CIA to air decades of its dirty laundry

I really disagree fundamentally with the idea of keeping entire branches of government secret from the public. How can we claim to be a democracy when we don't even know what our government is doing? Clearly, hiding the CIA and NSA's operations from public scrutiny has led to the many abuses that are about to be admitted by the CIA, as the Washington Post reports. Keeping the CIA and NSA hidden allows us to wallow in the myth of American benevolence and support for democracy. We can deny all these abuses by the CIA because they are never admitted by our leaders, whom we trust. But now they are admitted. But since they happened 30 years ago, we can pretend they were "abuses" that were long ago stopped, and that the secret CIA is not engaging in them anymore. It's like a religion. We have faith in our country not to do such things, and we deny all evidence to the contrary.

CIA to Air Decades of Its Dirty Laundry
By Karen DeYoung and Walter Pincus
Washington Post
June 22, 2007

The CIA will declassify hundreds of pages of long-secret records detailing some of the intelligence agency's worst illegal abuses -- the so-called "family jewels" documenting a quarter-century of overseas assassination attempts, domestic spying, kidnapping and infiltration of leftist groups from the 1950s to the 1970s, CIA Director Michael V. Hayden said yesterday.

The documents, to be publicly released next week, also include accounts of break-ins and theft, the agency's opening of private mail to and from China and the Soviet Union, wiretaps and surveillance of journalists, and a series of "unwitting" tests on U.S. civilians, including the use of drugs.

"Most of it is unflattering, but it is CIA's history," Hayden said in a speech to a conference of foreign policy historians. The documents have been sought for decades by historians, journalists and conspiracy theorists and have been the subject of many fruitless Freedom of Information Act requests.

In anticipation of the CIA's release, the National Security Archive at George Washington University yesterday published a separate set of documents from January 1975 detailing internal government discussions of the abuses. Those documents portray a rising sense of panic within the administration of President Gerald R. Ford that what then-CIA Director William E. Colby called "skeletons" in the CIA's closet had begun to be revealed in news accounts.

A New York Times article by reporter Seymour Hersh about the CIA's infiltration of antiwar groups, published in December 1974, was "just the tip of the iceberg," then-Secretary of State Henry A. Kissinger warned Ford, according to a Jan. 3 memorandum of their conversation.

Kissinger warned that if other operations were divulged, "blood will flow," saying, "For example, Robert Kennedy personally managed the operation on the assassination of [Cuban President Fidel] Castro." Kennedy was the attorney general from 1961 to 1964.

Worried that the disclosures could lead to criminal prosecutions, Kissinger added that "when the FBI has a hunting license into the CIA, this could end up worse for the country than Watergate," the scandal that led to the fall of the Nixon administration the previous year.

In a meeting at which Colby detailed the worst abuses -- after telling the president "we have a 25-year old institution which has done some things it shouldn't have" -- Ford said he would appoint a presidential commission to look into the matter. "We don't want to destroy but to preserve the CIA. But we want to make sure that illegal operations and those outside the [CIA] charter don't happen," Ford said.

Most of the major incidents and operations in the reports to be released next week were revealed in varying detail during congressional investigations that led to widespread intelligence reforms and increased oversight. But the treasure-trove of CIA documents, generated as the Vietnam War wound down and agency involvement in Nixon's "dirty tricks" political campaign began to be revealed, is expected to provide far more comprehensive accounts, written by the agency itself.

The reports, known collectively by historians and CIA officials as the "family jewels," were initially produced in response to a 1973 request by then-CIA Director James R. Schlesinger. Alarmed by press accounts of CIA involvement in Watergate under his predecessor, Schlesinger asked the agency's employees to inform him of all operations that were "outside" the agency's legal charter.

This process was unprecedented at the agency, where only a few officials had previously been privy to the scope of its illegal activities. Schlesinger collected the reports, some of which dated to the 1950s, in a folder that was inherited by his successor, Colby, in September of that year.

But it was not until Hersh's article that Colby took the file to the White House. The National Security Archive release included a six-page summary of a conversation on Jan. 3, 1975, in which Colby briefed the Justice Department for the first time on the extent of the "skeletons."

Operations listed in the report began in 1953, when the CIA's counterintelligence staff started a 20-year program to screen and in some cases open mail between the United States and the Soviet Union passing through a New York airport. A similar program in San Francisco intercepted mail to and from China from 1969 to 1972. Under its charter, the CIA is prohibited from domestic operations.

Colby told Ford that the program had collected four letters to actress and antiwar activist Jane Fonda and said the entire effort was "illegal, and we stopped it in 1973."

Among several new details, the summary document reveals a 1969 program about CIA efforts against "the international activities of radicals and black militants." Undercover CIA agents were placed inside U.S. peace groups and sent abroad as credentialed members to identify any foreign contacts. This came at a time when the Soviet Union was suspected of financing and influencing U.S. domestic organizations.

The program included "information on the domestic activities" of the organizations and led to the accumulation of 10,000 American names, which Colby told Silberman were retained "as a result of the tendency of bureaucrats to retain paper whether they needed it or acted on it or not," according to the summary memo.

CIA surveillance of Michael Getler, then The Washington Post's national security reporter, was conducted between October 1971 and April 1972 under direct authorization by then-Director Richard Helms, the memo said. Getler had written a story published on Oct. 18, 1971, sparked by what Colby called "an obvious intelligence leak," headlined "Soviet Subs Are Reported Cuba-Bound."

Getler, who is now the ombudsman for the Public Broadcasting Service, said yesterday that he learned of the surveillance in 1975, when The Post published an article based on a secret report by congressional investigators. The story said that the CIA used physical surveillance against "five Americans" and listed Getler, the late columnist Jack Anderson and Victor Marchetti, a former CIA employee who had just written a book critical of the agency.

"I never knew about it at the time, although it was a full 24 hours a day with teams of people following me, looking for my sources," Getler said. He said he went to see Colby afterward, with Washington lawyer Joseph Califano. Getler recalled, "Colby said it happened under Helms and apologized and said it wouldn't happen again."

Personal surveillance was conducted on Anderson and three of his staff members, including Brit Hume, now with Fox News, for two months in 1972 after Anderson wrote of the administration's "tilt toward Pakistan." The 1972 surveillance of Marchetti was carried out "to determine contacts with CIA employees," the summary said.

CIA monitoring and infiltration of antiwar dissident groups took place between 1967 and 1971 at a time when the public was turning against the Vietnam War. Agency officials "covertly monitored" groups in the Washington area "who were considered to pose a threat to CIA installations." Some of the information "might have been distributed to the FBI," the summary said. Other "skeletons" listed in the summary included:

· The confinement by the CIA of a Russian defector, suspected by the CIA as a possible "fake," in Maryland and Virginia safe houses for two years, beginning in 1964. Colby speculated that this might be "a violation of the kidnapping laws."

· The "very productive" 1963 wiretapping of two columnists -- Robert Allen and Paul Scott -- whose conversations included talks with 12 senators and six congressmen.

· Break-ins by the CIA's office of security at the homes of one current and one former CIA official suspected of retaining classified documents.

· CIA-funded testing of American citizens, "including reactions to certain drugs."

The CIA documents scheduled for release next week, Hayden said yesterday, "provide a glimpse of a very different time and a very different agency."

Barred by secrecy restrictions from correcting "misinformation," he said, the CIA is at the mercy of the press. "Unfortunately, there seems to be an instinct among some in the media today to take a few pieces of information, which may or may not be accurate, and run with them to the darkest corner of the room," Hayden said.

Hayden's speech and some questions that followed evoked more recent criticism of the intelligence community, which has been accused of illegal wiretapping, infiltration of antiwar groups, and kidnapping and torturing of terrorism suspects.

"It's surely part of [Hayden's] program now to draw a bright line with the past," said National Security Archive Director Thomas S. Blanton. "But it's uncanny how the government keeps dipping into the black bag." Newly revealed details of ancient CIA operations, Blanton said, "are pretty resonant today."

How children lost the right to roam in four generations

From the Daily Mail:

How children lost the right to roam in four generations
By DAVID DERBYSHIRE
Daily Mail
15th June 2007

When George Thomas was eight he walked everywhere.

It was 1926 and his parents were unable to afford the fare for a tram, let alone the cost of a bike and he regularly walked six miles to his favourite fishing haunt without adult supervision.

Fast forward to 2007 and Mr Thomas's eight-year-old great-grandson Edward enjoys none of that freedom.

He is driven the few minutes to school, is taken by car to a safe place to ride his bike and can roam no more than 300 yards from home.

Even if he wanted to play outdoors, none of his friends strays from their home or garden unsupervised.

The contrast between Edward and George's childhoods is highlighted in a report which warns that the mental health of 21st-century children is at risk because they are missing out on the exposure to the natural world enjoyed by past generations.

The report says the change in attitudes is reflected in four generations of the Thomas family in Sheffield.

The oldest member, George, was allowed to roam for six miles from home unaccompanied when he was eight.

His home was tiny and crowded and he spent most of his time outside, playing games and making dens.

Mr Thomas, who went on to become a carpenter, has never lost some of the habits picked up as a child and, aged 88, is still a keen walker.

His son-in-law, Jack Hattersley, 63, was also given freedom to roam.

He was aged eight in 1950, and was allowed to walk for about one mile on his own to the local woods. Again, he walked to school and never travelled by car.

By 1979, when his daughter Vicky Grant was eight, there were signs that children's independence was being eroded.

"I was able to go out quite freely - I'd ride my bike around the estate, play with friends in the park and walk to the swimming pool and to school," said Mrs Grant, 36.

"There was a lot less traffic then - and families had only one car. People didn't make all these short journeys."

Today, her son Edward spends little time on his own outside his garden in their quiet suburban street. She takes him by car to school to ensure she gets to her part-time job as a medical librarian on time.

While he enjoys piano lessons, cubs, skiing lessons, regular holidays and the trampoline, slide and climbing frame in the garden, his mother is concerned he may be missing out.

She said: "He can go out in the crescent but he doesn't tend to go out because the other children don't. We put a bike in the car and go off to the country where we can all cycle together.

"It's not just about time. Traffic is an important consideration, as is the fear of abduction, but I'm not sure whether that's real or perceived."

She added: "Over four generations our family is poles apart in terms of affluence. But I'm not sure our lives are any richer."

The report's author, Dr William Bird, the health adviser to Natural England and the organiser of a conference on nature and health on Monday, believes children's long-term mental health is at risk.

He has compiled evidence that people are healthier and better adjusted if they get out into the countryside, parks or gardens.

Stress levels fall within minutes of seeing green spaces, he says. Even filling a home with flowers and plants can improve concentration and lower stress.

"If children haven't had contact with nature, they never develop a relationship with natural environment and they are unable to use it to cope with stress," he said.

"Studies have shown that people deprived of contact with nature were at greater risk of depression and anxiety. Children are getting less and less unsupervised time in the natural environment.

