MEDIA ROOTS – Upon returning home from his second tour in Afghanistan, Lt. Colonel Daniel L. Davis unloaded several truths that exposed continued deception by multiple senior military officials.  The 17-year Army veteran describes, in an 84-page “open-source” report, an increasingly bleak reality for soldiers while chronicling specific episodes of personal gain from top military leaders.

“No one expects our leaders to always have a successful plan,” he explains in a recent summary of the report in Armed Forces Journal.  “But we do expect – and the men who do the living, fighting, and dying deserve – to have our leaders tell the truth about what’s going on.”

Prior to informing his chain of command, Davis met with six members of Congress and a New York Times reporter, to submit two documents – one classified and one not – to the Pentagon for internal review.  However, upon learning that there would be a delay in the release of the unclassified report, Davis decided to go public last week in the nation’s premier independent military periodical.  “How many more men must die in support of a mission that is not succeeding?”

The next day, the Times covered the story, but only to appear backpaged on A13.  Then, last Friday, Rolling Stone released it in an article written by Michael Hastings, the journalist that wrote the bombshell article that lead to General McChrystal’s premature retirement in 2010.

With specific evidence of industry actually impeding military development, hundreds of billions of dollars being wasted, and virtually no accountability of top decision-makers, some generals continue to deceive Congress and the U.S. people.  But with the ongoing expenditure of “blood, limbs, and lives of tens of thousands” of service members and only small gains for the country, “deception reach[ed] an intolerable low,” Davis writes. “If the public had access to these classified reports they would see the dramatic gulf between what is often said in public by our senior leaders and what is actually true behind the scenes.”

While assigned to the Future Combat Systems (FCS) organization in Fort Bliss, Texas, Davis discovered that deception was not isolated to one base or division but had become Army-wide.  Starting in 1999 and lasting nearly a decade, the FCS organization cost nearly $20 billion dollars of taxpayer monies.  Despite the Government Accountability Office documenting consistently significant problems with the agency, senior leaders routinely downplayed failures and often gave the impression of success to Congress.  To date, none of these officials involved in these deceptions have been held accountable.  Instead, one proponent, Major General Charles Cartwright, was promoted Vice President of Advanced Programs at Raytheon upon retirement.  Raytheon was a primary supplier of the FCS blunder that was eventually canceled by the Defense Secretary.

The report also offers an extensive review of the 2007 Iraqi troop surge and the misplaced credit given to CIA Director General Patreaus.  Several perspectives of the surge are featured that mention how, prior to the surge, the Iraqi Sunni community had already decided to revolt against their Al-Qaeda allies.  This shifted momentum and left some Iraqi officials perplexed at why the U.S. was sending additional battalions after they had specifically requested that U.S. troops stay on the bases outside of conflict areas.

The allegations make a clear distinction between criticism for military officials and the presumed naivety of the President and Congress.  According to Obama’s Wars by Bob Woodward, the Commander-in-Chief asked many difficult questions prior to ordering the 30,000-troop surge in Afghanistan that ultimately failed.  Obama was still in his first year of the presidency, had no personal military history, and was outnumbered in opinion by senior security advisors.  Additionally, several misleading testimonies from top brass are provided, with context and factual disparity, that exemplify the rampant deceit offered to Congress and major media outlets.

The report goes on to suggest several areas where the U.S. has lost credibility.  Davis cites how many mid-grade officers are now retiring early within the Army, due to increased disenfranchisement, and warns of a future military with dwindling respect for the chains of command.  Also, as Congress continues to remain unaware of some classified intelligence, several defense contractors are able to study such material at their convenience.  Davis recommends a bipartisan Congressional investigation of all the leaders involved to respond to these allegations, under oath.

When questioned why he felt compelled to come out with these accusations despite the fact he was going to be flamed by Army brass, Davis replied, “I believe that with knowledge comes responsibility; I knew too much to remain silent.”

Oskar Mosquito is a veteran of the U.S. Army and a producer at truth-march.

Picture provided by Flickr user hectorir

MEDIA ROOTS — Capitalism Is The Crisis: Radical Politics in the Age of Austerity is a film featuring a diverse array of thinkers offering common sense analysis of the trappings of modern life and critical perspectives on basic assumptions of capitalism and democracy.  The film presents original interviews, including Chris Hedges, David Graeber, Derrick Jensen, Michael Hardt, Leo Panitch, David McNally.

The movie is about waking up our neighbours to the glaring ills plaguing our society. It argues that capitalism is the crisis and dares us to imagine saner alternatives.

