MONTGOMERY, Ala. (AP) — Alberta Martin, the last widow of a Civil War veteran, died Monday, ending an unlikely ascent from poor sharecropper's daughter to the belle of 21st century Confederate history buffs who paraded her across the South. She was 97.

Martin died at an Enterprise nursing home of complications from a heart attack she suffered May 7, said her caretaker, Dr. Kenneth Chancey. She died just as the nation was celebrating Memorial Day and nearly 140 years after the Civil War ended.

Her May-December marriage to a Civil War veteran in the 1920s and her longevity made her a celebrated final link to the old Confederacy.

After living in obscurity and poverty for most of her life, she spent her final years with the Sons of Confederate Veterans carrying her to conventions and rallies, often with a small Confederate battle flag waving in her hand and her clothes the colors of the rebel banner.

"I don't see nothing wrong with the flag flying," she said frequently.

Gertrude Janeway, the last widow of a Union veteran from the Civil War, died in January 2003 at her home in Tennessee. She was 93 and had married veteran John Janeway when she was 18.

. . . .

Alberta Stewart Martin was not from the "Gone With the Wind" South of white-columned mansions and hoop skirts. She was born Alberta Stewart to sharecroppers on Dec. 4, 1906, in Danley's Crossroads, a tiny settlement built around a sawmill 70 miles south of Montgomery.

Her mother died when she was 11, and her widowed father eventually moved to Tallassee in central Alabama. At 18, she met a cab driver named Howard Farrow, and they had a son before Farrow died in a car accident in 1926.

Stewart, her father and her son soon moved to Opp to stay with relatives. Just up the road lived William Jasper Martin, a widower born in Macon County, Ga., in 1845. He enjoyed a $50-a-month Confederate veteran's pension and was looking to get remarried.

The cantankerous 81-year-old man struck up a few conversations with the 21-year-old neighbor and a marriage of convenience was born.

"I had this little boy and I needed some help to raise him," Alberta Martin recalled in a 1998 interview.

They were married in a civil ceremony at the courthouse in Andalusia on Dec. 10, 1927, and 10 months later had a son, William.

UPDATE: When I was writing this post, I had a dim recollection that there was a book with a related title. I just figured out that it is Allan Gurganus' novel "Oldest Living Confederate Widow Tells All," which was first published in 1989. That was a work of fiction, of course, but it amazes me that the actual oldest living Confederate widow died 15 years after Gurganus' book and, more relevantly, 139 years after the end of the Civil War.

Letter to the Editor
by Sharon Underwood, Sunday, April 30, 2000
from the Valley News (White River Junction, VT/Hanover, NH)

As the mother of a gay son, I've seen firsthand how cruel and misguided people can be.

Many letters have been sent to the Valley News concerning the homosexual menace in Vermont. I am the mother of a gay son and I've taken enough from you good people.

I'm tired of your foolish rhetoric about the "homosexual agenda" and your allegations that accepting homosexuality is the same thing as advocating sex with children. You are cruel and ignorant. You have been robbing me of the joys of motherhood ever since my children were tiny.

My firstborn son started suffering at the hands of the moral little thugs from your moral, upright families from the time he was in the first grade. He was physically and verbally abused from first grade straight through high school because he was perceived to be gay.

He never professed to be gay or had any association with anything gay, but he had the misfortune not to walk or have gestures like the other boys. He was called "fag" incessantly, starting when he was 6.

In high school, while your children were doing what kids that age should be doing, mine labored over a suicide note, drafting and redrafting it to be sure his family knew how much he loved them. My sobbing 17-year-old tore the heart out of me as he choked out that he just couldn't bear to continue living any longer, that he didn't want to be gay and that he couldn't face a life without dignity.

You have the audacity to talk about protecting families and children from the homosexual menace, while you yourselves tear apart families and drive children to despair. I don't know why my son is gay, but I do know that God didn't put him, and millions like him, on this Earth to give you someone to abuse. God gave you brains so that you could think, and it's about time you started doing that.

At the core of all your misguided beliefs is the belief that this could never happen to you, that there is some kind of subculture out there that people have chosen to join. The fact is that if it can happen to my family, it can happen to yours, and you won't get to choose. Whether it is genetic or whether something occurs during a critical time of fetal development, I don't know. I can only tell you with an absolute certainty that it is inborn.

If you want to tout your own morality, you'd best come up with something more substantive than your heterosexuality. You did nothing to earn it; it was given to you. If you disagree, I would be interested in hearing your story, because my own heterosexuality was a blessing I received with no effort whatsoever on my part. It is so woven into the very soul of me that nothing could ever change it. For those of you who reduce sexual orientation to a simple choice, a character issue, a bad habit or something that can be changed by a 10-step program, I'm puzzled. Are you saying that your own sexual orientation is nothing more than something you have chosen, that you could change it at will? If that's not the case, then why would you suggest that someone else can?

A popular theme in your letters is that Vermont has been infiltrated by outsiders. Both sides of my family have lived in Vermont for generations. I am heart and soul a Vermonter, so I'll thank you to stop saying that you are speaking for "true Vermonters."

You invoke the memory of the brave people who have fought on the battlefield for this great country, saying that they didn't give their lives so that the "homosexual agenda "could tear down the principles they died defending. My 83-year-old father fought in some of the most horrific battles of World War II, was wounded and awarded the Purple Heart.

He shakes his head in sadness at the life his grandson has had to live. He says he fought alongside homosexuals in those battles, that they did their part and bothered no one. One of his best friends in the service was gay, and he never knew it until the end, and when he did find out, it mattered not at all. That wasn't the measure of the man.

You religious folk just can't bear the thought that as my son emerges from the hell that was his childhood he might like to find a lifelong companion and have a measure of happiness. It offends your sensibilities that he should request the right to visit that companion in the hospital, to make medical decisions for him or to benefit from tax laws governing inheritance.

How dare he? you say. These outrageous requests would threaten the very existence of your family, would undermine the sanctity of marriage.

You use religion to abdicate your responsibility to be thinking human beings. There are vast numbers of religious people who find your attitudes repugnant. God is not for the privileged majority, and God knows my son has committed no sin.

The deep-thinking author of a letter to the April 12 Valley News who lectures about homosexual sin and tells us about "those of us who have been blessed with the benefits of a religious upbringing" asks: "What ever happened to the idea of striving...to be better human beings than we are?"

Indeed, sir, what ever happened to that?

[T]he poll of 600 likely registered voters, conducted May 21-24, shows Kerry with a commanding 16 percentage-point lead over Bush in a head-to-head November matchup--54 percent to 38 percent. And even if independent Ralph Nader were to qualify for the Illinois ballot, Kerry maintains a 16 percentage-point lead over Bush--53 percent to 37 percent. Nader receives only 4 percent.

The poll showed 52 percent of Illinois voters now say they have an unfavorable opinion of Bush compared with only 37 percent who look upon him favorably. In addition, 55 percent say they disapprove of the way he is handling the presidency.

While Illinois has trended Democratic and Bush lost the state by a dozen percentage points in the 2000 presidential contest, a similar poll taken just five months ago showed 51 percent of Illinois voters held a favorable attitude toward Bush while 40 percent disapproved. Back then, 49 percent of Illinois voters approved of the job Bush was doing as president while 42 percent did not. (link via Atrios)

Obama:

Though the U.S. Senate campaign in Illinois has months to go, a new Tribune/WGN-TV poll finds Democratic nominee Barack Obama holding a lopsided lead over Republican Jack Ryan, who also must overcome a serious perception problem with voters.

. . . .

The new poll, the first such survey by the Tribune since Ryan and Obama scored primary victories in March, shows Obama with a 22 percentage point lead over Ryan--52 percent to 30 percent. The poll has a margin of error of plus or minus 4 percentage points.

. . . .

Of voters who consider themselves independent, a key portion of the electorate for both candidates, nearly one in four had an unfavorable opinion of Ryan while only 29 percent had a favorable view of him. Obama led Ryan among independents 46 percent to 27 percent. Even Republicans were unsure about their candidate, with a third of GOP voters saying they have yet to form an opinion about Ryan. Only 19 percent of Democrats had not yet formed an opinion about Obama.

Obama and Ryan are seeking to replace U.S. Sen. Peter Fitzgerald, a Republican . . . .

. . . .

According to the survey, 31 percent of voters who consider themselves "very conservative" intend to vote for Obama despite the fact he won the Democratic primary touting a mostly liberal platform. Since then, Obama has tried to move himself to the center of the political spectrum, voting in Springfield to allow retired police officers to carry concealed weapons and comparing his political style during a radio interview to moderate former Republican governors Jim Thompson and Jim Edgar.

Obama, who is African-American, also has found success with white voters. Among them, Obama leads Ryan by 46 percent to 34 percent, the survey found.

. . . .

The poll showed 18 percent of those who consider themselves "moderate or liberal" do support the conservative Ryan.

But it looks like Ryan has more work to do. In Chicago, the poll shows Ryan trails Obama 74 percent to 15 percent, while among black voters he is being trounced 91 percent to 4 percent.

WASHINGTON - Several U.S. guards allege they witnessed military intelligence operatives encouraging the abuse of Iraqi prison inmates at four prisons other than Abu Ghraib, investigative documents show.

Court transcripts and Army investigator interviews provide the broadest view of evidence that abuses, from forcing inmates to stand in hoods in 120-degree heat to punching them, occurred at a Marine detention camp and three Army prison sites in Iraq besides Abu Ghraib.

. . . .

Testimony about tactics used at a Marine prisoner of war camp near Nasiriyah also raises the question whether coercive techniques were standard procedure for military intelligence units in different service branches and throughout Iraq.

At the Marines' Camp Whitehorse, the guards were told to keep enemy prisoners of war - EPWs, in military jargon - standing for 50 minutes each hour for up to 10 hours. They would then be interrogated by "human exploitation teams," or HETs, comprising intelligence specialists.

. . . .

The Marine Corps judge hearing the Camp Whitehorse case wrote that forcing hooded, handcuffed prisoners to stand for 50 minutes every hour in the 120-degree desert could be a Geneva Convention violation. Col. William V. Gallo wrote that such actions "could easily form the basis of a law of war violation if committed by an enemy combatant."

Two Marines face charges in the June 2003 death of Nagem Sadoon Hatab at Camp Whitehorse, although no one is charged with killing him. Military records say Hatab was asphyxiated when a Marine guard grabbed his throat in an attempt to move him, accidentally breaking a bone that cut off his air supply. Another Marine is charged with kicking Hatab in the chest in the hours before his death.

. . . .

Most of the seven enlisted soldiers charged in the Abu Ghraib abuses say they were encouraged to "soften up" prisoners for interrogators through humiliation and beatings. Several witnesses also report seeing military intelligence operatives hit Abu Ghraib prisoners, strip them naked and order them to be kept awake for long periods.

Other accusations against military intelligence troops include:

-Stuffing an Iraqi general into a sleeping bag, sitting on his chest and covering his mouth during an interrogation at a prison camp at Qaim, near the border with Syria. The general died during that interrogation, although he also had been questioned by CIA operatives in the days before his death.

-Choking, beating and pulling the hair of detainees at an Army prison camp near Samarra, north of Baghdad.

-Hitting prisoners and putting them in painful positions for hours at Camp Cropper, a prison at Baghdad International Airport for prominent former Iraqi officials.

. . . .

One focus of the incident at Qaim is Chief Warrant Officer Lewis Welshover, an interrogator with the Army's 66th Military Intelligence Group. Welshover told The Associated Press on Friday: "I am not at liberty to discuss any of the details."

Welshover was part of a two-person interrogation team that questioned former Iraqi Air Force Maj. Gen. Abed Hamed Mowhoush, 57. Military autopsy records say Mowhoush was asphyxiated by chest compression and smothering.

Army officials say members of a California Army National Guard military intelligence unit are accused of abusing prisoners at a camp near Samarra, north of Baghdad. The New York Times has reported those accusations include pulling prisoners' hair, beating them and choking them to force them to give information.

The Red Cross complained to the military in July that Camp Cropper inmates had been kept in painful "stress positions" for up to four hours and had been struck by military intelligence soldiers.

WASHINGTON - Earlier this week Attorney General John Ashcroft warned of an attack planned on America for sometime in the coming months. That may happen, but NBC News has learned one of Ashcroft’s sources is highly suspect.

In warning Americans to brace for a possible attack, Ashcroft cited what he called "credible intelligence from multiple sources," saying that "just after New Year's, al-Qaida announced openly that preparations for an attack on the United States were 70 percent complete.… After the March 11 attack in Madrid, Spain, an al-Qaida spokesman announced that 90 percent of the arrangements for an attack in the United States were complete."

But terrorism experts tell NBC News there's no evidence a credible al-Qaida spokesman ever said that, and the claims actually were made by a largely discredited group, Abu Hafs al-Masri Brigades, known for putting propaganda on the Internet.

"This particular group is not really taken seriously by Western intelligence," said terrorism expert M.J. Gohel of the Asia-Pacific Foundation, an international policy assessment group. "It does not appear to have any real field operational capability. But it is certainly part of the global jihad movement — part of its propaganda wing, if you like. It likes to weave a web of lies; it likes to put out disinformation so that the truth is deeply buried. So it is a dangerous group in that sense, but it is not taken seriously in terms of its operational capability."

The group has claimed responsibility for the power blackout in the Northeast last year, a power outage in London and the Madrid bombing. None of the claims was found to be credible.

"The only thing they haven't claimed credit for recently is the cicada invasion of Washington," said expert Roger Cressey, former chief of staff of the critical infrastructure protection board at the White House and now an analyst for NBC News. Cressey also served as deputy to former counterterrorism chief Richard Clarke.

A senior U.S. intelligence official previously told NBC News that this group has no known operational capability and may be no more than one man with a fax machine. (link via BuzzFlash)

 Elizabeth Eve never thought of herself as an exhibitionist. But these days, the 33-year-old history professor with the gold nose ring can barely contain the urge to lift her skirt and flash her skivvies.

"There is something so liberating and exciting about it, you've got to try it out," she said recently as she fidgeted, fully clothed, on the couch in her friend Tasha's Manhattan apartment. "I was teaching a class on imperialism, " she continued, "and I was delivering all this material that was kind of new and upsetting, and everyone was getting all worked up and upset, and I was getting all worked up and upset, and all of a sudden, all I wanted to do was flash my underwear! It was crazy," she said with a throaty giggle.

That's because she wasn't wearing just any panties. Elizabeth is part of Axis of Eve, a fledgling group of rabble-rousing feminists and anti-war activists who have taken to flashing their undies as a form of political dissent. The Eves, as they call themselves, are on a mission to sex up protest. They take to the streets wearing "protest panties" which come emblazoned with anti-Dubya double-entendres like "Expose Bush," "Lick Bush," "Give Bush the Finger" and "Drill Bush Not Oil." When the Eves flash them at rallies, the effect is somewhere between a 1970s' love-in and George Bush's worst, frat- addled nightmare of a panty raid gone awry. (link via The Sideshow)

Here's the "Axis of Eve" website and photo gallery.

It was Barry Goldwater, the revered conservative, who convinced Nixon that he must resign or face certain conviction by the Senate — and perhaps jail. Goldwater delivered his message in person, at the White House, accompanied by Republican congressional leaders.

Republicans on the House Judiciary Committee likewise put principle above party to cast votes for articles of impeachment. On the eve of his mission, Goldwater told his wife that it might cost him his Senate seat on Election Day. Instead, the courage of Republicans willing to dissociate their party from Nixon helped Ronald Reagan win the presidency six years later, unencumbered by Watergate.

Another precedent is apt: In 1968, a few Democratic senators — J. William Fulbright, Eugene McCarthy, George McGovern and Robert F. Kennedy — challenged their party's torpor and insisted that President Lyndon Johnson be held accountable for his disastrous and disingenuous conduct of the Vietnam War, adding weight to public pressure, which, eventually, forced Johnson not to seek re-election.

Today, the United States is confronted by another ill-considered war, conceived in ideological zeal and pursued with contempt for truth, disregard of history and an arrogant assertion of American power that has stunned and alienated much of the world, including traditional allies. At a juncture in history when the United States needed a president to intelligently and forcefully lead a real international campaign against terrorism and its causes, Bush decided instead to unilaterally declare war on a totalitarian state that never represented a terrorist threat; to claim exemption from international law regarding the treatment of prisoners; to suspend constitutional guarantees even to non-combatants at home and abroad; and to ignore sound military advice from the only member of his Cabinet — Powell — with the most requisite experience. Instead of using America's moral authority to lead a great global cause, Bush squandered it.

In Republican cloakrooms, as in the Oval Office, response to catastrophe these days is more concerned with politics and PR than principle. Said Tom DeLay, House majority leader: "A full-fledged congressional investigation — that's like saying we need an investigation every time there's police brutality on the street." (link via Geodog's MT Weblog)

Go read the whole thing.

Iraqi women were also abused at Abu Ghuraib, according to the Taguba report and reports of photographs seen by the US Congress. As this Islamist PakNews story notes, most of the reporting on torture and abuse of detainees at Abu Ghuraib has focused on men. It is clear, however, that Iraqi women were also made to strip naked, were photographed in that compromising position, and it is alleged that some were raped by US military personnel. . . .

A scandal that has not yet broken in the press is the story of how many women ended up in US prisons. The fact is, few were suspected of having themselves committed a crime or an act of insurgency. Rather, they were taken as hostages or potential informants because their husbands or sons were wanted by the US military. This kind of arrest, however, is a form of collective punishment and not permitted under the Fouth Geneva Convention governing military occupations of civilian populations. The sexual abuse of these women is therefore a double crime.

Eventually these photographs of abused or tortured Muslim women are likely to leak, and the reaction in the Muslim world will be explosive. One shakes one'́s head in bewilderment as to what the Bush administration thought they were doing. (link via liberalmediaconspiracy)

Professor Cole is not quite right that the press has not broken the story that many women have been held as hostages in American prisons. Newsday broke the story on Tuesday, as I reported that day.

An urgent investigation has been launched in Washington into whether Iran played a role in manipulating the US into the Iraq war by passing on bogus intelligence through Ahmad Chalabi's Iraqi National Congress, it emerged yesterday.

Some intelligence officials now believe that Iran used the hawks in the Pentagon and the White House to get rid of a hostile neighbour, and pave the way for a Shia-ruled Iraq.

According to a US intelligence official, the CIA has hard evidence that Mr Chalabi and his intelligence chief, Aras Karim Habib, passed US secrets to Tehran, and that Mr Habib has been a paid Iranian agent for several years, involved in passing intelligence in both directions.

The CIA has asked the FBI to investigate Mr Chalabi's contacts in the Pentagon to discover how the INC acquired sensitive information that ended up in Iranian hands.

The implications are far-reaching. Mr Chalabi and Mr Habib were the channels for much of the intelligence on Iraqi weapons on which Washington built its case for war.

"It's pretty clear that Iranians had us for breakfast, lunch and dinner," said an intelligence source in Washington yesterday. "Iranian intelligence has been manipulating the US for several years through Chalabi."

