The Agonist - USA

Court respite for Blackwater guard

Sat, 21 Nov 2009 07:01:05 -0800

Associated Press | November 21

Al Jazeera -
The US justice department intends to drop manslaughter and weapons charges against one of the Blackwater Worldwide security guards involved in a deadly 2007 Baghdad shooting, according to court documents.

A one-paragraph notice filed on Friday says only that prosecutors have asked that the case against Nicholas Slatten be dropped.

The government's detailed request to the court was filed with the judge and with the defendant, but was not made public.

The shooting in Nisoor Square left 17 Iraqis dead and inflamed anti-American sentiment abroad.

Philip Morris ordered to pay $300 million to smoker

Fri, 20 Nov 2009 12:05:33 -0800

Gina Keating & Carol Bishopric | Los Angeles | November 20

Reuters - A Florida jury on Thursday ordered cigarette maker Philip Morris USA to pay $300 million in damages to a 61-year-old ex-smoker named Cindy Naugle who is wheelchair-bound by emphysema.

The Broward Circuit Court jury assessed $56.6 million in past and future medical expenses against the company, part of Altria Group Inc, as well as $244 million in punitive damages.

The verdict is the largest of the so-called Engle progeny cases that have been tried so far, both sides said.

Philip Morris will seek further review of the verdict because of "numerous erroneous rulings by the trial judge," Philip Morris spokesman Murray Garnick said in a statement.

"We believe that the punitive damages award is grossly excessive and a clear violation of constitutional and state law," Garnick said.

House Panel Votes to Advance Paul Plan on Fed Audits

Thu, 19 Nov 2009 19:12:10 -0800

Scott Lanman | Washington | November 19

Bloomberg - A U.S. House committee advanced a proposal to remove a three-decade ban on congressional audits of Federal Reserve interest-rate decisions, a measure backed by a lawmaker who has called for the abolition of the central bank.

The House Financial Services Committee today, in a 43-26 vote and a second voice vote, attached the amendment for a broad audit of the Fed to legislation creating a council of regulators to monitor systemic risk. The proposal was offered by Representative Ron Paul, a Republican from Texas, and based on a bill with more than 300 co-sponsors.

Fed Chairman Ben S. Bernanke has opposed the Paul legislation, saying it may result in interference with monetary policy. The panel’s vote increases the possibility that Congress will reverse the ban on audits of interest-rate decisions. The broader bill on financial regulation is subject to a vote by the committee, then must be approved by the House and Senate and signed into law by President Barack Obama.

“It’s going to be seen as weakening the independence of monetary policy with consequent negative implications,” Barney Frank, the Massachusetts Democrat who chairs the committee, told reporters after the vote. “People are going to be worried about the impact on the dollar, on the interest rate.”

Frank, who opposed the Paul measure, said the issue “may be revisited” when the legislation reaches the House floor.

h/t Zero Hedge: Paul-Grayson Amendment To Audit The Fed Passes Overwhelmingly By 43-26
Grayson Remarks On The Passing Of The Paul-Grayson Amendment As Well As A Full List Of Voters

Libyan Leader in Italy Seeks Tall, Leggy and Pious

Tue, 17 Nov 2009 03:32:03 -0800

Rachel Donadio | Rome | November 16

NYT - The 200 women who answered a Rome modeling agency’s advertisement for tall, attractive party guests thought they would be attending an elegant soirée on Sunday. They were — only the host turned out to be the Libyan leader, Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi, and instead of hors d’oeuvres he offered them copies of the Koran and urged them to convert to Islam, the Italian news media reported Monday.

The women, all between the ages of 18 and 35, assembled in a Rome hotel before being screened by both metal detectors and the fashion police, who turned away anyone in a miniskirt or provocative clothing, according to Paola Lo Mele, a journalist for the ANSA news agency, who answered the modeling agency’s request and went undercover to the event. The women were each paid $75 to attend.

Colonel Qaddafi and other world leaders are in Rome for the World Summit on Food Security of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations.

