As the military investigation team insisted that artillery fire had stopped by the time the explosion occurred and suggested it had been caused by a bomb planted in the sand, Amir Peretz, the Defence Minister, declared: " The accumulating evidence proves that this incident was not due to Israeli forces."
But the official interpretation was strongly challenged by a former Pentagon battle damage expert who has surveyed the scene of the beach explosion. He said yesterday that "all the evidence points" to a 155mm Israeli land-based artillery shell as its cause.
Marc Garlasco, who worked in war zones including Iraq and Kosovo during his seven-year stint in the US Department of Defence, called for an independent investigation into the killings after concluding that shell fragments and shrapnel from the site, the size and distribution of the craters on the beach, and the type of injuries sustained by the victims made Israeli shelling easily the likeliest cause.
His assessment came as at least another seven civilians, including two children, as well as two Islamic Jihad militants, were killed in a double Israeli missile strike on a VW van in the densely populated Zeitoun district of Gaza City yesterday. The two children were hit at a nearby house by flying shrapnel and the civilian dead included three medical workers from a nearby children's hospital who rushed to help after hearing the first explosion.
Israel said the militants had been on their way to launch Katyusha rockets which have a much longer range than the Qassam rockets normally fired from Gaza into Israel. One of the two dead Islamic Jihad militants was Hamoud Wadiya, described as the top rocket launcher in the faction. Mr Peretz said before the strike that Israel was resuming operations "to protect the citizens of Israel" after a pause caused by what he had acknowledged had been "the international storm" over the civilian deaths at the Beit Lahia beach last Friday.
The debate over the beach explosion is unlikely to die down however. Mr Garlasco who is now the senior military analyst for Human Rights Watch, said yesterday: "Of course I can't be completely conclusive but all the evidence points to its being a 155mm Israeli shell which killed the Palestinians on the beach."
Mr Garlasco said that most of the serious injuries of the victims in the Gaza hospitals that he had visited were to the torsos and heads, which were inconsistent with a land mine or of a bomb embedded in the sand. "If this had been a landmine I would have expected to see serious leg injuries," he said. Mr Garlasco said that while he could not rule out the theoretical possibility that Palestinian militants had rigged up an unexploded 155mm shell to make an explosive device of their own, that too would have normally produced many more severe leg injuries.
Mr Garlasco produced a four to five-inch, mainly blackened shell fragment which he collected about 100 yards from the scene of the explosion and in which the figures 55 and the letters "mm" are clearly discernible. While acknowledging that this was not itself definite proof that the shell had killed the Palestinians he said some fragments and shrapnel which the Palestinian police explosives department say they took from the scene where the victims were killed were definitely from a 155mm shell.
Mr Garlasco who accompanied a small group of journalists to the Beit Lahia beach, pointed to three separate craters, each covered in a whitish powder, which he said were fresh, one of which was at the spot where witnesses agree the fatal blast occurred, and the two others separated it from it by about 120 and 250 yards. Mr Garlasco added: "It would be a really ridiculous coincidence if there is active shelling and then suddenly an IED [improvised explosive device] goes off."
The military have admitted firing earlier in the area but now say that the explosion occurred between 4.47 and 5.10pm, when it says firing had stopped. An ambulance driver from the nearby al-Awda hospital, Khaled Abu Sada, said that he first took a call about the emergency at 4.50pm.
The military did not explicitly repeat claims in earlier leaks that Hamas had planted the device or say whether it was a dud shell. It says that shrapnel taken from the bodies of victims being treated in Israeli hospitals was not from a 150mm shell. But Mr Garlasco said that copper-lined shrapnel taken from two injured girls who had been in a car at the time of the blast and from the car itself were consistent with such a shell fired by a M109 howitzer.
Mr Garlasco ruled out the possibility that the shells were naval, as originally thought, on the grounds that they were too large to be fired from Israeli navy coastal vessels.
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Editorial: Nuking Iran
By Paul Craig Roberts
06/12/06 "Information Clearing House"
John Bolton, a notorious neocon warmonger who could not be confirmed as America's ambassador to the UN by even the compliant and corrupt US Senate, got the job as a recess appointment. He is using the platform to push America into war with Iran.
Bolton told the Financial Times (June 9) that the Bush Regime has no intention of reaching an agreement with Iran. Time is running out for diplomacy, Bolton told the Financial Times. Iran has a short time remaining in which it can give up its right under the non-proliferation treaty to enrich uranium for nuclear energy or be attacked. Bolton said that US security guarantees for Iran "were not on the table."
There is no evidence that Iran has a nuclear weapons program. Every physicist knows that the enrichment requirement for weapons is many times greater than for nuclear energy and that Iran can barely achieve the latter. Despite the facts, Bolton told the Financial Times: "They've [Iran] got both feet on the accelerator, which is why we have a sense of urgency. Each day that goes by gives Iran more time to continue to perfect its efforts for mass production."
Bolton is lying through his teeth. Bush Regime lies about Iraqi weapons of mass destruction and propagandistic references to mushroom clouds convinced the befuddled American public to accept an illegal invasion of Iraq. The same collection of neocon war criminals is again deceiving the American public about Iran.
In his remarks to the Financial Times, Bolton shows himself to be extremely disturbed by the prospect that the diplomatic efforts of Europe, Russia, and China could undermine the Bush Regime's plan to attack Iran. Bolton is doing everything possible to make certain that there is no diplomatic solution.
To help undermine any prospect for peace in the Middle East, Israeli gunboats shelled a public beach and killed or wounded 50 Palestinians. This was done in order to provoke Hamas into abandoning the long-established cease-fire that Hamas had imposed in the interest of negotiating a Palestinian settlement.
The Israeli government succeeded, and now there will a resurgence of "Hamas terrorism" that Bolton and his neocon compatriots can use to build a frightening spectacle of Muslim terrorism.
The Bush/Olmert axis-of-evil have made it clear that "we don't want no stinking peace."
Writing in Antiwar.com (June 10), University of California Professor Jorge Hirsch explains the tripwire that the Bush Regime has laid for Iran in order to have an excuse to launch an attack on that country.
Just as the Bush Regime planned to attack Iraq and then orchestrated a case based on lies, the Bush Regime has already planned to attack Iran. Only this time nuclear weapons will be used.
Nuking Iran is an essential part of the attack plan. The US lacks the necessary conventional military force to invade and occupy Iran, but the use of nuclear weapons against Iran has a wider purpose. The neocons are determined not to have any more embarrassments, such as the Iraqi insurgency. By nuking Iran they intend to send a wider message that the US will use every means at its disposal to ensure its hegemony. The neocons believe that the use of nukes will convince Arabs and the wider world that there is no recourse to accepting America's will.
The neoconservatives could not care less about public opinion. Neocons are contemptuous of the American people. Leo Strauss taught neocons that it was their duty to deceive the clueless American people in order to implement their agenda of global domination. The neocons believe that they have a perfect right, even the obligation, to manipulate the public through propaganda and black ops in order to create acceptance and support for their wars of aggression.
The neocons are the epitome of evil, and they have succumbed to hubris. Like Hitler when he attacked the Soviet Union, neocons believe that their manipulative skills and use of military power will carry the day for their agenda. Hitler's hubris doomed Germany to destruction. What price will America pay for neocon hubris?
When the neocon nazis nuke Iran it will revive memories in Japan and break the US-Japanese alliance. Japan owns enough US Treasury bonds to be able to destroy both the US dollar and the market for Washington's endless red ink. Russia, China, India, and even our European lackeys will have it forcefully brought home to them that the US is an out-of-control rogue nation. They will unify against us. Most likely our bought and paid for puppets in the MIddle East will fall, and Islamic leaders will gain Pakistan's nuclear weapons. Al Qaeda will gain tens of millions of recruits.
Francis Fukuyama's phrase, "the end of history" takes on new meaning.
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Editorial: Jemaah Islamiah Patsy Exits Prison
Wednesday June 14th 2006, 7:43 am
Kurt Nimmo
Another Day in the Empire
Obviously, the neocon and Likud infested Jerusalem Post is none too happy with the release from prison of the "reputed top leader of the al-Qaida linked terror group," Jemaah Islamiah.
"Islamic cleric Abu Bakar Bashir, 68, had served 26 months for conspiracy in the Bali nightclub bombings that killed 202 people, mostly young foreign tourists.... Australia and the United States, which have accused Bashir of being a key member of the Southeast Asian terror group Jema'ah Islamiyah, said they were disappointed at his release, as did Australian victims of the Bali blasts."
Australia and the United States should be "disappointed" with the Indonesian military creation of Jemaah Islamiah, but this of course would be asking too much.
Indonesia's former president, Abdurrahman Wahid, told the Australian last October "a key figure behind the formation of terror group Jemaah Islamiah was an Indonesian spy" and "police or military officers may have played a role in the 2002 Bali bombing," a predictable outcome as the Indonesian military has a long and sordid relationship with the CIA, including the training of its brutal Kopassus, responsible for wanton slaughter in East Timor and assassinating West Papuan independence leaders.
"There is not a single Islamic group either in the movement or the political groups that is not controlled by (Indonesian) intelligence," Umar Abduh, described as a "former terrorist" told SBS Dateline. "Abduh has written a book on Teungku Fauzi Hasbi, a key figure in Jemaah Islamiah (JI) who had close contact with JI operations chief Hambali and lived next door to Muslim cleric Abu Bakar Bashir.... He says Hasbi was a secret agent for Indonesia's military intelligence while at the same time a key player in creating JI."
Documents cited by SBS showed the Indonesian chief of military intelligence in 1990 authorized Hasbi to undertake a "special job".
A 1995 internal memo from the military intelligence headquarters in Jakarta included a request to use "Brother Fauzi Hasbi" to spy on Acehnese separatists in Indonesia, Malaysia and Sweden.
And a 2002 document assigned Hasbi the job of special agent for BIN, the Indonesian national intelligence agency.
Security analyst John Mempi told SBS that Hasbi, who was also known as Abu Jihad, had played a key role in JI in its early years.
"The first Jemaah Islamiah congress in Bogor was facilitated by Abu Jihad, after Abu Bakar Bashir returned from Malaysia," Mr Mempi said.
"We can see that Abu Jihad played an important role. He was later found to be an intelligence agent. So an intelligence agent has been facilitating the radical Islamic movement."
Not surprisingly, Hasbi met a gruesome end-he was disemboweled "in a mysterious murder in 2003 after he was exposed as a military agent and his son Lamkaruna Putra died in a plane," a not uncommon fate for exposed intelligence operatives. No telling who murdered Hasbi, however it should be noted that dead operatives tell no tales about their government handlers or embarrassing operation details.
JI can also be traced back to the CIA-ISI effort in Afghanistan, essentially the locus of virtually all modern "al-Qaeda" centric terrorism. "A recent ICG [International Crisis Group] report entitled Jemaah Islamiyah in South East Asia: Damaged but still Dangerous estimates that more than 200 men associated with the JI network were sent to Afghanistan. In most cases, the Islamic World League paid their expenses. All of them were trained at the military camps run by the Mujaheddin faction led by Abdul Rasul Sayyaf. Sayyaf, a proponent of strict Wahhabi Islam, had extremely close links to Saudi Arabia and its logistics operations in Pakistan and Afghanistan, which were run by Osama bin Laden, among others," writes Peter Symonds (The Political Origins of Jemaah Islamiyah: Behind the Bali Bombings).