Larry Johnson, a former senior counter-terrorist official at the state department, said: "When the story ultimately comes out we'll see that Iran has run one of the most masterful intelligence operations in history. They persuaded the US and Britain to dispose of its greatest enemy." (link via the rude pundit)

Sidney Blumenthal writes at Salon:

May 27, 2004 | At a well-appointed conservative think tank in downtown Washington and across the Potomac River at the Pentagon, FBI agents have begun paying quiet calls on prominent neoconservatives, who are being interviewed in an investigation of potential espionage, according to intelligence sources. Who gave Ahmed Chalabi classified information about the plans of the U.S. government and military?

The Iraqi neocon favorite, tipped to lead his liberated country post-invasion, has been identified by the CIA and Defense Intelligence Agency as an Iranian double agent, passing secrets to that citadel of the "axis of evil" for decades. All the while the neocons cosseted, promoted and arranged for more than $30 million in Pentagon payments to the George Washington manqué of Iraq. In return, he fed them a steady diet of disinformation, and in the run-up to the war he sent various exiles to nine nations' intelligence agencies to spread falsehoods about weapons of mass destruction. If the administration had wanted other material to provide a rationale for invasion, no doubt that would have been fabricated. Either Chalabi perpetrated the greatest con since the Trojan horse or he was the agent of influence for the most successful intelligence operation conducted by Iran, or both.

The CIA and other U.S. agencies had long ago decided that Chalabi was a charlatan, so their dismissive and correct analysis of his lies prompted their suppression by the Bush White House. In place of the normal channels of intelligence vetting, a jury-rigged system was hastily constructed, running from the office of the vice president to the newly created Office of Special Plans inside the Pentagon, staffed by fervent neocons. CIA Director George Tenet, possessed with the survival instinct of the inveterate staffer, ceased protecting the sanctity of his agency and cast in his lot with Cheney et al. Secretary of State Colin Powell, resistant internally but eventually overcome, decided to become the most ardent champion, unveiling a series of neatly manufactured lies before the United Nations. Last week Powell declared, "It turned out that the sourcing was inaccurate and wrong and, in some cases, deliberately misleading. And for that I'm disappointed, and I regret it." But who had "deliberately" misled him? He did not say. Now the FBI is investigating espionage, fraud and by implication treason.

. . . .

Washington, which was just weeks ago in the grip of neoconservative orthodoxy and absolute belief in Bush's inevitability and righteousness, is now in the throes of agonizing events and being ripped apart by investigations. Things fall apart; all that was hidden is revealed; all sacred exposed as profane: the military, loyal and lumbering, betrayed and embittered; the general in the field, Lt. Gen. Sanchez, disgraced and cashiered; and the most respected retired generals training their artillery on those who have ill-used the troops, still dying in the field; the intelligence agencies, a nautilus of chambers, abused and angry, its retired operatives plying their craft with the press corps, seeping dangerous truths; the press, hesitatingly and wobbly, investigating its own falsehoods; the neocons, publicly redoubling their passionate intensity, defending their hero and deceiver Chalabi, privately squabbling, anxiously awaiting the footsteps of FBI agents; Colin Powell, once the most acclaimed man in America, embarked on an endless quest to restore his reputation, damaged above all by his failure of nerve; everyone in the line of fire motioning toward the chain of command, spiraling upward and sideways, until the finger pointing in a phalanx is directed at the hollow crown. (link via Daily Kos)

So Chalabi bamboozled the Bushies into carrying out the wishes of Iran, a member of the "axis of evil," and into feeding intelligence to it. It's high time we start calling Bush-Cheney-Rice-Tenet-Rumsfeld-Wolfowitz-Feith-Perle the "axis of idiocy."

Worst. Administration. Ever.

[W]hy did the press credit Mr. Bush with virtues that reporters knew he didn't possess? One answer is misplaced patriotism. After 9/11 much of the press seemed to reach a collective decision that it was necessary, in the interests of national unity, to suppress criticism of the commander in chief.

. . . .

[L]et's not overlook the role of intimidation. After 9/11, if you were thinking of saying anything negative about the president, you had to be prepared for an avalanche of hate mail. You had to expect right-wing pundits and publications to do all they could to ruin your reputation, and you had to worry about being denied access to the sort of insider information that is the basis of many journalistic careers.

The Bush administration, knowing all this, played the press like a fiddle. But has that era come to an end?

A new Pew survey finds 55 percent of journalists in the national media believing that the press has not been critical enough of Mr. Bush, compared with only 8 percent who believe that it has been too critical. More important, journalists seem to be acting on that belief.

Amazing things have been happening lately. The usual suspects have tried to silence reporting about prison abuses by accusing critics of undermining the troops — but the reports keep coming. The attorney general has called yet another terror alert — but the press raised questions about why. (At a White House morning briefing, Terry Moran of ABC News actually said what many thought during other conveniently timed alerts: "There is a disturbing possibility that you are manipulating the American public in order to get a message out.")

It may not last. In July 2002, according to Dana Milbank of The Washington Post — who has tried, at great risk to his career, to offer a realistic picture of the Bush presidency — "the White House press corps showed its teeth" for the first time since 9/11. It didn't last: the administration beat the drums of war, and most of the press relapsed into docility.

But this time may be different. And if it is, Mr. Bush — who has always depended on that docility — may be in even more trouble than the latest polls suggest.

FALLUJAH, Iraq (AP) - With U.S. marines gone and central government authority virtually nonexistent, Fallujah resembles an Islamic mini-state - anyone caught selling alcohol is flogged and paraded in the city. Men are encouraged to grow beards and barbers are warned against giving "western" hair cuts.

"After all the blood that was shed, and the lives that were lost, we shall only accept God's law in Fallujah," said cleric Abdul-Qader al-Aloussi, offering a glimpse of what a future Iraq may look like as the U.S.-led occupation draws to a close. "We must capitalize on our victory over the Americans and implement Islamic sharia laws."

The departure of the marines under an agreement that ended the three-week siege last month has enabled hardline Islamic leaders to assert their power in this once-restive city 50 kilometres west of Baghdad.

This article is entitled "Resembling an Islamic mini-state, Fallujah may be a glimpse of Iraq's future." Recall that before we "liberated" Iraq, it was a secular state where women enjoyed more economic and political power than anywhere else in the Arab world.

If Iraq does become a state governed by Islamic law, it is very doubtful that that will be an improvement over "pre-liberation" Iraq. Look at other other Islamic countries. Women in Saudi Arabia are not allowed to drive, and are required to wear a veil and be accompanied by a male relative in public, and are restricted in their ability to enter many professions. 15 schoolgirls burned to death in 2002 after Saudi Arabian religious police prevented them from fleeing a burning building because they were not wearing proper Islamic attire. Saudi Arabia also allows no dissent and beheads 100 people a year for offenses such as apostasy, adultery, and sodomy. There is no freedom of religion in Saudi Arabia, Iran, and Egypt. In Pakistan, an estimated 80% of women prisoners are incarcerated because, having failed to prove rape charges, they were convicted of adultery. Amputation is the penalty for theft. In Iran, women are stoned to death for adultery.

You may well ask why a country as repressive as Saudi Arabia enjoys a cozy relationship with the United States, particularly when a Bush is in power. The much different treatment Dubya has accorded the repressive regimes in Iraq (an enemy that must be destroyed) and Saudi Arabia (dear friends) is due to the two countries' respective relationships with the Bushes, not their records on human rights. The Saudi Arabians and the Bushes go back a long way, and the Bushes have made millions off their relationship. Saudi Prince Bandar is so close to the Bushes that Dubya told him of his plans to invade Iraq two days before he told Colin Powell, his own Secretary of State. Although Saddam Hussein had previously been a friend of the Bushies, he had to be deposed because, as Dubya explained, "he tried to kill my dad."

"You know what," she offered angrily. "I was proved fucking right. That's what happened. People who disagreed with me were saying, 'There she goes again.' But I was proved fucking right."

No, Judith, you and all of your nonsense about Iraq's WMD's were proved fucking wrong. The Times should fire Miller and every editor who participated in repeatedly putting her screaming, warmongering bilge on its front page. As James C. Moore writes at Salon:

The failures of Miller and the Times' reporting on Iraq are far greater sins than those of the paper's disgraced Jayson Blair. While the newspaper's management cast Blair into outer darkness after his deceptions, Miller and other reporters who contributed to sending America into a war have been shielded from full scrutiny. The Times plays an unequaled role in the national discourse, and when it publishes a front-page piece about aluminum tubes and mushroom clouds, that story very quickly runs away from home to live on its own. The day after Miller's tubes narrative showed up, Andrea Mitchell of NBC News went on national TV to proclaim, "They were the kind of tubes that could only be used in a centrifuge to make nuclear fuel." Norah O'Donnell had already told the network's viewers the day before of the "alarming disclosure," and the New York Times wire service distributed Miller's report to dozens of papers across the landscape. Invariably, they gave it prominence. Sadly, the sons and daughters of America were sent marching off to war wearing the boots of a well-told and widely disseminated lie.

Of course, Judy Miller and the Times are not the only journalists to be taken by Ahmed Chalabi. Jim Hoagland, a columnist at the Washington Post, has also written of his long association with the exile. But no one was so fooled as Miller and her paper.

Russ Baker, who has written critically of Miller for the Nation, places profound blame at the feet of the reporter and her paper. "I am convinced there would not have been a war without Judy Miller," he said.

The introspection and analysis of America's rush to war with Iraq have turned into a race among the ruins. Few people doubt any longer that the agencies of the U.S. government did not properly perform. No institution, however, either public or private, has violated the trust of its vast constituency as profoundly as the New York Times. (two links via Paul Waldman at the invaluable The Gadflyer)

George W. Bush promised us a foreign policy with humility. Instead, he has brought us humiliation in the eyes of the world.

He promised to "restore honor and integrity to the White House." Instead, he has brought deep dishonor to our country and built a durable reputation as the most dishonest President since Richard Nixon.

Honor? He decided not to honor the Geneva Convention. Just as he would not honor the United Nations, international treaties, the opinions of our allies, the role of Congress and the courts, or what Jefferson described as "a decent respect for the opinion of mankind." He did not honor the advice, experience and judgment of our military leaders in designing his invasion of Iraq. And now he will not honor our fallen dead by attending any funerals or even by permitting photos of their flag-draped coffins.

How did we get from September 12th , 2001, when a leading French newspaper ran a giant headline with the words "We Are All Americans Now" and when we had the good will and empathy of all the world -- to the horror that we all felt in witnessing the pictures of torture in Abu Ghraib.

To begin with, from its earliest days in power, this administration sought to radically destroy the foreign policy consensus that had guided America since the end of World War II. The long successful strategy of containment was abandoned in favor of the new strategy of "preemption." And what they meant by preemption was not the inherent right of any nation to act preemptively against an imminent threat to its national security, but rather an exotic new approach that asserted a unique and unilateral U.S. right to ignore international law wherever it wished to do so and take military action against any nation, even in circumstances where there was no imminent threat. All that is required, in the view of Bush's team is the mere assertion of a possible, future threat - and the assertion need be made by only one person, the President.

More disturbing still was their frequent use of the word "dominance" to describe their strategic goal, because an American policy of dominance is as repugnant to the rest of the world as the ugly dominance of the helpless, naked Iraqi prisoners has been to the American people. Dominance is as dominance does.

Dominance is not really a strategic policy or political philosophy at all. It is a seductive illusion that tempts the powerful to satiate their hunger for more power still by striking a Faustian bargain. And as always happens - sooner or later - to those who shake hands with the devil, they find out too late that what they have given up in the bargain is their soul. (link via Atrios)

What a tragedy that this man, who won the election by 540,000 votes -- if only we lived in a democracy -- is not President of the United States.

Recognizing the urgency of this moment, a group of leading Democrats has established this matching fund. These stalwart supporters of our Party have agreed to match -- dollar for dollar -- every contribution we receive in response to this message.

If you can send a gift of $100, we'll have $200 available to fund critical grassroots organizing efforts that will benefit John Kerry and the entire Democratic ticket.

And, if somehow you can see your way to a $200 gift, we'll have $400 to devote to our single-minded mission: winning historic Democratic victories this November.

This election is a turning point for America. The country and the world as we know them literally may not survive another four years of Bush's policies of preemptive war, massive deficit spending, despoiling the environment, ignoring the threat of global warming, and trampling civil liberties. It is imperative that we remove Bush from office. It is also important that we give President Kerry a Congress he can work with, not a Republican Congress that refuses to enact legislation to undo Bush's terrible legacy. We have an excellent chance to retake the Senate and an outside chance to get the House, as well. (As I noted a couple of days ago, the new CBS poll shows that 65% of the electorate believes that the country is headed in the wrong direction, tying the highest percentage in the 20 years that CBS has asked the question. The last time that number was reached was in November 1994, when Republicans swept into control of both houses of Congress. Today, with the public equally disaffected and Republicans controlling every branch of government, we Democrats may be able to achieve a similar coup.)

So if you want to contribute to the DNC and help take back our country, click here. Even if you can only afford to donate $10 or $20, that is doubled to $20 or $40, so now is the time to do it. 

Over the last year this newspaper has shone the bright light of hindsight on decisions that led the United States into Iraq. We have examined the failings of American and allied intelligence, especially on the issue of Iraq's weapons and possible Iraqi connections to international terrorists. We have studied the allegations of official gullibility and hype. It is past time we turned the same light on ourselves.

. . . .

 

[W]e have found a number of instances of coverage that was not as rigorous as it should have been. In some cases, information that was controversial then, and seems questionable now, was insufficiently qualified or allowed to stand unchallenged. Looking back, we wish we had been more aggressive in re-examining the claims as new evidence emerged — or failed to emerge.

The problematic articles varied in authorship and subject matter, but many shared a common feature. They depended at least in part on information from a circle of Iraqi informants, defectors and exiles bent on "regime change" in Iraq, people whose credibility has come under increasing public debate in recent weeks. (The most prominent of the anti-Saddam campaigners, Ahmad Chalabi, has been named as an occasional source in Times articles since at least 1991, and has introduced reporters to other exiles. He became a favorite of hard-liners within the Bush administration and a paid broker of information from Iraqi exiles, until his payments were cut off last week.) Complicating matters for journalists, the accounts of these exiles were often eagerly confirmed by United States officials convinced of the need to intervene in Iraq. Administration officials now acknowledge that they sometimes fell for misinformation from these exile sources. So did many news organizations — in particular, this one.

Some critics of our coverage during that time have focused blame on individual reporters. Our examination, however, indicates that the problem was more complicated. Editors at several levels who should have been challenging reporters and pressing for more skepticism were perhaps too intent on rushing scoops into the paper. Accounts of Iraqi defectors were not always weighed against their strong desire to have Saddam Hussein ousted. Articles based on dire claims about Iraq tended to get prominent display, while follow-up articles that called the original ones into question were sometimes buried. In some cases, there was no follow-up at all.

The Times does not state or suggest that anyone will be asked to resign as a result of this debacle. That's not good enough. For months and months, Judith Miller acted as a shill for the Bush administration, uncritically printing any crap the Bushies or Chalabi fed her about WMD's. Miller's media whoring was aided and abetted by her editors, who not only left her stenography untouched but repeatedly dumped it onto page 1 of the Times. It is not for nothing that Billmon calls the once-proud Times "the new Pravda."

The Times got its undies into a bundle over Jayson Blair, firing him and two top editors for his fabrications. This is infinitely more serious. Blair's falsifications were inexcusable but, in the scheme of things, trivial. No one died because Blair made up details about Jessica Lynch's hometown. But the Times' uncritical parroting of the administration's lies helped lead a slumbering nation into a disastrous war. Probably tens of thousands of Iraqis, and over 800 Americans, have died so far, we have spent, at this moment, over $115 billion, with many tens or hundreds of billions more to come. This terrible expenditure of blood and fortune has only served to destroy our standing in the world community, inflame Iraq and the rest of the Middle East, and recruit more terrorists for al Qaeda.

The Times failed abjectly in its duty to inform public debate and serve as a member of the Fourth Estate instead of as a mouthpiece for a reckless, war-mongering administration. The blood of thousands is on the Times' hands, just as surely as it is on the hands of Bush, his administration, and the other members of the media who abdicated their responsibilities and acted as cheerleaders in the long runup to war. Judith Miller and the editors who served as her enablers must go.

In recent public statements, Bush administration officials have said that the Geneva Conventions were "fully applicable" in Iraq.

In a little-noticed development amid Iraq's prison abuse scandal, the U.S. military is holding dozens of Iraqis as bargaining chips to put pressure on their wanted relatives to surrender, according to human rights groups. These detainees are not accused of any crimes, and experts say their detention violates the Geneva Conventions and other international laws. The practice also risks associating the United States with the tactics of countries that it has long criticized for arbitrary arrests.

"It's clearly an abuse of the powers of arrest, to arrest one person and say that you're going to hold him until he gives information about somebody else, especially a close relative," said John Quigley, an international law professor at Ohio State University. "Arrests are supposed to be based on suspicion that the person has committed some offense."

Indeed, holding innocent civilians hostage in order to induce their relatives to surrender is a plain violation of Articles 31, 33, and 34 of the Fourth Geneva Convention, Relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War, signed at Geneva, August 12, 1949:

Art. 31. No physical or moral coercion shall be exercised against protected persons, in particular to obtain information from them or from third parties.

Art. 33. No protected person may be punished for an offence he or she has not personally committed. Collective penalties and likewise all measures of intimidation or of terrorism are prohibited.

. . . .

Reprisals against protected persons and their property are prohibited.

Art. 34. The taking of hostages is prohibited.

A "protected person" under the Fourth Geneva Convention is broadly defined as follows:

Art. 4. Persons protected by the Convention are those who, at a given moment and in any manner whatsoever, find themselves, in case of a conflict or occupation, in the hands of a Party to the conflict or Occupying Power of which they are not nationals.

Article 146 of the Fourth Geneva Convention requires each "High Contracting Party," including the United States, to enact legislation to punish those who commit grave breaches of the Convention. Article 147 defines "grave breaches" as including "unlawful confinement" and "taking of hostages":

Art. 146. The High Contracting Parties undertake to enact any legislation necessary to provide effective penal sanctions for persons committing, or ordering to be committed, any of the grave breaches of the present Convention defined in the following Article.

Each High Contracting Party shall be under the obligation to search for persons alleged to have committed, or to have ordered to be committed, such grave breaches, and shall bring such persons, regardless of their nationality, before its own courts. . . . .

Art. 147. Grave breaches to which the preceding Article relates shall be those involving any of the following acts, if committed against persons or property protected by the present Convention: . . . unlawful confinement of a protected person, . . . taking of hostages . . . .

The United States, in the War Crimes Act of 1996, codified at Title 18, section 1441 of the United States Code, implements sections 146 and 147's requirement to provide criminal penalties for grave breaches of the Fourth Geneva Convention, such as the taking of hostages:

Section 2441. War crimes

(a) Offense. - Whoever, whether inside or outside the United States, commits a war crime, in any of the circumstances described in subsection (b), shall be fined under this title or imprisoned for life or any term of years, or both, and if death results to the victim, shall also be subject to the penalty of death.

