Archive for June, 2006

Rep. McKinney Won’t Be Charged in Scuffle

Saturday, June 17th, 2006

WASHINGTON (AP) – A grand jury declined to indict Rep. Cynthia McKinney on Friday in connection with a confrontation in which she admitted hitting a police officer who tried to stop her from entering a House office building.

The grand jury had been considering the case since shortly after the March 29 incident, which has led to much discussion on Capitol Hill about race and the conduct of lawmakers and the officers who protect them.

“We respect the decision of the grand jury in this difficult matter,” said U.S. Attorney Kenneth Wainstein.

McKinney did not immediately comment.

Wainstein’s statement, released late Friday, also included support for the officer involved, Paul McKenna, and the Capitol Police. He said, “This is a tremendously difficult job, and it is one that Officer McKenna and his colleagues perform with the utmost professionalism and dignity.”

With that, Wainstein closed a case that has simmered with racial and political tension.
The encounter began when McKinney tried to enter a House office building without walking through a metal detector or wearing the lapel pin that identifies members of Congress.

McKenna did not recognize her as a member of Congress and asked her three times to stop. When she ignored him, he tried to stop her. McKinney then hit him.
McKinney described the encounter as “racial profiling,” insisting she had been assaulted and had done nothing wrong.

McKinney is black. McKenna is white.

She received little public support for that stance, even within the Congressional Black Caucus.

Wainstein, meanwhile, referred the matter to a federal grand jury, which then subpoenaed several House aides thought to have witnessed the encounter. McKenna, too, testified.

Members of the CBC privately urged McKinney to put the matter behind her. The next morning, she appeared on the House floor to apologize.

“I am sorry that this misunderstanding happened at all, and I regret its escalation, and I apologize,” McKinney, D-Ga., said April 6. “There should not have been any physical contact in this incident.”
apnews.myway.com

If she is guilty of assault, why didn’t the grand jury indict? Not only did the Congresswoman receive ‘liitle support’, she was labeled a ‘ghetto slut’ and became the subject of many mainstream articles about her HAIR!. Look at the picture which accompanies this article.

Death Squads at Colombia Universities

Saturday, June 17th, 2006

A Public Statement by Professors, Lecturers and Faculty of the Universidad de Antioquia
Medellin, Colombia, May 25 de 2006

PUBLIC STATEMENT TO THE NATIONAL AND INTERNATIONAL COMMUNITY
Professors, lecturers, and faculty of the University of Antioquia, gathered on May 25, 2006, outside the university campus, due to the unexpected closure of our Alma Mater and in the course of the deplorable events of threats by pamilitary death squads against our community, which severely affects normal functioning.

WE DENOUNCE:

1. On 9 May, 2006, on the university campus, a letter writtenin the name of a group of death squads that threatened to murder 15 members of our university community was circulated. On the 19 May 2006, through an email, another message extended the threat to 8 more members of the university, and 3 days later, a new communique was distributed and signed by a group calling itself “Colombia Free of Communists,” in which, by fully endorsing the current president and his “democratic security” policies, they extended threats to the whole university community and to various organizations defenders of freedom and human rights.

2. In the days leading up to the presidential elections, the University of Antioquia, as well as other state universities, were closed, silencing the possibility for deliberation, and obstructing that the chance that persons directly threatened with murder would be accompanied.

3. Furthermore, electoral authorities have decided to exclude the professors, lecturers, faculty, students, staff, and retired people of the University of Antioquia, among others, from exercising a historic function by serving as voting observers. This makes the environment even more strained, and casts a mantle of doubt over the elections.

4. Finally, we denounce that the series of threats, followed by the closure of the university and the evident mistrust spreading in our university community, represents an extremely serious precedent. We call for all university people and the national and international community to close ranks around the necessity to defend the open university, without any type of threats.

Above all, the University is a center for open and plural debate for the construction of knowledge and for the free exercise of citizenship with a critical spirit and social commitment.
counterpunch.org

1491: The Truth About the Americas Before Columbus

Saturday, June 17th, 2006

In many high school history classes students are told that before Columbus arrived the Americas were full of untamed wilderness loosely populated with savage Indians. Charles Mann’s book, 1491: New Revelations of the Americas Before Columbus proves that the opposite is true.

