The Rag Blog

BAGHDAD — The flowers appear overnight, and in the unlikeliest of places: carnations near a checkpoint, roses behind razor wire, and gardenias in a square known for suicide bombings.

Sometimes, U.S. armored vehicles hop a median and mow down the myrtle, leaving Baghdad parks workers to fume and reach for their trowels. When insurgents poured kerosene over freshly planted seedlings, landscapers swore a revenge of ficus trees and olive groves.

It’s all part of a stealthy campaign to turn the entire capital into a green zone.

Jaafar Hamid al Ali, the Baghdad parks supervisor, leads the offensive. He’s got a multi-million-dollar budget, along with 1,500 intrepid employees and a host of formidable enemies. There’s the fussy climate, salty soil, and nonstop violence that killed 30 of his workers in 2006. Every fallen gardener, Ali said, is a martyr in the struggle to beautify Baghdad.

BAGHDAD — Noor Ibrahim lay shivering underneath two blankets on a bed at al-Jarrah Hospital. Steps away was a red plastic bassinet. It was empty.

A few doors down, her recently born son lay wrapped in a pink blanket. He was a chubby boy of nearly nine pounds with a big patch of black hair. His eyes were closed, his head cocked to the left, his mouth slightly open, his skin soft and pale.

The boy was not in a bassinet. He was in a cardboard box. He was not heading to his mother’s room. He was heading to the morgue.

“Fresh death,” Ibrahim’s obstetrician said as she reached into the box and lifted the boy’s limp right arm, still covered in blood and amniotic fluid.

Giving birth is painful enough as it is. In war-torn Iraq, it’s also becoming more dangerous.

Spontaneous road closures, curfews and gun battles make even getting to the hospital a challenge for expectant mothers. Once they arrive, the women have no guarantee that they will receive adequate health care from a qualified physician.

“It’s spiraling downward. It’s getting worse each day,” said Annees Sadik, an anesthesiologist at al-Jarrah.

But the new congress has its work cut out for it with domestic policy: minimum wage, cut interest on student loans, tax breaks for small business, and a couple of things I can’t remember. Get something done first before all Hell breaks loose. The Progressive Populist says everything W has done since the Baker group report started leaking, and after it was released, has been preparation to reject the report. They called it attacking the Rescue Squad. He thinks he can say now that he tried negotiation and it didn’t work. (sacrifice of Condi). His idea of negotiatiing is to say, “Give me everything I want first, nothing for you, and then we’ll talk.” So what’s to talk about? Also that he is appointing other study groups so that the Baker report will be only one of many. Same issue accused W administration of venality, meaning thinking only of their own (short-term) political interests, never of the good of the country.

America has never learned to be an ally of the Third World, only a colonial master. No reciprocity. My observation. Never learned from Chairman Mao, though he explained it thoroughly and wrote it out. First win the hearts and minds of the local people. But no, we bring in multinational corporations, which hurt them.

Also, the military intelligence people in Iraq are rotated so often that they are always in a state of training, never anyone knowledgeable to work. This from PP.

The Iraqi army we have built consists of Shia death squads. Our disbanding of the Iraqi army and civil service played a big role in causing the Sunni insurgency. And we hanged Sadam for killing the Shia we stirred up to rebel against him with the weapons we saw to it that he got, which have been against International law since WWI.

Please find below links to the Diary of Dr Saad Eskander, Director of the Iraq National Library and Archive. Dr Eskander’s journal, which appears with his kind permission, starts in November 2006 and describes the perilous and tragic situation that the Iraq National Library and Archive is operating under and which led to the institution’s temporary closure at the end of that month.

I left Rome to Amman, and the next day, I arrived to the Baghdad International Airport. It is well known that the highway, which links the Airport to the Baghdad City, is the most dangerous road in the world.

For a security reason, I asked the taxi driver to drop me at the first military checkpoint, which is by car 3 minutes away from the Airport. One must not trust anybody, especially the Airport taxi drivers. At the checkpoint, my driver was waiting for me with his car. The security police asked us to leave the area immediately, as they were suspicious of abandoned car at the checkpoint. The highway was in a chaotic state, as everyone tried to leave the Airport area, including the policemen and the soldiers, who did not hesitate to point their guns at us, when our car slowed its speed in order to allow their cars to pass!!

