Podcast Interview with Inspector General for TARP: Treasury Department Is Not Being Transparent

ABC News Political Punch Blog, July 22, 2009

ABC News' Jake Tapper and Huma Khan report:

On this week’s ABC News Shuffle podcast, we spoke to Neil Barofsky, Special Inspector General for the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP), who just this week released a report on the whopping potential federal obligation of the bailout and other programs to jumpstart the economy.

You can download the podcast on iTunes or listen to it HERE.

Barofsky told us that the Treasury Department “is not being transparent with respect to the TARP,” the $700 billion in funds (and more) the government is using as loans and bailouts to help stabilize the financial markets. “They’ve failed to adopt some very basic recommendations we’ve had toward transparency,” he said.

Called the “SIGTARP,” Barofsky appeared before Congress this week and told them that the government’s commitment to fix the financial system could potentially reach $23.7 trillion, and criticized the Treasury Department for calling his team’s estimate “inflated.”

“I think that the Treasury Department ought to read the report before they make comments, at least the spokesperson’s office,” Barofsky said. “Our methodology is laid out in black and white in the report. ... As far as the numbers being inflated, where do you think we got the numbers from? We got it from the Treasury Department, we got it from the Federal Reserve. ... If these numbers are inflated, it’s because they inflated them when they put them out in the public, not because of us.”

The inspector general defended the numbers outlined in his report, saying that all his team has done is to “gather the 50 programs, put them in one place, and told the American people what the government has said about the maximum of each of these programs.”

“Perhaps their criticism is that we dare to do math,” he said. He added that his team tried to convince the Treasury that they were wrong, and that recipients should be required to report on how they use the federal funds, and those should be shown to the American people so that they know it’s “not being thrown into a black hole.”

The government currently has about 50 different programs to fix the economy. Those programs include bailing out banks and automakers, and improving the housing market. Barofsky said the way his team came up with that figure is by looking at three different figures for each program.

“One, how much money is currently outstanding under the program. Two, what the high water mark has been since the inception of the bailout and then three, what is the total amount the federal government has said they’re willing to commit to each program. And at the end, we add them all up,” he explained. “That’s where the 23.7 trillion number comes from. It’s what the federal government has said would be the maximum number for each of the approximately 50 programs.”

Barofsky said “this recent attack on my report is really, in many ways, an attack on basic transparency -- of not wanting the American people in a certain way to see exactly what’s going on in their government as included in our report.” He said the Treasury Department “with respect to this program, they’ve not met their claims that this is going to be ‘unprecedented transparency,’” as President Obama suggested there would be.

We also spoke to Mr. Barofsky about whether taxpayers were misguided, on his independence being challenged by the Treasury and the personal toll of his job.

You can download the podcast on iTunes or listen to it HERE.

The podcast was produced by Huma Khan, with special thanks to Matt Jaffe.

-- Jake Tapper and Huma Khan

Independent’s Day

Obama doesn't want to look back, but Attorney General Eric Holder may probe Bush-era torture anyway.
Daniel Klaidman, Newsweek.com, July 11, 2009

It's the morning after Independence Day, and Eric Holder Jr. is feeling the weight of history. The night before, he'd stood on the roof of the White House alongside the president of the United States, leaning over a railing to watch fireworks burst over the Mall, the monuments to Lincoln and Washington aglow at either end. "I was so struck by the fact that for the first time in history an African-American was presiding over this celebration of what our nation is all about," he says. Now, sitting at his kitchen table in jeans and a gray polo shirt, as his 11-year-old son, Buddy, dashes in and out of the room, Holder is reflecting on his own role. He doesn't dwell on the fact that he's the country's first black attorney general. He is focused instead on the tension that the best of his predecessors have confronted: how does one faithfully serve both the law and the president?

Alone among cabinet officers, attorneys general are partisan appointees expected to rise above partisanship. All struggle to find a happy medium between loyalty and independence. Few succeed. At one extreme looms Alberto Gonzales, who allowed the Justice Department to be run like Tammany Hall. At the other is Janet Reno, whose righteousness and folksy eccentricities marginalized her within the Clinton administration. Lean too far one way and you corrupt the office, too far the other way and you render yourself impotent. Mindful of history, Holder is trying to get the balance right. "You have the responsibility of enforcing the nation's laws, and you have to be seen as neutral, detached, and nonpartisan in that effort," Holder says. "But the reality of being A.G. is that I'm also part of the president's team. I want the president to succeed; I campaigned for him. I share his world view and values."

These are not just the philosophical musings of a new attorney general. Holder, 58, may be on the verge of asserting his independence in a profound way. Four knowledgeable sources tell NEWSWEEK that he is now leaning toward appointing a prosecutor to investigate the Bush administration's brutal interrogation practices, something the president has been reluctant to do. While no final decision has been made, an announcement could come in a matter of weeks, say these sources, who decline to be identified discussing a sensitive law-enforcement matter. Such a decision would roil the country, would likely plunge Washington into a new round of partisan warfare, and could even imperil Obama's domestic priorities, including health care and energy reform. Holder knows all this, and he has been wrestling with the question for months. "I hope that whatever decision I make would not have a negative impact on the president's agenda," he says. "But that can't be a part of my decision."

Holder is not a natural renegade. His first instinct is to shy away from confrontation, to search for common ground. If he disagrees with you, he's likely to compliment you first before staking out an opposing position. "Now, you see, that's interesting," he'll begin, gently. As a trial judge in Washington, D.C., in the late 1980s and early '90s, he was known as a tough sentencer ("Hold-'em Holder"). But he even managed to win over convicts he was putting behind bars. "As a judge, he had a natural grace," recalls Reid Weingarten, a former Justice Department colleague and a close friend. "He was so sensitive when he sent someone off to prison, the guy would thank him." Holder acknowledges that he struggles against a tendency to please, that he's had to learn to be more assertive over the years. "The thing I have to watch out for is the desire to be a team player," he says, well aware that he's on the verge of becoming something else entirely.

When Holder and his wife, Sharon Malone, glide into a dinner party they change the atmosphere. In a town famous for its drabness, they're an attractive, poised, and uncommonly elegant pair—not unlike the new first couple. But they're also a study in contrasts. Holder is disarmingly grounded, with none of the false humility that usually signals vanity in a Washington player. He plunges into conversation with a smile, utterly comfortable in his skin. His wife, at first, is more guarded. She grew up in the Deep South under Jim Crow—her sister, Vivian Malone Jones, integrated the University of Alabama—and has a fierce sense of right and wrong. At a recent dinner in a leafy corner of Bethesda, Malone drew a direct line from the sins of America's racial past to the abuses of the Guantánamo Bay detention center. Both are examples of "what we have not done in the face of injustice," she said at one point, her Southern accent becoming more discernible as her voice rose with indignation. At the same party, Holder praised the Bush administration for setting up an "effective antiterror infrastructure."