He draws from recent archeological and scientific discoveries to describe booming civilizations which thrived throughout the Americas centuries before the arrival of Europeans. Like Howard Zinn’s A People’s History of the United States this book made me want to call up my old history teachers and tell them they were very wrong. In fact, Mannês self-described thesis is to show that indigenous societies before the arrival of Columbus deserve more than a few misleading pages in a textbook.
upsidedownworld.org

Right-Wing Group Calling It Quits?

Saturday, June 17th, 2006

It looks like the Project for the New American Century, the neocon group that promoted the invasion of Iraq, is closing down.

In the absence of an official announcement and the failure since late last year of a live person to answer its telephone number, a Washington Post obituary would seem to be definitive. And, sure enough, the Post quoted one unidentified source presumably linked to PNAC that the group was “heading toward closing” with the feeling of “goal accomplished.”
alternet.org

Pentagon confirms Iranian directorate as officials raise new concerns about war

Saturday, June 17th, 2006

…A recent trip by Michael Ledeen to Rome has raised red flags among those concerned about a potential war with Iran. Some believe that Ledeen — a long-time advocate of Iranian regime change — was involved in the Niger forgeries scandal.

In late 2001, Ledeen, mid-east expert Harold Rhode and Pentagon analyst Larry Franklin (who later pleaded guilty to passing classified information to a Washington pro-Israel lobbying group) traveled to Rome to meet with Iranian arms dealer Manucher Ghorbanifar and various Italian, Iranian, and Egyptian intelligence agents. Not long after, documents falsely purporting that Iraq had attempted to buy yellowcake uranium surfaced in the international intelligence community, ending up at an Italian magazine, Panorama, for which Ledeen wrote periodic articles.

Ghorbanifar and Ledeen were directly involved in the Iran-Contra scandal of the 1980s, which implicated then-President Ronald Reagan, Vice President George H. W. Bush and the highest ranking members of the Reagan administration in the illegal sales of weapons to Iran.

LedeenÍs recent visit to Rome and meeting with Ghorbanifar have created new concern that something is developing with regard to US plans for Iran. Ledeen, however, denies that his visit to Italy was anything other than a personal trip with his wife Barbara.
rawstory.com

Sounds like the Project for the New American Century is anything but dead…

Iraq war tied to no attacks in the United States: Cheney

Saturday, June 17th, 2006

US Vice President Dick Cheney said that the war in Iraq was “in part responsible” for the absence of terrorist attacks in the United States since the September 11, 2001 strikes.

In a radio interview, a transcript of which was released by the White House, Cheney also said that US soldiers involved in alleged atrocities in Iraq should be presumed innocent until proven guilty, and predicted that US President George W. Bush’s Republican party would win November congressional elections.
breitbart.com

Well Dick should know.

US warns North Korea against ‘provocative’ missile test

Saturday, June 17th, 2006

WASHINGTON (AFP) – The United States sharply warned North Korea against testing a ballistic missile, saying it would take steps to protect itself as speculation mounts about an imminent launch.

“Together, our diplomacy and that of our allies has made clear to North Korea that a missile launch would be a provocative act that is not in their interests and will further isolate them from the world,” said US State Department spokesman Sean McCormack.

“We have a variety of national technical means that we could use to monitor the situation. We, of course, will take necessary preparatory steps to track any potential activities and to protect ourselves,” he told reporters.

North Korea on Friday accused a US reconnaissance plane of intruding over its territorial space to spy on strategic targets, amid jitters over the Stalinist country’s apparent preparations for a missile test.

South Korean and US officials have said that North Korea appears to be preparing to test-launch an intercontinental ballistic missile capable of reaching the mainland United States.

On Friday, South Korean officials and analysts said that North Korea had not yet begun fueling a long-range missile on its northeast coast, the final step before a possible launch.

