Body bag count puts strains on coalition
Spanish PM fights off calls to pull out after record death toll
Giles Tremlett in Madrid and Duncan Campbell in Los Angeles
Monday December 1, 2003
The Guardian
A weekend of bloodshed across Iraq saw November chalk up new and grim records, including the highest number of casualties among coalition troops and the deadliest single month for America's armed forces since the 1991 Gulf war.
The killings of seven Spanish military intelligence officers in an ambush at Mahmudiya, south of Baghdad, together with the deaths of two more US soldiers brought the monthly toll of coalition dead to 111.
It also brought to 79 the number of US troops killed in Iraq, outstripping the total for September and October.
The flow of body bags back to the US and other countries made its mark on the political arena, with the Democratic party presidential candidate Wesley Clark, a former Nato supreme commander, yesterday describing Iraq as "a distraction from the war on terror".
"Are we safer with Saddam Hussein gone? That's a very tough case to make," he told CNN.
In Spain, the prime minister, Jos� Maria Aznar, acted to head off criticism from opposition politicians and newspapers of his unpopular policies in Iraq.
With the deaths of the seven military intelligence officers last month bringing to nine the number of Spanish soldiers killed in Iraq, he vowed that the troops would not be brought back. "Withdrawal is the worst possible path to take," he said.
Mr Aznar claimed that the killings were, in themselves, proof that his own policies were correct.
"The fanatical hatred that has accompanied this new atrocity has provided unimaginable pictures that we will never forget. We have no option but to face this fanaticism head on," he said.
The Socialist opposition leader, Jos� Luis Rodr�guez Zapatero, praised the bravery of the dead men but also led calls for the 1,300 Spanish troops in Iraq to be "brought home".
He was backed by smaller opposition parties who, like I�aki Anasagasti of the Basque Nationalist party, warned there could be "many more deaths in a very short period of time and for no good reason".
Several newspapers condemned Mr Aznar's determination to keep troops in the country, despite the fact that 85% of Spaniards - more than any other EU country - believes the Iraq war was a mistake.
"Nobody who saw the glee with which passersby trampled the corpses of our countrymen can still maintain that the majority of Iraqis consider coalition troops to be their liberators," El Mundo newspaper said.
Mr Aznar, whose deputy prime minister and heir-to-be Mariano Rajoy will lead the People's party into a general election in the spring, was an enthusiastic backer of George Bush before and during the war.
An attack on South Korean civilian workers, which killed two and left two more badly injured, has increased pressure on South Korea's president, Roh Moo-hyun, after he pledged to send more troops to Iraq in addition to 675 medics and military engineers deployed since May. He has yet to make the politically sensitive decision whether to include combat forces in the expected 3,000-strong contingent.
Asked whether the killings would affect Korea's decision to send more troops the deputy foreign minister, Lee Soo-hyuck, told a hastily arranged briefing in Seoul: "It is too early to comment. We must take time to analyse things."
Japan, which had two diplomats killed in Iraq over the weekend, is also struggling with the thorny decision of whether to send troops. Plans to deploy non-combat soldiers were put on hold this month after the attack on the Italian base in Nassiriya.
November was the bloodiest month for the coalition forces in Iraq since the invasion, with the following deaths
US 79
Italy 19
Spain 7
Japan 2
South Korea 2
Poland 1
Colombia 1
� What the leaders say
US: "We did not charge hundreds of miles into the heart of Iraq, pay a bitter cost of casualties, defeat a ruthless dictator and liberate 25 million people only to retreat before a band of thugs and assassins" President George Bush
Italy: "No intimidation should divert us from our determination to help resurrect this country" Prime minister Silvio Berlusconi
Spain: "Against fanatical terrorism there is no other option than confronting it" Prime minister Jos� Mar�a Aznar
Sunday, November 30, 2003
Iraq Scientists: Lied About Nuke Weapons
AP: Iraqi Scientists Say They Lied to Saddam Hussein About Nuclear Weapons Development
The Associated Press
Nov. 30 � Iraqi scientists never revived their long-dead nuclear bomb program, and in fact lied to Saddam Hussein about how much progress they were making before U.S.-led attacks shut the operation down for good in 1991, Iraqi physicists say.
Before that first Gulf War, the chief of the weapons program resorted to "blatant exaggeration" in telling Iraq's president how much bomb material was being produced, key scientist Imad Khadduri writes in a new book.
Other leading physicists, in Baghdad interviews, said the hope for an Iraqi atomic bomb was never realistic. "It was all like building sand castles," said Abdel Mehdi Talib, Baghdad University's dean of sciences.
Seven months after a U.S.-British invasion toppled Saddam's Baath Party government, Iraqi scientists have grown more vocal in countering Bush administration claims, used to justify the war, that Baghdad had "reconstituted" nuclear weapons development, and that it once was a mere six months from making a bomb.
At best, Khadduri writes, it would have taken Iraq several years to build a nuclear weapon if the 1991 war and subsequent U.N. inspections had not intervened.
His self-published "Iraq's Nuclear Mirage," a chronicle of years of secret weapons work and of a final escape into exile, is part of this senior scientist's emergence from a low profile in Canada intended to refute what he calls a "massive deception" in Washington that led the United States into war.
Months of searching by hundreds of U.S. experts have found no trace of nuclear, chemical or biological weapons in Iraq, just as U.N. inspectors found none before the war. No Iraqi scientists have confirmed the programs were revived in recent years.
Bush administration officials still speak, nonetheless, of a threat from such weapons of Baghdad's "robust plans" for them, as Vice President Dick Cheney puts it in defending last March's U.S. invasion of Iraq. They offer no hard evidence, however.
Khadduri, a U.S.- and British-educated physicist, writes that he did theoretical work on nuclear weapons as long ago as the mid-1970s, after joining Iraq's Atomic Energy Commission. By the late 1980s, as the secret bomb program accelerated, he was in a pivotal position as coordinator of all its scientific and engineering information.
The U.N. inspectors of the International Atomic Energy Agency, who dismantled the bomb program after Iraq's defeat in the 1991 war, saw Khadduri as a key source and conducted an all-day interview with him earlier this year in Toronto, where he has resided since 1998.
"Iraq's Nuclear Mirage," available via online booksellers, dismisses the U.S. contention that the atom-bomb establishment was somehow resurrected after the IAEA demolished it, U.N. inspectors were stationed in Iraq and Iraqi specialists were scattered.
"Where is the scientific and engineering staff required for such an enormous effort?" he asks. "Where are the buildings and infrastructure?"
The continuing U.S. weapons hunt amounts to no more than "investigating mirages," he says.
An ex-bombmaker still in Iraq is just as dismissive of the unsubstantiated U.S. allegations.
"There was no point in trying to revive this program. There was no material, no equipment, no scientists," former bomb designer Sabah Abdul Noor said in a recent interview at Baghdad's Technology University.
"Scientists were scattered and under the eyes of inspectors, totally scattered. To do a project, you have to be together."
Talib, the newly elected university dean, was an anti-Baathist who didn't participate in the bomb program, but was close to many who did. They vastly oversold their accomplishments before 1991, the physicist said.
"They put a lot of lies on Saddam Hussein," he said in a Baghdad interview. "They took a lot of money out of him through what you call, in English, bluffing." When their installations were finally demolished, it "saved their necks" by burying their mistakes, he said. "They could tell Saddam, `There's nothing left.'"
Khadduri, in his core position in the program, could attest to the overselling.
He writes that when he transferred top-secret documents of bomb program chief Jafar Dhia Jafar to an optical disc in 1991, he found the "blatant exaggeration" in a 1990 report to Saddam.
With its clever wording, Khadduri said in a telephone interview from Toronto, "one could easily have been convinced we had produced a couple of kilograms of enriched uranium instead of a couple of grams" that is, about four pounds of bomb material instead of a fraction of an ounce.
A bomb would have required some 40 pounds of highly enriched uranium.
In a 1997 summary, the IAEA said there were no indications the Iraqis ever produced more than a few grams of such material. It also said there were "no indications that there remains in Iraq any physical capability for the production of amounts of weapon-usable nuclear material of any practical significance."
Khadduri and others said the design and actual production of a bomb would have been an extremely difficult task.
It was an impossible quest, "all futility," said one of Baghdad's senior nuclear physicists, Hamed M. al-Bahili.
Al-Bahili, who joined the Atomic Energy Commission in 1968 but remained outside the weapons program, said his colleagues inside "all knew they wouldn't achieve results." As for whether the program was later revived, he said, "these American inspectors are wasting their time."
AP: Iraqi Scientists Say They Lied to Saddam Hussein About Nuclear Weapons Development
The Associated Press
Nov. 30 � Iraqi scientists never revived their long-dead nuclear bomb program, and in fact lied to Saddam Hussein about how much progress they were making before U.S.-led attacks shut the operation down for good in 1991, Iraqi physicists say.
Before that first Gulf War, the chief of the weapons program resorted to "blatant exaggeration" in telling Iraq's president how much bomb material was being produced, key scientist Imad Khadduri writes in a new book.
Other leading physicists, in Baghdad interviews, said the hope for an Iraqi atomic bomb was never realistic. "It was all like building sand castles," said Abdel Mehdi Talib, Baghdad University's dean of sciences.
Seven months after a U.S.-British invasion toppled Saddam's Baath Party government, Iraqi scientists have grown more vocal in countering Bush administration claims, used to justify the war, that Baghdad had "reconstituted" nuclear weapons development, and that it once was a mere six months from making a bomb.
At best, Khadduri writes, it would have taken Iraq several years to build a nuclear weapon if the 1991 war and subsequent U.N. inspections had not intervened.
His self-published "Iraq's Nuclear Mirage," a chronicle of years of secret weapons work and of a final escape into exile, is part of this senior scientist's emergence from a low profile in Canada intended to refute what he calls a "massive deception" in Washington that led the United States into war.
Months of searching by hundreds of U.S. experts have found no trace of nuclear, chemical or biological weapons in Iraq, just as U.N. inspectors found none before the war. No Iraqi scientists have confirmed the programs were revived in recent years.
Bush administration officials still speak, nonetheless, of a threat from such weapons of Baghdad's "robust plans" for them, as Vice President Dick Cheney puts it in defending last March's U.S. invasion of Iraq. They offer no hard evidence, however.
Khadduri, a U.S.- and British-educated physicist, writes that he did theoretical work on nuclear weapons as long ago as the mid-1970s, after joining Iraq's Atomic Energy Commission. By the late 1980s, as the secret bomb program accelerated, he was in a pivotal position as coordinator of all its scientific and engineering information.
The U.N. inspectors of the International Atomic Energy Agency, who dismantled the bomb program after Iraq's defeat in the 1991 war, saw Khadduri as a key source and conducted an all-day interview with him earlier this year in Toronto, where he has resided since 1998.
"Iraq's Nuclear Mirage," available via online booksellers, dismisses the U.S. contention that the atom-bomb establishment was somehow resurrected after the IAEA demolished it, U.N. inspectors were stationed in Iraq and Iraqi specialists were scattered.
"Where is the scientific and engineering staff required for such an enormous effort?" he asks. "Where are the buildings and infrastructure?"
The continuing U.S. weapons hunt amounts to no more than "investigating mirages," he says.
An ex-bombmaker still in Iraq is just as dismissive of the unsubstantiated U.S. allegations.
"There was no point in trying to revive this program. There was no material, no equipment, no scientists," former bomb designer Sabah Abdul Noor said in a recent interview at Baghdad's Technology University.
"Scientists were scattered and under the eyes of inspectors, totally scattered. To do a project, you have to be together."
Talib, the newly elected university dean, was an anti-Baathist who didn't participate in the bomb program, but was close to many who did. They vastly oversold their accomplishments before 1991, the physicist said.
"They put a lot of lies on Saddam Hussein," he said in a Baghdad interview. "They took a lot of money out of him through what you call, in English, bluffing." When their installations were finally demolished, it "saved their necks" by burying their mistakes, he said. "They could tell Saddam, `There's nothing left.'"
Khadduri, in his core position in the program, could attest to the overselling.
He writes that when he transferred top-secret documents of bomb program chief Jafar Dhia Jafar to an optical disc in 1991, he found the "blatant exaggeration" in a 1990 report to Saddam.
With its clever wording, Khadduri said in a telephone interview from Toronto, "one could easily have been convinced we had produced a couple of kilograms of enriched uranium instead of a couple of grams" that is, about four pounds of bomb material instead of a fraction of an ounce.
A bomb would have required some 40 pounds of highly enriched uranium.
In a 1997 summary, the IAEA said there were no indications the Iraqis ever produced more than a few grams of such material. It also said there were "no indications that there remains in Iraq any physical capability for the production of amounts of weapon-usable nuclear material of any practical significance."
Khadduri and others said the design and actual production of a bomb would have been an extremely difficult task.
It was an impossible quest, "all futility," said one of Baghdad's senior nuclear physicists, Hamed M. al-Bahili.
Al-Bahili, who joined the Atomic Energy Commission in 1968 but remained outside the weapons program, said his colleagues inside "all knew they wouldn't achieve results." As for whether the program was later revived, he said, "these American inspectors are wasting their time."
Hippoluvr1: hey
hurtinflorida1: hey beautiful, how are u
hurtinflorida1: happy t dayHippoluvr1: is your phone working now?
hurtinflorida1: nope, he hasnt paid the bill, he has to catch up on his bills, he had to have a water pump put in his car
hurtinflorida1: sorry
Hippoluvr1: i am so depressed
hurtinflorida1: join the club, i love u
hurtinflorida1: i fight depression more and more, its been getting worse, i do feel for u
Hippoluvr1: plus i lost one of my pets last nite
hurtinflorida1: oh my god
Hippoluvr1: i think it's worse the older you get
hurtinflorida1: which one
Hippoluvr1: my guinea pig, ozzy
hurtinflorida1: oh bless ur heart honey
hurtinflorida1: i bet he is in guinea pig heaven for sure
Hippoluvr1: let's get in a car and drive as long as we can stay awake and not come back
hurtinflorida1: lol
hurtinflorida1: i know waht its like, ive come so close to taking myself out over the last few months
Hippoluvr1: i'm just too chicken to do it. i'm afraid i might live
hurtinflorida1: yeah, i dont want to go out that way
hurtinflorida1: life just sucks so much of the time
Hippoluvr1: im sure it's not supposed to be like this
hurtinflorida1: i agree
hurtinflorida1: when im down i try to find someething to do for fun, its hard
Hippoluvr1: yes it is. i went to a birthday party tonite and i left when i realized i was just sitting there, had not had anything to eat or drink and only talked to people when they spoke to me
hurtinflorida1: there was a greatful dead concert on pubs tonight, that was sort of cool, but it makes me feel sooooo old
hurtinflorida1: pbs
Hippoluvr1: i know, i watched farm aid and i was apalled at how old everyone was
hurtinflorida1: everyone has grey hair , oh my god
hurtinflorida1: there was this lady also on pbs today, barbara something, she was talking about finding ways to do things we love and levels of happiness, she was pretty cool
Hippoluvr1: was it barbara deangelis?
hurtinflorida1: she said she was not into self improvement shit, didnt even care if we have bad attitudes, just what was important was finding things we love to do
hurtinflorida1: that name sounds right
Hippoluvr1: she was about our age, longish dark hair?
hurtinflorida1: yeah
hurtinflorida1: i liked here approach
hurtinflorida1: her
Hippoluvr1: did you decide anything about your uncle?
hurtinflorida1: i wrote him and told him i would like to go but he would need to rent me a limo and a wheel car
Hippoluvr1: why a limo? to pick you up?
