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Indict Saddam
by KENNETH ROTH • Sunday March 24, 2002 at 07:34 PM
100,000 Kurds
The Bush administration's frustration with a decade of increasingly porous sanctions against Iraq has led to active consideration of military action. Yet one alternative has yet to be seriously tried -- indicting Saddam Hussein for his many atrocities, particularly the 1988 genocide against Iraqi Kurds.
As deposed Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic discovered, indictment for grave abuses can delegitimize a dictator and undermine his grasp on power. Even if Saddam escapes arrest, his indictment for heinous crimes would demonstrate that Iraq's desire for normal international relations is a pipe dream so long as Saddam is at the helm. That would weaken Saddam's support among the many governments that have been lining up for years to do commercial deals with him in anticipation of an end to sanctions. It would also encourage Iraqi officials to overthrow him.
Cowardice
Unfortunately, governmental cowardice and opportunism have stymied past attempts to indict Saddam, as Human Rights Watch learned during its intensive efforts to bring him to justice in the 1990s. At the top of any indictment should be Saddam's 1988 genocidal Anfal campaign against Iraqi Kurds, described by Jeffrey Goldberg in this week's New Yorker. Named after a Koranic verse justifying pillage of the property of infidels, the Anfal campaign unfolded as the 1980-88 Iran-Iraq war was winding down. Iraqi Kurds had taken advantage of Saddam's preoccupation with Iran to seize control of parts of mountainous northern Iraq. But as soon as Iraqi troops could be withdrawn from the Iranian front, Saddam shifted them to the north.
Several thousand Kurdish villages were destroyed, forcing residents to live in appalling camps. In at least 40 cases, Iraqi forces under Saddam's cousin, Ali Hassan al-Majid, used chemical weapons to kill and chase Kurds from their villages. Then, during the Anfal campaign from February to September 1988, Iraqi troops swept through the highlands of Iraqi Kurdistan rounding up everyone who remained in government-declared "prohibited zones." Some 100,000 Kurds, mostly men and boys, were trucked to remote sites and executed. Only seven are known to have escaped.
The full scope of the Anfal horror became known only after Saddam's defeat in the Gulf War. The Iraqi military's withdrawal from the region in October 1991 after the imposition of a no-fly zone made it feasible for the first time in years for outsiders to reach the area.
Human Rights Watch investigators took advantage of this opening to enter northern Iraq and document Saddam's crimes. Some 350 witnesses and survivors were interviewed. Mass graves were exhumed. And Kurdish rebels were convinced to hand over some 18 tons of documents that they had seized during the brief post-war uprising from Iraqi police stations. These documents were airlifted to Washington, where Human Rights Watch researchers poured through this treasure trove of information about the inner workings of a ruthless regime.
With this extraordinarily detailed evidence of genocide, Human Rights Watch launched a campaign to bring Saddam to justice. At the time the U.N. Security Council was creating special tribunals for Rwanda and the former Yugoslavia, but there was no consensus for similar action on Iraq. France and Russia, each with extensive business interests in Iraq, threatened to wield their veto. China, worried about analogies to its treatment of Tibetans, was disinclined to support an International Criminal Tribunal for Iraq. With no International Criminal Court then in the works, and the Pinochet option of exercising universal jurisdiction in national courts not yet widely recognized, the prospect of criminal prosecution was remote.
Human Rights Watch thus turned to the only available remedy -- a civil suit before the International Court of Justice in The Hague, commonly known as the World Court. The relevant U.N. treaty -- the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide -- assigned the World Court the task of adjudicating disputes under the treaty. We hoped for a declaratory judgment that the Iraqi government had committed genocide, damages for the survivors, and an order that the perpetrators be prosecuted.
The problem was that only governments can bring suit before the World Court. Washington was a logical first choice, and ultimately the Clinton administration endorsed the case. But restrictions in the U.S. ratification of the Genocide Convention stood in the way of a successful suit.
Human Rights Watch staff then circled the globe trying to convince another government to bring the suit. None would. At best, a couple of governments said they would join a coalition to bring the case, but only on the condition that at least one European government joined as well. Several European governments gave the matter serious consideration, but in the end none would take the plunge.
There were many reasons for this reluctance, some stated openly, others only hinted at. Governments feared the loss of business opportunities when Iraq emerged from U.N. sanctions. They feared a loss of influence in the Middle East for suing an Arab state. They feared terrorist retaliation by Iraqi agents. And they feared the expense of bringing the lawsuit (although offers were made to raise the funds).
This frustrating experience highlighted the importance of an International Criminal Court -- that is, a global tribunal that does not depend on the political courage of individual governments or the vagaries of consensus among the veto-wielding members of the U.N. Security Council. But the ICC will apply only to crimes that are committed after the treaty takes effect in several weeks. Many governments are ratifying the ICC treaty as an insurance policy against future Saddams. But the court cannot act retroactively on a crime such as the Anfal genocide.
Security Council
The best option remains Security Council action to establish an International Criminal Tribunal for Iraq, since the council would be free to grant the tribunal jurisdiction over past crimes. But council action depends on overcoming the veto of Russia, France and China. To date, that obstacle has been insurmountable, although no effort has been made in the post-Sept. 11 climate.
Saddam could also be prosecuted by any government that has given its courts universal jurisdiction for the crime of genocide, although in this case the actions of a single government would probably carry less weight than the pronouncements of an international court. Finally, one or more governments could sue in the World Court for a declaration that Iraq had committed genocide.
Regardless of the approach, formal condemnation of Saddam for such a heinous crime would signal definitively to Iraqis and Saddam's international sympathizers that he is beyond the pale -- not simply because of the threat he poses to others, but also because he has flouted the most basic norms on the treatment of his own people. That delegitimization would not guarantee his ouster, but it would certainly help build consensus that he is unfit to govern, and thus that something must be done to end his rule.
Mr. Roth is executive director of Human Rights Watch.
URL for this article:
http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,SB1016762854868646000.djm,00.html
Updated March 22, 2002 12:39 a.m. EST
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THE TRUTH ABOUT PROFILING
by NYP • Sunday March 24, 2002 at 07:42 PM
Racial profiling?
March 24, 2002 -- Over in New Jersey, the U.S. Justice Department a while back ordered state officials to study the driving habits of motorists along the New Jersey Turnpike - by race.
The idea, or so the feds believed, was that the survey would provide statistical proof of what has now become received wisdom: That state troopers for years practiced illegal racial profiling along the Turnpike.
So researchers - using specially designed radar gun cameras and high-speed photography - last spring captured images of 38,747 drivers who were exceeding the speed limit by at least 15 hours an hour.
Evaluators were able to agree on the races of 26,334 of the drivers - and what they found astonished them.
The survey showed that black drivers were photographed speeding twice as often as white drivers. And the higher the speed - i.e., the more egregious the offense - the higher the disparity.
In fact, the survey showed that blacks made up 16 percent of the speeders along the entire Turnpike - and 25 percent in the areas where profiling was said to be the most prevalent.
Why are these figures important? Because state figures show that 23 percent of the traffic stops along the Turnpike involve black drivers.
That is, the number of black drivers being pulled over corresponds almost identically with the rate at which the study found they were speeding.
Racial profiling?
Not exactly.
The study calls into serious doubt arguments that disparate impact - the fact that minority groups were stopped at a higher rate than their share of the general population -is proof positive that profiling was at work.
But now the Justice Department is refusing to let the folks in New Jersey release the results - saying that they're "wrong or unreliable."
