Criminal Prosecution and Accountability

By Dave Lindorff

The US Department of “Justice” has a distinctly nuanced concept of that term, taking a tough, no-holds-barred stance when it comes to individuals -- especially little people without much power or influence -- and trying at all costs to avoid prosecution when it comes to the powerful, and to big corporations -- especially big financial corporations. That schizoid approach to prosecution is personified in the recent actions--and inaction--of the DOJ’s man in Manhattan, US Attorney for the Southern District of New York Preet Bharara.

https://soundcloud.com/davidcnswanson/talk-nation-radio-edward

This show opens with an awesome poem about drones by Misty Rowan.

Edward S. Herman says that Desmond Tutu is wrong to support the International Criminal Court, given its bias for prosecuting only Africans and only those Africans not working with the United States. Herman is a Professor Emeritus of Finance at the Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania, where he gave courses in micro- and macro-economics and financial regulation for 30 years. He also taught courses on The Political Economy of the Mass Media and on The Analysis of Media Bias at the Annenberg School of Communication at Penn for a decade.  He has a regular "Fog Watch" column in the monthly Z Magazine and has published numerous articles on economics, finance, foreign policy, and media analysis in a wide array of professional and popular journals. Among his published books are The Political Economy of Human Rights (2 vols, with Noam Chomsky, South End Press, 1979); Corporate Control, Corporate Power (Cambridge University Press, 1981); Demonstration Elections: U.S.-Staged Elections in the Dominican Republic, Vietnam, and El Salvador (with Frank Brodhead, South End Press, 1984); Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media (with Noam Chomsky, Pantheon, 1988, revised editions 2002, 2008); The "Terrorism" Industry (with Gerry O'Sullivan, Pantheon, 1990); and most recently, The Politics of Genocide (with David Peterson, Monthly Review Press, 2010); and an edited volume, The Srebrenica Massacre: Evidence, Context, Politics (Alphabet Soup, 2011).

Total run time: 29:00

Host: David Swanson.
Producer: David Swanson.
Music by Duke Ellington.

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By Dave Lindorff

Let’s start here by conceding that today’s New York Times editorial saying that President Obama should “find a way to end (Edward) Snowden’s vilification and give him an incentive to return home” was pretty remarkable.

It shouldn’t be, though.

By Dave Lindorff

A few weeks ago, WhoWhatWhy ran a piece of mine criticizing a subtly deceptive article in the New York Times that made light of a wave of exhumations of popular leftist figures in Latin America. Quoting unnamed “scholars,” the paper’s Latin American correspondent Simon Romero suggested the forensic digs may be the secularized continuation of customs from the time of early Christianity, when a vibrant trade involved the body parts of saints.

That, in fact, is nonsense.  The purportedly “natural”, “accidental”, or “suicide-related” deaths of such important left-leaning figures as Nobel Laureate Pablo Neruda, Brazil’s President Joao Goulart and Chile’s President Salvador Allende all occurred during the rule of various rightist dictators.

The re-examination of evidence in these cases is based therefore on strong skepticism about the “official” narratives of their deaths.  This skepticism, in turn, is based on a well-documented history of thousands of cases of political murder in the region.

Far from looking for relics to sell, investigators are looking for evidence that these deaths were actually assassinations, the work of fearful tyrants anxious to prevent the victims’ return to power.  Now one result is in, and it’s explosive.

Truth Commission: Juscelino Kubitschek Assassinated

Investigators from Brazil’s Truth Commission, looking into the 1976 car crash of former leftist Brazilian president Juscelino Kubitschek and his limo driver, have discovered a bullet fragment lodged in the driver’s skull. This finding, the Commission ruled, along with other evidence, suggests that Kubitschek was murdered—most likely at the behest of the leaders of the CIA-backed military coup that also ousted his successor Joao Goulart.

By Dave Lindorff

The diplomatic brouhaha between the US and India over a federal arrest and multiple strip-search and cavity search of a high-ranking Indian consular official in New York has exposed the astonishing hypocrisy of the US when it comes to the issue of diplomatic immunity.

By Dave Lindorff

For the third time in three years, a CIA station chief has been outed in Pakistan, a country where the CIA is running one of its largest covert operations. It’s a remarkable record of failure by the CIA, since each outing, which has required a replacement of the station chief position, causes a breakdown in the agency’s network of contacts in the country.

