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Friday, December 31st, 2004
Volume 3, No. 21
7 Articles, 12 Pages

1. Letter from Israel
2. The Oil-For-Food 'Scandal" is a Cynical Smokescreen
3. US Casualty Toll in Iraq
4. How to End the Iraq War
5. Methane Burps: Ticking Time Bomb
6. Public Education in America Faces Complete Privatization
7. US Diplomats Are Guests in Cuba, Need to Grow Up


1. LETTER FROM ISRAEL: THE THIRD INTIFADA

BY

RAN HACOHEN

"Yes to peace, No to the Wall" To appreciate the breathtaking magnanimity expressed by this short slogan, one needs to remember its context. Imagine: a foreign army occupies your village for decades, reduces you to subjects without any rights, arrests you arbitrarily, savagely tortures the arrested, and, on top of it all, sends mighty bulldozers to erect a gigantic wall on your land, locking you up as in a cage. And your reaction? Peaceful demonstrations, shouting "No to the Wall" – but "Yes to Peace," to peace with your very oppressor and dispossessor.

Budrus, where this slogan was coined, is a small village of some 1,200 Palestinians in the northern part of the West Bank, just across the Green Line. Few Israelis have heard of it; but some may remember neighboring Kibia, just a mile to the east, where, on Oct. 14th, 1953, an Israeli army unit – led by a young officer called Ariel Sharon – ravaged the village (then still under Jordanian rule), destroying 40 houses and killing more than 50 people, an atrocity that caused international outrage and was strongly condemned by the UN Security Council.

Half a century after that massacre, PM Ariel Sharon sent his bulldozers to the same rural area. Many imagine the Wall as a kind of border separating Israel from the Palestinian territories. The facts are different: the Wall twists like a snake entirely inside the Palestinian territory, and – in combination with other physical barriers, most notoriously roads for-Israelis-only – it creates numerous small enclaves, in which Palestinian villages and towns – sometimes just a few hundred people, less than in any average prison – are locked up, unable to leave their unsafe haven except by mercy of an Israeli soldier at the gate, when equipped with proper permits issued (or rather not issued) by the Israeli army. The contiguous territory in-between the enclaves is designated for the Israeli settlements.

Living in a Cage

A'ed Murar from Budrus counts three levels on which the Wall is destructive to Palestinian life. First the immediate level: the Wall makes the agricultural lands and water wells of the village, either because it is constructed on them, or because they are left outside the Wall, inaccessible to the farmers. The section of the population that depends on agriculture thus loses most of its means of survival.

The second level is imprisonment: there are no clinics or hospitals, no higher schools or universities, nor any other social and economic infrastructure inside the enclave; moreover, about 80% of Budrus' population works outside the village: they, too, lose their means of survival as their access to the outside world is dependent on Israeli army caprices.

The third level is that of nation and vision: by locking up the Palestinians and taking the land in-between the enclaves, Israel robs them of their future, of a contiguous territory for the Palestinian State promised in President's Bush roadmap. The Palestinians are thus left with no way to earn their living, with no infrastructure to run their present life, and with no hope for the future.

A Short History of the Wall

Historian and Ta'ayush activist Gadi Algazi distinguishes several periods in the construction of the Wall. From April 2002-May 2003, the Wall was built with incredible speed – 300-500 bulldozers working simultaneously – hardly attracting any public attention at all, neither in Israel nor abroad, thus enabling the Israeli government to quietly and irreversibly change the geography of the land for decades. The Israeli public had the illusion that the Wall was being built along the Green Line – a good reason for naïve peaceniks to support it – and that at worst it was perhaps conflicting with property rights of some Palestinian landowners along its route. Even the Palestinians could hardly grasp the full impact of the project, both because of its indeed incredible dimensions , and because Israel refused to publish any maps at the time, so that information was scarce in a West Bank hardly recovering from the massive Israeli aggression of "Operation Defensive Shield." Some resistance to the Wall was led by small groups of Israelis, international activists, and Palestinians, like in the Mas'ha camp.