That is to say, they don't support a politically correct conclusion.
Suppressing data, of course, would be par for the course for Trenton. From the outset, New Jersey ignored the facts and dealt with the racial-profiling allegations in a wholly political manner.
Take, for example, the shooting case that opened up the entire debate: A judge dismissed the attempted murder indictment after finding that the case was driven primarily by "powerful and intimidating forces" - namely, the governor's office.
That the Bush administration may be adopting the same tone is profoundly troubling.
Racial profiling - that is, stopping drivers solely on the basis of ethnicity - is both wrong and illegal.
But the survey that Washington is so intent on suppressing suggests strongly that New Jersey state troopers were motivated by behavior, not skin color.
This report needs to be made public.
Now.
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HOW TERROR SKEWS
by NEIL J. KRESSEL • Sunday March 24, 2002 at 07:47 PM
In the end, the West gets a terribly skewed view of the thugs.
March 24, 2002 -- CHRISTIANE Amanpour, CNN's ace foreign correspondent and the mother of a small boy, lives a dangerous life.
Last week, in what her network described as a "rare encounter," she met in a secret location with black-hooded Palestinian terrorists. The killers waved their weapons freely and displayed scary stores of ammunition.
Needless to say, Amanpour - like most sensible journalists in similar situations - stayed as far as possible from the tough questions.
Indeed, if a top New York public relations firm had been hired to make the terrorists look good, it couldn't have done a better job.
When the terrorists announced a "preference" for attacking "military infrastructure or army checkpoints" - something that is patently false - the reportedly highest-paid foreign correspondent in the world let them off without a follow-up question.
Indeed, two days after her story aired, members of the very same group (Yasser Arafat's Al Aqsa Brigades) showed their true preference when they bombed a Jerusalem shopping district, killing three civilians and wounding 60. Some military target!
Exploring why terrorists murder innocent civilians, Amanpour turned to an 8-year-old Palestinian girl: "First, my grandfather was hit. And then, when my father went to help him, he was killed." The girl's Uncle Farid provided corroboration. In a scene complete with wailing widows, Uncle insisted that the two Palestinians had been entirely innocent. Now he was bitter, Amanpour suggested - as if to say Palestinian resentment stems primarily from attacks by Israelis.
This is not the first time she has shown anti-Israeli bias. Perhaps that's why she was chosen by the terrorists for the much-coveted interview in the first place.
But Amanpour's skewed report and others like it reflect something more insidious than the misguided sympathies of reporters. By murdering and threatening reporters, terrorists deter them from presenting news honestly.
Call it the Daniel Pearl effect.
Killers need kidnap and murder only a single reporter to strike fear in the hearts of their fellow journalists.
Since the decapitation of Daniel Pearl, correspondents throughout the Middle East no doubt are waking with images of themselves, hands bound, surrounded by crazies, begging for their lives.
And such fear, even if subconscious, can change for years the way events are presented in the press.
Foreign correspondents are an intrepid lot. But, after all, they are also human beings, with loved ones. As they interview sources and write stories, some surely will remember what happened to Pearl - and think about his widow and unborn child.
Perhaps unconsciously, many will calculate the life-threatening ramifications of landing atop the terrorists' enemies list.
That may lead them to refrain from pursuing important but potentially dangerous leads. Or writing honestly about the evil of people who may well retaliate.
In the end, the West gets a terribly skewed view of the thugs.
Yes, a few fearless souls - who worship truth and Pulitzers - will pursue tough stories. Some may even manage to retain a modicum of objectivity.
But most will not.
And who can blame them?
Jewish journalists face special risks. But all reporters in the Middle East - regardless of their ethnicity - have long understood what can happen when local extremists decide they are too critical of Islam, too supportive of Israel or otherwise offensive.
Thus, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia and most other Middle Eastern countries for decades have attracted correspondents with pro-Arab and pro-Muslim orientations.
For years, most journalists writing about Palestinian and Lebanese extremists from bases in the Muslim world have tried to court these people's friendship, in part, no doubt, out of unacknowledged fear.
The biggest problem is that most folks back home usually don't think about the Pearl factor when they're ingesting "news" reports like Amanpour's.
Maybe, in the interest of full disclosure, networks and newspapers should announce up front that their reports from dangerous areas are produced under duress.
And that the public should discount them accordingly.
Neil J. Kressel (kresseln @wpunj.edu) is author of "Mass Hate: The Global Rise of Genocide and Terror."
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BETTER THAN TERROR CAPTIVES DESERVE
by nyp • Sunday March 24, 2002 at 07:53 PM
there will be no kangaroo courts
March 22, 2002 -- The Bush administration has set the rules for the military tribunals to be faced by the suspected terrorists taken prisoner during military operations in Afghanistan.
It looks like there will be no kangaroo courts after all - contrary to the ludicrous expectations of critics on the American left and the usual suspects in Europe.
On the contrary, the rules include a provision for defense counsel, a presumption of innocence and a requirement of proof beyond a reasonable doubt.
They also allow press coverage of most proceedings - and require a unanimous verdict for the death penalty.
In these and other ways, the tribunals conform to America's noble traditions of justice and fairness.
And they stand in stark contrast with the behavior of the enemy towards American prisoners.
It is now all but certain that the al Qaeda-Taliban forces who captured Navy SEAL Neil Roberts when he fell out of a helicopter at Shah-i-Kot dragged him off, beat him and then executed him with a gunshot to the head.
The murdered special-operations sailor got off lightly by Afghan tribal standards; that is, he escaped the traditional torture and mutilation.
Then again, Roberts is the only American to fall into enemy hands; who's to doubt that the Qaedas are saving their worst for later?
In any event, the laws and customs of war are predicated on their observance by both sides in a conflict.
Given the standard set by the fate of Neil Roberts, it would seem that the U.S. already has done more than is required merely by refraining from the summary execution of its battlefield captives.
The Camp X-Ray detainees at Guantanamo Bay Naval Station need to consider their daily three square meals a bonus, actually. The fact that they'll also get due process in court is a credit to the mercy and humanity of the United States.
Certainly it's more than the captives deserve.
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FRANCE'S BLOODY HANDS
by nyp • Sunday March 24, 2002 at 08:06 PM
France's draconian anti-terror laws allow the state to detain anyone who "associates with wrongdoers."
March 24, 2002 -- The French minister of justice, Marylise Lebranchu, has said that she will not provide the U.S. with information and evidence gleaned in France if American prosecutors decide to seek the death penalty for Zacaraias Moussaoui.
Moussaoui, the accused "20th hijacker" of Sept. 11, is a French citizen of Moroccan descent.
France is hardly in a position to lecture the United States about justice, the death penalty or civil rights.
The last time that France was involved in a major terrorist campaign, in Algeria from 1954-62, French security forces routinely tortured rebel suspects - while murdering uncounted thousands in summary executions.
Only recently, retired French Army Gen. Paul Aussaresses published a sensational memoir calmy recounting his own role in these atrocities, which were carried out with the approval of French government figures - such as future President Francois Mitterand.
Even today, the French criminal justice system is so weighted against defendants that the accused is practically guilty until proven innocent.
And France's draconian anti-terror laws allow the state to detain anyone who "associates with wrongdoers."
In any case, it's one thing for France - which has officially abolished the death penalty at home - to register its unhappiness at the prospect of Moussaoui's execution, but it's quite another for this "ally" to threaten non-cooperation with the Sept. 11 investigation.
It is early in this war against terror, but you can be sure the United States will not forget the countries which stood beside her.