“It will take at least two days to fill the rocket with liquid fuel and if they finish it, we can say they are ready to start the countdown,” Baek Seung-Joo from the government-backed Korean Institute for Defence Analyses told AFP.
news.yahoo.com

Troops refusing Iraq duty get a haven

Saturday, June 17th, 2006

Prompted by a Fort Lewis Army officer’s decision to refuse to fight in Iraq, the First United Methodist Church of Tacoma has declared itself a sanctuary for servicemen and servicewomen who also don’t want to go to Iraq.

The 300-member congregation’s administrative council voted last weekend to open its doors beginning this Saturday after 1st Lt. Ehren Watada announced that he thinks the war in Iraq is illegal and that he has sought to resign his commission.

A statement from the church on Wednesday said that service members “who are unable to deploy to combat areas for reasons of conscience” can find protection behind its doors.

“Our initiative was because of Lieutenant Watada’s gesture and a clear sense that we have, as a reconciling congregation, deeply involved in justice issues throughout the city, that any war, particularly this one, is inconsistent with Christian teachings,” the Rev. Monty Smith said Wednesday night.
seattlepi.nwsource.com

U.S.-led coalition kills 40 in Afghanistan; offensive continues

Saturday, June 17th, 2006

MUSA QALA, Afghanistan (AP) „ Coalition forces killed 40 militants during combat operations linked to a large-scale anti-Taliban blitz launched across southern Afghanistan, the military said Friday.

U.S.-led warplanes and ground forces killed the insurgents Wednesday and Thursday in a remote part of southeastern Paktika province, bordering Pakistan, said Lt. Col. Paul Fitzpatrick.

The offensive was launched in support of Operation Mountain Thrust, the largest anti-Taliban military campaign undertaken since the former regime’s 2001 ouster in an American-led invasion.
usatoday.com

They’re dropping bombs from airplanes. They don’t know who they’re killing.

Mariya of the sorrows

Saturday, June 17th, 2006

A happy ending? Not an ending, and not happy. Mariya Aman was transferred this week to the Alyn children’s hospital in Jerusalem, after Israel had been on the point of returning her to Gaza, paralyzed and on a respirator. The little girl, aged 3 and a half, who lost her mother, her brother and her grandmother about a month ago, will have to undergo a rehabilitation process of several months. At the end of it, perhaps she will at least be able to breathe on her own, to speak, and maybe even to get out of bed. About half a year, maybe more, maybe less, according to the doctor’s estimate – during which time she will be hospitalized in this excellent hospital.

Although her father will be at her side, he will have no home and no
place to stay; he will be imprisoned in the hospital, while at his home in Gaza, his young son Muaman, 2, who lost his mother and has been separated from his father, is waiting for him.

The two children, Mariya and Muaman, are survivors of the “targeted assassination” carried out by the Israel Air Force, which was planning to kill Mohammed Dahduh of the Islamic Jihad, and cut down almost an entire family. Had it not been for the intervention of Physicians for Human Rights, and the belated response of Defense Minister Amir Peretz, who acted to provide funding for rehabilitation treatment for the child, she would have been sent to Gaza, where there is not a single rehabilitation hospital, to die a slow death. This week, a similar solution was being sought for her uncle, Nahed, father of two infants, who is also on a respirator and paralyzed from the attack.
haaretz.com

Arms transferred to Abbas with Israeli blessing: official
JERUSALEM (AFP) – Arms were transferred with Israel’s blessing to the forces loyal to Palestinian Authority president Mahmud Abbas, parliamentary foreign affairs committee chairman Tzahi Hanegbi said.

“By permitting the transfer of these arms last night, we applied a decision taken three weeks ago by Prime Minister Ehud Olmert on a recommendation by the security authorities,” Hanegbi told Israeli public radio.

According to the Yediot Aharonot daily, three trucks carrying 950 American M-16 automatic rifles crossed into the West Bank and Gaza from Jordan under Israeli military escort overnight Wednesday and early Thursday.

Some 400 were delivered to Abbas’s presidential guard at Ramallah in the West Bank and the remainder went to the same force in Gaza, it said.

The weapons are to enable Abbas “to cope with Hamas”, the hardline Islamist group that leads the Palestinian government, Olmert said at the British parliament in London on Tuesday.