqi town mourns its dead

By Nancy A. Youssef
Knight Ridder Newspapers

HADITHA, Iraq - In the middle of methodically recalling the day his
brother's family was killed, Yaseen's monotone voice and stream of
tears suddenly stopped. He looked up, paused and pleaded: "Please
don't let me say anything that will get me killed by the Americans. My
family can't handle any more."

The story of what happened to Yaseen and his brother Younes' family
has redefined Haditha's relationship with the Marines who patrol it.
On Nov. 19, a roadside bomb struck a Humvee on Haditha's main road,
killing one Marine and injuring two others.

The Marines say they took heavy gunfire afterwards and thought it was
coming from the area around Younes' house. They went to investigate,
and 23 people were killed.

Eight were from Younes' family. The only survivor, Younes' 13-year-old
daughter, said her family wasn't shooting at Marines or harboring
extremists that morning. They were sleeping when the bomb exploded.
And when the Marines entered their house, she said, they shot at
everyone inside.

The Navy Criminal Investigative Service (NCIS) began an investigation
in February after a Time Magazine reporter passed on accounts he had
received about the incident. A second investigation was opened into
how the Marines initially reported the killings - the Marines said
that 15 people were killed by the roadside explosion and that eight
insurgents were killed in subsequent combat.

On Friday, the Marines relieved of duty three leaders of the 3rd
Battalion, 1st Marine Regiment, which had responsibility for Haditha
when the shooting occurred. They are Lt. Col. Jeffrey R. Chessani,
commander of the 3rd Battalion, 1st Marine Regiment, and two of his
company commanders, Capt. James S. Kimber and Capt. Lucas M.
McConnell. McConnell was commanding Kilo Company of the 3rd Battalion,
the unit that struck the roadside bomb on Nov. 19 and led the
subsequent search of the area.

The Marines' announcement didn't tie the disciplinary actions directly
to Haditha, saying only that Maj. Gen. Richard Natonski, commanding
general of the 1st Marine Division, had lost confidence in the
officers' ability to command.

They were relieved because of "multiple incidents that occurred
throughout their deployment," said Lt. Lawton King, a spokesman at the
Marines' home base at Camp Pendleton, Calif., to which they recently
returned. "This decision was made independent of the NCIS
investigation."

The events of last November have clearly taken their toll on Yaseen
and his niece, Safa, who trembles visibly as she listens to Yaseen
recount what she told him of the attack. She cannot bring herself to
tell the tale herself.

She fainted after the Marines burst through the door and began firing.
When she regained consciousness, only her 3-year-old brother was still
alive, but bleeding heavily. She comforted him in a room filled with
dead family members until he died, too. And then she went to her Uncle
Yaseen's house next door.

Neither Yaseen nor Safa have returned home since.

Indeed, many in this town, whose residents are stuck in the battle
between extremists and the Americans, said now it is the U.S. military
they fear most.

"The mujahadeen (holy warriors) will kill you if you stand against
them or say anything against them. And the Americans will kill you if
the mujahadeen attack them several kilometers away," said Mohammed
al-Hadithi, 32, a barber who lives in neighboring Haqlania. With a
cigarette between his fingers, he pointed at a Marine patrol as it
passed in front of his shop. "I look at each of them, and I see
killers."

Haditha, a town of about 100,000 people in Anbar province, undeniably
is an insurgent bastion. Around the time of the attack, several
storefronts were lined with posters and pictures supporting al-Qaida,
although residents said they posted them to appease extremists.

Insurgents blend in with the residents, setting up their cells in
homes next to those belonging to everyday citizens, some of them
supportive.

There is no functioning police station and the government offices are
largely vacant. The last man to call himself mayor relinquished the
title earlier this year after scores of death threats from insurgents.

The military wouldn't release statistics, but attacks on U.S. troops
are frequent.

Indeed, Haditha has been the site of some of the deadliest attacks
against U.S. forces. On Aug. 1, six Marine reservists were killed in
an ambush; two days later, a roadside bomb killed 14 Marines traveling
in an amphibious assault vehicle just outside the town, the deadliest
single attack ever on U.S. forces.

On Nov. 19, according to military spokeswoman Lt. Col. Michelle
Martin-Hing, the Marines were hit four separate times by roadside
bombs and were fired on multiple times by gunmen they couldn't see.

Three years after the war began, the U.S. military concedes it hasn't
figured out how to tell a terrorist from an ordinary citizen in places
like Haditha.

A newly poured spot of asphalt now marks the spot where the IED, or
improvised explosive device, exploded. It was 7:15 a.m. and the blast
was the first IED of the day. Lance Cpl. Miguel Terrazas, 20, of El
Paso, Texas, died instantly. The armed fire attack started
immediately, according to the Marines.

There is as yet no official public version of what took place next and
U.S. officials familiar with the investigation would discuss the
incident only if their names were not used.

According to these officials, a car approached the convoy at about the
same time the shooting began. The Marines signaled it to stop and it
did. But it was too close to the convoy and when four men jumped out
of it, the Marines, suspecting the men had been involved in the IED
attack, shot them dead.

Yaseen said he and his brother's family were asleep in their houses
about 100 yards away when the explosion woke them. Minutes later, they
heard the Marines blocking off the road.

Yaseen, citing Safa's account, said Younes started to prepare the
family for the search they knew was coming, separating the men from
the women and the children, as is custom during searches.

Younes moved his five children and sister-in-law into the bedroom,
Yaseen said Safa told him. There, his wife was lying in bed,
recovering from an appendectomy. They waited.

The Marines moved into another house first, according to U.S.
officials. In that house, the Marines saw a line of closed doors and
thought an ambush was coming. They shot, and seven people inside were
killed, including one child. Two other children who stayed in the
house survived. A woman who ran out with her baby also survived,
military officials said.

Yaseen said Safa told him that her father heard something so he went
to the front of the house. Seconds later, Safa said she heard several
gunshots. She didn't know it at the time, but her father was dying.
Four Marines then moved into the bedroom, where some of her sisters
were standing at their mother's bedside, hugging her.

Yassen said Safa told him that one Marine started yelling at them in
English, but that they didn't understand what he was saying. The women
and children started screaming in fear, which Yaseen could hear from
next door. This went on for several minutes, he said.

He said he never heard gunshots, only a long sudden silence.

Desperate, he tried to get next door and find out what happened, but
Marines wouldn't let him pass.

"The waiting was killing me," Yaseen said. "We didn't know what
happened."

Three hours later, someone knocked at Yaseen's door. He could hear a
young voice wheezing and sobbing on the other side. It was Safa,
covered in blood and dirt. Yaseen said he couldn't remember what she
was wearing; he only saw the blood.

The family was dead, Safa told Yaseen.

Yaseen's wife cleaned Safa up while Yaseen prepared a white flag.
Marines were still blocking the area. Carrying the flag, Yaseen, his
wife, and Safa ran 200 yards to another relative's house where they
have stayed since.

Safa trembled as Yaseen told the story to a visitor. She tried to tell
it herself, but she couldn't. "My father told us to gather in one
room, so the Americans could search," she said. And then she started
to cry.

Yaseen said that Safa told him that four soldiers came into the
bedroom, but only one did the yelling. Her mother, who had heard the
shooting asked: "What did you do to my husband?" Her sisters, mother
and aunt were crying. And then the one soldier who had been yelling
started shooting.

Frightened, Safa fainted. She thought she had died. When she awoke,
she remembered seeing her mother still lying in bed. Her head was
blown open. She looked around and heard her 3-year-old brother,
Mohammed, moan in pain. The blood was pouring out of his right arm.

"Come on, Mohammed. Get up so we can go to uncle's house," she told
her brother. But he couldn't.

In the same room where her mother, aunt and sisters lay dead, Safa
grabbed the toddler, sat down and leaned his head against her
shoulder. She put his arm against her chest and held it to try to stop
the bleeding. She kept holding and talking to him until, like everyone
else in the room, he too was silent. And then she ran next door.

Yaseen didn't see the rest of his brother's family until he went to
Haditha Hospital the next day to pick up the bodies. Dr. Waleed Abdul
Khaliq al-Obeidi, the director of Haditha Hospital, said they arrived
around midnight, about 12 hours after Safa left her house.

According to the death certificates, Younes died of multiple gunshot
wounds to the chest. His wife, who was lying in bed, died of multiple
gunshot wounds to the head. The daughters were all shot in the chest.
Mohammed bled to death.

Younes didn't have a weapon, military officials confirmed.

According to the U.S. military officials, the Marines entered five
houses that day. In the third house, they found a group of women and
children and asked where the men were. The women pointed out the house
and the Marines left, without firing a round. At that house, they
found four men, some of them armed, and shot them dead.

Another group of Marines entered a fifth house, which appeared to be a
terrorist cell. It had sleeping bags, weapons and a pile of Jordanian
passports, military officials said. The men there were detained
without incident.

Late last month, an IED exploded near the same spot where Terrazas was
killed. Nearby shops started closing in the middle of the day, telling
customers they feared being detained. Drivers suddenly stopped and
pointed to the rising plume of smoke.

"That might have targeted the Americans," one driver said to another
stopped and fearful about what to do next. "The Americans are coming."

[A Knight Ridder Newspapers special correspondent who can't be named
for security reasons reported from Haditha. Youssef wrote the story
from Baghdad.]

*
================================================================
NY Transfer News Collective * A Service of Blythe Systems
Since 1985 - Information for the Rest of Us
339 Lafayette St., New York, NY 10012 http://www.blythe.org
List Archives: http://olm.blythe-systems.com/pipermail/nytr/
Subscribe: http://olm.blythe-systems.com/mailman/listinfo/nytr
================================================================

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.4.2 (GNU/Linux)

iD8DBQFEO0rSiz2i76ou9wQRAubaAKCTlnsAvemNiNegdfLmLx6u1axCUgCgqlw4
pOuu6+SeEwMfBnDKm5TuHJU=
=Ocab
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

==============================================================================
TOPIC: Bush: The Law Means What I Say It Means
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/6400afe6023ce4b5
==============================================================================

== 1 of 1 ==
Date: Tues, Apr 11 2006 1:24 am
From: NY.Transfer.News@blythe.org

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

Bush: The Law Means What I Say It Means

Via NY Transfer News Collective * All the News that Doesn't Fit

CounterPunch -Apr 10, 2006
http://www.counterpunch.org/nader04102006.html

The Law Means What I Say It Means

Tinhorn Caesar and the Spineless Democrats

By RALPH NADER

In the name of fighting stateless terrorism, George W. Bush is looming as
the American Caesar running roughshod over the civil liberties of the
American people who have turned against him in ever larger majorities.

