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Today's
Stories
September 1,
2004
Jeffrey St.
Clair
High
Plains Grifter: Part Two: Mark His Words
August 31,
2004
Joseph Nevins
Escapism
and Global Apartheid: The Dominican Republic & the NYTs
Matt Vidal
Beyond
Bush's Rhetoric on the Economy
Neve Gordon
Kerry and the Middle East
Dave Lindorff
Bush
the Peace Candidate?
Mike Whitney
NPR Leads the Charge for War Against Iran
Jack Random
Opening Night: Playing the War Card
Jeffrey St.
Clair
High
Plains Grifter: the Life and Crimes of George W. Bush (Part One)
CounterPunch Photo of the Day
Pete Seeger in NYC
August 30,
2004
Justin Podhur
The
Disappeared Mayor
Shaun Joseph
The
Hypocrites at TheNaderbasher.com
Mike Whitney
Israeli Moles in the Pentagon: What More Could They Possibly
Want?
Ron Jacobs
Live, From New York: the Majority of Protesters Claimed No Candidate
David Lindorff
Sunday in Manhattan: the Sound of Marchin', Chargin' Feet, Boy
Dave Zirin
USA Basketball: The Team White America Loved to Hate
Sam Husseini
Israeli Spying on the US: a Long History
Sex,
Drugs & the Blues!
Serpents in the Garden
CounterPunch's
Sizzling New Book on Culture and Sex is Now Available
Click here to purchase
August 28 /
29, 2004
Alexander Cockburn
Zombies
for Kerry
Patrick Cockburn
Najaf Ceasefire Good for Iraq, But Weakens Allawi and US
Ray McGovern
Blowing Smoke on Intelligence
Dr. Juan Romagoza
From El Salvador to Abu Ghraib: Reflections of Torture Survivor
Ray Hanania
An Israeli Spy in the Pentagon? Ridiculous!
Fred Gardner
Eddie Lepp Busted by DEA: Facing Life for Growing Medical Pot
Diane Christian
Big Men: the Better Leader Lets You Live
William S. Lind
The Desert Fox
Paul D'Amato
The Left Takes a Dive for Kerry
Joshua Frank
Greens at the Crossroads
Mickey Z.
Media Declares War on Anti-War Protests
Winslow T. Wheeler
Sen. McCain's Pork Chops: an Exchange
Justin E.H.
Smith
The New Age Racket and the Left
Thomas St. John
Burning Slaves at the Stake: On "Sinners in the Hands of
an Angry God"
Ali Tonak
Help the NYPD?
Mark Engler
New York Says "No"
Justin Felux
Haiti: the Attica of the Americas
Poets' Basement
Gelman, Albert, Ford and Hamod
August 27,
2004
Gary Leupp
Neocon
Musings
Robin Cook
The
Ghosts of Abu Ghraib
Diane Christian
Disarming
Michael Donnelly
Situational Democracy: the Show Me the Green Party?
Jack Random
4F and Other Heroes: an Army of War Resisters
Mike Ferner
"To the Swift Boats!"
Mazin Qumsiyeh
7000 Palestinian Political Prisoners
Veronza Bowers, Jr.
"You Won't Be Leaving Tomorrow"
August 26,
2004
M. Shahid Alam
The
Clash Thesis: a Failing Ideology?
Diane Christian
War
Rules: Bush is No Sun Tzu
Derek Seidman
"They're As Bad As Wal-Mart:" Starbucks Workers Get
Organized
David Lindorff
Court to RNC Protesters: Drop the Rally
Christopher
Brauchli
Signs of Dissent: the Bush in the Bubble
Stew Albert
Reporting Suspicious Activity
Mark Donham
Judgement in Athens: Give the Koreans Their Day in Court
Saul Landau
Pinochet:
the Al Capone of the Southern Cone
Website of
the Day
The Kerry 527 Ad You'll Never See
August 25,
2004
Amelia Peltz
Can
I Have 9.8 Seconds of Your Time?
