MotherJones.com | MoJoBlog - Social Issues and Political Commentary: February 18, 2007

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February 24, 2007

Important Gay Rights Bills Likely to Pass This Session

The San Diego Union-Tribune reports today that two breakthrough bills for gays and lesbians are likely to be passed by the new Democratic Congress. Both possibilities have me on the brink of tears of joy, they are so overdue and yet still seem so implausible. The first is an employment discrimination ban. Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.) projects that the bill will even include gender identity—which, to have any teeth, it must, lest employers shift from discriminating against those who are queer to those who act queer (which it doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out they've long since done).

The only problem with this bill—and it’s a major one—is that churches and small businesses would be exempt. Churches: Feh—I don't have the energy to wade into the constitutionally murky waters of whether they should be exempt or not. But small businesses, which is to say most businesses? Why should they be exempt? No one is talking about a quota; the issue is whether GLBT people are turned away from positions for which they are qualified.

The other bill would include GLBT identity among those covered by hate-crimes legislation. That's right, nearly 10 years after Matthew Shephard was executed there is no national hate-crimes protection for GLBT people, who make up 14 percent of all victims of hate crimes. If that's not reason enough to support it, here's what Tony Perkins of the Family Research Council has to say: "It's taking us to the point where anyone who opposes the sexual behavior of homosexuals will be silenced." Now, he's probably exaggerating, but just for a moment imagine the utopia of not having to listen to the invented slanderous anecdotes and statistics about GLBTs groups like Perkins' generate. The sweet, sweet silence of it.

But before you let those tears of joy trickle down your cheeks, remember on whose desk the veto pen rests.

Bill Richardson Serious About This "Running for President" Thing

New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson has an op-ed in today's WaPo arguing that George Bush's refusal to use diplomacy early in his administration led to a nuclear North Korea, and that if we aren't careful we'll repeat our mistakes with Iran. Hard to argue with logic like this:

Rather than directly engaging the Iranians about their nuclear program, President Bush refuses to talk, except to make threats. He has moved ships to the Persian Gulf region and claims, with scant evidence, that Iran is helping Iraqi insurgents kill Americans. This is not a strategy for peace. It is a strategy for war -- a war that Congress has not authorized. Most of our allies, and most Americans, don't believe this president, who has repeatedly cried wolf.

...

No nation has ever been forced to renounce nuclear weapons, but many have chosen to do so. The Iranians will not end their nuclear program because we threaten them and call them names. They will renounce nukes because we convince them that they will be safer and more prosperous if they do that than if they don't. This feat will take more than threats and insults. It will take skillful American diplomatic leadership.

As I wrote a couple days ago, I totally agree. The funny thing about this is that it isn't just Democratic boilerplate from a presidential candidate. Bill Richardson knows diplomacy. Bill Richardson knows nukes. The man was U.S. ambassador to the U.N., negotiated with Saddam Hussein way back when, negotiated a ceasefire in Darfur more recently, and briefly ran the U.S. Department of Energy under Clinton. (All of this leads me to believe that Richardson, who is unlikely to get the nomination for president, would make an excellent Secretary of State.)

February 23, 2007

Florida Appeals Court Rules Against Girl Based On Fantasized Future Events

In 2004, two Florida adolescents--16-year-old Amber and 17-year-old Jeremy--took digital photos of themselves nude and engaged in some sort of sexual contact. They then sent the photos from a computer at Amber's house to Jeremy's email address. Somehow, the Tallahassee police got possession of the photos, and both Amber and Jeremy were arrested and charged with producing, directing or promoting a photograph featuring the sexual conduct of a child. Jeremy was also charged with possession of child pornography.

Amber appealed the charge, believing she had the law on her side. In 1995, a Florida court ruled that two 16-year-olds could not be found delinquent for having sex with each other. Since Amber was engaged in legal sex, she and her attorney reasoned that the police had violated her guaranteed right to privacy.

Remember this (edited) exchange between Alice and the White Queen in Through the Looking Glass?

"Suppose he never commits the crime?"

"That would be all the better, wouldn't it?"

"Of course it would be all the better, but it wouldn't be all the better his being punished."

"You're wrong there, at any rate. Were you ever punished?"

"Only for faults."

"And you were all the better for it, I know!"

"Yes, but then I had done the things I was punished for. That makes all the difference."

"But if you hadn't done them, that would have been better still; better, and better, and better!"

This month, a Florida Appeals Court voted 2-1 to uphold the charge against Amber. Writing for the majority, Judge James R. Wolf, speculated that both Amber and Jeremy could have eventually sold the photos to child pornographers or shown them to friends. He also said that transferring the digital images from a camera to a computer and then sending them via email created "innumerable problems" because the computers could be hacked.