By John Grant

It’s that time of the year again. Ho. Ho. Ho. There’s the urge to celebrate the Winter Solstice (AKA Christmas) with family and friends. It’s also time for end-of-the-year assessments concerning the absurdities of life in a fading empire in denial.

By Linn Washington, Jr.

When Barack Obama, the first black president of America, delivered remarks during a South African memorial service for that country’s first black president, he muffed a historic opportunity to right a grave wrong done by the American government – one that helped send Nelson Mandela to prison for nearly 30-years.

Obama, during his remarks at a Johannesburg, SA memorial service for Mandela, who died on December 5 at age 95, recalled how that world-revered leader had endured “brutal imprisonment.”

By Linn Washington, Jr.

When Barack Obama, the first black president of America, delivered remarks during a South African memorial service for that country’s first black president, he muffed a historic opportunity to right a grave wrong done by the American government – one that helped send Nelson Mandela to prison for nearly 30-years.

Obama, during his remarks at a Johannesburg, SA memorial service for Mandela, who died on December 5 at age 95, recalled how that world-revered leader had endured “brutal imprisonment.”

A federal court will hear argument next April from an Iraqi woman who claims the Iraq War was illegal under international law.

Plaintiff Sundus Shaker Saleh, an Iraqi single mother and refugee now living in Jordan, filed a complaint in March 2013 in San Francisco federal court alleging that the planning and waging of the Iraq War was a "crime of aggression" against Iraqi civilians, a legal theory used at the Nuremberg Trials to convict Nazi leaders for planning and waging wars in Europe during World War II.

Saleh served the complaint in June 2013 against six Bush-era officials, including George W. Bush, Richard Cheney, Colin Powell, Condoleezza Rice, Donald Rumsfeld and Paul Wolfowitz. Her complaint seeks damages for herself as well as for other Iraqi civilian victims of the war.

Saleh alleges that Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz openly planned the Iraq War beginning in 1998 through a neoconservative think-tank called "The Project for the New American Century." She further alleges that once in power, Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz convinced other Bush officials to invade Iraq and to use 9/11 as an excuse to scare and mislead the American public into supporting a war.

President Obama's Department of Justice (DOJ) is representing the defendants and has filed court papers seeking to immunize them from civil proceedings, arguing that these former officials were acting within the scope of their employment in planning and waging the Iraq War. The Obama DOJ has also argued that Saleh's lawsuit is a political question and should be dismissed.

"This is the first time that a court will examine arguments that the Iraq War was illegal under international law," chief counsel Inder Comar of Comar Law said. "We will ask the court to recognize the Nuremberg judgment as binding precedent against these six defendants, and to reject the Obama DOJ argument that Bush-era officials were acting within the scope of their employment when they publicly planned the Iraq War prior to entering office."

In 1946, the International Military Tribunal at Nuremberg ruled that planning and waging a war of aggression is the "supreme international crime" and convicted Nazi leaders of engaging in premeditated wars that violated international law. Several Nazi leaders were sentenced to death for committing the crime of aggression and other war crimes.

The case is Saleh v. Bush (N.D. Cal. Mar. 13, 2013, No. C 13 1124 JST). Oral argument is set for hearing on April 3, 2014, 2:00 p.m., in the Northern District of California, San Francisco division.  Updates, including court documents, can be found at http://witnessiraq.com.

Contact:
Press at Comar Law
press@comarlaw.com

By Lori Spencer

“This is content based denial of free speech in a public park and at a designated historic site. Dealey Plaza belongs to history and to the American people, especially on the 50th anniversary.”

              -- John Judge, executive director of the Coalition on Political Assassinations
 

By Linn Washington, Jr.

Florida U.S. Congressman Trey Radel, recently convicted of possessing cocaine, rightly wears the label of Drug War hypocrite, but assigning that total to just that one prominent felon helps tends to hide the long-standing stench of Drug War hypocrisy that extends from Capitol Hill to the White House and state capitals nationwide, including members of both parties.

By Lori Spencer

I once did know a President
A way down South, in Texas.
And, always, everywhere he went,
He saw the Eyes of Texas.

The Eyes of Texas are upon you, all the livelong day.
The Eyes of Texas are upon you, you cannot get away.
Do not think you can escape them
At night or early in the morn
The Eyes of Texas are upon you 'til Gabriel blows his horn.

By Alfredo Lopez

This past Friday, Internet activist Jeremy Hammond stood in a federal courtroom and told Judge Loretta A. Preska why he released a trove of emails and other information uncovering the possibly illegal and certainly immoral collaboration of a major surveillance corporation called Stratfor with our government.

