Under The Same Sun

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August 30, 2005

Finally! I Can Cancel My Vacation!

So the headline reads, "Bush Cancels Vacation to Focus on Relief"

How badly do you think they had been waiting an opportunity to cancel his vacation, both to get away from the antiwar protesters camped in Crawford and to get people to stop talking about how much time he spends vacationing?

I think pretty badly.

If we had a functioning media, that headline would be accompanied by a paragraph that recapped his vacation.

Also, I bet those states hit by hurricane Katrina, which many experts are warning was so strong as an effect of global warming, sure could use the reserve units that are in Iraq. If there is one thing a military style organization is good for, it's disaster relief. Yet, they are over there, helping to create a disaster in that country instead of being here to help out.

Posted by zeynep at 07:24 PM | Comments (0)

August 29, 2005

Torture Yes, Poverty-Alleviation No. (Otherwise Known as Our Foreign Policy.)

There are two developments I have been meaning to write about, but have not found the time to do them justice. Fortunately, Body and Soul has covered both. The first is about the outcome of the case for the gruesome torture and murder of a taxi-driver in the Bagram base in Afhanistan.

Punishments were handed down for four American soldiers involved in the brutal murder of an Afghan taxi driver at Bagram prison:

One soldier has been sentenced to two months in prison, another to three months. A third was demoted and given a letter of reprimand and a fine. A fourth was given a reduction in rank and pay.

A reminder of what happened to Dilawar:

Mr. Dilawar was a frail man, standing only 5 feet 9 inches and weighing 122 pounds. But at Bagram, he was quickly labeled one of the "noncompliant" ones.

When one of the First Platoon M.P.'s, Specialist Corey E. Jones, was sent to Mr. Dilawar's cell to give him some water, he said the prisoner spit in his face and started kicking him. Specialist Jones responded, he said, with a couple of knee strikes to the leg of the shackled man.

"He screamed out, 'Allah! Allah! Allah!' and my first reaction was that he was crying out to his god," Specialist Jones said to investigators. "Everybody heard him cry out and thought it was funny."

Other Third Platoon M.P.'s later came by the detention center and stopped at the isolation cells to see for themselves, Specialist Jones said.

It became a kind of running joke, and people kept showing up to give this detainee a common peroneal strike just to hear him scream out 'Allah,' " he said. "It went on over a 24-hour period, and I would think that it was over 100 strikes."

A three month sentence.

The soldiers apparently weren't the only ones who thought the way they treated a helpless and innocent man was a joke.

Read more here.

The other is about the U.N. Millenium Summit to be held in September. Apparently, the US, led by Bolton, has basically decided that the summit should not be about the Millenium Development Goals, poverty, climate change, and all the other things it is about. To that end, John Bolton submitted "750 amendments to the draft and called for immediate talks on them" -- only three weeks before the summit. Read more about them here, or simply remember this tidbit:

U.S. complained the section on poverty was too long.

Posted by zeynep at 09:15 PM | Comments (0)

August 24, 2005

The Political is Personal

When Cindy Sheehan returned from her ailing mother's side back to Crawford, unbeknownst to her, the protesters had erected a "large banner depicting her son's face."

You can see the depth of her heartbreak in the following picture, snapped as she cried upon seeing her child's face, all of a sudden, right in front of her.

Much has been written about how she is using her personal tragedy for political ends. Of course she is, and what is more honorable than that -- instead of withdrawing from the world into her personal pain, she is trying to find a way to prevent further wrongs and further surrow. In the end though, however political her actions are, they are also deeply personal. How could it be any other way? And it is not just that the personal is political, as the feminist insight goes, but political is personal, always, at some level. Sooner or later, as the so-called political starts descending down from the abstract --from the decisions, budgets, slogans-- into individual lives, the values embedded in that which is called "political" start to have real impacts on real human beings, as individuals, families and communities.

I can't help thinking, though, if Casey Sheehan had lived, would he have taken a life that would leave an Iraqi mother as heartbroken as his own mother is? Will his legacy be the power his mother has displayed as she refuses to budge from her drive to stop other people's children from killing or being killed?

This is up to us, of course, as it was beautifully put in Archibald MacLeish's poem (which I recently came across in the Vietnam War documentary "Regret to Inform.")

They say: We have given our lives but until it is finished

no one can know what our lives gave.

They say: Our deaths are not ours: they are yours,

they will mean what you make them.

They say: Whether our lives and our deaths were for

peace and a new hope or for nothing we cannot say,

it is you who must say this.

We leave you our deaths. Give them their meaning.

We were young, they say. We have died; remember us.

Posted by zeynep at 11:18 PM | Comments (2)

August 22, 2005

The Poor, The Unlikeable

Last weekend, I came across this blatant example of the kind of subtle and not-so-subtle "blame the poor" angle that one often sees in the stories regarding low-income people (if it wasn't bad enough how rare such stories are).

Now, if you were a journalist and were assigned to write a story about how the rising energy costs were making life hard for low-income people, who would you pick? And what would you cover?