In the name of fighting terrorism, George W. Bush fabricated numerous
excuses for illegally invading Iraq and occupying it for now over three
costly years in ways that are magnets for the recruitment and training of
ever more stateless terrorists. His own CIA Director, Porter Goss, made
exactly this point in testimony before the U.S. Senate in February 2005. So
too have many retired intelligence and military specialists including those
who recently worked for George W. Bush.

More and more evidence of the workings of Caesar Bush are coming to public
light. Just this week, in court filings by the prosecutor against the
indicted I. Lewis Libby Jr., Dick Cheney's right hand man, another
thunderbolt came forth. Mr. Libby testified that, in the words of The New
York Times, "Mr. Bush, who has long criticized leaks of secret information
as a threat to national security" himself approved Libby leaking just such
information to the press in order to rebut a critic.

Democratic Senate Leader, Senator Harry Reid (D-Nevada) said that "in light
of today's shocking revelation, President Bush must fully disclose his
participation in the selective leaking of classified information," calling
the President "the leaker in chief."

Not that the Democrats will do anything about this latest outrage, but the
Republicans in the Congress are reaching certain limits to their
self-censored sycophancy toward Caesar Bush. Also this week, Attorney
General Alberto R. Gonzales told a House Committee that the President may
have the legal authority even to wiretap communications between Americans
inside the United States without a court order. When pressured for his
authority behind such breathtaking outlawry, he fell back on his usual
Caesarean mantra "his inherent [the President's] role as commander in
chief." Sounds like the modern version of the "divine right of Kings".

This was too much even for the House Judiciary Chair, Republican F. James
Sensenbrenner, Jr. (R-Wisconsin), who accused the Bush administration of
"stonewalling".

Unbridled Presidential authority is un-American whether in peacetime,
wartime or fighting a gang whose exaggerated power has served Bush and
Cheney very well politically. How better to silence the Democrats, stifle or
chill public dissent, distract attention from domestic necessities, until
their post-Katrina debacle, enrich their donating corporate buddies with
military contracts and concentrate more lawless power in the White House at
the expense of the courts and Congress than by breaking our constitutional
system of separation of powers?

Mr. Bush gave the "Go" signal for the leak without going through a
conventional declassification process to determine how such "information
might compromise methods or sources," according to Professor Jonathan Turley
of the George Washington University Law School.

Rep. Adam Schiff (D-California) summed the leak up this way:

If the [Bush] administration believes it can tap purely domestic phone
calls between Americans without court approval, there is no limit to
executive power. This is contrary to settled law and the most basic
constitutional principles of the separation of powers.

Still the Democrats do not have the modest fortitude to support Senator
Russell Feingold's (D-Wisconsin) modest motion to censure George W. Bush.
The Democrats are waiting for more incriminating material to spill out from
the Executive Branch to add to the mounds of evidence already made public
from U.S. and British sources.

For sure more will spill out. Whenever there are court cases like Libby's,
where the defendant wants to defend only himself, there will be more
damaging memos, emails, testimony and maybe confessions. When an awakened
mainstream media is hungry in pursuit of such stories, you can be sure more
will come out. Inside contacts and sources will increase. Retirements will
increase as well to produce more whistleblowers.

If the House and Senate start exercising their constitutional rights to
oversight, more power will be added to extract information from the gold
mines of what Bush and Cheney did and when prior and after the invasion of
Iraq.

At some point the Bush regime's luck, bred by secrecy, cover-ups and
mendacity, will run out. The critical mass will be reached. And the American
Caesar will fall, with or without the assistance of the pitiful Democrats.

Writing about the Democratic Primary race in Connecticut between Senator
Joseph Lieberman and Ned Lamont, who calls the incumbent "Bush's favorite
Democrat", Keith C. Burris of the Manchester, Connecticut Journal Inquirer
declares, "Even in wartime, the power of government must be checked; even in
wartime the president is not a law unto himself; even in wartime the people
deserve to be informed by the free exchange of ideas. Even in wartime, the
citizens may seek to change the government."

Especially during an unconstitutional, illegal war in Iraq started by George
W. Bush!

See http://www.DemocracyRising.US for more information.

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.4.2 (GNU/Linux)

iD8DBQFEO0rSiz2i76ou9wQRAprsAKCbzNuj4872V/dvYwpMBTnBNem/7ACgnwih
RGuJg3RaClZthwpTW1k3fW4=
=zE+O
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

==============================================================================
TOPIC: Katrina "recovery" plagued by bloat and waste: La. officials
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/6ec6a9211be30678
==============================================================================

== 1 of 1 ==
Date: Tues, Apr 11 2006 6:26 am
From: NY.Transfer.News@blythe.org

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

Katrina "recovery" plagued by bloat and waste: La. officials

Via NY Transfer News Collective * All the News that Doesn't Fit

Reuters - Apr 10, 2006
http://today.reuters.com/misc/PrinterFriendlyPopup.aspx?type=politicsNews&storyID=uri%3a2006-04-11T000818Z_01_N10398609_RTRUKOC_0_US-HURRICANES-RECOVERY.xml

Louisiana officials say Katrina recovery wasteful

By Michael Depp

NEW ORLEANS (Reuters) - Multibillion-dollar hurricane recovery efforts on
the U.S. Gulf Coast are plagued by bloated costs and waste with too many
contractors getting a piece of the action, lawmakers said at a hearing on
Monday.

Louisiana legislators frustrated by the slow pace of recovery accused the
Federal Emergency Management Agency and Army Corps of Engineers of
spearheading a flawed rebuilding process with little transparency and
contractor oversight.

U.S. Sen. Tom Coburn, an Oklahoma Republican and chairman of the Senate
Subcommittee on Federal Financial Management, held the field hearing as part
of efforts to avoid the mistakes made after Hurricane Katrina in future
crises.

"There seems to be a great pillow in the middle," Kevin Davis, president of
storm-ravaged St. Tammany Parish, said of a disconnect between FEMA
management and on-the-ground personnel. "Creativity and flexibility are
discouraged."

The August 29 storm killed at least 1,300 people along the Gulf Coast. The
region is bracing for the formal start to the 2006 hurricane season on June
1 against a backdrop of often-fractious relations with the federal agencies.

Coburn questioned the Corps' debris removal contracts as an example of
mismanagement. He asked why details were not being divulged and questioned
FEMA's deferral of key cleanup initiatives to the Corps.

"We believe that they have the requisite experience that we don't have
within FEMA," responded Tina Burnette, deputy director of acquisitions for
Katrina under the Department of Homeland Security, which oversees the
agency.

But Sen. David Vitter, a Louisiana Republican, said the Corps contracted out
its key cleanup operations to large, private firms, which in turn
sub-contracted down a lengthy chain of companies before any work was done.

Too much of $100 billion-plus earmarked for Louisiana hurricane relief
efforts is tied up in wasteful subcontracting practices, lawmakers said
often at the hearing.

Also, local contractors are frequently being shut out of big jobs despite
laws guaranteeing their role, Vitter said.

Derrell Cohoon, chief of the Louisiana Association of General Contractors,
which represents 700 firms, said local players were getting subcontracts
that were too small and piecemeal to be either profitable or meaningful.

Several politicians complained about FEMA travel trailers used for temporary
housing, which have cost the agency $50,000-$70,000 each to buy and install.
The money would be better put in residents' hands to repair their homes or
to find other housing, the said.

The trailers themselves have been troublesome. One local politician
testified some of his constituents have had them delivered, only to be
locked out because different contractors were in charge of handing out the
keys.

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.4.2 (GNU/Linux)

iD8DBQFEO0rRiz2i76ou9wQRAtFNAKCgNwKd6Pq9S1uIWJ03hi1Er3tbYACgklov
zOW/U8H9U4oMEKAInUtGqM4=
=b4/r
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

==============================================================================
TOPIC: Immigration News Briefs - Apr 9, 2006
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/87901c8e6211fa8
==============================================================================

== 1 of 1 ==
Date: Tues, Apr 11 2006 6:26 am
From: NY.Transfer.News@blythe.org

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

Immigration News Briefs - Apr 9, 2006

Via NY Transfer News Collective * All the News that Doesn't Fit

Immigration News Briefs
Vol. 9, No. 13 - April 9, 2006

1. School Threats Lead to Student Suicide?
2. ICE Pulls Kids Off School Buses
3. New Raids in New Orleans
4. Senate Compromise Falters

Immigration News Briefs is a weekly supplement to Weekly News
Update on the Americas, published by Nicaragua Solidarity
Network, 339 Lafayette St, New York, NY 10012; tel 212-674-9499;
fax 212-674-9139; wnu@igc.org. INB is also distributed free via
email; contact nicajg@panix.com for info. You may reprint or
distribute items from INB, but please credit us and tell people
how to subscribe.

*1. SCHOOL THREATS LEAD TO STUDENT SUICIDE?

A 14-year-old boy who took part in a student walkout on Mar. 28
in Ontario, California--one of hundreds of walkouts around the
country demanding immigrant rights--killed himself on Mar. 30
after a vice principal at De Anza Middle School told him he would
be punished for his truancy. The administrator said he could not
attend graduation, his mother would be fined $250, and he could
be jailed for three years, said attorney Sonia Mercado. Soltero
phoned his mother with the news, but before she could get home,
he shot himself in the head using a gun his stepfather had hidden
in the garage, leaving behind apology notes. "We have to let the
schools know that they can't punish our children for exercising
their rights," said his mother, Louise Corales, in a statement
issued by Mercado. [Press-Enterprise (Riverside) 4/8/06; Press
Release from Civil Rights Lawyer R. Samuel Paz 4/7/06]

*2. ICE PULLS KIDS OFF SCHOOL BUSES

US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents arrested 49
Mexicans and two Salvadorans on Mar. 30 and 31 in Merced County
in central California. ICE said all those arrested had prior
deportation orders. In at least two cases, ICE seized US citizen
children off school buses before or after arresting their
parents. In Firebaugh, two unmarked ICE vans pulled up alongside
a school bus on the morning of Mar. 31, said Brian Walker,
superintendent of the Dos Palos Oro Loma Joint Unified School
District. One van drove in front of the bus, forcing the driver
to stop. ICE agents boarded the bus and took three children away
in a van. The concerned bus driver followed the vans to a home
where he saw agents handcuffing people who appeared to be the
students' parents, said Walker. In Merced, agents took two
students from Franklin Elementary School off a bus after
arresting their parents.

Walker said he called ICE officials to discuss how arrests could
be handled in the future. "[W]e want to share with them that it
can be a traumatizing experience for students to be pulled over,"
said Walker. "We...think it could have been handled differently."

