Dear Kalila,
It has been five years since you, as a 12-year old 7th grader, joined your classmates in a walk-out at your school in protest of the impending invasion of Iraq.
Iraq
Progressives for Success in Iraq
“Even though I oppose the planned invasion of Iraq, I want my new country to succeed in my old country.” This is what I told the person in the State Department in charge helping formulate pre- and post-invasion plans in 2002 before the invasion. Though I had spoken to this person several times, this was the last conversation I had with him. Clearly, my sentiments against the invasion disqualified me from offering solutions to rebuild Iraq.
Hear This Hammer Ring
Don’t you hear this hammer ring?
I’m gonna split this rock
And split it wide!
When I split this rock,
Stand by my side.
Time’s Up: Bring The Guard Home
Guess what, Mr. President? Your authority to keep state National Guard troops in Iraq has expired. So says a new bill introduced this week to the Vermont Legislature by Rep. Michael Fisher and Sen. Peter Shumlin. It is supported by 30 of their colleagues.
Winter Soldier Hearings
Get ready for the horrible, honest reality of the American occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan like you haven’t heard it before. For four days, from March 13 through March 16, hundreds of U.S. veterans of the two wars will descend on Washington and testify in the “Winter Soldier” hearings about what they really did while they were serving their country in Iraq. And their experiences aren’t pretty.
The Quagmire in Iraq
Editor’s note: Since 2004, IPS has been tracking the costs of the Iraq War in human and financial costs to the United States, Iraq, and the rest of the world. This latest fact sheet is designed to help bring a full understanding of the devastation of the war. The PDF version of this article http://www.fpif.org/pdf/reports/0803iraqcow.pdf provides the following information in an easy to read format designed for duplication and popular education.
Sublime
Sublime, if the gardens in misfortune are taken, they shall be returned
The Enduring Trap in Iraq
A showdown is brewing between Republicans and Democrats over the Iraq War once again. The Bush administration is stirring the pot once again by negotiating an agreement with the “sovereign” Iraqi government to place U.S. military troops and bases permanently on Iraqi soil despite strong objections from many Democrats.
The Million Year War
Think of the top officials of the Bush administration as magicians when it comes to Iraq. Their top hats and tails may be worn and their act fraying, but it doesn’t seem to matter. Their latest “abracadabra,” the president’s “surge strategy” of 2007, has still worked like a charm. They waved their magic wands, paid off and armed a bunch of former Sunni insurgents and al-Qaeda terrorists (about 80,000 “concerned citizens,” as the president likes to call them), and magically lowered “violence” in Iraq. Even more miraculously, they made a country that they had already turned into a cesspool and a slagheap — its capital now has a “lake” of sewage so large that it can be viewed "as a big black spot on Google Earth" — almost entirely disappear from view in the United States.
Teachers and the War
Many Americans would be surprised to learn that among the most important constituencies backing the Bush administration’s disastrous agenda in the Middle East and promoting anti-Arab policies has been the one million-strong American Federation of Teachers (AFT). The AFT leadership has gone so far as to make a series of public statements and push through resolutions with demonstrably inaccurate assertions in its defense of administration policy. A key constituent union of the AFL-CIO, the AFT – which also represents a significant number of health care and other public service workers – gives over $5 million in contributions to congressional candidates each election cycle.
In January 2003, as anti-war activists were scrambling to prevent a U.S. invasion of Iraq war by challenging the Bush administration’s claims about Iraq having reconstituted its chemical and biological weapons capability, offensive delivery system, and nuclear weapons program, the AFT’s executive council decided to weigh in on the debate.