Without the CIA's dirty operations in Afghanistan, neither Jemaah Islamiyah nor Al Qaeda would have come into existence. The anti-Soviet war provided the money and the training, as well as forging the loose international network of contacts that was to characterize the future modus operandi of these organizations.... As the ICG explained: "All of JI's top leaders and many of the men involved in JI bombings trained in Afghanistan over a ten-year period, 1985-95. The jihad in Afghanistan had a huge influence in shaping their worldview, reinforcing their commitment to jihad, and providing them with lethal skills... It is important to note that the process of sending recruits to Afghanistan began at least seven years before JI formally came into being. In many ways, the emergence of a formal organization around 1992 merely institutionalized a network that already existed."
Indeed, a network organized and nurtured by the CIA and Pakistan's notorious ISI (Inter-Services Intelligence), and in the case JI, sustained by BIN. In addition to Indonesia, the CIA-ISI terror collaboration spread out over the globe, from the Philippines to Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, France, Tajikistan, Azerbaijan, China, Egypt, Algeria, Morocco, the Balkans and elsewhere, where it is put to use creating the phantom of international terrorism rising from the imputed virulence of Islam.
"Bashir was found guilty of blessing the 2002 Bali attacks, but cleared of more serious terrorist charges, including heading Jem'aah Islamiyah, which Indonesian police say received funds from al-Qaida," the Jerusalem Post continues. "No evidence has ever been presented linking him to the execution, preparation or commission of terrorist attacks, and most analysts say he played no operational role in the group's attacks," because operations are run by BIN and Indonesian intelligence and Bashir is little more than a patsy. Of course, when we are told JI "received funds from al-Qaida," this translates into JI receiving funds from the CIA.
JI served its purpose. "Reminiscent of Operation Northwoods, the Bali attack served to trigger 'a useful wave of indignation.' They contributed to swaying Australian public opinion in favor of the US invasion of Iraq, while weakening the anti-war protest movement," writes Michel Chossudovsky. "In the wake of the Bali attack, the Australian government 'officially' joined the US-led 'war on terrorism,'" a multi-headed hydra operating on many levels but concentrating primarily on Islamic terrorism, an on-going and relentless campaign engineered to demonize Muslims, as the ludicrous events most recently in London and Canada demonstrate.
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Editorial: There Is A Dark Cloud Over America
Dorothy A. Seese
June 14, 2006
NewsWithViews.com
Some of us, observers of times, trends and events, have been waiting for the American housing boom to go bust, and that day is apparently on the horizon now. But this would cause no ordinary recession.
The world economic situation isn't stable, it has been destabilized by international monetary interests that stand to gain from the emergence, publicly, of the New World Order that has been in the making in the U.S. since the war between the North and South, with the Northern union of centralized federal control winning the conflict. Two engineered world wars, the Great Depression that brought about cries for socialistic government "reforms" and the obliteration of a free market society have steadily pinched America into a place of incalculable debt, loss of personal freedom, a service-oriented economy for most workers, and a false sense of confidence in our ability to bounce back from short periods of recession. "Made in America" doesn't mean much when the company making goods or services is owned by foreign companies. They can pull back to their own homeland and leave ours devastated.
Most Americans own a lot more debt than anything else, so they're totally vulnerable to a major crash. Even illegal aliens can flee home (after all, there was no law to keep them at home and no law saying they cannot return). The American people, filled now with frustration over inflation and the separation of their own government from the citizenry, fill huge cities where they depend on their livelihood from jobs rather than from land ownership and self-sufficiency that rides out hard times. With world violence increasing exponentially, and American violence making life both edgy and dangerous, the relatively quiet Great Depression could never happen again in the United States. A major depression would bring about unthinkable violence and then martial law with United Nations intervention, doubtless at the request of the US government leadership in power at the time of the crash and backlash.
When I moved into a small condo unit in an Arizona retirement city in 1998, gasoline was selling for a dollar a gallon, food cost about half of what it does now, and housing was about 40% of its present cost. Signs asking for people to fill jobs and touting hiring bonuses were plastered on billboards and newspaper ads. Outsourcing was a very small percentage of what it is today. Times appeared good. But it was a house of cards built on a dot-com revolution that pushed technological changes, competition, and speculative investment over the top of the charts.
The homebuilding industry survived and became America's big non-service industry. While construction companies and their subcontractors hired a considerable number of undocumented workers (illegal aliens to be politically incorrect) they also required more skilled labor, American citizens of various ethnic backgrounds. Raw land around major metropolitan areas has grown scarce, so there have been many cities that took their neglected slum areas and renovated them or razed and rebuilt on the land around "downtown" while others created new developments in outlying areas for commuters (thus increasing the need for more roads and expressways).
There is hardly any business that is not affected, directly or indirectly, by the housing industry.
Worse yet, no one owns their home as their property, free and clear. The mortgage may be paid off, but property taxes, assessments for roads and other government fees and taxes turn into a form of rental to remain in one's own home or lose it to the taxing authority! And then there's the new twist to eminent domain that says your property can be taken (for the taker's idea of a fair value) for some good reason, "good" being defined by the takers.
Still, the housing industry not only produced huge new levels of debt for American homebuying families, but jobs that made a buffer for an overly outsourced American economy that produces little in the way of goods. Forty years ago, the automobile industry was largely American. Now, foreign automakers put assembly plants on US soil and save the cost of shipping while the profits go back to the country of origin, or to international financiers who move investments around like chess pieces on the world's coordinates.
When the housing industry goes bust, Americans will wonder what happened and why. Exactly how bad things will become depends on the agenda that the globalists want to put into effect. If it's total obliteration of America as we have known it, only a facade of which still exists anyway, there will be an enormous crash and enormous losses among small investors, businesses, and workers.
Original
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Georgie Skulks in and out of Baghdad
Bush deems surprise trip to Baghdad a success
Last Updated Wed, 14 Jun 2006 11:32:34 EDT
CBC News
President George W. Bush applauded the efforts of coalition forces in Iraq on Wednesday but gave no hints about when U.S. troops will leave and hand power to the Iraqi government.
"I was inspired to be able to visit the capital of a free and democratic Iraq," said Bush, who spent more than five hours in Baghdad on Tuesday on a trip so secret most in his administration were not told beforehand. While the president did not specifically address when some of the 130,000 U.S. troops might pull out, he was resolute in adhering to his plan of listening to military officials on the ground before deciding on any timetable.
"The message to the enemy is: Don't count on us leaving before we succeed," Bush told reporters in Washington after his surprise trip to Baghdad.
He had high praise after his first meeting with newly installed Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, saying: "I saw first-hand the strength of his character and his deep determination to succeed."
Any uncertainty he may have had over the political will of al-Maliki and his cabinet to follow through on the reconstruction plan was eliminated, Bush said.
The president also applauded the tightening of security that began on Wednesday to quell any increase in insurgency action, with coalition troops focusing on central Baghdad before fanning out. He was briefed by the military on raids on insurgents and the air strike last week that killed Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, Al-Qaeda's leader in Iraq.
Bush said the fact that Iraqi officials didn't know of his arrival until the last minute shouldn't be viewed in any kind of negative light, but, rather, was a necessary security precaution.
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Iraq war seen as biggest threat to peace
Ewen MacAskill, diplomatic editor
Wednesday June 14, 2006
The US occupation of Iraq presents a bigger danger to world peace than Iran's alleged nuclear ambitions, according to a worldwide survey published on Wednesday.
The annual survey by the Washington-based Pew Research Centre suggests that support for the US-led "war on terrorism" continues to be on the wane around the world, undermined by the Iraq conflict.
The Pew, which is widely respected and has been running since 2001, polled 17,000 people in 15 countries between March and May. In a press release, it says: "Despite growing concern over Iran's nuclear ambitions, the US presence in Iraq is cited at least as often as Iran - and in many countries much more often - as a danger to world peace."
Only in the US and Germany is Iran seen as presenting a greater danger than the US in Iraq. Public opinion in 12 of the other countries - Britain, France, Spain, Russia, Indonesia, Egypt, Jordan, Turkey, Pakistan, Nigeria, India and China - cite the US presence in Iraq as being the greater danger. Opinion in Japan was evenly divided.
Throughout the period the poll was conducted the crisis over Iran's nuclear programme, intensified by hardline comments from its president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, was repeatedly in the news. Iraq, too, has been almost daily in the news, with the formation of a new Iraqi government being accompanied by fears of a civil war.
As well as Iraq and Iran, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict was also high on the list of issues that present a danger to world peace. Public opinion in about a third of the countries polled put it at the top of their list of threats.
The poll confirms the extent to which the well of international goodwill towards the US in the aftermath of 9/11 is being drained. Favourable opinions of the US have fallen in most of the countries.
One of the sharpest declines in support for the US has been in Spain. Only 23% of the Spaniards polled expressed positive views of the US, down from 41% last year. Even though Madrid suffered a large death toll from an al-Qaida attack two years ago, only about one in four supports the "war on terrorism".
Other countries where positive views dropped significantly include India (56%, down from 71%); Russia (43%, from 52%); and Indonesia (30%, from 38%). In Turkey only 12% said they held a favourable opinion, compared with 23% last year.
In the UK, the US's closest ally in Iraq and the second biggest contributor of troops, 60% said the Iraq war had made the world more dangerous. Only 30% said it had made the world safer.
Forty-one per cent of British people said the US presence in Iraq represented a great danger to world peace, with 34% citing Iran as a big threat.
By contrast, concern about Iran has almost doubled in the US over the past two years, according to the poll. Almost half of Americans, 46%, view Mr Ahmadinejad's government as "a great danger" to stability in the Middle East and world peace, up from 26% in 2003. The growing concern in the US is shared in Germany, where 51% of those polled see Iran as a great danger to world peace compared with just 18% three years ago.
Public opinion is overwhelming opposed to Iran acquiring a nuclear weapon.
While the public in most Muslim countries have a high regard for Iran, little confidence was expressed in Mr Ahmadinejad. About two-thirds in Egypt and Jordan said they had little confidence he would "do the right thing" in world affairs.
Full Survey
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'Marines' Cheer Song About Killing Iraqi Civilians - Song's Lyrics: 'I Blew Those Little F**kers to Eternity'
PRNewswire
12 June 06
WASHINGTON - The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) today called on the Pentagon and Congress to investigate a music video posted on the Internet that seems to show U.S. Marines cheering a song that glorifies the killing of Iraqi civilians.
CAIR said the four-minute video, called "hadji girl," purports to be a "marine in Iraq singing a song about hadji." (A "Hajji" is a person who has made the Islamic pilgrimage to Mecca, but the term has often been used as a pejorative by U.S. troops in Iraq.) The song, posted online in March, tells of a U.S. Marine's encounter with an Iraqi woman. It has been viewed by almost 50,000 people.
The song's lyrics include: "I grabbed her little sister and put her in front of me. As the bullets began to fly, the blood sprayed from between her eyes, and then I laughed maniacally ... I blew those little f**kers to eternity ... They should have known they were f**king with the Marines." Members of the audience, not shown in the video, laughed and cheered wildly for these lyrics.
SEE: HADJI GIRL
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xTh9ZYS6Flc
Comments apparently posted by other military personnel express approval for the song's contents. One comment states: "This makes me happy to be a Marine. But look out! Here comes the rest of the country to call us evil!" Other comments criticize the video as racist.