"There was no intention to target the children," said ICE
spokesperson Virginia Kice. "We were arresting their parents. The
parents were concerned about the kids coming home to an empty
house. We didn't want to separate a family."

The timing of the raids, during a week of nationwide protests for
immigrant rights, was a coincidence, said ICE Deputy Field Office
Director Timothy Aitken. "We do this every day," he said. "This
had nothing to do with the protests or the bills in the House and
the Senate." Three of ICE's "fugitive operations" teams conducted
the raids; local law enforcement agencies were not formally
involved, but the Merced County Sheriff's Department helped with
at least one arrest, said Aitken. [Merced Sun-Star 4/4/06]

*3. NEW RAIDS IN NEW ORLEANS

Over the weekend of Apr. 1, ICE agents and the Gretna Police
Department arrested 68 immigrants from Mexico, Honduras, Peru and
El Salvador in a joint operation in New Orleans, Louisiana. ICE
said the raid targeted criminals, but admitted that only 12 of
the 68 immigrants had criminal records; nine had illegally re-
entered the US after having been deported, and three had
outstanding warrants of removal. [ICE did not indicate why the
others were arrested; presumably they only lacked legal
documents.] [ICE News Release 4/5/06]

On Mar. 17, ICE agents arrested 40 immigrant workers in New
Orleans. ICE said the immigrants were undocumented and that at
least a dozen of them had violent criminal backgrounds in Central
America. ICE officials said the action was not part of a major
campaign but was instigated by complaints from people associated
with small businesses around Lee Circle who were apparently
disconcerted by large numbers of workers gathering there waiting
for jobs. During the raid, one worker trying to escape allegedly
drove a car over an ICE agent's foot. [KATC.com 3/18/06 from AP]
Mexican national Dennis Dedert has since been indicted by a
federal grand jury on a charge of assaulting, resisting and
impeding a federal officer. [KATC.com 3/24/06 from AP]

*4. SENATE COMPROMISE FALTERS

On Apr. 7, a day after key senators announced they had reached a
final compromise on immigration reform, the deal fell apart and
the US Senate broke for a two-week recess. [CNN 4/8/06 from AP;
Time 4/7/06] The bill would have allowed undocumented immigrants
present in the US to get permanent residence within 6 to 8 years,
although those here less than five years would have to leave the
US first and come back as temporary workers. Those who arrived
after Jan. 7, 2004, would not be eligible, but would not be
barred from a temporary worker program. [National Immigration
Forum 4/7/06] The compromise also included proposals harmful to
immigrants, among them ones which would expand expedited removal
and legalize indefinite detention. [Asylum Working Group 4/6/06]

Sen. Harry Reid (D-NV), the Senate's minority leader, apparently
scuttled the deal because he feared amendments would make the
Senate bill unworkable, and the final bill would worsen when
lawmakers meet to reconcile it with HR 4437, an anti-immigrant
bill passed by the House last December. In an election year, Reid
did not want to lead an effort to block the final bill. Sen.
Arlen Specter (R-PA), chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee,
said he would take the compromise up in committee as soon as the
recess ends, and send it to the Senate floor a week later. [CNN
4/8/06 from AP; Time 4/7/06]

- ----------------------------------------------------------------
END

Contributions toward Immigration News Briefs are gladly accepted:
they should be made payable and sent to Nicaragua Solidarity
Network, 339 Lafayette St, New York, NY 10012. (Tax-deductible
contributions of $50 or more may be made payable to the A.J.
Muste Memorial Institute and earmarked for "NSN".)

=======================================================================
Weekly News Update on the Americas * Nicaragua Solidarity Network of NY
339 Lafayette Street, New York, NY 10012
phone: 212-674-9499 fax: 212-674-9139 email: wnu@igc.org
=======================================================================

*
================================================================
NY Transfer News Collective * A Service of Blythe Systems
Since 1985 - Information for the Rest of Us
339 Lafayette St., New York, NY 10012 http://www.blythe.org
List Archives: http://olm.blythe-systems.com/pipermail/nytr/
Subscribe: http://olm.blythe-systems.com/mailman/listinfo/nytr
================================================================

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.4.2 (GNU/Linux)

iD8DBQFEO0rRiz2i76ou9wQRAsCXAJ9uyzAo/f5TNurXmFRGw5WX0ukrxQCgkdhF
9hk6MGpg7208QO6XnKZFnI0=
=Iw2j
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

==============================================================================
TOPIC: Hamas sees Israeli moves as declaration of war
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/daefdb8ae3d9ef9f
==============================================================================

== 1 of 1 ==
Date: Mon, Apr 10 2006 11:26 pm
From: NY.Transfer.News@blythe.org

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

Hamas sees Israeli moves as declaration of war

Via NY Transfer News Collective * All the News that Doesn't Fit

Reuters - Apr 11, 2006
http://today.reuters.com/misc/PrinterFriendlyPopup.aspx?type=worldNews&storyID=uri%3a2006-04-11T043200Z_01_L10465704_RTRUKOC_0_US-MIDEAST.xml

Hamas sees Israeli moves as declaration of war

By Nidal al-Mughrabi

GAZA (Reuters) - Israel suspended formal security ties to the Palestinian
government on Monday in what Hamas said amounted to "a declaration of war".

European Union foreign ministers added to U.S. and Israeli pressure on the
Islamic militant group by approving a temporary halt in direct EU aid to the
new government.

Thousands of Palestinians poured onto the streets of Gaza, protesting
Western aid cuts and a spike in Israeli military strikes since election
victor Hamas took control of the Palestinian Authority in late March.

An Israeli shell killed a young Palestinian girl and injured 12 others,
including five children, when it hit a house in the northern Gaza Strip,
Palestinian officials said.

Israel says the shelling in Gaza is meant to combat rocket attacks by
militants.

Avi Dichter, a top adviser to interim Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert,
told Israel Radio that a ground assault of Gaza could not be ruled out.

"We have done it in the past and can do so in the present," said Dichter, a
former secret intelligence chief who may be appointed to a senior security
post in Olmert's new cabinet.

The Palestinians urged the U.N. Security Council to act against Israel for
intensifying military strikes.

"The international community cannot continue to stand idly by while
defenseless women, children and men continue to be killed, wounded and
maimed," Palestinian U.N. Observer Riyad Mansour said in a letter to the
Council.

In statements issued in quick succession on Monday, President Mahmoud Abbas
and Hamas denounced Israel for branding the Palestinian Authority a "hostile
entity".

Mahmoud al-Zahar, foreign minister in the new Hamas government who has a
reputation as a hard-liner, said in a statement that the European Union
decision was "unacceptable" and "collective punishment against the
Palestinian people".

Zahar added that the Palestinian people would not succumb to the
international pressure and would remain committed to their goal of
establishing an independent Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital.

Hamas spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri said in a statement that Israel's decision to
sever contacts with the Palestinian Authority constituted "a declaration of
war and a failed attempt to cause internal divisions among Palestinians".

In the West Bank city of Ramallah, Abbas said Israel's position "completely
violates the agreements we have signed with them and violates international
law".

"We demand from this Israeli government to stop such measures", said Abbas,
whose Fatah faction was crushed by Hamas in an election in January.

COOPERATION SUSPENDED

Having ruled out contacts with the Hamas-led Palestinian Authority, the
Israeli army moved on Monday to suspend remaining security coordination.

At a joint coordination office near the West Bank city of Jericho,
Palestinian Colonel Khaled Ziyar and his men piled their belongings on to a
pick-up truck and turned keys to the facility over to the Israelis.

Before they drove away, the Palestinian officers took down posters of Abbas
and a Palestinian flag.

The Jericho district coordination office, located on the outskirts of the
ancient town, was the last security facility to be manned by both Israelis
and Palestinians. In other parts of the West Bank, cooperation was done by
telephone.

As part of its new policy, Israel blocked Brigadier General Ala Hosni, who
heads the Gaza police, and several other officials from moving between Gaza
and the West Bank.

Many Palestinians who lined up to get travel permits at civil administration
offices in the West Bank were turned away, witnesses said.

At an earlier protest, Palestinian children threw eggs at U.N. offices in
Gaza.

Hamas is sworn to destroy Israel but has largely abided by a year-old
ceasefire that other militant groups have ignored.

Israel and the United States have vowed not to deal with Hamas unless it
recognizes the Jewish state's right to exist, renounces violence and accepts
interim peace deals. Hamas says talks with Israel would be futile.

Israel has halted the transfer of tax revenues to the Palestinian Authority,
but it said it would allow the funds to be used to pay the authority's debts
to Israeli utilities.

(Additional reporting by Wafa Amr in Ramallah; Allyn Fisher-Ilan and Adam
Entous in Jerusalem)

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.4.2 (GNU/Linux)

iD8DBQFEO0rRiz2i76ou9wQRApVKAKCc15woIKUEa3j2NDreMCKT7NoVpwCdHHnt
cuKceQCT+k4OYZDjBU6N1lg=
=ox0p
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

==============================================================================
TOPIC: Weekly News Update #845 - Apr 9, 2006
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/71a711f1618367fd
==============================================================================

== 1 of 1 ==
Date: Tues, Apr 11 2006 6:26 am
From: NY.Transfer.News@blythe.org

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

Weekly News Update #845 - Apr 9, 2006

Via NY Transfer News Collective * All the News that Doesn't Fit

WEEKLY NEWS UPDATE ON THE AMERICAS
ISSUE #845, APRIL 9, 2006
NICARAGUA SOLIDARITY NETWORK OF GREATER NEW YORK
339 LAFAYETTE ST., NEW YORK, NY 10012
(212) 674-9499 <wnu@igc.org>

1. Guatemala: Murders Follow Uprising Call
2. Dominican Republic: US Flights Probed
3. Brazil: Repression Against Protesters
4. Honduras: General Loses in US Suit
5. Peru: Vote to Go to Second Round
6. Colombia: Activists Murdered in Santander
7. Haiti: Deportations, Prisoners & More

ISSN#: 1084-922X. Weekly News Update on the Americas covers news
from Latin America and the Caribbean, compiled and written from a
progressive perspective. It has been published weekly by the
Nicaragua Solidarity Network of Greater New York since 1990. If
this issue was forwarded to you, please write to wnu@igc.org for
a free one-month subscription.

Feel free to reproduce these updates, or reprint or re-post any
information from them, but please credit us as "Weekly News
Update on the Americas," and include our full contact information
so people will know how to find us. Send us a copy of any
publication where we are cited or reprinted.

