Re:Action | July/August 2004

Backdraft

Holy War Inc.: Inside the Secret World of Osama bin Laden (Free Press 2001) is Peter Bergen’s examination of bin Laden’s network and motivations. For a hawk’s perspective, read Kenneth Pollack’s The Threatening Storm: The Case for Inavding Iraq (Random House 2002). Al-Qaeda: Casting a Shadow of Terror (I.B. Tauris 2004).

From Militant to Moderate

Listen to a three-part series on the history of Iraq up to the U.S. invasion on the BBC’s”The World.” Learn more about a leading Shiite party, the Supreme Council for Islamic Resistance in Iraq, at its website. The war’s military and economic costs are documented by Iraq Occupation Watch, which was founded by a coalition of international peace groups.

The Diddly Awards

Want to congratulate a Diddly Award winner on a job well done? Email your favorite recipient via house.gov or senate.gov.

Transforming Teresa

The efforts of the Heinz Endowments, the Heinz Family Philanthropies, and the Heniz Awards are detailed on their respective websites (where nary a”Kerry”can be found). The John Kerry campaign website features a biography of Teresa.

Meadow’s End

Learn more about Dr. John Harte’s”warming meadow”experiment at The Rocky Mountain Biological Laboratory. Feeling the Heat: Dispatches from the Frontlines of Climate Change (Routledge, 2004) is a collection of essays by leading environmental writers who’ve witnessed the effects of global warming from New Jersey to New Delhi. Find other climate”hot zones”at climatehotmap.org. Warming trends”should be elevated beyond a scientific debate to a national security concern,”says a recent Defense Department report [links to PDF] that described”an abrupt climate change scenario”leading to mass geopolitical instability.

The Crude Doctrine

For an engaging account of the struggle to control Central Asia’s oil, read < a href="http://www.newgreatgame.com/" target="new">The New Great Game: Blood and Oil in Central Asia (Atlantic Monthly 2003). The Institute for Democracy in Eastern Europe has United States-Azerbaijan Chamber of Commerce.

Keepers of a Lost Language

The Maidu Interpretive Center in Roseville, California, explores the history of the tribe. The United Nations estimates that fifty percent of the world’s 6,000 languages are in danger of dying out. The Green Book of Language Revitalization in Practice (Academic Press 2001) examines how societies are working to save their indigenous languages. For an insider’s view of these issues, see A Will to Survive: Indigenous Essays on the Politics of Culture, Language, and Identity (McGraw-Hill 2003).

Party Favors

Not all New Yorkers will be putting out the red carpet for the GOP. RNCNotWelcome.org and CounterConvention.org are organizing what they hope will be the city’s largest protest in years. The Mojo 100, an online package on the post-McCain-Feingold world of campaign finance, examines Bush’s Rangers and Pioneers and the top Democratic donors.

Hogging the Air
Environmental Defense’s online “Poop Counter” is an up-to-the-minute update of the manure the pigs and people of North Carolina are producing. Strategies for how to fight factory farms near you are on the Grace Factory Farm Project’s website. Send comments about the EPA’s proposed air-quality rules to the Environmental Protection Agency.

Under Desert Sands

In its report “Off Target”, Human Rights Watch says cluster munitions are one of the leading causes of civilian casualties in Iraq. The documentary “Bombies” (Lumiere Productions 2002) explores the deadly legacy of America’s cluster bombing of Laos, where 8 million unexploded bomlets still litter the landscape. The Cluster Munitions Coalition is pushing to change the Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons to require nations to clean up their unexploded munitions.

Power to the Pickers

The Coalition of Immokalee Workers documents its Boycott the Bell and other fair-trade campaigns on its website. The story of Romeo Ramirez, a coalition member who went undercover to expose a Florida slavery ring, appears in < ahref="http://www.newsociety.com/bookid/3756" target="new">Global Uprising: Confronting the Tyrannies of the 21st Century: Stories from a New Generation of Activists (New Society Publishers 2001). And if you’re in southwest Florida, tune in to Radio Conciencia 107.9 FM.

Life Against The Wall

To hear the mayor of Qalqiliya talks about the wall encircling his town in an online documentary [links to movie] on electronicintifada.net. Stop the Wall Campaign and The Palestine Monitor provide fact sheets, maps, and articles on the wall. Interview: Sarah Jones

More on Sarah Jones’ battle with the FCC over her song”Your Revolution”can be found at yourrevolutionisbanned.com.