Australian Courts free themselves from draconian Migration Act laws

Moves are afoot from the judiciary, indicating it's sick of the intransigence of the Howard government's Department of Immigration, the draconian Immigration legislation as laid down in the Migration Act, and the deepseated misery it has created amongst asylum seekers and refugees.

There is some good news today, and I think it stands in a context of developments around Australia which are also good news. The judiciary is developing some independence and opinion. Of course it always has had an opinion, but it seems that there is a shift. Below is news from the NSW Law Council, announcing it will embark on a project seeking to ask questions about permanent detention of asylum seekers, it will even question the need for detention itself. The judiciary are not just public servants, following laws made by politicians, but the courts have a duty to test laws against a broader framework, even in Australia, where we, I think, are in dire need for a Bill of Rights.

Last week Justice Justice Michael Kirby, at the University of Wellington, delivered Deep lying Rights - A Constitutional Conversation Continues as the 2004 Robin Cooke lecture, and he indicated that under the majority government of Howard since the 2004 election, the judiciary has a mandate to even more so scruninise the material presented before it. He also argued, and not for the first time, that Australia may need a Bill fo Rights:

"In Australia, we have a written Constitution that is accepted as enjoying a superior and entrenched status. As Justice McHugh remarked in Al-Kateb, Australia may now need a written Bill of Rights despite the opposition to that notion on the part of those on different sides in politics who cling to the idea of unrestrained legislative power and talk misleadingly of 'parliamentary sovereignty'."

Further, Justice Kirby goes on to remark about the role of the courts under a majority government:

"Where governments enjoy large majorities in a unicameral parliament, or effective majorities in both houses of a bicameral parliament, the role of the courts in protecting minority rights becomes more important. It is a power to be exercised lawfully, wisely and for the purpose of protecting the true sovereign - all of the people of the polity concerned... The temper of the present time is, sadly, often angry. In such a time, the calm and resolute voice of the judges, listening to the centuries, upholding fundamentals when they lawfully can, is more needed than ever before."

Opinion writer for The Australian Dennis Shenahan doesn't like it much and a discission item on the Kirby speech and the need for a Bill of Rights ensued on Margo Kingston's Web Diary.

Elizabeth Colman, in The Australian (Kirby prepared to curb Howard, November 25, 2004) writes about Kirby's speech:

HIGH Court judge Michael Kirby signalled last night that he was prepared to rein in the Howard Government's enhanced mandate, saying the rights of minorities were at risk of being abused.

Justice Kirby warned the Government that it still had to share constitutional power with the judiciary, despite the October 9 election granting the Coalition an absolute majority in the Senate.

Attorney-General Philip Ruddock hit back, saying the judiciary's role was to back parliament.

"There is in Australia respective roles for the legislature and the judiciary and I would anticipate any judge in any proceedings would uphold the law of Australia," he said.

Justice Kirby emphasised the reluctance of the High Court to override federal laws out of concern for human rights, pointing to the decision to overturn the Family Court's ruling that children be released from detention.

In a speech to the University of Wellington in New Zealand, Justice Kirby said the Constitution denied parliament "uncontrolled power".

"A democracy, and especially a federation such as Australia, is a place of shared powers. It has many checks and balances," he said. "The calm and resolute voice of the judges ... upholding fundamentals when they lawfully can, is more needed than ever before."

Judges' traditional role as parliamentary watchdogs would become "more important" after the Howard Government gained control of the Senate on July 1, he said.

"Where governments enjoy large majorities in a unicameral parliament, or effective majorities in both houses of a bicameral parliament, the role of the courts in protecting minority rights becomes more important".

Judges were a "calm" voice in the face of the largely reactive political landscape, Justice Kirby said.

"The protection of fundamental human rights, and especially the rights of minorities, is one of the great issues of the law and of the world today ... The judiciary has an essential role in achieving that end."

Justice Kirby said he was particularly concerned about the rights of minorities in the new era of government power, and renewed calls for an entrenched bill of rights.

"Parliaments, from time to time, overlook or even override the fundamental rights of minorities. In Australia, this has been done to those of minority religions, communists, refugees and others, including a minority I understand well, homosexual people," he said.

"Australia may now need a written bill of rights, despite the opposition to that notion on the part of those on different sides in politics who cling to the idea of unrestrained legislative power and talk misleadingly of 'parliamentary sovereignty'."

"To talk of parliamentary 'sovereignty' is ... misleading. It leads parliamentarians to believe that they enjoy a plenary and uncontrolled power. At least under Australia's constitutional arrangements, that is never so".

Link to the article in The Australian

Today three Woomera escapees went to the Magistrates' court in Adelaide. AAP reports:

"The Afghan men escaped the now-closed Woomera detention centre, in SA's far north, in 2002. The court was told the men, all of whom suffered mental illness and had attempted self-harm while in detention, had not intended to escape but had been encouraged by protesters. Chief Magistrate Kelvyn Prescott did not record a conviction against the men but ordered them to enter a $100 12-month good behaviour bond. "Your particular circumstances evoke a great deal of sympathy," Mr Prescott told them."

And the ABC reports: "The men's lawyer, Claire O'Connor, urged magistrate Kelvin Prescott not to record a conviction because her clients were suffering mental illnesses brought on by their detention. Mr Prescott agreed, saying psychiatric reports clearly showed that the men were under severe mental strain."

The results of this court case may not be earthshattering, but they are significant in terms of the incalculation of the growing body of evidence about circumstances of detention, built up over the last three years. For me, today is a day of celebration.

Refugee group backs Woomera escape ruling

ABC NEWS ONLINE
Wednesday, December 1, 2004. 2:05pm (AEDT)

There are hopes a court ruling against the conviction of three escapees from the Woomera Detention Centre will have wider implications for Australia's immigration laws.

South Australia's chief magistrate, Kelvin Prescott, yesterday ruled that the Afghan asylum seekers were suffering from mental illness at the time of the escape in 2002.

Jack Smit from refugee lobby group Project SafeCom says the ruling indicates the courts are fed up with what he says is the atrocious way Australia treats asylum seekers.

"I'm just glad that the courts now have, in terms of mandatory detention, come of age, if you like," he said.

"Because... for three years it has been clear to me and many, many other people around Australia and around the world that Australia's methods of dealing with asylum seekers is atrocious."

http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200412/s1255613.htm

Move to change migration law

Sydney Morning Herald
By Cynthia Banham
November 29, 2004

A group of high-profile lawyers, appalled by a recent High Court decision to uphold the Federal Government's right to detain asylum seekers indefinitely, have banded together to seek an overhaul of migration law.

In an unexpected move, the Law Council of Australia has set up a working group to examine possible legal reform of mandatory detention, saying lawyers have a responsibility to fight for the "fundamental human right" to liberty.

In August the High Court said the Migration Act - which allowed failed asylum seekers who could not be deported because no other country would accept them to be locked up for indefinite periods - was valid, a fact one of the majority judges, Justice Michael McHugh, said was "tragic".

The working group, which will be chaired by the Law Council president, Stephen Southwood, QC, and includes Sydney barrister Bret Walker, SC, will examine whether any further legal challenges are possible to the act.

If the lawyers decide no further challenges are possible, the group will consider whether legal reform is needed to give the courts a greater role in overseeing the long-term detention of asylum seekers, in terms of reviewing how long people had been detained, why they were still there, and what steps had been taken to finalise their refugee claims or deport them.

But the Law Council's working group will also look at whether detention is necessary at all, or whether there should be time caps of 18 months or two years on detention periods, after which asylum seekers should be released into the community under monitoring arrangements.

Because mandatory detention had bipartisan political support, Mr Southwood conceded the working groups faced significant obstacles.

But the Northern Territory barrister, who cited the example of the successful campaign begun by lawyers to repeal the Territory's mandatory sentencing rules, said the difficulty in the task did not mean "the argument should not be put, or an appropriate attempt made".

"Someone has to start the debate," Mr Southward said.

He said the working group's starting point was that the "liberty of the subject, and the liberty of aliens, is really the most fundamental of the human rights", and that lawyers had "a major role in ensuring the liberty of individuals".

The Immigration Department says there are 42 people in immigration detention centres who have been there for four years or more. Peter Qasim, a stateless asylum seeker born in Kashmir, has been in detention the longest - for six years and two months.

Mr Southwood said the Law Council's aim would be to "elevate the debate" over immigration detention, and try and demonstrate it was possible to achieve the Government's objective of national security while also maintaining people's right to liberty.

He pointed to a number of factors which he said meant an overhaul of immigration detention might be achievable today. Among them were that people were being held longer and longer, and that the Government had set up better systems to stop human trafficking.

"I think if [governments] continue to invest resources at the core area as opposed to the other end in terms of the detention, people will be more confident that the floodgates aren't going to open and we aren't suddenly going to be overwhelmed by populations of people," Mr Southwood said.

Link to the SMH article

Judge renews call for bill of rights

The Age
By Meaghan Shaw
Canberra
November 26, 2004

High court judge Michael Kirby has urged the judiciary to be vigilant to protect human rights and counterbalance governments with large majorities.

In a speech delivered in New Zealand yesterday, he also rekindled debate on an Australian bill of rights.

Justice Kirby said Australian parliamentarians did not have uncontrolled power - rather their powers were subject to the written constitution and court scrutiny. "Where governments enjoy large majorities in a unicameral parliament, or effective majorities in both houses of a bicameral parliament, the role of the courts in protecting minority rights becomes more important," he said.

