The Rag Blog

Many years ago, when my older cousin Bruce headed off to college on a basketball scholarship, I asked him where he was going to. “UCLA?, UNC?, Georgetown?”. “No, I’m going to Wilberforce, in Ohio,” he told me. “Wilberforce?”, I naively asked him. “Who was he?” Bruce smiled and said, “He’s the cat who ended slavery in England, look him up.” Indeed, Wilberforce is considered one of the Historically Black Colleges, and rightly so. The new film, “Amazing Grace”, recounts the life of William Wilberforce, abolitionist, statesman, and his lifelong friendship with then British Prime Minister William Pitt. This is a truly inspiring film and will leave anyone who watches it, moved by an incredibly important and compelling true story.

Amazing Grace the film, was directed by Michael Apted and chronicles the campaign against the slave trade in 19th century Britain, led by it’s most famous abolitionist William Wilberforce. Wilberforce was responsible for steering anti-slave trade legislation through the British parliament.

The US, NATO and the expanding EU: In a statement reflecting the growing distrust between Moscow and the West, a top Russian general warns that Poland and the Czech Republic risk being targeted by Russian missiles if they agree to host U.S. missile defense bases. The rest of Europe has illegal US nukes already.

THE EXPANDING EU WILL PRESENT A ‘MINI TREATY’

FPF – Europe – Febr. 21st – 2007 – Next month, March 25th in Berlin, the managers of the 26 US/NATO countries in the so called ‘European Union’ will not only celebrate the EU’s 50th anniversary. Shill and chancellor Angela Merkel who ‘runs’ Germany, will present the plan of further expanding the EU by a new ‘European treaty’ next June. We are not supposed to know this, but they will call and sell it to Europeans as a ”mini-treaty”. A plan which of course has been ready for ages, but is ‘adjusted’ so the populace is kept unaware and doesn’t protest. “And don’t ever use the expression Constitution again!” is the warning to all EU shills. To avoid losing another ‘referendum’ none will be held… Also the European people are denied a vote, and ‘democracy’ is now ‘facts fixed around the policy’.

The collaborating buffers between the people and the managers – also called and ‘sold’ as ‘governments’ or ‘civil servants’ – will use their lightning rod position to shove more fascism down the throat of the Europeans. And, like ‘constitution’, the word ‘referendum’ or ‘taxes’ will be avoided at all cost in the brainwashing propaganda. This, by the way, is one of the very few positive signs for humanity: the people pulling the tricks are afraid. As many in the Bush and ‘crazies’ administration in Washington are. The ‘front men’ and women are scared. They know they are corrupt and mortal, so it has to look ‘real’ on the surface. ‘Legal’ in an acceptable way. Because they understandably are afraid of people finding out and – wanting revenge – the stooges may find themselves ending up in a lantern pole á la Mussolini, or like Romanian dictator Ceaucescu and his wife: summarily heard and shot without further ado. [http://www.securitate.org/trial.htm]

SHEER MADNESS: GULAG AND/OR GUILLOTINE

The further expansion and placement of US/NATO bases, troops and arms in the turf war on EU territory – without any thought about the growing distrust and threats from all sides – is sheer madness, but just planned to go on. No wonder the Russian leadership gets nervous with the US/NATO’s EU-expansion crawling up its doorstep. Needless to say of course that 99% of the people who are forced to pay for this by taxes extorted from them, is absolutely not informed. Journalism in the EU too has for 90% turned into foul propaganda and has betrayed mankind by making the war crimes and fight for hegemony possible. Those cowards in the warmonger’s media don’t even ask nor debate anymore but keep stenographing the propaganda, spreading it and help others to a Gulag or guillotine. Without all those compliant traitors and assorted Quislings in the massmedia the war crimes would NEVER have been possible.

And every day now the US war machine, including NATO and a hundred thousand mercenaries, the EU and its blood money, the people are further lied to and misused for the cancerous growth of the US junta’s empire and interests. Leading in all of the by them invaded and usurped countries to more death, destruction, hatred and counter attacks which are called “terror by insurgents”. But the real terror is spread by the US junta and its ‘Coalition of the Killing’. The latest warning by Russian missile forces chief General Nikolai Solovtsov is one of the most bellicose comments this far. And the signs are getting worse: ten days ago Russian president Vladimir Putin send shock waves through the warmonger’s spines with his frank description of the US junta manager’s profit and power plans for a unipolar world. Concerning the warmongers wrecking the world today, meaning the US/NATO/EU war machine, president Putin said:

“However one might embellish this term, at the end of the day it refers to one type of situation, namely one centre of authority, one centre of force, one centre of decision-making. It is a world in which there is one master, one sovereign. And at the end of the day this is pernicious not only for all those within this system, but also for the sovereign itself because it destroys itself from within.”