Malone traces many of their differences to their divergent upbringings. "His parents are from the West Indies..he experienced a kinder, gentler version of the black experience," she says. Holder grew up in East Elmhurst, Queens, a lower-middle-class neighborhood in the shadow of New York's La Guardia Airport. The neighborhood has long been a steppingstone for immigrants, but also attracted blacks moving north during the Great Migration. When Holder was growing up in the 1950s, there were fewer houses—mostly semi-detached clapboard and brick homes, like the one his family owned on the corner of 101st Street and 24th Avenue—and more trees. Today the neighborhood is dominated by Mexican, Dominican and South Asian families, with a diminishing number of West Indians and African-Americans.

As we walk up 24th on a recent Saturday, Holder describes for me a happy and largely drama-free childhood. The family was comfortable enough. His father, Eric Sr., was in real estate and owned a few small buildings in Harlem. His mother, Miriam, stayed at home and doted on her two sons. Little Ricky, as he was known, was bright, athletic, and good-natured. As we walk past the baseball diamond where Holder played center field, he recalls how he used to occasionally catch glimpses of Willie Mays leaving or entering his mansion on nearby Ditmas Boulevard. Arriving at the basketball courts of PS 127, Holder bumps into a couple of old schoolyard buddies, greets them with a soul handshake and falls into an easy banter, reminiscing about "back in the day" when they dominated the hardcourt. "Ancient history," says Jeff Aubry, now a state assemblyman. "When gods walked the earth," responds Holder, who dunked for the first time on these courts at age 16.

Holder doesn't dispute the idea that his happy upbringing has led to a generally sunny view of the world. "I grew up in a stable neighborhood in a stable, two-parent family, and I never really saw the reality of racism or felt the insecurity that comes with it," he says. "That edge that Sharon's got—I don't have it. She's more suspicious of people. I am more trusting." There's a pause, and then, with a weary chuckle, one signaling gravity rather than levity, Holder says, "Lesson learned." And then adds, under his breath: "Marc Rich."

The name of the fugitive financier pardoned—with Holder's blessing—at the tail end of the Clinton administration still gnaws at him. It isn't hard to see why. As a Justice Department lawyer, Holder made a name for himself prosecuting corrupt politicians and judges. He began his career in 1976, straight out of Columbia Law School, in the Justice Department's Public Integrity Section, where prosecutors are imbued with a sense of rectitude and learn to fend off political interference. And though Holder has bluntly acknowledged that he "blew it," the Rich decision haunts him. Given his professional roots, he says, "the notion that you would take actions based on political considerations runs counter to everything in my DNA." Aides say that his recent confirmation hearings, which aired the details of the Rich pardon, were in a way liberating; he aspires to no higher office and is now free to be his own man. But his wife says that part of what drives him today is a continuing hunger for redemption.

When I ask Malone the inevitable questions about Rich, she looks pained. "It was awful; it was a terrible time," she says. But she also casts the episode as a lesson about character, arguing that her husband's trusting nature was exploited by Rich's conniving lawyers. "Eric sees himself as the nice guy. In a lot of ways that's a good thing. He's always saying, 'You get more out of people with kindness than meanness.' But when he leaves the 'nice guy' behind, that's when he's strongest."

Any White House tests an attorney general's strength. But one run by Rahm Emanuel requires a particular brand of fortitude. A legendary enforcer of presidential will, Emanuel relentlessly tries to anticipate political threats that could harm his boss. He hates surprises. That makes the Justice Department, with its independent mandate, an inherently nervous-making place for Emanuel. During the first Clinton administration, he was famous for blitzing Justice officials with phone calls, obsessively trying to gather intelligence, plant policy ideas, and generally keep tabs on the department.

One of his main interlocutors back then was Holder. With Reno marginalized by the Clintonites, Holder, then serving as deputy attorney general, became the White House's main channel to Justice. A mutual respect developed between the two men, and an affection endures to this day. (Malone, a well-regarded ob-gyn, delivered one of Emanuel's kids.) "Rahm's style is often misunderstood," says Holder. "He brings a rigor and a discipline that is a net plus to this administration." For his part, Emanuel calls Holder a "strong, independent attorney general." But Emanuel's agitated presence hangs over the building—"the wrath of Rahm," one Justice lawyer calls it—and he is clearly on the minds of Holder and his aides as they weigh whether to launch a probe into the Bush administration's interrogation policies.

Holder began to review those policies in April. As he pored over reports and listened to briefings, he became increasingly troubled. There were startling indications that some interrogators had gone far beyond what had been authorized in the legal opinions issued by the Justice Department, which were themselves controversial. He told one intimate that what he saw "turned my stomach."

It was soon clear to Holder that he might have to launch an investigation to determine whether crimes were committed under the Bush administration and prosecutions warranted. The obstacles were obvious. For a new administration to reach back and investigate its predecessor is rare, if not unprecedented. After having been deeply involved in the decision to authorize Ken Starr to investigate Bill Clinton's affair with Monica Lewinsky, Holder well knew how politicized things could get. He worried about the impact on the CIA, whose operatives would be at the center of any probe. And he could clearly read the signals coming out of the White House. President Obama had already deflected the left wing of his party and human-rights organizations by saying, "We should be looking forward and not backwards" when it came to Bush-era abuses.

Still, Holder couldn't shake what he had learned in reports about the treatment of prisoners at the CIA's "black sites." If the public knew the details, he and his aides figured, there would be a groundswell of support for an independent probe. He raised with his staff the possibility of appointing a prosecutor. According to three sources familiar with the process, they discussed several potential choices and the criteria for such a sensitive investigation. Holder was looking for someone with "gravitas and grit," according to one of these sources, all of whom declined to be named. At one point, an aide joked that Holder might need to clone Patrick Fitzgerald, the hard-charging, independent-minded U.S. attorney who had prosecuted Scooter Libby in the Plamegate affair. In the end, Holder asked for a list of 10 candidates, five from within the Justice Department and five from outside.

On April 15 the attorney general traveled to West Point, where he had been invited to give a speech dedicating the military academy's new Center for the Rule of Law. As he mingled with cadets before his speech, Holder's aides furiously worked their BlackBerrys, trying to find out what was happening back in Washington. For weeks Holder had participated in a contentious internal debate over whether the Obama administration should release the Bush-era legal opinions that had authorized waterboarding and other harsh interrogation methods. He had argued to administration officials that "if you don't release the memos, you'll own the policy." CIA Director Leon Panetta, a shrewd political operator, countered that full disclosure would damage the government's ability to recruit spies and harm national security; he pushed to release only heavily redacted versions.