May 2003 signaled a change: since then, the Wall has become the focus of media attention, and turned into a political issue in Israel and abroad. Demonstrations, many of them by Israelis and international activists, and their violent dispersion by the army increased public awareness and reduced the pace of construction. The clear decision of the International Court of Justice against the Wall as well as the critical position taken by the Israeli Supreme Court regarding its route mark a peak in the public struggle against the Wall; consequently, in the summer of 2004, the construction was virtually stopped, and the Israeli establishment started looking for new tactics.

In is in this period, in places like Budrus, that people like Mr. Murar – who had participated in the first Intifada and had been jailed and brutally tortured by Israelis – reached the conclusions that resistance to the Wall should be led and organized first of all by Palestinians themselves; that waiting quietly for courts and verdicts was not enough; and, above all, that nonviolent demonstrations were the best weapon of the weaker side. He believes this for moral reasons, but also because nothing could harm the Palestinian interest more than violence, immediately exploited by Israel to distract public attention from the Palestinian plight and to accelerate the construction project behind the thick screen of "fighting off terrorism." A'ed Murar calls it the Third Intifada: the Intifada against the Wall.

Since the Palestinian Authority offered no real strategy or help in the villagers' struggle, they had only themselves to rely on – aided by Israeli and international supporters, like Ta'ayush, International Solidarity movement, or Anarchists against the Wall. The Third Intifada is a popular uprising: in villages like Budrus, party affiliation and other differences are put aside, and the whole village marches together time after time to demonstrate against the Israeli bulldozers. Footage taken in several such demonstration shows the utter embarrassment of the Israeli soldiers, armed to the teeth against unarmed men, women, and children, who can stand for hours just a few meters away from them singing and shouting without any violence at all. If at last a single stone is thrown, the soldiers seem to be truly relieved: they immediately employ their heavy truncheons, shoot tear-gas and rubber-covered bullets at the crowd, and make violent arrests. But the resistance is not in vain: when a whole village stands together day after day, even the cruelest army must have second thoughts. So far, the demonstrations in Budrus managed to save the biggest plantation of the village from Israel's bulldozers.

Crucial Stage

The construction of the Wall, says Algazi, seems to have reached a crucial period. Following the verdicts from The Hague and Jerusalem, the Israeli establishment made a pause and took some time to reorganize and elaborate a new route and new strategies; these are now ready, and the construction of the Wall is about to resume in full speed. Signals and threats conveyed to inhabitants in Budrus make it clear that Israel is not going to give up easily on their land and water. The number of soldiers sent to demonstrations in villages like Budrus has been reduced, to increase the soldiers' insecurity and ease their finger on the trigger, and villagers are warned that if they do not capitulate this time, live ammunition may be used.

This nonviolent popular struggle is hardly reported in mainstream press. One needs to refer to alternative media to read about it. The idea of nonviolent Palestinian resistance sharply contradicts the stereotype of Palestinians as a "nation of suicide-bombers"; reporting peaceful Palestinian demonstrations is highly undesirable in official Israel's eyes. For all those reasons, this is a struggle very worthy of both public interest and support: The future of Israel/Palestine will be decided here, on the ground, rather than in press conferences in Washington or coalition intrigues in Jerusalem.

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2. THE OIL-FOR-FOOD 'SCANDAL' IS A CYNICAL SMOKESCREEN

BY

SCOTT RITTER

US Senators, led by the Republican Norm Coleman, have launched a crusade of sorts, seeking to "expose" the oil-for-food programme implemented by the UN from 1996 until 2003 as the "greatest scandal in the history of the UN". But this posturing is nothing more than a hypocritical charade, designed to shift attention away from the debacle of George Bush's self-made quagmire in Iraq, and legitimize the invasion of Iraq by using Iraq corruption, and not the now-missing weapons of mass destruction as the excuse.

The oil-for-food programme was derived from the US-sponsored Security Council resolution, passed in April 1995 but not implemented until December 1996. During this time, the CIA sponsored two coup attempts against Saddam, the second, most famously, a joint effort with the British that imploded in June 1996, at the height of the "oil for food" implementation negotiations. The oil-for-food programme was never a sincere humanitarian relief effort, but rather a politically motivated device designed to implement the true policy of the US – regime change.