The women who made the cut were bused to a villa in Rome, ANSA reported, where they waited an hour, unsure of what was to follow, before the famously late Libyan leader arrived.

“All the girls expected a party with a gala dinner,” Ms. Lo Mele reported. Instead, Colonel Qaddafi “made a 45-minute speech on Islam and women’s role in Islam.” He gave the women a copy of the Koran and said that he would pay for them to visit Mecca, the duty of every Muslim, if they converted.

Catholic Bishops' leader defends role in health debate, (& swipes at New York Times)

Mon, 16 Nov 2009 15:35:03 -0800

Julia Duin | Baltimore | Nov 16

Washington Times - Cardinal Francis George, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, defended the bishops' involvement in national health care legislation Monday, saying the church must be "leaven" in the debate.

Speaking at the opening of the bishops' annual business meeting, "to limit our teaching or governing to what the state is not interested in would be to betray both the constitution of our country and, much more importantly, the Lord himself," he said.

Not only did USCCB staff and individual bishops play a vital role in getting abortion restrictions into the recently passed House version of the health care overhaul bill, they served notice Monday they will influence the bill's future.

"We will work to persuade the Senate to follow the example of the House and include these critical safeguards in their version of health care reform legislation," Cardinal George said.

Other prelates expressed jubilation at how the USCCB's lobbying proved crucial to the House bill's passage earlier this month as well as anger at some of their critics.

"This is a principled position, not a political position," Bishop William Murphy of Rockville Centre said.

In a reference to the New York Times, "The grey lady of New York has continued to misrepresent this as a fundamental change to the availability of abortion in this country being curtailed because of the nefarious bishops," he added. "That is not the case."

Sex infections still growing in U.S., says CDC

Mon, 16 Nov 2009 05:18:21 -0800

Maggie Fox | Washington | November 16

Reuters - American squeamishness about talking about sex has helped keep common sexually transmitted infections far too common, especially among vulnerable teens, U.S. researchers reported Monday.

Latest statistics on chlamydia, gonorrhea and syphilis show the three highly treatable infections continue to spread in the United States.

"Chlamydia and gonorrhea are stable at unacceptably high levels and syphilis is resurgent after almost being eliminated," said John Douglas, director of the division of sexually transmitted diseases at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

"We have among the highest rates of STDs of any developed country in the world," Douglas added in a telephone interview.

[...]

Overall, CDC estimates that 19 million new sexually transmitted infections occur each year, almost half among 15- to 24-year-olds.

Obama, Vietnam, and Afghanistan

Sat, 14 Nov 2009 06:05:07 -0800

I've spent a good part of the last week re-reading Neil Sheehan's book, A Bright Shining Lie: John Paul Vann and America in Vietnam. Partly, this is just happenstance; I found a nicely annotated hardback copy in a local used book store. But it's also because I wanted to look again at the 1962-64 period of the Vietnam War to see how much it resembles our current situation in Afghanistan. I don't have good news to report.

Starting in earnest in 1962, the U.S. began arming the Viet Cong inadvertently through the strategic hamlet and strategic outpost programs. The communist side in the South was not relying on Chinese or Soviet supplies, except for heavy weapons that could not easily be captured. They got all the guns and ammo they needed simply by taking them from the people the U.S. handed them out to. The strategic hamlet program turned the peasants against the Saigon regime for good. Indiscriminate bombing of villages turned the rural populace into mortal foes of the United States. The cities were lost because the Catholic regime was brutal, corrupt, and attempted to crush the power of the Buddhist leadership.

The parallels to Afghanistan are not perfect, but the situations have enough commonality to give serious pause. The most worrisome feature is the corruption and illegitimacy of the Karzai Regime. If this was 1963, our ambassador would be plotting a coup to make sure Karzai and his opium-selling brother were assassinated and replaced by a (hopefully) more competent and popular successor. But, with hindsight, we know that that gambit didn't save South Vietnam and it probably wouldn't save Afghanistan either.

