Not In Our Name Weekend, London Masses, Cops Suck, FBI Shocker, Buy Nothing Day, and lots more...

Return to CounterHeg Home
Uzalauáká! AMERICA: NO WAR! Oct 6 London Report Fox Hunting Trumps Peace Activism at Washington Post & New York Times accounts of police brutality What really happened on Friday (September 27, 2002 DC Demonstration) French Public Workers Demonstrate PORT BOSSES OUT TO BREAK DOCKWORKERS Netherlands budget outlines spending cuts and privatization SHOCKER!! FBI Violates Civil Liberties Farm Workers Suffer for Taco Bell Profits Former strike leader challenges in Brazilian election In the Name of National Security: Bush declares war on unions. HAIDI GIULIANI SPEAKS IN THE UK CIVIL DISOBEDIENCE TO STOP THE WAR SAND IN THE WHEELS: ATTAC Weekly newsletter BOSTON: October 4th BUSH PROTEST Crime pays: CEOs rake it in as stocks and jobs evaporate Buy Nothing Day Precision Farming: The Marriage Between Agribusiness and Spy Technology SAND IN THE WHEELS: ATTAC Weekly newsletter - Wednesday 02/10/02 BUY NOTHING DAY Queers Against The War (s) "YOU ARE EITHER WITH US, OR YOU ARE FIRED!" $4.6 Million to Fight Biotech Food Labels GM trial ruined by rogue gene strain Army recruitment drive thwarted Antarctic ozone hole splits in two Rome: Communists lead anti-war demo The president's real goal in Iraq Visitor sees too many cars at BSU No war without UN, warns poll The Bunk Dossier: Two typical articles from British newspapers Oil Wars and Oil Embargoes: the Cost of Oil in Blood and Human Rights Violations *** AMERICA: NO WAR! Oct 6 WAR WITHOUT END? . . NOT IN OUR NAME http://www.notinourname.net/ For more info: info@notinourname.net For organizing and travel information to New York City for the October 6 Not in Our Name event from these areas and cities, contact: Thursday, October 3, 2002, 7:30PM NOT IN OUR NAME: An Evening of Conscience Great Hall at Cooper Union, NYC 7 E. 7th Street, #6 Astor Place Readings and performances by: Edward Asner, Oscar Brown Jr., Eve Ensler, Andre Gregory, Jessica Hagedorn, Suheir Hammad, Marie Howe, Tony Kushner, Pete Seeger, Wallace Shawn, Marisa Tomei, Howard Zinn, and more to be announced. The October 3 Evening is presented by the Not in Our Name Statement of Conscience Signers and co-sponsored by the Cooper Union Continuing Education and Public Program Office. Complete event information ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ---- California - Fresno Sunday, October 6, 2002, Noon River Park Shopping Center Meet on sidewalk, east side of Blackstone Ave. "Don't Attack Iraq" signs will be provided. Participants can take the Not In Our Name "Pledge of Resistance". For more information: danyaseen@aol.com (PeaceFresno) ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ---- California - Los Angeles Sunday, October 6, 2002, 1PM Gather at Westwood Federal Bulding (Wilshire and Veteran). March to U.S. Army Reserve Training Center/California National Guard Headquarters (Wilshire and Federal) at 2PM For more information: notinourname.net/LA or email: lanotinourname@hotmail.com ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ---- California - San Francisco "Not in Our Name Mass Convergence" Sunday, October 6, 2002, 2PM Union Square Many different organizations will be coming from around the greater Bay Area to converge on Union Square to say “Not in Our Name!” to a war without limits. As groups make their way to the convergence from points north, east and south, they will be distributing materials, parading puppets, and flying banners. Oct. 6th - Be There! Page Ad in the SF Bay Guardian, Oct 2-8. Includes speakers, performers, pre-convergence regional gathering places, and ad co-sponsors. Friday, October 11, 2002, 7:30pm Join Bay Area performers for an evening of culture to benefit Not In Our Name, Bay Area. At the Fellowship of Humanity located at 411 28th Street, Oakland. Featured poets and musicians include: Elizabeth/Ching-In Chen, Shelley Doty, Kenny Mostern, Delia Nakayama, and Shailja Patel. $10 at the door, no one turned away. For more information: www.nionbayarea.net ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ---- Connecticut - New Haven Sunday, October 6, 2002 Meet at the New Haven train station at 10AM to catch the 10:34 train to NYC Grand Central Station. Monday, October 7, 2002 Protest rally at the office of Senator Christopher Dodd. For more information: The Connecticut Peace Coalition/New Haven supports and endorses the call for action put out by the NOT IN OUR NAME Project... ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ---- Georgia - Atlanta Saturday, October 5, 5pm Caravan to New York Central Park event leaves Atlanta. Returns by Noon, Monday, October 7. Cost: $50 Sunday, October 6, 5:30pm Buckhead Park (intersection of Roswell Rd and Peachtree). Join fellow anti-war people in taking the Pledge of Resistance, and participate in Dances for Universal Peace. Download and print the leaflet for this event PDF For more information: nion_atl@leveller.org ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ---- Illinois - Chicago Sunday, October 6, 2002, 1PM "Protest and Resistance Culture" Tribune Plaze, 435 N. Michigan, Chicago Chicago Flyer - Take the Pledge PDF For more information: notinourname_chi@together.net ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ---- Indiana - Fort Wayne Sunday, October 6, Noon "Not in Our Name" Rally Courthouse Green, Main at Clinton Streets For more information ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ---- New Mexico - Santa Fe Sunday, October 6, 2002, 2pm "Rally to Stop the War and Take a Stand for Peace" At the New Mexico State Capitol (the Roundhouse) March to the Plaza of Santa Fe to follow. For more information: Peace Action New Mexico 505-989-4812 ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ---- North Carolina - Chapel Hill Sunday, October 6, 2002, 10:15AM Forum at Chapel Hill Friends Meeting 531 Raleigh Road, Chapel Hill "Forum on why we need to be active and what we can do." For more information: notinournamenc@yahoo.com ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ---- Ohio - Cleveland Saturday, October 5, 2002, 10PM Send off rally before we board the buses at Cleveland State University. Exact location to be announced - bring your friends, poetry, songs. Saturday, October 5, 2002, 11PM Buses to New York City, October 6th Not in Our Name protest. Buses will be leaving on Saturday, October 5 at 11pm from Cleveland State University, E. 22nd and Euclid Ave. There is ample free parking in the area The buses will then pick up students from Kent Sate University at midnite at the bus stop in front of the Student Center. We will return to Cleveland at CSU around 4am Monday, October 7 Bus tickets are $40 round trip. Sunday, October 6, 2002, 2PM Video Showing:"Killing Iraqi Children," by John Pilger With a recitation of the Pledge of Resistance Parma Ridge Library For More info: no_more_war_us@yahoo.com ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ---- Ohio - Columbus Sunday, October 6, 5pm "War without End? Not in Our Name! Demonstrate against Bush's Endless War" 15th Ave and Hight Street, Columbus For more information, call: 614-252-9255 Also, a car caravan will be going from Columbus to the NYC event, contact: paltrip@hotmail.com ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ---- Oregon Regional anti-war events listed by Portland IndyMedia Center Oregon - Corvallis "NOT IN OUR NAME: A community rally for peace and justice" October 6, 2002, 2-4PM Benton County Courthouse grounds Sponsored by Alternatives to War and other area organizations. Keynote speakers: Ann and Bruce Huntwork of the Mennonite Central Committee who recently spent six months in Tehran and Mashhad, Iran, where they worked with the Iranian Red Crescent Society (IRCS) to report on material aid distributed to Afghan refugees and internally displaced Afghans. Solidarity statements from representatives of the Muslim community, area youth, Unheard Voices, Oregon PeaceWorks, Wrench (OSU student organization), and others. Music by: BALAFON, legendary marimba band, SAMUSSON AND TOMASSI, NW songwriters and singers of "songs in service of grassroots america," LAURIE CHILDERS, Corvallis area songwriter and singer. Reading: The Beasts' Confusion, by Roger Weaver For further information, contact: calex@peak.org ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ---- Oregon - Eugene Saturday, October 5, 1pm "Not in Our Name: No War in Iraq!" Rally at the Federal Building For more information ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ---- Oregon - Portland Saturday, October 5, 2002, Noon "No New War on Iraq" March and Rally for Peace South Park Blocks - Southwest Salmon & 9th M arch at 12:30 pm For more information: Call Peace and Justice Works Iraq Affinity Group 503-236-3065 ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ---- Pennsylvania - Philadelphia Sunday, October 6th, 9am Get on the bus to NYC "Not in Our Name" event 30th Street Station, Philadelphia Bus will leave 9:30am SHARP. Bus will leave NYC at 5:30pm and return to Philly by 8:30pm. Price: $10 to $20 (sliding scale) - $10 for students. First come basis, only 47 seats available. For ticket purchase and information: 215-888-7563, email: phillyrnr@hotmail.com ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ---- Rhode Island - Westerly Monday, October 7, 4-6 pm Not In Our Name Peace Rally In front of the Westerly Town Hall For from information: Contact: fineco@riconnect.com ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ---- South Carolina - Greenville Sunday, October 6, 2002, 8PM Dramatic Reading of MLK, Jr's "Beyond Vietnam," with the Pledge of Resistance Centerpeice Restaurant, 20 Pendleton Street, Greenville Monday, October 7, 2002, 7PM IT'S THE OIL: 1st Anniv of US bombing of Afghanistan New Greenville Library, Heritage Green For more information: Email: mxgrm@aol.com ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ---- Tennessee - Nashville Sunday, October 6, 2pm Fountain in Bicentennial Mall (off James Robertson Parkway in Downtown Nashville) For more information: Nashville Peace and Justice Center nashpeacejustice@aol.com 615-321-9066 ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ---- Texas - Houston Sunday, October 6, Noon Heights Festival and Parade - NION Contingent Noon to 5pm along Heights Blvd. from 14th to 20th streets. March with the Not in Our Name contingent against the war on Iraq. Peace Action and Houston Coalition for Justice Not War will have a booth educating against war. For more information: notinournamehou@yahoo.com ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ---- Utah - Salt Lake City Sunday, October 6, Noon Walk for Peace and Justice People for Peace and Justice of Utah are having a Walk for Peace and Rally for Justice in Salt Lake City, Utah on October 6th starting at noon. At the Rally we will be encouraging those in attendance to take the Pledge of Resistance. Flyer: www.utahpeace.org/oct6.htm More information: www.utahpeace.org ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ---- Washington - Bellingham Sunday, October 6, 7pm All night vigil outside the Federal Building Downtown Belingham - "Not in Our Name Days of Resistance". Bring songs, instruments, prayers, friends....anything you want to contribute! For more information: funkeolise@mybluelight.com ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ---- Virginia - Charlottesville Monday, October 7, 5pm "Call to Action– War Without End? Not in Our Name!" Large peace demonstration at the four corners of Barracks Road and Emmett Street. More more information Email: schase@cstone.net Charlottesville Center for Peace and Justice ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ---- Washington - Seattle Sunday, October 6, 2002, 1PM "Not in Our Name Days of Mass Resistance" Rally at Volunteer Park Amphitheater (10th Ave E and E Prospect St, near the north end of Broadway in Capitol Hill). March to Westlake Center (4th & Pine, downtown Seattle) at 3PM. List of Oct. 6 Seattle march and rally endorsors. For more information: Email: seattle_notinourname@hotmail.com Local website: www.notinourname-seattle.net Not in Our Name Seattle: "All Out on October 6th!" September 27, 2002 Call ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ---- Wisconsin - Kickapoo Region Sunday, October 6, 2002, Noon Rally at Riverside Park, LaCrosse - simultaneous with NYC Central Park event. Monday, October 7, 2002, 5-8PM Community Potluck and Vigil at Eckhardt Park, Viroqua. For more information: kickapoonion@care2.com For information about other locations, watch this site or contact: info@notinourname.net * London Report http://www.left-turn.org ZNet by Tariq Ali September 28, 2002 London: Saturday 28th September. It was a beautiful clear blue sky. No mists but a great deal of mellow fruitfulness. The Stop the War Coalition--- a united front that includes socialists of most stripes, liberals and radicals, pacifists and the moderate Muslim groups----had expected 200,000 people, but the mood in Britain was uneasy and large numbers of people, many of them conservative or even apolitical, had decided to swell the march. The week before the march, New Labour issued the so-called Blair dossier, a farrago of half-truths and stale facts that was a very