He lamented Australia's history of parliaments overriding the fundamental rights of minorities. "In Australia, this has been done to those of minority religions, communists, refugees and others, including a minority I understand well - homosexual people."

Justice Kirby raised the issue of a bill of rights as he referred to recent High Court decisions upholding the mandatory detention of children and the indefinite detention of stateless asylum seekers. In those cases, the court found Parliament's laws to be valid despite a breach of international law. He said it was inevitable that calls for a constitutional bill of rights would grow as the High Court's "willingness" to find rights implied in the language and structure of the Constitution receded.

Attorney-General Philip Ruddock said the Government was not convinced of the need for a bill of rights: "We've been committed to the protection of human rights and we consider our democratic institutions - our Constitution, common law and current law including the anti-discrimination legislation we have in place - are adequate for that purpose."

Link to article in The Age

High stakes, when the right to detain is a given

Sydney Morning Herald
November 30, 2004

Lawyers' associations have a vital role to play in questioning new laws, writes Bret Walker.

Murderers sentenced to life, and political calls for them to be cemented in jail. Prisoners sentenced to long imprisonment for terrible crimes, unrepentant and unreformed, serving their entire punishment, and then being held in custody to prevent them committing further offences, to public acclaim.

Unsuccessful asylum-seekers, refused entry because their claims of persecution are not believed, but unable to be returned home, or somewhere equivalent, because of threats, unrest or even war - and detained in custody in Australia, indefinitely.

What do these people, wretched as they are, have in common apart from that state? Some are being punished for what they have done, some have been punished in full for what they have done and are now jailed not to be punished but to prevent crimes not committed, and others have committed no offence and are not being punished, yet are in jail. Some know when they will be released; others could not possibly guess.

Parliament has enacted laws which authorise some people to be detained indefinitely, in some cases it seems for life, who have committed no crime and are not considered dangerous. So the High Court recently held, rejecting a challenge to the validity of laws permitting unsuccessful asylum seekers to be detained in custody, pending deportation. The indefinite duration arises when deportation is impossible, for various reasons including reasons not the fault of the detainee.

The loss of any individual's liberty is always serious. Now the High Court has declared such laws are valid, the question is whether those valid laws are good laws.

This is why the Law Council of Australia has set up a working group to examine possible reform of mandatory detention. People may ask whether it is appropriate for lawyers be involved in an issue like this.

Among the few voices raised to question the merits of the laws that create and continue the plights of persons mentioned above are the several strands of advocacy championed by the legal profession. Mostly, we speak through our peak body, the Law Council of Australia, or through local or specialised associations, or groups focused on criminal, migration or legal aid issues.

Apart from the differences one can spot between these various groups, it's not to be forgotten that the tens of thousands of lawyers in whose names, supposedly, those reform pleas are voiced, do not all oppose those penal, criminal or migration laws. Lawyers probably divide, politically, on these issues more or less as the general body of voters is split.

Three problems are, I think, unavoidable with such lawyers' advocacy. First, the more the legal bodies rely on their members' deeper and more detailed acquaintance with the rough end of these controversial polices, the more our general audience or readership - and their lightning-rods, our parliamentarians and ministers - distrust what is too easily dismissed as special pleading by a self-absorbed coterie of specialists. That answer is nearly always wrong about the lawyers' motives, but then none of us wants self-described experts to monopolise the debate, let alone decision, on these important public policies. The trouble is, why would anyone prefer the thunder of ignorance to the complaints of experience?

Second, there will forever be the confusion between lawyers arguing for fair process and tolerable principles on the one hand, and defending or promoting appalling, dangerous or illegal conduct on the other. How often is it sneeringly said of such lawyers that they should be ignored because no one decent could countenance supporting murderers, rapists, illegal aliens, etc? And some of those who sneer will never be persuaded by being asked to imagine their son, brother, mother in trouble and then the independence of critical lawyers is suddenly prized, by them at least, for once.

Finally, simply because the laws which are criticised by lawyers on those occasions manifest the policy choices of some government, the lawyers' organisations are taken to be partisan opponents of the Government. That is nearly always inaccurate or an overstatement. For one thing, in law and order debates, it's a rare thing for parliamentary oppositions to oppose the Government apart from urging further and further in the same direction.

For another thing, it reduces matters of transcendent importance, individual liberty, the international obligation to relieve the victims of disaster, and mercy - to mere aspects of day-to-day politics.

The wide range of people whose cases attract interventions by the legal profession at this political level defies simple description. The principles at stake are important for all manner of people and emergencies. If lawyers did not speak up to question the lengths these laws go to, their details as they are administered and their human consequences, who should? The Government won't, the Opposition daren't, and lawyers' organisations can.

Bret Walker is a Sydney SC, and a member of the Law Council's working group on the indefinite detention of asylum seekers.

Link to the SMH article

Law Council seeks to challenge High Court decision on asylum seeker detention

ABC Radio | The World Today
Monday 29 November 2004 12:26:00
Reporter: Jayne-Maree Sedgman

ELEANOR HALL: Even as he ruled that the Government's immigration detention policy was legal, one of the High Court judges who made the decision described it as tragic.

Now the Law Council of Australia is moving to overturn the controversial ruling which found that the Federal Government does have the right to detain asylum seekers indefinitely, even if no other country will accept them.

The Council has established a working group to determine if the High Court decision, handed down three months ago, can be challenged. And the Council's President, Stephen Southwood QC, says that if there are no legal avenues available, then the Law Council will lobby for reform of the system.

Stephen Southwood has been speaking to Jayne-Maree Sedgman.

STEPHEN SOUTHWOOD: It's not that we so much disagree with the decision of the High Court. The High Court's function is to declare the law as it is. We have been monitoring the workings of the migration act and the position of asylum seekers for some time now.

It's really the effect of those decisions which has caused us to decide to review the state of the law as it is now, to see whether there are any additional arguments which may be put to the High Court and if not to look at making recommendations as to what we think might be appropriate amendments to the migration act in circumstances where it now does seem as though people can be detained for very long periods of time.

JAYNE-MAREE SEDGMAN: Realistically, are there many areas of legal challenge open to you, are there many apparent at this stage?

STEPHEN SOUTHWOOD: On the face of it, it looks as though any potential for further argument is very limited, so I think our major emphasis will probably end up being on a review of the legislation and considering what amendments we think can be made with the aim of trying to ensure maximum liberty, while at the same time recognising the need for there to be proper steps taken in this area to ensure national security.

JAYNE-MAREE SEDGMAN: Once you've examined the current system and come up with a number of reforms, can you take us through the process from there?

STEPHEN SOUTHWOOD: Well, what we will then be doing is in effect making a submission, firstly to the directors of the Law Council of Australia for their consideration and approval and if they approve the submission we make and the recommendations that are contained therein, we will be making a submission to both the Minister for Immigration ... or for Migration I should say, and also the Attorney-General.

JAYNE-MAREE SEDGMAN: You're looking for the courts to play a greater role when it comes to determining what should happen to people who have been in detention long term.

Are you optimistic that you will get the Government onside when it comes to reforming this process? I mean, you're effectively taking away some of the power that the current government currently has.

STEPHEN SOUTHWOOD: I think convincing the Government of the view that amendments are necessary will be difficult. However, simply because the job's hard it shouldn't mean that we shouldn't undertake it.

So we are anticipating that it will be a matter which will involve fairly extensive submissions and is going to take time. But I think when you have people being locked up for more than four years, and those people could have contributed to society, whether it be in Australia or somewhere else, it's time to have a real good look at what's happening.

ELEANOR HALL: President of the Law Council of Australia, Stephen Southwood QC, speaking to Jayne-Maree Sedgman.

http://www.abc.net.au/worldtoday/content/2004/s1253914.htm

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Antony Loewenstein: Australia reports Arafat's death and legacy

Antony Loewenstein writes the Engineering Consent column for Margo Kingston's Webdiary on the workings of the media. He also wrote a chapter in Margo's book Not Happy John!, and he writes for Counterpunch. This article was first written for and published at Margo Kingston's Webdiary, and it is reproduced here with his permission. You can e-mail Anthony at antloew(at)yahoo.com.au

Israel has a population of about five million Jews and nearly 1.3 million Arabs. There are around four million Palestinians registered as refugees by the United Nations. The death of Yasser Arafat will not, despite the rhetoric suggesting otherwise, inevitably lead to a more likely resolution of the Israel/Palestine conflict, although if one only read the Australian media after the PLO leader's death, one could be forgiven for thinking that a road block to peace had been removed.

Yet many astute commentators suggest that Islamic fundamentalism may in fact rise in prevalence in the Palestinian territories. Juan Cole, professor of Modern Middle East and South Asian History at the University of Michigan, wrote in Newsday on November 19:

"Arafat's secular nationalism was supple enough to compromise with Israel and to imagine a two-state solution, if even the negotiations remained rocky ... Even if local Palestinian leaders remain strong enough to keep al-Qaeda out, the festering Israeli/Palestinian struggle remains among the best recruiting posters for al-Qaeda with young Muslim men. Resolving this conflict would be the most effective weapon the United States could deploy in its war on terror."

This kind of nuanced analysis was nowhere to be found in Australia. Instead, our mainstream media outlets seemed to take their cues from American and Israeli government sources, and, in a familiar pattern in the reporting of the conflict, dissenting voices were essentially ignored.