Yesterday I went to the bank.

Wow! I thought. So many people!

Iraqis are not “bank oriented” people, if they have any excess; they tend to keep it at home.

Previous experiences have taught us not to trust banks; they have been known to hold on to your money when you need it in a jiffy!

But looking at the numbers inside that bank, I thought, “I have been out of touch; bad girl.”

I go in, only to find people pushing and shoving one another; fighting, shouting and cursing each other. “This is not normal,” I said to myself.

I try to reach the employee with whom I have business, but my efforts are to no avail. One human current pushes me this way and another pulls me that. A proper riot!

I began to have serious misgivings.

“What is this all about?” I asked a lady who was trying, in vain, to keep from being crushed between two men, to my right, “Have you got any idea?”

“Where do you come from? Don’t you know that the government is giving people relief? At last we are remembered!”

“Really!! That’s excellent!!” It was my good fortune to be at the bank this day! Although half suffocated, I felt elated at being “remembered”. “How much?”

“10 000 Dinars!” (Equivalent to $7.75, purchasing power: 50 eggs).

….. Numbness.. …..

Fighting ….. Rioting ….. Flayed nerves and hot tempers flying ….. for 10 000 Dinars.

Where do I come from?

How many thousands have been decommissioned?

How many thousands were in Saddam’s army, police and intelligence agencies?

Thousands of others – professionals – dismissed from their government jobs on pretext of debathhification?

Yet more thousands displaced; and more still terrorized into a futile stay-at-home existence??

Riots in the bank for ID 10 000, $ 7.75.

And for $100; what would they be prepared to do?

For $500?

For $1000??

How many will cross that line? It’s not easy to see your family starve for principles.

Mercenaries on Iranian payroll.

Mercenaries on American payroll.

Mercenaries on ANY payroll.

Cairo, March 4, (VOI) – On Sunday, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), António Guterres, urged the international community to shoulder its responsibilities towards Iraqi refugees and to help the countries that host them, particularly Jordan and Syria.

“The mass media showed great interest in developments in Iraq but no one showed interest in the ensuing tragedy: the largest displacement in the region since 1948,” Guterres said in his inaugural address of the 127th session of the Arab foreign ministers meeting in Cairo on Sunday.

Guterres pointed out, “millions of Iraqis decided to leave their homes to escape threats against their lives or to relocate to other areas inside the country.”

The UNHCR praised Jordan and Syria for having taken on the largest refugee burden. Syria hosts about one million Iraqis and Jordan 750,000, adding that these two countries have been left unassisted, which caused price hikes there as well as other problems.

“I totally understand the fears these two countries have about their own national security but after all the (Iraqi) refugees are victims of terrorism and can never be terrorists,” said Guterres.

The UNHCR chief also announced that an international conference on Iraqi refugees would be held in Geneva in April, and said he had discussed with Syria and Jordan “the preparation of this conference and the way to make it a success.”

Between 600,000 and one million Iraqi refugees are believed to have fled to Syria, and around 750,000 are estimated to be in neighboring Jordan.

Syria’s vice president has blamed Washington for the “humanitarian catastrophe” caused by the outflow of refugees from war-torn Iraq, and told Guterres the arrivals had “imposed heavy economic, social and security burdens.”

George W. Bush learned at least one lesson from his father: You want your federal prosecutors to be team players who will throw a political elbow or two when the White House needs some help.

When George H.W. Bush faced a tough reelection battle in 1992, his administration tried to destroy Bill Clinton by implicating him in criminal investigations. But those plans collapsed when federal law enforcement officials, including a U.S. Attorney in Arkansas, resisted what they saw as improper White House political pressure.

Now, the younger George Bush is moving to ensure that he won’t be sabotaged by similarly independent-minded prosecutors. The Washington Post reported that the White House approved the firing of seven U.S. attorneys at the end of 2006 after the Justice Department identified them as insufficiently supportive of the President’s policies.

The Justice Department got input on the firings from congressional Republicans, including Sen. Pete Domenici of New Mexico who criticized the performance of U.S. Attorney David Iglesias, the Post reported. [Washington Post, March 3, 2007]

Iglesias has alleged that two New Mexico legislators – whom he says he will identify only under oath – pressured him to speed up indictments of Democrats before Election 2006. At the time, the Republican congressional majority was in jeopardy, in part, because of a series of GOP corruption scandals.

