coldtype reader 6 2006

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W R I T I N G W O R T H R E A D I N G l I S S U E 6 l J U N E 2 0 0 6

ARE YOU SUREYOU’RE FEELING OK?

INSIDE: OPENING THE DEBATE ON ISRAEL l SIXTEENKILOS OF WRITER’S BLOCK l BONO’S INDEPENDENTl MY MISSING YEARS l MEMORIAL DAY? l & MORE

ColdTypeWRITING WORTH READING FROM AROUND THE WORLD

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A PROJECT OF

3. ARE YOU SURE YOU’RE FEELING OK? By Stan Cox

11. APPEALING TO THE U.S. IS NOT VERY APPEALING By William Blum

13. COLBERT AND THE COURTIER PRESS By Robert Parry

17. OPENING THE DEBATE ON ISRAEL By Norman Solomon

21. CLOSE TO HOME: MY MISSING YEARSBy Andy Moore

24. RED LIGHT DISTRICT; BONO’S INDEPENDENT By Harry Browne

38. SIXTEEN KILOS OF WRITER’S BLOCKBy Paul Ash

30. “COME OUT WITH YOUR HANDS UP” By Bill Blum

38. HATE BAITING AT THE NATIONAL POSTBy C. L. Cook

40. MEMORIAL DAY? By David Rubinson

Editor: Tony [email protected]

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ISSUE 6 | JUNE 2006

You see a TV show or a com-mercial featuring medicalproblems, and you start feel-ing the symptoms yourself: a

twinge in the leg or maybe a momentof doubt about your emotional sta-bility.

If so, you, like millions of Ameri-cans, could be suffering from a seriouscondition known as telechondria. Buthelp is here, with new Advertil(R) inthe green-and-yellow caplet. Ask yourdoctor …

No, wait, don’t really ask. Tele-chondriacs have not yet been recog-nized by science. Pharmacists are notdispensing drugs like “Advertil,” andthey probably never will. The lastchemical that pharmaceutical execu-tives would want to sell you is onethat makes it harder for them to con-vince you that you’re sick and needtheir products.

Drug corporations and their“awareness” groups, as we’re allpainfully aware, have defined andredefined a host of medical conditions– including female sexual dysfunc-tion, erectile dysfunction, restless legs,

sleeplessness, bipolar disorder, atten-tion deficit disorder, social anxietydisorder and irritable bowel syn-drome – to include larger and largersegments of the population in theUnited States and other Westernnations.

Accepting for a moment the indus-try’s claims about the numbers ofpeople suffering from the eight dis-eases listed above, we could do somesimple calculations showing that upto 93 percent of adult women andmen in the United States suffer fromat least one of them. Throw in a fewmore conditions like depression, bonedensity loss and premenstrual dys-phoric disorder, and industry figuresmake it appear that virtually everyAmerican has a disease in need of atreatment.

Last year, Ray Moynihan and AlanCassels called attention to the epi-demic of disease marketing in theirbook “Selling Sickness.” Last month,health professionals, academics, jour-nalists and consumers gathered inNewcastle, Australia, for the Inaugur-al Conference on Disease Mongering.

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Throw in a fewmore conditionslike depression,bone densityloss andpremenstrualdysphoricdisorder, andindustry figuresmake it appearthat virtuallyevery Americanhas a disease in need of a treatment

G O O D H E A L T H ?

ARE YOU SURE YOU’RE FEELING OK?

Drug companies are cashing in on a host of newly-defined medical conditions,including female sexual dysfunction, erectile dysfunction,restless legs syndrome,sleeplessness, social anxiety disorder and irritable bowel syndrome. If we believethe industry, says Stan Cox, we’ve all got a disease in need of treatment

A set of papers from that meeting waspublished free by the online journalPLoS Medicine. Also last month, thePrescription Access Litigation Project(PALP) in Boston announced its “2006Bitter Pill Awards,” recognizing drugcompanies that engaged in the year’sworst “overzealous and questionablemarketing practices.”

These and other recent activitiesmake it all too clear that the prof-itable practices exposed in Lynn Pay-er’s 1992 book “Disease Mongers: HowDoctors, Drug Companies, and Insur-ers Are Making You Feel Sick” havebeen refined and amplified in recentyears, with the apparent goal of med-icating an entire population.

Restless legs

The evolution of “restless legs syn-drome,” documented by Steven Wol-oshin and Lisa Schwartz in a paperfrom the Disease Mongering Confer-ence, is a case study in how a phar-maceutical company, with help fromthe media, can turn what is a seriousproblem for some people into a con-trived medical condition for millionsmore.

Woloshin and Schwartz analyzedmedia coverage in the interval be-tween 2003, when GlaxoSmithKlineInc. first issued press releases abouttrials of its drug Requip for relief ofrestless legs syndrome, and 2005,when the U.S. Food and DrugAdministration (FDA) approved thatuse.

Of 187 major newspaper articlespublished during those two years, 64percent relayed without comment the

industry’s claims that millions ofAmericans – as many as “1 in 10adults” – suffer restless leg. Forty-fivepercent of the articles stressed thatmany people may be unaware they’resick, even though, according to 73 per-cent of the articles, the syndrome canhave extreme physical, social andemotional consequences. Reports ofthe relief provided by drug treatmentused “miracle language” 34 percent ofthe time, while 93 percent of articlesfailed to quantify Requip’s side effects.

Yet the relief people get fromRequip appears to be anything butmiraculous. In one trial, 73 percent ofsubjects saw improvement – com-pared with 57 percent whose symp-toms improved with a placebo! Sideeffects that occurred in clinical trialsat least twice as often with Requip aswith a placebo included nausea (40percent of subjects), vomiting (11 per-cent), somnolence (12 percent), dizzi-ness (11 percent) and fatigue (8 per-cent).

My attempts to obtain responsesfrom several drug companies tocharges of mongering restless leg andother conditions went unanswered.Quoted last month by the Guardian(U.K.) as he defended his companyagainst bad publicity generated bythe conference, David Stout of Glaxo-SmithKline said, “You need to talk tothe patients. Things like restless legsyndrome can ruin people’s lives. It iseasy to trivialize things when youdon’t have them. If people did notwant the treatments, they would notseek them.”

Restless leg syndrome in its most

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Forty-fivepercent of the articlesstressed thatmany peoplemay beunaware they’re sick,even though,according to 73 percent of the articles,the syndromecan haveextremephysical, socialand emotionalconsequences


serious form is indeed no joke. Myfather was tormented for years bynear-constant symptoms, until, with-out ever having seen an advertise-ment, he sought treatment.

But, says Dr. David Henry, who is aphysician, professor at the Universityof Newcastle and co-organizer of theDisease Mongering conference,“When you extend a drug beyond the[most severely afflicted] group onwhich claims of its effectiveness arebased, you see a falling ratio of goodto harm. The benefits of the drugdiminish, while the side effects tendto stay the same.”

Henry told me, “The companiesknow quite consciously that they’regoing into areas where they’re doingnet harm.”

In their conference paper, Woloshinand Schwartz note that restless legssyndrome is one of those “diseasepromotion stories” that the pressloves to cover: “The stories are full ofdrama: a huge but unrecognized pub-lic health crisis, compelling personalanecdotes, uncaring or ignorant doc-tors, and miracle cures.”

Irritable bowels

The story of another disease, irritablebowel syndrome, has all of those dra-matic elements, plus dead patients.

In “Selling Sickness,” Moynihanand Cassels describe public-relationsoffensives by Novartis Pharmaceuti-cals and GlaxoSmithKline to popular-ize a condition called irritable bowelsyndrome (symptoms of which aredescribed as “abdominal pain or dis-comfort associated with changes in

bowel habits in the absence of anyapparent structural abnormality”).

The companies stood to gain bil-lions in sales if, as they claimed, asmany as 20 percent of Americans hadthe syndrome. GlaxoSmithKline’sdrug Lotronex received FDA approvalfor treatment of irritable bowel in2000, and Novartis’ Zelnorm wasapproved in 2002. In statements to theFDA and the public, the companiestended to characterize irritable bow-el syndrome as it is experienced bythe worst-afflicted patients – a tinypercentage of the total – whileemphasizing claims that the syn-drome hits vast numbers of Ameri-cans.

TV star Kelsey Grammer and hiswife Camille Grammer, who suffersfrom the disease, made the rounds oftalk shows in a publicity effort quiet-ly funded by GlaxoSmithKline, whileNovartis deployed former WonderWoman Lynda Carter to stress thatcommon stomach problems might beirritable bowel, a “real medical condi-tion.” The FDA wrote to Novartis in2003, demanding that the companydiscontinue other advertising that itconsidered misleading because itexaggerated the drug’s benefits andthe numbers of people who need itwhile minimizing its side effects.

Lotronex can now be prescribedonly by doctors who have enrolled ina GlaxoSmithKline “Prescribing Pro-gram.” According to Moynihan andCassels, the drug came under fire inlate 2000 when three FDA scientistswrote to their superiors expressingalarm over a rising toll of deaths and

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The story of anotherdisease,irritable bowelsyndrome, has all ofthose dramaticelements, plus deadpatients


hospitalizations of irritable-bowelpatients during the nine months thatLotronex had been on the market.(The concern was spurred by theremarkably increased rates; thedeaths had not been shown in a clin-ical trial to have been caused byLotronex.)

“Selling Sickness” contains thisfrightening description of one sideeffect: “For some of those who expe-rienced severe constipation after tak-ing the drug, their feces would be-come so impacted within their bowelthat the bowel wall perforated, lead-ing to potentially fatal infectionsinside the body.”

Devastating?

A conference paper by David Healytraced the expanding definition ofbipolar disorder over the past quartercentury. The disease officially enteredthe manual of mental disorders in1980, and based on its original diag-nostic criteria – which included anepisode of hospitalization – bipolardisorder is a devastating disease for0.1 percent of the U.S. population.Over time, it has been broadenedwith additional criteria based oncommunity surveys, so that the dis-ease once known as “manic depres-sion” is now said to affect 5 percent ormore of Americans.

According to Healy, there is“almost no evidence” that drug treat-ment works for that much broadergroup of “community-based” disor-ders. Yet manufacturers like Eli Lillyand Co. and Janssen L.P. have heavilypromoted pharmaceutical treatment

of bipolar, as broadly defined, throughwebsites, patient literature and newscientific journals devoted to the dis-ease.

Evidence is accumulating that onedrug prescribed for bipolar disorder(Lilly’s Zyprexa) causes withdrawalsymptoms, that patients on drugs forbipolar tend to be hospitalized moreoften than those who are not, thatthe drugs are associated with aheightened risk of suicide and thatantipsychotic drugs in general areassociated with increased death rates.

Despite such problems, says Healy,there is a recent “surge of diagnoses ofbipolar disorder in American chil-dren.” He cites one book that actual-ly appears to accept the possibilitythat bipolar disorder may first showup in hyperactive fetuses.

The drug industry has thoroughlypenetrated the juvenile market foranother well-known disease, atten-tion deficit disorder (ADD, also calledattention deficit hyperactivity disor-der, ADHD). The numbers of pre-scriptions to be written are huge; theNational Institutes of Mental Healthestimates that there’s an average of atleast one afflicted child per typical-size classroom. But people spendmany more years as adults than aschildren, and stiff competition amongthe major ADD drugmakers – amongthem Shire PLC, Novartis and Lilly –guaranteed that the larger pool ofpotential adult patients would be tar-geted.

All three companies contribute orhave contributed funds to the organ-ization Children and Adults with

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Evidence isaccumulatingthat one drugprescribed forbipolar disorder(Lilly’s Zyprexa)causeswithdrawalsymptoms . . .the drugs areassociated witha heightenedrisk of suicideand thatantipsychoticdrugs ingeneral areassociated with increaseddeath rates


Attention Deficit/Hyperactivity Dis-order (CHADD), which calls ADD “alifespan disorder, affecting children,adolescents and adults.” In “SellingSickness,” Moynihan and Casselsdescribe a talk by a Shire executive ata CHADD charity golf event, in whichhe estimated that 8 million U.S.adults could benefit from treatment.CHADD gets about 20 percent of itsfunding from drug firms, and its web-site provides detailed advice on med-ication for ADD. One example:

Although there is little research onutilizing short-acting and long-actingmedications together, many individuals,especially teenagers and adults, findthat they may need to supplement alonger-acting medication taken in themorning with a shorter-acting dose tak-en in mid- to late afternoon. The “boost-er” dose may provide better coverage fordoing homework or other late afternoonor evening activities and may alsoreduce problems of “rebound” when theearlier dose wears off.

