United for Peace of Pierce County, WA - We nonviolently oppose the reliance on unilateral military actions rather than cooperative diplomacy.

This Monday and last Monday (Feb. 1 & 8) UFPPC's Monday evening book discussion group, Digging Deeper, is examining two recent books by philospher Slavoj Zizek, In Defense of Lost Causes (Verso, 2008) and First as Tragedy, Then as Farce (Verso, 2009).  --  The French translation of the latter was reviewed last week in Le Monde (Paris); Jean Birnbaum's mixed review is translated below.[1] ...

Below is a link to the full 78-minute Q & A that President Barack Obama conducted at the House Republican Conference in Baltimore.[1]  --  This included an exchange with Mike Pence (R-IN 6th) on the economic stimulus and tax cuts (about 13 minutes), an exchange with Paul Ryan (R-WI 1st) on earmarks and line-item vetoes to control spending (about 6 minutes), an exchange with Shelley Moore Capito (R-WV 2nd) on energy, climate change, "clean coal" (about 4 minutes), an exchange with Jason Chaffetz (R-UT 3rd) on the "trust deficit," an exchange with (about 6 minutes); an exchange with Marsha Blackburn (R-TN 7th) on ideas for health care -- and here Obama began to push back, accusing Republicans of "going after" the health care plan as if it were "some Bolshevik plot" and engaging in demonization (about 10 minutes), an exchange with Tom Price (R-GA 6th) and Mike Pence again on grandstanding in the health care debate (about 9 minutes), an exchange with Peter Roskam (R-IL 6th) on the "sour climate on Capitol Hill," in Obama's words (about 7 minutes), and an exchange with Jeb Hensarling (R-TX 5th) and Paul Ryan on deficits and the national debt, with Obama complaining that Hensarling's "the whole question was structured as a talking point for running a campaign" and included untrue claims (and the New York Times later backed him up) and that the Republicans in general engage in the politics of fear -- and here Obama pointed at pollster Frank Luntz sitting in the front row and said:  "It's all tactics!" (about 12 minutes).  --  About 10 minutes of footage of Obama shaking hands afterwards is included.  --  The exchange could scarcely be described as unbridled or in-depth, but even so, it was so unusual that Grover Norquist on the right and Katrina vanden Heuvel on the left were moved to join many others in calling in "An Open Letter to Our Fellow Americans" on "President Barack Obama and House Minority Leader John Boehner to hold these sessions regularly -- and allow them to be broadcast and webcast live and without commercial interruption, sponsorship, or intermediaries."[2] ...

With the fusion on Jan. 31, 2010, of Fort Lewis and McChord AFB into Joint Base Lewis-McChord (JBLM), Pierce and Thurston Counties in Washington State are now home to "the largest military installation on the West Coast," the News Tribune (Tacoma, WA) reported Sunday in a front-page article.[1]  --  The merger comes out of base consolidation recommendations made in 2005 by the federal Base Realignment and Closure Commission under which some twenty-six bases of different branches of the military on U.S. soil have been, for the first time in American history, collapsed into twelve "joint bases."  --  The Lewis-McChord fusion is the culmination of a four-year process, and it's not finished yet:  "A 5-inch-thick, 990-page memorandum of agreement between Lewis and McChord is still being implemented."  --  The fusion has some curious features.  --  For one thing, although it's a "joint base," it isn't joint.  --  "Will a road between Fort Lewis and McChord open soon?"  --  "No."  --  "[O]fficials are working on developing a four-lane road network," but what they are chiefly to be working on is getting the $30m project funded, and "there’s no date for construction."  --  The difficulty of the merger is also due, no doubt, to primal (primate?) territorial sensitivities:  reporter Kris Sherman speaks ominously of the arousal of "deep emotions, loyalties, and rivalries."  --  There is only nominally a single commander in charge at the "joint base":  Col. Thomas H. Brittain, a West Point graduate and infantry officer, "commands the new garrison"; Air Force Col. Kenny Weldon "retains his Air Force title and duties as mission support commander of the 62nd Airlift Wing" while also being "deputy commander" of the entire joint base.  --  (Readers of Catch-22, use your imaginations.)  --  Col. Kenny Weldon is a master of metaphor; he compared the new joint base to a merger of "Burger King and McDonald's" and said of the Army and the Air Force:  "We both produce defense for our country."  --  Say again?  --  How many orders of defense did you say you wanted?  --  Well, too bad, you're getting more.  --  The whole point of creating joint bases was to save money, but "Federal accounting watchdogs are increasingly doubtful" that these savings will be realized.  --  Adam Smith (D-WA 9th), who on Jan. 21 was elected chair of the House Subcommittee on Air and Land Forces, said that while the mergers should help all of the nation’s armed forces “move toward greater jointness,” they "underestimated in the joint-basing decision" the "uniqueness of the cultures of the Army and the Air Force.” ...