"They need time playing in the countryside, in parks and in gardens where they can explore, dig up the ground and build dens."

The report, published by Natural England and the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds, also found that children's behaviour and school work improve if their playground has grassy areas, ponds and trees.

It also found evidence that hospital patients need fewer painkillers after surgery if they have views of nature from their bed.

48% of Americans, 68% of Republicans don't believe in evolution

From a Gallup Poll:

"Now thinking about how human beings came to exist on Earth, do you, personally, believe in evolution, or not?"

	Yes	No	Unsure
Americans	49	48	2
Republicans	30	68	2
Democrats	57	40	3
Independents	61	37	2
Church Weekly	24	74	2
Church Monthly	52	45	3
Church Rarely	71	26	3

Gallup's summary:

The majority of Republicans in the United States do not believe the theory of evolution is true and do not believe that humans evolved over millions of years from less advanced forms of life. This suggests that when three Republican presidential candidates at a May debate stated they did not believe in evolution, they were generally in sync with the bulk of the rank-and-file Republicans whose nomination they are seeking to obtain.

Independents and Democrats are more likely than Republicans to believe in the theory of evolution. But even among non-Republicans there appears to be a significant minority who doubt that evolution adequately explains where humans came from.

The data from several recent Gallup studies suggest that Americans' religious behavior is highly correlated with beliefs about evolution. Those who attend church frequently are much less likely to believe in evolution than are those who seldom or never attend. That Republicans tend to be frequent churchgoers helps explain their doubts about evolution.

The data indicate some seeming confusion on the part of Americans on this issue. About a quarter of Americans say they believe both in evolution's explanation that humans evolved over millions of years and in the creationist explanation that humans were created as is about 10,000 years ago.

FBI terrorist watch list swells to over 500,000 names

From ABC News:

A terrorist watch list compiled by the FBI has apparently swelled to include more than half a million names.

Privacy and civil liberties advocates say the list is growing uncontrollably, threatening its usefulness in the war on terror.

The bureau says the number of names on its terrorist watch list is classified.

A portion of the FBI's unclassified 2008 budget request posted to the Department of Justice Web site, however, refers to "the entire watch list of 509,000 names," which is utilized by its Foreign Terrorist Tracking Task Force.

Iphone ushers in world peace, confers instant transcendental enlightenment

A little comic relief:

Have you heard of the iPhone? Have you heard of, say, oxygen? Duh. Of course you have. Fact is, not only has the entire universe heard of this glorious and eminently distracting gizmo, but anticipation for the damnable thing is apparently running so scaldingly high for its now-official June 29 release date that Apple is rumored to be downplaying the rollout just a bit.

It’s true. Apple PR is apparently actually being forced to manage expectations so there’s not some sort of titanic weeping backlash when those 3 million iPhones finally hit the streets and everyone goes, Hey, what the hell, you mean it’s only a cell phone and an iPod and a Web browser and an e-mail program and a digital camera and an IM client and photo library and a movie player in one gorgeous tiny gizmo the size of a tin of Altoids?

That’s it? That’s all it does? You mean it does not confer instant transcendental enlightenment? It does not make my skin look younger and more supple? It will not make my wife want to deliver more enthusiastic oral sex or make my kids actually want to speak to me or perhaps get Israel and Palestine to stop hating on each other and it won’t help us all numb the savage karmic pain of the fact that our president remains a childish hell-born imbecile?

...

Maybe this time such a distraction can be healthy. Maybe this time it’s a good form of anticipation, the kind of sheer unadulterated consumerist nirvana that actually lifts you out of this brutal spiritual stasis and allows you a glimpse of a world sans scowls and warmongering and incessant error messages.

The destruction of Iraq's archaeological heritage

From The Guardian, we have this incredible story of the wilful destruction of the archaeological sites of Iraq by the American occupation. Ironic, isn't it, that one of the reasons given by war hawks for overthrowing the Taliban was their destruction of the Buddhist statues?

In Iraq's four-year looting frenzy, the allies have become the vandals
British and American collusion in the pillaging of Iraq's heritage is a scandal that will outlive any passing conflict
Simon Jenkins
Friday June 8, 2007
The Guardian

Fly into the American air base of Tallil outside Nasiriya in central Iraq and the flight path is over the great ziggurat of Ur, reputedly the earliest city on earth. Seen from the base in the desert haze or the sand-filled gloom of dusk, the structure is indistinguishable from the mounds of fuel dumps, stores and hangars. Ur is safe within the base compound. But its walls are pockmarked with wartime shrapnel and a blockhouse is being built over an adjacent archaeological site. When the head of Iraq's supposedly sovereign board of antiquities and heritage, Abbas al-Hussaini, tried to inspect the site recently, the Americans refused him access to his own most important monument.

Yesterday Hussaini reported to the British Museum on his struggles to protect his work in a state of anarchy. It was a heart breaking presentation. Under Saddam you were likely to be tortured and shot if you let someone steal an antiquity; in today's Iraq you are likely to be tortured and shot if you don't. The tragic fate of the national museum in Baghdad in April 2003 was as if federal troops had invaded New York city, sacked the police and told the criminal community that the Metropolitan was at their disposal. The local tank commander was told specifically not to protect the museum for a full two weeks after the invasion. Even the Nazis protected the Louvre.

When I visited the museum six months later, its then director, Donny George, proudly showed me the best he was making of a bad job. He was about to reopen, albeit with half his most important objects stolen. The pro-war lobby had stopped pretending that the looting was nothing to do with the Americans, who were shamefacedly helping retrieve stolen objects under the dynamic US colonel, Michael Bogdanos (author of a book on the subject). The vigorous Italian cultural envoy to the coalition, Mario Bondioli-Osio, was giving generously for restoration.

The beautiful Warka vase, carved in 3000BC, was recovered though smashed into 14 pieces. The exquisite Lyre of Ur, the world's most ancient musical instrument, was found badly damaged. Clerics in Sadr City were ingeniously asked to tell wives to refuse to sleep with their husbands if looted objects were not returned, with some success. Nothing could be done about the fire-gutted national library and the loss of five centuries of Ottoman records (and works by Piccasso and Miro). But the message of winning hearts and minds seemed to have got through.

Today the picture is transformed. Donny George fled for his life last August after death threats. The national museum is not open but shut. Nor is it just shut. Its doors are bricked up, it is surrounded by concrete walls and its exhibits are sandbagged. Even the staff cannot get inside. There is no prospect of reopening.

Hussaini confirmed a report two years ago by John Curtis, of the British Museum, on America's conversion of Nebuchadnezzar's great city of Babylon into the hanging gardens of Halliburton. This meant a 150-hectare camp for 2,000 troops. In the process the 2,500-year-old brick pavement to the Ishtar Gate was smashed by tanks and the gate itself damaged. The archaeology-rich subsoil was bulldozed to fill sandbags, and large areas covered in compacted gravel for helipads and car parks. Babylon is being rendered archaeologically barren.

Meanwhile the courtyard of the 10th-century caravanserai of Khan al-Raba was used by the Americans for exploding captured insurgent weapons. One blast demolished the ancient roofs and felled many of the walls. The place is now a ruin.

Outside the capital some 10,000 sites of incomparable importance to the history of western civilisation, barely 20% yet excavated, are being looted as systematically as was the museum in 2003. When George tried to remove vulnerable carvings from the ancient city of Umma to Baghdad, he found gangs of looters already in place with bulldozers, dump trucks and AK47s.

Hussaini showed one site after another lost to archaeology in a four-year "looting frenzy". The remains of the 2000BC cities of Isin and Shurnpak appear to have vanished: pictures show them replaced by a desert of badger holes created by an army of some 300 looters. Castles, ziggurats, deserted cities, ancient minarets and mosques have gone or are going. Hussaini has 11 teams combing the country engaged in rescue work, mostly collecting detritus left by looters. His small force of site guards is no match for heavily armed looters, able to shift objects to eager European and American dealers in days.

Most ominous is a message reputedly put out from Moqtada al-Sadr's office, that while Muslim heritage should be respected, pre-Muslim relics were up for grabs. As George said before his flight, his successors might be "only interested in Islamic sites and not Iraq's earlier heritage". While Hussaini is clearly devoted to all Iraq's history, the Taliban's destruction of Afghanistan's pre-Muslim Bamiyan Buddhas is in every mind.

Despite Sadr's apparent preference, sectarian militias are pursuing an orgy of destruction of Muslim sites. Apart from the high-profile bombings of some of the loveliest surviving mosques in the Arab world, radical groups opposed to all shrines have begun blasting 10th- and 11th-century structures, irrespective of Sunni or Shia origin. Eighteen ancient shrines have been lost, 10 in Kirkuk and the south in the past month alone. The great monument and souk at Kifel, north of Najaf - reputedly the tomb of Ezekiel and once guarded by Iraqi Jews (mostly driven into exile by the occupation) - have been all but destroyed.

It is abundantly clear that the Americans and British are not protecting Iraq's historic sites. All foreign archaeologists have had to leave. Troops are doing nothing to prevent the "farming" of known antiquities. This is in direct contravention of the Geneva Convention that an occupying army should "use all means within its power" to guard the cultural heritage of a defeated state.

Shortly after the invasion, the British minister Tessa Jowell won plaudits for "pledging" £5m to protect Iraq's antiquities. I can find no one who can tell me where, how or whether this money has been spent. It appears to have been pure spin. Only the British Museum and the British School of Archaeology in Iraq have kept the flag flying. The latter's grant has just been cut, presumably to pay for the Olympics binge.

As long as Britain and America remain in denial over the anarchy they have created in Iraq, they clearly feel they must deny its devastating side-effects. Two million refugees now camping in Jordan and Syria are ignored, since life in Iraq is supposed to be "better than before". Likewise dozens of Iraqis working for the British and thus facing death threats are denied asylum. To grant it would mean the former defence and now home secretary, the bullish John Reid, admitting he was wrong. They will die before he does that.

Though I opposed the invasion I assumed that its outcome would at least be a more civilised environment. Yet Iraq's people are being murdered in droves for want of order. Authority has collapsed. That western civilisation should have been born in so benighted a country as Iraq may seem bad luck. But only now is that birth being refused all guardianship, in defiance of international law. If this is Tony Blair's "values war", then language has lost all meaning. British collusion in such destruction is a scandal that will outlive any passing conflict. And we had the cheek to call the Taliban vandals.

simon.jenkins@guardian.co.uk

Race and class issues in revoking Venezuelan TV station RCTV's broadcast license

Interesting article from Dissident Voice about the revoking of the broadcast license of the TV station RCTV in Venezuela:

Muting RCTV in Venezuela
The battle over the media is about race as well as class
by Richard Gott
June 8th, 2007

After 10 days of rival protests in the streets of Caracas, memories have been revived of earlier attempts to overthrow the Bolivarian revolution of Hugo Chávez, now in its ninth year. Street demonstrations, culminating in an attempted coup in 2002 and a prolonged lock-out at the national oil industry, once seemed the last resort of an opposition unable to make headway at the polls. Yet the current unrest is a feeble echo of those tumultuous events, and the political struggle takes place on a smaller canvas. Today’s battle is for the hearts and minds of a younger generation confused by the upheavals of an uncharted revolutionary process.

