On Tuesday’s Your World, guest host Alexis Glick didn’t bother to hide her horror that Wal-Mart had signed a letter endorsing President Obama’s plan to require big businesses to give their employees health insurance. “What in the world is going on at Wal-Mart,” she asked as if the very notion of ensured coverage were an outrage.
What can the progressive movement learn from the LGBT community? On the 40th anniversary of Stonewall there has been a good deal of reflection and soul searching on the role of the struggle for gay rights within the larger civil rights movement. Yesterday when Barack Obama met with gay couples in the White House he said, “It’s not for me to tell you to be patient any more than it was for others to counsel patience to African-Americans who were petitioning for equal rights a half-century ago. We’ve been in office six months now. I suspect that by the time this administration is over, I think you guys will have pretty good feelings about the Obama administration.” That could be applied to a number of issues, not only those affecting the LGBT community.
Today, all U.S. troops must be withdrawn from Iraqi cities, including U.S. bases in Baghdad, according to the Status Of Forces Agreement (SOFA) between the U.S. and Iraq. The Iraqi government will also take legal responsibility for the actions of U.S. troops and have legal jurisdiction over American soldiers who commit crimes off-base and off-duty, and the SOFA will grant permission to U.S. troops for military operations, as well as ban the U.S. from staging attacks on other countries from Iraq.
While it may seem like a step forward toward ending the six-year occupation of Iraq, the Pentagon is doing what it can to dodge or play down these SOFA stipulations. In recent weeks, it has been re-classifying bases and troops, hiring “corporate security” mercenaries, and preventing Iraq from having jurisdiction over those actions. It’ll get away with it too, as Congress never ratified the SOFA, and because many are justifying further occupation under the banner of keeping Iraq secure.
Bob Woodward’s piece for the WaPo, in which he recounts national security advisor Jim Jones telling military leaders that any further calls for more troops in Afghanistan would occasion a “Whiskey Tango Foxtrot moment” from Obama, has both COINdinistas and contraCOINers discussing prioritization of the (still benchmarkless) strategy’s confusing components in Afghanistan.
Marine general Lawrence Nicholson is quoted by Woodward as having a mission of “Protect the populace by, with and through the ANSF,” where “killing the enemy is secondary.” By contrast, Obama back in his March Af/Pak stratergy speech said that “These soldiers and Marines will take the fight to the Taliban in the south and east, and give us a greater capacity to partner with Afghan Security Forces and to go after insurgents along the border.” Pretty much everyone agrees that there aren’t enough troops on the ground – whether they be U.S., allied or local Afghan forces – to cover all the bases; to both secure population centers in a COIN “clear, hold and build” operation and to go after the insurgency in its own rural and border territory. Something has to give – and it looks like it will be the latter.
Paul Bass of the New Haven Independent catches up with President Lieberman, who says a public plan is not going to happen — because he’s going to rally a bipartisan Senate group against it.
Which, of course, instantly spawned much fond nostalgia from veterans of the 2006 campaign.
This week, workers at Hartmarx Factory won a major victory against Wells Fargo, as Wells Fargo agreed to keep their factory open. The story of the Hartmarx workers had drawn national attention as they threatened to occupy their factory if Wells Fargo closed it. Their victory yesterday represents a major triumph in the growing trend of factory sit ins that started last December when workers, members of United Electrical, Radio, and Machine Workers (UE) occupied the Republic Windows and Doors factory in Chicago
Last January, Hartmarx, the maker of men’s apparel and an employer of nearly 4,000 people, filed for bankruptcy after Wells Fargo refused to extend them a line of credit. Wells Fargo then pushed for the company to be liquidated in order to increase their short term profits. They favored liquidating the factory and laying off the 4,000 workers despite the fact that there were proposals by several groups to purchase the company and keep it running.
As the US military launches operation “Strike of the Sword” in Afghanistan, sending 4,000 newly arrived Marines and 650 Afghan forces into the Helmland River valley, we must consider how this major offensive will impact Afghan civilians forced to flee this war torn region. Rough estimates from The Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan (RAWA) suggest there are already up to 1,000 Helmland families living in refugee camps near Kabul. Who knows how many thousands more families will seek shelter in these camps in the ensuing weeks due to deadly battles in Helmland or anywhere else in Afghanistan. One thing is clear though, which Tom Hayden nailed in his recent piece on the Long War, “American troops can never “protect” Afghanistan civilians from American troops!”
The Afghan Women’s Mission and RAWA have been working tirelessly to help Afghan refugees in dire need, despite threats from warlords and the Afghan intelligence agency. At this point, refugees lack food more than anything else. Just consider what the prices of food are in an Afghan market (based on a exchange rate of $1 US = 50.2 Afghanis):
5 kg ghee = 247 Afg
4 kg rice = 145 Afg
50 kg flour = 1100 Afg
A middle quality blanket = 500 Afg
A middle quality tent carpet = 2000 Afg
The simultaneous conflicts in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan and beyond are all connected to the Pentagon strategy of “the Long War” projected to last fifty years in “the arc of crisis” that just happens to stretch across Muslim lands where there are oil reserves and plans for Western-dominated pipelines. The term “Long War” was introduced by Gen. John Abizaid in the 1990s and is the perspective of counterinsurgency experts around the Pentagon and think tanks led by the Center for New American Security.
The Long War will require a long peace movement, and a different one.
Many veterans of the movement against the Iraq War, impacted by the multiple wars, the financial and budget crises, and confused about the Obama era, are pondering the question of what to think and do. The following are brief notes outlining a possible strategy.
I’ve been fighting breast cancer for 16 years now, and am gratefully in recovery from my third bout.
I’m lucky to be one of the ones who fought and won, but there are many who fought and lost.
The New York Times has a story this morning about the number of people who had health insurance that were nonetheless driven into personal bankruptcy because of their medical bills. I’ve written before that despite being fully insured by Blue Cross, the cost has been enormous.
Fighting for your life and knowing you could lose everything you have in the process is agonizing.
So when I see women like Kay Hagan who oppose a public plan because she wants “to ensure private health insurance isn’t going to be destabilized,” I take it pretty personally.
I would like to invite you to an event with Congresswoman Maxine Waters that will be held at Brave New Studios on Thursday, July 2nd. Representative Waters has served as a Democratic member of the U.S. House of Representatives since 1991 for California’s 35th congressional district. She sits on the Committee on the Judiciary and the subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security, among others. She co-founded and chairs the Congressional Out of Iraq Caucus and serves as a member of the Congressional Progressive Caucus. Representative Waters is someone with an insider perspective on Congress and will be discussing U.S. involvement in Afghanistan and other important legislative topics.
You will not want to miss this discussion.
Here are the event details:
Date: Thursday, July 2nd
Location: 10536 Culver Boulevard, Culver City, CA 90232
Please enter through the gate behind the building.
Time: 5 pm
RSVP: Please RSVP by emailing ewagner@bravenewfoundation.org
Seating is very limited, so we will be taking a small number of RSVPs.
Parking: There is free parking on the streets on either side of our building. Please do not park in the parking spots behind the building as they are reserved.
I hope you can join us at the Brave New Foundation offices for this event.
