The Blog

Arianna Huffington: Sunday Roundup

2009-11-29T05:45:10Z

With the Senate ready to begin debating its health care bill next week, it's time for President Obama to make an unambiguous case for its passage. Finally. He needs to deliver on health care reform, including a public option, and then quickly move on to jobs, jobs, jobs -- the latest Fed forecast predicts that unemployment will still be over 9 percent when the 2010 midterms roll around. Yet, on Tuesday, when the president addresses the nation, he won't be making the case for health care or a jobs bill. Instead, he'll be explaining why we need to "finish the job" in Afghanistan by escalating the war. Can someone in the White House Priorities Department please hit reboot?

Michael Kieschnick: Second Thoughts on the Obama Peace Prize

2009-11-28T22:25:32Z

If I were on the selection committee for the Peace Prize, I would be having buyer's remorse about the selection of Barack Obama. Far from emboldening the president, the prize seems to have given him comfort to move the country away from taking stands that meet our international obligations.

In the last few days, Mr. Obama has decided to dramatically escalate our presence in Afghanistan, and announced weak and inadequate global warming goals to bring to Copenhagen.

Faced with the unholy trinity of a stolen election by a corrupt Afghani president, domestic concern over rapidly rising fiscal deficits, and a public challenge by his handpicked general to send tens of thousands of additional troops or lose the war, Mr. Obama has gone with tens of thousands of additional troops. Without doubt, the new strategy will include tough new anti-corruption standards that are not worth the paper they are printed on. And the Administration is far more likely to pressure progressive members of Congress to vote to expand the war than it might threaten Blue Dogs who vote against deficit-reducing health care reform. At $1 million per soldier per year (ever wonder how much of that goes to the soldier and how much goes to corporate contractors?), the Afghanistan misadventure heralds an Obama era without money for many campaign promises.

Regardless of the escalation and the anti-corruption rhetoric, we will almost certainly still lose by any reasonable definition of loss. Yes, a surge might temporarily appear to create a victory, but the rural and patriarchal forces of reaction among Afghanis, like the Iraqi Shiites, are patient and measure progress in decades. We may call it a victory, having spent a trillion dollars and thousands of lives, but it will be a loss nonetheless. Not since Genghis Kahn has anyone successfully occupied Afghanistan. No sane analyst would call what we have accomplished in Iraq a victory.

The White House also recently announced that the president would visit the global warming summit at Copenhagen and deliver a message that the U.S. will commit to lowering our greenhouse emissions by 17%. For those in the know - which will include most people in Copenhagen, this will be deeply disturbing.

The International Panel on Climate Change has argued that the science indicates that the developed countries (of which the U.S. is by far the largest polluter) must reduce their 2020 greenhouse emissions by 25% to 40% from 1990 levels. The White House, and the House legislation that they are referring to, do the equivalent of lowering the basketball rim from ten to eight feet and say they are dunking. The White House says it can commit to lowering emissions 17% from the levels of 2005 - fifteen years and a great deal of added pollution from 1990. The U.S. press may not notice, but the rest of the world surely will.

And it was not a good day to be Sen. Barbara Boxer, whose global warming legislation passed out of committee with a 20% reduction. With her own president stating a 17% goal, her position is now toast.

One of the pernicious effects of the international gathering at Copenhagen has been that it has been used to generate immense pressure to compromise the science with the battle cry - legislation must be passed so that Copenhagen will not fail. The lobbyists for the coal and oil industries were successful in leveraging the desire to pass ANY legislation with weakening the already weakened targets.

And having praised legislation that does not remotely meet the targets the best scientists believe are necessary, the Administration was willing to bargain away their only trump card - the ability of the EPA to regulate greenhouse gases beyond that legislated by Congress. The House legislation eliminated that power in a backroom deal with Rep. Boucher, D (coal industry) without public notice or debate.

As a sad result, the 17% House/Obama goal, rather than being a floor for reduction became an upper limit. An upper limit which literally ensures that global warming will get worse - most likely terribly worse. And most perversely, of course, the worst damage from global warming will not fall on those of us in the United States which has caused most of the problem, but on those in the developing world who have done the least.

