[NYTr] Blum's Anti Empire Report #51

[All the News That Doesn't Fit]

The Anti-Empire Report

Read this or George W. Bush will be president the rest of your life
                                         
November 6, 2007
                                           
by William Blum                               
http://www.killinghope.org

In a sound-bite society, reality no longer matters

Last month, Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni told assembled world
leaders at the United Nations that the time had come to take action
against Iran. "None disagrees," she said, "that Iran denies the
Holocaust and speaks openly of its desire to wipe a member state - mine
- off the map. And none disagrees that, in violation of Security
Council resolutions, it is actively pursuing the means to achieve this
end. Too many see the danger but walk idly by - hoping that someone
else will take care of it. ... It is time for the United Nations, and
the states of the world, to live up to their promise of never again. To
say enough is enough, to act now and to defend their basic values."[1]

Yet, later the same month, we are informed by Haaretz, (frequently
described as "the New York Times of Israel"), that the same Foreign
Minister Tzipi Livni had said a few months earlier, in a series of
closed discussions, that in her opinion "Iranian nuclear weapons do not
pose an existential threat to Israel." Haaretz reported that "Livni
also criticized the exaggerated use that [Israeli] Prime Minister Ehud
Olmert is making of the issue of the Iranian bomb, claiming that he is
attempting to rally the public around him by playing on its most basic
fears."[2]

What are we to make of such a self-contradiction, such perfect
hypocrisy?

And here is Fareed Zakaria, editor of Newsweek International: "The one
time we seriously negotiated with Tehran was in the closing days of the
war in Afghanistan, in order to create a new political order in the
country. Bush's representative to the Bonn conference, James Dobbins,
says that 'the Iranians were very professional, straightforward,
reliable and helpful. They were also critical to our success. They
persuaded the Northern Alliance [Afghan foes of the Taliban] to make
the final concessions that we asked for.' Dobbins says the Iranians
made overtures to have better relations with the United States through
him and others in 2001 and later, but got no reply. Even after the Axis
of Evil speech, he recalls, they offered to cooperate in Afghanistan.
Dobbins took the proposal to a principals meeting in Washington only to
have it met with dead silence. The then Secretary of Defense Donald
Rumsfeld, he says, 'looked down and rustled his papers.' No reply was
ever sent back to the Iranians. Why bother? They're mad."[3]

Dobbins has further written: "The original version of the Bonn
agreement ... neglected to mention either democracy or the war on
terrorism. It was the Iranian representative who spotted these
omissions and successfully urged that the newly emerging Afghan
government be required to commit to both."[4] ... "Only weeks after
Hamid Karzai was sworn in as interim leader in Afghanistan, President
Bush listed Iran among the 'axis of evil' -- surprising payback for
Tehran's help in Bonn. A year later, shortly after the invasion of
Iraq, all bilateral contacts with Tehran were suspended. Since then,
confrontation over Iran's nuclear program has intensified."[5]

Shortly after the US invasion of Iraq in 2003, Iran made another
approach to Washington, via the Swiss ambassador who sent a fax to the
State Department. The Washington Post described it as "a proposal from
Iran for a broad dialogue with the United States, and the fax suggested
everything was on the table -- including full cooperation on nuclear
programs, acceptance of Israel and the termination of Iranian support
for Palestinian militant groups." The Bush administration "belittled
the initiative. Instead, they formally complained to the Swiss
ambassador who had sent the fax." Richard Haass, head of policy
planning at the State Department at the time and now president of the
Council on Foreign Relations, said the Iranian approach was swiftly
rejected because in the administration "the bias was toward a policy of
regime change."[6]

So there we have it. The Israelis know it, the Americans know it. Iran
is not any kind of military threat. Before the invasion of Iraq I posed
the question in this report: What possible reason would Saddam Hussein
have for attacking the United States or Israel other than an
irresistible desire for mass national suicide? He had no reason, and
neither do the Iranians. Of the many lies surrounding the invasion of
Iraq, the biggest one of all is that if, in fact, Saddam Hussein had
those weapons of mass destruction the invasion would have been
justified.

The United States and Israel have long strived to dominate the Middle
East, viewing Iraq and Iran as the most powerful barriers to that
ambition. Iraq is now a basket case. Iran awaits basketization. And,
eventually perhaps, the omnipresent American military bases, closing
the base-gap between Iraq and Afghanistan in Washington's encirclement
of China, and the better to monitor the flow of oil from the Persian
Gulf and Caspian Sea areas.

There was a time when I presumed that the sole purpose of United States
hostile policy toward Iran was to keep the Iranians from acquiring
nuclear weapons, which would deprive the US and Israel of their mideast
monopoly and ultimate tool of intimidation. But now it appears that
destroying Iran's military capability, nuclear and otherwise, smashing
it to the point of being useless defensively or offensively, is the
Bush administration's objective, perhaps along with the hope of some
form of regime change. The Empire leaves as little to chance as
possible.