The marketing of ADD can ventureinto bewildering territory. One ofPALP’s 2006 Bitter Pill Awards went toLilly for a TV commercial plugging itsdrug Strattera. In the ad, informationon approved uses and risks is accom-panied by wildly distracting sightsand sounds of a video game. The FDAissued Lilly a mild rebuke over the ad:“The overall effect of the distractingvisuals and graphics is to underminethe consumer’s ability to pay atten-tion and comprehend the risk infor-mation …”

The Bitter Pill Awards stressed theobvious irony of an attention-con-

founding ad targeted at a clientelewho have difficulty paying attention.It could also be that the well-knownpractice of drawing notice away fromside-effects information had to becranked up a couple of notches in thisad to help persuade people who don’treally have a serious ADD problemthat they might just need Strattera.

“Selling Sickness” traces anotherhistory of market expansion: thememorable publicity blitz that start-ed with the FDA’s 1999 approval ofGlaxoSmithKline’s antidepressantPaxil for a condition called “socialanxiety disorder.” An early pressrelease insisted that social anxietydisorder is “not just shyness” butsomething far worse.

Enough people were convincedthat they had that “something worse”to make Paxil the country’s biggest-selling antidepressant for a time in2000. Moynihan and Cassels writethat GlaxoSmithKline avoided theterm “social phobia,” which was pre-ferred by psychiatry for what can be aseriously debilitating condition, prob-ably because “a lot more people canbe categorized as being ill if you applythe definition of an anxiety disorderrather than a phobia.”

It also couldn’t have hurt that theinitial letters of GlaxoSmithKline’sname for the disease spelled “SAD.”

Erection problems

Seeing the continuing deluge ofadvertising for impotence remedies inthe American media, a visitor fromthe planet Zefitor could be forgivenfor wondering how Earth, with such

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An early pressrelease insistedthat socialanxiety disorderis “not justshyness” but somethingfar worse


seemingly dysfunctional male hu-mans, ever came to be inhabited by6.5 billion of the species.

At the Disease Mongering Confer-ence, Joel Lexchin traced the historyof the Pfizer Inc. campaign that trans-formed the father of all impotencedrugs, Viagra, “from an effective prod-uct for erectile dysfunction due tomedical problems, such as diabetesand spinal-cord damage, into a drugthat ‘normal’ men can use.”

Pfizer spent $303 million in direct-to-consumer advertising for Viagra in1999-2001, often featuring younger-looking men and sports stars. Thateffort paid off handsomely, by extend-ing the market well beyond men withwell-defined medical conditions andattaining its greatest sales growth inthe 18 to 45 age group. Pfizer’s sales-manship broke the age barrier forViagra, but the company failed toextend the drug’s market to that halfof the human population that is com-pletely immune to erectile dysfunc-tion: women.

A paper by conference speakerLeonore Tiefer traced the term“female sexual dysfunction” (FSD)back to 1997. In the years that fol-lowed, demand for a “pink Viagra”was boosted by sisters Jennifer andLaura Berman, who, says Tiefer,“became the female face of FSD,opening a clinic at UCLA in 2001, andcontinuing to popularize FSD and off-label drug treatments on their televi-sion program, website and books; inappearances on the television showOprah; and in innumerable women’smagazines.”

Pfizer aggressively promoted FSD,which it labeled “female sexual arous-al disorder.” But its plans for awomen’s Viagra eventually fizzledbecause of “consistently poor clinical-trial results.”

Tiefer is coordinator of the Cam-paign for a New View of Women’sSexual Problems, which runs themedia-watchdog website fsd-alert.org. The Campaign and othergroups have been fighting backagainst the medicalization of sex withsome success.

Sleeping sickness

What latest malady is the pharma-ceutical industry selling? It’s turningout to be a hard-to-escape one-twopunch: sleeplessness and sleepiness.

In the past year, any TV viewerwho’s managed to stay awakethrough commercials knows that thedrugmakers’ latest target is sleepless-ness. The media blitzes of two com-panies, the sanofi-aventis Group(that’s their lower-case), which makesAmbien, and Sepracor Inc., whichmakes Lunesta, earned them a 2006Bitter Pill Award “for overmarketinginsomnia medications to anyonewho’s ever had a bad night’s sleep.”

Last month, at the request of gov-ernment- and industry-fundedgroups, the National Institute of Med-icine issued a report concluding that50 million to 70 million Americanssuffer from sleep problems and thatU.S. businesses lose as much as $100billion a year because of sleepy work-ers.

In a Baltimore Sun op-ed column,

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In the past year, any TVviewer who’smanaged to stay awakethroughcommercialsknows that thedrugmakers’latest target is sleeplessness


Ira R. Allen, vice president of the Cen-ter for the Advancement of Health,blasted the Institute for having been“co-opted.” He stressed to me that hewas not criticizing the report’s meth-ods or results, that “sleep is an impor-tant issue” and that “there were somelegitimate partners in sponsoring thereport.” But, he said, “The report wasissued right on the heels of NationalSleep Awareness Week (March 27-April 2), and just as advertising forsleep aids was reaching a peak.”

That, he said, is just too much of acoincidence: “I doubt that the UnitedStates has suddenly been invaded bytsetse flies! I’m not naive; I know thecountry’s economy is built on adver-tising. But our organization’s messageis ‘Transparency, transparency, trans-parency.’ Don’t hide your motive.”

Even if we accept the Institute’sand the drug industry’s claims of asleep-loss epidemic, other researchhas shown that the benefits of drugtreatment are far from overwhelming.The class of drugs to which Ambienand Lunesta belong provide an extrahalf-hour of sleep per night, on aver-age. (And Ambien made headlinesearlier this year when reportsrevealed that some patients who tookthe drug were eating and even cook-ing in their sleep.)

The lack of a clearly superior phar-maceutical solution to sleeplessnessmay partly explain the recent orgy ofadvertising for sleep problems andsleep aids in general. Drug companiesspent $345 million on ads for sleepdrugs in 2005 alone, and that’s expect-ed to increase this year.

But, you say, you’re already gettingenough sleep? Well, maybe it’s toomuch! The latest, and perhaps mostdisturbing, wave of sleep-controllingdrugs are designed to let you stayawake for up to 48 hours with no illeffects.

According to the Feb. 18, 2006, printedition of the British magazine NewScientist, Cephalon Inc., the maker ofone such product called Provigil,insists that the drug is meant only fortreating serious diseases like nar-colepsy and sleep apnea. But Provigilis also becoming a “lifestyle drug” forpeople who can’t fit everything theywant to do into 16 hours a day. And itcan’t help but beckon employers withthe promise of an always-alert workforce.

New Scientist reports that the Pen-tagon’s Defense Advanced ResearchProjects Agency (the notoriousDARPA) “is one of the most activeplayers in the drive to conquer sleep.”Sometime this year, DARPA will testan experimental wakefulness drug,CX717, on combat soldiers engaged inhard work for four straight nightswith only four hours of “recoverysleep” in between. Tests have shownthat monkeys awake on CX717 for 36straight hours had better memoryand alertness than undrugged mon-keys after normal sleep.

Yet another generation of drugsthat skew sleep toward the mostrestorative, so-called “slow wave”phase are on the horizon. Due forrelease as early as next year, Merck &Co. Inc.’s gaboxadol, says New Scien-tist, holds out “the promise of a pow-

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Ambien madeheadlinesearlier this yearwhen reportsrevealed thatsome patientswho took thedrug wereeating and even cooking in their sleep


er nap par excellence.” The tempta-tion to seek approval for the broadestpossible labeling (and profit base) fordrugs like Provigil, CX717 and gabox-adol will likely be overwhelming.

Sane political leaders

What kinds of medical conditions willexpand to embrace millions of newlydiagnosed “patients” in the comingmonths and years? I put that questionto Dr. Richard Lippin, an occupation-al-health physician, health forecaster,and co-founder of a health-carereform blog, Critical Condition. Hisresponse:

“My guess is anything to do withpain, fatigue or feeling stressed. Thefirst two are related to medicalizingthe avoidance of aging and deathamong baby boomers and the third –stress – is due to very real anxietypeople should feel about a host ofworldwide and U.S. megatrends thatlegitimately create anxiety anddepression – trends like global warm-ing, wars, economic collapse, politicalcorruption, etc. But the answers arenot pills. The answer is to elect sanepolitical leaders. There is no pill forthe ‘white water’ that’s ahead for allof us.”

David Henry says that the disease-mongering documented at his confer-ence “can’t be stopped. It’s a conse-quence of our political economy, thedomination of marketing in all areasof life. So we need to build counter-forces. People are becoming moreskeptical, and that needs to beencouraged. We should exercise thesame healthy skepticism when beingsold a drug as we do when being solda secondhand car.”

He says greater use of the atten-tion-getting term “disease monger-ing” will prove useful in changing thebehavior of medical professionals, themedia and even pharmaceutical pub-lic-relations departments. “We wantit to be an idea that pops up in theirheads, so PR people will say, ‘Hey, wedon’t want to run this ad and beaccused of disease mongering!’”

Where would be a good place foraverage Americans to start exercisingthe healthy skepticism that’s neededto fight disease mongering by thepharmaceutical industry? Ask yourdoctor. CT

Stan Cox is a plant breeder and writerin Salina, Kansas.

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We shouldexercise the samehealthyskepticismwhen beingsold a drug as we do when beingsold asecondhand car


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The Iraqis,moreover,pledged to hold UN-supervised freeelections;surely freeelections is somethingthe UnitedStatesbelieves in, the Iraqisreasoned, and will be moved by

D O N ’ T B O T H E R T O W R I T E

With his recent letter toPresident Bush, IranianPresident MahmoudAhmadinejad has be-

come part of a long tradition of Third-World leaders who, under imminentmilitary or political threat from theUnited States, communicated withWashington officials in the hope ofremoving that threat.

Under the apparent belief that itwas all a misunderstanding, that theUnited States was not really intentupon crushing them and their move-ments for social change, the Guat-emalan foreign minister in 1954, Pres-ident Cheddi Jagan of British Guianain 1961, and Maurice Bishop, leader ofGrenada, in 1983 all made their ap-peals to be left in peace, Jagan doingso at the White House in a talk withPresident John F. Kennedy.(1) All werecrushed anyhow. In 1961, Che Guevaraoffered a Kennedy aide several impor-tant Cuban concessions if Washingtonwould call off the dogs of war. To noavail.(2)

In 2002, before the coup in Vene-zuela that ousted Hugo Chavez, someof the plotters went to Washington to

get a green light from the Bushadministration. Chavez learned of thisvisit and was so distressed by it thathe sent officials from his governmentto plead his own case in Washington.The success of this endeavor can bejudged by the fact that the coup tookplace soon thereafter. (3)

Shortly before the US invasion ofIraq in March 2003, Iraqi officials,including the chief of the Iraqi Intelli-gence Service, informed Washington,through a Lebanese-American busi-nessman, that they wanted the Unit-ed States to know that Iraq no longerhad weapons of mass destruction,and they offered to allow Americantroops and experts and “2000 FBIagents” to conduct a search. TheIraqis also offered to hand over a manaccused of being involved in theWorld Trade Center bombing in 1993who was being held in Baghdad. TheIraqis, moreover, pledged to hold UN-supervised free elections; surely freeelections is something the UnitedStates believes in, the Iraqis reasoned,and will be moved by. They alsooffered full support for any US plan inthe Arab-Israeli peace process. “If this

APPEALING TO THE USNOT VERY APPEALING

Third World leaders, when they’re threatened by the United States, have a habit of writing to Washington in the hope of removing the threat. Doesn’t work, saysWilliam Blum, who shows how the Bush administration and its predecessors have a curious habit of turning deaf ears and blind eyes to their opponents

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D O N ’ T B O T H E R T O W R I T E

is about oil,” said the intelligence offi-cial, “we will talk about US oil conces-sions.” These proposals were por-trayed by the Iraqi officials as havingthe approval of President SaddamHussein.(NYT 11-6-03) The UnitedStates ignored these overtures.

