Wednesday, February 26, 2003

THE BOTTOM LINE QUOTE OF THE DAY "By God, we've kicked the Viet Nam Syndrome once and for all!" - - George H. Bush (1991) RHINO HERE: TODAY is the Virtual March On Washington, organized by: http://www.moveon.org and http://www.winwithoutwarus.org/ Call your Senators & call the Senate Leadership & tell them where you stand. And if you dare, call the shrub house & give him what for too. But the organizers ask we be polite since the people manning the phones will have a very full day. Also part of the effort is a TV ad featuring the acting President Of The U.S. Martin Sheen stating: "Our message to Washington will be clear, 'Don't invade Iraq. We can contain Saddam Hussein without killing innocent people, diverting us from the war on terrorism and putting us all at risk'." The White House - 202-456-1414 or 202-456-1111 Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist - 202-224-3344 Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle - 202-224-2321 Senate Majority Whip Mitch McConnell - 202-224-2541 Senate Minority Whip Harry Reid - 202-224-3542 TONIGHT ON 60 MINUTES II- Rather Interviews Saddam who offers to debate the shrub "Iraqi people are not the enemy of the American people. If the American people want to know more through dialogue through television screens, I am ready to dialogue with Bush." - - Saddam Hussein 60 Minutes II on Wednesday, 9 p.m. EST, 8 pm CT., Saddam answers key questions about what his actions might be in the event of a U.S . led war against Iraq. The interview with Rather was Saddam's first with an American journalist in about a decade. For an update on the push pull action at the U.N. as of Tuesday night, check out: "Blix Says Iraq Signals New Cooperation" Tue Feb 25, 6:40 PM ET, Associated Press Writer UNITED NATIONS - Iraq is providing new information about its weapons and has reported the discovery of two bombs, including one possibly filled with a biological agent - moves that the chief U.N. weapons inspector said Tuesday signal real cooperation... New Cooperation Rhino calls your attention today to 2 articles, written by two very different men, with 2 very different outlooks. The first is written by Scott McConnell, executive editor of The American Conservative magazine and it is the Cover Story for that magazine this month. He provides a background on the group of men he says have been pushing an agenda he calls neo-imperialism. In spite of his conservative bent, he's against the impending war. An informative and thought provoking read. The second piece, THE BOTTOM LINE today, is written by a man for whom I have a lot of both sympathy & respect. He is José Ramos-Horta, East Timor's Minister of Foreign Affairs & Cooperation. Ramos-Horta shared the Nobel Peace Prize in 1996 for his leadership of East Timor through their nightmare period when the Indonesian Army, largely funded by the U.S., was wreaking havoc on his people while the rest of the world looked the other way. His article from yesterday's NY Times causes me to step back & consider my positions anew. Is force of arms necessary in some situations even considering collateral damage? Is Iraq a case in point? How much collateral damage is acceptable? Given the first article by McConnell, can we believe that shrub or his string pullers could care less about the Iraqi people? 10:59:24 AM    comment

"The Madness of Empire The War Party's Militarized Strategy Will Unite The World Against Us" The American Conservative, Cover Story, 2/24/03, By Scott McConnell, Executive Editor Recently the novelist John le Carré wrote in the Times of London that the United States has entered a "period of madness" that dwarfs McCarthyism or the Vietnam intervention in intensity. One generally would not pay much attention to the cynical British spy-tale weaver, never especially friendly to America. But concern about America's mental health is more broadly in the air, spreading well beyond the usual professional anti-Americans. It is now pervasive in Europe, and growing in Asia, and when Matt Drudge posted le Carré's piece prominently on his website, it got passed around and talked about here in ways it never would have five years ago. The proximate cause of le Carré's diagnosis is Washington's plan for a pre-emptive war against Iraq, a nation whose weapons pose no threat to the United States and that has no substantial links to al-Qaeda or 9/11. The U.S. would fight this war virtually without allies, though a few countries might be dragged into the fray against the will of their populations. But mad or not, this drive toward war is not mania of sudden onset but ratification of a neo-imperialist strategy that has been germinating in neoconservative circles since the end of the Cold War. THE ENTIRE ARTICLE IS POSTED AT: http://www.amconmag.com/02_24_03/cover.html 10:45:54 AM    comment

War for Peace? It Worked in My Country THE BOTTOM LINE NY Times, 2/25/03, By Jose Ramos-Horta ILI, East Timor - I often find myself counting how many of us are left in this world. One recent morning my two surviving brothers and I had coffee together. And I found myself counting again. We were seven brothers and five sisters, another large family in this tiny Catholic country. One brother died when he was a baby. Antonio, our oldest brother, died in 1992 of lack of medical care. Three other siblings were murdered in our country's long conflict with Indonesia. One, a younger sister, Maria Ortencia, died on Dec. 19, 1978, killed by a rocket fired from a OV-10 Bronco aircraft, which the United States had sold to Indonesia. She was buried on a majestic mountaintop and her grave was tended by the humble people of the area for 20 years. Early in September of last year, I went through the heart-wrenching process of unearthing the improvised grave of our sister, whom I last saw when she was 18. As her body was exhumed, I noticed that the back of her head and one side of her face had been blown off. She must have died instantly. We reburied our sister in the cemetery in the capital, Dili. Two other siblings who were killed, our brothers Nuno and Guilherme, were executed by Indonesian soldiers in 1977. With little information on the area where they were killed and disposed of, we have no hope of recovering their bodies for a dignified burial. There is hardly a family in my country that has not lost a loved one. Many families were entirely wiped out during the decades of occupation by Indonesia and the war of resistance against it. The United States and other Western nations contributed to this tragedy. Some bear a direct responsibility because they helped Indonesia by providing military aid. Others were accomplices through indifference and silence. But all redeemed themselves. In 1999, a global peacekeeping force helped East Timor secure its independence and protect its people. It is now a free nation... THE ENTIRE ARTICLE IS POSTED AT: http://www.nytimes.com/2003/02/25/opinion/25HORT.html?th "RHINO'S BLOG" is the responsibility of Gary Rhine. (rhino@kifaru.com) Feedback, and requests to be added or deleted from the list are encouraged. SEARCH BLOG ARCHIVES / SURF RHINO'S LINKS, AT: http://www.rhinosblog.info RHINO'S OTHER WEB SITES: http://www.dreamcatchers.org (INDIGENOUS ASSISTANCE & INTERCULTURAL DIALOG) http://www.kifaru.com (NATIVE AMERICAN RELATIONS VIDEO DOCUMENTARIES) Articles are reprinted under Fair Use Doctrine of international copyright law. http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.html All copyrights belong to original publisher. 10:36:56 AM    comment

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