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IRAQ
A Country In Chaos

This past Saturday marked the one-year anniversary of President Bush's now-famous declaration that major combat operations in Iraq were over. Over the weekend, he attempted to defend the speech, claiming, ''A year ago, I did give the speech from the carrier, saying that we had achieved an important objective, that we had accomplished a mission, which was the removal of Saddam Hussein." He did not mention the original premise for war – Iraq's supposed weapons of mass destruction. His statement also contradicted his claim six months ago that "the 'Mission Accomplished' sign, of course, was put up by the members of the USS Abraham Lincoln, saying that their mission was accomplished," not to be confused with his statements on the end of major combat in Iraq. April was the deadliest month of conflict since the war began and with the transfer of power a mere two months away, "the Bush administration is squeezed between quelling the insurgency and the search for any idea that reduces the chances of a violent confrontation." The administration has thus far "left the impression it was grasping at alternatives, with little sense of how" new tactics "fit into the larger strategy or of its possible pitfalls," a balancing act analysts say "will only get harder...even after an interim Iraqi government takes charge and begins to prepare for elections."

THE MISTAKES: In today's LA Times, American Progress fellow Larry Korb outlines some of the mistakes the administration did not learn from the war in Vietnam which are contributing to the ongoing chaos and struggle in Iraq. "The first, and presumably the most egregious, was to exaggerate the dangers our adversaries posed to us, something the Bush administration did in Iraq by exaggerating intelligence about Iraq's weapons of mass destruction and its ties to Al Qaeda." Also, "the administration failed to let Congress and the American people have a full, frank debate about the reasons for going to war or how long it would take or how much it would cost." The Bush administration "has still not explained why it was mistaken about the primary reasons for going to war." Finally, the organizational failures in Iraq have been paramount. A full year after the fall of Baghdad, "it remains unclear who is in charge of reconstruction and stabilization."

ALLEGED ABUSE: The front pages of the papers today headline the reported abuse of Iraqi prisoners inside the notorious Abu Ghraib prison in Baghdad. According to an internal military report obtained by Seymour Hersh in the most recent the New Yorker, the abuse in the prison was "systemic and illegal." Air Force Gen. Richard B. Myers, the U.S.'s top general, acknowledged this weekend the "allegations that Iraqi prisoners were abused at a detention facility run by the Army have set back efforts to cultivate a positive image for the U.S. military in the region." The allegations underscore the larger problem of outsourcing military duties to private defense contractors, who may not adhere to the strict standards set by the military. One contractor under investigation is CACI International Inc., "an Arlington-based security firm, which supplied interrogators to assist military intelligence officers." CACI employees had "encouraged military police to abuse prisoners to 'soften them up' for questioning." A second company is also under investigation, the Titan Corp., which employed translators at the prison

REPORT COMPLETED IN FEBRUARY: The 53-page report outlining the abuse, written by Major General Antonio M. Taguba and not meant for public release, was completed in late February. This weekend, however, Myers acknowledged he had not read the internal report, saying, "It's working its way to me." In the months since the completion of the report, it appears military leaders haven't done anything in response.

IRAQI GENERAL REPLACED IN FALLUJAH: In a move indicative of the general confusion and lack of planning the United States has shown in conducting military operations in Iraq, the U.S. has backed away from turning the security of the embattled city of Fallujah over to former Iraqi General Jassim Mohammed Saleh. Marines had named Saleh, a former member of the Saddam's Republican Guard, to lead the new Fallujah Brigade. However, while U.S. commanders "said that Saleh had agreed to go after the purported foreign fighters in Fallujah, Saleh announced that none are there." According to one perplexed military official, "We've just told him he can form a brigade and take over the city. Now we're telling him that he has to step aside?" Appointed in Saleh's place was Muhammad Latif, a former intelligence officer in the Iraqi army who studied at the British Staff College for military officers. Saleh will now "help lead only one of the three battalions that will form the brigade."