Through various control mechanisms, the US and Great Britain were able to turn on and off the flow of oil as they saw best. In this way, the Americans were able to authorize a $1bn exemption concerning the export of Iraqi oil for Jordan, as well as legitimize the billion-dollar illegal oil smuggling trade over the Turkish border, which benefited NATO ally Turkey as well as fellow regime-change plotters in Kurdistan. At the same time as US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright was negotiating with Russian Foreign Minister Yevgeny Primakov concerning a Russian-brokered deal to end a stand–off between Iraq and the UN weapons inspectors in October-November 1997, the US turned a blind eye to the establishment of a Russian oil company set up on Cyprus.

This oil company, run by Primakov's sister, bought oil from Iraq under "oil for food" at a heavy discount, and then sold it at full market value to primarily US companies, splitting the difference evenly with Primakov and the Iraqis. This US-sponsored deal resulted in profits of hundreds of millions of dollars for both the Russians and Iraqis, outside the control of "oil for food". It has been estimated that 80% of the oil illegally smuggled out of Iraq under "oil for food" ended up in the US.

Likewise, using its veto-wielding powers on the 661 Committee, set up in 1990 to oversee economic sanctions against Iraq, the US was able to block billions of dollars of humanitarian goods legitimately bought by Iraq under the provisions of the oil-for-food agreement. And when Saddam proved too adept at making money from kickbacks, the US and Britain devised a new scheme of oil sales which forced potential buyers to commit to oil contracts where the price would be set after the oil was sold, an insane process which quickly brought oil sales to a halt, starving the oil-for-food programme of money to the point that billions of dollars of humanitarian contracts could not be paid for by the UN.

The corruption evident in the oil-for-food programme was real, but did not originate from within the UN, as Norm Coleman and others are charging. Its origins are in a morally corrupt policy of economic strangulation of Iraq implemented by the US as part of an overall strategy of regime change. Since 1991, the US had made it clear – through successive statements by James Baker, George W. Bush and Madeleine Albright – that economic sanctions, linked to Iraq's disarmament obligation, would never be lifted even if Iraq fully complied and disarmed, until Saddam Hussein was removed from power. This policy remained unchanged for over a decade, during which time hundreds of thousands of Iraqis died as a result of these sanctions.

While money derived from the off-the-book sale of oil did indeed go into the purchase of conventional weapons and the construction of presidential palaces, the vast majority of these funds were poured into economic recovery programmes that saw Iraq emerge from near total economic ruin in 1996. By 2002, on the eve of the US-led invasion, Baghdad was full of booming businesses, restaurants were full, and families walked freely along well-lit parks. Compare and contrast that image with the reality of Baghdad today, and the ultimate corruption that was the oil-for-food programme becomes self-evident.

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3. US CASUALTY TOLL IN IRAQ

BY

RALPH NADER

Dear President Bush:

On June 30th, 2004, I wrote you an open letter urging that your Administration include, in the US casualty toll, in Iraq: (1) injuries in non-combat situations: (2) personnel who have come down with disabling diseases; and (3) causes of mental trauma requiring evacuation from Iraq. You did not respond, nor did Senator John Kerry, who received a copy of the letter.

I should have added three additional categories which are also not part of the official casualty count - - (4) fatalities that occur after US military personnel are brought stateside; (5) soldiers committing suicide in Iraq; and (6) injuries and fatalities incurred by corporate contractors operating in the Iraq war theatre.

On November 21st, 2004, CBS' 60 Minutes led its program with a segment on the subject of uncounted "non-combat" casualties. 'They interviewed badly injured soldiers who were upset by their being excluded from the official count, even though they were, in one soldier's words, "in hostile territory." The Pentagon declined to be interviewed, instead sending a letter that contained information not included in published casualty reports. "More than 15,000 troops with so-called 'non-battle' injuries and diseases have been evacuated from Iraq," wrote the Department of Defense. John Pike, director of Global Security.org told 60 Minutes that this uncounted casualty figure "would have to be somewhere in the ballpark of over 20, maybe 30,000".