Fats: In the family jewels?
Gary: In the family jewels, man!
Wyatt: Worst pain there is.
Gary: Broke my heart in two!
Fats: She broke more than your heart.
--Weird Science

It's great that the CIA is now nearly half female, but we shouldn't rest until 51 percent of their victims are women too.
— Charles Davis (@charliearchy) November 14, 2013

It turns out that procreation of secretive criminal government agencies doesn't require a male or a female, and family jewels have little to do with it. The CIA (short for Criminal Implementation of Arrogance) calls certain reports on its immoral and illegal activities its "family jewels." John Prados, author of The Family Jewels, the CIA, Secrecy, and Presidential Power, calls all of the CIA's outrageous secrets its family jewels.  But the CIA reproduces itself whether or not its secrets are exposed, and if it's a family we might just all end up dying from a bad case of family values.

Prados' book recounts various CIA abuses from the 1970s through today, with chapters on domestic surveillance, detention and interrogation, and assassination.  Of course, the abuses predate the period focused on in this book, go back to the origins, and could fill much thicker volumes.  If the CIA has a problem with bad apples, we're talking about orchards full of them.  The vicious power-mad bursts of criminality do seem to come in historical cycles, peaking every 60 seconds or so for the past 60 years. There's no record of the CIA functioning in "proper" manner without the atrocities that are its bread and butter.  A CIA history is a history of relentless destructiveness -- relentless but worsening.

"What are we talking about, here?" asked Senator Frank Church, back in the day. "Agencies of the government that are licensed to undertake murder. Is the president of the United States going to be a glorified godfather?"

Today that goes without saying, although I'm not sure opinion polls wouldn't find the mafioso godfather to be the more glorified of the two, presidential drones or no presidential drones.

One problem, Prados points out, is secrecy.  "Not only does secret knowledge have extremely seductive power, when spooks walk on the dark side they experience the greatest invitation to excess, believing that security classification shields their actions from scrutiny."

Prados quotes Harry Howe Ransom: "At the level of representatives of the people -- executive and legislative -- the problem is primarily how to control a dimly seen instrument so hot that if not handled with great skill it can burn its user instead of its adversary."

(You may take a moment here to remember President Kennedy if you are so inclined.)

Secrecy is a source of evil, but not of its procreation.  The way the CIA keeps going is through the granting of immunity for its crimes, the glorification of its culture, the Hollywood propagandizing of its purpose, the cowardice of Congress members, the complicity of media types, the indifference of millions, and the repetitive-to-the-point-of-insanity push to reform the unreformable.

It ought to be abolished.

As someone engaged in the very useful work of exposing secrets, Prados seems at least as outraged by the CIA's reluctance to reveal its secrets as by the murderous horrors from which those secrets are constituted.  But if the secrets are exposed, they'll still be horrors, and -- frankly -- they'll be nothing entirely new.  If the United Nations sees the details on every drone murder, the United Nations will become a more openly pro-war institution, but the dead will still rot, their loved ones will still wail, and the CIA will still be seen as some mixture of necessary strength, heroic cool, and occasional unavoidable excesses so common that we get tired of hearing about them. Unless we decide that enough is enough.

It ought to be abolished.

By Dave Lindorff

A revealing page-one article in today’s New York Times (“Tap on Merkel Provides Peek a Vast Spy Net”) reports on how the NSA’s global spying program, dating back at least to early in the Bush/Cheney administration, was vacuuming up the phone conversations (and no doubt later the internet communications) of not just leaders like German Chancellor Angela Merkel, but opposition leader Merkel before her party took power in Germany.

By Dave Lindorff

Last week President Obama was largely successful at blacking out from the American public word that Nobel Peace Prize Malala Yousafzai, the courageous Pakistani advocate of girls’ education nearly killed by Taliban gunmen a year ago, used a photo-op invitation to the White House to ask the president to halt to his drone killings of Pakistanis. But Obama cannot so easily silence the condemnations today of his remote drone “Murder, Inc.” program by Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch.

By Dave Lindorff

Talk about turnabout being fair play.

The Guardian:

British military operations are at risk of being undermined by human rights law and health and safety red tape, a research institute has warned.

Policy Exchange said Britain's enemies could view the courtroom as a new front in any future conflict as a way of "paralysing" the armed forces.

The Defence Secretary, Philip Hammond, admitted he was "concerned" about recent court judgments which could make it "more difficult" to carry out operations.

