"In January [2007] more than 1,900 people — soldiers, security officers and civilians — were killed in the insurgency in Iraq, up from 800 in January 2006. Many corpses showed signs of torture, meaning the victims were probably killed by religious and tribal death squads. This map, based on data from the American, British and Iraqi governments and from news reports, shows the dates, locations and circumstances of deaths for the first month of the year. Given the vast size of Iraq and the communications difficulties inherent in war, the information may be incomplete. Nonetheless, it is our effort to visually depict the continuing human cost of the Iraq war."
By Adriana Lins de Albuquerque, a doctoral student in political science at Columbia, and Alicia Cheng, a graphic designer at mgmt. design in Brooklyn. 2007, The New York Times.]
infographic representing the type and location of each attack in the Iraq war, responsible for the 2,592 recorded deaths among American and other coalition troops, Iraqi security forces and members of the peshmerga militias controlled by the Kurdish government.
Winner - Special Documentary Jury Prize - 2007 Sundance Film Festival
"The most important movie you are likely to see this year." - Richard Shickel, TIME
"Masterful. Enraging. Apocalyptic." - Rob Nelson, VILLAGE VOICE
"The first film of its kind to chronicle the reasons behind Iraq’s descent into guerilla war, warlord rule, criminality and anarchy, NO END IN SIGHT is a jaw-dropping, insider’s tale of wholesale incompetence, recklessness and venality. Based on over 200 hours of footage, the film provides a candid retelling of the events following the fall of Baghdad in 2003 by high ranking officials, Iraqi civilians, American soldiers and prominent analysts. NO END IN SIGHT examines the manner in which the principal errors of U.S. policy – the use of insufficient troop levels, allowing the looting of Baghdad, the purging of professionals from the Iraqi government and the disbanding of the Iraqi military – largely created the insurgency and chaos that engulf Iraq today."
'No End in Sight,' A Direct Hit on Iraq War Makers
By Stephen Hunter Washington Post Staff Writer Friday, July 27, 2007; Page C04
"The script of Charles Ferguson's 'No End in Sight' would certainly be in the hands of prosecutors in the event of impeachment hearings. The documentary is a furious, if quietly stated, indictment of the president and all his men in the debacle that our adventure in Iraq has turned into. Ferguson builds a compelling case of bad judgment, error, stubbornness, arrogance, all of it adding up to a mess with no end in sight.
"It's also, most impressively, an evocation of that horror. Astutely edited by Chad Beck and Cindy Lee, it assembles a depressing cascade of imagery from the war: the tanks pulling through the dusty, ancient towns; the young Americans scooting through the ruins in their Terminator shades; optics-festooned plastic rifles, looking for targets as the children and women flee; the detonation of a roadside bomb with its surreal combination of speed and energy; and, of course, the talking heads, who talk, then talk some more, then talk still more, that is, if they'll talk at all. (Wolfowitz, Bremer and Rumsfeld wouldn't; all are represented in archival footage.)"
"...the military code served Japan's rulers well. Without bushido's terrible sanction of dishonour, in 1944-45 a host of Japanese would otherwise have given themselves up, rather than perish to prolong futile resistance...Overlaid upon this, however, was a rational calculation by Tokyo. The superiority of American resources was manifest. If Japan pursued the war within the limits of conventional military behaviour, its defeat was inevitable. Its leader's chosen course was to impose such a ghastly blood price for each American gain that this 'nation of shopkeepers' would find it preferable to negotiate, rather than accept the human cost of invading Japan's main islands...If this assessment was fanciful, and founded upon ignorance of the possibility that a weapon might be deployed which rendered void all conventional military calculations, it offered a germ of hope to desperate men..."
Max Hastings, Nemesis: The Battle For Japan, 1944-45
One can easily imagine Mike Davis, kode9, subtopia, ballardian, and many others singing from the same song sheet on this issue. Whilst their characteristic modes of engagement are admirable in their own terms, I believe the piece from Spiked! I've chosen distinguishes itself, (blessedly sans the punditry of Civitas Institute miscreants such as Patrick West, which sometimes plagues Spiked!), on account of how it highlights the cultural and social lines of communication that need be opened up for the sake of a critical response; i.e. in Habermasian terms, a reinvigoration of a "public sphere", amounting to a more expansive solution than the "Buzz Off" campaign that has arisen in opposition to the device (to reiterate: commendable as that stance may well be in and of itself up to a certain point). A necessary theoretical supplement might also be found on the e-journal "Surveillance and Society", at least to the extent their Foucauldian perspectives on the panopticon are tempered by the aforementioned Habermasian approach.
In other words, stated as briefly as possible, it is my view that the disciplinary solutions in question fill the power vacuum that exists because of not exactly the absence of a functioning public sphere per se, but rather the depletion symptomatic of increasing privatisation by risk managers ("re-feudalisation" was Habermas' apt descriptive term for such a state of affairs). Although the video quality is poor, the chosen clip still manages to fulfill the minimal journalistic requirement of establishing the respective standpoints of the social activists involved (both pro and con the Mosquito).
