THE FLASHLIGHT, March 22-28, 2008

THE FLASHLIGHT
March 22-28, 2008
No Peace without Justice, no Justice without the Facts

Tibet

Time, 3-31. Pico Ayer, “A Monk’s Struggle”, discusses the reforms of the Dalai Lama, 72, at his headquarters in Dharamsala, India. Science is part of the monastic curriculum. Women are allowed to study for doctorates and become Buddhist abbots. After the age of ten, children receive lessons only in English.
In Lhasa, Chinese immigrants make up two-thirds of the population of about 300,000. There are many tourists. On the main streets alone the journalist counted 238 discos and karaoke places and 658 brothels. The Potala Palace, former residence of the Dalai Lama, is surrounded by an amusement park.

NYT 3-24. Witnesses say that on March 14 Tibetans looted and burned the Chinese shops in the Old Quarter. They burned down the Bank of China and overturned cars and fire trucks. Since then China has brought in more troops and cracked down on the insurgents.

Iraq

NYT 3-24. The death toll of Americans in Iraq now exceeds 4,000.
CNN 3-25. The Shiite dominated Maliki Government is now fighting the Mahdi Army in both Baghdad and Basra and other Shiite militias in Basra.
CNN 3-26. Michael Ware. The battle for Baghdad is over, and the Shiite have won: they represent 75-80% of the population. Most Baghdad Sunnis are now refugees in Syria, Jordan, et al. The Iranians are helping in varying degrees all the Shiite forces in Iraq who are now fighting each other. Thus, Iranian influence is being consolidated. Bush pretends that American backed forces are winning.
3-27. The Green Zone in under frequent attack and two Americans have been killed there by mortar fire. There is a new upsurge in violence all over southern Iraq.

Israel/Palestine

Osama bin Laden, judging from a recent video, seems to be seeking more influence in the Palestinian territories. He said, “Palestine cannot be retaken by negotiations and dialogue, but with fire and iron.” [Osama may have been exposed to Bismarck’s famous quotation that Germany could be reunited only with “blood and iron.’]

US Presidential Campaign

CNN 3-22. After making his speech on race, Obama appears to have righted his ship, recovering his lead over Hilary Clinton in the national polls. She still leads in Pennsylvania, where white working class males hold the balance.

CNN 3-24. In the month of February Obama raised $51 million, Clinton, $35 million, and McCain, $11 million. 3-25. In Pennsylvania Hilary has important advantages: many people over 65, strong labor unions, and the support of the governor of the state. If she loses there, says a commentator, she is finished.

CNN 3-37. The Democratic candidates are now focusing attention on the economy. They say that the federal government should not help only the banks, but those facing foreclosed mortgages. Since the Rev. Wright affair, Hilary’s popularity has declined.

US Entitlements

W Post 3-26. Social Security and Medicare entitlements are now being paid from declining funds. Medicare will be bankrupt in 2019; Social Security in 2041.

THE FLASHLIGHT, March 15-21, 2008

THE FLASHLIGHT
March 15-21, 2008
No Peace without Justice, no Justice without the Facts

US Economy

NYTimes 3-14. The credit crunch grows worse and the economy is weak as a result of deficit spending. Food and gasoline prices are rising.
BBC 3-17. With the help of the Federal Government, Morgan Chase Bank bought Bear Stearns Bank for $2 a share, a fraction of its former value. Overseas, stock prices are falling. US commentators say they still do not see where the bottom will be.
CNN 3-18. The long-term mortgage interest rate is rising. The Federal Reserve reduced an interest rate by 0.75%. Inflation is the biggest worry.

US Politics

NY Times 3-14. Democratic super-delegates are beginning to break for Obama.
CNN 3-18. The new Governor of New York, David Paterson, revealed that he had had several extra-marital affairs, and that his wife had also had one.
CNN 3-19. It is now unlikely that there will be a Presidential primary re-vote in either Michigan or Florida.
NYT 3-21. Gov. Bill Richardson of New Mexico has endorsed Obama for President.

Tibet

CNN 3-19. After fifty years of Chinese oppression and colonization, Tibetans rose in revolt in both Tibet and in western parts of China where they are numerous The Chinese Government sent in troops and barred journalists. In Northern India and Nepal as well Tibetans demonstrated. “Dozens” were killed in Chinese controlled territory.
BBC 3-18. The Dalai Lama condemned the violence by both sides.

Iraq

NYT 3-16. The insurgency in Iraq is running on the profits from a lake of oil underground. Sunnis are in control of the Baiji Refinery. US military officials say that at least one-third of the oil produced is sold on the black market. Tankers are hijacked; drivers, bribed; meters, manipulated; papers, forged. Insurgents still kill about a hundred Iraqis a week.
The vast majority of insurgents are not jihadists. Half of the money going to the insurgents is from Saudi Arabia.

