Scholars, advocates, and activists seeking to make the U.S. a more responsible global partner.
Commentaries
Tourist Photograph from Iraq

Tourist Photograph from Iraq

by , | Apr 5, 2007

This is how I wanted to see my self…
This is what I thought we would do in Iraq
That’s what I always thought we were about…
Barefoot, little kids… I remember that one
there… he couldn’t have been five years old
Just a damn little kid, you know?
Little, black, cracked, bare… Dust covered
feet.
Tiny little kid… Tough as hell. His brother
too.
The sand must’ve been 150 degrees, fuckin’
hotter than that! Everything was so damn
hot; the heat
Would come up through my boots like standing on a stove.
The kid had baby toes that were like coarse
callused black elephant leather. That kid
had the craziest rough ass skin
I gave the kid an M.R.E. and some other
food. A bunch of crap I was sick of eating…
Kids would stand on the roads every damn day asking for that crap.
There was nothing else… bleak dead dust
days, powdered sand-lands of nothing for
miles and miles.
There was nothing but an unattainable horizon
and a damn long ass road.
But the fucking little ass kids would come
out of nowhere…
Nothing around! Not a damn thing! But these
damn kids would just appear.
I thought we were going over to help these
damn kids that would come out of nothing and go back into it. Feed the hungry, help the
oppressed, give relief from day in day out
pain.
That is what I wanted to think I was there
for.
Barefoot, all day long
All they wanted was food from us…
Like damn kids on the 4th of July… we were a spectacle, a parade of crazy floats passing
out food.
But then we hit one you know… That was it!
It all changed
We were told not to stop… Don’t stop not in
the towns. Keep the truck moving and don’t
stop. Forget the kids!
Now, now I can’t forget the kids. Damn kid.
I’m not even there. Hundred thousand miles
away and its still in my fucking head.
Ah fuck ’em they were just a part of the damn landscape anyway.

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Rep. DeFazio: Don’t Attack Iran

by , | Apr 2, 2007

Rep. Peter DeFazio (D-OR) has been in Congress since 1986. In April 2006, he wrote a letter to President Bush to remind him that he must seek authorization from Congress before launching any preemptive attacks against Iran. He also introduced Resolution 391 to the same effect as well as a similar amendment to this year’s Defense Authorization Act (which was voted down). One year later, rumors of an upcoming U.S. military assault on Iran still abound, the latest from Russian intelligence that predicts a Good Friday attack. Here Rep. DeFazio talks of the congressional strategy to prevent a war with Iran.

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Rep. Kucinich: Stop Funding the War

by , | Mar 29, 2007

Dennis Kucinich is a Democratic congressman from Ohio. He was one of only 14 Democrats to oppose the current Iraq supplemental bill, which sets a deadline for a withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq. The bill, the Iraq Accountability Act, did not, however, cut funding for the war. Here he speaks with Michael Shank about the reasons for his vote, his fears of an attack on Iran, his concerns about the future of the Democratic Party, and his faith that new American leadership will craft a different partnership with the world community.

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Left-Right Alliance Against War?

by , | Mar 28, 2007

Americans opposed to war are a distinct minority. If the Iraq War were going well, most Americans would support it. Yet the Iraq venture has been such a disaster for America that peace groups have a chance to expose the pro-war interests in the nation and advance an alternative foreign policy based on law and international cooperation. Incredible war costs, a growing police state at home, loss of allies, and tremendous anti-Americanism abroad have given most Americans pause about our foreign policies.

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Another Casualty: Coverage of the Iraq War

by | Mar 23, 2007

Iraq is the most dangerous place in the world for journalists. Along with names and dates, the Brussels Tribunal has listed the circumstances under which Iraqi media personnel have been killed since the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq in March 2003. This extremely credible report cites 195 as dead. If non-Iraqi media representatives are included, the figure goes beyond 200. Both figures are well in excess of the media fatalities suffered in Vietnam or during World War II.

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A Cluster Bomb Treaty: Again, It’s the U.S. v. the World

by , , | Mar 23, 2007

On March 6, 2007, the U.S. Department of State released its Country Reports on Human Rights Practices for 2006. This annual report to Congress details the human rights practices of foreign governments, from restrictions on free press in Iran, to extrajudicial killings in Pakistan, to spiraling violence in the Darfur region of Sudan. The Country Reports do not, however, “purport to assess any human rights implications of actions by the United States Government or its representatives.” If they did, the reports would expose the grave consequences of U.S. policies in a world where the use and sale of inaccurate and unreliable weapons tends to trump humanitarian concerns.

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An Open Letter to My Fellow Veterans

by , | Mar 21, 2007

As we enter our fifth year of occupation, and as Iraq continues to degenerate into sectarian violence and civil war, I think it important that we talk, vet to vet. Real talk, talk from the heart, as we did back in Iraq, in the Nam, in Korea, on the battlefields of Europe and the Pacific. Let us put aside, for a moment, all the bunk we have been fed over the years by those who were not there. You know who I mean. The politicians and war strategists who cavalierly make war, decide tactics, and send us off to fight, bleed, and die for a cause that is uncertain or non-existent. Self-proclaimed "patriots" who, while remaining safe at home, try to convince us that the threat to our way of life – – to America and to freedom – – is real and grave and that the disruption of our lives and the sacrifices we make, and that our brothers and sisters make, are necessary and glorious.

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