WITH FRIENDS LIKE THESE...: Newsweek reports that Ahmad Chalabi, "the longtime Pentagon favorite to become leader of a free Iraq, has never made a secret of his close ties to Iran." Those ties may have deadly repercussions for U.S. troops, however; "top Bush administration officials have been briefed on intelligence indicating that Chalabi and some of his top aides have supplied Iran with 'sensitive' information on the American occupation in Iraq." According to officials, "electronic intercepts of discussions between Iranian leaders indicate that Chalabi and his entourage told Iranian contacts about American political plans in Iraq. There are also indications that Chalabi has provided details of U.S. security operations. According to one U.S. government source, some of the information Chalabi turned over to Iran could 'get people killed.'" The Iraqi exile, who has close ties to Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz and Undersecretary of Defense for Policy Douglas Feith, has his own agenda and "may be working both sides in an effort to solidify his own power and block the advancement of rival Iraqis."

ANTIWAR EQUALS RACIST?: In one of the weirder claims to be put forth by the White House, President Bush tied anti-war sentiment to racism. Friday the president announced: "There's a lot of people in the world who don't believe that people whose skin color may not be the same as ours can be free and self-govern...I believe that people whose skins aren't necessarily—are a different color than white can self-govern." Neither President Bush nor Press Secretary Scott McClellan commented on exactly who the people are who supposedly think that. The phrase "ours" to mean "white" is also offensive, given that the Census reports a quarter of people in the United States are other than white.

CIVIL LIBERTIES
Secret Searches Skyrocket

The Justice Department conducted more than 1700 secret electronic searches approved by the secret intelligence court last year, almost double the number conducted just two years ago. The dramatic rise in clandestine electronic surveillance, most directed at phones and computers, represents a sea change in the way the government investigates crime in the United States. The number of electronic searches approved by the secret court exceeded the number approved by all regular federal and state courts combined. Of the 1727 applications for secret searches requested by the Justice Department all but three were approved by the court – and two of those were ultimately approved after changes were made in the application. The trend is disturbing because applications for secret searches can be approved on a weakened standard of "probable cause" or other traditional protections afforded to the target of a criminal investigation under the 4th Amendment. Nevertheless, the fruits of the secret surveillance "can later be used in criminal prosecutions," although "defendants in such proceedings have fewer rights to attack the basis of the searches or to obtain intercepted information." The rise in this type of activity "was a direct result of the easing of standards for intelligence-gathering that was authorized by the Patriot Act" – a bill passed hastily in the days following 9/11. (For more on the stalled policy on Guantanamo, read this American Progress column by Mark Agrast.)

AIRLINES SEND VAST AMOUNTS OF SENSITIVE PERSONAL INFO TO FBI: In 2001, some of the nation's largest airlines, including American, United and Northwest, "turned over millions of passenger records to the Federal Bureau of Investigation." The information, which in some cases included as much as a year's worth of passenger records, included "names, addresses, travel destinations and credit card numbers." But, despite the size of the request, an F.B.I. official said "there is no indication that the passenger data produced any significant evidence about the [9/11] plot or the hijackers." The quantity of information turned over by the airlines to the FBI – 6,000 CD-ROMs of digital records from Northwest Airlines alone – was revealed by a Freedom of Information Act request by the Electronic Privacy Information Center. Stewart Baker, former general counsel for the National Security Agency, said the incident "is clearly something that is going to be, at minimum, a public embarrassment" for the government and the airlines.

TWO YEARS LATER, ONLY TWO DETAINEES IN GITMO CHARGED WITH A CRIME: 600 detainees still are languishing in the legal black hole of Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Only two have been formally charged with a crime and just a handful have been permitted to see a lawyer. Many "have been in custody for two years." The detentions "have been condemned by foreign governments and human rights groups and are now being weighed by the U.S. Supreme Court." Paul W. Butler, a Defense Department official who oversaw the detentions, said, "we freely admit we're learning this as we go along." While Vice President Dick Cheney called the detainees "the worst of a very bad lot," 134 were released without ever being charged with any crime.