Judge Wolf's reasoning must make every Florida parent with photos of their naked children a bit uncomfortable. After all, they might show the photos to friends, and those friends might even sell them to child pornographers. Or one might slip out a of parent's pocket or purse and be picked up by a stranger, who could then sell it to a child pornographer. And who knows how many parents with photos of their naked toddlers might become child pornographers?

Amber and Jeremy are too young to be listed on a sex offender registry, thank goodness, but there is no doubt that their privacy was violated, and there is no telling what kind of psychological effect this circus has had on them.

Ahmad Chalabi Breaks My Spirit

Like a monster that will not die, Ahmad Chalabi is back in the headlines. Apparently everyone's favorite Iraqi troublemaker has gotten himself a job leading the implementation of the surge from the Iraqi end. Story from the subscription-only Wall Street Journal site here, excerpts here.

I won't even bother with this, because I trust all of you know Chalabi's sordid history and because I've spent more brain-hours thinking about Chalabi in the last year than I care to count. But if you want to know why working with this character is bad, bad, bad idea for the American government, see all of the Chalabi entries in the Mother Jones Iraq War Timeline.

Few Weeks of Anonymity Doom Presidential Campaign, Vilsack Goes Back to Lifetime of Anonymity

We've all been a bit harsh on presidential candidate and Iowa Gov. Tom Vilsack (Wonkette refers to him as "~~Tim~~ ~~Pete~~ Tom Vilsack") because of his lack of name recognition, charisma, any chance at all of winning the nomination, etc.

Well, apparently we got to him. Vilsack decided that being the top presidential candidate from Iowa (but not the top candidate -- or even second -- in Iowa polls), was fun while it lasted but he's packing it in. Sadly, with the first candidate to exit the race also goes the most ambitious climate-change plan.

Newsweek: "Petraeus is Engaged in a Giant 'Do-Over.'"

Scary, essential new reporting from Michael Hirsh of Newsweek:

Gen. David Petraeus’s new "surge" plan is committing U.S. troops, day by day, to a much deeper and longer-term role in policing Iraq than since the earliest days of the U.S. occupation. How long must we stay under the Petraeus plan? Perhaps 10 years. At least five. In any case, long after George W. Bush has returned to Crawford, Texas, for good.

The previous general in Iraq, George Casey, was focusing on training Iraqi forces before he left his post, in a move designed to prep the country for an American departure. Under Casey's plan, reports Hirsh, "By 2008, the remaining 60,000 or so U.S. troops were supposed to be hunkering down in four giant 'superbases,' where they would be relatively safe." But under Petraeus's plan, the Army is setting up hundreds of "mini-forts" all over the country, right in the middle of some of the worst fighting. The idea that the Iraqis can take responsibility for their own security -- always a fallacy -- has been discarded. American servicemen and women are walking beats. The most dangerous beats in the world. "We're putting down roots," one former Army captain tells Hirsh.

This is the last thing Democrats -- who are trying to decide which way, not if, they are going end the war, both in Congress and if they were to take the White House in 2008 -- want to hear. Could the disconnect between what candidates are saying on the trail and what is happening on the ground in Iraq be any greater?

But ignore that for a second. It's like the 2006 elections never happened. In their rhetoric, members of the Administration acknowledge that politically, they can't get away with another long-term go at achieving stability in Iraq: the people have spoken, and they won't have it. For example, when Secretary of Defense Robert Gates was asked at a congressional hearing how long the surge was expected to last, he said, "I think for most of us, in our minds, we're thinking of it as a matter of months, not 18 months or two years."

But the fact of the matter is that Petraeus has gone ahead and implemented a long-term strategy that is useless if we cut it off in one year or even two. It doesn't pay dividends that quickly. Don't get me wrong: I see the value in what Petraeus is doing. It's the proper way to fight an insurgency. But really, it's the proper way to prevent an insurgency, and the well-intentioned Petraeus and his genius-club of advisors are at least two years late to the scene. (An aside: "Civil Affairs" teams are a little-known part of the military. They are commissioned to do what Petraeus has the whole Army doing, and if they had been used from the beginning of this war, we could have avoided this whole mess. For more, consider "Waging Peace" by veteran reporter Rob Schultheis. It's an excellent read and is totally relevant to discussions how wars like this one should be fought.)

In the end, I suspect this will prove the Powell Doctrine right yet again -- Bush's war in Iraq is one long, painful lesson on how right Powell was when he said that foreign wars should only be fought if we have a clearly defined objective and exit strategy, the support of the international community, and broad support amongst the American people. Before, we didn't have clearly defined objectives or an exit strategy. Now that we do, there is no support amongst the American people for what Petraeus is doing, and with Congress looking to redraw the 2002 war authorization in order to more narrowly define what American troops can be used for in Iraq... it looks like even this worthy new plan from a worthy new general is just another path that ends in failure.

