Let's not forget whistleblower Chelsea Manning

A previous post compared US concern for protecting the Trump Ukraine whistleblower with the lust for revenge against Iraq war and illegal surveillance whistlebloweres Julian Assange and Ed Snowden. But while both Assange nor Snowden are still out of Uncle Sam's clutches, Iraq war whistleblower Chelsea Manning is, imprisoned since March 8, 2019, for refusing to testify to the Grand Jury in the US effort to extradite Assange from his UK prison. The UN Special Rapportuer On Torture, Nils Melzer, sent a letter the US government in November expressing concerns that Manning's continued detention, including stints in solitary, amounts to torture. This relates to Manning's original 9 month detention in the Quantico Virginia Marine Brig in 2010 that included extended solitary, isolation and forced nudity, ended only after an outpouring of international outrage. To Uncle Sam, anyone who seriously challenges US criminality, whether in senseless war or massive illegal government surveillance, gets no whistleblower protection. Join the many thousands calling for Chelsea Manning's release at  https://actionnetwork.org/petitions/sign-the-petition-free-chelsea-manning-now

My money and my vote still go to Bernie

Entering University of Chicago in 1963, a scruffy Brooklyn upperclassman there was spending his college years working for civil rights and an end to the Vietnam War. Tho I dabbled in both movements I never met this gentleman. But if someone told me that 53 years on I’d be contributing money and my vote to elect him president I’d have considered that person on his way to W-3 (UC mental health facility). And four years later I find myself contributing a few bucks and set to vote once again for Bernie Sanders for President in the Illinois Primary, March 17.

With Julian Castro’s withdrawal, 14 Democratic candidates remain standing. But to my ear they all take a back seat when Bernie rises to speak. He is the most authentic, the most sincere, the most consistent and the one who most speaks to my values, hopes and yearnings for a better America. Since it’s not clear that any Democrat can overcome billionaire billions, voter suppression and criminal outreach to foreign governments for electoral help, I’m staying with the one candidate I believe can energize the most non-voting voters who dropped out from cynicism that presidential politics cannot be meaningful. Without these voters we have barely a chance to unseat the moral degenerate and his Senate enablers befouling the White House. With these disaffected voters we have a fighting chance.

And frankly, my dear, I don’t give a damn how old Bernie is. When Bernie speaks I’m transported back 57 years ago to the youthful, passionate classmates who always, always inspired me to give a damn.

A way out of Iraq? Entire Middle East?

The murderous US attacks on the Baghdad Airport and Iraqi military bases which assassinated a top Iranian general and killed dozens of Iraqis may pave the way for the US exit from this country we shattered 17 years ago. Hundreds of thousands killed, millions displaced, trillions squandered.

We remain in Iraq at the request and permission of the Iraqi government, albeit a US puppet government. Iraq is collapsing from internal chaos directed at the US puppet government and threatening further disintegration of an already disintegrated country...thanks to Uncle Sam. But these new attacks may finally spur the Iraqi government to demand our departure and if so we should leave promptly. Likewise for US troops in Afghanistan and Syria. We should end all support for Saudi Arabia and Israel, committing crimes against humanity against the hapless Yemenis and Palestinians.

These are not outlier views. Millions of Americans support that action, including I feel, a significant portion of the military not in leadership. Military leaders, defense contractors, congressional hawks, even presidents of both parties, need perpetual war, which is their business. Without war there are no profits, no political gain, no glory.

My hope is that we leave Iraq and greater Middle East soon and gracefully. My fear is our recklessness in Iraq and across the Middle East will blunder us into a war with Iran which would be a catastrophe for Iran, America, the world.

US still killing Iraqis in failed Iraq war

After 17 years of failure in Iraq, turning it into a failed state, one might presume the US would take a powder. But no, we just launched airstrikes killing 25 Iraqi forces we claim are allied with our bete noir Iran and are targeting the 5,000 US troops and support contractors. The Iraqis have threatened massive retaliation which jeopardizes the entire US mission in Iraq. It is a failed mission, a senseless mission, a murderous mission. We're responsible for hundreds of thousands of needless Iraqi deaths in the past 17 years at a cost over $3 trillion in precious US treasure. It would be welcome and a tad ironic if just the last 25 we killed there were the impetus to send Uncle Sam packing up for good.