What's your problem here? The American people need to know the full casualty toll of US personnel in Iraq and know it regularly and in a timely fashion. Not to do so is disrespectful, especially of the military families, but none more so that of the soldiers themselves. As a severely wounded Chris Schneider said to CBS: "Every one of us went over there with the knowledge that we could die. And then they tell you - - you're wounded - - or your sacrifice doesn't deserve to be recognized or we don't deserve to be on their list - - it's not right. Its almost disgraceful."

Soldiers like Chris Schneider, Joel Gomez and Graham Alstrom want to know whether you are going to continue to stonewall their desire for official respect. What shall we tell them and others who seek that simple, decent official recognition? Please do not think that because you are a chronic non-responder to critical questions, you will be able to delay this growing demand indefinitely. Your hit and run photo opportunities with the troops just doesn't cut the mustard. Stand up and face it. It is the right thing to do by them.

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4. HOW TO END THE IRAQ WAR

BY

TOM HAYDEN

It is in the nature of truly mass movements that people choose the paths that seem to promise effective results, even victories. So it should surprise no one that much of the energy of the peace and justice movement flowed into presidential campaigns for Howard Dean, Dennis Kucinich and ultimately John Kerry (the UnBush).

As a result millions of people became engaged politically on grassroots levels, many for the first time. The peace and justice message was heard more widely than before.

Under pressure the Democratic platform opposed the Central American Trade Agreement (CAFTA) and promised a full review of US trade policy. The movement was unable to push Kerry and the Democrats into an anti-Iraq position, although Kerry at least voiced a constant attack on Bush's policy as mistaken. The pressure of antiwar voices and the Kerry campaign led Bush to delay the request for a supplemental $75 billion appropriation, the assault on Falluja, and the US-sponsored Iraqi elections until after Nov. 2nd.

Once the election was over, the Bush administration turned Falluja into a slaughterhouse – even as the Democrats remained silent and thousands of activists seemed frozen in mourning or internal discussions of what went wrong.

There is a lesson here for progressives. Since the anti-war sentiment was a factor of public opinion during the presidential race that made Bush defer tough decisions, the movement needs to create an even greater force of opposition that will become indigestible, a kind of gallstone in the stomach of power.

If this seems unlikely, one must remember that the war-makers are feverishly trying to manipulate the perceptions of restive Americans. They fear the multitudes. That is why reporters were embedded at the beginning. That is why the toppling of Saddam Hussein's statue on April 9th, 2003 was "stage-managed" by the US Army, according to the LA Times.

Even the most recent battle of Falluja was about "the American military intending to fight its own information war," as the New York Times observed. According to another Times article, the Falluja hospital was shut down on the first day of the operation because our Army considered it a "source of rumors about heavy casualties." A senior military official called the hospital "a center of propaganda" as scores of patients were being treated.

The importance of public opinion was stated quite frankly by Robert Kaplan, a leading neo-conservative, in the Atlantic Monthly last year. The most important battleground of America's new "combination warfare," he wrote, is the media:

Indeed the best information strategy is to avoid attention-getting confrontations in the first place and to keep the public's attention as divided as possible. We can dominate the world only quietly, so to speak. The moment the public focuses on a single crisis like the one in Iraq…it becomes a rallying point around which lonely and alienated people in a global mass society can defined themselves through an uplifting group identity, be it European, Muslim, anti-war intellectual, or whatever.

Therefore, public opinion – if strategically focused – can end this war. To understand this requires a different analysis than the usual one that assumes that there will be an "exit strategy" after Iraq is "stabilized." The war will end either when the US military "wins" or it will not end at all.

The Iraqi elections are designed to inflate the currently non-existent legitimacy of the Allawi regime by co-opting Shiite, Sunni and Kurdish parties, which are led mostly by long-time exiles. In this scenario., the new regime would technically end the occupation and "request" the US to stay until the country is "stabilized," which means permanently, i.e. fulfilling the long–term agenda of the neo-conservatives, now entrenched more deeply than ever at the pinnacles of power.

While it is theoretically possible (and in my view, desirable) that the January election might bring to power a Shiite-led coalition that would ask the US to withdraw troops, that is hardly the intent. The US still plans to permanently remake a new Iraq, plans that include American military bases, a privatized market economy, ready access to oil, a prime target for Western and, especially Christian, proselytizing in the region. According the Wall Street Journal, the US is already flooding Iraq with satellite dishes and television while privatizing its 200 state owned companies: Bremer discussed the need to privatize government with such fervor that his voice cut through the din of the cargo hold."