(b) Circumstances. - The circumstances referred to in subsection (a) are that the person committing such war crime or the victim of such war crime is a member of the Armed Forces of the United States or a national of the United States (as defined in section 101 of the Immigration and Nationality Act).

(c) Definition. - As used in this section the term ''war crime'' means any conduct -

(1) defined as a grave breach in any of the international conventions signed at Geneva 12 August 1949 . . . .

Bottom line: every member of the United States armed forces, and every United States national, responsible for holding an Iraqi hostage in order to induce his or her relative to surrender is guilty of a grave breach of the Fourth Geneva Convention, and of 28 U.S.C. section 1441. Every such person (particularly those in positions of authority) should be prosecuted as a war criminal.

UPDATE: The Newsday story quotes "a senior military official who asked not to be named" as stating, "The coalition does not take hostages. Relatives who might have information about wanted persons are sometimes detained for questioning, and then they are released. There is no policy of holding people as bargaining chips."

Despite this bold statement by an anonymous interlocutor ("The coalition does not take hostages in violation of international law – but don’t quote me on that!"), other American military officers have been quoted by name as stating that the United States military has seized family members and used them as bargaining chips. The Chicago Tribune reported last week:

A military intelligence analyst who recently completed duty at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq said Wednesday that the 16-year-old son of a detainee there was abused by U.S. soldiers to break his father’s resistance to interrogators.

The analyst said the teenager was stripped naked, thrown in the back of an open truck, driven around in the cold night air, splattered with mud and then presented to his father at Abu Ghraib, the prison at the center of the scandal over abuse of Iraqi detainees.

Upon seeing his frail and frightened son, the prisoner broke down and cried and told interrogators he would tell them whatever they wanted, the analyst said.

. . . .

Sgt. Samuel Provance, who maintained the 302nd Military Intelligence Battalion’s top-secret computer system at Abu Ghraib prison, gave the account of abuse of the teenager in a telephone interview from Germany, where he is now stationed. He said he also has described the incident to Army investigators.

Provance’s account of mistreatment of a prisoner's son is consistent with concerns raised by the International Committee of the Red Cross, which had received reports that interrogators were threatening reprisals against detainees' family members.

Provance already has been deemed a credible witness by Maj. Gen. Antonio Taguba, who included the Army sergeant in a list of witnesses whose statements he relied on to make his findings of prisoner mistreatment at Abu Ghraib.

The Washington Post reported on July 28, 2003:

Col. David Hogg, commander of the 2nd Brigade of the 4th Infantry Division, said tougher methods are being used to gather the intelligence. On Wednesday night, he said, his troops picked up the wife and daughter of an Iraqi lieutenant general. They left a note: "If you want your family released, turn yourself in." Such tactics are justified, he said, because, "It's an intelligence operation with detainees, and these people have info." They would have been released in due course, he added later.

The tactic worked. On Friday, Hogg said, the lieutenant general appeared at the front gate of the U.S. base and surrendered. (thanks to Blair, and to Seb of Sadly, No!, for the link)

Over the last month, President Bush has repeatedly recounted how he was inspired by "the courage of the firefighters and the police" [1] in the aftermath of the September 11 terrorist attacks. He recounted how, when standing atop a pile of rubble at Ground Zero, he was told by a firefighter, "Don't let me down" [2]. But more than two years later, he continues to ignore the needs of firefighters and police officers who are now suffering adverse health effects from their rescue efforts at Ground Zero. The situation has reached a head: yesterday, 1,700 cops and firefighters were forced to sue in court for the medical help they desperately need [3].

While the President's very first campaign commercial used photos of coffin draped corpses [4] being pulled from the rubble, the White House has sought to hide evidence that Ground Zero firefighters and cops were exposed to hazardous toxins. Specifically, the White House Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ) intervened to doctor EPA press releases [5] that were supposed to warn the public about toxins near Ground Zero. The press releases were modified to claim that the air was safe - despite the fact that there was not adequate scientific evidence to substantiate that claim. The CEQ was headed by James Connaughton, a former asbestos industry lawyer who represented companies in toxic pollution cases [6].

When Ground Zero firefighters and cops began getting sick, the White House tried to block $90 million in funding [7] for medical treatment. When Congress forced the Administration to accept the $90 million, the Administration then delayed the money [8] and threatened to shut down the health-screening program. Even today, the New York Police Department has been denied much needed health grants [9].

Sources:

1. Remarks by the President at Victory 2004 Luncheon, 04/20/2004.

2. Remarks by the President to the American Conservative Union 40th Anniversary Gala, 05/13/2004.

3. "1,700 sue over 9/11 sickness", New York Daily News, 05/24/2004.

4. "President Bush: Don't use my husband as your mascot", Salon, 03/05/2004.

5. "W. House Molded EPA's 9/11 Reports", CBS News, 08/22/2003.

6. "It's public be damned at the EPA", New York Daily News, 08/26/2003.

7. "Cough up 9/11 aid, workers tell Bush", New York Daily News, 01/25/2003.

8. "$90M in WTC aid on hold", New York Daily News, 07/10/2003.

9. "1,700 sue over 9/11 sickness", New York Daily News, 05/24/2004.

Now      49% Kerry-41% Bush

4/2004   46% Kerry-44% Bush

3/2004   43% Kerry-46% Bush

We must face the facts, the cold, hard facts. We illegally invaded another nation, engaging in war crimes to do so, in that we lied to the UN as to the causes for war. We did so without pressing necessity to invade - or to lie at all, since our target was an individual who could have been legally indicted for war crimes by merely stretching forth our hand. We invaded solely because of the electoral time table of George W Bush Jr, and for no other reason. This is worse than a crime, it is worse than a mistake, it is a blot against that most precious object of a free people - our willingness to comply with our own laws.

We did not invade because Saddam was a threat, but because he was not. We did not invade because we knew he had WMD, but because we knew he did not. The high officials of the State Department, the Defense Department and the National Security Council were perfectly aware of this, and their war plans reflect this knowledge, since we took scant precautions that any reasonable military would take against a foe with such capabilities in a fight for its own survival.

Our leaders, if we were a defeated nation, would be sent to the Hague or some other tribunal for War Crimes prosecution. That we will not do this insures that our enemies, fortified by the clear bankruptcy of our laws, and our clear willingness to flagrantly break them when it is to our own advantage, and the complete and utter lack of accountability for those that break them, and those who enable breaking them - will strike, with devastating force, at the centers of our commerce and population. They will, rightly, point to the devastation of Baghdad as their reason for attack.

The United States, in the wake of 30 years of devastating conflict, laid the foundation for international institutions that endured until this conflict took place. While imperfect, often abused, and frequently engaged in their own follies, there was a progressive adherence to the idea of international law, and global leadership. This has been broken. Merely removing Bush will not restore it, because legitimacy rests not on there not being a criminal in power, but it being impossible for a criminal to come to power.

Every organ of our society - journalistic, political, academic and social - has failed utterly to prevent a criminal enterprise from commandeering the powers of the Presidency, and the Congress. Every individual of any position or honour in our society must count themselves as guilty of this failure, for it would have been better to die exercising Jefferson's ultimate right, then to live under the shame of knowing that, even should they be removed, it will be merely a temporary respite from corruption, which will, in 2, 4 or 8 years time, seize power again, and again tear on a profligate attack of borrow and squander. (two typos corrected by me)

Sen. Mike DeWine (R-Ohio) on Friday fired a young staffer for "unacceptable use of Senate computers" after she posted her sex diaries on the Internet and raised a hubbub of speculation last week: Who is this wicked woman that calls herself "Washingtonienne"? Was she really bedding six different men or making it all up? And who is the married, high-level federal employee she claims paid her $400 for a lunch-hour tryst?

 

First off, her name is Jessica Cutler. She's 24, holds a bachelor's degree in international relations from Syracuse University, once aspired to be a journalist and says she is not ashamed in the least of her behavior. "Everything is true," Cutler told us in an interview. "It's so cliched. It's like, 'There's a slutty girl on the Hill?' There's millions of 'em," she said, laughing. "A lot of my friends are way worse than me."

On Tuesday, Cutler was suspended from a staff assistant's position that paid $25,000 a year. Without identifying Cutler by name, DeWine said in a statement Friday afternoon that she had used Senate "resources and work time to post unsuitable and offensive material to an Internet Web log." Cutler admits she did. And a few hours after being sacked, she happily accepted our invitation to explain why she bared her intimate encounters for the world to see.

"If you don't like or care about your job, what's the big deal?" she said, explaining that her blog was a time-saving substitute for e-mailing friends. "I am so over it."

(If you're easily offended, don't click on any of the links in the following paragraph.) Cutler's sex-blogging exploits were publicly revealed by Washington politics/gossip blogger Wonkette. She didn't mention (and probably didn't then know) Cutler's name, but others obviously figured it out. Cutler promptly took down her blog, "Washingtonienne," but Wonkette posted its contents, substituting different initials for those Cutler had used for her six paramours. Someone put up a fake Washingtonienne site, which was pretty funny for those with an unrefined sense of humor (I read it this morning), but tragically it now seems to have been taken down. Shortly after Washingtonienne/Cutler was fired, she spoke to Wonkette (this post links to 13 other Wonkette posts about Washingtonienne that I haven't linked to), and they went out drinking.

Today in the WaPo:

A public service announcement for the half-dozen men (so far) caught up in the "Washingtonienne" sex scandal on Capitol Hill: It would be prudent to get HIV tests, advises Jessica Cutler . . . . "I'm not the only one in the world who should worry about this," Cutler, the 24-year-old former staff assistant who kept the Washingtonienne blog, told us yesterday.

"I was practicing safe sex, as much as that is possible," she added. Juggling media interviews and requests, Cutler said she intended to keep a previously scheduled doctor's appointment yesterday to get tested for the virus. "I get tested at least once a year. I'm fine as far as I know. It's not like I'm in a panic or anything."

. . . .

Some Web sites are speculating on the names of various sexual partners whom Cutler only identified with initials. The sites are eager to ID a married, Bush-appointed "chief of staff" at a federal agency who she claimed paid her $400 for a lunch-hour tryst last Tuesday. (hat tip to World O'Crap, who alerted me to this sordid saga)

Republicans, we hear, are frustrated by polls showing that the public has a poor opinion of George Bush's economic leadership. In their view, the good news about Mr. Bush's economic triumphs is being drowned out by the bad news from Iraq.

A recent article in The New York Times, citing concerns of "Republican elected officials, pollsters and strategists," put it this way: "The creation of nearly 900,000 new jobs in the last four months — a development that might otherwise have redefined the race in Mr. Bush's favor — has been largely crowded out of the electorate's psyche by images from Iraq."

Funny, isn't it? In 2002, Republican strategists used the impending Iraq war to distract the public from the miserable economic news. Now they're complaining that Iraq is taking voters' focus off the economy.

But is the economic news really that good? No. While the recent economic performance is better than in the administration's first three years, it isn't at all exceptional by historical standards. And after those three terrible years, the economy has a lot of ground to make up.

. . . .

Here's one way to look at it. The job forecast in the 2002 Economic Report of the President assumed that by 2004 the economy would have fully recovered from the 2001 recession. That recovery, according to the official projection, would lead to average payroll employment of 138 million this year — 7 million more than the actual number. So we have a gap of 7 million jobs to make up.

And employment is chasing a moving target: it must rise by about 140,000 a month just to keep up with a growing population. In April, the economy added 288,000 jobs. If you do the math, you discover that President Bush needs about four years of job growth at last month's rate to reach what his own economists consider full employment.

The bottom line, then, is that Mr. Bush's supporters have no right to complain about the public's failure to appreciate his economic leadership. Three years of lousy performance, followed by two months of good but not great job growth, is not a record to be proud of.

Retired Marine General Anthony Zinni lists the ten biggest mistakes we made in Iraq and discusses what we do now. It's a long piece, well worth reading (I wonder if anyone in the administration will bother? -- we know Dubya won't), but here is the list, without his explanations:

1. The belief that containment as a policy doesn't work.
2. The strategy was flawed.
3. As in Vietnam, we created a false rationale for going in in order to get public support.
4. We failed to internationalize the effort.
5. We underestimated the task.
6. We propped up and trust the exiles.
7. Lack of planning.
8. Insufficiency of military forces on the ground.
9. We threw an ad hoc organization into Iraq.
10. A series of bad decisions on the ground. (link via Political Animal)

LONDON - Far from being crippled by the U.S.-led war on terror, al Qaeda has more than 18,000 potential terrorists scattered around the world and the war in Iraq is swelling its ranks, a report said Tuesday.

 

Al Qaeda is probably working on plans for major attacks on the United States and Europe, and it may be seeking weapons of mass destruction in its desire to inflict as many casualties as possible, the International Institute of Strategic Studies said in its annual survey of world affairs.

Osama bin Laden's network appears to be operating in more than 60 nations, often in concert with local allies, the study by the independent think tank said.

Although about half of al-Qaida's top 30 leaders have been killed or captured, it has an effective leadership, with bin Laden apparently still playing a key role, it said.

"Al Qaeda must be expected to keep trying to develop more promising plans for terrorist operations in North America and Europe, potentially involving weapons of mass destruction," IISS director Dr. John Chipman told a press conference releasing "Strategic Survey 2003/4."

At the same time it will likely continue attacking "soft targets encompassing Americans, Europeans and Israelis, and aiding the insurgency in Iraq," he added.

The report suggested that the two military centerpieces of the U.S.-led war on terror - the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq - may have boosted al-Qaida.

Driving the terror network out of Afghanistan in late 2001 appears to have benefited the group, which dispersed to many countries, making it almost invisible and hard to combat, the story said.

"It's extremely difficult to govern when you control all three branches of government," says Hastert spokesman John Feehery, a burden of which Democrats would happily relieve them.

Mr. Bush's overall job approval rating has continued to decline. Forty-one percent approve of the job he is doing as president, while 52 percent disapprove — the lowest overall job rating of his presidency. Two weeks ago, 44 percent approved. A year ago, two-thirds did.

Sixty-one percent of Americans now disapprove of the way Mr. Bush is handling the situation in Iraq, while just 34 percent approve.

As concern about the situation in Iraq grows, 65 percent now say the country is on the wrong track — matching the highest number ever recorded in CBS News Polls, which began asking this question in the mid-1980's. Only 30 percent currently say things in this country are headed in the right direction. One year ago, in April 2003, 56 percent of Americans said the country was headed in the right direction.

The last time the percentage that said the country was on the wrong track was as high as it is now was back in November 1994. Then, Republicans swept into control of both houses of Congress for the first time in decades.

Majorities disapprove of the way Mr. Bush is handling foreign policy and the economy. Terrorism remains the only positive area for the president — a majority of 51 percent approve of the way he is handling the campaign against terrorism. But that number matches his lowest rating ever on terrorism.

Just 37 percent — the lowest number in his presidency — now approve of Mr. Bush's handling of foreign policy, while 56 percent disapprove. Mr. Bush's ratings on the economy are similar: 36 percent approve of his handling of it and 57 percent disapprove.

On the campaign against terrorism, however, Mr. Bush receives more positive ratings. Fifty-one percent of Americans approve of the job he is doing, while 42 percent disapprove. Fifty percent say his administration's policies have made the country safer from terrorism, not much changed from what people said a month ago. (link via Atrios)

Kerry told reporters in front of cameras, ‘Did the training wheels fall off?’ . . . Reporters are debating whether to treat it as on or off the record . . .

Josh Marshall's interpretation of this is that Kerry made the quip off the record, but it was so good that some reporters "couldn't resist and passed it on to Drudge."

In an occupation marked by dizzying strategy shifts and policy repudiations, the U.S.'s abandonment of Chalabi may prove to be the most head-snapping reversal of all. A little more than a year ago, a triumphant Chalabi flew into Iraq escorted by U.S. special forces, having achieved his decade-long goal of persuading the U.S. to overthrow Saddam Hussein. But U.S. officials say last week's raid was the culmination of months of irritation with Chalabi over his discredited prewar claims about Saddam's weapons programs, the suspected corruption of i.n.c. members and Chalabi's criticism of the U.S. plan to hand political control to a U.N.-appointed Iraqi government on June 30. U.S. intelligence and law-enforcement officials tell Time they are also investigating more serious offenses. After a CIA complaint, the FBI launched a full field criminal probe into whether Chalabi and senior i.n.c. aides passed high-level intelligence to Iran—information believed to be so sensitive, a senior U.S. official says, that it may have provided Iranian authorities with insights into the U.S.'s sources and methods for collecting intelligence and could even "lead to the loss of lives."

. . . .

The rupture between the U.S. and its favorite son has been months in the making, the product of election-year politics, bureaucratic jousting and deeply personal feuds. In January Bush invited a delegation of the Iraqi Governing Council, including Chalabi, to Washington for the State of the Union address. Chalabi sat just behind First Lady Laura Bush. But that publicity coup masked anxieties. Chalabi says that during a meeting with George W. Bush in the Oval Office, he implored the President not to hand control over Iraq's political future to the U.N. Chalabi has long railed against the U.N. for propping up Saddam through its corrupt oil-for-food program. He warned Bush that the U.N.'s envoy to Iraq, Lakhdar Brahimi, was trying to give former Sunni Baathists a role in the future government. Chalabi tells Time, "The President said to me, 'If there is anything you don't have to worry about, it's that.'" He should have been worried. In early April, with coalition forces fighting a two-front insurgency and the White House desperate for an exit strategy, Bush declared that the U.S. would back any political arrangement Brahimi could come up with before June 30. When the U.N. envoy returned to Iraq last month, he announced that members of the Governing Council would not be a part of the caretaker government he plans to name. Chalabi blames Bush for trashing the pledge he made in January. "Two months down the line, the President decides for his re-election strategy to have the U.N. determine how things are going to be in Iraq," he says.

. . . .

It may still take months for the U.S. to sort out just how much damage its flirtation with Chalabi has wrought. Bush Administration officials argue that their willingness to cut Chalabi loose shows that the U.S. is learning from the faulty assumptions that have plagued the occupation for more than a year. That's a point that Bush plans to stress in a series of speeches he will begin to deliver this week in an effort to prepare the country for June 30. "This is in part about managing expectations," says a White House official. "The President is going to be very frank about that and talk about where things went well and where they didn't go well—but which we're correcting." Such candor is encouraging. But after so many missteps, the Administration may have a hard time convincing the world it knows how to get it right. (link via Talking Points Memo)

Tell me again why anyone supports the buffoon in the White House?

You know, back in 2000 a Republican friend warned me that if I voted for Al Gore and he won, the stock market would tank, we'd lose millions of jobs and our military would be totally overstretched. You know what: I did vote for Al Gore, he did win, and I'll be damned if all those things didn't come true. (quoted by Stephen Heiser)

Another big stack of pages is causing concern over at the Senate Armed Services Committee, which is investigating abuses at Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison. Committee aides discovered belatedly that their copy of the 6,000-page report on prison abuses produced by Major General Antonio M. Taguba might not be complete. The copy they got after Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld's testimony on May 7 was a thick document with 106 annexes, and it was quickly arranged into separate binders. Only later did the committee stack up all the pages, compare them with a ream of 6,000 blank pages and decide that at least 2,000 pages were missing. "We'd certainly like to know why they're missing," said Republican Senator John McCain. Pentagon spokesman Larry Dirita insisted, "If there is some shortfall in what was provided, it was an oversight."