hurtinflorida1: yeah, cause i cant drive, he didnt write me back, lol
Hippoluvr1: i was thinking about it and i think you shouldn't compromise yourself because you want to ge tto know him
hurtinflorida1: he wants to save my soul, but to hell with my body
hurtinflorida1: i agree, fuck him
hurtinflorida1: he used to be so cool, he used to be an athesit
hurtinflorida1: ive given up on my family , they only want good news, how unreal is that
hurtinflorida1: i love my mom, but i cant even tell her whats going on, oh well
Hippoluvr1: i only want good news too, think that will work for me?
hurtinflorida1: i look at m;y friend james johnson, who just found out he has hiv, and i look at me, and im okay
Hippoluvr1: i know what you mean
hurtinflorida1: i would just shit
Hippoluvr1: i'm supposed to get my ct this week and find out about my own health
hurtinflorida1: and he is staying positive and he is telling eveyrone
Hippoluvr1: they still can't get my sugar under controll
hurtinflorida1: ur in my prayers, all the time
hurtinflorida1: i told him were all gonna die from something, dont matter what i figure
Hippoluvr1: that's true, i say that all the time
hurtinflorida1: does that make you dizzy, the suger thing
Hippoluvr1: no, i feel tired but that's all
Hippoluvr1: and i think that's from the medicine
hurtinflorida1: ok
Hippoluvr1: my eyesight has gotten lots worse in the last few months
hurtinflorida1: wow
Hippoluvr1: there is no reason to live like this david. i don't understand
hurtinflorida1: i went thru that this summer, my new glasses cost over 400
hurtinflorida1: i dont understand either
hurtinflorida1: ive been a good person, its not fair
Hippoluvr1: i am sure no one will look at me and say, wow, look how well she is suffering
Hippoluvr1: that's not how it is
hurtinflorida1: i keep telling myself there is some purpose in suffering, when im trying to be positive
Hippoluvr1: don't you think that being positive takes a lot of energy?
hurtinflorida1: for sure
Hippoluvr1: i suck
hurtinflorida1: well i love the way you suck, lol
hurtinflorida1: i suck too
hurtinflorida1: i think the holidays are always the worse
Hippoluvr1: true
hurtinflorida1: i didnt even have a thanksgiving this time, its weird
hurtinflorida1: waht the fuck
hurtinflorida1: i wish for hope
hurtinflorida1: its so hard to find fun things to do when we are in pain all the time
Hippoluvr1: i had thanksgiving dinner at work
Hippoluvr1: that was it
hurtinflorida1: wow, well we both are in the same boat
hurtinflorida1: how is erin
hurtinflorida1: tell her to do some good spells for us
hurtinflorida1: we just have to keep fighting, thats all i can learn from all the suffering and pain
hurtinflorida1: im gonna die fighting
Hippoluvr1: i'm too tired to fight any more
hurtinflorida1: i know that feeling too,
Hippoluvr1: i guess i should just go to sleep, that usually makes me feel better at least a little
hurtinflorida1: sleep is always a good thing, listen i love you so so much, and i will send you a lot of energy
Hippoluvr1: thanks i love you too
hurtinflorida1: good nite honey, lets chat again tomorrow
Hippoluvr1: ok
hurtinflorida1: cool, nite
Hippoluvr1 signed off at 12:53:23 AM.
hurtinflorida1: hey beautiful, how are u
hurtinflorida1: happy t dayHippoluvr1: is your phone working now?
hurtinflorida1: nope, he hasnt paid the bill, he has to catch up on his bills, he had to have a water pump put in his car
hurtinflorida1: sorry
Hippoluvr1: i am so depressed
hurtinflorida1: join the club, i love u
hurtinflorida1: i fight depression more and more, its been getting worse, i do feel for u
Hippoluvr1: plus i lost one of my pets last nite
hurtinflorida1: oh my god
Hippoluvr1: i think it's worse the older you get
hurtinflorida1: which one
Hippoluvr1: my guinea pig, ozzy
hurtinflorida1: oh bless ur heart honey
hurtinflorida1: i bet he is in guinea pig heaven for sure
Hippoluvr1: let's get in a car and drive as long as we can stay awake and not come back
hurtinflorida1: lol
hurtinflorida1: i know waht its like, ive come so close to taking myself out over the last few months
Hippoluvr1: i'm just too chicken to do it. i'm afraid i might live
hurtinflorida1: yeah, i dont want to go out that way
hurtinflorida1: life just sucks so much of the time
Hippoluvr1: im sure it's not supposed to be like this
hurtinflorida1: i agree
hurtinflorida1: when im down i try to find someething to do for fun, its hard
Hippoluvr1: yes it is. i went to a birthday party tonite and i left when i realized i was just sitting there, had not had anything to eat or drink and only talked to people when they spoke to me
hurtinflorida1: there was a greatful dead concert on pubs tonight, that was sort of cool, but it makes me feel sooooo old
hurtinflorida1: pbs
Hippoluvr1: i know, i watched farm aid and i was apalled at how old everyone was
hurtinflorida1: everyone has grey hair , oh my god
hurtinflorida1: there was this lady also on pbs today, barbara something, she was talking about finding ways to do things we love and levels of happiness, she was pretty cool
Hippoluvr1: was it barbara deangelis?
hurtinflorida1: she said she was not into self improvement shit, didnt even care if we have bad attitudes, just what was important was finding things we love to do
hurtinflorida1: that name sounds right
Hippoluvr1: she was about our age, longish dark hair?
hurtinflorida1: yeah
hurtinflorida1: i liked here approach
hurtinflorida1: her
Hippoluvr1: did you decide anything about your uncle?
hurtinflorida1: i wrote him and told him i would like to go but he would need to rent me a limo and a wheel car
Hippoluvr1: why a limo? to pick you up?
hurtinflorida1: yeah, cause i cant drive, he didnt write me back, lol
Hippoluvr1: i was thinking about it and i think you shouldn't compromise yourself because you want to ge tto know him
hurtinflorida1: he wants to save my soul, but to hell with my body
hurtinflorida1: i agree, fuck him
hurtinflorida1: he used to be so cool, he used to be an athesit
hurtinflorida1: ive given up on my family , they only want good news, how unreal is that
hurtinflorida1: i love my mom, but i cant even tell her whats going on, oh well
Hippoluvr1: i only want good news too, think that will work for me?
hurtinflorida1: i look at m;y friend james johnson, who just found out he has hiv, and i look at me, and im okay
Hippoluvr1: i know what you mean
hurtinflorida1: i would just shit
Hippoluvr1: i'm supposed to get my ct this week and find out about my own health
hurtinflorida1: and he is staying positive and he is telling eveyrone
Hippoluvr1: they still can't get my sugar under controll
hurtinflorida1: ur in my prayers, all the time
hurtinflorida1: i told him were all gonna die from something, dont matter what i figure
Hippoluvr1: that's true, i say that all the time
hurtinflorida1: does that make you dizzy, the suger thing
Hippoluvr1: no, i feel tired but that's all
Hippoluvr1: and i think that's from the medicine
hurtinflorida1: ok
Hippoluvr1: my eyesight has gotten lots worse in the last few months
hurtinflorida1: wow
Hippoluvr1: there is no reason to live like this david. i don't understand
hurtinflorida1: i went thru that this summer, my new glasses cost over 400
hurtinflorida1: i dont understand either
hurtinflorida1: ive been a good person, its not fair
Hippoluvr1: i am sure no one will look at me and say, wow, look how well she is suffering
Hippoluvr1: that's not how it is
hurtinflorida1: i keep telling myself there is some purpose in suffering, when im trying to be positive
Hippoluvr1: don't you think that being positive takes a lot of energy?
hurtinflorida1: for sure
Hippoluvr1: i suck
hurtinflorida1: well i love the way you suck, lol
hurtinflorida1: i suck too
hurtinflorida1: i think the holidays are always the worse
Hippoluvr1: true
hurtinflorida1: i didnt even have a thanksgiving this time, its weird
hurtinflorida1: waht the fuck
hurtinflorida1: i wish for hope
hurtinflorida1: its so hard to find fun things to do when we are in pain all the time
Hippoluvr1: i had thanksgiving dinner at work
Hippoluvr1: that was it
hurtinflorida1: wow, well we both are in the same boat
hurtinflorida1: how is erin
hurtinflorida1: tell her to do some good spells for us
hurtinflorida1: we just have to keep fighting, thats all i can learn from all the suffering and pain
hurtinflorida1: im gonna die fighting
Hippoluvr1: i'm too tired to fight any more
hurtinflorida1: i know that feeling too,
Hippoluvr1: i guess i should just go to sleep, that usually makes me feel better at least a little
hurtinflorida1: sleep is always a good thing, listen i love you so so much, and i will send you a lot of energy
Hippoluvr1: thanks i love you too
hurtinflorida1: good nite honey, lets chat again tomorrow
Hippoluvr1: ok
hurtinflorida1: cool, nite
Hippoluvr1 signed off at 12:53:23 AM.
Saturday, November 29, 2003
I FIND MYSELF FIGHTING DEPRESSION AS IF IT WERE A REAL PERSON IN FRONT OF ME, OVER POWERING ME, IN ITS ATTEMPT TO DESTROY ME
HOW DO I OVERCOME THIS PERIOD OF PAIN AND HORRIDS, HOW DO I CHANGE MY NEGATIVE PERIOD INTO A POSITIVE AND FRUITFUL ONE,
I MUST BEGIN TO SCUPLT, I MUST BEGIN TO SCUPLT, IT IS MY ONLY HOPE
HOW DO I OVERCOME THIS PERIOD OF PAIN AND HORRIDS, HOW DO I CHANGE MY NEGATIVE PERIOD INTO A POSITIVE AND FRUITFUL ONE,
I MUST BEGIN TO SCUPLT, I MUST BEGIN TO SCUPLT, IT IS MY ONLY HOPE
Friday, November 28, 2003
Cheap Political Stunts 101
President George Bush pulled one hell of a political stunt on Thursday when he flew in Air Force One all the way to Iraq International Airport for another chance to wear a military uniform and to thank troops for defending America by attacking countries which pose no particular threat.
He carried a turkey and stuffing. He hugged soldiers. He shook hands with soldiers. He stayed all of 2.5 hours before jetting back (at tax payers expense) to the land of the free where the citizens are not allowed to see the caskets of dead Americans as they return home from Bush's preposterous war.
"The turkey has landed," ran the front-page headline in the London daily Independent.
"George Bush becomes the first US president to visit Iraq in order to provide the television pictures required by his re-election campaign," it said, noting that Hillary Rodham Clinton, "his undeclared Democratic opponent," was on her way to Baghdad from Afghanistan.
President George Bush pulled one hell of a political stunt on Thursday when he flew in Air Force One all the way to Iraq International Airport for another chance to wear a military uniform and to thank troops for defending America by attacking countries which pose no particular threat.
He carried a turkey and stuffing. He hugged soldiers. He shook hands with soldiers. He stayed all of 2.5 hours before jetting back (at tax payers expense) to the land of the free where the citizens are not allowed to see the caskets of dead Americans as they return home from Bush's preposterous war.
"The turkey has landed," ran the front-page headline in the London daily Independent.
"George Bush becomes the first US president to visit Iraq in order to provide the television pictures required by his re-election campaign," it said, noting that Hillary Rodham Clinton, "his undeclared Democratic opponent," was on her way to Baghdad from Afghanistan.
US Iraq occupation criticised in army report
28/11/2003 - 06:28:21
American military commanders did not impose curfews, halt looting or order Iraqis back to work after Saddam Hussein�s regime fell because US policymakers were reluctant to declare American troops an occupying force, according an internal Army review.
As a result, the Bush administration�s first steps at reconstruction in Iraq were severely hampered, creating a power vacuum that others quickly moved to fill, and a growing mistrust on the part of ordinary Iraqis, the report said.
Since those first days, the US effort in Iraq has been hampered by a growing insurgency with persistent and deadly attacks against American forces.
The review, a postwar self-evaluation by the 3rd Infantry Division (Mechanized), said the political decision to call the US forces that arrived in Baghdad �liberators� instead of �occupying forces� left the division�s officers uncertain about their legal authority in postwar Baghdad and other cities.
Under international law, the report says, the troops were an occupation force and had both rights and responsibilities.
�Because of the refusal to acknowledge occupier status, commanders did not initially take measures available to occupying powers, such as imposing curfews, directing civilians to return to work, and controlling the local governments and populace.
�The failure to act after we displaced the regime created a power vacuum, which others immediately tried to fill,� says the report.
A spokesman for the 3rd Infantry Division, Major Darryl Wright, described the report, marked �For Official Use Only�, as a candid effort to find ways to improve the division the next time it is called to fight.
It reflects multiple, sometimes disparate, points of view from officers and troops who took part in the fighting, he said.
It mirrors recent criticisms by Jay Garner, the retired American general who briefly headed the first occupation government in Iraq.
He said in a BBC interview that the military did not act quickly enough to restore law and order and key services in Baghdad, and should have tried harder to win support from the Iraqi people.
Between 12,000 and 15,000 3rd Infantry Division troops fought in Iraq, and 44 were killed in action, Maj Wright said. The division, along with the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force, comprised the bulk of the ground advance north from Kuwait to Baghdad during late March and early April.
In the section regarding legal matters facing the division, the report said unidentified �higher officials� constrained the occupation effort and did not prepare for the fall of Saddam�s government.
�Despite the virtual certainty that the military would accomplish the regime change, there was no plan for oversight and reconstruction, even after the division arrived in Baghdad,� the report says.
�State, Defense, and other relevant agencies must do a better and timelier job planning occupation governance and standing up a new Iraqi government.�
The division confiscated 1 billion dollars from palaces in Baghdad, but was not permitted to use that money to help the city on its feet, despite having the legal authority to do so, the report says.
�The money could have been used to hire, train, and equip the police force, clear the rubble from government buildings and city streets, hire sanitation workers and other municipal employees, clean up the courts and hire judicial personnel.
�At first, the people were anxious to get started and looked to the US for assistance. They soon saw us as being unable or unwilling to get anything done,� the report says.
The hunt for evidence of Saddam�s alleged chemical, biological and nuclear programmes � the Bush administration�s key reason for going to war � was also problematic from the start, the report says.
28/11/2003 - 06:28:21
American military commanders did not impose curfews, halt looting or order Iraqis back to work after Saddam Hussein�s regime fell because US policymakers were reluctant to declare American troops an occupying force, according an internal Army review.
As a result, the Bush administration�s first steps at reconstruction in Iraq were severely hampered, creating a power vacuum that others quickly moved to fill, and a growing mistrust on the part of ordinary Iraqis, the report said.
Since those first days, the US effort in Iraq has been hampered by a growing insurgency with persistent and deadly attacks against American forces.
The review, a postwar self-evaluation by the 3rd Infantry Division (Mechanized), said the political decision to call the US forces that arrived in Baghdad �liberators� instead of �occupying forces� left the division�s officers uncertain about their legal authority in postwar Baghdad and other cities.
Under international law, the report says, the troops were an occupation force and had both rights and responsibilities.
�Because of the refusal to acknowledge occupier status, commanders did not initially take measures available to occupying powers, such as imposing curfews, directing civilians to return to work, and controlling the local governments and populace.
�The failure to act after we displaced the regime created a power vacuum, which others immediately tried to fill,� says the report.
A spokesman for the 3rd Infantry Division, Major Darryl Wright, described the report, marked �For Official Use Only�, as a candid effort to find ways to improve the division the next time it is called to fight.
It reflects multiple, sometimes disparate, points of view from officers and troops who took part in the fighting, he said.