Holder and his aides thought they'd been losing the internal battle. What they didn't know was that, at that very moment, Obama was staging a mock debate in Emanuel's office in order to come to a final decision. In his address to the cadets, Holder cited George Washington's admonition at the Battle of Trenton, Christmas 1776, that "captive British soldiers were to be treated with humanity, regardless of how Colonial soldiers captured in battle might be treated." As Holder flew back to Washington on the FBI's Cessna Citation, Obama reached his decision. The memos would be released in full.

Holder and his team celebrated quietly, and waited for national outrage to build. But they'd miscalculated. The memos had already received such public notoriety that the new details in them did not shock many people. (Even the revelation, a few days later, that 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and another detainee had been waterboarded hundreds of times did not drastically alter the contours of the story.) And the White House certainly did its part to head off further controversy. On the Sunday after the memos were revealed, Emanuel appeared on This Week With George Stephanopoulos and declared that there would be no prosecutions of CIA operatives who had acted in good faith with the guidance they were given. In his statement announcing the release of the memos, Obama said, "This is a time for reflection, not retribution." (Throughout, however, he has been careful to say that the final decision is the attorney general's to make.)

Emanuel and other administration officials could see that the politics of national security was turning against them. When I interviewed a senior White House official in early April, he remarked that Republicans had figured out that they could attack Obama on these issues essentially free of cost. "The genius of the Obama presidency so far has been an ability to keep social issues off the docket," he said. "But now the Republicans have found their dream…issue and they have nothing to lose."

Emanuel's response to the torture memos should not have surprised Holder. In the months since the inauguration, the relationship between the Justice Department and the White House had been marred by surprising tension and acrimony. A certain amount of friction is inherent in the relationship, even healthy. But in the Obama administration the bad blood between the camps has at times been striking. The first detonation occurred in only the third week of the administration, soon after a Justice lawyer walked into a courtroom in California and argued that a lawsuit, brought by a British detainee who was alleging torture, should have been thrown out on national-security grounds. By invoking the "state secrets" privilege, the lawyer was reaffirming a position staked out by the Bush administration. The move provoked an uproar among liberals and human-rights groups. It also infuriated Obama, who learned about it from the front page of The New York Times. "This is not the way I like to make decisions," he icily told aides, according to two administration officials, who declined to be identified discussing the president's private reactions. White House officials were livid and accused the Justice Department of sandbagging the president. Justice officials countered that they'd notified the White House counsel's office about the position they had planned to take.

Other missteps were made directly by Holder. Early on, he gave a speech on race relations in honor of Black History Month. He used the infelicitous phrase "nation of cowards" to describe the hair trigger that Americans are on when it comes to race. The quote churned through the cable conversation for a couple of news cycles and caused significant heartburn at the White House; Holder had not vetted the language with his staff. A few weeks later, he told reporters he planned to push for reinstating the ban on assault weapons, which had expired in 2004. He was simply repeating a position that Obama had taken on numerous occasions during the campaign, but at a time when the White House was desperate to win over pro-gun moderate Democrats in Congress. "It's not what we wanted to talk about," said one annoyed White House official, who declined to be identified criticizing the attorney general.

The miscues began to reinforce a narrative that Justice has had a hard time shaking. White House officials have complained that Holder and his staff are not sufficiently attuned to their political needs. Holder is well liked inside the department. His relaxed, unpretentious style—on a flight to Rome in May for a meeting of justice ministers, he popped out of his cabin with his iPod on, mimicking Bobby Darin performing "Beyond the Sea"—has bred tremendous loyalty among his personal staff. But that staff is largely made up of veteran prosecutors and lawyers whom Holder has known and worked with for years. They do not see the president's political fortunes as their primary concern. Among some White House officials there is a not-too-subtle undertone suggesting that Holder has "overlearned the lessons of Marc Rich," as one administration official said to me.

The tensions came to a head in June. By then, Congress was in full revolt over the prospect of Gitmo detainees being transferred to the United States, and the Senate had already voted to block funding to shut down Guantánamo. On the afternoon of June 3, a White House official called Holder's office to let him know that a compromise had been reached with Senate Democrats. The deal had been cut without input from Justice, according to three department officials who did not want to be identified discussing internal matters, and it imposed onerous restrictions that would make it harder to move detainees from Cuba to the United States.

Especially galling was the fact that the White House then asked Holder to go up to the Hill that evening to meet with Senate Democrats and bless the deal. Holder declined—a snub in the delicate dance of Washington politics—and in-stead dispatched the deputy attorney general in his place. Ultimately the measure passed, despite Justice's objections. Obama aides deny that they left Holder out of the loop. "There was no decision to cut them out, and they were not cut out," says one White House official. "That's a misunderstanding."

Holder is clearly not looking to have a contentious relationship with the White House. It's not his nature, and he knows it's not smart politics. His desire to get along has proved useful in his career before, and may now. Emanuel attributes any early problems to the fact that "everyone was getting their sea legs," and insists things have been patched up. "It's not like we're all sitting around singing 'Kumbaya,' " he says, but he insists that Obama got in Holder exactly what he wanted: "a strong, independent leader."

There's an obvious affinity between Holder and the man who appointed him to be the first black attorney general of the United States. They are both black men raised outside the conventional African-American tradition who worked their way to the top of the meritocracy. They are lawyers committed to translating the law into justice. Having spent most of their adult lives in the public arena, both know intimately the tug of war between principle and pragmatism. Obama, Holder says confidently, "understands the nature of what we do at the Justice Department in a way no recent president has. He's a damn good lawyer, and he understands the value of having an independent attorney general."

The next few weeks, though, could test Holder's confidence. After the prospect of torture investigations seemed to lose momentum in April, the attorney general and his aides turned to other pressing issues. They were preoccupied with Gitmo, developing a hugely complex new set of detention and prosecution policies, and putting out the daily fires that go along with running a 110,000-person department. The regular meetings Holder's team had been having on the torture question died down. Some aides began to wonder whether the idea of appointing a prosecutor was off the table.

But in late June Holder asked an aide for a copy of the CIA inspector general's thick classified report on interrogation abuses. He cleared his schedule and, over two days, holed up alone in his Justice Depart ment office, immersed himself in what Dick Cheney once referred to as "the dark side." He read the report twice, the first time as a lawyer, looking for evidence and instances of transgressions that might call for prosecution. The second time, he started to absorb what he was reading at a more emotional level. He was "shocked and saddened," he told a friend, by what government servants were alleged to have done in America's name. When he was done he stood at his window for a long time, staring at Constitution Avenue.