The above incidents reflect ThirdWorld leaders apparent belief that theUnited States was open to negotia-tion, to discussion, to being reason-able. Undoubtedly, fear and despera-tion played a major role in producingthis mental state, but also perhaps themystique of America, which has cap-tured the world’s heart and imagina-tion for two centuries. In 1945 and1946, Vietnamese leader Ho Chi Minhwrote at least eight letters to US Pres-ident Harry Truman and the StateDepartment asking for America’s helpin winning Vietnamese independencefrom the French. He wrote that worldpeace was being endangered byFrench efforts to reconquer Indochinaand he requested that “the four pow-ers” (US, Soviet Union, China, andGreat Britain) intervene in order tomediate a fair settlement and bringthe Indochinese issue before the Unit-ed Nations.(4)

This was a remarkable repeat ofhistory. In 1919, at the Versailles PeaceConference following the First WorldWar, Ho Chi Minh had appealed toUS Secretary of State Robert Lansing(uncle of Allen Dulles and John FosterDulles, whom Lansing appointed tothe US delegation) for America’s helpin achieving basic civil liberties and animprovement in the living conditionsfor the colonial subjects of French

Indochina. His plea was ignored.(5)His pleas following the Second WorldWar were likewise ignored, with con-sequences for Vietnam, the rest ofIndochina, and the United States weall know only too well. Ho Chi Minh’spleas were ignored because he was,after all, some sort of Communist; yethe and his Vietminh followers had infact been long-time admirers of theUnited States. Ho trusted the UnitedStates more than he did the SovietUnion and reportedly had a picture ofGeorge Washington and a copy of theAmerican Declaration of Indepen-dence on his desk. According to a for-mer American intelligence officer, Hosought his advice on framing the Viet-minh’s own declaration of independ-ence. The actual declaration of 1945begins: “All men are created equal.They are endowed by their creatorwith certain inalienable rights, amongthese are life, liberty and the pursuitof happiness.”(6)

Now comes the president of Iranwith a lengthy personal letter to Pres-ident Bush. It has the same purposeas the communications mentionedabove: to dissuade the American pitbull from attacking and destroying,from adding to the level of suffering inthis sad old world. But if the WhiteHouse has already decided upon anattack, Ahmadinejad’s letter will haveno effect. Was there anything Czecho-slovakia could have done to prevent aNazi invasion in 1938? Or Poland in1939? CT

William Blum’s Anti-Empire reportbegins on Page 30

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NOTES1. Guatemala:Stephen Schles-inger and StephenKinzer, Bitter Fruit:The Untold Story ofthe American Coupin Guatemala(1982), p.183; Jagan:Arthur Schlesinger,A Thousand Days(1965), pp.774-9;Bishop: AssociatedPress, May 29, 1983,Leftist GovernmentOfficials Visit UnitedStates2. Miami Herald,April 29, 1996, p.13. NY Times, April16, 20024.The PentagonPapers (NY Timesedition, BantamBooks, 1971), pp.4,5, 8, 26.5. Washington Post,September 14, 1969,p.256. Archimedes L.A.Patti, Why Viet-nam? Prelude toAmerica’s Albatross(1980). Patti is theformer intelligenceofficer (OSS) consulted by Ho;Chester Cooper,The Lost Crusade:The Full Story of USInvolvement in Viet-nam from Rooseveltto Nixon (1971)pp.22, 25-7, 40.

William Blum is theauthor of KillingHope: U.S. Militaryand CIAInterventions SinceWorld War II, RogueState: a guide to theWorld’s Only SuperPower. and West-Bloc Dissident: aCold War PoliticalMemoir.

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COLBERT AND THECOURTIER PRESS

When Stephen Colbert delivered a vicious satire of George W. Bush’s relationshipwith the American media at the annual White House Correspondents’ Associationdinner, the assembled tuxedoed journalists were not impressed. Robert Parryhas some words of advice for the media watchdogs who became lapdogs to power

Washington Post colum-nist Richard Cohen hasjoined the swellingranks of big-name jour-

nalists outraged over comedian Ste-phen Colbert’s allegedly rude per-formance, offending George W. Bushat the White House Correspondents’Association Dinner on April 29.

“Colbert was not just a failure as acomedian but rude,” Cohen wrote.“Rudeness means taking advantageof the other person’s sense of deco-rum or tradition or civility that keepsthat other person from striking backor, worse, rising in a huff and leaving.The other night, that person wasGeorge W. Bush.”

According to Cohen, Colbert wasso boorish that he not only criticizedBush’s policies to the President’s face,but the comedian mocked the assem-bled Washington journalists deckedout in their tuxedos and eveninggowns.

“Colbert took a swipe at Bush’sIraq policy, at domestic eavesdrop-ping, and he took a shot at the newscorps for purportedly being nothing

more than stenographers recordingwhat the Bush White House said,”Cohen wrote. “Colbert was morethan rude. He was a bully.” [Wash-ington Post, May 4, 2006]

Yet, while Cohen may see himselfdefending decorum and civility, hiscolumn is another sign of what’s ter-ribly wrong with the U.S. newsmedia: With few exceptions, theWashington press corps has failed tohold Bush and his top advisersaccountable for their long record ofdeception and for actions that haveviolated U.S. constitutional principlesand American moral standards.

Over the past several years, asBush asserted unlimited presidentialpowers and implemented policiesthat have led the United States intothe business of torture and an unpro-voked war in Iraq, Washington jour-nalists mostly stayed on the sidelinesor actively assisted the administra-tion, often wrapping its extraordi-nary actions in a cloak of normalitydesigned more to calm than alert thepublic. At such a dangerous moment,when a government is committing

According to Cohen,Colbert was so boorish thathe not onlycriticizedBush’s policiesto thePresident’sface, but thecomedianmocked theassembledWashingtonjournalistsdecked out in their tuxedosand eveninggowns

R U D E A W A K E N I N G

14 TheREADER


crimes of state, politeness is not nec-essarily a virtue.

So, average Americans are growingmore and more agitated because toooften in the past five years they havewatched the national press act morelike courtiers to a monarch than anindependent, aggressive FourthEstate. This fawning style of theWashington media continued into theApril 29 dinner.

Even as the number of U.S. soldierskilled in Iraq passed 2,400 and the tollof Iraqi dead soared into the tens ofthousands, the journalists seemedmore interested in staying in Bush’sfavor than in risking his displeasure.Like eager employees laughing at theboss’ jokes, the journalists applaudedBush’s own comedy routine, whichfeatured a double who voiced Bush’sprivate contempt for the news mediawhile the real Bush expressed hisinsincere respect.

Two years ago, at a similar dinner,journalists laughed and clapped whenBush put on a slide show of himselfsearching under Oval Office furniturefor Iraq’s non-existent weapons ofmass destruction.

Rather than shock over Bush’stasteless humor – as the Presidentrubbed the media’s noses in thedeceptions about Iraq’s WMD – thepress corps played the part of thegood straight man. Even representa-tives of the New York Times and theWashington Post – the pillars of whatthe Right still likes to call the “liberalmedia” – sat politely after havingserved as little more than conveyorbelts for Bush’s pre-war propaganda.

But the media’s willful blindnessdidn’t end even when Bush’s WMDclaims were no longer tenable. Lessthan a year ago, as evidence surfacedin Great Britain proving that Bushhad twisted the WMD intelligence,major U.S. newspapers averted theireyes and chastised anyone who didn’tgo along.

The so-called Downing StreetMemo and other official governmentpapers, which appeared in Britishnewspapers in late spring 2005, docu-mented how the White House in 2002and early 2003 was manipulatingintelligence to justify invading Iraqand ousting Saddam Hussein.

On July 23, 2002, British intelligencechief Richard Dearlove told PrimeMinister Tony Blair about discussionswith top Bush advisers in Washing-ton, according to the meeting min-utes. “Bush wanted to remove Sad-dam, through military action, justifiedby the conjunction of terrorism andWMD. But the intelligence and factswere being fixed around the policy,”Dearlove said. [See Consortium-news.com’s “LMSM – the LyingMainstream Media.”]

Despite that dramatic evidence –emerging in June 2005 – the Washing-ton Post failed to pay much attention.When hundreds of Post readers com-plained, a lead editorial lectured themfor questioning the Post’s news judg-ment.

“The memos add not a single factto what was previously known aboutthe administration’s prewar delibera-tions,” the Post’s editorial sniffed.“Not only that: They add nothing to

Like eageremployeeslaughing at the boss’sjokes, the journalistsapplaudedBush’s owncomedy routine

TheREADER 15

Colbert’smonologue also struck tooclose to homewhen he pokedfun at thejournalists for letting thecountry downby not askingthe toughquestionsbefore the Iraq War

TheREADER 15


what was publicly known in July2002.” [Washington Post, June 15,2005]

When Rep. John Conyers and a fewDemocratic congressmen tried todraw public attention to the histori-cally important British documents –but were denied an actual hearingroom by the Republican majority –Post political correspondent DanaMilbank mocked the Democrats forthe cheesy surroundings of their rumphearing.

“In the Capitol basement yester-day, long-suffering House Democratstook a trip to the land of make-believe,” Milbank wrote. “They pre-tended a small conference room wasthe Judiciary Committee hearingroom, draping white linens over fold-ing tables to make them look like wit-ness tables and bringing in cardboardname tags and extra flags to make thewhole thing look official.” [Washing-ton Post, June 17, 2005]

After Colbert’s lampooning of Bushand the Washington press corps, Mil-bank appeared on MSNBC on May 1to pronounce the comedian’s spoof“not funny,” while Milbank judgedthe President’s skit with Bush imper-sonator Steve Bridges a humoroushit.

Milbank’s assessment was sharedby many journalists at the dinner, areaction that can partly be explainedby the pressure Washington reportershave long felt from well-organizedright-wing media-attack groups togive Bush and other conservatives thebenefit of every doubt.

For Washington journalists, who

realized their reactions at the dinnerwere being broadcast on C-SPAN,laughing along with Bush was a win-win – they could look good with theWhite House and avoid any career-damaging attacks from the Right –while laughing at Colbert’s jokescould have been a career lose-lose.However clever Colbert’s jokes were,they were guaranteed to face a toughcrowd with a lot of reasons to give thecomedian a chilly reception.

Colbert’s monologue also strucktoo close to home when he poked funat the journalists for letting the coun-try down by not asking the toughquestions before the Iraq War.

Using his faux persona as a right-wing Bush acolyte, Colbert explainedto the journalists their proper role:“The President makes decisions; he’sthe decider. The press secretaryannounces those decisions, and youpeople of the press type those deci-sions down.

“Make, announce, type. Put themthrough a spell check and go home.Get to know your family again. Makelove to your wife. Write that novelyou got kicking around in your head.You know, the one about the intrepidWashington reporter with thecourage to stand up to the adminis-tration. You know – fiction.”

Even before the Colbert controver-sy, the White House Correspondents’Association annual dinner and similarpress-politician hobnobbing havebeen cringing examples of unethicaljournalistic behavior.

The American people count on thenews media to act as their eyes and

16 TheREADER

In a world with a trulyindependentnews media,it is hard toimagine therewould ever be a White HouseCorrespondents’dinner


ears, as watchdogs on the govern-ment, not lap dogs wagging tails andlicking the faces of administrationofficials. Whatever value these din-ners might once have had – as anopportunity for reporters to get toknow government sources in a morecasual atmosphere – has long passed.

Since the mid-1980s, the dinnershave become competitions among thenews organizations to attract thebiggest Hollywood celebrities or infa-mous characters from the latestnational scandal. Combined with lav-ish parties sponsored by free-spend-ing outlets like Vanity Fair orBloomberg News, the dinners havebecome all about the buzz.

Plus, while these self-indulgentaffairs might seem fairly harmless innormal political times, they are moreobjectionable when American troopsare dying overseas and the ExecutiveBranch is asserting its right to trampleconstitutional rights, including FirstAmendment protections for journal-ists.