AS PER USUAL, HALLIBURTON PROFITS: The prison camps in Guantanamo cost the military about $118 million a year to operate. A new facility, Camp 5, will open this week, expanding the prison's capacity to 1,100. Halliburton subsidiary KBR has been awarded $110 million worth of work "to build prison cells and other facilities." The expansion is curious in light of the fact that Paul Butler said the United States is interested in transferring at least half of the 600 remaining detainees to the custody of their home countries.







SCIENCE – CUTTING RESEARCH WHILE FALLING BEHIND: According to the NYT, “In a report last month, the American Association for the Advancement of Science said the Bush administration, to live up to its pledge to halve the nation's budget deficit in the next five years, would cut research financing at 21 of 24 federal agencies — all those that do or finance science except those involved in space and national and domestic security.” These cuts threaten to further deplete scientific resources just as “the United States has started to lose its worldwide dominance in critical areas of science and innovation,” according to several measures, including prizes awarded to Americans and the number of papers published in major professional journals. Clearly the world leader less than 20 years ago, America's advances in basic science are now often rivaled or exceeded by foreign advances, a trend with “implications for jobs, industry, national security or the vigor of the nation's intellectual and cultural life.”

MEDIA – CONSERVATIVE LIKE A FOX: A brand-new media watchdog group led by author David Brock, MediaMatters.org, keeps an eye on Fox News this week. They report that the conservative Fox network announced yesterday it would broadcast a show next Sunday, May 9, designed to throw an administration-friendly, positive spin on the list accomplishments so far in Iraq, a blatant attempt to counter the broadcast by Nightline last Friday of a list illustrating the human toll the U.S. is paying in the war. It's little wonder Vice President Cheney last week endorsed the Fox News Channel, calling the decidedly conservatively biased station "more accurate" than other stations. (This assertion is belied by a study done last year by the Program on International Policy [PIPA] at the University of Maryland which showed that Fox viewers were significantly more likely than viewers of other stations to hold misperceptions about the war in Iraq. The misperceptions, such as a link between al Qaeda and Iraq, had also been pushed by the Vice President, which may explain his enthusiasm for the channel.)

MILITARY – IT'S GETTING DRAFTY: According to the Seattle Post Intelligencer, "The chief of the Selective Service System has proposed registering women for the military draft and requiring that young Americans regularly inform the government about whether they have training in niche specialties needed in the armed services." The proposal also "seeks to extend the age of draft registration to 34 years old, up from 25." Although no plans are currently in place to reinstitute the draft, wars in Afghanistan and Iraq have left a military stretched thin, and the armed forces are facing "critical shortages" in areas such as linguists and computer specialists.

TAXES – MOST AMERICANS HAVEN'T NOTICED A CUT: According to a University of Pennsylvania poll conducted in April "only about one in 10 said they were paying less in federal taxes this year than last because of the cuts." The results reinforced the findings of a March NYT survey which found just 22% of respondents believed Bush tax policy lowered their taxes, 46% reported no change and 25% reported higher taxes. One explanation for the results: 75% of Americans pay more in payroll taxes than income tax, which the President has ignored in favor of income tax cuts for the very wealthy.

HEALTH CARE – DRUG CARD DAY: Beginning today, millions of Medicare recipients can enroll in one of dozens of programs offering savings off retail prescription drug prices. However, according to recent reports, the discount isn't as much as seniors can find other places. "Prices for Lipitor, Celebrex and other popular brand-name medicines offered by Medicare's new drug discount cards are no better than those that consumers can find, without discounts, from online pharmacies." And the drugs are cheaper still in Canada. Also, the NYT reports, according to drug card sponsors, the official Medicare website "comparing prescription drug prices is full of inaccurate, erroneous information."



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