Certainly, most low-income people live frugal lives, out of necessity, which often becomes an admirable habit, and find their budgets strained by even small fluctuations --such as an increase in gasoline prices. Plus, in a country with scant public transportation, many low-income people are forced to drive to work whether they like it or not. So, it shouldn't be too hard to go to, say, a job search center, a welfare-to-work office, or any of the myriad of places one can find huge numbers of people struggling to make ends meet.

Or, if you are really unimaginitive, one could ask the janitor that cleans your office every night about how gas prices are effecting them, or people they know. (And one can be against gas being too cheap, since it is a non-renewable, limited resource, along with some subsidies for low-income people as well as subsidies for mass transit).

Then again, you might spend your time and find an unsympathetic character. (Extra points if that person is black).

So, here's the person chosen by a Washington Post reporter:

Alfred Jones used to steer his sporty Mazda MX-6 onto the Beltway and drive the entire loop for the thrill of it. He knew the trip was senseless, but he could afford the gas.

Things have changed. Jones lost his job, and rising gas prices have forced him to give up driving his car entirely.

Higher pump prices have drained his savings and left him unable to renew his vehicle registration. Jones, 48, of Upper Marlboro spends much of his time at his mother's house, where he lives, frequently checking online job listings.

"You have to make choices now between food or gas," Jones said. "It hurts. It's killing me."

It's not like the rest of the story is that bad -- except perhaps for the family that -bohoo- had to cancel the Pizza Hut outings and stop buying PlayStation games. It's just that when you start with someone reckless enough with money --and earth's resources-- to loop around the beltway for the fun of it, you are rolling your eyes by the time you get to the it's now food or gas line.

Plus, the story also ends with this person, with the line, "moving and grooving," which seems to me to be aimed at reminding everyone that our wanna-be gas-guzzler is black (with an additional picture on the side if anyone is still underinformed at this point.)

When his car registration expired, he did not have enough money left to cover it, so he has parked his Mazda for now.

When he does leave the house to run errands for his mother and he sees other people driving, he realizes what he is missing.

"I'm supposed to be out there moving and grooving too," he said.

Yeah, moving and grooving. That's all poor people think about, get it? Nudge-nudge. I say, let's not stop with Social Security, let's abolish Medicaid too.

Posted by zeynep at 09:02 PM | Comments (1)

August 18, 2005

Back

Hello everyone -- I'm back. Blogging at regular, ahem, schedule as of tomorrow.

Posted by zeynep at 09:19 PM | Comments (2)

August 11, 2005

The Most Important Question in the World

I will be gone for a week and instead of asking for a guest blogger, I thought I'd leave us with a photo about an issue that's been on my mind greatly, lately -- unfortunately, I did not yet have time to write about it, although every little detail I learn saddens and angers me more. (Where do you start? The role of IMF in pushing bugdet controls that made it impossible to maintain emergency grain reserves on world's second poorest country? The crisis that was warned about for a whole year while the world turned away? The fact that we only ever talked about this country vis-a-vis yellowcake?)

So, for this week, here's the the most important question in the world -- most important save for the same question about every other little kid in the world.

Will this little girl make it?

Posted by zeynep at 01:38 PM | Comments (0)

August 10, 2005

New Force of Nature

Empire Notes has an important commentary on the anniversary of the atomic bombings:

And yet, in a way, horrific crimes as the bombings of Dresden and Tokyo were, Hiroshima and Nagasaki were worse. First, of course, because they started the nuclear arms race and brought us to the point where we can actually annihilate ourselves. Second, because of the radiation and lingering effects.

But there's another way, and it's hard to talk about logically. Freeman Dyson, in his autobiography Disturbing the Universe, talks about his experience. He worked as an analyst for British Bomber Command and, over the years, became completely disillusioned with what he called this "crazy game of murder." Then one day, after he was out and the war for him was over, he picked up a newspaper and saw the headline, "New Force of Nature Unleashed."

It's always struck me that, of all the headlines put up on August 7, that one is somehow the most profound. Even now, reading it sends a chill down my spine. To discover some of the most profound secrets of nature and use them to incinerate over 200,000 men, women, and children is unspeakable in some way that goes deeper than logic.

Posted by zeynep at 08:07 AM | Comments (1)

August 08, 2005

That word was Nagasaki

"I had to add, though, that I knew a single word that proved our democratic government was capable of committing obscene, gleefully rabid and racist, yahooistic murders of unarmed men, women, and children, murders wholly devoid of military common sense. I said the word. It was a foreign word. That word was Nagasaki."

Kurt Vonnegut, Timequake

Posted by zeynep at 01:32 PM | Comments (0)

August 06, 2005

Loved Ones of 9/11 Victims Apologize to Victims of Hiroshima and Nagasaki Atomic Bombings

To be read in Hiroshima on August 6th, in closing ceremonies of Stonewalk, 2005. [Stonewalk 2005 was a 34-day walk from Nagasaki to Hiroshima where Japanese atomic bomb survivors [Hibakusha] joined family members of those killed on September 11th in pulling a two-ton granite memorial stone dedicated to the unknown victims of war everywhere.]