I continue to hope for the best for President Obama. The Nobel committee rolled the dice betting that several good speeches were the down payment on fighting for tough changes. They got an expanded war and a guaranteed to fail approach to global warming.

Rev. Frank Desiderio: Oh My God: What Is God?

2009-11-28T22:09:51Z

For the past month, HuffPost has hosted an array of respondents -- including spiritual leaders, world leaders, personalities and celebrities -- who are asked to fill in the blank for the statement: God is...

The series led up to and accompanied the November 13 opening of the documentary Oh My God?

****

God is a word we use to describe the Ultimate Reality. All language about God is metaphorical, given that, I agree with Ringo Star who says at the end of the film Oh My God? that "God is Love". Now let me tell you what I mean by Divine Love.

I am convinced that built into our DNA is a moral law, and that law can best be described as love that goes out of itself to create. This moral law in us is remnant of our own creation. That creation occurred when what we call God went out of the God-self. This going out of Self to create something other than Self is what I call Divine Love.

God went out of God's Self to create and the universe is the result. That creation continued from space to light to planets, like Earth, to beings to human beings. In the Christian tradition we believe that God went out of himself to come to us in history in the person of Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ, in his person, gave us the exemplar of self-giving love and taught us how to be self-gift. Through Christ we learn that this giving of self is the core of what it is to be a human being.

Love is not a romantic feeling, love is more than the urge to procreate, however, procreation shows us the nature of the Law of Love. Two people go out of themselves to create another self. They make sacrifices to nurture that other self and so, the Law of Love is perpetuated.

In the Christian tradition the symbol of this going out of self in love is the cross of Jesus Christ. The ultimate gift of self is to give your life in service to others. Jesus, out of integrity to the truth of his relationship with the Ultimate Reality, refused to renounce this truth and the law of love at the heart of his truth. His fidelity got him killed but allowed a deeper truth to emerge: Love does not die.

An important expression of this self-gift we call love is compassion. When we deeply examine our humanity and our needs we become aware that we share that humanity and our needs with others. Our common humanity can touch the common humanity of another. We remember when we were hungry or cold or sick or trapped in a bad situation and we identify with someone who is in a similar situation. We don't say of them, "Oh, that poor thing." We say, "Oh, that poor person." And we consider how we can help them and then we do something, we express our compassion with action. This is the Law of Love at work. To follow this law may require deep sacrifice but it also puts us in harmony with the deepest truth of our selves.

First we look deeply in ourselves and discover our common humanity. Then, for those of a mystical mindset, that is those who recognize a transcendent reality, they look deeply in themselves and discover the Ultimate Reality dwelling in them and can recognize that Ultimate Reality in another person.

A most significant expression of compassion is forgiveness. We give a gift to someone who doesn't deserve it. The gift is releasing the perpetrator from any emotional debt they owe us and renouncing revenge thoughts. We may still need to seek justice. The person who harmed us may need to pay a debt to us or to society but we do not seek retribution. We let go of negative feelings and wish them well.

The Law of Love is worked out in the practicalities of compassion and forgiveness. This Law of Love reflects the nature of what we call God and is built into our human nature. Obviously, people don't follow the Law of Love and when they don't suffering is the result. When we do follow the Law of Love we find ourselves in harmony with our deepest selves and the Ultimate Reality we call God.

Read the previous responses, from Oh My God?'s director Peter Rodger; Dr. Lawrence Blair; Demartini Institute founder Dr. John Demartini; and pastor/filmmaker Frank Desiderio.

Johann Hari: Dubai Has Always Been Bankrupt -- Morally and Environmentally

2009-11-28T22:02:43Z

Dubai is finally financially bankrupt – but it has been morally bankrupt all along. The idea that Dubai is an oasis of freedom on the Arabian peninsular is one of the great lies of our time. Yes, it has Starbucks and Dunkin' Donuts and the Gucci styles, but beneath these accouterments, there is a dictatorship built by slaves.

If you go there with your eyes open – as I did earlier this year – the truth is hidden in plain view. The tour books and the bragging Emiratis will tell you the city was built by Sheikh Mohammed, the country's hereditary ruler.