URL: http://www.newsweek.com/id/206300
From the magazine issue dated Jul 20, 2009

Yoo (Not You) Might Go to Prison

AfterDowningStreet.org, June 18, 2009

The good news this week, other than the strength of the fight we put up against war funding (we got 32 of the 39 votes we needed!) was contained in a beautiful 42-page order by a judge (PDF). It says that leading torture lawyer John Yoo can be sued in court by one of his victims. Read about it:
http://afterdowningstreet.org/node/43738

A Rally Near You Next Thursday

A coalition of human rights organizations too lengthy to list here but available on the website has planned a day of action: Torture Accountability Action Day, June 25th, 2009. That’s next Thursday.

In Washington, D.C., we will gather for a rally at 11 a.m. in John Marshall Park (501 Pennsylvania Avenue NW) and march at noon to the Department of Justice. If the DOJ does not agree to appoint a special prosecutor or to meet with us and discuss it, those who are so inclined will engage in nonviolent protest led by the National Campaign for Nonviolent Resistance.

Also on June 25th, there will be rallies in San Francisco, CA; Pasadena, CA; Boston, MA; Salt Lake City, UT; Seattle, WA; Portland, OR; Las Vegas, NV; Honolulu, HI; and Anchorage, AK. Details here: http://tortureaccountability.webs.com/eventsacrossus.htm

In Washington, D.C., more actions will follow, organized by the Torture Abolition and Survivors Support Coalition International. There's a congressional hearing following the rally and protest, and then an evening speaker on the 25th, an all-day conference on the 26th, and a 24-hour vigil at the White House on Saturday the 27th. Details here: http://tassc.org/index.php?sn=309

Check the websites of the ACLU, Amnesty International, and other groups in the coalition for other actions in Washington and around the country this week.

Sheehan leads group of protesters near Bush home

AP, June 8, 2009

DALLAS — Around 50 people joined antiwar activist Cindy Sheehan as she led a brief protest Monday afternoon near former President George W. Bush's Dallas home.

Sheehan's son was killed in the war on Iraq.

The event also brought out about a dozen people protesting the protest and about two dozen members of the media.

The march was sponsored by the Dallas Peace Center, which has been involved in protests with Sheehan since 2005. That year, Sheehan staged a prolonged demonstration outside Bush's ranch near Crawford. She said that her issues with Bush didn't end with his presidency.

"My guess is that the neighbors would probably rather that we not be there," said Trish Major, communications director for the Dallas Peace Center.

"But it's also important to remember this is the neighborhood that welcomed the Bushes warmly, and they knew that by having a person of this stature in their neighborhood, this is something they would have to deal with."

Protesters met at an intersection and then walked about a mile to John J. Pershing Elementary School, across from Bush's new home. Sheehan carried a sign that read, "For what noble cause."

Debbie Valentine, who lives down the street from the Bushes, told The Dallas Morning News, "I understand their right to protest, but this is just disrespectful."

Bush supporters carried signs that said "Pro Bush" and "Go Home Cindy."

Television footage showed children operating a lemonade stand that had been set up near the protest.

Sept. 1: David Swanson Book Tour in Charlotte

Tues., Sept. 1, 2009
7:00 pm

Park Road Books (Park Road Shopping Center)
4139 Park Rd
Charlotte, NC 28209

Info: Action Center For Justice
http://charlotteaction.blogspot.com
charlotteaction@gmail.com
704.759.6529

Download flyers

Forthcoming Book:

Daybreak: Undoing the Imperial Presidency and Forming a More Perfect Union
by David Swanson

BOOK TOPIC:

Daybreak is a prescription for political reform that literally ends with a to-do list for citizens, and draws inspiration from the misdeeds and missteps of the Bush and Obama presidencies.

What powers were stripped from Congress and handed to the White House while George W. Bush lived there, and what would it take to permanently move them back? Which of these powers is Barack Obama making use of or even expanding upon? And in the future, how can we expand our rights, create democratic representation in Congress, and make presidents into executives rather than emperors?

This is a citizens' guide to the long-term task of removing power from the hands of one person, placing it in a body of representatives, and (here's the hard part) making that body truly representative of the American people.

Swanson's analysis makes clear that the imperial presidency, which advanced so dramatically during the Bush-Cheney era, will not be stopped merely by electing better presidents. Major structural changes are needed in our system of government to rein in both the imperial presidency and, at the same time, the presidential empire.

Only through the active efforts of citizens, Swanson argues, can we restore and protect our rights, and expand our conception of political rights to meet new challenges.

AUTHOR BIO:
David Swanson is the author of the upcoming book "Daybreak: Undoing the Imperial Presidency and Forming a More Perfect Union" by Seven Stories Press and of the introduction to "The 35 Articles of Impeachment and the Case for Prosecuting George W. Bush" published by Feral House and available at Amazon.com. Swanson holds a master's degree in philosophy from the University of Virginia. He has worked as a newspaper reporter and as a communications director, with jobs including press secretary for Dennis Kucinich's 2004 presidential campaign, media coordinator for the International Labor Communications Association, and three years as communications coordinator for ACORN, the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now. Swanson is Co-Founder of AfterDowningStreet.org, creator of ConvictBushCheney.org and Washington Director of Democrats.com, a board member of Progressive Democrats of America, the Backbone Campaign, and Voters for Peace. Full bio here.

PRAISE:
"David Swanson is the most thoughtful, determined, and energetic progressive activist in America, and one of the most important voices of his generation. He's also a unique bridge between traditional real-world organizing and the brand new world of online activism. His combination of cheerful organizing, passionate speaking, and brilliant blogging is an inspiration to everyone who craves a more just, peaceful, and sustainable world." --Bob Fertik, President of Democrats.com

"In this important book, David Swanson carefully documents the myriad ways in which Bush-Cheney has amassed unprecedented imperial power, while Congress has abdicated its constitutional duty to check and balance the executive. A useful guide to restore the balance of powers and reclaim our constitutional system of government." --Marjorie Cohn, President of National Lawyers Guild

"Swanson's book gives a most compelling description of the significance of signing statements -- those mostly invisible steps to fascism. As for the role of the 110th Congress...if it's possible, they turn out to be bigger weasels than I had previously thought." -- Mike Ferner, National President of Veterans For Peace, author of "Inside the Red Zone: A Veteran For Peace Reports from Iraq."

"Swanson has been an indefatigable commentator and activist tirelessly advocating for the dismantling of the imperial presidency and the restoration of the principles of our Constitution. His energy and passion are infectious, as is his cogent reasoning. 'Daybreak' urgently reminds us that good political intentions are not sufficient to ensure the continuation of our democracy; informed vigilance is vital to that task." -- Mark Karlin, Editor and Publisher, BuzzFlash.com

"When people ask about how and where to follow what is happening with the movements to end the war in Iraq, to prevent a war with Iran and to hold to account those who launched one mad war and now seek to initiate another, the answer is always www.AFTERDOWNINGSTREET.org site. Constantly updated by the indefatigable DAVID SWANSON, the site is fresh -- there were even six posts on Christmas Day -- and it features local actions (via YouTube) as well as national interventions. Because it is so thorough and so engaged with local and regional protests and events, the AfterDowningStreet site provides the best illustration of the extent to which mainstream media has neglected the most vital movements of the moment." -- John Nichols, The Nation

How Many Americans Can Picture Rape WITHOUT Seeing Photos?

by David Swanson, AfterDowingStreet.org, May 29, 2009

It's been five years since Republican and Democratic senators, generals, and reporters told us about the rape photos. We know that there were rapes and photos. We just haven't seen the photos. Are we going to openly tell each other that we can't be upset until we see images? OR WILL WE ACT?