Instead of assuming that the Bush administration has an "exit strategy", the movement needs to force our government to exit. The strategy must be to deny the US occupation funding, political standing, sufficient troops, and alliances necessary to their strategy for dominance.

A Plan of Action

The first step is to build pressure at congressional district levels to oppose any further funding or additional troops for war. If members of Congress balk at cutting off all assistance and want to propose "conditions" for further aid, it is a small step toward threatening funding. If only 75 members of Congress go on record against any further funding, that's a step in the right direction – towards the exit.

The important thing is for anti-war activists to become more grounded in the everyday political life of their districts, organizing anti-war coalitions including clergy, labor and inner city representatives to knock loudly on congressional doors and demand that the $200 billion squandered on Iraq go to infrastructure and schools at home. When trapped between imperial elites and their own insistent constituents, members of Congress will tend to side with their voters. That is how the wars in Vietnam and Cambodia were ended in 1975.

Two, we need to build a Progressive Democratic movement which will pressure the Democrats to becomes an anti-war opposition party. The anti-war movement has done enough for the Democratic Party this year. It is time for the Democratic leadership to end its collaboration with the Bush Administration – with its endorsement of the offensive on Falluja, the talk of "victory" and "killing the terrorists" – and now play the rôle of the opposition. The progressive activists of the party should refuse to contribute any more resources – volunteers, money, etc. – to candidates or incumbents who act as collaborators.

Thought should be given to selectively challenging hawkish Democratic incumbents in primaries, and supporting peace candidacies in 2006 and 2008.

Three, we need to build alliances with Republican anti-war conservatives. Non-partisan anti-war groups (such as Win Without War) should reach out to conservatives who, according to the New York Times, are "ready to rumble" against Iraq. Pillars of the American right, including Paul Weyrich, Pat Buchanan and William F. Buckley, are seriously questioning the quagmire created by the neo conservatives. Strategists like Grover Norquist call the war "as drag on votes" and "threatening to the Bush coalition" that cost Bush six percentage point in the election. The left cannot create a left majority,, but it can foster a left-right majority that threatens the hawks in both parties.

Four, we must build solidarity with dissenting combat veterans, reservists, their families and those who suffered in 9/11. Just as wars cannot be fought without taxpayer funding, wars cannot be fought without soldiers willing to die, even for a mistake. Every person who cares about peace should start their daily email messages with the current body count, including a question mark after the category "Iraqi civilians."

Groups like Iraq Veterans Against the War deserve all the support the rest of the peace movement can give. This approach opens the door to much-needed organizing in both the so-called "red" states and inner cities, which give disproportionate levels of the lives lost in Iraq.

The movement will need to start opening another underground railroad to havens in Canada for those who refuse to serve, but for now even the most moderate grievances should be supported – for example, relief from the "back door draft" that is created by extending tours of duty.

Over one-third of some 3,900 combat veterans have resisted their call-ups, and the Army National Guard is at 10 percent of its recruitment goal. More generally, the "superpower" is stretched to a breaking point, with 14 of the Army's 33 combat brigades on front-line duty in Iraq. Though most discourse on Vietnam ignores or underplays the factor of dissent within the American armed forces, it was absolutely pivotal to bringing the ground war to an end. It already is becoming a real "gallstone" for the Pentagon again.

Five, we need to defeat the US strategy of "Iraqization." "Clearly, it It's better for us if they're in the front-line," Paul Wolfowitz explained last February. This cynical strategy is based on putting an Iraqi "face" on the US occupation in order to reduce the number of American casualties, neutralize opposition in other Arab countries, and slowly legitimize the puppet regime. In truth, it means changing the color of the body count.

The problem for the White House is that if the Iraqi police and troops will not suppress and kill other Iraqis on behalf of the US , the war effort will completely disintegrate. In April, the 200,000-strong Iraqi security forces assigned to Falluja simply collapsed. In the most recent battle of Falluja, the Iraqi troops took part in little of any combat,. In Mosul, insurgents seized five Iraqi police stations, not an uncommon event.