This contradiction is especiallystriking as the news media fawns overBush while he attacks any nascentsigns of journalistic independence.The administration is currently look-ing into the possibility of jailing inves-tigative reporters and their sources forrevealing policies that the WhiteHouse wanted to keep secret, such aswarrantless wiretaps of Americansand clandestine overseas prisonswhere detainees are hidden andallegedly tortured.

The fact that so many nationaljournalists see no problem cavorting

with Bush and his inner circle at sucha time explains why so many Ameri-cans have reached the conclusion thatthe nation needs a new news media,one that demonstrates a true commit-ment to the public’s right to know,rather than a desire for cozy relationswith the insiders.

Indeed, in a world with a trulyindependent news media, it is hard toimagine there would ever be a WhiteHouse Correspondents’ dinner.

In such a world, the WashingtonPost also might find better use for itstreasured space on its Op-Ed pagethan giving it over to a columnist whofavors decorum over accountability.The Post might even hire a columnistwho would object less to a sharp-tongued comedian lampooning apolitician and complain more about aPresident who disdains domestic andinternational law, who tolerates abu-sive treatment of prisoners, and whoinflicts mayhem on a nation thou-sands of miles away that was notthreatening the United States.

Only the likes of Richard Cohencould see George W. Bush as the vic-tim and Stephen Colbert as the bully. CT

Robert Parry broke many of the Iran-Contra stories in the 1980s for theAssociated Press and Newsweek. Hislatest book, Secrecy & Privilege: Riseof the Bush Dynasty from Watergateto Iraq, can be ordered atsecrecyandprivilege.com. It’s alsoavailable at Amazon.com, as is his1999 book, Lost History: Contras,Cocaine, the Press & ‘Project Truth.’

TheREADER 17

“The truth is that theaccusation ofanti-Semitismis far too often raisedin this countryagainst anyonewho criticizesthe governmentof Israel”

T H E I S R A E L L O B B Y

The extended controversyover a paper by two profes-sors, “The Israel Lobby andU.S. Foreign Policy,” is pry-

ing the lid off a debate that has beenbottled up for decades.

Routinely, the American newsmedia have ignored or pilloried anystrong criticism of Washington’s mas-sive support for Israel. But the paperand an article based on it by respect-ed academics John Mearsheimer ofthe University of Chicago andStephen Walt, academic dean of theKennedy School of Government atHarvard University, first published onMarch 23 in the London Review ofBooks, are catalysts for some healthypublic discussion of key issues.

The first mainstream media reac-tions to the paper – often with thecustomary name-calling – were most-ly efforts to shut down debate beforeit could begin.

Early venues for vituperativeattacks on the paper included the op-ed pages of the Los Angeles Times(“nutty”), the Boston Herald (head-line: “Anti-Semitic Paranoia at Har-

vard”) and The Washington Post(headline: “Yes, It’s Anti-Semitic”).

But other voices have emerged, onthe airwaves and in print, to bypassthe facile attacks and address crucialissues. If this keeps up, the uproarover what Mr. Mearsheimer and Mr.Walt had to say could invigorate pub-lic discourse about Washington’s poli-cies toward a country that consistent-ly has received a bigger U.S. aid pack-age for a longer period than any oth-er nation.

In April, syndicated columnist Mol-ly Ivins put her astute finger on a vitalpoint. “In the United States, we donot have full-throated, full-throttledebate about Israel,” she wrote. “InIsrael, they have it as a matter ofcourse, but the truth is that the accu-sation of anti-Semitism is far toooften raised in this country againstanyone who criticizes the governmentof Israel. ... “

She continued,”I don’t know thatI’ve ever felt intimidated by the knee-jerk ‘you’re anti-Semitic’ charge lev-eled at anyone who criticizes Israel,but I do know I have certainly heard

OPENING THE DEBATE ON ISRAEL

Is it anti-Semitic to be critical of washington’s massive support for Israel? Yes, say critics of a controversial paper by two professors, ‘The Israel lobby and USForeign Policy’. No, says Norman Solomon, America’s biggest anti-Semitismproblem has to do with the misuse of the label as a tactic to short-circuit debate

18 TheREADER

NumerousAmericanJewish groupsdedicated tosupportingIsrael are eagerto equate Israelwith Judaism.Sometimes they have the arroganceto depict thecountry and the religion as inseparable


it often enough to become tired of it.And I wonder if that doesn’t producethe same result: giving up on the dis-cussion.”

The point rings true, and it’s one ofthe central themes emphasized byMr. Mearsheimer and Mr. Walt.

If the barriers to democratic dis-course can be overcome, the paper’sauthors say, the results could be high-ly beneficial: “Open debate will ex-pose the limits of the strategic andmoral case for one-sided U.S. supportand could move the U.S. to a positionmore consistent with its own nation-al interest, with the interests of theother states in the region, and withIsrael’s long-term interests as well.”

Outsized support for Israel hasbeen “the centerpiece of U.S. MiddleEastern policy,” the professors con-tend – and the Israel lobby makesthat support possible. “Other special-interest groups have managed toskew America’s foreign policy, but nolobby has managed to divert it as farfrom what the national interestwould suggest,” the paper says. Oneof the consequences is that “the Unit-ed States has become the de factoenabler of Israeli expansion in theoccupied territories, making it com-plicit in the crimes perpetratedagainst the Palestinians.”

In the United States, “the lobby’scampaign to quash debate aboutIsrael is unhealthy for democracy,”Mr. Mearsheimer and Mr. Walt assert.They point to grave effects on thebody politic: “The inability of Con-gress to conduct a genuine debate onthese important issues paralyzes the

entire process of democratic delibera-tion.”

While their paper overstates theextent to which pro-Israel pressuresdetermine U.S. foreign policy in theMiddle East, a very powerful lobby forIsrael clearly has enormous leveragein Washington. And the professorsmake a convincing case that the U.S.government has been much too close-ly aligned with Israel – to the detri-ment of human rights, democracy andother principles that are supposed toconstitute American values.

The failure to make a distinctionbetween anti-Semitism and criticismof Israel routinely stifles publicdebate.

When convenient, pro-Israelgroups in the United States will con-cede that it’s possible to oppose Israelipolicies without being anti-Semitic.Yet many of Israel’s boosters reflexive-ly pull out the heavy artillery ofcharging anti-Semitism when theirposition is challenged.

Numerous American Jewish groupsdedicated to supporting Israel areeager to equate Israel with Judaism.Sometimes they have the arroganceto depict the country and the religionas inseparable. For example, in April2000, a full-page United JewishAppeal ad in The New York Timesproclaimed: “The seeds of Jewish lifeand Jewish communities everywherebegin in Israel.”

Like many other American Jewswho grew up in the 1950s and ‘60s, Iwent door to door with blue-and-white UJA cans to raise money forplanting trees in Israel. I heard about

TheREADER 19

As I remember,Arabs wereportrayed in the pictureas cold-bloodedkillers while the Jews who killedArabs werepresented as heroicfightersengaged in self-defense


relatives who had died in concentra-tion camps during the Holocaust twodecades earlier and about relativeswho had survived and went to Israel.In 1959, my family visited some ofthem, on a kibbutz and in Tel Aviv.

The 1960 blockbuster movie Exo-dus dramatized the birth of Israel adozen years earlier. As I remember,Arabs were portrayed in the pictureas cold-blooded killers while the Jewswho killed Arabs were presented asheroic fighters engaged in self-defense.

The film was in sync with frequentmedia messages that lauded Jews forrisking the perilous journey to Pales-tine and making the desert bloom, asthough no one of consequence hadbeen living there before.

The Six-Day War in June 1967enabled Israel to expand the territo-ry it controlled several times over, inthe process suppressing huge num-bers of Palestinians in the West Bankand Gaza. Their plights and legiti-mate grievances got little space in theU.S. media.

In 1969, the independent Americanjournalist I. F. Stone expressed hopefor “a reconstructed Palestine of Jew-ish and Arab states in peaceful coex-istence.” He contended that “to bringit about, Israel and the Jewish com-munities of the world must be willingto look some unpleasant truthssquarely in the face. ...

“One is to recognize that the Arabguerrillas are doing to us what ourterrorists and saboteurs of the Irgun,Stern and Haganah did to the British.Another is to be willing to admit that

their motives are as honorable aswere ours. As a Jew, even as I feltrevulsion against the terrorism, I feltit justified by the homelessness of thesurviving Jews from the Nazi campsand the bitter scenes when refugeeships sank, or sank themselves, whenrefused admission to Palestine.

“The best of Arab youth feels thesame way; they cannot forget theatrocities committed by us against vil-lages like Deir Yassin, nor the uproot-ing of the Palestinian Arabs from theirancient homeland, for which they feelthe same deep ties of sentiment as doso many Jews, however assimilatedelsewhere.”

When I crossed the Allenby Bridgefrom Jordan into the West Bank 15years ago, I spoke with a 19-year-oldborder guard who was carrying amachine gun. He told me that he’demigrated from Brooklyn, N.Y., a fewmonths earlier. He said the Palestini-ans should get out of his country.

In East Jerusalem, I saw Israeli sol-diers brandishing rifle butts at elder-ly women in a queue. Some in the linereminded me of my grandmothers,only these women were Arab.

Today, visitors to the Web site ofthe Israeli human-rights group B’Tse-lem can find profuse documentationabout systematic denial of Palestinianrights and ongoing violence in alldirections. Since autumn 2000, inIsrael, the West Bank and Gaza,according to the latest figures posted,the number of Israelis killed by Pales-tinians has totaled 998 and the num-ber of Palestinians killed by Israelishas totaled 3,466.

20 TheREADER

Now, theneoconservative agenda for the MiddleEast maintainsthe U.S.embrace of Israel withgreatenthusiasm.And defendersof that agendaoften resort to timeworntactics forsquelchingdebate


Overall, in the American newsmedia, the horrible killings of Israelisby Palestinian suicide bombers getfront-page and prime-time coveragewhile the horrible killings of Palestini-ans by Israelis get relatively scant anddispassionate coverage.

If the U.S. news media were tobecome committed to a single stan-dard of human rights, the shift wouldtransform public discourse aboutbasic Israeli policies – and jeopardizethe U.S. government’s support forthem. It is against just such a singlestandard that the epithet of “anti-Semitism” is commonly wielded.From the viewpoint of Israel and itssupporters, the ongoing threat ofusing the label helps to prevent U.S.media coverage from getting out ofhand. Journalists understand criticalwords about Israel to be hazardous totheir careers.

In the real world, bigotry towardJews and support for Israel have longbeen independent variables. For in-stance, as Oval Office tapes attest,President Richard M. Nixon was anti-Semitic and did not restrain himselffrom expressing that virulent preju-dice in private. Yet he was a bigadmirer of the Israeli military and aconsistent backer of Israel’s govern-ment.

Now, the neoconservative agendafor the Middle East maintains theU.S. embrace of Israel with greatenthusiasm. And defenders of thatagenda often resort to timeworn tac-tics for squelching debate.

Last fall, when I met with editors ata newspaper in the Pacific Northwest,

a member of the editorial boardresponded to my reference to neoconsby declaring flatly that “neocon” is an“anti-Semitic” term. The absurd claimwould probably amuse the mostpowerful neocons in the U.S. govern-ment’s executive branch today, VicePresident Dick Cheney and DefenseSecretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, nei-ther of whom is Jewish.

Over the past couple of decades, agrowing number of American Jewshave seen their way clear to opposeIsraeli actions.

Yet their voices continue to benearly drowned out in major U.S.media outlets by Israel-right-or-wrong outfits such as the AmericanIsrael Public Affairs Committee, theAnti-Defamation League and theAmerican Jewish Committee.

As with all forms of bigotry, anti-Semitism should be condemned. Atthe same time, these days, America’sbiggest anti-Semitism problem has todo with the misuse of the label as amanipulative tactic to short-circuitdebate about Washington’s alliancewith Israel. CT

Norman Solomon is executive directorof the Institute for Public Accuracyand the author of War Made Easy:How Presidents and Pundits KeepSpinning Us to Death.(www.warmadeasy.com)

E-mail Solomon at:[email protected].