The Update is produced by an all-volunteer team and is funded
solely through subscription contributions. For a one-year
subscription (52 issues) via email, we ask for a suggested
donation of $25. Make checks or money orders payable to Nicaragua
Solidarity Network, 339 Lafayette Street, New York, NY 10012 (for
tax deductible donations or to send money from overseas, contact
us for details.)

*1. GUATEMALA: MURDERS FOLLOW UPRISING CALL

Four heavily armed men dressed in black murdered Tz'utujil Maya
indigenous leader Antonio Ixbalan Cali and his wife, Maria Petzey
Cool, on Apr. 5 in their home in the community of Valparaiso,
Chicacao municipality in the Guatemalan department of
Suchitepequez. Ixbalan was a local leader of the National
Indigenous and Campesino Coordinating Committee (CONIC) and
president of the Farmers Association of Santiago Atitlan. The
Valparaiso community is composed of 44 families that carried out
a successful struggle for their land, formerly a private ranch;
they were granted the legal title on Feb. 8, 2002.

The murders came within days of two other apparently political
killings. On Apr. 2 Meregilda Suchite, a community leader and
member of the local Women's Network in Olopa, Chiquimula
municipality, in the Ch'orti region, was shot six times and
attacked with a machete. Suchite's husband said police failed to
arrest the murderer, Cesar Perez Gonzalez. On Apr. 6 two men on a
motorcycle gunned down legislative deputy Mario Ronaldo Pivaral
Montenegro, of the center-right National Hope Unity (UNE), in
front of the party's headquarters in Guatemala City. He had gone
outside to answer a call on his cell phone. [Guatemala Hoy
4/6/06, 4/7/06]

National CONIC leaders tied the murders of Ixbalan and Petzey to
a call they issued hours earlier on Apr. 5 for a "National Mayan
and Popular Uprising." In a press conference CONIC leaders and
leaders of the National Teachers Assembly (ANM) announced the
uprising as they broke off talks with the government of President
Oscar Berger. "The response to our demands mocks the Maya and
popular movement," said CONIC general coordinator Pedro Esquina.
Another CONIC leader, Juan Tiney, projected actions starting
after Easter weekend ends on Apr. 16 that could include taking
over farms, blocking highways, and holding assemblies and
demonstrations. "They are forcing us to choose the route of
popular struggle," he said. "Ecuador and Bolivia are examples of
the results that can occur, and we believe that in Guatemala this
is also possible. Everything CONIC says, it does." The CONIC
leaders called on all Mayans who hold government posts to resign
and join the Mayan people's struggle, including human rights
activists Rosalina Tuyuc and Rigoberta Menchu.

The movement's demands include the resolution of more than 100
land conflicts, forgiveness of debts to the government for land
awarded to campesinos, the suspension of mining concessions, a
law on nationality and indigenous peoples, and an end to the
effort to fire ANM leader Joviel Acevedo from his teaching job.
[Guatemala Hoy 4/6/06, 4/7/06; Prensa Libre (Guatemala) 4/6/06]

The call for an uprising followed a demonstration by thousands of
campesinos and others in Guatemala City on Mar. 30, largely
organized by CONIC and ANM around the same demands. Mar. 27 and
28 had brought road blockades by people whose homes and land had
been damaged by hurricane Stan in October, along with
demonstrations against the US-backed Dominican Republic-Central
America Free Trade Agreement (DR-CAFTA). [La Semana en Guatemala
4/4/06]

On Mar. 29, in the midst of these mobilizations, army troops,
reportedly backed by tanks and helicopters, violently evicted
some 310 members of the Worker and Campesino Labor Federation
(FESOC) from land they were occupying in the community of La
Bendicion, Flores municipality, Peten department. The campesinos
were waiting for the National Council of Protected Areas (CONAP)
to comply with its commitment to relocate them on other suitable
land. The troops reportedly injured campesinos and burned their
homes and possessions. [Amnesty International Urgent Action
4/3/06]

*2. DOMINICAN REPUBLIC: US FLIGHTS PROBED

Two US Black Hawk combat helicopters were observed flying over
the border between the Dominican Republic and Haiti on at least
two occasions in March: 4:00-4:30am on Mar. 23 and 10pm-12:00am
on Mar. 24. The flights, reported by Dominican military
commanders in Duverge and Jimani, in the southwestern province of
Independencia, alarmed the residents of several communities.

The Dominican military was not informed about the flights, army
head Major Gen. Jose Ricardo Estrella Fernandez said on Mar. 28.
"Not only the [helicopters] were put at risk but also the lives
of their crews and passengers, if Dominican troops had opened
fire on them," an unnamed Dominican military source told the
daily El Nacional. But Armed Forces Secretary Adm. Sigfrido Pared
Perez insisted, also on Mar. 28, that there had just been a
failure of communication between the US and Dominican forces and
that the problem had been corrected. Dominican pilots with
training in night flying accompanied the US pilots in the
helicopters, he said; the flights were authorized by the Civil
Aeronautics Board, and the helicopters did not fly over any
restricted areas, such as military installations.

The Black Hawks are stationed in the Dominican Republic in
connection with the "New Horizons 2006" joint Dominican-US
military operation, based in the city of Barahona, in Barahona
province, about 100 kilometers from where the flights were
reported. According to the US, the operation will employ some
3,500 US soldiers--but not more than 450 at any one time--
building schools and clinics in Barahona province before it ends
in May. Dominican activists have repeatedly demonstrated against
the presence of US troops, asking why the soldiers have brought
tanks and helicopters to build clinics and charging that the US
is planning to build a military base in the Dominican Republic
[see Updates #838, 840, 843]. [El Nacional 3/28/06, 3/29/06; Hoy
(Santo Domingo) 3/28/06; El Diario-La Prensa (NY) 3/29/06 from
correspondent]

*3. BRAZIL: REPRESSION AGAINST PROTESTERS

On Apr. 2, nearly 1,500 members of Brazil's Movement of Dam-
Affected People (MAB) and other organizations linked to Via
Campesina, an international peasant movement, demonstrated at the
Minas Gerais Energy Company (Cemig) in Belo Horizonte, capital of
Minas Gerais state. Agents of the state-controlled Military
Police (PM) attacked the protesters, sending 17 to the hospital
and leaving more than 30 others injured and 30 more disappeared.
Another seven people were arrested.

It was the second day of protests around energy and water issues
in Belo Horizonte: on Apr. 1, some 3,000 people took part in a
march for "Water and Energy for the Sovereignty of the Brazilian
People." As they marched to Freedom Plaza to support seven
activists on hunger strike there since Mar. 30, the protesters
clashed with police three times. The marchers have been camping
in People's Plaza--across from the Legislative Assembly--where
they inaugurated the First Meeting of the Minas Gerais Social
Movements. The day before, Mar. 31, some 200 police agents had
blocked MAB members on the BR 040 highway for over an hour.

On Apr. 3, the protests--and the repression--continued: as many
as 100 armed PM agents used pepper spray and truncheons against
some 2,000 demonstrators as they staged another march against
Cemig in the center of Belo Horizonte.

Minas Gerais has the highest energy prices in Brazil, and the
public pays disproportionately higher prices than corporations
for electricity, despite using less of it. The protesters object
to the privatization policies promoted by the Inter-American
Development Bank (IDB)--a major financer of hydroelectric and
other projects--and want a reduction in electricity rates.
[Adital 4/4/06]

On Mar. 27 in Para state, nearly 280 agents from the PM's "Shock
Troops" forcibly evicted 600 families, members of the Movement of
Landless Rural Workers (MST), from an encampment on the Rio
Vermelho estate in Sapucaia municipality. The estate had been
illegally appropriated by the Quagliato group. Police also
arrested MST member Tim Maia. Angered by the eviction, some 800
families from an encampment in Lourival Santana blocked the PA
150 highway near Eldorado dos Carajas, and occupied a property
known as the Peruvian estate. [Adital 3/29/06]

Brazil's Movement of Small Farmers (MPA) held a national campaign
of mobilizations Mar. 27-30, with nearly 10,000 people
participating in actions in 14 states against big agribusiness
interests and in defense of campesino agriculture. Actions
included marches, road blockades, demonstrations and debates.
[Adital 3/30/06]

*4. HONDURAS: GENERAL LOSES IN US SUIT

In a ruling issued late on Mar. 31 in Miami, US district Judge
Joan Lenard ordered a former Honduran military officer, Lt. Col.
Juan Lopez Grijalba, to pay $47 million to torture survivors and
relatives of victims murdered by troops Lopez Grijalba commanded
in the early 1980s. The plaintiffs, who now live in the US, were
Gloria and Oscar Reyes, a married couple abducted and tortured by
soldiers in and around Tegucigalpa in 1982; Zenaida Velasquez,
the sister of Manfredo Velasquez, a university student leader
murdered in 1981; and the two sisters of university student Hans
Madisson, mutilated and decapitated in 1982. During this period,
Lopez Grijalba headed the National Investigations Directorate
(DNI) and the death squad known as Battalion 316. Judge Lenard
ruled that Lopez Grijalba was responsible for the actions of the
troops, and that he was present and giving orders during the raid
in which Madisson and Gloria and Oscar Reyes were captured.

The monetary award was mostly symbolic, since Lopez Grijalba is
living in Honduras and apparently has no assets in the US. He
moved to the Miami area in 1998; US immigration authorities
arrested him in April 2002, and he was deported to Honduras on
Oct. 21, 2004 for his participation in human rights abuses.