Update on rape photos from Scott Horton:

The Daily Beast has confirmed that the photographs of abuses at Iraq’s Abu Ghraib prison, which President Obama, in a reversal, decided not to release, depict sexually explicit acts, including a uniformed soldier receiving oral sex from a female prisoner, a government contractor engaged in an act of sodomy with a male prisoner and scenes of forced masturbation, forced exhibition, and penetration involving phosphorous sticks and brooms.

And on video: Gen. Taguba Saw Video of Male Soldier Sodomizing Female Detainee.

Read this: Torture and Truth, by Jonathan Schell.

And this: Busted, Pentagon: Why The Photos Probably Do Show Detainees Sodomized and Raped, by Naomi Wolf.

Also, Levin joins Feingold in saying he's seen the memos Cheney claims he wants and that Cheney is full of Enhanced Dissembling Techniques.

WILL WE ACT?

The United Nations thinks we should: U.N. calls U.S. human rights record "deplorable": "A refusal to look back inevitably means moving forward in blindness."

Life After Guantánamo: Lakhdar Boumediene Speaks
By Andy Worthington on Bosnians in Guantanamo

Open Government Extends Hours

You Can Still Vote After Voting Has Ended!
Hours Extended By Lack of Popular Demand
By David Swanson AfterDowningStreet.org

The president's open government site was supposed to allow brainstorming through May 28th, but the top policy proposal and third highest ranked proposal overall, as of the end of the 28th, was "End the Imperial Presidency."

It is not too late for you to vote for this proposal.

That's because the Open Government just changed the rules and won't be moving on to phase 2 until June 3rd, and will be leaving phase 1 (brainstorming) open until June 19th. Of course the Open Government had openly announced that the brainstorming would be open only from May 21 to May 28.

Now it is entirely possible that other ideas will move to the top by June 3rd or June 19th (or another date to be announced later - the government's not so open that we know these things).

It's also entirely possible that prosecuting Bush and Cheney and ending the imperial presidency will remain where it is or climb even higher. The outcome is really up to you. How many people can you send this link to?
http://opengov.ideascale.com/akira/dtd/3161-4049

And remember: you should have an open government but not so open that your imperial powers fall out.

Help Open the Government

I posted this proposal earlier today on the president's open government site and it has shot up to #2 (in the category of legal and policy changes) right behind legalizing pot. I think we can take first place. Can your organization help?
by David Swanson, AfterDowningStreet.org, May 26, 2009

1. Vote Up This Proposal on Obama's Open Government Website

Here's a direct link to a proposal I've just posted on the president's new website. Please go there, read the proposal, and if you like it vote for it. And post your ideas to improve it.

http://opengov.ideascale.com/akira/dtd/3161-4049

Candidate Obama asked for our opinions through a website. Our top demand was that he keep his promise to vote against immunity for telecoms that spied illegally. He ignored us, promised to do better as president, and hasn't.

President-Elect Obama asked for our opinions through his transition website. Our top question was whether he would appoint a special prosecutor for Bush, Cheney, and gang. He refused to answer the question until asked by the corporate media, and then talked about "looking forward".

Now President Obama is asking for our opinions on a website. This is a good thing but should be gone into with some caveats. First, Obama has always ignored us before, and ignoring people who obediently type on your website as supporters of whatever you do first and citizens with their own opinions second is easier than ignoring just about anything else. Here are other actions you can take following the 30 seconds needed for this one: http://prosecutebushcheney.org

Second, we have representatives and senators whom we are supposed to lobby and whom we are much more likely to lobby successfully, and they are supposed to run the country, not the executive. Third, majority opinion and the clear mandates of our nation's laws ought to carry more weight than the opinions of a self-selected group of presidential advisors (I mean other than Congress which has devolved into more or less just that).

But what if a flood of American citizens were to give the president the kind of advice that is most useful rather than the kind that is most enjoyable to hear? What if we were to ask President Obama to (allow the attorney general to) prosecute his predecessors and (encourage Congress to) remove the unconstitutional powers they claimed from the presidency? Might someone hear our voices, repeat our questions on camera, begin thinking about our point of view, or ask about our issues before confirming a new Supreme Court Justice?

It's certainly possible. Here's the proposal to read and vote for:
http://opengov.ideascale.com/akira/dtd/3161-4049

The Politics of Office

by Mumia Abu-Jamal, Prison Radio, recorded May 18, 2009

click here to listen to audio column

The Power of Truth is Final -- Free Mumia!

PLEASE CONTACT:
International Concerned Family & Friends of MAJ
P.O. Box 19709
Philadelphia, PA 19143
Phone - 215-476-8812/ Fax - 215-476-6180
E-mail - icffmaj@aol.com
AND OFFER YOUR SERVICES!

Send our brotha some LOVE and LIGHT at:
Mumia Abu-Jamal
AM 8335
SCI-Greene
175 Progress Drive
Waynesburg, PA 15370

WE WHO BELIEVE IN FREEDOM CAN *NOT* REST!!

Submitted by: Sis. Marpessa

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"When a cause comes along and you know in your bones that it is just, yet refuse to defend it--at that moment you begin to die. And I have never seen so many corpses walking around talking about justice." - Mumia Abu-Jamal

www.FreeMumia.com

June 25: Torture Accountability Action Day

A day of demonstration everywhere, including in Washington, D.C., aimed at ending torture by holding those responsible accountable.

On June 25, we'll hold a rally in Washington, D.C., and then march to the Department of Justice to demand a special prosecutor for torture. If our demand is not met, some may choose to engage in nonviolent civil resistance, risking arrest.

The rally is sponsored by: After Downing Street, Amnesty International, CODE PINK: Women for Peace, Democrats.com, Indict Bush Now, National Campaign for Nonviolent Resistance, Progressive Democrats of America, Torture Abolition and Survivors Support Coalition, Veterans for Peace, Washington Peace Center, Witness Against Torture, World Can't Wait. The march and nonviolent resistance are sponsored by: After Downing Street, CODE PINK: Women for Peace, Democrats.com, Indict Bush Now, National Campaign for Nonviolent Resistance, Progressive Democrats of America, Torture Abolition and Survivors Support Coalition, Veterans for Peace, Washington Peace Center, Witness Against Torture, World Can't Wait.