It is untrue. The people who really built the city can be seen in long chain-gangs by the side of the road, or toiling all day at the top of the tallest buildings in the world, in heat that Westerners are told not to stay in for more than 10 minutes. They were conned into coming, and trapped into staying.

In their home country – Bangladesh or the Philippines or India – these workers are told they can earn a fortune in Dubai if they pay a large upfront fee. When they arrive, their passports are taken from them, and they are told their wages are a tenth of the rate they were promised.

They end up working in extremely dangerous conditions for years, just to pay back their initial debt. They are ringed-off in filthy tent-cities outside Dubai, where they sleep in weeping heat, next to open sewage. They have no way to go home. And if they try to strike for better conditions, they are beaten by the police.

I met so many men in this position I stopped counting, just as the embassies were told to stop counting how many workers die in these conditions every year after they figured it topped more than 1,000 among the Indians alone.

Human Rights Watch calls this system "slavery." Yet the Westerners who have flocked to Dubai brag that they "love" the city, because they don't have to pay any taxes, and they have domestic slaves to do all the hard work. They train themselves not to see the pain.

But Dubai's bankruptcy does not end there: it is ecologically bust. This is a city built in the burning desert, where everything shrivels up and blows away if it is not kept artificially cold all the time. That's why it has the highest per capita carbon emissions on earth – some 250 percent higher even than America's. The city has to ship in desalinated water – which is more costly than oil. When it runs out of cash, it will run out of water.

Today Dubai will be bailed out by the United Arab Emirates, the oil-rich country of which it is only one state. But the oil will not last forever. More importantly, there is no Bank of Morality that could provide a bailout for this sinister mirage in the desert.

To read Johann's full report from Dubai, click here.

Johann hari is a writer for the Independent. To read more of his articles, click here.

Jose Antonio Vargas: Salahis' Self-Marketing 2.0 (PHOTOS)

2009-11-28T20:37:06Z

"Hey, you hear the news about the housewives of DC crashing the president's party?" read a quick note from one of my best friends, Manny Varela, a 29-year-old engineer from Miami. Like most people, Manny is not one to care about some party in D.C., never mind that it's the Obamas' first state dinner. But he is a fan of "housewives" -- short for the Bravo's hit and addicting "The Real Housewives" reality TV series, now filming its Washington, D.C. edition.

"How funny," Manny wrote. "What great marketing for the show."

A very, very good point.

This is, after all, all about marketing, whether Bravo likes it or not. Though folks at Bravo have told various news organizations that they have yet to finalize the cast for its D.C. series, it's this drive for self-marketing that seems to have landed socialites-turned-"gate-crashers" Tareq and Michaele Salahi inside the White House in the first place. Hey, who could resist a "real housewife" who gets face-time from a smiling President Obama? In our reality TV culture exacerbated by the rise of social networking sites -- in which 15 minutes of fame can be elongated by the number of photos and videos swirling around the Web -- who can blame the Salahis for their sheer, shameless self-promotion? Their shared Facebook profile have 743 photos and 14 videos, and you don't need to be Facebook friends with Tareq and Michaele to see them. Just click away.

Inevitably, people have created and joined groups mostly chastising and mocking the wedding crashers heard 'round Facebook.

A group called "Tareq and Michaele Salahi Crashed My Party" has 173 members. Introducing himself as the Salahis, the group's creator wrote: "Hi, we're fameseeking losers Tareq and Michaele Salahi and reality show wannabes. Got a party? Tag sale? Doesn't matter. We'll crash it. Is your 5-year old having a birthday next week? Just tell us when and where. Join this group--it's even easier to get in than a White House gala."

There's also a group called "Tareq and Michaele Salahi deserve a reality show!!" The group has 469 members. A member wrote on the group's wall: "Laughin' all the way from Malaysiaaaa...." Wrote another: "Lol, This is great. And 'they' say our Ports and Borders are secure!"