crude attempt at war propaganda. It backfired miserably. Blair was at his worst. The grinning disk-jockey in clerical mode. Everything reduced to a pseudo-morality tale. War-talk and piety is such an ugly combination. It may have convinced his ghastly cabinet, a bunch of mediocrities, most of whom would find it difficult to gain employment elsewhere. Blair prefers it like this: in the land of the blind, the one-eyed beggar is king. The DAILY MIRROR, a leading London tabloid devoted 8 pages to denouncing the dossier and Blair. This newspaper has turned decisively after 9/11, in sharp contrast to its rivals and 'betters'. The only pro-war piece in the paper, hallucinatory on every level and published to give the White House a voice, appeared under the byline of the former NATION columnist, Christopher Hitchens. The man with the Orwell-complex has fallen really low. He will fall further. No war in Iraq and Justice for Palestine were the themes that united everyone present on Saturday 28th September. Murdoch's Sky TV reported 400,000. Irish radio insisted there were half-a-million. Channel Five News said 'over a quarter of a million'. Only BBC TV reported the 'police figure' of 150,000. Let's be modest. Let's accept that there were over 350,000 people who came from all parts of the country to show their contempt for Tony Blair and his backing for Bush's planned war against Iraq. I met people, old and young, who had never been on a demonstration before. Rites of passage. And the mood was one of defiance and anger. The new wave of trade-union leaders who have been elected to defy the New Labour Thatcherites were solidly against the war. Bob Crow, the 40--something leader of the railway workers denounced Blair in vitriolic language. So did Mark Serotka from the Civil Servants Union and others. Then there was Tony Benn and George Galloway and Jeremy Corbyn (the last two still Members of Parliament) spoke for the Labour Party members opposed to Blair. It was the Jewish sabbath. So the contingent of Hassidic Jews could not speak, but their moving plea for Palestinian rights was read by a young Muslim from Leicester. The Mayor of London, Ken Livingstone, was also there strongly denouncing the Prime Minister. Many Londoners heaved a sigh of relief when Blair refused to let Livingstone back in the Labour Party. No longer needing to suck up to the New Labour leadership, Livingstone shifted his position once again. Sometimes opportunism can lead in the left direction. Nobody on the demonstration was taken in by the talk of a UN-led war being somehow more acceptable than a Bush-Blair attack. The British peace movement, for one, will not be taken in if the permanent members of the UNSC allow their arms to be twisted and their purses filled by the Bushmen. Here the movement will continue. And when the bombs begin to drop there will be acts of non-violent civil disobedience all over the country. We need the same in the United States. * Fox Hunting Trumps Peace Activism at Washington Post & New York Times FAIR.org ACTION ALERT: Fox Hunting Trumps Peace Activism at Washington Post & New York Times September 30, 2002 Last Saturday, hundreds of thousands of people took to the streets of London to protest military action against Iraq, rallying in what the London Independent called "one of the biggest peace demonstrations seen in a generation" (9/29/02). Yet neither the Washington Post nor the New York Times saw fit to run a full article about the protests, instead burying passing mentions of the story in articles about other subjects. In contrast, both papers showed real interest in another recent London march of comparable size-- last week's protest against a proposed ban on fox-hunting. The Washington Post ran a 1,331-word story about the fox-hunting protest on the front page of its Style section (9/23/02), while the New York Times ran a short Reuters piece on page A4 (9/23/02), which it followed up with an op-ed exploring the class politics of the hunt (9/24/02). A Times story on Prince Charles' involvement in politics (9/26/02) also made reference to the pro-fox-hunting protest. Estimates of the crowd size at the peace march vary. The Independent (9/29/02) reported both the police estimate of 150,000 protesters and the organizers' early estimate of 350,000; similarly, the London Times cited the police estimate alongside a later organizers' estimate of 400,000 (9/30/02). A London Observer columnist (9/29/02) who attended the march dismissed the police figures as politically motivated, writing: "The Stop the War coalition last night claimed the total was more than 350,000; the police reluctantly moved up from 'four men with beards and a small dog' to 150,000, and the truth was, if anything, even higher than either." According to British press reports, the peace march was notable not just for its size, but for how broad-based it was. Organized by the Stop the War coalition and the Muslim Association of Britain, the demonstration was focused on two main slogans, "Don't Attack Iraq" and "Freedom for Palestine" (Guardian, 9/30/02). The Observer (9/29/02) reported solidarity between the causes, describing an "an undeniable unity of purpose" in a diverse crowd that included everyone from Muslim activists in keffiyah to "Hampstead ladies with their granddaughters in prams." According to the Independent (9/29/02), "the sheer numbers who turned out to express vociferous opposition to military action in Iraq. meant there was no way they could be dismissed as 'the usual suspects' of the hard left." Despite all that, the entirety of the New York Times' coverage of the peace march was nestled at the end of one sentence in an article titled "Blair Is Confident of Tough U.N. Line on Iraqi Weapons" (9/30/02). Many Labour Party MPs, said the Times, "were encouraged by the turnout of 150,000 protesters who staged an antiwar march in London on Saturday". The Washington Post managed one reference more, but seemed to have seriously under-counted the crowd. The Post article "Iraq Rejects Inspection Revisions" (9/29/02) mentioned "thousands" of protesters in London, and an article the next day about European opposition to U.S. unilateralism referred to "tens of thousands" of demonstrators. Britain is the only European country backing the Bush administration's war plans, so the size and composition of the London peace march-- not to mention the arguments articulated there-- have particular relevance to the international debate over Iraq. The pro-fox-hunting march, which also addressed broader issues of urban/rural tension in England, was newsworthy enough, but much more local in focus. Given the looming prospect of a war that could kill thousands of people and throw an entire region into turmoil, it's disturbing that the New York Times and the Washington Post gave the two events such disparate treatment. ACTION: Please ask the Washington Post and New York Times why they did not devote more attention to the September 28 peace march in London, and encourage them to give serious, thorough coverage to peace activism in the future. CONTACT: Washington Post Michael Getler, Ombudsman mailto:ombudsman@washpost.com (202) 334-7582 New York Times mailto:nytnews@nytimes.com Toll free comment line: 1-888-NYT-NEWS As always, please remember that your comments are taken more seriously if you maintain a polite tone. Please cc fair@fair.org with your correspondence. * accounts of police brutality (note: these nexttwo are really sad. while english activists celebrate the biggest anti-war demonstration in a generation, we have to deal with this nasty reality!) Date: Wed, 02 Oct 2002 09:43:57 -0500 From: "Sheri Whatley" <sheriwhatley@hotmail.com> Subject: accounts of police brutality hi, this is sheri from DC, i'm writing to ask you and others that you know to write individual accounts of police brutality that happened on Friday, Sept. 27 at the protests in Washington, DC. the publication i work with, off our backs, is putting out a press release Thursday, 10/3/02 and dedicating a significant portion of our next issue to the protests. it is so important to get these stories out there and put the issue of police repression and brutality into discussion. if you know any others who were brutalized, please send them this message. we need a full spectrum of what happened. you can send all responses to my work address: offourbacks@cs.com please forward this message to any listserve that is relevant. thanks so much. sheri * What really happened on Friday (September 27, 2002 DC Demonstration) >From Shawna Bader: [member of the DC Statehood Green Party] This is the story of one of the more than 600 victims of the illegal and unconstitutional mass arrests made by police in Washington DC on Friday, September 27. Please pass this along ... On Friday morning, I was illegally arrested along with more than 600 others, the vast majority of whom did not intend to be arrested and had committed absolutely no illegal act. WARNING: Sitting in a park watching people drum and dance is now a crime. At 8am on Friday, I went into downtown DC, curious to figure out what the Anti-Capitalist Convergence (see www.abolishthebank.org) was all about. I had heard they were planning some marches and rallies that day, and even though I knew they did not have permits for these actions, I thought I would go check them out from the sidewalk for an hour or so before going to work. I have been to dozens of demonstrations and several recently in DC, and I thought I knew the drill-the cops humor you for a while and then get ticked off and give you few minutes to disperse and arrest those that don't. So I wasn't too worried. I passed by some people getting arrested in front of one of the IMF buildings, watched for a second, and then got the heck out of there-I support these guys and what they are protesting with all my heart, but I really wanted to get to work by 11am and had no interest in getting bullied by the cops or arrested. Besides, there were permitted rallies and marches the next two days being organized by the Mobilization for Global Justice (www.globalizethis.org) that I wanted to participate in. I stopped by a café (not Starbucks!) and grabbed a little yuppie cappuccino and a biscotti, and kept walking. I had heard there was going to be a "die in" in Freedom Plaza at 10am-street theater in which people dress up as Palestinians, Afghans, Iraqis, Columbians and other victims of American supported terror and injustice-and I thought I would watch that from a distance before going to work. I got to the park (ironically named "Freedom Plaza") a little after 9am, and saw a group of people dancing and drumming, and went over to watch. Hundreds started converging on the park. I was so impressed with the undergrads and even some high school students (at 28, I was one of the oldest people around) who were there, and as I heard them speaking articulately about the connection between consumerism in America, the World Bank, globalization and global poverty, I felt inspired and hopeful. Don't believe anyone who says these demonstrators don't understand the issues, or are not forming a movement, or that they have no connection with each other. They do. I saw about a dozen people march into the street chanting anti-World Bank and IMF slogans, and they were immediately pushed back to the park by the cops. I got as far away from that as that as I could; again, I did not want to get arrested. Around 9:15am I noticed hundreds of cops in riot gear surrounding the park. It seemed absurdly disproportionate, because the vast majority of the people in the park were clearly not trying to do anything illegal. So there I am, holding a cappuccino in a park surrounded by police, saying to myself, OK, it is time to get out of here. The police refused to let me out. Some cops on one part of the park said, "I don't care where you have to go, you made the choice to come down here and you are not getting out." I went to try a different side of the park, and there I heard the cops saying to others like me trying to leave "We will make an announcement soon letting those who want to leave, leave, and the rest will be arrested" (that turned out to be a lie and a form of entrapment). Meanwhile, they were closing in on us and it was getting pretty tight. The cops were getting all worked up, and the protestors started to chant, "we want to leave peacefully, we want to leave peacefully!" Before I knew it, these huge officers from Chicago, Boston, DC, and federal Park Police where pulling out their batons and wacking people. The protestors chanted, "Shame! Shame! Shame!" in response. Then it got really ugly and scary. The police yelled "There are only two ways you are going to get out of here-by volunteering to be arrested, or by being arrested by force." Bewildered people lined up near me to get 'voluntarily arrested.' The woman standing next to me was a photographer I think from AP, who had come across the activities in the park on her way somewhere else, got out to take a picture, forgot her press badge and found herself in handcuffs. I later heard of several passers-by that happened to; and many hundreds of others who, like me, just wanted to check out and support the demonstrators on Friday, who were sitting in the park that day but who were really in DC for Saturday's and