I asked the driver to take me to my office straightaway. Minutes after we left the highway, two terrorists bombed a police checkpoint in the Al-Yarmook district, killing 60 people and injuring 90 others. My driver and I decided to take another route via the Al-Karradah district. Once again, just as we entered the Al-Karradah district, two car-bombs exploded killing and injuring a lot of civilians. I decided not to go to my office, as the other main routes were extremely dangerous. Indeed, on the same day and in the very busy Al-Sa’adun area, two more car-bombs exploded, killing and injuring many people. It was a very nice welcome and back to reality.

13 November, 2006

I received bad news, as soon as I arrived to my office. In my absent, INLA was bombed twice and snipers’ bullets broke several windows. Fortunately, no body was hurt. My staff withheld these information from me, when I contacted them. They claimed that they did not want me to be worried and to spoil my visit.

This week, Lt. Ehren Watada faces a court martial for his refusal to serve in Iraq. But the trial of Lt. Watada is one in which We The People will be judged.

Following World War Two the Neuremberg trials established the principle that following orders was NOT an excuse for war crimes. The correlary is that soldiers not only have a right, but a duty to refuse to obey orders they consider to be illegal or immoral. This right is a foundation of the Uniform Code of Military Justice under which Amerecan military troops operate.

And, given that officers issuing illegal or immoral orders are not likely to announce them as such, implicit in the right to refuse such orders is the right and obligation of the soldier receiving those orders to make a determination if the orders are legal.

This is the principle the US Government is trying to bury as it prepares for Lt. Watada’s Court Martial. The last thing the government wants is for the legality of the war in Iraq to be put on trial.

But there is another principle the US Government hope is also pretending does not exist. And that is that the military of the United States is subordinate to the civilian control of the nation. That is why the Commander in Chief is a civilian position. That is why Congress must vote on the top military honors and promotions. Congress is, in theory, subordinate to the will of the people. That is why it is called a representative government.

It therefore follows that the civilians of the United States, i.e. WE THE PEOPLE have an authority in principle to tell the military court martial of Ehren Watada that this case is indeed about the legality of the Iraq war.

With that right, comes responsibility. And the world will judge not Lt. Watada, not the court martial, not the White House, but WE THE PEOPLE based on what we do to avert what appears to be a serious abuse of military authority.

If we accept that a soldier has a right and a duty to refuse to obey an illegal order, it follows that We The Poeple have a similar right and duty to stand by that soldier. WE have to make noise. We have to call attention to the injustice. We must hold that injustice up to the world’s criticism.

If, on the other hand, we sit still and allow our government to establish a precedent that soldiers CAN be ordered to commit illegal acts, we are no better than those Germans who remained quiet while Hitler ordered their soldiers to commit war crimes.

So, how do you want history to remember you?

And what are you prepared to do about it.

Showing up for work!
1992-1993

At the crack of dawn one humid July morning, I mounted my trusty iron horse and pedaled off to La Julia in Batabano municipality, 50 kilometers south of my Havana residence. I was on my way to participate in what Che called that “special atmosphere” of collective volunteer labor.

“To build communism, you must build new man, as well as the economic base…the instrument for mobilizing the masses … must be moral in character … Work must cease being what it still is today, a compulsory social obligation, and be transformed into a social duty … Our goal is that the individual feels the need to perform voluntary labor out of internal motivation, as well as because of the special atmosphere that exists.” (1)

A “Special Period” was declared by the State soon after the collapse of European state socialism. Cubans lost 63% of their foodstuffs, previously imported from Comecon trade partners. They also lost 85% of export income including oil-for-sugar barter trade.

Cuba’s leaders designated plan alimentario (food plan) as priority number one, alongside tourism. The state emphasizes becoming self-sufficient in many areas. Everybody’s belt had to be tightened.

After cycling without stop for two hours, a sign marked GIA-2 appeared on the flat horizon saturated with banana plants and vegetable crops. The camp looked like others I had just passed: white-painted, one-story concrete dormitory buildings neatly arranged in rows. Shrubs, flowers and garden vegetables grew between the buildings. In the distance, I could just make out the sea where I had sailed past Batabano on petroleum runs.