From a news perspective, Thanksgiving 2009 has been hijacked by the Salahis. They're splashed across front pages and covers of newspapers, from the Washington Post to the New York Daily News. Who they are, why they did what they did, how they sneaked past layers of security and snaked their way inside a White House state dinner have given cable TV much to be thankful for in what could have been a sleepy weekend news cycle. They're now subjects of comprehensive, heavily foot-noted Wikipedia articles -- one for him, one for her -- and featured in an article on "gate-crashing." They got all the publicity they were asking for -- and then some.

"Remember, now, they're not just some random people. They're people who are trying to get on a show," Nick O'Neill, the founder and editor of AllFacebook.com, told HuffPostTech. "This is savvy marketing for them."

Yep, marketing in our digital age. And the Salahis aren't done yet, which might explain why, three days after Roxanne Roberts and Amy Argetsinger of the Washington Post originally broke the story, they have not deleted their joint Facebook account. The photos, videos and everything Salahi-related are still on Facebook, and there's a link to Michaele's self-described "exclusive" fan page. The latest entry on the page, posted at 11:46 a.m., read: "I was honored to be invited to attend the First State Dinner hosted by President Obama & the First Lady to honor India. In June 2010, the America's Polo Cup will be between INDIA & the UNITED STATES. Please join me in this cultural celebration of politics, diplomacy, fashion, sports, entertainment & family fun."

The page lists 10,152 fans.

Connie Hedegaard: Time Is Up - The Deadline Is Copenhagen

2009-11-28T15:24:17Z

There are moments in history where the world can choose to go down different paths. The COP15 Climate Conference in Copenhagen is one of those defining moments: We can choose to go down the road towards green prosperity and a more sustainable future. Or we can choose a pathway to stalemate and do nothing about climate change leaving an enormous bill for our kids and grand-kids to pay. It really isn't that hard a choice.

The Danish government's goal is clear and unambiguous: we are working for an ambitious, global agreement that reduces greenhouse gas emissions and delivers on adaptation, technology and finance. Also, Copenhagen should include a deadline for when to close a legally binding agreement.

Time is of the essence. For each day we wait the price increases and the potentially catastrophic consequences of climate change increase. According to the International Energy Agency every year lost to inaction will cost us 500 billion dollars. We must make the pressure pay and use the political momentum to make the leaders of the world live up to their responsibility and act swiftly on climate change.

The Copenhagen deadline works. One by one, governments from all over the world are delivering before the climate conference next month. Recently, we saw concrete targets from Brazil and South Korea and Russia improved its bid.

President Obama has announced US targets, not only for 2020, but maybe more noticeable for 2025 and 2030. 4 percent below 1990 might not be what the world has been hoping for, but the US seems to know that the price for coming late is that the pathway for reductions after 2020 will be extra steep with 18 % below 1990-levels in 2025 and 32 percent in 2030.

It is also new and very encouraging that China comes forward internationally. We must analyse more carefully what the new Chinese announcement translates to when it comes to a percentage for deviation from business as usual.

All of this is a clear sign that the deadline of Copenhagen is working and world-leaders are feeling the pressure of expectations from citizens, business and the rest of society. Now is the time for these leaders to live up to the pledges to our planet and deliver results in Copenhagen.

Denmark didn't set the deadline to be this December 2009. With the Bali Action Plan from 2007 the world as a whole decided that COP15 in Copenhagen is a turning-point in the campaign to put the world on a more sustainable path. 192 countries signed up to this mandate and now we must not let that deadline slip out of our hands. Now is the time to act and now is the time to cash in on the political momentum. World leaders have promised the citizens of the planet a solution. Now is the time to live up to that responsibility and come up with an ambitious, truly global climate agreement in Copenhagen.

The content of a deal is basically four challenges that need solutions. The deal should involve binding medium and long-term greenhouse gas reduction goals for developed countries. And it should put the big developing economies on a cleaner and greener path to prosperity. Finally it needs to provide assistance for the vulnerable countries -- those who are hit hardest and hit first. The deal must bring new and truly additional finance on the table -- some of which needs to fund adaptation in developing countries -- and an agreement needs to be reached on how we can work together to disseminate and develop technology and knowledge. These are the four cornerstones in Copenhagen that we must deliver on.

And solve it we must. We have no alternative. We must handle climate change and we must do it right now. Copenhagen is the deadline. Time is up. Let's get the job done.