And those that let her down.
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FIRST VICTORY, THEN MEMORIALS
by eric fettmann • Sunday March 24, 2002 at 08:13 PM
What he did will live forever - and will have far more meaning to future generations than a simple name carved into a piece of stone.
FIRST VICTORY,
THEN MEMORIALS
March 21, 2002 -- SPURRED on by an emotional appeal Tuesday from Lisa Beamer - whose husband, Todd, led the passenger revolt against the hijackers of Flight 93 - members of Congress unveiled their proposal to build a national memorial on the National Mall in Washington to the victims of terrorism.
Originally intended to honor just the victims of 9/11, it has since been expanded to include the victims of Oklahoma City. Others will surely follow.
I don't mean to sound crass or unfeeling, but is this really such a good idea? Particularly now - and particularly the way organizers are going about it?
The nation's continuing grief over the events of 9/11 is understandable. But the rush to build a massive monument in Washington, like those calls to leave the entire World Trade Center site empty as a permanent memorial, seems more like a macabre celebration of victimhood.
If only the rebuilding of lower Manhattan would proceed this swiftly.
The legislation, sponsored by Rep. Jim Turner (D-Texas), demands that a site be selected and a final design approved within 12 months - a process that normally takes six years.
It also bypasses current law requiring that 25 years pass before such monuments are erected in the national capital. But despite Turner's insistence that "the uniqueness of what we're dealing with here" justifies an exemption, there is good reason to move more slowly.
"Succeeding generations provide a more objective viewpoint when evaluating the most appropriate way to honor historical events or individuals of historical significance," National Park Service official Daniel Smith told Congress.
Consider: Despite the national outpouring of grief over the then-unprecedented assassination of Abraham Lincoln after a four-year war unique in the American experience, a monument to his memory wasn't built in Washington until 57 years after his death.
Similar monuments to George Washington and Thomas Jefferson weren't begun until 49 and 117 years, respectively, after their passing.
The Bush administration favors a national monument, although not on the Mall: The National Park Service notes, correctly, that commemorating historical events is best done at the actual site itself.
At Pearl Harbor, for example, memory of those thousands who were killed is tastefully recalled at the simple, yet profoundly moving, shrine built over the wreckage of the sunken USS Arizona.
But Turner and his colleagues - the bill already is co-sponsored by 126 House members - envision a grand monument.
Given all the emotion surrounding 9/11, it's hardly surprising that proponents want a monument on a grand scale. "This can't just be a little thing," says Rep. Jim Hansen (R-Utah).
But should America be rushing to build a massive monument to victimhood?
Lisa Beamer says she wants "to bring my kids to a place and show [them] their daddy's name on it." That's entirely understandable. But I suspect that Mrs. Beamer's children can take far greater pride in recounting the national wave of pride that Americans took in her late husband's courageous actions.
What he did will live forever - and will have far more meaning to future generations than a simple name carved into a piece of stone.
Most importantly, though, America should not be building monuments to its most horrendous defeat.
Rep. Turner says he envisions a symbol "that marks the commitment and resolve of this nation to win the war against terrorism," one that will demonstrate that "America stood tall, we persevered and we defeated hate and evil."
He's got the right idea. But why, then, build a monument that commemorates death and destruction?
Better to construct a permament edifice that celebrates America's eventual victory over international terrorism - one that, to be sure, appropriately commemorates those whose lives were lost in terrorist attacks and in the military battles that followed.
But one that speaks to how determined Americans took the events of 9/11 and turned them into a note of triumph.
Which, in turn, would help focus Americans on their most important immediate priority: not just mourning the dead, but winning the war.
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Palestinian resistance suicide persons are 'martyrs'
by Grand Imam of AL-Azhar Mohamed Sayed Tantawi • Sunday March 24, 2002 at 08:21 PM
"Those who blow themselves up among aggressors, who demolish houses, kill men, women and innocent people and assault honour and property of Palestinians, are martyrs," he said.
Grand Imam Tantawi said Palestinian resistance suicide persons are 'martyrs'
Egypt-Palestine, Religion, 3/21/2002
Grand Imam of AL-Azhar Mohamed Sayed Tantawi said President Hosni Mubarak's attitudes towards Jerusalem and AL-Aqsa mosques crystallize the aspirations of one billion Muslims.
Al-Azhar Grand Imam Wednesday said that bombers who blow themselves up to avenge aggression are martyrs as along as they do not plan to kill the weak. "Or if they confine their operations to places where there are aggressors from Jews."
He was answering a question on whether Palestinian bombers are suicides or martyrs.
"Those who blow themselves up among aggressors, who demolish houses, kill men, women and innocent people and assault honour and property of Palestinians, are martyrs," he said.
He said "Chivalry, gallantry and honor in Islamic Sharia prohibit one from blowing himself up among children. But suppose that he (the bomber) enters a settlement and this Jewish settlement includes proven aggressors and blows himself up inside that settlement killing men, women and children, he is still a martyr because he could not make a distinction among them."
Palestinian has been the target of a brutal Israeli crackdown for nearly 18 months.
The Israeli troops have recently stepped up its attacks against the Palestinians in a desperate bid to quell their Intifada against occupation.
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Yasser Arafat's 'Martyrs'
by usn • Sunday March 24, 2002 at 08:26 PM
"We are all sacrificing our lives," the kids chanted, "for al-Aqsa."
Suicide terrorists
Yasser Arafat's 'Martyrs'
RAMALLAH, WEST BANK–The day began at 6:30 a.m. for the fighters of the al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades. One of their explosive mines in Gaza blew apart an Israeli tank, killing three soldiers. Al-Aqsa men later shot to death two suspected Palestinian collaborators in Bethlehem's Manger Square, tying the body of one to the back of a jeep and dragging it before the crowds. Mutasen Hammad, a brigades leader in the city of Tulkarm, was killed when an Israeli helicopter fired a missile at the chicken coop where he made bombs.
In the Palestinian intifada, some of the deadliest fighters come from the al-Aqsa brigades (named for the revered mosque in Jerusalem, where the uprising began in September 2000 following a visit to the compound by then prime ministerial hopeful Ariel Sharon). There are thousands of them–under the nominal control of Yasser Arafat–and they are responsible for killing about 200 Israeli soldiers and civilians.
Rambos. In downtown Ramallah's Manara Square, dozens of al-Aqsa men shouted "Allahu akhbar" ("God is great") as they took turns firing AK-47 and M-16 rifles at Israeli tanks about 200 yards away. Some were dressed like Rambo, in bandannas and combat boots, knives and grenades hanging off their belts. Others wore the green or camouflage uniforms of their "day jobs"–security officers of the Palestinian Authority.
The brigades are the fighting force of the Tanzim, the youth movement of Arafat's Fatah organization. The brigades, which at first concentrated on drive-by shootings of West Bank settlers, have evolved into the leading Palestinian suicide terrorists. Al-Aqsa claimed responsibility for the first two female suicide bombers. But members of the brigades, in general, don't blow themselves up; instead they set bombs, fire rifles, throw grenades, and slash knives into civilians. Striking in downtown areas, they are inevitably killed by Israeli police, soldiers, or armed civilians. Unless intercepted and arrested, they are just as lethal as the Islamic fanatics who blow themselves up with explosive belts. "Even if Yasser Arafat tells us to stop," says a brigade leader, "we won't."