On November 12, the Canberra Times page one lead read, "Arafat's death brings hope". On the same day, Murdoch's Australian offered, "Death gives peace a chance". Its foreign Editor Greg Sheridan wrote that if the Palestinians behaved themselves and offered something acceptable to the Israelis (and therefore the Americans) they would get their own state. The paper editorialised on November 13 under the headline "Thirty years of death -- and all for nothing". It is a viewpoint unlikely to be shared by many in the Arab world.

Despite Arafat's corruption and other failures, of which they were many, he articulated a Palestinian nationalism that remains too confronting for many in the West. Afif Safieh is the Palestinian General Delegate to the UK and the Holy See. Writing in The Guardian on November 12, a clearer picture of Arafat's legacy emerged:

"His message was: we the Palestinian are the victims of the victims of European history. We have become the Jews of the Jews. But we do not want to make them the Palestinians of the Palestinians..."

The Sydney Morning Herald's page one headline on November 12 was "Palestinians mourn passing of an era". The paper's coverage was the least unbalanced in the country, featuring a number of differing viewpoints on Arafat's life and times, though remarkably for a leader so rooted in the Arab world, opinion pieces or comment from the region were absent. It was as if only Western commentators fully understood the seriousness of the developments.

The Age editorialised on November 13 with a screed on the newfound responsibilities for the Palestinians: "If [they] truly want to honour the memory of Mr Arafat, then they must move beyond terrorism as a means to achieve an end." No mention was made of Israel's 37 year-old Occupation of West Bank and Gaza, the ever-expanding settlements, the military invasions into Palestinian territory and the ongoing Israeli policy of what some see as essentially ethnic cleansing. The Palestinians needed to reform, said The Age, and the Americans and Israelis will be watching and judging accordingly. There was no discussion of the reality that the number of Jewish settlers doubled during the Oslo "peace process" -- the period Israel was supposedly preparing to withdraw from the territories.

The Independent's journalist Robert Fisk wrote after Arafat's death:

"That the final demise of the corrupt old guerrilla leader should be a sign of optimism demonstrates just how catastrophic the conflict in the Middle East has become. It's a bit like Fallujah. The more we destroy it, the crueller we are, the brighter the chances of Iraqi democracy."

"It's the same old agenda [in the Israel/Palestine conflict.] The Palestinians have to have a democracy. They have to prove themselves; they -- not the Israelis -- have to show that they are a worthy 'negotiating partner'."

Even Murdoch's Herald Sun tabloid entered the debate, publishing Colin Rubenstein, Executive Director of the Melbourne-based pro-Zionist group, AIJAC. "[Arafat] personified the destructive contradiction that was the heart of Palestinian nationalism,", he wrote.

Rubenstein's offsider Ted Lapkin, associate editor of AIJAC's Review magazine, expressed similar disadain in the Australian Financial Review on 15 November:

"The Palestinians are world class rememberers, to the point where they either do not recall things as they happened, or they recollect things that neve happened at all."

Every Australian paper editorialised on the importance of the Americans in the peace process and hoped that a re-elected George W. Bush would more fully 'engage' in resolving the crisis. The fact that the last four years of Bush's presidency has seen a deterioration of the situation, due in no small part to his administration's extreme closeness to Ariel Sharon's positions, was not mentioned.

Equally off the agenda were the unpleasant truths surrounding the Israeli leader's proposed Gaza pullout early in 2005, wholeheartedly endorsed by the Americans, Europeans and Australians. It is, simply put, a charade.

Upon Arafat's death, world leaders offered the usual platitudes, with notable exceptions, including Nelson Mandela, who called the PLO leader "one of the outstanding freedom fighters of his generation, one who gave his entire life to the cause of the Palestinian people".

Aside from the comments of Israeli Justice Minister Yosef Lapid -- "Without Arafat there could have already been peace in the region and a Palestinian state...the Government of Israel will continue with its efforts to reach peace", Prime Minister John Howard was the only world leader who condemned the Palestinian leader. "I think history will judge him very harshly," Howard said, "for not having seized the opportunity in the year 2000 to embrace the offer that was very courageously made by the then Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak, that involved the Israeli agreeing to about 90 per cent of what the Palestinians wanted." (Robert Fisk seeks to debunk these 'facts' in Death, Delusion and Democracy).

The Palestinian Foreign Affairs Minister, Nabil Shaath, condemned Howard for his lack of "empathy". "I mean, he is probably the only leader in the world who actually demonised President Arafat after his death," Shaath said, "something that not even the Israelis have done, or the Americans".

The Wall Street Journal in Europe praised Howard's comments:

"Lionising a leader who espoused violence does the Middle East a great disservice. If only more Asian regional leaders could have grasped this in the way of some of their more forthright counterparts Down Under."

But most commentators thought it unseemly, a complete misunderstanding of the importance of Arafat to Palestinian self-determination and counterproductive in bringing the many sides back to the table.

Labor's Foreign Affairs spokesman, Kevin Rudd, was more conciliatory:

"Yasser Arafat was a passionate, controversial leader of the Palestinian people. Whatever people thought of Arafat, there was wide consensus that he was a symbol for a secular Palestinian state."

Indeed, when the Senate returned to business on November 18, Greens senator Kerry Nettle moved a resolution noting the PLO leader's death and extending condolences to the Palestinian people:

"Many Palestinians were offended by the Prime Minister's uncharitable attack on the recently deceased Palestinian leader. This motion was in part intended to show that most Australians are capable of expressing appropriate condolences."

In Israel itself, life-long peace activist Uri Avnery spoke of the "37 years of occupiers [that] have bestialised our society and left it bereft even on common decency".

"Minister and fishmongers, TV icons and university professors, "leftists" and outright fascists tried to outdo each other in utter vulgarity ... No Arab leader -- and very few world leaders -- evoke such profound love and admiration among their people as this man, whom Israelis consider a veritable monster in human form. The Palestinians trusted him, relied on him, let him make all the big decisions that demanded courage, derived from him the strength to defy the intolerable conditions under a brutal occupation.

"Ariel Sharon has absolutely no interest in sitting opposite a democratically elected leadership enjoying international legitimacy and respect, perhaps even weakening his control over President Bush and obstructing his plan for the annexation of most of the West Bank. He will do everything to prevent elections, and of course, blame the Palestinians."

While John Howard has always been a strong supporter of Israel's position in the conflict, his position has hardened in the last years. At a press conference at the King David Hotel in Jerusalem on May 2, 2000, a journalist asked Howard for his opinion of Arafat:

"Very interesting. A man who's gone through an enormous amount. A man who is searching for peace. Who is conscious of the extremist elements that seek to undermine and overthrow him. I found him a fascinating person to meet and it has been quite an experience to taste the new approach here and that is true in relation to the Israelis as well."

Howard's praise of Arafat began at another press conference the day before, May 1, 2000:

"...The people who Mr Arafat leads and the people of Israel are keen and passionate about achieving peace. They want to put the past behind them and if Australia can make a small contribution, given its history in this part of the world and the special significance it has to millions of Australians then we ought to do so in a very positive frame of mind without debating particular stances in the past."

Yet during an address at the American Jewish Committee in New York in January 2002, Howard then laid the blame for the failure of a Palestinian state firmly at the feet of Arafat:

"...Until stronger and more effective efforts are taken by the Palestinian Council, by Yasser Arafat and others, we can only continue to condemn them for what they have done and for what they have failed to do in relation to restraint, necessary restraint being imposed on the random acts of terror which are so frequently visited upon the people of Israel."

Howard's shift in attitude can be traced to similar overtures by the Bush administration, and then their shutting out, with Israeli support and advice, of Arafat and the Palestinian Authority. Mike Clear of Penrith, NSW wrote a letter to The Canberra Times on November 13 on this shift:

"I think we reveal a vulgar national character when we can join a pre-emptive war and occupation against people in the Arab world and then, at the death of one its much-loved leaders, not have the PM or a senior minister represent us at the funeral. If President Arafat's death represents an opportunity for some renewal of the peace process, as our Foreign Minister rather fatuously likes to tell us, then surely it also represents an opportunity for the most aggressive protagonists of war to identify with the pain of the Palestinian people and their abject oppression from decades of hostile occupation. John Howard and Mr Downer should understand that this failure to regard the pain of others is a significant aspect of the cycle of suffering and violence that racks the globe."

The Herald Sun's Andrew Bolt parroted the government's line on November 19: "There is a sickness in Palestinian culture -- and an anarchy in its government -- that makes talk of peace with its people seem as grounded as the sweet dreams of a sleepwalker in a crowded minefield."

Neither the Bolts of this world, nor the Australian government, appear capable of seeing past Arafat's corruption and frequent duplicity. Writing in bitterlemons on November 13, Yossi Alpher explained the duality of the PLO leader's legacy:

"Israelis will not mourn Yasser Arafat. But they should take the time now to reflect on how, under his leadership, the Palestinians got where they are -- to world recognition, national pride and the brink of statehood, but also to the depths of the present brutal conflict, with its accompanying humiliation and impoverishment."

Where to from here? For the last three years of his life, Israel isolated Arafat in his Ramallah compound, publicly arguing that he was the main obstacle to peace and therefore should be sidelined. America agreed and although British Prime Minister Tony Blair talks constantly about a Middle East peace settlement, he has made little progress with Washington.