Andy Borowitz: White House Party Crashers Almost Started Nuclear War

2009-11-28T13:48:43Z

WASHINGTON (The Borowitz Report) - The couple who crashed the state dinner at the White House earlier this week made their way to the Oval Office and came within seconds of triggering a nuclear war, Secret Service officials admitted today.

According to a Secret Service spokesperson, the uninvited couple managed to reach the unlocked Oval Office without supervision and began "drunk dialing" Russian President Dmitry Medvedev before they were nabbed.

"They should not have been in the Oval Office and should not have been on the red phone trying to start a nuclear war," said Carol Foyler, the Secret Service spokesperson. "On behalf of the entire Secret Service, let me say, 'My bad.'"

The Obama White House said it was exploring a number of alternatives to prevent party crashing from occurring in the future, such as instituting a so-called "public option" for state dinners that would allow uninvited members of the public to attend. More here.

Jane Smiley: Stop The Injustice: Free Gary McKinnon

2009-11-28T13:41:29Z

If you read the Guardian, then you know already that the screaming injustice that is about to be perpetrated on Scottish computer hacker Gary McKinnon has taken another step toward the cruel and unusual. McKinnon is a 43-year-old man from North London who, in 2001 and 2002, hacked into US military computers, looking for evidence of visitors from other planets. He was extremely successful, not only because he was a smart guy, but also because, as he said in messages left on the victim computers, "Your security is crap." McKinnon, as one might assume of a guy who spends his time in his room looking for evidence of space aliens, has been diagnosed with Asperger's syndrome. He is terrified of coming to the US and being thrown into a high security American prison for sixty years. As well he should be. American officials have reassured his mother that he will be taken care of -- but hey, you know how reliable American officials are about taking care of the vulnerable, don't you? No wonder McKinnon is said to be suicidal.

But the mental illness does not belong to Gary McKinnon, it belongs to the US military, which has pursued McKinnon ruthlessly in order to punish and destroy him. They should have pursued him in order to hire him because, guess what? Their security was crap. He cost them $700,000! About one fifth the price of a nice apartment in Manhattan. Nothing! A day's pay for Blackwater! If they had hired McKinnon as a consultant, they might have learned something, and improved both their security and their international relations.

In Britain, the media dogs are barking because the English government has gone along with extraditing McKinnon like the sick puppies they are -- Iraq? Sure! You have no reason to invade? Well, make one up, we'll help ya! So even while the Iraq inquiry is going on, they are allowing the US to drag this guy kicking and screaming to the exact place where he most fears going.

You've got to ask yourself why the US thinks this is a big deal. It's because they don't care as much about security as they do about humiliation and embarrassment. Now that's what I call mental illness! We'll show this helpless little guy what the might of the US feels like! We can't win a war to save out lives, no matter how we try, but we sure can drive a guy with Asperger's to suicide. The US government from Obama on down should being falling over themselves to show this guy some mercy and put him on the payroll (he can work from home). But no. Why do people hate us? Well, take a look.

And do please sign the petition.

Tara Stiles: Your Holiday Relaxation Rescue Guide (VIDEO)

2009-11-28T13:34:53Z

Wouldn't it be nice to fully relax the body and mind. Reserving some time for ourselves around the holidays seems so far away from the reality of forced spending, emotional exhaustion, and general frustration. What ever happened to peace, love and harmony? There still is hope. No matter how robbed we feel by the state of our country, family, and friends, we can reserve a few moments to remedy our inner peace. Everything begins here.

I think there are two great ways to relax around the holidays. One is to spend a little time taking your mind off your mind. For most of us our usual way of being is all attention on a very active mind, always thinking, planning, and figuring things out. The very idea of letting this go even creates all kinds of defensive arguments, which can run something like "If I stop my thinking, who'll run the show, feed the kids, and keep me from turning into one of those "blissed out" types incapable of navigating this world?" This is a very reasonable question!