Sunday's events. Empty DC public transit buses came out of nowhere and lined up near the curb. Cops lined the way to the first bus. I was grabbed by the neck by a huge man wearing gloves really hard, and forced toward the bus. He tightened when I tried to look behind me, and yelled not to look back. I wondered if that was because someone was being beaten. A few minutes earlier, I saw a tiny woman who couldn't have been more than about 20 and 100lbs shackled and punched in the back. Others were slammed to the ground and were bleeding. I decided not to look back again! But I did rotate my neck around so that the officer was in effect giving me a massage :) We got on the bus and were handcuffed behind our backs. I ended up on the bus handcuffed like that from 10am-4pm, at which point we were brought into a large gym at the Police Training Academy in SW DC, where we were shackled right-cuff-to-left-ankle (so we couldn't stand up) for 20 hours, laying on mats. Many of us were denied food and access to lawyers. We were not told the charges against us for hours after being detained ("Failure to Obey a police officer" ended up being the charge. Of course, we were never given an order to obey in the first place). That part was not too surprising. Neither was being harassed and humiliated and lied to by the cops repeatedly for over 24 hours. I am sure if I had been a person of color or poor or arrested for possession, or for being homeless, I would have been treated far worse-I'm not saying we suffered police brutality! But we were treated like crap nonetheless, especially given the minor charges against us. This was clearly meant to intimidate protestors from ever getting out on the streets again. Judging from the conversations I had with those around me, the police instead learned a lesson in how to radicalize college students. The message coming out of the police is: If you go to a demonstration, permitted or not, peaceful or not, whether or not you are planning a non-violent direct action or even if you are just walking by, you have no rights if the cops decide you don't. For a minute under detention I got all high-and-mighty about my rights, and told the officer standing over me "You are not allowed to hold me for more than 12 hours without giving me food, it's against the law." The officer laughed in my face, and said "Don't talk to me about the law." I told him not to laugh at me, more cops gathered, and I decided to go back to sleep. He was right, in this disturbed and unjust scenario they could do whatever they wanted. If they could arrest us by simply ignoring our supposed "constitutional rights" to freedom of speech and assembly, not read us our rights and keep us from our lawyers, of course they could deny us food. Who knows how long someone on a student visa would be held for (6 months to a year, if the Sept 11 detentions are any clue). Some people arrested decided not to take the charge and ask for a day in court. I heard some people had charges against them dropped when they went before a judge on Monday, and that the judge had said the arrests were illegal and the charges trumped up. I decided not to go to court and just pay my 50 bucks, plead "no contest," and get the hell out of jail. Others refused to give their names at all and may still be in detention, I really don't know. The truth is that protecting property and keeping traffic flowing trump civil liberties in the US, now more than ever. I personally have not paid enough attention to our eroding rights post-Sept 11. You start to feel like if we are not careful we will not be allowed to dissent outside our own thoughts in a while! It is true that Americans do get all self-righteous (rightfully so) about "our rights and liberties" from time to time. I found myself inspired by the other protestors, and also mad enough at the situation, to say to my arresting officer who told me I shouldn't have been in the park that day, somewhat dramatically: "I'm a proud American. Dissent is an American value. This country was built on protest and dissent, and doing both are acts of patriotism. What was the Boston Tea Party, anyway?" That didn't go over too well. I got laughed at. On the other hand, when 600 people are arrested in a park, the news reports on it as if it was a victory for the police department and the city, and somehow the public seems to agree that we "shouldn't have been out there protesting." Says who? When thousands of German college students march through the streets protesting a college fee hike as happened a few years ago, do Germans watching the events on TV get uniformly angry at the protestors? Do they say, like DC residents did, "What's wrong with these demonstrators, why don't they just stay out of the city and leave us alone?" Do they all get arrested, or are they allowed to march peacefully down the street without a permit for a while? When Egyptians and Jordanians get arrested in their countries by the hundreds simply for peacefully demonstrating in support of the Intifada or against their governments' relationships with the US, doesn't the State Department human rights report cite that as examples of civil rights and free speech violations? (it does, I've read it). What's the difference between them and us? * French Public Workers Demonstrate Guardian http://www.guardian.co.uk/worldlatest/story/0,1280,-2061047,00.html Thursday October 3, 2002 3:30 PM PARIS (AP) - Tens of thousands of public workers, fearing job cuts, marched through Paris Thursday to protest government plans to sell off parts of state companies. The demonstrators came from all parts of France to defend public services and signal the honeymoon is over for the new center-right government of Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin. Employees at state-controlled Air France and Paris' two airports went on strike in solidarity. Air France officials reported no delays but said the company canceled 24 flights from Charles de Gaulle airport because of small passenger loads. France currently is struggling to balance its deficit to meet European Union standards and Raffarin's government is keen to pursue a privatization program to raise cash. Protesters packed the streets from the eastern Place de la Nation to the Place de l'Opera in the center of the city. Labor leaders predicted a turnout of at least 60,000. The march was led by electricity and gas workers but also included postal and railway employees and those from struggling telecommunications giant France Telecom. ``It is an important day which should make it (the government) reconsider its economic and social plans,'' said Bernard Thibault, the head of the powerful Communist-affiliated CGT union. France has proposed changing the legal status of utility giants Electricite de France and Gaz de France to let them raise funds on capital markets. But the proposal is fiercely opposed by the public sector's highly unionized workers. Many fear they will loose their generous public sector retirement benefits, and will no longer have lifetime job security. Others fear that partial privatization will lead to job cuts. ``If the government in France tries to privatize a single public service, it will get its throat cut because we won't let them do it,'' Jean-Luc Melechon, a protester, told France-Inter radio. Finance Minister Francis Mer held talks with union leaders Thursday, a day after he reaffirmed to parliament the government's intention to press ahead with the utilities' partial privatization. Six unions called for a work stoppage at Air France, part of which has already been sold to investors. The government has said it would likely reduce it stake to between 20 percent and 25 percent. * PORT BOSSES OUT TO BREAK DOCKWORKERS Socialist Worker, US http://www.socialistworker.org/2002-2/424/424_12_ILWU.shtml October 4, 2002 | Page 12 TODD CHRETIEN and SUE SANDLIN report on the fight on the West Coast docks. SHIPPING BOSSES have thrown down the gauntlet to West Coast dockworkers--and the entire labor movement. As Socialist Worker went to press, the employers’ Pacific Maritime Association (PMA) had locked out more than 10,500 longshore workers from Seattle to San Diego, and International Longshore and Warehouse Union (ILWU) members were picketing. But with billions of dollars worth of cargo piling up, the union and management were scheduled to meet with a federal mediator October 1. With $300 billion of goods passing through West Coast ports every year, the stakes of this struggle are clear. As one worker on the picket line in Oakland, Calif., told Socialist Worker, "It’s all about who’s got the power on the docks. We don’t make enough money for them to worry about." What’s more, the Bush administration has threatened to use the anti-union Taft-Hartley law to ban any work stoppage--effectively giving management a gun to hold to the union’s head. "The issues are the survival of the longshore union and even the very survival of the American trade union movement," said Jack Heyman, a business agent in ILWU Local 10 in San Francisco. "Because if the ILWU goes down the tubes, other unions will follow. The labor movement must learn from the history of PATCO," the air traffic controllers union busted by President Ronald Reagan in a 1981 strike. "This is not a PATCO, a union that had supported Reagan, but a union with a long tradition of supporting social struggles around the world." Ken Riley, president of Local 1422 of the International Longshoremen’s Association, which represents dockworkers on the East Coast, recalled the support that the ILWU gave his union during the victorious struggle of the Charleston Five--longshore workers put under house arrest for nearly two years after a police attack on their picket line. Riley pledged to return that support. "Workers in Charleston recognize the type of solidarity that was given to them and recognize that we could not have come out of the South with a victory like that without it," he told Socialist Worker. "We are forever joined at the hips."... * Netherlands budget outlines spending cuts and privatization WSWS http://www.wsws.org/articles/2002/oct2002/neth-o03.shtml ...While social support is being slashed, the legal system and the police are to be strengthened. The government intends 10,000 more cases to go through the courts in 2003, legal fees will be raised and legal aid for migrants and asylum-seekers will be reduced. New measures to search vehicles, introduce ID cards and use DNA databases are proposed. More closed circuit TV will be introduced and police numbers will be increased. A national criminal investigation organisation will be set up. The government intends to build several thousand new prison cells, introduce multi-prisoner cells and harshly punish repeat offenders. There is to be more cooperation between the judiciary, the police and the intelligence services, under the guise of the “struggle against terrorism”. Even the transport budget has a law-and-order slant. While petrol tax is to be cut, the state subsidy to public transport “sharply reduced” and new planned rail lines left unbuilt, the government intends to give supervisors on public transport additional powers—such as handcuffs, batons, dogs and the ability to impose travel bans. Resting on the broad frustration over the decay of health provision under the previous PvDA-led “Purple Coalition”, the new government intends the state to open up as many areas of health provision as possible to “market forces”. Private health insurance is to be encouraged and hospital league tables are to be introduced. Shortly before budget day, the new health minister, Eduard Bomhoff, trumpeted a “perestroika” in health care. In education, schools and colleges “there will be greater emphasis on the responsibility of individual institutions”, by which is meant tight financial targets, and a deepening inequality in education. All areas of public services will be deregulated. In line with the anti-immigrant hysteria generated by the assassinated Pim Fortuyn, and deepened by LPF immigration minister Hilbrand Nawijn, the government singles out migrants: “The admissions policy will become more restrictive, the options for family forming and family reunification will be restricted.” The government intends to cut successful asylum applications to a mere 18,000 annually—the Netherlands has a population of 16 million people. Biometric scanning will be introduced against migrants without documentation. Remaining in the Netherlands illegally will be made a criminal offence, and undocumented migrants will be locked up prior to deportation. Days after the budget announcement, a sweep in Amsterdam by 500 police arrested 100 people from Romania and Bulgaria for immediate deportation... * FBI Violates Civil Liberties Project Censored http://projectcensored.org/ Under Attorney General John Ashcrofts' guidelines, FBI agents will be able to monitor what you say in Web chatroom, or in religious and political meetings without a court order, without any evidence of a potential crime, even without approval from FBI headquarters. For the first time, under the Patriot Act, the FBI will also be able to use commercial databases to monitor the books you buy, the publications you subscribe to, where you travel, your credit profile and a wide swath of other data. What all this