But Matt Eisenbrandt, litigation director for the San Francisco-
based Center for Justice & Accountability (CJA), which brought
the suit in 2002 on behalf of the plaintiffs [see Updates 641,
652], said the decision might advance a case the Honduran human
rights prosecutor opened against Lopez Grijalba when he was
deported. "A judgment in the United States can carry a lot of
weight in that country," Eisenbrandt said. Bertha Oliva,
coordinator of the Committee of Relatives of the Detained-
Disappeared in Honduras, called the decision "historic" and said
it "obligates the Honduran authorities to review their role as
fixers and builders of impunity." [El Nuevo Herald, Miami,
4/4/06; Miami Herald 4/4/06; La Nacion (Costa Rica) 4/3/06 from
ACAN-EFE; CJA press release 4/3/06]

*5. PERU: VOTE TO GO TO SECOND ROUND

Exit polls in Peru's Apr. 9 general elections are showing
nationalist presidential candidate Ollanta Humala Tasso of the
Union for Peru coalition in the lead with 29.6% of the vote, well
below the 50% needed to avoid a runoff in May with the second-
place candidate. Exit surveys by the polling firm Apoyo show a
virtual tie for second place between social democratic ex-
president Alan Garcia Perez of the Peruvian Aprista Party with
24.5% of the vote and Lourdes Flores Nano of the rightwing
National Unity coalition with 24.2%. [Resumen Latinoamericano
4/9/06; AP 4/9/06]

In the heavily indigenous Andean regions of Ayacucho, Cusco and
Apurimac, Humala seems to have won with more than 50%. Peruvians
also elected two vice presidents, 120 members of the single-
chamber Congress and 15 members of the Andean parliament.
Pollsters predict that only six parties will have representation
in Congress, with no party holding an absolute majority. Exit
polls for the congressional race show the Aprista Party with
about 20.7% of the votes, followed by Union for Peru with 17.7%,
National Unity with 17.1%, ex-president Alberto Fujimori's
Alliance for the Future with 12.9% and ex-president Valentin
Paniagua's Center Front with 8.6%. Possible Peru, the party of
current president Alejandro Toledo, got 4.2%. [AP 4/9/06]

Humala, who has developed friendly relations with left-populist
Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez Frias and leftist Bolivian
president Evo Morales Ayma, was attacked by rightwing mobs when
he and his wife went to cast their votes at the Ricardo Palma
University in Lima. The mob shouted insults--including "Ollanta
is Hugo Chavez--as they threw paper and trash at Humala and tried
to attack him physically. Humala was finally escorted from the
building by dozens of riot police. [Resumen Latinoamericano
4/9/06]

*6. COLOMBIA: ACTIVISTS MURDERED IN SANTANDER

Yamile Agudelo Penalosa, a 26-year old member of the Popular
Women's Organization (OFP) from the Colombian city of
Barrancabermeja, in Santander department, was brutally tortured,
raped and murdered. Her body was found in the Barrancabermeja
municipal trash dump, on the road leading to the village of
Llanito, on Mar. 22; the body was identified two days later by
her parents, OFP member Marisabel Penalosa and Alfonso Agudelo.
Her face had been destroyed and one of her ears was cut off. The
OFP has not accused any armed group of responsibility for the
killing, but notes that Yamile Agudelo was assigned to one of the
OFP's community soup kitchens in Barrancabermeja, and that the
city is controlled by rightwing paramilitaries. [OFP Communique
3/25/06 via Colombia Indymedia; Vanguardia Liberal (Bucaramanga)
3/26/06; Yahoo Noticias 3/28/06]

On Apr. 2, armed assailants shot to death Daniel Cortez Cortez, a
member of the Sintraelecol union, while he was working in the
Montoyas village of Puerto Parra municipality, Santander
department. Cortez was an active union member throughout his
nearly 16 years working at Electrificadora de Santander, the
departmental electric company. He was murdered in a place
completely controlled by the allegedly demobilized members of the
supposedly disbanded rightwing paramilitary United Self-Defense
Forces of Colombia (AUC). The assailants also apparently robbed
Cortez's pay. [Communique from Unitary Workers Federation (CUT)-
Barrancabermeja Committee, undated, via Resumen Latinoamericano
4/8/06]

*7. HAITI: DEPORTATIONS, PRISONERS & MORE

According to the Haiti-based Support Group for the Repatriated
and Refugees (GARR), more than 3,000 immigrants were deported
from the Dominican Republic to Haiti during the month of March.
Just on the night of Mar. 29-30, GARR encountered 400 deportees
at Anse-a-Pitre, in the Southeast department, across the border
from Pedernales. Belladere, in the Central Plateau department,
received 1,726 deportees in March. People were also deported to
Lascahobas (Plateau Central) and Malpasse (West department).
[AlterPresse 4/7/06]

On Mar. 29, the 19th anniversary of the passage of the Haitian
Constitution, and again on Apr. 6, Thierry Fagart, a French
attorney who heads the Human Rights Division of the United
Nations Stabilization Mission in Haiti (MINUSTAH), called for the
release of all prisoners who have not been charged within the
constitutional time limits. According to official figures, 4,034
prisoners are currently held in 17 prisons; only 450 have been
convicted and sentenced. Fagart demanded that the authorities
respect the constitutional requirement for prisoners to be
charged or released within 48 hours of their arrest. [Haiti
Progres (NY) 4/5/06; Agence Haitienne de Presse 4/6/06]

On Mar. 18 dozens of people attended a meeting the Haitian
Platform for Alternative Development (PAPDA), a non-governmental
organization, convened to push for an end to the United Nations
occupation. "The time has come to force the foreign soldiers to
withdraw," said Ansy Vixamar of Tet Kole Ti Peyizan ("Union of
Small Farmers"), calling for a common front to defend Haiti's
sovereignty. [Haiti Support Group News Briefs 3/18/06 from
AlterPresse]

On Mar. 25, 17 human skulls were found in a vacant lot in
Petionville, an upscale Port-au-Prince suburb. PNH agents and
MINUSTAH soldiers removed the skulls for analysis. Another 11
were found on Mar. 27 in Port-au-Prince's Canape-Vert
neighborhood. [Agence Haitienne de Presse 3/25/06; Haiti Press
Network 3/26/06]

END

VOLUNTEERS NEEDED to help us write and edit Weekly News Update on
the Americas. Please contact Jane or David at 212-674-9499 or
wnu@igc.org for details.

Your support is appreciated. A print edition of the Update is
also available via first class mail (a contribution of at least
$30 is suggested to cover printing and postage within the US).
Back issues and source materials are available on request. Update
items are available in searchable form at http://americas.org

Update subscribers also receive, as a supplement, our own weekly
Immigration News Briefs, and can opt to receive a separate
service, the weekly Centr-Am News. Discounted joint subscription
rates are available for John Ross' "Blind Man's Buff (formerly
"Mexico Barbaro") and the weekly Nicaragua News Service.

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.4.2 (GNU/Linux)

iD8DBQFEO0rRiz2i76ou9wQRAqDBAKCJQptgLYjI2qEiW9fOgc/Z8PiJwgCfVzIL
CbT47ogMr2nEf37sYOxaBro=
=FTOt
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

==============================================================================
TOPIC: Brit Murdered by Israel: All in the Line of Duty
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/43bbfd98cde91d0e
==============================================================================

== 1 of 1 ==
Date: Mon, Apr 10 2006 11:26 pm
From: NY.Transfer.News@blythe.org

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

Brit Murdered by Israel: All in the Line of Duty

Via NY Transfer News Collective * All the News that Doesn't Fit

sent by Sanjoy Mahajan (activ-l)

[The student's father: "Our view is this soldier was doing no more than
what was expected of him. It has become very clear to me that shooting
civilians was a regular army activity in that area." -Sanjoy]

The Independent - Apr 11, 2006
http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/legal/article357010.ece

Activist was unlawfully killed in Israel, says inquest jury

"April 6 2003. I have been shot at, gassed, chased by soldiers, had sound
grenades thrown within metres of me, been hit by falling debris and been in
the way of a 10-tonne D-9 that didn't stop. As we approached, I kept
expecting a part of my body to be hit by an 'invisible' force and shot of
pain. It took a huge amoung of will to continue. I wondered what it would be
like to be shot, and strangely I wasn't too scared. It is strange to know
that each night people are shot and killed for breaking military curfew, and
in the darkness on the north west side there is an Israeli settlement and a
few hundred metres away with military snipers in between and any one of the
four of us could be being watched through a sniper's sights at this moment.
The certainty is that they are watching, and it is in the decision of any
one Israeli soldier or settler that my life depends. I know that I'd
probably never know what hit me, but it's part of the job to be as visible
as possible."

Five days after he wrote these words, Tom Hurndall was shot by Israeli
forces and later died.

By Terri Judd

The Attorney General was called upon to consider the prosecution of five
senior Israeli officers after an inquest jury found that a British student
had been murdered by one of their soldiers.

In a rare move, the coroner, Andrew Reid, concluded the inquest into Tom
Hurndall's death by revealing that he would write to Lord Goldsmith to
explore further legal action relating to the 22-year-old's death.

Mr Hurndall a photojournalism student who travelled to Gaza along with a
group of peace activists was trying to save children from a volley of
bullets when he was hit in the head in April 2003. He never recovered
consciousness and died nine months later in a hospital in London.

Three weeks after the shooting, the British cameraman James Miller, 34, was
shot dead by another soldier from the same unit just a mile away.

While an Israeli soldier was eventually convicted in Israel of manslaughter
in Mr Hurndall's case after a protracted fight by his family, the jury at St
Pancras Coroner's Court took it a step further and decided unanimously that
he had been killed unlawfully and intentionally.

Dr Reid added that he had written to Lord Goldsmith: "On the basis that,
although an individual has been prosecuted, there are wider issues.'' The
Government, he said, had an obligation to protect British citizens from
being killed in similar circumstances.

The legal option available to Mr Hurndall's family include the Attorney
General authorising an extradition request under the Geneva Convention to
try the five men in a British court for alleged war crimes. He could also
pursue a war crimes prosecution in the International Criminal Court.

In an eerie premonition of the fate that awaited him, Mr Hurndall wrote in
his diary upon arrival in Rafah days earlier of the horror that greeted him,
including the regular shootings, gassings and use of sound grenades by
troops.

"The certainty is that they are watching and it is on the decision of any
one Israeli soldier or settler that my life depends. I know that I'd
probably never know what hit me, but it's part of the job to be as visible
as possible," he wrote. His last words to a young Palestinian man were that
he and his fellow activists from the International Solidarity Movement,
"wanted to do something to make a difference''.

On 11 April 2003, just hours after two Palestinian teenagers were shot and
killed for no apparent reason, the activists were trying to set up a tent to
block the Israeli tanks when shots rang out from a watchtower.

A group of children playing nearby scattered, but three froze in fear. Mr
Hurndall rescued a five-year-old boy before running back for two little
girls. As he bent down to pick one up, he was hit in the head. He died days
before his 21st birthday.

The inquest yesterday saw graphic footage of the young man wearing a high
visibility orange top being carried away, bleeding heavily, by panicked
colleagues. The jury heard that, as Mr Hurndall's family from north London
dealt with constant obstruction and deception by the Israeli authorities,
they were "astonished and shocked'' not to receive any high-profile support
from either Tony Blair or the Foreign Secretary, Jack Straw. It fell to his
father, Anthony Hurndall, to piece together the events of that day which
contradicted the original assertion that the Israel Defence Force had fired
at a Palestinian gunman in camouflage. At one point, in an armoured convoy
with British embassy officials, the family were shot at themselves, said his
mother, Jocelyn.