"Given the recent allegations that U.S. Marines massacred Iraqi civilians in Haditha and other areas, we need to determine if this video is what it purports to be," said CAIR Executive Director Nihad Awad. "The inappropriate actions of a few individuals should not be allowed to tarnish the reputation of all American military personnel."
Awad called on Pentagon officials and members of Congress to investigate the video and all other allegations of such conduct in Iraq.
CAIR, America's largest Muslim civil liberties group, has 32 offices and chapters nationwide and in Canada. Its mission is to enhance the understanding of Islam, encourage dialogue, protect civil liberties, empower American Muslims, and build coalitions that promote justice and mutual understanding.
NOTE: CAIR offers an e-mail list designed to be a window to the American Muslim community. Subscribers to the list receive news releases and other materials dealing with American Muslim positions on issues of importance to our society. To subscribe to ISLAM-INFONET, go to: http://cair.biglist.com/islam-infonet/
CONTACT: CAIR Communications Director Ibrahim Hooper, 202-488-8787 or 202-744-7726, E-Mail: ihooper@cair-net.org
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Déjà vu in Ramadi
By Mike Whitney
06/13/06 "Information Clearing House"
"Come and see the blood in the streets." Pablo Neruda, 'Selected Poems'
We've seen this before. An Iraqi city is surrounded by troops and armored vehicles; the artillery is wheeled into place, the roads are blocked, a giant wall of sand is piled up around the perimeter, and everything goes silent before the final onslaught.
We've seen it in Falluja, al Qaim, Husbaya and Tel Afar; the same persistent refrain over and over again; Rumsfeld's lone mantra; "surround, isolate and destroy".
This time it's Ramadi, next time somewhere else; what difference does it make? Iraq is being decimated city by city, town by town; ravaged by invaders who see an opportunity to fatten their wallets or enhance their reputations. They'll level everything before they're done.
Ramadi is just another dot on the map; another set of mud-buildings in a vast ocean of oil; another convenient testing-ground for the War Department's next generation of high-tech weaponry. To hell with the people; their lives mean nothing.
The strategy for Ramadi is the same as everywhere else; "search and destroy"; identify all areas of resistance and crush them with an iron fist. We don't do diplomacy, we don't do negotiations, we don't do "body counts".
No one defies the new boss.
Ramadi is a teeming city of 400,000 people. Now it is under siege by Rumsfeld's legions. The water lines have been blown up, medical supplies have been blocked, electricity has been cut off, and tens of thousands of people are fleeing into the countryside without shelter or food.
This is what is taking place in Ramadi right now. It's not a video game; its real, and its being executed by the United States under the cover of "liberation" or some other such nonsense.
According to Times correspondent Megan Stack:
"The image pieced together from interviews with tribal leaders and fleeing families in recent weeks is one of a desperate population of 400,000 people trapped in the crossfire between insurgents and U.S. forces...U.S. and Iraqi forces had cordoned off the city...Air-strikes on several residential areas picked up, and troops took to the streets with loudspeakers to warn civilians of a fierce impending attack."
"Air strikes on residential areas"?
Not our areas, their areas. Areas where "hajis" and rag-heads live. Ramadi is just another "terrorist sanctuary" to be "democratized" with laser-guided weapons and firebombs. Who cares that thousands of lives will be lost in another barbarous assault on a civilian population? Who cares that property and infrastructure will be reduced to rubble?
The "free press" will paper it over. They always do.
1500 fresh troops have been deployed to Ramadi for the offensive. Residents are afraid of a Falluja-style battle where vast swathes of the city will be left in ruins and thousands of people killed or injured.
The city has been cut off from all sides and American patrols have announced on loudspeakers that civilians should evacuate immediately. Independent journalists are reporting that "fierce fighting" has already broken out between occupation forces and resistance fighters. Air strikes and helicopter raids have intensified. American soldiers are forcing their way into homes in residential areas and snipers have taken positions on the city's roof tops.
On Saturday, June 10, accounts from inside the city confirmed that:
"A full-scale American attack on Ramadi has commenced and fierce fighting is taking place in most of the districts...American fighter planes are now taking part in the offensive."
Silence from the American media. Silence from the congress. Silence from the United Nations.
Another colossal war crime is taking shape and the world averts its eyes once again.
Thousands of the city's residents have refused to leave because they either have no money, no means of transportation, or no place to go. They'll probably be caught in the crossfire just as others were in Falluja.
It's a good day for Rumsfeld; another chance to spread misery across the pock-marked landscape; another opportunity to experiment with the Pentagon's latest lethal gadgetry, another occasion to reduce a major Iraqi city to Dresden-type wreckage.
He is completely free to work his magic. No one will notice anyway.
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American Accomplice of Terrorist Linked to Death Squads in Iraq
ACN Cuban News Agency
Havana, June 6 (ACN) US Army Colonel James Steele, who was involved in the Iran-Contras scandal along with international terrorist Luis Posada Carriles at his command, is now an advisor to death squads in Iraq.
The presence of the US army officer in Iraq has just been revealed by US Congressman Dennis J. Kucinich, Granma daily reports.
Luis Posada Carriles, currently under arrest in the US charged with illegal entry into that country, was the first to report to Colonel Steele about the downing of a DC-3 aircraft in Nicaragua and the arrest of Eugene Hassenfus, the incident that led to the Iran-Contras scandal.
In a letter addressed to the US State Department, Kucinich notes that Colonel Steele, a current advisor to the US ambassador in Iraq, implemented a plan in El Salvador under which tens of thousands Salvadorans "disappeared" or were murdered, including Archbishop Oscar Romero and four American nuns.
Colonel Steele has been assigned to the new counter-insurgence unit known as the Special Police Commando, which operates under the Iraqi Interior Ministry, said Kucinich.
A 1996 investigation by US journalist Robert Parry, who formerly worked as a reporter for Associated Press, Newsweek and PBS TV, revealed that Posada reported to two FBI officers on his participation in the huge drug trafficking and weapon smuggling operation at the orders of Colonel Steele, a close ally of Colonel Oliver North and his bosses in the White House.
In his book titled "Caminos del Guerrero" (Paths of the Guerilla), terrorist Posada Carriles boasts of his close links to Steele and wrote that in El Salvador, he, Felix Rodriguez Mendigutiand and Colonel Luis Orlando Rodriguez jointly cooperated with Colonel Steel outside their formal bounds of service."
In its article, the Granma newspaper points out that it is no surprise that -having such powerful allies- Posada now enjoys the protection and privileges that he is being given in El Paso, Texas.
At the same time that Posada is being held in that city, five Cuban anti-terrorist fighters remain in prison for having risked their lives by infiltrating Florida-based Cuban-American terrorist groups which served as faithful accomplices of the US' dirty wars against Latin America.
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Another U.S. Cover-Up Surfaces
By Dahr Jamail and Arkan Hamed
Inter Press Service
06/12/06 -- BAGHDAD, Jun 12 (IPS)
In the wake of the Haditha massacre, reports of another atrocity have surfaced in which U.S. troops killed two women in Samarra, and then attempted to hide evidence of their responsibility.
Among the innumerable such cases people speak of, this one too has now come to light.
According to an earlier account, Nabiha Nisaif Jassim, a 35-year-old mother of two, was killed in firing along with her 57-year-old cousin Saliha Mohammed Hassan on May 30 when they were being transported to Samarra General Hospital for Nabiha to give birth.
What was not reported, according to an Iraqi human rights investigator who spoke with IPS on condition of anonymity, was that both women were shot in the back of the head by U.S. snipers.
"I investigated this incident myself, and both of these women were shot from behind," said the investigator. "Nabiha's brains were splattered on her brother who was driving the car, since she was in the back seat."
The U.S. military said soldiers fired on the car after it entered a "clearly marked prohibited area near an observation post" after failing to stop despite "repeated visual and auditory warnings." The U.S. military said in a statement that "shots were fired to disable the vehicle."
The brother of the pregnant woman, Redam Nisaif Jassim, who was driving the car, told IPS that he neither saw nor heard any warnings by the U.S. military. Two men who witnessed the incident from a nearby home also said they saw no signs of any warning.
"These kinds of killings by the Americans happen daily in Iraq," said Jassim, "They gave no warning to us before killing my cousin and sister. Of course we know they have no respect for the lives of Iraqis."
The U.S. military claims the incident is being investigated.
The Haditha slaughter in which 24 Iraqis were killed is under investigation for the incident itself, and further for the cover-up, since the initial report given by the Marine Corps stated only that 15 civilian deaths were caused by a roadside bomb and fighting with insurgents.
In this case too, all signs point to a cover-up. "The area where they were killed by the Americans was completely unmarked," the human rights investigator told IPS. A warning sign at the place was put up after the two women were killed, he said.
Like the Haditha massacre, this incident too should be investigated both for the killing and the cover-up, he said.
According to the investigator, the U.S. troops who killed the two women made no attempt to assist them after the shooting.
The next day Redam Jassim was summoned to a local police station. "The Americans offered me 5,000 dollars, and told me it wasn't compensation but because of tradition," Jassim told IPS. The U.S. military pays usually 2,500 dollars compensation for killing an Iraqi. Jassim says he refused the payment.
The U.S. military recently announced in a Defence Department report provided to Congress that it paid out 19 million dollars in compensation to Iraqis last year -- half of which paid out by Marines in al-Anbar province west of Baghdad.
The military claimed the amount was paid in 600 separate incidents, but it is common knowledge in Iraq that the usual payout for a non-combat civilian death is 2,500 dollars.
A payment of 19 million dollars compensation at 2,500 dollars a person would suggest such killings in thousands.
Jassim told IPS and the human rights investigator that he was asked by the Americans' translator to sign a paper written in English. The family and their relatives live in a village called al-Muta'assim, a 40-minute drive from the main hospital in Samarra.. Most people there, like the Jassims, neither speak nor read English.
After he signed the paper, Jassim was offered 2,500 dollars by U.S. soldiers, which he again refused.
"It is clear the Americans tried to cheat him as well as cover up their tracks at the same time," the investigator told IPS. "Like in Haditha, this incident, along with so many others we cannot keep track of, requires a truly independent investigation, rather than one by the U.S. military."
Phone calls and emails to the U.S.. military spokesperson in Baghdad have not been returned.
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US 'planning to keep 50,000 troops in Iraq for many years'
By Francis Harris in Washington
06/12/06 "The Telegraph "
America plans to retain a garrison of 50,000 troops, one tenth of its entire army, in Iraq for years to come, according to US media reports.
The revelation came as George W Bush summoned his top political, military and intelligence aides to a summit on Iraq's future today at the presidential retreat at Camp David.
Tomorrow the Americans will talk by video link to Nouri al-Maliki, Iraq's prime minister, and members of his cabinet, as well as American military commanders in Iraq.
The meeting marks the highest profile discussion of Iraq's future so far, and reflects the Bush administration's determination to exploit the two most promising developments in Iraq for many months - the death of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the leader of al-Qa'eda in Iraq, and the completion of the first permanent post-war cabinet.
Mr Bush said the meeting would decide "how to best deploy America's resources in Iraq and achieve our shared goal of an Iraq that can govern itself, sustain itself, and defend itself".
But despite fierce domestic pressure to reduce troop levels before November's critical mid-term elections, there were growing signals that Gen George Casey, America's Iraq commander, may raise troop levels in the short-term.
Mr Bush said in his weekend radio address that "violence in Iraq may escalate" as terrorists tried to prove that they had survived the loss of their leader.