There is no sign, aside from Pentagon spin, that an Iraqi force can replace the American occupation in the foreseeable future. Pressure for funding cuts and for an early American troop withdrawal will expose the emptiness of the promise of "Iraqization." In Vietnam, the end quickly came when South Vietnamese troops were expected to defend their country. The same is likely to occur in Iraq – or the US can deepen its dilemma through permanent occupation.

Six, we should work to dismantle the US war "coalition" by building a "Peace Coalition" by the means of the global anti-war movement. Groups with international links (such as Global Exchange or other solidarity groups) could organize conferences and exchanges aimed at uniting public opinion against any regimes with troops supporting the US in Iraq. Every time an American official shows up in Europe demanding support, there should be speakers from the American anti-war movement offering a rebuttal to the official line.

Hungary is only the latest government to "bow to public pressure and prepare to bring its troops home". The others who have packed up or plan to depart include Spain, Costa Rica, the Dominican Republic, Nicaragua, Honduras, the Philippines, Norway, Poland, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Thailand, Singapore, Moldova and Bulgaria – 15 of the original 32. Japan is trying to limit its troops to non-combat roles.

The most frightening US "ally" is Pakistan, where 65 percent of the population has a favorable impression of Osama bin Laden and only seven percent a positive image of President Bush.

But the most important governments with troops still on the ground are Britain (8.361), South Korea (2,800), Italy (2,700) and more symbolically, Japan (550) and Australia (250). Peace movements have achieved majority or near-majority status in all five countries, with Britain being the most vulnerable. In addition, both France and Germany continue to resist the US dominated coalition, in part because of the movements in those countries. Any strategy to mobilize public opinion across Europe, especially in Britain and Italy, could complete America's isolation from its historic allies and the world in general.

With Secretary-General Kofi Annan suggesting that the Iraq policy is illegal, the Bush administration faces the danger of being frozen out of international diplomacy. At some point, the administration will painfully find that it cannot impose its will on everyone on the planet.

In short: pinch the funding arteries, push the Democrats to become an opposition party, ally with anti-war Republicans, support dissenting soldiers, making "Iraqization" more difficult, and build a peace coalition against the war coalition. If the politicians are too frightened or ideologically incapable of implementing an exit strategy, the only alternative is for the people to pull the plug.

Where do mass demonstrations and civil disobedience fit into this framework? Certainly Bush's inauguration will be an appropriate time to dissent in the streets. Nationwide rallies are an important way to remain visible, but many activists may tire if they see not strategic plan. The civil disobedience actions at Bechtel, the San Francisco financial district, and the Port of Oakland in early 2003 came closer to the strategy of pressuring the nerve centers of war. Care will have to be taken during such militant actions to send the clearest possible message to mainstream public opinion.

Time for Action

If this sounds "irresponsible," the "responsible" people have had their chance – they can still rig the Iraqi election to install a regime that will ask us to leave. After that, there's no hope but to begin the withdrawal one person, one community, one country at a time, until the president learns there's no there over there.

Ending this bloodbath is the most honorable task Americans can perform to restore progressive priorities and our respect in the world. We have passed the point for graceful exit strategies. Our policy is to go on mechanically killing people unless they vote in January for us to keep on killing people.

By any moral or economic accounting, we now are worsening the lives of Iraqis since the fall of Saddam. We have turned innocent young Americans into torturers in places like Abu Ghraib. When going into battle, we close hospitals first. We make sure that television and newspapers are not "able to show pictures of bleeding women and children being taken into hospital wards" – this reported on Veterans Day in the Times. Not even our friends like us anymore, whether we are tourists in Europe or diplomats at the UN.

We bomb Iraq towards an American-style market economy, passing along a 200 billion dollar war cost and trillion dollar debt cost to our children, while our own market economy has failed most of us: minimum wage, down thirty percent since 1978; company pensions, holders down 18 percent since 1979; median job tenure, down from 11 years to 7.7 since 1978; health insurance coverage, down from 70 percent to 63 percent since 1987.

We may even be making another 9/11-type attack more likely. What kind of government repeatedly states that another attack is "inevitable," "not a mater of if but when," then behaves in ways to provoke one?