Below is a link to the complete unedited video of Jon Stewart of "The Daily Show" on Comedy Central interviewed by Bill O'Reilly on "The O'Reilly Factor."  --  In a conversation about forty-five minutes in length that took place on Feb. 3, 2010, Stewart and O'Reilly (with whom Stewart has a playfully complicitous if tense relationship) debate the Fox News agenda, the Obama administration, climate change, Iran, the trial of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, Sarah Palin, whether there is a "real America," and which of them is "out of touch with the folks." ...

The Supreme Court's appalling decision in Citizens United v. FCC has prompted a corporation to take "'democracy's next step':  It is running for Congress," a New York Times blog reported on Tuesday.[1] ...

On Saturday, as she headlined a national Tea Party Convention in Nashville, Tennessee, the New York Times ran a front-page article on Sarah Palin.[1]  --  Having "expanded her house and turned it into a compound” wired for media access to the world, Palin has become "invisible in Alaska but as big a celebrity as Princess Di everywhere else,” Mark Leibovich said.  --  Palin "represents a new breed of unelected public figures operating in an environment in which politics, news media, and celebrity are fused as never before."  --  Regardless of what she does, she has achieved a "status that has become an end in itself:  access to an electronic bully pulpit, a staff to guide her, an enormous income, and none of the bother or accountability of having to govern or campaign for office."  --  Once considered a moderate Republican, Palin is rapidly moving to the right, and "as she jumps more into the national political swamp, Ms. Palin is proving as divisive in Republican circles as she was within the fractious McCain campaign."  --  But "Ms. Palin’s ambitions and abilities remain as much a mystery now as when she first stormed the national consciousness 18 months ago.  They warn against any notion that she has any grand plan beside keeping faith that God would help her recognize 'the next open door' (a favorite Palin refrain)."  --  COMMENT: The New York Times may feign cluelessness about what Palin is up to, but it's clear that she is being positioned (and enriched) by wealthy élites to co-opt the anger emerging from the anti-establishment far right....

Last week the director of national intelligence told the House Intelligence Committee that the U.S government follows "a set of defined policy and legal procedures that are very carefully observed" when it kills U.S. citizens.  --  This remarkable statement elicited a list by David Swanson of "Top 10 Problems With America Assassinating Americans."[1] ...

Commenting on the death of three U.S. special forces soldiers in Afghanistan this week, an unidentified "former member of CENTCOM and U.S. Special Forces with extensive experience in the Afghanistan-Pakistan theater" told Jeremy Scahill that "the expansion of 'white' Special Operations Forces into Pakistan" is the sort of development that is "almost always a precursor to expanded military operations," the Nation said Thursday.[1]  --  The same source says that a "paradigm shift . . . has occurred" in U.S. operations:  "[W]here CIA was the darkest of the dark, now it is JSOC [Joint Special Operations Command].  Therefore, military forces have more leeway to do anything in support of future military objectives.  The CIA used to have the ultimate freedom -- now that freedom is in JSOC's hands, and the other elements of the military have been ordered to adapt."  --  "The former CENTCOM member said that what is unfolding in Pakistan is part of the Bush-era philosophy, continued by the Obama administration, of 'preparing the battlefield,'" Scahill said.  --  "He sketches out a pattern wherein 'black' operations are followed by 'white' operations and then conventional U.S. forces."  --  Scahill concluded:  "One thing is certain:  as the situation in Pakistan becomes more volatile and the U.S. military presence in the country expands, it will become increasingly difficult for the Obama administration to downplay or deny the reality that a U.S. war in Pakistan is already underway." ...

Ten days before he was scheduled to speak at The Evergreen State College in Olympia, WA, Howard Zinn died of a heart attack in Santa Monica, CA.  --  The speaking event was, of course, canceled, but on the day Zinn would have spoken, Sat., Feb. 6, a free "celebration of life memorial" will be held in Lecture Hall 1 in Zinn's name at 3:00 p.m.[1] ...