Pulling the granite stone from Nagasaki to Hiroshima

Statement of apology to the Hibakusha from September 11th Families for Peaceful Tomorrows:

We Americans today apologize for the atrocities of August 6th and 9th, 1945, committed against the civilians of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. We express our great sorrow and great remorse for the sufferings caused by these nuclear holocausts. We know that we cannot experience the exact feelings of those who have lived through those events, but we must remember that history teaches us to understand, as much as we are able, how horrible, how tragic, how devastating those events were. You, the Hibakusha, are that history, standing before us.

Crimes against humanity are not new. We grieve for all victims of war and violence inflicted by nations upon other nations, individuals upon other individuals, societies upon other societies. But the unique cruelty of the nuclear devastation which you endured, and from which you have suffered since those days 60 years ago, must be acknowledged. As the countrymen and women of those who endorsed and committed such acts, the grief and the remorse we carry with us is a special sorrow, and therefore the apology we extend to you for those acts must be unique in its sincerity and in its expression.

The evil which brought about the decisions to bomb Hiroshima and Nagasaki must be prevented from re-emerging, and causing such terrible catastrophes to be repeated in the future. Already, in the 60 years since the bombings, the world has learned of the many terrible threats that come with the development and proliferation of nuclear arms. You Hibakusha, who are victims of the effects of nuclear weapons, already know the most personal and direct effect of nations continuing to rely on these weapons of evil. As the citizens of a nation that continues to pursue this evil path, we must acknowledge our personal sorrow that we have not been able to stop this tragedy, and we must apologize as best we can for our failure to change the hearts and minds of those who continue to lead us in this terrible direction.

The foolishness of pursuing the development and deployment of nuclear arms has other less direct effects which we all, as citizens of the world, are suffering daily. The continuing fear of the threat of nuclear attack from the growing number of nations and organizations which are already -- or are seeking to be -- nuclear entities places a burden upon the nations and peoples of the world which cannot be counted. The costs are counted not only in dollars spent on weapons research and deployment instead of humanitarian concerns, but also in the true currency of human and international relations -- compassion and cooperation -- which comes from understanding, instead of the evil currency of hatred and violence which come from fear.

Whether each of our hearts is filled with the understanding that the pursuit of peace can only come with the abandonment of the tools of violence and war -- that is something that only each one of us can know. But we stand before you, the Hibakusha, reminded that your powerful presence is testimony to that fact. We thank you for your continuing role in changing the course of history, and we are grateful for each step we can take with you toward that day when nuclear weapons -- indeed, all weapons -- will be a thing of the past.

Sincerely, September 11th Families for Peaceful Tomorrows, 2005

The inscription on the stone

The stone covered with peace cranes, earth and peace flags flying over it.

[I received this text from a man who lost his only child on United Flight 93 on September 11, 2001. Why isn't he, or someone like him who represents the best face of our nation, our ambassador to the United Nations?]

Posted by zeynep at 12:49 AM | Comments (2)

August 03, 2005

Tortured to Death? Yawn.

Story after story of brutal killings of detainees has surfaced and been published in major newspapers, much like this one.

Iraqi Maj. Gen. Abed Hamed Mowhoush was being stubborn with his American captors, and a series of intense beatings and creative interrogation tactics were not enough to break his will. On the morning of Nov. 26, 2003, a U.S. Army interrogator and a military guard grabbed a green sleeping bag, stuffed Mowhoush inside, wrapped him in an electrical cord, laid him on the floor and began to go to work. Again.

It was inside the sleeping bag that the 56-year-old detainee took his last breath through broken ribs, lying on the floor beneath a U.S. soldier in Interrogation Room 6 in the western Iraqi desert. Two days before, a secret CIA-sponsored group of Iraqi paramilitaries, working with Army interrogators, had beaten Mowhoush nearly senseless, using fists, a club and a rubber hose, according to classified documents.

...

The sleeping-bag interrogation and beatings were taking place in Qaim about the same time that soldiers at Abu Ghraib, outside Baghdad, were using dogs to intimidate detainees, putting women's underwear on their heads, forcing them to strip in front of female soldiers and attaching at least one to a leash. It was a time when U.S. interrogators were coming up with their own tactics to get detainees to talk, many of which they considered logical interpretations of broad-brush categories in the Army Field Manual, with labels such as "fear up" or "pride and ego down" or "futility."

Other tactics, such as some of those seen at Abu Ghraib, had been approved for one detainee at Guantanamo Bay and found their way to Iraq. Still others have been linked to official Pentagon guidance on specific techniques, such as the use of dogs.

...

Two Army soldiers with the 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment in Fort Carson, Colo., are charged with killing Mowhoush with the sleeping-bag technique, and his death has been the subject of partially open court proceedings at the base in Colorado Springs. Two other soldiers alleged to have participated face potential nonjudicial punishment.

It seems that we have almost made peace with being a nation that systematically tortures, and doesn't even bother with serious slap on the wrist for those that kill prisoners while torturing them.

It's hard to find an original comment to make, something new to say. Yes, we are torturing them to death. Yes, nobody is getting punished. Yes, it is happening again and again. Yawn.

Posted by zeynep at 11:47 PM | Comments (2)