After several months, Sergeant Taysir Hayb conceded that he had fired at Mr
Hurndall, but insisted he had aimed 10cm away. He admitted that he had only
sought permission to fire after hitting Mr Hurndall and was later convicted
of manslaughter and obstruction of justice and sentenced to eight years. But
he told the court he was acting under orders. Mr Hurndall Snr said: "Our
view is this soldier was doing no more than what was expected of him. It has
become very clear to me that shooting civilians was a regular army activity
in that area."

The Israeli authorities refused to co-operate with the inquest and Mr
Hurndall said those higher up the command including Generals Jiora Eiland
and Doron Almog, as well as a colonel, deputy brigadier- general and captain
should be held accountable.

Michael Mansfield QC, on behalf of the family, said yesterday the British
Government should pressure the Israelis to prosecute the senior officers,
seek extradition or a European arrest warrant. It was only through the
family's "harrowing struggle", he said, that the rare prosecution of the
junior soldier had been achieved.

He continued: "It is about time a few demands were made of the Israeli
government. It is time the Government complies with its own obligations and
at least states to this family and the Miller family that they are
considering instigating proceedings under the act [Geneva Convention] which
is part of our domestic legislation. This is exactly the sort of case they
should be using it for and they have done nothing about it."

Another British inquest ruled last week that cameraman James Miller, 34, had
been murdered by an Israeli soldier. He was gunned down while making a
documentary about the impact of the conflict on Palestinian children in the
Rafah refugee camp in May 2003. Last December, an inquest found that Briton
Ian Hook, who was leading a UN reconstruction programme in the Jenin refugee
camp, was a victim of a "deliberate killing"in November 2002.

Tom Hurndall arrived in Rafah after hearing of the death of Rachel Corrie,
an American peacekeeper. She died on 17 March 2003 from injuries caused by
an Israeli army bulldozer while she was trying to stop the Rafah refugee
camp being demolished. Mr Hurndall Snr: "We have achieved a great deal more
than anyone expected and I don't see why we should not achieve more."

A tragedy unfolds

* 11 APRIL 2003
Tom Hurndall, a journalist, is shot in the head as he tries to move
Palestinian children out of line of fire of Israeli gunmen in Rafah

* 12 APRIL 2003
His parents fly to Israel to be by his side in hospital in Beer Sheva, where
he is being kept alive only by a ventilator. A brain scan shows the bullet
that entered Mr Hurndall's head left hundreds of particles of shrapnel

* 29 MAY 2003
He is flown from Israel to the UK and transferred to a London hospital,
still stays in a coma

* 17 JUNE 2003
His parents meet Jack Straw and demand the soldier who shot their son be
prosecuted. They also hand the Foreign Secretary two reports on the killing

* 13 JANUARY 2004
Tom Hurndall dies at a hospital in Putney, south-west London, after
contracting pneumonia

* 16 JANUARY 2004
The Westminster Coroner Paul Knapman orders a police investigation into
Hurndall's death

* 11 APRIL 2004
Israeli army charges Sergeant Taysir Hayb, an accomplished shot, with intent
to cause injury in relation's to Hurndall's death. The charge is later
upgraded to manslaughter

* 10 MAY 2004
The trial against Hayb opens at a military base in Israel. Hurndall's mother
Jocelyn is present to hear the opening speeches. It is adjourned for nine
days

* 20 DECEMBER 2004
A US peace activist tells the trial how he saw Hurndall shot. Joseph Carr,
23, said: "Tom moved into the area to evacuate the children. I looked away
and heard a shot and a scream, and saw him on the ground with blood coming
from his head."

* JUNE 2005
An Israeli miltary court convicts Sgt Hayb of Hurndall's manslaughter. He
denied the charge and said he was made a scapegoat by the Israeli army

* 11 AUGUST 2005
Hayb is jailed for eight years for the death of Tom Hurndall

* 10 APRIL 2006
A British inquest jury rules Tom Hurndall was deliberately murdered. His
parents call on the Government to take further action. His father says he
has not lost hope of justice.

*
================================================================
NY Transfer News Collective * A Service of Blythe Systems
Since 1985 - Information for the Rest of Us
339 Lafayette St., New York, NY 10012 http://www.blythe.org
List Archives: http://olm.blythe-systems.com/pipermail/nytr/
Subscribe: http://olm.blythe-systems.com/mailman/listinfo/nytr
================================================================

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.4.2 (GNU/Linux)

iD8DBQFEO0rSiz2i76ou9wQRAkCfAKCUZu58QCl3RG6lgOCYAM6uFa++DACfd1/Z
Od3YWx+VXoVkDBgWG9MaGgM=
=BGwn
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

==============================================================================
TOPIC: Memo Paints Grim Picture of Life in Iraq
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/50de0a310b0fbbc7
==============================================================================

== 1 of 1 ==
Date: Tues, Apr 11 2006 6:26 am
From: NY.Transfer.News@blythe.org

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

Memo Paints Grim Picture of Life in Iraq

Via NY Transfer News Collective * All the News that Doesn't Fit

The New York Times via Sydney Morning Herald - Apr 10, 2006
http://www.smh.com.au/news/world/memo-paints-grim-picture-of-life-in-iraq-as-killings-worsen/2006/04/09/1144521211020.html

Memo paints grim picture of life in Iraq as killings worsen

By Eric Schmitt and Edward Wong in Washington

AN INTERNAL staff report by the US embassy and military command in Baghdad
provides a sobering province-by-province snapshot of Iraq's political,
economic, and security situation, rating the overall stability of six of the
18 provinces "serious" and one "critical".

The report contrasts with some recent optimistic public statements by top US
politicians and military officials. Publication of the report's key findings
comes as a senior official in the Iraqi Government for the first time said
the country was in a state of civil war.

The Deputy Interior Minister, Hussein Ali Kamal, told the BBC on Saturday
that Iraq had been in "undeclared" civil war for the past year. His comments
were echoed by Egypt's President, Hosni Mubarak, who said in an interview on
the satellite television channel Al Arabiya that civil war had "pretty much
started" in Iraq.

Hours earlier, a car bomb killed at least six Shiite pilgrims and wounded 16
in the town of Musayib south of Baghdad. Thousands of Shiite men marched
through central Baghdad on Saturday morning, the day after suicide bombers
killed 85 people when they set off explosions at the city's leading Shiite
Muslim mosque. The demonstrators chanted slogans and waved banners
proclaiming themselves to be companies of the two Shiite religious party
militias - the Mahdi Army and the Badr Organisation.

"We will turn things upside down" if told to, one of the men said through a
loudspeaker.

Assassinations, many carried out by Shiite gunmen against Sunni Arabs in
Baghdad and elsewhere, accounted for more than four times as many deaths
last month as bombings and other mass casualty attacks, according to
military data.

On Saturday the US ambassador to Iraq, Zalmay Khalilzad, and the senior
military commander in Iraq, General George Casey, issued a statement
praising some of the political and security goals achieved in the past three
years, but cautioned that "despite much progress, much work remains".

The internal US staff report, titled Provincial Stability Assessment,
underscores the shift in the nature of the Iraq war three years after Saddam
Hussein was toppled. There are warnings of sectarian and ethnic frictions in
many regions, even in provinces that US officials generally describe as
non-violent.

There are also alerts about the growing power of Iranian-backed religious
Shiite parties, several of which the US helped put into power, and rival
militias in the south. The authors also point to the Arab-Kurdish fault line
in the north as a big concern, with the two ethnic groups vying for power in
Mosul, where violence is rampant, and Kirkuk, whose oil fields are critical
for economic growth.

The patterns of discord mapped by the report confirm that ethnic and
religious schisms have become entrenched across much of the country. Those
indications show that Iraq is undergoing a de facto partitioning along
ethnic and sectarian lines.

The report was written over six weeks by a joint civilian and military group
in Baghdad that wanted to assess conditions that new reconstruction teams
would face as they were deployed to the provinces, said Daniel Speckhard, a
US envoy in Baghdad who oversees reconstruction efforts.

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.4.2 (GNU/Linux)

iD8DBQFEO0rRiz2i76ou9wQRAiKlAJkBtPBb7ZFuQ10fcqi0iWXN+KwvRACeM4Qm
u5phevN7viWOWwmzW3RsBNA=
=e/xR
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

==============================================================================
TOPIC: Hersh Defends His Report on US Plotting Against Iran
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/1696e7b8d41dc972
==============================================================================

== 1 of 1 ==
Date: Tues, Apr 11 2006 6:26 am
From: NY.Transfer.News@blythe.org

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

Hersh Defends His Report on US Plotting Against Iran

Via NY Transfer News Collective * All the News that Doesn't Fit

sent by Mark Graffis (activ-l) - Apr 10, 2006

ThinkProgress.org - Apr 9, 2006
http://thinkprogress.org/2006/04/09/hersh-military/

Hersh: Our Military Is 'Very Loyal to the President,
But They're Getting to the Edge'

This morning on CNN, New Yorker journalist Seymour Hersh addressed the
uproar at the highest levels of the U.S. military over plans to launch a
massive strike against Iran that would include nuclear weapons:

"What I'm writing here is that if this [plan to use nukes] isn't removed -
and I say this very seriously, I've been around this town for 40 years -
some senior officers are prepared to resign. They're that upset about the
fact that this plan is kept in... [O]ne thing about our military, they're
very loyal to the president, but they're getting to the edge. They're
getting to the edge with not only Rumsfeld, but with Cheney and the
President."

Hersh also addressed claims today by British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw
that the idea of a nuclear strike on Iran is "completely nuts." Hersh's
response: "He didn't deny there's serious planning about the military
strike, is the point. He's absolutely right about a nuclear option, but
there is planning for conventional war."

Full transcript:

HERSH: When the JCS, the Joint Chiefs and the planners then wanted to walk
back that option [to use nuclear weapons], what happened is about three or
four weeks ago, the White House - people in the White House, in the Oval
Office, the Vice President's office - said "No, let's keep it in the plan.
That doesn't mean it's going to happen." They refuse to take it out. What
I'm writing here is that if this isn't removed - and I say this very
seriously, I've been around this town for 40 years - some senior officers
are prepared to resign. They're that upset about the fact that this plan is
kept in. Again, let me make the point, you're giving a range of options
early in the planning, to be sure of getting rid of it, you give that
option. .

BLITZER: Some senior military officers are prepared to resign?

HERSH: I'm saying if this isn't walked back and if the President isn't told
that you cannot do it - and once the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, some
senior members of the military say to the President, let's get the nuclear
option off the table, it will be taken off. He will not defy the military in
a formal report. Unless something specific is told to the White House that
you've got to drop the dream of a nuclear option, and that's exactly the
issue I'm talking about, people have said to me they would resign.

BLITZER: Do you want to name names?

HERSH: Are you kidding?