Atrios observes:

It's not even funny to say anymore, but Jeebus...imagine if Clinton were pulling this shit?

Indeed.

A German couple who went to a fertility clinic after eight years of marriage have found out why they are still childless - they weren't having sex.

The University Clinic of Lubek said they had never heard of a case like it after examining the couple who went to see them last month for fertility tests.

Doctors subjected them to a series of examinations and found they were both apparently fertile, and should have had no trouble conceiving.

A clinic spokesman said: "When we asked them how often they had had sex, they looked blank, and said: "What do you mean?".

"We are not talking retarded people here, but a couple who were brought up in a religious environment who were simply unaware, after eight years of marriage, of the physical requirements necessary to procreate."

The 30-year-old wife and her 36-year-old husband are now being given sex therapy lessons while the university clinic undertakes a study to try to find out if there are more couples with a similar lack of sex education. (link via Blogging in the Burbs)

It figures, you're a scumbag lawyer. Supporting Kerry because he will protect your ability to fleece Americans.

You people are disgusting. You will resort to any means to achieve your ends. You and your selfish crowd are going down in flames.

DS

The following is an essay written by a High School sophomore in Freyburg, Maine, as the essay part of the final exam in his English class. His teacher sent it to CounterPunch as an example of the uprightness of modern youth.

The most important lesson I learned this year in school is to pay attention in class and not to doodle while the teacher is talking. The worst thing you can do is draw a picture that shows President Bush's head on a pole with blood gushing out of his bulging eyeballs. If you do something like this, it means you're probably going to blow up the Oklahoma Book Depository, or fly remote control planes into the White House, like the CIA did on 9/11. Even if you're only 15 like me, you can hijack a bus (like Sandra Bullock did in that cool movie, Speed), and drive it into the Bush ranch at Waco, and burn all the children to death.

I learned that drawing pictures of the President with his arms growing out of his head is no laughing matter. It's bad to make the President look stupider than he already is. You can't draw him writing memos on wide-ruled paper with a crayon, or dressed up like a cowboy and playing with toy pistols in the Awful Office. That type of humor isn't funny. You can't make him look like Alfred E. Neuman from Mad Magazine, with blood gushing out of his ears.

It is OK to draw a picture of Saddam Hussein on all fours, with Condoleezza Rice in a furry African bikini and rings around her neck, holding the evildoer on a leash, and Donald Rumsfeld whacking him on the behind and making him bark like a dog, because that's just a frat prank (like the sexy girl soldier Lynndie English did at that prison in Israel I mean Iraq). But the President is God, which is why his picture is on the dollar bill, and why you can't make him look like an elephant like those soldiers did. You know. Kneeling with his feet up in the air and one finger in his nose and the other in his anus. That's really bad.

You can't draw the president's face on a stick, even if you make it look like a lollipop or a Bubblehead doll. You are a bad person if you do that and if you do that, the Secret Police will come to your house at midnight and make you stand on a box with a shopping bag over your head and electrodes attached to your genitals. Then they'll bulldoze your house into dust! (Which is way cool to see them do that on TV.)

If you make fun of the president that means you hate him and are an enemy combatant. The president has so much to worry about, like his physical fitness and if he takes his sedatives on time, he doesn't need some wise-ass kid sneaking into the Lincoln bedroom at night and fucking his wife (you shouldn't say fuck), or his really cute daughters, who drink a lot and fall down at parties and are pretty easy. The president was bad too, like his daughters, before he learned that Jesus wanted him to kill all the Arabs. The president is truly blessed, so you can't tell your friends you made a videotape of him masturbating and sent it to Seymour Hersh. You can't do that, because one of your friends may be an informer for Homeland Security and then they'll chop your fucking head off!

What I learned this year is that the President is not someone to mock. Even if he is an idiot and a war criminal who deserves to be hanged, and even if no one in the media has the balls to say so. (You shouldn't say balls either.)

Billy Wilson

Billy Wilson can be reached through his teacher at: redspruce@comcast.net (via susanp at Daily Kos; misspellings in essay corrected by me)

WASHINGTON, May 22 — A federal grand jury has subpoenaed at least two journalists, Tim Russert of NBC's "Meet the Press" and Matthew Cooper of Time magazine, to testify about whether the Bush White House leaked the identity of an undercover C.I.A. officer to the news media.

Lawyers for both NBC and Time said they would fight the subpoenas.

. . . .

The investigation follows the disclosure last summer of the identity of Valerie Plame, a C.I.A. officer, by Robert D. Novak, a syndicated columnist who did not name his sources.

Democrats have accused the White House of disclosing Ms. Plame's identity to get back at her husband, Joseph C. Wilson IV, a former ambassador, for criticizing the war in Iraq.

Mr. Wilson had challenged President Bush's assertion in his 2003 State of the Union address that Iraq might be trying to buy uranium for nuclear weapons from Africa.

On a government mission months before the speech, Mr. Wilson went to Niger to investigate trade in uranium. He said he had found nothing to substantiate the allegations.

WASHINGTON, May 22 - A coalition of computer scientists, voter groups and state officials, led by California's secretary of state, Kevin Shelley, is trying to force the makers of electronic voting machines to equip those machines with voter-verifiable paper trails.

Following the problems of the 2000 election in Florida, a number of states and hundreds of counties rushed to dump their punch card ballot systems and to buy the electronic touch screens. Election Data Services, a consulting firm that specializes in election administration, estimates that this November 50 million Americans - about 29 percent of the electorate - may be voting on touch screens, up from 12 percent in 2000.

But in the last year election analysts have documented so many malfunctions, including the disappearance of names from the ballot, and computer experts have shown that the machines are so vulnerable to hackers, that critics have organized to counter the rush toward touch screens with a move to require paper trails.

Paper trails - ballot receipts - would let voters verify that they had cast their votes as they intended and let election officials conduct recounts in close races.

Not everyone agrees that paper trails are necessary, or even advisable. Numerous local election officials - the ones who actually conduct elections - argue that paper trails could create worse problems than the perceived ones that they are intended to cure. They warn of paper jams, voter confusion and delays in the voting booth while voters read their receipts.

There are no national standards to help resolve the disputes. The federal commission that Congress created after 2000 to guide states is behind schedule, and the research body that was supposed to set standards for November 2004 has not even been appointed. So states, prompted by voter organizations, are taking matters into their own hands.

Nevada, which is using touch screens in all its voting precincts this November, has become the first state to require the manufacturer to attach printers in time for Election Day.

California is requiring voter-verified paper trails for any electronic machines that counties in the state buy after November; for this November, it has banned touch-screen machines unless counties meet certain security standards. Three counties are suing the state to overturn the ban and a fourth has said it plans to use the touch screens anyway.

. . . .

More than a dozen other states are considering legislation to require paper backups, and Congress, which had left the matter on the back burner, is considering several similar proposals.

"People are demanding this," said Representative Rush D. Holt, a New Jersey Democrat who has introduced a bill to require that by November, all voters be able to cast ballots that they can verify. This would entail either retrofitting touch screens with printers or requiring a county to go back to a paper-based system like optical-scan equipment or even punch cards.

. . . .

Ohio is the latest state to hit the paper trail. Earlier this month, Gov. Bob Taft, a Republican, signed legislation requiring all counties to have paper trails with their touch-screen machines by November 2006. But the law also allows counties to use the machines this November without paper trails.

Some officials, like state Senator Teresa Fedor, Democrat of Toledo, said this made no sense. If a paper trail is so important, she asked, why should voters go through even one election without them - especially in a state where the presidential vote could be close. She successfully argued to the Legislature that Ohio counties should be able to postpone buying the machines. "There are too many concerns for us to keep a blind eye," she said.

As a result, elections boards in 31 counties are debating whether to postpone their purchases. Since Governor Taft signed the bill, 18 have voted to wait.

WASHINGTON, May 22 — Presented last fall with a detailed catalog of abuses at Abu Ghraib prison, the American military responded on Dec. 24 with a confidential letter asserting that many Iraqi prisoners were not entitled to the full protections of the Geneva Conventions.

The letter, drafted by military lawyers and signed by Brig. Gen. Janis Karpinski, emphasized the "military necessity" of isolating some inmates at the prison for interrogation because of their "significant intelligence value," and said that prisoners held as security risks could legally be treated differently from prisoners of war or ordinary criminals.

But the military insisted that there were "clear procedures governing interrogation to ensure approaches do not amount to inhumane treatment."

In recent public statements, Bush administration officials have said that the Geneva Conventions were "fully applicable" in Iraq. That has put American-run prisons in Iraq in a different category from those in Afghanistan and in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, where members of Al Qaeda and the Taliban have been declared unlawful combatants not eligible for protection. However, the Dec. 24 letter appears to undermine administration assertions of the conventions' broad application in Iraq. (link via Sadly, No!)

CANNES, France (Reuters) - U.S. director Michael Moore's controversial anti-Bush documentary "Fahrenheit 9/11" won the Palme d'Or best film award at the Cannes film festival on Saturday in an evening otherwise dominated by Asian films.

"What have you done? I'm completely overwhelmed by this," an emotional Moore said in his acceptance speech.

"The last time I was on an award stage in Hollywood, all hell broke loose," he added with a laugh.

Moore won a special award in Cannes two years ago for his anti-gun documentary "Bowling for Columbine," which went on to win an Oscar. Moore drew criticism for his extended acceptance speech in which he spoke out against President Bush.

"Fahrenheit 9/11" attracted acres of publicity before the festival when Disney, the parent company of Miramax which produced the film, said it did not want to distribute the picture in an election year.

The New York Times adds:

["Fahrenheit 9/11"] was the first documentary to win Cannes' highest prize, the Palme d'Or, since "The Silent World" by Jacques Cousteau in 1956.

. . . .

There was sharp competition for the award, with a solid crop of good movies among the 19 entries in the festival's main competition but no great ones that rose obviously to front-runner status.

While "Fahrenheit 9/11" was well-received by Cannes audiences, many critics considered it inferior to Bowling for Columbine," the documentary that earned Mr. Moore a special prize at Cannes in 2002.

Some critics had speculated that if "Fahrenheit 9/11" won the top prize, it would be more for the film's politics than its cinematic value.

With Mr. Moore's customary blend of humor and horror, "Fahrenheit 9/11" accuses Mr. Bush of stealing the 2000 election, overlooking terrorism warnings before Sept. 11 and fanning fears of more attacks to secure Americans' support for the Iraq war.

Mr. Moore appears on-screen far less in "Fahrenheit 9/11" than in "Bowling for Columbine" or his other documentaries. The film relies largely on interviews, footage of American soldiers and war victims in Iraq, and archival footage of Mr. Bush.

The screening of "Fahrenheit 9/11" at the festival received a 20-minute standing ovation, "‘the longest ovation in the history of the festival,’ according to Thierry Fremaux, the festival's director."

While the Internet provides fertile ground for spoofs on Bush's job being outsourced to India, his task is certainly being made a lot easier by Indians. Until recently, HCL eServe, the business process outsourcing (BPO) arm of Shiv Nadar-promoted HCL Technologies, handled Bush's nationwide fundraising campaign over the telephone.

HCL has been very reluctant to provide information about the project, but now that it is over it is more forthcoming, though strictly off the record. According to reports, for 14 months between May 16, 2002, and July 22, 2003, HCL eServe had more than 100 agents working in seven teams soliciting financial contributions for the Republican Party. A report that appeared in the Hindustan Times this Sunday says the task was to mobilize support for President Bush and solicit political contributions ranging between US$5 and $3,000 from legions of registered Republican voters. The report further adds that the voters' database was provided by the Republican National Committee (RNC), the party's premier political organization. The contract for running the campaigns was originally awarded by RNC to Washington-based Capital Communications Group, which provides consulting services to government and private clients for cultural and political networking. For cost and efficiency gains, the company outsourced the work to HCL Technologies, which in turn sent it offshore.

Nobody from HCL BPO Services is willing to go on record to talk about the deal, but sources in the company told Asia Times Online that such a project was under way for a long time, with more than 10 million registered Republican voters contacted for pledging funds. Estimates put the extent of funds pledged due to efforts from India at more than $10 million, with the retrieval of the money being followed up by the RNC. According to the sources, the calling process involved a high degree of automation in order to limit human intervention, with voice recording and recognition technology. In this way the US respondents would not have any idea where the calls were coming from, with foreign-accented instead of Indian voices being used.

HCL eServe also ran at least seven other campaigns to gauge voter moods, including simple yes-or-no polls on such issues as abortion rights. Though HCL executives are tight-lipped, there is a possibility that there are still some projects on hand, with respondents being asked about their views on the war in Iraq. (link via Orcinus)

Bush, despite his fake rhetoric about "creating jobs" (the economy has actually lost 1.6 million jobs since March 2001), doesn't give a rat's ass about American workers. As long as corporate executives attend Bush's $2,000-a-plate dinners and solicit donations from their rich friends, Bush couldn't care less if they lay off American workers. Indeed, according to the Bushies, if a company makes a few extra bucks by laying off American workers and hiring foreign workers, that is cause for celebration:

Wading into an election-year debate, President Bush's top economist yesterday said the outsourcing of U.S. service jobs to workers overseas is good for the nation's economy.

Shipping jobs to low-cost countries is the "latest manifestation of the gains from trade that economists have talked about" for centuries, said N. Gregory Mankiw, chairman of the White House Council of Economic Advisers. Just as U.S. consumers have enjoyed lower prices from foreign manufacturers, so too should they benefit from services being offered by overseas companies that have lower labor costs, he said.

Mankiw's comments come as the president struggles to shore up support in manufacturing states that have lost millions of jobs and Democratic rivals make economic nationalism a centerpiece of their attacks on the administration.

. . . .

The Economic Report of the President made the same point [as Mankiw]: "When a good or service is produced more cheaply abroad, it makes more sense to import it than make or provide it domestically."

• Blog readers are fairly old, with the largest group being 31-40 (29.4%) and the second largest group being 41-50 (23.1%).
• Blog readers are fairly affluent, with the largest group having an annual family income of $60,000 to $90,000 (21.6%) and the second largest group at $90,000-$120,000 (16.7%).
• For some reason, blog readers are overwhelmingly male (only 20.9% female, 79.1% male).
• Oddly, the percentages of blog readers who have their own blog were the same as above (20.9% do, 79.1% don't),
• The most common profession of blog readers is "Computer Professional" (11%), thus explaining all those geeky technical comments one reads in response to bloggers' posts about their computer problems.
• Respondents were further left politically than the general population (40.2% Democratic, 22.6% Republican, 20.2% Independent, 11.3% Libertarian (!), and 3.9% Green.
• 91.4% of respondents live in the U.S., and 3% in Canada.
• Respondents subscribe to a lot of magazines, and more intellectual magazines than the general population. The most common are the New Yorker (20.6%), the Economist (15.4%), Newsweek (14.8%), National Geographic (14.4%), Atlantic Monthly (13.7%), and Time (11.3%).
• Respondents said that a walloping 54.1% of their news comes from Internet sources, far outdistancing print newspapers (16.5%), radio (14.7%), television (12.7%), and print magazines (10.3%).
• 55% said that blogs were "extremely useful" sources of news and opinion, with much smaller percentages saying that about online newspapers (22%), online magazines (12%), print newspapers (9%), radio (9%), print magazines (6%), and television (2%!).
• Blog readers read a lot of blogs, with the largest number reading 5 blogs a day (15.9%), 11-15 blogs a day (13.3%), and 10 blogs a day (11.6%).
• In this survey, the blogs that were most often read twice or more daily were Atrios (38% of respondents), the odious Instapundit (29%), Daily Kos (28%), and Talking Points Memo (26%). (link via Atrios)

UPDATE: Josh Marshall has some results from a survey of his readership, which indicates that readers of Talking Points Memo are even more male, more affluent, and better educated than the Blogads respondents.

WASHINGTON -- The Army disclosed Friday that it has investigated the deaths of at least 37 people in Iraq and Afghanistan who died while in custody of U.S. forces since August 2002.

Death certificates also released Friday listed blunt force injuries or suffocation, sometimes in combination, as the cause of death for eight of the detainees--raising the possibility that some prisoners may have died due to beatings or other mistreatment.

Nine of the investigations remain active cases, with eight of them classified as homicides involving suspected assaults on prisoners. Two already have been completed as homicide cases. The rest of the deaths have been judged to be of natural causes, justified homicides or undetermined causes, said a senior military official who briefed reporters.

"The Christian in me says it's wrong, but the corrections officer in me says, 'I love to make a grown man piss himself.'"

Abu Ghraib gives a hint of the abuse being inflicted by "corrections officers" in American jails and prisons where no one's around taking photographs:

In the newly obtained documents, the MPs who gave statements describe Graner and [Staff Sgt. Ivan L. "Chip" Frederick II] as the leaders and organizers of the abuse. Frederick was the enlisted man in charge of Tier 1A and worked as a prison guard in Virginia.

Graner is described as "a Pennsylvania prison guard in civilian life," so both of the reported "leaders and organizers of the abuse" are prison guards in the United States. Go read the whole article. (link via Atrios)

Previously secret sworn statements by detainees at the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq describe in raw detail abuse that goes well beyond what has been made public, adding allegations of prisoners being ridden like animals, sexually fondled by female soldiers and forced to retrieve their food from toilets.

The fresh allegations of prison abuse are contained in statements taken from 13 detainees shortly after a soldier reported the incidents to military investigators in mid-January. The detainees said they were savagely beaten and repeatedly humiliated sexually by American soldiers working on the night shift at Tier 1A in Abu Ghraib during the holy month of Ramadan, according to copies of the statements obtained by The Washington Post.

The statements provide the most detailed picture yet of what took place on the cellblock. Some of the detainees described being abused as punishment or discipline after they were caught fighting or with a prohibited item. Some said they were pressed to denounce Islam or were force-fed pork and liquor. Many provided graphic details of how they were sexually humiliated and assaulted, threatened with rape, and forced to masturbate in front of female soldiers.

"They forced us to walk like dogs on our hands and knees," said Hiadar Sabar Abed Miktub al-Aboodi, detainee No. 13077. "And we had to bark like a dog, and if we didn't do that they started hitting us hard on our face and chest with no mercy. After that, they took us to our cells, took the mattresses out and dropped water on the floor and they made us sleep on our stomachs on the floor with the bags on our head and they took pictures of everything."

. . . .

Most of the detainees said in the statements that they were stripped upon their arrival to Tier 1A, forced to wear women's underwear, and repeatedly humiliated in front of one another and American soldiers. They also described beatings and threats of death and sexual assault if they did not cooperate with U.S. interrogators.

Kasim Mehaddi Hilas, detainee No. 151108, told investigators that when he first arrived at Abu Ghraib last year, he was forced to strip, put on a hood and wear rose-colored panties with flowers on them. "Most of the days I was wearing nothing else," he said in his statement.

