From rich at o...net Tue Jul 3 14:01:37 2001 From: rich at o...net (Rich Cowan) Date: Tue, 3 Jul 2001 09:01:37 -0400 Subject: [RWWATCH] David Brock Admits Covering for Thomas, Slandering Anita Hil Message-ID: <0.1600003522.1618708774-738719082-994164998@topica.com> RWWATCH -- July 3, 2001 (please forward) [This came in without any punctuation, so I added back some of what was missing. It still may be not 100% restored; see the link before quoting it. It makes you wonder if this is only coming out now because of some statute of limitations for libel. -rich cowan ] June 27, 2001 Thomas Book Author Says He Lied in His Attacks on Anita Hill by ALEX KUCZYNSKI and WILLIAM GLABERSON The author of a best-selling book that attacked the credibility of Anita F. Hill has disavowed its premise, and now says that he lied in print to protect the reputation of Justice Clarence Thomas. http://www.msnbc.com/news/593157.asp Author says he lied about Anita Hill David Brocks new book Blinded by the Right claims he was exploited By Howard Kurtz THE WASHINGTON POST June 27 -- David Brock, who made his name trashing Anita Hill after the Clarence Thomas confirmation hearings, now says he lied and he's sorry. The formerly right-wing author, in a forthcoming book, says he lost my soul in printing allegations he knew to be untrue. Brock writes that he was dumping virtually every derogatory and often contradictory allegation I had collected on Hill into the vituperative mix. "I not only wrote a book I now believe was wrong, I consciously lied in print in a book review on this subject. I think I owe a debt to the historical record to correct it. " BROCK NOW CHARGES that Supreme Court Justice Thomas used him to spread derogatory information about one of Thomas's critics an allegation strongly denied yesterday by the man who Brock says was the intermediary between them. Thomas was complicit in an effort to discredit another witness against him with negative personal information, which is exactly what he claimed the Anita Hill forces had done to him, Brock said in an interview. Thomas declined to comment through a court spokeswoman. Brocks new book, Blinded by the Right, which continues his recent renunciation of his conservative past, is excerpted in the August issue of Talk magazine. NEW CONFESSIONS Why is he confessing now? "I not only wrote a book I now believe was wrong, I consciously lied in print in a book review on this subject," he said from his Washington home. "I think I owe a debt to the historical record to correct it. If I made a mistake here, the mistake would be that I knew these facts five years ago and didn't disclose them. " Brock rose to prominence with his best-selling 1993 book _The Real Anita Hill_ calling the woman who accused Thomas of making offensive sexual remarks a little bit nutty and a little bit slutty and became a star anti-Clinton writer for the American Spectator. In the Anita Hill book, he now writes, "I demonized Democratic senators, their staffs and Hills feminist supporters without ever interviewing any of them. . . . I was so blinded by my partisan tunnel vision and my tortured desire to make it in the movement that I believed my own propaganda." At one party, he says, Thomas's wife, Ginni, tearfully embraced me. Hill, who now teaches at Brandeis University, wants to keep her reaction personal and private, spokesman Dennis Nealon said. The most startling section of this about-face involves Brocks attempt to discredit Strange Justice, a 1994 book on the Hill-Thomas clash by Jane Mayer and Jill Abramson. As a witting cog in the Republican sleaze machine, Brock writes, he had access to Thomas through an intermediary, Mark Paoletta, a close Thomas friend who worked on his confirmation as a lawyer in the first Bush White House. PLAYING DIRTY Confirmation that Thomas frequently rented porno tapes made Hills entire story much more plausible, Brock writes. According to Brock, Thomas passed along, through Paoletta, unverified embarrassing personal information about his friend [Kaye] Savage that Thomas claimed had been raised against her in a divorce proceeding. . . . Thomas was playing dirty, and so was I. Savage, who had made some disparaging comments about Thomas in Strange Justice, soon got a visit from Brock. Armed with the personal information, Brock says, he demanded that Savage give me a written statement retracting the statements in Strange Justice . . . or I would blacken her name, just as I had done to every other woman who had impugned Thomass reputation.He says Savage later faxed him a statement backing off her earlier criticism. Paoletta, who now works for a House committee, called the account simply not true. Justice Thomas did not ask me to pass along any derogatory information to David Brock about Kaye Savage. Savage said in an interview that I feel grateful to Mr. Brock that he has admitted he tried to intimidate me and appreciate that the public record is now clear. . . . I think it takes a great deal of courage. She called her experience with Brock a little frightening. Brock says he also tried to blow away Mayer and Abramson's contention that Thomas had been a frequent customer at the X-rated video store Graffiti during the early 1980s, when Hill alleged he had graphically discussed such videos with her. According to Brock, Thomas confirmed, again through Paoletta, that he often rented pornographic videos from Graffiti. Confirmation that Thomas frequently rented porno tapes made Hills entire story much more plausible, Brock writes. Nevertheless, in a Spectator review of Strange Justice, Brock wrote that there was no evidence that Thomas had ever rented a single X-rated video, dismissing the book as one of the most outrageous journalistic hoaxes in recent memory. When I wrote those words, Brock admits in his new book, I knew they were false. Paoletta said he did not confirm to David Brock that Justice Thomas ever rented videos from the Graffiti video store. In fact, to this day, I do not personally know whether he in fact rented videos from that store. . . . Why in the world would I say anything to hurt him? Mayer, now a New Yorker staff writer, said yesterday: Im glad he's finally confessed the truth, which we knew all along, which is that he fabricated material, suppressed evidence and falsified the record in order to undermine the truth, which is what we wrote in the first place. I'm sorry that he waited so long. It was personally painful. CREDIBILITY PROBLEMS Abramson, now Washington bureau chief of the New York Times, said that the problem with Brock's credibility is that once you admit youve knowingly written false things, how do you know when to believe what he writes? . . . It'd be awfully convenient to now say because what he's writing is personally pleasing to me that he's a 100 percent solid reporter. That would be a little disingenuous. While relations have thawed to the point that Brock spoke to a class Abramson was teaching at Princeton last fall, I still have quite a bit of contempt for the kind of journalism he practiced, she said. Advertisement Activist Barbara Ledeen yesterday challenged one part of the Brock excerpt in which he maintains that the two of them wrote a radio script attacking Strange Justice and faxed it to Rush Limbaugh, who is said to have used it on his radio show. I completely deny that, Ledeen said. I have never done anything with David Brock except attend a few parties. Limbaugh said he had no recollection of receiving such a script. Ledeen, who now works for the Senate Republican leadership, laughingly dismissed Brocks contention that she threatened to firebomb his house after he wrote a sympathetic biography of Hillary Rodham Clinton. Firebombing is not part of the résumé for a middle-class lady from Chevy Chase, she said. In recent years, Brock has made a second career of denouncing his earlier work as a conservative reporter. In 1998, he expressed regrets in an Esquire article for digging into President Clintons sex life and said he believed his sources exaggerated the details. Brocks 1993 Troopergate article in the Spectator, filled with allegations about Arkansas womanizing, described a woman named Paula, which led Paula Jones to file her sexual harassment suit against Clinton. Could Brock now be described as betraying those who were once his conservative friends some of whom the man who was then a closeted gay now describes as racist, homophobic Clinton-haters? I came to view these relationships as mutual-use relationships rather than friendships, Brock says. I was using them and they were using me. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- © 2001 The Washington Post Company ===================================================================== This message was sent via RWWATCH, a low-traffic forum that responds to right-wing campaigns (coming from any party) to misrepresent the truth in order to undermine democracy. info page: http://www.topica.com/lists/rwwatch subscribe: rwwatch-subscribe@topica.com (send a blank email) unsubscribe: rwwatch-unsubscribe@topica.com RWWATCH is a project of Organizers' Collaborative (http://www.organizenow.net) We are a new grassroots effort supported by over 160 contributors. You can help us foster online communication and resource sharing by social change groups by donating at our website. (http://www.organizenow.net/join) Thanks! Organizers' Collaborative, PO Box 400897, Cambridge MA 02140 ===================================================================== ==^================================================================ EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?bUrCaA.bUGmpu Or send an email To: rwwatch-unsubscribe@topica.com This email was sent to: rich at o...net T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^================================================================ From rich at o...net Wed Jul 11 05:24:25 2001 From: rich at o...net (Rich Cowan) Date: Wed, 11 Jul 2001 00:24:25 -0400 Subject: [RWWATCH] More Links from Right Wing Watcher Bill Berkowitz Message-ID: <0.1600003522.568467837-738719082-994825484@topica.com> RWWATCH -- July 11, 2001 (please forward) [forwarded from Bill Berkowitz -- the first article addresses what the former head of the right-wing Bradley Foundation is now up to -- working of course with the Bush administration. -rich ] Hi Rich, Here's links to three stories that I think your folks might be interested in: 1. TomPaine.com: "Saving Bush's Faith-Based Initiative -- Michael Joyce to the Rescue" --http://www.tompaine.com/opinion/2001/06/28/4.html 2. GayToday.com: "Creationism on the March: 'We're not in Kansas Anymore!' http://gaytoday.badpuppy.com/viewpoint.htm 3. workingforchange.com: "Getting plucked over -- Foul treatment for Tyson chicken catchers" http://www.workingforchange.com/article.cfm?ItemId=11484 my best, Bill ===================================================================== This message was sent via RWWATCH, a low-traffic forum that responds to right-wing campaigns (coming from any party) to misrepresent the truth in order to undermine democracy. info page: http://www.topica.com/lists/rwwatch subscribe: rwwatch-subscribe@topica.com (send a blank email) unsubscribe: rwwatch-unsubscribe@topica.com RWWATCH is a project of Organizers' Collaborative (http://www.organizenow.net) We are a new grassroots effort supported by over 160 contributors. You can help us foster online communication and resource sharing by social change groups by donating at our website. (http://www.organizenow.net/join) Thanks! Organizers' Collaborative, PO Box 400897, Cambridge MA 02140 ===================================================================== ==^================================================================ EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?bUrCaA.bUGmpu Or send an email To: rwwatch-unsubscribe@topica.com This email was sent to: rich at o...net T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^================================================================ From rich at o...net Thu Jul 12 17:30:22 2001 From: rich at o...net (Rich Cowan) Date: Thu, 12 Jul 2001 12:30:22 -0400 Subject: [RWWATCH] Infighting Kills Leading US Anti-Semitic Publication Message-ID: <0.1600003522.1910466610-738719082-994955438@topica.com> RWWATCH -- July 12, 2001 (please forward) [Spotlight was a far-right publication, outside the mainstream of the conservative movement. As a "populist" publication it also tried to gain suporters on the left who are who are connected to the left-wing anti-globalization movement. Chip Berlet of Political Research Associates has written about these linkages; see the discussion on the Left Business Observer email list at http://nuance.dhs.org/lbo-talk/0001/0059.html; and also see http://nuance.dhs.org/lbo-talk/0001/0035.html. As you can see from the article, the people behind Spotlight are likely to revive it under another name. -rich cowan ] http://washingtontimes.com/national/20010710-931279.htm July 10, 2001 Liberty Lobby goes under, ends Spotlight publication By Andrea Billups THE WASHINGTON TIMES Liberty Lobby has closed its doors and its weekly newspaper, the Spotlight, has published its last edition after a federal bankruptcy judge last week dismissed the group's latest claim for Chapter 11 protection. The most recent ruling by U.S. bankruptcy Judge S. Martin Teel Jr. puts an end to a complicated eight-year battle between Liberty Lobby founder Willis A. Carto and his former associates at the California-based Institute for Historical Review (IHR). IHR sued and won a multimillion-dollar judgment on claims that Mr. Carto illegally diverted funds from the institute's Texas parent company, the Legion for the Survival of Freedom. Mr. Carto, a resident of Escondido, Calif., founded the Washington-based Liberty Lobby in 1955. The nonprofit outfit and its publication, the Spotlight, funded by outside donations and subscriptions, claimed to be America's key defender of patriotism and a hub for grass-roots conservative activism. But they also have been criticized as a fertile breeding ground for the views of anti-government extremists, conspiracists and racists. Yesterday, as about 25 employees gathered personal belongings and wrapped up last-minute business at the Liberty Lobby offices, located at 300 Independence Ave., a spokesman defended Mr. Carto and vowed to fight on. "Nobody is really that sad, but everybody is mad," said spokesman William Francis. "While Liberty Lobby may be dissolved, nobody has given up here. We know that we did nothing wrong as an institution. Everybody has complete faith in Mr. Carto and how he administered the funds." While offering few specifics, Mr. Francis hinted that a new incarnation of the Spotlight was already in the works. "They may come in and shut us down, but the staff are fully committed to make new efforts to get something going. Over the last several days, we've had hundreds of phone calls to the office, pledges of hundreds of thousands of dollars to set up a new newspaper," he said. "We have a citizens army behind us." Mark Weber, director of IHR, said the ruling may signal the end of Liberty Lobby, but he predicts Mr. Carto will endure with some other venture. "This is a welcome culmination of an exhausting, costly, bitter legal and public relations dispute," said Mr. Weber, who has been assailed in the pages of the Spotlight as a "rat," "weasel," "toilet bowl," "cockroach" and "devil." Mr. Francis yesterday reiterated his claims that IHR plans to sell one of the Liberty Lobby's final assets, its subscriber mailing list, to such watchdog organizations as the Southern Poverty Law Center and the Anti-Defamation League, which have been critical of both feuding groups. "It's a lie," Mr. Weber said of those claims. Liberty Lobby once sued the Wall Street Journal for having called the organization "anti-Semitic." But Judge Robert Bork dismissed the suit in 1984, declaring, "If anti-Semitism has a core, factual meaning, it was demonstrated here." Mr. Carto, a 74-year-old native of Fort Wayne, Ind., has been called "the most influential anti-Semite in the United States." About 90,000 people are paid subscribers to the Spotlight, which in 1981 had an estimated readership of more than 300,000. The weekly's "favorite political targets included the Rockefellers, the Rothschilds, Henry Kissinger, the Council on Foreign Relations and the 'Zionist entity' in Palestine," according to author Dennis King. Mr. Carto played a key role in co-founding IHR in 1978. The Anti-Defamation League has called IHR "the world's single most important outlet for Holocaust-denial propaganda" Mr. Carto was ousted by IHR's board of directors in September 1993 after the staff complained, among other things, of Mr. Carto's interference in editorial decisions for the Journal of Historical Review, an IHR publication. ===================================================================== This message was sent via RWWATCH, a low-traffic forum that responds to right-wing campaigns (coming from any party) to misrepresent the truth in order to undermine democracy. info page: http://www.topica.com/lists/rwwatch subscribe: rwwatch-subscribe@topica.com (send a blank email) unsubscribe: rwwatch-unsubscribe@topica.com RWWATCH is a project of Organizers' Collaborative (http://www.organizenow.net) We are a new grassroots effort supported by over 170 contributors and several foundations. You can help us foster online communication and resource sharing by social change groups by donating at our website. (http://www.organizenow.net/join) Thanks! Organizers' Collaborative, PO Box 400897, Cambridge MA 02140 ===================================================================== ==^================================================================ EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?bUrCaA.bUGmpu Or send an email To: rwwatch-unsubscribe@topica.com This email was sent to: rich at o...net T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^================================================================ From rich at o...net Tue Jul 17 03:39:46 2001 From: rich at o...net (Rich Cowan) Date: Mon, 16 Jul 2001 22:39:46 -0400 Subject: [RWWATCH] The Paperclip Holocaust Memorial Message-ID: <0.1600003522.713834428-738719082-995338051@topica.com> RWWATCH - July 16, 2001 [For a change, here is a heartwarming story and a positive use of the Internet to boot. The good news is that in the 3 months since the story appeared in the Post, 20 million additional paper clips were sent in. So they don't need any more paper clips! Thanks to Harold Rosenthal for forwarding this. -rc ] ______________________________________________________________________ WASHINGTON POST ARTICLE (April 7, 2001) WHITWELL, Tenn. -- It is a most unlikely place to build a Holocaust memorial, much less one that would get the attention of the president, that would become the subject of a book, that would become an international cause. Yet it is here that a group of eighth-graders and their teachers decided to honor each of the 6 million Jews killed in the Holocaust by collecting 6 million paper clips and turning them into a sculpture. This is remarkable because, for one thing, Whitwell, a town of 1,600 tucked away in a Tennessee valley just west of the Smokies, has no Jews. In fact, Whitwell does not offer much opportunity to practice racial or religious tolerance of any kind. "Our community is white, Christian and very fundamentalist," says Linda Hooper, principal of the middle school, which has 425 students, including six blacks, one Hispanic, zero Asians, zero Catholics, zero Jews. "During coal-mining days, we were a mixed community," explains the town's unofficial historian, Eulene Hewett Harris. "Now there are only a handful of black families left." Whitwell is a town of two traffic lights, 10 churches and a collection of fast-food joints sprinkled along the main drag. It was a thriving coal town until 1962, when the last mine closed. Some of the cottages built by the mining companies still stand, their paint now chipped and their cluttered porches sagging. Trailers have replaced the houses that collapsed from age and neglect during lean economic times. Only 40 miles up the road is Dayton, where the red-brick Rhea County Courthouse