Very busy week

It's finally Friday and I am very tired from a long week of classes and running around. I also finished a website for one company and have to do a skeleton for another soon. It has also been nice to sit back and watch the media roaring after Bush like a bunch of crazed sharks. On the other hand a lot of Gazans died this week and late night CNN kept getting interrupted with breaking news of massive bombings. How many times will this happen before the U.S. shields Iraqi people who have to line up outside the gates of security facilities? (much like the bombing of Iraqis lined up outside Baghdad's Assassin's Gate at the Green Zone edge)

Prof. Juan Cole is trying to start a service to translate great American works to Arabic.

Was Robert Novak personally asked not to name Valerie Plame in his accursed news column?

Clinton's advisor Sidney Blumenthal is pointing out (from the UK) that Kerry can tangle with Bush over issues of war and patriotism.

The Vietnam war gave Nixon the platform for his resurrection. Once he became president, the game of smearing the Democrats was reinvented as he set Vietnam veterans and hard hat, blue-collar workers against war protesters.

In the spring of 1971, a worrisome new political figure emerged to oppose Nixon's Vietnam policy. On April 22, John Kerry, wearing combat fatigues, his silver star, bronze star and three purple hearts, testified before the Senate foreign relations committee.

"How do you ask a man to be the last man to die in Vietnam?" Kerry asked. "How do you ask a man to be the last man to die for a mistake? This administration has done us the ultimate dishonour. They have attempted to disown us and the sacrifices we made for this country."

According to Nixon's secret White House tapes, a number of fretful meetings were held about how to discredit Kerry. Nixon, the ultimate opportunist, wanted to characterise Kerry as one, too. "Well, he is sort of a phoney, isn't he?" Nixon was recorded as saying. "A racket, sure." "He came back a hawk and became a dove when he saw the political opportunities," Charles Colson, his hatchet man, noted. At which Nixon said: "Well, anyway, keep the faith." Colson then sent Nixon a memo: "Destroy the young demagogue ..."

The day after Kerry's testimony, Nixon held another meeting. His chief of staff, HR Haldeman, said: "He did a superb job on it at foreign relations committee yesterday. A Kennedy-type guy, he looks like a Kennedy, and he talks exactly like a Kennedy."

Next we'll learn that Kerry gave Bill Safire a wedgie back in his Nixon days.

Afghanistan remains "appalling" for women, still. The story points out Herat, which was the subject of a story in the book I'm reading for Central Asia class, The Great Game. A Victory in the War on Terror.

Though girls and women in Kabul, and some other cities, are free to go to school and have jobs, this is not the case in most parts of the country. In the western province of Herat, the warlord Ismail Khan imposes Taliban-like decrees. Many women have no access to education and are banned from working in foreign NGOs or UN offices, and there are hardly any women in government offices. Women cannot take a taxi or walk unless accompanied by a close male relative. If seen with men who are not close relatives, women can be arrested by the "special police" and forced to undergo a hospital examination to see if they have recently had sexual intercourse. Because of this continued oppression, every month a large number of girls commit suicide - many more than under the Taliban.

Women's rights fare no better in northern and southern Afghanistan, which are under the control of the Northern Alliance. One international NGO worker told Amnesty International: "During the Taliban era, if a woman went to market and showed an inch of flesh she would have been flogged; now she's raped."

Even in Kabul, where thousands of foreign troops are present, Afghan women do not feel safe, and many continue to wear the burka for protection. In some areas where girls' education does exist, parents are afraid to allow their daughters to take advantage of it following the burning down of several girls' schools. Girls have been abducted on the way to school and sexual assaults on children of both sexes are now commonplace, according to Human Rights Watch.

Will Ariel Sharon help Bush win re-election?

The United States among the ruins of Arab nationalism. The Asia Times carries work from a lot of good reporters.

Fallout from Israel's land chompin wall. The Palestinians are set to get a hearing from the International Court of Justice. It's a pretty horrible project with decidedly evil topology of annexation and cutting point A off from point B, be it agricultural, water resources or access from village to cities with schools and hospitals. Here's much more on that from a feature in the New York Review of Books, featuring a nasty jab at Condi Rice's ignorance.

So hurray! The honeymoon is over! The press is all up about the National Guard shadiness. For updates on emerging stories and how all the documents fit together, consider checking CalPundit and Washington reporter Josh Marshall's Talking Points Memo.

Of course the irrepressible paleo beast Pat Buchanan chimes in that Bush has shattered the trust of the American people for wars based on what? What, dammit?! This story is on Antiwar.com, no less! Other websites of information worth checking include War in Context.

What is the ultimate Bush vision for the Middle East, anyway? Posted by HongPong at February 13, 2004 08:56 PM
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