Hilas also said he witnessed an Army translator having sex with a boy at the prison. He said the boy was between 15 and 18 years old. Someone hung sheets to block the view, but Hilas said he heard the boy's screams and climbed a door to get a better look. Hilas said he watched the assault and told investigators that it was documented by a female soldier taking pictures.

. . . .

Hilas told investigators that he asked Graner for the time one day because he wanted to pray. He said Graner cuffed him to the bars of a cell window and left him there for close to five hours, his feet dangling off the floor. Hilas also said he watched as Graner and others sodomized a detainee with a phosphoric light. "They tied him to the bed," Hilas said.

. . . .

Mustafa Jassim Mustafa, detainee No. 150542, told military investigators he also witnessed the phosphoric-light assault. He said it was around the time of Ramadan, the holiest period of the Muslim year, when he heard screams coming from a cell below. Mustafa said he looked down to see a group of soldiers holding the detainee down and sodomizing him with the light.

Graner was sodomizing him with the phosphoric light, Mustafa said. The detainee "was screaming for help. There was another tall white man who was with Graner -- he was helping him. There was also a white female soldier, short, she was taking pictures."

Another detainee told military investigators that American soldiers sodomized and beat him. The detainee, whose name is being withheld by The Post because he is an alleged victim of a sexual assault, said he was kept naked for five days when he first arrived at Abu Ghraib and was forced to kneel for four hours with a hood over his head. He said he was beaten so badly one day that the hood flew off his head. "The police was telling me to crawl in Arabic, so I crawled on my stomach and the police were spitting on me when I was crawling, and hitting me on my back, my head and my feet," he said in his sworn statement.

George W. Bush, May 3, 2004:

Because we acted, torture rooms are closed, rape rooms no longer exist . . . in Iraq.

Accusing top Pentagon officials of "dereliction of duty," retired Marine General Anthony Zinni says staying the course in Iraq isn't a reasonable option. "The course is headed over Niagara Falls. I think it's time to change course a little bit or at least hold somebody responsible for putting you on this course," he tells Steve Kroft in an interview to be broadcast on 60 MINUTES Sunday, May 23 (7:00-8:00 PM, ET/PT) on the CBS Television Network.

The current situation in Iraq was destined to happen, says Zinni, because planning for the war and its aftermath has been flawed all along. "There has been poor strategic thinking in this...poor operational planning and execution on the ground," says Zinni, who served as commander-in-chief of the U.S. Central Command from 1997 to 2000.

He blames the poor planning on the civilian policymakers in the administration known as neoconservatives who saw the invasion as a way to stabilize the region and support Israel. He believes these people, who include Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz and Douglas Feith, the undersecretary of defense, have hijacked U.S. foreign policy. "They promoted it and pushed [the war]...even to the point of creating their own intelligence to match their needs. Then they should bear the responsibility," Zinni tells Kroft.

In his upcoming book, Battle Ready, written with Tom Clancy, Zinni writes of the poor planning in harsh terms. "In the lead-up to the Iraq war and its later conduct, I saw, at minimum, true dereliction, negligence and irresponsibility; at worse, lying, incompetence and corruption," he writes. Zinni explains to Kroft, "I think there was dereliction in insufficient forces being put on the ground and [in not] fully understanding the military dimensions of the plan."

He still believes the situation is salvageable if the U.S. can communicate more effectively with the Iraqi people and demonstrate a better image to them. The enlistment of the U.N. and other countries to participate in the mission is also crucial, he says. Without these things, says Zinni, "We are going to be looking for quick exits. I don't believe we're there now, and I wouldn't want to see us fail here," he tells Kroft. Also central to success in Iraq is more troops, from the U.S. and especially other countries, to control violence and patrol borders, he says.

Zinni feels that undertaking the war with the minimum of troops paved the way for the security problems the U.S. faces there now - the violence Rumsfeld recently admitted he hadn't anticipated. "He should not have been surprised," says Zinni. "There were a number of people who before we even engaged in this conflict that felt strongly that we underestimated...the scope of the problems we would have in [Iraq]," he tells Kroft.

The fact that no one in the administration has paid for the blunder irks Zinni. "But regardless of whose responsibility...it should be evident to everybody that they've screwed up, and whose heads are rolling on this?"

OTTAWA (Reuters) - Summer temperatures in the Arctic have risen at an incredible rate over the past three years and large patches of what should be ice are now open water, a British polar explorer said on Monday.

Ben Saunders, forced by the warm weather to abandon an attempt to ski solo from northern Russia across the North Pole to Canada, said he had been amazed at how much of the ice had melted.

"It's obvious to me that things are changing a lot and changing very quickly," a sunburned Saunders told Reuters less than two days after being rescued from the thinning ice sheet close to the North Pole.

"I do know it's happening because that was my third time in the Arctic (in the last three years)," said Saunders, who explored the region in 2001 and 2003.

An international study last year said global warming would melt most of the Arctic icecap in summertime by the end of the century. Many scientists blame the rising temperatures on human emissions of greenhouse gases while others point to what they say are longer-term natural warming and cooling cycles.

"The temperatures were incredibly warm ... I had days when I could ski with no gloves and no hat at all, just in bare hands, because I was too hot," said Saunders.

Logs from an expedition in 2001 showed the average Arctic temperature at this time of year was minus 15 to minus 20 degrees Celsius (plus 5 to minus 4 degrees Fahrenheit).

Saunders said the average temperature this time was just minus 5 to minus 7 degrees Celsius (23 to 19 degrees Fahrenheit).

"I saw open water every single day of the expedition, which is not what I was expecting," said Saunders, who had to don a special thermal suit and drag his sled across open patches of water nine times during the 71 days he spent alone. He covered a total of 965 km (600 miles) before giving up.

. . . .

Saunders said he had also been struck by the almost complete absence of polar bears on the Russian side.

"That surprised me a lot ... that's historically been a very concentrated area for bears," he said.

. . . .

Polar bears hunt out on the ice during summer months and are forced to retreat back to land when the ice is too thin. (link via Daily Kos)

Will we wake up and do something about global warming before it's too late? This is deadly serious. The survival of humanity may literally depend on whether we succeed in throwing Bush out of the White House.

Of all the revelations that have surfaced about the Abu Ghraib prison-abuse scandal so far, the least surprising is that Douglas Feith may be partly responsible. Not a single Iraq war screw-up has gone by without someone tagging Feith—who, as the Defense Department's undersecretary for policy, is the Pentagon's No. 3 civilian, after Donald Rumsfeld and Paul Wolfowitz—as the guy to blame. Feith, who ranks with Wolfowitz in purity of neoconservative fervor, has turned out to be Michael Dukakis in reverse: ideology without competence.

BAGHDAD - With attention focused on the seven soldiers charged with abuse at the Abu Ghraib prison, U.S. military and intelligence officials familiar with the situation tell NBC News the Army’s elite Delta Force is now the subject of a Pentagon inspector general investigation into abuse against detainees.

The target is a top-secret site near Baghdad’s airport. The battlefield interrogation facility known as the "BIF" is pictured in satellite photos.

According to two top U.S. government sources, it is the scene of the most egregious violations of the Geneva Conventions in all of Iraq’s prisons. A place where the normal rules of interrogation don’t apply, Delta Force’s BIF only holds Iraqi insurgents and suspected terrorists —— but not the most wanted among Saddam’s lieutenants pictured on the deck of cards.

These sources say the prisoners there are hooded from the moment they are captured. They are kept in tiny dark cells. And in the BIF’s six interrogation rooms, Delta Force soldiers routinely drug prisoners, hold a prisoner under water until he thinks he’s drowning, or smother them almost to suffocation.

. . . .

All of those practices would be violations of the Geneva Conventions. . . .

[A]s Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld has made clear, the Geneva Conventions do apply in Iraq.

. . . .

So, does Rumfeld know about the BIF and what goes on there?

Several top U.S. military and intelligence sources say yes, and that he, through other top Pentagon officials, directed the U.S. head of intelligence in Iraq, Gen. Barbara Fast, and others to bring some of the methods used at the BIF to prisons like Abu Ghraib, in hopes of getting better intelligence from Iraqi detainees.

The White House is about to get hit by the biggest tsunami since the Iran-Contra affair, maybe since Watergate. President George W. Bush is trapped inside the compound, immobilized by his own stay-the-course campaign strategy. Can he escape the massive tidal waves? Maybe. But at this point, it's not clear how.

If today's investigative shockers—Seymour Hersh's latest article in The New Yorker and a three-part piece in Newsweek—are true, it's hard to avoid concluding that responsibility for the Abu Ghraib atrocities goes straight to the top, both in the Pentagon and the White House, and that varying degrees of blame can be ascribed to officials up and down the chain of command.

. . . .

Read together, the magazine articles spell out an elaborate, all-inclusive chain of command in this scandal. Bush knew about it. Rumsfeld ordered it. His undersecretary of defense for intelligence, Steven Cambone, administered it. Cambone's deputy, Lt. Gen. William Boykin, instructed Maj. Gen. Geoffrey Miller, who had been executing the program involving al-Qaida suspects at Guantanamo, to go do the same at Abu Ghraib. Miller told Brig. Gen. Janis Karpinski, who was in charge of the 800th Military Brigade, that the prison would now be dedicated to gathering intelligence. Douglas Feith, the undersecretary of defense for policy, also seems to have had a hand in this sequence, as did William Haynes, the Pentagon's general counsel. Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez, commander of U.S. forces in Iraq, learned about the improper interrogations—from the International Committee of the Red Cross, if not from anyone else—but said or did nothing about it for two months, until it was clear that photographs were coming out. Meanwhile, those involved in the interrogations included officers from military intelligence, the CIA, and private contractors, as well as the mysterious figures from the Pentagon's secret operation.

That's a lot more people than the seven low-grade soldiers and reservists currently facing courts-martial.

So, what happens next?

First, members of the Senate Armed Services Committee have said they will keep their hearings going until they "get to the bottom of this." Republicans as well as Democrats are behaving in an unusually—and unexpectedly—aggressive fashion on the question of how high up the blame should go.

Second, the courts could get involved. Newsweek reports that the Justice Department is likely to investigate three deaths that occurred during CIA interrogations, possibly with an eye toward charges of homicide. War-crimes charges, for willful violation of the Geneva Conventions, are not out of the question. Rumsfeld and Cambone could conceivably face perjury charges; if the latest news stories are true, their testimony before the armed services committees—taken under oath—will certainly be examined carefully.

Third, Seymour Hersh seems to be on his hottest roll as an investigative reporter in 30 years, and the editors of every major U.S. daily newspaper aren't going to stand for it. "We're having our lunch handed to us by a weekly magazine!" one can imagine them shouting in their morning meetings. Scoops and counterscoops will be the order of the day.

All of these hound-hunts will be fueled by the extraordinary levels of internecine feuding that have marked this administration for years. . . . Secretary of State Colin Powell, tiring of his good-soldier routine, is attacking his adversaries in the White House and Pentagon with eyebrow-raising openness. Hersh's story states that Rumsfeld's secret operation stemmed from his "longstanding desire to wrest control of America's clandestine and paramilitary operations from the CIA." Hersh's sources—many of them identified as intelligence officials—seem to be spilling, in part, to wrest back control. Uniformed military officers, who have long disliked Rumsfeld and his E-Ring crew for a lot of reasons, are also speaking out. Hersh and Newsweek both report that senior officers from the Judge Advocate General's Corps went berserk when they found out about Rumsfeld's secret operation, to the point of taking their concerns to the New York Bar Association's committee on international human rights.

The knives are out all over Washington—lots of knives, unsheathed and sharpened in many different backroom parlors, for many motives and many throats. In short, this story is not going away.

How'd we get into this? After 50 years of pretty consistently prudential foreign policy, managed mostly on a consensus of bipartisan agreement (yes, there are exceptions, but by and large, true), they decided to bet the national ranch on an idea. Actually it was a series of ideas, wrapped together in an odd tangle that could look like an odd jumble when viewed from outside. The key, however, was betting the national ranch on steep odds.

Only, they weren't confident the country would get behind such a riverboat gamble. So they lied about what they were doing. They didn't trust the people -- which might be an epitaph we should return to.

Now, what do we expect of people who make reckless gambles with other people's money? Of people who can't discipline themselves enough to distinguish between their hopes and reality? What do you expect of that ne'er-do-well relative who's always hitting you up for a loan because he's come up with a sure thing?

Do you expect those sorts of folks to take responsibility when things go bad? Or do you expect them to blame others?

Character, alas, really does count.

Indeed. Intelligence and experience are also pretty damned important. Go figure. Click on one of the links in the left column to donate to Kerry, the DNC, or MoveOn and help restore sanity to the White House.

"I believe we are absolutely on the brink of failure. We are looking into the abyss," General Joseph Hoar, a former commander in chief of US central command, told the Senate foreign relations committee.

. . . .

Larry Diamond, an analyst at the conservative Hoover Institution, said: "I think it's clear that the United States now faces a perilous situation in Iraq.

"We have failed to come anywhere near meeting the post-war expectations of Iraqis for security and post-war reconstruction.

"There is only one word for a situation in which you cannot win and you cannot withdraw - quagmire."

. . . .

General Hoar was equally scathing about the calibre of the Bush administration.

"The policy people in both Washington and Baghdad," he said, "have demonstrated their inability to do a job on a day-to-day basis this past year."

I can't help but think that while your tone might change [in print], you still ought to provide readers with your real, unvarnished opinion —— and if your real opinion is that the Bush administration is populated by "clowns," you have an obligation to figure out a way to say that regardless of medium. Not only do you owe it to your readers to say what you really feel, but you also owe it to your critics to let them know the point of view that informs your writing.

THE ABU GHRAIB FAMILY SINGERS PRESENT:
"Our Favorite American Songs"

THANKS FOR THE SODOMY
(To the tune of "Thanks For The Memory")

THANKS FOR THE SODOMY
WHILE WE WERE COLD AND WET
YOU HAD A CIGARETTE.
THE INTERNET
WILL NOT FORGET
THE PRESIDENT’S "REGRET"
WE THANK YOU, SO MUCH

AND THANKS FOR THE BROOMSTICK PROBE
YOU MADE US FIRST DISROBE,
WE’VE BEEN SEEN ‘ROUND THE GLOBE
WE THOUGHT HOODS AND ELECTRODES
SURE MADE A CHIC WARDROBE
HOW CLASSY, YOU WERE

WHILE YOU ABUSED EACH TABOO
WE WERE AFRAID FOR OUR LIVES
NOW YOU CAN GIVE RUSH YOUR HIGH-FIVES–
NOTHING MEAN, JUST BLOWING OFF STEAM

AND THANKS, FOR THE PHOTO OP
OF STANDING ON A BOX
WHILE YOU POINTED AT OUR COCKS
WE WEREN’T DEFILED BY PIGGY PILES
BECAUSE YOUR SMILES INSIST
IT WAS JUST "FRAT PRANKS"

THANKS FOR MY NEW NIGHTMARES
ALTHOUGH SADDAM HUSSEIN
SEEMED TO BE INSANE
YOUR "LIBERTY"
IS NEW TO ME
I WISH YOU WOULD EXPLAIN
HOW LUCKY WE ARE
(link via Rising Hegemon)

Just four months after an alliance of conservative Christians was threatening a churchgoer revolt unless President Bush championed an amendment banning same-sex marriage, members say they have been surprised and disappointed by what they call a tepid response from the pews.

Most of the groups supporting the proposed federal constitutional amendment concede that it appears all but dead in Congress for this election year.

. . . .

[T]he opponents of gay marriage say they are puzzling over why such a volatile cultural issue is not spurring more rank-and-file conservative Christians to rise up in support of the amendment. They are especially frustrated, they say, because opinion polls show that a large majority of voters oppose gay marriage.

"Our side is basically asleep right now," Matt Daniels, founder of the Alliance for Marriage, which helped draft the proposed amendment, said in an interview last week.

The Rev. Louis P. Sheldon, chairman of the Traditional Values Coalition, said: "I don't see any traction. The calls aren't coming in and I am not sure why."

Some conservatives warn that the Christian leaders rallying behind the amendment may now face a loss of credibility. Their influence with evangelical believers is a subject of keen interest in Washington, in part because the Bush campaign has made ensuring their turnout at the polls a top priority.

. . . .

Gay rights groups argue that social conservatives in Washington overestimated the level of anxiety about gay marriage among their supporters. "Other issues are far more important to most Americans, including evangelicals — issues like the economy, jobs, health care, the war in Iraq," said Matt Foreman, executive director of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force.

. . . .

The amendment's backers say that they always knew approval by Congress would be difficult, but that they had expected to get far enough that every candidate in the country would have to take a position on it in the fall. But although the amendment is bogged down, some opponents of same-sex marriage say they see evidence of support for their cause at the state level.

Some noted that Ohio, a traditional swing state, recently passed a law blocking not only same-sex marriage but civil unions. And five states that are considered reliably conservative — Georgia, Kentucky, Mississippi, Oklahoma and Utah — have put state constitutional amendments banning gay marriage on the November ballot.

. . . .

Conservatives are also trying to put state constitutional amendments on the ballot in several states that are considered pivotal swing states in the presidential election: Louisiana, Michigan, Ohio, Oregon, North Carolina and Arkansas. Missouri's Legislature voted Friday to add a ballot measure, too. The ballot questions could help motivate traditionalists to go to the polls, which would be a boon for President Bush and lower-level conservative candidates.

. . . .

But Mr. Foreman of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force suggested that watching gay weddings in Massachusetts would make people more accepting, not less.

"The minute you pose the question to somebody, ‘How will this hurt you?,’ they never have an answer," he said. "As this discussion has gone on and people have seen these images of regular people thrilled to be married, it has dispelled the myth and a lot of the fear around same-sex marriage."

All I know is one more misadventure involving a female soldier from West Virginia and we’ve got ourselves a very special episode of Celebrity Jeopardy.

It's incredible: The guy is so compassionate. His wife too: She doesn't seem to have any trouble reading to a bunch of kindergartners of color.

And now, there he is again, reading to a different roomful of black schoolchildren. It's amazing — photo after photo, 19 in all, and almost every single one of them giving further testimony to the astonishing capaciousness of the guy's Compassion, by which we are given to understand: He just has no trouble at all touching black people! Hammering with them, bagging groceries, tottering alongside them on weirdly high stools.

It's like Ben Hur among the lepers — the guy doesn't hesitate, he just goes and does it! Why, the Compassion page even includes a photo of him standing next to his own secretary of State, Colin Powell!

I mean, bracket for a moment some of the actual facts concerning the fate of blacks and other people of color across the years of the Bush administration. How, for instance, tax cuts massively skewed toward the wealthy favor whites, while the huge resultant deficits necessitate service cuts massively disfavoring the poor, a group that includes proportionally more blacks.

My question is, for whom is this photo gallery intended? Does anybody seriously think blacks are going to be swayed by one staged photo op after another, in which time and again their confederates are cast as the pitiable recipients of an ostentatious display of kingly compassion?

Maybe it's for the president's white supporters, anxious lest they be visited by tinges of self-doubt over their own arguable racism in continuing to support such a state of affairs. Maybe it's all just a mistake — some staffer messed up.