Some of the fired prosecutors handled those Republican corruption cases or served in offices that could play significant political roles in Campaign 2008. For instance, ousted San Diego U.S. Attorney Carol Lam oversaw the prosecution of Republican Rep. Randy “Duke” Cunningham, whose case had opened a window on Washington war profiteering.

President Bush also replaced the U.S. Attorney in Arkansas, which was a focal point of investigative activity during Campaign 1992 when George H.W. Bush’s reelection campaign was digging for dirt on Bill Clinton – and which could be mined again if Hillary Clinton becomes the Democratic presidential nominee.

In 1992, the elder George Bush found himself in an uphill battle against the upstart Arkansas governor who had impressed many Americans with his energetic plans for the future, especially when contrasted with Bush’s difficulty in articulating a clear rationale for a second term.

Ross C. “Rocky” Anderson, Mayor of Salt Lake City, has called for the impeachment of George W. Bush before the Washington State Senate Governmental Operations Committee.

“I am honored to address you today and am pleased that you, unlike so many members of Congress and most state legislatures, have recognized your solemn responsibility to examine whether proceedings should be commenced for the impeachment of the President of the United States,” the Mayor said.

“Never before has there been such a compelling case for impeachment and removal from office of the president of the United States for heinous human rights violations, breaches of trust, abuses of power injurious to the nation, war crimes, misleading Congress and the American people about threats to our nation’s security and the supposed case for war, and grave violations of treaties, the Constitution, and domestic statutory law,” Anderson proclaimed.

The mayor has attended anti-war, anti-Bush rallies in Salt Lake City, one in August 2006, another in August 2005, addressing the demonstrators that Bush and Cheney should be probed into and possibly impeached by the Congress.

His written testimony, which was read before the committee, indicted Bush for “mislead(ing) the congress and the American people” by implicating the nation in an unwanted war in Iraq, violating basic human rights by kidnapping, torturing and detaining people on suspicion of terror without bringing any charges in a legal way, and reneging on all his duties as a president to observe the constitution and laws passed by congress.”

He also accused Bush administration of subjecting U.S. citizens to illegal surveillance methods through spying and wire-trapping.”

“Impeachment and removal from office is the only appropriate remedy for a president who asserts such abusive, totalitarian power, in contravention of fundamental rights and liberties embodied in the U.S. Constitution,” Anderson told the hearing committee.

Hundreds of anti-war activists in Olympia (Wash. State) had urged state lawmakers on Thursday to support a resolution asking that Congress investigate the Bush administration’s handling of the Iraq war and possibly consider impeachment of the president and vice president.

“This memorial is not directly about the war. In fact, it’s not even directly about impeachment. It’s about getting answers,” said state Sen. Eric Oemig, D-Kirkland, who sponsored the resolution.

“It’s a petition to Congress asking them to do a legitimate, real, serious investigation,” he added.

The Selective Service System last year studied whether it should revert to a Cold War-era plan of being able to draft people within 13 days of a crisis, compared to its current goal of carrying it out within six months. But the agency ultimately decided not to make such a major change because of opposition from within the Selective Service System.

William Chatfield, the Selective Service System director, ordered the Arlington, Va.-based agency to study how the organization would shift to what is known as “emergency mobilization.” The agency defines emergency mobilization as being able to conduct a lottery of young American men and delivering 500,000 of them through the doors of military processing stations within 13 days from the start of a draft.

The last time the agency was geared up for an emergency mobilization was in the 1980s, when the U.S. and its NATO allies faced a numerically superior Soviet Union during the Cold War. The 13-day draft option was officially eliminated in 1993.

Since then, the Selective Service System has had its current, less aggressive mission of getting draftees to the military in 193 days-or a little more than six months-in the event of a draft. “Nothing has changed at all,” Chatfield said in an interview, adding: “We are taking a look at all different kinds of scenarios.”

Richard Flahavan, a spokesman for the agency, said of the 13-day option, “We have it on the shelf. We intend to do nothing with it.”

President Bush and Defense Secretary Robert Gates have said they oppose bringing back the draft–as do most members of Congress–to address severe personnel shortages in the armed forces caused by ongoing military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan.

A US federal appeals court on Friday upheld a refusal to hear the case of a Lebanese-born German man who says he was tortured by the CIA, citing national security reasons.

Khaled el-Masri claims was detained by the CIA for several months in 2004 on suspicion of links to terrorism.

Masri, 43, filed suit in December 2005 saying he had been snatched while on a trip in Macedonia, taken to Afghanistan, jailed, beaten and harassed before being set free without charge after five months.

He demanded an explanation and an apology from the United States for his detention, as well as 75,000 dollars in damages.

The US government had urged the court to reject the appeal saying that for national security reasons it could not confirm or deny any of the allegations because they were related to the activities of the CIA.