It's clear that the Palestinian leadership must be allowed time and space to conduct free and fair elections. Whether the Americans and Israelis like the Palestinian peoples' choice is another matter. The situation could prove remarkably similar to that in Iraq, where elections, if they occur at all, may favour Islamic leaders with close ties to Iran, something that the Bush administration will find less than acceptable.

Aside from the death of Arafat, the world has been transfixed in the last months on Ariel Sharon's proposed "disengagement" from the Gaza Strip in 2005. Although most of the "quality" media has praised Sharon's apparent about face (father of the settlements turns his back on his legacy, being a familiar refrain), the actual details of the plan expose something else. Human Rights Watch stated in a November report that even after the supposed pull-out, "Israeli forces will continue to surround Gaza on land, patrol its coastline and its skies. That military cordon will allow Israel to continue to control the flow of all goods and people into and out of the territory. Gaza will remain dependent on Israel for water, sewerage, electricity, telephone access, trade and currency, which will remain the Israeli shekel."

Yet much of the Western media and its leaders appear to have been hoodwinked. Closer examination of Sharon's plan reveals a devious definition of Israeli "disengagement". Israeli academic Tanya Reinhart has examined the plans and concludes that it is yet far from clear whether the pullout will occur and under what terms:

"Throughout the Western world, Sharon is now depicted as a messenger of peace, because he has declared that he is willing to evacuate some of the territories. All of a sudden, Sharon is viewed as a sane centre of Israel, withstanding right-wing pressure [but] the Israeli army terrorises the Gaza strip, dozens of Palestinians are being killed, including children on their way to school, houses are demolished and agricultural land destroyed."

For more detail see Reinhart's Sharon's Gaza Pullout: Not Gonna Happen.

Finally, two sobering accounts of the current political environment in Israel put paid to the myth that Arafat was the only stumbling block to peace. Reports have recently surfaced of Israeli soldiers using dead bodies of Palestinians, whom they thought were innocent, as trophies to take pictures with. Echoes of Abu Ghraib abound. Many Israelis are outraged by the discoveries. Daily paper Yedioth Ahronot reports that the practice has become widespread in the Israeli army. Israeli academic Idan Landau writes of the affair:

"Hundreds of reports during the Intifada on the horrors committed by the IDF against live Palestinians haven't managed to scratch our collective elephant hide. They did not move the very people who are now so outraged by what uniform wearing animals committed upon dead Palestinians. Senior politicians, IDF commanders and newspaper columnists maintained a thundering silence while watching the wholesale killing of innocent unfortunate Palestinians who somehow end up in a forbidden zone or in the path of a straying shell. But the moment the media gets hold of a photo or two of exposed Palestinian flesh, the same people beat their chest in disgust ("we've turned into animals") and turn their heads in revulsion. Demolishing occupied people's houses, killing children on their way to school -- that's OK. But if a Zionist soldier places a dead Palestinian's head on a pole -- then our world collapses upon us."

A close friend and colleague of Sharon, Dov Weissglas, gave an interview recently to Haaretz newspaper on what he said were the true aims of Sharon's "disengagement" plan, quoted in The New York Times Review of Books, Weissglas explained that the plan pushed through by Sharon, President Bush and both houses of Congress, was in fact designed to prevent a peace process, ditch the much-discussed "Road Map to Peace" and preclude the emergence of a Palestinian state:

"Effectively, this whole package called the Palestinian state, with all that it entails, has been removed indefinitely from our agenda.

"And all this...with a [US] presidential blessing and the ratification of both houses of Congress."

He explained that the "disengagement" was "actually formaldehyde":
"It supplies the amount of formaldehyde that is necessary so there will not be a political process with the Palestinians."

Ephraim Sneh, a Labor member of the Knesset, replied: "Formaldehyde, it should be noted, is the liquid in which dead bodies are preserved."

Reading the Australian media after Arafat's death, these truths were not spoken.

Read more ...

Eureka 150 years: Howard snubs Australian history

It really is a remarkable state of affairs when the Head of State of The Australian Commonwealth, John Howard, snubs a major historical event such as the 150-year anniversary commemorations of the Eureka Stockade, which started yesterday with a major celebration in Ballarat, and with events planned in all States and Territories around the country. So, it's not just the ALP member for Ballarat, who should be prepared to speak out about it and name Howard. Everyone around Australia should be clear that Howard really fails in his national duty. Mark Latham: "I am disappointed ... the prime minister won't attend any of the Eureka celebrations, and nor will the senior ministers of his government", as reported in The Australian.

PM's Eureka snubbing shows he is unable to govern for all Australians

Project SafeCom Media Release
Saturday November 26 2004 15:00pm WST
For Immediate Release
No Embargoes

"The fact that prime minister John Howard has snubbed the Australia-wide Eureka celebrations that move millions of Australians, students, children as well as adults and families during this week, shows Howard is too selfish to celebrate the Australian national character and Australian history", Project SafeCom spokesman Jack Smit said today.

"The Eureka stockade was the birth of a defining moment in Australian history, it was the birth of a central piece in our larrikan nature as well as our democratic principles, and it has inspired millions of Australians, old and young people, workers and citizens alike."

"From Eureka we received our model of citizens' protests and rallies for causes. And, as was related during a discussion in Melbourne on Friday evening, Indigenous people as well as women were also amongst the groups that make the Eureka events into what they were."

"Mr Howard would like Australians to believe that Eureka is about a Labor Party celebration, but his shunning of the events and his refusal to fly the Eureka flag from Parliament House, make him into an old and stubborn man, who refuses to celebrate Australia for what it is and participate in it."

"Mr Howard is Un-Australian, and his attitude is an affront to the celebration of modern democracy. Mr Howard would like our country to be an Australia without citizens' protest and workers' rights, he would like to snuff out the strength of the union movement, and all of us need to 'be alert and alarmed' that Mr Howard does not further create a "John Howard's Australia" in his image. This is especially true for Refugee Rights advocates, Aboriginal people, and more recently, people in receipt of a Disability Pension."

Michelle Grattan in The Age reports: Mark Latham last night celebrated the spirit of Eureka and criticised John Howard and the Coalition for missing its symbolism and significance. Mr Latham told the Eureka democracy conference in Ballarat the Eureka story "resonates with Australians today".

He said he might be sentimental, but he loved the thought of Eureka. "The spirit of solidarity. Tough and ambitious self-made men, fighting for their rights against the self-serving establishment. And through this struggle, forging a new national identity: the authentic Australian character with its rebellious, larrikin streak. This is a great Australian story.

"And one that we must always tell. Because ultimately it wasn't so much who won and lost at Eureka - it was the spirit of dissent and defiance that defined the Stockade. It was the struggle, not the victory, that mattered."

He said the story of Eureka was fundamental to Labor's story, but "it's fundamental to Australia's story... it should be embraced by all Australians, across the political spectrum".

Mr Latham said he was disappointed that Mr Howard and senior ministers would not attend any of the Eureka celebrations.

"Labor is the true party of the self-employed, the small entrepreneur, the economic independents," he said. "We know their history here in Ballarat and honour their achievements. The other side of politics has missed the point - the true meaning of Eureka and its economy."

He said the Prime Minister had refused to fly the Eureka flag in the Parliament House precinct in Canberra, saying it was not officially appointed as a flag under the Flags Act. But next week state parliaments and local government authorities would fly the flag "with its dramatic and inspired design".

"Undoubtedly, some federal members and senators will stand up for their rights as parliamentarians and the rights of their constituents by displaying the flag in various parts of the Parliament building," Mr Latham said. "We too shall salute the Southern Cross."

He said that Australians had always interpreted Eureka in the context of their own time in history. In 1904, in a nation that had just experienced bitter strikes, Eureka's 50th anniversary was celebrated as a milestone in formation of the Australian Labor movement. In the 1970s, the Stockade took on special significance. Australia was experiencing a new confidence and sense of independence, and Eureka symbolised its new nationalism.

Rightly so, Catherine King is one of the folks who want the flag registered, as we're told by John Huxley in The Age (PM to snub Eureka's 150th party).

The Eureka flag may have been used by unions and at workers' rights protests, it may have developed an association with the union movement - I keep seeing it on building sites - and it may even have been "hijacked" by some right-wing militant groups around Australia - but this does not diminish its historical significance, it merely confirms it. The Eureka Stockade brought democracy closer, and faster, into Australia. Eureka and The Southern Cross are amongst the most solid foundations underpinning Australian society.

Some exquisite summaries of the Eureka stockage and its historical significance have sprung up in the Australian media, especially in the Sydney Morning Herald and The Age - go have a read of them. It's our history, it's our nation, mister Howard. The links are below.

Ballarat: Eureka 150 website

Victorian Eureka Celebrations website

The Age: PM to snub Eureka's 150th party

Sydney Morning Herald: The miner's skirmish that created a legend

Sydney Morning Herald: Eureka Stockade unravelled

The Age: James Button, Children of rebellion maintain the rage

The Age: Birth of a notion

The Age: Eureka legend grows

And a discussion of Howard's stab at "militant unionism" in Victoria:

The Age: Memo PM: unions aren't the only ones at fault

The Age: Have the day of the demos passed?