made history during the 1925 Scopes trial, the "monkey trial," in which teacher John T. Scopes was convicted of violating a Tennessee law that made it unlawful "to teach any theory that denies the story of Divine Creation" and to teach Darwinian evolutionary theory instead. Almost eight decades later, most people in this Sequatchie River valley hold firmly to those beliefs under the watchful eyes of their church leaders. "Look, we're not that far away from the Ku Klux Klan," founded only 100 miles west, in Pulaski, Tenn., says Hewett Harris. "I mean, in the 1950s they were still active here." Such is the setting for a memorial not only to remember Holocaust victims but, above all, to sound a warning on what intolerance can wreak. The Whitwell students and teachers had no idea how many lives they were about to touch. Math and History The Holocaust project had its genesis in the summer of 1998 when Whitwell Middle's 31-year-old deputy principal and football coach, David Smith, attended a teacher training course in nearby Chattanooga. A seminar on the Holocaust as a teaching tool for tolerance intrigued him because the Holocaust had never been part of the middle school's curriculum and was mentioned only tangentially in the local high school. He came back and proposed an after-school course that would be voluntary. Principal Hooper, 59, loved the idea. "We just have to give our children a broader view of the world," she says. "We have to crack the shell of their white cocoon, to enable them to survive in the world out there." She was nervous about how parents would react, and held a parent-teacher meeting. But when she asked the assembled adults if they knew anything about the Holocaust, only a few hands went up, hesitatingly. Hooper, who has lived in Whitwell most of her life and had taught some of the parents in elementary school, explained the basics. Just one parent expressed misgivings Should young teenagers be shown terrifying photos of naked, emaciated prisoners? Hooper admitted she wasn't sure. "Well," the father asked, "would you let your son take the class?" Yes, she replied, and the father was on board. There wasn't a question about who would teach it Sandra Roberts, 30, the English and social sciences teacher, always a captivating storyteller. In October 1998, Roberts and Smith held the first session. Fifteen students and almost as many parents showed up. Roberts began by reading aloud -- history books, "The Diary of Anne Frank," Elie Wiesel's "Night" -- mostly because many of the students did not have the money to buy the books; 52 percent of Whitwell's students qualify for free lunch. What gripped the eighth-graders most as the course progressed, was the sheer number of dead. Six million. The Nazis killed 6 million Jews. Can anyone really imagine 6 million of anything? They did calculations If 6 million adults and children were to lie head to toe, the line would stretch from Washington to San Francisco and back. One day, Roberts was explaining to the class that there were some good people in 1940s Europe who stood up for the Jews. After the Nazis invaded Norway, many courageous Norwegians expressed solidarity with their Jewish fellow citizens by pinning ordinary paper clips to their lapels. One girl -- nobody remembers who it was -- said Let's collect 6 million paper clips and turn them into a sculpture to remember the victims. The idea caught on, and the students began bringing in paper clips, from home, from aunts and uncles and friends. Smith, as the school's computer expert, set up a Web page asking for donations of clips, one or two, or however many people wanted to send. A few weeks later, the first letter arrived. One Lisa Sparks from Tyler, Tex., sent a handful. Then a letter landed from Colorado. By the end of the school year, the group had assembled 100,000 clips. It occurred to the teachers that collecting 6 million paper clips at that rate would take a lifetime. Help From Afar Unexpected help came in late 1999 when two German journalists living in Washington, D.C., stumbled across the Whitwell Web site. Peter Schroeder, 59, and Dagmar Schroeder-Hildebrand, 58, had been doing research at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, tracing concentration camp survivors to interview. Schroeder-Hildebrand was author of "I'm Dying of Hunger," a book about a camp survivor who devised imaginary dinners to survive; Peter had written "The Good Fortune of Lena Lieba Gitter," about a Viennese Jew who escaped the Nazis and devoted her life to civil rights. The Whitwell Web site came up during a routine search under "Holocaust." The idea of American children in a conservative Southern town collecting paper clips intrigued the couple. They called the school, interviewed teachers and students by telephone, then wrote several articles for the nine newspapers they work for in Germany and Austria. Whitwell and the Schroeders were hit with a blizzard of paper clips from the two countries. The couple soon had 46,000, filling several large plastic containers. The thing to do, they decided, was to drive them to Whitwell, 12 hours away. They received a hero's welcome. The entire school showed up. None of the eighth-graders had ever met anyone from outside the United States, let alone anyone from Germany, the country of the Holocaust perpetrators. At the end of the four-day visit, the students told their principal, "They are really quite normal." The Schroeders were so touched they wrote a paperback about Whitwell. "The Paper Clip Project," which has not been translated into English, was published in September 2000, in time for Germany's largest book fair in Frankfurt. The blizzard of clips became an avalanche. Whitwell eighth-graders came to Washington in March last year to visit the Holocaust Museum. They went home carrying 24,000 more paper clips collected by the Schroeders. Airport security had trouble understanding why a bunch of teenagers and their teachers were transporting boxes and boxes of paper clips to Tennessee. Linked to the Past Just a year later, the Holocaust project has permeated the school. The after-school group is the most favored extracurricular activity -- students must compete in an essay contest for its 20 to 25 places. They've become used to being interviewed by local television and national radio. Foreign countries are no longer mysterious, with hundreds of letters bearing witness to them. The group's activities have long spilled over from Roberts's classroom. Across the hall, the students have created a concentration-camp simulation with paper cutouts of themselves pasted on the wall. Chicken wire stretches across the wall to represent electrified fences. Wire mesh is hung with shoes to represent the millions of shoes the victims left behind when they were marched to death chambers. And every year now they reenact the "walk" to give students at least an inkling of what people must have felt when jackbooted Nazi guards marched them off to camps. The students are blindfolded, tied together by the wrists, roughly ordered onto a truck and driven to the woods. "I was truly scared," recalls Monica Hammers, a participant in last year's walk. "It made me think, and it made me realize that I have to put myself into other people's shoes." Meanwhile, the counting goes on. It is daunting. On a late winter day, as the picturesque valley floor shows the first shimmer of soft green, 22 students gather for their Wednesday meeting. All wear the group's polo shirt, emblazoned "Changing the World, One Clip at a Time." The neat white shirts conform to the school's dress code solid-colored shirts devoid of large logos, solid-colored pants, knee-length shorts or skirts, worn with a belt. Many of the girls have attached colored paper clips to their collars. These are no loose-mannered kids -- they reply "yes, ma'am" and "yes, sir." Even lunch in the cafeteria is disciplined and relatively quiet. Yet, there is an obvious and warm bond between students and teachers. The group's first item of business is opening the mail that has accumulated during the past three days. That takes half of the two- to three-hour meeting. A large package has arrived from Germany, two smaller ones from Austria and more than a dozen letters. Laura Jefferies is in charge of the ledger and keeps a neat record of each sender's address, phone number and e-mail address. One group of students responds to the e-mails sent via their Web site, www.Marionschools.org. Roberts opens the packages, which have been examined in the principal's office to make sure they contain nothing dangerous. "We've had a few negative letters from Holocaust deniers, but we have never received a threat," says the silver-haired Hooper. "But even if we did, we would go on. We cannot live in fear; that would defeat the entire purpose." The large package, from a German school, contains about 40 letters, with paper clips pasted onto each page. Roberts sighs. "This is a huge amount of work," she says. "There are days when I wished we could just stop it. But it has gotten way beyond us. It's no longer about us. There is no way we could stop this now." When the students fall behind, it's Roberts who spends hours sorting and filing. The students crowd around Roberts's desk and receive a letter at a time. They carefully empty all paper clips onto little piles. Drew Shadrick, a strapping tackle on the football team, is the chief counter and stands over a three-foot-high white plastic barrel, about the size of an oil drum. He counts each clip, drops it into the barrel, keeping track on a legal pad. Two other barrels, which once contained Coca-Cola syrup and were donated by the corporation, are filled to the rim and sealed with transparent plastic. "It takes five strong guys to move one of those barrels," says Roberts. Against the wall this day are stacks and stacks of boxes. In early February, an Atlanta synagogue had promised 1 million paper clips, and sure enough, a week later a pickup truck delivered 84 boxes bought from an office supply store. Half are still unopened. All sorts of clips arrive -- silver- tone, bronze-tone, plastic- coated in all colors, small ones, large ones, round ones, triangular clips and artistic ones fashioned from wood. Then there are the designs made of paper clips, neatly pasted onto letter paper. If removing the paper clips would destroy the design, the students count the clips, then replace them in the barrel with an equal number purchased by the group. The art is left intact. Occasionally a check for a few dollars arrives. The money goes toward buying supplies. Both Roberts and Smith won teacher awards last year, and their $3,000 in prize money also went toward supplies, and helping students pay for what has become an annual trip to Washington and the Holocaust Museum. The students file all letters, all scraps of paper, even the stamps, in large white ring binders. By now, 5,000 to 8,000 letters fill 14 neat binders. The letters are from 19 countries and 45 states, and include dozens of rainbow pictures, and flowers, peace doves and swastikas crossed out with big red bars -- in the shape of paper clips. There are poems, personal stories. "Today," one letter reads, "I am sending 71 paper clips to commemorate the 71 Jews who were deported from Bueckeburg." One man sent five paper clips to commemorate his mother and four siblings murdered by the Nazis in Lithuania in November 1941. "For my handicapped brother," says another letter. "I'm so glad he didn't live then; the Nazis would have killed him." "For my grandmother," says another. "I'm so grateful she survived the camp." "For my son, that he may live in peace," wrote a woman from Germany. Last year, a letter containing eight paper clips came from President Clinton. Another arrived from Vice President Gore, a native of Tennessee, thanking the students for their "tireless efforts to preserve and promote human rights," but including no clips. Every month, Smith writes dozens of celebrities, politicians and sports teams, requesting paper clips. He gets many refusals, form letters indicating that the addressee never saw the request. But clips came in from Tom Bosley (of TV's "Happy Days" fame), Henry Winkler (the Fonz), Tom Hanks, Elie Wiesel, Madeleine Albright. Among the football teams that contributed are the Tennessee Titans, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, the Indianapolis Colts and the Dallas Cowboys. So many clips in memory of specific Holocaust victims have come in that one thing has become clear Melting them into a statue would be inconceivable. Each paper clip should represent one victim, the students believe, and so a new idea has been hatched. They want to get an authentic German railroad car from the 1940s, one that may have actually transported victims to camps. The car would be turned into a museum that would house all the paper clips, as well as display all the letters. Dagmar and Peter Schroeder plan to travel to Germanynext week to find a suitable railroad car and have it transported to Whitwell. They are determined to find such a car and the necessary funding. Like counting the clips, the task is daunting. Whitwell's Legacy Whatever happens, for generations of Whitwell eighth-graders, a paper clip will never again be just a paper clip, but instead carry a message of patience, perseverance, empathy and tolerance. Roberts, asked what she thought she had accomplished with the project so far, said "Nobody put it better than Laurie Lynn [a student in last year's class]. She said, 'Now, when I see someone, I think before I speak, I think before I act, and I think before I judge.' " And Roberts adds "That's all I could ever hope to achieve as a teacher." She gives this week's assignment "Tomorrow, I want you all to go and sit next to a person at lunch whom you never talk with, a person that nobody wants to sit with at lunch. I want you to stop one of those people in the hall and say 'Hi! What'd you do last night?' Now, don't make it obvious -- they may know that it's just an assignment. That would hurt." Drew pipes up "Well, I've already tried that, but that kid -- that, you know, he just sits there and stares, what can I do?" "Keep at it -- don't give up," says Roberts. Class dismissed. Latest count 2,108,622 paper clips. 3,891,378 to go. Paper clips are gratefully accepted by Whitwell Middle School, Holocaust Project, 1130 Main St., Whitwell, TN 37397 ===================================================================== This message was sent via RWWATCH, a low-traffic forum that responds to right-wing campaigns (coming from any party) to misrepresent the truth in order to undermine democracy. info page: http://www.topica.com/lists/rwwatch subscribe: rwwatch-subscribe@topica.com (send a blank email) unsubscribe: rwwatch-unsubscribe@topica.com RWWATCH is a project of Organizers' Collaborative (http://www.organizenow.net) We are a new grassroots effort supported by over 170 contributors and several foundations. You can help us foster online communication and resource sharing by social change groups by donating at our website. (http://www.organizenow.net/join) Thanks! Organizers' Collaborative, PO Box 400897, Cambridge MA 02140 ===================================================================== ==^================================================================ EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?bUrCaA.bUGmpu Or send an email To: rwwatch-unsubscribe@topica.com This email was sent to: rich at o...net T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^================================================================ From rich at o...net Tue Aug 14 01:21:51 2001 From: rich at o...net (Rich Cowan) Date: Mon, 13 Aug 2001 20:21:51 -0400 Subject: [RWWATCH] Campaign to Impeach Supreme Court Justices Message-ID: <0.1600003522.1547436957-212058698-997748709@topica.com> [the following is from Nathan Newman, a board member of NLG. He can be reached at: nathan@newman.org -r] Dear Friends, The National Lawyers Guild is exploring the legal, economic and viable political grounds for launching a broad-based impeachment campaign against the five members of the Bush v. Gore majority on the Supreme Court. We are writing to ask for your input, support and, if possible, endorsement of the projected campaign. We have a commitment from a very high ranking member of the House Judiciary Committee that he will introduce the bills of impeachment if we can create the political support to back up serious campaign effort. At our recent meeting, our National Executive Committee voted to recommend to its members at the Guild's National Convention in October that the Guild launch such a campaign based on considered discussion of the illegitimacy of the Supreme Court following its misconduct in last fall's election and in the context of their other recent decisions unconstitutionally assaulting civil and economic rights. Our recommendation, however, is contingent on a decision by the Guild Convention this October that the political support and viable legal grounds exist for such a campaign. We are thus approaching a range of organizations in the next two months to ask for "sense of the body" resolutions, letters from directors, or even full endorsements so that we can assess the real support for mounting a successful campaign. The National Lawyers Guild intends to commit serious resources to the campaign if our national convention endorses it, but we must first evaluate whether and to what extent such support exists. We would be glad to provide you with copies of the materials we are circulating debating the potential campaign which will be located at our web site. To be clear about our strategic approach, we very specifically will NOT be arguing that our democratic system would have been fine if the Supreme Court had not intervened and Gore won. We are framing this campaign in the broadest terms connecting the whole set of issues of electoral disenfranchisement and connecting it to the range of rightwing court decisions that are rolling back the civil and economic rights of our nation. Below is the resolution approved at the NEC meeting. We are devoting one of our main plenaries at the Convention solely to this topic: "We recommend to the convention that the National Lawyers Guild support an impeachment campaign if we determine that it will be politically effective. Whereas the NEC believes that the Supreme Court violated the law, Whereas impeachment may contribute to the opposition to the right-wing judicial takeover Therefore, be it resolved, that the NEC endorses a campaign to impeach the "Felonious Five" majority of the Supreme Court contingent on a decision by the convention that there are legal, economic and viable political grounds for such a campaign." We appreciate your organization's support and thoughts on this endeavor. Please send endorsements or refer questions to impeachment@nlg.org or call 212-627-2656. Please also check our web site for informational materials and updates at http://www.nlg.org/impeachment/ In Solidarity, Heidi Bogosian Executive Director National Lawyers Guild (late july, 2001) Background on the NLG: The National Lawyers Guild is an association of lawyers, legal workers, law students and jailhouse lawyers committed to fighting social injustice in this country and internationally. Founded, in 1937, the Guild has been at the forefront of the legal and political struggles of ordinary people to end oppression and discrimination in our society for over sixty years. Go to www.nlg.org for more info. ===================================================================== This message was sent via RWWATCH, a low-traffic forum that responds to right-wing campaigns (coming from any party) to misrepresent the truth in order to undermine democracy. info page: http://www.topica.com/lists/rwwatch subscribe: rwwatch-subscribe@topica.com (send a blank email) unsubscribe: rwwatch-unsubscribe@topica.com RWWATCH is a project of Organizers' Collaborative (http://www.organizenow.net) We are a new grassroots effort supported by over 170 contributors and several foundations. You can help us foster online communication and resource sharing by social change groups by donating at our website. (http://www.organizenow.net/join) Thanks! Organizers' Collaborative, PO