The court said that to make his case, el-Masri “would be obliged to produce admissible evidence not only that he was detained and interrogated, but that the defendants were involved in his detention and interrogation in a manner that renders them personally liable to him.

“Such a showing could be made only with evidence that exposes how the CIA organizes, staffs and supervises its most sensitive intelligence operations.

“The defendants could not properly defend themselves without using privileged evidence,” the decision said.

American Civil Liberties Union director Anthony Romero said the court was wrong.

“Regrettably, today’s decision allows CIA officials to disregard the law with impunity by making it virtually impossible to challenge their actions in court,” he said in a statement.

“The state secrets doctrine has become a shield that covers even the most blatant abuses of power,” he said.

Masri has also taken his case to the German courts and a court in southern Munich in January ordered the arrest of 13 people, thought to be CIA agents, in connection with his alleged kidnapping.

His is one of the most high-profile cases of the suspected “extraordinary renditions” by the CIA — flying terror suspects through European states to detention in third countries where they risk being tortured.

After meeting with US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice in December 2005, German Chancellor Angela Merkel said Masri’s case “was accepted as a mistake by the US government,” but US officials later suggested her remark was the result of a misunderstanding.

Things began looking more sketchier than ever to John Owen as he boarded a nondescript white jet on his way back to Iraq in March 2005 following some R’n’R in Kuwait city.

Employed by First Kuwaiti Trading & Contracting, the lead builder for the new $592-million US embassy in Baghdad, Owen remembers being surrounded at the airport by about 50 company laborers freshly hired from the Philippines and India. Everyone was holding boarding passes to Dubai — not to Baghdad.

“I thought there was some sort of mix up and I was getting on the wrong plane,” says the 48-year-old Floridian who was working as a general construction foreman on the embassy project.

Seven months after signing on with First Kuwaiti in November 2005, he quit.

In the resignation letter last June, Owen told First Kuwaiti and US State Department officials that his managers physically assaulted and beat the construction workers, demonstrated little regard for worker safety, and routinely breached security.

And it was all happening smack in the middle of the US-controlled Green Zone — right under the nose of the State Department that had quietly awarded the controversial embassy contract in July 2005.

He also complained of poor sanitation, squalid living conditions and medical malpractice in the labor camps where several thousand low-paid migrant workers lived. Those workers, recruited on the global labor market from the Philippines, India, Pakistan and other poor south Asian countries, earned as little as $10 to $30 a day. As with many US-funded contractors, First Kuwaiti prefers importing labor because it views Iraqi workers as a security headache not worth the trouble.

Despite numerous emails and phone calls about such allegations, neither First Kuwaiti general manager Wadih Al Absi nor his lawyer Angela Styles, the former top White House contract policy advisor, have responded. After a year of requests, State Department officials involved with the project also have ignored or rejected opportunities for comment.

Your Passports Please

That same March Owen returned to work in Baghdad, Rory Mayberry would witness similar events after he flew to Kuwait from his home in Myrtle Creek, Oregon.

The gravely voiced, easy-going Army veteran had previously worked in Iraq for Halliburton and the private security company, Danubia. Missing the action and the big paychecks US contractors draw Iraq, he snagged a $10,000 a month job with MSDS consulting Company.

MSDS is a two-person minority-owned consulting company that assists US State Department managers in Washington with procurement programming. Never before had the firm offered medical services or worked in Iraq, but First Kuwaiti hired MSDS on the recommendation of Jim Golden, the State Department contract official overseeing the embassy project. Within days, an agreement worth hundreds of thousands of dollars for medical care was signed.

The 45-year-old Mayberry, a former emergency medical technician in the Army who worked as a funeral director in Oregon, responded to a help wanted ad placed by MSDS. The plan was that he would work as a medic attending to the construction crews on the work site in Baghdad.

Mayberry sensed things weren’t right when he boarded a First Kuwaiti flight on March 15 to Baghdad — a different flight from Owen’s.

At the airport in Kuwait City, Mayberry said, he saw a person behind a counter hand First Kuwaiti managers a passenger manifest, an envelope of money and a stack of boarding passes to Dubai. The managers then handed out the boarding passes to Mayberry and 50 or so new First Kuwaiti laborers, mostly Filipinos.

“Everyone was told to tell customs and security that they were flying to Dubai,” Mayberry explains. Once the group passed the guards, they went upstairs and waited by the McDonald’s for First Kuwaiti staff to unlock a door — Gate 26 — that led to an unmarked, white 52-seat jet. It was “an antique piece of shit” Mayberry offers in a casual, blunt manner.