University students from privileged backgrounds have been pitched against newly enfranchised young people from the impoverished shantytowns, beneficiaries of the increased oil royalties spent on higher education projects for the poor. These separate groups never meet, but both sides occupy their familiar battleground within the city, one in the leafy squares of eastern Caracas, the other in the narrow and teeming streets in the west. This symbolic battle will become ever more familiar in Latin America in the years ahead: rich against poor, white against brown and black, immigrant settlers against indigenous peoples, privileged minorities against the great mass of the population. History may have come to an end in other parts of the world, but in this continent historical processes are in full flood.

Ostensibly the argument is about the media, and the government’s decision not to renew the broadcasting licence of a prominent station, Radio Caracas Television (RCTV), and to hand its frequencies to a newly established state channel. What are the rights of commercial television channels? What are the responsibilities of those funded by the state? Where should the balance between them lie? Academic questions in Europe and the US, the debate in Latin America is loud and impassioned. Here there is little tradition of public broadcasting, and commercial stations often received their licence in the days of military rule.

The debate in Venezuela has less to do with the alleged absence of freedom of expression than with a perennially tricky issue locally referred to as “exclusion”, a shorthand term for “race” and “racism”. RCTV was not just a politically reactionary organisation which supported the 2002 coup attempt against a democratically elected government; it was also a white supremacist channel. Its staff and presenters, in a country largely of black and indigenous descent, were uniformly white, as were the protagonists of its soap operas and the advertisements it carried. It was “colonial” television, reflecting the desires and ambitions of an external power.

At the final, close-down party of RCTV last month, those most in view on the screen were long-haired and pulchritudinous young blondes. Such images make for excellent television watching by European and North American males, and these languorous blondes are indeed familiar figures from the Miss World and Miss Universe competitions in which the children of recent immigrants from Europe are invariably Venezuela’s chief contenders. Yet their ubiquity on the screen prevented the channel from presenting a mirror to the society that it sought to serve or to entertain. To watch a Venezuelan commercial station (and several still survive) is to imagine that you have been transported to the US. Everything is based on a modern, urban and industrialised society, remote from the experience of most Venezuelans. Their programmes, argues Aristóbulo Istúriz, until recently Chávez’s minister of education (and an Afro-Venezuelan), encourage racism, discrimination and exclusion.

The new state-funded channels (and there are several of them too, plus innumerable community radio stations) are doing something completely different, and unusual in the competitive world of commercial television. Their programmes look as though they are taking place in Venezuela, and they display the cross-section of the population to be seen on cross-country buses or on the Caracas metro. As in every country in the world, not everyone in Venezuela is a natural beauty. Many are old, ugly and fat. Today they are given a voice and a face on the television channels of the state. Many are deaf or hard of hearing. Now they have sign language interpretation on every programme. Many are inarticulate peasants. They too have their moment on the screen. Their immediate and dangerous struggle for land is not just being observed by a documentary film-maker from the city. They are being taught to make the films themselves.

Blanca Eekhout, the head of Vive TV, the government’s cultural channel, launched two years ago, coined the slogan “Don’t watch television, make it”. Classes in film-making have been set up all over the country. Lil Rodríguez, an Afro-Venezuelan journalist and the boss of TVES, the channel that replaces RCTV, claims that it will become “a useful space for rescuing those values that other models of television always ignore, especially our Afro-heritage”. With time, the excluded will find a voice within the mainstream.

Little of this is under discussion in the dialogue of the deaf on the streets of Caracas. For the protesting university students, the argument about the media is just one more stick with which to hit out against the ever-popular Chávez. Yet as they mourn the loss of their favourite soap operas, they are already aware that their eventual loss may be more substantial. As children of the oligarchy, they might have expected soon to run the country. Now fresh faces are emerging from the shantytowns to challenge them, a new class educating itself at speed and planning to seize their birthright.

Just a few weeks ago, Chávez outlined his plans for university reform, encouraging wider access and the development of a different curriculum. New colleges and technical institutes across the country will dilute the prestige of the older establishments, still the preserve of the wealthy, and the battle over the media will soon be submerged in a wider struggle for educational reform. Chávez takes no notice of the complaints and simply soldiers on, with the characteristics of an evangelical preacher: he urges people to lead moral lives, live simply and resist the lure of consumerism. He is embarked on a challenge to the established order that has long prevailed in Venezuela and throughout the rest of Latin America, hoping that the message of his cultural revolution will soon echo across the continent.

This article was first published in The Guardian.

Richard Gott is the author of Hugo Chávez and the Bolivarian Revolution.

Censorship or Democratization? RCTV and Freedom of Speech in Venezuela

This article from Counterpunch is another great piece telling the other side of the "Venezuela becoming a dictatorship, suppressing free speech" story that is popular now in the American press. This article analyzes the Venezuelan TV stations and breaks them down into three groups: pro-government, anti-government, and neutral. It uses several different measures of influence, but according to the measure of what people actually watch, the closing of RCTV has made the Venezuelan TV news landscape arguably more balanced, not less. As the article says, "To argue that pluralism of views in Venezuela has been diminished by RCTV's going off the air completely misses the reality of Venezuela's media landscape." Before the closing of RCTV, the numbers (Pro-Government / Anti-Government / Neutral) looked like this : 20-25%/50-55%/30-40%. After: 20-25%/15%/30-40%. Considering that Chavez has been winning popular elections by a 2/3 majority, 25% pro-government doesn't seem excessively high to me. If anything, giving the opposition 55% of the airwaves seems excessive, if it only makes up 1/3 of the population.

Censorship or Democratization?
RCTV and Freedom of Speech in Venezuela
By GREGORY WILPERT
Counterpunch
June 4, 2007

As far as world public opinion is concerned, as reflected in the international media, the pronouncements of freedom of expression groups, and of miscellaneous governments, Venezuela has finally taken the ultimate step to prove its opposition right: that Venezuela is heading towards a dictatorship. Judging by these pronouncements, freedom of speech is becoming ever more restricted in Venezuela as a result of the non-renewal of the broadcast license of the oppositional TV network RCTV. With RCTV going off the air at midnight of May 27th, the country's most powerful opposition voice has supposedly been silenced.

It is generally taken for granted that any silencing of opposition voices is anti-freedom of speech. But is an opposition voice really being silenced? Is this the correct metaphor? Is the director of RCTV, Marcel Granier, actually being silenced? No, a better metaphor is that the megaphone that Granier (and others) used for the exercise of his free speech is being returned to its actual owners--a megaphone that he had borrowed, but never owned. Not only that, he is still allowed to use a smaller megaphone (cable & satellite).

In other words, the radio frequency that RCTV used for over half a century is being returned to its original owners-the Venezuelan people-under the management of its democratically elected leadership. Still, while the decision about how to use the airwaves might be the prerogative of the government (as many critics concede), critics of the move have a point when they complain that the freedom to use the airwaves cannot be solely a matter of majority rule. After all, shouldn't minorities (in this case a mostly relatively wealthy minority) also have access to the megaphone, so it may use it to convince the majority of its point-of-view? At least, progressives who defend the rights of traditionally disenfranchised minorities would argue that minorities should always have access to the media. [1] Even though Marcel Granier and his friends cannot be considered to be a disenfranchised minority, surely this minority deserves to be heard in the media, at least a little bit, in the name of pluralism.

Chavez supporters concede the validity of this argument in that they counter by pointing out that the opposition still has plenty of broadcast frequencies to present its point-of-view. Their argument for the justness of the decision to let RCTV's license expire for good is that, first, the opposition still has plenty of other media outlets to broadcast its views, second, RCTV is a subversive and law-breaking broadcaster (because it participated in the coup and oil industry shutdown, among other things), and third, it needs to make way for a new public service television channel that is mandated by the constitution. Let us briefly examine each of these arguments, starting with Venezuela's media landscape.


Venezuela's Media Landscape

As with most questions about Venezuela, there is almost complete disagreement about what Venezuela's media landscape looks like. According to the opposition, Chavez already controls most of the broadcast media, either directly, though state ownership or sponsorship, or indirectly, via supposedly repressive media laws. According to Chavez supporters, though, the opposition controls 95% of all media.

The problem is, there are several different angles from which one can examine a media landscape, which is why one can reach quite different conclusions about what this landscape actually looks like. First, one could examine it solely from the perspective of who owns or controls different media outlets. Second, one can look at which types of media outlets reach the population. And, third, one can look at what people end up watching or listening to.

In the first case, of who owns the media outlets-an analysis Chavez supporters tend to use-it is quite clear that a vast majority of television stations, radio stations, and newspapers are privately owned. Here, indeed, Chavez supporters are correct when they say that 95% of all media outlets (TV, radio, and print) are privately owned and that a significant majority of these are more sympathetic with the opposition than with Chavez and his government. [2]

In the second type of analysis, which opposition sympathizers tend to prefer, we look at which types of stations have the most potential to reach Venezuelans. Here it is generally said that the two stations with the largest national reach are channel 2 (formerly RCTV now TVes) and channel 8 (the government controlled VTV). The private national stations Venevisión, Televen, and Globovisión have a far more limited range, since they are broadcast mainly in larger population centers.[3] Obviously, private local channels and community channels don't reach beyond their locality, but community TV stations are beginning to rival private TV stations in number. Looked at this way, it would seem that in terms of television broadcasting the government has acquired the definitive upper hand, with RCTV going off the air, its replacement by TVes, the strength of the government station, and the two dozen or so community television channels that for the most part sympathize with the government.

This picture shifts significantly, though, if we examine what people actually watch. According to studies that examine the audience share of the different types of television channels, only about five TV stations, a handful of radio stations, and a few newspapers are viewed, listened to, or read by most Venezuelans. That is, in television, RCTV and Venevisión are watched by about 60% of the viewing audience (RCTV about 35-40% and Venevisión about 20-25%). The remaining 40% are shared among the government station VTV (about 15-20%), Televen (around 10%), Globovisión (around 10%), cable channels, and various local channels.[4]

Given the political positions and the relative audience shares of the different media outlets, we can divide Venezuela's media landscape into three categories of opposition, neutral or balanced, and pro-government. Before RCTV's demise it looked as follows:

Opposition: 50-55%

RCTV: 35-40%

Globovisión: 10%

Private local: 5%

Neutral or balanced: 30-40%

Venevisión: 20-25%

Televen: 10-15%

Pro-government: 20-25%

VTV: 15-20%

Other (Telesur, Vive, Community): 5%

Now, in the post-RCTV era there is indeed a significant shift, so that the media landscape could look as follows, if, as promised, TVes (RCTV's replacement) does not become a pro-government channel, but is neutral.