Box 400897, Cambridge MA 02140 ===================================================================== ==^================================================================ EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?bUrCaA.bUGmpu Or send an email To: rwwatch-unsubscribe@topica.com This email was sent to: rich at o...net T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^================================================================ From rich at o...net Wed Aug 22 22:33:55 2001 From: rich at o...net (Rich Cowan) Date: Wed, 22 Aug 2001 17:33:55 -0400 Subject: [RWWATCH] ACTION ALERT: Protest Cancellation of Right Wing Watcher's Talk Message-ID: <0.1600003522.1489724388-951758591-998516105@topica.com> RWWATCH -- August 22, 2001 (please forward) [We featured Al Ross's organization, the Institute for Democracy Studies (IDS, http://institutefordemocracy.org), several times last year in connection with their recent report on the Federalist Society. It is obvious, if you read the NYT article below, that exposing the connections of the far right is an effective strategy. So effective, in fact, that the Bush administration was afraid to have Al Ross speak at a conference that started in Baltimore today, and successfully pressured the conference sponsor to have him removed. The organization that uninvited Ross under pressure from the Bush administration is the National Industry Liaison Group, an association of mostly corporate affirmative action officers. See http://www.jhuapl.edu/NILG, and also see the version of the site as of a week ago by going to www.google.com and typing in "National Industry Liaison Group" and click on the "Cached" link of the first item found. That will give you a copy of the page when when Google last examined it. WHAT YOU OR YOUR ORGANIZATION CAN DO: Contact conference co-chair Robert Willis at: The Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory 11100 Johns Hopkins Road, Laurel, MD 20723-6099 robert.willis@jhuapl.edu 443-778-7133 and suggest that an organization that supposedly supports affirmative action should not buckle so easily to pressure to censor a group which is arguably one of the most important defenders of affirmative action (see their reports on the challenge to diversity). Also, please send a copy of your correspondence to a news outlet that might be willing to report on the facts behind Bush staffer's past stances on issues of diversity and racial justice. The media can contact IDS directly to get the scoop, at 212-423-9237. -rich cowan RWWATCH moderator p.s. The place where Robert Willis works, Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Lab, has received in excess of $250 million per year in government contracts for applied military research, much of it related to the 'Star Wars' program. ] >From: "Kathleen Maffei" >To: "Rich Cowan" >Subject: NY Times article >Date: Wed, 22 Aug 2001 14:53:26 -0700 > >The following New York Times article can currently be found at >http >://www.nytimes.com/2001/08/21/politics/21CENS.html?searchpv=day01. > >----- Original Message ----- >Bush Aide Accused of Having a Talk Canceled >By >ADAM CLYMER > >BALTIMORE, Aug. 20 - A trade association of corporate >antidiscrimination officers, whose members depend on Labor >Department approval to win federal contracts, bowed to >pressure from the Bush administration and canceled a >conference speaker who planned to attack conservative >organizations as enemies of affirmative action, the speaker >contended today. > >The speaker, Alfred E. Ross, said the group dropped him on >the demand of a Labor Department offical, Charles E. James >Jr. Mr. Ross said Mr. James had threatened that the >department would not participate in the conference unless >Mr. Ross was dropped from the program. > >Mr. James and conference organizers acknowledged that they >spoke before Mr. Ross was dropped, but they would not say >what they discussed. > >The National Industry Liaison Group replaced Mr. Ross as >today's keynote speaker with Mr. James, the deputy assistant >secretary in charge of the Office of Federal Contract >Compliance Programs. > >Mr. Ross, president of the Institute for Democracy Studies, >said he planned to single out the Heritage Foundation, where >Labor Secretary Elaine L. Chao worked before joining the >administration, as one of the groups "engaged in a battle to >turn back the clocks on the civil rights gains of the last >four decades." > >Mr. James met with the group's leaders on Aug. 14 in >Washington, association officials said. The next morning, >the group's Web site stopped listing Mr. Ross as a >speaker. > >Today, Mr. James refused to say what he had told the group's >officers. "What I said, I said to that group," he said. >"It's their business." > >Mr. Ross, a 55-year-old lawyer who has taught and worked for >the United Nations and Planned Parenthood, created his >institute in 1999 to study challenges to "bipartisan >democratic consensus." Recent publications include "The >Assault on Diversity." > >According to the text of remarks he intended to deliver, Mr. >Ross planned to say that the Heritage Foundation and another >group closely allied with the Bush administration, the >Federalist Society, have put "fundamental principles of >diversity and civil and constitutional rights under >siege." > >Speaking in his place, Mr. James quoted Ms. Chao as saying >his office would put assistance to companies seeking to >comply with federal requirements ahead of enforcement >actions. > >He insisted that this was no "rollback of enforcement," and >said that enforcement actions would be taken against federal >contractors who "do not comply or who have egregious >practices in their places of work." > >The only official of the industry group who would discuss >the issue, James Baker, its Baltimore region president, said >that the invitation to Mr. Ross was canceled "because we did >not want an adversarial conference." Mr. Baker would not say >what Mr. James told the group last week. > >Mr. Baker said that an inexperienced planning committee had >invited Mr. Ross and that older hands had decided to cancel >him. He minimized Mr. James's role, saying the decision was >withdrawn "without influence, without undue influence" from >Mr. James's office. He used that formulation repeatedly. > >Mr. Ross's account, in interviews and a written chronology, >is much more vivid. In a letter to the trade group, he says >that Robert Willis, the conference co-chairman who invited >him, told him on Aug. 8 that Mr. James was concerned that >Mr. Ross might criticize the Heritage Foundation. He said >Mr. James's boss, Ms. Chao, and Mr. James's wife, Kay James, >head of the Office of Personnel Management, had worked at >Heritage before joining the Bush administration. > >Mr. Ross said Mr. James told Mr. Willis that if Mr. Ross's >appearance was not canceled, all Labor Department officials >would be withdrawn from the conference, saying, "If you let >him speak, we're going to walk." > >Mr. Willis has refused to discuss the matter. > >Mr. Ross's chronology says that on Aug. 9 he asked Mr. >Willis, who works for the Johns Hopkins University Applied >Physics laboratory, what concerned the administration, and >that Mr. Willis replied, "They do not want any mention of >Heritage, they do not want any charts distributed." > >Mr. Ross had planned to pass out a complex chart to show the >connections between various organizations and individuals >who have opposed affirmative action. > >Mr. Ross said that Mr. Willis said, "They are making >threats," and explaining that "you need to understand that >they audit you." The Office of Federal Contract Compliance >Programs ensures compliance with affirmative action plans as >a condition of receiving government money. ===================================================================== This message was sent via RWWATCH, a low-traffic forum that responds to right-wing campaigns (coming from any party) to misrepresent the truth in order to undermine democracy. archive: http://www.topica.com/lists/rwwatch/read (subscribers only) subscribe: rwwatch-subscribe@topica.com (send a blank email) RWWATCH is a project of Organizers' Collaborative (http://www.organizenow.net) We are a new grassroots effort supported by over 180 contributors and three foundations. You can help us foster online communication and resource sharing by social change groups by donating at our website(http://www.organizenow.net/join.html) Thanks! Organizers' Collaborative, PO Box 400897, Cambridge MA 02140 ===================================================================== ==^================================================================ EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?bUrCaA.bUGmpu Or send an email To: rwwatch-unsubscribe@topica.com This email was sent to: rich at o...net T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^================================================================ From rich at o...net Fri Aug 24 00:09:32 2001 From: rich at o...net (Rich Cowan) Date: Thu, 23 Aug 2001 19:09:32 -0400 Subject: [RWWATCH] One-Woman Wrecking Crew Targets Democratic Leaders Message-ID: <0.1600003522.1182931660-212058698-998608257@topica.com> RWWATCH -- August 23, 2001 http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A43033-2001Aug21.html One-Woman Wrecking Crew Targets Democratic Leaders Meticulous Comstock Helps RNC Skewer the Opposition By John Mintz Washington Post Staff Writer Wednesday, August 22, 2001; Page A17 Barbara Comstock, a daughter of Massachusetts Democrats and the only kid in her eighth-grade class for George McGovern in 1972, recalls her moment of political revelation: She was a college intern in Washington for Sen. Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.), and her roommate handed her a copy of a magazine she had never heard of -- National Review. Soon, she said, "I'd be at hearings and think, 'I agree with Orrin Hatch [R-Utah], not Ted Kennedy.' " Democrats everywhere should bewail that that conservative magazine ever changed hands. Since joining the GOP, Comstock has become a kind of one-woman wrecking crew targeting Democratic leaders. As a onetime senior aide to Rep. Dan Burton (R-Ind.) who directed numerous investigations of Clinton-era scandals, and now as head of research for the Republican National Committee, Comstock has perhaps done more than any other GOP operative to skewer Bill Clinton, Al Gore and their congressional allies. Comstock is a practitioner of the mysterious Washington art of "opposition research" -- mining public documents for embarrassing facts about political adversaries and releasing them for maximum punch. "Rush Limbaugh should pay her as a news source for all her stuff he uses," an RNC colleague said. Republicans rave about her effectiveness, but what is striking is that in this time of bitter political partisanship, even some Democrats privately acknowledge the even-keeled Comstock does her work with care. Asked for a comment about her, a spokesman for the Democratic National Committee called back with a statement from John Podesta, White House counsel under former president Clinton. He recalled his depositions at the hands of Comstock and Barbara Olson, her more overtly partisan partner during their years as congressional GOP investigators. "In the world of the Barbaras," Podesta said, "you'd have to say Barbara Comstock is the good twin." Gary Maloney, himself a GOP opposition researcher, said Clinton's presidential campaigns swamped Republican opponents in 1992 and 1996 with sharper research and swifter dissemination. But the GOP's research operation roared back under Comstock in the last two years, he said. "She's meticulous and thorough . . . [and] research was one of the most successful parts of the RNC in 2000," Maloney said. "She's built respect among reporters for not being exceedingly partisan, she avoids ideological boilerplate and she's not a hater." In any case, politicking came late to her. She proudly points out that after law school, she stayed home raising three children -- "the hardest job I ever had," she said. In 1990, she volunteered in the office of Rep. Frank R. Wolf (R-Va.) and later worked for him full time, on youth issues. In 1993, Wolf asked her to look into allegations that the Clintons had improperly arranged the firing of White House travel office employees, who were Wolf constituents. Soon she was pursuing that case for the House Government Reform Committee, run by Rep. William Clinger (R-Pa.). Alone in the office one late night in 1993, she was scrutinizing boxes of newly released papers on the matter when she spotted a line in a White House official's memo -- "there would be hell to pay" with first lady Hillary Rodham Clinton, it said, if the travel office employees were not dismissed. She immediately called her colleague Olson to return to the office. "We were up all night," Comstock said. Hillary Clinton, now a New York senator, has maintained she played no role in the firings, but last year independent counsel Robert W. Ray said her sworn testimony to that effect was false. Soon Comstock was working on the panel for a more confrontational and controversial boss, Burton, for whom she led investigations into the Democratic fundraising scandals of 1996. In 1999, she was recruited to revamp the RNC's research office. Soon she had a staff of 30, including experts in such fields as health care and foreign policy. Most were more experienced and a decade older than their Democratic research counterparts. She was the one who publicized former vice president Gore's testimony that he hadn't been present for a key discussion of a questionable fundraising gambit because he "drank a lot of iced tea" and was in the bathroom. In that case and others, she said, "when something you put out ends up on Jay Leno, you say, 'Yay.' " Drawing on a massive RNC computer data base and video library she built, Comstock compiled a foot-high binder and CD-ROM called "The Gore File," which became a bible of sorts for GOP publicists and ad-makers. When Democratic presidential contender Bill Bradley alleged in primary season debates that Gore had flip-flopped on abortion, he was relying on this Comstock lode, political sources said. Her team also helped prepare George W. Bush for the presidential debates by amassing files on Gore's debating techniques. GOP officials credit her with discovering some of the alleged cases of Gore overstatement during the Bush-Gore debates that upended the vice president late in the campaign. "We quote, we source, we document," Comstock said, "because we know we'll be attacked." After the election, her team spent a month pulling virtual all-nighters at a West Palm Beach hotel assisting GOP operatives in the Florida vote recount. They then wrote the GOP playbook defending Bush nominees such as John D. Ashcroft, for attorney general. Comstock's authority at RNC is widening fast, and she now heads not only its research but also its strategic planning. She is helping run an expensive new RNC initiative to address a problem that has deepened for her party since 1980 -- the fact that most women vote Democratic. "Republicans have an opportunity with women because of the issues President Bush is working on, like education," she said. "I want my daughter to know, when he's talking about troop movements in Iraq, he's talking to [national security adviser] Condoleezza Rice." The women's initiative could be one reason Comstock, usually guarded about discussing her investigations, agreed to be interviewed for this article, GOP sources said. Her personal story -- returning to work after years as a homemaker, and then rising to the top of her trade -- as well as her gentle exterior, dovetail with the party's appeals to women, the GOP sources said. "I care about these issues for my kids, and my parents," she said. "I'm doing something that connects to my whole life." But one Democratic woman is unswayed -- her grandmother. After Comstock appears on television dispensing the GOP line, the older woman will call, she said, "and Grandma will say, 'I listened with the sound down. I liked your suit.' " © 2001 The Washington Post Company http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A43033-2001Aug2 .html This email may contain copyrighted material the use of which has not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. I am making such material available in our efforts to advance understanding of environmental, political, human rights, economic, democracy, scientific, and social justice issues, etc. I believe this constitutes a 'fair use' of any such copyrighted material as provided for in section 107 of the US Copyright Law. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C.Section 107, the material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. For more information go to: http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use', you must obtain permission from the copyright owner. This messaged wrapped with eWrapper 1.0, a free utility for Windows. See http://organizenow.net/ewrapper. ===================================================================== This message was sent via RWWATCH, a low-traffic forum that responds to right-wing campaigns (coming from any party) to misrepresent the truth in order to undermine democracy. archive: http://www.topica.com/lists/rwwatch/read (subscribers only) subscribe: rwwatch-subscribe@topica.com (send a blank email) RWWATCH is a project of Organizers' Collaborative (http://www.organizenow.net) We are a new grassroots effort supported by over 180 contributors and three foundations. You can help us foster online communication and resource sharing by social change groups by donating at our website(http://www.organizenow.net/join.html) Thanks! Organizers' Collaborative, PO Box 400897, Cambridge MA 02140 ===================================================================== ==^================================================================ EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?bUrCaA.bUGmpu Or send an email To: rwwatch-unsubscribe@topica.com This email was sent to: rich at o...net T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^================================================================ From rich at o...net Wed Sep 5 18:57:14 2001 From: rich at o...net (Rich Cowan) Date: Wed, 05 Sep 2001 13:57:14 -0400 Subject: [RWWATCH] Black Entertaiment Television Serving Bush Agenda Message-ID: <0.1600003522.1129168952-738719082-999712804@topica.com> RWWATCH -- September 5, 2001 (please forward) [Thanks to Douglas Schwegler for passing this on! -r] Date: Wed, 22 Aug 2001 23:35:07 -0400 (EDT) From: Patrick L Mason Subject: Robert L. Johnson: Painted Black http://www.thenewrepublic.com/082701/chait082701.html The New Republic August 27, 2001 Robert Johnson, W.'s favorite race baiter Painted Black By Jonathan Chait Robert L. Johnson came to the Bush administration's attention when it needed him most. The cause of the White House's duress was an annoyingly munificent collection of millionaires, headed by Bill Gates Sr., who had banded together to oppose President Bush's plan to abolish the estate tax. In newspaper ads and press conferences, they held forth on the obligation of the wealthy to give back to society. So effectively did they seize the moral high ground that even the most fervent opponents of the estate tax resigned themselves to it. "[I]t is looking increasingly doubtful," reported The Wall Street Journal a week later, "that large estates will escape federal taxation altogether." Evidently this didn't sit well with Johnson, the billionaire founder of Black Entertainment Television (BET), whose family stood to gain millions if Bush succeeded. Johnson is not a man with a deep sense of social obligation. Not long ago, when an interviewer prodded him for his views on philanthropy, Johnson scoffed, "[B]eing a very wealthy person is not something that I wake up in the morning and say, `Gee, I got all this money. How do I give it away?'" There is, however, an important exception to this every-man-for-himself ethos: society's duty to aid extremely wealthy African Americans. This social obligation Johnson takes very seriously. So Johnson did what he often does when his interests