means is that we are now entering a period that Sam Smith, editor of The Progressive Review, rightly describes as a 'Post-Constitutional America'. And in the present jingoistic climate, once our Bill of Rights protections against government abuse of power are given away, one by one; we won't get them back. That's arguably the terrorists' greatest victory to date. Synopsis: Alice Reese Source: In These Times, 7/8/02, "New FBI Same Old Problem," by Doug Ireland * Farm Workers Suffer for Taco Bell Profits Project Censored http://projectcensored.org/ If you eat a Chalupa Supreme for lunch, you may be helping to exploit farmworkers. That's the message of a coalition of students and farmworkers urging a boycott of the Taco Bell restaurant chain. Farmworkers employed by Six L's Picking Company, a main supplier to Taco Bell, earn only 40 cents for every 32-pound bucket of tomatoes they pick and have not had a pay raise since 1978. In addition to this, the workers have no heath insurance, sick leave, pension, paid holidays, vacations, or overtime compensation. Taco Bell maintains that though they are one of Six L's largest buyers, they do not employ the farmworkers and it is not their responsiblity for the wages that they receive. A spokesman for Taco Bell stated, "This is a labor dispute between the farmworkers and their employer." SAF (Student Action with Farmworkers) insists that if Taco Bell agreed to pay one penny more per pound for their tomatoes they could double the picking piece rate paid to farmworkers. Synopsis: Sarah Anderson Source: Asheville Global Report, 6/13/02, "Coalition Urges Taco Bell Boycott," by Brendan Conley Domestic Sweatshops The Department of Labor states that over half of American garment production shops violate minimum wage and overtime regulations and over 75% violate health and safety laws. In the Los Angeles garment district alone the Department of Labor reports that 61% of garment shops ignore wage and hour regulations, and 96% violate health and safety codes. According to the U.S. General Accounting Office sweatshops are defined as "an employer that violates more than one federal or state labor, industrial homework, occupational safety and health, workers' compensation or industrial regulation law." The manufacturers of the clothing are contracted out by retail companies, who are not affiliated with the production, or responsible for labor conditions in the factories. A small number of retailers control the majority of the market, and are thus able to dictate the quantity and price of the goods. The cheaper the price, the more there is to be made, and sweatshops offer quantity for virtually nothing. The employees of these shops are usually newly arrived undocumented immigrants who will work for much less and who are not in a position to go to the authorities for fear of deportation. In 1999, in an effort to curb horrendous working conditions, California Governor Gray Davis signed Bill 633 into law. Designed to crack down on employers who owe an estimated $81 million in unpaid wages, it has since collected $17,274. Synopsis: Josh Sisco Source: Clamor, Jul./Aug. 2002, "American Made: Sweatshops in the USA," by Casey Boland * Former strike leader challenges in Brazilian election Socialist Worker, England http://www.socialistworker.co.uk/1820/sw182012.htm A vote that could shake a continent By Paul McGarr THE PEOPLE who head the institutions of global capitalism are nervous over the outcome of next Sunday's presidential election in Brazil. Luis Inacio Lula da Silva, known universally as Lula in the South American country, looks set to top the poll. He is a former left wing socialist and mass strike leader. Lula has soared in the polls as popular discontent has grown with the current government of President Fernando Henrique Cardoso. "Lula is riding a wave of disillusionment with rising unemployment and inequality," notes the Financial Times. Lula was a metal worker who became a key leader of a massive strike wave of car and engineering workers in the 1970s. This powerful movement broke the back of the military dictatorship that dominated Brazil, and paved the way for a move to parliamentary democracy. The strikes and wider social movements gave birth to a new party, the Workers Party, known as the PT from its Brazilian initials. Lula and the Workers Party leaders have moved a long way from the militant strikes where they had their origins. But it still has a mass base among Brazil's trade unions and the poor. Through the 1980s and 1990s it won elections to run some of Brazil's states and cities. In both 2000 and 2001 a Workers Party state government in the south of Brazil hosted the World Social Forum in the city of Porto Alegre, a gathering of anti-capitalists and social movements from across the globe. A victory next Sunday for Lula in the presidential election would be a political earthquake that would have repercussions across Latin America. Those repercussions would be intensified by the turmoil gripping much of the continent already. Most of Brazil's neighbours-Argentina, Colombia, Venezuela, Peru, Bolivia, Paraguay and Uruguay-have seen major protests, strikes or uprisings in the last year. Brazil has by far the biggest economy in Latin America, and on some measures is the tenth biggest economy in the world..... * In the Name of National Security: Bush declares war on unions. American Prospect http://www.prospect.org/print/V13/19/bacon-d.html ...On March 9, 2001, a little more than a month after taking office, Bush issued an executive order in which he told 10,000 mechanics, plane cleaners and janitors at Northwest Airlines that they couldn't strike for 60 days. Bush set up the Presidential Emergency Board to make findings in the dispute, despite the fact that the mechanics' union contract had expired more than four years earlier. His action eliminated any incentive for the airline to negotiate, and it broke off talks with the union. Invoking "cooling-off periods" (in effect, a temporary ban on strikes) and the appointment of such boards has become a Bush hallmark. He did it again last December at United Airlines, where 15,000 mechanics, working under wage concessions negotiated in 1994, had voted almost unanimously to strike. This September, Bush officials followed up by telling United's unions that unless they agreed to even further concessions, the administration would withhold the $1.8 billion bailout the airline said it needed to avoid bankruptcy. Airline unions are now battling a Republican bill that would allow the secretary of transportation to impose contract settlements on workers, effectively eliminating their right to strike. Regardless of union rights, the administration has argued, the functioning of the air transportation industry is vital to the U.S. economy -- the same argument used to justify the airline bailout package rushed through Congress weeks after September 11. Interruptions, whether by union action or financial insolvency, are viewed as threats to the economy and to the nation itself. The administration's implicit use of national security as an anti-union device became explicit with its proposal to establish a Department of Homeland Security. In July the House passed the proposal essentially as the president asked. It would allow the secretary of homeland security to write new employment rules exempting any group in the department from existing civil-service regulations. And it would eliminate Title 5 of the Civil Service Act, which guarantees collective bargaining rights for federal workers. The Senate has debated a bill that makes less sweeping changes in job rights, and the president has threatened to veto it.... * HAIDI GIULIANI SPEAKS IN THE UK Next week the European Social Forum gets a real boost in the UK, Haidi Giuliani, the mother of Carlo who was killed by the police in Genoa, is coming to speak on a tour raising the profile of the European Social Forum. Since losing her son, Haidi has been speaking at countless protests and meetings, driven by a similar anger at the way things are run today. Haidi is one of the most inspiring speakers in Europe today, do everything you can to hear her speak. The confirmed dates of the tour are: Monday 7 October 7.00pm Bristol University, Merchant Venturers Building. Speakers include Alex Gordon, RMT nat. exec., Chris Nineham ESF Tuesday 8 October 1.00pm Students Union, Goldsmiths College, New Cross London SE14 Speakers include Asad Rehman ESF, Billy Hayes CWU gen. sec. 7.00pm University of London Union, Malet Street London WC1 Speakers include Alex Gordon, Alex Callinicos, author and Dave Timms World Development Movement Wednesday 9 October 1.00pm Physics Lecture Theatre, Warwick University 7.30pm Mechanics Institute cnr Major and Princess Street, Manchester City Centre Speakers include Jonathan Neale ESF Thursday 10 October 12.30pm Moors Room, Sheffield University Students Union Speakers include Alice Hood SUSU, Chris Bambery ESF, World Development Movement 7.30pm Peak Lecture Theatre, Owen Building, Arundel Gate, Sheffield Hallam University Speakers include Richard Isdell CWU, WDM, Chris Bambery Friday 11 October 7.30pm Moir Hall, Mitchell Library, Glasgow Speakers include Mike Gonzalez, author and Noam Chomsky (live by video link) All the above meetings have been organised by the Mobilisation for the European Social Forum www.mobilise.org.uk <http://www.mobilise.org.uk> * CIVIL DISOBEDIENCE TO STOP THE WAR "I've never said this before. Non-violent resistance to the government will show they cannot claim to do this in our name. We should stop the buses, stop the trains, stop the schools." Tony Benn THURSDAY 31 OCTOBER - NATIONAL DAY OF PROTEST Basking in the glory of 28 september, the Stop the War Coalition have issued a call for a national day of civil disobedience against the war on Iraq. If you're a student - occupy your college or school, if you're a worker, organise a meeting for all your work mates (during working hours, maybe?) if you're not - find a big road junction to block, or use yer bonce to dream up other non-violent naughty things to do.... This is a call for local groups of whatever organisation to take a lead - not the task of putting on transport to a big centralised event like Saturday. Put your heads together, produce leaflets, call an activists meeting, contact different organisations and go for it. * SAND IN THE WHEELS: ATTAC Weekly newsletter http://attac.org/attacinfoen/attacnews147.pdf Special announcement The European Social Forum to be held in Florence November 6 to 10, is looking for volunteer interpreters. Find out the details and the volunteering form downloading one of the two file formats hereafter www.fse-esf.org/babel/babel-en.rtf or www.fse-esf.org/babel/babel-en.zip 1- From the Quarantine Against Greed (By Mark Engler) Even without our protests telling them so, it must be obvious to the finance ministers who attend the annual meetings of the IMF/World Bank that their institutions are sick. Those inside the Washington, D.C., headquarters can't feel so healthy after the year that passed. It was a year when corporations that they nurtured and nourished, like Enron, collapsed with little warning and less grace. When countries that had long swallowed their prescriptions, like Argentina, found themselves suffering from nauseous economies and rashes of popular uprising. 2- The Legacy of the Battle for Seattle (By Tom Hayden) The world of BS--"before Seattle"--was a dizzying can-do era of overnight millionaires with fantasies of wiring the planet in a grid of greed. Then came the protests, the greatest civil disobedience of the era, with thousands of people teaching the masters of the universe that they could no longer conduct business as usual, and the fantasy world began to shudder. 3- The Battle for WSSD's Endorsement of the Need for Corporate Accountability (By Martin Khor) One of the few bright spots in an otherwise disappointing World Summit on Sustainable Development was th4e successful campaign by many NGOs to get WSSD to make a commitment to make corporations accountable for their actions and the effects of these. 4- Chiapas' Stand Against Corporate Exploitation (By Ryan Zinn) The Chiapas' Montes Azules Integral Biosphere is best known for its ancient Maya pyramids and as a haven for endangered species. Yet it has become the focus of the battle against the development scheme PPP (Plan Pueblo Panama), which would make of Southern Mexico, and all of Central America, a paradise for corporate exploitation. The local communities, many of them Zapatista supporters, are to be subjected to an army-enforced "resettlement" scheme, destined to "guarantee the security for private investment." 