CBS newsman's $70m lawsuit likely to deal Bush legacy a new blow

$70m lawsuit likely to deal Bush legacy a new blow

As George W Bush prepares to leave the White House, at least one unpleasant episode from his unpopular presidency is threatening to follow him into retirement.

A $70m lawsuit filed by Dan Rather, the veteran former newsreader for CBS Evening News, against his old network is reopening the debate over alleged favourable treatment that Bush received when he served in the Texas Air National Guard during the Vietnam war. Bush had hoped that this controversy had been dealt with once and for all during the 2004 election.

Eight weeks before the 2004 presidential poll, Rather broadcast a story based on newly discovered documents which appeared to show that Bush, whose service in the Texas Air National Guard ensured that he did not have to fight in Vietnam, had barely turned up even for basic duty. After an outcry from the White House and conservative bloggers who claimed that the report had been based on falsified documents, CBS retracted the story, saying that the documents' authenticity could not be verified. Rather, who had been with CBS for decades and was one of the most familiar faces in American journalism, was fired by the network the day after the 2004 election.

He claims breach of contract against CBS. He has already spent $2m on his case, which is likely to go to court early next year. Rather contends not only that his report was true - "What the documents stated has never been denied, by the president or anyone around him," he says - but that CBS succumbed to political pressure from conservatives to get the report discredited and to have him fired. He also claims that a panel set up by CBS to investigate the story was packed with conservatives in an effort to placate the White House. Part of the reason for that, he suggests, was that Viacom, a sister company of CBS, knew that it would have important broadcasting regulatory issues to deal with during Bush's second term.

Among those CBS considered for the panel to investigate Rather's report were far-right broadcasters Rush Limbaugh and Ann Coulter.

"CBS broke with long-standing tradition at CBS News and elsewhere of standing up to political pressure," says Rather. "And, there's no joy in saying it, they caved ... in an effort to placate their regulators in Washington."

Rather's lawsuit makes other serious allegations about CBS succumbing to political pressure in an attempt to suppress important news stories. In particular, he says that his bosses at CBS tried to stop him reporting evidence of torture at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq. According to Rather's lawsuit, "for weeks they refused to grant permission to air the story" and "continued to raise the goalposts, insisting on additional substantiation". Rather also claims that General Richard Meyers, then head of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the top military official in the US, called him at home and asked him not to broadcast the story, saying that it would "endanger national security".

Rather says that CBS only agreed to allow him to broadcast the story when it found out that Seymour Hersh would be writing about it in the New Yorker magazine. Even then, Rather claims, CBS tried to bury it. "CBS imposed the unusual restrictions that the story would be aired only once, that it would not be preceded by on-air promotion, and that it would not be referenced on the CBS Evening News," he says.

The charges outlined in Rather's lawsuit will cast a further shadow over the Bush legacy. He recently expressed regret for the "failed intelligence" which led to the invasion of Iraq and has received heavy criticism over the scale and depth of the economic downturn in the United States.

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Bush's shoe attacker has broken arm, ribs: brother

Bush's shoe attacker has broken arm, ribs: brother

Published: Tuesday December 16, 2008

The Iraqi journalist who hurled his shoes at US President George W. Bush has a broken arm and ribs after being struck by Iraqi security agents, his brother told AFP on Tuesday.

Durgham Zaidi was unable to say whether his brother Muntazer had sustained the injuries while being overpowered during Sunday's protest against Bush's visit to Baghdad or while in custody later.

He said he had been told that his brother was being held by Iraqi forces in the heavily fortified Green Zone compound in central Baghdad where the US embassy and most government offices are housed.

"He has got a broken arm and ribs, and cuts to his eye and arm," said Durgham.

"He is being held by forces under the command of Muwaffaq al-Rubaie," Iraq's national security adviser, he added.

Zaidi, 29, a journalist for private Iraqi television channel Al-Baghdadia, was swiftly overpowered by Iraqi security forces after he threw the shoes at Bush in a gesture seen as the supreme mark of disrespect in the Muslim world.

An AFP journalist said that blood was visible on the ground as he was led away into custody although it was unclear if it was his.

Bush, who was on a swansong visit to the battleground that came to dominate his eight-year presidency, ducked when the shoes were thrown and later made light of the incident.

But Zaidi's action won him widespread plaudits in the Arab world where Bush's policies have drawn broad hostility.

The Lebanese television channel NTV, known for its opposition to Washington, went as far as offering a job to the journalist.

In its evening news bulletin on Monday, it said that if he takes the job, he will be paid "from the moment the first shoe was thrown".

A manager at the channel told AFP that it had made its offer known to Zaidi and was ready to post bail on his behalf.