BLITZER: I'm giving you the opportunity.

HERSH: No. You know why? Because this is a punitive government right now.
This is a government that pretty much has its back against the wall, as
you've been saying all morning in iraq, and in the military - one thing
about our military, they're very loyal to the president, but they're getting
to the edge. They're getting to the edge with not only Rumsfeld, but with
Cheney and the President.

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.4.2 (GNU/Linux)

iD8DBQFEO0rRiz2i76ou9wQRAttrAKCnsW9sa0se5OG7m9K3YEiX84wVuQCglLHX
lBtZeFuVNLZNIO81soHxCWM=
=n44p
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

==============================================================================
TOPIC: US Intent on Toppling Iranian Govt
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/4b4f349cb0ce9554
==============================================================================

== 1 of 1 ==
Date: Tues, Apr 11 2006 6:26 am
From: NY.Transfer.News@blythe.org

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

US Intent on Toppling Iranian Govt

Via NY Transfer News Collective * All the News that Doesn't Fit

sent by Sanjoy Mahajan (activ-l)

"In Britain, Jack Straw told the BBC that the idea of a US nuclear strike
against Iran was 'completely nuts'."

Which is what Straw said about the invasion of Iraq, so it means that
the US and UK are making joint plans, and maybe a few years later we'll
get more Downing Street memos to confirm it.

"There is also rising concern in the US military and abroad that Mr
Bush's goal in Iran is not counter-proliferation but regime change"

Shocking!
Operation Iranian Liberation.

- -Sanjoy

***

The Guardian - Apr 10, 2006
http://www.guardian.co.uk/frontpage/story/0,,1750680,00.html

US plans strike to topple Iran regime - report

- - US 'intent on Iran attack'
- - Bush accused of 'messianic' mission

by Julian Borger in Washington and Bob Tait in Tehran

The US is planning military action against Iran because George Bush is
intent on regime change in Tehran - and not just as a contingency if
diplomatic efforts fail to halt its suspected nuclear weapons programme, it
was reported yesterday.

In the New Yorker magazine, Seymour Hersh, America's best known
investigative journalist, concluded that the Bush administration is even
considering the use of a tactical nuclear weapon against deep Iranian
bunkers, but that top generals in the Pentagon are attempting to take
that option off the table.

Hersh, who helped break the story of the Abu Ghraib prisoner abuse scandal,
quoted an unnamed Pentagon adviser as saying the resurgence of interest in
tactical nuclear weapons among Pentagon civilians was "a juggernaut that has
to be stopped" and that some senior officers and officials were considering
resignation over the issue.

There is also rising concern in the US military and abroad that Mr Bush's
goal in Iran is not counter-proliferation but regime change, the article
reports. The president and his aides now refer to the Iranian president,
Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, as a potential Adolf Hitler, according to a former
senior intelligence official.

Another government consultant is quoted as saying Mr Bush believes he must
do "what no Democrat or Republican, if elected in the future, would have the
courage to do" and "that saving Iran is going to be his legacy".

"The word I'm hearing is messianic," Mr Hersh said yesterday on CNN. "[Bush]
is politically free. He really thinks he has a chance and this is his
mission."

There was no formal response from the White House yesterday but Fox News
television quoted unnamed officials as saying Mr Hersh's article was "hyped,
without knowledge of the president's thinking". In Britain, Jack Straw told
the BBC that the idea of a US nuclear strike against Iran was "completely
nuts".

Military action against Iran was "not on the agenda", the foreign secretary
said. "They [the Americans] are very committed indeed to resolving this
issue ... by negotiation and by diplomatic pressure."

An Iranian foreign ministry spokesman, Hamid Reza Asefi, dismissed the
reports as "psychological war, launched by Americans because they feel angry
and desperate regarding Iran's nuclear dossier".

Vincent Cannistraro, a former CIA counter-terrorism operations chief said Mr
Bush had not yet made up his mind about the use of direct military action
against Iran.

"There is a battle for Bush's soul over that," he said, adding that Karl
Rove, the president's chief political adviser is adamantly opposed to a war.

However, Mr Cannistraro said covert military action, in the form of special
forces troops identifying targets and aiding dissident groups, is already
under way.

"It's been authorised, and it's going on to the extent that there is some
lethality to it. Some people have been killed."

He said US-backed Baluchi Sunni guerrillas had been involved in an attack in
Sistan-Baluchistan last month in which over 20 Iranian government officials
were killed and the governor of the provincial capital was wounded. The
Iranian government had blamed British intelligence for the incident.

Last week, the Iranian regime made a public show of its combat readiness by
test-firing some of its missile technology during seven days of war games in
the Gulf, images of which were broadcast repeatedly on state television.

The Washington Post reported yesterday that Pentagon and CIA planners had
been exploring possible targets, including a uranium enrichment plant at
Natanz and a uranium conversion site in Isfahan, as part of a broader
strategy of "coercive diplomacy" aimed at forcing Iran to abandon its
nuclear ambitions. But that report made no mention of the possible use of a
tactical nuclear bunker-buster, such as the B61-11, against deep underground
targets, reported by Mr Hersh.

The UN security council has given Iran until the end of this month to
suspend its uranium enrichment programme, which most western governments
believe is intended to produce a nuclear warhead, not generate electric
power as Tehran insists. There is no consensus in the security council over
what steps to take if the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) reports
back that Iran has failed to comply. The IAEA director, Mohamed ElBaradei is
due in Tehran this week for talks.

The US ambassador to the UN, John Bolton said last week the US would explore
other diplomatic and economic options if the security council fails to
agree. He has also told British parliamentarians that he believes that
military action could halt or at least set back the Iranian nuclear
programme by striking it at its weakest point.

The Washington Post reported that while no military action is likely in the
short term, the possible targets went beyond suspected nuclear installations
and included the option of a "more extensive bombing campaign designed to
destroy an array of military and political targets".

It is a widespread belief in Washington's neo-conservative circles that a
comprehensive air assault would disorient the Tehran government and
galvanise the Iranian people into bringing it down. The departure of senior
neo-conservatives from the administration after Mr Bush's 2004 re-election
was thought to have weakened their clout, but Mr Hersh's report suggested
that the president's personal convictions may yet prove decisive.

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.4.2 (GNU/Linux)

iD8DBQFEO0rRiz2i76ou9wQRAoTjAJ47dfo7Tx/IJK4h0tEFJfXiv4OdTQCeIAM1
tXz58VgUPEzNmk6izDP58a0=
=PZCq
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

==============================================================================
TOPIC: Sides won't budge on Iraqi leadership
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/cbf59417c12a51c1
==============================================================================

== 1 of 1 ==
Date: Tues, Apr 11 2006 6:26 am
From: NY.Transfer.News@blythe.org

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

Sides won't budge on Iraqi leadership

Via NY Transfer News Collective * All the News that Doesn't Fit

International Herald Tribune - Apr 11, 2006
http://www.iht.com/bin/print_ipub.php?file=/articles/2006/04/10/news/iraq.php

Sides won't budge on Iraqi leadership

By Kirk Semple The New York Times

BAGHDAD Sunni Arab and Kurdish political leaders rejected a last-ditch
attempt Monday to corral support for Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari and
urged the Shiite leadership to settle on another nominee to lead the next
government, officials said.

The top members of the Shiite coalition have agreed to meet Tuesday to
debate their next move, which could include selecting another candidate or
putting the issue before the National Assembly for a vote.

"It's clear the road is blocked for Jaafari," said Jalal Aldeen al-Saghir, a
member of the Shiite coalition, known as the United Iraqi Alliance.

Also Monday, the American military announced that three more American
soldiers had died in Anbar Province, where a hardcore insurgency has stymied
political and infrastructure development and beleaguered the U.S. military.

The formation of a new government has stalled on Jaafari's nomination, which
faces widespread opposition among Sunni Arabs, Kurds, independents and even
members of the Shiite alliance.

Jaafari has refused to step aside, saying he was fairly chosen in a ballot
among members of the alliance, which gained the constitutional right to pick
the prime minister by winning a plurality of the votes in the December
election.

The Shiite leadership Sunday decided to form a three-member committee to
lobby the opposition blocs.

But the Kurds, and then the Sunni Arabs, firmly reiterated their resistance
Monday to Jaafari and their unwillingness to join a new government led by
him.

"We expressed our hope that they will inform us of the names of their new
candidates to discuss them," Dhafir al- Ani, a spokesman for the largest
Sunni Arab bloc, said in an interview.

Some members of the alliance bristled Monday at the embedded message from
the opposition blocs that they should be included in the decision- making
process.

"It's not as straightforward as, 'They don't like Jaafari,'" said Haider al-
Abadi, an adviser to the prime minister.

"Apparently they think they have a say," Abadi added. "That will make it
extremely difficult because if we go along that route, we may never settle
on a person."

American officials have been pressuring Iraqi leaders to resolve the impasse
and have barely concealed their wish that the Shiites nominate someone other
than Jaafari.

Vice President Adel Abdul Mahdi has been a preferred Shiite candidate for
the Americans; he was warmly received by the Bush administration during a
visit to Washington last autumn.

But Mahdi's candidacy is opposed by many of Jaafari's allies, particularly
loyalists of cleric Moktada al-Sadr, who has had a long-running and
sometimes violent rivalry with Mahdi's party, the Supreme Council for the
Islamic Revolution in Iraq. Sadr and the Supreme Council have their own
militias that have occasionally taken up arms against each other. This
animosity could force the Shiite alliance to settle on a compromise
candidate.

In recent days, the candidacies of Hussein al-Shahristani, an independent
Shiite and member of the alliance, and Ali al-Adeeb, a leader of Jaafari's
Dawa Party, have been gaining momentum.

Asked Monday whether he could predict who might emerge as a new candidate
for the alliance, Adnan Pachachi, the venerable Sunni Arab politician,
sighed deeply and said: "I really can't tell because there are so many
currents, so many groups fighting."

Two of the soldiers whose deaths were announced Monday were assigned to the
2/28 Brigade Combat team in Anbar and were killed by insurgents Sunday, the
military said.

The third was a soldier operating with the Marine Corps' Regimental Combat
Team and died of combat wounds sustained Saturday, the military said.

At least 26 American troops have been killed this month, according to the
military, and at least 15 of them have died in Anbar.

[Khalid al-Ansary and Qais Mizher contributed reporting from Baghdad.]