are at stake: He played the race card. Johnson gathered a collection of black business leaders and demanded an end to the estate tax. Taking out newspaper ads of their own, Johnson's group attacked the tax for draining wealth from the black community. Unlike "very wealthy white Americans" who supported the tax, he declared, "We as African Americans have come to our wealth on a different path, a different road than they have." Gates and his friends, Johnson implied, were not really promoting the common good; they were trying to keep the black man down. All of a sudden, it was not so clear who held the moral high ground. Estate tax repeal had become a civil rights issue. Almost no one -- not even the White House -- had thought to frame the issue this way. And for good reason: It is a bizarre inversion of the truth. "Elimination of the Estate Tax," Johnson's ad argued, using extraneous capitalizations for emphasis, "will help close the wealth gap in this nation between African American families and White families." But the estate tax is paid only by people who inherit large fortunes, and black people, as one might suspect, are far less likely than white people to do so. (Blacks make up about 12 percent of the population, but less than one-half of 1 percent of estate tax payers.) And the revenues from the tax, obviously, fund government programs, which tend to help those with low incomes, who are disproportionately black. Repealing the estate tax, therefore, would dramatically widen the wealth gap. But Johnson gave Bush the cover he needed to once again cast himself as a champion of minority interests. "As Robert Johnson of Black Entertainment Television argues, the death tax and double taxation weighs heavily on minorities," said Bush, who added that his plan would allow people to transfer wealth "from one generation to the next, regardless of a person's race." Fortunately for Johnson, and even more fortunately for his heirs, estate tax repeal subsequently passed into law. But Johnson's campaign to abolish the estate tax was more than just a way to save a few million bucks. It was the beginning of a political partnership between the CEO of BET and the president of the United States, one that has now turned its attention to an even grander cause: the privatization of Social Security. On May 2, Bush appointed Johnson to his commission charged with transforming the popular program. Once again, Johnson has racialized a long- standing conservative crusade. We must turn Social Security into a system with individual investment accounts, he argues, because the existing program unfairly shortchanges blacks. Social Security overhaul is Bush's most radical -- and most politically perilous -- aspiration. That the administration has entrusted Johnson with this task, despite his lack of expertise (and, indeed, his lack of any history of public interest in the issue), is a measure of the ideological reliability with which it now regards him. Johnson, according to one analyst, "is trying to position himself as Bush's go-to guy in the African American community." And it looks like he's succeeding. At first blush, there is something peculiar about this burgeoning partnership. Before Bush took office, Johnson cut the standard political profile of a member of the black bourgeoisie -- his strongest political connections were with the civil rights establishment, and he donated hundreds of thousands of dollars to Democrats. And yet his alliance with the president is not as strange as it may appear. Johnson has spent his career converting the moral capital of the black struggle for equality to his own personal economic advantage. One of Bush's central innovations has been to cloak an economic agenda radically geared to the interests of the wealthy in multicultural imagery. In a sense, the business strategy of Robert Johnson and the political strategy of George W. Bush were destined for each other. Johnson presents himself as the very opposite of a shrewd manipulator of racial politics. His preferred self-image is that of a bottom-line businessman who does his best to disregard racial barriers. A New York Times profile last year began with Johnson recounting how, early in his career, he swallowed his anger while a white colleague told a racist joke at a bar. (Profiles of Johnson often feature him recounting racial slights, always to make the point that he is not bothered by them.) The Times summed up Johnson's ethos this way: "That philosophy -- keep emotions in check, don't let issues of race get in the way of the deal -- has helped Mr. Johnson, 54, become one of the country's most successful black entrepreneurs." But while Johnson's talent as a businessman is undeniable -- he has, after all, earned more than $1 billion from scratch -- he didn't come by his fortune through the classic build-a-better-mousetrap method of American capitalism. Rather, his genius lies in finding certain corners of the economy where he can guarantee himself a steady stream of risk-free profit without having to provide goods or services of any special value. He does so by making himself politically indispensable to his business partners. Johnson's career has less in common with Henry Ford than with, say, the Soviet gas monopoly. And to acquire such franchises, he offers not baksheesh but racial absolution. Johnson first demonstrated this ability in 1979, when, as a cable TV lobbyist, he came up with the one true innovation in his business career: a cable TV station targeted to black viewers. At the time, cities represented cable's only remaining untapped market. And cable companies that could claim to support black culture enjoyed a political advantage in the race to wire them. All of which set the stage for Johnson's sweetheart deal. A Denver-based cable giant called TCI put up half a million dollars to acquire a minority share of Johnson's new network, which he called Black Entertainment Television. Johnson got the majority stake -- after putting up just $15,000 of his own money. The benefit to TCI was clear: It could tell the mayors and city councils in charge of doling out contracts that it carried and financed a black-owned, black-themed station. "Under traditional investment standards, the return on investment has not been what one would look for," a TCI official told The Washington Post ten years later. But that, he added, doesn't account for "how much goodwill we get from making a major attempt to provide programming of interest to the minority community." Johnson, meanwhile, reaped a windfall. Of course, now that Johnson had a cable station, he had to put content on the air. But this turned out to be pretty simple, too. Since BET's main purpose was to score political points for Johnson's financial patron, the actual programming hardly mattered. As Johnson liked to tell his staff, "We don't have to reinvent the wheel. We just have to paint it black." During its first couple of years, BET broadcast only two hours per week -- an old movie on Friday nights. It took four years to expand to 24-hour broadcasting, and its main criterion still seems to be finding ways to fill airtime at no cost. The network devotes hour after hour to infomercials -- "Black Entertainment Television," goes one joke, "is neither black nor entertainment." And it relies heavily on music videos, which studios provide to the network for free in order to promote their albums and which, as of two years ago, accounted for more than half of BET's content. Unfortunately, the videos tend to feature the least edifying elements of African American culture -- gangsta rappers and booty-shaking dancers. That's one reason Johnson and BET have for years come under withering criticism within the African American community. One BET executive confessed at a music conference in June 1996 that she doesn't permit her daughter to watch the station. Aaron McGruder, who authors an edgy cartoon about black life, has made a living disparaging Johnson. In one strip, a character asserts that he "used to be a firm believer" that "powerful black business people would then act in the best interests of black America." But then "BET shot a few holes in that theory." Johnson has also endured criticism for serving as a front man for TCI -- a role he reprised in 1984 when he acquired the rights to provide cable television to Washington, D.C. Like many other local governments, Washington's city council put great emphasis on finding a locally owned, minority contractor. Even though the council's cable committee recommended another firm, Johnson's group won the bid, in large part -- as the Post suggested at the time -- because its shareholders included a number of cronies and financial donors of then-Mayor Marion Barry. Johnson promised that his company "would not be back seeking relief from promises we could not keep." But, within a few months, Johnson acknowledged (as did cable contractors in other cities) that he could not keep his commitment without millions of dollars in concessions from the city. Johnson also obtained tens of millions in additional financing from TCI, giving it financial control of the operation. With Johnson and his local, minority partners reduced to figureheads, a Post columnist observed, "Would the D.C. City Council have given the cable franchise in the first place to a white company from Denver with local black managers? I doubt it." Johnson has a blunt reply to such detractors. "There are thousands of white businessmen who never get asked, `Are you a hero?' and never are asked what they have given back to the white community," he told C-SPAN in 1992, "What are my responsibilities to black people at large? If I help my family get over and deal with the problems they might confront, then I have achieved that one goal that is my responsibility to society at large." As Johnson tells it, he asks only to be treated like any other entrepreneur, black or white. But he applies his disregard for race selectively. When he's asked to help the black community, he's just a businessman. On the other hand, when Johnson's own interests are at stake, he portrays himself as a stand-in for black America. Race is his catchall justification for all sorts of socially and economically noxious behavior. He has turned the racial mau-mau into a business plan. For example, Johnson has a long record of quashing efforts by his underpaid employees to unionize. On one occasion he laid off or reduced the hours of BET workers who joined an electricians' union, an action that a federal judge subsequently ruled illegal. He justifies such behavior by accusing the unions of racial bias for trying to organize a black-owned network. "I don't see them taking part in the [naacp's threatened network] boycott. I don't see them writing open letters to the networks about their lack of black representation. Why do they pick on BET? Why not ABC or NBC or Fox?" In 1994 Johnson brought his tactics to the world of professional sports when he decided he wanted to purchase Washington's NBA franchise, the Bullets. When the team's owner, Abe Pollin, turned down his entreaties, Johnson tried another tack. "I told him, `Abe, you're from the suburbs, I'm from the city,'" he recounted to the Post, "`You're white, I'm black. The city is mostly black, and the players are too.'" When Pollin resisted this line of reasoning, Johnson declared that he wanted to bring a second NBA franchise to the area. The league, he acknowledged, traditionally discourages the establishment of a new franchise in such close proximity to an existing one. But, he mused, it might not want to oppose a prospective black owner. That plan failed, too, but only after Johnson waged a protracted fight against Pollin's effort to build a new arena in downtown Washington -- just the sort of economic development most boosters of the majority-black city encourage. But the quintessential Robert Johnson business deal was unveiled last spring, when United Airlines announced its intention to purchase its main rival, US Airways. The merger was politically perilous, since the Clinton Justice Department did not seem favorably disposed toward another merger in such a heavily consolidated industry. The airlines tried to solve this problem by cutting Johnson in on the deal. Under the proposed arrangement, Johnson would create a new airline, DC Air. DC Air would lease its planes and runway spots from United, with which -- in theory -- it would also compete. It was yet another no-lose proposition for Johnson. He would get a pre-fab airline -- complete with planes, parts, and the people to make it work -- for well below market value. (Continental Airlines subsequently offered to pay 50 percent more than Johnson for the same assets.) In return, Johnson provided United essentially the same thing Virgil "the Turk" Sollozzo wanted from Don Corleone: police and political protection. Johnson enjoyed a close relationship with President Clinton, having donated hundreds of thousands of dollars to Democratic campaigns. Airline analysts speculated -- but, of course, could not prove -- that United believed Johnson's influence could help make antitrust concerns disappear. Johnson quickly went about using race to demonize the merger's opponents. In a hearing on June 15 of last year, James Oberstar, the top-ranking Democrat on the House Transportation Committee, pointed out that DC Air would be dependent on its supposed rival, United. "That's not a real competitive environment," Oberstar noted. At that point he slipped in an unfortunate phrase: "That's a plantation." Oberstar later explained that he was trying to draw an analogy to the serf-like status of the District of Columbia, which is sometimes called "the last plantation." But US Airways Chairman Stephen Wolf saw the remark on C-SPAN, and -- no doubt sensing an opportunity -- phoned Johnson, who pounced. Calling Oberstar's remark "blatant racism," he demanded that the congressman apologize and recuse himself from the issue. Oberstar dutifully apologized, but Johnson played the race card again the following January, accusing New York Senator Charles E. Schumer, a merger critic, of favoring DC Air's rivals "because they are white businesspersons." Despite Johnson's best efforts, the Justice Department delayed the merger. In fact, its review dragged on past the end of the year (before being officially nixed at the end of July). But, even before the deal fell through, something happened that completely overturned its political calculus: Bush took office. All at once, Johnson's connections with Clinton were useless. "I think with [Johnson's] issue on the airlines," speculates Harry Alford, a fellow black anti-estate-tax activist, "he saw he had to get both sides of the aisle." As Alford implies, it is highly unlikely that Johnson would have undergone such a rapid political metamorphosis had his business dealings not demanded it. Yet his newfound conservatism is not entirely philosophically incoherent. The premise of Johnson's special pleading has always been that his business interests are the only legitimate civil rights issue. His right to amass more wealth trumps his employees' interest in higher wages, the community's interest in non-debasing black entertainment, and travelers' interest in affordable airfares. The fact that many of the people on the other side of the equation are black does not enter into Johnson's accounting. And, in recent months, he seems to have discovered that the moral logic that propelled his spectacular business career has an application in the world of public policy as well. Johnson's interest in the estate tax is, of course, a direct consequence of his financial interests. His membership on the President's Commission to Strengthen Social Security, on the other hand, came about by accident. In mid-March, Johnson delivered a speech at Brown University about his life. By happenstance, Sam Beard was in the audience. Beard is a full-time evangelist for Social Security privatization. He is particularly intent on sharing the gospel with nonconservatives -- he treated me to a soliloquy in the course of telling this story -- and can explain the idea so it sounds not like the product of right-wing think tanks but like the natural outgrowth of the Great Society. Beard saw in Johnson an ideal convert. "His whole presentation is about wealth," recounts Beard, meaning this as a compliment. Beard struck up a conversation with Johnson and, finding him receptive, asked whether he would like to serve on a presidential commission on the topic if invited to. Johnson said yes. Chuck Blahous, the White House staffer in charge of Social Security reform, does not recall the precise genesis of Johnson's involvement. "We were looking for diversity of background," he explains. In fact, there is nothing in the public record to suggest that Johnson had any previous interest in the topic. And that may have worked in his favor. Johnson's obvious role on the commission is to argue that Social Security privatization will help blacks, who, he claims, are treated unfairly by the current system. Pro-privatization think tanks, such as the Heritage Foundation and the Cato Institute, have argued that for years, pumping out position papers and targeting the black media. But the idea never received much mainstream attention until Bush anointed Johnson to take it up. Johnson well understands his role -- he brings up the racial angle at every turn, generally leaving to others the broader case for personal accounts. He doesn't have to reinvent the case for privatization. He just has to paint it black. Johnson's argument is rooted in a simple misunderstanding. "African Americans who contribute to the Social Security system and payroll taxes," he says, "also have one of the highest mortality rates, so in the end, they may not receive the full benefits of what they put in Social Security." And it's true that blacks, on average, die younger than whites. Social Security pays its retirement benefits only as long as a worker is alive. Therefore, privatizers conclude, blacks would particularly benefit from individual retirement accounts. That way, those who die early won't get less benefits -- extra money in their account will be passed on to their heirs. There are two reasons this conclusion is false. First, Social Security does more than pay benefits to retirees. It also gives benefits to the families of workers who die or are disabled at a young age. Since black workers are more likely to suffer workplace injuries, they benefit disproportionately from this part of the program. And the more Social Security tax dollars are drained away into private accounts -- as Bush proposes to do -- the less that is available for survivors' benefits. Second, Social Security's retirement benefits are progressive: They offer a higher rate of return to lower-paid workers. Since black workers, on average, earn less than the population at large, they benefit from this redistribution. This more than makes up for any loss they suffer from dying younger. On the whole, then, Social Security redistributes money from whites to blacks. Most plans for private accounts do not. As with the estate tax, Johnson has his racial analysis backward. But Johnson's argument is more than untrue; it is deeply revealing. Before Social Security, retirees couldn't know how much of a pension to allot themselves out of their savings, if they had any, because they didn't know how long they would live. If they spent too much, they might outlive their savings. Social Security fixed that problem by giving retired workers a guaranteed income for as long as they lived. Johnson, and Bush's commission, now argue that it would make more sense to give each retiree an individual account. It's true that this one feature, by itself, would tend to benefit those who die younger. But, of course, nobody can be certain that he or she will die young. Suppose we were to discover that, say, Italian-Americans are somewhat less likely than other Americans to lose their homes from natural disasters. One could then make the case that federal disaster relief constitutes a net transfer of wealth out of their community, and that they should oppose it. The important point here is not even that blacks wouldn't benefit from Social