Latham to visit Eureka 150, while PM says no

The Ballarat Courier
Tuesday, 16 November 2004

FEDERAL opposition leader Mark Latham is to visit Ballarat next week for the 150th anniversary of the Eureka Stockade. Mr Latham is set to arrive on Thursday, November 25, and stay for the official opening at the Eureka Centre on Friday, November 26.

Mr Latham will be the most senior federal politician to attend the Eureka 150th celebrations, with Prime Minister John Howard declining to attend. A government spokesman yesterday said Mr Howard was not scheduled to attend at any stage. Mr Howard has not visited Ballarat since October 10, 2001. Victorian Premier Steve Bracks is to officially open the celebrations on Friday morning.

Ballarat MHR Catherine King accused the government of "snubbing" the Eureka Stockade and its role in history. Ms King said Federal Parliament would be the "odd one out" as all states and territories are to fly the flag during the next month.

Still, more than 200 of the navy blue and white Eureka flags will fly in Canberra. Eureka flags are to be raised outside the ACT's parliamentary building. During this year's election campaign, Mr Latham promised to fly the flag at Parliament House if Labor won.

Ms King vowed to raise the issue again when parliament sits during the anniversary. She added she would fly the flag in her office. "It's ridiculous that the flag is flying in every state and territory parliament across the country but not at Federal Parliament," she said. "The government is snubbing the Eureka Stockade's significance to the development of democratic principles in Australia."

Australian Capital Territory chief minister Jon Stanhope said it was important to display the Eureka flag prominently during the anniversary.

Ballarat Courier: Latham to visit Eureka 150, while PM says no

Importance of Eureka, past and future

The Ballarat Courier
Friday, 26 November 2004

THE Eureka 150 Democracy Conference opened yesterday with Federal Opposition Leader Mark Latham taking the Howard Government to task over its record on Eureka.

The Labor leader said the government had "missed the point" with the historic event in its refusal to fly the Eureka flag at Parliament House and attend the 150th celebrations.

"The celebration of Eureka is an event of national significance, it's at the centre of our history and our national identity," he told the audience at the opening.

"So I'm disappointed that the Prime Minister won't be attending, nor any of the ministers of his government."

Mr Latham was one of about 200 guests and dignitaries at a cocktail party officially opening the Releasing the Spirit of Democracy Conference.

Other dignitaries included East Timor Foreign Minister Jose Ramos Horta, Premier Steve Bracks and former Northern Ireland Secretary of State Marjorie Mowlam.

The two-day conference - hosted by the University of Ballarat - has attracted delegates from across the world and kicks off an 11-day calendar of events across the city.

Mr Latham will attend part of today's conference and said it was a great honour to take part in celebrating "one of the great stories of Australian history."

"The Eureka story is vitally important not just to Australia's past but also to our future. I reckon Eureka says a lot about the Australian character, our love of the underdog and support for those who have a go... our tradition

of defiance and dissent (and) the larrikin spirit that makes us truly Australian."

University Vice-Chancellor Kerry Cox said 270 delegates had registered to take part in the landmark conference.

"It's fantastic, we have a very diverse group of extremely experienced people who have a deep understanding of the levels of democracy and are willing to discuss how democracy can be made even better."

Ballarat Mayor David Vendy said a democracy conference was a fitting way to begin the 150th anniversary celebrations.

"Eureka was essentially about the right for a fair go, it was a defining event in the development of democracy and our great way of life. It was the birthplace of the Australian spirit and indeed the birthplace of democracy," he said.

Ballarat Courier: Importance of Eureka, past and future

Rebellion over Eureka Walk

news.com.au
December 2, 2004

THE father of suspected al-Qaeda terrorist David Hicks has defended his decision to lead Sunday's Eureka dawn lantern walk in Ballarat.

Walk organiser Graeme Dunstan is understood to have invited Terry Hicks to lead this year's walk on the theme of fighting injustice.

The walk, which is being held as part of a ceremony marking the 150th anniversary of the Eureka Stockade uprising, will include about 1000 people following in the path taken by police and troopers in 1854.

But Former Ballarat Liberal MP and Senator-elect Michael Ronaldson said the choice of Mr Hicks to lead the walk had angered Ballarat residents.

"I've got no personal issue with Terry Hicks," Mr Ronaldson said.

"My issue is with the organising committee who at best have been stupid and naive and at worst are giving recognition to an alleged terrorist.

"This is totally opposed to the principles of Eureka."

Mr Hicks today said he was invited to lead the walk.

"I was invited to walk, and I thought a lot about this, and the overall picture is that it (Eureka) was something that changed the democratic face of Australia," he said.

"I can see a similar line with what the miners fought for - they fought for their rights and their say - and I can see a similar line with what I am fighting for now."

Mr Hicks has fought hard for the rights of his son who been held in a US detention camp at Guantanamo bay, Cuba, for almost three years on terrorism charges.

The march will follow the 3.5km track the police and soldiers used before their dawn attack on the diggers at the stockade at the Eureka goldfield on December 3, 1854.

About 150 miners established the stockade to protest against the 30 shilling fee for a digger's licence and to demand a charter of rights.

About 400 soldiers and police overpowered the diggers in about 15 minutes.

AAP

Link to the article at news.com.au

Read more ...

The Top 25 Censored Media Stories of 2003-2004

The Mission of Project Censored is to educate people about the role of independent journalism in a democratic society and to tell The News That Didn't Make the News and why.

Project Censored is a media research group out of Sonoma State University which tracks the news published in independent journals and newsletters. From these, Project Censored compiles an annual list of 25 news stories of social significance that have been overlooked, under-reported or self-censored by the country's major national news media.

Between 700 and 1000 stories are submitted to Project Censored each year from journalists, scholars, librarians, and concerned citizens around the world. With the help of more than 200 Sonoma State University faculty, students, and community members, Project Censored reviews the story submissions for coverage, content, reliability of sources and national significance. The university community selects 25 stories to submit to the Project Censored panel of judges who then rank them in order of importance. Current or previous national judges include: Noam Chomsky, Susan Faludi, George Gerbner, Sut Jhally, Frances Moore Lappe, Norman Solomon, Michael Parenti, Herbert I. Schiller, Barbara Seaman, Erna Smith, Mike Wallace and Howard Zinn. All 25 stories are featured in the yearbook, Censored: The News That Didn't Make the News.

See Project Censored Exposed

1: Wealth Inequality in 21st Century Threatens Economy and Democracy

Wealth inequality increased dramatically in the United States in the late 1990s. The top 5% is now capturing an increasingly greater portion of the pie while the bottom 95% is clearly losing ground, resulting in the rapidly vanishing middle class. This trend is the product of legislative policies carefully crafted and lobbied for by corporations and the ultra-wealthy over the past 25 years. America's economic trends have a global footprint. Today, the top 400 income earners in the U.S. make as much in a year as the entire population of the 20 poorest countries in Africa. A series of reports released in 2003 by the UN warn that further increases in the imbalance in wealth throughout the world will have catastrophic effects if left unchecked, such as the collapse of the entire global economy.

http://www.projectcensored.org/publications/2005/1.html

2: Ashcroft vs. the Human Rights Law that Holds Corporations Accountable

Attorney General John Ashcroft is seeking to strike down one of the world's oldest human rights laws, the Alien Torts Claim Act (ATCA) which holds government leaders, corporations, and senior military officials liable for human rights abuses taking place in foreign countries. Organizations such as Human Rights Watch (HRW) vehemently oppose the removal of this law, as it is one of the few legal defenses victims of human rights violations can claim against powerful organizations such as governments or multinational corporations. By attempting to throw out this law, the Bush Administration is effectively opening the door for human rights abuses to continue under the veil of foreign relations diplomacy.

http://www.projectcensored.org/publications/2005/2.html

3: Bush Administration Censors Science

In Washington D.C. more than 60 of the nation's top scientists, including 20 Nobel laureates, medical experts, and former federal agency directors, issued a statement February 18, 2004 accusing the Bush Administration of deliberately distorting scientific results for political ends. They are calling for regulatory and legislative action to restore scientific integrity to federal policymaking. Under the current administration, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has blacklisted scientists who pose a threat to pro-business ideology, and many unqualified scientists with close industry ties have been appointed to advisory boards.

http://www.projectcensored.org/publications/2005/3.html

4: High Levels of Uranium Found in Troops and Civilians

Civilian populations in Afghanistan and Iraq and occupying troops have been contaminated with astounding levels of radioactive uranium as a result of post-9/11 use of tons of uranium munitions by the U.S. Four million pounds of radioactive uranium were dropped on Iraq in 2003 alone. Most American weapons (missiles, smart bombs, bullets, tank shells, cruise missiles, etc.) contain high amounts of uranium that on detonation, release a radioactive dust. Once ingested, these subatomic particles slice through DNA. With a half-life of 4.5 billion years, it is a permanent contaminant distributed throughout the environment. Scientists from around the world testify to the huge increase in birth deformities and cancers wherever uranium munitions have been used. The effects of the U.S. deployment will be felt in all the neighboring countries in the Middle East and Asia, as well as in our returning troops.

http://www.projectcensored.org/publications/2005/4.html

5: The Wholesale Giveaway of Our Natural Resources

The Bush Administration's environmental policies are destroying much of the environmental progress made over the past 30 years. Between the "Clean Skies Initiative," a recent policy that allows power plants to emit more than five times more mercury and twice as much sulfur dioxide, and the "Healthy Forests Initiative," which allows the wholesale liquidation of ancient forests by corporate timber interests under the guise of fire prevention, resource extraction and pollution is occurring at unprecedented rates.