But if somebody doesn't stop them, the future will only get bloodier. In a Gaza refugee camp, dozens of 4-, 5-, and 6-year-old boys, wearing green bandannas declaring, "Martyrs of al-Aqsa," took aim with AK-47s and M-16s. They were in a training camp run by the most dangerous gang in the intifada. "We are all sacrificing our lives," the kids chanted, "for al-Aqsa." -K.A.T. and L.D.
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Class Struggle
by wsj • Sunday March 24, 2002 at 08:33 PM
The unionization of grad students.
If they were picking coffee beans for Starbucks or stitching blouses for Wal-Mart, no doubt they would have been long ago uncovered by the povertycrats meeting this week in Monterrey, Mexico. But this caste of workers labors north of the Rio Grande.
They're called graduate students.
More specifically, we mean the men and women who serve as teaching and research assistants in our colleges and universities--a vast army of have-nots in the campus class system created by tenure. And they're rising up. This month alone, grad students fighting for a union occupied the administration building of the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign; those at the University of Michigan, where they already have a union, called a work stoppage; and Columbia's teaching assistants voted on joining the United Auto Workers union.
They have a point. As Hoover Institution economist Dave Henderson notes, "graduate students are the closest thing America has to serfdom." And their resentments aren't even primarily about compensation. Fundamentally they're about a relationship that leaves these students vulnerable to the worst aspects of academe: arbitrariness, unaccountability and plain old rudeness. At a time when universities are increasingly shifting their workload to grad students and other part-timers, the anti-union argument that New York University made to the National Labor Relations Board--that graduate assistants are not employees--becomes ever harder to sustain.
In theory, the relationship is supposed to be paternal: the master nurturing the apprentice. In practice, tenure not only leaves those who have it unanswerable to those who don't; it reduces job turnover, especially now that there's no mandatory retirement. Grad students are caught in the squeeze. In his suicide note, Jason Altom, a Ph.D. candidate and research assistant in Harvard's chemistry department who took his own life in 1998, bitterly complained about having no way around a Nobel Prize-winning faculty adviser he deemed too powerful. To Harvard's credit, its departments have been moving toward multimember faculty panels.
So long as tenure remains intact, however, it will remain hard to discipline professors. On the student side, meanwhile, the tuition subsidies universities extend to their grad students guarantee a continuing glut of Ph.D.s competing for relatively few jobs--never a good situation for those on the labor side of the equation. Only last year, for example, Stanford grad students received a letter announcing that their health-care coverage was being cut and suggesting that they consider applying for public assistance.
College presidents are right to argue that unionization, with its assumption of an antagonistic relationship, is inimical to the health of universities. But as these institutions fend off the efforts of their grad students to organize, they would do better to look at the tenure arrangements that put the class struggle in their classrooms.
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Calling for War in the Name of Kurdistan
by questioning yankee • Monday March 25, 2002 at 12:02 AM
so why don't we see the Kurdish groups making this their prime political point. Or is this just another attempt by the Iraqi National Congress, a.k.a. the CIA to stage a new military assualt in Iraq? Get rid of Saddam a new despot takes over. Iraqis deserve real change, change from the grassroots of Iraqi citizens themselves until the sanctions are ended there will be no grassroots movement because sanctions have killed the seeds of change, namely hope for a future.
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articles linked
by ibm, sf-imc • Tuesday March 26, 2002 at 10:58 AM
imc-sf-editorial [at] lists.indymedia.org
the sf-imc editorial collective consented to link these 9 articles together because they are viewed as spam and therefore constitute an abuse of the newswire as a space for marginalized voices to be heard. it's an obvious attempt at discrediting sf indymedia (and indymedia overall).
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one word...
by one word... • Tuesday March 26, 2002 at 05:12 PM
Turkey. The Turks are seriously concerned that a Greater Kurdistan won't stay nicely comparmentalised within Northern Iraq, and will seek to encroach on their borders. Problem is, the INC are a bunch of goofballs that are going to spend more time fighting amongst themselves and aren't going to get the job done in deposing Saddam. The only hope to unseat Saddam by public uprising is to provide the Shiite majority the opportunity though all-out war on Iraq by the US and its allies. However, this opens the door for their cousins in Iran to seize upon the chaos to install a pro-Iran regime, as they're doing now against the interim government in Afghanistan - the very reason why the US didn't take him out in 1991.
Weapons inspections per the armistice, or destruction of those facilities thourgh direct action - with ensuing instability in Iraq - are the only plausible scenarios in ending the WMD threat in the region. Pick you poison.
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manufacturing dissent
by frustrated • Tuesday March 26, 2002 at 05:14 PM
So says the Kommisar. You can express any opinion you like on SFindymedia, so long as it's the right one.
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by KENNETH ROTH • Sunday March 24, 2002 at 07:34 PM
100,000 Kurds
The Bush administration's frustration with a decade of increasingly porous sanctions against Iraq has led to active consideration of military action. Yet one alternative has yet to be seriously tried -- indicting Saddam Hussein for his many atrocities, particularly the 1988 genocide against Iraqi Kurds.
As deposed Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic discovered, indictment for grave abuses can delegitimize a dictator and undermine his grasp on power. Even if Saddam escapes arrest, his indictment for heinous crimes would demonstrate that Iraq's desire for normal international relations is a pipe dream so long as Saddam is at the helm. That would weaken Saddam's support among the many governments that have been lining up for years to do commercial deals with him in anticipation of an end to sanctions. It would also encourage Iraqi officials to overthrow him.
Cowardice
Unfortunately, governmental cowardice and opportunism have stymied past attempts to indict Saddam, as Human Rights Watch learned during its intensive efforts to bring him to justice in the 1990s. At the top of any indictment should be Saddam's 1988 genocidal Anfal campaign against Iraqi Kurds, described by Jeffrey Goldberg in this week's New Yorker. Named after a Koranic verse justifying pillage of the property of infidels, the Anfal campaign unfolded as the 1980-88 Iran-Iraq war was winding down. Iraqi Kurds had taken advantage of Saddam's preoccupation with Iran to seize control of parts of mountainous northern Iraq. But as soon as Iraqi troops could be withdrawn from the Iranian front, Saddam shifted them to the north.
Several thousand Kurdish villages were destroyed, forcing residents to live in appalling camps. In at least 40 cases, Iraqi forces under Saddam's cousin, Ali Hassan al-Majid, used chemical weapons to kill and chase Kurds from their villages. Then, during the Anfal campaign from February to September 1988, Iraqi troops swept through the highlands of Iraqi Kurdistan rounding up everyone who remained in government-declared "prohibited zones." Some 100,000 Kurds, mostly men and boys, were trucked to remote sites and executed. Only seven are known to have escaped.
The full scope of the Anfal horror became known only after Saddam's defeat in the Gulf War. The Iraqi military's withdrawal from the region in October 1991 after the imposition of a no-fly zone made it feasible for the first time in years for outsiders to reach the area.
Human Rights Watch investigators took advantage of this opening to enter northern Iraq and document Saddam's crimes. Some 350 witnesses and survivors were interviewed. Mass graves were exhumed. And Kurdish rebels were convinced to hand over some 18 tons of documents that they had seized during the brief post-war uprising from Iraqi police stations. These documents were airlifted to Washington, where Human Rights Watch researchers poured through this treasure trove of information about the inner workings of a ruthless regime.
