June 2009

UPDATE 7/5/09
Posted at GreenPartyWatch.orgThis breaking news comes via David Josue, a close associate and supporter of Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney: Editor’s notes in italics.

Mairead (Mairead Maguire, winner of a Noble Peace Prize for her work in Northern Ireland) called me(David Josue) and told me that Cynthia and the others were removed from the cells (an Israeli prison cellblock in Ramle) and sent to the airport. I called the American embassy in Tel Aviv to inform them. They did not even know about the transfer. I just spoke with the duty officer and he confirmed that they are at the airport and the embassy sent someone to talk to them. I don’t know the flight arrangement yet. It looks like they will enter via Boston, but this is not confirmed yet. I sent emails to Brent,(Brent McMillan, Green Party Political Director) Scott (Scott McClarty, Green Party Media Coordinator) and Sanda (Sanda Everett, Green Party national co-chair, California) in the west co(ast)

IT IS NOT OVER UNTIL SHE IS AT HOME IN DC.

Original story and previous update at Read More

Court won’t hear Sept. 11 claims vs. Saudi Arabia
June 29, 2009
News.Yahoon.com
WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court has refused to allow victims of the Sept.
11 attacks to pursue lawsuits against Saudi Arabia and four of its princes over
charitable donations that were allegedly funneled to al-Qaida.
The court, in an order Monday, is leaving in place the ruling of a federal
appeals court that the country and the princes are protected by sovereign immunity,
which generally means that foreign countries can’t be sued in American courts.
The Obama administration had angered some victims and families by urging the
justices to pass up the case.
In their appeal, the more than 6,000 plaintiffs said the government’s court
brief filed in early June was an “apparent effort to appease a sometime
ally” just before President Barack Obama’s visit to Saudi Arabia.

On Wednesday, June 24, 2009, the New York City Coalition for Accountability Now
filed a petition containing 52,000 signatures calling for a referendum on the
creation of a New York City independent commission to investigate the events of
September 11, 2001.
9/11 Family Members Maureen Hunt and Manny Badillo, and First Responders Charlie
Giles of the Feal Good Foundation and Bill Gleason of the World Trade Center
Rescuers Foundation arrived at the City Clerk’s office to deliver the
petition and speak on behalf of all the proud and concerned citizens who deserve
an unbiased, nonpolitical investigation of the tragedy that has affected us
so deeply.
Thank you for getting us this far! City Council now has until August 24 to
approve the placement of the referendum on the November 3 ballot. As hundreds
more 9/11 family members, first responders and survivors join NYC CAN’s
campaign for a new investigation, lobbying their council members to support
the petition, our chances grow.

by Prof. Peter Dale Scott
June 10, 2009
GlobalResearch.ca
In his remarkable speech at Cairo University on June 4, President Obama promised
“a new beginning.” In the words of the Israeli commentator Uri Avnery,
the speech offered “the map of a new world, a different world, whose values
and laws he spelled out in simple and clear language — a mixture of idealism
and practical politics, vision and pragmatism.”1
Much of what Obama had to say was new, and warmed the hearts of observers like
myself, who had become increasingly concerned about the new president’s
fidelity to the financial and military policies of the previous Bush-Cheney
administration. But while Obama broke new ground on Israel-Palestine issues,
he glossed over troubling issues pertaining to the US presence in Iraq and Afghanistan.
He also glossed over one of the fundamental issues alienating the Muslim world:
America’s relentless efforts to preserve its threatened financial status
by moves to dominate the region’s oil resources. Here his careful ambiguity
was ominously reminiscent of the Bush era.
The speech reaffirmed a complete withdrawal of US forces from Iraq by 2012,
as the U.S. committed itself to do in a signed agreement last December. In addition
Obama asserted that “we do not want to keep our troops in Afghanistan…
We would gladly bring every single one of our troops home if we could be confident
that there were not violent extremists in Afghanistan and now Pakistan.”
But Obama’s remarks did not address the statement on May 26, 2009, by
Gen. George Casey, Army chief of staff, that, despite the agreement with Iraq,
the United States would continue to have fighting forces in Iraq and Afghanistan
beyond 2012. The reality, Casey said, is that “we’re going
to have 10 Army and Marine units deployed for a decade in Iraq and Afghanistan.”2
Nor is it clear that Obama’s promise to withdraw “troops”
from Iraq would also cover private military contractors (PMCs) . Jeremy Scahill,
author of a book on the notorious firm Blackwater, said on the Bill Moyers show
that what we’re seeing in the Cairo speech “is sort of old wine in a new
bottle. Obama is sending one message to the world,” he told Moyers, “but
the reality on the ground, particularly when it comes to private military contractors,
is that the status quo remains from the Bush era.”3

Friday, June 26, 2009
By Dafna Linzer and Peter Finn
ProPublica and Washington Post Staff Writer
The Obama administration, fearing a battle with Congress that could stall plans
to close Guantanamo, has drafted an executive order that would reassert presidential
authority to incarcerate terrorism suspects indefinitely, according to three
senior government officials with knowledge of White House deliberations.
Such an order would embrace claims by former president George W. Bush that
certain people can be detained without trial for long periods under the laws
of war. Obama advisers are concerned that bypassing Congress could place the
president on weaker footing before the courts and anger key supporters, the
officials said.
After months of internal debate over how to close the U.S. military prison
at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, White House officials are growing increasingly worried
that reaching quick agreement with Congress on a new detention system may prove
impossible. Several officials said there is concern in the White House that
the administration may not be able to close the facility by the president’s
January deadline.
White House spokesman Ben LaBolt did not directly respond to questions about
an executive order but said the administration would address the cases of Guantanamo
detainees in a manner “consistent with the national security interests
of the United States and the interests of justice.”