This essay originally appeared in the Baltimore Sun.

TheREADER 21

I used to be ashamed that it tookme 11 years to graduate fromUW-Madison. At parties andpicnics, during beers and breezy

banter, I dreaded the question,“When did you go to school here?”Luckily, since my answer spanned adecade, no one took me seriously.“Ha!” people laughed. “No, really!”

I became a master at blowing con-versational smoke at the topic of col-lege, ingeniously derailing the subjectthe way my mother used to avoidrevealing her age.

The story of why it took me so longto graduate isn’t nearly as worthy ashow I finally finished. A turning pointin life isn’t a product of an event somuch as the presence of a key person.In the matter of getting over myundergraduate hump, that personwas former Dean of Students PaulGinsberg.

The path I traveled to Dean Paul’sdoor had many stops and starts. Theingredients in a soufflé don’t matter ifit collapses in the oven, so I won’tdrag you through the whole ordeal.

Suffice it to say I logged more time

on probation than the entire popula-tion of Animal House. I began to wearmy academic crashes like badges ofdishonor, gaining a rebel reputationamong my fellow drinkers at thePlaza Tavern, who were, I started tonotice, getting younger by the minute.

My self-respect bottomed out onefrigid afternoon in South Hall. There Isat at the head of a long, gleamingconference table in what was surelygoing to be my last hearing as a UWstudent. At the other end of the table,a block away, sat a kind, serious man.An assistant dean. Dean Martin.

And I tell you as a factual measureof just how hard I threw in the towelthat day that when he wondered atthe end of our conversation if I hadquestions for him, I asked, “Will yoube making any more pictures with Jer-ry Lewis?”

That comment ended what wenow refer to as my “Missing Years.”Other than swimming, which paid forthe first four years of my college, pre-tending to be a student was almost allI knew how to do. Fortunately, I hadone other skill: flirting with girls, a

I began to wear myacademiccrasheslike badges of dishonor,gaining a rebelreputationamong myfellow drinkersat the PlazaTavern, whowere, I startedto notice,getting youngerby the minute

S C H O O L D A Z E

CLOSE TO HOME:MY MISSING YEARS

How many people take eleven years to get a university degree, ‘logging more time on probation than the population of Animal House’? Well, Andy Moore did beforehe finally got his degree, helped by his love for a girl called Peggy, and a man who ‘so honored my potential that I had no choice but to repay him with success’

22 TheREADER

knack that led me to the other keyperson in this story. A lanky girl fromMequon named Peggy.

Love, like one too many beers,blinds you to a person’s imperfec-tions. That’s why when Peggy lookedat me, she saw a clever, sensitive,good-time guy instead of a lazy,manipulating loser with no life goals.

It was only a matter of time.You can go through the motions in

school. You can laze your waythrough a job. But love? Love is theconsummate taskmaster. It’s the onlycareer worth having that comes withnever-ending accountability.

Peggy’s love took the ratty, tangledpile of rope that was my life and laidit out straight. From where we stoodtogether, that length of life didn’t looktoo bad. Even doable. And I knewthat without the fire she ignited with-in me, it would twist back up like agnarled strand of Christmas lights.

For all her gifts, Peggy had only onerequest of me: Finish college. “I don’tcare if you use your degree,” she said,her eyes saying the rest – we’ll haveanother diploma if we need it. Thismeant, for one last time, I had to hikeup Bascom Hill to try to get back inschool.

Paul Ginsberg’s office was on thefirst floor of Bascom Hall. His highwindows opened to a brochure viewdown the groomed, grassy hill toLibrary Mall. Pipe smoke filled theroom. Blue curtains of it. The smokeheld fast to the sunlight comingthrough the windows and fixed aneon sheen upon the space.

Portly and serene, Paul sat Bud-

dha- like behind a paper-fouled desk.My student file, fat and corner-torn asan old phone book, sat over to theleft. Paul’s eyes were heavy-lidded,nearly shut. He turned toward meand opened his palm to an emptychair.

“Please sit down,” he said, thenreached for his pipe. He took his time,like he had all the time in the world.In my anxious state of mind, watchinghim slowly, silently dispatch histobacco tools was unbearable.

He devoted complete concentra-tion to this work, lost in it, loadingand tamping, sweeping spare flecks ofleaf tobacco from his desk, hissing inthe chimney smoke when the firetouched the bowl. I was certain he’dforgotten I was in the room.

As I soon learned, this was merelyPaul’s way. The most important thingin the world to him was the thing athand. And after he completely serv-iced his pipe, he fixed his sleepy eyesupon me and, like magic, I became thecenter of his universe.

“Tell me why you’re here,” heinstructed in a soft, barely audiblerasp.

I gave it all to him. I had nothing tolose. An academic confessional. Myindiscretions, my irresponsibilities, myself-delusions and wasting of otherpeople’s money and time.

It poured from me in a single, 30-minute breath. And it felt so good inthe doing, so liberating as it all emp-tied out that, by the time I got to thePeggy part I’d made up my mind thevisit was worthwhile even if I didn’tget back into school.

By the timeI got to thePeggy part I’d made up my mind the visit wasworthwhileeven if I didn’t getback intoschool

S C H O O L D A Z E

TheREADER 23

Paul never interrupted. He listenedto much of it with his eyes closed.And when I finished, my words cling-ing to the smoke that enveloped us,he said, “Bring Peggy here next week.”And we were done. Or, I should say,beginning.

Paul met with Peggy and me thenext week. I was re-admitted that fall.Paul continued to treat us as a team.I met with him regularly that semes-ter, and Paul spent as much time ask-ing about how we were doing as peo-ple as he did asking me about mystudies. He so honored my potentialthat I had no choice but to repay himwith success.

I think a lot about my friend Paullately. He’s 81, and bravely shoulder-ing the indignities of surgery andrecovery. We still get together forlunch from time to time. The focus ofour conversation has now shifted toanother student.

In June Peggy’s and my 18-year-old,Tucker, graduates from East High.

He’s enrolled at UW-LaCrosse for thefall. Suddenly my 11-year odyssey tofinish college is an embarrassmentagain, and even as my apple-from-the-tree worries grow deeper rootseach day, I realize I’ve been concernedabout all the wrong things for the lastyear.

The whole college search thing, allthe hand-wringing, online searchingand screening, the course compar-isons, the campus visits, the obsessionover facilities, all of that. It temporar-ily obscured the lesson I learned fromPaul.

There’s just one thing that willmake a difference for our son in col-lege and beyond. People. People likePaul who will treat Tucker’s potentialas a holy thing, who will take him bythe shoulders and turn him in thedirection of his own gifts. CT

This article originally appeared inIsthmus, the alternative newsweeklyfor Madison, Wisconsin.

He so honoredmy potentialthat I had no choice but to repayhim withsuccess

S C H O O L D A Z E

ARE YOU A JOE BAGEANT FAN?Download and read all of his political andhumorous essays, all in pdf format, at

www.coldtype.net

I have no embarrassment at all.No shame.” Bono says it himself,in the course of his luvvie inter-view with comic Eddie Izzard,

and that’s a typically ‘disarming’ tac-tic. But don’t be disarmed: Bono’sshamelessness is of a whole differentorder from anything we’ve seenbefore, and it crossesnew frontiers in theedition of the LondonIndependent that heallegedly ‘edited’ to-day (16 May).

For a day, you see,it’s the RED Indepen-dent. (The capital let-ters in RED are oblig-atory, for some rea-son.) Much of thepaper is given over toplugging Brand RED, this corporatePR strategy that sees a few big com-panies buy Bono-bestowed credibili-ty in return for some shillings toAfrica. If the word for Bono is indeed‘shameless’, then the word that comesto mind in relation to the newspaperitself (a usually credible outlet in Irish

mogul Tony O’Reilly’s media empire)is ‘prostitute’.

Much of Bono’s RED Indy is online,but its special qualities are bestappreciated on paper. RED is some-how related to the colour red anyway,so we get a front-page created bycelebrity artist Damien Hirst, soaked

in red and declaring“NO NEWS TODAY”and an asterisk lead-ing to the small print:“Just 6,500 Africansdied today as a resultof a preventable, trea-table disease. (HIV/AIDS)” So far, not ter-rible, highlighting theissue and its absencefrom the conventionalWestern news agen-

da. But why does it say “Genesis 1.27”on the cover? That’s the line abouthow “God created man in his ownimage, in the image of God he creat-ed him; male and female he createdthem.” Since Bono is responsible forcreating this paper in his image, doesthat mean he’s God?

24 TheREADER

Since Bono isresponsible for creating this paper in his image,does that mean he’s God?

I N T H E R E D

RED LIGHT DISTRICT:BONO’S INDEPENDENT

Last month, London’s Independent newspaper was guest-edited by rock star Bono,as a fundraising campaign for relieving African poverty and eradicating AIDS.Unimpressed, Harry Browne, writer for Dublin’s Village magazine, describes the event as a ‘low point in the history of journalism and public culture’

“

It’s not an entirely facetious ques-tion. Certainly this edition, largelygiven over to Africa and AIDS, createsan image of a continent in dire need ofan outside Savior. On page after page,in stories, photographs and advertise-ments, Africans are presented aspathetic victims, often children. NoAfricans write about Africa. Only oneis presented in an interview as havingany agency at all, Nigerian financeminister Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala. It isremarkable that even for the sake ofappearances Bono is incapable of hid-ing his essential paternalism.

A colleague points out that there isnothing here about the arms trade.But perhaps this is not surprising giv-en all the advertising and editorialspace given over to endorsing REDmobile phones from Motorola, a mil-itary contractor. Nothing either cover-ing mineral exploitation in Africa, per-haps something else Motorola mightbe sensitive about, given the impor-tance of African-extracted materialsin cellphones.

The self-crafted character of Bono,on the other hand, is never far fromthe page. Justifying his commercialfundraising strategy, he writes: “Foranyone who thinks this means I’mgoing to retire to the boardroom andstop banging my fist on the door ofNo. 10 [Downing Street], I’m sorry todisappoint you.” Frankly, we hadn’tnoticed any fistbanging: the butler isalways discreetly ready to open thedoor unbidden for a welcome guestlike Bono.

Bono’s status on Downing Street,at No. 10 and No. 11 (where Gordon

Brown, Chancellor of the Exchequer,is to be found), is underlined by thecozy, snoozy interview Tony Blair andBrown “teamed up” to do (by phone)with the U2 frontman. Bono’s hard-hitting line of questioning includes:“Chancellor, I’ve just got back from atrip to Washington, where yourannouncement of $15bn over 10 yearsfor education for the poorest of thepoor created a real reverberation. Areyou worried that some of your otherG8 partners and finance ministers arenot coming up with new initiatives tomatch this?”

Bono is still reverberating when hetalks to Blair: “Prime Minister, I wantto just take you to a more personalplace in your trips to this terriblebeauty that we call Africa now – to aninspiring moment, a person you havemet, or a moment of despair.” Bonolikes his Yeatsian “terrible beauty”,repeating the phrase in his editorial.

Half the proceeds from this editionsupposedly go to fight AIDS in Africa.Given all the extra advertising for coolproducts, gigs and charities targetingthe day’s once-off buyers, you can besure those proceeds will be consider-able.

No outing with Bono would becomplete without licking-up to theWhite House as well as DowningStreet. So we’ve got Condoleezza Ricenaming her “ten best musical works”.Condi, it seems, is a “big fan” of Bonoand names “anything” by U2 as num-ber 7 on her list, just ahead of EltonJohn’s ‘Rocket Man’. As for Cream’s‘Sunshine of Your Love’ at number 2(after Mozart): “I love to work out to

TheREADER 25

A colleaguepoints out thatthere is nothinghere about thearms trade. Butperhaps this isnot surprisinggiven all theadvertising andeditorial spacegiven over toendorsing REDmobile phonesfrom Motorola,a militarycontractor

I N T H E R E D

this song. Believe it or not I loved acidrock in college – and I still do.”