We can start by setting our minds at rest, since that's where the question comes from. We're not talking about a permanent shut-down. We all have plenty of practice running the show from our thinking control center, so there's little chance of losing that ability for when we need it. What can help us immeasurably is letting go a little bit, just enough to turn attention to something other than our thoughts. Things like meditation and physical yoga often pick breathing and moving as good starting points. When everything is focused on our thinking, there's very little room to hear or feel anything else. Focus on your breath for a bit, and you start to notice things. Spending a little time to relax your mind and give yourself the chance to feel can have a very calming effect. You may notice that you feel good!

This brings up a second way to relax that is helpful right around now. It's related to the first because it involves letting go just for a bit all the reaching, planning, and figuring out. The best way to get where you want to go is to be right where you are. Everybody knows that, but sometimes a reminder is helpful. Again, for most of us the logical challenges can come right up with a statement like that, running along the lines of "If I don't plan and figure things out, how will anything ever get done around here?"

Our logical minds can definitely have a hard time dealing with paradoxes. The thing is, reality isn't bound by logic. It just is. Science will keep trying to measure and predict, how things are will keep on being how things are, and this will often perplex our ability to predict and control through logic. In this case the truth is, being exactly where we are, with all our senses focused precisely on what's in front of us right now, is a good way to feel calm and happy. And it's also the best way to get anywhere. If we need a rational explanation for that, it may have something to do with being "right here" enough to see things for how they are gives us greater ability to act appropriately. When our minds wander off, we deal less with reality and more with fitting things into what we imagine as a path to some future desire.

However we explain it, being happy to be right where we are is a good idea. Taking a little time off the mind through some breathing and yoga can go a long way to helping us relax and get wherever it is we need to be. Try checking out this video for a start in the right direction.

. . . and if that doesn't work here is a little holiday humor for you!

Huff Radio: Left, Right & Center: Is America Ungovernable? Plus: Men, Women and History

2009-11-28T03:16:36Z

Two big-think, deep evergreen topics are up for discussion: Is America ungovernable? Are moneyed and special interests so entrenched that we cannot govern of, for and by the people? Marx, Carlyle and Hegel are all raised in this discussion.

And the second deep question: Is history made by great men and women? Or is it the reverse: Does the moment make the man/woman? This show is a winner.

Candy Spelling: Time's 'Decade From Hell' Vs. 'The Best Is Yet To Come"

2009-11-28T02:57:34Z

The day after Thanksgiving is always a day of reflection. Yesterday, we thought about all the reasons we have to be thankful. Today, once we separated into the "I'm not going to fight the Black Friday crowds" or "I'm going shopping" factions, it was back to real life.

I was listening to the radio as I went through the mail.

Friends had been saying, "KGIL is back." That local radio station had changed formats so many times, I didn't know which one to expect. Happily, it turned out that KGIL had become "Retro 1260," and the next few minutes were filled with some of the best music ever.

That was fortunate because topping my mail stack was Time magazine, with the crying baby on the cover and the words, "The Decade From Hell."

I turned up the volume on the radio.

"The Best Is Yet To Come" was playing on the radio. That was encouraging. I wondered if Time and Retro 1260 has somehow digitally arranged for this happy message to greet the pronouncement of what had happened the last 10 years. I know the technology today is amazing.

Time, fortunately, added a line on the cover that read, "and why the next one will be better."

Whew. I was glad to read that. The radio played "The In Crowd." I remembered how important that used to be, many seemingly-heavenly decades ago.

As I read the story in Time and remembered all the terrible events and circumstances (and people) that brought the magazine to this conclusion, the radio played "The Fool on a Hill."

Was that more synergy, saying we should have done more about the wars, or said something about subprime mortgages, or demanded more aid for victims of Hurricane Katrina?

Maybe we would be wiser, and that's why the next decade will be better. The next song was "There's No Place Like Home for the Holidays." Yup.

Page after page, Time's story wasn't convincing me that things would be better. I was just reminded about more things we'd all rather forget.

I blasted the radio, and heard:

"Take one fresh and tender kiss
And one stolen night of bliss,"

and remembered all the happy memories when I used to hear those lyrics in "Memories Are Made of This." Does anyone use words like "tender" and "bliss" any longer? We should.