It mirrors recent criticisms by Jay Garner, the retired American general who briefly headed the first occupation government in Iraq.
He said in a BBC interview that the military did not act quickly enough to restore law and order and key services in Baghdad, and should have tried harder to win support from the Iraqi people.
Between 12,000 and 15,000 3rd Infantry Division troops fought in Iraq, and 44 were killed in action, Maj Wright said. The division, along with the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force, comprised the bulk of the ground advance north from Kuwait to Baghdad during late March and early April.
In the section regarding legal matters facing the division, the report said unidentified �higher officials� constrained the occupation effort and did not prepare for the fall of Saddam�s government.
�Despite the virtual certainty that the military would accomplish the regime change, there was no plan for oversight and reconstruction, even after the division arrived in Baghdad,� the report says.
�State, Defense, and other relevant agencies must do a better and timelier job planning occupation governance and standing up a new Iraqi government.�
The division confiscated 1 billion dollars from palaces in Baghdad, but was not permitted to use that money to help the city on its feet, despite having the legal authority to do so, the report says.
�The money could have been used to hire, train, and equip the police force, clear the rubble from government buildings and city streets, hire sanitation workers and other municipal employees, clean up the courts and hire judicial personnel.
�At first, the people were anxious to get started and looked to the US for assistance. They soon saw us as being unable or unwilling to get anything done,� the report says.
The hunt for evidence of Saddam�s alleged chemical, biological and nuclear programmes � the Bush administration�s key reason for going to war � was also problematic from the start, the report says.
3rd Army commanders felt ammunition was short before Iraq invasion, internal report says
JOHN J. LUMPKIN and DAFNA LINZER, Associated Press Writers Thursday, November 27, 2003
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
(11-27) 22:51 PST WASHINGTON (AP) --
Soldiers with the Army's 3rd Infantry Division charged into Iraq in April short of the ammunition their commanders had said was necessary to invade, according to the division's postwar evaluation of the fighting.
It was one of a number of supply problems encountered by the 3rd Infantry before and during its 21-day dash to Baghdad from Kuwait, according to the internal review, a 293-page after-action report created by the division's senior officers and troops.
During the run-up to the war, division commanders requested additional ammunition be delivered to front-line units. The request was approved, but the troops could not obtain all the ordnance despite months of war preparations.
"Every attempt to gain the ammunition assets resulted in some agency or another denying requests, short-loading trucks or turning away soldiers," the report said. "The entire situation became utter chaos. ... The division crossed (into Iraq) short the ammunition it had declared necessary to commit to combat."
The report, whose authors were not identified by name, catalogued serious problems with supply, security and the handling of prisoners of war. It blamed many problems on higher headquarters or other parts of the military, although it did point out some places where the division could train its own soldiers better.
A spokesman for the division, Maj. Darryl Wright, characterized the report as a candid effort to pinpoint problems and refine tactics so the division fights better next time. He said the report, obtained by The Associated Press and other outlets, had not yet been finalized.
During the Iraq invasion, more than 12,000 troops of the 3rd Infantry Division (Mechanized) joined thousands of Marines and other soldiers in the northward thrust to Baghdad. The first U.S. infantry and armored units entered Iraq on March 20 and took Baghdad within three weeks.
The 3rd Infantry, based at Fort Stewart, Ga., suffered 44 killed during combat in Iraq. Much of its report focused on problems encountered during the rapid thrust into Iraq, which has since given way to an increasingly dangerous occupation.
The report praised the division's troops, leaders and front-line fighting gear, particularly the M-1 Abrams tank and the M-2 Bradley fighting vehicle.
"The Third Infantry Division (Mechanized) moved farther and faster than any other ground offensive operation in history," the report claimed.
"U.S. armored combat systems enabled the division to close with and destroy heavily armored and fanatically determined enemy forces with impunity, often within urban terrain," it said.
Yet the division had serious problems receiving supplies while on the move, including vehicle parts, ammunition, fuel and medical supplies. Had the division been required to move beyond Baghdad, or had it required more time to reach the city, its advance would have stalled, the report suggested.
"Most units literally spent 21 days in continuous combat operations without receiving a single repair part," the report said. "Shortages of predictably high-demand repair parts and vehicular fluids had the most lasting effect on fleet readiness."
In a section describing the problems combat engineers faced in receiving needed construction equipment, the report said, "The Army's current supply system failed before and during the operation."
Despite well-publicized fears that Iraqi President Saddam Hussein would use chemical or biological weapons on advancing U.S. troops, not all soldiers had complete protective gear, the report said.
A battalion of air defense troops was among those. "More than half of the battalion deployed with some type of nuclear, biological and chemical equipment shortage," the report said.
Units ran into shortages of gloves, suits and mask filters. Some protective suits weren't fitted properly, and decontamination kits had expired. Some troops simply left their equipment at home.
The division also had problems handling enemy prisoners of war, the report said.
"Soldiers failed to properly record the circumstances of many captures," it said. "Later, we were unable to identify enemy soldiers who violated the law of war, and, therefore, cannot achieve a major goal set forth by President Bush: To punish those who violate the law of war."
Some units that operated away from the front lines had inadequate weapons to defend themselves as they faced guerrilla attacks, the report said. "Security was lacking for critical command and control nodes ... as well as for critical staff personnel."
Communications were another persistent problem. The division, along with other advancing units, stretched out across southern Iraq, with support units reaching back to Kuwait. But some transmitters didn't have the range to reach more distant units. Iridium satellite phones only functioned about half of the time, the report said.
The division also had difficulty delivering mail to the troops, the report said. Mail, in particular, is considered a critical morale booster for fighting soldiers.
JOHN J. LUMPKIN and DAFNA LINZER, Associated Press Writers Thursday, November 27, 2003
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
(11-27) 22:51 PST WASHINGTON (AP) --
Soldiers with the Army's 3rd Infantry Division charged into Iraq in April short of the ammunition their commanders had said was necessary to invade, according to the division's postwar evaluation of the fighting.
It was one of a number of supply problems encountered by the 3rd Infantry before and during its 21-day dash to Baghdad from Kuwait, according to the internal review, a 293-page after-action report created by the division's senior officers and troops.
During the run-up to the war, division commanders requested additional ammunition be delivered to front-line units. The request was approved, but the troops could not obtain all the ordnance despite months of war preparations.
"Every attempt to gain the ammunition assets resulted in some agency or another denying requests, short-loading trucks or turning away soldiers," the report said. "The entire situation became utter chaos. ... The division crossed (into Iraq) short the ammunition it had declared necessary to commit to combat."
The report, whose authors were not identified by name, catalogued serious problems with supply, security and the handling of prisoners of war. It blamed many problems on higher headquarters or other parts of the military, although it did point out some places where the division could train its own soldiers better.
A spokesman for the division, Maj. Darryl Wright, characterized the report as a candid effort to pinpoint problems and refine tactics so the division fights better next time. He said the report, obtained by The Associated Press and other outlets, had not yet been finalized.
During the Iraq invasion, more than 12,000 troops of the 3rd Infantry Division (Mechanized) joined thousands of Marines and other soldiers in the northward thrust to Baghdad. The first U.S. infantry and armored units entered Iraq on March 20 and took Baghdad within three weeks.
The 3rd Infantry, based at Fort Stewart, Ga., suffered 44 killed during combat in Iraq. Much of its report focused on problems encountered during the rapid thrust into Iraq, which has since given way to an increasingly dangerous occupation.
The report praised the division's troops, leaders and front-line fighting gear, particularly the M-1 Abrams tank and the M-2 Bradley fighting vehicle.
"The Third Infantry Division (Mechanized) moved farther and faster than any other ground offensive operation in history," the report claimed.
"U.S. armored combat systems enabled the division to close with and destroy heavily armored and fanatically determined enemy forces with impunity, often within urban terrain," it said.
Yet the division had serious problems receiving supplies while on the move, including vehicle parts, ammunition, fuel and medical supplies. Had the division been required to move beyond Baghdad, or had it required more time to reach the city, its advance would have stalled, the report suggested.
"Most units literally spent 21 days in continuous combat operations without receiving a single repair part," the report said. "Shortages of predictably high-demand repair parts and vehicular fluids had the most lasting effect on fleet readiness."
In a section describing the problems combat engineers faced in receiving needed construction equipment, the report said, "The Army's current supply system failed before and during the operation."
Despite well-publicized fears that Iraqi President Saddam Hussein would use chemical or biological weapons on advancing U.S. troops, not all soldiers had complete protective gear, the report said.
A battalion of air defense troops was among those. "More than half of the battalion deployed with some type of nuclear, biological and chemical equipment shortage," the report said.
Units ran into shortages of gloves, suits and mask filters. Some protective suits weren't fitted properly, and decontamination kits had expired. Some troops simply left their equipment at home.
The division also had problems handling enemy prisoners of war, the report said.
"Soldiers failed to properly record the circumstances of many captures," it said. "Later, we were unable to identify enemy soldiers who violated the law of war, and, therefore, cannot achieve a major goal set forth by President Bush: To punish those who violate the law of war."
Some units that operated away from the front lines had inadequate weapons to defend themselves as they faced guerrilla attacks, the report said. "Security was lacking for critical command and control nodes ... as well as for critical staff personnel."
Communications were another persistent problem. The division, along with other advancing units, stretched out across southern Iraq, with support units reaching back to Kuwait. But some transmitters didn't have the range to reach more distant units. Iridium satellite phones only functioned about half of the time, the report said.
The division also had difficulty delivering mail to the troops, the report said. Mail, in particular, is considered a critical morale booster for fighting soldiers.
Bush whacked in Iraq
Joseph Charles
Get me outta here
"The turkey has landed," and George Dubya Bush gets the treatment with all the trimmings from the Independent.
The leader of the free world touched down in Baghdad yesterday for a "dramatic Thanksgiving Day surprise".
Complete with an American-size platter-for-one the size of a small cow, the Independent suspects the unannounced visit is for re-election footage for Bush next year.
As if.
"Two hundred and ten days after declaring and end to major combat, President Bush slipped into the unstable and dangerous Middle Eastern country," it says.
After dishing out turkey and corn to the troops, Bush high-tailed it out of Iraq quicker than a Norfolk broiler caught in Bernard Mathew's pantry.
Some Iraqi's were unimpressed with Bush's visit: "To hell with Bush," said one, "He is another Mongol in a line of invaders who have destroyed Iraq."
And here's George thinking he comes from Texas.
Joseph Charles
Get me outta here
"The turkey has landed," and George Dubya Bush gets the treatment with all the trimmings from the Independent.
The leader of the free world touched down in Baghdad yesterday for a "dramatic Thanksgiving Day surprise".
Complete with an American-size platter-for-one the size of a small cow, the Independent suspects the unannounced visit is for re-election footage for Bush next year.
As if.
"Two hundred and ten days after declaring and end to major combat, President Bush slipped into the unstable and dangerous Middle Eastern country," it says.
After dishing out turkey and corn to the troops, Bush high-tailed it out of Iraq quicker than a Norfolk broiler caught in Bernard Mathew's pantry.
Some Iraqi's were unimpressed with Bush's visit: "To hell with Bush," said one, "He is another Mongol in a line of invaders who have destroyed Iraq."
And here's George thinking he comes from Texas.
Wednesday, November 26, 2003
Government by Juggernaut
Wednesday, November 26, 2003; Page A24
THE HOUSE REPUBLICANS' manipulation of the Medicare vote was characteristic of the bullying, win-by-any-means style that has become the congressional norm. More than at any time during their nine years in control, congressional Republicans have been unabashed in their exercise of raw political power. However poisonous relations between the parties were heading into the 108th Congress, this session has witnessed levels of partisanship unhealthy not only for both sides but for the people they're supposed to represent.
Hardball isn't new to politics; Democrats happily employed the rules to their advantage when they held power, and, in the Senate, where the minority has greater protections, they still do. Republicans once clamored for fair treatment and railed against their subjugation at Democratic hands. But their use of the rules to impose their will is making the Democrats look benevolent by comparison. "The Republicans had better hope that the Democrats never regain the majority," Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) said the day after the House Medicare vote.
In the session now limping to its conclusion, Democrats have been excluded from conference committees, where the majority seems to view them as a pesky irrelevance. On the energy bill, they were shut out entirely. On prescription drugs, a favored few Democratic senators inclined to support the bill were allowed into the room. But Minority Leader Thomas A. Daschle (S.D.), who had voted for the Senate measure and been appointed to the conference by his party, was barred; so were all House Democrats. And while conferences are supposed to resolve differences between the two houses, these days legislation often emerges with provisions previously unseen -- and undebated -- in either house. Other provisions approved by both chambers disappear in conference. Lawmakers are then confronted with an unappetizing up-or-down vote on the entire package.
Rank-and-file lawmakers of both parties are often unable to see legislation until the vote is upon them -- not just because details are still being hammered out, but because exposing the document to public scrutiny would hurt the cause of those who seek to have it passed by any means. Both houses have rules designed to prevent this sort of governing by ambush. But these are routinely swept aside in the interest of swift passage, however uninformed. Contempt for the minority extends to the White House, which sought recently to require that Democrats obtain the approval of Republican committee chairs before submitting questions to the administration.
In the House, where the majority has the parliamentary power, the ability to offer amendments is constricted, and often curtailed entirely, with Democrats stopped from even offering their alternative for a vote. Debate is abridged to the point of parody. On prescription drugs, each side had an hour to present its views on one of the biggest changes in Medicare since its enactment. But when the time came to vote and Republicans lacked a majority, the haste evaporated. The customary 15-minute limit for voting was stretched to close to three hours, as GOP leaders confronting a loss bludgeoned members to switch their votes. While this was the longest such stretch, it wasn't an aberration: The majority has kept the vote open about a dozen times in recent years. Adding time to a vote may not seem like a big deal, but when it's done in contravention of the usual practice and solely for the purpose of achieving the desired outcome, it leaves lasting bitterness.
In 1987, when then-House Speaker Jim Wright (D-Tex.) employed a pale version of this practice -- keeping the vote open an extra 15 minutes -- Republicans denounced this as an outrageous departure from regular order. Then-Rep. Trent Lott (R-Miss.) railed against "Jim Wright and his goons." And a Republican congressman named Dick Cheney denounced the move as "the most arrogant, heavy-handed abuse of power I've ever seen in the 10 years that I've been here." Funny, but Vice President Cheney doesn't seem nearly so outraged now.
Wednesday, November 26, 2003; Page A24
THE HOUSE REPUBLICANS' manipulation of the Medicare vote was characteristic of the bullying, win-by-any-means style that has become the congressional norm. More than at any time during their nine years in control, congressional Republicans have been unabashed in their exercise of raw political power. However poisonous relations between the parties were heading into the 108th Congress, this session has witnessed levels of partisanship unhealthy not only for both sides but for the people they're supposed to represent.
Hardball isn't new to politics; Democrats happily employed the rules to their advantage when they held power, and, in the Senate, where the minority has greater protections, they still do. Republicans once clamored for fair treatment and railed against their subjugation at Democratic hands. But their use of the rules to impose their will is making the Democrats look benevolent by comparison. "The Republicans had better hope that the Democrats never regain the majority," Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) said the day after the House Medicare vote.
In the session now limping to its conclusion, Democrats have been excluded from conference committees, where the majority seems to view them as a pesky irrelevance. On the energy bill, they were shut out entirely. On prescription drugs, a favored few Democratic senators inclined to support the bill were allowed into the room. But Minority Leader Thomas A. Daschle (S.D.), who had voted for the Senate measure and been appointed to the conference by his party, was barred; so were all House Democrats. And while conferences are supposed to resolve differences between the two houses, these days legislation often emerges with provisions previously unseen -- and undebated -- in either house. Other provisions approved by both chambers disappear in conference. Lawmakers are then confronted with an unappetizing up-or-down vote on the entire package.