Create and find events: http://democrats.com/events

Holder's Plans As Clear As Gonzales' Memory

By David Swanson, AfterDowningStreet.org, May 14, 2009

"I don't recall" is now "that would depend." While then-Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, when testifying before Congress, was oddly unable to remember anything prior to that morning's breakfast, now Attorney General Eric Holder is oddly unable to forecast what, if anything, he will do to hold government officials accountable to the rule of law.

On Thursday, Holder testified before the House Judiciary Committee. Congressman Brad Sherman asked Holder what he would do if a government official was clearly and blatantly violating the law, was misspending funds on a project they had not been appropriated for, or was refusing to make public information in a manner clearly and explicitly required by law. Sherman asked about specific current examples and didn't get a straight answer. He then asked a more general hypothetical question, and still didn't get a straight answer. Sherman asked a third time, and still got nowhere. Holder avoided saying that, even as a general principle, he would ever prosecute a government official. (Here's video).

Holder tried to suggest that Congressional oversight hearings might handle such matters, but Sherman pointed out that oversight hearings do not necessarily change anything. He asked whether Congress was just an advisory board now with no power at all. And of course, when you've reached the point of having members of Congress ask the executive branch whether Congress can have any power, Congress does not have any power. What went unsaid by questioner and witness alike, of course, was that oversight hearings would have teeth if Congress had not thrown away the power of impeachment.

Congressman Jerrold Nadler, earlier in the hearing, had explained to Holder that the appointment of a special counsel is legally required by the current evidence of torture. Nadler asked for an estimate as to when the special counsel who is investigating the CIA's destruction of its torture videotapes will conclude his investigation, but Holder wouldn't even guess, not within a month or a year, no guess at all. Asked whether that counsel's task could be expanded to include the torture itself, in addition to the destruction of tapes, Holder just couldn't answer or predict how or when or whether he ever would become capable of forming a thought on that topic. Asked whether he believes "state secrets" claims can be used to throw out entire cases rather than particular pieces of evidence, Holder just didn't know what his opinion was or when he would have an opinion on that point either.

Nadler asked next whether, in Holder's opinion, a president has the power to detain people indefinitely and without charge. If a yes-no question was going to elicit a yes or no response on Thursday, this seemed like the one. Who doesn't say No to this question? Well, Nadler didn't get a straight answer the first time he asked it, or the second, or the third, or the fourth, or the fifth. Nadler reworded his question five times as Holder ran out the clock without ever giving an answer that could possibly restrain his future conduct in any way. The closest that Holder came was in his fifth response, in which he said that a president does not have the power to detain people indefinitely and without charge unless doing so is "tied to" a "statute", "international agreement", or "custom." Got that? If it's "tied to" a "custom" the president has the authority to hold people indefinitely and without charge. What custom might that possibly be? The custom of slavery?

Congressman Robert Wexler circulated an Email after the hearing that read, in part: "Today, I participated in Judiciary Committee hearings where Attorney General Eric Holder said definitively: “If somebody was tortured to death, clearly a crime would have occurred.” That's definitive, except that there is no doubt that the United States has tortured numerous people to death (not - exactly - breaking news), no doubt that Holder knows this, and no doubt that our laws make torture a crime even when the victim does not die. Wexler's Email was very positive about Holder's comments but pointed out the pile of dead bodies and the legal necessity of appointing a special prosecutor.

When Holder was auditioned for his job before the Senate Judiciary Committee a few months ago he admitted that waterboarding is torture. Our laws require the prosecution of any act complicit in torture. Our former vice president now confesses to authorizing waterboarding on an almost daily basis. Waterboarding is the least of it. And the disgusting debates over exactly how much pain-infliction constitutes torture are outrageous when we are dealing with torture to the point of death.

These basic facts will not change because a new report comes out or more photos are released. The Senate is delaying further hearings, and the House is delaying Bybee's impeachment, until Holder releases his department's internal report on the torture lawyers. But we as citizens have no business delaying our work for any additional and superfluous pieces of evidence. We have an obligation to act now.

--

David Swanson is the author of the upcoming book "Daybreak: Undoing the Imperial Presidency and Forming a More Perfect Union" by Seven Stories Press. You can pre-order it for a discount price at http://tinyurl.com/daybreakbook

http://afterdowningstreet.org/node/42640

Lawrence Wilkerson Drops an Iraq-Torture Bombshell

By Bob Fertik, Democrats.com, May 14, 2009

On Wednesday, Colin Powell's former chief of staff, Col. Lawrence Wilkerson dropped a bombshell (h/t Heather):

what I have learned is that as the administration authorized harsh interrogation in April and May of 2002 -- well before the Justice Department had rendered any legal opinion -- its principal priority for intelligence was not aimed at pre-empting another terrorist attack on the U.S. but discovering a smoking gun linking Iraq and al-Qa'ida.

So furious was this effort that on one particular detainee, even when the interrogation team had reported to Cheney's office that their detainee "was compliant" (meaning the team recommended no more torture), the VP's office ordered them to continue the enhanced methods. The detainee had not revealed any al-Qa'ida-Baghdad contacts yet. This ceased only after Ibn al-Shaykh al-Libi, under waterboarding in Egypt, "revealed" such contacts. Of course later we learned that al-Libi revealed these contacts only to get the torture to stop.

There in fact were no such contacts. (Incidentally, al-Libi just "committed suicide" in Libya. Interestingly, several U.S. lawyers working with tortured detainees were attempting to get the Libyan government to allow them to interview al-Libi....)

On April 21, McClatchy's Jonathan Landay first suggested the Bush Administration used torture to intentionally extract false confessions linking Al Qaeda (and 9/11) to Iraq, to give Bush a false "casus belli" to invade Iraq.

Landay's suggestion was shocking. I called it the "Iraq-Torture Scandal" because of its similarity to the Iran-Contra Scandal, where two seemingly unconnected scandals (Reagan's illegal sale of weapons to Iran and his illegal funding of the Nicaraguan contras) were suddenly linked. Paul Krugman called it the "Grand unified scandal":

Let’s say this slowly: the Bush administration wanted to use 9/11 as a pretext to invade Iraq, even though Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11. So it tortured people to make them confess to the nonexistent link.

There’s a word for this: it’s evil.

A number of prominent progressives came to the same conclusion, including Keith Olbermann (who calls it "backfilling"), Rachel Maddow, Ron Suskind, Frank Rich, and Dan Froomkin. But serious coverage of this humongous scandal did not go beyond progressives.

Why? First, because Landay is not a TV regular like investigative reporters Seymour Hersh or Michael Isikoff, although his work is just as good. Second, because his two sources didn't quite prove the scandal.