American commanders are also worried by the situation in the Sunni areas at the heart of the insurgency, where American units have complained of a shortage of men.
Mr Maliki pledged in a Washington Post article to confront the Shia militia, but his plan to "re-establish a state monopoly on weapons" could well generate a confrontation between ultra-religious gunmen and the fledgling Iraq security forces.
America's military would be drawn into any defining battle over who rules Iraq.
Gen Casey has already summoned his main reserve unit, a 3,500-man armoured brigade based in Kuwait and has alerted a Germany-based brigade that it may be needed soon.
Military planners have begun to assess the costs of keeping a 50,000-man force in Iraq for a protracted period of time. At present the total number of serving American troops is about 500,000.
The plan has not yet received presidential approval. But it would fit with the administration's belief that while troops numbers will fall, American forces will have to remain in Iraq beyond Mr Bush's departure from the White House in early 2009.
Military analysts have noted that significant American spending is already being committed to permanent bases in Iraq. They say Iraq's military may soon be able to fight by itself, but it cannot feed or supply itself and it has no air force to speak of.
The Camp David meeting will be attended by Dick Cheney, the vice-president, Donald Rumsfeld, the defence secretary, Condoleezza Rice, the secretary of state, John Negroponte, the director of national intelligence, Gen Michael Hayden, the CIA director and Gen Peter Pace, America's top soldier.
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Bush pledges to help Iraq succeed
Wednesday, 14 June 2006, 16:35 GMT 17:35 UK
US President George W Bush has pledged to do "what it takes" to help the new Iraqi government to succeed.
His comments came in a news conference following a surprise trip to Baghdad on Tuesday, where he met new Prime Minister Nouri Maliki.
"I saw first-hand the strength of his character and his deep determination to succeed," Mr Bush told reporters.
He also announced details of tough new measures in Baghdad in an effort to win back control of the city's streets.
Some 40,000 Iraqi and US troops were put on the streets just after dawn as part of a crackdown ordered by Mr Maliki.
He has said he is willing to talk to some insurgents, as long as they do not have blood on their hands.
Meanwhile violence continued, with clashes breaking out between gunmen and security forces in the city's north.
No casualties were reported in the clashes, in the mainly Sunni Adhamiya district, which officials said lasted about half an hour.
A car bomb also exploded in northern Baghdad, killing at least two people and injuring 10, police said. A second car bomb exploded in another northern area, but no-one died.
Fears are high that al-Qaeda in Iraq is preparing new attacks after the killing of their leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.
Zarqawi's successor, named as Abu Hamza al-Mujahid, has reportedly vowed to defeat "crusaders and Shias" in Iraq.
'Capable people'
Mr Bush acknowledged that violence in Iraq would never be completely eliminated.
But he said intelligence gathered from raids after the death of Zarqawi was being used to track down insurgents.
"I was inspired to be able to visit the capital of a free and democratic Iraq," Mr Bush said of his visit on Tuesday, which gave Mr Maliki just five minutes' warning.
The US president had been chairing talks in the US on future policy in Iraq and had been due to speak to Mr Maliki via videophone.
He said the trip had banished any doubts about the new government's "will to go forward".
Mr Bush described the new prime minister's agenda and cabinet as "impressive".
"I came away with the feeling they're plenty capable people," he said.
Difference noticed
The new security measures will be the strictest imposed on Baghdad since the US-led invasion in 2003.
On Wednesday, the nightly evening curfew began at 2030, not 2300 as it did before, and will run until 0600.
Extra troops were posted throughout Baghdad in the morning, setting up new checkpoints to secure road travel in and around the city.
Residents said they had already noticed the difference, with more vehicles being stopped and searched and long queues building up as a result.
But the BBC's Hugh Sykes in Baghdad says checkpoints and patrols provide easy targets for car bombers, and ordering a suicide car bomber to pull over could prompt him to detonate, thereby helping him to achieve his objective.
Insurgents are to be targeted by snap raids, with the majority of resources deployed to the most dangerous areas of Baghdad.
But the question among Iraqis is whether this is just a show of force or whether it can make a dent in the daily bombings and shootings that claim at least 20 to 30 lives in the capital every day.
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Majority Leader Boehner's Confidential Strategy Memo For Thursday's Iraq Debate
Thinkprogress
On Thursday, the House of Representatives will hold a debate on the Iraq war. Media reports say Majority Leader John Boehner (R-OH) "hopes to match the serious, dignified tone of deliberation that preceded the Gulf war, in 1991."
ThinkProgress has obtained a "Confidential Messaging Memo" from Boehner instructing his caucus to conduct a very different kind of deliberation. Here's a quick summary:
1. Exploit 9/11. The two page memo mentions 9/11 seven times. It describes debating Iraq in the context of 9/11 as "imperative."
2. Attack opponents ad hominem. The memo describes those who opposes President Bush's policies in Iraq as "sheepish," "weak," and "prone to waver endlessly."
3. Create a false choice. The memo says the decision is between supporting President Bush's policies and hoping terrorist threats will "fade away on their own."
You can read the confidential memo for yourself HERE.
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Crackdown on Baghdad begins
By QASSIM ABDUL-ZAHRA
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
14 June 06
BAGHDAD, Iraq -- Iraq's prime minister set in motion the biggest security crackdown in Baghdad since the U.S.-led invasion, with 75,000 Iraqi and U.S. troops to deploy across the strife-prone capital starting today.
Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki also announced plans for an extended curfew and a weapons ban, saying he would show "no mercy" to terrorists six days after al-Qaida in Iraq leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi was killed in a U.S. airstrike northeast of Baghdad.
The announcement came as radical anti-U.S. cleric Muqtada al-Sadr planned a demonstration today in Baghdad to protest President Bush's surprise visit to the capital.
Bush's visit Tuesday was seen by many as a boost for al-Maliki, who is seeking to build momentum after al-Zarqawi's death and the appointment of defense and interior ministers following weeks of political stalemate.
Al-Zarqawi's successor, identified by the nom de guerre Abu Hamza al-Muhajer, vowed to defeat "crusaders and Shiites" in Iraq and said "holy warriors" in the country were stronger than ever, according to the new leader's first Web statement, posted Tuesday.
Underlining the threat, explosions struck oil-rich Kirkuk, killing at least 16 people. Kirkuk police Brig. Gen. Sarhad Qader said the attacks in the city 180 miles north of Baghdad were believed to be "a reaction to avenge the killing of al-Zarqawi."
Al-Qaida in Iraq has been increasingly focusing its attacks on Baghdad rather than on U.S. targets in western Iraq.
Security officials said 75,000 Iraqi and multinational forces would be deployed throughout Baghdad today, securing roads in and out of the city, establishing more checkpoints, launching raids against insurgent hideouts and calling in airstrikes if necessary.
"Baghdad is divided according to geographical area, and we know the al-Qaida leaders in each area," said Maj. Gen. Mahdi al-Gharrawi, commander of public order forces under the Interior Ministry.
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The operation, to be launched at 6 a.m. today, was to be the biggest of its kind in Baghdad since the U.S. handed over sovereignty to Iraq in June 2004, al-Gharrawi said.
Civilians have complained of random violence and detentions by Iraqi forces, especially the police, which are widely believed to have been infiltrated by sectarian "death squads."
Al-Gharrawi said there were plans for a single uniform to distinguish legitimate forces in the coming days.
Al-Maliki's plan additionally includes banning personal weapons and implementing a 9 p.m. to 6 a.m. curfew, which hitherto had begun at 11 p.m. The new curfew was expected to begin Friday.
Al-Maliki said in his news conference the plan "will provide security and confront the terrorism and ... enable Iraqis to live in peace in Baghdad."
The Iraqi army launched a similar crackdown dubbed Operation Lightning in May 2005, deploying more than 40,000 Iraqi police and soldiers, backed by U.S. troops and air support. However, violence continued to spike and many Sunnis were alienated by the heavy-handed tactics concentrating on their neighborhoods.
So far in 2006, at least 3,829 Iraqi civilians and at least 754 Iraqi security forces have been killed in war-related violence. There have been at least 335 coalition troop deaths in 2006; of these at least 312 have been U.S. military.
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Germany Says No to Rumsfeld Request for Help in Iraq
Spiegel Online
9 June 06
US Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld is reportedly looking for Germany to provide more assistance in Iraq. The German government, however, has declined the invitation.
The United States remains interested in a greater German involvement in Iraq according to a newspaper report on Friday. According to the Berlin daily Berliner Zeitung, US Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld has asked his German counterpart Franz Josef Jung for help in training the Iraqi military in Baghdad. Germany's policy of only providing training assistance outside the borders of Iraq, however, will continue, Jung said at a meeting of NATO defense ministers in Brussels on Thursday.
"We're contributing our part to the stabilization of Iraq," Jung said while also emphasizing that German assistance outside Iraq would continue.
Germany has participated in training Iraqi officers in both Hamburg and in the United Arab Emirates as part of a NATO mission begun in 2004 aimed at stabilizing the situation in Iraq. Some 1,000 Iraqi officers have been trained in Baghdad since then with a further 500 travelling to Europe for training. But Germany has consistently refused to become involved directly in Iraq -- a policy that has not changed since Chancellor Angela Merkel's election in the autumn of 2005. Nevertheless, Merkel's term in office has corresponded with a thawing of trans-Atlantic relations which had become frosty under Merkel's predecessor Gerhard Schröder.
Despite the change of tone, however, a direct German involvement in Iraq would likely be extremely controversial. Schröder's outright refusal to get involved in Iraq, first voiced categorically during his 2002 campaign for the chancellery, was extraordinarily popular in Germany and led to his re-election that year. Four years later, the US presence in Iraq remains deeply unpopular in Germany.
The German military only recently pledged almost 800 troops to participate in a peace-keeping operation in the Democratic Republic of Congo during elections there at the end of July. German troops are likewise stationed in Afghanistan, Kosovo and off the Horn of Africa.
wes/Berliner Zeitung/dpa
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Organized Theft
U.S. inflation prompts more rate hike worries
Last Updated Wed, 14 Jun 2006 10:18:06 EDT
CBC News
Fresh reports of rising costs for gasoline and housing in the United States sparked concern Wednesday that interest rates will continue to rise.
The U.S. Labour Department reported that the overall consumer price index was up by 0.4 per cent last month, which was what economists had been forecasting.
However, the core rate of inflation - which factors out volatile items such as food and energy -was up by 0.3 per cent last month. Economists had been looking for an increase of 0.2 per cent.
Rent costs were up by 0.6 per cent in May for the biggest gain since August 1990.
Energy costs increased by 2.4 per cent. So far for 2006, energy costs have been rising at an annual rate of 30.8 per cent, more than double the 2005 rate of 17.1 per cent.
Eyes on the Federal Reserve
Stock markets have been edgy since June 5, when U.S. Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke said he would remain vigilant in fighting inflation.
The comment upset investors, who fear that another rise in U.S. interest rates will have a spillover effect on Canadian markets by dampening demand for Canada's mineral resources.
The Fed's next decision on interest rates is slated for June 29. The Fed's key interest rates currently stand at a five-year high of five per cent following a string of 16 rate hikes of one-quarter of a percentage point.
Analysts agreed that the latest inflation figures all but guarantee a June 29 rate increase.
"We're sticking to our call for a peak of 5.25 per cent in the funds rate, since the Fed is also going to be facing increasing evidence of a moderation in growth that should, if the central bank is patient, cap the pressure on core inflation," said CIBC World Markets economist Avery Shenfeld.