(Although in this context it's worth recalling Bush's own reply to a journalist in 2001 who, citing the new president's highly unusual refusal to address the annual meeting of the NAACP, had asked how he might respond to critics who said his "civil rights record was less than stellar." Smirking, the president replied: "Let's see. There I was sitting around the table with foreign leaders looking at Colin Powell and Condi Rice." End of discussion. Even some conservative commentators were taken aback by the glibness of that answer. Tucker Carlson called it a "lame response" and insulting to Powell and Rice for Bush to say, "I was sitting with black people when I was criticized.")

So let's just say that the Compassion photo page was some staff screw-up. Surely heads are going to roll; somebody is going to be held to account, right? They'll take down the site and somebody is going to take the fall. In fact, maybe they'll replace the Compassion file tab with a new one: I don't know, say: Accountability. And that slide show will display the administration's forthright approach in consistently facing up to and correcting policy lapses, featuring, one after the next, all the Bush appointees who, for failure to head off variously egregious foul-ups, have been required to resign. You know, people like … well, like … hmmm … oh heck, never mind. (link via Pandagon)

Once exposed, the torturer and the torturing nation tend to minimize the abuse. Maybe it wasn't torture. Captain Ben-Moshe, whose men had beaten Palestinians into unconsciousness, broken clubs over their bodies, and abandoned them in the rain in fields far from any house, told me that what his men had done was not torture. His men had not asked any questions of the Palestinians, so it couldn't be torture, he said, and he believed (wrongly) that they had actually failed to break any bones. He preferred to call the beatings punishment, though he conceded that the army had no right to punish.

 

The British government was called before the European Commission on Human Rights for torturing 14 Northern Irish Catholics in August 1971. The men were tortured in a secret location then moved to the Long Kesh internment camp near Belfast. In September 1976 the commission ruled that the British techniques (sleep deprivation, food deprivation, hooding, bombardment with noise, the forced assumption of painful positions, the humiliating denial of access to a toilet) amounted to torture and inhuman and degrading treatment. The Times of London, vigorously defending the actions, responded with an editorial explaining that the British should not be lumped with notorious regimes like those of Greece, Brazil, Iran, and Argentina, where the terror of continued pain forced victims to submit. The Times argued that the UK's techniques were more humane, designed merely to introduce mental disorientation so the victim's will to resist was lost. British editorial writers had a field day when the European Court overruled the commission in 1978, saying that the techniques, while inhuman and degrading, were not torture, because they did not "occasion suffering of the particular intensity and cruelty implied by the word 'torture.'" The Daily Telegraph called the ruling "a triumph." The Daily Express said that the British people were amazed that the case should have been brought at all.

 

In 1991 I tracked down the 14 Irish men. One had died of a heart attack in 1975 at the age of 45. His hair had turned white overnight in the wake of the torture, and he'd believed that he received messages from a television set in Long Kesh that told him how the camp should be run. Another man had died in 1984 at the age of 49, also of a heart attack. After the torture he'd seen rabbits in the ceiling of the prison and had tried to feed them. A third man had died in 1985 of stomach cancer. He was 54, and he'd become so averse to noise that he couldn't stand the sound of cars idling outside his house. One man had developed Hodgkin's disease in Long Kesh. He'd been shot in 1977 after his address was printed in a newspaper in an article about the torture. Another man had gone berserk and barricaded himself in his prison cell, believing his torturers were back. Two men who had survived to 1991 had been hospitalized in mental institutions. A third had been treated for depression and Crohn's disease and had not worked in the 20 years after his arrest. One man refused to talk about the ordeal, while another made several appointments with me for which he never showed.

 

The final refuge of the torturer and the torturing nation is the conviction that someone else is doing or has done something worse. Captain Ben-Moshe and Lieutenant Kochva, who had broken arms and legs in the West Bank, believed they were not as bad as the Americans in Vietnam, who, in their estimation, had become "animals." I interviewed an American interrogator who had tortured in Vietnam. He spoke of the viciousness of the South Vietnamese National Police. An Uruguayan told me that he had tortured to get information and that he had no hard feelings toward his victims, while the far worse Argentines had tortured to punish. A Rhodesian army tracker who had tortured children had a line he would not cross -- he, unlike others, did not attack anyone's genitals. President Bush now says we are better than the regime we replaced in Iraq, as if not being Saddam is the standard by which we should be judged.

GREENSBORO, Ga. -- Joined by President Bush, Vice President Cheney and a host of celebrities, hundreds of wealthy Republicans gathered at the Ritz-Carlton Lodge here in the first weekend in April, not for a fundraiser but for a celebration of fundraisers. It was billed as an "appreciation weekend," and there was much to appreciate.

As Bush "Pioneers" who had raised at least $100,000 each for the president's reelection campaign, or "Rangers" who had raised $200,000 each, the men and women who shot skeet with Cheney, played golf with pros Ben Crenshaw and Fuzzy Zoeller and laughed at the jokes of comedian Dennis Miller are the heart of the most successful political money operation in the nation's history. Since 1998, Bush has raised a record $296.3 million in campaign funds, giving him an overwhelming advantage in running against Vice President Al Gore and now Sen. John F. Kerry (D-Mass.). At least a third of the total -- many sources believe more than half -- was raised by 631 people.

When four longtime supporters of George W. Bush in 1998 developed a name and a structure for the elite cadre that the then-Texas governor would rely on in his campaign for president, the goal was simple. They wanted to escape the restraints of the public financing system that Congress had hoped would mitigate the influence of money in electing a president. Their way to do it was to create a network of people who could get at least 100 friends, associates or employees to give the maximum individual donation allowed by law to a presidential candidate: $1,000.

The Pioneers have evolved from an initial group of family, friends and associates willing to bet on putting another Bush in the White House into an extraordinarily organized and disciplined machine. It is now twice as big as it was in 2000 and fueled by the desire of corporate CEOs, Wall Street financial leaders, Washington lobbyists and Republican officials to outdo each other in demonstrating their support for Bush and his administration's pro-business policies.

. . . .

Of the 246 fundraisers identified by The Post as Pioneers in the 2000 campaign, 104 -- or slightly more than 40 percent -- ended up in a job or an appointment. A study by The Washington Post, partly using information compiled by Texans for Public Justice, which is planning to release a separate study of the Pioneers this week, found that 23 Pioneers were named as ambassadors and three were named to the Cabinet: Donald L. Evans at the Commerce Department, Elaine L. Chao at Labor and Tom Ridge at Homeland Security. At least 37 Pioneers were named to postelection transition teams, which helped place political appointees into key regulatory positions affecting industry.

A more important reward than a job, perhaps, is access. For about one-fifth of the 2000 Pioneers, this is their business -- they are lobbyists whose livelihoods depend on the perception that they can get things done in the government. More than half the Pioneers are heads of companies -- chief executive officers, company founders or managing partners -- whose bottom lines are directly affected by a variety of government regulatory and tax decisions.

When Kenneth L. Lay, for example, a 2000 Pioneer and then-chairman of Enron Corp., was a member of the Energy Department transition team, he sent White House personnel director Clay Johnson III a list of eight persons he recommended for appointment to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission. Two were named to the five-member commission.

Lay had ties to Bush and his father, former president George H.W. Bush, and was typical of the 2000 Pioneers. Two-thirds of them had some connection to the Bush family or Bush himself -- from his days in college and business school, his early oil wildcatting in West Texas, his partial ownership of the Texas Rangers baseball team and the political machine he developed as governor.

. . . .

For the 2004 election, the composition of the Pioneers has changed, reflecting the broad support the Bush administration has given and received from industries ranging from health care to energy.

Of the 246 known Pioneers from the 2000 election, about half -- 126 -- are Pioneers or Rangers again. They are joined by 385 new Pioneers and Rangers whose backgrounds are less from Texas and the Bush circle than from the nation's business elite, particularly Wall Street and such major players as Bear Stearns & Co. Inc., Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co.; Goldman Sachs Group Inc., Merrill Lynch & Co. Inc., Credit Suisse First Boston Inc. and Morgan Stanley & Co. Inc.

. . . .

No candidate in recent history was better positioned than George W. Bush to draw on so many disparate sources of wealth. The task for the four Bush friends who met in Midland, Tex., in late 1998 -- Texas Republican fundraiser and public relations specialist James B. Francis Jr., fundraiser Jeanne Johnson Phillips, state Republican chairman Fred Meyer and Don Evans, then a Texas oil man -- was to figure out how to capitalize on the extensive network of rich and powerful people that the governor, his father, brothers, uncles, grandfather and great-grandparents had built up over the past century.

. . . .

Two wings of the family, the Bushes and the Walkers, had long been entrenched in the industrial Midwest and on Wall Street. This establishment, in turn, had produced the investors who had bankrolled the venture of George H.W. Bush into the oil industry after World War II, his acquisition of wealth through oil and his ascent to national prominence.

The 41st president had, in pursuing his own political ambitions, built up a financial network that he in turn could pass on to two of his sons, George W. and Jeb.

. . . .

The first was that the Bush network was made up of men, and a scattering of women, who were used to writing big checks. Donations to Bush's gubernatorial campaigns, to the Republican National Committee's "Team 100," to Jeb Bush's Florida Republican Party and to the Bushes' earlier oil and baseball ventures had no contribution limits. Transfers and gifts of $100,000 or more were commonplace within this universe.

Federal elections, however, were different. A key provision of the 1974 Watergate reforms for the first time set a limit on individual contributions to a presidential campaign: a relatively paltry $1,000.

. . . .

Francis came up with the idea of making it a competition. "We purposely set the bar high," Francis said. "These are very successful, very competitive people," and the requirement of raising at least $100,000 in contributions of $1,000 or less was designed "to tap into their competitive instincts."

Not only would the fundraisers compete to make Pioneer, they would also vie to see who could raise the most money, and, even more significantly, who could recruit the largest number of other Pioneers.

. . . .

Soon after the 1998 Midland strategy session, Francis, Evans, Phillips and Meyer joined other campaign operatives in Dallas to put the plan to work. The four reported directly to Karl Rove, Bush's principal political adviser. Francis took charge of the Pioneer program. In addition to Bush family members and friends, Francis had essentially four spheres of money to mine, all of which overlapped at various points.

The first sphere was formed by the group of men who had repeatedly gambled on George W. Bush as an entrepreneur, investing in failed Bush ventures in the oil business and then joining Bush in the highly profitable acquisition of the Texas Rangers baseball team. The Rangers made millions for Bush and his partners.

The second sphere was made up of the Texas political elite and business community that supported him as governor. Many were involved in the energy industry. Others sought tighter restrictions on lawsuits against corporations and physicians. Gov. Bush had won approval of state legislation favorable to both of these constituencies.

The third sphere was made up of the Republican financial elite with strong ties to Bush's father, the 41st president.

. . . .

The importance of this legacy to George W. Bush is clearly reflected in the composition of the 246 men and women who would become Pioneers in 2000. At least 60 -- 24 percent -- had been supporters of Bush's father in the 1980 or 1988 campaigns.

The fourth sphere was composed of the supporters of Bush's fellow Republican governors, most importantly those of his brother, Jeb Bush in Florida. By November 1999, well before any primaries or caucuses had been held, George W. Bush already had the endorsements of 26 of 30 GOP governors.

The Bush campaign tapped these sources to raise a then-record $96.3 million for the primaries in 2000, far outdistancing Democrat Gore's $49.5 million. Both candidates received $68 million in public financing for the general election campaign.

In 2002, Congress enacted the McCain-Feingold bill banning contributions to political parties of what is known as "soft money" -- unlimited donations from corporations, unions or the wealthy. Instead, the legislation raised the "hard money" limit on contributions to candidates from $1,000 to $2,000.

. . . .

With soft money banned, the 2004 Bush campaign has greatly expanded the Pioneer program, setting a new record of more than $200 million raised so far. This year, Kerry, the presumptive Democratic nominee, followed Bush's lead and rejected public financing for his primary campaign, fearing he would be crushed by the Bush organization if he were forced to abide by the $45 million spending limits that accompany public financing. Kerry recently released a list of 182 people who have each raised a minimum of $50,000, helping to bring his total to at least $110 million.

. . . .

At least 64 Rangers and Pioneers are lobbyists, including Jack Abramoff, who until recently specialized in representing Indian tribes with gambling interests; Kirk Blalock, whose clients include Fannie Mae, the Health Insurance Association of America, and the Business Roundtable; Jack N. Gerard, president of the National Mining Association; and Lanny Griffith, whose clients include the American Trucking Associations, Brown & Williamson Tobacco Corp., the Southern Co., a major energy concern, and State Street Corp.

. . . .

Sometimes the interests of Pioneers are relayed in subtle, indirect ways, through members of Congress or Republican leaders, especially in the case of major administration bills enacted since Bush took office: three bills granting tax relief to the wealthy and to corporations, the 2003 Medicare bill supported by the drug industry and other major health lobbies, and pending legislation providing tax breaks and regulatory relief to the energy sector.

. . . .

Critics complain that the Pioneer and Ranger program allows the campaign to track those who raise big money while cloaking details about them from the public; campaigns are required to report the names of the individual donors, but not the fundraisers who solicit the donations.

"The campaign is tracking them and giving them credit -- and supposedly all the access and influence that comes with huge campaign contributions," said McDonald of Texans for Public Justice. He said the Bush campaign has never released a complete list of Pioneers and Rangers with the specific amounts of money they have raised. Once, in response to a lawsuit, campaign officials said that such a list was not available.

"It is unbelievable that the most successful fundraising list in the history of politics has been misplaced," McDonald said.

. . . .

On a bright Saturday morning, more than 300 of Bush's Pioneers and Rangers eschewed the links to gather in a windowless conference room. Sipping imported mineral water and coffee, Wall Street mingled with Texas.

. . . .

There they learned that the Rangers would soon lose their top status, just as the Pioneers had before them. Raising $200,000 was a starting point, they were told. But to qualify as a "Super Ranger," they would have to raise an additional $300,000 for the Republican National Committee, where the individual contribution limit is $25,000.

"The name of the game is maxing out the dollars," Oliver told the gathering.

. . . .

To reach the new goals, Travis Thomas, the Bush-Cheney finance director, explained to the gathered Rangers and Pioneers how they could hold fundraisers in their homes featuring an appearance by the president that would bring in $2 million to $3 million in bundled contributions. Private homes, he pointed out, are more comfortable for the president.

And, Thomas added, "If it is in a private residence, it can be closed to the press."

Funniest line in the article:

Asked whether the president gives any special preference to campaign contributors in making decisions about policy, appointments or other matters, White House spokesman Trent Duffy said, "Absolutely not." The president, Duffy said, "bases his policy decisions on what's best for the American people."

The Pentagon, however, called the assertions, "outlandish, conspiratorial, and filled with anonymous conjecture." It strongly denied that Rumsfeld, who has been under fire for the prisoner abuse scandal, or any Pentagon official had sanctioned the interrogation program.

Defense Department spokesman Lawrence Di Rita said the abuses of Iraqis at the Abu Ghraib prison depicted in photos and videos had "no basis in any sanctioned program, training manual, instruction, or order of the Department of Defense."

However, Newsweek's account is consistent with Hersh:

The Bush administration created a bold legal framework to justify this system of interrogation, according to internal government memos obtained by NEWSWEEK. What started as a carefully thought-out, if aggressive, policy of interrogation in a covert war—designed mainly for use by a handful of CIA professionals—evolved into ever-more ungoverned tactics that ended up in the hands of untrained MPs in a big, hot war. Originally, Geneva Conventions protections were stripped only from Qaeda and Taliban prisoners. But later Rumsfeld himself, impressed by the success of techniques used against Qaeda suspects at Guantanamo Bay, seemingly set in motion a process that led to their use in Iraq, even though that war was supposed to have been governed by the Geneva Conventions. Ultimately, reservist MPs, like those at Abu Ghraib, were drawn into a system in which fear and humiliation were used to break prisoners' resistance to interrogation. (link via Atrios)

Kevin Drum has more here and here. Josh Marshall observes:

[E]ven if we set aside the issue of whether there was this specific black operation -- noted by Hersh -- the basic story seems more and more clear, and increasingly confirmed from multiple sources. That is, that irregular methods originally approved for use against al Qaida terrorists who had just recently landed a devastating blow against the US, were later expanded (by which mix of urgency, desperation, reason, bad values or hubris remains to be determined) to the prosecution of the insurgency in Iraq.

In the words recently attributed to Gen. Miller, they Gitmo-ized the counterinsurgency operation in Iraq.

In other words, methods approved for use against the worst and most dangerous terrorists spread -- like ink through tissue paper -- to other military theaters that were, at best, only tangentially related to the war on terror. And this, I think we can say, is tied to the boundless, undefined and ever-expanding definition which the administration has given to the war on terror.

Encouraging schoolchildren to experiment with oral sex could prove the most effective way of curbing teenage pregnancy rates, a government study has found.

The story of course refers to a British government study, not an American one. Somehow I don't expect Bush and the rest of those advocating "abstinence-only" education to jump on this bandwagon.

Question: W looks doomed unless he manages to gin up a fourth crowd pleaser to spike his numbers back up. What do you think it will be? And when?

May 15 (Bloomberg) -- President George W. Bush faces the disapproval of a majority of Americans for the first time in his presidency, with only 42 percent saying they approve of the job he's doing, the lowest number yet in a Newsweek magazine poll.

Bush's overall job approval rating in the survey conducted May 13 and 14 fell from 49 percent in the last Newsweek poll almost a month ago, while the number of respondents who say they approve of his handling of Iraq also dropped to 35 percent from 44 percent. Forty-one percent of registered voters say they want Bush reelected, down from 46 percent.

. . . .

The thinning support for Bush, 57, hasn't pushed Senator John Kerry, the Massachusetts Democrat and presidential candidate, ahead of his opponent. The last Newsweek poll found that Kerry, 60, would have defeated Bush, if the election were held at that time, with 50 percent of the vote to Bush's 43 percent. In the new poll, the candidates are in a statistical tie.

. . . .

Bush's approval rating is now lower than the ratings Bill Clinton and Ronald Reagan enjoyed at the same point in their first terms as president, Newsweek said.

In May 1996, Clinton garnered a 48 percent approval rating while Reagan's rating reached 54 percent in May 1984, according to Newsweek. Both men were re-elected.

Gerald Ford, who lost his bid for a second term as president, had a 47 percent approval rating in May 1976. George H. W. Bush, who also failed to win re-election, had a 35 percent approval rating in May 1992.

The margin of error in the new poll of 1,010 adults, contacted by Princeton Survey Research Associates International for Newsweek, was plus or minus 3 percentage points.

Bush's approval rating is also at 42% in the new Zogby poll. Conventional wisdom is that an election involving an incumbent President is a referendum on his job performance, and that his approval rating mirrors the percentage of the vote he will receive in the election.

Atrios asks, "Do I hear the 30s calling?" God, I hope so. Just three points more. Down, down, down . . . .

The second news story that heaves more burdens on the president comes from an NBC News broadcast by Jim Miklaszewski on March 2. Apparently, Bush had three opportunities, long before the war, to destroy a terrorist camp in northern Iraq run by Abu Musab Zarqawi, the al-Qaida associate who recently cut off the head of Nicholas Berg. But the White House decided not to carry out the attack because, as the story puts it:

[T]he administration feared [that] destroying the terrorist camp in Iraq could undercut its case for war against Saddam.