His first source was anonymous - "a former senior U.S. intelligence official familiar with the interrogation issue" - which undercut his/her impact. And this source made the "Iraq-Al Qaeda" motive secondary to "preventing another attack."

"There were two reasons why these interrogations were so persistent, and why extreme methods were used," the former senior intelligence official said on condition of anonymity because of the issue's sensitivity.

"The main one is that everyone was worried about some kind of follow-up attack (after 9/11). But for most of 2002 and into 2003, Cheney and Rumsfeld, especially, were also demanding proof of the links between al Qaida and Iraq that (former Iraqi exile leader Ahmed) Chalabi and others had told them were there."

Landay's second source was former U.S. Army psychiatrist, Maj. Charles Burney, who

told Army investigators in 2006 that interrogators at the Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, detention facility were under "pressure" to produce evidence of ties between al Qaida and Iraq.

"While we were there a large part of the time we were focused on trying to establish a link between al Qaida and Iraq and we were not successful in establishing a link between al Qaida and Iraq," Burney told staff of the Army Inspector General. "The more frustrated people got in not being able to establish that link . . . there was more and more pressure to resort to measures that might produce more immediate results."

Landay did not specify when Burney's interrogations were taking place, but it was October 2002. That was still during the pre-war sales campaign (the invasion began on March 19, 2003), but it was after the fall "product rollout" when Bush, Cheney, and Rice repeatedly insisted they had proof from Al Qaeda captives of Iraq ties. That story came from Ibn al-Shaykh al-Libi, whose false confession in Egypt was much earlier - in February 2002. (See Update 3 below for correction.)

So Wilkerson's account is a bombshell for three reasons. First, he is well-known - and credible. Second, he says the desire to manufacture an Iraq-Al Qaeda link was the principal priority - not secondary to preventing another attack.

its principal priority for intelligence was not aimed at pre-empting another terrorist attack on the U.S. but discovering a smoking gun linking Iraq and al-Qa'ida.

Third, he pushes the timeline back to "April and May of 2002" - not as far back as February 2002, but getting close.

The "smoking gun" of the Iraq-Torture Scandal will be proof that the CIA took Ibn al-Shaykh al-Libi away from the FBI in February 2002 and sent him to Egypt for one specific reason: to use torture to extract a false confession of Iraq-Al Qaeda ties.

Lawrence Wilkerson's account takes us much closer to finding that "smoking gun." And al-Libi's mysterious death guarantees that everyone will be looking for it.

Update 1: Liz Holtzman just reminded me that Bush decided on February 7, 2002 to exclude Al Qaeda detainees in Afghanistan from the Geneva Conventions. Obviously that opened the door for the CIA to torture them. al-Libi was captured in on December 18, 2001, so he may have decided to revoke Geneva with al-Libi in mind.

Update 2: Former NBC News investigative producer Robert Windrem ties Cheney's office to a waterboarding request after the invasion of Iraq in April 2003:

*Two U.S. intelligence officers confirm that Vice President Cheney’s office suggested waterboarding an Iraqi prisoner, a former intelligence official for Saddam Hussein, who was suspected to have knowledge of a Saddam-al Qaeda connection.

*The former chief of the Iraq Survey Group, Charles Duelfer, in charge of interrogations, tells The Daily Beast that he considered the request reprehensible.

*Much of the information in the report of the 9/11 Commission was provided through more than 30 sessions of torture of detainees.

This isn't a smoking gun for the Iraq-Torture Scandal because it followed the invasion, but it's another piece of evidence that the Buseviks used torture to try to link Iraq and al Qaeda.

Meanwhile Windrem is trying to get a formal response from Cheney. '

Update 3: According to the Senate Armed Services Committee report, Burney arrived in Guantanamo in June 2002. He was immediately seconded by Maj. Gen. Michael Dunleavy into Task Force 170 - the military interrogation team - because it lacked a psychiatrist. TF-170 started formally using "harsh" interrogation in October 2002 on Gen. James Hill's vocal approval, before Rumsfeld signed off on them. Prisoner "063", Mohammed al-Qahtani, was earlier subjected to "certain types of deprivation and psychological stressors."

Update 4: Andrew Sullivan reaches the same conclusion:

Lawrence Wilkerson has a must-read on what he now believes is the real reason Cheney was so insistent on torturing prisoners - he needed proof of an al Qaeda-Saddam connection to justify the war he had already decided to wage. This really is the explosive charge, because it reveals the real danger of torture in the hands of big government: it means our leaders can manufacture facts to justify anything. It gives them the crucial weapon they need to, as Ron Suskind's famous source explained, "create reality"

Indeed they did.

Update 5: Dan Froomkin cites Wilkerson in writing:

I've been amazed at how little media pickup there's been of the revelation by the Senate Armed Services Committee last month that the White House started pushing the use of torture not when faced with a "ticking time bomb" scenario from terrorists, but when officials in 2002 were desperately casting about for ways to tie Iraq to the 9/11 attacks.

Word.

Update 6: Josh Marshall cites Wilkerson too:

Next you have a flurry of claims that a key motive behind the push to torture was to elicit 'confessions' about an alliance between Saddam Hussein and al Qaida, which was of course the key predicate for the invasion of Iraq. That again has to create much more pressure to clarify what happened. The basis of most of the anti-torture push has been the assumption that torture was used for the purpose of eliciting information about future terrorist attacks. Whether it was illegal, wrong-headed, misguided, immoral -- whatever -- most have been willing to at least give the benefit of the doubt that that was the goal. If the driving force was to gin up new bogus intel about the fabled Iraq-al Qaida link, politically it will put the whole story in a very different light. And rightly so.

Update 7: Marcy Wheeler drills down on Dick Cheney's role:

Wilkerson is stating, clearly, that in early 2002, Dick Cheney ordered Ibn Sheikh al-Libi to be tortured even after the interrogation team reported that al-Libi was compliant.

While we can't be sure of the date when Cheney started ordering people to be waterboarded even after they were compliant, we know this order had to have occurred before February 22, 2002--because that's when al-Libi first reported on ties between Iraq and al Qaeda. From DIA's report on that day:

"This is the first report from Ibn al-Shaykh [al-Libi] in which he claims Iraq assisted al-Qa'ida's CBRN efforts. However, he lacks specific details on the Iraq's involvement, the CBRN materials associated with the assistance, the location where the training occurred. It is possible he does not know any futher details; it is more likely this individual is intentionally misleading the debriefers. Ibn al-Shaykh has been undergoing debriefs for several weeks and may be describing scenarios to the debriefers that he knows will retain their interest."

So sometime in February 2002--when Bush was declaring that the Geneva Convention did not apply to al Qaeda and when Bruce Jessen was pitching torture to JPRA--Cheney was personally (according to Wilkerson) ordering up waterboarding. The DIA immediately labeled the result of this session of waterboarding probable disinformation.