Rank-and-file lawmakers of both parties are often unable to see legislation until the vote is upon them -- not just because details are still being hammered out, but because exposing the document to public scrutiny would hurt the cause of those who seek to have it passed by any means. Both houses have rules designed to prevent this sort of governing by ambush. But these are routinely swept aside in the interest of swift passage, however uninformed. Contempt for the minority extends to the White House, which sought recently to require that Democrats obtain the approval of Republican committee chairs before submitting questions to the administration.
In the House, where the majority has the parliamentary power, the ability to offer amendments is constricted, and often curtailed entirely, with Democrats stopped from even offering their alternative for a vote. Debate is abridged to the point of parody. On prescription drugs, each side had an hour to present its views on one of the biggest changes in Medicare since its enactment. But when the time came to vote and Republicans lacked a majority, the haste evaporated. The customary 15-minute limit for voting was stretched to close to three hours, as GOP leaders confronting a loss bludgeoned members to switch their votes. While this was the longest such stretch, it wasn't an aberration: The majority has kept the vote open about a dozen times in recent years. Adding time to a vote may not seem like a big deal, but when it's done in contravention of the usual practice and solely for the purpose of achieving the desired outcome, it leaves lasting bitterness.
In 1987, when then-House Speaker Jim Wright (D-Tex.) employed a pale version of this practice -- keeping the vote open an extra 15 minutes -- Republicans denounced this as an outrageous departure from regular order. Then-Rep. Trent Lott (R-Miss.) railed against "Jim Wright and his goons." And a Republican congressman named Dick Cheney denounced the move as "the most arrogant, heavy-handed abuse of power I've ever seen in the 10 years that I've been here." Funny, but Vice President Cheney doesn't seem nearly so outraged now.
Tuesday, November 25, 2003
Weapons of Mass Hysteria
By Paul Edwards
t r u t h o u t | Perspective
Tuesday 25 November 2003
President Bush, as the world and many Americans have long known, is a fraud and a liar. Sadly, that's no big surprise. American presidents have a long tradition of mendacity that has ranged from the quirky and trivial to the unpardonable and even treasonous.
Some Presidential lies have been simply personally disgraceful and ridiculous, as was Clinton's brazen denial of sex at the office; others have been of such monstrous gravity that they have shaken the presidency and jeopardized the nation.
Nixon's lies in the Watergate crime were of that profoundly damaging kind. He authorized a burglary of political opponents' offices, his thugs were caught, and he used the full power of his Presidency to attempt to hide his guilt. These were the brazen tactics of a power-addled dictator. Legally thwarted and exposed, he resigned to avoid certain impeachment.
The Reagan-Bush Iran/Contra crime was comparable. Reagan knowingly broke the law in arming Contra mercenaries in Nicaragua and was exposed by Ollie North's blundering attempt at bribing hostile Iran. Reagan stonewalled and let underlings take the fall, and a cowardly, corrupt Congress preferred to let our constitution sustain a massive insult rather than to punish a simple-minded, dangerous, and criminal President.
We Americans are now confronted with the monstrous lies of George W. Bush and we must decide what has to be done about them. It is not as if there had been only one. The Bush presidency has been built and sustained on a basis of outrageous falsehoods and cynical deceptions in every area of public policy.
He lied to the nation about his fiscally insane Tax Cuts For Tycoons. Struggling working families get chump change as the top 1% of the super-wealthy reaps huge windfalls.
He lied in affecting support for working people when his labor policy is calculated to emasculate unions and to abuse, exploit and impoverish the working middle class.
He lied in claiming energy independence must come from raping our last wild lands for gas and oil, spurning solid viable technologies that could end fossil fuel addiction now.
He lied about supporting our soldiers, crafting an $87 billion boondoggle for his giant corporate backers to "rebuild" the Iraq he ordered our troops to fight and die to destroy.
He lied about fires in his Stealthy Forest Act, exploiting public fear to promote high-grading of our last old growth rather than protecting the urban-wildland interface.
He lied about supporting fairness and equity on the Federal courts while he has fought fiercely to pack them with ignorant, blatant racists and rabid, sexist zealots.
He lied about domestic security to pass the egregious Patriot Act that has blasted our Bill of Rights, eroded civil freedoms, invaded our privacy, and made us all potential suspects.
So many lies... but the lie that was far the most cynical, most despicable, most criminal of all, is the lie that caused America to break two hundred years of honorable tradition to invade, without provocation or cause, a small, weak, devastated and tyrannized country.
Bush told us Saddam had Weapons of Mass Destruction and was threatening to attack America. This was the paramount, indeed, the single solid justification for his war.
While the world implored him to give U.N. inspectors time to find the WMDs he swore were there, Bush refused on the grounds that an attack by Saddam on America was not only likely, but imminent. He implied, and led Americans to believe, that Saddam and Osama bin Laden were allies when they were, and always had been, bitter enemies.
After the bludgeoning of an already prostrate Iraq, the world waited for evidence, for the discovery that was to have justified this brutal blitzkrieg. It never came. And it never will, because there were no WMDs and never had been. Bush lied to goad Americans to a climax of fear and fury so as to launch a baseless, shameful assault for which we will answer to our consciences, our children, and the world, for as long as our country exists.
The Constitution cites "high crimes and misdemeanors" against the state as grounds for impeachment. Could there be any higher crime against the American people than to have knowingly deceived us in order to stampede us into an act of barbarism that has betrayed our finest ideals, our highest ethical standards, our national honor, and our whole history?
Now, as the web of lies that created the Iraq disaster collapses in the light of bitter, incontrovertible truth, and the unending cortege of our dead and wounded young people continues to come home to hospitals and graveyards, we are asked to forget Bush's lies. We are told by cynics and moral defectives that his monstrous lie about WMDs didn't matter. We are told that eliminating its dictator was reason enough to bludgeon Iraq and to kill, maim and brutalize its stunned and powerless people.
Facing a furiously rising national rebellion and clear evidence that we are justly blamed, hated, and seen as the enemy by the Iraqi people, we are asked to swallow the horror of this deception, to accept what has been inflicted on Iraq and on us, with all its bloody, bankrupting consequences, and to authorize, by our silence, cowardice and quiescence, the continuation of this grisly nightmare, and of our sociopathic appointed figurehead's odious misrule.
I submit that Bush has committed the vilest, most cynically depraved act of betrayal of the American people in the history of the Presidency.
Nothing less than impeachment, with the conviction that must inexorably follow, can begin to address the damage and redress the harm this President and his amoral handlers have inflicted on America.
God help us as a country if we allow this cancer of mendacity to continue to consume us.
-------
Jump to TO Features for Tuesday 25 November 2003
Today's TO Features -------------- Los Angeles Times | Military Actively Involved in Domestic Spying David Corn | The 9/11 Cover-up Iraq's Model City Starts to Get Ugly Vengeance Has its Day Paul Edwards | Weapons of Mass Hysteria The Other Conflict Continues to Take a G.I. Toll Counting the Costs of Growth With a Forest of Formulas Mistrust at the U.N. Ian Williams | The Less-Than-Special Bush/Blair Relationship Heavy U.S. Security in Iraq as Ramadan Ends
� Copyright 2003 by TruthOut.org
By Paul Edwards
t r u t h o u t | Perspective
Tuesday 25 November 2003
President Bush, as the world and many Americans have long known, is a fraud and a liar. Sadly, that's no big surprise. American presidents have a long tradition of mendacity that has ranged from the quirky and trivial to the unpardonable and even treasonous.
Some Presidential lies have been simply personally disgraceful and ridiculous, as was Clinton's brazen denial of sex at the office; others have been of such monstrous gravity that they have shaken the presidency and jeopardized the nation.
Nixon's lies in the Watergate crime were of that profoundly damaging kind. He authorized a burglary of political opponents' offices, his thugs were caught, and he used the full power of his Presidency to attempt to hide his guilt. These were the brazen tactics of a power-addled dictator. Legally thwarted and exposed, he resigned to avoid certain impeachment.
The Reagan-Bush Iran/Contra crime was comparable. Reagan knowingly broke the law in arming Contra mercenaries in Nicaragua and was exposed by Ollie North's blundering attempt at bribing hostile Iran. Reagan stonewalled and let underlings take the fall, and a cowardly, corrupt Congress preferred to let our constitution sustain a massive insult rather than to punish a simple-minded, dangerous, and criminal President.
We Americans are now confronted with the monstrous lies of George W. Bush and we must decide what has to be done about them. It is not as if there had been only one. The Bush presidency has been built and sustained on a basis of outrageous falsehoods and cynical deceptions in every area of public policy.
He lied to the nation about his fiscally insane Tax Cuts For Tycoons. Struggling working families get chump change as the top 1% of the super-wealthy reaps huge windfalls.
He lied in affecting support for working people when his labor policy is calculated to emasculate unions and to abuse, exploit and impoverish the working middle class.
He lied in claiming energy independence must come from raping our last wild lands for gas and oil, spurning solid viable technologies that could end fossil fuel addiction now.
He lied about supporting our soldiers, crafting an $87 billion boondoggle for his giant corporate backers to "rebuild" the Iraq he ordered our troops to fight and die to destroy.
He lied about fires in his Stealthy Forest Act, exploiting public fear to promote high-grading of our last old growth rather than protecting the urban-wildland interface.
He lied about supporting fairness and equity on the Federal courts while he has fought fiercely to pack them with ignorant, blatant racists and rabid, sexist zealots.
He lied about domestic security to pass the egregious Patriot Act that has blasted our Bill of Rights, eroded civil freedoms, invaded our privacy, and made us all potential suspects.
So many lies... but the lie that was far the most cynical, most despicable, most criminal of all, is the lie that caused America to break two hundred years of honorable tradition to invade, without provocation or cause, a small, weak, devastated and tyrannized country.
Bush told us Saddam had Weapons of Mass Destruction and was threatening to attack America. This was the paramount, indeed, the single solid justification for his war.
While the world implored him to give U.N. inspectors time to find the WMDs he swore were there, Bush refused on the grounds that an attack by Saddam on America was not only likely, but imminent. He implied, and led Americans to believe, that Saddam and Osama bin Laden were allies when they were, and always had been, bitter enemies.
After the bludgeoning of an already prostrate Iraq, the world waited for evidence, for the discovery that was to have justified this brutal blitzkrieg. It never came. And it never will, because there were no WMDs and never had been. Bush lied to goad Americans to a climax of fear and fury so as to launch a baseless, shameful assault for which we will answer to our consciences, our children, and the world, for as long as our country exists.
The Constitution cites "high crimes and misdemeanors" against the state as grounds for impeachment. Could there be any higher crime against the American people than to have knowingly deceived us in order to stampede us into an act of barbarism that has betrayed our finest ideals, our highest ethical standards, our national honor, and our whole history?
Now, as the web of lies that created the Iraq disaster collapses in the light of bitter, incontrovertible truth, and the unending cortege of our dead and wounded young people continues to come home to hospitals and graveyards, we are asked to forget Bush's lies. We are told by cynics and moral defectives that his monstrous lie about WMDs didn't matter. We are told that eliminating its dictator was reason enough to bludgeon Iraq and to kill, maim and brutalize its stunned and powerless people.
Facing a furiously rising national rebellion and clear evidence that we are justly blamed, hated, and seen as the enemy by the Iraqi people, we are asked to swallow the horror of this deception, to accept what has been inflicted on Iraq and on us, with all its bloody, bankrupting consequences, and to authorize, by our silence, cowardice and quiescence, the continuation of this grisly nightmare, and of our sociopathic appointed figurehead's odious misrule.
I submit that Bush has committed the vilest, most cynically depraved act of betrayal of the American people in the history of the Presidency.
Nothing less than impeachment, with the conviction that must inexorably follow, can begin to address the damage and redress the harm this President and his amoral handlers have inflicted on America.
God help us as a country if we allow this cancer of mendacity to continue to consume us.
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Jump to TO Features for Tuesday 25 November 2003
Today's TO Features -------------- Los Angeles Times | Military Actively Involved in Domestic Spying David Corn | The 9/11 Cover-up Iraq's Model City Starts to Get Ugly Vengeance Has its Day Paul Edwards | Weapons of Mass Hysteria The Other Conflict Continues to Take a G.I. Toll Counting the Costs of Growth With a Forest of Formulas Mistrust at the U.N. Ian Williams | The Less-Than-Special Bush/Blair Relationship Heavy U.S. Security in Iraq as Ramadan Ends
� Copyright 2003 by TruthOut.org
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Source: Texas A&M University
Date: 2003-11-24
URL: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2003/11/031124071045.htm
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Gardens Have The Potential To Improve Health, Research Shows
COLLEGE STATION, Nov. 21, 2003 � Adding greenery in the form of a garden to the often sterile, cold environment of hospitals and other healthcare facilities can reduce stress in patients, visitors and staff and even lessen a patient's pain in some instances, says a Texas A&M University authority on health care design.
Roger Ulrich, professor and director of the Center for Health Systems & Design at Texas A&M's College of Architecture, says a growing body of research is giving credibility to the widely held belief that nature can improve health.
"Knowledge and research into fields such as health psychology and behavioral medicine have demonstrated that there need not be anything magical about the processes through which gardens in healthcare facilities should be capable of reducing stress and improving patients' health," Ulrich says.
Ulrich's research focuses on the effects of built and natural environments on people's psychological well-being, stress and health, and he says more and more healthcare facilities are incorporating "healing gardens" into their designs as part of an international movement seeking to improve the quality of healthcare.
Healing gardens, he explains, refer to a variety of garden features that have in common a tendency to foster restoration from stress and have other positive influences on patients, visitors, staff and caregivers. They feature prominent amounts of real nature content, such as green vegetation, flowers and water and can be outdoor or indoor spaces, varying in size.
"Supportive gardens in healthcare facilities potentially can be an important adjunct to the healing effects of drugs and other modern medical technology, and help improve the overall quality of care," Ulrich says.
What's more, research has linked poor design � or psychologically inappropriate physical surroundings � to detrimental health effects such as higher anxiety, delirium, increased need for pain medication, elevated blood pressure and sleeplessness, Ulrich notes.
Probable advantages associated with healing gardens include reduced stress and anxiety in patients, visitors and staff, reduction in depression, higher reported quality of life for chronic and terminal patients, improved way-finding in facilities and reduced pain in patients, he notes. Gardenlike scenes can apparently reduce pain, he explains, as indicated by patient ratings of perceived pain and observed intake of pain-relieving medications.
Other potential advantages, he says, include reduced provider costs because some patients need fewer doses of costly strong pain medication and the length of stay is shorter for some patients. Increased patient mobility and independence, higher patient satisfaction with facility and increased staff job satisfaction are also potential advantages.
The belief that nature is beneficial for people with illness dates back centuries and is consistent across cultures, Ulrich notes. There are several theories, he says, that attempt to explain people's affinity for nature.
Learning theories hypothesize that people associate relaxation with nature, for example during vacations. They acquire stressful associations with urban environments because of aspects like traffic, work and crime. Other scientists argue that built environments are overly taxing to people's senses because of high levels of noise and visual complexity. Nature settings are not as arousing and therefore less stressful.
Proponents of an evolutionary theory believe that humans may have a genetic readiness to respond positively to nature such as vegetation and water because these things were favorable to survival during some two to three million years of evolution.