Israel/Palestine

Haaretz (Tel Aviv), 3-17. Pres. Olmert says that there is no chance that Israel will stop building settlements in Har Homa, East Jerusalem, an area claimed by the Palestinians.

Science

Comedy Central 3-18. Prof. Brian Fagan, anthropologist, in a new book on the history of climate, The Great Warming, predicted that a large part of the US, especially California, Arizona and Nevada, are facing drought, extreme for 18% of the population, and severe for 30%.

NYT 3-21. In Science magazine anthropologists reported that very early in the human lineage, six million years ago, individuals were walking upright. Their bones were discovered in Kenya.

THE FLASHLIGHT, March 8-14, 2008

THE FLASHLIGHT
March 8 – 14, 2008
No Peace without Justice, no Justice without the Facts

World Food Crisis

Time 3-11. There is a growing world food crisis because of drought and global warming and because of the use of land to grow crops for fuel.

Iraq

NYT 3-17. Pres. Ahmedinejad of Iran said, “It is not funny that those with 160,000 troops in Iraq accuse us of interference.”

PBS 3-11. Violence has spiked in Iraq in the last three days. People in Baghdad now live in gated communities patrolled by militias or warlords. But there is no reconciliation between Sunnis and Shias. A commentator said there will no full US withdrawal from Iraq in the near future.
On account of the rise in world oil prices Iraq is now able to fund its own reconstruction.

PBS 3-11. Admiral Fallon, the head of US military forces in the Middle East, resigned after only a year in office. He is said to have opposed the use military force against Iran.

CNN 3-13. The Chaldean Catholic Archbishop in Iraq, who had been kidnapped, was found dead near Mosul. Al-Qaeda was blamed.

Israel/Palestine

The Economist, March 8-14. 87% of Arab support more rocket attacks on Israel.
Guardian 3-9. Defying Pres. Olmert, Israeli settlers vow to build eight new settlements on Palestinian land, one for each of the students killed in the latest suicide bombing of the Jerusalem Yeshiva.
NYT 3-10. The government of Israel approved the construction of hundreds of homes in a West Bank settlement and in East Jerusalem. The move occurred a few days before the arrival of US envoy Lt. Gen. William M. Fraser to hold talks with israelis and Palestinians over progress on the 2003 Peace Plan, which called for the cessation of all settlement construction and all Arab violence.
Haaretz 3-10. Vice-President Cheney plans to visit this months Israel and the West Bank in a tour that also includes Oman, Saudia, and Turkey.
BBC 3-10. There has been a sudden decrease in the number of Palestinian rockets sent over Israel. The Israelis have stopped all military operations in Gaza. The State Department condemned illegal settlement building.

US Politics

CNN 3-10. Eliot Spitzer, Governor of New York, was revealed to have been a customer of a call girl of the Emperor’s Club agency. He was caught accidentally in an FBI investigation of money laundering. He paid out over $80,000 over several months. The girl was identified as Ashley Dupres, a 22 year old high school dropout. She became a call girl when her boyfriend moved out of their Manhattan apartment and she needed money to pay her rent. Her fee is $1000 an hour. For the last engagement Spitzer paid for two hours plus her fare from New York to Washington, the room rent at the Mayflower Hotel, and a down payment on their next date, totaling $4,300..
On 3-13, Spitzer resigned, his wife at his side. David Boies, top US lawyer, doubted that he would be prosecuted, saying that Spitzer needs treatment, not prosecution. He is replaced by the Lt. Gov., David Paterson. Paterson is the first Afro-American and the first blind man to become Governor of New York.
Ashley identifies her occupation as a singer. A commentator said, “There will be a book.”

US Economy

PBS 3-7. The Dow Jones slipped below 12,000 to 11,893.
NYT 3-8. A dismal employment report indicated that a recession is inevitable. A half-million people have lost their jobs. The number of part-time workers and people who have given up looking for work is believed to be high.
CNN 3-13. The world oil price is now $111. a barrel. An
Important contributing cause is the fall in the value of the dollar, in which oil prices are measured.

Presidential Primaries

PBS 3-8. Obama wins Wyoming by a decisive margin.
CNN 3-11. Obama wins Mississippi by a decisive margin.
Polls show Hilary Clinton ahead in Pennsylvania.