TD Securities strategist Eric Lascelles said it was still possible for economic data to be released in the next two weeks to persuade the Fed to pause instead of boost its key interest rate.
"But the odds of this outcome have grown exceedingly slim," he said.
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Fed Stumbles Add to Global Market Meltdown
By PAUL THARP
NY Post
14 June 06
As world markets spiral toward a crash landing, Wall Street is hoping new Federal Reserve boss Ben Bernanke keeps his mouth shut.
Skittish investors worried about rising interest rates around the globe yesterday as stock prices collapsed in many of the world's capitals and gold plunged in its biggest one-day drop in 26 years.
Tokyo's stock market triggered the global rout overnight as shares plunged there in the biggest point drop since 9/11.
U.S. blue chips followed by losing all their gains this year, while investors in crude oil fled to escape a possible collapse of crude's long-running bull market.
The Dow Jones industrial average fell 86.44 points to 10,706.14, while the S&P 500 dipped 12.71 to 1,223.69. The Nasdaq composite index dropped 18.85 to 2,072.47, its eighth-straight losing session, the longest such streak in 12 years.
Many market watchers believe Bernanke has dropped the ball in his five months at the economy's helm as Fed chief - and that his talk on inflation, and the rate hikes he plans to contain it, have rattled investors.
"Bernanke started with some tough talk, but he got mealy-mouthed and then real dovish to keep everyone in the game," said Bill King, market strategist at M. Ramsey & King Securities.
Other Fed bankers didn't help matters, King said. "They were out there every day making speeches in a public-relations campaign to say 'Inflation is contained,' " he said.
"All of them should just keep their mouths shut. And Bernanke? 'Just shut up!' "
But they all got rock-star status and just loved it too much to stop, King said.
"Now it's blowing up in their face because they were shills instead of quietly running policy," said King, echoing other analysts' frustrations.
Their comments came as global markets were being knocked around.
"There's a massive liquidation in just about everything - oil, stocks, gold, copper," said Peter Beutel, energy analyst at Cameron Hanover.
Oil tumbled here 2 percent to $68.56 a barrel - which is more than triple its price of $19.73 a barrel in January 2002.
"We're at the foothills of another energy recession," Beutel said. "Every time we've tripled energy prices, we get a major recession."
Analysts said they are certain Bernanke will hike rates again this summer.
"This mixture of potentially higher interest rates and an economic slowdown could lead to the next recession," said Herb Kurlan, president of Vtrader Pro.
New government data yesterday said inflation is rising faster than the government predicted, due to broadly rising costs blamed on surging energy.
The Producers Price Index rose 0.3 percent last month, much steeper than forecast.
What's more, energy costs have drained an extra $203 billion a year out of consumer pockets since 2003 for vehicles and heating homes - or an additional $525 million more each day than they spent three years ago.
paul.tharp@nypost.com
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U.S. stocks drop continuously
www.chinaview.cn 2006-06-14 08:54:42
BEIJING, June 14 (Xinhuanet)-- U.S. Stocks dropped on Tuesday amid persistent worries about rising interest rates and slower economic growth after the latest warnings on inflation from Federal Reserve officials.
On Tuesday the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 86.44 points, or 0.80 percent, to 10,706.14, sliding into negative territory for the year. It was the seventh decline by the blue-chip average in the past eight trading sessions. The Dow has fallen 8 percent since closing within 80 points of its all-time high on May 10.
The Standard & Poor's 500 Index was down 12.71 points, or 1.03 percent, at 1,223.69. The Nasdaq Composite Index was down 18.85 points, or 0.90 percent, at 2,072.47.
The Nasdaq finished down for the eighth day in a row, matching a losing streak it registered in May which was its longest in 12 years.
Stocks fell in volatile trading on Tuesday as inflation data added to concerns that the Federal Reserve would raise interest rates for the 17th consecutive time in June.
"It is becoming more widely accepted that the Fed is likely to raise rates at its June meeting and that is being slowly priced into the market," said Charles Lieberman, chief investment officer of Advisors Capital Management in Paramus, New Jersey.
"Fears of Federal Reserve over-reaction in its fight on inflation continue to haunt Wall Street and other global equity markets," said Fred Dickson, chief market strategist at DA Davidson.
Investors searching for undervalued shares after weeks of selling helped to offset the concerns, but many were hesitant to make bets before the Consumer Price Index report on Wednesday.
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Global equity meltdown costs investors $2 trillion
By Chris Sanders
Reuters
13 June 06
NEW YORK - The month-long slide in global stocks has wiped out at least $2 trillion in wealth, leaving investors few alternatives to preserve their holdings aside from bonds and money markets.
Investors have been dumping stocks, commodities and emerging market assets on growing concerns that economic growth will suffer from higher inflation and interest rates.
"It is essentially one consistent story worldwide, starting here in the U.S. There is a fear that the Fed's repeated commitment to limiting inflation demonstrates a willingness to risk economic activity," said Christopher Low, chief economist at FTN Financial in New York.
Stock markets have been punished since the U.S.
Federal Reserve raised interest rates for 16th time in a row on May 10 and issued a hawkish statement saying it may need to do so again to fight inflation. Investors had expected some sign of an end to the tightening cycle.
Global markets have suffered since, and strategists show little agreement about how deep and how long the sell-off will go. Bonds have been the most direct beneficiary of the equities route, with benchmark U.S. 10-year Treasuries staging their longest rally of the year since mid-May.
MARKETS FALL INTO THE RED ON THE YEAR
The Dow Jones industrial average (^DJI - news) is off 8.2 percent since mid-May and as of Tuesday's close had erased its gain for the year. The Nasdaq Composite Index (^IXIC - news) is off 12.75 percent from its high for the year on April 19 and the Standard & Poor's 500 Index (^SPX - news) has fallen by nearly 8 percent from its May peaks.
On Tuesday, Tokyo's Nikkei average booked its biggest one-day percentage fall in two years, tumbling 4.14 percent, wiping out more than 16.56 trillion yen ($145 billion) in market value from the Tokyo Stock Exchange's first section. It was the biggest one-day point drop since immediately after the September 11, 2001, attacks on New York and Washington.
In Europe, the FTSEurofirst 300 (^FTEU3 - news) index of top European shares has fallen about 11 percent since May 11. The index finished at 1,238.5 points on Tuesday, its lowest closing level since November 30.
Since its year high hit in early May, the MSCI World Index (^MSCIWO - news) of global stocks has lost $1.9 trillion in market capitalization, nearly 12 percent of its value and more than the economic output of the United Kingdom.
The index compiled by MSCI Barra does not account for all global stocks, meaning the total amount of lost wealth is greater still.
As global central banks in Europe and United States have raised interest rates to cool inflation, investors are aggressively slashing their exposure to emerging markets as well.
OUTFLOWS FROM EQUITIES
Investors pulled out about $8.5 billion from emerging equities in the three weeks ending June 8, according to data from EmergingPortfolio.com Funds research. The benchmark MSCI emerging market stock index (^MSCIEF - news) has lost about 24 percent since May 10.
"We've seen a lot of panic selling by people who have gotten into emerging markets and commodities later in the game -- pessimism is high," said Scott Wren, a senior equity strategist with A.G. Edwards & Sons. "People are sitting on a lot of cash and are afraid to get back in the market."
Given the drop-off markets, analysts said investors should now seek quality.
Tom McManus, chief investment strategist with Banc of America Securities said investors should look at "the bonds of the stock market. Steady companies with strong earnings and geographic diversification."
These shares have been out of favor since about 1998, he added, and are the kind of companies
Warren Buffett has been known to own -- companies with top-quality balance sheets and diversified earnings streams.
Shares held by Buffett include Coca Cola Co. (NYSE:KO - news), American Express Co. (NYSE:AXP - news), Wal-Mart Stores Inc. (NYSE:WMT - news), Wells Fargo & Co. (NYSE:WFC - news) and Anheuser-Busch (NYSE:BUD - news). Each of these has retained their gains even as the S&P 500 has erased its advance and now stands 2 percent lower on the year.
The global sell-off, however, is not over and may only be just starting, according to JPMorgan Chase & Co.'s global equity strategist Abhijit Chakrabortti.
"This is nothing compared with what we may see late in the summer and early October -- once slower growth finally sinks in and expectations for higher benchmark rates, at 6 percent or even more, come out," Chakrabortti told the Reuters Investment Outlook Summit in New York.
"Sectors most dependent on growth and the companies most dependent on volume and price declines, which also includes tech companies, should be avoided," he said.
"We like the big telecom providers such as Verizon (NYSE:VZ - news) and AT&T (NYSE:T - news), as well as Colgate (NYSE:CL - news)," he added. All three have soundly outperformed the market this year, gaining 4.75 percent, 10.3 percent and 12 percent, respectively.
Among U.S. mutual funds, investors pulled only $1.9 billion out of equity funds in the week that ended June 7, not a huge amount compared with outflows of $7.1 billion during the previous week, research firm TrimTabs reported late last week.
At Boston-based Fidelity Investments, the world's biggest mutual fund company, "we have not noticed unusual activity during the past several days but we had strong money market inflows in May," said Vincent Loporchio, a spokesman.
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Like a dinosaur, US economy heads to extinction because of excessive indebtedness
Pravda
14 June 06
Today the US economy is often compared with a dinosaur, because it is the next largest economy in the world and almost as large as that of the six other members of the Group of Seven combined.
Contrary to what we used to believe, leviathans like the diplodocus were not exactly sloths. It is now thought that they had the strength to stand on their hind legs in order to reach food at the top of trees. They may even have been able to run rather than merely plod. But it seems reasonable to assume that their reaction times were slow; it was a very long way from the diplodocus's tail to its brain. If a predator sank its fangs into that tail, it might have taken the diplodocus a few moments to feel the pain.
The big question about the dinosaurs is, of course, What caused their extinction? Why were so many species unable to evolve in response to environmental changes? The most common explanation is that a very sudden event, like a meteor's impact, gave the dinosaurs too little time to evolve and provided smaller and more dynamic life forms with an opportunity to take over.
An analogous question for economists is whether the United States is capable of evolving out of its present excessive indebtedness. Or could the global economic environment change so drastically as to threaten, if not extinction, then at least decline relative to smaller, more dynamic economies?
When the National Debt clock in Times Square was turned on in 1989, the federal debt amounted to around $2.7 trillion. Eleven years later, on Sept. 7, 2000, the clock read: "Our national debt: $5,676,989,904,887. Your family share: $73,733." That's when the clock was turned off, because, in those innocent days, it seemed as if the $5.6 trillion debt was set to decline, perhaps to disappear altogether. On that same date, CNN reported, "Vice President and Democratic presidential nominee Al Gore . . . outlined a plan that he says would eliminate the debt by 2012." The proposal was uncontroversial. Economic advisers to the Republican candidate, George W. Bush, were said to have "agreed with the principle of paying down the debt," but their candidate had "not committed to a specific date for eliminating it."
That should have set the alarm bells ringing.
Since becoming president, George Bush has presided over one of the steepest peacetime rises ever in the federal debt. The gross federal debt now exceeds $8.3 trillion. There are three reasons for the post-2000 increase: reduced revenue during the 2001 recession, generous tax cuts for higher income groups and increased expenditures not only on warfare abroad but also on welfare at home. And if projections from the Congressional Budget Office turn out to be correct, America is just a decade away from a $12.8 trillion debt - more than double what it was when Bush took office.