The Mosquito captures adult fears and uncertainties about the next generation. This faceless, hidden device, which doesn’t have to be manned by anyone and which does not involve communicating any words or ideas to young people (just a piercing noise), sums up the authorities’ sense of distance and dislocation from youth. In this sense, the Mosquito could make matters even worse: it is a constant deafening reminder to those within range that they are untrustworthy and have a propensity for Doing Wrong. It treats young people effectively like roaming beasts, shunted from one place to the next by little more than noise. The buzz follows them as they wander around… reminding them they are not yet ‘fit’ for adulthood, or to be out in public. Is it any wonder that some young people feel alienated, even angry, and sometimes respond by smashing something up or getting pissed? The failure of adult society to reason with young people, to talk to them, or even to provide them with some half-decent facilities to hang out in, can only exacerbate their feeling of being cut adrift. Getting the Mosquito to ‘buzz off’ is a good start. But let us also challenge the cultural and political view of young people as both dangerous and endangered, and instead try communicating with them.
"The very public debate about child abuse is like Baudrillard's 'war porn'. It has parodied the horrible suffering of Aboriginal people. The crisis in Aboriginal society is now a public spectacle, played out in a vast 'reality show' through the media, parliaments, public service and the Aboriginal world. This obscene and pornographic spectacle shifts attention away from everyday lived crisis that many Aboriginal people endure – or do not, dying as they do at excessive rates."
Top 25 Censored Stories of 2008 #2 Bush Moves Toward Martial Law Sources: Toward Freedom , October 25, 2006 Title: “Bush Moves Toward Martial Law” Author: Frank Morales www.towardfreedom.com/home/content/view/911
Student Researchers: Phillip Parfitt and Julie Bickel Faculty Evaluator: Andy Merrifield, Ph.D.
The John Warner Defense Authorization Act of 2007, which was quietly signed by Bush on October 17, 2006, the very same day that he signed the Military Commissions Act, allows the president to station military troops anywhere in the United States and take control of state-based National Guard units without the consent of the governor or local authorities, in order to “suppress public disorder.”
By revising the two-century-old Insurrection Act, the law in effect repeals the Posse Comitatus Act, which placed strict prohibitions on military involvement in domestic law enforcement. The 1878 Act reads, “Whoever, except in cases and under circumstances expressly authorized by the Constitution or Act of Congress, willfully uses any part of the Army or Air Force as a posse comitatus or otherwise to execute the laws shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than two years, or both.” As the only US criminal statute that outlaws military operations directed against the American people, it has been our best protection against tyranny enforced by martial law—the harsh system of rules that takes effect when the military takes control of the normal administration of justice. Historically martial law has been imposed by various governments during times of war or occupation to intensify control of populations in spite of heightened unrest. In modern times it is most commonly used by authoritarian governments to enforce unpopular rule.1
Section 333 of the Defense Authorization Act of 2007, entitled “Major public emergencies; interference with State and Federal law,” states that “the President may employ the armed forces, including the National Guard in Federal service—to restore public order and enforce the laws of the United States when, as a result of a natural disaster, epidemic, or other serious public health emergency, terrorist attack or incident, or other condition in any State or possession of the United States, the President determines that domestic violence has occurred to such an extent that the constituted authorities of the State or possession are incapable of (or “refuse” or “fail” in) maintaining public order—in order to suppress, in any State, any insurrection, domestic violence, unlawful combination, or conspiracy.”
Thus an Act of Congress, superceding the Posse Comitatus Act, has paved the way toward a police state by granting the president unfettered legal authority to order federal troops onto the streets of America, directing military operations against the American people under the cover of “law enforcement.”
The massive Defense Authorization Act grants the Pentagon $532.8 billion to include implementation of the new law which furthermore facilitates militarized police round-ups of protesters, so-called illegal aliens, potential terrorists, and other undesirables for detention in facilities already contracted and under construction, (see Censored 2007, Story #14) and transferring from the Pentagon to local police units the latest technology and weaponry designed to suppress dissent.
Author Frank Morales notes that despite the unprecedented and shocking nature of this act, there has been no outcry in the American media, and little reaction from our elected officials in Congress. On September 19, a lone Senator Patrick Leahy (D-Vermont) noted that 2007’s Defense Authorization Act contained a “widely opposed provision to allow the President more control over the National Guard [adopting] changes to the Insurrection Act, which will make it easier for this or any future President to use the military to restore domestic order without the consent of the nation’s governors.”
A few weeks later, on September 29, Leahy entered into the Congressional Record that he had “grave reservations about certain provisions of the fiscal Year 2007 Defense Authorization Bill Conference Report,” the language of which, he said, “subverts solid, longstanding posse comitatus statutes that limit the military’s involvement in law enforcement, thereby making it easier for the President to declare martial law.” This had been “slipped in,” Leahy said, “as a rider with little study,” while “other congressional committees with jurisdiction over these matters had no chance to comment, let alone hold hearings on, these proposals.”
Leahy noted “the implications of changing the [Posse Comitatus] Act are enormous.” “There is good reason,” he said, “for the constructive friction in existing law when it comes to martial law declarations. Using the military for law enforcement goes against one of the founding tenets of our democracy. We fail our Constitution, neglecting the rights of the States, when we make it easier for the President to declare martial law and trample on local and state sovereignty.”
Morales further asserts that “with the president’s polls at a historic low and Democrats taking back the Congress it is particularly worrisome that President Bush has seen fit, at this juncture to, in effect, declare himself dictator.”
Citation 1. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martial_law, “Martial Law,” May 2007
Please no citation or reproduction of any original writings or images appearing on this blog without the permission of its authors.
"Defects of empirical knowledge have less to do with the ways we go wrong in philosophy than defects of character do; such as the simple inability to shut up; determination to be thought deep; hunger for power; fear, especially the fear of an indifferent universe" (David Stove The Plato Cult and Other Philosophical Follies 1991: 188)