Wilberforce Be With You: The Christian Right Claims Amazing Grace

Yesterday was the 200th anniversary of Britain's abolition of slavery. But since Hollywood doesn't release new titles on Thursday, it's waiting until today to launch Amazing Grace, a new movie about 18th-century British abolitionist William Wilberforce. The flick, directed by Michael Apted (creator of the mesmerizing 7-Up documentary series) and produced by the studio that did The Chronicles of Narnia, is getting enthusiastic advance reviews. But nowhere is the film more highly anticipated than among conservative Christians, who see parallels between Wilberforce's moral battle and their faith-based campaign against sex trafficking. But Wilberforce's unlikely victory is also viewed as a metaphor for the Christian right's struggle to remake the culture. Presidential hopeful Sam Brownback was dubbed a "Wilberforce Republican" by the Economist, and has eagerly accepted the title. And check out this email appeal I recently received from Ted Baehr, who runs MovieGuide, an evangelical movie review site:

One man, William Wilberforce, was used by God to abolish the slave trade in England and bring about a reformation of manners.
Imagine what you and I can do together to redeem the media and save our culture! [...]
Because of Wilberforce's willingness to serve the Lord, a Victorian society where women and children were safe and where the Church was addressing social evils in creative ways saved a nation that was quickly falling into rampant paganism.
[...] you can help us bring about a moral reform in our nation that will set the captives free from the bondage and slavery of corrupt media.
This is the chance for the Church in our era to address social evils in creative ways!

Wilberforce has officially been recruited as a culture warrior. (BTW, MovieGuide gives Amazing Grace four stars, though it warns viewers that it contains "female cleavage.")

Of course, Wilberforce's story doesn't just resonate with religious conservatives. His against-the-odds struggle for social justice plucks liberal heartstrings as well—ours included. For a progressive interpretation of British abolitionism, see Mother Jones co-founder Adam Hochshild's most recent book, Bury the Chains, which argues that the anti-slavery movement was "the first great human-rights campaign." As Hochschild explained when I interviewed him:

In a time that feels politically grim, especially for anyone in the U.S. who cares about social justice, I hope people will take heart from a story of folks who started a campaign at a time when it looked even grimmer. The idea of ending slavery seemed totally utopian, crackpot, wildly too idealistic. But they succeeded. And they succeeded in 50 years, in the lifespan of some people [...] They went through some very grim times, one of them being the long wartime period like the one we’re seeing now. Wartime is bad news for progressives, and it was the same thing [during the Napoleonic wars]. So I guess to the extent that it’s possible for a book like this to have any effect, I would just like to see it have the effect of making people working for justice today feel heartened and to know that any big struggle will always be a long one with many setbacks.

I don't see anyone calling themselves "Wilberforce Democrats" any time soon, but that's no reason to let the right lay exlcusive claim to the legacy of abolitionism, or even Amazing Grace. So take a break from your usual pagan film fare and see if it lives up to the hype. (And for you history buffs/Afropop fans, it's your chance to see Youssou N'Dour's silver screen debut as Olaudah Equiano.)

February 22, 2007

What Do Jet Blue and Gavin Newsom Have in Common?

They are both really, really good at apologies. (Jet Blue's here. Gavin's latest, in which CBS asks him about "the man code" here.)

I never had any doubts that Jet Blue could recover from its PR nightmare, for the simple fact that I fly cross country a fair bit on Jet Blue, and I haul my butt over to Oakland because their fares are lower, the flights are always, in my experience, on time, and I can indulge in 6 hours of HGTV if I care to do so. (Sadly, I do.) Gavin, I wasn't so sure (and by recovery here I mean: bid for Sacramento or Washington). But then I saw his "exclusive" interview (and most recent apology) with the local CBS affliate.

Damn, the man is good (though was it the lighting, or does he have a bald spot? Check the video).

He was frank, he managed to be funny, he hit a lot of demos (including dyslexics, like me!) without appearing to pander, he got away with saying "I am who I am" without sounding like Popeye...

Now granted, the interview had the fingerprints of Peter Ragone and Chris Lehane all over it, but Peter's sock puppet incident aside (Dude! didn't you learn the lesson of Lee Siegel? Though Ragone's lesson was a promotion. His boss' scandal hit just in time.), there's a reason why these guys, all three of them, are considered killers.

Gavin killed.

UPDATE: Check out the Wiki war on Gavin, specifically if dating a Scientologist reflects badly upon him. (On that subject, don't even get me started.) And let's hope Ragone's not indulging in any Wiki reverts.