Whatever the case may be, the capability of gardens to improve health arises mainly from their effectiveness as stress reducing and buffering resources, Ulrich notes.
Stress is a widespread problem for patients, he explains. The vast majority of patients with illness suffer from stress and many suffer from acute stress. Many aspects of hospitalization are stressful to patients, such as impending surgery, pain and unknown diagnostic procedures, depersonalization, disruption of social relationships and job activities. Stress is also a problem for families of patients and healthcare staff.
And while gardens have the potential to help patients and staff cope with stressful scenarios, not any garden will do, Ulrich emphasizes. To be effective in reducing stress, Ulrich has found that gardens must address four main areas: promoting a sense of control, encouraging social support, offering opportunities for physical movement and providing access to natural distractions.
"If a researcher had seriously proposed two decades ago that gardens could improve medical outcomes in healthcare facilities, the position would have met with skepticism by most behavioral scientists and probably with derision by many physicians," Ulrich notes.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
This story has been adapted from a news release issued by Texas A&M University.
Source: Texas A&M University
Date: 2003-11-24
URL: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2003/11/031124071045.htm
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Gardens Have The Potential To Improve Health, Research Shows
COLLEGE STATION, Nov. 21, 2003 � Adding greenery in the form of a garden to the often sterile, cold environment of hospitals and other healthcare facilities can reduce stress in patients, visitors and staff and even lessen a patient's pain in some instances, says a Texas A&M University authority on health care design.
Roger Ulrich, professor and director of the Center for Health Systems & Design at Texas A&M's College of Architecture, says a growing body of research is giving credibility to the widely held belief that nature can improve health.
"Knowledge and research into fields such as health psychology and behavioral medicine have demonstrated that there need not be anything magical about the processes through which gardens in healthcare facilities should be capable of reducing stress and improving patients' health," Ulrich says.
Ulrich's research focuses on the effects of built and natural environments on people's psychological well-being, stress and health, and he says more and more healthcare facilities are incorporating "healing gardens" into their designs as part of an international movement seeking to improve the quality of healthcare.
Healing gardens, he explains, refer to a variety of garden features that have in common a tendency to foster restoration from stress and have other positive influences on patients, visitors, staff and caregivers. They feature prominent amounts of real nature content, such as green vegetation, flowers and water and can be outdoor or indoor spaces, varying in size.
"Supportive gardens in healthcare facilities potentially can be an important adjunct to the healing effects of drugs and other modern medical technology, and help improve the overall quality of care," Ulrich says.
What's more, research has linked poor design � or psychologically inappropriate physical surroundings � to detrimental health effects such as higher anxiety, delirium, increased need for pain medication, elevated blood pressure and sleeplessness, Ulrich notes.
Probable advantages associated with healing gardens include reduced stress and anxiety in patients, visitors and staff, reduction in depression, higher reported quality of life for chronic and terminal patients, improved way-finding in facilities and reduced pain in patients, he notes. Gardenlike scenes can apparently reduce pain, he explains, as indicated by patient ratings of perceived pain and observed intake of pain-relieving medications.
Other potential advantages, he says, include reduced provider costs because some patients need fewer doses of costly strong pain medication and the length of stay is shorter for some patients. Increased patient mobility and independence, higher patient satisfaction with facility and increased staff job satisfaction are also potential advantages.
The belief that nature is beneficial for people with illness dates back centuries and is consistent across cultures, Ulrich notes. There are several theories, he says, that attempt to explain people's affinity for nature.
Learning theories hypothesize that people associate relaxation with nature, for example during vacations. They acquire stressful associations with urban environments because of aspects like traffic, work and crime. Other scientists argue that built environments are overly taxing to people's senses because of high levels of noise and visual complexity. Nature settings are not as arousing and therefore less stressful.
Proponents of an evolutionary theory believe that humans may have a genetic readiness to respond positively to nature such as vegetation and water because these things were favorable to survival during some two to three million years of evolution.
Whatever the case may be, the capability of gardens to improve health arises mainly from their effectiveness as stress reducing and buffering resources, Ulrich notes.
Stress is a widespread problem for patients, he explains. The vast majority of patients with illness suffer from stress and many suffer from acute stress. Many aspects of hospitalization are stressful to patients, such as impending surgery, pain and unknown diagnostic procedures, depersonalization, disruption of social relationships and job activities. Stress is also a problem for families of patients and healthcare staff.
And while gardens have the potential to help patients and staff cope with stressful scenarios, not any garden will do, Ulrich emphasizes. To be effective in reducing stress, Ulrich has found that gardens must address four main areas: promoting a sense of control, encouraging social support, offering opportunities for physical movement and providing access to natural distractions.
"If a researcher had seriously proposed two decades ago that gardens could improve medical outcomes in healthcare facilities, the position would have met with skepticism by most behavioral scientists and probably with derision by many physicians," Ulrich notes.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
This story has been adapted from a news release issued by Texas A&M University.
Monday, November 24, 2003
(Washington, D.C.) Conservative groups across the country are amassing tens of millions of dollars for a national war against same-sex marriage.
One group, United Families International, based in Mesa, Arizona, has launched a campaign to build a $10 million war chest to promote a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage.
On the weekend 800 supporters packed a $1000 a plate breakfast to hear conservative talk-show host Sean Hannity blast the Massachusetts high court for ruling that same-sex couples cannot be prevented from getting married.
"Kids need a mother and a father," said Hannity. "That's what children need. Traditionally, throughout civilization, marriage has been defined as one man and one woman."
Heather Sandstrom, a spokeswoman for UFI, said the money will help pay for TV commercials, radio spots and newspaper advertisements to "educate the public."
Similar media campaigns are being planned by conservative political action groups such as Focus On The Family. Christian televangelists are planning to devote special programs to the amendment. By some accounts, conservatives are eyeing the collection of $100 million to block gays from marrying.
The federal marriage amendment, which was introduced in May, faces two hurdles. First, two-thirds of Congress must vote to approve it and 38 state legislatures must to ratify it.
Sandstrom would not say whether the ads would be used to attack or support specific candidates in the 2004 election.
One group, United Families International, based in Mesa, Arizona, has launched a campaign to build a $10 million war chest to promote a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage.
On the weekend 800 supporters packed a $1000 a plate breakfast to hear conservative talk-show host Sean Hannity blast the Massachusetts high court for ruling that same-sex couples cannot be prevented from getting married.
"Kids need a mother and a father," said Hannity. "That's what children need. Traditionally, throughout civilization, marriage has been defined as one man and one woman."
Heather Sandstrom, a spokeswoman for UFI, said the money will help pay for TV commercials, radio spots and newspaper advertisements to "educate the public."
Similar media campaigns are being planned by conservative political action groups such as Focus On The Family. Christian televangelists are planning to devote special programs to the amendment. By some accounts, conservatives are eyeing the collection of $100 million to block gays from marrying.
The federal marriage amendment, which was introduced in May, faces two hurdles. First, two-thirds of Congress must vote to approve it and 38 state legislatures must to ratify it.
Sandstrom would not say whether the ads would be used to attack or support specific candidates in the 2004 election.
"The President Ought to be Ashamed"
By Eric Boehlert
Salon
Friday 21 November 2003
Former Sen. Max Cleland blasts Bush's "Nixonian" stonewalling of the 9/11 commission, his "lies" about Iraq, and his flight-suit photo op on the USS Lincoln after "hiding out" during Vietnam.
During his six years as a United States senator from the conservative state of Georgia, Max Cleland was known as a moderate Democrat. He drew the wrath of liberals in 2001 when he broke ranks with Democrats and voted for President Bush's tax cuts, and last year he backed the resolution authorizing Bush to wage war with Iraq (though on that vote, at least, he was joined by some liberals).
Today, though, Cleland has emerged as one of the president's harshest critics, especially about the war he voted to authorize. Today, he says, it's a move he deeply regrets, as he scans the headlines from Baghdad. "I feel like I have been duped, I don't mind telling you," Cleland admits. "Everybody in the administration was selling this used car. The problem is all the wheels have fallen off the car and we've got a lemon."
Cleland, perhaps known for being a triple amputee Vietnam vet, lost his Senate seat last November in a race that has gone down in history as typifying the GOP's take-no-prisoners approach to politics. The disabled veteran was smeared as soft on terror because he didn't back Bush's version of homeland security legislation.
Now, outspoken and blunt, he's furious about the White House's handling of the war with Iraq, which he calls a disastrous "war of choice." And he mocks the administration's claims that Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden were allies. "They had a plan to go to war [with Iraq], and when 9/11 happened that's what they did; they went to war."
Meanwhile, as one of 10 commissioners serving on the independent panel created by Congress to investigate the 9/11 attacks, Cleland bemoans the administration's "Nixonian" love of secrecy and its attempt to "slow walk" the commission into irrelevancy.
At the center of the secrecy debate are sensitive presidential daily briefings, or PDBs, that the commission wants to examine as part of its inquiry. Particularly important is the crucial Aug. 6, 2001 PDB, which warned of Osama bin Laden's desire to hijack commercial planes in the United States. For months the White House resisted, and the commission hinted it might subpoena the document. A deal was finally cut last week, which Cleland opposed, allowing a handpicked subset of commissioners to be briefed on the PDBs.
"We shouldn't be making deals," Cleland complains. "If somebody wants to deal, we issue subpoenas. That's the deal."
Republicans say the partisan flavor of Cleland's anti-Bush broadsides are easy to explain; he's still stinging from his surprise reelection loss last November. Cleland denies it, but if he were still bitter, it would be easy to see why, considering he was the victim of a now-infamous attack ad, which even some Republicans objected to.
Cleland's opponent, Saxby Chambliss, who sat out Vietnam with a bad knee, aired a spot featuring unflattering pictures of Osama bin Laden, Saddam Hussein ... and Max Cleland. Chambliss charged Cleland, the Vietnam vet amputee, was soft on national security because he'd voted against creating the Homeland Security Act. In truth, Cleland co-wrote the legislation to create the Homeland Security Department, but objected to repeated attempts by the White House to deprive future Homeland Security employees of traditional civil service protection.
It's hard to imagine any recent Democratic senator less soft on national security than Max Cleland, a reflection on the unlikely path he took to the U.S. Senate. In 1967 he volunteered for combat duty. The next year, during the siege of Khe Sahn, Cleland lost both his legs and his right hand to a Viet Cong grenade. Two years later, at the age of 28, he became the youngest person ever elected to the Georgia state Senate. In 1977 President Jimmy Carter appointed him to head the Veterans Administration. He later became Georgia's secretary of state. And in 1996, Georgia voters sent Cleland and his wheelchair to the Senate.
In a lengthy phone interview on Tuesday, Cleland wondered why Bob Woodward gets better access to White House documents than the 9/11 commission ("Just think about that"), blasted Bush on Iraq ("We've got an absolute disaster on our hands"), while constructing a viable exit strategy ("They're trying to make Iraq the 51st state.") He also talked about the trouble Democratic politicians are having getting elected in the South.
Let's start with the 9/11 commission. What are your concerns about how it's dealing with the White House?
First of all, as someone who co-sponsored legislation creating the 9/11 commission, against great opposition from the White House, this independent commission should be independent and should not be making deals with anybody. I start from there. It's been painfully obvious the administration not only fought the creation of the commission but that their objective was the war in Iraq, and one of the notions that was built on was there was a direct connection between al Qaida and 9/11 and Saddam Hussein. There was not.
So therefore they didn't want the 9/11 commission to get going. What you have is the fear from the White House that the commission would uncover pretty quickly the fact that one of four legs that the war stood on was nonexistent. So they slow-walked it, and they continue to slow-walk it. They want to kick this can down past the elections. We should not be making any deals; we should stick to our original timetable of [completing the final report by] May. However, we're coming up on Thanksgiving here and we're still struggling over access issues. It should be a national scandal.
What have some of the access problems been?
In May, the commission asked the FAA to give us the documents we're looking for. We've had to subpoena the FAA. We've now had to subpoena documents from Norad, which they have not given us. I for one think we ought to subpoena the White House for the presidential daily briefings, to know what the president knew, what the administration knew, and when they knew it so we can determine what changes ought to be made in our intelligence infrastructure, our warning system, so that we don't go through this kind of surprise attack again.
Now, it's not partisan; Bill Clinton has already agreed to come personally before the 9/11 commission. But a majority of the commission has agreed to a bad deal.
And what is the deal?
A minority of the commissioners will be able to see a minority of the [PDB] documents that the White House has already said is pertinent. And then a minority of the commissioners themselves will have to brief the rest of the commissioners on what the White House thinks is appropriate.
So the minority of commissioners will get a briefing on the documents?
Yes, but first they have to report to the White House what they're going to tell the other commissioners.
9/11 commission chairman Tom Kean has suggested if you issue subpoenas on the White House and they fight it, it's going to go to the courts and take months and months of legal wrangling.
Well, that's up to the president, he's made this decision. I say that decision compromised the mission of the 9/11 commission, pure and simple. Far from the commissioners being able to fulfill their obligation to the Congress and the American people, and far from getting access to all the documents we need, the president of the United States is cherry-picking what information is shown to what minority of commissioners. Now this is ridiculous. That's not full and open access.
If you trust one commissioner you should trust them all. I don't understand it. You can say, 'I'm not going to show anything to anybody, and take me to court.' At least that's consistent. But it's not consistent at all to say we're going to parse out this information and we determine how many members of the commission get to see it.
Let me read you something from AP regarding Philip Zelikow, who's executive director of the 9/11 commission. Quote, "He said the bipartisan panel asked specifically for pieces of the daily briefings that dealt with subjects such as terrorism, Al Qaeda and Usama bin Laden, the Saudi-born fugitive leader of the terror network. Other sections, such as those dealing with intelligence on topics and countries not related to terror threats, intentionally were left out of the request, Zelikow said."
That's correct, and that's fair.
"'We asked for everything we wanted, and the White House has discovered hundreds of responsive PDB articles, and we are seeing all of them,' Zelikow said. 'None of those articles are being edited. We're seeing everything we asked to see. And our request was never the subject of negotiation.'"
Well, the request was put forward, but the president's decision and response to the request was negotiated time and time again by Tom Kean and [vice chairman] Lee Hamilton, going over to the White House with hat in hand several times, meeting with the lawyers first, and then with [chief of staff] Andy Card.
Secondly, you determine up front there are 22 PDB's in one stack and over 300 in a second stack. And then the White House says if you come in, and play nice and say nice things to us, then you'll be able to report back to the commission. And then maybe we'll take under consideration with our lawyer whether some elements of the PDB's in the second stack can go into the first stack. I mean come on!
It's Nixonian in the approach. The approach ought to be, "Yes, the 9/11 commission gets access to the documents, all the commissioners get access. Whatever items you request we'll be forthcoming in giving you."
Why, in the end, do you think a majority of the commissioners agreed to the deal with the White House?
You'll have to ask each member of the commission. A couple of weeks ago I voted to subpoena the White House and I'll continue to vote to subpoena the documents.
Doesn't the White House have a point though, in terms of these PDB's, which I don't think have ever been released before? And that if analysts writing them are concerned they could be made public one day, than they won't be as forthright with the president?
Let me walk you through this thing here. First of all, we're not talking about a prescription drug plan under Medicare here. We're talking about the most serious assault on the homeland of the United States since the British invaded during the war of 1812. This is the deal. The joint inquiry made up of Democrats and Republican members of Congress, they issued a report [this summer], but they couldn't get at the PDB's. They kicked the can down the street so that the 9/11 commission could get at the full story. That's the reason for this independent commission, with the time and energy and staff to get at all of this. Had the Joint Intelligence Committee been able to do its job, there wouldn't have even been a 9/11 commission.