Opposition: 15%

Globovisión: 10%

Private Local: 5%

Neutral/balanced: 30-40% or more

Venevisión: 20-25%

Televen: 10-15%

TVes: ??%

Pro-government: 20-25%

VTV: 15-20%

Other: 5%

In other words, the ratio of opposition-oriented to government-oriented television changed from about 50:25 (or 2:1) in favor of the opposition to 15:25 (or 1:1.7) in favor of the government in terms of audience share. In most countries in the world, where the media is not democratically controlled, any opposition would be overjoyed by having such a ratio. In Venezuela, of course, where the opposition is used to having ruled the country for four decades, such a disadvantage is an intolerable encroachment on their "freedom of speech."

However, there are three unknowns that could change the ratio in favor of the opposition. First, those who used to watch RCTV might very well watch more Globovisión, thus increasing their share of the audience. Second, Venevisión could very well become more oppositional, now that many opposition supporters are looking for a new home. There are already first indications that this will happen, according to a recent news report in the weekly newspaper Quinto Dia. [5] And third, many lovers of RCTV who want to continue watching it but did not have cable access, might, if they can afford it, switch to cable to watch RCTV. Thus, if Globovisión's audience share increases, if Venevisión moves back into the oppositional column, and if RCTV continues to attract a large audience on cable, [6] then the opposition to pro-government balance in the Television media could easily swing to at last 1:1.

If you look at audience shares in the newspaper market or in radio, it is still far more favorable for the opposition than for the government. Many Chavez supporters say that the country's largest newspaper, Últimas Noticias, is a Chavista newspaper, but if you look at the newspaper's content and at its columnists, it is actually the most balanced newspaper in Venezuela, with government criticism and praise equally present. The second and third largest newspapers (El Universal and El Nacional), plus a good majority of smaller ones are all solidly in the opposition camp. The situation is even more lopsided among radio stations, where the pro-government share of radio audience (RNV, YVKE, and community radio) makes up a far smaller share than the opposition-oriented radio stations.

Thus, to argue that pluralism of views in Venezuela has been diminished by RCTV's going off the air completely misses the reality of Venezuela's media landscape. More than that, by defending the right of RCTV to broadcast, one is actually just defending the right of the country's minority to continue its privileged place in the media landscape.


RCTV's Rights and Responsibilities

Now that we have examined the arguments about whether RCTV's going off the air represents a threat to media pluralism and thus to freedom of expression, we can turn to the other two arguments for and against RCTV: that RCTV deserves to lose its license due to its past actions and that it needs to make room for a new public Television Channel.

This is not the place to detail the numerous accusations against RCTV that the government has made, such as RCTV's participation in the 2002 coup attempt, in the 2002-3 oil industry shutdown, and its violations of the country's broadcasting regulations. [7] These facts are generally uncontested. Rather, what is contested is that these acts can justify the non-renewal of a broadcast license when another broadcaster, such as Venevisión, committed the same violations, but whose license was renewed on May 27th. In other words, on what legal grounds was RCTV's license not renewed, but Venevisión's license was, if they committed the same violations? According to RCTV, political discrimination is the only answer because RCTV's hard-line opposition to the government continued, while Venevisión became neutral in Venezuela's political conflict. [8]

To fend off this accusation of discrimination and that RCTV is being punished for crimes that have never been proven in court, the government argues that RCTV's non-renewal is not a punishment at all. Rather, RCTV's license expiration provides an excellent opportunity for the government to launch a public service television station, in compliance with a constitutional mandate. [9] At a later point Telecommunications Minister Jesse Chacón explained that RCTV (and not Venevisión) was chosen for non-renewal because RCTV's VHF channel 2 is better suited for public service TV because channel 2 has the better reception throughout the country.

In theory, though, it might still be possible for RCTV to reverse the license renewal once the full Supreme Court trial concludes with a decision in favor of RCTV, on the basis that either discrimination or that due process were violated. If this is the case, then the government might have to hold public hearings in which an objective analysis is made as to which of the three channels that are up for license renewal (RCTV, Venevisión, and VTV) needs to make room for TVes.

In any case, RCTV and the opposition have once again bungled the political situation. Instead of challenging Chavez in the political arena, they focused exclusively on legal challenges, international appeals, and confrontation. They could have organized a consultative (non-binding) referendum back in January, right after it was clear that Chavez would not renew RCTV's license. Polls indicated that the up to 70% of Venezuelans did not want RCTV to go off the air. With only 10% of registered voters' signatures the Electoral Council would have been forced to convoke a referendum on the issue. If the polls are accurate, the opposition would have won that referendum easily, thereby embarrassing Chavez and perhaps forcing him to renew RCTV's license. Maybe this course of action did not occur to anyone in the opposition, but more likely is that they prefer to challenge Chavez in the legal and international arenas and on the streets than politically because actions that use Venezuela's democratic processes would legitimate a political system that the opposition continuously decries as a dictatorship and whose ultimate goal it is to de-legitimate.


Diversification and Democratization of the Media?

While the legal challenge to the non-renewal of RCTV's license could have some merit, particularly the charge that RCTV is being discriminated against vis-á-vis Venevisión, what about the government's goal of diversifying and democratizing the country's media landscape? Do the government's media policies contribute to diversification and democratization of the media?

With regard to diversification and democratization, the Chavez government has arguably done more than any government in Venezuelan history or in the history of most countries of the world. Enabling hundreds of community radio stations and of dozens of community television stations gives ordinary citizens access to the media in an unprecedented manner. The opposition, of course, calls these community media outlets "Chavez controlled," but there is no evidence for this. Indeed, most of these media outlets (by no means all) are located in poor neighborhoods, where Chavez support is strong. However, criticism of national, state, and local governments is very common and these outlets provide a form of citizen accountability that can contribute to better governance.

Also, the creation of several new, certainly pro-government, Television outlets contributes to a diversification of the media landscape. Important in this regard is the launch of Vive TV, which focuses on communal issues and problems throughout the country, and of ANTV, the television channel of the National Assembly. ANTV allows Venezuelans (who receive cable) to observe the debates in the National Assembly, thus further enhancing democratic oversight over the country's political processes.

Venezuela's Law on Social Responsibility in Television and Radio has, despite opposition criticism, also contributed to the diversification of the media landscape, in that it mandates that five hours per day (between 5am and 11pm) be produced by independent national producers, with no single producer contributing more than 20% of this. [10] Thousands of independent producers have already registered with a national registry for their participation in this requirement.

Opposition critics say that the social responsibility law limits freedom of expression because it punishes the broadcasting of messages that are discriminatory, promote violence, promote the breaking of laws, or of "secret messages." [11] However, despite all of the anti-government broadcasting that has taken place since this law went into effect, no broadcaster has been called to task for violating these provisions. Also, most of these provisions are standard broadcast regulations in most countries in the world.

Finally, the government's most recent measure of creating Venezuelan Social Television (TVes, pronounced "te ves" or "you see yourself") could indeed be a move towards democratizing and diversifying Venezuelan broadcast media, if the channel is truly independent of the government. So far, though, the board of directors has been named by the president and the channel's funding comes from the central government. Even if the board does not receive any direction from the president, as long as it is named by the president, it cannot be considered independent. The government has promised, though, that this is merely a temporary arrangement and that later on the board and the financing of the channel will become truly independent. This issue notwithstanding, Venezuela's independent television producers have applauded the new channel because it will broadcast almost entirely independent national productions--an important move that gives far more opportunity to Venezuelans to be heard on a national level than any other television channel provides.

Conclusion

While the decision not to renew RCTV's license is still being challenged in court, [12] due to a possible violation of due process and equal treatment under the law, it is clear that the decision is legal to the extent that it is the prerogative of the state to decide which broadcasters are to receive licenses to use the airwaves, maintains pluralism in Venezuela's media landscape, does not violate principles of freedom of speech for Venezuelans, and contributes to the democratization of the country's airwaves by granting more Venezuelans access to these than before, via the new television channel TVes.

It is thus very disappointing to see international human rights groups, such as Human Rights Watch, the Washington Office on Latin America, the Carter Center, and the Committee to Protect Journalists condemn the government's decision. These groups, just as Venezuela's opposition, claim that the decision sends a chilling effect on freedom of speech. This supposed chilling effect, though, has been invoked over and over again by the government's critics, but they have yet to point to a single instance of a story or a criticism that has not been aired due to this supposed effect. Globovisión continues to be as critical of the government as ever, just as the country's most important newspapers and radio programs--arguably some of the most critical in the western hemisphere. RCTV, when it comes back via cable, will, no doubt, also continue to be as critical as ever. In effect, the groups that condemn Venezuela's sovereign decision to change the way its airwaves are used are defending the right of corporate media to use the airwaves, to the detriment of the poor majority, who prior to Chavez have never had access to the country's corporate-controlled media complex. Ideally, all broadcast frequencies should be under collective democratic and not private control. That, however, will take more time and will receive far more condemnation by the world's establishment.

Gregory Wilpert is a freelance writer and editor of Venezuelanalysis.com. He is also the author of the forthcoming book, Changing Venezuela by Taking Power: The Policies of the Chavez Presidency, Verso Books, September 2007


Appendix: Who Controls Which Channel and What they Show

Looking only at the channels that significant numbers of people watch, it makes sense to examine the political orientations of the most widely watched outlets. RCTV clearly is/was the most popular and also one of the most anti-Chavez TV stations. In the days leading up to and during the 2002 coup, the 2002-3 oil industry shutdown, and the August 2004 recall referendum RCTV had nearly constant anti-Chavez news coverage and advertisements. However, between these periods and following the recall referendum, RCTV focused on its core business, which is entertainment programming, both from Hollywood and from Venezuela (mostly game shows and soaps). Its explicitly political programming was limited to its nightly news programs and one morning political talk show (La Entrevista with Miguel Angel Rodriguez).

RCTV is clearly part of Venezuela's old elite, owned by one of the country's richest families, the Phelps family, which also owns soap and food production and construction companies. Eliado Lares, the president of RCTV, is related to Henry Ramos Allup, the Secretary General of the former governing party Acción Democrática (AD). Lares played an important role in ensuring that RCTV's concession was renewed in 1987, when it almost lost its license during the presidency of Jaime Lusinchi, due to RCTV director Marcel Granier's fights with Lusinchi. Granier himself came into directing RCTV and its parent company 1BC, due to his marriage with Dorothy Phelps, one of the heirs to the Phelps fortune. [13]

The second-most watched channel is Venevisión, which belongs to Gustavo Cisneros, the Cuban-Venezuelan media mogul, who is one of the world's richest men and owns about 70 media outlets in 39 countries, including the Spanish-language network Univisión in the U.S. Also, he owns countless food distribution companies. There has always been a strong rivalry between Granier and Cisneros, since both are said to have presidential aspirations. Ironically, their two families are closely linked via marriage, because Cisneros is married to Patricia Phelps, the sister of Granier's wife Dorothy.