What a long strange trip it’s been.And that’s before you open the sup-plement and find, after some grimmonochrome photos of Deep Southpoverty from Sam Taylor-Wood,another hard-hitting interview. “She’sthe bright young star breaking all therules. He’s the grand master whoseinfluence on the way we dress is feltaround the world. In a rare interview,STELLA McCARTNEY asks GiorgioArmani about fur, fashion andfilm–and why RED is his newfavourite colour.”

Indy associate editor Paul Vallely isBono’s luvvie for the day, with his full-page ‘big question’ feature, “Can rockstars change the world?” arriving atan ever-so-British qualified Yes – “Ohall right then. But with a little helpfrom their friends. Which includes allof us – fans, activists, politicians andnow – as Project RED so clearlydemonstrates – shoppers too.”

The edition is themed around thisnotion. Even “The 5-Minute Inter-view”, with BBC radio DJ Zane Lowe,finishes with an incongruous, not tosay idiotically phrased, question, “Canbig corporations make a difference topeople’s lives?” Lowe sings fromBono’s hymnsheet: “The only thingpeople who are trying to make a dif-ference can do is work alongside cor-porations. We’re not going to abolishbig business, people aren’t going tostop drinking Starbucks and buyingNike, but you can say to them,‘There’s a big difference you can makeand if we find a way to make it easier

for you, would you contribute?’”This notion of lowest common

denominator activism is the keynoteof Bono’s signed, somewhat tetchyeditorial: “So forgive us if we expandour strategy to reach the high street,where so many of you live and work.We need to meet you where you areas you shop, as you phone, as youlead your busy, businessy lives.”

Two more signed opinion pieces,by Geldof and Niall Fitzgerald (chair-man of Reuters, former chairman ofUnilever) both advocate more or lessneoliberal solutions to Africa’s crisis.In fairness (and believe me, it’s toughto feel fair about these egomaniacalcreeps), Geldof, like Bono in the Blair-Brown interview, does criticise “enfor-ced liberalisation by the IMF, theWorld Bank or the EU”, but in bothcases it’s pretty parenthetical.

Not much new ‘news’ makes thepaper at all. There is room for a rub-bishy Google short declaring that“Irish are top users of ‘lonely’ searchterm”, but no room at all for the sto-ry convulsing Bono’s hometown ofDublin: 41 Afghan men have been onhunger and thirst strike inside historicSt Patrick’s Cathedral to prevent theirdeportation to the dangers of theirhome country. Since this story clearlyinvolves the West’s role in the suffer-ing of people from the poorer world,and it also involves poor people tak-ing their own, desperate measures todefy a Western government’s pre-scriptions, it fails to fit Bono’s world-view.

Young fogey Johann Hari inter-views Hugo Chavez with reasonable

26 TheREADER

Since this storyclearly involvesthe West’s rolein the sufferingof people fromthe poorerworld, and it also involvespoor peopletaking theirown, desperatemeasures to defy aWesterngovernment’sprescriptions, it fails to fitBono’s world-view

I N T H E R E D

sympathy over two pages, pausing towring his hands about Chavez’s admi-ration for Castro and Mugabe. Theinterview appears to be shorter thanthe online version because of the bigads for Unicef and the Global Busi-ness Coalition on HIV/Aids.

One weak attempt at self-mockeryis John Walsh’s unfunny columnabout some of the “less successfulguest-star interventions in history” –Groucho Marx addressing the Penta-gon War Room on the eve of D-Day,Margaret Thatcher guest-editingteen-mag Jackie – “the usual ques-tions about petting, bra sizes andperiods were replaced by enquiriesabout the public sector borrowingrequirement”. (Did I say unfunny?)Bono is obsessed with justifyingLive8, and the centre-spread is givenover to a board game called “Glenea-

gles Crazy Golf” (“Will the G8 keeptheir word?”). The biggest move avail-able in the game is “Move Forward 3:Independent goes RED”.

Much more can be said about thislow point in the history of journalismand public culture, but the final wordshould go to Julia Raeside on Megas-tar.co.uk : “We wonder if Simon Kell-ner, the editor of the Indy, will get tospend a day being a self-important,whining rock bore in silly pink sun-glasses and trousers that are ever soslightly too tight.” CT

Harry Browne lectures in DublinInstitute of Technology and writes for Village magazine.

Contact [email protected]

This article originally appeared atcounterpunch.org

TheREADER 27

“We wonder ifSimon Kellner,the editor of the Indy, will get to spend a day being a self-important,whining rockbore in sillypink sunglassesand trousersthat are ever so slightlytoo tight”

I N T H E R E D

DON’T MISS YOUR COPY OF

The READERGreat writing from around the world.FREE every month.Download it at http://coldtype.net

I am writing a novel. Actually, itwould be more accurate to saythat I am sinking, quite fast, as ithappens, in the quicksand of

“research”. Others might call itwriter’s block. But you don’t want tohear about my travails. Funnilyenough, neither do my friends.

This was not always so. Untilrecently it was clearly a coup to havea working novelist present at dinnerparties. I sure as hell got a lot of invi-tations. Invariably someone wouldask, “How’s the novel going?” and arespectful hush would fall on thetable as I detailed progress to date. Ihave spent months talking about plot,characters, structure and telling somefairly graphic and bloody stories – it’sa faction about Angola, or will beonce I finish the bloody thing – thathave girls making soft, tender gesturesand boys sadly shaking their heads.One could, quite reasonably, say thatthe time spent talking would havebeen better used writing, blah blahblah, yes, I know already . . . who areyou? My mother?

Part of the problem was that I was

determined to write it on a type-writer. I have a typewriter which I usefrom time to time to write letters. Ilike the way the words flow when Itype. I like the thump of the carriageevery time I hit the Shift key and howthe clacking keys work into my sub-conscious, like distant rifle fire, appro-priate, I felt, given the subject and all.

But my machine is an old andcranky 1936 Remington portable andmy first novel, I reasoned, needed abig-ass, manual desk typewriter. So Iscoured. Oh boy, did I scour. In junkshops. Antique dealers. I trawledpawn brokers like an addict. I went toshops I remembered as a kid and wasmildly surprised that they, like theirowners, had shuffled off into history. Ihad figured, wrongly as it turns out,that they would be indestructible.Like their typewriters.

I also had to do this all on the sly.Someone looking for a desk type-writer in the 21st century attractsattention, none of it benevolent. Andforget, if you will, please – eventhough my wife won’t – that I havetwo Macs which would do just fine as

28 TheREADER

I have spentmonths talkingabout plot,characters,structure andtelling somefairly graphicand bloodystories – it’s afaction aboutAngola, or willbe once I finishthe bloodything

T H E W R I T I N G G A M E

SIXTEEN KILOS OFWRITER’S BLOCK

Paul Ash is a working novelist. He’s invited to a host of dinner parties, where he thrills guests with details of his bloody plot. Only problem is, he wants to writehis book the old-fashioned way, on a ‘big-ass, manual typewriter,’ which he findsafter much searching. At last, he can sit down and start to write like a pro . . .

writing machines.Eventually, I struck gold.Surfing the shady world of interna-

tional typewriter web rings I foundOlex, a dealer in Pretoria that couldsell me 16 kilograms of brand-newOlivetti.

The typewriter business is still bigin Africa, apparently, and the compa-ny sells a couple of hundred a year topolice forces, lawyers and shippingcompanies north of the Limpopo.

I nearly wet myself when I heardthe price – nearly half a Mac. Italianquality, I figured.

A couple of days later I brought mystealth purchase home, secure in myfirmly held conceit that using a type-writer would force me to write withlinear and logical precision. Like a pro,said the voices in my head.

Like Kerouac. Yeah, yeah. I set herup the next day and got to work.Thunk-clack-clackclack.

Ting! I thumped all day. It was likechewing wet cement. I made count-less typos. The voices shrieked: “Stop!

You fucking HATE this!” I forged on.By sunset I had six or so error-riddledpages. But hey . . . I’d begun.

That night I went to a party. Stand-ing on the balcony, watching cold rainsweep in from the north, I feltsuperlative. I boasted to a writerfriend – who is published – that I hadstarted.

“Good,” he said. “And?” “I’m using a typewriter.”He choked on his vodka but to his

everlasting credit, didn’t actuallylaugh at me. “That, bru,” he said, “ispure affectation.”

And there it was. Killed with onestraight arrow to the heart: affecta-tion. Like a real author, like Jack, Ithen got drunk, went home, shot thealbatross and took it back to the dealer. CT

Paul Ash is deputy editor of the Travel& Food section of Johannesburg’sSunday Times. This article firstappeared in the newspaper’s award-winning weekly Lifestyle supplement.

TheREADER 29

A couple ofdays later Ibrought mystealthpurchase home,secure in myfirmly heldconceit thatusing atypewriterwould force meto write withlinear andlogicalprecision

T H E W R I T I N G G A M E

READ JOHN PILGER Download all of his political essays andcolumns, all in pdf format, at

www.coldtype.net

I used to be called brother, John,Daddy, uncle, friend,” John AllenMuhammad said at his trial inMaryland earlier this month.

“Now I’m called evil.” Muhammad, formerly known as

“the DC Sniper”, was on trial for sixslayings in Maryland in 2002. Alreadysentenced to die in Virginia for sever-al other murders, he insisted that hewas innocent despite the evidenceagainst him – including DNA, finger-prints, and ballistics analysis of a riflefound in his car.[1]

Bereft of any real political power,I’m reduced to day-dreaming ... acourtroom in some liberated part ofthe world, in the not-too-distantfuture, a tribunal ... a defendant testi-fying ...

“I used to be called brother,George, son, Daddy, uncle, friend,Dubya, governor, president. Now I’mcalled war criminal,” he says sadly,insisting on his innocence despite theoverwhelming evidence presentedagainst him.

Can the man ever take to heart ormind the realization that America’s

immune system is trying to get rid ofhim? Probably not. No more than hisaccomplice can.

Two years ago the vice presidentvisited Yankee Stadium for a baseballgame. During the singing of “GodBless America” in the seventh inning,an image of Cheney was shown onthe scoreboard. It was greeted with somuch booing that the Yankees quick-ly removed the image.[2] Yet lastmonth the vice president showed upat the home opener for the Washing-ton Nationals to throw out the firstpitch.

The Washington Post reported thathe “drew boisterous boos from themoment he stepped on the field untilhe jogged off. The derisive greetingwas surprisingly loud and long, giventhe bipartisan nature of our nationalpastime, and drowned out a smatter-ing of applause reported from theupper decks.”[3]

It will be interesting to see ifCheney shows up again before a largecrowd in a venue which has not beencarefully chosen to insure that onlyright-thinking folks will be present.

30 TheREADER

It will beinteresting tosee if Cheneyshows up againbefore a largecrowd in avenue whichhas not beencarefullychosen toinsure that onlyright-thinkingfolks will bepresent

A N T I - E M P I R E R E P O R T

“COME OUT WITHYOUR HANDS UP”

One day Dubya may face trial as a war criminal, says Bill Blum, who alsodemolishes the economic myths of the post-war Marshall Plan, and wonders if UN Security Council members will ever stand up to the schoolyard bully. And what did Condoleezza tell the Foreign Relations Committee about India?

“

Even that might not help. Twice inthe last few months, a public talk ofDonald Rumsfeld has been interrupt-ed by people in the audience callinghim a war criminal and accusing himof lying to get the United States intowar. This happened in a meetingroom at the very respectable Nation-al Press Club in Washington andagain at a forum at the equallyrespectable Southern Center for Inter-national Policy in Atlanta.

In Chile, last November, as formerdictator Augusto Pinochet movedcloser to being tried for the deaths ofthousands, he declared to a judge: “Ilament those losses and suffer forthem. God does things, and he willforgive me if I committed some exces-ses, which I don’t believe I did.”[4]

Dubya couldn’t have said it better.Let’s hope that one day we can com-pel him to stand before a judge, butnot one appointed by him.

But what about the Marshall Plan?During my years of writing and spea-king about the harm and injusticeinflicted upon the world by unendingUnited States interventions, I’ve oftenbeen met with resentment from thosewho accuse me of chronicling only thenegative side of US foreign policy andignoring the many positive sides.