Billionaires Toast to Merrill Lynch Underwriting Coal-Fired Power Plants

The Billionaires for Coal had a grand old time cavorting outside Merill Lynch in downtown San Francisco yesterday. Toasting with champagne glasses, tossing out one-liners, they sneered at a group of earnest, banner-waving protesters nearby. Just a few pairs of hipster sneakers and some scruffy facial hair poked out from under the Billionaires' suits, top hats, and cocktail dresses.

"Why travel to the tropics when we can bring the tropics to us?" asked Jodie van Horn. In real life she's an activist with Rainforest Action Network, but as a Billionaire she goes by Alata Monie. "We'll convert our winter properties to summer properties, and our summer properties to scuba properties."

Read the rest of this blog and more on The Blue Marble.

Cal. to Consider Bolstering Mental Health Care in Prisons

California ushered in the dark trend of turning the mentally ill out to the streets to fend for themselves (leading to an explosion in homelessness). Perhaps the state can also pioneer a saner way of dealing with mental illness.

About a quarter of the state's immense prison population suffers from a major mental illness, but there is little mental health care available in prison. Mentally ill men are 10 times more likely to commit violent crimes. Ergo, the golden state is graced with the highest recidivism rates in the country.

A bill to be introduced tomorrow in Sacramento will call for a complete overhaul of prison mental health care. It might cost money, but it will also almost certainly save the state money in the end since a precursor program cut incarceration rates by 72 percent.

Rape, Murder, War Crimes and a Plea

While we're on the subject of rape in Iraq, remember, back last March when five U.S. soldiers gang raped the Iraqi teenager and killed her and her family? Well, a second American soldier, Sergeant Paul Cortez, has pleaded guilty to the gang rape of a 14 year old in Mahmudiyah.

According to Cortez's plea,

"While we were playing cards Barker and Green started talking about having sex with an Iraqi female. Barker and Green had already known..." Cortez said before breaking down. He bowed his head and remained silent, sniffling occasionally, for a full minute before continuing. "Barker and Green had already known what, um, house they wanted to go to. They had been there before and knew only one male was in the house, and knew it would be an easy target," Cortez said.

Cortez went on to describe how the group changed their clothes so they would not be recognized as American soldiers on the way to the house. When he began crying again, his lawyer asked the court for a recess, which was granted.

When the court-martial opened Tuesday, a military judge read a guilty plea in which Cortez described how, in addition to raping the girl, he held her down and acted as a lookout so other soldiers could take their turns raping her before she was shot to death. In the plea agreement, Cortez said he held the girl's hands while Barker raped her, then he raped her himself...

Meanwhile, the suspected ringleader, Steven Green, shot dead the girl's father, mother, and 6-year-old sister. He then raped the girl while Cortez acted as a lookout and Green finally shot the girl dead.

What an atrocity. And is it any wonder that we are now seeing Iraqi forces accused of rape? Look who trained them.

But at least this case was uncovered. How many barbaric acts such as these go unreported or undiscovered? Several media outlets are reporting that this case "was considered among the worst in a series of alleged atrocities by U.S. military personnel in Iraq" but there may very well be many more cases of violations and war crimes that we never hear of. We should also remember that war crimes are more prevalent and systematic than we think.

— Neha Inamdar

Obama's Smear Staff

It's hard to say (and not worth the effort) who was in the wrong in yesterday's bitchfight between Barack and Hillary (for everything you need to know about it, see the Top Story box of MoJo's News and Politics page). Sure, former Clinton-backer David Geffen's comments about Hillary and Bill were pretty personal—and IMHO, Maureen Dowd was off the mark to publish them. But Hillary's campaign exaggerated Geffen's position on Barack's staff. So call it a tie. But it turns out that Barack (I'm going to call him by his first name since everyone calls Hillary by hers) executed his response based on the advice of Robert Gibbs, whom DailyKos calls "a well-known smear-meister best known for his work trashing other Democrats"—this from a guy who talks about keeping it positive. End result: Bleh for them both.

Whole Foods Smells Weakness, Buys Wild Oats

Whole Foods, the Wal-Mart of organic and health food, announced yesterday it will acquire rival chain Wild Oats for $565 million.

Whole Foods made the decision to pursue Wild Oats after the chain suffered a debilitating sequence of mishaps in late 2006. In November, Wild Oats' CEO resigned over contract disputes, and the company closed 8 underperforming stores. The cost of the closings was more than $25 million, and Wild Oats' CFO resigned in December.

"I thought, gosh, maybe this would be a good time to approach Wild Oats," said Whole Foods' CEO/Founder, John Mackey. Mackey said the acquisition deal with Wild Oats' interim CEO, Gregory Mays, came together in a matter of weeks.