Cuba and Original Sin

Since the early days of the Cuban Revolution assorted anti-communists
and capitalist true-believers around the world have been relentless in
publicizing the failures, real and alleged, of life in Cuba; each
perceived shortcoming is attributed to the perceived shortcomings of
socialism -- It's simply a system that can't work, we are told, given
the nature of human beings, particularly in this modern, competitive,
globalized, consumer-oriented world.

In response to many of these criticisms, defenders of Cuban society
have regularly pointed out how the numerous draconian sanctions imposed
by the United States since 1960 are largely responsible for most of the
problems pointed out by the critics. The critics, in turn, say that
this is just an excuse, one given by Cuban apologists for every failure
of their socialist system. However, it would be very difficult for the
critics to prove their point. The United States would have to drop all
sanctions and then we'd have to wait long enough for Cuban society to
recover what it's lost and demonstrate what its system can do when not
under constant attack by the most powerful nation in the world.

The sanctions (which Cuba calls an economic blockade), designed to
create discontent toward the government, have been expanding under the
Bush administration, both in number and in vindictiveness. Washington
has adopted sharper reprisals against those who do business with Cuba
or establish relations with the country based on cultural or tourist
exchanges; e.g., the US Treasury has frozen the accounts in the United
States of the Netherlands Caribbean Bank because it has an office in
Cuba, and banned US firms and individuals from having any dealings with
the Dutch bank.

The US Treasury Department fined the Alliance of Baptists $34,000,
charging that certain of its members and parishioners of other churches
had engaged in tourism during a visit to Cuba for religious purposes;
i.e., they had spent money there. (As George W. once said: "U.S. law
forbids Americans to travel to Cuba for pleasure."[7])

American courts and government agencies have helped US companies
expropriate the famous Cuban cigar brand name 'Cohiba' and the
well-known rum "Havana Club".

The Bush administration sent a note to American Internet service
providers telling them not to deal with six specified countries,
including Cuba.[8] This is one of several actions by Washington over
the years to restrict Internet availability in Cuba; yet Cuba's critics
claim that problems with the Internet in Cuba are due to government
suppression.

Cubans in the United States are limited to how much money they can send
to their families in Cuba, a limit that Washington imposes only on
Cubans and on no other nationals. Not even during the worst moments of
the Cold War was there a general limit to the amount of money that
people in the US could send to relatives living in the Soviet
satellites in Eastern Europe.

In 1999, Cuba filed a suit against the United States for $181.1 billion
in compensation for economic losses and loss of life during the first
forty years of this aggression. The suit held Washington responsible
for the death of 3,478 Cubans and the wounding and disabling of 2,099
others. In the eight years since, these figures have of course all
increased. The sanctions, in numerous ways large and small, makes
acquiring many kinds of products and services from around the world
much more difficult and expensive, often impossible; frequently, they
are things indispensable to Cuban medicine, transportation or industry;
or they mean that Americans and Cubans can't attend professional
conferences in each other's country.

The above is but a small sample of the excruciating pain inflicted by
the United States upon the body, soul and economy of the Cuban people.

For years American political leaders and media were fond of labeling
Cuba an "international pariah". We don't hear much of that any more.
Perhaps one reason is the annual vote at the United Nations on a
General Assembly resolution to end the US embargo against Cuba. This is
how the vote has gone:

           Yes-No
1992     59-2   (US, Israel)
1993     88-4   (US, Israel, Albania, Paraguay)
1994   101-2   (US, Israel)
1995   117-3   (US, Israel, Uzbekistan)
1996   138-3   (US, Israel, Uzbekistan)
1997   143-3   (US, Israel, Uzbekistan)
1998   157-2   (US, Israel)
1999   155-2   (US, Israel)
2000   167-3   (US, Israel, Marshall Islands)
2001   167-3   (US, Israel, Marshall Islands)
2002   173-3   (US, Israel, Marshall Islands)
2003   179-3   (US, Israel, Marshall Islands)
2004   179-4   (US, Israel, Marshall Islands, Palau)
2005   182-4   (US, Israel, Marshall Islands, Palau)
2006   183-4   (US, Israel, Marshall Islands, Palau)
2007   184-4   (US, Israel, Marshall Islands, Palau)

Cuba's sin, which the United States of America can not forgive, is to
have created a society that can serve as a successful example of an
alternative to the capitalist model, and, moreover, to have done so
under the very nose of the United States. And despite all the hardships
imposed on it by Washington, Cuba has indeed inspired countless peoples
and governments all over the world.

Long-time writer about Cuba, Karen Lee Wald, has observed: "The United
States has more pens, pencils, candy, aspirin, etc. than most Cubans
have. They, on the other hand, have better access to health services,
education, sports, culture, childcare, services for the elderly, pride
and dignity than most of us have within reach."

In a 1996 address to the General Assembly, Cuban Vice-President Carlos
Lage stated: "Each day in the world 200 million children sleep in the
streets. Not one of them is Cuban."