Noah Leavitt
Defining and Redefining Torture
Ron Jacobs
Takin' It to the Streets: It's Not About the Election, It's About
Democracy
James Brooks
Coronado Crosses the Jordan
Akiva Eldar
How to Win the Jewish Vote: Turn Gaza into a "Mini-Afghanistan"
Gemma Araneta
Chavez's New Brand of Populism
Philip Cryan
Uribe's Boys: the Death Squads of Colombia
CounterPunch Wire
Cheney Opens the Closet Door
August 24,
2004
Jeremy Scahill
John
Kerry: the Warchurian Candidate
Gary Leupp
"We
Want Them to Go Away"
David Domke
God
Willing: an Echoing Press and Political Fundamentalism
William Loren Katz
The Meaning of Hugo Chávez: Black and Indian Power in
Venezuela
Jonah Gindin
With Chavez? Reading the International Private Media
Fran Schor
Denying Atrocities: From Vietnam to Fallujah
Joe Bageant
Driving
on the Bones of God
Website of the Day
The Great America Lockdown: a Primer for the RNC
August 23,
2004
Winslow Wheeler
Don't
Mind If I Do: Porkbarrel and the War on Terror
John Pilger
Bush
May Be the Lesser Evil
Stan Goff
Swift
Boat Dogfight
Bill and Kathleen
Christison
Notes
from the West Bank: Build, Demolish, Rebuild
Mike Whitney
The Unraveling of Afghanistan
William Blum
Brave
New World of Iraqi Sovereignty
Ralph Nader
A Letter to the Washington Post: a Shameful and Unsavory Editorial
August 21 /
22, 2004
Cockburn /
St. Clair
"They
Want Blood:" The Bi-Partisan Origins of the Total War on
Drugs
Landau / Hassen
Failing
the Mission? Form a Commission
Brian Cloughley
The
Bush Team in Iraq: Moral Cowardice, as Practiced by Experts
Josh Frank
Nader as David Duke? The ADL Wants You to Think So
Mike Whitney
Reincarnating Mengele: the Torture Doctors of Abu Ghraib
Ron Jacobs
Day Labor Blues
Mickey Z.
Shooting at Whales: 40 Years After Tonkin
Fred Gardner
Dr. Wolman Comes Out: The Cannabis Consultants
Dave Zirin
Uprising in Athens: Iraqi Soccer Team Gives Bush the Boot
Josh Saxe
Witnessing Police Brutality in LA
Yanar Mohammed
Letter from Baghdad: a Democracy of Killings and Bombings
Helen Williams
Ali's Story: a Taste of Reality from Baghdad
Michael Donnelly
Elemental and NaturalForests, Fire and Recovery
Elizabeth Schulte
The Crisis in Affordable Housing
Poets' Basement
Adler, Albert, Virgil, Ford and Krieger
Hot Stories
Alexander Cockburn
Behold,
the Head of a Neo-Con!
Subcomandante
Marcos
The
Death Train of the WTO
Norman Finkelstein
Hitchens
as Model Apostate
Steve Niva
Israel's
Assassination Policy: the Trigger for Suicide Bombings?
Dardagan,
Slobodo and Williams
CounterPunch Exclusive:
20,000 Wounded Iraqi Civilians
Steve
J.B.
Prison Bitch
Sheldon
Rampton and John Stauber
True Lies: the Use of Propaganda
in the Iraq War
Wendell
Berry
Small Destructions Add Up
CounterPunch
Wire
WMD: Who Said What When
Cindy
Corrie
A Mother's Day Talk: the Daughter
I Can't Hear From
Gore Vidal
The
Erosion of the American Dream
Francis Boyle
Impeach
Bush: A Draft Resolution
Click
Here for More Stories.
|
September 1, 2004
Protest
in White
Not
All of New York Rises Up
By
JOSH FRANK
My girlfriend Jessica and I finalized
our move from Brooklyn to Albany, New York last Sunday. We were
forced to move and follow the money, as they say. While we filled
our UHAUL full of odds and ends, gritty white hipsters from South
Williamsburg were convening to protest the neocons arrival to
the Big Apple. I was upset that I coulnd't join them. I wanted
nothing more then to drop the boxes I was carrying and raise
my fist in dissent against an administration that has an appetite
for the inept.
As I watched these protesters
amass, however, I noticed something peculiar. Most fellow Williamsburgers
on the street seemed unconcerned that George W. Bush was using
their city to host the Republican National Convention. They didn't
give a shit that Bush was about to exploit the tragedy of September
11 to promote his re-election campaign. They were not angered
by the whole charade. Not in the least.
At first I was perplexed. "Why
aren't these people, poor black and Latino minorities, on the
front-lines raging against Bush and his band of thugs? They certainly
have ample reason." I thought. "In fact they have more
reasons then these twenty-something's, myself included, who will
forever have the gift of white skin as a saving social grace.
Why the overt political apathy?"