More bad news in the magazine was accompanied by more inspiration and happiness from the radio. The next song was "I Can't Give You Anything but Love." Literally, that isn't the case. But I know the next decade would be better with more love.

The next song was "More." It was about love, not possessions.

I reached the end of the article just as "It's a Most Unusual Day" started playing. It is a most unusual day, and the decade was, hopefully, unusual. Wouldn't it be ironic, I thought, if the next song would be "Eve of Destruction" or "Revolution"?

I'm ready for a medley of "Sound of Music," "Here Comes the Sun," "Twelfth of Never," "I Feel Pretty," "Strike Up the Band," "and "My Funny Valentine." How can the decade not improve if we're hearing those kinds of words?

The next song I heard was "Fever."

I'm voting for the fever that has infected our country and the world to break to begin the next decade.

Roger Morris: Matthew Hoh Speaks Grim Truth To Power

2009-11-28T02:44:44Z

The rare resignation on principle is always telling in American government. When Matthew Hoh recently left the State Department -- a Marine Captain in Iraq who became a diplomat in Afghanistan -- his act was significant far beyond the first reports.

Hoh speaks grim truth to power. His message is that to pursue the Afghan war policy in any guise -- regardless of the troop level President Obama now chooses -- will be utter folly, trapping America in an unwinnable civil war in the Hindu Kush, and only fueling terrorism.

An advisor in southern Afghanistan, Hoh knew the malignancy of want behind the war. Eight years after the U.S. invasion and a third of a trillion dollars spent, half the nation faces starvation on 45 cents a day, half the children die before five, and half the surviving young have no schools, part of a torment Afghans plead in poll after poll to be understood as the core of their conflict. He knew well the source of that scourge in the U.S.-installed Kabul regime, a kleptocracy of war- and drug-lords holed up amid American bodyguards in "poppy palaces," while clan-based "security forces" loot the countryside, sodomize its sons, and swell insurgent ranks. "We're propping up a government," Hoh said last week, "that isn't worth dying for." So pervasive and profound is that corruption, so entwined with the private exploitation and official graft of the U.S. occupation regime -- including kickbacks or extortion payments from both the American military and civilian aid programs to both the new Kabul plutocracy and the multi-layered Taliban -- that the morass makes every other issue of policy moot.

The 36-year-old diplomat brings unique authority to public debate. An insider confirming outside critics dispels the myth that classified information redeems a failed policy. He also speaks to and for many in government, infusing honesty where folly feeds on wary quiet and fraudulent unanimity. "There are a lot of guys, not just in the Foreign Service but in the military, who are looking at this thing and they don't understand what we are doing there," he told one audience. "I get mails all the time from junior and mid-level officers telling me, 'Keep it up. This makes no sense to us.'"

Whatever this protest says outwardly, its deeper meaning is devastating. The sheer contrast between Hoh and senior officials -- seeing the same reality, the same reports -- exposes some dirty little secrets of policy haunting the Obama presidency.

With the 8-year enormity of waste, venality and oppression since the invasion of 2001, ravages Hoh saw climaxed around him, went the knowing silence if not collusion of a succession of U.S. diplomats and officers responsible in the defiled occupation of Afghanistan. There is a troubling legacy, too, in the policy process. In the grip of experience irrelevant in Afghanistan, a generation of military commanders comes with a crudely recycled but promotion-rich creed of counter-insurgency, avenging what some as young officers in the 1970s saw as a false defeat if not home-front betrayal in Vietnam. They are allied with the lucrative in-and-out careerism of powerful if publicly faceless civilian Pentagon officials, what State Department rivals call the "COIN-heads" of counter-insurgency dogma. Those currents run like a murky subterranean river beneath the doomed policy Hoh silhouettes.

Most telling may be the disparity between Hoh -- the serious student of Afghan culture -- and Washington's decision-makers. To deal with one of the most complex settings on earth, the Obama administration relies on key figures -- Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Defense Secretary Robert Gates, Af-Pak Special envoy Richard Holbrooke and NSC Advisor James Jones -- whose careers in politics or the bureaucracy (like those commanding generals David Petraeus and Stanley McChrystal) are bereft of any substantive knowledge of a people they are supposed to master. It leaves them all dangerously dependent on staff, and prey to the absence of dissenters like Hoh among aides whose credentials are hardly more impressive than their own.