And a month later, when the CIA captured Abu Zubaydah, James Mitchell immediately set up as a contractor so he could waterboard Abu Zubaydah.

We chose waterboarding--not simply torture, but waterboarding itself--knowing it'd be unreliable. Or rather, Dick Cheney chose it.

I'm not sure Cheney ordered up waterboarding in particular because it would produce disinformation. I think he chose waterboarding because it was the only form of outright torture that American officials had experience with (thanks to the SERE program). That meant it could be administered by Americans (Jessen and Mitchell) and also could be "sold" to the numerous American intelligence agencies as producing reliable information.

As I argued previously, I believe Cheney had to in-source torture (by America) because the out-sourced torture (by Egypt) produced results that an American intelligence agency - the DIA - rejected as unreliable.

Update 8: Andy Worthington recaps the investigative reporting that preceeded Wilkerson's revelation. He also raises some useful questions about Wilkerson's timeline.

http://democrats.com/lawrence-wilkerson-drops-an-iraq-torture-bombshell

200 Organizations Ask Holder to Appoint a Special Prosecutor for Bush, Cheney, et alia

David Swanson, ProsecuteBushCheney.org, May 12, 2009

Two hundred organizations, including After Downing Street, Democrats.com, the Robert Jackson Steering Committee, the Center for Constitutional Rights, the National Lawyers Guild, the Society of American Law Teachers, Human Rights USA, the American Freedom Campaign, and the Bill of Rights Defense Committee, have signed a joint statement urging Attorney General Eric Holder to appoint a special prosecutor for former top officials of the Bush Administration.

The complete list of organizations can be found at http://specialprosecutor.us

The complete statement reads as follows:

We urge Attorney General Eric Holder to appoint a non-partisan independent Special Counsel to immediately commence a prosecutorial investigation into the most serious alleged crimes of former President George W. Bush, former Vice President Richard B. Cheney, the attorneys formerly employed by the Department of Justice whose memos sought to justify torture, and other former top officials of the Bush Administration.

Our laws, and treaties that under Article VI of our Constitution are the supreme law of the land, require the prosecution of crimes that strong evidence suggests these individuals have committed. Both the former president and the former vice president have confessed to authorizing a torture procedure that is illegal under our law and treaty obligations. The former president has confessed to violating the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act.

We see no need for these prosecutions to be extraordinarily lengthy or costly, and no need to wait for the recommendations of a panel or “truth” commission when substantial evidence of the crimes is already in the public domain. We believe the most effective investigation can be conducted by a prosecutor, and we believe such an investigation should begin immediately.

United for Peace and Jelly? Junipers? Jerkarounds?

David Swanson, AfterDowningStreet.org, Feb. 13, 2009

Some months back, United for Peace and Justice held a big conference in
Chicago for three days, and hundreds of us from all over the country
spent most of those three days voting on the language to go in the
documents that would determine what UFPJ would work on in the coming
year and a half, especially the program document. In past years, I
hadn't bothered to push for inclusion of accountability, but this year I
did. I went to the conference, and we voted overwhelmingly to make
accountability and prosecution for war crimes an item on the agenda, and
we explicitly voted to make it just as important as the other items. We
then formed a working group. But our agenda is ignored by UFPJ, is not
part of plans for a big event on April 4th and other events on the 6th
anniversary of the invasion of Iraq, and is left out of a list of things
to talk to Congress about in the coming week. In fact, the list of
things to talk to Congress about in the coming week looks a lot like a
program document that someone has taken and rewritten in private, which
means that they could have spared us all those tedious hours in Chicago.
Let's compare the two documents.

Here are the section headings in the document we all voted for:

UFPJ PROGRAM FOR ACTION
As amended and adopted at the 4th UFPJ National Assembly – 12/13/08

1) We remain committed to the urgent goal of immediately ending the U.S.
wars and occupations in Iraq and Afghanistan and bringing all the troops
home.
• 6th Anniversary of the War in Iraq:
• Pressure on Congress to End the War in Iraq:
• Voices of Iraqis, Humanitarian Crisis and Rebuilding Iraq:
• Afghanistan
• Support for Military Resisters, Veterans and Military Families:
• Truth In Recruiting:
• Campaign to Bring Home the National Guard:
2) Our work for peace and justice will include an action response to the
economic, social and environmental crisis at home and worldwide.
• Economic Crisis and a Green Job Economy:
• End to Global Warming, Climate Justice Now:
3) We will work to prevent new wars in Pakistan, Iran and elsewhere.
• Iran – Stop Threatening, Start Talking:
• Nuclear Disarmament:
• Pakistan, Syria, North Korea, Venezuela, Cuba and elsewhere:
4) It is time to challenge the Global War on Terror and the Empire
Building Agenda of the U.S.
• No Foreign Bases Campaign:
• End the Israeli Occupation of Palestinian Territories:
• Offering New Approaches for U.S. Foreign Policy:
5) Defending, protecting and expanding civil liberties, civil rights and
democracy are necessary
steps to ensure our ability to achieve our other strategic goals.
• Restore Civil Liberties, End Torture:
• Accountability and prosecution of high officials guilty of war crimes,
including the supreme crime of aggressive war.
• Immigrant Rights:

***

Here, in contrast, are the section headings from the new version:

BEYOND WAR - A New Economy is Possible
Send America to Work, Not to War
1. Militarism
Out of Iraq and Afghanistan
16 MONTH PLAN FOR IRAQ
AFGHANISTAN
THERE IS NO “GOOD WAR”
NUCLEAR WEAPONS
FOREIGN BASES
MILITARY INDUSTRIAL COMPLEX
THE PENTAGON IS NOT A JOBS ENGINE
HUMANITARIAN AID

2. Poverty
CUT THE MILITARY BUDGET AND FUND HUMAN NEEDS
POVETY [sic] IN THE UNITED STATES
HOME FORECLOSURES
HEALTHCARE
EMPLOYEE FREE CHOICE ACT
GET RID OF INEFFECTIVE “TRICKLE DOWN” ECONOMICS
THE GRAVITY OF THE CLIMATE CRISIS
WE SHOULD INVEST IN GREEN

3. Racism
BLACK PRISON POPULATION
BLACK POVERTY
EDUCATION

***

What do you notice?

First of all, section 5 of the document we carefully wrote by committee,
voting on almost every line, a section we explicitly voted to make equal
with the others so that it would not be ignored, has been deleted.

Second, new items have been added, including making racism one of three
main headings. Now, I for one would have voted to include fighting
racism in our work if someone had raised it. But did they? Not that I
recall. If they did, it lost.

My question is what the point of the endless tedious edit-the-documents
conference was, why the pretense of laborious democracy? Why the
elaborate efforts to claim to be the coalition of coalitions, if there's
just a little clique rewriting everything?