Currently, Wild Oats has 72 stores in 22 states. Whole Foods has 193 stores in 32 states, the U.K., and Canada. Despite Whole Foods' commitment to the environment, organic goods, and animal rights (they recently stopped selling live lobster except in Maine), the company has been vocally criticized for their flat denial to provide a worker's union. CEO Mackey memorably compared unionization to herpes, saying: "It doesn't kill you, but it's unpleasant and inconvenient and it stops a lot of people from becoming your lover." Whole Food also imports much of its organic produce.

Whole Foods most recently opened stores in London, Brooklyn, and Portland, Maine, and a huge new store in New York City's historic--but rapidly gentrifying--Lower East Side, on a spot formerly occupied by one of the city's largest Jewish theaters.

--Jennifer Phillips

Tag--You're It

About 50 students at New York University have signed up to play a game, "Find the Illegal Immigrant," created by student members of the College Republicans. One student is chosen to wear a tag identifying her as an illegal immigrant, and the first student "immigration enforcement agent" to find the tagged student wins a prize.

About 500 students have signed up to protest the game, which they consider "ignorant" and "dehumanizing." NYU has issued a statement supporting the College Republicans' right to free speech and the resulting debate that is created by the illegal immigrant hunt.

A CNN news segment is available here.

What's the Best Case Scenario With Iran?

Kevin Drum has some thoughts on whether or not it's feasible to reestablish diplomatic relations with Iran, and I quibble only with his assertion that there is the possibility that Iran could turn not only from an enemy into a partner, but from an enemy into a friend.

Here's Drum:

Iran is not some wayward child with a heart of gold that can be made into our bosom buddy by sitting down and swapping a few stories. It's a harsh, illiberal theocracy that's been a state sponsor of terrorism for decades. But the weird thing is that this senior official [Earlier, Drum quotes a senior Iranian official who calls the U.S. and Iran "natural allies."] is right: there really aren't any fundamental geopolitical reasons that Iran and the United States need to be enemies. Iran isn't territorial, they're happy to sell their oil to the highest bidder, and they really do hate al-Qaeda.

Agreed on all counts. I would argue that in addition to the three criteria Drums lists at the end of this paragraph, we have to include the subject of Israel because there are too many staunch defenders of Israel in Congress, Washington's think tanks, and America's special interests. And on the Israel question Iran fails absolutely. But Drum isn't dumb and anticipates my thinking. "I know, I know. There's still Israel. And obviously I don't have any magical solution to that," he says. "But even there, there might be a deal to be struck. Not an easy one, or a quick one, but something."

I don't know if a deal needs to be struck. We're not talking about pacifying the region here; we're just talking about whether or not the U.S. and Iran can get along well enough to start talking again. I would venture that all we need are guarantees from Ahmadinejad to stop making loony "Death to Israel" pronouncements and to start making high-profile assurances that Iran's nuclear program is not meant to be a threat to Israel. Some people in the United States aren't going to be satisfied with that that. They're still going to see Ahmadinejad as a dangerous wildcard and will insist that we can't negotiate with a country run by such a man. They'll just have to realize that talks with Iran fundamentally make the United States safer. Right now we have no influence over Iran, and, if anything, continue to antagonize them. Entering a tense but workable diplomatic relationship humanizes both sides, allows them to talk through grievances, and begins the process of making concessions and finding middle ground.

Think of it this way: There's a crazy man running around down the street and the neighbors are getting worried. Do you poke him with a stick? Or do you try to settle him down and find out what ails him? And do you wait to act until the crazy man gets a gun in his hand, or do you try and talk to him before it gets to that point?

Here's the quibble that I mentioned earlier. Drum says:

The Soviet Union turned from implacable enemy to semi-friend in a remarkably short time, and that conflict was far longer lasting and more deeply rooted than our conflict with Iran. And remember: Ronald Reagan ensured his legacy by cutting a deal with the Soviets during his final two years in office. Maybe Bush should try to do the same.

I guess I just don't see it. The Soviet Union was a westernizing country that was ready to admit that the models it had used to construct its economy and basic national outlook were corrupt and rotting. They were ready for an alternative. If the people of Iran are dying to burst out of their burquas and hit the club, I haven't seen any indication. I think the best we can hope for with Iran is detente, but I think that's good enough. And like Drum, I think we'll never know unless we try.

Second Rape Charge In a Week for Iraqi Forces

Earlier this week we reported that a 20 year-old Iraqi woman was taken to a police facility and gangraped by three members of the Iraqi security forces. Then came Prime Minister Maliki's thoroughly disgusting response -- he exonerated the suspects after an "investigation" that lasted less than a day, declared that they should be honored (for unspecified actions), made the name of the accuser public, and finally, called her a criminal and a fraud.