Humor
National Public Radio, Prairie Home Companion. Annual jokes program:
If God had wanted us to use the metric system, there would have been ten apostles.
Definition of a transister: a priest dressed like a nun.
What does the show Sixty Minutes have in common with an Irish mother? Both say tik-tik-tik.
Call to a hot-line center in Pakistan: Center: What is wrong?
Caller: I feel suicidal. Center: Can you drive a truck?
Why do scientists disconnect their door bells? So they can get the Nobel Prize.

THE FLASHLIGHT, March 1-7, 2008

THE FLASHLIGHT
March 2-7, 2008
No Peace without Justice, no Justice without the Facts
Mary Matossian, Editor

The United States
Economy

NYT 3-7 Krugman. Economic anxiety is eclipsing the Iraq War as the greatest concern of US voters. A shift of white working class voters who voted for Bush in 2004 may be the key to Democratic victory. Economic confidence is collapsing.
CNN 3-6. There are now 900,000 homes in foreclosure. There has been a drop in homeowners’ equity and a continued fall in home prices. On Thursday the oil price peaked at $106. a barrel. Bloomberg 3-7. The US lost 63,000 jobs in February.

NYT 3-6. OPEC refused the US request to increase its oil production. It said there is enough oil available; the high price is the result of US mismanagement of its economy and financial policy. [Most members of OPEC are Arab states.]

Presidential Primaries

CNN, NY Times 3-4. John McCain won the Republican nomination for President. Mike Huckabee withdrew.
Hilary Clinton won the Texas, Ohio, and Rhode Island primaries. Her win in Ohio, which has a distressed economy, was decisive. Her win in Texas was very narrow, and Obama may end up with more delegates there than Clinton. Obama won Vermont. Overall, he still leads in delegates.
When Clinton went negative, Obama was said to have failed to hit back hard enough.

Iraq

NYT 3-1. After eight days in Iraqi northern territory, Turkey withdrew its troops.
NYT 3-7. Two bombs in Baghdad killed 54 dead and 123 wounded. Al-Qaida was blamed.
AIPAC Trial

NYTimes 3-3. A trial of two American Jewish officials will be in late April in Alexandria, Virginia in federal court. The case is concerned with how the supporters of Israel try to influence the US government. It is also concerned with the dual loyalty of US Jews (to the US and Israel).
AIPAC, the America-Israel Public Affairs Committee, maintains close contact with US senior policy makers, lawmakers, diplomats, and journalists. Two former senior AIPAC analysts, Steven J. Rose and Keith Weissman, are charged with espionage. They are charged with giving their AIPAC colleagues, journalists and Israeli Embassy officials information about Iran and Iraq which they learned from talking to high level US policy makers.
A number of high level Bush administration officials are required to testify: Condoleeza Rice, Stephen Hadley, Richard Armitage, Paul Wolfowitz, et al.
The trial is occurring less than a year after the publication of a
heavily documented book, The Israel Lobby, by Prof. John J. Mearsheimer of the University of Chicago and Prof. Stephen M. Walt of Harvard. The authors argue that Israel suppresses legitimate criticism of Israel in the US.

Israel/Palestine Conflict

Haaretz (Israel) 3-2. The European Union, United Nations, and Pope Benedict condemned the “disproportionate use” of force by the Israeli Defense Forces in Gaza, who killed at least 60 Palestinians in one day. They also condemned Palestinian rocket attacks on southern Israel.
WPost 3-2. In the last five days the Israelis killed 117 Palestinians. The Palestinians killed four Israeli soldiers.
BBC 3-6. Humanitarian aid officials in Gaza say that the situation there is the worst it has been in 40 years on account of the lack of food, medicine, and jobs. Israel is still blockading all entry points on account of continuing Palestinian rocket attacks from Gaza.
[The rocket attacks are in response to continuing Israeli building of illegal settlements on the West Bank et al.]
NYT 3-7. On 3-6 an Israeli Army jeep patrolling the border with Gaza was blown up by an IED.

CNN, NYT 3--6-7. An East Jerusalem Arab driver, dressed is a Jewish religious student, entered the library of a West Jerusalem Yeshiva carrying a hidden Kalashnikov rifle. He killed eight persons, wounding nine others of which three were seriously wounded. The gunman was able to change ammunition clips at least once.
This Yeshiva, like others in Israel, had championed the illegal settlement movement, claiming that redemption could be had by “reclaiming” land [occupied by Palestinians].
BBC 3-6. Thousands of Palestinians in Gaza celebrated the event by demonstrating in public, calling the above attack a “heroic act.” The BBC reported that 410 Palestinians had been killed in the latest fighting.
President Abbas and President Bush condemned the Yeshiva attack. Abbas broke off peace talks with Israel indefinitely, but under pressure from Sec. of State Condoleeza Rice, said he would resume talks – without setting any date.