Venevisión itself was just as, if not more, involved in the April 2002 coup attempt because it had exclusive interviews with coup plotters and actually filmed some of the key footage that was later used to falsely claim that Chavez supporters were shooting at unarmed opposition demonstrators. It was also actively involved in the oil industry shutdown, urging people to participate in a general strike via thousands of public service announcements, just as RCTV did.

However, this channel changed its tune in June 2004, two months before the August 15, 2004 recall referendum against Chavez, in which Chavez and Cisneros agreed to a media cease-fire between the two that was brokered by former U.S. President Jimmy Carter. Officially, the two agreed to "honor constitutional processes and to support future conversations between the government of Venezuela and the media" [14] According to some reports, Cisneros had actually agreed to tone down his anti-Chavez propaganda in return for Chavez's help with introducing Cisneros to Brazil's President Lula. [15] Chavez, though, denied that any kind of pact had been made other than what was in the official statement. Still, Venevisión removed its political talk show "24" with Napoleon Bravo, one of the most strident anti-Chavistas on Television and its news programs became more balanced.

The next most important channel, in terms of reaching the population, is the government's VTV station, which has been a state channel for most of Venezuela's democratic history. Its programming is controlled quite directly by the executive, which names its director. As such, it is not a public broadcasting channel as in many European countries, which tend to be more independent of the government. Most of VTV's programming is quite political, with many pro-government public service announcements and political talk shows in which government representatives or supporters predominate.

Televen, is one of the country's newer channels, broadcasting since 1988. Unlike most of the other channels, it has always been slightly more neutral in Venezuela's media wars, except that it once employed Marta Colomina for its morning talk show, one of the country's most strident anti-Chavistas after Napoleon Bravo. Her program was taken off the air, though, following the 2004 recall referendum and the channel became far more balanced and now strives to invite as many government supporters as opponents for its political talk shows. Its economic interests are not as well defined as those of RCTV, Venevisión, and Globovisión because, unlike the other three, it is not affiliated with quite as large private economic interest groups.

Finally, there is Globovisión, which, as a 24-hour news and opinion channel has a political importance that far exceeds the size of its audience and its potential broadcasting reach. One of Venezuela's newest channels, it was founded in 1994 by Alberto Federico Ravell (its director), Guillermo Zuloaga, and Nelson Mezerhane, who all belong to Venezuela's upper crust, with Zuloaga coming from one of Venezuela's richest families (who is also related to Ana corina Machado, one of the directors of the opposition NGO Súmate). While Globovisión's UHF reach is limited, covering only three major cities, it does have cooperation agreements with numerous local private stations, so that it does reach most larger population centers over the airwaves. Politically, Globovisión is as opposition-oriented as a Television station could possibly be, broadcasting anti-government opinions and analysis 24 hours a day.

The other pro-government channels, such as most (but by no means all) community television stations, Vive, Telesur, and ANTV (National Assembly Television) all have extremely limited viewership according to the rating studies, so that these can be safely dismissed for the purposes of this analysis. The same goes for the opposition-oriented private local stations.

Notes

[1] Although, many progressives would argue that extreme right-wing views, which are racist or fascist, should not have access to the airwaves, even if a majority were to hold them. In many places it is actually illegal for such views to be broadcast under any circumstances. This is one of the reasons some say RCTV does not deserve a license.

2] More specifically, only three or TV channels broadcast via antenna out of over 200 are state owned (VTV, Vive, and Avila TV), only two out of 426 radio stations, and no daily newspapers. In each category, the privately owned outlets are overwhelmingly (perhaps around 80%) pro-opposition and anti-Chavez.

[3] Also, there are a few national specialty broadcasters, such as Vale TV, an educational channel, Meridiano, a sports channel, Puma, a music channel, and La Tele, an entertainment channel.

[4] Audience shares found in an El Nacional article of May 27, 2007. The percentages are given in ranges because different studies have slightly different results.

[5] "This happened with journalists and actors [of Venevisión]. They decided to complain about the editorial line of the Cisneros channel and got authorization to not just attend the demonstrations or to express their solidarity [with RCTV employees] in any other channel, but could now do it from their own screen." J.A. Almenar, "Exclusivas de última pagina," Quinto Día, June 1-8, 2007.

[6] Information on how many households receive cable or satellite TV is difficult to come by, but judging by the number of illegal cable connections that are said to exist and the number of DirecTV dishes (many with illegal decoders) in the barrios, it could be safe to guess that nearly half of Venezuelan households receive cable or satellite TV.

[7] For information on these acts of RCTV, see: Cartoon Coup D'Etat , Venezuela, RCTV, And Media Freedom: Just The Facts, Please , and the Libro Blanco (Spanish PDF) published by the Ministry of Communication and Information

8] The May 23rd decision of Venezuela's Supreme Court, in which RCTV's court injunction against the license non-renewal was rejected, but a trial about the issue was allowed, could leave a challenge open in this regard. The court merely states that RCTV failed to provide evidence for unequal treatment, but does not say that there was no unequal treatment. See: Supreme Tribunal of Justice Decision of May 23, 2007 (in Spanish) or Supreme Court Allows RCTV Case to Proceed, but Station Must Go off Air for a summary of the decision.

[9] See section IV, No. 2 of the May 23rd Supreme Court decision (in Spanish)

[10] Article 14, Ley de responsabilidad social en radio y televisión (Resorte)

[11] Article 28, No. 4 u-z, Ley Resorte

[12] The decision is being challenged not only in Venezuela's Supreme Tribunal of Justice, but will also be tried by the Inter-American Court for Human Rights.

[13] See: http://www.aporrea.org/medios/a34490.html

[14] According to the Carter Center statement released after the meeting. http://www.aporrealos.org/actualidad/n17674.html

[15] See: "Venezuela's Murdoch" by Richard Gott, New Left Review, May-June 2006

The Chinese gold rush

Following up on my previous post criticizing free market capitalism with respect to the American health care system, an article from the June issue of National Geographic (China's Instant Cities, by Peter Hessler) is a fascinating portrait of China's boom economy. It reminds me of the American Gold Rush. Some excerpts:

Qiaotou's population is only 64,000, but 380 local factories produce more than 70 percent of the buttons for clothes made in China. In Wuyi, I asked some bystanders what the local product was. A man reached into his pocket and pulled out three playing cards -- queens, all of them. The city manufactures more than one billion decks a year. Datang township akes one-third of the world's socks. Songxia produces 350 million umbrellas every year. Table tennis paddles come from Shangguan; Fenshui turns out pens; Xiaxie does jungle gyms. Forty percent of the world's neckties are made in Shengzhou.

Everything is sold in a town called Yiwu... Yiwu's slogan is 'a sea of commodities, a paradise for shoppers.' Yiwu is in the middle of nowhere, a hundred miles from the coast, but traders come from all over the world to buy goods in bulk. There's a scarf district, a plastic bag market, an avenue where every shop sells elastic. If you're burned out on buttons, take a stroll down Binwang Zipper Professional Street. The China Yiwu International Trade City, a local mall, has more than 30,000 stalls -- if you spend one minute at each shop, eight hours a day, you'll leave two months later.

U.S. health care system is world's most expensive but "comes in dead last in almost any measure of performance"

From Common Dreams, this story tackles the myth held by a lot of Americans that the American health care system may be expensive, but because of its free-market properties it is the best in the world. The study cited in the article finds that "not only is the U.S. health care system the most expensive in the world (double that of the next most costly comparator country, Canada), but it comes in dead last in almost any measure of performance.... The United States is ... last on dimensions of access, patient safety, efficiency and equity.... It is the best only for the very rich. For the rest of the population, its deficits far outweigh its advantages."

U.S. Health Care Is Bad For Your Health
by César Chelala
The San Francisco Chronicle
June 3, 2007

One of the most contentious issues of the U.S. presidential campaign will be how to fix what many agree is a malfunctional health-care system. Adding fuel to the fire is a study published last month detailing the shortcomings of U.S. health care when compared to the systems of other developed countries, including Canada, the United Kingdom and New Zealand.

The study, entitled “Mirror, Mirror on the Wall: An International Update on the Comparative Performance of American Health Care,” released by the Commonwealth Fund in New York, finds that not only is the U.S. health care system the most expensive in the world (double that of the next most costly comparator country, Canada) but comes in dead last in almost any measure of performance.

Although U.S. political leaders are fond of stating that we have the best health-care system in the world, they fail to acknowledge an important caveat: It is the best only for the very rich. For the rest of the population, its deficits far outweigh its advantages.

For the Republican presidential candidates, health care hasn’t become a major issue — yet. The three leading Democratic candidates, however, are outspoken critics of the health-care system and argue for the need to increase coverage to most, if not all, Americans.

This new study not only confirms the findings of previous Commonwealth Fund studies, but also a previous analysis by the World Health Organization in 2000 that found the overall performance of the U.S. health-care system ranked 37th among the countries included in the analysis.

The Commonwealth study compared the United States with Australia, Canada, Germany, New Zealand and the United Kingdom. Although the most notable way in which the United States differs from the other countries is in the absence of universal coverage, the United States is also last on dimensions of access, patient safety, efficiency and equity.

The other five countries considered spend considerably less on health care, both per capita and as a percent of gross domestic product, than the United States. The United States spends $7,000 per person per year on health care, almost double that of Australia, Canada and Germany, each of which achieve better results on health status indicators than the United States. This suggests that the U.S. health-care system can and must do much more with its substantial investment in health.

The United States also lags behind all industrialized nations in terms of health coverage. The most recent data available from the U.S. Census Bureau indicate that 46.6 million Americans (about 15.9 percent of the population) had no health insurance coverage during 2005, an increase of 1.3 million over the previous year. It is no wonder, then, that medical bills are overwhelmingly the most common reason for personal bankruptcy in the United States.

According to the Children’s Health Fund, 9 million children are completely uninsured in the United States, while another 23.7 million - nearly 30 percent of the nation’s children — lack regular access to health care.

Compared to the other countries studied, the United States lags behind in the adoption of information technology and other national policies that promote quality improvement. Up-to-date information systems in countries such as New Zealand, Germany and the United Kingdom enhance physicians’ ability to monitor chronic conditions and medication use, including medications prescribed by other physicians. In other countries, experienced nurses are working to monitor chronic conditions, thus easing the physicians’ burden.

The United States also ranks last among the countries studied, both in terms of efficiency and equity. The United States has poor performance on national health expenditures and administrative costs. In terms of equity, Americans with below-average income were more reluctant to visit a physician when sick, and more often did not get a recommended test, fill a prescription or undergo a needed treatment or seek a proper follow-up on a condition.