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.4.2 (GNU/Linux)

iD8DBQFEO0rRiz2i76ou9wQRAt6LAJ0eonOhcCGM7N5n2DLD2zV+bH/4awCfRDwR
s68BHtYoyQKSV4G3VWkLTk8=
=5c+W
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

==============================================================================
TOPIC: Now Yoga finds a place in Pakistani society
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/4e7124389d365093
==============================================================================

== 1 of 2 ==
Date: Mon, Apr 10 2006 11:27 pm
From: "Mirza Ghalib"

Wonder what they chant in place of "Om"?
Gradually, and surely, Paki Muslims are being Hinduized.
And one day the hold of Islam will vanished.

A pic of the instructor accompanies the article.
=============================================
A DAY IN THE LIFE OF A YOGA INSTRUCTOR

By Rumana Husain, Dawn Review, April 6

In our country yoga is considered as a fitness tool. It is really a
lifestyle. The physical part is actually the third step in yoga

Breathe in, keep inhaling, stretch, now turn, exhale," this might
sound like some truly basic instruction, as all of us assume that we
know how to perform the act of breathing. But attending yoga sessions
with Tarannum Ellahi for almost a year now, I have realised that, just
as athletes, actors and professional speakers know; correct breathing
is an effective and potent tool to enhance body performance.

"Yoga is not really understood, nor is it practised as it should
be," regrets Tarannum. "In our country it is considered merely a
fitness tool. Yoga is really a lifestyle. The physical part is actually
the third step in yoga. The first step comprises the do's and
don'ts; which is its very essence." She then elaborates, "The
very first 'don't' is non-violence, in thought, word and deed.
Secondly, yoga is about breathing, the postures are next in importance.
If there is no emphasis on breathing in the class, it serves no
purpose."

Acclaimed pioneer Dr Andrew Weil, who has made a tremendous impact on
the ways in which people view healing and health, mind/body
interactions and the practice of integrative medicine, says that if
there was just one tip for healthier living, it would without a doubt
be "learning to breathe correctly."

Ellahi says her own healing powers through counselling, Reiki and
hypnosis give her a unique satisfaction. "Everyone needs a good
listener. So if people unburden themselves, I feel blessed as my own
problems seem small in comparison. And helping them or healing them not
only gives me satisfaction, but makes me feel more energised."

Tarannum Ellahi got enrolled at the local yoga training institute, for
a teacher's training course. "Then I started teaching yoga there.
My teacher decided to start his own institute and asked me to join
him." And she did.

She conducts her morning yoga classes that normally last for an hour.
"If I can manage a short nap after lunch, I do that and then get
ready to conduct the afternoon classes," she says of her busy
schedule, which includes Reiki sessions, hypnosis, telepathy and also
the training of yoga teachers.

"Although the work in the institute ends at 7:30pm, my own day
actually ends around midnight. I have a list of people seeking distant
Reiki from me, and I prefer to heal them through it at night," she
elaborates.

While all yoga styles seek to balance the body, mind, and spirit, they
go about it in different ways. They may differ in how asanas are done
and where they focus one's attention, but nearly all yoga styles are
rooted in hatha yoga, which represents the duality in life -- yin
and yang, masculine and feminine, darkness and light. It leads the way
to balancing these opposing forces.

"When you consider each breath could be your last breath, then you
realise that there is very little time to do good for yourself or for
others." n

== 2 of 2 ==
Date: Mon, Apr 10 2006 11:38 pm
From: "naureen101@aol.com"

Mirza Ghalib wrote:
> Wonder what they chant in place of "Om"?
> Gradually, and surely, Paki Muslims are being Hinduized.
> And one day the hold of Islam will vanished.
>
This is not a news .Yoga is not new in pakistan. My parents were in
yoga classes during their youth. The only thing new here is your access
to media in your olden days.

==============================================================================
TOPIC: Phone-Jamming Records Point to White House
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/448bcf7a176fc43d
==============================================================================

== 1 of 1 ==
Date: Mon, Apr 10 2006 11:28 pm
From: NY.Transfer.News@blythe.org

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

Phone-Jamming Records Point to White House

Via NY Transfer News Collective * All the News that Doesn't Fit

AP via Yahoo - Apr 10, 2006
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060410/ap_on_go_pr_wh/election_phone_jamming&printer=1;_ylt=AmUuHLy9.4MPz16sPTlM0AwGw_IE;_ylu=X3oDMTA3MXN1bHE0BHNlYwN0bWE-

Phone-Jamming Records Point to White House

By LARRY MARGASAK
Associated Press Writer

Key figures in a phone-jamming scheme designed to keep New Hampshire
Democrats from voting in 2002 had regular contact with the White House and
Republican Party as the plan was unfolding, phone records introduced in
criminal court show.

The records show that Bush campaign operative James Tobin, who recently was
convicted in the case, made two dozen calls to the White House within a
three-day period around Election Day 2002 as the phone jamming operation
was finalized, carried out and then abruptly shut down.

The national Republican Party, which paid millions in legal bills to defend
Tobin, says the contacts involved routine election business and that it was
"preposterous" to suggest the calls involved phone jamming.

The Justice Department has secured three convictions in the case but hasn't
accused any White House or national Republican officials of wrongdoing, nor
made any allegations suggesting party officials outside New Hampshire were
involved. The phone records of calls to the White House were exhibits in
Tobin's trial but prosecutors did not make them part of their case.

Democrats plan to ask a federal judge Tuesday to order GOP and White House
officials to answer questions about the phone jamming in a civil lawsuit
alleging voter fraud.

Repeated hang-up calls that jammed telephone lines at a Democratic
get-out-the-vote center occurred in a Senate race in which Republican John
Sununu defeated Democrat Jeanne Shaheen, 51 percent to 46 percent, on Nov.
5, 2002.

Besides the conviction of Tobin, the Republicans' New England regional
director, prosecutors negotiated two plea bargains: one with a New Hampshire
Republican Party official and another with the owner of a telemarketing firm
involved in the scheme. The owner of the subcontractor firm whose employees
made the hang-up calls is under indictment.

The phone records show that most calls to the White House were from Tobin,
who became President Bush's presidential campaign chairman for the New
England region in 2004. Other calls from New Hampshire senatorial campaign
offices to the White House could have been made by a number of people.

A GOP campaign consultant in 2002, Jayne Millerick, made a 17-minute call to
the White House on Election Day, but said in an interview she did not recall
the subject. Millerick, who later became the New Hampshire GOP chairwoman,
said in an interview she did not learn of the jamming until after the
election.

A Democratic analysis of phone records introduced at Tobin's criminal trial
show he made 115 outgoing calls mostly to the same number in the White
House political affairs office between Sept. 17 and Nov. 22, 2002. Two
dozen of the calls were made from 9:28 a.m. the day before the election
through 2:17 a.m. the night after the voting.

There also were other calls between Republican officials during the period
that the scheme was hatched and canceled.

Prosecutors did not need the White House calls to convict Tobin and
negotiate the two guilty pleas.

Whatever the reason for not using the White House records, prosecutors
"tried a very narrow case," said Paul Twomey, who represented the Democratic
Party in the criminal and civil cases. The Justice Department did not say
why the White House records were not used.

The Democrats said in their civil case motion that they were entitled to
know the purpose of the calls to government offices "at the time of the
planning and implementation of the phone-jamming conspiracy ... and the
timing of the phone calls made by Mr. Tobin on Election Day."

While national Republican officials have said they deplore such operations,
the Republican National Committee said it paid for Tobin's defense because
he is a longtime supporter and told officials he had committed no crime.

By Nov. 4, 2002, the Monday before the election, an Idaho firm was hired to
make the hang-up calls. The Republican state chairman at the time, John
Dowd, said in an interview he learned of the scheme that day and tried to
stop it.

Dowd, who blamed an aide for devising the scheme without his knowledge,
contended that the jamming began on Election Day despite his efforts. A
police report confirmed the Manchester Professional Fire Fighters
Association reported the hang-up calls began about 7:15 a.m. and continued
for about two hours. The association was offering rides to the polls.

Virtually all the calls to the White House went to the same number, which
currently rings inside the political affairs office. In 2002, White House
political affairs was led by now-RNC chairman Ken Mehlman. The White House
declined to say which staffer was assigned that phone number in 2002.

"As policy, we don't discuss ongoing legal proceedings within the courts,"
White House spokesman Ken Lisaius said.

Robert Kelner, a Washington lawyer representing the Republican National
Committee in the civil litigation, said there was no connection between the
phone jamming operation and the calls to the White House and party
officials.

"On Election Day, as anybody involved in politics knows, there's a
tremendous volume of calls between political operatives in the field and
political operatives in Washington," Kelner said.

"If all you're pointing out is calls between Republican National Committee
regional political officials and the White House political office on
Election Day, you're pointing out nothing that hasn't been true on every
Election Day," he said.

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.4.2 (GNU/Linux)

iD8DBQFEO0wxiz2i76ou9wQRAvFjAJ9ik1wuduEWZ1eLthIrOCHhmwcJ5wCgsuhO
nbWWIEMNMFIW3TAjElpP0AQ=
=v6dJ
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

==============================================================================
TOPIC: For God's sake!!
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/browse_thread/thread/6032b73b5ced69a2
==============================================================================

== 1 of 1 ==
Date: Mon, Apr 10 2006 11:50 pm
From: "naureen101@aol.com"

India's version of Islam is largely unreformed and looks outdated as
compared with other Islamic countries. The rush to marry off pree teen
girls. To the extent, indian muslims seems to accept arabs(aliens) as
prospective grooms for their daughters..Puke. I don't heard of any
Pakistani rich or poor willing to give away his daughter to an
arab.Fatwas are frequently issued on the correct length of tennis
players' skirts. In India Muslim men can divorce their wives by saying
talaq three times. LOL .almost every household in pakistan when angry
utter tripple talaqs millions of times in their marriage time span but
no one cares.
Looks like indians are working to hard to look authentic muslims. The
most striking example of this attempt to be "authentic" are the beards
and topi caps of students among the verandas and courtyards of Darul
Uloom (House of Knowledge), a madrasa . Although Darul Uloom spreads a
message of peace, the Taliban sprung from its teaching.
No wonder all the mirza's and ruksnet here consider Pakistan as some
version of indian hyderabad or lucknow ka chowk. For Gods' sake we are
not stuck into pre partition era in which indian muslims have found a
refuge to look authentic.

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

You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "soc.culture.usa"
group.

To post to this group, send email to soc.culture.usa@googlegroups.com or visit
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa

To unsubscribe from this group, send email to soc.culture.usa-unsubscribe@googlegroups.com

To change the way you get mail from this group, visit:
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.usa/subscribe

To report abuse, send email explaining the problem to abuse@googlegroups.com

==============================================================================
Google Groups: http://groups.google.com

¶ 11:53 PM

Comments: Post a Comment

<< Home

About Me