Security privatization. It's that Johnson implicitly rejects the very idea that politics is about the common good. Conservatives used to vehemently -- sometimes even eloquently -- oppose this kind of thinking. Color-blindness, they once insisted, was the only moral basis for decent public policy. But the Bush administration has changed that. It boasts incessantly about its racial, ethnic, and gender diversity and has hatched a slew of initiatives targeted at specific constituencies. For women, the White House is pushing the "Winning Women" campaign. For Catholics, Bush appropriates the language of the Church. For Mexican-Americans, Bush last month floated an amnesty program that wouldn't apply to all immigrants -- just this one, politically important immigrant group. Bush, of course, did not invent identity politics; his contribution has been to tether it to policies geared toward the interests of accumulated wealth. In short, Bushism and Johnsonism are made for each other; their nascent alliance represents a historic synthesis of the racial separatism of the left and the libertarianism of the right. Johnson, even more than Bush, seemed to recognize this commonality from the beginning. "If he's smart," the businessman said of the president last April, "he'd take the opportunity to reach out to these African American business leaders and say, `We agree on at least one thing. What else can we talk about?'" The answer, alas, is plenty. -- Jonathan Chait is a senior editor at TNR. ===================================================================== This message was sent via RWWATCH, a low-traffic forum that responds to right-wing campaigns (coming from any party) to misrepresent the truth in order to undermine democracy. archive: http://www.topica.com/lists/rwwatch/read (subscribers only) subscribe: rwwatch-subscribe@topica.com (send a blank email) RWWATCH is a project of Organizers' Collaborative, a project using technology to enhance grassroots organizing, research, and movement building by organizations working for democracy and social justice. We depend on your financial support to keep this work going. Please consider joining with almost 200 others by making an annual gift of $15, $30, $50, or $100 at http://organizenow.net/join.html. OC is a 501(c)(3) organization, so all contributions are tax-deductible!! To join by check, please send payment to: Organizers' Collaborative, PO Box 400897, Cambridge MA 02140 ==^================================================================ EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?bUrCaA.bUGmpu Or send an email To: rwwatch-unsubscribe@topica.com This email was sent to: rich at o...net T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^================================================================ From rich at o...net Fri Sep 7 03:57:47 2001 From: rich at o...net (Rich Cowan) Date: Thu, 06 Sep 2001 22:57:47 -0400 Subject: [RWWATCH] from FAIR: some Jesse Helms shockers! Message-ID: <0.1600003522.539111988-738719082-999831555@topica.com> RWWATCH -- September 6, 2001 (please forward) Thanks to Sachin Chheda for forwarding this from the FAIR list! ---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: FAIR-L To: FAIR-L@LISTSERV.AMERICAN.EDU Date: Fri, 31 Aug 2001 18:22:56 -0400 Subject: [FAIR-L] Media Downplay Bigotry of Jesse Helms FAIR-L Fairness & Accuracy in Reporting Media analysis, critiques and news reports MEDIA ADVISORY: Media Downplay Bigotry of Jesse Helms August 31, 2001 News that North Carolina's Jesse Helms will retire from the Senate when his term is up in 2003 received polite coverage in mainstream media. USA Today (8/22/01) described Helms' views as "unabashed and outspoken conservatism." To the Washington Post (8/22/01), Helms is one of the Senate's "most ardent champions of conservative causes...a man of bold colors and few pastels." Curiously using the past tense, the Los Angeles Times observed, "he personified the unvarnished, uncompromising, attack-dog brand of conservatism." (8/22/01) Most of the coverage alluded to Helms' unrepentant racism and homophobia-- though few called it that. Some outlets presented his bigotry as merely accusations from political foes: "His opponents have accused him of using race to win elections." (CBS Evening News, 8/21/01) Overall, most outlets painted Helms as a conservative whose career has merely been punctuated by controversial episodes, not as a demagogue whose career has been defined by the politics of hate and reaction. One exception was Washington Post columnist David Broder, whose August 29 column, headlined "Jesse Helms, White Racist," offered a glimpse into the public record that many other reporters were side-stepping. Broder offered a few examples of Helms' bigotry. There are many. As an aide to the 1950 Senate campaign of North Carolina Republican candidate Willis Smith, Helms reportedly helped create attack ads against Smith's opponent, including one which read: "White people, wake up before it is too late. Do you want Negroes working beside you, your wife and your daughters, in your mills and factories? Frank Graham favors mingling of the races." Another ad featured photographs Helms himself had doctored to illustrate the allegation that Graham's wife had danced with a black man. (The News and Observer 8/26/01; The New Republic, 6/19/95; The Observer, 5/5/96; "Hard Right: The Rise of Jesse Helms," by Ernest B. Furgurson, Norton, 1986) Ancient history? No. Helms remains unapologetic to this day. Forty years after the Smith campaign, Helms would win election against black opponent Harvey Gantt with another ad playing to racist white fear-- the so-called "white hands" ad, in which a white man's hands crumple a rejected job application while a voiceover intones, "You needed that job...but they had to give it to a minority." In columns, commentaries and pronouncements from the Senate floor, Helms sowed hatred and called names: The University of North Carolina was "the University of Negroes and Communists." (Capital Times, 11/22/94) Black civil rights activists were "Communists and sex perverts." (Copley News Service, 8/23/01) Of civil rights protests Helms wrote, "The Negro cannot count forever on the kind of restraint that's thus far left him free to clog the streets, disrupt traffic, and interfere with other men's rights." (WRAL-TV commentary, 1963) He also wrote, "Crime rates and irresponsibility among Negroes are a fact of life which must be faced." (New York Times, 2/8/81) Over the years Helms has declared homosexuality "degenerate," and homosexuals "weak, morally sick wretches." (Newsweek, 12/5/94) In a tirade highlighting his routine opposition to AIDS research funding, Helms lashed out at the Kennedy-Hatch AIDS bill in 1988: "There is not one single case of AIDS in this country that cannot be traced in origin to sodomy." (States News Service, 5/17/88) Helms remonstrated ten female members of the House of Representatives to "act like ladies" when they interrupted a Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing to demand support of a U.N. treaty against gender discrimination, and subsequently had them removed from the hearing by Capitol police. (St. Louis Post-Dispatch, 10/28/99) And the man ABC News now describes as a "conservative icon" (8/22/01) in 1993 sang "Dixie" in an elevator to Carol Moseley-Braun, the first African-American woman elected to the Senate, bragging, "I'm going to make her cry. I'm going to sing Dixie until she cries." (Chicago Sun-Times, 8/5/93) More recently, when a caller to CNN's Larry King Live show praised guest Jesse Helms for "everything you've done to help keep down the niggers," Helms' response was to salute the camera and say, "Well, thank you, I think." (Wilmington Star-News, 9/16/95) Finally, Helms' strong if sometimes shadowy support for violent, anti-democratic forces abroad, from South Africa to El Salvador, might have given media outlets further pause in describing him as a mere conservative; few probed his ties to groups that would more accurately be described as fascist. One exception was an editorial in the Boston Globe (8/23/01): "Helms' role in supporting foreign thugs such as Roberto D'Aubuisson, the cashiered Salvadoran major who ran death squads responsible for savage political murders, did lasting harm to America's good name. In South Africa, Argentina, Mozambique, Honduras, and Nicaragua, Helms cooperated with racists and fascists who have nothing in common with the ideals of American democracy." With 17 months remaining in his Senate term there will be many more "send-offs" dedicated to Jesse Helms. It remains to be seen whether he will continue to get kid glove treatment from the press, or if journalists will choose to tell the unvarnished truth about Helms' career. ---------- Feel free to respond to FAIR ( fair@fair.org ). We can't reply to everything, but we will look at each message. We especially appreciate documented example of media bias or censorship. And please send copies of your email correspondence with media outlets, including any responses, to us at: fair@fair.org . You can subscribe to FAIR-L at our web site: http://www.fair.org , or by sending a "subscribe FAIR-L enter your full name" command to LISTSERV@LISTSERV.AMERICAN.EDU . Our subscriber list is kept confidential. FAIR (212) 633-6700 http://www.fair.org/ E-mail: fair@fair.org list administrators: FAIR-L-request@american.edu ===================================================================== This message was sent via RWWATCH, a low-traffic forum that responds to right-wing campaigns (coming from any party) to misrepresent the truth in order to undermine democracy. archive: http://www.topica.com/lists/rwwatch/read (subscribers only) subscribe: rwwatch-subscribe@topica.com (send a blank email) RWWATCH is a project of Organizers' Collaborative, a project using technology to enhance grassroots organizing, research, and movement building by organizations working for democracy and social justice. We depend on your financial support to keep this work going. Please consider joining with almost 200 others by making an annual gift of $15, $30, $50, or $100 at http://organizenow.net/join.html. OC is a 501(c)(3) organization, so all contributions are tax-deductible!! To join by check, please send payment to: Organizers' Collaborative, PO Box 400897, Cambridge MA 02140 ==^================================================================ EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?bUrCaA.bUGmpu Or send an email To: rwwatch-unsubscribe@topica.com This email was sent to: rich at o...net T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^================================================================ From rich at o...net Mon Sep 10 21:57:08 2001 From: rich at o...net (Rich Cowan) Date: Mon, 10 Sep 2001 16:57:08 -0400 Subject: [RWWATCH] PFAW analysis of Ashcroft's record Message-ID: <0.1600003522.114073590-212058698-1000155539@topica.com> RWWATCH -- September 10, 2001 (please forward) This is an excerpt... the full report is at: http://www.pfaw.org/issues/democracy/ash_update.shtml September 2001 John Ashcroft's First Six Months at the Justice Department: The Right-Wing Dream Team Takes Over Introduction When President-elect George W. Bush announced that former U.S. Senator John Ashcroft would be his nominee for U.S. Attorney General, People For the American Way helped lead a coalition of extraordinary breadth and depth opposing his confirmation. Based on Ashcroft's record as a senator and as Missouri state attorney general and governor, public interest advocates believed that Ashcroft was a right-wing ideologue who should not be entrusted with overseeing the enforcement of laws and the protection of constitutional guarantees affecting civil rights, civil liberties, religious liberty, reproductive rights, environmental protection, and more. A copy of People For the American Way's exhaustively documented report, "The Case Against the Confirmation of John Ashcroft as Attorney General of the United States" is available.. Six months into Ashcroft's tenure, it is clear that many of the concerns raised by public interest groups and hundreds of thousands of Americans were well warranted. The soothing rhetoric Ashcroft employed at his confirmation hearings continues, but cannot hide the continued aggressive promotion of the far-right legal and ideological agenda that has marked his career in public office. The strategy of putting a moderate face on a far-from-moderate agenda makes Ashcroft in some ways emblematic of the Bush administration writ large, which has clearly internalized the advice of Bush campaign adviser and former Christian Coalition president Ralph Reed, who has urged his fellow Religious Right activists to shun harsh language in order to achieve their goals. At the time of Ashcroft's nomination, People For the American Way President Ralph G. Neas criticized Bush for choosing someone with a voting record to the right of Sen. Jesse Helms (according to 1997-1998 voting records analysis from the nonpartisan National Journal.) Said Neas, "On the key criterion of commitment to equal justice under the law, Ashcroft's record simply does not measure up to the standards the American people have a right to expect from the person entrusted with protecting their rights and their Constitution. John Ashcroft's record shows him to be a man who has not earned the people's high trust but has used his power and position to advance a far right agenda at the expense of Americans' fundamental rights and liberties." Ashcroft has occasionally disappointed his allies on the far right, for example, by moving in one visible case to uphold federal law protecting clinics from anti-abortion protestors and defending a Department of Transportation affirmative action program. But there have been many more troubling actions or lack of action on a range of issues, including civil rights, civil liberties, gun control, the federal judiciary, church-state separation, and legal and constitutional interpretation. And what is already a poor record is nearly certain to get worse. Indeed, in his first months in office, Ashcroft has assembled the radical right's Dream Team, giving Religious Right leaders and their political allies reason to believe that their all-out efforts on behalf of George W. Bush have paid off. Many of these appointees are just settling into office, so their full impact on public policy has not yet been felt. This is particularly true about the top priority of the Bush administration and its right-wing allies - dominance of the Supreme Court and the entire federal judiciary by right-wing ideologues. Members of the Federalist Society for Law and Public Policy Studies, whose legal philosophy is represented on the current Supreme Court by Justices Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas, play central roles in the Justice Department and White House in the process by which federal judicial nominees are selected. It is in this arena that the Bush administration, if successful, will have the longest and most detrimental effect on American law and society, potentially overturning seven decades of social justice progress and blocking progressive initiatives for the next generation. This report will highlight some of the appointees to important Justice Department positions, discuss the relevance of the Federalist Society affiliation of many of those nominees, consider the impact of Ashcroft and his legal team on the federal judiciary, and briefly review Department of Justice actions under Ashcroft in more than a dozen policy areas. ===================================================================== This message was sent via RWWATCH, a low-traffic forum that responds to right-wing campaigns (coming from any party) to misrepresent the truth in order to undermine democracy. archive: http://www.topica.com/lists/rwwatch/read (subscribers only) subscribe: rwwatch-subscribe@topica.com (send a blank email) RWWATCH is a project of Organizers' Collaborative, a project using technology to enhance grassroots organizing, research, and movement building by organizations working for democracy and social justice. We depend on your financial support to keep this work going. Please consider joining with almost 200 others by making an annual gift of $15, $30, $50, or $100 at http://organizenow.net/join.html. OC is a 501(c)(3) organization, so all contributions are tax-deductible!! To join by check, please send payment to: Organizers' Collaborative, PO Box 400897, Cambridge MA 02140 ==^================================================================ EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?bUrCaA.bUGmpu Or send an email To: rwwatch-unsubscribe@topica.com This email was sent to: rich at o...net T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^================================================================ From rich at o...net Wed Sep 12 19:39:20 2001 From: rich at o...net (Rich Cowan) Date: Wed, 12 Sep 2001 14:39:20 -0400 Subject: [RWWATCH] Analyzing the Right's Response Message-ID: <0.1600003522.64855387-951758591-1000320134@topica.com> RWWATCH -- September 12, 2001 (please forward) Like many of us, you may still be in a state of shock regarding yesterday's events, but I think it is appropriate, before the government figures out its response, for us to begin to engage in the debates that are now beginning to take shape. For starters, see Michael Moore's latest commentary at: http://www.michaelmoore.com/2001_0912.html. Even though some portions are perhaps more provocative than something I might write, there are two very important points, namely: #1 -- that airport security is very lax, and #2 -- that the US and CIA (especially during the first Bush presidency) have unfortunately given an incredible amount of support and training to organizations that are turning that around to attack US civilians. See: "Bin Laden comes home to roost" at: http://www.msnbc.com/news/190144.asp . I might add to this: #3 -- this morning, several news stations reported that the FAA website announces to the world that knives of up to 4 inches in length are permitted on US planes. #4 -- figuring out flight times needed to coordinate this kind of attack "within minutes of each other" as one Congressman mentioned (was it Moran) does not "indicate a level of sophistication requiring state sponsorship" when you can look up all the flight times you want on web sites like http://orbitz.com It is important for us engage in this debate, because there are already calls by conservative commentators such as James A. Phillips of the Heritage Foundation (see: http://www.heritage.org/staff/phillips.htm) for the US to dramatically increase our $350 billion military budget. This, despite the fact that this budget is already 23 times the combined military budget of the 7 nations considered to be the worst potential threats, according to the latest issue of the Defense Monitor (see: http://www.cdi.org/dm/2001/issue7/dm701.pdf, p.4). Such measures are proposed without removing those items from the budget, like $7 billion in subsidies, last I checked, (see also http://www.fas.org/asmp/index.html) for purchases of US arms by countries on both sides of the conflicts in the Middle East, which may actually contribute to more anti-US violence. And these measures are proposed without removing those items from the budget like $7-9 billion in SDI (Ballistic Missile Defense) research, which create pressure for enormous new high-tech military spending programs offering no real protection against the kinds of threat we are most likely to face -- low tech methods of attack. What am I proposing? I am issuing a call for help from the 1100 subscribers of RWWATCH in helping to monitor the news. The goal in this effort is to reveal MYTHS that the Right (including some hawkish Democrats) may be perpetuating in order to use the crisis for their their own ends. These ends might include expansion of the already bloated, wasteful, "defense" establishment, or a form of escalation that would likely sow the seed of many future terrorist attacks. Please send what you see to us: myths@organizenow.net so that the results can be reposted to the entire list. If you include the date and news source, exact quote