Only a thorough reform can solve the U.S. health care system’s deep structural problems. It is imperative that everyone is adequately insured and has the possibility to afford good care. At the same time, the United States must make sure to incorporate the advantages of modern health information technology and to ensure an integrated medical record and information system.

Lessons from other countries’ experiences could be applied and adapted to the U.S. situation. In a recent article in the Journal of the American Medical Association, Dr. Ezekiel J. Emanuel, from the Department of Clinical Bioethics at the National Institutes of Health stated, “The U.S. health-care system is considered a dysfunctional mess.” Given the seriousness of the situation, this is an understatement.

César Chelala, M.D., Ph.D., is an international public health consultant for several U.N. and other international agencies.

The other side of the Chavez TV censorship story

Regarding the story about Chavez suppressing free speech by not renewing a TV station's license, ZNet has the other side of it: the station fomented the coup against Chavez several years ago. From the article: "If RCTV were broadcasting in the United States, its license would have been revoked years ago. In fact its owners would likely have been tried for criminal offenses, including treason." It's a good example of the shifting realities created by government propaganda, and our country is no better than others in this respect, with our media constantly parroting Bush propaganda about our official enemies.

Venezuela and the Media: Fact and Fiction
by Robert McChesney and Mark Weisbrot
CommonDreams.org
June 02, 2007

To read and view the U.S. news media over the past week, there is an episode of grand tyranny unfolding, one repugnant to all who cherish democratic freedoms. The Venezuelan government under "strongman" Hugo Chavez refused to renew the 20-year broadcast license for RCTV, because that medium had the temerity to be critical of his regime. It is a familiar story.

And in this case it is wrong.

Regrettably, the US media coverage of Venezuela's RCTV controversy says more about the deficiencies of our own news media that it does about Venezuela. It demonstrates again, as with the invasion of Iraq, how our news media are far too willing to carry water for Washington than to ascertain and report the truth of the matter.

Here are some of the facts and some of the context that the media have omitted or buried:

1. All nations license radio and TV stations because the airwaves can only accommodate a small number of broadcasters, far fewer than the number who would like to have the privilege to broadcast. In democratic nations the license is given for a specific term, subject to renewal. In the United States it is eight years; in Venezuela it is 20 years.

2. Venezuela is a constitutional republic. Chavez has won landslide victories that would be the envy of almost any elected leader in the world, in internationally monitored elections.

3. The vast majority of Venezuela's media are not only in private hands, they are constitutionally protected, uncensored, and dominated by the opposition. RCTV's owners can expand their cable and satellite programming, or take their capital and launch a print empire forthwith. Aggressive unqualified political dissent is alive and well in the Venezuelan mainstream media, in a manner few other democratic nations have ever known, including our own.

The media here report that President Chavez "accuses RCTV of having supported a coup" against him. This is a common means of distorting the news: a fact is reported as accusation, and then attributed to a source that the press has done everything to discredit. In fact, RCTV - along with other broadcast news outlets - played such a leading role in the April 2002 military coup against Venezuela's democratically elected government, that it is often described as "the world's first media coup."

In the prelude to the coup, RCTV helped mobilize people to the streets against the government, and used false reporting to justify the coup. One of their most infamous and effective falsifications was to mix footage of pro-Chavez people firing pistols from an overpass in Caracas with gory scenes of demonstrators being shot and killed. This created the impression that the pro-Chavez gunmen actually shot these people, when in fact the victims were nowhere near them. These falsified but horrifying images were repeated incessantly, and served as a major justification for the coup.

RCTV then banned any pro-government reporting during the coup. When Chavez returned to office, this too was blacked out of the news. Later the same year, RCTV once again made all-day-long appeals to Venezuelans to help topple the government during a crippling national oil strike.

If RCTV were broadcasting in the United States, its license would have been revoked years ago. In fact its owners would likely have been tried for criminal offenses, including treason.

RCTV's broadcast frequency has been turned over to a new national public access channel that promises to provide programming from thousands of independent producers. It is an effort to let millions of Venezuelans who have never had a viable chance to participate in the media do so, without government censorship.

The Bush Administration opposes the Chavez government for reasons that have nothing to do with democracy, or else there would be a long list of governments for us to subvert or overthrow before it would get close to targeting Venezuela. Regrettably, our press coverage has done little to shed light on that subject.

Our news media should learn the lesson of Iraq and regard our own government's claims with the same skepticism they properly apply to foreign leaders. Then Americans might begin to get a more accurate picture of the world, and be able to effectively participate in our foreign policy.

Robert W. McChesney is Research Professor of Communications at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
Mark Weisbrot is Co-Director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research, in Washington, DC

Words in a time of war: American empire, the Age of Rhetoric, and the reality-based community

Tom Dispatch carries the commencement address for the Department of Rhetoric at the University of California, Berkeley, which Cursor describes as "chronicl[ing] the 'Age of Rhetoric' ushered in by the Bush administration's conviction that 'power can remake reality'."

Words in a Time of War
Taking the Measure of the First Rhetoric-Major President
By Mark Danner

[Note: This commencement address was given to graduates of the Department of Rhetoric at Zellerbach Hall, University of California, Berkeley, on May 10, 2007]

When my assistant greeted me, a number of weeks ago, with the news that I had been invited to deliver the commencement address to the Department of Rhetoric, I thought it was a bad joke. There is a sense, I'm afraid, that being invited to deliver The Speech to students of Rhetoric is akin to being asked out for a romantic evening by a porn star: Whatever prospect you might have of pleasure is inevitably dampened by performance anxiety -- the suspicion that your efforts, however enthusiastic, will inevitably be judged according to stern professional standards. A daunting prospect.

The only course, in both cases, is surely to plunge boldly ahead. And that means, first of all, saluting the family members gathered here, and in particular you, the parents.

Dear parents, I welcome you today to your moment of triumph. For if a higher education is about acquiring the skills and knowledge that allow one to comprehend and thereby get on in the world -- and I use "get on in the world" in the very broadest sense -- well then, oh esteemed parents, it is your children, not those boringly practical business majors and pre-meds your sanctimonious friends have sired, who have chosen with unerring grace and wisdom the course of study that will best guide them in this very strange polity of ours. For our age, ladies and gentlemen, is truly the Age of Rhetoric.

Now I turn to you, my proper audience, the graduating students of the Department of Rhetoric of 2007, and I salute you most heartily. In making the choice you have, you confirmed that you understand something intrinsic, something indeed…. intimate about this age we live in. Perhaps that should not surprise us. After all, you have spent your entire undergraduate years during time of war -- and what a very strange wartime it has been.

When most of you arrived on this campus, in September 2003, the rhetorical construction known as the War on Terror was already two years old and that very real war to which it gave painful birth, the war in Iraq, was just hitting its half-year mark. Indeed, the Iraq War had already ended once, in that great victory scene on the USS Abraham Lincoln off the coast of San Diego, where the President, clad jauntily in a flight suit, had swaggered across the flight deck and, beneath a banner famously marked "Mission Accomplished," had declared: "Major combat operations in Iraq have ended. In the battle of Iraq, the United States and our allies have prevailed."

Of the great body of rich material encompassed by my theme today -- "Words in a Time of War" -- surely those words of George W. Bush must stand as among the era's most famous, and most rhetorically unstable. For whatever they may have meant when the President uttered them on that sunny afternoon of May 1, 2003, they mean something quite different today, almost exactly four years later. The President has lost control of those words, as of so much else.

At first glance, the grand spectacle of May 1, 2003 fits handily into the history of the pageantries of power. Indeed, with its banners and ranks of cheering, uniformed extras gathered on the stage of that vast aircraft carrier -- a stage, by the way, that had to be turned in a complicated maneuver so that the skyline of San Diego, a few miles off, would not be glimpsed by the television audience -- the event and its staging would have been quite familiar to, and no doubt envied by, the late Leni Riefenstahl (who, as filmmaker to the Nazis, had no giant aircraft carriers to play with). Though vast and impressive, the May 1 extravaganza was a propaganda event of a traditional sort, intended to bind the country together in a second precise image of victory -- the first being the pulling down of Saddam's statue in Baghdad, also staged -- an image that would fit neatly into campaign ads for the 2004 election. The President was the star, the sailors and airmen and their enormous dreadnought props in his extravaganza.

However ambitiously conceived, these were all very traditional techniques, familiar to any fan of Riefenstahl's famous film spectacular of the 1934 Nuremberg rally, Triumph of the Will. As trained rhetoricians, however, you may well have noticed something different here, a slightly familiar flavor just beneath the surface. If ever there was a need for a "disciplined grasp" of the "symbolic and institutional dimensions of discourse" -- as your Rhetoric Department's website puts it -- surely it is now. For we have today an administration that not only is radical -- unprecedentedly so -- in its attitudes toward rhetoric and reality, toward words and things, but is willing, to our great benefit, to state this attitude clearly.

I give you my favorite quotation from the Bush administration, put forward by the proverbial "unnamed Administration official" and published in the New York Times Magazine by the fine journalist Ron Suskind in October 2004. Here, in Suskind's recounting, is what that "unnamed Administration official" told him:

"The aide said that guys like me were 'in what we call the reality-based community,' which he defined as people who 'believe that solutions emerge from your judicious study of discernible reality.' I nodded and murmured something about enlightenment principles and empiricism. He cut me off. 'That's not the way the world really works anymore,' he continued. 'We're an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you're studying that reality -- judiciously, as you will -- we'll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that's how things will sort out. We're history's actors.... and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do.'"

I must admit to you that I love that quotation; indeed, with your permission, I would like hereby to nominate it for inscription over the door of the Rhetoric Department, akin to Dante's welcome above the gates of Hell, "Abandon hope, all ye who enter here."

Both admonitions have an admirable bluntness. These words from "Bush's Brain" -- for the unnamed official speaking to Suskind seems to have been none other than the selfsame architect of the aircraft-carrier moment, Karl Rove, who bears that pungent nickname -- these words sketch out with breathtaking frankness a radical view in which power frankly determines reality, and rhetoric, the science of flounces and folderols, follows meekly and subserviently in its train. Those in the "reality-based community" -- those such as we -- are figures a mite pathetic, for we have failed to realize the singular new principle of the new age: Power has made reality its bitch.

Given such sweeping claims for power, it is hard to expect much respect for truth; or perhaps it should be "truth" -- in quotation marks -- for, when you can alter reality at will, why pay much attention to the idea of fidelity in describing it? What faith, after all, is owed to the bitch that is wholly in your power, a creature of your own creation?