With this extraordinarily detailed evidence of genocide, Human Rights Watch launched a campaign to bring Saddam to justice. At the time the U.N. Security Council was creating special tribunals for Rwanda and the former Yugoslavia, but there was no consensus for similar action on Iraq. France and Russia, each with extensive business interests in Iraq, threatened to wield their veto. China, worried about analogies to its treatment of Tibetans, was disinclined to support an International Criminal Tribunal for Iraq. With no International Criminal Court then in the works, and the Pinochet option of exercising universal jurisdiction in national courts not yet widely recognized, the prospect of criminal prosecution was remote.
Human Rights Watch thus turned to the only available remedy -- a civil suit before the International Court of Justice in The Hague, commonly known as the World Court. The relevant U.N. treaty -- the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide -- assigned the World Court the task of adjudicating disputes under the treaty. We hoped for a declaratory judgment that the Iraqi government had committed genocide, damages for the survivors, and an order that the perpetrators be prosecuted.
The problem was that only governments can bring suit before the World Court. Washington was a logical first choice, and ultimately the Clinton administration endorsed the case. But restrictions in the U.S. ratification of the Genocide Convention stood in the way of a successful suit.
Human Rights Watch staff then circled the globe trying to convince another government to bring the suit. None would. At best, a couple of governments said they would join a coalition to bring the case, but only on the condition that at least one European government joined as well. Several European governments gave the matter serious consideration, but in the end none would take the plunge.
There were many reasons for this reluctance, some stated openly, others only hinted at. Governments feared the loss of business opportunities when Iraq emerged from U.N. sanctions. They feared a loss of influence in the Middle East for suing an Arab state. They feared terrorist retaliation by Iraqi agents. And they feared the expense of bringing the lawsuit (although offers were made to raise the funds).
This frustrating experience highlighted the importance of an International Criminal Court -- that is, a global tribunal that does not depend on the political courage of individual governments or the vagaries of consensus among the veto-wielding members of the U.N. Security Council. But the ICC will apply only to crimes that are committed after the treaty takes effect in several weeks. Many governments are ratifying the ICC treaty as an insurance policy against future Saddams. But the court cannot act retroactively on a crime such as the Anfal genocide.
Security Council
The best option remains Security Council action to establish an International Criminal Tribunal for Iraq, since the council would be free to grant the tribunal jurisdiction over past crimes. But council action depends on overcoming the veto of Russia, France and China. To date, that obstacle has been insurmountable, although no effort has been made in the post-Sept. 11 climate.
Saddam could also be prosecuted by any government that has given its courts universal jurisdiction for the crime of genocide, although in this case the actions of a single government would probably carry less weight than the pronouncements of an international court. Finally, one or more governments could sue in the World Court for a declaration that Iraq had committed genocide.
Regardless of the approach, formal condemnation of Saddam for such a heinous crime would signal definitively to Iraqis and Saddam's international sympathizers that he is beyond the pale -- not simply because of the threat he poses to others, but also because he has flouted the most basic norms on the treatment of his own people. That delegitimization would not guarantee his ouster, but it would certainly help build consensus that he is unfit to govern, and thus that something must be done to end his rule.
Mr. Roth is executive director of Human Rights Watch.
URL for this article:
http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,SB1016762854868646000.djm,00.html
Updated March 22, 2002 12:39 a.m. EST
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THE TRUTH ABOUT PROFILING
by NYP • Sunday March 24, 2002 at 07:42 PM
Racial profiling?
March 24, 2002 -- Over in New Jersey, the U.S. Justice Department a while back ordered state officials to study the driving habits of motorists along the New Jersey Turnpike - by race.
The idea, or so the feds believed, was that the survey would provide statistical proof of what has now become received wisdom: That state troopers for years practiced illegal racial profiling along the Turnpike.
So researchers - using specially designed radar gun cameras and high-speed photography - last spring captured images of 38,747 drivers who were exceeding the speed limit by at least 15 hours an hour.
Evaluators were able to agree on the races of 26,334 of the drivers - and what they found astonished them.
The survey showed that black drivers were photographed speeding twice as often as white drivers. And the higher the speed - i.e., the more egregious the offense - the higher the disparity.
In fact, the survey showed that blacks made up 16 percent of the speeders along the entire Turnpike - and 25 percent in the areas where profiling was said to be the most prevalent.
Why are these figures important? Because state figures show that 23 percent of the traffic stops along the Turnpike involve black drivers.
That is, the number of black drivers being pulled over corresponds almost identically with the rate at which the study found they were speeding.
Racial profiling?
Not exactly.
The study calls into serious doubt arguments that disparate impact - the fact that minority groups were stopped at a higher rate than their share of the general population -is proof positive that profiling was at work.
But now the Justice Department is refusing to let the folks in New Jersey release the results - saying that they're "wrong or unreliable."
That is to say, they don't support a politically correct conclusion.
Suppressing data, of course, would be par for the course for Trenton. From the outset, New Jersey ignored the facts and dealt with the racial-profiling allegations in a wholly political manner.
Take, for example, the shooting case that opened up the entire debate: A judge dismissed the attempted murder indictment after finding that the case was driven primarily by "powerful and intimidating forces" - namely, the governor's office.
That the Bush administration may be adopting the same tone is profoundly troubling.
Racial profiling - that is, stopping drivers solely on the basis of ethnicity - is both wrong and illegal.
But the survey that Washington is so intent on suppressing suggests strongly that New Jersey state troopers were motivated by behavior, not skin color.
This report needs to be made public.
Now.
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HOW TERROR SKEWS
by NEIL J. KRESSEL • Sunday March 24, 2002 at 07:47 PM
In the end, the West gets a terribly skewed view of the thugs.
March 24, 2002 -- CHRISTIANE Amanpour, CNN's ace foreign correspondent and the mother of a small boy, lives a dangerous life.
Last week, in what her network described as a "rare encounter," she met in a secret location with black-hooded Palestinian terrorists. The killers waved their weapons freely and displayed scary stores of ammunition.
Needless to say, Amanpour - like most sensible journalists in similar situations - stayed as far as possible from the tough questions.
Indeed, if a top New York public relations firm had been hired to make the terrorists look good, it couldn't have done a better job.
When the terrorists announced a "preference" for attacking "military infrastructure or army checkpoints" - something that is patently false - the reportedly highest-paid foreign correspondent in the world let them off without a follow-up question.
Indeed, two days after her story aired, members of the very same group (Yasser Arafat's Al Aqsa Brigades) showed their true preference when they bombed a Jerusalem shopping district, killing three civilians and wounding 60. Some military target!
Exploring why terrorists murder innocent civilians, Amanpour turned to an 8-year-old Palestinian girl: "First, my grandfather was hit. And then, when my father went to help him, he was killed." The girl's Uncle Farid provided corroboration. In a scene complete with wailing widows, Uncle insisted that the two Palestinians had been entirely innocent. Now he was bitter, Amanpour suggested - as if to say Palestinian resentment stems primarily from attacks by Israelis.
This is not the first time she has shown anti-Israeli bias. Perhaps that's why she was chosen by the terrorists for the much-coveted interview in the first place.
But Amanpour's skewed report and others like it reflect something more insidious than the misguided sympathies of reporters. By murdering and threatening reporters, terrorists deter them from presenting news honestly.
Call it the Daniel Pearl effect.
Killers need kidnap and murder only a single reporter to strike fear in the hearts of their fellow journalists.
Since the decapitation of Daniel Pearl, correspondents throughout the Middle East no doubt are waking with images of themselves, hands bound, surrounded by crazies, begging for their lives.
And such fear, even if subconscious, can change for years the way events are presented in the press.
Foreign correspondents are an intrepid lot. But, after all, they are also human beings, with loved ones. As they interview sources and write stories, some surely will remember what happened to Pearl - and think about his widow and unborn child.