The ascension to power of the Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ), led by Yukio Hatoyama, has led Japan to reconsider a 2006 accord with the U.S. to relocate the controversial U.S. Marine Corps air station at Futenma.  --  On Friday, Asia Times Online reviewed the controversy.  --  Axel Berkofsky said that the U.S. is exerting pressure on this issue, elevating it to the status of a litmus test of U.S.-Japan relations.[1]  --  UFPPC's Joe Thompson said he "can't help seeing a link between Toyota's worsening recall problem[2] and the the defiant Japanese stance in Okinawa." ...

Patrick Buchanan speculated on Friday that "should war [with Iran] come, that would be the end of GOP dreams of adding three-dozen seats in the House and half a dozen in the Senate."[1] ...

On Thursday Noam Chomsky called the Supreme Court's decision in Citizens United v. FCC "a dark day in the history of U.S. democracy, and its decline."[1]  --  "It is well-known that [through] corporate contributions, sometimes packaged in complex ways," "corporate managers can in effect buy elections directly, bypassing more complex indirect means. . . . The court has just handed much more power to the small sector of the population that dominates the economy."  --  Chomsky also commented at length on Scott Brown's victory in the Massachusetts senatorial election....

A columnist writing for the Financial Times of London said Friday that as the Greek debt crisis unfolds on the world stage in the coming weeks, "it will be fascinating to watch what happens to . . . hedge funds.  For there is a fascinating transatlantic divide at work in the investment world.  In the eyes of many Wall Street players it now seems entirely logical, if not inevitable, that Greece will eventually default on its bonds or exit the euro, given the underlying fiscal maths."[1]  --  But "[t]o many European bankers and politicians . . . this story is . . . about . . . politics . . . [D]oughty figures at the heart of Europe are increasingly likening this to an 'attack' on the euro, on a par with, say, the attack on sterling launched by George Soros two decades ago," wrote columnist Gillian Tett.  --  "The potential for some form of political backlash is running high. . . . Perhaps Greece will manage to get its fiscal affairs in order fast enough . . . But some powerful investors are clearly now betting against that.  Stand by for more drama, and not just in Greece." ...

The three American soldiers who died in a Taliban suicide attack on Wednesday were "among at least 60 to 100 members of a Special Operations team that trains Pakistan’s paramilitary Frontier Corps in counterinsurgency techniques, including intelligence gathering and development assistance," assigned to a Special Operations command in Pakistan but not commandos from the elite Delta Force or Special Forces, the New York Times reported Thursday in its lead story.[1]  --  "The United States has about 200 military service members in Pakistan," Jane Perlez said.  --  The incident "lifted the veil on United States military assistance to Pakistan that the authorities here would like to keep quiet and the Americans, as the donors, chafe at not receiving credit for."  --  "[T]hese were the first [American soldiers] killed as part of the Special Operations training, which has been under way for 18 months."  --  A regional expert said they "were probably made targets as a result of the drone strikes" conducted by the CIA in Pakistan that have increased markedly in recent weeks and months.  --  When they died, "the American soldiers were dressed in traditional Pakistani garb of baggy trousers and long tunic, known as shalwar kameez," they "also wore local caps that helped cover their hair," and they were traveling in a protective cordon, raising the question of whether their identity had been betrayed from within the Frontier Corps.  --  Médecins Sans Frontières reported that its doctors helped treat some 126 people, including children, wounded by the blast, which took place outside a school.[2]  --  On Thursday, Pakistan's International News cited also "the possible death of Hakimullah Mehsud" as a cause of the attack, called attention to the fact that Americans were first reported to be "foreign journalists," and asked "why 'U.S. army trainers' were present at the inaugural ceremony of a girls' school that had apparently been built by our own armed forces after the previous school had been demolished.  It may also be wondered how the terrorists were able to place their IED -- reportedly of 70kg, a very large device -- in an area that had reportedly been 'cleared' and moreover plant it on such a high-profile target that should have been guarded as closely as possible given that 'foreign visitors' were on their way.  Nobody noticed a 70kg bomb being buried in the road?"[3]  --  On Thursday the Christian Science Monitor seemed eater to report that "a backlash [against the revelation of U.S. forces working inside Paksitan] has failed to materialize."[4]  --  Ahmed said that "Some analysts had predicted that the bombing . . . would be blamed on the presence of the U.S. troops . . . But so far that hasn’t happened."  --  COMMENT: This is odd, as the International News piece just cited does blame the presence of the U.S. troops for the bombing.  --  And in any case, how is it possible to judge hours after such an event whether it has produced a backlash? ...