Of course I should not say "those such as we" here, for you, dear graduates of the Rhetoric Department of 2007, you are somewhere else altogether. This is, after all, old hat to you; the line of thinking you imbibe with your daily study, for it is present in striking fashion in Foucault and many other intellectual titans of these last decades -- though even they might have been nonplussed to find it so crisply expressed by a finely tailored man sitting in the White House. Though we in the "reality-based community" may just now be discovering it, you have known for years the presiding truth of our age, which is that the object has become subject and we have a fanatical follower of Foucault in the Oval Office. Graduates, let me say it plainly and incontrovertibly: George W. Bush is the first Rhetoric-Major President.

The Dirtied Face of Power

I overstate perhaps, but only for a bit of -- I hope -- permitted rhetorical pleasure. Let us gaze a moment at the signposts of the history of the present age. In January 2001, the Rhetoric Major President came to power after a savage and unprecedented electoral battle that was decided not by the ballots of American voters -- for of these he had 540,000 fewer than his Democrat rival -- but by the votes of Supreme Court Justices, where Republicans prevailed 5 to 4, making George W. Bush the first president in more than a century to come to the White House with fewer votes than those of his opponent.

In this singular condition, and with a Senate precisely divided between parties, President Bush proceeded to behave as if he had won an overwhelming electoral victory, demanding tax cuts greater and more regressive than those he had outlined in the campaign. And despite what would seem to have been debilitating political weakness, the President shortly achieved this first success in "creating his own reality." To act as if he had overwhelming political power would mean he had overwhelming political power.

This, however, was only the overture of the vast symphonic work to come, a work heralded by the huge, clanging, echoing cacophony of 9/11. We are so embedded in its age that it is easy to forget the stark, overwhelming shock of it: Nineteen young men with box cutters seized enormous transcontinental airliners and brought those towers down. In an age in which we have become accustomed to two, three, four, five suicide attacks in a single day -- often these multiple attacks from Baghdad don't even make the front pages of our papers -- it is easy to forget the blunt, scathing shock of it, the impossible image of the second airliner disappearing into the great office tower, almost weirdly absorbed by it, and emerging, transformed into a great yellow and red blossom of flame, on the other side; and then, half an hour later, the astonishing flowering collapse of the hundred-story structure, transforming itself, in a dozen seconds, from mighty tower to great plume of heaven-reaching white smoke.

The image remains, will always remain, with us; for truly the weapon that day was not box cutters in the hands of nineteen young men, nor airliners at their command. The weapon that day was the television set. It was the television set that made the image possible, and inextinguishable. If terror is first of all a way of talking -- the propaganda of the deed, indeed -- then that day the television was the indispensable conveyer of the conversation: the recruitment poster for fundamentalism, the only symbolic arena in which America's weakness and vulnerability could be dramatized on an adequate scale. Terror -- as Menachem Begin, the late Israeli prime minister and the successful terrorist who drove the British from Mandate Palestine, remarked in his memoirs -- terror is about destroying the prestige of the imperial regime; terror is about "dirtying the face of power."

President Bush and his lieutenants surely realized this and it is in that knowledge, I believe, that we can find the beginning of the answer to one of the more intriguing puzzles of these last few years: What exactly lay at the root of the almost fanatical determination of administration officials to attack and occupy Iraq? It was, obviously, the classic "over-determined" decision, a tangle of fear, in the form of those infamous weapons of mass destruction; of imperial ambition, in the form of the neoconservative project to "remake the Middle East"; and of realpolitik, in the form of the "vital interest" of securing the industrial world's oil supplies.

In the beginning, though, was the felt need on the part of our nation's leaders, men and women so worshipful of the idea of power and its ability to remake reality itself, to restore the nation's prestige, to wipe clean that dirtied face. Henry Kissinger, a confidant of the President, when asked by Bush's speechwriter why he had supported the Iraq War, responded: "Because Afghanistan was not enough." The radical Islamists, he said, want to humiliate us. "And we need to humiliate them." In other words, the presiding image of The War on Terror -- the burning towers collapsing on the television screen -- had to be supplanted by another, the image of American tanks rumbling proudly through a vanquished Arab capital. It is no accident that Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, at the first "war cabinet" meeting at Camp David the Saturday after the 9/11 attacks, fretted over the "lack of targets" in Afghanistan and wondered whether we "shouldn't do Iraq first." He wanted to see those advancing tanks marching across our television screens, and soon.

In the end, of course, the enemy preferred not to fight with tanks, though they were perfectly happy to have us do so, the better to destroy these multi-million dollar anachronisms with so-called IEDs, improvised explosive devices, worth a few hundred bucks apiece. This is called asymmetrical warfare and one should note here with some astonishment how successful it has been these last half dozen years. In the post-Cold War world, after all, as one neo-conservative theorist explained shortly after 9/11, the United States was enjoying a rare "uni-polar moment." It deployed the greatest military and economic power the world has ever seen. It spent more on its weapons, its Army, Navy, and Air Force, than the rest of the world combined.

It was the assumption of this so-called preponderance that lay behind the philosophy of power enunciated by Bush's Brain and that led to an attitude toward international law and alliances that is, in my view, quite unprecedented in American history. That radical attitude is brilliantly encapsulated in a single sentence drawn from the National Security Strategy of the United States of 2003: "Our strength as a nation-state will continue to be challenged by those who employ a strategy of the weak using international fora, judicial processes and terrorism." Let me repeat that little troika of "weapons of the weak": international fora (meaning the United Nations and like institutions), judicial processes (meaning courts, domestic and international), and.... terrorism. This strange gathering, put forward by the government of the United States, stems from the idea that power is, in fact, everything. In such a world, courts -- indeed, law itself -- can only limit the power of the most powerful state. Wielding preponderant power, what need has it for law? The latter must be, by definition, a weapon of the weak. The most powerful state, after all, makes reality.

Asymmetric Warfare and Dumb Luck

Now, here's an astonishing fact: Fewer than half a dozen years into this "uni-polar moment," the greatest military power in the history of the world stands on the brink of defeat in Iraq. Its vastly expensive and all-powerful military has been humbled by a congeries of secret organizations fighting mainly by means of suicide vests, car bombs and improvised explosive devices -- all of them cheap, simple, and effective, indeed so effective that these techniques now comprise a kind of ready-made insurgency kit freely available on the Internet and spreading in popularity around the world, most obviously to Afghanistan, that land of few targets.

As I stand here, one of our two major political parties advocates the withdrawal -- gradual, or otherwise -- of American combat forces from Iraq and many in the other party are feeling the increasing urge to go along. As for the Bush administration's broader War on Terror, as the State Department detailed recently in its annual report on the subject, the number of terrorist attacks worldwide has never been higher, nor more effective. True, al-Qaeda has not attacked again within the United States. They do not need to. They are alive and flourishing. Indeed, it might even be said that they are winning. For their goal, despite the rhetoric of the Bush administration, was not simply to kill Americans but, by challenging the United States in this spectacular fashion, to recruit great numbers to their cause and to move their insurgency into the heart of the Middle East. And all these things they have done.

How could such a thing have happened? In their choice of enemy, one might say that the terrorists of al-Qaeda had a great deal of dumb luck, for they attacked a country run by an administration that had a radical conception of the potency of power. At the heart of the principle of asymmetric warfare -- al-Qaeda's kind of warfare -- is the notion of using your opponents' power against him. How does a small group of insurgents without an army, or even heavy weapons, defeat the greatest conventional military force the world has ever known? How do you defeat such an army if you don't have an army? Well, you borrow your enemy's. And this is precisely what al-Qaeda did. Using the classic strategy of provocation, the group tried to tempt the superpower into its adopted homeland. The original strategy behind the 9/11 attacks -- apart from humbling the superpower and creating the greatest recruiting poster the world had ever seen -- was to lure the United States into a ground war in Afghanistan, where the one remaining superpower (like the Soviet Union before it) was to be trapped, stranded, and destroyed. It was to prepare for this war that Osama bin Laden arranged for the assassination, two days before 9/11 -- via bombs secreted in the video cameras of two terrorists posing as reporters -- of the Afghan Northern Alliance leader, Ahmed Shah Massood, who would have been the United States' most powerful ally.

Well aware of the Soviets' Afghanistan debacle -- after all, the U.S. had supplied most of the weapons that defeated the Soviets there -- the Bush administration tried to avoid a quagmire by sending plenty of air support, lots of cash, and, most important, very few troops, relying instead on its Afghan allies. But if bin Laden was disappointed in this, he would soon have a far more valuable gift: the invasion of Iraq, a country that, unlike Afghanistan, was at the heart of the Middle East and central to Arab concerns, and, what's more, a nation that sat squarely on the critical Sunni-Shia divide, a potential ignition switch for al-Qaeda's great dream of a regional civil war. It is on that precipice that we find ourselves teetering today.

Critical to this strange and unlikely history were the administration's peculiar ideas about power and its relation to reality -- and beneath that a familiar imperial attitude, if put forward in a strikingly crude and harsh form: "We're an empire now and when we act we create our own reality." Power, untrammeled by law or custom; power, unlimited by the so-called weapons of the weak, be they international institutions, courts, or terrorism -- power can remake reality. It is no accident that one of Karl Rove's heroes is President William McKinley, who stood at the apex of America's first imperial moment, and led the country into a glorious colonial adventure in the Philippines that was also meant to be the military equivalent of a stroll in the park and that, in the event, led to several years of bloody insurgency -- an insurgency, it bears noticing, that was only finally put down with the help of the extensive use of torture, most notably water-boarding, which has made its reappearance in the imperial battles of our own times.

If we are an empire now, as Mr. Rove says, perhaps we should add, as he might not, that we are also a democracy, and therein, Rhetoric graduates of 2007, lies the rub. A democratic empire, as even the Athenians discovered, is an odd beast, like one of those mythological creatures born equally of lion and bird, or man and horse. If one longs to invade Iraq to restore the empire's prestige, one must convince the democracy's people of the necessity of such a step. Herein lies the pathos of the famous weapons-of-mass-destruction issue, which has become a kind of synecdoche for the entire lying mess of the past few years. The center stage of our public life is now dominated by a simple melodrama: Bush wanted to invade Iraq; Bush told Americans that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction; Iraq did not have such weapons. Therefore Bush lied, and the war was born of lies and deception.

I hesitate to use that most overused of rhetorical terms -- irony -- to describe the emergence of this narrative at the center of our national life, but nonetheless, and with apologies: It is ironic. The fact is that officials of the Bush administration did believe there were weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, though they vastly exaggerated the evidence they had to prove it and, even more, the threat that those weapons might have posed, had they been there. In doing this, the officials believed themselves to be "framing a guilty man"; that is, like cops planting a bit of evidence in the murderer's car, they believed their underlying case was true; they just needed to dramatize it a bit to make it clear and convincing to the public. What matter, once the tanks were rumbling through Baghdad and the war was won? Weapons would be found, surely; and if only a few were found, who would care? By then, the United States military would have created a new reality.