Another commonality is the weakness of the Afghan National Army. Like the ARVN before it, the Afghan Army is losing the countryside to a more determined and dedicated foe. It's undermanned, most of its troops are AWOL, and it serves a corrupt and incompetent government. We tried to turn the ARVN into a lethal fighting force for two decades, and we failed. If the Afghan Army is going to turn out better, we need to know why.

Like Lyndon Johnson, President Obama has to take over the war planning from a previous president. He still has some of the same advisers that Bush relied upon. He's being urged to make a major investment in troops to salvage a deteriorating situation. It's no wonder he's just rejected all of the options presented to him by his national security team. Obama is demanding the kinds of answers that were never answered in 1964-65 when the decision was made to escalate in Vietnam. Namely, how are these investments going to change the basic reality that the central government is weak, corrupt, and illegitimate?

Now, the one big difference between Afghanistan and Vietnam is that the Taliban are not considered to be heroes like Ho Chi Minh's Viet Minh armies were by the Vietnamese. The Taliban don't have nationwide legitimacy, and they are openly feared and loathed by most of the Afghan population. In that sense, we can be sure that we aren't fighting on the wrong side of this war. But we can't be sure that we will be any more successful, because there is little evidence that we can be at any realistic price.

I hope Obama holds out until he has a plan that makes sense and has a definite end point.

Using the Web to adjust the color on TV

Sat, 14 Nov 2009 06:01:00 -0800

Minorities find a warm reception through online channels

Washington Post, By DeNeen L. Brown, November 15

A black superwoman appears on your laptop in shimmering blue tights, green socks and a midnight blue cape. Her hair in Afro puffs, she is sitting on a promenade bench. She looks worried and a bit worn out. Her makeup is smeared, probably from crying.

She tells us she has just caught her boyfriend with a "second-rate superhero." The nerve of him.

The woman, who identifies herself as Fantastica, climbs a railing on a ledge several stories aboveground.

She holds tight to the rail behind her, breathes deeply, then announces dramatically: "Death over dishonor." And lets go.

You shout at your computer: Girl, don't go out like that over a man.

Khadr to face charges in U.S.

Fri, 13 Nov 2009 11:05:55 -0800

Washington | November 13

CBC - Omar Khadr will be transferred to the United States from Guantanamo Bay to face charges in a military commission, the U.S. Department of Justice announced Friday, on the same day that the Supreme Court of Canada heard a federal government appeal in his case.

It is unclear when or where the 23-year-old inmate will be transferred, but he is one of 10 high-profile detainees to be sent to the U.S. to face justice.

Five of those inmates, including Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, alleged mastermind of the Sept. 11, 2001, hijackings, will be on trial in a federal civilian court in New York City.

Five other inmates, including Khadr, will be headed to military commissions in the United States on a variety of terrorism charges.

News of his transfer came on the same day as the Canadian government pleaded its appeal in the Supreme Court on Khadr's latest case. Ottawa asked the top court to overturn a Federal Appeal Court decision to uphold a lower-court ruling that required Ottawa to try to repatriate Khadr, the only Western citizen still being held at the U.S. military base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

On Friday, Conservative MP Pierre Poilievre told reporters that "any decision to ask for Mr. Khadr’s return to Canada is a decision for the democratically elected government of Canada and not for the courts.”

Asked whether that meant the government would ignore the Supreme Court's decision if it rules against it, Poilievre repeated that Khadr's fate should be decided by an elected government and not the courts.

9/11 suspects to be tried in New York: Official

Reuters, By Jeremy Pelofsky and James Vicini, November 13

WASHINGTON -- U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder said Friday that he planned to seek the death penalty against the five men accused of plotting the Sept. 11 attacks if they are convicted in federal criminal court.

"I fully expect to direct prosecutors to seek the death penalty against each of the alleged 9/11 conspirators," Holder told reporters in unveiling plans to try the men, including the alleged plot mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, in federal court.

Mohammed and four other top terrorism suspects held at Guantanamo Bay are to be sent to New York to be tried in a criminal court, the first major step to closing the controversial prison.