Our priorities must change.

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5. METHANE BURPS: TICKING TIME BOMB

BY

JOHN ATCHESON

The Arctic Council's recent report on the effects of global warming in the far north paints a grim picture: global floods, extinction of polar bears and other marine mammals, collapsed fisheries. But it ignored a ticking time bomb buried in the Arctic tundra.

There are enormous quantities of naturally occurring greenhouse gases trapped in ice-like structures in the cold northern mud and at the bottom of the seas. These ices, called clathrates, contain 3,000 times as much methane as is in the atmosphere. Methane is more than 20 times as strong a green house gas as carbon dioxide.

Now here's the scary part. A temperature increase of merely a few degrees would cause these gases to volatilize and "burp" into the atmosphere, which would further raise temperatures., which would release yet more methane, heating the earth and seas further, and so on. There's 400 gigatons of methane locked in the frozen artic tundra – enough to start this chain reaction and the kind of warming the Arctic Council predicts is sufficient to melt the clathrates and release the greenhouse gases into the atmosphere.

Once triggered, this cycle could result in runaway global warming the likes of which even the most pessimistic doomsayers aren't talking about.

An apocalyptic fantasy concocted by hysterical environmentalists? Unfortunately, no. Strong geological evidence suggests something similar has happened at least twice before.

The most recent of these catastrophes occurred about 55 million years ago in what geologists call the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum (PETM), when methane burps caused rapid warming and massive die-offs, disrupting the climate for more than 100,000 years.

The granddaddy of these catastrophes occurred 251 million years ago, at the end of the Permian period, when a series of methane burps came close to wiping out all life on earth.

More than 94 percent of the marine species present in the fossil record disappeared suddenly as oxygen levels plummeted and life teetered on the verge of extinction. Over the ensuing 500,000 years, a few species struggled to gain a foothold in the hostile environment. It took 20 million to 30 million years for even rudimentary coral reefs to re-establish themselves and for forests to grow again. Ins some areas, it took more than 100 million years for ecosystems to reach their former healthy diversity.

Geologist Michael J. Benton lays out the scientific evidence for this epochal tragedy in a recent book, When Life Nearly Died: The Greatest Mass Extinction of All Time. As with the PETM, greenhouse gases, mostly carbon dioxide from increased volcanic activity, warmed the earth and seas enough to release massive amounts of methane from these sensitive clathrates, setting off a runaway green house effect.

The cause of all this havoc?

In both cases, a temperature increase of about 10.8 degrees Fahrenheit, about the upper range for the average global increase today's models predict can be expected from burning fossil fuels by 2100. But these models could be the tail wagging the dog since they don't add in the effect of burps from warming gas hydrates. Worse, as the Arctic Council found, the highest temperature increases from human greenhouse gas emissions will occur in the arctic regions – an area rich in these unstable clathrates.

If we trigger this runaway release of methane, there's no turning back. No do-overs. Once it starts, it's likely to play out all the way.

Humans appear to be capable of emitting carbon dioxide in quantities comparable to the volcanic activity that started these chain reactions. According to the US Geological Survey, burning fossil fuels releases more than 150 times the amount of carbon dioxide emitted by volcanoes – the equivalent of nearly 17,000 additional volcanoes the size of Hawaii's Kilauea.

And that is the time bomb the Arctic council ignored.

How likely is it that humans will cause methane burps by burning fossil fuels? No one knows. But it is somewhere between possible and likely at this point, and it becomes more likely with each passing year that we fail to act.

So forget rising sea levels, melting ice caps, more intensive storms, more floods, destruction of habitats and the extinction of polar bears. Forget warnings that global warming might turn some of the world's major agricultural areas into deserts and increase the range of tropical diseases, even though this is the stuff we're pretty sure will happen.

Instead, let's just get with the Bush administration's policy of pre-emption. We can't afford to have the first sign of a failed energy policy be the mass extinction of life on Earth. We have to act now.