We're coming down to the final [months] of the commission and we're still messing around with access issues. This is a key item. I don't think any independent commission can let an agency or the White House dictate to it how many commissioners see what. So this "deal," we shouldn't be dealing. If somebody wants to deal, we issue subpoenas. That's the deal. That was the deal with the FAA, that was the deal with Norad.
And the reason is principle. Clinton has agreed to cooperate with the commission and is eager to come before it. So why doesn't this White House, which was on the bridge when the ship got attacked, why doesn't this White House want to know everything that happened on their watch so that it can't happen again? Why they want to play games with this commission, to make deals, I don't know. It's information control. It's not transparency.
I don't know if they're hiding something. But the public will never know and the 9/11 commission will never know because under the current deal, a minority of commissioners will see a small number of documents and then brief the White House on what they're going to tell the other commissioners. Wait a minute! That doesn't make any sense at all.
Can the commission finish its work by May?
I think it's going to be increasingly difficult. I think the White House has made it darn near impossible to get full access to the documents by May, much less get a full report out analyzing those docs by May. This is a three- or four-year project, it really is. And to delay and deny at this point is to compromise the work of the commission from here on out. I can't say, as a commissioner, to the Congress and the American people, that I had full access to all the documents pertaining to 9/11 and here's the conclusion. I can't say that.
You've heard the claim, the Wall Street Journal editorial page and others have made it, that you are still upset about your 2002 reelection loss and that's why you are so critical of the White House.
This doesn't have anything to do with the 2002 election. It has everything to do with 9/11.
So it's not some sort of payback?
No. It's all about 9/11. This is not a political witch hunt. This is the most serious independent investigation since the Warren Commission. And after watching History Channel shows on the Warren Commission last night, the Warren Commission blew it. I'm not going to be part of that. I'm not going to be part of looking at information only partially. I'm not going to be part of just coming to quick conclusions. I'm not going to be part of political pressure to do this or not do that. I'm not going to be part of that. This is serious.
You say you think it should be a national scandal ...
It is a national scandal. Here's the deal. The administration made a connection on Sept. 11, and you can read Bob Woodward's book ["Bush at War"]. He's a private citizen. He got access to documents we don't have yet! Just think about that. He's a great reporter and a good guy. Bless his heart. But he got documents over two years ago, handwritten notes from Rumsfeld tying the terrorism attack into Iraq. This administration had a point of view the day that happened. If you look at 9/11 separately you realize it had nothing to do with Saddam Hussein. Except [vice president Dick] Cheney and [Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul] Wolfowitz put a plan together in '92 to try to convince [president] Bush One to invade Iraq, but here's what Bush One said about it, in his book "A World Transformed," which I think is devastating:
"I firmly believed that we should not march into Baghdad. To occupy Iraq would instantly shatter our coalition, turning the whole Arab world against us and make a broken tyrant into a latter day Arab hero. Assigning young soldiers to a fruitless hunt for a secretly entrenched dictator and condemning them to fight what would be an unwinnable urban guerilla war."
Now, this administration bought the Cheney-Wolfowitz plan from '92 hook line and sinker. It was all about using 9/11 as an excuse to go into Baghdad, not as a reason.
What's the significance?
Let's chase this rabbit into the ground here. They had a plan to go to war and when 9/11 happened that's what they did; they went to war. They pulled off their task force in Afghanistan, their Predator assets, and shifted them over to the war in Iraq. They took their eye off the 9/11 ball and transferred it to the Iraq ball. And that's a very strategic question that ultimately has got to be answered. I'm focused on 9/11 and the administration is not focused on it. They don't want to share information, and they didn't agree with the commission in the first place.
For the commission's final report, will the White House have final say over what gets released publicly?
For national security reasons, yes, it will be vetted by the CIA and the national security apparatus. Please don't misunderstand here. We're not talking about releasing or even seeing full presidential daily briefings. I don't care about what the president was briefed on about China. Nobody on the commission is going to spill national secrets, nobody's going to give away methods of recruiting agents. As a matter of fact, it was administration officials who ratted out one of their own CIA agents in order to keep guys like Joseph Wilson quiet.
What's your take on the situation in Iraq?
One word: Disaster. And when the secretary of defense puts out a memo to his top staff and says we don't have the metrics to determine whether we're winning or losing the war on terrorism? If the secretary of defense does not understand that we're losing our rear end in Iraq in order to save our face, he ought quit being secretary of defense. Because all you have to do is ask any Pfc. out there. They're sitting ducks with targets on their backs; they're getting blown up. The question more and more is, for what? And, when are we coming home?
The president is trying to find a reason, now that there's no weapons of mass destruction, no yellow cake coming from Niger, no connection with al-Qaida and no immediate threat to the United States, we now have a war of choice. I'm telling you we're in a mess. It's a disaster.
If the pattern holds for the rest of the month, we'll have 100 U.S. soldiers killed during November.
We've lost more youngsters killed in Iraq in less than a year than we lost during the first three years of the Vietnam War. And people say there's no Vietnam analogy?
Do you regret your vote last fall in favor of the resolution authorizing war?
I do. Because I sensed it was a political ploy rather than a ploy to genuinely protect the United States. It was just an attempt to get any resolution passed so the administration could say, just like Lyndon Johnson [with Vietnam], 'We got the approval of Congress.' And then, just like Lyndon Johnson, they went ahead and did whatever they wanted to do; massive buildup, putting the military on thin political ice, getting a bunch of kids killed.
You were up for reelection at the time and you felt a pressure to vote yes?
Yes. They did this purposefully. I will say to you that I did think that it was worth a shot to give the president of the United States the authority to go to the United Nations and try to put together a coalition to try to find out if there were weapons of mass destruction. And if there were weapons of mass destruction, to destroy them.
Of course what I did not know was that the White House had the 1992 Cheney-Wolfowitz war plan on the front burner. I knew they wanted regime change. But I did not know that the Cheney-Wolfowitz war plan was what they were going to do with and that they hadn't figured out a plan B.
I know you're a supporter of Sen. John Kerry.
I am yes, a big supporter.
Do you think his vote last fall in favor of war has hurt him?
Yes, it's cost him. But he and I were trying to do the right thing and give the president of the United State the benefit of the doubt. After all, the vice president stood up at the VFW convention and said Iraq is building nuclear weapons. It was all part of cherry-picking the intelligence and boosting the case for war in Iraq, which they'd already decided to do. They were just looking for reasons. They kept saying there was a connection between Saddam Hussein and al-Qaida. And the president said it's all about terrorism and the war on terrorism. Everybody in the administration was selling this used car. The problem is all the wheels have fallen off the car and we've got a lemon. Looking back, yeah, I regret that vote. I gave the president of the United States the benefit of the doubt. He took it as a blank check. I feel like I have been duped, I don't mind telling you. But the deal with Iraq was obvious. [White House political strategist] Karl Rove and those guys knew that all of a sudden the president's numbers shot up, so the Cheney-Wolfowitz plan fit with Karl Rove's plan; perpetual war keeps the president's numbers up and we'll cover over any attack on the president and any other issue. So they put that front and center and used it as a hammer. They even put me up there with Osama bin Laden and all that kind of stuff, and said I voted against Homeland Security when I was really one of the authors of the Homeland Security bills. So you can see how they used it as a hammer over members of Congress who were running.
And now we've got an absolute disaster on our hands. And now the president's numbers are falling and they don't know what to do about it. So the ground truth has overtaken the political B.S. and now the real truth of the war, the cost of the war, is coming out. The American people, one thing I know is, they do not fight wars of attrition well. And as Thomas Paine once said, "Time makes more converts than reason." As time goes on, this war will not be resolved.
Now, how does this relate to the 9/11 commission? If you slow-walk the 9/11 commission and keep kicking this can down the road, and keep making deals and denying access, within a year they'll have the election out of the way. So it's election-driven.
What should the U.S. now do to improve the situation in Iraq?
You've got to go back and do what you didn't do in the first place. You didn't put together a U.N. coalition, you didn't get the vote of the National Security Council. You didn't bring along your NATO allies. As a matter of fact, all of Europe is laughing at us and the president is going into the teeth of 100,000 demonstrators against our transatlantic ally, the only one we've got left, Britain. This is a disaster.
Do we need more troops in Iraq?
No, no, no. You've got a have an exit strategy. You've got to make this a U.N protectorate with our NATO allies taking up the political and economic restoration of Iraq and we have to command our troops and withdraw our forces. We've got to give up our oil fields.
You've got to pull out. Don't try to make it the 51st state. That's what the White House was trying to do; they're trying to make Iraq the 51st state. The dream of Cheney and Wolfowitz was you create a base of operations in Iraq and then you attack Syria and Iran. I'm serious. You think this is nuts. It is nuts in the case of this particular cost of blood and treasure that the American people are finding out and they're going south on this big time.
When you were in the Senate you were known as a moderate Democrat; you voted in favor of the Bush tax cuts. It's clear your perception of the White House has changed dramatically.
Yeah, they lied to me. I know they lied flat-out about any connection to al-Qaida. Now al-Qaida is teaming up with Saddam loyalists and are doing what? Targeting Americans. They do have a target in common now and that's the 130,000 U.S. soldiers out there. And we lost two more yesterday.
What was your reaction when you saw President Bush landing on the deck of the USS Abraham Lincoln in May to give a victory speech of sorts?
I'll tell you the truth. I thought, "Oh my God." A man who deliberately got out of going to Vietnam by hiding out in the National Guard and who did not even complete his National Guard tour of duty, now walks onto an aircraft carrier in a flight suit with helmet under his arm, as if he's Tom Cruise in "Top Gun," and "Mission Accomplished."
What do you think now?
The president ought to be ashamed because real soldiers are out there fighting and dying for a disastrous policy that he created. I'm telling you this is serious business. And that has now all been acknowledged as a sham. We're in a helluva mess. And the worst part is the kids are getting killed every damn day, that's what gets me.
I want to ask you about Democrats in the South. They just won the Louisiana governor's race, but the weeks earlier had not been good for Democrats in Mississippi and Kentucky. There's lot of concerns in Democratic circles that the South is essentially gone, which could relegate Democrats almost to a permanent minority party. As someone who won lots of elections in the South, what do you think Democrats have to do to win statewide elections?
I think these states have their own peculiarities of local issues. In Georgia, with the president being 70 percent popular and coming in targeting me as hostile to national security, putting me up there with Osama bin Laden, and raising millions of dollars, and Karl Rove pumping in millions of dollars to [former Georgia GOP chief] Ralph Reed down there, and using Georgia as a test case for voter turnout and capturing the white male anger, the backlash at the governor for taking the Confederate banner off the state flag, that was powerful and it took out me and the governor.
When you mobilize the entire Republican apparatus and you energize it with race and the good ole boys in the South, that's tough to beat. That's the Nixon 1968 "Southern strategy." And the Republicans have adopted the Southern strategy.
Meanwhile, the Florida seat is open now. Bob Graham said to heck with it and I understand that. And we'll see how Florida pans out. With Jeb Bush as governor it'd be tough to get a Democrat there. Georgia has an open seat and you're probably looking at a Republican taking that.
Democrats in the South have to do a better job organizing themselves and not take things for granted. I think we in Georgia took for granted that our base would be organized. It's now obvious the Republicans have set a new standard with Ralph Reed and Karl Rove in charge, they nationalize local elections.
-------
Wednesday, November 19, 2003
Across the site
George Bush
Inside the palace, the state visit and the Middle East - full page of today's links
Also from this section
The royal banquet: French food and the Queen's best china
Glass Shard, Europe's tallest building, to be built in London
Sedgefield battens down as the Bush machine rolls into town
Pride of the north: Leeds is best place to live in UK
Walking the Bush way, an American in London tests the mood as President arrives
Behind the scenes: dogs eating toast, royals swearing and staff standing around for hours
By Ian Burrell
20 November 2003
None of the satirical portrayals of the Royal Family has quite managed to paint the picture that emerged yesterday of the bizarre rituals that go on every day inside Buckingham Palace.
On the day that the Queen was playing host to the 43rd President of the United States in one of the most important state visits for decades, her subjects were treated to an extraordinary glimpse of daily life in the Royal Household.
The disclosures included mundane slices of life, such as corgis underneath the royal breakfast table gorging on toast, spread with "light" marmalade and fed to them by the Queen.
The Duke of Edinburgh would sit opposite, with his transistor radio arranged at precisely the right angle next to his Tupperware box of dried porridge oats and a pile of newspapers, with the Racing Post on the top.
The Duke of York had a toy replica of Monkey, the mascot of the former company ITV Digital, in his room.
There were disturbing stories, such as the Princess Royal allegedly berating a clumsy member of the household as a "f*cking incompetent tw*t" and Prince Andrew greeting staff in the morning with expletives when in a grumpy mood.
These were royal revelations that are almost beyond parody. Spitting Image, with its grotesque rubber effigies of an irascible Prince Philip and a gin-swilling Queen Mother, cruelly caricatured the home life of the Royal Family in the Eighties, but the truth is even stranger.
It was told by Ryan Parry, the Daily Mirror reporter who spent eight weeks inside Buckingham Palace masquerading as a footman.
What Mr Parry uncovered was not just an alarming failing in security but an insight into the minutiae of the workings of the Royal Household.
He found that the Queen's footmen are issued with a detailed plan of her breakfast table, setting out the exact positions of every utensil, condiment and cereal.
Similar guides are in existence for the tea trays of every senior Royal.
Prince Philip insists on what he calls a "calling tray" at 7.30am, with the pot of tea and china cup and saucer arranged just so. A later tea tray must include oat cakes and honey.
Buckingham Palace has a big thing about trays, it appears, especially one which is loaded with whisky, soda, clarets and beer for drinks parties. It is grandly referred to as "The Prime Minister's Tray".
According to Mr Parry's account, staff can stand around for hours on end for the opportunity to carry a tray for a few feet along a corridor and pass it to a colleague.
On one weekend during the reporter's brief period of royal employment, he was one of 10 members of staff waiting on the Queen as she enjoyed a cup of coffee. His colleagues were a footman, two kitchen porters, two chefs, two silver pantry under-butlers, a page and a coffee-room maid.
"The maid waited two and a half hours to pick up a pot of coffee from a hot plate and pour it into a silver jug," Mr Parry wrote.
"She then handed it to me. My role was to take the tray 20 metres to the page's vestibule and hand it to the page, who then carried it another eight metres to the Queen in her dining room."
Mr Parry was prepared to enjoy the same kind of access to George and Laura Bush when they arrived at Buckingham Palace on Tuesday.
During the eight weeks he was in the palace, he toured the Belgian suite where the couple were staying, taking in its vast candelabras, occasional chairs and tables, open fires and carriage clocks. He also saw the rooms which were to provide the President's "operation centre".
If he had not blown his cover, Mr Parry would have served a 7am breakfast to Mr Bush, known to be an early riser, and would have then remained on standby to provide a steady supply of tea and biscuits to the first couple and their high-powered team from the White House. The picture that emerges is a mixed one. It recalls, on the one hand, the extravagances and ceremony of royal courts from centuries past, at odds with Buckingham Palace's repeated assurances to the public that budgets are tight and money is spent frugally.
But there are also elements of television's The Royle Family, particularly in Prince Andrew's suite where he watches television on a wide-screen set and has a cushion on his sofa with the slogan "Eat, Drink and Remarry".
Although the Mirror referred to Prince Andrew's "plush sitting room", the picture it published showed a green sofa and tartan cushions surrounded by a clutter of family photographs (many including Sarah Ferguson) that would not have displeased Barb Royle, played in the television series by Sue Johnston.