Now it seems that the U.S. military, led by recently-elected Gen. David Petraeus, has ordered its own investigation into the rape, and has already appointed an American officer to take charge of gathering evidence.

This comes as a second rape allegation surfaces, with the AP reporting that four Iraqi soldiers have been accused of raping a 50-year-old Sunni woman and the attempted rape of her two daughters. In Muslim society in particular, rape victims rarely speak publicly, fearing shame and even death at the hands of male relatives seeking to save the family honor. Yet this victim chose to speak out, and even appeared today on Al-Jazeera television, saying the soldiers asked her about certain individuals and accused her of lying to them when she insisted that she didn't know them. No word yet on Maliki's response this time around.

—Jen Phillips

February 21, 2007

Archbishop Akinola Needs To Watch Some Nature Shows

Nigeria's Anglican archbishop, Peter Akinola, has declared that homosexuality is ''an aberration unknown even in animal relationships,'' a statement so ignorant, you have to wonder how one gets to be an archbishop these days. Hundreds of species, from beetles to primates, exhibit homosexual behavior as a way of bonding or communicating. Of course, Akinola also believes it should be illegal for homosexuals to form organizations, read gay literature and eat together in pubilc places.

Akinola is not alone in his quest to get the gay out of the Anglican Communion. On Monday, the Communion gave the Episcopal Church of the U.S. a September deadline to stop blessing same-sex unions. "If the reassurances requested of the House of Bishops cannot in good conscience be given, the relationship between the Episcopal Church and the Anglican Communion as a whole remains damaged at best, and this has consequences for the full participation of the church in the life of the communion,'' the statement said. The request to stop blessing same-sex unions was first made in 2004.

Seven archbishops showed their frustration with the Episcopal Church of the U.S. by refusing to take communion with U.S. presiding bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori, an outspoken supporter of gay congregants. Several Episcopal congregations in Virginia and one in Kansas have broken away from the national church because of the blessing of same-sex unions and the ordination of gay bishop Gene Robinson, bishop of New Hampshire, in 2003. Robinson, by the way, wore a bullet-proof vest under his cassock during the ordination ceremony.

Rampant Abuse of GLBT Students in US Schools

A study released last week by Human Rights Watch reads, in part:

In the United States, only 55 percent of students say they feel safe in school. Human Rights Watch found that lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender youth in many U.S. schools are particularly vulnerable to unrelenting harassment from their peers. Despite the pervasiveness of the abuse, few school officials intervened to stop the harassment or to hold the abusive students accountable; in fact, some teachers and administrators encouraged or participated in the abuse. Over time, verbal harassment often escalated into sexual harassment and other forms of physical violence.

Turns out all the drumming up of anti-gay sentiment Republicans have been doing to win elections has real consequences. For kids.

Thought Things Couldn't Get Worse in Iraq?

Wrong again. Today, our last ally of note, the UK, announced that it had seen the writing on the wall and will begin withdrawing troops. (Denmark and Lithuania are also going to begin withdrawal.) Add to that a new tactic being used by insurgents: bombs that dispense lethal chlorine gas. Three such bombs have exploded in the last month, killing 27 and wounding 180, and insurgents haven't yet learned how to use the bombs most effectively.

The insurgents have another new tactic: Shooting American helicopters out of the sky. They've had success with that as well, shooting down their first chopper today since the military said it was changing flight patters to thwart the emerging trend.

Add to that that the much-touted crackdown in Baghdad is a flop (with violence spilling out of the security zones and continuing within) and what you have is a situation anyone in their right mind would get the hell out of, post-haste.

So?

Guess Who's Coming to the GOP Fundraiser?

One of the GOP hard-hitting political campaign managers in California is a punk musician and one-time druggie who disappears for days at a time running from the police. Said chairman of the state Republican party: "Some of the more conservative (politicos) are taken aback by the tattoos and leather jacket, but that goes away as soon as they realize how good he is at what he does."

If only social conservatives could grant the rest of us the same largesse.

Read a complete (two-part) profile here and here.

John McCain Might as Well be Gay

Asked if they'd be willing to vote for a "generally well-qualified" candidate with the following characteristics, here's how Americans responded in a Feb. 9-11 Gallup poll.

Black 94%
Jewish 92%
A woman 88%
Hispanic 87%
Mormon 72%
Married for third time 67%
72 years of age 57%
A homosexual 55%
An atheist 45%

Several things stand out. First, Americans are much more tolerant of inherent characteristics (race, sex) than of things they view as a candidate's choice (religion, sexual orientation, marriage tendencies), which means we've moved past racism to simple prejudice. Take that for what it's worth.

Also, John McCain is old -- so old that his age puts him at the same disadvantage as a gay candidate for president, the very idea of which must horrify a huge portion of our (obviously) homophobic electorate and would galvanize the religious right. I suspect we should take these numbers with a grain of salt, but... wow.