An Iraqi lawyer said Zaidi risks a minimum of two years in prison if he is successfully prosecuted for insulting a visiting head of state.

In Gaza, around 20 Palestinian gunmen from the Popular Resistance Committees, a hardline militant group that has been behind a spate of rocket attacks on Israel in recent weeks, staged a demonstration in support of Zaidi.

Wearing fatigues and brandishing Kalashnikov assault rifles, they stamped on photographs of the US president and held banners in support of the journalist.

Egyptian independent daily Al-Badeel carried a frontpage caricature of the US flag with the sole of a shoe replacing the stars in the top corner.

Even government-owned newspapers in Cairo praised Zaidi's actions. "Pelting the American president with shoes was the best way for expressing what Iraqis and Arabs feel toward Bush," wrote Al-Gomhuria editor Mohammad Ali Ibrahim.

In Iraq, press comment was divided.

The pro-government Al-Sabah newspaper expressed concern about the potential impact on press freedom of what it called Zaidi's "abnormal individual behaviour."

But the independent Al-Dustur newspaper hailed the journalist as the "only Iraqi whose patriotic feelings made him express his opinion in this way."

"It is not a declaration by the Iraqi media only, but for all Iraqis who have suffered over the years and we demand that he not be handed over to US forces," the paper said.

Cheney admits authorizing detainee's torture

Cheney admits authorizing detainee's torture

Outgoing VP says Guantanamo prison should stay open until end of terror war, but has no idea when that might be.

Monday, outgoing Vice President Dick Cheney made a startling statement on a nation-wide, televised broadcast.

When asked by ABC News reporter Jonathan Karl whether he approved of interrogation tactics used against a so-called "high value prisoner" at the controversial Guantanamo Bay prison, Mr. Cheney, in a break from his history of being press-shy, admitted to giving official sanctioning of torture.

"I supported it," he said regarding the practice known as "water-boarding," a form of simulated drowning. After World War II, Japanese soldiers were tried and convicted of war crimes in US courts for water-boarding, a practice which the outgoing Bush administration attempted to enshrine in policy.

"I was aware of the program, certainly, and involved in helping get the process cleared, as the agency in effect came in and wanted to know what they could and couldn't do," Cheney said. "And they talked to me, as well as others, to explain what they wanted to do. And I supported it."

He added: "It's been a remarkably successful effort, and I think the results speak for themselves."

ABC asked him if in hindsight he thought the tactics went too far. "I don't," he said.

The prisoner in question, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, who the Bush administration alleges to have planned the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, is one of Guantanamo's "high value targets" thus far charged with war crimes.

Former military interrogator Travis Hall disagrees.

"Proponents of Guantanamo underestimate what a powerful a propaganda tool Guantanamo has become for terrorist groups such as Al Qaeda, despite several Department of Defense studies documenting the propaganda value of detention centers," he said in a column for Opposing Views.

"For example, West Point’s Combating Terrorism Center has monitored numerous Al Qaeda references to Guantanamo in its recruitment propaganda materials," continued Hall. "Improvements to Guantanamo’s administration of judicial mechanisms will not make its way into Al Qaeda propaganda. Nothing short of closing Guantanamo will remove this arrow from its quiver."

President-elect Barack Obama has promised to close the prison and pull US forces out of Iraq. Cheney, however, has a different timeline for when Guantanamo Bay prison may be "responsibly" retired.

"Well, I think that that would come with the end of the war on terror," he told ABC.

Problematic to his assertion: Mr. Bush's "war on terror" is undefinable and unending by it's very nature, and Cheney seems to recognize this as fact.

Asked when his administration's terror war will end, he jostled, "Well, nobody knows. Nobody can specify that."

This video is from ABC's World News, broadcast Dec. 15, 2008.

It's not about them...it's about us: Why we must prosecute Bush and his administration for war crimes

It's not about them...it's about us: Why we must prosecute Bush and his administration for war crimes

During the rush to get the Nuremberg Tribunals underway, the Soviet delegation wanted the tribunal’s historic decisions to have legitimacy only for the Nazis. U.S. Supreme Court Justice, Robert Jackson, serving as the chief prosecutor for the Allies, strong-armed the Soviets until the very beginning of the tribunal before changing their mind.

In his opening statement Jackson very purposely stipulated, "…Let me make clear that while this law is first applied against German aggressors, the law includes, and if it is to serve a useful purpose it must condemn aggression by any other nations, including those which sit here now in judgment."

Can there be a better reason for prosecuting George Bush and his administration for war crimes than those words from the chief prosecutor of the Nazis, a U.S. Supreme Court Justice, with the full support of the U.S. government? Robert Jackson’s words and the values this nation claims to stand for provide sufficient moral basis for putting Bush and Cheney, their underlings who implemented their policies and the perverted legal minds who justified them all in the dock. If those are not sufficient reasons, there is a long list of binding law and treaties – written in black and white in surprisingly plain English.