When I ask the person to give mesome examples of what s/he thinksshow the virtuous face of America’sdealings with the world in moderntimes, one of the things almost alwaysmentioned is The Marshall Plan. Thisis explained in words along the linesof: “After World War II, we unselfish-

ly built up Europe economically,including our wartime enemies, andallowed them to compete with us.”Even those today who are very cyni-cal about US foreign policy, who arequick to question the White House’smotives in Afghanistan, Iraq and else-where, have no problem in swallow-ing this picture of an altruistic Amer-ica of the period of 1948-1952.

After World War II, the UnitedStates, triumphant abroad and un-damaged at home, saw a door wideopen for world supremacy. Only thething called “communism” stood inthe way, politically, militarily, and ide-ologically.

The entire US foreign policy estab-lishment was mobilized to confrontthis “enemy”, and the Marshall Planwas an integral part of this campaign.How could it be otherwise? Anti-communism had been the principalpillar of US foreign policy from theRussian Revolution up to World WarII, pausing for the war until the clos-ing months of the Pacific campaign,when Washington put challengingcommunism ahead of fighting theJapanese. This return to anti-commu-nism included the dropping of theatom bomb on Japan as a warning tothe Soviets.[5]

After the war, anti-communismcontinued as the leitmotif of foreignpolicy as naturally as if World War IIand the alliance with the SovietUnion had not happened. Along withthe CIA, the Rockefeller and FordFoundations, the Council on ForeignRelations, various corporations, andother private institutions, the Mar-

TheREADER 31

After the war,anti-communismcontinued asthe leitmotif offoreign policyas naturally asif World War IIand the alliancewith the SovietUnion had nothappened


shall Plan was one more arrow in thequiver in the remaking of Europe tosuit Washington’s desires – spreadingthe capitalist gospel (to counterstrong postwar tendencies towardssocialism); opening markets to pro-vide new customers for US corpora-tions (a major reason for helping torebuild the European economies; e.g.,almost a billion dollars of tobacco, at1948 prices, spurred by US tobaccointerests); pushing for the creation ofthe Common Market and NATO asintegral parts of the West Europeanbulwark against the alleged Sovietthreat; suppressing the left all overWestern Europe, most notably sabo-taging the Communist Parties inFrance and Italy in their bids for legal,non-violent, electoral victory.

Marshall Plan funds were secretlysiphoned off to finance this lastendeavor, and the promise of aid to acountry, or the threat of its cutoff, wasused as a bullying club; indeed,France and Italy would certainly havebeen exempted from receiving aid ifthey had not gone along with theplots to exclude the communists.

The CIA also skimmed largeamounts of Marshall Plan funds tocovertly maintain cultural institu-tions, journalists, and publishers, athome and abroad, for the heated andomnipresent propaganda of the ColdWar; the selling of the Marshall Planto the American public and elsewherewas entwined with fighting “the redmenace”.

Moreover, in its covert operations,CIA personnel at times used the Mar-shall Plan as cover, and one of the

Plan’s chief architects, Richard Bissell,then moved to the CIA, stopping offbriefly at the Ford Foundation, a longtime conduit for CIA covert funds;one big happy family.

The Marshall Plan imposed all kindsof restrictions on the recipient coun-tries, all manner of economic and fiscalcriteria which had to be met, designedfor a wide open return to free enter-prise.

The US had the right to control notonly how Marshall Plan dollars werespent, but also to approve the expen-diture of an equivalent amount of thelocal currency, giving Washington sub-stantial power over the internal plansand programs of the European states;welfare programs for the needy sur-vivors of the war were looked uponwith disfavor by the United States;even rationing smelled too much likesocialism and had to go or be scaleddown; nationalization of industry waseven more vehemently opposed byWashington.

The great bulk of Marshall Planfunds returned to the United States,ornever left, to buy American goods,making American corporations amongthe chief beneficiaries.

It could be seen as more a jointbusiness operation between govern-ments, with contracts written byWashington lawyers, than an Ameri-can “handout”; often it was a busi-ness arrangement between Americanand European ruling classes, many ofthe latter fresh from their service tothe Third Reich, some of the former aswell; or it was an arrangement be-tween Congressmen and their favorite

32 TheREADER

The CIA alsoskimmed largeamounts ofMarshall Planfunds tocovertlymaintainculturalinstitutions,journalists, andpublishers, athome andabroad, for theheated andomnipresentpropaganda ofthe Cold War;the selling ofthe MarshallPlan to theAmericanpublic andelsewhere wasentwined withfighting “thered menace”


corporations to export certain com-modities, including a lot of militarygoods. Thus did the Marshall Plan laythe foundation for the military indus-trial complex as a permanent featureof American life.

It is very difficult to find, or puttogether, a clear, credible descriptionof how the Marshall Plan was princi-pally responsible for the recovery ineach of the 16 recipient nations. Theopposing view, no less clear, is thatthe Europeans – highly educated,skilled and experienced – could haverecovered from the war on their ownwithout an extensive master plan andaid program from abroad, and indeedhad already made significant stridesin this direction before the Plan’sfunds began flowing.

Marshall Plan funds were notdirected primarily toward feedingindividuals or building individualhouses, schools, or factories, but atstrengthening the economic super-structure, particularly the iron-steeland power industries. The period wasin fact marked by deflationary poli-cies, unemployment and recession.The one unambiguous outcome wasthe full restoration of the propertiedclass.[6]

Is someone finally learning a lesson ?The United States has been pushingthe UN Security Council to invokeChapter VII of the UN Charteragainst Iran because of its nuclearresearch. Chapter VII (“Action withRespect to Threats to the Peace,Breaches of the Peace, and Acts ofAggression”) can be used to impose

sanctions and take military actionagainst a country deemed guilty ofsuch violations (except of course if thecountry holds a veto power in theSecurity Council).

The United States made use ofChapter VII to bomb Yugoslavia in1999 and to invade Iraq in 2003. Onboth occasions, the applicability ofthe chapter and the use of force werehighly questionable, but to placateCouncil opponents of military actionthe US agreed to some modificationsin the language of the Council resolu-tion and refrained from stating explic-itly that it intended to take militaryaction. Nonetheless, in each case,after the resolution was passed, theUS took military action. Severe mili-tary action.

In early May, John Bolton, the USambassador to the UN, asserted:“The fundamental point is for Russiaand China to agree that this [Iran’snuclear research] is a threat to inter-national peace and security underChapter VII.”

However, Yury Fedotov, the Russ-ian ambassador to the United King-dom, declared that his countryopposed the Chapter VII referencebecause it evoked “memories of pastUN resolutions on Yugoslavia andIraq that led to US-led military actionwhich had not been authorised by theSecurity Council.”

In the past, the United States hadargued that the reference to ChapterVII in a Council resolution was need-ed to obtain “robust language,” saidFedotov, but “afterwards it was usedto justify unilateral action. In the case

TheREADER 33

The oneunambiguousoutcome wasthe fullrestoration ofthe propertiedclass


of Yugoslavia, for example, we weretold at the beginning that referencesto Chapter VII were necessary to sendpolitical signals, and it finally endedup with the Nato bombardments.”[7]

It remains to be seen whether theRussians or any other Security Coun-cil members have taken this lesson toheart and can stand up to the school-yard bully’s pressure by refusing togive the United States another pre-text for expanding the empire’s con-trol over the Middle East.

You can love your mom, eat lotsaapple pie, and wave the Americanflag, but if you don’t believe in Godyou are a hell bound subversiveA recent study by the University ofMinnesota department of sociologyhas identified atheists as “America’smost distrusted minority”. Universityresearchers found that Americans rateatheists below Muslims, recent immi-grants, homosexuals and other min-ority groups in “sharing their vision ofAmerican society.”

Atheists are also the minoritygroup most Americans are least will-ing to allow their children to marry.The researchers conclude that athe-ists offer “a glaring exception to therule of increasing social tolerance overthe last 30 years.”

Many of the study’s respondentsassociated atheism with an array ofmoral indiscretions ranging fromcriminal behavior to rampant materi-alism and cultural elitism. The study’slead researcher believes a fear ofmoral decline and resulting social dis-order is behind the findings. “Ameri-

cans believe they share more thanrules and procedures with their fellowcitizens, they share an understandingof right and wrong. Our findings seemto rest on a view of atheists as self-interested individuals who are notconcerned with the commongood.”[8]

Hmmm. I’ve been a political activistfor more than 40 years. I’ve marchedand fought and published weeklynewspapers alongside countless athe-ists and agnostics who have risked jailand being clubbed on the head, andwho have forsaken a much higherstandard of living, for no purpose oth-er than the common good. Rampantmaterialism? Hardly. “Secular human-ism”, many atheists call it. And wedon’t read about mobs of atheistsstoning, massacring, or otherwiseharming or humiliating human beingswho do not share their non-beliefs.

The public attitude depicted bythis survey may derive in part fromthe Cold-War upbringing of so manyAmericans – the idea and the imageof the “godless atheistic communist”.But I think more than that is thedeep-seated feeling of insecurity, eventhreat, that atheists can bring out inthe religioso, putting into question,consciously or unconsciously, theircore beliefs.

You must wonder at times, as I do,how this world became so unbearablycruel, corrupt, unjust, and stupid. Canit have reached this remarkable levelby chance, or was it planned? It’senough to make one believe in God.Or the Devil.

34 TheREADER

Atheists arealso theminority groupmost Americansare least willingto allow theirchildren tomarry. Theresearchersconclude thatatheists offer“a glaringexception tothe rule ofincreasingsocial toleranceover the last 30 years”


Manure of the taurusThe US Interests Section in Havanahas been flashing electronic messageson its building for the benefit ofCubans passing by. One recent mes-sage said that Forbes, the weeklyfinancial magazine, had named FidelCastro the world’s seventh-wealthiesthead of state, with a fortune estimat-ed at $900 million. This has shockedCuban passers by[9], as well it shouldin a socialist society that claims tohave the fairest income distribution inthe world. Are you not also shocked,dear readers?

What’s that? You want to knowexactly what Forbes based their rank-ings on? Well, as it turns out, twomonths before the Interests Sectionflashed their message, Forbes hadalready stated that the estimates were“more art than science”. “In the past,”wrote the magazine, “we have reliedon a percentage of Cuba’s gross dom-estic product to estimate Fidel Cas-tro’s fortune. This year, we have usedmore traditional valuation methods,comparing state-owned assets Castrois assumed to control with compara-ble publicly traded companies.”

The magazine gave as examplesstate-owned companies such as retailand pharmaceutical businesses and aconvention center.[10]

So there you have it. It was basedon nothing. Inasmuch as George W.“controls” the US military shall weassign the value of all the DefenseDepartment assets to his personalwealth? And Tony Blair’s wealthincludes the BBC, does it not?

Another message flashed by the

Interests Section is: “In a free countryyou don’t need permission to leavethe country. Is Cuba a free country?”This, too, is an attempt to blow smokein people’s eyes. It implies that there’ssome sort of blanket government re-striction or prohibition of travelabroad for Cubans, a limitation ontheir “freedom”. However, the realityis a lot more complex and a lot lessOrwellian.

The main barrier to overseas travelfor most Cubans is financial; theysimply can’t afford it. If they have themoney and a visa they can normallyfly anywhere, but it’s very difficult toobtain a visa from the United Statesunless you’re part of the annual immi-gration quota.

Cuba being a poor country con-cerned with equality tries to makesure that citizens complete their mili-tary service or their social service.Before emigrating abroad, trainedprofessionals are supposed to givesomething back to the country fortheir free education, which includesmedical school and all other schools.And Cuba, being unceasingly threat-ened by a well-known country to thenorth, must take precautions: Certainpeople in the military and those whohave worked in intelligence or haveother sensitive information may alsoneed permission to travel; this issomething that is found to one extentor another all over the world.

Americans need permission to trav-el to Cuba. Is the United States a freecountry? Washington makes it so dif-ficult for its citizens to obtain permis-sion to travel to Cuba it’s virtually a

TheREADER 35

Atheists arealso theminority groupmost Americansare least willingto allow theirchildren tomarry. Theresearchersconclude thatatheists offer“a glaringexception tothe rule ofincreasingsocial toleranceover the last 30years”


prohibition. I have been rejected twiceby the US Treasury Department.