(H/T Crooks and Liars)

Increase in STD Vaccines Signals Trouble for Abstinence Industry

Via Feministing, we learn that there is a new shot to prevent chlamydia in the works. It seems STD prevention in the form of needles is the new black. A few weeks back, Cameron plugged this Prospect piece on the new HPV vaccine. The article discussed that low income girls do not have access to the vaccine, due to lack of funding, but are most at risk. Today, Feministing discusses "the clam" as well as what the proliferation of STD-prevention shots could mean for the abstinence-only education industry. (Mother Jones did a profile on this billion-dollar industry in our November/December 2006 issue.)

"If the scientific community continues to develop STD vaccines, abstinence-only programs are going to have to resort to their far-weaker arguments about the emotional/moral consequences of sex rather than the straight-up medical risks."

Sadr City On the Table for Security Crackdown

The LA Times reports today that, due to political pressure from Sunnis, the U.S. military is now considering entering Sadr City as part of its security crackdown. This signifies a shift in strategy that many feared. Bush's top advisers on the recent surge warned last month that entering the Shi'ite neighborhood would "unnecessarily unite the country's now-splintered Shiite leadership" and "would almost certainly force the [Al Mehdi militia] into [a direct] confrontation with American troops." There has been careful consideration of the military's failed attempt to control the city in 2004 and that of the fact that among ruin and chaos in Baghdad, the neighborhood is a beacon of prosperity and calm (due to a hefty chunk of reconstruction funds from the government).

But according to the Times, all this consideration will likely be thrown out the window and surge advocates are doing a 180. It looks like once again, we are about to make a military error. What is most interesting about this shift is that, in part, it stems from rumors that Mehdi Army leader Muqtada al-Sadr has fled to Iran, opening a window for the U.S. military to move in. This rumor appears not to be true. Military analyst and surge adviser, Frederick Kagan also says that he "overestimated the Sadrists and underestimated Maliki." So, let's get this straight. We are going to enter a relatively secure (the surge is about security, right?) area, because of false intelligence and due to a lack of respect for our enemy.

In addition, there are broader consequences that a mistake like this could have within the Iraqi government. As Tim Grieve points out over at Salon's War Room:

Sadr and his supporters make up one of the key constituencies of the government of Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki; if Sadr were to withdraw that support, Maliki's government might well collapse."

Rest assured, a collapse of the Iraqi government would do nothing for the security of the country. And, yes, we can't ignore the fact that Sadr City is a safe haven for the Mehdi Army and has spawned death squads, but I guarantee a few thousand troops can't do anything about that, except, maybe, make the situation worse.

Follow Up to the Rape of Sabrine

Two days ago, Jim blogged about the rape of an Iraqi woman named Sabrine that was making headlines. Sabrine had the courage to go to Al Jazeera after she was assaulted by Iraqi security forces, and her story was so powerful it was hard to ignore.

Sheikh Ahmad Abdul Ghafoor al-Samaraei, who according to the New York Times is "the head of the Sunni Endowment, whose organization cares for Sunni mosques and shrines in Iraq," came forward after Sabrine's story went public and said that he knows of many cases of rape by Iraqi security forces. (Sabrine had been taken to a police facility on suspicion of helping Sunni insurgents, and was raped there.)

Prime Minister Maliki, a Shiite and widely considered to be in the pocket of the powerful Shiite militias that control parts of Baghdad, decided to go the strongman route: He fired Samaraei and had his office release a medical report indicating that there were no signs that Sabrine had been raped. The report has some nasty things to add: "We expected this fabricated propaganda... It seems that the success of the law enforcing plan was resented by some people because it foils some political calculations."

The United States has supported some disgusting characters in the past 50-100 years, but as a country we've always had some distance from the chaos and pain our goons created. Now we're getting a history lesson.

Update: Maliki has called the woman an imposter and a criminal and has made her name public. He is insisting that the officers accused of the rape be honored.

Hillary the Hawk

Out of the Hillary fog bank, comes a voice of reason in the form of Bob Scheer's Truthdig blog. He says what every politician knows: Hillary is the Democrats' stealth war candidate.

Let's face it: No matter how much many of us who oppose the war in Iraq would also love to elect a female president, Hillary Clinton is not a peace candidate. She is an unrepentant hawk, à la Joe Lieberman. She believed invading Iraq was a good idea, all available evidence to the contrary, and she has, once again, made it clear that she still does.

"If the most important thing to any of you is choosing someone who did not cast a vote [to authorize the war] or has said his vote was a mistake, then there are others to choose from," she said in New Hampshire last week, confusing contempt for antiwar Americans — now a majority — with the courage of her indefensible conviction that she bears no responsibility for the humanitarian, economic and military disaster our occupation has wrought.