One case that raised concerns was the supreme court ruling this year that damages claims could be launched by families of soldiers killed in Iraq against the Ministry of Defence under legislation covering negligence and human rights.

By Linn Washington Jr.

Ed Forchion, recognized as America’s foremost black marijuana legalization activist, freely admits that he “agitates” people – powerful people from prosecutors to politicians and even more mainstream anti-pot prohibition advocates who bristle at his antics.

The activism of Forchion, often outrageous like his March 2000 stunt of smoking a marijuana joint inside the New Jersey State Assembly chamber while dressed in bold black and white stripped jailhouse garb, has drawn praise and prison terms.

Protest Planned on Halloween at Metro Toronto Convention Centre

(Toronto) Lawyers from the National Lawyers Guild (U.S.), International Association of Democratic Lawyers, European Centre for Constitutional and Human Rights (Germany), Brussells Tribunal (Belgium), International Initiative to Prosecute US Genocide in Iraq (Iraq, Egypt, Spain), Lawyers Against the War (Canada) and Rights International Spain (Spain) are urging Canada to either bar Dick Cheney from Canada – as a person credibly accused of torture – or to arrest and prosecute him on arrival, as required by the Convention against Torture. A letter from Lawyers Against the War (LAW) sent to Canada’s Prime Minister, Attorney General and Ministers of Foreign Affairs and Immigration has been gravely ignored. 

"It is long overdue for Cheney and other Bush administration officials to be held to account for the high crimes of instituting and implementing the systematic practice of torture. This record of impunity must not be allowed to stand."

Azadeh Shahshahani, President, National Lawyers Guild.

Torture and war crimes suspect Dick Cheney is scheduled as a keynote speaker at the October 31^st luncheon of the Toronto Global Forum, hosted by the International Forum of the Americas.  Should Cheney be allowed to freely enter Canada despite the illegalities involved, civil society groups are planning a rally beginning at 11:00 am on Halloween, Oct. 31^st, outside the Metro Toronto Convention Centre.

The Facebook page for the protest can be viewed here.

BrussellsTribunal (BT)is peace organization and think tank with a special focus on Iraq. BT founded IAON, the International Anti-Occupation Network which continues to monitor Iraq.  Members of the BT network include Noam Chomsky, John Pilger, Denis Halliday, Hans von Sponeck, Tun Mahathir, Richard Falk, Father Miguel d'Escoto Brockmann, Eduardo Galeano and many others. 

Canadian Peace Alliance(CPA) is Canada's largest umbrella peace organization working for global nuclear disarmament and peace. CPA organizes campaigns, facilitates actions and provides education for peace. Since its foundation in 1985 the organization has been helping member groups to act as a broad network, in order to provide a strong, coordinated voice for peace issues at the national level.

CODEPINK is a US women-initiated grassroots peace and social justice movement working to end US- funded wars and occupations, to challenge militarism globally, and to redirect our resources into health care, education, green jobs and other life-affirming activities –www.codepink.org.

EuropeanCenter for Constitutional and Human Rights(ECCHR) is an independent, non-profit legal and educational organization dedicated to protecting civil and human rights throughout Europe. ECCHR engages in innovative strategic litigation, using European, international, and national law to enforce human rights and to hold state and non-state actors accountable for egregious abuses.

The International Association of Democratic Lawyers (IADL) is committed to the principle of equality among peoples, the rights of all peoples to self-determination, the elimination of imperialism and colonialism and the peaceful settlement of international disputes. IADL has members in over ninety countries and has consultative status with ECOSOC and UNESCO of the United Nations.

International Initiative to Prosecute US Genocide in Iraq  ismainly concerned with possibilities for legal action against those responsible of war crimes, crimes against humanity and the crime of genocide in Iraq.

Lawyers Against the War(LAW) is a Canada-based committee of jurists and others who oppose war and advocate for adherence to international humanitarian law and against impunity for violators.

National Lawyers Guild (NLG)is a U.S. national non-profit legal and political organization comprised of lawyers, legal workers, law students, and jailhouse lawyers, founded in 1937.

Rights International Spain(RIS) is an independent, non-profit, NGO, composed of jurists specialized in international law, human rights, transitional justice and criminal law. RIS mission is to strengthen human rights accountability in Spain by monitoring government activity, with a particular focus on rule of law and access to justice, as well as raising civil society’s awareness and mobilize support to demand justice.