Big public debts are not always bad, to be sure. It could be argued that in his first term Bush wisely used fiscal policy to boost aggregate demand and counter the impact of the dot-com bust. Public borrowing also allows "tax smoothing" by spreading out over time the cost of big one-off expenses like wars, three of which the United States has fought since 1999.
On the other hand, by requiring larger interest payments, big public debts devour revenue that could be spent on other programs. They may crowd out private investment by pushing up long-term interest rates. They may also have a regressive distributional impact, transferring economic resources from taxpayers to bondholders or from future generations to the present generation.
It all depends how you measure the debt. If you exclude bonds and bills in the possession of government agencies and programs, like the Social Security trust fund, the debt actually held by private investors is less than $5 trillion. Economists commonly calculate the debt burden as a
percentage of gross domestic product. Counting only the debt held by the public, that works out to around 38 percent of G.D.P., a major increase relative to 1981 but still modest compared with the years after World War II. What's more, the C.B.O. forecasts (albeit with the rosy assumption of annual growth close to 5 percent) that the debt-to-G.D.P. ratio will actually decline in the decade ahead, to perhaps as little as 34.5 percent - even if today's lax budgetary plans are adhered to.
The trouble is that the officially stated borrowings of the federal government are only one part of the U.S. debt problem. For it is not only the government's debt that has grown large of late. Ordinary American households have also gone on prodigious borrowing sprees.
In the past five years alone, the value of U.S. home-mortgage debt has increased by nearly $3 trillion. Not all of that borrowing went to pay for real estate, the traditional function of mortgages. In 2004, net mortgage borrowing not used for the purchase of new homes amounted to nearly $600 billion. The International Monetary Fund estimates that this kind of equity extraction has risen from less than 2 percent of household disposable income in the year 2000 to more than 9 percent in the third quarter of last year.
And let's not forget those other debts that families did not formerly run up. Consumer credit in the 1960's and 1970's averaged less than 13 percent of G.D.P. In the past 10 years it has climbed to around 18 percent.
Not only do Americans borrow as never before; they also save remarkably little. The impressive resilience of American consumer spending in the past 15 years has been based partly on a collapse in the personal savings rate from around 7.5 percent of income to below zero. The aggregate national savings rate, which includes the public sector and corporations, averaged 13 percent in the 1960's. Last year it was just 0.8 percent.
The trouble is that, for demographic reasons, Americans need to save more than this. According to the 2006 Retirement Confidence Survey, 6 in 10 American workers say they are saving for retirement, and just 4 in 10 say they have actually calculated how much they should be saving - many of them figure that they will simply work longer. According to survey data, the average worker plans to work until age 65. But it turns out that he or she actually ends up retiring at 62; indeed, about 4 in 10 workers end up leaving the work force earlier than planned.
This has grave implications for the federal budget. Already, Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid consume nearly half of federal tax revenues. And that proportion is bound to rise, not only because the number of retirees is going up but also because benefits programs are out of control. Over the past four years, Medicare benefits per recipient grew 16 times as fast as the real wages of the workers paying for them through taxation.
In short, the federal government seems to have much larger unfinanced liabilities than official data imply. If you compare the present value of all projected future government expenditures, including debt-service payments, with the present value of all projected future government receipts, the gap is about $66 trillion, according to calculations by the economists Jagadeesh Gokhale and Kent Smetters. That's almost eight times the size of the official gross federal debt.
American consumption has been the principal engine of economic growth in the world over the past decade. But the readiness of American households and politicians to borrow has an inevitable corollary: the United States has become the world's biggest debtor.
In almost every year since 1992, the gap between the amount of goods and services the United States exports and the amount it imports has grown wider. This year the current account deficit, which is largely a trade deficit, could rise as high as 7 percent of G.D.P., nearly double its peak in the mid-1980's. What results is a remarkable accumulation of foreign debt. Estimates of the net international investment position of the United States - the difference between the overseas assets owned by Americans and the American assets owned by foreigners - have declined from a modest positive balance of around 5 percent of G.D.P. in the mid-80's to a huge net debt of minus 20 percent today.
What this means is that foreigners are accumulating large claims on the future output of the United States. However the borrowed money is used, whether productively or not, a proportion of the future returns on U.S. investments will end up flowing abroad as dividends or interest payments.
Asian central banks in particular have been buying large quantities of dollars and dollar-denominated securities. Chinese purchases of U.S. bonds in 2005, for example, are estimated to have risen as high as 2 percent of our G.D.P., a very significant proportion of America's foreign borrowing. At first sight, the channeling of Chinese savings into American bonds seems bizarre.
The average American has an income of about $40,000 a year and has, as we have seen, a personal savings rate of zero. The average Chinese earns around $1,500 per year but has personal savings of 23 percent of his income - and is lending a large chunk of these savings, via the People's Bank of China, to the average American. The conventional explanation for this strange transaction is that the Chinese authorities need to buy dollar-denominated bonds to prevent their own currency from appreciating relative to ours. The logic is that China needs a weak exchange rate to ensure that its exports continue to flow into the American market.
Of course, it is not only the Chinese who have been engaging in the accumulation of dollars and dollar-denominated securities. The Japanese have been nearly as active, as have other Asian economies. Middle Eastern oil producers have also been running large trade surpluses, thanks to high oil prices, and investing at least some of the proceeds in the United States.
As a result, there has been an immense rise in foreign ownership of American securities of all kinds, but especially government bonds. Foreign ownership of the U.S. federal debt passed the halfway mark in June 2004. About a third of corporate bonds are now in foreign hands, as is more than 13 percent of the U.S. stock market. One analyst has half-seriously calculated that at the current rate of foreign accumulation, the last U.S. Treasury held by an American will be purchased by the People's Bank of China on Feb. 9, 2012.
To those familiar with the Latin American debt crises of the 80's and 90's, there's a case to be made that the United States is on the road to becoming a Latin American country. While it is certainly true that our net external debt is now as large in relative terms as some Latin American debts have been in past crises, there's a difference. Latin American countries have generally had to borrow in the currency used by their creditors. A decline in the borrowing country's currency, say the peso, threatens to send its dollar-denominated debt skyrocketing in peso terms.
But the happy position of the United States is more like that of Britain in the aftermath of World War II, when a substantial part of its war debt was owed in sterling to current or former colonies. Because Britain borrowed in its own currency, it had control over the unit of account. As the pound slid from $4 to below $2 from the 40's to the 70's, its sterling liabilities were reduced by half in terms of the key postwar currency.
Could the dollar follow a similar downward path? It has happened before. Between March 1985 and April 1988, the dollar depreciated by more than 40 percent against the currencies of America's trading partners. As a fiscal strategy, dollar depreciation has much to recommend it. At a stroke, American exports would regain their competitiveness overseas and Asian imports would become more expensive, leading to at least some contraction - though not an elimination - of the trade deficit. Foreign creditors would take the hit, finding their dollar assets suddenly worth much less in terms of their own currencies.
So what's the catch? A sudden increase in the dollar price of American imports could stoke inflation in the United States. There is already some patchy evidence of an upturn in inflation. Whichever measure you use, prices are certainly rising at a faster rate now than they were two years ago, as are hourly earnings. As measured by the spread between conventional bonds and inflation-proof bonds, inflation expectations are also up slightly.
But is that really a catch? Not necessarily. Because higher inflation means that the real value of your debt ends up being reduced (in terms of the purchasing power of the amount that you owe) - provided, that is, that your debt is not adjustable-rate or index-linked.
Alas, those are two really serious caveats.
It's a pretty safe bet that if a dollar decline shows signs of boosting inflation, the Federal Reserve will raise interest rates. The credibility of the new Fed chairman would be on the line. Even a federal-funds rate above 5 percent might seem too low. Bear in mind that the federal-funds rate (the overnight rate at which the Fed lends to the banking system) has been going up for two years, from its nadir of below 1 percent in June 2004. Now ask yourself, Who has been most affected by this monetary tightening?
Two important categories of debtor spring to mind. First, there are the households with adjustable-rate mortgages. More Americans have variable-rate mortgages than ever before, even if most existing mortgage rates remain fixed. Since March 2004, there has been a 59 percent increase in one-year adjustable-rate mortgages. But that just means that they have become more expensive for new borrowers. The key question is, When do existing A.R.M.'s reset? The answer: Soon.
According to calculations published by Barron's in February, over the next two years the monthly payments on about $600 billion of mortgages taken out by borrowers in the so-called subprime market (those with checkered or nonexistent credit histories) will increase by as much as 50 percent. This is because many A.R.M.'s have two-year teaser periods to entice borrowers. After that, the meaning of "adjustable" suddenly becomes (in this case, painfully) apparent.
To which you might respond by saying, Caveat emptor. If borrowers fail to read the small print or to anticipate higher rates, then more fool they. And no doubt in the subprime market there are many people who made one or both of those mistakes and will pay dearly for doing so.
Yet the surprising thing is that the second category of debtor vulnerable to higher short-term rates can scarcely plead ignorance or naïveté. For it is none other than the federal government itself.
The protracted decline of long-term interest rates since the 80's has been a boon for an indebted government. Since 1990, the cost of servicing the federal debt has actually declined from 3.2 percent of G.D.P. in 1990 to 1.5 percent in 2005, even as the absolute size of the debt has soared. But that decline has been achieved partly thanks to the term structure of the debt - that is, to the relatively short duration of the bonds issued by the Treasury, which has allowed the government to take maximum advantage of falling rates. At the end of fiscal year 2005, for example, fully a third of the federal debt had a maturity of less than one year, and the average maturity of the entire debt was just 57 months (down from 74 months at the end of 2000).
This was wonderful so long as interest rates were falling. But now that they have started going up, it creates a potential fiscal nightmare: big slices of the federal debt that have to be refinanced at higher market rates. And that creates a new source of budgetary red ink: rising interest payments. It turns out that George Bush has the biggest A.R.M. in the world.
The most important lesson to be drawn from the history of debt is this: It's not the absolute size of your borrowings that matters. It's not even the relative size in relation to your income. The crux is whether the interest payments you have to make are more or less than you can afford to pay. And that, in turn, is a function of whether or not the rate can move, whether or not your income can change and whether or not inflation can help you or hurt you. On this basis, both subprime American mortgage-holders and a distinctly subprime administration may find the months ahead more painful than they anticipated.
The dinosaurs, we conjecture, succumbed to global climate change. The American beast - call it debtlodocus - faces a comparable economic challenge. The global economic climate seems to be changing. We hear no more talk of deflation; we hear a lot about rising rates.
For America 's giant, dinosaurlike economy - with its small, wealthy head; its big, fat middle; and its long low-income tail - there is a tried-and-tested response to a change in the weather. Dollar depreciation and inflation have saved the debtlodocus before. The assumption seems to be that they will do the trick again.
Yet this time may be different. For sinking like a velociraptor's fangs into the tail of the debtlodocus are interest-rate hikes that may outpace and check any increase in inflation. And no one knows when and how violently the leviathan may react to this slowly discernible pain.
It is too soon to speak of extinction, of course. But one obvious inference to be drawn from the British experience of an indebted empire and a sliding currency, as well as from the history of the diplodocus, is that eternal life is not on offer.
Source: The New York Times
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Housing bubble correction could be severe
By Paul J. Lim
U.S. News and World Report
13 June 06
Contrary to popular belief, the housing market hasn't cooled off that much. In fact, residential real estate prices continue to soar in a number of key metropolitan areas, according to a new study released this week.