Bush imagined, and his attorneys advised, that he could simply wave aside these laws with "they don’t apply." Imagine how a judge would treat even a simple traffic court defendant who brazenly stated the law was only a quaint notion, just "words on paper?"

Masses of people and an embarrassingly small number of their elected representatives in this country read the law for themselves and demanded otherwise, only to be silenced by the Guardians of Reality in the corporate news media.

But it’s all there, where it has been for 220 years, the Constitution’s "supremacy clause," Article II, section 4, and in the War Crimes Act of 1996 (18USC §2441). They provide the authority to make additional treaties legally binding – no matter how much former White House lawyers David Addington and John Yoo may object.

Those additional treaties include among others, the Geneva Conventions, the Nuremberg rulings, the Laws and Customs of War on Land and UN General Assembly Resolution 3314. To give just a snapshot of how serious these laws are, consider this portion of 18 USC 2441 which defines a war crime as "…a grave breach in any of the international conventions signed at Geneva 12 August 1949, or any protocol to such convention to which the United States is a party…" The guilty can be "...fined under this title or imprisoned for life or any term of years, or both, and if death results to the victim, shall also be subject to the penalty of death."

Here, Justice Jackson answers another question about war crimes – who bears the greater responsibility: those who committed barbaric acts in the field or those who created the conditions for barbarism?

The case as presented by the United States will be concerned with the brains and authority back of all the crimes. These defendants were men of a station and rank which does not soil its own hands with blood. They were men who knew how to use lesser folk as tools. We want to reach the planners and designers, the inciters and leaders without whose evil architecture the world would not have been for so long scourged with the violence and lawlessness, and wracked with the agonies and convulsions, of this terrible war.

And yet it is not just because Bush violated the Constitution and federal law that he and his lieutenants must be prosecuted.

At Nuremberg, the foremost crime identified was starting a "war of aggression," later codified by U.N. Resolution 3314, Art. 5, as "a crime against international peace." Launching a war of aggression, as Hitler did against Poland, is considered so monstrous that the nation responsible can then be charged with "war crimes" and "crimes against humanity," spelled out in detail in the Geneva Conventions. As Tom Paine said long before the U.N. formalized the definition of aggression, "He who is the author of a war lets loose the whole contagion of Hell and opens a vein that bleeds a nation to death."

A small sampling of the contagion of Hell let loose by Bush includes illegally invading a sovereign state, using banned weapons such as white phosphorous and napalm, bombing hospitals and civilian infrastructure, withholding aid and medical supplies, terrorizing and knowingly killing civilians, torturing prisoners, killing a million people and displacing four million more in Iraq alone.

Following World War II, humanity resolved that wars do more than spark a series of loathsome, individual crimes. Leaders responsible for a war actually commit crimes against the entirety of humanity. They inflict harm on every human being, something that must be put right before humanity can be restored.

There is a final reason why we must prosecute Bush and Co. It is not what some argue, although they point to a serious danger: that Bush trashed the law and usurped powers, encouraging future presidents to expand where he left off. Such reasons are about George Bush and those who hold the office after him, but in the final analysis this is about us.

We are complicit in the horrors of this administration. We can claim neither ignorance nor innocence. We are complicit by the very fact that we are citizens of the United States, more so because we paid for the war, and even more so for this reason. Listen to a village sheik I met in Iraq describe it better than I ever could.

I met this man in a small farming village one afternoon in early 2004. He described how he and a dozen others were swept up in a raid by the U.S. Army and detained on a bare patch of ground surrounded by concertina wire. They had no shelter and but six blankets. They dug a hole with their hands for a toilet. They had to beg for water until one time it rained for three days straight and they remained on that open ground. He somehow found the graciousness to say he understood there was a difference between the American people and our government. Then through his tears he added, "But you say you live in a democracy. How can this be happening to us?"

Do we? Whether or not we bring our own government officials to justice for their crimes will determine the answer.

www.mikeferner.org

Mike Ferner is a freelance writer and former Toledo city councilman. His book, "Inside the Red Zone: A Veteran For Peace Reports from Iraq" is just out from Praeger Publishers.

Day to `call in gay' finds few willing to strike

By LISA LEFF, Associated Press Writer Lisa Leff, Associated Press Writer Thu Dec 11, 12:03 am ET

SAN FRANCISCO – A daylong work stoppage during which employees were encouraged to "call in gay" to express support for same-sex marriage drew spotty participation nationwide Wednesday, with some gay rights activists praising the concept but questioning its effect.