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6. PUBLIC EDUCATION IN AMERICA FACES COMPLETE PRIVATIZATION

BY

JIM FARRELL

(Blue Print for Educators and Their Allies to Protect America's Public Schools)

A new report released today by the Commonweal Institute (CI),"Responding to the Attack on Public Education and Teacher Unions", shows how a well funded conservative movement is on the verge of creating a major shift toward privatization of the nation's public schools. Authored by David C. Johnson and Leonard M. Salle, the in-depth study is intended as a wake up call and offers a plan of action for those who care about protecting and improving America's public education system from its adversaries.

"Most Americans are unaware of the threat posed by this well-organized and funded assault on our nation's public schools. The threat is real and it is urgent. Teacher organizations, however, are quite familiar with the efforts to undermine public schools through vouchers and privatization. What we are doing here is showing how they can respond effectively to protect our children's public schools," said Mr. Salle, who is the President of the Commonweal Institute.

The report shows that the attack on public education is part of a broader "conservative" opposition to many "liberal" institutions and policies, such as organized labor, progressive taxation, regulation of business, reproductive choice, and the environment. The CI report exposes the anti-public education perspectives being marketed daily to the American public by an ultra-conservative movement led by Grover Norquist and others. It lays out how Americans now hear almost exclusively hard-right messaging from such diverse sources as Rush Limbaugh, Fox News, and "talking heads" from conservative think tanks.

Although the new report focuses on public education, it also makes it clear that the conservative movement is positioned for success in multiple other areas of their agenda.

The report also provides a detailed plan for those who support public education to be able to compete with the conservative movement in this country. It shows how public education advocates can work with allies to form a network of organizations and individuals – an infrastructure – that will craft and distribute their messages to the broad public and provide an alternative perspective to what Americans now hear and see. A determined and coordinated effort by public education advocates and their allies can be expected to result in much stronger political and public support for public education.

"Today's report shows that, in this new era of No Child Left Behind, it is imperative that moderate and progressive citizens organize to create a new, substantial messaging infrastructure to combat a conservative movement in this country. If there is no effective counter-force, ultra-conservatives will continue to advance their ideological agenda without significant opposition," says Mr. Salle. "The only electable candidates for public office, of any party, will be those who embrace conservative ideology, including privatization of public education, because that is what the public will have been conditioned to believe is in their best interests."

The report is available online at: http://commonwealinstitute.org/reports/Responding_Ed_Report.pdf

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7. US DIPLOMATS ARE GUESTS IN CUBA, NEED TO GROW UP

EDITORIAL FROM THE DECATUR DAILY

US diplomats in Cuba should abide by that country's government and remove Christmas decorations.

We struggle enough with international relations without deliberately provoking hostility. As guests in Cuba, our diplomats should abide by that government's wishes.

The US Interest Section, headed by James Cason, erected a huge white Santa Claus, images of galloping reindeer, a flashing sign wishing Cubans a happy Christmas, white lights and candy canes.

Also included in the display was a sign with the number "75," a reference to the number of political dissidents jailed in Cuba last year.

Mr. Cason ignored a recent request from the Cuban government to remove the decorations.

There are times when Cuba takes actions that the US correctly opposes. This is not one of them. We are a guest in Cuba. If our diplomats are not capable of honoring the wishes of their hosts, it is time they returned home.

Mr. Cason is regularly demonstrating his confusion about his role in Cuba. Just weeks before his decorating binge, Mr. Cason made a public appearance at an anti-Castro meeting. Just days before, he organized a ceremony in which he placed the names of jailed dissidents in a time capsule. Just hours before that, he publicly proclaimed the imminent end of communist control in Cuba.

Were the decorations on his house rather than a US controlled building on Cuban soil, his bravado might make more sense. In words that suggest political aspirations, Mr. Cason said, "They could expel us, they could continue to hinder our activities. We don't know what they're going to do. … We're prepared to pay whatever price for the things we believe in."

If he were the only one paying that price, his stand might seem laudable. But he is not. Mr. Cason is an employee of the US. The people of the US did not hire him to make a sophomoric stance against a sovereign nation.

It is fine and wonderful to decorate for Christmas in America, a free country. Cuba is not a free country.

Cuba should provide him with a one-way ticket home, where he can fill his yard with all the Santas he wants. Absent that, it may be time to squeeze him into the same time capsule he used to pick fights with the Cuban government.

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