Perhaps unconsciously, many will calculate the life-threatening ramifications of landing atop the terrorists' enemies list.
That may lead them to refrain from pursuing important but potentially dangerous leads. Or writing honestly about the evil of people who may well retaliate.
In the end, the West gets a terribly skewed view of the thugs.
Yes, a few fearless souls - who worship truth and Pulitzers - will pursue tough stories. Some may even manage to retain a modicum of objectivity.
But most will not.
And who can blame them?
Jewish journalists face special risks. But all reporters in the Middle East - regardless of their ethnicity - have long understood what can happen when local extremists decide they are too critical of Islam, too supportive of Israel or otherwise offensive.
Thus, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia and most other Middle Eastern countries for decades have attracted correspondents with pro-Arab and pro-Muslim orientations.
For years, most journalists writing about Palestinian and Lebanese extremists from bases in the Muslim world have tried to court these people's friendship, in part, no doubt, out of unacknowledged fear.
The biggest problem is that most folks back home usually don't think about the Pearl factor when they're ingesting "news" reports like Amanpour's.
Maybe, in the interest of full disclosure, networks and newspapers should announce up front that their reports from dangerous areas are produced under duress.
And that the public should discount them accordingly.
Neil J. Kressel (kresseln @wpunj.edu) is author of "Mass Hate: The Global Rise of Genocide and Terror."
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BETTER THAN TERROR CAPTIVES DESERVE
by nyp • Sunday March 24, 2002 at 07:53 PM
there will be no kangaroo courts
March 22, 2002 -- The Bush administration has set the rules for the military tribunals to be faced by the suspected terrorists taken prisoner during military operations in Afghanistan.
It looks like there will be no kangaroo courts after all - contrary to the ludicrous expectations of critics on the American left and the usual suspects in Europe.
On the contrary, the rules include a provision for defense counsel, a presumption of innocence and a requirement of proof beyond a reasonable doubt.
They also allow press coverage of most proceedings - and require a unanimous verdict for the death penalty.
In these and other ways, the tribunals conform to America's noble traditions of justice and fairness.
And they stand in stark contrast with the behavior of the enemy towards American prisoners.
It is now all but certain that the al Qaeda-Taliban forces who captured Navy SEAL Neil Roberts when he fell out of a helicopter at Shah-i-Kot dragged him off, beat him and then executed him with a gunshot to the head.
The murdered special-operations sailor got off lightly by Afghan tribal standards; that is, he escaped the traditional torture and mutilation.
Then again, Roberts is the only American to fall into enemy hands; who's to doubt that the Qaedas are saving their worst for later?
In any event, the laws and customs of war are predicated on their observance by both sides in a conflict.
Given the standard set by the fate of Neil Roberts, it would seem that the U.S. already has done more than is required merely by refraining from the summary execution of its battlefield captives.
The Camp X-Ray detainees at Guantanamo Bay Naval Station need to consider their daily three square meals a bonus, actually. The fact that they'll also get due process in court is a credit to the mercy and humanity of the United States.
Certainly it's more than the captives deserve.
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FRANCE'S BLOODY HANDS
by nyp • Sunday March 24, 2002 at 08:06 PM
France's draconian anti-terror laws allow the state to detain anyone who "associates with wrongdoers."
March 24, 2002 -- The French minister of justice, Marylise Lebranchu, has said that she will not provide the U.S. with information and evidence gleaned in France if American prosecutors decide to seek the death penalty for Zacaraias Moussaoui.
Moussaoui, the accused "20th hijacker" of Sept. 11, is a French citizen of Moroccan descent.
France is hardly in a position to lecture the United States about justice, the death penalty or civil rights.
The last time that France was involved in a major terrorist campaign, in Algeria from 1954-62, French security forces routinely tortured rebel suspects - while murdering uncounted thousands in summary executions.
Only recently, retired French Army Gen. Paul Aussaresses published a sensational memoir calmy recounting his own role in these atrocities, which were carried out with the approval of French government figures - such as future President Francois Mitterand.
Even today, the French criminal justice system is so weighted against defendants that the accused is practically guilty until proven innocent.
And France's draconian anti-terror laws allow the state to detain anyone who "associates with wrongdoers."
In any case, it's one thing for France - which has officially abolished the death penalty at home - to register its unhappiness at the prospect of Moussaoui's execution, but it's quite another for this "ally" to threaten non-cooperation with the Sept. 11 investigation.
It is early in this war against terror, but you can be sure the United States will not forget the countries which stood beside her.
And those that let her down.
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FIRST VICTORY, THEN MEMORIALS
by eric fettmann • Sunday March 24, 2002 at 08:13 PM
What he did will live forever - and will have far more meaning to future generations than a simple name carved into a piece of stone.
FIRST VICTORY,
THEN MEMORIALS
March 21, 2002 -- SPURRED on by an emotional appeal Tuesday from Lisa Beamer - whose husband, Todd, led the passenger revolt against the hijackers of Flight 93 - members of Congress unveiled their proposal to build a national memorial on the National Mall in Washington to the victims of terrorism.
Originally intended to honor just the victims of 9/11, it has since been expanded to include the victims of Oklahoma City. Others will surely follow.
I don't mean to sound crass or unfeeling, but is this really such a good idea? Particularly now - and particularly the way organizers are going about it?
The nation's continuing grief over the events of 9/11 is understandable. But the rush to build a massive monument in Washington, like those calls to leave the entire World Trade Center site empty as a permanent memorial, seems more like a macabre celebration of victimhood.
If only the rebuilding of lower Manhattan would proceed this swiftly.
The legislation, sponsored by Rep. Jim Turner (D-Texas), demands that a site be selected and a final design approved within 12 months - a process that normally takes six years.
It also bypasses current law requiring that 25 years pass before such monuments are erected in the national capital. But despite Turner's insistence that "the uniqueness of what we're dealing with here" justifies an exemption, there is good reason to move more slowly.
"Succeeding generations provide a more objective viewpoint when evaluating the most appropriate way to honor historical events or individuals of historical significance," National Park Service official Daniel Smith told Congress.
Consider: Despite the national outpouring of grief over the then-unprecedented assassination of Abraham Lincoln after a four-year war unique in the American experience, a monument to his memory wasn't built in Washington until 57 years after his death.
Similar monuments to George Washington and Thomas Jefferson weren't begun until 49 and 117 years, respectively, after their passing.
The Bush administration favors a national monument, although not on the Mall: The National Park Service notes, correctly, that commemorating historical events is best done at the actual site itself.
At Pearl Harbor, for example, memory of those thousands who were killed is tastefully recalled at the simple, yet profoundly moving, shrine built over the wreckage of the sunken USS Arizona.
But Turner and his colleagues - the bill already is co-sponsored by 126 House members - envision a grand monument.
Given all the emotion surrounding 9/11, it's hardly surprising that proponents want a monument on a grand scale. "This can't just be a little thing," says Rep. Jim Hansen (R-Utah).
But should America be rushing to build a massive monument to victimhood?
Lisa Beamer says she wants "to bring my kids to a place and show [them] their daddy's name on it." That's entirely understandable. But I suspect that Mrs. Beamer's children can take far greater pride in recounting the national wave of pride that Americans took in her late husband's courageous actions.
What he did will live forever - and will have far more meaning to future generations than a simple name carved into a piece of stone.
Most importantly, though, America should not be building monuments to its most horrendous defeat.