U.S. will try 9/11 plotters in New York, foresaking military trials

Miami Herald, By Carol Rosenberg, November 13

Confessed 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheik Mohammed and his four co-accused will face a federal trial in New York City — not a military tribunal in Guantánamo, Attorney General Eric Holder announced Friday.

Charges against the alleged al Qaeda kingpin have not yet been filed in the Manhattan court.

But President Barack Obama's administration has decided to abandon a Pentagon prosecution and pursue the case of the mass murder case of nearly 3,000 people on Sept. 11, 2001 in a civilian setting.

"They will be brought to New York -- to New York -- to answer to their alleged crimes in a courtroom just blocks away from where the Twin Towers once stood,'' Holder said.

Khadr to face U.S. military tribunal

The Globe And Mail, By Paul Koring, November 13

Canadian Omar Khadr, the last westerner left in Guantanamo Bay, will face trial by military tribunal unlike the high-profile Sept 11, 2001, attacks plotters who will be brought to New York for trial in a civilian courts where they have far greater rights and protections, U.S. officials announced Friday.

Mr. Khadr's lawyer Barry Coburn, accused the administration of resorting to Bush-era injustice.

“We thought that the incoming Obama administration signalled a new day with respect to these cases, a new respect for civil liberties, an abhorrence of torture, a respect for the time-honored legal procedures and protections that are mandated by the Constitution and enforced by the federal courts,” he said.

Instead and despite the president's promises it has failed “to make these fundamental protections available to Omar Khadr, who was fifteen years old when he was detained in Afghanistan as a child soldier and has been locked away in Guantanamo ever since, is, quite frankly, devastating and shocking to me personally.

“I had thought this administration was better than that.”

Key 9/11 Suspect to Be Tried in New York

New York Times, By Charlie Savage, November 13

WASHINGTON — Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, the self-described mastermind of the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, and four other men accused in the plot will be prosecuted in federal court in New York City, the United States attorney general announced Friday.

But the administration will prosecute another set of high-profile detainees now being held at the military prison at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba — Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri, who is accused of planning the 2000 bombing of the Navy destroyer Cole in Yemen, and four other detainees — before a military commission.

Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. announced those decisions in a news conference Friday at the Department of Justice. The arrangements would mean that civilian prosecutors would handle those detainees accused of the 2001 terrorist attacks, which killed nearly 3,000 people in New York, northern Virginia and Pennsylvania, while the 2000 attack against the Cole would remain within the military system.

No detainee is being moved right away. Under a law Congress enacted this year, lawmakers must be given 45 days notice before the executive branch moves any Guantánamo Bay detainee onto United States soil.

The decision marks a milestone in the administration’s efforts to close the Guantánamo prison, something that President Obama announced shortly after taking office that he would do within a year, but that has proved difficult to achieve because of uncertainty about what to do with the detainees housed there.

Water Found on Moon, Scientists Say

Fri, 13 Nov 2009 10:35:46 -0800

Kenneth Chang | Moffett Field, CA | November 13

NYT - There is water on the Moon, scientists stated unequivocally on Friday, and considerable amounts of it.

“Indeed yes, we found water,” Anthony Colaprete, the principal investigator for NASA’s Lunar Crater Observation and Sensing Satellite, said in a news conference.

The confirmation of scientists’ suspicions is welcome news both to future explorers who might set up home on the lunar surface and to scientists who hope that the water, in the form of ice accumulated over billions of years, could hold a record of the solar system’s history.

The satellite, known as Lcross (pronounced L-cross), slammed into a crater near the Moon’s south pole a month ago. The impact carved out a hole 60- to 100-feet wide and kicked up at least 24 gallons of water.

“We got more than just whiff,” said Peter H. Schultz, a professor of geological sciences at Brown University and a co-investigator of the mission. “We practically tasted it with the impact.”

Four mosques seized in US

Fri, 13 Nov 2009 06:09:21 -0800

November 13

Al Jazeera -
US authorities have moved to seize four mosques in New York City and a Manhattan skyscraper owned by a non-profit Muslim organisation suspected of having secret links with Iran.