GIA-2´s director, Oscar Geerken, a handsome man in his mid-40s, led me to his cubicle where I’d be staying. It had four, two-tiered bunk beds, thin foam rubber mattresses and pillows. Two ventilators whirled overhead to cool the room and chase away persistent mosquitoes—Cuba’s only dangerous animal, Fidel was fond of saying.

“We built this camp ourselves with help from local constructors,” proudly proclaimed the mustachioed Oscar, “and we did it in just 29 days.”

Geerken was a chemistry teacher and school administrator, who had come here with the original 120 founders, in November 1990. He, like the others, would get his job back following two years of volunteer work, or even before if he quit earlier.

Something funny has been happening to the CCTV cameras in our neighbourhood. They have started growing ears. Not real ones – at least not yet – but audio functions enabling them to “hear” what is happening around them as well as see. At the moment the experiment is confined to six cameras operating in the Soho area of Westminster, London, which has a high concentration of clubs and bars. An advanced wireless network which the council is building relays the information to a monitoring centre. If it is successful, it will be expanded to other selected areas. Police in the UK are also thinking about installing new CCTV cameras sensitive enough to record conversations up to 100 yards away to thwart hooliganism but, wisely, are keen to have a national debate about it first.

Westminster council claims that the devices don’t eavesdrop since they monitor ambient noise, not actual voices. For instance, if the decibels emanating from clubs rise above acceptable levels late at night then the authorities are automatically informed so, instead of sending out noise monitoring officers they can ring the club’s owners to warn them or, if it is serious enough, take the appropriate action.

WASHINGTON — President Bush quietly has claimed sweeping new powers to open Americans’ mail without a judge’s warrant.

Bush asserted the new authority Dec. 20 after signing legislation that overhauls some postal regulations. He then issued a “signing statement” that declared his right to open mail under emergency conditions, contrary to existing law and contradicting the bill he had just signed, according to experts who have reviewed it.

A White House spokeswoman disputed claims that the move gives Bush any new powers, saying the Constitution allows such searches.

Still, the move, one year after The New York Times’ disclosure of a secret program that allowed warrantless monitoring of Americans’ phone calls and e-mail, caught Capitol Hill by surprise.

“Despite the president’s statement that he may be able to circumvent a basic privacy protection, the new postal law continues to prohibit the government from snooping into people’s mail without a warrant,” said Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., the incoming House Government Reform Committee chairman, who co-sponsored the bill.

Experts said the new powers could be easily abused and used to vacuum up large amounts of mail.

“The [Bush] signing statement claims authority to open domestic mail without a warrant, and that would be new and quite alarming,” said Kate Martin, director of the Center for National Security Studies in Washington.

“You have to be concerned,” a senior U.S. official agreed. “It takes executive-branch authority beyond anything we’ve ever known.”

A top Senate Intelligence Committee aide promised a review of Bush’s move.

“It’s something we’re going to look into,” the aide said.
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Most of the Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act deals with mundane changes. But the legislation also explicitly reinforces protections of first-class mail from searches without a court’s approval.

Yet, in his statement, Bush said he will “construe” an exception, “which provides for opening of an item of a class of mail otherwise sealed against inspection in a manner consistent … with the need to conduct searches in exigent circumstances.”

How many people who aren’t news junkies know that Madrid Airport was bombed on Saturday? Relatively few I would venture, and that’s because major western governments and their media mouthpieces don’t hype terror unless Muslims are behind it.

I personally only caught the story a couple of days after it happened on an obscure channel on UK digital satellite called Euro News. Operatives of the Basque separatist organization ETA packed 800kg of explosives in a car bomb that ripped apart the parking lot of Barajas Madrid Airport, killing two and injuring twenty people.

The American voters in November made it clear that it’s time to start withdrawing from Iraq. Political leaders from both parties and any number of experts are increasingly coming to the realization that American soldiers are dying, day in and day out, in pursuit of an unattainable goal.

So what is President Bush about to do? By all indications: escalate. His “new way forward” in Iraq appears to call for more troops — along with a series of other measures that might have helped if he’d taken them three years ago.

News reports suggest that Bush’s plan is not likely to win enthusiastic support, even from within his own party. But my question is: Where’s the outrage?