or web link if available, your information will be more useful to people who might then want to use that information later. Thanks! -rich cowan RWWATCH editor ===================================================================== This message was sent via RWWATCH, a low-traffic forum that responds to right-wing campaigns (coming from any party) to misrepresent the truth in order to undermine democracy. archive: http://www.topica.com/lists/rwwatch/read (subscribers only) subscribe: rwwatch-subscribe@topica.com (send a blank email) RWWATCH is a project of Organizers' Collaborative, a project using technology to enhance grassroots organizing, research, and movement building by organizations working for democracy and social justice. We depend on your financial support to keep this work going. Please consider joining with almost 200 others by making an annual gift of $15, $30, $50, or $100 at http://organizenow.net/join.html. OC is a 501(c)(3) organization, so all contributions are tax-deductible!! To join by check, please send payment to: Organizers' Collaborative, PO Box 400897, Cambridge MA 02140 ==^================================================================ EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?bUrCaA.bUGmpu Or send an email To: rwwatch-unsubscribe@topica.com This email was sent to: rich at o...net T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^================================================================ From rich at o...net Thu Sep 13 02:41:21 2001 From: rich at o...net (Rich Cowan) Date: Wed, 12 Sep 2001 21:41:21 -0400 Subject: [RWWATCH] US now giving over $100 Million/yr to Taliban Message-ID: <0.1600003522.1759006887-738719082-1000345396@topica.com> RWWATCH -- September 12, 2001 [The Taliban is the Islamic fundamentalist government now in control of Afghanistan, that has been accused of protecting Osama Bin Laden. I received the article below from Mattingly Conner "Mattingly Conner" . Before releasing this, I checked it out a bit and added 5 additional links. The aid mentioned was targeted, mostly for supplying wheat and food. And this is not just a GWB issue: it continued a policy left over from the Clinton years. But not all of the annual US aid is for food, apparently. According to the CNN link referenced below, total US aid for the Taliban was $124.2 million this year. It kind of makes you wonder whether it might be a good idea to ask Bush, before making grave pronouncements about "those who harbor terrorists", might do well to might do well to consider why his administration is sending fat checks to those very same "harborers." -rc] see also: STOP GENDER APARTHEID IN AFGHANISTAN; update as of today http://www.feminist.com/activism/afghanalert.html http://www.feminist.org/news/newsbyte/uswirestory.asp?id=5796 Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan http://songs.rawa.org/rawa/index.html U.S. gives $43 million to Afghanistan http://www.cnn.com/2001/US/05/17/us.afghanistan.aid/index.html Taliban gets US Aid! http://www.grazianoforcongress.com/taliban.htm Indian Express Editorial http://www.indian-express.com/ie20010525/ed2.html one possible web search: http://www.google.com/search?q=%2243+million%22+taliban http://www.robertscheer.com/1_natcolumn/01_columns/052201.htm Bush's Faustian Deal With the Taliban By Robert Scheer Published May 22, 2001 in the Los Angeles Times Enslave your girls and women, harbor anti-U.S. terrorists, destroy every vestige of civilization in your homeland, and the Bush administration will embrace you. All that matters is that you line up as an ally in the drug war, the only international cause that this nation still takes seriously. That's the message sent with the recent gift of $43 million to the Taliban rulers of Afghanistan, the most virulent anti-American violators of human rights in the world today. The gift, announced last Thursday by Secretary of State Colin Powell, in addition to other recent aid, makes the U.S. the main sponsor of the Taliban and rewards that "rogue regime" for declaring that opium growing is against the will of God. So, too, by the Taliban's estimation, are most human activities, but it's the ban on drugs that catches this administration's attention. Never mind that Osama bin Laden still operates the leading anti-American terror operation from his base in Afghanistan, from which, among other crimes, he launched two bloody attacks on American embassies in Africa in 1998. Sadly, the Bush administration is cozying up to the Taliban regime at a time when the United Nations, at U.S. insistence, imposes sanctions on Afghanistan because the Kabul government will not turn over Bin Laden. The war on drugs has become our own fanatics' obsession and easily trumps all other concerns. How else could we come to reward the Taliban, who has subjected the female half of the Afghan population to a continual reign of terror in a country once considered enlightened in its treatment of women? At no point in modern history have women and girls been more systematically abused than in Afghanistan where, in the name of madness masquerading as Islam, the government in Kabul obliterates their fundamental human rights. Women may not appear in public without being covered from head to toe with the oppressive shroud called the burkha , and they may not leave the house without being accompanied by a male family member. They've not been permitted to attend school or be treated by male doctors, yet women have been banned from practicing medicine or any profession for that matter. The lot of males is better if they blindly accept the laws of an extreme religious theocracy that prescribes strict rules governing all behavior, from a ban on shaving to what crops may be grown. It is this last power that has captured the enthusiasm of the Bush White House. The Taliban fanatics, economically and diplomatically isolated, are at the breaking point, and so, in return for a pittance of legitimacy and cash from the Bush administration, they have been willing to appear to reverse themselves on the growing of opium. That a totalitarian country can effectively crack down on its farmers is not surprising. But it is grotesque for a U.S. official, James P. Callahan, director of the State Department's Asian anti-drug program, to describe the Taliban's special methods in the language of representative democracy: "The Taliban used a system of consensus-building," Callahan said after a visit with the Taliban, adding that the Taliban justified the ban on drugs "in very religious terms." Of course, Callahan also reported, those who didn't obey the theocratic edict would be sent to prison. In a country where those who break minor rules are simply beaten on the spot by religious police and others are stoned to death, it's understandable that the government's "religious" argument might be compelling. Even if it means, as Callahan concedes, that most of the farmers who grew the poppies will now confront starvation. That's because the Afghan economy has been ruined by the religious extremism of the Taliban, making the attraction of opium as a previously tolerated quick cash crop overwhelming. For that reason, the opium ban will not last unless the U.S. is willing to pour far larger amounts of money into underwriting the Afghan economy. As the Drug Enforcement Administration's Steven Casteel admitted, "The bad side of the ban is that it's bringing their country--or certain regions of their country--to economic ruin." Nor did he hold out much hope for Afghan farmers growing other crops such as wheat, which require a vast infrastructure to supply water and fertilizer that no longer exists in that devastated country. There's little doubt that the Taliban will turn once again to the easily taxed cash crop of opium in order to stay in power. The Taliban may suddenly be the dream regime of our own war drug war zealots, but in the end this alliance will prove a costly failure. Our long sad history of signing up dictators in the war on drugs demonstrates the futility of building a foreign policy on a domestic obsession. - - - Robert Scheer Is a Syndicated Columnist. This email may contain copyrighted material the use of which has not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. I am making such such material available in our efforts to advance understanding of environmental, political, human rights, economic, democracy, scientific, and social justice issues, etc. I believe this constitutes a 'fair use' of any such copyrighted material as provided for in section 107 of the US Copyright Law. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C.Section 107, the material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. For more information go to: http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use', you must obtain permission from the copyright owner. This messaged wrapped with eWrapper 1.0, a free utility for Windows. See http://organizenow.net/ewrapper. ===================================================================== This message was sent via RWWATCH, a low-traffic forum that responds to right-wing campaigns (coming from any party) to misrepresent the truth in order to undermine democracy. archive: http://www.topica.com/lists/rwwatch/read (subscribers only) subscribe: rwwatch-subscribe@topica.com (send a blank email) RWWATCH is a project of Organizers' Collaborative, a project using technology to enhance grassroots organizing, research, and movement building by organizations working for democracy and social justice. We depend on your financial support to keep this work going. Please consider joining with almost 200 others by making an annual gift of $15, $30, $50, or $100 at http://organizenow.net/join.html. OC is a 501(c)(3) organization, so all contributions are tax-deductible!! To join by check, please send payment to: Organizers' Collaborative, PO Box 400897, Cambridge MA 02140 ==^================================================================ EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?bUrCaA.bUGmpu Or send an email To: rwwatch-unsubscribe@topica.com This email was sent to: rich at o...net T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^================================================================ From rich at o...net Tue Sep 18 20:15:13 2001 From: rich at o...net (Rich Cowan) Date: Tue, 18 Sep 2001 15:15:13 -0400 Subject: [RWWATCH] More on US Training of Afghan Militants Message-ID: <0.1600003522.1569962933-738719082-1000840570@topica.com> RWWATCH -- September 18, 2001 (please forward) [From the Guardian of London, 9/15/01. Thanks to Phil Agre for posting this link on his "red rock eater" list. The names of the "middlemen" in this report -- Adnan Kashoggi and Manuchehr Ghorbanifar -- should be familiar to those of you who lived through the scandals of the late 1980s. They were prominently featured in several "Frontline" specials on PBS in the late 1980s and early 1990s. I have added, to the end of this article, an excerpt from the description of "Camp Peary" -- a Virginia-based CIA training center at which some US Muslims, reportedly recruited from NY area mosques, were schooled for the fight against the Soviets in Afghanistan. The information on "Camp Peary" is from the web site of the "Federation of American Scientists". Finally, MSNBC has an article on how Saudi piliots, probably including three of the hijackers, were trained in the early 1990s at US military facilities in Florida and Alabama. See "Alleged Hijackers May Have Trained at U.S. Bases" - http://www.msnbc.com/news/629529.asp -rc] http://www.guardian.co.uk/afghanistan/story/0,1284,551971,00.html Blowback chronicles Giles Foden on the murky deals that fuelled international terrorism Special report: Afghanistan Special report: Terrorism in the US Saturday September 15, 2001 The Guardian During the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan, US officials passed billions in funding and training to the mojahedin. The CIA, in particular while under the direction of William Casey - head of the agency during the Reagan administration - was the main manager of these operations. With the Russian withdrawal in 1989, the CIA "celebrated its victory with champagne". So says Unholy Wars: Afghanistan, America and International Terrorism (Pluto Press, £12.99), the definitive account by ABC journalist John Cooley. The celebrations, under the presidency of George Bush senior (himself a former CIA director), were premature. The sophisticated methods taught to the mojahedin, and the thousands of tonnes of arms supplied to them by the US - and Britain - are now tormenting the west in the phenomenon known as "blowback", whereby a policy strategy rebounds on its own devisers. The sins of the father, it might well be said, are being heaped on the head of the son. Self-laceration may seem the last thing the US needs right now. But the lesson of these books is that only by facing up to its dark past will a beleaguered country be able to create a future in which terrorist attacks on this scale can be avoided. The whole issue of American "creation" of bin Laden in the Frankenstein's laboratory of Afghanistan during the 1980s is generally avoided by government sources. Cooley points out that while the State Department released a fact sheet on bin Laden in 1997 (the year prior to the bombing of the East African embassies), the document "omits the background facts which help to explain how early and close were his connections in the United States - making it easier for the Reagan-Casey jihad team to enlist his talents and his fortune". The British military establishment colluded with the US in supporting the mojahedin, with SAS and Green Berets going into Afghanistan itself. As ex-SAS soldier Tom Carew explains in his Andy McNab-like Jihad: The Secret War in Afghanistan (Mainstream, £7.99), they were inevitably drawn into actual combat. "We came to a small hamlet and were stopped by a couple of mojahedin. They asked us, surprisingly politely, whether we would mind helping them, as their commander had decided he was going to make some kind of stand against the Russians." As Cooley points out, in this country, "it was only Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher's British government which supported the jihad with full enthusiasm". Hindered by Congressional interference, the CIA covertly sought Mrs Thatcher's help - in one incident, during the Falklands war, they curried favour by handing over an illegal supply of Stinger missiles to British officials in a Washington car park. Much of the help given to the mojahedin was coordinated by an MI6 field officer in Islamabad. It was surely only a matter of time before some of this aid would find its way to the likes of bin Laden. Like the covert British and American teams, many of which received dollar-for-dollar funding from the Saudi royal family, he arrived in Afghanistan directly after the Soviet invasion in 1979. Everyone was getting along famously, according to Cooley. "Delighted by his impeccable Saudi credentials, the CIA gave Osama free rein in Afghanistan, as did Pakistan's intelligence generals." In Ken Connor's Ghost Force: The Secret History of the SAS (Orion, £7.99), it is claimed that the elite regiment actually trained Afghan fighters in remote locations in Scotland. In Afghanistan itself, the services of Keenie-Meenie Services were used. This was an offshoot of British security firm Control Risks, mainly comprising ex-SAS members and former members of Rhodesian and South African special forces. It took its name from the Swahili word for the movement of a snake through grass. KMS later played a role in the Oliver North, Iran-Contra affair of 1987. On American soil, the CIA used Muslim charities and mosque communities as fronts for recruitment of fighters in their secret war against the USSR in the Hindu Kush. As Cooley writes in Unholy Wars : "One was [in] New York's Arab district, in Brooklyn along Atlantic Avenue... Another was a private rifle club in an affluent community of Connecticut." Bin Laden and a man named Mustafa Chalaby, who ran a jihad refugee centre in Brooklyn, were both protégés of Abdullah Azzam. A formative influence on bin Laden, the charismatic Azzam was killed in a car-bomb in 1987: according to some rumours he was killed by the CIA. Others claim he was himself a CIA agent. Cooley says that those directly recruited by the US went to Camp Peary - "the Farm", as the CIA's spy training centre in Virginia is known in the intelligence community - in scenes, as he tells them, reminiscent of the preparations for the killing of JFK recounted in Don DeLillo's Libra. At the Farm and other secret camps, young Afghans and Arab nationals from countries such as Egypt and Jordan learned strategic sabotage skills. Passed down to the younger jihad generation which filled the ranks of the bin Laden organisation, these skills would come back to haunt the US. Simon Reeve's The New Jackals: Ramzi Yousef, Osama bin Laden and the Future of Terrorism (Deutsch, £17.99) looks at how they were applied at the time of the 1993 attack on the World Trade Centre and the 1998 embassy bombings in Nairobi and Dar-es-Salaam. In the financial world, too, there is a blowback scenario, given that for years global banking has gained considerable benefits from lack of transparency and regulation. BCCI, the British-Pakistani bank that was closed down in 1991 after a massive fraud, was a regular route for mojahedin funding, including that provided by Saudi intelligence. Financing for Pentagon and CIA "black budget" operations - particularly in the era of William Casey - also passed through BCCI, as did drug money. Some analysts claim black-budget US and British operatives flew out opium on the planes with which they brought in arms. Later, jihad funding came from the construction-industry coffers of Osama bin Laden and other Muslim "philanthropists". Bin Laden established his own bank, the Al-Shamal Islamic, in Khartoum. In Unholy Wars, Cooley provides convincing evidence that Arab businessman and arms merchant Adnan Kashoggi had dealings with bin Laden's father, receiving a $50,000 cheque from him. Oil broker Roy Furmark, Cooley says, provided a link between his CIA friend Casey and Kashoggi, introducing the latter to Manuchehr Ghorbanifar, "the Iranian middleman who became a central figure in the arms for hostages and funds for Contras deals with Iran, in which Kashoggi got involved". Oil itself has long been a factor in the "great game" of Asian geopolitics, one which brings the other big player in the blowback scenario, Russia, into the picture. As Afghan expert Michael Griffin puts it in Reaping the Whirlwind: The Taliban Movement in Afghanistan (Pluto, £19.95): "A trans-Afghan pipeline would undermine Russia's control of energy prices from Central Asia". Griffin argues that the US under Clinton trimmed its opposition to the Taliban to gain an advantage in oil politics. By that time, in this high-stakes game of snakes and ladders, Clinton's successor was effectively already in the picture, as the son of a man with close ties to the oil company Unocal, which wanted to put a pipeline across Afghanistan. Among their partners in the venture were BP and the Saudi royal family. The future was beginning to cast as heavy a shadow as the past. Griffin's introduction was penned seven months ago, but what he has to say still makes sobering reading. "The accession in the US of President George W Bush... may shed yet fresh light on at least two central mysteries of the Taliban ... The first is the extent to which the administration of Bill Clinton actively encouraged its former cold war allies, Pakistan and Saudi Arabia, to assemble and finance a tribal military force to end the misrule of the mojahedin in the post-Soviet years. The second - of greater sensitivity - is to provide a coherent explanation for the studied incompetence of the FBI, CIA and other American intelligence agencies in addressing the alleged threats posed to the US by Osama bin Laden and his network. Bush's links with the US energy industry, most notably Unocal, are, regrettably, more likely to restrict the current state of knowledge about US policy in Afghanistan in the late 1990s, than to enlarge it." Appalling as they are, this