5- European Social Forum - A Call for Rights The "Board of migrant people of Social Forums" invites the European networks on migrations to a meeting in Florence at the European social forum. Last year, during the protests at the G8 in Genoa, something important happened in the history of the global movement, a movement grown stronger and stronger since November 1999 in Seattle against the WTO. (Information on the ESF at the end of the article) * BOSTON: October 4th BUSH PROTEST Independent Media Center http://www.boston.indymedia.org:8081 October 4th BUSH PROTEST UPDATE - TIME CHANGE to 11:30AM! (english) Monday 30 Sep 2002 author: bkayal summary The initial time has been changed. Bush is coming to town for a luncheon (so showing up at 6pm is worthless) MEET AT 11:30AM AT THE Northern Avenue (now Moakley) Bridge. (It's between the South Station Red Line stop and the Aquarium Blue Line stop.) DOWNLOAD UPDATED PDF FLYER web link http://legitgov.org/protest_bush_boston_10_4.html * Crime pays: CEOs rake it in as stocks and jobs evaporate WSWS http://www.wsws.org/articles/2002/oct2002/ceos-o02.shtml ...In the wake of scandals at Enron, Worldcom and Global Crossing, in which tens of thousands of workers have lost their jobs and many more their life savings, government prosecutors are making an example of Kozlowski’s particularly flagrant abuse in an attempt to restore confidence in corporate America. Rampant corruption and greed, however, are not merely the result of a few bad apples, but endemic to the capitalist system in its current state of decay. According to the annual BusinessWeek survey of executive pay, first at the corporate trough during 2001 was Lawrence Ellison of the high-tech firm Oracle Corporation. While receiving neither salary nor bonuses, he cashed in stock options worth $706 million in January 2001, just before Oracle stock took a dive. Eight other executives earned over $100 million in 2001, while another 16 received over $50 million. Sixth on the list at $127 million was Louis Gerstner of IBM Corp, who exercised $115 million in stock options. The price of IBM stock has dropped 50 percent so far in 2002. The IBM CEO retired in March with a multimillion-dollar regular pension, a $2 million annual “Supplemental Executive” pension, a $2 million annual consulting contract, plus 10 years’ entitlement to use IBM aircraft, cars, offices, a luxury apartment and financial planning and home security services. In addition, he retains unexercised stock options valued at $382 million as of earlier this year. Gerstner’s retirement package stands in stark contrast with the treatment he meted out to IBM’s regular employees in 1999, when he introduced a defined contribution pension plan to replace the defined benefit plan, saving the company an estimated $200 million a year at its workers’ expense. In a study released in August entitled “Executive Excess 2002: CEOs Cook the Books, Skewer the Rest of Us”, [www.ufenet.org/press/2002/EE2002_pr.html] the Institute for Policy Studies and United for a Fair Economy examine CEO compensation at 23 major companies that are under investigation by the Securities and Exchange Commission, the US Justice Department or other authorities. These include such well-known corporate names as AOL Time Warner, Bristol-Myers Squibb, Kmart, Lucent Technologies and Xerox.... * Buy Nothing Day Adbusters.org Jammers, Buy Nothing Day has hit a five-alarm tipping point, and BND 2002 is set to be huge. How huge? Try a free concert in Chicago, voluntary shop closures in Germany, free films in Toronto, and a barter fair in the heart of L.A. And that's just the beginning. The BND headquarters is <http://www.adbusters.org>, where you'll find downloadable images, background info and highlights from past years' actions in the streets, malls and campuses worldwide. There are new events for 2002 as well -- help launch the Buy Nothing TV spots, or the "Curb Your Consumption" billboard campaign across the First World! Maybe you have your own plan for the 24-hour consumer fast. Yes? Then let's get your name on the Organizers List. <http://adbusters.org/campaigns/bnd/toolbox/contacts.jhtml> We'll send you big ideas and breaking news -- and you can keep us in the loop as things get cooking in your part of the world. This year could be the big one -- the year Buy Nothing Day erupts as a global mega-meme. And then . . . pop goes the paradigm! Staff & Volunteers Adbusters/ABTV * Precision Farming: The Marriage Between Agribusiness and Spy Technology CorpWatch http://www.corpwatch.org/issues/PID.jsp?articleid=4208 Flip the tortilla" ("virar la tortilla") is a common Puerto Rican expression. It describes the act of taking someone's argument and turning it on its head. This is precisely what the biotechnology and agribusiness industries are now doing to confound their critics. The genetically modified corn tortilla is certainly being flipped as major biotech corporations begin to soften to activist demands to label and segregate GM crops. Far from being a sincere expression of corporate responsibility, critics say corporations are pushing for these measures in order to tighten their hold on farmers. Carmelo Ruiz-Marrero of the Institute for Social Ecology investigates for CorpWatch. IN THE NEWS http://www.corpwatch.org/news/PNR.jsp *Dockworker Lockout Shuts Down West Coast *USA: Risks of Colombian Coca Spraying *USA: Peace Movement's Diverse Allies Keep the Spirit Alive *USA: Activists Decry Police Tactics *USA: Lawsuit Seeks IPO Profits From Five Executives BULLETIN BOARD http://www.corpwatch.org/bulletins/PBR.jsp *Dockworker Solidarity *World Bank and IMF Fiddle While Africa Burns *World Bank Finances Polluting Incinerators, Flouts International Law Check back throughout the week for more news and bulletins. * SAND IN THE WHEELS: ATTAC Weekly newsletter - Wednesday 02/10/02 http://attac.org/attacinfoen/attacnews147.pdf Content Special announcement The European Social Forum to be held in Florence November 6 to 10, is looking for volunteer interpreters. Find out the details and the volunteering form downloading one of the two file formats hereafter www.fse-esf.org/babel/babel-en.rtf or www.fse-esf.org/babel/babel-en.zip 1- From the Quarantine Against Greed (By Mark Engler) Even without our protests telling them so, it must be obvious to the finance ministers who attend the annual meetings of the IMF/World Bank that their institutions are sick. Those inside the Washington, D.C., headquarters can't feel so healthy after the year that passed. It was a year when corporations that they nurtured and nourished, like Enron, collapsed with little warning and less grace. When countries that had long swallowed their prescriptions, like Argentina, found themselves suffering from nauseous economies and rashes of popular uprising. 2- The Legacy of the Battle for Seattle (By Tom Hayden) The world of BS--"before Seattle"--was a dizzying can-do era of overnight millionaires with fantasies of wiring the planet in a grid of greed. Then came the protests, the greatest civil disobedience of the era, with thousands of people teaching the masters of the universe that they could no longer conduct business as usual, and the fantasy world began to shudder. 3- The Battle for WSSD's Endorsement of the Need for Corporate Accountability (By Martin Khor) One of the few bright spots in an otherwise disappointing World Summit on Sustainable Development was th4e successful campaign by many NGOs to get WSSD to make a commitment to make corporations accountable for their actions and the effects of these. 4- Chiapas' Stand Against Corporate Exploitation (By Ryan Zinn) The Chiapas' Montes Azules Integral Biosphere is best known for its ancient Maya pyramids and as a haven for endangered species. Yet it has become the focus of the battle against the development scheme PPP (Plan Pueblo Panama), which would make of Southern Mexico, and all of Central America, a paradise for corporate exploitation. The local communities, many of them Zapatista supporters, are to be subjected to an army-enforced "resettlement" scheme, destined to "guarantee the security for private investment." 5- European Social Forum - A Call for Rights The "Board of migrant people of Social Forums" invites the European networks on migrations to a meeting in Florence at the European social forum. Last year, during the protests at the G8 in Genoa, something important happened in the history of the global movement, a movement grown stronger and stronger since November 1999 in Seattle against the WTO. (Information on the ESF at the end of the article) * BUY NOTHING DAY www.adbusters.org Jammers, Buy Nothing Day has hit a five-alarm tipping point, and BND 2002 is set to be huge. How huge? Try a free concert in Chicago, voluntary shop closures in Germany, free films in Toronto, and a barter fair in the heart of L.A. And that's just the beginning. The BND headquarters is <http://www.adbusters.org>, where you'll find downloadable images, background info and highlights from past years' actions in the streets, malls and campuses worldwide. There are new events for 2002 as well -- help launch the Buy Nothing TV spots, or the "Curb Your Consumption" billboard campaign across the First World! Maybe you have your own plan for the 24-hour consumer fast. Yes? Then let's get your name on the Organizers List. <http://adbusters.org/campaigns/bnd/toolbox/contacts.jhtml> We'll send you big ideas and breaking news -- and you can keep us in the loop as things get cooking in your part of the world. This year could be the big one -- the year Buy Nothing Day erupts as a global mega-meme. And then . . . pop goes the paradigm! Staff & Volunteers Adbusters/ABTV Want to join the Culture Jammers Network? Visit http://adbusters.org/information/network/ * Queers Against The War (s) interested in seeing and participating in a visible and collective LGBT/Queer presence at the upcoming Sunday October 6 1PM Central Park East Meadow 96th St & 5th Ave entrance NYC anti-war rally and the Saturday October 26 antiwar demo in Washington DC. Look for the rainbow flag(s) (even if you don't like the rainbow flags, look at it this way, it's clearly an easy way to spot the other queer folks (unless you're gaydar is particularly good) and who said that it only has to be seen as a symbol of consumption, win it back for rebellion!). Also, we've set up a listserve, Queers Against War, to join it, just send an e-mail to: QueersAgainstWar-subscribe@yahoogroups.com form a local affinity group in your area, and connect with other affinity groups at regional/national/international actions. More dick, less cheney More bush, less George (sorry to those named George) * "YOU ARE EITHER WITH US, OR YOU ARE FIRED!" Michael Moore Dear Friends, I was going to write you a letter about what a pathetic liar George W, Bush is -- but then I figured, hey, why waste your time telling you something you already know! You already know that his planned invasion of Iraq is a ruse meant to distract the public from the real issues, those issues being the following: 1. The number of people unemployed since he "took" office has risen by 35%. 2. We had a federal SURPLUS of $281 billion when he was inaugurated; today we have a DEFICIT of $157 billion. 3. TWO MILLION jobs have been eliminated since Bush began his occupation of the Oval Office. 4. The stock market is down 34% since January of 2001. 5. Another 1.4 million people now have NO health insurance, making it a total of over 41 million Americans who can't afford to get sick. 6. Only 13 corporate crooks out of HUNDREDS have been indicted, and none of them have been the close personal friends of Mr. Bush. THOSE are the real issues facing us, not some phony excuse for a war. But, like I said, you already know that. You know that Bush is lying through his smirk when he says Iraq has "weapons of mass destruction." He has not offered one shred of evidence to prove this. Not one! You know he is lying when he says that there is a "connection" between Saddam and bin Laden. Even members of his own administration have admitted that is not true. It's just one lie after another, and I applaud those three congressmen who went to Iraq this week and told it like it is -- and demanded that the sanctions which have already killed a half-million Iraqi children be ended. Sen. Trent Lott said "they should come home and keep their mouths shut." I say, we need more damn Democrats with that kind of courage and with mouths like that! Which brings me to the real point of this letter. The Democrats. I have never seen a more lame bunch of cowards and appeasers in my life. They are ready to bow down before Bush and give him what he wants to wage war against Iraq. This pathetic excuse of a party is an embarrassment to us all. The fact that they let Robert Torricelli run for re-election in New Jersey, knowing how dirty he was, shows just how capable they are of handing the Senate over to Bush and the Republicans come November. They have blown it over and over again, and lots of good people I know who keep putting their faith in the Democrats are just giving up -- and that is the worst thing to happen in a free society. What are we going to do? Left to their own devices, the Democrats will not only hand both the House and the Senate to the Republicans in November, they will guarantee that Bush gets his second undeserved term in 2004. We must not let that happen. This year's election was theirs for the taking. Just look at the state of the union Bush gave us: Bush cronies caught stealing from the corporate till, Bush and Cheney caught breaking the law in the '90s, the economy in the toilet, and Bush failing to do the only real job he had to do since 9/11: Get bin Laden! What a disgrace! Yet the Democrats could not even find enough candidates to offer a REAL challenge to the Republicans in nearly 200 House districts for the November 5th elections. What an appalling excuse of a party. OK, I