On April 6, 1960, L.D. Mallory, a US State Department senior official,
wrote in an internal memorandum: "The majority of Cubans support
Castro ... the only foreseeable means of alienating internal support is
through disenchantment and disaffection based on economic
dissatisfaction and hardship. ... every possible means should be
undertaken promptly to weaken the economic life of Cuba." Mallory
proposed "a line of action that makes the greatest inroads in denying
money and supplies to Cuba, to decrease monetary and real wages, to
bring about hunger, desperation and the overthrow of the government."
Later that year, the Eisenhower administration instituted the
embargo.[9]


Hugo the demon dictator strikes again
The latest evidence that Hugo Chavez is a dictator, we are told, is
that he's pushing for a constitutional amendment to remove term limits
from the presidency. It's the most contentious provision in his new
reform package which has recently been approved by the Venezuelan
congress and awaits a public referendum on December 2. The lawmakers
traveled nationwide to discuss the proposals with community groups at
more than 9,000 public events[10], rather odd behavior for a
dictatorship, as is another of the reforms -- setting a maximum
six-hour workday so workers would have sufficient time for "personal
development."

The American media and the opposition in Venezuela make it sound as if
Chavez is going to be guaranteed office for as long as he wants. What
they fail to emphasize, if they mention it at all, is that there's
nothing at all automatic about the process -- Chavez will have to be
elected each time. Neither are we enlightened that it's not unusual for
a nation to not have a term limit for its highest office. France,
Germany, and the United Kingdom, if not all of Europe and much of the
rest of the world, do not have such a limit. The United States did not
have a term limit on the office of the president during the nation's
first 175 years, until the ratification of the 22nd Amendment in 1951.
Were all American presidents prior to that time dictators?

Is it of any significance, I wonder, that the two countries of the
Western Hemisphere whose governments the United States would most like
to overthrow -- Venezuela and Cuba -- have the greatest national
obsession with baseball outside of the United States?


Reason Number 3,467 for having doubts about our God-given
free-enterprise system I recently bought my first cellphone and took it
with me to Burlington, Vermont, only to discover that it didn't work
there. It seems that AT&T/Cingular doesn't have cellphone towers in
that area. But other phone companies do have towers there and their
subscribers' phones work. Is that not a really clever system?

To have a single national telephone system with all towers available
for use by everyone would presumably upset libertarians and others who
worship at the shrine of competition.. So instead we're given another
charming "market solution", and the beauty of competition is preserved.
Why stop there?  Just imagine the advantages in being able to call
around to find out which fire station will give you the best rate
should your house suddenly go up in flames.


An unwelcome guest at the table of respectable opinion
In the September edition of this report I presented a review of New
York Times reporter Tim Weiner's new book "Legacy of Ashes: The History
of the CIA". It was rather critical of the book, particularly as to
what has been left out about CIA operations and the effect upon foreign
peoples of these operations. The net result of these numerous omissions
is to paint a picture of US foreign policy that significantly downplays
the actions most destructive to the peace, prosperity, and happiness of
the world.  It's an old story -- the media decide which issues to cover
in the first place; they then decide how many sides there are to an
issue; and then they decide what type of coverage is "balanced". The
major ideological problem of the American media is that they do not
believe that they have any ideology.

But I wondered if I was not being somewhat unfair to Weiner in one or
more cases; perhaps he had a good reason for some of his omissions;
perhaps in the 700 pages, including 155 pages of small-type notes, I
had missed something I thought had been omitted. I decided to send a
copy of the review to him, hopefully to get his reaction, and wrote to
the Times asking for his email address. I got back an email from Weiner
himself which read, in full:

"Dear Mr. Blum: I read your review several days ago. And I've read all
your books. best wishes, tw"

No challenges to anything I said; no corrections. I'd be surprised if
he's done more than skim a few pages of any of my books. His letter is
his way of saying: "I really don't want to hear from you again. Our
worlds are not designed for mingling. Our truths are not the same, and
neither my publisher nor the New York Times pays me to disseminate
yours."


NOTES
[1] Haaretz.com (Israeli newspaper), October 1, 2007

[2] Haaretz.com, October 25, 2007; print edition October 26

[3] Newsweek, October 20, 2007

[4] Washington Post, May 6, 2004

[5] Washington Post, July 22, 2007, p.B7, op-ed by Dobbins

[6] Washington Post, June 18, 2006, p.16

[7] White House press release, October 10, 2003

[8] Press release from the Cuban Mission to the United Nations, October
17, 2007, re this and preceding three paragraphs.

[9] Department of State, "Foreign Relations of the United States,
1958-1960, Volume VI, Cuba" (1991), p.885

[10] Washington Post, October 31, 2007, p.12


William Blum is the author of:

Killing Hope: US Military and CIA Interventions Since World War 2
Rogue State: A Guide to the World's Only Superpower
West-Bloc Dissident: A Cold War Memoir
Freeing the World to Death: Essays on the American Empire
       Portions of the books can be read, and signed copies purchased,
at <www.killinghope.org > Previous Anti-Empire Reports can be read at
this website at "essays". To add yourself to this mailing list simply
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