But then it hit me. The truth
is these folks don't see a point in protesting only one sect
of the ruling elite while ignoring the other -- their problems
are systemic, and yes, bipartisan in origin. Bush is only a symbolic
figure head of a corrupt corporatized state. They don't need
C. Wright Mills to point it out. They witness it daily.
They know it was Bill Clinton
who signed welfare reform. Not Bush. They know it was Clinton
who cut Pell-Grants and raped the federal education funds, making
it harder for these people to dig their way out of entrenched
poverty. It is Democrat John Kerry who wants to put more cops
on the streets to crack some minority heads -- which will inevitably
send more non-violent individuals from poor neighborhoods like
South Williamsburg into the prison industrial system. These poor
Americans have few, if any, allies in Washington. They're votes
are typically ignored if even counted, and the presidential aspirants
like Kerry rarely speak to their needs -- even if Kerry's Veep
Edwards smiles his way through his "Two-America's"
speech. These folks aren't biting.
Iraq isn't a major issue either,
and why would it be? They aren't surprised America has launched
an imperial war. Many of my former neighbors are from Puerto
Rico, where they know first hand the wrath of American stewardship.
Iraq is just another chapter in a long history book of American
aggression.
They know that regardless of
who wins in November, their struggles will surely continue: Finding
adequate work. Food for their hungry children. Health care that
doesn't put them in the poor house. A solid education that leads
to opportunities for their precious kids. And the list goes on.
I heard one older man sitting
on an over turned bucket say to his friend as Jessica and I passed
with our oversized mattress in hand, "I bet these protesters
wouldn't be doing this if that Kerry were in town." He was
right of course. It was a keen observation of our political reality,
aka the ABB (Anybody But Bush) epidemic.
The majority of protesters
now assembled in NYC would not have thought of taking to the
streets of Boston to rail the Democrats for their acceptance
of "everything-Bush" just one month ago. Not only is
it now cool to be anti-W, which is the major ABB draw, it is
also intellectually appealing. At least for the selective-minded
spectator. Most New York City ABBer's believe it is their duty
to protest the RNC. Bless 'em. I'd be there if I could, and I
am sure many marching through the streets of Mid-Town know the
Democrats are to blame for much of what has transpired. But after
seeing another segment of America that has ample reason to hate
Bush -- sit back and laugh at the hipster upheaval in Williamsburg
that day -- reality has painted a slightly different picture
of the RNC.
The problems plaguing America,
and Najaf for that matter, are not the neocon's alone. Bush has
acted on policies laid out by Bill Clinton and the New Democrats
in the 1990s. The face painted protesters that passed my girlfriend
and I as we packed our belongings in the back of our rented truck
may not understand this. But the guy on the overturned bucket,
and the other Brooklynites that seemed unconcerned with the Republican
takeover of NYC, continue to see through the perpetual lies.
They know 100,000 protesters in the streets is a good thing.
They just wish such dissent was not partisan in nature. If it
were, I'm sure they'd be arm in arm with their white neighbors.
Joshua Frank, a contributor to CounterPunch's forthcoming
book, A
Dime's Worth of Difference: Beyond the Lesser of Two Evils,
is putting the finishing touches on Left
Out: How Liberals did Bush's Work for Him, to be published
by Common Courage Press. He welcomes comments at frank_joshua@hotmail.com.
Weekend
Edition Features for August 7 / 8, 2004
James Petras
The
Anatomy of "Terror Experts": Meet the Mandarins of
Abu Ghraib
Fred Gardner
Run
Ricky Run: Football, Pot and Pain
Justin Delacour
Anti-Chavez Pollsters Panic: Fix Numbers; Reinvent Venezuela
Brian Cloughley
Persecuted by All; Supported by None: Who Would Be A Kurd?
Joshua Frank
The
Outsider: a Talk with Ralph Nader
Iain A. Boal
On "Shame": Warmed-Over Orientalism and Racist Projection
Chris Floyd
All About Eve: Open Season on Women in DC and Rome
Andrew Fenton
Fighting for Democracy and Justice in Haiti
Aseem Shrivastava
Saga of an Anguished Afghan
Neil Corbett
See Cuba: Sometimes a Cigar is Just a Cigar, Mr. Bush
Carol Miller
/ Forrest Hill
Rigged Convention; Divided Party: How David Cobb Won with Only
12% of the Vote
Tarek Milleron
Breaking the Principled Voter
Donald Macintyre
The
Battle of Najaf
Ron Jacobs
Spirits of The Dead: Why I Love My Petty Bourgeois Tendencies
Mickey Z.
Kid
Gavilan's Grave: Propaganda Scores a TKO
Poets' Basement
Adler, Ford and Albert
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