know, there is not much we can do about this now. But we all need to get busy and ensure that this whole rotten system is rocked by the disgruntled millions come election day 2004. Otherwise, we have no right to complain. In the meantime, we must stop the Bush attack on Iraq. We must find out now, as W says, "who is wid us and who is agin us." I am asking each of you to please sign the petition I have posted here (http://www.michaelmoore.com/petitions/peacepledge/index.php) and on my website (www.michaelmoore.com) informing the Democrats that whoever amongst them votes for this war, we pledge NEVER to vote for them again. I will personally see that your on-line signatures are delivered to every member of Congress. I guarantee your voice will be heard loud and clear. Go to http://www.michaelmoore.com/petitions/peacepledge/index.php and sign the petition to the Democrats: "You're Either With Us Or You're Fired." Then let's figure out together what we can do to turn things around by 2004. Thanks for taking the time to do this. We have no other choice. Yours, Michael Moore * $4.6 Million to Fight Biotech Food Labels http://www.transnationale.org/anglais/forums/alimentation__transgenique/show message.asp?messageID=409 O'Dwyer's PR Daily, September 30, 2002 "Conkling Fiskum & McCormick is counseling a coalition of heavyweight food biotechnology companies in a push to defeat a November ballot initiative in Oregon requiring labels for genetically-modified foods in that state," reports O'Dwyer's PR Daily. The Coalition Against the Costly Labeling Law plans to spend $6 million and has already raised $4.6 million from companies including CropLife International, PepsiCo, General Mills and ConAgra Foods. The citizens movement pushing for labeling of genetically engineered food expects to be massively outspent by corporate dollars flowing into Oregon from food and biotech companies. PR Watch, September 30, 2002 * GM trial ruined by rogue gene strain http://www.transnationale.org/anglais/forums/alimentation__transgenique/show message.asp?messageID=408 Seed sown in GM trials over the past three years has been contaminated with controversial antibiotic genes which went undetected by government inspectors. Embarrassed officials admitted yesterday that there had been a "serious breach" of regulations and that the seed company, Aventis, was under investigation and could be prosecuted if found to have broken licence conditions. Although company executives could face up to five years in jail and unlimited fines, the government none the less has a PR disaster on its hands. The joint statement by the Scottish Executive and the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs admitted there had been a complete failure of its regulatory system which failed to detect the contaminated seed despite many "paper" inspections, meaning it had simply accepted Aventis's word. The government said yesterday it was investigating its own failures and may overhaul the entire regulatory system. It said the entire crop, which is about to be harvested, would be destroyed, and that there was no danger to public health even though the 2.6% of rogue genes found were antibiotics. Critics have repeatedly called for antibiotic genes to be phased out amid evidence that GM plants and weeds of the same species readily swap genes. This is a particular problem with oilseed rape, which has relatives growing wild in hedgerows. Antibiotic genes are controversial because of the danger of gene transfer to bacteria in animals and humans, who could then develop immunity to common life-saving antibiotics. The government said Aventis, not its own inspectors, had found the contamination and had notified authorities. It is unclear whether the contamination occurred from accidental mixing of two types of seeds or cross-fertilisation of two different GM crops. A Scottish Executive spokesman said: "Aventis has been given very strong advice to make sure this doesn't happen again. And we have called on the GM inspectorate to investigate and see if legal action should be taken against the firm. "This is a very serious breach of regulations which shows there could be problems with how Aventis puts together rape seed for GM trials." No one at Aventis was available for comment yesterday. The contaminated fields are in Aberdeenshire, Gloucestershire, Oxfordshire, Yorkshire, Lincolnshire, Wiltshire, Warwickshire, and Worcestershire. The seeds were also sown at three trial sites in England in 1999, and at six in 2000. The find comes days after the government launched a "public debate" on the future of GM crops in Britain as the three-year crop trials draw to a close. The tests aimed to assess the impact of GM crops on the countryside. The fact that contaminated seeds have grown undetected throughout the trial will be hard for Margaret Beckett, the environment secretary, to explain away as she tours the country this autumn. It also begs the question whether the last batch of oilseed rape due to be planted this autumn to end the trials is also suspect. Aventis has been asked to reassure the government before planting. Friends of the Earth called yesterday for an immediate halt to the outdoor testing of GM crops. It said that before planting, the government must carry out a full investigation and ensure there is no repetition, guarantee that winter oilseed rape seed is not contaminated, and publish results. Friends of the Earth's Adrian Bebb said: "This is yet another biotech blunder from the GM industry. How can we trust them to produce our food if they cannot even run a GM test site? It is clear Aventis are incompetent and should not be allowed to experiment with our countryside or our food anymore. It beggars belief that the government's own inspectorate visited Aventis in April but did not uncover this contamination." Contrary to government comments, antibiotic-resistant genes can provide immunity to the important antibiotic gentamicin, which is used to treat life-threatening illnesses such as meningitis, he added. * Army recruitment drive thwarted UK IndyMedia Today in Brixton the local job centre invited a british army recruitment team to come to the job centre and take a few clients off their hands. Anyone joining up was no longer the responsibility of the DSS especially if they were dead. Local peace activists had other ideas and mounted a demo outside. In the face of this ferocious opposition the army packed up and left after a mere 25 mins. Rumours that Saddam Hussains Repulican Guard are now training with pink and yellow placards are not yet confirmed. * Antarctic ozone hole splits in two http://www.cnn.com/2002/TECH/space/09/30/ozone.holes/index.html Like a giant amoeba in the sky, the ozone hole above Antarctica has divided into two parts, which have spread away from the southernmost continent. The surprising development is the first of its kind since NASA and other U.S. agencies began monitoring the ozone hole, a seasonal vortex high in the atmosphere, more than two decades ago. Satellite images from 2002 also reveal that the ozone hole had shrunk considerably compared with the previous two years. Scientists caution that the data are insufficient to conclude that the fragile ozone layer is on the mend. "This is the first time we've seen the polar vortex split in September," said Craig Long, a meteorologist with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). Exceptionally strong weather disturbances this autumn in the stratosphere spawned the ozone hole division, Long said. Moreover, the hole had dwindled in size before the split because of unusually warm temperatures in the atmosphere, according to NASA ozone scientist Paul Newman. The stratosphere stretches from six to 30 miles above the Earth's surface and contains high concentrations of ozone, shielding the planet from dangerous ultraviolet solar rays, which can cause skin cancer. In fact, without the ozone layer, life as we know it could not exist. Since the 1970s, satellite, balloon and ground-based instruments have observed a temporary ozone hole open up over Antarctica for several months during the winter and spring in the Southern Hemisphere. Scientists speculate that certain chlorine and bromine chemical compounds used in everything from aerosol cans to air conditioning are to blame. The industrial pollutants, phased out by the Montreal Protocols by the mid-1990s, are known to persist high in the atmosphere where they can repeatedly break down ozone molecules. Between 1996 and 2001, the ozone hole reached more than 9 million square miles (24 million square km), larger than Antarctica. Preliminary estimates from early September 2002 suggest that the seasonal hole had dwindled to about 6 million square miles (15 million square km), according to NASA. The air over the South Pole usually becomes coolest in August and September. The frigid weather is associated with the formation of thin clouds, where the floating industrial chemicals eat up the fragile ozone molecules. By October, the atmospheric region warms up and the hole begins to disappear. The 2002 development could be an aberration caused by weather patterns and does not necessarily reflect a long-term trend, NOAA and NASA scientists said. "While chlorine and bromine chemicals cause the ozone hole, temperature is also a key factor in ozone loss," Newman said. * Rome: Communists lead anti-war demo Tens of thousands of leftist protesters marched in Rome on Saturday against a possible U.S. war against Iraq, shouting anti-war slogans and insisting that any conflict would end up doing more harm than good. The march, led by the Communist Refoundation Party, snaked by ancient Roman ruins before settling in the central Piazza del Popolo. Police said about 30,000 protesters showed up, although organizers claimed a turnout of 150,000. Communist leader Fausto Bertinotti addressed the crowd with an angry speech. "Bush is isolated, but sadly that isolation might lead to a war. War would push the world into turmoil." "Our words must be unequivocal and united: No to war! We want only peace!" he said. The protest wasn't limited to worries of an Iraq war, but also included strong criticism of Israeli government policies and of Italy's conservative Premier Silvio Berlusconi. However, the marchers -- holding up a sea of red communist flags -- were largely concerned with the possibility of war. The latest opinion polls suggest that almost 70 percent of Italians are against the idea of going to war with Iraq. 7-year-old protester Luca Cecchi said, "Bush is exactly like Saddam. The only difference is that Saddam dictates in Iraq, while Bush controls the world." * The president's real goal in Iraq The Atlanta Journal Constitution http://www.accessatlanta.com/ajc/opinion/0902/29bookman.html ...This war, should it come, is intended to mark the official emergence of the United States as a full-fledged global empire, seizing sole responsibility and authority as planetary policeman. It would be the culmination of a plan 10 years or more in the making, carried out by those who believe the United States must seize the opportunity for global domination, even if it means becoming the "American imperialists" that our enemies always claimed we were. Once that is understood, other mysteries solve themselves. For example, why does the administration seem unconcerned about an exit strategy from Iraq once Saddam is toppled? Because we won't be leaving. Having conquered Iraq, the United States will create permanent military bases in that country from which to dominate the Middle East, including neighboring Iran.... * Workers Struggles: The Americas WSWS http://www.wsws.org/articles/2002/oct2002/lab-o01.shtml Latin America Peruvian workers strike against President Toledo + Mexico settles oil pact + Thousands demand “bread, peace and jobs” in Argentina + United States United Airlines unions give concessions + Civil disobedience protest at Yale University + Tentative agreement in Pennsylvania Boeing strike Canada Saskatchewan health care strike widens + Strike targets New Brunswick government * Visitor sees too many cars at BSU http://www.thestarpress.com/tsp/news/local/02/sep/0930bsuparkingnews.php MUNCIE - Canadian environmentalist James Fulton, one of the speakers at last week's UniverCity 2000 festival, suggested closing a main road through the heart of Ball State University. He didn't make the proposal hastily. The director of the David Suzuki Foundation and former member of Canada's House of Commons spent the entire week on campus. He walked through parking lots, rode the shuttle bus and counted the number of passengers in cars. "You can gather some pretty accurate data pretty quickly," Fulton said in an interview. So when a student - a fraternity president - asked during a seminar, titled Our Land, Our Community: Who is Responsible/Is Community Alive? what he could do to make a difference, Fulton gave his idea. Circulate a petition to close McKinley Avenue between Emens Auditorium and the College of Architecture and Planning. "Some great things can be done on this campus to make it greener, more friendly, save money and get people on the track of sustainability," Fulton said. It appeared to Fulton that about 50 percent of the vehicles on campus were sport utility vehicles and light trucks. In addition, he