Last night John Lloyd, the creator of Spitting Image, said that the puppet series had been 19 years ahead of its time in presenting the Windsors as a normal family.
"We had an ex-Buck House footman way back in the first series in 1984, and we had all sorts of tips," said Mr Lloyd, now making the BBC quiz show QI.
Prince Andrew, we are told in the Mirror account, has a "running joke" with household staff in which he leaves Monkey (the puppet sidekick of the comedian Johnny Vegas) in unusual locations around the palace, including in the jaws of a stuffed leopard. Above the toilet in the Wessexes' quarters hangs a cartoon of the Queen telling a group of penguins of her displeasure with the media.
That annoyance will have increased after the Mirror revelations, which may well have caused spluttering over yesterday's toast and "light" marmalade. For although the public may have warmed to the image of the corgis "sprawled out in the corridor asleep" in the Queen's apartments, there were other details in the account that will have damaged the monarchy once again.
The Princess Royal, who is often portrayed as a tireless charity worker, apparently enjoys sitting for portraits.
She reportedly installed a raised platform in her sitting room and donned a navy blue uniform "filled with gold detail, a decorative aiguilette across one shoulder and a line of medals across the left breast" for a sitting.
Mr Parry reported that the Princess Royal flies to London by helicopter from her estate in Gloucestershire before taking a chauffeured Bentley from Kensington Palace to Buckingham Palace.
She is then described pushing aside a post-lunch cup of coffee in disgust at its smell, before heading off to the City of London to attend a conference about crime.
But perhaps the most damaging revelation for the Royal Family's public image is the way it treats the servants.
Footmen live in spartan rooms and share communal toilets and washrooms. They start their day at 7.30am and are told to avoid walking on the middle of the carpets and to stick to "the slow lane" next to the wall.
Mr Parry was required to steam the clothes of the Queen's equerry, Major James Duckworth-Chad, and buff his sword and medals and polish his shoes to a "glass finish".
The footman's salary was �11,881, reduced to �9,338 after living costs. The household has a high turnover of staff. After the hasty departure of the Mirror journalist it is difficult to see who might want to fill the vacancy - other than another undercover reporter, or worse.
UNDERCOVER AT THE PALACE
The undercover reporter who worked inside Buckingham Palace saw the post of footman advertised on the Palace's website.
It demanded the successful applicant should have "good communication skills, be able to work unsupervised and within a team" while also retaining a "friendly, polite disposition."
After downloading the application form and drafting a fake CV containing his real name, Ryan Parry sent off the documents to the Palace.
He was phoned 48 hours later by a royal official and an interview was set for 7 August at 9.30am. There were three interviews, mainly concerned with his aptitude for the work, and he was fitted with his uniform before any references, fake or otherwise, had been received.
Buckingham Palace gave him security clearance on the word of a regular in a pub in Anglesey where Mr Parry had once collected glasses.
The reporter had given the name of a former manager of the Parciau Arms as a referee. When the Palace called the Welsh pub to check the reference it found that the manager had moved on. The Palace was nevertheless prepared to accept a casual acknowledgement from a man at the bar.
His other referee was a fictitious director of a Manchester paint company.
Parry was given clearance to start his job when he received a phone call from the Palace personnel department on 22 September.
The following day he strolled through the gates of the palace to begin his new life as a royal servant.
George Bush
Inside the palace, the state visit and the Middle East - full page of today's links
Also from this section
The royal banquet: French food and the Queen's best china
Glass Shard, Europe's tallest building, to be built in London
Sedgefield battens down as the Bush machine rolls into town
Pride of the north: Leeds is best place to live in UK
Walking the Bush way, an American in London tests the mood as President arrives
Behind the scenes: dogs eating toast, royals swearing and staff standing around for hours
By Ian Burrell
20 November 2003
None of the satirical portrayals of the Royal Family has quite managed to paint the picture that emerged yesterday of the bizarre rituals that go on every day inside Buckingham Palace.
On the day that the Queen was playing host to the 43rd President of the United States in one of the most important state visits for decades, her subjects were treated to an extraordinary glimpse of daily life in the Royal Household.
The disclosures included mundane slices of life, such as corgis underneath the royal breakfast table gorging on toast, spread with "light" marmalade and fed to them by the Queen.
The Duke of Edinburgh would sit opposite, with his transistor radio arranged at precisely the right angle next to his Tupperware box of dried porridge oats and a pile of newspapers, with the Racing Post on the top.
The Duke of York had a toy replica of Monkey, the mascot of the former company ITV Digital, in his room.
There were disturbing stories, such as the Princess Royal allegedly berating a clumsy member of the household as a "f*cking incompetent tw*t" and Prince Andrew greeting staff in the morning with expletives when in a grumpy mood.
These were royal revelations that are almost beyond parody. Spitting Image, with its grotesque rubber effigies of an irascible Prince Philip and a gin-swilling Queen Mother, cruelly caricatured the home life of the Royal Family in the Eighties, but the truth is even stranger.
It was told by Ryan Parry, the Daily Mirror reporter who spent eight weeks inside Buckingham Palace masquerading as a footman.
What Mr Parry uncovered was not just an alarming failing in security but an insight into the minutiae of the workings of the Royal Household.
He found that the Queen's footmen are issued with a detailed plan of her breakfast table, setting out the exact positions of every utensil, condiment and cereal.
Similar guides are in existence for the tea trays of every senior Royal.
Prince Philip insists on what he calls a "calling tray" at 7.30am, with the pot of tea and china cup and saucer arranged just so. A later tea tray must include oat cakes and honey.
Buckingham Palace has a big thing about trays, it appears, especially one which is loaded with whisky, soda, clarets and beer for drinks parties. It is grandly referred to as "The Prime Minister's Tray".
According to Mr Parry's account, staff can stand around for hours on end for the opportunity to carry a tray for a few feet along a corridor and pass it to a colleague.
On one weekend during the reporter's brief period of royal employment, he was one of 10 members of staff waiting on the Queen as she enjoyed a cup of coffee. His colleagues were a footman, two kitchen porters, two chefs, two silver pantry under-butlers, a page and a coffee-room maid.
"The maid waited two and a half hours to pick up a pot of coffee from a hot plate and pour it into a silver jug," Mr Parry wrote.
"She then handed it to me. My role was to take the tray 20 metres to the page's vestibule and hand it to the page, who then carried it another eight metres to the Queen in her dining room."
Mr Parry was prepared to enjoy the same kind of access to George and Laura Bush when they arrived at Buckingham Palace on Tuesday.
During the eight weeks he was in the palace, he toured the Belgian suite where the couple were staying, taking in its vast candelabras, occasional chairs and tables, open fires and carriage clocks. He also saw the rooms which were to provide the President's "operation centre".
If he had not blown his cover, Mr Parry would have served a 7am breakfast to Mr Bush, known to be an early riser, and would have then remained on standby to provide a steady supply of tea and biscuits to the first couple and their high-powered team from the White House. The picture that emerges is a mixed one. It recalls, on the one hand, the extravagances and ceremony of royal courts from centuries past, at odds with Buckingham Palace's repeated assurances to the public that budgets are tight and money is spent frugally.
But there are also elements of television's The Royle Family, particularly in Prince Andrew's suite where he watches television on a wide-screen set and has a cushion on his sofa with the slogan "Eat, Drink and Remarry".
Although the Mirror referred to Prince Andrew's "plush sitting room", the picture it published showed a green sofa and tartan cushions surrounded by a clutter of family photographs (many including Sarah Ferguson) that would not have displeased Barb Royle, played in the television series by Sue Johnston.
Last night John Lloyd, the creator of Spitting Image, said that the puppet series had been 19 years ahead of its time in presenting the Windsors as a normal family.
"We had an ex-Buck House footman way back in the first series in 1984, and we had all sorts of tips," said Mr Lloyd, now making the BBC quiz show QI.
Prince Andrew, we are told in the Mirror account, has a "running joke" with household staff in which he leaves Monkey (the puppet sidekick of the comedian Johnny Vegas) in unusual locations around the palace, including in the jaws of a stuffed leopard. Above the toilet in the Wessexes' quarters hangs a cartoon of the Queen telling a group of penguins of her displeasure with the media.
That annoyance will have increased after the Mirror revelations, which may well have caused spluttering over yesterday's toast and "light" marmalade. For although the public may have warmed to the image of the corgis "sprawled out in the corridor asleep" in the Queen's apartments, there were other details in the account that will have damaged the monarchy once again.
The Princess Royal, who is often portrayed as a tireless charity worker, apparently enjoys sitting for portraits.
She reportedly installed a raised platform in her sitting room and donned a navy blue uniform "filled with gold detail, a decorative aiguilette across one shoulder and a line of medals across the left breast" for a sitting.
Mr Parry reported that the Princess Royal flies to London by helicopter from her estate in Gloucestershire before taking a chauffeured Bentley from Kensington Palace to Buckingham Palace.
She is then described pushing aside a post-lunch cup of coffee in disgust at its smell, before heading off to the City of London to attend a conference about crime.
But perhaps the most damaging revelation for the Royal Family's public image is the way it treats the servants.
Footmen live in spartan rooms and share communal toilets and washrooms. They start their day at 7.30am and are told to avoid walking on the middle of the carpets and to stick to "the slow lane" next to the wall.
Mr Parry was required to steam the clothes of the Queen's equerry, Major James Duckworth-Chad, and buff his sword and medals and polish his shoes to a "glass finish".
The footman's salary was �11,881, reduced to �9,338 after living costs. The household has a high turnover of staff. After the hasty departure of the Mirror journalist it is difficult to see who might want to fill the vacancy - other than another undercover reporter, or worse.
UNDERCOVER AT THE PALACE
The undercover reporter who worked inside Buckingham Palace saw the post of footman advertised on the Palace's website.
It demanded the successful applicant should have "good communication skills, be able to work unsupervised and within a team" while also retaining a "friendly, polite disposition."
After downloading the application form and drafting a fake CV containing his real name, Ryan Parry sent off the documents to the Palace.
He was phoned 48 hours later by a royal official and an interview was set for 7 August at 9.30am. There were three interviews, mainly concerned with his aptitude for the work, and he was fitted with his uniform before any references, fake or otherwise, had been received.
Buckingham Palace gave him security clearance on the word of a regular in a pub in Anglesey where Mr Parry had once collected glasses.
The reporter had given the name of a former manager of the Parciau Arms as a referee. When the Palace called the Welsh pub to check the reference it found that the manager had moved on. The Palace was nevertheless prepared to accept a casual acknowledgement from a man at the bar.
His other referee was a fictitious director of a Manchester paint company.
Parry was given clearance to start his job when he received a phone call from the Palace personnel department on 22 September.
The following day he strolled through the gates of the palace to begin his new life as a royal servant.
Tuesday, November 18, 2003
Did quark matter strike Earth?
By Dr David Whitehouse
BBC News Online science editor
A group of researchers have identified two seismic events that they think provide the first evidence of a previously undetected form of matter passing through the Earth.
We can't prove that this was strange quark matter, but that is the only explanation that has been offered so far
Eugene Herrin
The so-called strange quark matter is so dense that a piece the size of a human cell would weigh a tonne.
The two events under study both took place in 1993.
Other scientists are tantalised, saying that while these seismic disturbances are unlikely to have been caused by strange quark matter, they do not as yet have alternative explanations.
Out of the fireball
Strange quark matter could have arisen after the Big Bang, according to a theory by physicist Edward Witten of the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, US.
The primordial fireball may have produced dense, heavy particles made of three types of quarks, which are fundamental particles.
Whereas so-called "up" and "down" quarks form protons and neutrons, the addition of "strange" quarks might result in a stable form of matter that could grow far more massive than ordinary atoms.
There is some evidence that strange quark matter does exist in the cosmos. In April 2002, two different teams of scientists reported that they had identified collapsed stars that might be composed of the ultra-dense material.
Chandra observatory finds evidence for quark stars
In 1984, Harvard physicist and Nobel Laureate Sheldon Glashow suggested that physicists should team up with seismologists to search for traces of the strange matter that might have passed through the Earth at supersonic speed.
'Unassociated events'
He calculated that strange quark particles would dash through Earth with dramatic effect: a one-tonne spec would release the energy of a 50-kilotonne nuclear bomb, spread along its entire path through the Earth.
In 1993, Vidgor Teplitz, Eugene Herrin, David Anderson and Ileana Tibuleac, all of the Southern Methodist University in the US, began looking for such events.
Seismic records were searched for anomolies
They searched the world's seismographic records for so-called "unassociated events". They looked at more than a million records collected by the US Geological Survey between 1990 to 1993 that were not associated with traditional seismic disturbances, such as earthquakes.
Previously, Herrin and Teplitz speculated that it would be possible to search for seismic events that might indicate passage of strange quark matter (also known as nuclearites) through the Earth because such events would have a distinct seismic signal - a straight line.
This seismic signature would be caused by the large ratio of the nuclearites speed to the speed of sound in the Earth. It was estimated that the strange quark matter might pass through the earth at 400 km per second (250 miles per second), 40 times the speed of seismic waves.
Data collection halted
The team also determined that the minimum requirement for detection of a nuclearite would be detection of its signal by seven monitoring stations.
The researchers latest findings single out two seismic events with the linear pattern they were looking for.
In two cases, the arrival times and forms of seismic waves at nine far-flung stations pointed to linear bursts of energy. The ruptures ripped through the planet at hundreds of kilometres per second rather than fracturing only near the surface, as typical earthquakes do.
One event occurred on 22 October 1993, when, according to the researchers, something entered the Earth off Antarctica and left it south of India 0.73 of a second later.
The other occurred on 24 November 1993, when an object entered south of Australia and exited the Earth near Antarctica 0.15 of a second later.
The first event was recorded at seven monitoring stations in India, Australia, Bolivia and Turkey, and the second event was recorded at nine monitoring stations in Australia and Bolivia.
"We can't prove that this was strange quark matter, but that is the only explanation that has been offered so far," Herrin says.
Unfortunately, scientists may not be able to find any more events that suggest the passage of strange quark matter through the Earth.
In 1993 the US Geological Survey stopped collecting data from "unassociated events."
By Dr David Whitehouse
BBC News Online science editor
A group of researchers have identified two seismic events that they think provide the first evidence of a previously undetected form of matter passing through the Earth.
We can't prove that this was strange quark matter, but that is the only explanation that has been offered so far
Eugene Herrin
The so-called strange quark matter is so dense that a piece the size of a human cell would weigh a tonne.
The two events under study both took place in 1993.
Other scientists are tantalised, saying that while these seismic disturbances are unlikely to have been caused by strange quark matter, they do not as yet have alternative explanations.
Out of the fireball
Strange quark matter could have arisen after the Big Bang, according to a theory by physicist Edward Witten of the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, US.
The primordial fireball may have produced dense, heavy particles made of three types of quarks, which are fundamental particles.
Whereas so-called "up" and "down" quarks form protons and neutrons, the addition of "strange" quarks might result in a stable form of matter that could grow far more massive than ordinary atoms.
There is some evidence that strange quark matter does exist in the cosmos. In April 2002, two different teams of scientists reported that they had identified collapsed stars that might be composed of the ultra-dense material.
Chandra observatory finds evidence for quark stars
In 1984, Harvard physicist and Nobel Laureate Sheldon Glashow suggested that physicists should team up with seismologists to search for traces of the strange matter that might have passed through the Earth at supersonic speed.