I have often had a daydream about this. I see a solitary Army private -- a cook perhaps, or a quartermaster -- breaking the padlock on some forgotten warehouse on an Iraqi military base, poking about and finding a few hundred, even a few thousand, old artillery shells, leaking chemicals. These shells -- forgotten, unusable -- might have dated from the time of the first Gulf War, when Iraq unquestionably possessed chemical munitions. (Indeed, in the 1980s, the United States had supplied targeting intelligence that helped the Iraqis use them effectively against the Iranians.) And though now they had been forgotten, leaking, unusable, still they would indeed be weapons of mass destruction -- to use the misleading and absurd construction that has headlined our age -- and my solitary cook or quartermaster would be a hero, for he would have, all unwittingly, "proved" the case.

My daydream could easily have come to pass. Why not? It is nigh unto miraculous that the Iraqi regime, even with the help of the United Nations, managed so thoroughly to destroy or remove its once existing stockpile. And if my private had found those leaky old shells what would have been changed thereby? Yes, the administration could have pointed to them in triumph and trumpeted the proven character of Saddam's threat. So much less embarrassing than the "weapons of mass destruction program related activities" that the administration still doggedly asserts were "discovered." But, in fact, the underlying calculus would have remained: that, in the months leading up to the war, the administration relentlessly exaggerated the threat Saddam posed to the United States and relentlessly understated the risk the United States would run in invading and occupying Iraq. And it would have remained true and incontestable that -- as the quaintly fact-bound British Foreign Secretary put it eight months before the war, in a secret British cabinet meeting made famous by the so-called Downing Street Memo -- "the case [for attacking Iraq] was thin. Saddam was not threatening his neighbors and his WMD capability was less than that of Libya, North Korea or Iran."

Which is to say, the weapons were a rhetorical prop and, satisfying as it has been to see the administration beaten about the head with that prop, we forget this underlying fact at our peril. The issue was never whether the weapons were there or not; indeed, had the weapons really been the issue, why could the administration not let the UN inspectors take the time to find them (as, of course, they never would have)? The administration needed, wanted, had to have, the Iraq war. The weapons were but a symbol, the necessary casus belli, what Hitchcock called the Maguffin -- that glowing mysterious object in the suitcase in Quentin Tarantino's Pulp Fiction: that is, a satisfyingly concrete object on which to fasten a rhetorical or narrative end, in this case a war to restore American prestige, project its power, remake the Middle East.

The famous weapons were chosen to play this leading role for "bureaucratic reasons," as Paul Wolfowitz, then Deputy Secretary of Defense and until quite recently the unhappy president of the World Bank, once remarked to a lucky journalist. Had a handful of those weapons been found, the underlying truth would have remained: Saddam posed nowhere remotely near the threat to the United States that would have justified running the enormous metaphysical risk that a war of choice with Iraq posed. Of course, when you are focused on magical phrases like "preponderant power" and "the uni-polar moment," matters like numbers of troops at your disposal -- and the simple fact that the United States had too few to sustain a long-term occupation of a country the size of Iraq -- must seem mundane indeed.

Imperial Words and the Reality-Based Universe

I must apologize to you, Rhetoric Class of 2007. Ineluctably, uncontrollably, I find myself slipping back into the dull and unimaginative language of the reality-based community. It must grate a bit on your ears. After all, we live in a world in which the presumption that we were misled into war, that the Bush officials knew there were no weapons and touted them anyway, has supplanted the glowing, magical image of the weapons themselves. It is a presumption of great use to those regretful souls who once backed the war so fervently, not least a number of Democratic politicians we all could name, as well as many of my friends in the so-called liberal punditocracy who now need a suitable excuse for their own rashness, gullibility, and stupidity. For this, Bush's mendacity seems perfectly sized and ready to hand.

There is, however, full enough of that mendacity, without artificially adding to the stockpile. Indeed, all around us we've been hearing these last many months the sound of ice breaking, as the accumulated frozen scandals of this administration slowly crack open to reveal their queasy secrets. And yet the problem, of course, is that they are not secrets at all: One of the most painful principles of our age is that scandals are doomed to be revealed -- and to remain stinking there before us, unexcised, unpunished, unfinished.

If this Age of Rhetoric has a tragic symbol, then surely this is it: the frozen scandal, doomed to be revealed, and revealed, and revealed, in a never-ending torture familiar to the rock-bound Prometheus and his poor half-eaten liver. A full three years ago, the photographs from Abu Ghraib were broadcast by CBS on Sixty Minutes II and published by Seymour Hersh in The New Yorker; nearly as far back I wrote a book entitled Torture and Truth, made up largely of Bush administration documents that detailed the decision to use "extreme interrogation techniques" or -- in the First President of Rhetoric's phrase -- "an alternative set of procedures" on prisoners in the War on Terror.

He used this phrase last September in a White House speech kicking off the 2006 midterm election campaign, at a time when accusing the Democrats of evidencing a continued softness on terror -- and a lamentable unwillingness to show the needed harshness in "interrogating terrorists" -- seemed a winning electoral strategy. And indeed Democrats seemed fully to agree, for they warily elected not to filibuster the Military Commissions Act of last October, which arguably made many of these "alternative sets of procedures" explicitly legal. And Democrats did win both houses of Congress, a victory perhaps owed in part to their refusal to block Bush's interrogation law. Who can say? What we can say is that if torture today remains a "scandal," a "crisis," it is a crisis in that same peculiar way that crime or AIDS or global warming are crises: that is, they are all things we have learned to live with.

Perhaps the commencement address to the Department of Rhetoric at the University of California at Berkeley is not the worst of places to call for a halt to this spinning merry-go-round. I know it will brand me forever a member of the reality-based community if I suggest that the one invaluable service the new Democratic Congress can provide all Americans is a clear accounting of how we came to find ourselves in this present time of war: an authorized version, as it were, which is, I know, the most pathetically retrograde of ideas.

This would require that people like Mr. Wolfowitz, Mr. Rumsfeld, and many others be called before a select, bipartisan committee of Congress to tell us what, in their view, really happened. I squirm with embarrassment putting forward such a pathetically unsophisticated notion, but failing at least the minimally authorized version that Congress could provide, we will find ourselves forever striving -- by chasing down byways like the revelation of the identity of Valerie Plame, or the question of whether or not George Tenet bolstered his slam dunk exclamation in the Oval Office with an accompanying Michael Jordan-like leap -- to understand how precisely decisions were made between September 11, 2001 and the invasion of Iraq eighteen months later.

Don't worry, though, Rhetoric graduates: such a proposal has about it the dusty feel of past decades; it is as "reality-based" as can be and we are unlikely to see it in our time. What we are likely to see is the ongoing collapse of our first Rhetoric-Major President, who, with fewer than one American in three now willing to say they approve of the job he is doing, is seeing his power ebb by the day. Tempting as it is, I will urge you not to draw too many overarching conclusions from his fate. He has had, after all, a very long run -- and I say this with the wonder that perhaps can only come from having covered both the 2000 and 2004 election campaigns, from Florida, and the Iraq War.

I last visited that war in December, when Baghdad was cold and grey and I spent a good deal of time drawing black X's through the sources listed in my address book, finding them, one after another, either departed or dead. Baghdad seemed a sad and empty place, with even its customary traffic jams gone, and the periodic, resonating explosions attracting barely glances from those few Iraqis to be found on the streets.

How, in these "words in a time of war," can I convey to you the reality of that place at this time? Let me read to you a bit of an account from a young Iraqi woman of how that war has touched her and her family, drawn from a newsroom blog. The words may be terrible and hard to bear, but -- for those of you who have made such a determined effort to learn to read and understand -- this is the most reality I could find to tell you. This is what lies behind the headlines and the news reports and it is as it is.

"We were asked to send the next of kin to whom the remains of my nephew, killed on Monday in a horrific explosion downtown, can be handed over...

"So we went, his mum, his other aunt and I...

"When we got there, we were given his remains. And remains they were. From the waist down was all they could give us. ‘We identified him by the cell phone in his pants' pocket. If you want the rest, you will just have to look for yourselves. We don't know what he looks like.'

"…We were led away, and before long a foul stench clogged my nose and I retched. With no more warning we came to a clearing that was probably an inside garden at one time; all round it were patios and rooms with large-pane windows to catch the evening breeze Baghdad is renowned for. But now it had become a slaughterhouse, only instead of cattle, all around were human bodies. On this side; complete bodies; on that side halves; and everywhere body parts.

"We were asked what we were looking for; ‘upper half' replied my companion, for I was rendered speechless. ‘Over there.' We looked for our boy's broken body between tens of other boys' remains; with our bare hands sifting them and turning them.

"Millennia later we found him, took both parts home, and began the mourning ceremony."

The foregoing were words from an Iraqi family, who find themselves as far as they can possibly be from the idea that, when they act, they create their own reality -- that they are, as Bush's Brain put it, "history's actors." The voices you heard come from history's objects and we must ponder who the subjects are, who exactly is acting upon them.

The car bomb that so changed their lives was not set by Americans; indeed, young Americans even now are dying to prevent such things. I have known a few of these young Americans. Perhaps you have as well, perhaps they are in the circles of your family or of your friends. I remember one of them, a young lieutenant, a beautiful young man with a puffy, sleepy face, looking at me when I asked whether or not he was scared when he went out on patrol -- this was October 2003, as the insurgency was exploding. I remember him smiling a moment and then saying with evident pity for a reporter's lack of understanding. "This is war. We shoot, they shoot. We shoot, they shoot. Some days they shoot better than we do." He was patient in his answer, smiling sleepily in his young beauty, and I could tell he regarded me as from another world, a man who could never understand the world in which he lived. Three days after our interview, an explosion near Fallujah killed him.

Contingency, accidents, the metaphysical ironies that seem to stitch history together like a lopsided quilt -- all these have no place in the imperial vision. A perception of one's self as "history's actor" leaves no place for them. But they exist and it is invariably others, closer to the ground, who see them, know them, and suffer their consequences.

You have chosen a path that will let you look beyond the rhetoric that you have studied and into the heart of those consequences. Of all people you have chosen to learn how to see the gaps and the loose stitches and the remnant threads. Ours is a grim age, this Age of Rhetoric, still infused with the remnant perfume of imperial dreams. You have made your study in a propitious time, oh graduates, and that bold choice may well bring you pain, for you have devoted yourselves to seeing what it is that stands before you. If clear sight were not so painful, many more would elect to have it. Today, you do not conclude but begin: today you commence. My blessings upon you, and my gratitude to you for training yourself to see. Reality, it seems, has caught up with you.

Mark Danner, who has written about foreign affairs and politics for two decades, is the author of The Secret Way to War; Torture and Truth; and The Massacre at El Mozote, among other books. He is Professor of Journalism at the University of California at Berkeley and Henry R. Luce Professor at Bard College. His writing on Iraq and other subjects appear regularly in The New York Review of Books. His work is archived at MarkDanner.com.