counted a high percentage of vehicles being driven with only one occupant. "It's among the highest that I've ever seen," he said..... * No war without UN, warns poll Guardian http://www.observer.co.uk/politics/story/0,6903,801073,00.html ...Nearly three-quarters of people asked if they would support an attack on Saddam Hussein said it would require international agreement. Just 18 per cent would support unilateral action if a new UN resolution was not passed. The findings are a blow to Tony Blair's attempts to win 'hearts and minds' on the argument that action must be taken whether or not there is a new UN resolution. The poll for a Channel 4 programme tonight, War on Iraq: Which side are you on?, shows that there is a great deal of scepticism about the war against Saddam. Nearly 60 per cent of the 1,000 people questioned by NOP thought war was 'inevitable' no matter what the UN or countries opposed to military action argued. Asked who they thought was the greatest threat to world peace, 43 per cent said Saddam while 37 per cent said President George Bush.... * California teachers' union opposes war against Iraq California Federation of Teachers Resolution Against War on Iraq Passed by the CFT State Council on September 21, 2002 Whereas, the United States and Britain have been bombing Iraq on a virtually continuous basis since the end of the Gulf War, and Whereas, the Bush administration has presented no credible evidence that Iraq has intentions of harming the citizens of this country or that Iraq presents a threat to the United States, and Whereas, the Bush administration is seeking any pretext to overthrow the government of a sovereign nation, in violation of international law, and Whereas, a war with Iraq would require the re-direction of vital resources and funds to a destructive, senseless, and illegal goal while further strengthening an administration that has restricted the civil liberties of its citizens, and Whereas, this administration is using the so-called "War on Terrorism" to distract the American people from the vital issues they confront, Therefore, be it resolved that the California Federation of Teachers goes on record as strenuously opposing the Bush administration's march toward war with Iraq, And be it further resolved that the California Federation of Teachers urge its members and affiliates to get involved with organizations working toward stopping the Bush administration's march toward war with Iraq. ************************************** Fred Glass, Communications Director California Federation of Teachers One Kaiser Plaza, Suite 1440 Oakland, CA 94612 510/832-8812 fax 510/832-5044 www.cft.org * Two typical articles from British newspapers In the UK the government has published a dossier about the claim that Iraq is developing weapons of mass destruction and put its case before Parliament, to justify its coming policies in relation to Iraq. It has been greeted with widespread scepticism in many mass circulation papers. These two articles exemplify the deep doubts throughout Britain and the worries about hitching ourselves up to US foreign policy under George Bush. The first is today's editorial of the Daily Mirror, a tabloid newspaper. The second an article from the Independent, a broadsheet. THERE'S NOTHING NEW IN BLAIR'S DROSSIER TONY Blair really knows how to make the best of a bad case. He must have been a brilliant barrister. His speech to the Commons yesterday was as good a defence of the indefensible as was possible. To listen to him, you could understand how he had swung his cabinet behind him. But Mr Blair's argument was let down by the dossier he released before his Commons performance. It was 50 pages of old facts and new guesses, held together by the Prime Minister's belief that Saddam Hussein is a real threat to world peace. The Daily Mirror said it needed to have killer facts. Instead, it had marshmallow ones. The dossier began by calling into evidence the recent report from the International Institute for Strategic Studies. This, said the dossier, "suggested Iraq could assemble nuclear weapons within months of obtaining fissile material from foreign sources". What it actually concluded was that Saddam is years away from developing his own nuclear weapons. And, in its words, it is highly unlikely he could persuade someone to sell him fissile material anyway. To start the dossier with such a distortion casts a shadow over the rest of it. Why should we take on trust such a vital document when it begins with a deliberate misreading of the facts? There is no doubting Tony Blair's sincerity. And if he does what he said yesterday he will do, most people would back him. For in the Commons he insisted that nothing had yet been decided, that the views of the United Nations were paramount, that the object was to neuter Saddam, not to replace him. That is not what President Bush and his warmongering friends want, though. Liberal Democrat leader Charles Kennedy spoke for millions of concerned Britons when he attacked the notion of "regime change". The emphasis must be on getting weapons inspectors back into Iraq, not in launching a macho and bloody invasion. Tony Blair did not dispute that. But a huge question mark continues to hang over his closeness to President Bush. If there is no option except to attack Saddam, the British people will be right behind the Prime Minister. But as long as Mr Bush continues to insist on military action, Mr Blair will be accused of simply going along with the White House's lust for war. Yesterday the Daily Mirror asked Tony Blair to prove what he says about the threat from Iraq. We do not believe the dossier does. There is still not enough evidence to persuade us that Saddam is capable of using chemical or biological weapons. Still not enough to make a real case that he will soon have nuclear arms and the ability to deliver them. Still not enough to convince us we are wrong to believe that a lot can be done before the last desperate resort is reached and the bombers and troops are sent in. The Lawyer: A flawed document, and the price to preserve unity By Anthony Scrivener 25 September 2002 Saddam Hussein is a deplorable tyrant but despite losing the "mother of all battles" in 1991 the allies allowed him to remain in power. The Government's dossier sets out the history of President Saddam's grotesque misdeeds at length but does it justify an immediate war, which would destroy the lives of thousands of innocent people who suffer under his regime and turn their country into rubble? The short answer is that it does not even attempt to do so. Anyone used to sifting "evidence" will soon spot the yawning gap in the argument. You only have to read Chapter 3, "The Current Position: 1998-2002". Past sins there are aplenty but there is no convincing evidence that Iraq is intending to attack anyone. In fact the idea that it had such an intention is frankly ludicrous unless President Saddam was intending to wipe out the US and the UK at the same time.We must accept that the "evidence" largely comes from intelligence reports that are incapable of proper verification, but a government has to act upon such material on occasions. The position is different in a court. When proper evidence was required in two cases alleged to have al-Qa'ida connections that came to court in England, one was thrown out by the jury and in the other the US Government were unable to produce any evidence to support an extradition. The chronology is important. The Gulf War ended in 1991 with Iraq crippled. Unscom was established to provide for intrusive inspections and to eliminate Iraq's chemical and biological weapons and ballistic missiles with a range in excess of 150km (93 miles). Over the next seven years large quantities of chemical weapons and ballistic missiles and production facilities were destroyed and nuclear materials were removed. In January 1999 inspectors withdrew, unable to account for large quantities of chemicals that could be used in chemical warfare. The ability to monitor was gone. UN resolutions had probably been broken but there were no demands for war at that time, so what has changed? What is the "evidence"? It is Chapter 3 that purports to set out "what we know of Saddam Hussein's chemical, biological, nuclear and ballistic missile programme". The list is unimpressive, even allowing for favourable presentation. It has to be conceded that almost all components and supplies used in weapons of mass destruction and ballistic programmes are dual purpose and could have innocent application. The main chemical weapon production facility at al-Muthanna has not been re-built, but a new one at al-Sharrat has been constructed. There is no evidence that it is being used in connection with chemical warfare. The fact that it has guards is hardly surprising. It is stated that most of the personnel involved in chemical research are still in Iraq. This does not mean they are engaged on the same work and they could hardly be deported. It cannot be disproved that Iraq has destroyed technical manuals as they claim. Iraq is developing two short-range missiles with a range of 150km but the UN resolution permits this. A wish to develop missiles with a longer range does not mean they have done so. It is stated that Iraq has tried to procure items that could be used in connection with the enrichment of uranium but there is no evidence that it has succeeded or that it has acquired uranium apart from that held under IAEA supervision. It is not suggested that Iraq has already got a nuclear capability, let alone that it was intending to use it. The evidence that Iraq continues work on developing nuclear weapons depends upon a report that "uranium has been sought from Africa that has no civil nuclear application" (a fact repeated on at least three occasions in the dossier) and also attempts to acquire certain equipment that could be used for nuclear weapons. Neither was in fact acquired. In the case of specialised aluminium tubes it is conceded there is no "definitive intelligence that it is destined for a nuclear programme". Even with the assistance of the gifted British Civil Service who drafted it, the dossier hardly presents a convincing picture. There are other countries, such as Israel, Pakistan, India and China, which have a nuclear weapon programme, but no one so far has suggested that this would be a justification for going to war with them. The breach by Iraq of UN resolutions is a matter for the UN, not an excuse to embark on a war. So what has changed? The answer is that 9.11.01 changed everything for the United States. The hurried announcement by President George Bush after that tragedy of war against terrorism generally needs to show some results. Progress has been made in Afghanistan but Osama bin Laden may have slipped the net. If you wish to show your determination to smash up a particularly nasty regime with a bad track record, then Iraq is a good bet. The strength of the political arguments in the Government that have gone on behind the scenes can be seen from the final words in the Prime Minister's Foreword. There is no cry for war or for immediate military action of the kind the US is proposing. The Foreword ends much more lamely: "The UK Government has been right to support the demands that the issue be confronted and dealt with." Such is the price of unity. Such is the strength of the evidence. * Oil Wars and Oil Embargoes: the Cost of Oil in Blood and Human Rights Violations Brian Davey Presented to Stop the War Teach In Nottingham April 2002 Over the next 30 to 40 years the world economy and society have to make a transition from an energy intensive mode of production, based largely on fossil fuel based energy sources, to a low energy mode of production, based largely on renewable sources. This is because the planet cannot absorb the toxicity of fossil fuels and petrochemical products, as the Greenhouse effect shows, and also because of oil and gas depletion. It will not be an easy transition to make. There are powerful inertial forces in the economic, social and political structure. Physical models of the economy show that making the transition to renewable energy, and less energy intensive production, will take considerable time and energy resources - and there is powerful inertia which resides in a reluctance of the public to change their life styles. It is highly stressful to make major life style and work changes quickly, as anyone who has ever been made redundant, or who must pay a big bill in a cash crisis knows. The scale of the transition we are talking about may strain many people’s coping abilities to the limit. Also there is a huge reluctance in the political economic elite to start the change process - because their investments and their mind set are centred around easily available fuels, as well as economic activities which are energy intensive, and which assume cheap and readly available energy. However, as I said, oil and gas depletion is and will continue to push them to change. Now, of course, people will say, what oil and gas depletion? World oil production is continuing to rise and there are, according to BP, 35 years of supply left based at current projected rates of consumption. Gas reserves will last even longer. Is there not plenty of time for an easy transition here? In