The implications of this are more shocking, in their way, than the news from Abu Ghraib. Bush promoted the invasion of Iraq as a vital battle in the war on terrorism, a continuation of our response to 9/11. Here was a chance to wipe out a high-ranking terrorist. And Bush didn't take advantage of it because doing so might also wipe out a rationale for invasion.

The story gets worse in its details. As far back as June 2002, U.S. intelligence reported that Zarqawi had set up a weapons lab at Kirma in northern Iraq that was capable of producing ricin and cyanide. The Pentagon drew up an attack plan involving cruise missiles and smart bombs. The White House turned it down. In October 2002, intelligence reported that Zarqawi was preparing to use his bio-weapons in Europe. The Pentagon drew up another attack plan. The White House again demurred. In January 2003, police in London arrested terrorist suspects connected to the camp. The Pentagon devised another attack plan. Again, the White House killed the plan, not Zarqawi.

When the war finally started in March, the camp was attacked early on. But by that time, Zarqawi and his followers had departed.

This camp was in the Kurdish enclave of Iraq. The U.S. military had been mounting airstrikes against various targets throughout Iraq—mainly air-defense sites—for the previous few years. It would not have been a major escalation to destroy this camp, especially after the war against al-Qaida in Afghanistan. The Kurds, whose autonomy had been shielded by U.S. air power since the end of the 1991 war, wouldn't have minded and could even have helped.

But the problem, from Bush's perspective, was that this was the only tangible evidence of terrorists in Iraq. Colin Powell even showed the location of the camp on a map during his famous Feb. 5 briefing at the U.N. Security Council. The camp was in an area of Iraq that Saddam didn't control. But never mind, it was something. To wipe it out ahead of time might lead some people—in Congress, the United Nations, and the American public—to conclude that Saddam's links to terrorists were finished, that maybe the war wasn't necessary. So Bush let it be.

In the two years since the Pentagon's first attack plan, Zarqawi has been linked not just to Berg's execution but, according to NBC, 700 other killings in Iraq. If Bush had carried out that attack back in June 2002, the killings might not have happened. More: The case for war (as the White House feared) might not have seemed so compelling. Indeed, the war itself might not have happened.

As Kevin Drum puts it:

Unlike Saddam, Zarqawi really was developing poisons such as ricin and cyanide for use in terrorist attacks in the West and elsewhere. But we hesitated to take action because destroying the Ansar al-Islam camps might have been inconvenient for George Bush's speechwriters.

Bush was much more interested in ginning up a case for war against Saddam than in destroying, at minimal cost to us, actual terrorists. So he left Zarqawi and his training camp alone, resulting in the deaths (so far) of Nick Berg and hundreds of others. Instead, Bush embarked on the war with Iraq, in which we have spent obscene quantities of lives and dollars in order to destabilize the Middle East and breed thousands more terrorists. Absolutely sickening. Worst. President. Ever.

Things are kind of weird at Air America these days. No one disputes that the network, now in its seventh week, has had a rocky lift-off and continues to be buffeted by financial and managerial turbulence. It has lost key stations in two of its top three markets, Chicago and Los Angeles, and this week closed its sales offices there and laid off staff.

. . . .

[A]t least outside the revolving doors of the executive suites, the mood -- and news -- is good. Personalities for the various shows are beginning to emerge and the amateurish technical glitches are beginning to subside.

"People need to separate the business stuff from the on-air success," said Tom Taylor, editor of the industry newsletter Inside Radio. "I think they're doing a Herculean job."

The fledgling network continues to add new cities to its roster along with real advertisers such as Walgreens and Kay Jewelers (instead of public service announcements). Experts say its Internet presence -- drawing as many as 80,000 listeners an hour at http://www.airamericaradio.com -- is unparalleled. "Air America is far bigger than any other radio network's presence on the Internet," said Kurt Hanson, editor of RAIN, a radio and Internet newsletter. "It is the biggest success story for a U.S. broadcaster to date."

Will all that be enough to keep Air America aloft? Among the 100 or so staffers, the mood remains defiant and the mission clear.

"When they pay you to hate this [Bush] administration and to expose the lies, it's the best job in the world," said Lizz Winstead, the former Minnesotan who has taken over as programming chief in addition to her five-day-a-week show.

. . . .

[T]he business uncertainties remain a concern to some observers.

"The negative news doesn't make it any more attractive for a station to break its format and sign on in any long-term basis with Air America," said John Rash, director of broadcast negotiations for Minneapolis-based Campbell Mithun ad agency.

Michael Harrison, editor of the talk radio magazine Talkers, was more blunt:

"The impression one gets from this whole thing is that it's really more of a political campaign with contributers than it is a radio business with investors. That's been the thing that's made it seem so shaky to those inside the business. It doesn't follow the pattern of a business; it's more of a political movement. And radio is not a political machine. Radio is a medium." (link via Atrios)

I hope they find a good executive or two and get straightened out. It's a great station. If would be wonderful if they can do for liberalism what Rush Limbaugh has done for the Right.

Public support for President George W. Bush's handling of the war in Iraq has plunged to only 36 per cent and his approval rating has fallen to the lowest level of his presidency, according to a Zogby poll due out on Sunday.

Confronted with a rising US body count and images of torture in Abu Ghraib prison, Americans have begun to countenance failure in Iraq. The majority of people polled now do not think it was worth going to war.

The shift in the national mood bodes ill for Mr Bush's hopes of a second term and has bolstered the campaign of John Kerry, his Democrat challenger.

The poll will show 42 per cent of people approve of Mr Bush's overall performance. Almost two-thirds are critical of his handling of Iraq, according to John Zogby, the pollster.

. . . .

Most alarming to the strategists running Mr Bush's campaign is that 54 per cent of the 1,000-plus likely voters surveyed by Zogby this week said they thought the country was heading in the wrong direction.

Frank Luntz, the Republican pollster and political strategist, said public opinion was moving against the war: "The photographs projected everything the public thinks is wrong about the war and drowned out everything the public thinks is right . . .[The president] has to be concerned."

John Mueller, a political scientist at Ohio State University, says the situation in the US is now "fairly comparable . . . to late '67, early '68 when there was a really substantial decline of support".

Mr Mueller said that much as public backing for the Vietnam war never returned to 50 per cent-plus levels after 1968, so "it is hard to imagine much of a recovery now. As American casualties continue to come in, the support will continue to erode." (via Daily Kos)

As a former combat infantryman in World War II, I've always believed we must fully support our troops. Reluctantly, I now believe the best way to support troops in Iraq is to bring them home, starting with the "hand-over" on June 30.

Only a carefully planned withdrawal can clean up the biggest military mess miscreated in the Oval Office and miscarried by the Pentagon in my 80-year lifetime.

. . . .

After 9/11[,] Bush bravely took on a necessary fight against terrorists who attacked us. But then he diverted his attention to an unrelated and unnecessary "pre-emptive" war.

. . . . He led us astray by falsely claiming Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction that threatened us. After the "Mission Accomplished" boast in May 2003, he put our troops in new jeopardy by taunting terrorists from other countries with his "Bring 'em on!" challenge last July 2. His anything-goes-against-the-bad-guys attitude and his total lack of postwar planning helped prompt the ongoing prison-abuse embarrassments and brutal retaliations.

. . . .

Maybe Bush should take a cue from a fellow Texan, former president Lyndon Baines Johnson, who also had some cowboy characteristics.

LBJ, after mismanaging the Vietnam War that so bitterly divided the nation and the world, decided he owed it to his political party and to his country not to run for re-election. So, he turned tail and rode off into the sunset of his Texas ranch. (link via Atrios)

(CNN) -- As Americans express growing unease about Iraq, President Bush's job approval rating has taken a hit, according to a poll released Friday by CNN and Time magazine.

That development appears to be helping Sen. John Kerry, the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee. He wins the support of 51 percent of likely voters, compared to 46 percent for Bush. In February, Bush was ahead of Kerry by two percentage points.

If independent Ralph Nader is among the choices, Kerry gets 49 percent, Bush 44 percent and Nader 6 percent.

Bush's overall job approval rating fell from 49 percent to 46 percent since the last CNN/Time poll on April 8, while his disapproval rating rose from 47 percent to 49 percent -- the first time that more people disapproved of Bush's job performance than approved.

More people than not believe that going to war with Iraq was the right thing to do, but that number has declined to 48 percent in this poll, compared to 53 percent in April. And 56 percent of those polled say the war is not worth U.S. lives and other costs.

. . . .

The margin of error for the total sample of 1,001 adult Americans is 3.1 percentage points, but that margin varied for questions specifically asked of smaller groups, such as likely voters.

The prison abuse scandal stunned Americans, 27 percent of whom said it made them "less supportive" of the war in Iraq. And 55 percent of those polled said Bush is doing a poor job of handling Iraq, compared to 39 percent who said he was doing a good job.

. . . .

Kerry and Bush are essentially tied over who would handle Iraq better -- 46 percent to 43 percent.

Bush appears to have an advantage over Kerry on the war on terrorism with 49 percent saying he would do a better job, compared to 42 percent for Kerry. He also had the edge in "moral values" -- 46 percent to 42 percent.

On the question of who would do a better job, Kerry had big leads on health care, protecting the environment, reducing the deficit and reducing unemployment. He even did better than Bush on the question of taxes.

In the fight against terrorism -- one of Bush's strengths in many polls -- this poll showed a split over whether Bush is doing a good job. Forty-six of those polled said he was, but 47 percent said he was doing a poor job.

The poll also indicated that Bush's troubles may hurt the GOP in other races. On the generic ballot for congressional races, Democrats have a 13 point lead among likely voters.

Overall, those polled said they believed things are going well in the country, but they expressed growing concern about Bush.

Those with "doubts and reservations" about Bush's ability to lead the country rose from 55 percent to 59 percent while those who believe the president can be trusted as a leader dropped from 44 percent to 39 percent, since early February. (link via Daily Kos)

The arrogance, inconsistency, and unreliability of the administration's diplomacy have undermined American alliances, alienated friends, and emboldened our adversaries.

This statement is absolutely true, except that the "administration" it refers to is the Clinton administration. Supremely ironic.

President Bush and Senator John Kerry are pouring resources into more than 20 states in a struggle to master what both sides describe as one of the largest and most complex electoral playing fields in nearly 20 years.

The broad map, including such unusual additions as Arizona, Colorado and Louisiana as well as the traditionally contested states like Ohio, is partly the result of the vast amount of money each candidate has raised and their decision to quit a campaign finance system that would put a ceiling on their spending. That has allowed Mr. Bush and Mr. Kerry to spend - and experiment - in states they might otherwise have been forced to ignore, campaign aides said.

The new map also reflects demographic shifts that have put places like Arizona, a nominally Republican state, in play because of its growing Hispanic population, as well as polling that has found an increasing number of states that are nearly evenly divided. Campaign aides also say they feel pressure not to repeat what they view as Al Gore's mistake of abandoning states that ended up being decided by a few thousand votes.

The two campaigns are, as of now, looking at 22 states between them, a playing field that is about one-third larger than it was at this point in 2000. Analysts say it could expand even more in the months ahead, before undergoing the contraction that inevitably takes place after Labor Day, as the campaigns take stock of where they stand for the remaining 60 days of the contest.

. . . .

Arizona is one of the states that has caught the early attention of the candidates as they adjust to this new terrain. The changing demographics here - in particular, the increasing number of Hispanic voters - has made it more Democratic since 2000, when Mr. Bush defeated Mr. Gore by six percentage points, campaign aides said. A poll of Arizona voters conducted by KAET-TV and the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication at Arizona State University in late April found that Mr. Bush and Mr. Kerry were effectively tied.

. . . .

In these early days of a presidential contest, there is often a bit of bluster on both sides, as they seek to bluff the opposition to squander resources on what should be safe territory. Still, officials for each candidate noted the recriminations that Mr. Gore's campaign suffered after pulling out of states like Ohio and West Virginia, which he narrowly lost, and say they are determined to avoid decisions that could subject them to second-guessing in November.

Analysts outside the campaigns said there appeared to be less feinting than in any recent election. Mr. Kerry, for example, spent nearly $2 million last week on advertising in Colorado and Louisiana. Those are two states that had not been considered particularly competitive because Mr. Bush won them by more than seven percentage points in 2000. And Mr. Kerry campaigned in Louisiana on Friday and Saturday.

"It's an objective fact we have expanded the battleground," said Tad Devine, a senior adviser to Mr. Kerry. "And we intend to further expand it."

Mr. Bush quickly responded to Mr. Kerry's advertisements by putting his own advertisements up on the air in Louisiana and Colorado.

The Bush campaign has been advertising in Delaware, a move that has made Democrats nervous, even though Mr. Gore defeated Mr. Bush there by 13 percentage points in 2000. Aides to Mr. Bush said they were also likely to turn their attention to a second state that has been considered a lock for Democrats in presidential elections, New Jersey.

"You want to start out with a broader field and pare it down," said Matthew Dowd, one of Mr. Bush's chief strategists. "And we obviously have the resources to start broader."

A state is generally considered on the playing field if it was won by either Mr. Gore or Mr. Bush by six percentage points or less in 2000. There are 16 states that fall into that category: Arkansas, Florida, Iowa, Maine, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Mexico, Ohio, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Washington and Wisconsin.

Five of those states are considered the most competitive and most likely to consume a preponderance of the candidate's resources by October: Florida, Ohio and Missouri, where Mr. Bush won, and Pennsylvania and Iowa, where Mr. Gore won.

Beyond that, there are six states that while decided by a larger margin in 2000, were described by analysts and aides to Mr. Bush and Mr. Kerry as potentially in play this year: Arizona and West Virginia, followed by Delaware, Colorado, Louisiana and New Jersey.

Both sides are looking to pick off states that they lost last time and, notably, there is little disagreement about which states those are.

For Republicans, those are Pennsylvania, New Mexico, Wisconsin, Maine, Washington, Oregon, Iowa, Minnesota, Delaware and, possibly, Michigan. For Democrats, the states are Florida, Ohio, New Hampshire, Arizona, Missouri, Nevada, Arkansas, West Virginia, Colorado and Louisiana.

Some Democrats also include Tennessee, even though Mr. Gore, a native of that state, lost there to Mr. Bush by four points. That Mr. Bush and Mr. Kerry are roaming so broadly reflects the changing and more complex geography of presidential politics. An era when presidential competitions were dominated by a few large states like California, New York, New Jersey and Ohio has given way to a more intricate political canvas, with candidates spending money and time in states that a generation ago might have drawn barely a glance.

The need to try to win each winnable state, rather than simply striving to win a majority of the nationwide vote, is a legacy of the Electoral College, one of the least inspired ideas conceived by the Founding Fathers. With so many states in play, this will be a very expensive election, and money will play a big role. If you can afford it, consider clicking on the button to the left to donate money to Kerry.

This is no different than what happens at the Skull & Bones initiation. . . . I'm talking about people having a good time. These people -- you ever heard of emotional release? You ever heard of needing to blow some steam off?

• Only 44% approve of Bush's job performance, while 49% disapprove; this parallels the most recent Gallup poll, which showed 46% approval and 51% disapproval.
• On the handling of the economy, Bush fares even worse, with 34% approving of his performance and 60% disapproving. 
• Only 29% say the war "was worth it"; 64% say it was not.
• 60% of Americans say the abuse of Iraqi prisoners is a "very serious" problem for U.S. progress in Iraq; 23% say it is "somewhat serious"; 14% think it is "not serious." 
•  Only 31% of respondents say the U.S. is in control in Iraq, while 57% say it is not.
• 55% say the U.S. should turn Iraq over to the Iraqis as soon as possible; only 38% say U.S. troops should stay in Iraq "as long as it takes for stability."
• Only 31% say the U.S. is winning in Iraq; 10% say the Iraqi resistance is winning; 54% say neither side is winning.
• Only 6% of Americans are deluded enough to say that the war is improving the U.S. image in the Arab world; 73% say the war is making the U.S.' image worse; 14% say it makes "no difference."
• Only 43% approve of Rumsfeld's job performance, while 45% disapprove.
• 39% approve of Bush's handling of the war in Iraq; while 58% disapprove.
• 51% approve of Bush's handling of the campaign against terrorism (a 9% drop from two weeks ago), while 39% disapprove. (link via Atrios)

In the latest Gallup poll, John Kerry leads George Bush by five points among registered voters when Nader is included, and by 6 when he is not. How do we know just how strong a showing that is for Kerry?

Looking at the history of presidential races is one approach. No challenger has ever done as well against an elected incumbent at this point in the cycle. Every incumbent who won re-election had a double-digit lead over his challenger at this stage. Lyndon Johnson led Barry Goldwater by 59 points in the spring of ’64. Bill Clinton led Bob Dole by 14 points, Ronald Reagan led Walter Mondale by 17 and Richard Nixon was ahead of George McGovern by 11.

Of course, some incumbents who went on to lose were doing better than Bush is today. The president’s father led Clinton by six points at this stage but was beaten anyway.

Thus, Kerry’s margin is 11 points better than was Bill Clinton’s at a similar point in time against Bush I. What, you haven’t seen that "Kerry stronger than Clinton" headline?

Only one challenger has ever done as well against an incumbent at a comparable time in the election cycle. Jimmy Carter had a similar six-point lead over the unelected and subsequently defeated Gerald Ford. The nation had just been through the long national nightmare of Watergate and Ford had pardoned Nixon.

. . . .

[I]n most races involving incumbents the critical number is not the margin over the challenger but rather the percentage of the vote the incumbent is garnering. As sophisticated poll-watchers know, few incumbents get more votes on Election Day than they do in the last polls. Voters who are undecided at the end break overwhelmingly to the challenger.

With just 44 percent support in both of the two most recent polls, Bush is in real and serious trouble.

Democrats should not be popping champagne corks yet, but our party should be delighted that Kerry is turning in a stronger performance to date than any challenger since the advent of modern polling. (link via Daily Kos)

The administration and its Republican allies appear to have settled on a way to deflect attention from the torture of prisoners at Abu Ghraib: accuse Democrats and the news media of overreacting, then pile all of the remaining responsibility onto officers in the battlefield, far away from President Bush and his political team. That cynical approach was on display yesterday morning in the second Abu Ghraib hearing in the Senate, a body that finally seemed to be assuming its responsibility for overseeing the executive branch after a year of silently watching the bungled Iraq occupation.

The senators called one witness for the morning session, the courageous and forthright Maj. Gen. Antonio Taguba, who ran the Army's major investigation into Abu Ghraib. But the Defense Department also sent Stephen Cambone, the under secretary of defense for intelligence, to upstage him. Mr. Cambone read an opening statement that said Donald Rumsfeld was deeply committed to the Geneva Conventions protecting the rights of prisoners, that everyone knew it and that any deviation had to come from "the command level." A few Republican senators loyally followed the script, like Senator James Inhofe of Oklahoma, who offered the astounding comment that he was "more outraged by the outrage" than by the treatment of prisoners. After all, he said, they were probably guilty of something.