http://www.projectcensored.org/publications/2005/5.html

6: The Sale of Electoral Politics

Conflicts of interest exist between the largest suppliers of electronic voting machines in the United States and key leaders in the Republican Party. While the voting machines themselves present some technical issues, the political affiliations within the voting machine industry pose even more serious questions. The three major companies involved in implementing the new, often faulty, technology at voting stations throughout the country have strong ties to the Bush Administration, Republican leaders, and major defense contractors.

http://www.projectcensored.org/publications/2005/6.html

7: Conservative Organization Drives Judicial Appointments

In 2001 George W. Bush eliminated the longstanding influence of the American Bar Association (ABA) in the evaluation of the prospective federal judges. ABA's judicial ratings had long kept extremists from the right and left off the bench. In its place, Bush has been using the Federal Society for Law and Public Policy Studies--a national organization whose mission is to advance a conservative agenda by moving the country's legal system to the right. One of the most important issues in the country is the control of one of the three branches of government, the judiciary. While Presidents and Congress-members get elected every few years, judicial appointments are for life, Our courts deal with nearly every aspect of life; work conditions and wages, schools, civil rights, affirmative action, crime and punishment, abortion and the environment, amongst others.

http://www.projectcensored.org/publications/2005/7.html

8: Cheney's Energy Task Force and The Energy Policy

Cheney Energy Task Force documents turned over in the summer of 2003 by the Commerce Department as a result of the Freedom of Information Act lawsuit brought by Sierra Club and Judicial Watch contain maps of Iraqi oilfields, pipelines, refineries and terminals. The documents, dated March 2001, also contain plans of occupation and exploitation that predate September 11, confirming suspicions that the Bush Administration energy policy is driving U.S. military strategy.

http://www.projectcensored.org/publications/2005/8.html

9: Widow Brings RICO Case Against U.S. government for 9/11

Ellen Mariani became widowed when her husband Louis Neil Mariani perished in the collision between United Airlines flight 175 and the South Tower of the World Trade Center. In addition to her refusal of the government's million-dollar settlement offer, Mrs. Mariani has filed a 62 page complaint in federal district court charging that President Bush and officials: (1) had adequate foreknowledge of 911, yet failed to warn the country or attempt to prevent it; (2) have since been covering up the truth of that day; (3) have therefore abetted the murder of plaintiff's husband and violated the Constitution and multiple laws of the United States; and (4) are thus being sued under the Civil Racketeering, Influences, and Corrupt Organization (RICO) Act for Malfeasant conspiracy, obstruction of justice and wrongful death.

http://www.projectcensored.org/publications/2005/9.html

10: New Nuke Plants: Taxpayers Support, Industry Profits

Senator Peter Domenici (R-NM), along with the Bush Administration, is looking to give the nuclear power industry a huge boost through the new Energy Policy Act. The Domenici-sponsored bill will give nuclear power plants credits costing taxpayers an estimated 7.5 billion dollars, to build six new privately owned, for-profit reactors across the country. Safety standards will be lowered and liability will be passed on to taxpayers. This is in addition to the $4 billion already provided for other nuclear energy programs.

http://www.projectcensored.org/publications/2005/10.html

11: The Media Can Legally Lie

In 2003, a Florida Court of Appeals ruled that there are no written rules against distorting news in the media. It agreed with an argument by Fox Television that, under the First Amendment, broadcasters have the right to lie or deliberately distort news reports on public airwaves. Under the current ruling, it is up to the public to discover whether or not they are being lied to.

http://www.projectcensored.org/publications/2005/11.html

12: The Destabilization of Haiti

On February 29, 2004, President Jean-Bertrand Aristide was forced into exile by American military. While U.S. officials were eventually forced to acknowledge the kidnapping allegations, they were quick to discredit them and deny responsibility. Meanwhile, the circumstances that led to the current situation in Haiti, as well as the history of U.S. involvement, are being ignored by U.S. officials and the mainstream media.

http://www.projectcensored.org/publications/2005/12.html

13: Schwarzenegger Met with Enron's Ken Lay Years Before the California Recall

In 2002, while the California Governor and his deputy were attempting to re-regulate the energy industry (and get back the $9 billion that was defrauded from California taxpayers by Enron and other energy companies) Arnold Schwarzenegger was being groomed to overthrow Governor Davis in a recall - and cancel plans to re-regulate or to recoup the $9 billion. Back in May of 2001, in the midst of California's energy crisis, Schwarzenegger met with Enron's Ken Lay to discuss "fixing" California's energy crisis.

http://www.projectcensored.org/publications/2005/13.html

14: New Bill Threatens Intellectual Freedom in Area Studies

The International Studies in Higher Education Act of 2003 threatens academic freedom and classroom curriculum. Under this act, professors whose ideological principles do not support U.S. practices abroad can have their appointments terminated, any course curriculum containing criticism of U.S. foreign policy can be censored, and any course deemed anti-American can be barred from the classroom.

http://www.projectcensored.org/publications/2005/14.html

15: U.S. Develops Lethal New Viruses

Scientists funded by the US government have developed a way to make pox viruses incredibly deadly. The stated goal of this research is to fight possible bio-terror attacks. The new virus kills all mice even if they have been given antiviral drugs along with a vaccine that would normally protect the victim from death.

http://www.projectcensored.org/publications/2005/15.html

16: Law Enforcement Agencies Spy on Innocent Citizens

With little media comment, federal, state and local agencies have begun working as partners in the collection, analysis, and dissemination of intelligence information. Under the "Global Intelligence Working Group" (that oversees the new network) police departments receive increased funding for surveillance activity. This has resulted in the recent COINTELPRO-style instances of police infiltration of groups critical of government policies.

http://www.projectcensored.org/publications/2005/16.html

17: U.S. Government Represses Labor Unions in Iraq in Quest for Business Privatization

According to the Wall Street Journal, the Bush Administration has "sweeping plans to remake Iraq's economy in the US image." The US is calling for the privatization of state-owned industries such as oil and water. But it has chosen not to overturn Sadaam-era edicts that outlaw unions. Every day the economic policies of occupying authorities create more hunger among Iraq's working people, transforming them into a pool of low-wage, semi-employed labor, desperate for jobs at any price.

http://www.projectcensored.org/publications/2005/17.html

18: Media and Government Ignore Dwindling Oil Supplies

Even industry executives affirm that oil is close to reaching, or may have already reached, its highest levels of production potential. Once the peak is reached, oil prices will start to rise (as they have every year since 2000). As oil decline accelerates, prices will rise even faster, with devastating effects to the US economy. Over the years, U.S. leaders, bowing to oil industry pressure, have not worked to develop viable alternatives (as they have done in Europe).

http://www.projectcensored.org/publications/2005/18.html

19: Global Food Cartel Fast Becoming the World's Supermarket

Agribusiness and supermarket alliances are transforming the agri-food system into a powerful network of transnational corporations. They now have the power to control the world's food supply at every stage of food production. As fewer corporations control food production, traditional farming is becoming a high-tech form of serfdom. Lack of competition is leading to higher prices, lower choice and quality, and employee abuse.

http://www.projectcensored.org/publications/2005/19.html

20: Extreme Weather Prompts New Warning from UN

In 2003, The UN's World Meteorological Organization reported unprecedented levels of extreme weather and climate occurrences all over the world. The report emphasized an alarming increase in global warming and pointed to the impact of human activity. The significance of this particular report is that the highly respected UN organization is known for its normally conservative predictions and statements.

http://www.projectcensored.org/publications/2005/20.html

21: Forcing a World Market for GMOs

The Bush Administration is trying to force Europe to drop trade barriers against genetically modified organisms (GMOs). Meanwhile, the agricultural biotechnology industry is focusing even more intently on developing countries, where regulations governing their use are generally more lax. At the same time, biotech promoters continue to suppress studies that show GMOs may have adverse effects on health and the environment.

http://www.projectcensored.org/publications/2005/21.html

22: Censoring Iraq

After the fall of Saddam, Paul Bremer told journalists they were now "free to criticize whoever, or whatever, you want." But when negative critiques of U.S. policies appeared in the Iraqi media, Bremer quickly placed controls on its content. And rather than hiring a media outlet to run the Iraqi media (or simply allowing the news groups already there to continue reporting), the Pentagon chose a defense contractor to define the news.

http://www.projectcensored.org/publications/2005/22.html

23: Brazil Holds Back in FTAA Talks, But Provides Little Comfort for the Poor of South America

The Free Trade Area of the America's (FTAA) could become the biggest trading block in history, expanding NAFTA to 34 countries from Canada to the bottom of South America. This deal is unlikely to meet its January 2005 deadline, now that the second largest player in the negotiations, Brazil, is holding back. However, Brazilian President Lula has begun, of his own volition, to institute his own brand of FTAA austerity policies that are sure to drive the poor of the region deeper into poverty.

http://www.projectcensored.org/publications/2005/23.html

24: Reinstating the Draft

The Selective Service System (SSS), the Bush Administration, and the Pentagon have been quietly moving to fill draft board vacancies nationwide in order to prepare for a military draft that could start as early as June 15, 2005. Several million dollars have been added to the 2004 SSS budget. Meanwhile, through an on-going militarization of public school systems, the Pentagon has begun efforts to double the number of Latinos in the U.S. military by 2006.

http://www.projectcensored.org/publications/2005/24.html

25: Wal-Mart Brings Inequality and Low Prices to the World

The vision of the international division of Wal-Mart is one where Wal-Mart becomes a global brand, just like McDonald's or Coca- Cola, monopolizing the global retail market. The next five or six years could see about 5,000 to 6,000 Wal-Mart stores outside of the United States. Wal-Mart is Americanizing retailing around the world and exercising an inordinate amount of economic power.

http://www.projectcensored.org/publications/2005/25.html

Read more ...