“The way to make money is to buy when blood is running in the streets.”  —John D. Rockefeller, American oil magnate, robber baron

“The engines of corporatists cannot be halted.  They are impervious to the will of those who they exploit, they are more powerful than the governments they control, and they have built within them an inevitable, kind of, mechanism for self-annihilation because corporations have this strange pathology where they turn everything into a commodity.  Human beings become commodities.  The natural world becomes a commodity.  And you exploit these commodities until exhaustion or collapse.  And that’s precisely what’s happening.” —Chris Hedges

Messina

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Capitalism is the Crisis

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CAPITALISM IS THE CRISIS — The 2008 “financial crisis” in the United States was a systemic fraud in which the wealthy finance capitalists stole trillions of public dollars. No one was jailed for this crime, the largest theft of public money in history.

Instead, the rich forced working people across the globe to pay for their “crisis” through punitive “austerity” programs that gutted public services and repealed workers’ rights.

Austerity was named “Word of the Year” for 2010.

This documentary explains the nature of capitalist crisis, visits the protests against austerity measures, and recommends revolutionary paths for the future.

Special attention is devoted to the crisis in Greece, the 2010 G20 Summit protest in Toronto, Canada, and the remarkable surge of solidarity in Madison, Wisconsin.

It may be their crisis, but it’s our problem.

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Photo by flickr user JHS

MEDIA ROOTS — Film director Michael Winterbottom has adapted best-selling author Naomi Klein’s book Shock Doctrine in an excellent feature documentary.  Winterbottom, who has directed such films as Welcome to Sarajevo, The Road to Guantanamo and Code 46, produces a compelling treatment of Klein’s book.

The shock doctrine thesis maintains elites have taken draconian shock therapy ‘treatments’ (inflicted upon individual psychiatric patients during the 20^th century) and applied them economically, politically, and psychologically to nations where leaders have exploited crises in order to push through elite policies against the interests of the people.  

The film also takes a look at U.S. imperialism and its consequences for humanity.  If you haven’t heard of it, it’d be no surprise.  This is not the kind of film corporate America loves to promote.

Messina

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The Shock Doctrine directed by Michael Winterbottom

“The thesis of the shock doctrine is that we’ve been sold a fairy tale about how these radical policies have swept the globe, that they haven’t swept the globe on the backs of freedom and democracy, that they have needed shock.  They have needed crises.  They have needed states of emergencies. 

“Milton Friedman understood the utility of crisis.  ‘Only a crisis, actual or perceived, produces real change.  When that crisis occurs, the actions that are taken depend on the ideas that are lying around.’” —Naomi Klein

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Photo by Flickr user david_shankbone

MEDIA ROOTS — On January 28th, 2012, Occupy Oakland moved to take a vacant building to use as a social centre and a new place to continue organising.  This is the story of what really happened that day as told by the participants.  The video features raw footage of police brutality and interviews with Boots Riley, David Graeber, Maria Lewis, along with several other witnesses to the events.

MR

The Battle of Oakland by Brandon Jourdan

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Photo by Abby Martin

MEDIA ROOTS — As U.S. imperialism abroad goes unchecked, Federalised police platoons are cracking down on political dissent at home.  The militarization of local police consists of hundreds of cops in riot gear from multiple forces, aerial support for coordinated assaults, plans for launching surveillance drones against dissenting demonstrators, police brutality, unwarranted methods of crowd control, kettles and mass arrests.  Facial recognition methods seem to be utilised by police to target particular protesters labelled as persons of interest, as done in the U.K. during the recent Tottenham uprisings.

Berkeley Copwatch discusses the continuing violence led by Oakland Mayor Jean Quan and the OPD, elaborating on who’s really in charge of the increasingly Federalised police operations against Constitutionally-protected peaceful protest.

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FLASHPOINTS — “You’re listening to Flashpoints on Pacifica Radio.  My name is Dennis Bernstein.  This is your daily investigative news magazine.

“We’re going to start off by taking another look at what happened over the weekend in Oakland and the incredibly violent Oakland Police Department, cheered on by Mayor Jean Quan.

“And joining us to begin the discussion is our good friend Andrea Pritchett.  She is the founder of Berkeley Copwatch.  She’s been out there watching those folks in Oakland.

“Andrea, welcome back to Flashpoints.”

Andrea Pritchett (c. 2:02):  “Thanks, Dennis.”

Dennis Bernstein (c. 2:06):  “Well, you were out there.  Tell me a little bit.  Give me your overview, as somebody who’s used to watching and documenting and filming.  I know you did some filming of police actions.”

Andrea Pritchett (c. 2:20):  “Yeah, well, Saturday afternoon it was really quite a celebration.  It seemed like, from the amount of stuff that people were carrying, they were quite prepared to move into a building.  And, so, it was, in fact, Move-In Day. 

“So, with the celebration and that atmosphere going on the first thing that happened was that there was a sound-truck that got jammed up by the police.  They got surrounded and they were being detained.  So, that didn’t bode well for the whole attitude of the Police Department towards the protest. 