Read the whole thing here.

This election already is resembling 2004: Moneybags Hillary coming out of the Democratic Leadership Council, as the candidate of the middle class, i.e. status quo. Like Lieberman before her, Hillary is ranked against the so-called left. In 2004 the DLC gang saw Howard Dean as the commie slime. (Dean,of course, is a conservative doctor whose major left wing interest as Vermont governor was providiing children with health care.) But much to the chagrin of the rightwing Dems, Dean is still hanging around. He can be a real pain in the ass. As head of the Democratic National Committee, he knows where the bodies are buried in the Dem garbage dump.

Obama remains a curiosity in all this. The one person who actually might win the election for the Dems is John Edwards. He was a DLCer in 2004, but appears to have shaken off the deadly soccer mom image and is flirting with populist notions. Then there's Gore, who almost surely will get a pat on the back from Oscar for his climate movie and could turn out to be the Hollywood candidate. If that's the case, Gore will have money to fight Hillary.

February 20, 2007

Mother Jones Exclusive: How the Iraq War Inspired a Wave of Global Terrorism

The White House has long claimed that our presence in Iraq attracts terrorists who might otherwise attack American interests. This assertion has always seemed dubious, but in a new Mother Jones exclusive study, Peter Bergen and Paul Cruickshank put the "flypaper" theory firmly to rest. They've crunched the numbers and found that the Iraq War has, in fact, led to a significant increase in jihadist terrorism across the globe. Call it the "Iraq Effect." If you include Iraq and Afghanistan, terror attacks have increased 609% since the U.S. took Baghdad; take away Iraq and Afghanistan and the increase drops, but it's still a hefty 35%. Rather than eliminating terrorists, Bergen and Cruickshank explain, the war has energized terror groups and become a "catalyst for the increasing globalization of the jihadist cause." It's a sobering assessment of an overlooked consequence of the Iraq debacle.

The full study will be posted tonight at 10 PM Eastern/7 PM Pacific, when Bergen and Cruickshank will be appearing on Anderson Cooper 360 on CNN to discuss the Iraq Effect. Bergen will appear on C-Span's Washington Journal tomorrow morning at 9:15 AM Eastern/6:15 AM Pacific.

And stay tuned as we roll out more of our "Iraq 101" package tonight. It's loaded with info on everything you wanted to know about the war but were afraid to ask.

Hip-Hop On the Couch, PBS Tonight

Don't miss Beyond Beats and Rhymes, a documentary on violence, sexism and homophobia in hip-hop, airing tonight on PBS. Including interviews with some big timers -- Mos Def, Fat Joe, Chuck D, Russell Simmons -- as well as a slew of hip-hop insiders and rap fans, the filmmaker goes there, and some balk (like Simmons and the head of BET).

Byron Hurt, a novice documentarian but veteran hip-hop head, calls out his fellow black men asking how the bravado that encourages guns, violence, sexual violence and homophobia is also the pride of the community. Rap artist Jadakiss asks in response, "Do you watch movies? What kind of movies do you watch?" pointing out that what sells in hip-hop is no different than what sells in Hollywood: sex and violence. In one scene Hurt asks some unknowns to rhyme for him and all they spit are lines about sex, drugs, killing. He calls them on it and one of them starts rhyming about poverty, and drugs in the community, then stops and says, "no one wants to hear that." And more to the point, no one can get a record deal rapping thusly.

Sexism? Just look at politics -- there's a clip of Schwarzenegger's "girly man" comment illustrating that hip hop is not misogyny's first, or only, rodeo. Homophobia, says Hurt and others, comes in part from the macho over-the-top display of physical dominance in hip-hop that means power, where powerful white men, like say Donald Trump, can hide behind the desk (and hair) and still have power.

Other scenes are set in Daytona Beach at BET's annual Spring Bling and show firsthand the sexism at play, and the disconnect between the music and message. Hurt talks with one white kid from suburbia whose blasting rap from his dad's truck. The guy says he's loved hip hop "since forever, the beginning," identifies with it, then in the next breath refers to Byron and black folks as "colored people." (Hurt calls him on it.)

Hurt is knee deep in this one, expressing his conflicted feelings about making the documentary, feeling such allegiance to the medium, hip-hop being part of him, but also wanting to ask the questions no one seems to be asking.

Indeed, there are lots of questions, for every level of the industry, really provocative stuff. And if you are a teacher, or an educator, or a provider of some kind who has an audience for the film Independent Lens is putting together an educational program to match, check it out here.

And for a steady stream of posts on music, films to watch, and general cultural commentary bookmark The Riff.

Posted by Elizabeth Gettelman on 02/2