Americans on the “No-fly list” can’tgo anywhere. All Americans need per-mission to leave the country. The per-mission slip – of which one must havea sufficient quantity – is green andbears the picture of a US president.

Save this for that glorious daywhen more than two centuries ofAmerican “democracy” reachesits zenith with a choice betweenCondi and Hillary

Condoleezza Rice, testifying April 5before the Senate Foreign RelationsCommittee about the US-India nu-clear deal:

“India’s society is open and free. Itis transparent and stable. It is multi-ethnic. It is a multi-religious democra-cy that is characterized by individualfreedom and the rule of law. It is acountry with which we share com-mon values. ... India is a rising globalpower that we believe can be a pillarof stability in a rapidly changing Asia.In other words, in short, India is anatural partner for the United States.”

And here is a State Departmenthuman rights report – released thevery same day – that had this to sayabout India:

“The Government generally res-pected the rights of its citizens andcontinued efforts to curb humanrights abuses, although numerousserious problems remained. Theseincluded extrajudicial killings, disap-pearances, custodial deaths, excessiveuse of force, arbitrary arrests, torture,poor prison conditions, and extended

pretrial detention, especially relatedto combating insurgencies in Jammuand Kashmir. Societal violence anddiscrimination against women, traf-ficking of women and children forforced prostitution and labor, andfemale feticide and infanticide re-mained concerns. Poor enforcementof laws, widespread corruption, a lackof accountability, and the severelyoverburdened court system weakenedthe delivery of justice.”

Is it not enough to murder yourbrain?

For the record

In March I agreed to speak on a pan-el at the American-Arab Anti-Dis-crimination Committee convention, tobe held in June in Washington, DC.The panel is called: “America, Empire,Democracy and the Middle East”.Then someone at the ADC apparent-ly realized that I was the personwhose book had been recommendedby Osama bin Laden in January, andthey tried to cancel my appearancewith phoney excuses. I objected, call-ing them cowards; they relented, thenchanged their mind again, telling mefinally “all of the seats on the journal-ism panel, for the ADC convention,are filled.” Two months after ouragreement, they had discovered thatall the panel seats were filled.

American Muslims are very conser-vative. 72% of them voted for Bush in2000, before they got a taste of apolice state. Now, they’re still veryconservative, plus afraid.

University officials are also conser-vative, or can easily be bullied by

36 TheREADER

“India is arising globalpower thatwe believecan be apillar ofstability in a rapidlychangingAsia. In otherwords, inshort, India is a naturalpartner forthe UnitedStates”


campus conservative organizationswhich are part of a well-financednational campaign (think David Hor-owitz) to attack the left on campus,be they faculty, students or outsidespeakers. Since the bin Laden recom-mendation, January 19, I have notbeen offered a single speaking en-gagement on any campus; a few stu-dents have tried to arrange somethingfor me but were not successful at con-vincing school officials. This despiteJanuary-May normally being the mostactive period for me and other cam-pus speakers.

Speakout, a California agencywhich places progressive speakers oncampuses, informs me that theHorowitz-type groups have succeed-ed in cutting sharply into their busi-ness.[11] CT

NOTES

[1] (Thanks to Kevin Barrett of the Mus-lim-Jewish-Christian Alliance for 9/11Truth for the title of this section) Washington Post, May 5, 2006, p.B1

[2] New York Times, June 30, 2004

[3] Washington Post, April 12, 2006, p.C3

[4] Associated Press, November 16, 2005

[5] See my essay on the use of the atom-ic bomb:http://members.aol.com/essays6/abomb.htm

[6] See, for example, Joyce & GabrielKolko, “The Limits of Power: The Worldand US Foreign Policy 1945-1954” (1972),chapters 13, 16, 17; Sallie Pisani, “The CIAand the Marshall Plan” (1991) passim;Frances Stoner Saunders, “The CulturalCold War: The CIA and the world of artsand letters” (2000) passim

[7] The Independent (London), May 8,2006

[8] http://www.ur.umn.edu/FMPro?-db=releases&-lay=web&-format=umn-newsreleases/releasesdetail.html&ID=2816&-Find

[9] Washington Post, May 13, 2006, p.10

[10] Reuters, March 17, 2006

[11] http://www.speakersandartists.org/

William Blum is the author of: Killing Hope: US Military and CIAInterventions Since World War 2;Rogue State: A Guide to the World’sOnly Superpower West-Bloc Dissident:A Cold War Memoir; Freeing theWorld to Death: Essays on theAmerican Empire. His web site iswww.killinghope.org

TheREADER 37

Then someoneat the ADCapparentlyrealized that Iwas the personwhose bookhad beenrecommendedby Osama binLaden inJanuary, andthey tried tocancel myappearancewith phoneyexcuses


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It sometimes seems we live in atime of unprecedented corruption,perfidy, and abomination; but, asthe Bible says somewhere: “There’s

nothing new under the sun.” “Hitler” is a name often invoked in

the media these days.The terrors of theNazi regime, especially referencing itsgrotesque concentration camps, whereState enemies were dispatched aftersuffering religious humiliation, torture,and God knows what else. The worldhas witnessed ruthless invasions andoccupations, inflicted by a tyrannical,rogue nation on its smaller neighboursbefore; in the form of Hitler’s Germany,the world watched,horror-struck,a rac-ist, ideologically perverse campaign ofglobal domination, whose goal was noless than the enslavement of the entireplanet.

Yes verily there is nothing new underthe sun.

The story of Jewish suffering underthe Nazis, both during the rise of fas-cism in Germany, through its progres-sion to its inevitable ends behind thebarbed wire of the concentrationcamps, reminds of the gruesome poten-

tial of collective barbarity. Even today,more than 70 years from the shockingand aweful ascension of Hitler and hishenchmen,the remembrance of the leg-islated “branding” of German Jews, allmade to sew the Star of David on theirclothing, is a particularly poignant sym-bol of totalitarianism, the apposite ofhuman decency, early warning of terri-ble portent.

It also serves a reminder of howquickly a society can be led into mad-ness, an induced insanity that wouldallow the blasphemies, forever recorded

38 TheREADER

I can’t believeit took this longfor the LikuditeCanwest Globalto descend tothe eye-poking,nostril-gouginglevel it has in its smearassault against“evil” Iran

O N P R O P A G A N D A

HATE BAITING ATTHE NATIONAL POST

Canada’s National Post recently ran a front page story suggesting Iran was about to make Jews wear badges on their clothes. The story, says C. L. Cook, was bullshit,‘phoney as Saddam’s WMD, fake as the babies thrown from Kuwaiti incubators,abandoned to die on a hospital floor, etc . . . used to justify the first Gulf War’

TheREADER 39

The Post’s ‘Iran EyesBadges forJews,Christians?’ is an incitementto disgust, fear,and the loathingof Iran, and its people, the ones likely to suffer shouldanother front in the War onTerror beallowed opened

O N P R O P A G A N D A

in the annals of history. It’s a story thatdemands reverent acknowledgement,respect, and a regular revisiting. Asindeed it is remembered in solemn cer-emonies, news media, and motion pic-tures. It is a lesson hard learned by mil-lions of our predecessors, and not to betreated cynically for political advance-ment, or commercial interest.

Though that’s a message apparentlylost on the editors of Canada’s Nation-al Post newspaper.

The logical extension of the avowed-ly pro-Israel media monster’s pro-warpropaganda-driven “information” dis-semination philosophy, (as iterated byits late owner, Israel “Izzy” Asper,on hisassumption of much of the mediaempire built by the disgraced formermedia magnate, Lord Black’) the Holo-caust hijacking presented on the Post’sfront page recently was the flowering ofa hate war waged by Canwest in theservice of a greater and possibly perpet-ual state of war in the world.

I can’t believe it took this long for theLikudite Canwest Global to descend tothe eye-poking, nostril-gouging level ithas in its smear assault against “evil”Iran; as sinisterly personified singularlyin the person of its president, anotherHitler in the making, who given half achance would create a nuclear-tippedmissile to set fire to the world; begin-ning in Israel.

And he hates Jews, we’re daily told;would have them all wear badges, im-molate the nation, etc...

Yet, the story is bullshit.Phoney as Saddam’s WMD, the

National Post published a pack of lies;lies told at a time when the rally cry to

an unprovoked war of conquest andoccupation in a far off land is the goal ofa furious lobbying campaign in Ameri-ca, and around the world. Fake as thebabies thrown from Kuwaiti incubators,abandoned to die on the cold, cold hos-pital floor,etc...used to “justify” the firstGulf War. The Post’s ‘Iran Eyes Badgesfor Jews,Christians?’ is an incitement todisgust, fear, and the loathing of Iran,and its people, the ones likely to suffershould another front in the War on Ter-ror be allowed opened.

Unlike America, Canada has lawsagainst crimes of incitement to hatredof identifiable groups, based on ethnic,gender, or sexual orientation parame-ters. What are Persian-Canadians, andthe greater Muslim population of Cana-da, to make of the Post’s story? Whateffects might they suffer at the long-knuckled hands of the National Post’smisinformed readership? Canada’snewly-arrived prime minister, Harperresponded to questions from the Can-west reporter tasked to refute the frontpage fiasco, saying simply:

“Unfortunately we’ve seen enoughalready from the Iranian regime to sug-gest that it is very capable of this kind ofaction. It boggles the mind that anyregime on the face of the earth wouldwant to do anything that would remindpeople of Nazi Germany.”

Yes Stephen, it boggles the mind tobe sure. CT

Chris Cook is a contributing editor of PEJ News where this commentaryfirst appeared. He also hosts GorillaRadio, broad/webcast from theUniversity of Victoria, Canada.

Now come all the impassioned eulo-gies for Our Troops. Lies, all of it.I donot support our troops. I do not sup-port anyone's troops.

It is emblematic that throughout the USA wededicate an official holiday to the deificationand glorification of “our” warriors.

All across America today, people of everykind, hawks and doves, peaceniks and sabre rat-tlers, pro-war and anti-war, are stepping upproudly to proclaim that, whether they supportthe war or not, they support our troops.

I do not support our troops. They are notmine. They are not admirable brave men andwomen, nor are they fighting for our country.They are certainly not fighting for me.

They are murderers and killers, torturers andrapists, who have willingly committed inhumanand unconscionable acts on uncountable vic-tims.

Some of them may also be victims but all ofthem are perpetrators.

Many of them may be reluctant warriors, butall of them have the moral obligation to refuseto kill, and choose instead to follow orders.

They may have been sent to do the filthywork of insane power mongers and incompre-hensibly greedy pigs, but the filthy work they do– often, as can be seen on countless video clips– with gusto and relish.

America looks out into the world, and sees

not the hundreds of thousands of humans wehave killed, wounded, or burned beyond recog-nition, but sees only its own brave soldiers, as ifthey were the victims.

And this of course is why we go so easily intowar. For Us, the Others don’t exist. It is all aboutUs, and Our sons and Our mothers and Ourchildren.

Supporting Our Troops means we supportourselves, and rationalizes what we have done.

For each of us has made the same moralchoice as each of the soldiers. Each of us has, inone way or another, followed orders, and deathand destruction have been the result.

We must find the courage to NOT supportthe troops, and NOT support what we all havecommitted. We must blame the troops, andblame ourselves, and take full responsibility forwhat we and our soldiers have done.

Today should be called Victims’ Day.A day for the nation to stop everything and

contemplate and examine in extreme detail,everything we have brought on humanity. Forcenturies.

A day when we individually and collectivelyface the truth.

Today let us mark the beginning of redemp-tion by memorializing and humanizing and glo-rifying the victims of our crimes. Let us marchand sadly display the tragic photos of those wehave killed, and not of Us, their killers. CT

40 TheREADER

L A S T W O R D S

MEMORIAL DAY?

As we were finalising this issue on May 29, America’s Memorial Day, we received the latest rant from correspondent David Rubinson’s Drant Daily([email protected]). With the latest storm breaking about American war crimes in Iraq, it echoes what many of us are thinking

W R I T I N G W O R T H R E A D I N G F R O M A R O U N D T H E W O R L D

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