'Unassociated events'
He calculated that strange quark particles would dash through Earth with dramatic effect: a one-tonne spec would release the energy of a 50-kilotonne nuclear bomb, spread along its entire path through the Earth.
In 1993, Vidgor Teplitz, Eugene Herrin, David Anderson and Ileana Tibuleac, all of the Southern Methodist University in the US, began looking for such events.
Seismic records were searched for anomolies
They searched the world's seismographic records for so-called "unassociated events". They looked at more than a million records collected by the US Geological Survey between 1990 to 1993 that were not associated with traditional seismic disturbances, such as earthquakes.
Previously, Herrin and Teplitz speculated that it would be possible to search for seismic events that might indicate passage of strange quark matter (also known as nuclearites) through the Earth because such events would have a distinct seismic signal - a straight line.
This seismic signature would be caused by the large ratio of the nuclearites speed to the speed of sound in the Earth. It was estimated that the strange quark matter might pass through the earth at 400 km per second (250 miles per second), 40 times the speed of seismic waves.
Data collection halted
The team also determined that the minimum requirement for detection of a nuclearite would be detection of its signal by seven monitoring stations.
The researchers latest findings single out two seismic events with the linear pattern they were looking for.
In two cases, the arrival times and forms of seismic waves at nine far-flung stations pointed to linear bursts of energy. The ruptures ripped through the planet at hundreds of kilometres per second rather than fracturing only near the surface, as typical earthquakes do.
One event occurred on 22 October 1993, when, according to the researchers, something entered the Earth off Antarctica and left it south of India 0.73 of a second later.
The other occurred on 24 November 1993, when an object entered south of Australia and exited the Earth near Antarctica 0.15 of a second later.
The first event was recorded at seven monitoring stations in India, Australia, Bolivia and Turkey, and the second event was recorded at nine monitoring stations in Australia and Bolivia.
"We can't prove that this was strange quark matter, but that is the only explanation that has been offered so far," Herrin says.
Unfortunately, scientists may not be able to find any more events that suggest the passage of strange quark matter through the Earth.
In 1993 the US Geological Survey stopped collecting data from "unassociated events."
Physicists find 'rebel' particle
By Dr David Whitehouse
BBC News Online science editor
Physicists have found a new subatomic particle, named Ds (2317). It will help them better understand the building blocks of matter.
The particle consists of an unusual combination of more fundamental particles - quarks.
Two quarks form Ds (2317) and, curiously, its properties are not what theory predicted.
The announcement was made by physicist Antimo Palano to a packed auditorium at the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center (Slac) in the US.
The discovery was made by the BaBar international consortium, which operates a detector at Slac that analyses debris from subatomic particle collisions.
'Back to the drawing boards'
"Congratulations to BaBar," said Slac's director, Jonathan Dorfan.
"The existence of the particle is not a surprise, but its mass is lower than expected. This result will send theorists back to their drawing boards."
Quarks are fundamental particles of which there are six types present in nature. The "up" and "down" quarks are the lightest, and are found within the nuclei of atoms of ordinary matter.
There are also the "charm", "strange", as well as the "top" and "bottom" quarks. These are heavier than the up and down quarks. Quarks can also have antiparticles such as anti-down, etc.
Heavier quarks were present in the early Universe and are created today in particle accelerators and in collisions of cosmic rays with atoms in the Earth's atmosphere.
The Ds (2317) combines a charm quark with another heavy quark - an anti-strange quark.
'From unexpected directions'
Physicists are hailing its discovery as important because it has unexpected properties that will provide insight into the force that binds the quarks together.
This force, unlike most others in nature, becomes stronger as the distance between the two quarks increases.
Marcello Giorgi, from the University of Pisa, Italy, who leads the BaBar collaboration, said: "Sometimes, the most exciting discoveries come from unexpected directions. There has been a buzz of excitement in the experiment in the past few weeks.
"We have discovered a new charm particle in an experiment designed to probe the difference between matter and antimatter using bottom quarks."
Bob Cahn, a BaBar collaborator from Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, US, added: "The unexpected mass will make us look again at the forces between quarks and will stimulate new interest in charm-quark systems."
And Dr Raymond Orbach, director of the US Energy Department's Office of Science, said: "The BaBar experiment continues to produce important new knowledge adding to our fundamental understanding of the structure of matter."
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/science/nature/2987195.stm
Published: 2003/04/30 21:22:21 GMT
� BBC MMIII
Behold the pentaquark
By Dr David Whitehouse
BBC News Online science editor
Physicists have discovered a new class of subatomic particle that will provide unexpected insights into the fundamental building blocks of matter.
The discovery involves quarks - particles that make up the protons and neutrons usually found in the nuclei of atoms.
The new particle is the so-called pentaquark - five quarks in formation. Until now, physicists had only seen quarks packed into two- or three-quark combinations.
They say the discovery of this new particle should have far-reaching consequences for our understanding of how the Universe is put together.
Confirmed discovery
Until recently, no firm evidence of pentaquarks existed, even though physicists have searched for these objects for over 30 years.
In 2002, the first tentative evidence of the pentaquark was put forward at an international scientific conference in Japan. Earlier this year, a report of this work was submitted for publication to the journal Physical Review Letters.
The report says that pentaquarks were created by blasting carbon atoms with X-rays. The work was done by a Japanese team, led by Takashi Nakano of Osaka University.
Other evidence for the pentaquark has recently been reported by other experiments, with perhaps the strongest evidence coming from the Jefferson Lab in Virginia, US.
Physicist Ken Hicks, of Ohio University, who took part in both the experiment and the confirmatory work at the Jefferson Lab, says it took him two months to convince himself that the pentaquark was real.
We are quarks
More than 99.9% of the mass of everyday objects is contained within the nuclei of atoms. This means that most of your body mass comes from subatomic particles that are made up of quarks.
There are hundreds of subatomic particles known and most are composites of simpler particles. They all fit into two categories - baryons and mesons.
Baryons are made of three quarks and mesons are comprised of two quarks - a quark and an anti-quark.
For a long time, scientists have been puzzled as to why only these quark combinations existed. Some predicted other combinations such as the pentaquark, which consists of five quarks, including an anti-quark.
The discovery of the pentaquark, also known as a new exotic baryon state, should have far-reaching consequences for our theory of particle interactions that attempt to explain the structure of matter.
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/science/nature/3034754.stm
Published: 2003/07/01 19:05:54 GMT
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Scientists find mystery particle
By Dr David Whitehouse
BBC News Online science editor
Scientists have found a sub-atomic particle they cannot explain using current theories of energy and matter.
The discovery was made by researchers based at the High Energy Accelerator Research Organisation in Tsukuba.
Classified as X(3872), the particle was seen fleetingly in an atom smasher and has been dubbed the "mystery meson".
The Japanese team says understanding its existence may require a change to the Standard Model, the accepted theory of the way the Universe is constructed.
An eternity
X(3872) was found among the decay products of so-called beauty mesons - sub-atomic particles that are produced in large numbers at the Tsukuba "meson factory".
It weighs about the same as a single atom of helium and exists for only about one billionth of a trillionth of a second before it decays into other longer-lived, more familiar particles.
Although this is extremely short-lived by human standards, scientists say that a billionth of a trillionth of a second is nearly an eternity for a sub-atomic particle this heavy.
Particles smaller than the atom are grouped into families depending upon their mass, spin and electric charge.
But X(3872) is peculiar in that it does not fit easily into any known particle scheme and, as a result, has attracted a considerable amount of attention from the world's physics community.
New pairs
Its discovery was recently confirmed by researchers at the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory in Illinois, US, home of the Tevatron, the world's largest atom smasher. It was the US outfit that gave X(3872) its mystery tag.
A normal meson is comprised of a quark and an antiquark held together by the "colour" force, also called the "strong" force because it is the most powerful known in nature.
The large variety of meson particles that have been found to date reflect the many different ways that these combinations can be achieved.
However, again, X(3872) does not match theoretical expectations for any conceivable quark-antiquark arrangement.
To explain it, theoretical physicists may have to modify their theory of the colour force; or make X(3872) the first example of a new type of meson, one that is made from four quarks (two quarks and two antiquarks).
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/science/nature/3277579.stm
Published: 2003/11/18 11:36:19 GMT
� BBC MMIII
BOSTON, Nov. 18 � Massachusetts� highest court ruled Tuesday that same-sex couples are legally entitled to wed under the state constitution, but stopped short of allowing marriage licenses to be issued to the couples who challenged the law. The Supreme Judicial Court�s 4-3 ruling ordered the Legislature to come up with a solution within 180 days.
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Should same-sex marriages be allowed?
* 2278 responses
Yes
48%
No
48%
Can't decide
4%
Survey results tallied every 60 seconds. Live Votes reflect respondents' views and are not scientifically valid surveys.
�WE DECLARE that barring an individual from the protections, benefits, and obligations of civil marriage solely because that person would marry a person of the same sex violates the Massachusetts Constitution,� the court majority declared.
The court left the details of the same-sex marriage issue to the Legislature. Advocates said the case took a significant step beyond the 1999 Vermont Supreme Court decision that led to civil unions in that state.
Attorney Mary Bonauto, who represented the seven gay couples who sued the state, said the only task assigned to the Legislature is to come up with changes in the law that will allow gay couples to marry at the end of the 180-day period.
Vermont-style civil unions would not be enough, she said, because that would fall short of marriage. A constitutional ban on gay marriage could not be enacted in Massachusetts until 2006 because it takes seveal years to change the state�s constitution.
�This is a very good day for gay and lesbian families in Massachusetts and throughout the country,� Bonauto said.
GOVERNOR OPPOSES
But the issue may find a hostile audience in the Massachusetts Legislature, which has been considering a constitutional amendment that would legally define a marriage as a union between one man and one woman. The state�s powerful Speaker of the House, Tom Finneran of Boston, has endorsed this proposal.
First Read
� Medicare, Soc, Sec, & Gay marriage
� Bush's lowest "caring" numbers
� New boss of Democratic Party?
� Dems vs AARP
And Republican Gov. Mitt Romney criticizing the ruling, saying: �Marriage is an institution between a man and a woman. I will support an amendment to the Massachusetts Constitution that makes that expressly clear. Of course, we must provide basic civil rights and appropriate benefits to nontraditional couples, but marriage is a special institution that should be reserved for a man and a woman.�
A key group of state lawmakers also has recently been working behind the scenes to craft civil union legislation similar to the law passed in Vermont.
OTHER RECENT RULINGS
Gay and lesbian advocates had been cheered by a series of advances this year, including a U.S. Supreme Court decision striking down anti-sodomy laws, the ordination of an openly gay bishop in the Episcopal Church, and a Canadian appeals court ruling that it was unconstitutional to deny gay couples the same marriage rights as heterosexual couples. Belgium and the Netherlands also have legalized gay marriage.
In addition to Vermont, courts in Hawaii and Alaska have previously ruled that the states did not have a right to deny marriage to gay couples. In those two states, the decisions were followed by the adoption of constitutional amendments limiting marriage to heterosexual couples. No American court has ordered the issuance of a marriage license � a privilege reserved for heterosexual couples.
The U.S. House is currently considering a constitutional ban on gay marriage. President Bush, although he believes marriage should be defined as a union between one man and one woman, recently said that a constitutional amendment is not yet necessary.
Full text of Mass. court ruling
BACKGROUND TO THE CASE
� Write a letter to the editor
� Read letters to the editor
The Massachusetts case began in 2001, when seven gay couples went to their city and town halls to obtain marriage licenses. All were denied, leading them to sue the state Department of Public Health, which administers the state�s marriage laws.
A judge threw out the case in 2002, ruling that nothing in state law gives gay couples the right to marry. The couples appealed to the Supreme Judicial Court.
The plaintiffs argued that barring them from marrying a partner of the same sex denied them access to an intrinsic human experience and violated basic constitutional rights.
The state�s Attorney General�s office, which defended the Department of Public Health, argued that neither state law nor its constitution created a right to same-sex marriage. The state also said any decision to extend marriage to same-sex partners should be made by elected lawmakers, not the courts.
� Buy Life Insurance
� Holiday shopping made easy!
� Yellow Pages
� expedia.com
� Shopping
Should same-sex marriages be allowed?
* 2278 responses
Yes
48%
No
48%
Can't decide
4%
Survey results tallied every 60 seconds. Live Votes reflect respondents' views and are not scientifically valid surveys.
�WE DECLARE that barring an individual from the protections, benefits, and obligations of civil marriage solely because that person would marry a person of the same sex violates the Massachusetts Constitution,� the court majority declared.
The court left the details of the same-sex marriage issue to the Legislature. Advocates said the case took a significant step beyond the 1999 Vermont Supreme Court decision that led to civil unions in that state.
Attorney Mary Bonauto, who represented the seven gay couples who sued the state, said the only task assigned to the Legislature is to come up with changes in the law that will allow gay couples to marry at the end of the 180-day period.
Vermont-style civil unions would not be enough, she said, because that would fall short of marriage. A constitutional ban on gay marriage could not be enacted in Massachusetts until 2006 because it takes seveal years to change the state�s constitution.
�This is a very good day for gay and lesbian families in Massachusetts and throughout the country,� Bonauto said.
GOVERNOR OPPOSES
But the issue may find a hostile audience in the Massachusetts Legislature, which has been considering a constitutional amendment that would legally define a marriage as a union between one man and one woman. The state�s powerful Speaker of the House, Tom Finneran of Boston, has endorsed this proposal.
First Read
� Medicare, Soc, Sec, & Gay marriage
� Bush's lowest "caring" numbers
� New boss of Democratic Party?
� Dems vs AARP
And Republican Gov. Mitt Romney criticizing the ruling, saying: �Marriage is an institution between a man and a woman. I will support an amendment to the Massachusetts Constitution that makes that expressly clear. Of course, we must provide basic civil rights and appropriate benefits to nontraditional couples, but marriage is a special institution that should be reserved for a man and a woman.�
A key group of state lawmakers also has recently been working behind the scenes to craft civil union legislation similar to the law passed in Vermont.
OTHER RECENT RULINGS
Gay and lesbian advocates had been cheered by a series of advances this year, including a U.S. Supreme Court decision striking down anti-sodomy laws, the ordination of an openly gay bishop in the Episcopal Church, and a Canadian appeals court ruling that it was unconstitutional to deny gay couples the same marriage rights as heterosexual couples. Belgium and the Netherlands also have legalized gay marriage.
In addition to Vermont, courts in Hawaii and Alaska have previously ruled that the states did not have a right to deny marriage to gay couples. In those two states, the decisions were followed by the adoption of constitutional amendments limiting marriage to heterosexual couples. No American court has ordered the issuance of a marriage license � a privilege reserved for heterosexual couples.
The U.S. House is currently considering a constitutional ban on gay marriage. President Bush, although he believes marriage should be defined as a union between one man and one woman, recently said that a constitutional amendment is not yet necessary.
Full text of Mass. court ruling
BACKGROUND TO THE CASE
� Write a letter to the editor
� Read letters to the editor
The Massachusetts case began in 2001, when seven gay couples went to their city and town halls to obtain marriage licenses. All were denied, leading them to sue the state Department of Public Health, which administers the state�s marriage laws.
A judge threw out the case in 2002, ruling that nothing in state law gives gay couples the right to marry. The couples appealed to the Supreme Judicial Court.
The plaintiffs argued that barring them from marrying a partner of the same sex denied them access to an intrinsic human experience and violated basic constitutional rights.
The state�s Attorney General�s office, which defended the Department of Public Health, argued that neither state law nor its constitution created a right to same-sex marriage. The state also said any decision to extend marriage to same-sex partners should be made by elected lawmakers, not the courts.