“The protest, the march went and surrounded the sound-truck and sort of ‘liberated it’ from that situation.  And the march began.

“But what was real clear, with significant air support from the helicopters above, that the police were determined to stop the march at every turn.  And, so, it happened time and again where we would march down the street and meet a line of cops.  And then the march would try to go a different direction to achieve their objective. 

“And what had been laid down pretty clearly is that [liberal Oakland Mayor] Jean Quan and the police had said, ‘You’re not taking anything. You’re not taking any buildings’ and, apparently, they made a decision to say, ‘by any means necessary, we’re gonna stop you from doing that.’

“Now, theoretically, being in an empty building could possibly constitute trespassing or something.  But the use of force, the decision to use force was made long before the protest.”

Dennis Bernstein (c. 3:50):  “And you’re listening to Flashpoints on Pacifica Radio.  Andrea Pritchett of Copwatch in the studio.

“Lali is on the phone.  She just got out of court.  She’s on the line with us.  She was in the line of these arrests.

“Also, joining us is an activist, very active with Occupy Oakland, Christoph.

“But let me start off with you, Lali.  You just got out of court?”

Lali (c. 4:13):  “I did.  I’m actually, right now, standing in front of the Court House on 7^th and Washington and we just came out.  And I can give you an update on what’s happened.

“As we know, somewhere around 400 people were arrested on Saturday [28 Jan 2012], most of them in the mass arrests when they were trapped into Broadway around 24^th Street in front of the YMCA. 

“And some of those people were cited out through the weekend.  And, for most people, actually, most of these people were held cuffed for up to eight to twelve hours during the actual arrests and were not allowed to use the bathroom.  Many people reported to us that they were forced to urinate on themselves.

“And all of these 400 people, many of them were not even processed 48 hours later.  Basically, they kind of just disappeared into a black hole of the criminal justice system.  Even as of today, there were people that we still weren’t able to find in the system.  And we came to court for the arraignments of those people that they have held in custody and found, at the end of the day today, that they did not file charges on anyone, except four people for felonies and seven people for misdemeanours.  So, out of 400 people on Saturday that were arrested, most of them had been held for days before being cited out.  Some are still being held.  Close to a hundred are still being held.  And out of all of those, the district attorney was only able to file charges on eleven people here today.  And the rest are gonna be, we assume, released tonight at Santa Rita.”

“So, we have a case here of close to 400 people, and this has been happening to us week after week, with a dozen here, a dozen there.  But now we have 400 people who have been held, many of them two, three nights and no charges are being filed, with the exception of eleven of them.

“And the stories that we’re hearing from the conditions that people are being held in are just absolutely terrifying.  There were a number of people who had serious, serious injuries, that were beaten very badly and we were unable to get medical attention for them.  We had people who needed serious medication that they were on, everything from bacterial infections to all kinds of other issues that were denied their medication.

“There were people who reported that when they refused to be interrogated without a lawyer, that they were placed in solitary.  Many, many of the women we spoke to have said that they were forced to take pregnancy tests in open bathrooms with male guards around.

“So, we’re getting all kinds of stories of what people have experienced in the past few days.  And what we need to remember is that these 400 people, with the exception of 11, have been really, brutally punished by the City of Oakland with no kind of criminal basis.  And I think it’s absolutely atrocious and something needs to be done about this.  OPD cannot continue to file these, kind of, bogus, conflated charges, and hold hundreds of people, and a really dangerous situation when the District Attorney is unable to file charges because there’s actually no legal basis.

“There were up to 50 people who were charged with felony burglary for being inside of the YMCA.  Those people all of them are still being held right now, but no charges were filed against them.  None of those charges were filed.”

Dennis Bernstein (c. 7:51):  “So, they are still being held and no charges are filed?”

Lali (c. 8:05):  “We only have eleven people out of those 400 for whom those charges were filed.  And they had to file charges today because their time is up to hold these people on custody.  So, they have to release them.

“I do want to say, though, that we still are a little bit concerned because they still have up to one year to file charges.  And we’ve now had incidences where people were held in jail for several days we came to the situation.  There were no charges filed ten weeks later.  The District Attorney issued warrants.  So, it’s not that we necessarily know we’re clear and the situation is over.  We’re gonna have to continue to monitor it.  But the police did not provide anything that they were able to actually legally file charges for somewhere around 390 of the people.”

MARJORY COHN ON U.S. VIOLENCE ABROAD AND DOMESTIC REPRESSION AT HOME, NDAA, OM

Marjory Cohn (0:00):  “

Dennis Bernstein (0:00):  “

Marjory Cohn (0:00):  “…U.S. drones are flying over Baghdad to protect the largest U.S. Embassy in the world.  And it still houses 11,000 Americans protected by 5,000 mercenaries and Adnan al-Asadi, the acting Iraqi Interior Minister said, ‘Our sky is our sky, not the U.S.A.’s sky.’ 