These silly arguments not only obscure the despicable treatment of the prisoners, most of whom are not guilty of anything, but also ignore the evidence so far. While some of the particularly sick examples of sexual degradation may turn out to be isolated events, General Taguba's testimony, and a Red Cross report from Iraq, made it plain that the abuse of prisoners by the American military and intelligence agencies was systemic. The Red Cross said prisoners of military intelligence were routinely stripped, with their hands bound behind their backs, and posed with women's underwear over their heads. It said they were "sometimes photographed in this position."

. . . .

It was alarming yesterday to hear General Taguba report that military commanders had eased the rules four times last year to permit guards to use "lethal force" on unruly prisoners. The hearing also disclosed that Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez, the commander in Iraq, had authorized the presence of attack dogs during interrogation sessions. It wasn't very comforting that he had directed that these dogs be muzzled.

These practices go well beyond any gray area of American values, international law or the Geneva Conventions. Mr. Cambone tried to argue that Mr. Rumsfeld had made it clear to everyone that the prisoners in Iraq were covered by those conventions. But Mr. Rumsfeld's public statements have been ambiguous at best, and General Taguba said that, in any case, the Abu Ghraib guards had received no training. . . . .

General Sanchez did give some misguided orders involving the Abu Ghraib prison and prisoners in general. But the deeply flawed mission in which he participates is the responsibility of the Bush administration. It was Mr. Bush and Mr. Rumsfeld, not General Sanchez, who failed to anticipate the violence and chaos that followed the invasion of Iraq, and sent American soldiers out to handle it without the necessary resources, manpower and training.

Bush's motto is always, "The Buck Stops Anywhere But Here."

THE BUSH administration still seeks to mislead Congress and the public about the policies that contributed to the criminal abuse of prisoners in Iraq. Yesterday's smoke screen was provided by Stephen A. Cambone, undersecretary of defense for intelligence. Mr. Cambone assured the Senate Armed Services Committee that the administration's policy had always been to strictly observe the Geneva Conventions in Iraq; that all procedures for interrogations in Iraq were sanctioned under the conventions; and that the abuses of detainees at the Abu Ghraib prison were consequently the isolated acts of individuals. These assertions are contradicted by International Red Cross and Army investigators, by U.S. generals overseeing the prisoners, and by Mr. Cambone himself.

. . . .

The Third Geneva Convention, which applies to prisoners of war and captured insurgents, says that they "may not be threatened, insulted, or exposed to any unpleasant or disadvantageous treatment of any kind" as a way to make them answer questions. The Fourth Geneva Convention, which covers people under foreign occupation, says "no physical or moral coercion shall be exercised against" them, "in particular to obtain information from them or from third parties." A senior Army official, Lt. Gen. Keith B. Alexander, testified that the Army believes its "harsh" techniques are allowed under these provisions. The Red Cross, which is designated by the conventions as their monitoring organization, believes otherwise: That the U.S. practices are in violation was one of the principal findings of its February report. U.S. forces were systematically breaking the conventions in five major ways, the report found, three of which concerned the treatment of prisoners under interrogation. It described the abuse as "standard operating procedure."

Mr. Cambone made no attempt to reconcile his claim of U.S. adherence to international law with the actual procedures his office has helped to promulgate. Instead he insisted that the crimes at Abu Ghraib -- which, though they went beyond the established practices, were based on the same principles -- were the responsibility of the guards and their commanders, and not the intelligence-gathering system. In this he was contradicted by the witness sitting next to him, Maj. Gen. Antonio M. Taguba, who repeated the conclusion of his own investigation: that the practices were introduced by intelligence interrogators who were improperly placed in command of the guards. (link via Talking Points Memo)

MORE NUMBERS: The new Gallup poll records Bush's approval rating at an all-time low of 46 percent. It's worth remembering that the Bush campaign has long seen job approval as one of the best predictors of victory or defeat for an incumbent president.

How does Bush compare to his predecessors? At this point in their losing reelection campaigns, Jimmy Carter was at 43 percent in the Gallup poll, and George H.W. Bush was at 42 percent. Their numbers kept sinking right up to Election Day. However, in their winning campaigns, Ronald Reagan was at 54 percent at this point, and Bill Clinton was at 55 percent. Neither of them ever dipped below 52 percent from May onward.

Bush is looking less like Reagan and Clinton and more like Carter and Bush Senior every day.

UPDATE: In its polling story this morning, USA Today adds the following about the history of job approval ratings and a president's reelection:

"For an incumbent to be at 46% job approval at this point in an election year has historically always spelled defeat" for presidents since 1950, says Frank Newport, editor in chief of the Gallup Poll. But he says it's a small sample; only eight presidents have sought re-election, five successfully. (via Political Animal)

In an attempt to quell growing international controversy last week, President Bush expressed outrage at the abuse of Iraqi prisoners. He told Arab television that he thinks "this is a serious matter" and that "we will fully investigate" (1). However, the President has yet to answer why no action was taken to deal with the problem in the last six months --when the Administration was repeatedly warned of "widespread" abuse (2).

Specifically, The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) delivered a confidential report to the White House earlier this year which "concluded that abuse of prisoners in Iraq in custody of U.S. military intelligence was widespread and in some cases 'tantamount to torture" (3). It also charged coalition forces with "serious violations" of the Geneva Conventions governing treatment of prisoners of war violations that may have been encouraged by Bush's "pre-war decision that the Geneva Conventions didn't apply" to detainees (4). The Red Cross said it had been aware of the situation in Abu Ghraib and "repeatedly asked the U.S. authorities to take corrective action," but were rebuffed (5).

Even top Administration officials were asking the White House to address the situation earlier, but were ignored. The Washington Post reported that "Secretary of State Colin L. Powell urged action in several White House meetings that included Rumsfeld" (6). Similarly, Coalition Provisional Authority chief Paul Bremer "repeatedly raised the issue of prison conditions as early as last fall - both in one-on-one meetings with Rumsfeld and other administration leaders, and in group meetings with the President's inner circle on national security" (7). But "the Pentagon repeatedly failed to act" (8). At the same time, the Red Cross was told by intelligence officials that the abuse it witnessed was just "part of the process" (9).

Sources:

1. President Bush Meets with Al Arabiya Television on Wednesday, 05/05/2004.

2. "Red Cross Found Widespread Abuse Of Iraqi Prisoners", Wall Street Journal, 05/07/2004 (subscription required).

3. Id.

4. "Pentagon intelligence chief appears before Senate panel", Fox News, 05/11/2004.

5. "Red Cross says it repeatedly warned about jail", Reuters, 05/06/2004.

6. "Bush Privately Chides Rumsfeld," Washington Post, 05/06/2004 (free registration required).

7. "Bush Apologizes for Abuse of Prisoners," Washington Post, 05/07/2004.

8. "Bush Privately Chides Rumsfeld," Washington Post, 05/06/2004.

9. "Red Cross Was Told Iraq Abuse 'Part of the Process", Reuters, 05/10/2004.

Didn't you know, in your gut, that something like Abu Ghraib would eventually come to light?

When the world first learned about the abuse of prisoners, President Bush said that it "does not reflect the nature of the American people." He's right, of course: a great majority of Americans are decent and good. But so are a great majority of people everywhere. If America's record is better than that of most countries — and it is — it's because of our system: our tradition of openness, and checks and balances.

Yet Mr. Bush, despite all his talk of good and evil, doesn't believe in that system. From the day his administration took office, its slogan has been "just trust us." No administration since Nixon has been so insistent that it has the right to operate without oversight or accountability, and no administration since Nixon has shown itself to be so little deserving of that trust. Out of a misplaced sense of patriotism, Congress has deferred to the administration's demands. Sooner or later, a moral catastrophe was inevitable.

Just trust us, John Ashcroft said, as he demanded that Congress pass the Patriot Act, no questions asked. After two and a half years, during which he arrested and secretly detained more than a thousand people, Mr. Ashcroft has yet to convict any actual terrorists. (Look at the actual trials of what Dahlia Lithwick of Slate calls "disaffected bozos who watch cheesy training videos," and you'll see what I mean.)

Just trust us, George Bush said, as he insisted that Iraq, which hadn't attacked us and posed no obvious threat, was the place to go in the war on terror. When we got there, we found no weapons of mass destruction and no new evidence of links to Al Qaeda.

Just trust us, Paul Bremer said, as he took over in Iraq. What is the legal basis for Mr. Bremer's authority? You may imagine that the Coalition Provisional Authority is an arm of the government, subject to U.S. law. But it turns out that no law or presidential directive has ever established the authority's status. Mr. Bremer, as far as we can tell, answers to nobody except Mr. Bush, which makes Iraq a sort of personal fief. In that fief, there has been nothing that Americans would recognize as the rule of law. For example, Ahmad Chalabi, the Pentagon's erstwhile favorite, was allowed to gain control of Saddam's files — the better to blackmail his potential rivals.

And finally: Just trust us, Donald Rumsfeld said early in 2002, when he declared that "enemy combatants" — a term that turned out to mean anyone, including American citizens, the administration chose to so designate — don't have rights under the Geneva Convention. Now people around the world talk of an "American gulag," and Seymour Hersh is exposing My Lai all over again. (link via Atrios)

GENEVA - The Red Cross saw American officers mistreating Abu Ghraib prisoners by keeping them naked in total darkness in empty cells, and up to 90 percent of Iraqi detainees were arrested by mistake, according to a report disclosed Monday.

The report by the International Committee of the Red Cross supports its allegations that abuse of Iraqi prisoners by American soldiers was broad and "not individual acts" - contrary to President Bush's contention that the mistreatment "was the wrongdoing of a few."

"ICRC delegates directly witnessed and documented a variety of methods used to secure the cooperation of the persons deprived of their liberty with their interrogators," according to the confidential report.

The delegates saw in October how detainees at Abu Ghraib were kept "completely naked in totally empty concrete cells and in total darkness," the report said. It said it found evidence supporting prisoners' allegations of other forms of abuse during arrest, initial detention and interrogation.

Among the evidence were burns, bruises and other injuries consistent with the abuse that prisoners alleged, it said.

The 24-page document, confirmed by the ICRC as authentic after it was published Monday by the Wall Street Journal, said the abuses were primarily during the interrogation stage by military intelligence.

Once the detainees were moved to regular prison facilities, the abuses typically stopped, it said.

The report cites abuses - some "tantamount to torture" - including brutality, hooding, humiliation and threats of "imminent execution."

"These methods of physical and psychological coercion were used by the military intelligence in a systematic way to gain confessions and extract information and other forms of cooperation from person who had been arrested in connection with suspected security offenses or deemed to have an 'intelligence value.'"

. . . .

It said some coalition military intelligence officers estimated "between 70 percent and 90 percent of the persons deprived of their liberty in Iraq had been arrested by mistake. They also attributed the brutality of some arrests to the lack of proper supervision of battle group units."

. . . .

[Pierre] Kraehenbuehl [, ICRC director of operations] said the abuse of prisoners represented more than isolated acts, and that the problems were not limited to Abu Ghraib.

"We were dealing here with a broad pattern, not individual acts. There was a pattern and a system," he said, declining to give further details.

The report described how male prisoners were forced to parade around in women's underwear.

It said that information obtained "suggested the use of ill-treatment against persons deprived of their liberty went beyond exceptional cases and might be considered a practice tolerated by" coalition forces.

Since 9/11, a handful of officials at the top of the Defense Department and the vice president's office have commandeered American foreign and defense policy. In the name of fighting terror they have systematically weakened the traditional restraints that have made this country respected around the world. Alliances, international institutions, norms and ethical conventions have all been deemed expensive indulgences at a time of crisis.

Within weeks after September 11, senior officials at the Pentagon and the White House began the drive to maximize American freedom of action. They attacked specifically the Geneva Conventions, which govern behavior during wartime. Donald Rumsfeld explained that the conventions did not apply to today's "set of facts." He and his top aides have tried persistently to keep prisoners out of the reach of either American courts or international law, presumably so that they can be handled without those pettifogging rules as barriers. Rumsfeld initially fought both the uniformed military and Colin Powell, who urged that prisoners in Guantanamo be accorded rights under the conventions. Eventually he gave in on the matter but continued to suggest that the protocols were antiquated. Last week he said again that the Geneva Conventions did not "precisely apply" and were simply basic rules.

The conventions are not exactly optional. They are the law of the land, signed by the president and ratified by Congress. Rumsfeld's concern—that Al Qaeda members do not wear uniforms and are thus "unlawful combatants"—is understandable, but that is a determination that a military court would have to make. In a war that could go on for decades, you cannot simply arrest and detain people indefinitely on the say-so of the secretary of Defense.

The basic attitude taken by Rumsfeld, Cheney and their top aides has been "We're at war; all these niceties will have to wait." As a result, we have waged pre-emptive war unilaterally, spurned international cooperation, rejected United Nations participation, humiliated allies, discounted the need for local support in Iraq and incurred massive costs in blood and treasure. If the world is not to be trusted in these dangerous times, key agencies of the American government, like the State Department, are to be trusted even less. Congress is barely informed, even on issues on which its "advise and consent" are constitutionally mandated.

Leave process aside: the results are plain. On almost every issue involving postwar Iraq—troop strength, international support, the credibility of exiles, de-Baathification, handling Ayatollah Ali Sistani—Washington's assumptions and policies have been wrong. By now most have been reversed, often too late to have much effect. This strange combination of arrogance and incompetence has not only destroyed the hopes for a new Iraq. It has had the much broader effect of turning the United States into an international outlaw in the eyes of much of the world.

Whether he wins or loses in November, George W. Bush's legacy is now clear: the creation of a poisonous atmosphere of anti-Americanism around the globe. I'm sure he takes full responsibility. (link via Atrios)

WIESBADEN, Germany - The two military intelligence soldiers, assigned interrogation duties at the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq, were young, relatively new to the Army and had only one day of training on how to pry information from high-value prisoners.

But almost immediately on their arrival in Iraq, say the two members of the 205th Military Intelligence Brigade, they recognized that what was happening around them was wrong, morally and legally.

They said in interviews Friday and yesterday that the abuses were not caused by a handful of rogue soldiers poorly supervised and lacking morals but resulted from failures that went beyond the low-ranking military police charged with abuse.

The beatings, the two soldiers said, were meted out with the full knowledge of intelligence interrogators, who let military police know which prisoners were cooperating with them and which were not.

"I was told, 'Don't worry about it - they probably deserved it,'" one of the soldiers said in an interview, referring to complaints he made while trying to persuade the Army to investigate. "I was appalled."

The two soldiers are the first from a military intelligence unit known to speak publicly about what happened at Abu Ghraib, and they are the first from such a unit to contend publicly that some interrogators were complicit in the abuses. The soldiers stressed that not all interrogators were involved.

. . . .

"Everybody knew what was going on, but when we complained, we were ignored," said one of the soldiers. "We knew some [military police] were getting some blame, but what we were complaining about went way beyond them."

"We weren't at the other holding areas, so I don't want to say for sure the same thing was going on at them," said the other soldier, both of whom are in their 20s. "But it was going on there. The guys doing the interrogating, the MPs, they were all the same guys, going one place to the other. We were the standard on how to treat the prisoners."

. . . .

The two soldiers hold the relatively low rank of specialist, which is more a reflection of their time in the Army - less than three years.

Though they entered Iraq with no training in interrogation, they were assigned to extract information from prisoners considered of high intelligence value - ranking Baath Party members and suspected insurgents, for example - and report on their findings.

They had access to prisoner files, they said, and interviewed several Iraqis who claimed they had been beaten by military police after being told by intelligence interrogators that they would be punished for their lack of cooperation.

"There would be the handoff from MI [Military Intelligence] to the MPs, and the word would be, 'Here you go, here's one who's not cooperating,'" one of the soldiers said. "Then - What do you know? - that prisoner ends up beaten or paraded around naked."

One of the soldiers witnessed military intelligence interrogators put one Iraqi naked under an outside shower for four hours in view of other prisoners, a violation of the Geneva Conventions, which the soldiers said they were briefed on.

They encountered another Iraqi prisoner whose face was badly disfigured from a beating, but they said complaints about this were also ignored even after they questioned other injured Iraqis and found a pattern of them being abused.

"I have an obligation to the Army, and I have an obligation to follow my orders," one of the soldiers said. "I also have an obligation to be a decent person and do what's right and to do what I can to get the truth out."

The soldiers interviewed estimate that about 3,000 Iraqis were held by the U.S. military at Abu Ghraib prison, the most notorious of Saddam Hussein's torture facilities.

. . . .

About 800 Iraqis were in the section the two soldiers were assigned to. To interview all of those prisoners, only about 20 two-person teams of interrogators - called "Tiger Teams" - were available, and they had access to even fewer interpreters.

Interrogations typically lasted three hours, often more, which led to the backup of prisoners.

"We were working 12-hour days, sometimes more, six days a week - and then catching up on the seventh day," one of the soldiers said. "It's not like we weren't working. We just didn't have enough guys."

As described by the soldiers, military intelligence was under enormous pressure to get "actionable intelligence" during this time. The soldiers were working from two lists of tactics to get Iraqis to talk.

The "A" list included directly asking for information as well as relatively mild interrogation techniques, such as becoming angry with the prisoner or threatening to withhold meals - but not actually doing so. The interrogators were free to use these techniques at their will.

The "B" list included harsher techniques, such as sleep deprivation and withholding meals.

These techniques were considered acceptable, but because they were also considered close to the line of abuse, the interrogators could not use them without permission from their commanding officer, Col. Thomas Pappas, or his designate.

Around November, with casualties among U.S. troops rising, Saddam Hussein still in hiding and solid intelligence becoming more urgent, Pappas issued an order that broadened acceptable interrogation methods.

"I think he was referring to any techniques on the A and B lists," the soldier said. "But there was kind of the third list, the unofficial list. Guys called that the 'made-up list.'"

'Wild, wild west'

The made-up list spawned a couple of other terms, the soldiers said: "going cowboy" and "wild, wild west."

"I don't know where they got this from, but the MPs would say it all the time," one of the soldiers said. "MI would drop off a guy who wasn't talking, and the MP would say, 'So looks like I'll be going cowboy on him' or 'Looks like he needs some wild, wild west.'"

The terms meant beatings, they said, and the military intelligence interrogators and private contractors did nothing to discourage them.

They do not believe, the soldiers said, that Pappas realized the extent of the abuses. A Pentagon source last week said that Pappas had received a severe letter of reprimand, which will most likely end his career. The letter was a result of an investigation by Maj. Gen. Antonio M. Taguba.

. . . .

Many of the military intelligence interrogators were paired with private contractors from CACI International and with linguists from Titan Inc. The soldiers said most of those employees seemed to operate with autonomy, seemingly answerable to nobody in the command.

"They would say it right out, that 'we don't answer to you,'" one of the soldiers said. The Taguba report recommended that two of the contractors employed by CACI be dismissed.

. . . .

"Here's my point," one of the soldiers said. "All this that's going on? All these pictures all over the place, the whole world hating even more the United States? If two specialists could see how serious it was, how come nobody else could?" (link via Atrios)