TorontoCoalition to Stop the War(TCSW) is the largest peace organization in the Greater Toronto Area and represents over 60 labour, student, faith and community groups. The TCSW opposes war and occupation and supports civil liberties.

World Can't Wait  isa US-based movement formed to halt and reverse the terrible program of war and repression, initiated by the Bush/Cheney regime as well as the on-going crimes that continue to this day – www.worldcantwait.net.  War Criminals Watch is a project of World Can’t Wait – www.warcriminalswatch.org.
 

By Dave Lindorff

By Linn Washington, Jr.

Imagine U.S. House Speaker John Boehner blasted on weed.

Given Boehner’s teary-eyed trait, he’d probably cry uncontrollably when high on pot alternating his crocodile tears with hysterical laughter…perhaps even laughing at some of that dumb shi-tuff he and his GOP colleagues constantly do on Capitol Hill.

(Toronto) Torture suspect and former U.S. Vice President Richard (Dick) Cheney is scheduled to speak at the Toronto Global Forum, October 31, 2013, at the Metro Toronto Convention Centre. The event is hosted by the International Economic Forum of the Americas.

Lawyers and others are urging Canada to either bar Dick Cheney from Canada as a person credibly accused of torture – or to arrest and prosecute him on arrival, as required by the Convention against Torture. That Dick Cheney authorized, directed and failed to prevent the widespread use of torture by US officials on non-Americans detained in off-shore prisons is no longer open to question. The United Nations Committee Against Torture has determined that torture suspects temporarily in Canada must be dealt with in accordance with the Convention.

A letter has been sent to Canada’s Prime Minister, Attorney General and Ministers of Foreign Affairs and Immigration advising them of Canada’s legal obligations.  For a complete copy of the letter submitted click here.

Gail Davidson, spokesperson for Lawyers Against the War noted, "Evidence of Dick Cheney’s involvement in torture and other gross human rights abuses is overwhelming.  It is time for the law to step in."
 

"Former Vice President Cheney led the Bush administration into a war based on lies which destroyed Iraq, directing a far-flung regime of torture, rendition and detention he referred to as 'the dark side.' He should be indicted and prosecuted for violations of the conventions against torture," stated Debra Sweet, director of World Can’t Wait.

 
"Thus far the U.S. has failed to prosecute anyone up the chain of command for abuses that have occurred in the highest offices of the United States of America, setting a precedent for future leaders to repeat the same crimes," states Nancy Mancias, CODEPINK organizer. "We look to the leaders in Canada to take steps to ban former Vice President Dick Cheney from entering the country because of his involvement in torture and the Iraq war."

Lawyers Against the War(LAW) is a Canada-based committee of jurists and others who oppose war and advocate for adherence to international humanitarian law and against impunity for violators.

World Can't Wait is a US-based movement formed to halt and reverse the terrible program of war and repression, initiated by the Bush/Cheney regime as well as the on-going crimes that continue to this day – www.worldcantwait.net.  War Criminals Watch is a project of World Can’t Wait – www.warcriminalswatch.org.

CODEPINK is a US women-initiated grassroots peace and social justice movement working to end US- funded wars and occupations, to challenge militarism globall, and to redirect our resources into health care, education, green jobs and other life-affirming activities –www.codepink.org.

By Dave Lindorff

 
The US is demanding, in negotiations at the UN, that all Syrian chemical weapons, stocks and production facilities be eliminated by June 30 of next year. This has an element of hypocrisy, because the US itself has been incredibly slow about eliminating its own stocks of chemical weapons.

US Secretary of State John Kerry has referred to Syria as having one of the largest chemical stockpiles in the world. But the US and Russia both still have stocks of chemicals many times as large. Syria’s neighbor Israel, which refuses to admit it has the weapons and has yet to ratify the treaty banning them, is suspected of also having a large arsenal.

By Dave Lindorff

Syrian civilians and children should count themselves lucky that mass opposition in the US, the UK and much of the rest of the world to the idea of a US bombing blitz aimed at punishing the Syrian government for allegedly using Sarin gas in an attack on a Damascus neighborhood forced the US to back off and accept a Russian deal to get rid of Syria’s chemical weapons.

By Dave Lindorff

In what NPR called “perhaps President Obama’s last best chance” to make his case for launching a war against Syria, the president tellingly didn’t make a single effort to present hard, compelling evidence to prove that Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad had been behind the alleged Sarin Aug. 21 attack on residents of a suburb of Damascus.

Not one piece of evidence.