Rep. Turner says he envisions a symbol "that marks the commitment and resolve of this nation to win the war against terrorism," one that will demonstrate that "America stood tall, we persevered and we defeated hate and evil."
He's got the right idea. But why, then, build a monument that commemorates death and destruction?
Better to construct a permament edifice that celebrates America's eventual victory over international terrorism - one that, to be sure, appropriately commemorates those whose lives were lost in terrorist attacks and in the military battles that followed.
But one that speaks to how determined Americans took the events of 9/11 and turned them into a note of triumph.
Which, in turn, would help focus Americans on their most important immediate priority: not just mourning the dead, but winning the war.
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Palestinian resistance suicide persons are 'martyrs'
by Grand Imam of AL-Azhar Mohamed Sayed Tantawi • Sunday March 24, 2002 at 08:21 PM
"Those who blow themselves up among aggressors, who demolish houses, kill men, women and innocent people and assault honour and property of Palestinians, are martyrs," he said.
Grand Imam Tantawi said Palestinian resistance suicide persons are 'martyrs'
Egypt-Palestine, Religion, 3/21/2002
Grand Imam of AL-Azhar Mohamed Sayed Tantawi said President Hosni Mubarak's attitudes towards Jerusalem and AL-Aqsa mosques crystallize the aspirations of one billion Muslims.
Al-Azhar Grand Imam Wednesday said that bombers who blow themselves up to avenge aggression are martyrs as along as they do not plan to kill the weak. "Or if they confine their operations to places where there are aggressors from Jews."
He was answering a question on whether Palestinian bombers are suicides or martyrs.
"Those who blow themselves up among aggressors, who demolish houses, kill men, women and innocent people and assault honour and property of Palestinians, are martyrs," he said.
He said "Chivalry, gallantry and honor in Islamic Sharia prohibit one from blowing himself up among children. But suppose that he (the bomber) enters a settlement and this Jewish settlement includes proven aggressors and blows himself up inside that settlement killing men, women and children, he is still a martyr because he could not make a distinction among them."
Palestinian has been the target of a brutal Israeli crackdown for nearly 18 months.
The Israeli troops have recently stepped up its attacks against the Palestinians in a desperate bid to quell their Intifada against occupation.
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Yasser Arafat's 'Martyrs'
by usn • Sunday March 24, 2002 at 08:26 PM
"We are all sacrificing our lives," the kids chanted, "for al-Aqsa."
Suicide terrorists
Yasser Arafat's 'Martyrs'
RAMALLAH, WEST BANK–The day began at 6:30 a.m. for the fighters of the al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades. One of their explosive mines in Gaza blew apart an Israeli tank, killing three soldiers. Al-Aqsa men later shot to death two suspected Palestinian collaborators in Bethlehem's Manger Square, tying the body of one to the back of a jeep and dragging it before the crowds. Mutasen Hammad, a brigades leader in the city of Tulkarm, was killed when an Israeli helicopter fired a missile at the chicken coop where he made bombs.
In the Palestinian intifada, some of the deadliest fighters come from the al-Aqsa brigades (named for the revered mosque in Jerusalem, where the uprising began in September 2000 following a visit to the compound by then prime ministerial hopeful Ariel Sharon). There are thousands of them–under the nominal control of Yasser Arafat–and they are responsible for killing about 200 Israeli soldiers and civilians.
Rambos. In downtown Ramallah's Manara Square, dozens of al-Aqsa men shouted "Allahu akhbar" ("God is great") as they took turns firing AK-47 and M-16 rifles at Israeli tanks about 200 yards away. Some were dressed like Rambo, in bandannas and combat boots, knives and grenades hanging off their belts. Others wore the green or camouflage uniforms of their "day jobs"–security officers of the Palestinian Authority.
The brigades are the fighting force of the Tanzim, the youth movement of Arafat's Fatah organization. The brigades, which at first concentrated on drive-by shootings of West Bank settlers, have evolved into the leading Palestinian suicide terrorists. Al-Aqsa claimed responsibility for the first two female suicide bombers. But members of the brigades, in general, don't blow themselves up; instead they set bombs, fire rifles, throw grenades, and slash knives into civilians. Striking in downtown areas, they are inevitably killed by Israeli police, soldiers, or armed civilians. Unless intercepted and arrested, they are just as lethal as the Islamic fanatics who blow themselves up with explosive belts. "Even if Yasser Arafat tells us to stop," says a brigade leader, "we won't."
But if somebody doesn't stop them, the future will only get bloodier. In a Gaza refugee camp, dozens of 4-, 5-, and 6-year-old boys, wearing green bandannas declaring, "Martyrs of al-Aqsa," took aim with AK-47s and M-16s. They were in a training camp run by the most dangerous gang in the intifada. "We are all sacrificing our lives," the kids chanted, "for al-Aqsa." -K.A.T. and L.D.
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Class Struggle
by wsj • Sunday March 24, 2002 at 08:33 PM
The unionization of grad students.
If they were picking coffee beans for Starbucks or stitching blouses for Wal-Mart, no doubt they would have been long ago uncovered by the povertycrats meeting this week in Monterrey, Mexico. But this caste of workers labors north of the Rio Grande.
They're called graduate students.
More specifically, we mean the men and women who serve as teaching and research assistants in our colleges and universities--a vast army of have-nots in the campus class system created by tenure. And they're rising up. This month alone, grad students fighting for a union occupied the administration building of the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign; those at the University of Michigan, where they already have a union, called a work stoppage; and Columbia's teaching assistants voted on joining the United Auto Workers union.
They have a point. As Hoover Institution economist Dave Henderson notes, "graduate students are the closest thing America has to serfdom." And their resentments aren't even primarily about compensation. Fundamentally they're about a relationship that leaves these students vulnerable to the worst aspects of academe: arbitrariness, unaccountability and plain old rudeness. At a time when universities are increasingly shifting their workload to grad students and other part-timers, the anti-union argument that New York University made to the National Labor Relations Board--that graduate assistants are not employees--becomes ever harder to sustain.
In theory, the relationship is supposed to be paternal: the master nurturing the apprentice. In practice, tenure not only leaves those who have it unanswerable to those who don't; it reduces job turnover, especially now that there's no mandatory retirement. Grad students are caught in the squeeze. In his suicide note, Jason Altom, a Ph.D. candidate and research assistant in Harvard's chemistry department who took his own life in 1998, bitterly complained about having no way around a Nobel Prize-winning faculty adviser he deemed too powerful. To Harvard's credit, its departments have been moving toward multimember faculty panels.
So long as tenure remains intact, however, it will remain hard to discipline professors. On the student side, meanwhile, the tuition subsidies universities extend to their grad students guarantee a continuing glut of Ph.D.s competing for relatively few jobs--never a good situation for those on the labor side of the equation. Only last year, for example, Stanford grad students received a letter announcing that their health-care coverage was being cut and suggesting that they consider applying for public assistance.
College presidents are right to argue that unionization, with its assumption of an antagonistic relationship, is inimical to the health of universities. But as these institutions fend off the efforts of their grad students to organize, they would do better to look at the tenure arrangements that put the class struggle in their classrooms.
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Calling for War in the Name of Kurdistan
by questioning yankee • Monday March 25, 2002 at 12:02 AM
so why don't we see the Kurdish groups making this their prime political point. Or is this just another attempt by the Iraqi National Congress, a.k.a. the CIA to stage a new military assualt in Iraq? Get rid of Saddam a new despot takes over. Iraqis deserve real change, change from the grassroots of Iraqi citizens themselves until the sanctions are ended there will be no grassroots movement because sanctions have killed the seeds of change, namely hope for a future.