In San Francisco's gay Castro district, residents and merchants said they endorsed the message behind "Day Without a Gay" but didn't think a work stoppage was practical given the poor economy and the strike's organization.

"If we are going to make a huge impact and not be laughed at, then we have to take the time and make the time to communicate with all the parties. We could have shut down a lot of the hotels," said David Lang, a gymnastics coach. "In theory it's a great idea, but it's being done wrong and now that it's been done wrong, I don't think it will be done again."

The protest, which a gay couple from West Hollywood organized through the Internet, was designed to demonstrate the economic clout of same-sex marriage supporters following the passage of voter-approved gay marriage bans in California, Arizona and Florida last month.

Participants were asked to refrain from spending money or at least to patronize gay-friendly businesses for the day.

Paul Ellis, 51, a manager at Cliff's Variety hardware store, said he didn't want his employer to bear the burden of his support.

"My employers have always been there in every possible way," he said. "I didn't feel comfortable discomfiting them when they have gone out of their way to be there for me."

Out and Equal Workplace Advocates, a San Francisco-based nonprofit group that promotes equality for gay and lesbian employees, suggested that same-sex marriage supporters could send an effective message beyond Wednesday by openly discussing the issue at their workplaces.

"When people go into the voting booth and vote against (gay) rights, they often have no idea they are voting against the person sitting next to them in the next cubicle or office," said Selisse Berry, Out and Equal's executive director.

Berry noted that only 20 states have laws to protect workers from being fired for being homosexual, making lesbians and gays reluctant to reveal themselves to co-workers in most jurisdictions.

"Constantly lying about our weekends at the water cooler or changing pronouns, that takes up so much energy that we could be putting into our jobs," she said.

Participants who opted to take the day off from their jobs were encouraged to perform community service, and charitable organizations across the country said volunteers showed up.

"Visibility is really important for the gay community, so after a lot of thought I decided I would come out and be visible with my colleagues at work and use the time working for the community," said Carrie Lewis, 36, a University of California health researcher who spent the day working at the Sacramento Gay and Lesbian Center.

Backers of "Day Without a Gay" organized evening rallies in San Francisco; Austin, Texas; Logan, Utah; and other cities so supporters could gather to discuss the next steps. Rallies also were held earlier Wednesday in Chicago and on several college campuses in California.

"The movement that fought for equality and succeeded in electing Obama president is really looking to make progressive gains now," said Mark Airgood, who used a personal day to take off from his job as a middle school teacher in Berkeley. "I think we really can, and I think this is an important day for that."

Jon Stewart 'slays the homophobic Huckabee'

Blogger: Jon Stewart 'slays the homophobic Huckabee'

When former Arkansas governor and conservative Republican presidential candidate Mike Huckabee appeared on The Daily Show on Tuesday, Jon Stewart pressed him hard on the issue of gay marriage, knocking down one false argument after another.

As blogger Pam Spaulding at Pam's House Blend commented appreciatively, "Jon Stewart asked serious questions any hard-hitting progressive journalist or political commentator with a talk show is perfectly capable of asking. He made Huckabee explain his positions on LGBT rights and connects it to the messages in his new book about the merits of social conservatism that he's hawking."

"Please watch the whole interview," Spaulding adds. "It literally made me weep because Stewart gets it. This is a human rights issue."

Stewart began the interview by suggesting to Huckabee that there's "one thing I guess I don't understand about social conservatives. ... You write that marriage is the bedrock of our society. Why would you not want couples to buy into the stability of marriage?"

"Marriage still means one man, one woman, life relationship," Huckabee replied. "The only way we can create the next generation is through a male-female relationship. In 5000 years of recorded human history, that's what marriage has meant."

However, Stewart wouldn't let Huckabee get away with that assertion. He pointed out that Huckabee was taking things "back to the Old Testament -- where polygamy was the norm. ... Marriage has evolved greatly over those 5000 years from a property arrangement, polygamy. We've redefined it constantly."

"It seems like a fundamental human right," Stewart said of marriage. "You write in your book that all people are created equal, and yet for gay people you believe that it is corrosive to society to allow them to have the privileges that all humans enjoy."

Stewart then increasingly backed Huckabee into a corner, where in his attempts to avoid admitting that marriage is a fundamental right, Huckabee was left arguing that it is merely a legal arrangement that the government can define as it sees fit. He concluded weakly that "those who support the idea of same-sex marriage have a lot of work to do to convince the rest of us."

"It's a travesty that people have forced someone who is gay to have to make their case that they deserve the same basic rights," was Stewart's response.


This video is from Comedy Central's The Daily Show, broadcast Dec. 9, 2008.