Corporations are maneuvering to gain control of city water systems, using the financial pressures of the recession as leverage.  --  Jon Keesecker of Food & Water Watch said last week in an article posted on AlterNet that so far Akron and Milwaukee have managed to stymie their efforts, but that an important new battle in Chicago may be shaping up in 2010.[1]  -- BACKGROUND: For background on this subject, see here for a synopsis of Blue Gold: The Fight to Stop the Corporate Theft of the World's Water by Maude Barlow and Tony Clarke....

This news is not so new, it turns out.  --  On Monday a blog on the website of Discover magazine reported on an extraordinary case of "[i]mpregnation via the proximal gastrointestinal tract in a patient with an aplastic distal vagina."[1]  --  NOTE: NCBI stands for National Center of Biotechnology Information, and ROFL stands for Rolling On the Floor Laughing.  --  The Discover article shows the link to the article, but illegibly.  --  The article was originally published in the September 1988 issue of the British Journal of Obstetric Gynaecology, Vol. 95, No. 9, where it appears on pages 933-94.  --  Its author is D.A.A. Verkuyl (who is indeed the author of many other medical articles available online) and the case was reported from Mafeteng Districts Hospital in Losotho.  --  One reader on another site wrote that "I remember reading about this case many years ago in a newspaper article pasted into one of my parents scrapbooks.  Even back then I wondered if it was a hoax perpetrated upon a gullible South African newspaper."  --  However, a PDF file purporting to be of the original article has been posted online here.  --  The complete report includes details that cast the story in a less rosy light and that were omitted from Discover's excerpt.  --  It appears that the events described occurred in the mid-1980s....

What is believed to be the first interview in twenty years to be given by Bill Watterson, the creator of "Calvin and Hobbes," was published by John Campanelli of the Cleveland Plain Dealer on Monday.[1] ...

"The U.S.'s top intelligence officials said Tuesday that an attempted al Qaeda attack on the U.S. in the next three to six months was 'certain,'" the Wall Street Journal reported Wednesday.[1]  --  However, what Director of National Intelligence Dennis Blair really told the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence was that "The priority [of an attack by al Qaeda during that time frame] is certain, I would say," the New York Times reported.[2]  --  COMMENT: U.S. officials and media seem intent in terrorizing the U.S. population in comments and reports like these.  --  A priority is "a right to precedence over others in obtaining, buying, or doing something," and in its nature it cannot be said to be "certain"  three to six months in advance of a date.  --  Perhaps Blair meant that "the present aim is certain," based on his intelligence sources.  --  But that is still very different from the idea expressed in the Wall Street Journal's headline:  "Officials Warn Al Qaeda 'Certain' to Try Attack Soon."  --  NewsMax went one better, with a headline reading "Terrorist Attempt 'Certain' in Months" and a lead sentence saying that "The five senior leaders of the U.S. intelligence community told a Senate panel Tuesday they are "certain" that terrorists will attempt another attack on the United States in the next three to six months."[3]  --  But at least NewsMax gave Blair's entire, rather incoherent, sentence:  "An attempted attack, the priority is certain, I would say."  --  The Wall Street Journal stripped away everything but the word "certain."  --  BACKGROUND: See here for a synopsis of John Mueller's Overblown: How Politicians and the Terrorism Industry Inflate National Security Threats and Why We Believe Them (Free Press, 2006).  --  Mueller is a professor of political science (and also an unrivaled expert on the films of Fred Astaire) who shows how "our reaction against terrorism has caused more harm than the threat warrants" and that most Americans have "a false sense of insecurity." ...

On Monday Chris Hedges launched an attack on the "creed of objectivity and balance" that reigns in mainstream American journalism.[1]  --  Hedges has come to see in this creed "a convenient and profitable vehicle to avoid confronting unpleasant truths or angering a power structure on which news organizations depend for access and profits."  --  What has traditionally been considered a source of strength for American journalism is really its "disease."  --  COMMENT: It's too bad that for some reason Hedges speaks here only in generalities and does not draw much on his own experience a former journalist....