“So, here we invade Iraq, an unnecessary war, an illegal war, a tragic war that killed untold thousands, tens of thousands, wounded, even more, and then committed war crimes, such as the Haditha massacre.  There were other massacres, such as in Fallujah, a number of them. 

“And then the Iraqi’s see that there’s no accountability for what happened.”

Dennis Bernstein (0:00):  “Amazing.”

Marjory Cohn (c. 54:11):  “And, of course, this makes people in other countries resent us even more, this and the torture.  And then we wonder why people would want to do us harm.

“By the way, I should say, Dennis, the 24 victims of the Haditha massacre are buried in a cemetery in Iraq, it’s called Martyrs Graveyard.  And there’s graffiti on the deserted house of one of the families.  And it reads:  ‘Democracy Assassinated the Family That Was Here.’

ON THE NDAA (S.1867) AND THE RIGHT TO DISSENT IN THE U.S.
Dennis Bernstein (c. 54:41):  “Wow.  Let me tell people:  You’re listening to Marjory Cohn.  She is a Professor at Thomas Jefferson School of Law, a former President of the National Lawyers Guild.  She’s the author of a number of books in this context.  Her most recent book, The United States and Torture: Interrogation, Incarceration, and Abuse. 

“We only have a couple of minutes left, but I guess what really makes me nervous is we’re seeing in the United States the militarisation, the organisation of local police departments in regional structures.  And now they’re getting equipment from the military directly.

“There’s a new Federal law.  We see extraordinary training programmes that cover entire regions.  We see police departments now buying drones. 

“Are you concerned about this militarisation and what we see in Haditha we might be seeing in Oakland some time?”

Marjory Cohn (c. 55:43):  “I am very concerned.  And if you saw the excessive force and police over-reaction in Oakland recently, the Occupy Movement.  I understand they will start using drones for surveillance.  I don’t think they’ll be armed; of course, that comes next.

“And then we have the National Defense Authorization Act, which Obama signed on New Years Eve, which authorizes the indefinite detention, even of U.S. citizens.  That means the rest of your life locked up with no charges.  This is illegal.  It’s illegal under the International Coven on Civil and Political rights, which we ratified.

“And this is the kind of thing that we criticise other countries for doing.  And, yet, Obama said, ‘I really didn’t wanna sign it, but I had to.’  You know, just did not show any backbone at all, just went ahead and signed that law.  That’s very, very worrisome.  And it’s more in a long line of restrictions that started, well it’s happened throughout our history, but it really reached, kind of, an apex during the Bush Administration under the guise of the ‘War on Terror.’  And, now, Obama is continuing a lot of that as well and preventing accountability, both criminal and civil accountability for people who were subjected to extraordinary rendition, torture, etcetera.”

Dennis Bernstein (c. 57:06):  “You know, Marjory, we have a Council Member here, Ignacio De La Fuente who is already talking ‘terrorism,’ talking ‘national security,’ talking, this liberal, this Democrat, talking like maybe it’s time to use these new Federal Defense Authorisation against Occupy.”

Marjory Cohn (c. 57:30):  “That’s what I’m saying.  I mean it could be.  One of the things that’s really important to know about torture, and this is just covered in the preface to the United States and Torture by Sister Dianna Ortiz, who was a Catholic nun who went to Guatemala in the ‘80s and was viciously tortured.  The Americans were leading the torture there.  You know?  We were supporting these vicious dictatorships in Latin America.  And she says, ‘It’s done openly, notoriously, and it’s done to send a message to people that this will happen to you, if you challenge the status quo.

“And the stronger Occupy gets and the more influential and the more it spreads, you’re gonna see the repression grow commensurate with the strength of the Occupy Movement.  That’s gonna happen.”

Dennis Bernstein (c. 58:19):  “Okay, we’re out of time.  I’m sorry Professor Cohen, but we’re out of time.  This is a subject we wanna come back and talk to you more about. 

“Again, I recommend if people wanna check out you latest book, it is called The United States and Torture: Interrogation, Incarceration, and Abuse.  You teach at the Thomas Jefferson School of Law down south in Southern California.  Thanks for joining us.”

Marjory Cohn (c. 58:41):  “Thank you, Dennis.”

Dennis Bernstein (c. 58:45):  “And that does wrap it up for another edition of Flashpoints.  My name is Dennis Bernstein.  I produce this show with Free Wheelin’ Franklin Sterling.  And we are very privileged to have these free speech airwaves. 

“Tomorrow, tune in.  We’re gonna go back to our foreclosure on-air clinic.  If you’re getting closed out of your house, if you have a friend who is, check us out tomorrow on Flashpoints.”

Transcript by Felipe Messina for Media Roots.

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