Fallujah, The US Elections and 9/11: A matter of normalising the unthinkable

by John Pilger
from The John Pilger website
11 Nov 2004

In his latest column for the New Statesman, John Pilger demonstrates how the attack on Fallujah has been 'normalised' by the media. The same process of suppression has been applied to the 'blizzard of platitudes' that was the US election campaign and, as if nobody noticed, to the revelations of the Kean report on 9/11.

also:

Naomi Klein writes: Its idolisation of 'the face of Falluja' shows how numb the US is to everyone's pain but its own

Edward S Herman's landmark essay, "The Banality of Evil", has never seemed more apposite. "Doing terrible things in an organised and systematic way rests on 'normalisation'," wrote Herman. "There is usually a division of labour in doing and rationalising the unthinkable, with the direct brutalising and killing done by one set of individuals... others working on improving technology (a better crematory gas, a longer burning and more adhesive Napalm, bomb fragments that penetrate flesh in hard-to-trace patterns). It is the function of the experts, and the mainstream media, to normalise the unthinkable for the general public."

On Radio 4's Today (6 November), a BBC reporter in Baghdad referred to the coming attack on the city of Fallujah as "dangerous" and "very dangerous" for the Americans. When asked about civilians, he said, reassuringly, that the US marines were "going about with a tannoy" telling people to get out. He omitted to say that tens of thousands of people would be left in the city. He mentioned in passing the "most intense bombing" of the city with no suggestion of what that meant for people beneath the bombs.

As for the defenders, those Iraqis who resist in a city that heroically defied Saddam Hussein; they were merely "insurgents holed up in the city", as if they were an alien body, a lesser form of life to be "flushed out" (the Guardian): a suitable quarry for "ratcatchers", which is the term another BBC reporter told us the Black Watch use. According to a senior British officer, the Americans view Iraqis as untermenschen, a term that Hitler used in Mein Kampf to describe Jews, Romanies and Slavs as sub-humans. This is how the Nazi army laid siege to Russian cities, slaughtering combatants and non-combatants alike.

Normalising colonial crimes like the attack on Fallujah requires such racism, linking our imagination to "the other". The thrust of the reporting is that the "insurgents" are led by sinister foreigners of the kind that behead people: for example, by Musab al-Zarqawi, a Jordanian said to be al-Qaeda's "top operative" in Iraq. This is what the Americans say; it is also Blair's latest lie to parliament. Count the times it is parrotted at a camera, at us. No irony is noted that the foreigners in Iraq are overwhelmingly American and, by all indications, loathed. These indications come from apparently credible polling organisations, one of which estimates that of 2,700 attacks every month by the resistance, six can be credited to the infamous al-Zarqawi.

In a letter sent on 14 October to Kofi Annan, the Fallujah Shura Council, which administers the city, said: "In Fallujah, [the Americans] have created a new vague target: al-Zarqawi. Almost a year has elapsed since they created this new pretext and whenever they destroy houses, mosques, restaurants, and kill children and women, they say, 'we have launched a successful operation against Al Zarqawi'. The people of Fallujah assure you that this person, if he exists, is not in Fallujah... and we have no links to any groups supporting such inhuman behaviour. We appeal to you to urge the UN [to prevent] the new massacre which the Americans and the puppet government are planning to start soon in Fallujah, as well as many parts of the country." Not a word of this was reported in the mainstream in Britain and America.

"What does it take to shock them out of their baffling silence?" asked the playwright Ronan Bennett in April after the US marines, in an act of collective vengeance for the killing of four American mercenaries, killed more than 600 people in Fallujah, a figure that was never denied. Then, as now, they used the ferocious firepower of AC-130 gunships and F-16 fighterbombers and 500-pound bombs against slums. They incinerate children; their snipers boast of killing anyone, as snipers did in Sarajevo.

Bennett was referring to the legion of silent Labour backbenchers, with honourable exceptions, and lobotomised junior ministers (remember Chris Mullin?). He might have added those journalists who strain every sinew to protect "our" side, who normalise the unthinkable by not even gesturing at the demonstrable immorality and criminality. Of course, to be shocked by what "we" do is dangerous, because this can lead to a wider understanding of why "we" are there in the first place and of the grief "we" bring not only to Iraq, but to so many parts of the world: that the terrorism of al-Qaeda is puny by comparison with ours. There is nothing illicit about this cover-up; it happens in daylight. The most striking recent example followed the announcement, on 29 October, by the prestigious scientific journal, the Lancet, of a study estimating that 100,000 Iraqis had died as a result of the Anglo-American invasion. Eighty-four per cent of the deaths were caused by the actions of the Americans and the British, and 95 per cent of these were killed by air attacks and artillery fire, most of whom were women and children.

The editors of the excellent MediaLens observed the rush - no, stampede - to smother this shocking news with "scepticism" and silence (mediaLens.org). They reported that, by 2 November, the Lancet report had been ignored by the Observer, the Telegraph, the Sunday Telegraph, the Financial Times, the Star, the Sun and many others. The BBC framed the report in terms of the government's "doubts" and Channel 4 News delivered a hatchet job, based on a Downing Street briefing. With one exception, none of the scientists who compiled this rigorously peer-reviewed report was asked to substantiate their work until ten days later when the pro-war Observer published an interview with the editor of the Lancet, slanted so that it appeared he was "answering his critics". David Edwards, a MediaLens editor, asked the researchers to respond to the media criticism; their meticulous demolition can be viewed on medialens.org 2 November. None of this was published in the mainstream. Thus, the unthinkable that "we" had engaged in such a slaughter was suppressed - normalised. It is reminiscent of the suppression of the death of more than a million Iraqis, including half a million infants under five, as a result of the Anglo American driven embargo.

In contrast, there is no media questioning of the methodology of the Iraq Special Tribune which has announced that mass graves contain 300,000 victims of Saddam Hussein. The Special Tribune, a product of the quisling regime in Baghdad, is run by the Americans; respected scientists want nothing to do with it. There is no questioning of what the BBC calls "Iraq's first democratic elections". There is no reporting of the fact that the Americans have assumed control over the electoral process with two decrees passed in June that allows an "electoral commission" effectively to eliminate parties Washington does not like. Time magazine reports the CIA buying its preferred candidates, which is how the agency has fixed elections all over the world. When or if the elections take place, we will be doused in cliches about the nobility of voting as America's puppets are "democraticaly" chosen.

The model for this was the "coverage" of the American presidential election: a blizzard of platitudes normalising the unthinkable that what happened on 2 November was not democracy in action. With one exception, no one in the flock of pundits flown from London described the circus of Bush and Kerry as the contrivance of less than one per cent of the population, the ultra-rich and powerful, who control and manage a permanent war economy. That the losers were not only the Democrats, but the vast majority of Americans, regardless of whom they voted for, was unmentionable.

No one reported that John Kerry, by contrasting the "war on terror" with Bush's disastrous attack on Iraq, merely exploited public distrust of the invasion to build support for American dominance throughout the world. "I'm not talking about leaving [Iraq]," said Kerry. "I'm talking about winning!" In this way, both he and Bush shifted the agenda even further to the right, so that millions of anti-war Democrats might be persuaded that the US has "the responsibility to finish the job" lest there be "chaos". The issue in the presidential campaign was neither Bush nor Kerry but a war economy aimed at conquest abroad and economic division at home. The silence on this was comprehensive, both in America and here.

Bush won by invoking, more skilfully than Kerry, the fear of an ill-defined threat. How was he able to normalise this paranoia? Let's look at the recent past. Following the end of the cold war, the American elite - Republican and Democrat - were having great difficulty convincing the public that the billions of dollars spent on the war economy should not be diverted to a "peace dividend". A majority of Americans refused to believe there was still a "threat" as potent as the red menace. This did not prevent Bill Clinton sending to Congress the biggest "defence" bill in history in support of a Pentagon strategy called "full spectrum dominance". On 11 September 2001 the threat was given a name: Islam.

Flying into Philadelphia recently, I spotted the Kean Congressional report on 11 September on sale at the bookstalls. "How many do you sell?" I asked. "One or two" was the reply. "It'll disappear soon." Yet, this modest, blue-covered book is a revelation. Like the Butler report, which detailed all the incriminating evidence of Blair's massaging of intelligence before the invasion of Iraq, then pulled its punches and concluded nobody was responsible, so the Kean Commission makes excruciatingly clear what really happened, then fails to draw the conclusions that stare it in the face. It is a supreme act of normalising the unthinkable. This is not surprising as the conclusions are volcanic.

The most important evidence to the commission came from General Ralph Eberhart, commander of the North American Aerospace Defence Command (Norad). "Air force jet fighters could have intercepted hijacked airliners roaring towards the World Trade Center and Pentagon," he said, "if only air traffic controllers had asked for help 13 minutes sooner... We would have been able to shoot down all three... all four of them."