In what could prove to be one of the biggest counterterrorism seizures in US history, federal prosecutors filed a civil complaint on Thursday seeking the forfeiture of more than $500m in assets from the foundation.

They said the Alavi Foundation have long been suspected of illegally sending money to the Iranian government.

US judge bans Christian car plate

Wed, 11 Nov 2009 14:31:27 -0800

Columbia, SC | November 11

BBC - A US judge has ordered South Carolina not to issue a vehicle number plate with a Christian image and slogan.

The state legislature had approved a licence plate with a cross in front of a stained glass window and the words "I Believe" written along the top.

District Judge Cameron Currie said that the plate violated the First Amendment, which enshrines the separation of church and state.

A similar bid by a group in Florida last year did not pass state lawmakers.

[...]

And she hit out at Mr Bauer, saying: "Whether motivated by sincerely-held Christian beliefs or an effort to purchase political capital with religious coin, the result is the same.

"The statute is clearly unconstitutional and defence of its implementation has embroiled the state in unnecessary (and expensive) litigation."

Killing for God

Wed, 11 Nov 2009 11:27:21 -0800

The highly disturbing mass murder at the Fort Hood Army base in Texas reveals the obvious truth and some more obscure ones. Surely there is no surprise anymore when a person kills because of some religious conviction. This has gone on as long as humans have had religious beliefs of any kind, from the most primitive societies to the most advanced ones. What is more intriguing is what truths about the event are not so easily diagnosed and accepted.

Please read the rest of my article at:

http://searchwarp.com/swa555069-Killing-For-God.htm

Paranoia Strikes Deep

Wed, 11 Nov 2009 03:44:17 -0800

New York Times, By Paul Krugman, November 9

Last Thursday there was a rally outside the U.S. Capitol to protest pending health care legislation, featuring the kinds of things we’ve grown accustomed to, including large signs showing piles of bodies at Dachau with the caption “National Socialist Healthcare.” It was grotesque — and it was also ominous. For what we may be seeing is America starting to be Californiafied.

The key thing to understand about that rally is that it wasn’t a fringe event. It was sponsored by the House Republican leadership — in fact, it was officially billed as a G.O.P. press conference. Senior lawmakers were in attendance, and apparently had no problem with the tone of the proceedings.

True, Eric Cantor, the second-ranking House Republican, offered some mild criticism after the fact. But the operative word is “mild.” The signs were “inappropriate,” said his spokesman, and the use of Hitler comparisons by such people as Rush Limbaugh, said Mr. Cantor, “conjures up images that frankly are not, I think, very helpful.”

What all this shows is that the G.O.P. has been taken over by the people it used to exploit.

The state of mind visible at recent right-wing demonstrations is nothing new. Back in 1964 the historian Richard Hofstadter published an essay titled, “The Paranoid Style in American Politics,” which reads as if it were based on today’s headlines: Americans on the far right, he wrote, feel that “America has been largely taken away from them and their kind, though they are determined to try to repossess it and to prevent the final destructive act of subversion.” Sound familiar?

But while the paranoid style isn’t new, its role within the G.O.P. is.

U.N. running out of food aid for Somalia

Sun, 08 Nov 2009 07:27:36 -0800

Ariel David | Rome | November 8

WaPo - The United Nations says it is running out of food for millions of starving Somalis, in part because the United States is delaying aid amid fears it could be intercepted by militants linked to al-Qaeda.

Last month, the U.N. World Food Program began cutting rations by up to half for some people in the lawless, impoverished East African nation, and it will run out of supplies in December, the Rome-based agency said Saturday.

"WFP's food assistance supply line to Somalia is effectively broken," said Peter Smerdon, a spokesman for the agency in Nairobi. "The pipeline break is partly because [the U.S. government] has delayed U.S. assistance to Somalia."

The U.S. State Department confirmed it had concerns that militants could get their hands on humanitarian assistance and had suspended food shipments.