week's events may yet begin to force some dark secrets out into the light. • Zanzibar, Giles Foden's novel about the US embassy bombings in East Africa, is published by Faber next year. http://www.fas.org/irp/overhead/peary.htm (this page is not currently available, possibly do to server overload, but the contents were preserved by a web search engine) The Farm - Camp Peary Williamsburg, VA The 10,000 acre Camp Peary facility was established in World War II as a training base for Navy Seebees. In 1951 it was transferred to CIA, and redesignated the Armed Forces Experimental Training Activity (AFETA), which as to "develop prototype training programs for military and civilian departments of the Federal government." Currently the facility is called the Special Training Center, or STC. The CIA's Directorate of Operations uses the facility for training ranging from the Basic Operations Course (BOC) through advanced weapons and explosives training, driving techniques, field surveillance, infiltration and exfiltration, and other clandestine operations and paramilitary skills. Students in the BOC may be seen in near-by Williamsburg and neighboring communities practicing surveillance and counter-surveillance techniques, clandestine communications methods, brush passes, servicing dead drops, etc. On occasion, personnel from the foreign intelligence services have been brought to STC for training. Appropriate facilities, such as physical training and driving courses, firing ranges, explosives areas and so on are available for trainees. Training requiring more extensive facilities or isolation is carried in several other locations, such as Harvey Point, North Carolina. In addition, STC is used as a general-purpose training and conference facility by the rest of the CIA other Intelligence Community components. The central administrative area contains classrooms, a library, dormitories, cafeteria, bar, gym and swimming pool. There are outlying lodges with sleeping and dining facilities for "off-site" (i.e., "away from Washington") activities such as administrative and planning conferences or short-deadline group writing projects (Interagency Intelligence Memoranda, Special National Intelligence Estimates, etc.). Secure communications equipment ("Green line" telphone, STU-III telephone, fax and modem) and classified storage through TS/SCI are available in the central administrative area, and by arrangement in other locations. Traditionally, STC staff has been drawn from the ranks of CIA officers, usually assigned to the Office of Training on rotation, but in recent years contract trainers have been hired through the AFETA office at 1100 Executive Avenue in Williamsburg (telephone 757-229- 2121), which serves as the public interface for Camp Peary for a variety of other activities. These include its procurement office (229-8623), environmental issues (229-2369), and matters pertainaing to the operation of the Camp Peary Landing Strip. Faxes may be sent to 229-8621. STC Agency staff are quartered in a number of single-family houses near the two small inlets between the central administrative area and the airstrip. Bicycles are available and widely used within the facility. Like many other government reservations that have been mostly undeveloped and protected from public incursion, Camp Peary has a large wildlife population, and hunting is a popular sport for staff during turkey and deer season. Air service to STC is provided from the Washington DC area by a private contractor, although most travel is by automobile. The Camp Peary landing strip is listed by the FAA as a private use facility, site number 26067.1*A, identifier W94, latitude 37-18-20.522N longitude 076- 38-13.837W. This email may contain copyrighted material the use of which has not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. I am making such such material available in our efforts to advance understanding of environmental, political, human rights, economic, democracy, scientific, and social justice issues, etc. I believe this constitutes a 'fair use' of any such copyrighted material as provided for in section 107 of the US Copyright Law. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C.Section 107, the material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. For more information go to: http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use', you must obtain permission from the copyright owner. This messaged wrapped with eWrapper 1.0, a free utility for Windows. See http://organizenow.net/ewrapper. ===================================================================== This message was sent via RWWATCH, a low-traffic forum that responds to right-wing campaigns (coming from any party) to misrepresent the truth in order to undermine democracy. archive: http://www.topica.com/lists/rwwatch/read (subscribers only) subscribe: rwwatch-subscribe@topica.com (send a blank email) RWWATCH is a project of Organizers' Collaborative, a project using technology to enhance grassroots organizing, research, and movement building by organizations working for democracy and social justice. We depend on your financial support to keep this work going. Please consider joining with almost 200 others by making an annual gift of $15, $30, $50, or $100 at http://organizenow.net/join.html. OC is a 501(c)(3) organization, so all contributions are tax-deductible!! To join by check, please send payment to: Organizers' Collaborative, PO Box 400897, Cambridge MA 02140 ==^================================================================ EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?bUrCaA.bUGmpu Or send an email To: rwwatch-unsubscribe@topica.com This email was sent to: rich at o...net T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^================================================================ From rich at o...net Wed Sep 19 04:55:52 2001 From: rich at o...net (Rich Cowan) Date: Tue, 18 Sep 2001 23:55:52 -0400 Subject: [RWWATCH] Flyer Development in Response to New Media Myths Message-ID: <0.1600003522.2130557272-738719082-1000958920@topica.com> RWWATCH -- September 20, 2001 (please forward) [About 100 activists had a planning meeting in Boston tonight, focusing on how to respond to the military rampup. One outcome is that there is a group of about 8 people getting together to identify some of the key myths coming from the media right now which need to be addressed in a creative and careful fashion by activists. The goal of this group is to come up with a brainstorm of 50 to 100 possible flyers (each with only a small amount of text, and relevant photos or graphics) that might be used by activists in Boston, and elsewhere. This group needs your help. If you have any ideas for myths, please send those to myths@organizenow.net. Feel free to use as inspiration this flyer that was circulated in Boston during the last, relatively minor act of drumbeating, which occurred in February of 1994. And if you want to participate in flyer development once the list of myths is ready, please also send your email to myths@organizenow.net. -rich ] 10 Myths spread by the US to justify attacks on Iraq 1. "We want to seriously diminish the threat posed by Saddam Hussein's weapons of mass destruction." -- President Clinton (Feb. 17) Bombing cannot do that, because US officials admit they do not know where any chemical and biological arsenals are located, or if they exist. Former weapons inspector Raymond Zalinskas, a professor at the University of Maryland, said on NPR (Feb. 13) that inspections have resulted in the destruction of all major targets related to chemical or biological warfare, and that "95% of [their] work continues unhindered." Even if Iraqi arsenals were found, bombing could release toxins into the atmosphere poisoning Iraqis and people of neighboring countries. 2. "We have no intention of trying to wreak havoc on the Iraqi people." US National Security advisor Sandy Berger The US has already accomplished exactly that. According to reports verified by the UN, more than a million Iraqi civilians - over half of them children - died as a direct result of the US bombing of water and sewerage plants during the Gulf War and sanctions ever since. 4500 children per month continue to die, according to UNICEF. Furthermore, there is no way a massive bombing campaign can be accomplished without civilian casualties. 3. "If we don't strike now, Hussein will someday in the future obtain and use these weapons. He is like Hitler." Saddam Hussein is a repressive dictator, but the extent of the threat he poses to other countries has been overblown in the media. His power was diminished when the US stopped supporting him in August 1990. The US is no longer allowing the sale of cell cultures and equipment for biological warfare to Iraq, as it did in the late 1980s, according to 60 Minutes (Feb. 22). The US is no longer selling billions of dollars worth of weapons to Iraq as it did during the Iran/Iraq war. The US is no longer voting against UN condemnation of Iraq, as it did after an attack on the Kurds as recently as 1990. Saddam Hussein had weapons of "mass destruction" (chemical and biological war- equipped missiles) during the Gulf War, and he demonstrated restraint in not using them. Nonproliferation requires diplomacy, not the use of military force. 4. Iraq is a danger to the Middle East. The countries bordering Iraq oppose military action. President Mubarak of Egypt, a staunch US ally, said that "...The point is what the public in our countries thinks. You will not find one [Arab leader] who will say publicly: we support the strikes." These rulers fear public opinion more than they do Hussein's military. What is the Arab public so upset about? They see a double standard in the US position on Iraq compared to Israel, which also possesses weapons of mass destruction: nuclear weapons. 5. Iraq is unique. It has used weapons of mass destruction against its own people. To date, Turkey is engaged in a killing campaign against its Kurdish populations and the US government stays silent. The military in Indonesia, controlled by General Suharto, killed over half a million people from 1965-66. However, the US has not taken any action. In fact, the US has rewarded those countries with increased military aid. In the case of Indonesia, US embassy officials even helped provide logistical support for the massacre. [Kathy Kadane, States News Service, May 1989] 6. "Because of 'smart bombs' we will be able to make a concerted effort at minimizing civilian casualties." According to the Boston Globe (Feb. 20), the US arsenal is not much "smarter" now than it was in 1991, nor was it very "smart" to begin with. According to a recent study by the General Accounting Office, "smart" bombs miss their targets 75% of the time. Furthermore, wrong targets can be chosen. In 1991, a US bomb destroyed the Ameriya bomb shelter, killing 400 women and children. 7. Bombing Iraq, according to Madeleine Albright, will make the world safer by encouraging all nations to "play by the rules" of international conduct. To what rules is Albright referring? If she is referring to the rules of the UN, bombing Iraq to enforce a UN resolution without the support of the UN is a violation of international law. Perhaps Albright is referring to an unwritten rule: obey the United States. According to State Department documents, one of the main US objectives is to "try and service our economic interests by supporting the American business community." If in bombing Iraq, the US is enforcing such self-serving "rules", rather than principles of morality or self-determination, then it is the US that is not playing by the rules of international conduct. 8. Iraq's reluctance to comply with weapons inspectors demonstrated that Saddam Hussein has something to hide. Regardless of whether Hussein's palaces are hiding weapons, resistance to some of the demands of weapons inspectors serves as a effective form of "civil disobedience" to call attention to the widespread human suffering in Iraq as a result of the sanctions. 9. Killing Saddam Hussein might be worth the price of any backlash in world opinion. Killing Saddam Hussein legitimizes assassination. It opens the door for other nations or movements to use assassination to enforce their will. It teaches the rest of the world that the US will sabotage genuine attempts at cooperative conflict resolution. By demonstrating that the "one with the most arms rules" it promotes the use of political violence whether by other countries, terrorists, or religious fundamentalist movements. 10. Once hostilities begin, we need to support our troops. Protesting is justified if a wrong is being committed especially so if our country is involved, using our tax dollars. Protesting is a way to show support for resolving conflict in ways that do not cause hundreds of thousands of unnecessary deaths, of both troops and civilians. RESOURCES (still working in 2001): To join a college campus-centered e-mail discussion, send the e-mail message "SUBSCRIBE SPAN-TALK" to majordomo@igc.apc.org, or see http://www.gospan.org/ On the web, try Iraq Action Coalition: http://leb.net/IAC Otherwise, try the International Action Center at 212-633- 6646, or Voices in the Wilderness Campaign to End the Sanctions at 773-241-7019. ===================================================================== This message was sent via RWWATCH, a low-traffic forum that responds to right-wing campaigns (coming from any party) to misrepresent the truth in order to undermine democracy. archive: http://www.topica.com/lists/rwwatch/read (subscribers only) subscribe: rwwatch-subscribe@topica.com (send a blank email) RWWATCH is a project of Organizers' Collaborative, a project using technology to enhance grassroots organizing, research, and movement building by organizations working for democracy and social justice. We depend on your financial support to keep this work going. Please consider joining with almost 200 others by making an annual gift of $15, $30, $50, or $100 at http://organizenow.net/join.html. OC is a 501(c)(3) organization, so all contributions are tax-deductible!! To join by check, please send payment to: Organizers' Collaborative, PO Box 400897, Cambridge MA 02140 ==^================================================================ EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?bUrCaA.bUGmpu Or send an email To: rwwatch-unsubscribe@topica.com This email was sent to: rich at o...net T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^================================================================ From richato...net Wed Sep 19 14:05:24 2001 From: richato...net (Rich Cowan) Date: Wed, 19 Sep 2001 09:05:24 -0400 Subject: [RWWATCH] Flyer Development in Response to New Media Myths Message-ID: <4.2.0.58.20010919090519.0094ff00@organizenow.net> RWWATCH -- September 20, 2001 (please forward) [About 100 activists had a planning meeting in Boston tonight, focusing on how to respond to the military rampup. One outcome is that there is a group of about 8 people getting together to identify some of the key myths coming from the media right now which need to be addressed in a creative and careful fashion by activists. The goal of this group is to come up with a brainstorm of 50 to 100 possible flyers (each with only a small amount of text, and relevant photos or graphics) that might be used by activists in Boston, and elsewhere. This group needs your help. If you have any ideas for myths, please send those to myths@organizenow.net. Feel free to use as inspiration this flyer that was circulated in Boston during the last, relatively minor act of drumbeating, which occurred in February of 1994. And if you want to participate in flyer development once the list of myths is ready, please also send your email to myths@organizenow.net. -rich ] 10 Myths spread by the US to justify attacks on Iraq 1. "We want to seriously diminish the threat posed by Saddam Hussein's weapons of mass destruction." -- President Clinton (Feb. 17) Bombing cannot do that, because US officials admit they do not know where any chemical and biological arsenals are located, or if they exist. Former weapons inspector Raymond Zalinskas, a professor at the University of Maryland, said on NPR (Feb. 13) that inspections have resulted in the destruction of all major targets related to chemical or biological warfare, and that "95% of [their] work continues unhindered." Even if Iraqi arsenals were found, bombing could release toxins into the atmosphere poisoning Iraqis and people of neighboring countries. 2. "We have no intention of trying to wreak havoc on the Iraqi people." US National Security advisor Sandy Berger The US has already accomplished exactly that. According to reports verified by the UN, more than a million Iraqi civilians - over half of them children - died as a direct result of the US bombing of water and sewerage plants during the Gulf War and sanctions ever since. 4500 children per month continue to die, according to UNICEF. Furthermore, there is no way a massive bombing campaign can be accomplished without civilian casualties. 3. "If we don't strike now, Hussein will someday in the future obtain and use these weapons. He is like Hitler." Saddam Hussein is a repressive dictator, but the extent of the threat he poses to other countries has been overblown in the media. His power was diminished when the US stopped supporting him in August 1990. The US is no longer allowing the sale of cell cultures and equipment for biological warfare to Iraq, as it did in the late 1980s, according to 60 Minutes (Feb. 22). The US is no longer selling billions of dollars worth of weapons to Iraq as it did during the Iran/Iraq war. The US is no longer voting against UN condemnation of Iraq, as it did after an attack on the Kurds as recently as 1990. Saddam Hussein had weapons of "mass destruction" (chemical and biological war- equipped missiles) during the Gulf War, and he demonstrated restraint in not using them. Nonproliferation requires diplomacy, not the use of military force. 4. Iraq is a danger to the Middle East. The countries bordering Iraq oppose military action. President Mubarak of Egypt, a staunch US ally, said that "...The point is what the public in our countries thinks. You will not find one [Arab leader] who will say publicly: we support the strikes." These rulers fear public opinion more than they do Hussein's military. What is the Arab public so upset about? They see a double standard in the US position on Iraq compared to Israel, which also possesses weapons of mass destruction: nuclear weapons. 5. Iraq is unique. It has used weapons of mass destruction against its own people. To date, Turkey is engaged in a killing campaign against its Kurdish populations and the US government stays silent. The military in Indonesia, controlled by General Suharto, killed over half a million people from 1965-66. However, the US has not taken any action. In fact, the US has rewarded those countries with increased military aid. In the case of Indonesia, US embassy officials even helped provide logistical support for the massacre. [Kathy Kadane, States News Service, May 1989] 6. "Because of 'smart bombs' we will be able to make a concerted effort at minimizing civilian casualties." According to the Boston Globe (Feb. 20), the US arsenal is not much "smarter" now than it was in 1991, nor was it very "smart" to begin with. According to a recent study by the General Accounting Office, "smart" bombs miss their targets 75% of the time. Furthermore, wrong targets can be chosen. In 1991, a US bomb destroyed the Ameriya bomb shelter, killing 400 women and children. 7. Bombing Iraq, according to Madeleine Albright, will make the world safer by encouraging all nations to "play by the rules" of international conduct. To what rules is Albright referring? If she is referring to the rules of the UN, bombing Iraq to enforce a UN resolution without the support of the UN is a violation of international law. Perhaps Albright is referring to an unwritten rule: obey the United States. According to State Department documents, one of the main US objectives is to "try and service our economic interests by supporting the American business community." If in bombing Iraq, the US is enforcing such self-serving "rules", rather than principles of morality or self-determination, then it is the US that is not playing by the rules of international conduct. 