That's a good thing, right? Actually, no-because the froth building in housing prices raises the distinct possibility of significant corrections to come in many of those regions.
In the first quarter, home prices nationwide rose an additional 7.3 percent, according to a joint study by the financial services firm National City Corp. and the research firm Global Insight. As a result, there are now 71 metropolitan areas-representing nearly 40 percent of all single-family homes-that can be classified as "extremely overvalued," according to the study. By comparison, only 64 metro regions were considered frothy at the end of last year and only 1 percent were classified as such in the first quarter of 2004.
The report further stated that Californians and Floridians ought to be the most concerned, as their states are home to 17 of the 20 most overvalued markets. The frothiest region in the country, according to the study, is Naples, Fla., where home prices are said to be 103 percent overvalued. Rounding out the top five markets are Salinas, Calif.; Port St. Lucie/Fort Pierce, Fla.; Merced, Calif.; and Bend, Ore., which are all more than 75 percent overvalued, according to the report. (Global Insight and National City based their judgments on valuations on several factors, including historical market premiums and discounts, household income levels in those regions, interest rates, and population density.)
"The fact that this number of metro areas - representing such a large percent of the total single family market-is extremely overvalued should be a cause for concern," said Richard DeKaser, chief economist for National City.
Another worrisome sign is that the 50 most overvalued markets at the end of last year were again the biggest winners at the start of 2006. Indeed, the 50 hottest markets saw a 10.1 percent increase in home prices, on average, in the first quarter.
This study's findings would seem to contradict other housing market reports that have shown a steady decline in home prices recently. For example, the Commerce Department has indicated that the median sales price on new single-family homes purchased has fallen around 3 percent since the start of the year.
But DeKaser notes that new homes are sold by developers, not families. And developers generally don't have the luxury that regular families do of living in their homes for several more years to wait out attractive offers. Moreover, DeKaser said new homes represent only a small percentage of the total housing market. For their part, National City and Global Insight relied on national housing data collected by the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight.
Under normal circumstances, the fact that housing prices are continuing to rise would be something to cheer. But the housing boom has been going for most of this decade. And housing markets can't be overvalued for too long, as imbalances in residential real estate prices will eventually lead workers to relocate to more affordable cities.
The bottom line: Real estate prices eventually correct themselves. And unfortunately for homeowners, it often takes years before home prices start to rise again, especially after a big run up.
National City recently studied 66 major metro regions over the past 21 years that suffered through a 10 percent or greater decline in prices for at least a two-year period of time. It found that home prices, once they begin to correct, tend to decline 17 percent on average before markets heal themselves.
"And the average duration of these adjustments is 3.5 years," says DeKaser.
So what about families who recently bought into one of these "extremely overvalued" markets in hopes of turning a fast buck? "I extend them my deepest sympathies," says DeKaser.
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BANKRUPTCY FILINGS RISE AFTER REFORMS
Reuters
13 June 06
WASHINGTON - A new law to deter American consumers from seeking bankruptcy protection made filings plunge to a 20-year low in the first-quarter of 2006, but a rapid rise in new cases since then raises questions about whether the law is working as expected.
The 2005 bankruptcy reform law was pushed through Congress by banks and credit card companies that sought to prevent abuse by individuals trying to wipe their financial slates clean from runaway debt.
By making it more difficult to file for personal bankruptcy, the companies reasoned that consumers would be more likely to negotiate a repayment plan.
"I think the law so far is working as it was intended," said James Chessen, chief economist for the American Bankers Association. "Some of the abuses have been wrung out of the system."
But credit card companies and banks are keeping an eye on the recent increase in filings.
The law took effect Oct. 17, 2005, prompting a surge of 619,322 personal bankruptcy filings for that month as debt-laden consumers rushed to court.
New cases plunged to 13,758 in November, and have been steadily rising since, to 49,977 in March.
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Car buyers stymied by negative equity
Brian O'Connor
Detroit News
Jun. 13, 2006
Zero-interest deals and long-term car loans are boosting sales, but they are producing one troubling side effect: a growing number of drivers owe more on their vehicle than it's worth at trade-in time.
Last month, nearly 29 percent of U.S. car buyers found themselves "upside-down" on their loans, owing an average of $3,789 more than their trade-in value for the highest level since September 2004.
Loan officers and car dealers call it "negative equity," and there are plenty of negatives.
First, car buyers often pay more interest as they roll old upside-down loans into new car purchases.
Second, they will be saddled with higher payments that make it harder to save for their next car or keep up with their current automobile loans.
Third, those buyers are instantly turned upside down in their new purchases, creating a vicious cycle of excessive debt.
Upside-down loans also dampen auto sales, says Tony Jerome Jr., general manager of Tamaroff Dodge in Southfield, Mich.
"It hurts us all the time," Jerome said. "Typically, they can't do anything, which means we can't sell them a car. Sometimes you can, but some of the negative equity is ridiculous."
Longer car loans are the prime factor flipping car buyers upside down, experts say. Where the average car loan in 2003 lasted for 60 months, it has crept up to 64 months today, says Jesse Toprak, executive director of the Edmunds.com, a Web site for car shoppers. Part of the reason is the introduction of the 72-month loan.
"Seventy-two months is sort of becoming the norm," Toprak said. "Unless you put a substantial amount of money down, you will have negative equity."
Another trend turning car owners topsy-turvy is no-interest loans.
It sounds like a good deal: All of the payment goes toward reducing the principal instead of paying interest.
But buyers usually take the no-interest loans instead of a rebate that would cut the overall size of the loan.
"When they take that zero percent, they're doing that in lieu of $5,000 in rebates," Jerome said. "If they try to trade in early, they're automatically $5,000 the wrong way."
New cars depreciate rapidly in the first two years of life. The average car, says Edmunds.com, loses 25 percent of its value the moment it is driven off the dealer's lot.
Meanwhile, many loans have buyers paying mostly interest at the beginning and making little headway into reducing the principal amount owed on the car.
It could be worse. The increase in upside-down buyers comes at a time when used-car prices are rising, Toprak said. If they were dropping, car owners would be in even deeper.
Buyers frequently just don't do the math, focusing instead on getting the most car for the smallest monthly payment, says Alan Helfman, vice president of River Oaks Chrysler-Jeep in Houston. "A lot of people put them on five-year loans so they can make the payment affordable, and it depreciates faster than they can catch up."
But not every upside-down buyer has a choice, said Dorothy Guzek, a budget counselor with Greenpath Debt Solutions in Troy, Mich.
She described cash-strapped clients who need cars to get to work but can't afford much and end up financing undependable vehicles.
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Farmers, Celebrities Evicted From Urban Plot
By Hector Becerra, Times Staff Writer
4:11 PM PDT, June 13, 2006
The 14-year effort to establish an urban farm in the heart of South Los Angeles came to an end today when authorities evicted the farmers, as well as some celebrities who were supporting them by keeping vigil on the land.
The eviction occurred during a frenzied day both at the farm site and at City Hall as Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and other city leaders negotiated with the landowner through the morning, failing to reach a deal to save the farm even though the mayor said they had come up with the owner's $16-million asking price. "Today's events are unfortunate, disheartening and unnecessary," Villaraigosa said. "After years of disagreement over this property, we had all hoped for a better outcome."
Personnel using a huge fire ladder this afternoon removed actress Daryl Hannah and protest organizer John Quigley from the tree where they had vowed to remain as long as possible.
About 50 deputies arrived at the property about 5 a.m. and used bolt cutters to remove locks and gain access to the 14-acre property near 41st and Alameda streets. At least a dozen people had remained inside the farm, some chained under trees and others locking hands around 55-gallon drums filled with concrete. At least 40 people were arrested at the site.
Television broadcasts showed a large ladder extending from a firetruck reaching into the tree where Hannah, Quigley and two other people were located. Nearby, protesters were shown sitting on the street or sidewalk, many with their hands tied behind their backs as they were surrounded by police.
Several streets surrounding the farm were closed off by authorities. Trains on the Metro Blue Line, which runs adjacent to the property, were slowing down to about 15 mph in the vicinity of the garden, according to the Metropolitan Transportation Authority.
Hannah said she was sleeping in her tent when the Los Angeles County sheriff's deputies - who handle evictions in the county - arrived. Quigley alerted her to the raid, and she raced up the tree in about a minute.
"I felt an extreme sense of urgency. Not only did I have to climb up the tree, I had to pull up the rope behind me so they could not follow me," Hannah said in a cellphone interview with The Times from atop the tree.
Quigley criticized authorities for moving forward with the eviction without first telling the protesters. He said the protesters had a plan for how to peacefully resist an eviction when it came.
When the deputies arrived, Quigley said, some protesters walked out of the farm while others took their positions to block the eviction.
"It's unfortunate they had to come in such a heavy-handed manner," he said.
During an afternoon press conference, a visibly annoyed Villaraigosa said the city made a last-ditch effort to preserve the land, offering landowner Ralph Horowitz the price he had sought, raised through a variety of nonprofit groups.
But the mayor said Horowitz then said he thought the land was worth an additional $3 million and also said he was sick of the protesters, some of whom he said had made anti-Semitic slurs against him
The site has a contentious history. The city acquired the land from Horowitz through eminent domain in the 1980s for a planned trash incinerator, but the project was stopped by neighborhood opposition.
After the 1992 riots, the city leased the land to the Los Angeles Regional Food Bank, which began the community garden. In 2003, the city sold the land back to Horowitz for about $5 million.
But the farmers did not leave. In the last three years, and particularly in recent weeks, the farmers have pleaded to stay despite Horowitz's plans to sell the land for development.
A nonprofit group tried to buy the land and preserve the farm. But it announced last month that their fundraising effort was $10 million short of Horowitz's $16.3-million asking price.
Some in the community support him, arguing that the area would benefit from the jobs that would come if the land were developed.
Times staff writer Jesus Sanchez contributed to this report.
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Supreme Court skirts Holocaust dispute
By GINA HOLLAND
Associated Press
12 June 06
WASHINGTON - The Supreme Court turned back an appeal Monday from Austrian Jewish victims of the Nazi regime whose litigation had tied up payments from a $210 million settlement.
Justices refused to disturb a decision by the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which sided with the Bush administration in dismissing the class-action lawsuit against Austria.
That decision late last year cleared the way for payouts from a 2001 settlement fund. So far, more than 2,000 payments have been made to Austrian Jews whose property was confiscated during the Nazi era and World War II.
The fund was set up through negotiations with the Austrian government and businesses.
Lawyers who filed the class-action lawsuit told justices that the appeals court panel "swayed perhaps by an understandable desire to obtain some measure of compensation for Holocaust survivors during their lifetimes, has dismissed this case for the wrong reason."
The appeals court panel had split 2-1 in agreeing with the Bush administration that dismissing the case would improve U.S. relations with Austria, Israel and European nations. A dissenting judge said the ruling gives the government too much power to decide when lawsuits can be brought against other countries.
The lawsuit had been filed in 2000 by present and former nationals of Austria and their heirs and successors who suffered from Nazi persecution between 1938 and 1945.
Had the high court intervened and reinstated the case, Austria could have been forced to defend itself in court despite the settlement.
Gideon Taylor, executive vice president of the conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany, said more than 2,000 payments have been made and more are coming.
"It's important that payments are made quickly, because they're symbolic. As much as they're about the money, they're also about the history," Taylor said.
