As it begins to appear that the death toll in southeastern Louisiana and southern Mississippi from Hurricane Katrina may surpass that of 9/11, questions are once again being raised regarding the Bush administration’s distorted views as to what constitutes national security.
Article 25: “The state shall guarantee the reforming of the Iraqi economy according to modern economic bases, in a way that ensures complete investment of its resources, diversifying its sources and encouraging and developing the private sector.”
We believe that our plan to bring the troops home and internationalize the peace offers the best chance of ending the war and helping to repay our huge debt to the people of Iraq and to our returning soldiers, themselves made victims of this war. But we also understand that whatever the plan, it must be based on knowledge.
Knowledge of the staggering costs in lives, in money, in human rights, and so much more of this illegal war. Knowledge that this war has made all of us—the U.S., Iraqis, and the rest of the world—less safe. It is time to share the information, to open the debate and to work towards the common ground that will be required to bring the troops home and internationalize the peace.
Between Monday, September 17 and Thursday, September 20, FPIF circulated the following sign-on letter via the Internet. Over 1,800 people, mainly academics and foreign policy experts signed the letter–a remarkable response over a short period of time. We sent out a press release Thursday afternoon, just prior to President Bush’s speech to Congress and the country, and distributed the statement to all congressional members. Those who signed included professors from 83 different colleges and universities, students from 40 academic institutions, and people from 18 different countries, ranging from Cameroon to Pakistan to Ukraine. A number of the signers also sent notes and comments.
Key Points
The song speaks of “those lazy, hazy, crazy days of summer.”
The prevailing sentiment, less “laid back,” refers to “the dog days of summer” from which the rich and well-connected have historically sought relief by getting out of town. Indeed, one can easily picture Caesar Augustus—in whose honor the Roman Senate renamed and lengthened the sixth month in the Julian calendar—abandoning Rome in the same way Congress and the president flee Washington.
The devastating bombings which struck the Egyptian city of Sharm al-Sheik on July 24 underscore both the extent of the threat from Islamist terrorists and the failure of the United States and its allies to effectively deal with it.
Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s election victory in late June was a surprise
for pundits both inside and outside Iran. Not only did the proverbial favorite
Akbar Hashemi-Rafsanjani not win, but the turnout was around 60% in both rounds,
so the much-debated election boycott did not reduce participation to historic
lows. Ahmadinejad, Tehran’s mayor, with the help of the security-military
apparatus, mobilized his conservative base in the first round of balloting
to force an unprecedented second-round runoff against Hashemi-Rafsanjani. The
mayor then reached out to the political independent masses to win over 60%
of the vote. The unpredictability and close nature of the result (as well as
of Mohammad Khatami’s victory in 1997) are especially significant in
the Middle East, where elections, when they do occur, are often formalities.1
Within a day of arriving at the United Nations John Bolton, the former lobbyist for Taiwan and advocate for one permanent seat on the Security Council, the United States, had cut a deal with the Chinese representative. China wants to stop an additional permanent Security Council seat for Japan. The United States had promised Japan its support in return for its loyalty over Iraq, but hated Germany more than it loves Japan. So the two agreed to thwart the attempt by the G-4 (Brazil, Germany, India, and Japan), to secure permanent seats during the current reform proposals.
The election of the hard-line Teheran mayor, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, over
former President Ayatollah Hashemi Rafsanjani as the new head of Iran is
undeniably a setback for those hoping to advance greater social and political
freedom in that country. It should not necessarily be seen as a turn to the
right by the Iranian electorate, however. The 70-year old Rafsanjani—a cleric
and penultimate wheeler-dealer from the political establishment—was portrayed
as the more moderate conservative. The fact that he had become a millionaire
while in government was apparently seen as less important than his modest reform
agenda. By contrast, the young Teheran mayor focused on the plight of the poor
and cleaning up corruption.