8. Iraq's reluctance to comply with weapons inspectors demonstrated that Saddam Hussein has something to hide. Regardless of whether Hussein's palaces are hiding weapons, resistance to some of the demands of weapons inspectors serves as a effective form of "civil disobedience" to call attention to the widespread human suffering in Iraq as a result of the sanctions. 9. Killing Saddam Hussein might be worth the price of any backlash in world opinion. Killing Saddam Hussein legitimizes assassination. It opens the door for other nations or movements to use assassination to enforce their will. It teaches the rest of the world that the US will sabotage genuine attempts at cooperative conflict resolution. By demonstrating that the "one with the most arms rules" it promotes the use of political violence whether by other countries, terrorists, or religious fundamentalist movements. 10. Once hostilities begin, we need to support our troops. Protesting is justified if a wrong is being committed especially so if our country is involved, using our tax dollars. Protesting is a way to show support for resolving conflict in ways that do not cause hundreds of thousands of unnecessary deaths, of both troops and civilians. RESOURCES (still working in 2001): To join a college campus-centered e-mail discussion, send the e-mail message "SUBSCRIBE SPAN-TALK" to majordomo@igc.apc.org, or see http://www.gospan.org/ On the web, try Iraq Action Coalition: http://leb.net/IAC Otherwise, try the International Action Center at 212-633- 6646, or Voices in the Wilderness Campaign to End the Sanctions at 773-241-7019. ===================================================================== This message was sent via RWWATCH, a low-traffic forum that responds to right-wing campaigns (coming from any party) to misrepresent the truth in order to undermine democracy. archive: http://www.topica.com/lists/rwwatch/read (subscribers only) subscribe: rwwatch-subscribe@topica.com (send a blank email) RWWATCH is a project of Organizers' Collaborative, a project using technology to enhance grassroots organizing, research, and movement building by organizations working for democracy and social justice. We depend on your financial support to keep this work going. Please consider joining with almost 200 others by making an annual gift of $15, $30, $50, or $100 at http://organizenow.net/join.html. OC is a 501(c)(3) organization, so all contributions are tax-deductible!! To join by check, please send payment to: Organizers' Collaborative, PO Box 400897, Cambridge MA 02140 ==^================================================================ EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?bUrCaA.bUGmpu Or send an email To: rwwatch-unsubscribe@topica.com This email was sent to: rich at o...net T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^================================================================ From rich at o...net Wed Sep 19 22:32:59 2001 From: rich at o...net (Rich Cowan) Date: Wed, 19 Sep 2001 17:32:59 -0400 Subject: [RWWATCH] 9/20 peace vigil on 105 campuses and growing Message-ID: <0.1600003522.242235508-951758591-1000935318@topica.com> (please forward to campus activists): STUDENT GROUPS ARE TAKING THE LEAD on organizing a forceful response; possibly the effort by some faculty to put together teach-ins can be coordinated with the student formation in the next few weeks. There needs to be some faculty member willing to take the lead, and to contact peacefuljustice@hotmail.com. ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 18 Sep 2001 23:41:22 -0400 (EDT) From: clearinghouse@dojo.tao.ca Subject: National Student Day of Action For Peaceful Justice ************************ PLEASE FORWARD WIDELY... ************************ FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: September 19, 2001 Date: 12pm, Thursday September 20, 2001 Location: Campuses across the country Contacts: Andy Burns, #608-256-7081 Jessica Gould, #201-927-4606 Terra Lawson-Remer, #858-449-1010 Sarah Norr, #860-344-8782 NATIONAL STUDENT DAY OF ACTION FOR PEACEFUL JUSTICE In the Wake of Tuesday's Attacks, Students at Over 100 Colleges Campuses to Hold Teach-Ins, Vigils, and Rallies for Peace Students and community members at 105 schools in 30 states are gathering at noon on Thursday to offer our condolences and support to the victims, their families, and all those affected by the tragic events of September 11th. These nationally coordinated actions are meant to reaffirm the sanctity of life by seeking peace and justice in the wake of Tuesday's tragedy. Students and campus groups across the country are putting forth the following principles: · We unequivocally condemn the abominable terrorist attacks of Tuesday, September 11th. · The nation's political leadership must seek justice rather than revenge in order to avoid the loss of more innocent lives and to work towards a lasting peace. · Americans must resist the scapegoating of people on the basis of race, religion, and nationality, especially innocent Muslim and Arab peoples in the US and abroad, and take a stand against racism and xenophobia. · The people of the U.S. and their servants in the government must guard our precious civil liberties with vigilance and not allow fear and terrorism to undermine our commitment to freedom. We are hoping to stimulate a dialogue across the United States about the necessity of protecting human life around the world, the need for a reasoned and rational response to this tragedy, and the importance of long-term solutions to problems of injustice and violence. Throughout history, the voices of students and young people have been central to movements for peace and social change. In the aftermath of the terrorist attacks on the United States, we are seeking to raise our voices once again. "During this time of crisis we call upon Americans everywhere to reaffirm their commitment to the principles that make Americans a great people - our respect for freedom and liberty, our embrace of tolerance and diversity, and our commitment to due process and justice," said Jerome Chavez, a student at the University of New Mexico. Over a thousand students and community members from nine Boston area schools are expected to participate in noontime campus rallies that will converge in a march through Boston to Harvard Yard, while close to three thousand are expected to march and mourn on the Berkeley campus. Students at Wesleyan, the University of Southern California, the University of Wisconsin at Madison and other colleges across the nation expect a similar outpouring of grief and support. "This horrific tragedy must never happen again. We must rededicate ourselves to working towards true global justice both at home and abroad, as it is humanity's only hope for a lasting worldwide peace," stated Natalie Fasnacht, a student at UC Davis. This Thursday, voices for prudence and peace are raised in unison across the nation, reminding all of Mahatma Gandhi's cautionary words, "An eye for an eye leaves the whole world blind." Let us not lose our vision. For up to date information and a full list of participating schools and contact information visit . This event developed out of a grassroots organizing effort originating at Wesleyan University, which utilized the resources of and is endorsed by the following organizations: -STARC Alliance: Students Transforming and Resisting Corporations -180/Movement for Democracy and Education -Student Peace Action Network. This does not imply that all who participate in this event are necessarily members of these organizations or endorse their platforms. ===================================================================== This message was sent via RWWATCH, a low-traffic forum that responds to right-wing campaigns (coming from any party) to misrepresent the truth in order to undermine democracy. archive: http://www.topica.com/lists/rwwatch/read (subscribers only) subscribe: rwwatch-subscribe@topica.com (send a blank email) RWWATCH is a project of Organizers' Collaborative, a project using technology to enhance grassroots organizing, research, and movement building by organizations working for democracy and social justice. We depend on your financial support to keep this work going. Please consider joining with almost 200 others by making an annual gift of $15, $30, $50, or $100 at http://organizenow.net/join.html. OC is a 501(c)(3) organization, so all contributions are tax-deductible!! To join by check, please send payment to: Organizers' Collaborative, PO Box 400897, Cambridge MA 02140 ==^================================================================ EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?bUrCaA.bUGmpu Or send an email To: rwwatch-unsubscribe@topica.com This email was sent to: rich at o...net T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^================================================================ From rich at o...net Thu Sep 20 23:10:24 2001 From: rich at o...net (Rich Cowan) Date: Thu, 20 Sep 2001 18:10:24 -0400 Subject: [RWWATCH] Phil Gramm Blocks Laws that Might Disclose Terrorist Financing Message-ID: <0.1600003522.543608937-738719082-1001023820@topica.com> RWWATCH -- September 20, 2001 (please forward) [Just when you thought they could track down who might be financing terrorist operations, a Republican Senator steps up to the plate to block changes in laws that might make this possible. All to protect the Banking industry. Tim Weiner, one of the authors of the article below, is an investigative reporter who won a Pulitzer Prize for his 3-part exposure of covert operations during the Reagan Administration. Tim also did a ton of reporting on the covert war in Afghanistan; you can search at http://www.philly.com/newslibrary/search_pi.asp for his articles from 1986 through 1988, if you want. The Pulitzer Prize winning series was printed from 2/8/87 to 2/10/87: A GROWING 'BLACK BUDGET' PAYS FOR SECRET WEAPONS, COVERT WARS PLANNING FOR WORLD WAR IV COVERT FORCES MULTIPLY, SOME RUN AMOK -rich] http://www.nytimes.com/2001/09/20/business/20MONE.html THE PAPER TRAIL Roadblocks Cited in Efforts to Trace bin Laden's Money By TIM WEINER and DAVID CAY JOHNSTON A six-year struggle to uncover Osama bin Laden's financial network failed because American officials did not skillfully use the legal tools they had, did not realize they needed stronger weapons, and faced resistance at home and abroad, officials involved in the effort say. Federal officials say they have not persuaded foreign banks to open their books to investigators and that in this country, a law that would have allowed the United States to penalize foreign banks that did not cooperate was blocked last year by a single United States senator. Current laws and regulations give the government less authority to seize the assets of terrorists than of drug cartels, one federal investigator said; it may seize only assets that are the direct proceeds of terrorist violence. For drug cartels or organized crime gangs, it can seize any assets used to support their activities. Investigators also attribute their inability to pierce Mr. bin Laden's financial network to an ancient system of cash transfers based on trust, not detailed records, that they say has spread from countries like Pakistan into the United States. Since last week's attacks, proposals to curb money laundering by terrorists have suddenly gained support among old opponents — including the Bush administration — after languishing for two years. The White House says it now wants an aggressive attack on money laundering, including stepped-up seizure of assets. The bin Laden organization operates in 35 countries and needs to move money to its members, American intelligence officials say. Tracing the money could reveal not only terrorists' sources of support, but their intentions. But present and former government officials say that since the mid- 1990's, they did not fully use the legal tools they had to wage this difficult fight. "We could have starved the organization if we put our minds to it," said Richard Palmer, who gained experience in money laundering as the Central Intelligence Agency's station chief in Moscow during the 1990's. "The government has had the ability to track these accounts for some time." Congress is now reviving a proposal killed last year by Senator Phil Gramm, the Texas Republican who was then chairman of the Senate Banking Committee. The bill, introduced by the Clinton administration, would give the Treasury secretary broad power to bar foreign countries and banks from access to the American financial market unless they cooperated with money-laundering investigations. It was strongly opposed by the banking industry and Mr. Gramm. "I was right then and I am right now" in opposing the bill, Mr. Gramm said yesterday. He called the bill "totalitarian" and added, "The way to deal with terrorists is to hunt them down and kill them." But the bill is gathering support from both parties. "I would be amazed if there is not a sea change," said Senator John Kerry, the Massachusetts Democrat, who is sponsoring the bill with Senator Charles E. Grassley, Republican of Iowa. He said the opposition was based on "ridiculously phony" arguments. Even after the attacks last week, the banking industry continues to doubt the need for new rules to combat money laundering, a lobbyist said. Most experts say the funds used to finance the attacks here probably came into this country in small amounts either through wire transfers or through the use of brokers that belong to a paperless underground banking system. That system of brokers is often referred to by its Hindi name, "hawala," meaning "in trust." It enables individuals to transfer sizable sums of cash from their country to recipients in another country without the funds ever crossing borders. The system, which has spread to the United States, is particularly popular in countries like Pakistan and India where people want to avoid paying taxes or bribes to officials when transferring money across borders, experts said. "Somebody will come into the office of a hawala broker in Pakistan and say, `I want $100,000 to get to somebody in Vero Beach who is going to come in and identify themselves as Cupid,' " said Jonathan M. Winer, who led the State Department's international law enforcement efforts from 1994 to 1999 and now practices law in Washington. The Pakistani broker, Mr. Winer explained, will contact a counterpart in the United States, often using the Internet, then mail him a chit or agree on a code word to complete the transaction. Mr. Winer said such brokers might have been used to transfer sizable sums of money destined for terrorists in this country because carrying large amounts of cash posed too many risks. "The two brokers have absolute trust in each other," said Rowan Bosworth-Davies, an expert on money laundering at the Control Risks Group. "They often come from the same clan and that is why nothing is written down or records kept." Congress passed a law in 1993 requiring check-cashing businesses and informal financial enterprises like hawalas to register with the government and report transactions over $3,000. But the Clinton administration did not publish all the regulations until 1999. The Bush administration ordered a further delay until June 30, 2002. Jimmy Gurule, the Treasury under secretary for enforcement, said yesterday that the administration, in light of last week's attack, might move up the date. The effort to track the bin Laden group's money began in earnest when President Bill Clinton signed a classified presidential order on Oct. 21, 1995. The secret order, Presidential Decision Directive 42, ordered the Departments of Justice, State and Treasury, the National Security Council, the C.I.A. and other intelligence agencies to increase and integrate their efforts against international money laundering by terrorists and criminals. The government agencies joined together to try to penetrate the bin Laden network of businesses, charities, banks and front companies. They failed. The ball was handed to people who were generally incompetent to handle the intricate task, said one Clinton administration official directly involved in the effort to drain or divert the money flowing in and out of the bin Laden organization. The government agencies given the job suffered from "a lack of institutional knowledge, a lack of expertise," said William Wechsler, a National Security Council staff member under Mr. Clinton. "We could have been doing much more earlier. It didn't happen." Then attackers blew up two American embassies in Africa in August 1998. Richard A. Clarke, the government's counterterrorism coordinator, set up a new government team. He ordered it to find out how much money the bin Laden organization had, where it came from, how it moved around the world — and to stop it. "We had only marginal successes," said Mr. Wechsler, who led the new team in 1998 and 1999. The United Arab Emirates imposed money laundering laws and China banned flights by the Afghan state airline, Ariana, at the United States' urging, officials said. The lack of great success was "mostly due to the limited assistance we received from key countries abroad," Mr. Wechsler said. He blamed "their lack of political will or weaknesses in their laws which fail to effectively regulate their financial institutions and charities." Until last week's attacks, the Bush administration was not much more enthusiastic about new money laundering laws than Mr. Gramm. Led by its chief economic adviser, Lawrence B. Lindsey, the administration did not want to pressure international banks in the United States and elsewhere to open their books. Now the White House is setting up a new agency, called the Foreign Terrorist Asset Tracking Center, run by the Treasury Department with help from law enforcement and intelligence services, to try anew to track bin Laden's finances. The financial architecture of the bin Laden organization has not changed radically since he set up operations near the Khyber Pass in the mid-1980's and worked side by side with the C.I.A. to support the rebels fighting Soviet forces in Afghanistan, United States officials said. "The money movement and fund-raising system is the same," Mr. Wechsler said. This email may contain copyrighted material the use of which has not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. I am making such such material available in our efforts to advance understanding of environmental, political, human rights, economic, democracy, scientific, and social justice issues, etc. I believe this constitutes a 'fair use' of any such copyrighted material as provided for in section 107 of the US Copyright Law. 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See http://organizenow.net/ewrapper. ===================================================================== This message was sent via RWWATCH, a low-traffic forum that responds to right-wing campaigns (coming from any party) to misrepresent the truth in order to undermine democracy. archive: http://www.topica.com/lists/rwwatch/read (subscribers only) subscribe: rwwatch-subscribe@topica.com (send a blank email) RWWATCH is a project of Organizers' Collaborative, a project using technology to enhance grassroots organizing, research, and movement building by organizations working for democracy and social justice. We depend on your financial support to keep this work going. Please consider joining with almost 200 others by making an annual gift of $15, $30, $50, or $100 at http://organizenow.net/join.html. OC is a 501(c)(3) organization, so all contributions are tax-deductible!! To join by check, please send payment to: Organizers' Collaborative, PO Box 400897, Cambridge MA 02140 ==^================================================================ EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?bUrCaA.bUGmpu Or send an email To: rwwatch-unsubscribe@topica.com This email was sent to: rich at o...net T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^================================================================