The case is Schindler v. Whiteman, 05-1296.
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Billions feared stolen from hurricane relief
June 15, 2006
WASHINGTON: The US Government has doled out as much as $US1.4 billion ($1.9 billion) in bogus assistance to hurricane victims, getting duped to pay for football season tickets, a holiday and even a divorce lawyer.
Congressional investigators have found that prisoners, a supposed victim who used a cemetery for a home address and a person who spent 70 days at a Hawaiian hotel all were able to wrongly get taxpayer help.
Agents from the General Accountability Office, the investigative arm of the US Congress, went undercover to expose the ease of receiving disaster expense cheques from the Federal Emergency Management Agency.
The inquiry concluded that as much as 16 per cent of the billions of dollars in FEMA help to individuals in the aftermath of hurricanes Katrina and Rita was unwarranted. The findings are detailed in testimony to be delivered at a hearing today of the House of Representatives Homeland Security subcommittee on investigations.
To dramatise the problem, the GAO gave politicians a copy of a $US2358 US Treasury cheque for rental assistance that an undercover agent got using a bogus address.
The money was paid even after FEMA learned from its inspector that the undercover applicant did not live at the address.
"This is an assault on the American taxpayer," said Michael McCaul, chairman of the subcommittee that will conduct the hearing. "Prosecutors from the federal level down should be looking at prosecuting these crimes and putting the criminals who committed them in jail for a long time."
FEMA spokesman Aaron Walker said the agency, already criticised for a poor response to Katrina, made its highest priority during a disaster "to get help quickly to those in desperate need of our assistance".
"Even as we put victims first, we take very seriously our responsibility to be outstanding stewards of taxpayer dollars, and we are careful to make sure that funds are distributed appropriately," he said.
FEMA said it had identified more than 1500 cases of potential fraud after hurricanes Katrina and Rita and had referred those cases to the Homeland Security inspector-general.
The agency said it had identified $US16.8 million in improperly awarded disaster relief money and had started efforts to collect the money. The GAO said it was 95 per cent confident that improper and potentially fraudulent payments were much higher - between $US600 million and $US1.4 billion.
The investigative agency said it found people lodged in hotels often were paid twice, because FEMA gave them individual rental assistance and paid hotels directly.
FEMA paid Californian hotels $US8000 to house one individual - the same person who received three rental assistance payments for both disasters. In another instance, FEMA paid an individual $US2358 in rental assistance, while at the same time paying about $US8000 for the same person to stay 70 nights in a Hawaiian hotel.
FEMA also could not establish that 750 debit cards worth $US1.5million even went to Katrina victims, the auditors said.
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PSYOPs
Al Qaeda IDs 20th 9/11 hijacker - Saudi militant named in statement - Never mind that the other 19 "hijackers" weren't hijackers...
CNN
13 June 06
Al Qaeda identified a Saudi militant, who was killed in 2004, as the 20th hijacker in the September 11, 2001, attack on the United States, according to a statement published Tuesday on an Islamist Web site.
"Turki bin Fheid al-Muteiri -- Fawaz al-Nashmi -- may God accept him as a martyr (was) the one chosen by Sheikh Osama bin Laden to be the martyrdom-seeker number 20 in the raid on September 11, 2001," the statement said.
Al-Muteiri was not able to join the other hijackers in time for those attacks, the date of which had been pushed forward, the group said without elaborating.
"The (Sept. 11) operation was brought forward for some circumstances that brother Mohamed Atta explained to the general leadership, through brother Ramzi Binalshibh, God free him," the statement added.
Binalshibh, suspected of coordinating the 9/11 attacks, was arrested in 2002 in Karachi, Pakistan. He was once a roommate with Atta, the leader of the September attacks and the hijacker of American Airlines Flight 11 which crashed into the World Trade Center's north tower.
In June 2004, Al-Muteiri was one of four militants killed by Saudi forces during a raid on a residential compound for foreign companies in the oil city of Khobar. The attack killed 22 civilians, including several Westerners.
In its statement, Al Qaeda said it would publish a video of that attack and described the militants as "martyrs." The group has used the Web site for posting statements in the past.
The group's Internet posting also absolved Zacarias Moussaoui of any role in the attacks, according to The Associated Press. "Brother Zacarias Moussaoui had nothing to do with the September 11 attacks, as Sheik Abi Abdullah (bin Laden) mentioned in his last tape," the group's statement said, referring to a May 24 audiotape, the AP reported.
Another Saudi suspected
U.S. investigators have said they believe Mohammed al-Qahtani, another Saudi, was tapped by al Qaeda to be the 20th hijacker.
According to Time magazine, Atta was waiting for al-Qahtani outside the airport in Orlando, Florida, in August 2001, when an immigration officer detained al-Qahtani and denied him entry to the United States.
Al-Qahtani was captured in Afghanistan four months later and is being held at the U.S. military base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
Nineteen men commandeered four commercial airliners on September 11, 2001, piloting two into the World Trade Towers and one into the Pentagon. A fourth plane, United Airlines Flight 93, crashed in a Pennsylvania field.
With the exception of that flight, each plane was hijacked by five men.
Some officials have speculated that al-Qahtani may have been the missing hijacker on Flight 93. Initially, Moussaoui was believed to have had that role, one which he had claimed.
Moussaoui pleaded guilty last year to terrorism conspiracy and is the only person convicted in the United States for having a role in the September 11, 2001 attacks.
Last month, Moussaoui recanted the guilty plea, calling it a "complete fabrication," and explained that "solitary confinement made me hostile toward everyone, and I began taking extreme positions to fight the system." (Full story)
But the judge in the case said Moussaoui's request to set aside his guilty plea was "too late" under federal rules and must be rejected.
He was spared the death penalty but sentenced to six life sentences, to run as two consecutive life terms, in the federal supermax prison at Florence, Colorado.
Nearly 3,000 people died in the attacks.
Comment: Within hours of the September 11, 2001 attack, the blame was being laid at the doorstep of Osama bin Laden's cave in the mountains of Afghanistan. We were told that 19 Arab men, mostly Saudi nationals, were the hijackers, and for some obscure reason, Saudi National Hijackers being the culprits justified the 2003 invasion and occupation of Iraq.
This troubling inconsistency was not sufficient, however, to dissuade a majority of American citizens from believing that Saddam Hussein was also somehow involved in the 9/11 attacks, despite the fact that there has never been any evidence of a link between Osama and Saddam, while there is a mountain of evidence that there was no love lost between the secular Hussein and the religious zealot bin Laden. Furthermore, there has never been any proof offered that any of the 19 men accused of the hijackings were even on the planes that day, not to mention the fact that some of them are actually still alive according to international news reports.
Not long after these names were published, at least seven of the "hijackers" loudly and publicly stated that they were still alive as reported by the BBC in September of 2001.
FBI Director Robert Mueller acknowledged on Thursday that the identity of several of the suicide hijackers is in doubt.
Despite this, the same 19 "hijackers" remain on the FBI website to this day!
There is also a problem with alleged chief hijacker Mohammed Atta. In September of 2002 Atta's father went public with the claim that his son was still alive:
"As I saw the picture of my son," he said, "I knew that he hadn't done it. My son called me the day after the attacks on September 12th at around midday. We spoke for two minutes about this and that."
In fact, former Attorney General John Ashcroft went on record, and stated in no uncertain terms, that the United States government has no idea who the hijackers were, which, of course, begs the question as to how they know who to retaliate against.
We confront here a strange and frightening problem: What can lead so many people to believe a story for which there is not only no evidence, but in fact, the preponderance of evidence points in a different direction? How can so many people be wrong?
The Bush administration provided no proof of the existence of the weapons of mass destruction that it claimed Saddam was preparing to use against the U.S., or might prepare to use against the U.S., or might think about creating in order to prepare to use against the U.S. We now know, to the contrary, that he had no weapons of mass destruction, nor did he have the means of creating them due to years of international sanctions that had already reduced Iraq to a state of military and economic impotency.
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U.S. specialists finish autopsy on al-Zarqawi
BY PATRICK QUINN
ASSOCIATED PRESS
BAGHDAD, Iraq-- Two U.S. military forensic specialists finished an autopsy Sunday on the remains of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, part of the investigation to reconstruct the last minutes of his life before an American warplane bombed his hideout, the U.S. Command said.
The examination comes after U.S. authorities altered their account of how the most-wanted terrorist in Iraq died, first saying he died outright in the airstrike but then saying he survived and died soon after.
"The autopsy is completed. However, we are not releasing results yet," Maj. William Willhoite said.
Gen. George Casey, the top U.S. commander in Iraq, told "Fox News Sunday" he had not seen the autopsy results.
Meanwhile, Iran denied it helped American forces track al-Zarqawi down and kill him. The Islamic republic welcomed his death, though, because it has close ties to the Shiite parties now dominating Iraq's government, which al-Zarqawi sought to topple.
"It is natural that we, like the Iraqi people, are happy from this occurrence," Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Hamid Reza Asefi said. "This doesn't mean that we cooperated with the U.S. in getting him. We had no exchange of intelligence with the U.S. at all (on this)."
Maj. Gen. William Caldwell, a spokesman for the U.S. military in Baghdad, said Saturday the decision to fly in forensic experts was made shortly after al-Zarqawi's death. The airstrike also killed five others, including al-Zarqawi's spiritual adviser, Sheik Abdul-Rahman.
"I think if we don't do a full autopsy then that might irresponsible on our part," Caldwell said. "I think we sort of owe that just for this reason: How did he actually die?"
He said the U.S. government thought it was important enough "that we grabbed two people in the last 48 hours and told them pack up and move to Iraq."
An Iraqi man raised questions about al-Zarqawi's death, telling AP Television News that he saw U.S. soldiers after the airstrike beating an injured man resembling the dead terrorist until blood flowed from his nose.
Casey said the claim was "baloney."
"He died while American soldiers were attempting to save his life," Casey told "Fox News Sunday." "So the idea that there were people beating him is ludicrous."
The Iraqi, identified only as Mohammed, said he lives near the house where al-Zarqawi was killed. He said residents put a bearded man in an ambulance before U.S. forces arrived.
"When the Americans arrived they took him out of the ambulance, they beat him on his stomach and wrapped his head with his dishdasha, then they stomped on his stomach and his chest until he died and blood came out of his nose," Mohammed said, without saying how he knew the man was dead.
A dishdasha is a traditional Arab robe.
A similar account in The Washington Post identified the man as Ahmed Mohammed.
No other witnesses have come forward to corroborate the account. U.S. officials have only said al-Zarqawi mumbled and tried to roll off a stretcher before dying.
In announcing al-Zarqawi's death, the U.S. military said Thursday he was killed outright when two 500-pound bombs were dropped on his hideout. On Friday, the military said al-Zarqawi survived the bombing, which ripped a crater in the date-palm forest surrounding the house just outside Baqouba, 35 miles northeast of Baghdad.
"It's not going to be 100 percent accurate all the time, but the first reports are going to be a little confused. There are going to be some conflicting stories," Caldwell said, adding that the military should have an accurate chronology ready by Monday.
He said Iraqi police reached the scene first and found the 39-year-old al-Zarqawi alive.
"The coalition forces arrived on the scene. The Iraqi police were there. They in fact saw a person on a stretcher. They moved to that person immediately. A medical person started immediately applying first aid to that person. Another person was trying to talk to that person, to try to identify who