Why did this not happen?

The Kean report makes clear that "the defence of US aerospace on 9/11 was not conducted in accord with pre-existing training and protocols... If a hijack was confirmed, procedures called for the hijack coordinator on duty to contact the Pentagon's National Military Command Center (NMCC)... The NMCC would then seek approval from the office of the Secretary of Defense to provide military assistance..." Uniquely, this did not happen. The commission was told by the deputy administrator of the Federal Aviation Authority there was no reason the procedure was not operating that morning. "For my 30 years of experience..." said Monte Belger, "the NMCC was on the net and hearing everything real-time... I can tell you I've lived through dozens of hijackings... and they were always listening in with everybody else." But on this occasion, they were not. The Kean report says the NMCC were never informed. Why? Again, uniquely, all lines of communication failed, the commission was told, to America's top military brass. Secretary of Defence Donald Rumsfeld could not be found; and when he finally spoke to Bush an hour and a half later, it was, says the Kean report, "a brief call in which the subject of shoot-down authority was not discussed." As a result, NORAD's commanders were "left in the dark about what their mission was".

The report reveals that the only part of a previously fail-safe command system that worked was in the White House where Vice-President Cheney was in effective control that day, and in close touch with the NMCC. Why did he do nothing about the first two hijacked planes? Why was the NMCC, the vital link, silent for the first time in its existence? Kean ostentatiously refuses to address this. Of course, it could be due to the most extraordinary combination of coincidences. Or it could not. In July 2001, a top secret briefing paper prepared for Bush read: "We [the CIA and FBI] believe that OBL [Osama Bin Laden] will launch a significant terrorist attack against US and/or Israeli interests in the coming weeks. The attack will be spectacular and designed to inflict mass casualties against US facilities or interests. Attack preparations have been made. Attack will occur with little or no warning."

On the afternoon of 11 September, Donald Rumsfeld, having failed to act against those who had just attacked the United States, told his aides to set in motion an attack on Iraq - when the evidence was non-existent. Eighteen months later, the invasion of Iraq, unprovoked and based on lies now documented, took place. This epic crime is the greatest political scandal of our time, the latest chapter in the long 20th-century history of the west's conquests of other lands and their resources. If we allow it to be normalised, if we refuse to question and probe the hidden agendas and unaccountable secret power structures at the heart of "democratic" governments and if we allow the people of Fallujah to be crushed in our name, we surrender both democracy and humanity.

John Pilger is a visiting professor at Cornell University, New York. His latest book, Tell Me No Lies: investigative journalism and its triumphs, is published in the UK by Random House.

First published in the New Statesman - www.newstatesman.co.uk

From http://pilger.carlton.com/print

Smoking while Iraq burns

Its idolisation of 'the face of Falluja' shows how numb the US is to everyone's pain but its own

Naomi Klein
Friday November 26, 2004
The Guardian

Iconic images inspire love and hate, and so it is with the photograph of James Blake Miller, the 20-year-old marine from Appalachia, who has been christened "the face of Falluja" by pro-war pundits, and the "the Marlboro man" by pretty much everyone else. Reprinted in more than a hundred newspapers, the Los Angeles Times photograph shows Miller "after more than 12 hours of nearly non-stop, deadly combat" in Falluja, his face coated in war paint, a bloody scratch on his nose, and a freshly lit cigarette hanging from his lips.

Gazing lovingly at Miller, the CBS News anchor Dan Rather informed his viewers: "For me, this one's personal. This is a warrior with his eyes on the far horizon, scanning for danger. See it. Study it. Absorb it. Think about it. Then take a deep breath of pride. And if your eyes don't dampen, you're a better man or woman than I."

A few days later, the LA Times declared that its photo had "moved into the realm of the iconic". In truth, the image just feels iconic because it is so laughably derivative: it's a straight-up rip-off of the most powerful icon in American advertising (the Marlboro man), which in turn imitated the brightest star ever created by Hollywood - John Wayne - who was himself channelling America's most powerful founding myth, the cowboy on the rugged frontier. It's like a song you feel you've heard a thousand times before - because you have.

But never mind that. For a country that just elected a wannabe Marlboro man as its president, Miller is an icon and, as if to prove it, he has ignited his very own controversy. "Lots of children, particularly boys, play army, and like to imitate this young man. The clear message of the photo is that the way to relax after a battle is with a cigarette," wrote Daniel Maloney in a scolding letter to the Houston Chronicle. Linda Ortman made the same point to the editors of the Dallas Morning News: "Are there no photos of non-smoking soldiers?" A reader of the New York Post helpfully suggested more politically correct propaganda imagery: "Maybe showing a marine in a tank, helping another GI or drinking water would have a more positive impact on your readers."

Yes, that's right: letter writers from across the nation are united in their outrage - not that the steely-eyed, smoking soldier makes mass killing look cool, but that the laudable act of mass killing makes the grave crime of smoking look cool. Better to protect impressionable youngsters by showing soldiers taking a break from deadly combat by drinking water or, perhaps, since there is a severe potable water shortage in Iraq, Coke. (It reminds me of the joke about the Hassidic rabbi who says all sexual positions are acceptable except for one: standing up "because that could lead to dancing".)

On second thoughts, perhaps Miller does deserve to be elevated to the status of icon - not of the war in Iraq, but of the new era of supercharged American impunity. Because outside US borders, it is, of course, a different marine who has been awarded the prize as "the face of Falluja": the soldier captured on tape executing a wounded, unarmed prisoner in a mosque. Runners-up are a photograph of a two-year-old Fallujan in a hospital bed with one of his tiny legs blown off; a dead child lying in the street, clutching the headless body of an adult; and an emergency health clinic blasted to rubble.

Inside the US, these snapshots of a lawless occupation appeared only briefly, if they appeared at all. Yet Miller's icon status has endured, kept alive with human interest stories about fans sending cartons of Marlboros to Falluja, interviews with the marine's proud mother, and earnest discussions about whether smoking might reduce Miller's effectiveness as a fighting machine.

Impunity - the perception of being outside the law - has long been the hallmark of the Bush regime. What is alarming is that it appears to have deepened since the election, ushering in what can only be described as an orgy of impunity. In Iraq, US forces and their Iraqi surrogates are no longer bothering to conceal attacks on civilian targets and are openly eliminating anyone - doctors, clerics, journalists - who dares to count the bodies. At home, impunity has been made official policy with Bush's appointment of Alberto Gonzales as attorney general, the man who personally advised the president in his infamous "torture memo" that the Geneva conventions are "obsolete".

This kind of defiance cannot simply be explained by Bush's win. There has to be something in how he won, in how the election was fought, that gave this administration the distinct impression that it had been handed a get-out-of-the-Geneva-conventions free card. That's because the administration was handed precisely such a gift - by John Kerry.

In the name of electability, the Kerry team gave Bush five months on the campaign trail without ever facing serious questions about violations of international law. Fearing that he would be seen as soft on terror and disloyal to US troops, Kerry stayed scandalously silent about Abu Ghraib and Guantánamo Bay. When it became painfully clear that fury would rain down on Falluja as soon as the polls closed, Kerry never spoke out against the plan, or against the other illegal bombings of civilian areas that took place throughout the campaign. When the Lancet published its landmark study estimating that 100,000 Iraqis had died as result of the invasion and occupation, Kerry just repeated his outrageous (and frankly racist) claim that Americans "are 90% of the casualties in Iraq".

There was a message sent by all of this silence, and the message was that these deaths don't count. By buying the highly questionable logic that Americans are incapable of caring about anyone's lives but their own, the Kerry campaign and its supporters became complicit in the dehumanisation of Iraqis, reinforcing the idea that some lives are expendable, insufficiently important to risk losing votes over. And it is this morally bankrupt logic, more than the election of any single candidate, that allows these crimes to continue unchecked.

The real-world result of all the "strategic" thinking is the worst of both worlds: it didn't get Kerry elected and it sent a clear message to the people who were elected that they will pay no political price for committing war crimes. And this is Kerry's true gift to Bush: not just the presidency, but impunity. You can see it perhaps best of all in the Marlboro man in Falluja, and the surreal debates that swirl around him. Genuine impunity breeds a kind of delusional decadence, and this is its face: a nation bickering about smoking while Iraq burns.

A version of this column was first published in The Nation

http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,3604,1359871,00.html

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Got a disability? "Get over it, get a job", says Howard

Here we go folks - first it was refugees and asylum seekers, last week it was High Noon for Australian Indigenous people, and today Wild West Honest John targets people with a disability. To recap with a broad brush stroke: first, there were the Middle Classes and Upper Classes who had employ and the dollars, and the poor and the frail, including people on a disability, fell by the wayside. And we had the Poor Houses....

Then Social Policies came into the world, and created some semblance of justice for folks who had a disability - they would only receive a Disability Pension after an extensive assessment. It was some grace - and the notion was here to stay that those welfare measures were a right in a good society.

"Come in spinner", says Yi-haa (or Jihad?) John, and he puts one big bomb under all the Commonwealth Disability legislation.

Ken Livingstone, the former Mayor of London, is right after all then: "You can judge politicians by how they treat refugees; they do to them what they would do to everyone else if they could get away with it".

Govt pressures disability pensioners into work

ACB Radio - AM
Wednesday 24 November 2004