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articles linked
by ibm, sf-imc • Tuesday March 26, 2002 at 10:58 AM
imc-sf-editorial [at] lists.indymedia.org
the sf-imc editorial collective consented to link these 9 articles together because they are viewed as spam and therefore constitute an abuse of the newswire as a space for marginalized voices to be heard. it's an obvious attempt at discrediting sf indymedia (and indymedia overall).
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one word...
by one word... • Tuesday March 26, 2002 at 05:12 PM
Turkey. The Turks are seriously concerned that a Greater Kurdistan won't stay nicely comparmentalised within Northern Iraq, and will seek to encroach on their borders. Problem is, the INC are a bunch of goofballs that are going to spend more time fighting amongst themselves and aren't going to get the job done in deposing Saddam. The only hope to unseat Saddam by public uprising is to provide the Shiite majority the opportunity though all-out war on Iraq by the US and its allies. However, this opens the door for their cousins in Iran to seize upon the chaos to install a pro-Iran regime, as they're doing now against the interim government in Afghanistan - the very reason why the US didn't take him out in 1991.
Weapons inspections per the armistice, or destruction of those facilities thourgh direct action - with ensuing instability in Iraq - are the only plausible scenarios in ending the WMD threat in the region. Pick you poison.
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manufacturing dissent
by frustrated • Tuesday March 26, 2002 at 05:14 PM
So says the Kommisar. You can express any opinion you like on SFindymedia, so long as it's the right one.
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Insert story about boy who cried 'wolf' here.
On the other hand, hiding a comment is not something anyone at Indymedia takes lightly. Not counting duplicate comments, about half-a-dozen comments have been hidden since SF Indymedia went on line in September 2000. These hidden comments were RACIST ATTACKS on Indymedia and everyone agreed they should be hidden. If you're concerned that your RACIST ATTACKS on INDYMEDIA are being hidden please STOP WHINING and GET YOUR OWN WEBSITE.
We should be sectarian in our censorship, but let us define our boundaries. The general feeling seems to be: if it's left of the Greens, it's okay. Let's start censoring based on that!
An SF IMCer.
this MESSAGEBOARD needs to protect its agenda the same as rush limbaugh needs to protect his.
you wont see very many black ku klux klanman and you wont see very many white black panthers.
truth defeats the klan, rush limbaugh, black panthers, fruitopians, etc. .
pointing out "censorship" here is like pointing out the lack of abominable snowman storys on msnbc.
i get angry when i see censorship anywhere, but when i think for just a moment about the responsibility some have to others like them, it goes away.
reality is a very flexible thing, truth is not. let these boys and girls preach to the choir. dont seek truth here. and dont get mad when your posts are removed or hidden or marginalized. its the nature of this beast.
he is right about one thing in my humble opinion: that indymedia is not just some free speech haven where anyone and everyone can post whatever random racist, homophobic, sexist or whatever type of spam they please without having their posts moved to the hidden posts page. just like cnn and the ny times, we have a bias.
and if any of you censorship freaks paid attention to anything beside the publish and comment features on this site, you know, the one you're spamming with 15 consecutive corporate media reposts, you would realize that we strongly discourage verbatim corporate media reposts of all types. we're not a distribution service for the liberals/conseratives that already have ways to get their tired old message out. at least we try not to be, as there are many that abuse this.
and seriously, the kkk and the black panther party are not polar opposites. the latter fought for real emanicipation, while the former want to increase enslavement. come on dwt, you must have read Zinn's People's History of the US, right? you don't just suck up all the lies your teacher told you, no?
and no, i don't think that any of this "discussion" will change anything in the minds of those that come here and do nothing but disrupt. the anonymity of the internet allows even the most wingnut of wingnuts to continue with their reactionary attacks.
isn't there an ayn rand / david horowitz site around for you to drool over?
the kkk and the bpp are exactly the same organization. as well sf indyBOARD and rush limbaugh are the exact same organization. the differences are fewer than the differences in the races, nearly none at all.
i dont get the word wingnut being used as a negative slang. a wingnut is amazingly useful when used in the proper application. but i will humor you by saying, there is no larger group on "wingnuts" than those who consider this board there own. jim and tammy faye have exactly the same credibility in commenting on the world as do sf indyboard controllers.
as with the kkk and bpp, you indyboard controllers are your own worst enemies. your blinders and earplugs are exactly as effective. you are all killers of truth, to those you percieve to be below you. and my how those below you will go to bat for you. with hoods and masks and held up fists and banter banter banter.
Moron
by Mark Bialkowski • Tuesday March 26, 2002 at 07:20 PM
mbialkowski [at] rogers.coMAPSBLOCK
LINKED does not mean HIDDEN. The articles can still be accessed through the original article. Similar actions have been taken on rare occasions on the global newswire, so that the articles can still be read but don't take up several spaces on the newswire
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let me get this straight
by mark • Tuesday March 26, 2002 at 09:43 PM-
First of all, nothing has been censored. It's all still there and will be as long as this site is up. The original URL of the article still works. The articles can still be found by searching for them. How is it censorship?
Second of all, as for articles being LINKED, Did you bother to read our open publishing policy? It is clearly spelled out: Corporate reposts are NOT acceptable. Articles may be linked or occasionally even hidden. Hidden articles are still online at their original location and searchable.
Tertiarily, You're suggesting you wrote these articles? I'd like to see the Authors step up and level a complaint. Or the vast loyal readership of your plagiarized corporate spam utter even a word in defense of your BAD HABIT.
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This pathetic drivel deserves a second look. Don't you love the justification of burying challenging posts? Why can't these geniuses shoot them down with logic and facts?
Plus, I checked the hidden file. They didn't put the "spam" posts there either, they deleted them. Actions speak loudly...
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by I'm not. • Wednesday March 27, 2002 at 08:41 PM
If you don't like how we run this place, start your own website. When we're your guests, we'll play by your rules. In the meantime, show your hosts some common courtesy, lest we (and the audience) conclude you are a boor.
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I don't need to run a propaganda filled fear based censoring propaganda site. I don't hate myself, my family or my place of residence.
allow me to explain to you one last thing: when articles are linked, they are attached to a parent article. so the articles that you claim were "deleted," were, in fact, not deleted at all. you can see the whole lot of them here: http://www.indybay.org/news/2002/03/119382.php ...
we don't delete things here at sf indymedia. we hide what we feel is abuse of the website. that abuse is still viewable *one fucking click away* on the hidden articles page. bear in mind, however, that *linked* articles will not, i repeat *will not* appear on that page of hidden article. why? because they're not hidden. they're attached to other spam posts to take up less space on the newswire.
and listen up people, this shit isn't done by some clandestine group of imc elite. our process is open for all to read and participate in. get it? are you sure? we don't take hiding articles lightly. we don't just hide shit we don't like. there's debate. but spam is unacceptable.
flame away trolls.
by I'm not. • Wednesday March 27, 2002 at 08:41 PM
If you don't like how we run this place, start your own website. When we're your guests, we'll play by your rules. In the meantime, show your hosts some common courtesy, lest we (and the audience) conclude you are a boor. " " "
when you shine such a bright light on the pile of noxious shit you are, you do everyone a great service.
a five dollar poopy scooper and a tiny mind like yours is on the way to the landfill.
i'm really suprised a indyboarder insider would show his stank ass like that.
consensus and all.
hahaha.