fact, and this is crucial to understanding what is happening in world politics, the depletion of world oil and gas is and will be highly geograpically uneven. Oil production has been in decline in the USA itself since about 1970. In the North Sea oil production has begun to slip over the last two years and in the non OPEC countries as a whole it is generally recognised that oil production will fall unless new technologies can be found to get more oil out of existing wells. One estimate suggests, however, that this would cost $1trillion to bring about - a sum equal to 77% of British GDP for a year or 23 times the current yearly investment sum by all the major existing oil companies together, in all their areas of investment. But there are some places in the world where oil is still available, for now, in abundance - and in particular, the Middle East. Of course, production will go into decline in the middle eastern countries too eventually, especially as they end up supplying a larger and larger proportion of world supplies. And that is indeed what is set to happen - the more rapid depletion elsewhere will drive the share of the Middle East up. By 2009 it is estimated that the Middle East will supply over 50% of world production and that will give some countries a tremendous potential economic and political power. This is then real background to much of what is going on. If we look below all the propoganda, for the consumption of public opinion, about defending freedom and democracy, what is essential happening is that the US energy elite is involved in geo-political manoevres in order to secure its oil (and gas) supplies. The Texan oil barons, who currently run the White House want to ensure that they are not held hostage by Middle Eastern regimes that show an unwelcome independence, and that they are well placed, when the going gets difficult, to ensure that the oil and gas goes to the USA, and not to other places. This can be described as their strategy to defend the status quo, and, as I said, its intention is to try to create as long a time period as possible for the US to avoid the necessary economic, social and political changes to a solar and low energy economy. Given that there is only so much oil available this must be at the expense of other countries and peoples on the earth - above all the worlds poor, who are likely to be priced out of the world’s energy market. The presence in the Middle East of Britain and France, as well as of the German armies in world war two, are all explainable in terms of securing oil supplies. Over the last 50 years, of course, Britain and France, have been supplanted by the US as the dominant oil consumer and external military presence. The way the US operates is nicely explained by US Foreign Policy adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski in his book, published in 1997, "The Grand Chessboard - American Primacy And It's Geostrategic Imperatives," The aim, according to Brzezinski, is to "decipher the central external goals of the political elites and the likely consequences of their seeking to attain them;. second, to formulate specific U.S. policies to offset, co-opt, and/or control the above....To put it in a terminology that harkens back to the more brutal age of ancient empires, the three grand imperatives of imperial geostrategy are to prevent collusion and maintain security dependence among the vassals, to keep tributaries pliant and protected, and to keep the barbarians from coming together." (p.40) With that in mind the US has developed a special relationship with the Saudi royal family, that goes back to the 1940s, and with Israel. These two poles of US strategy do not sit well together. Israel is heavily backed militarily to be what Chomsky calls America’s "attack dog". Britain and France allied with Israel in this way in their attempt to attack what they saw as the danger or radical Arab nationalism embodied in Nasser, when he nationalised the Suez canal, the main oil route to Europe, in 1956. Then in 1967 Israel again dealt a heavy blow to radical nationalist regimes in the 6 day war. However, as I said, this support for Israel does not go down very well in the Arab world and does not do anything for the popularity and stability of the Saudi regime. Thus, in the 1973, the Arab world displayed a rare degree of unity and imposed an oil embargo against the west and the US for their support against Israel. In this respect its worth noting that virtually all OPEC countries are Muslim countries. As someone has put it, the God of Oil is Allah. In 1973 queues immediately formed at petrol pumps and oil prices rocketed. This had an enormous impact in getting energy looked at seriously and was a real boost to the green movement at the time. What the US fears, of course, and what Saddam Hussein would like to see happen...what many people in the Arab World would like to see happen, including Osama bin Laden, who has said so, is for that oil embargo to happen again. That makes the situation in Saudi Arabia and Iraq particularly important. Basically US policy in regard to Saudi Arabia has been the same since the 1940s. The US government promises to prop up the Saudi royal family militarily, sell its all the arms it wants, in return for Saudi oil at a slightly discounted price. The dollars that the Saudi’s get for their oil, also largely flows into US banks and the US banks. Another place these petrodollars flow is into the promotion of Saudi Arabia’ s particular brand of puritanical and autocratic Islam - Wahhabism. The US did not mind this at all for a long period of time - because Islamic extremism was a useful card that could be backed by the US too - to further its broader aims. Thus was Osama bin Laden supported by the CIA for many years. Islamic extremists were trained to be used against radical nationalist regimes and tendencies - as well in wars whose aim was to loosen Russian control over the Caspian Sea area, Central Asia and Afghanistan. This was also done, essentially, to secure access to oil and gas reserves in this area. In the 1980s and early 1990s it was thought that the oil and gas reserves there were much larger than they in fact are. The area was seen as an alternative source that would reduce dependence on the Middle East. According to Sheila Heslin, energy expert at the NSC, testifying to a Senate Committee hearing in 1997 - "US policy was to promote the rapid development of Caspian energy...We did so specifically to promote the development of these oil rich countries, in essence to break Russia’s monopoly control over the transportation of oil from that region, and frankly to promote Western energy security through diversification of supply" (quoted in Ahmed Rashid’s book "Taliban" ). This is a strategy which has formidable problems associated with it, however. For one thing there is not as much oil there as was at first thought - many exploratory wells came up dry. For another, some of the newly discovered fields, e.g. In Kazakhstan have been found to have a very high sulphur content, so it would be highly polluting to use. From an oil executive point of view the area is a wild west. The post Soviet political bosses are not good at sticking to their contracts - in a highly competitive environment where other oil companies are trying to break in. There is a huge amount of corruption. There are political disputes between the different countries around the Caspian about oil rights in it. And there are problems about transporting or pumping the oil out. Oil pipelines or potential pipeline routes lead through zones where already existing conflicts make them vulnerable - like Grozny, like the Kurdish areas of Iraq or Turkey, like Afghanistan. Putting troops into some of those areas to try to secure them has led to the exacerbation of conflicts and immense suffering. Yet there is no doubt that is why they are there. Thus, for example, as the US has been trying to detach Caspian Sea from Russian control, Putin’s government have been trying to ensure, in Grozny, that they can guarantee they keep a presence in the area - and has the alternative strategy of offering oil and gas, from and through Russia, to the West, to worm his way into a alliance with NATO, even perhaps eventual membership. In this regard he is making headway. Until very recently the US energy and military establishment still thought that they could work with the Islamic fundamentalists that they had built up. They were negotiating with the Taliban regime about pipelines through Afghanistan up until a few weeks before Sept 11th. The war on terror is really an abandonment of that strategy - and as entailed reaching a modus vivendi with Russia, which now wants to present itself as an alternative to Saudi Arabia on the world oil scene. There is a big question, however, of how much the Russians, who already provide huge gas supplies to Germany and elsewhere in Europe, have access the necessary supplies. So this is the background, as you will see to many current political development - in which regard let us not forget to mention Venezuela, where Hugo Chavez has just survived a really ham fisted coup attempt - at least in part because he is independent of the US and sees Venezuela’s oil revenues as being spent on programmes to support the poor in that country. So whereover one looks, underneath the geo-political manoevring, we discover that energy politics are absolutely central and that the drive towards war is about securing cheap and plentiful energy in a world where differential depletion is leading to greater dependency on the Middle East and Saudi Arabia. After Saudi Arabia, Iraq is next in line in terms of reserves and securing control over Iraq would also give Kuweit greater security and be strategically important in containing Iran. The question is what is to be done about all of this? It seems to me that merely opposing war preparations and murderous intrigues is not enough. One needs a credible energy policy that squarely confronts the issues and the broader context, namely, how to make the transition to a low energy intensity economy, powered by renewables. In this regard the cost of oil is far too cheap - it is too cheap because its market price does not reflect its scarcity value in the face of depletion, it does not reflect its cost to the environment, nor its cost in wars, blood and human rights violations. In order to motivate the massive change there will be a need for a corespondingly massive change in perception and government policies to cost of energy up and cost of labour (human expertise and ingenuity) down. So oil consumption has to be brought down. There are a number of very simple and admnistratively feasible ways in which this can be done - for example tradeable personal energy rights given to each citizen which the government limit so that, in total, a country can only consume no more than an agreed upper limits of calories or joules of energy. It would also be remarkably easy to tax primary energy sources (oil, gas, coal etc ) at the place they enter the economy (e.g. Where oil tankers dock) and abolish income tax and VAT. This system, the so called Unitax, would be effectively unevadable. The resultant tax regime would slightly discrimate against the poor because of the amount of their income they spend on space heating. However, it would be simple to have a rebate, or other system, for all citizens up to a certain figure on their energy bills. The resultant price changes would provide an enormous boost for energy efficiency and renewables, which would not be taxed, as well as encouraging a whole series of life style changes that would save on energy intensive consumption products and choices. House building would boom as the energy intensity of building is very low - it is a very labour intensive industry. More people would take to their bikes in preference to paying huge fuel bills for their cars. Local food would be cheaper because of lower transport costs and vegetarianism would be too, as meat is energy intensive. Local seaside resorts would have a renaissance as going abroad would cost a lot more. We can see, here, of course, the reasons that this will not happen without some major social and economic crisis. There is a network of vested interest and inertia behind the present arrangements and people find changing their routines stressful. Virtually all tax inspectors and tax advisers would become redundant, as would butchers, and a lot of workers in motor car manufacturing plants - though less so in plants producing really efficient vehicles. That said, we may be heading towards this crisis in the next few months - for we really do not know what will be the outcome once the US and Britain goes to war with Iraq. We know already what Saddam Hussein wants - a repeat of the 1973 oil embargo - and we will all hold our breath to see if the US, in those circumstances decides to use bunker buster mini nuclear weapons to prevent that occurring. At all events it is war that tends to speed up latent issues in politics and, by its effect on world oil supplies, this war might just give a huge shove behind the tendencies I have written about - including creating public recognition of the need for massive change and new policies of this type. Brian Davey April 2002 Return to CounterHeg Home