That intellectual vacuum, a mirror of Vietnam decision-making, explains the shock and hostility that greeted recent cables of US Ambassador Karl Eikenberry opposing added U.S. troops backing an irredeemable regime. As Hoh exemplifies, actual knowledge of Afghanistan is rare -- and the lack scarcely recognized -- in a war council prone to flippant lines like Clinton's recent "There are warlords and there are warlords," or Holbrooke's definition of success, "We'll know it when we see it."

At the heart of Washington's decision-making dysfunction, of course, is always a president in thrall to the hoary fears and myths of national security, the most important realm he governs and in which most take power least prepared. For Barack Obama, only historic courage and insight can surmount the multiple corruptions of policy he is heir to.

Hoh embodies that bravery. Implored by Eikenberry to stay, he chose to forgo a prized career to speak out. We know that agony. There is no easy course ahead in Afghanistan. US policies a half century before 2001 account for much of the politics now so deplored in Kabul, a breakdown inflicted as well as inherent, and a blood debt added to the toll of occupation and war.

The gruesome truth of that history is that our sacrifices so far have been largely in vain. It is Matthew Hoh's heroism to try to stop the inseparable casualties of lives and truth.

Roger Morris and George Kenney are both Foreign Service Officers who resigned on principle -- Morris at the 1970 invasion of Cambodia, Kenney in 1991 over policy in the Balkans -- both writers are award-winning authors. Morris's Between the Graves: America, Afghanistan and the Politics of Intervention, will be published by Knopf in 2010. Kenney produces and hosts a podcast at electricpolitics.com while on the Board of Editors at In These Times.

Bennet Kelley: Rumble in Little Rhody: Patrick Kennedy Takes On The Bishop And The Church's Moral Myopia

2009-11-27T23:59:51Z

It is fitting that the current battle between the Catholic Church and pro-choice lawmakers involves the nephew of the only Catholic president and takes place in Rhode Island, which not only was the first colony founded on the principles of religious liberty and the separation of church and state but was the strongest state for John Kennedy in 1960.

Providence Bishop Tobin’s barring Patrick Kennedy from receiving communion because of his pro-choice views is an assault on both Roger William’s vision of the separation of church and state now enshrined in the First Amendment and the Kennedy legacy itself (which the Church once embraced).

American Catholics have a historical relationship with the Democratic Party, as the Church and the Party were the two principal institutions that protected successive waves of immigrants from Europe in the 20^th Century. Nowhere was this more prevalent than in my home state of Rhode Island which was two-thirds Catholic and two-thirds Democratic (and often confused which was the religion).

This changed in 1980 when Boston’s Cardinal Medeiros issued a pastoral letter stating that those who elect pro-choice candidates “cannot separate themselves totally from [a] deadly sin.” Around this time, however, Notre Dame President Father Hesburgh warned that by making abortion their singular priority, the Church was asking Catholics to embrace candidates who disagreed with almost all of the Church’s social justice teachings.

That is exactly what has happened. In 2004, despite the fact that in the U.S. Conference of Bishops’ voter guide Senator Kerry beat President Bush in every issue category, including protecting human life and promoting family life, Kerry was ambushed by a number of U.S. cardinals and bishops over abortion. As a result, Kerry became the third Catholic to win the Democratic nomination but the first to lose the Catholic vote.

Now Bishop Tobin has sanctioned Patrick Kennedy, who has received a 100% voting score from NETWORK ( a Catholic social justice lobby) in four of the last six years, petulantly calling him “ignorant” and “a disappointment” while banning him from receiving communion after Kennedy criticized the Bishop for opposing health care reform unless it rolled back existing abortion rights.

What message does it send when the Church will deny communion to a pro-choice official like Patrick Kennedy whose voting record is otherwise consistent with church teaching, but not pro-life officials guided by the gospel of greed or intolerance or even mobsters such as the legendary crime boss Raymond Patriarca who was given a Catholic funeral? I do not recall the Sermon on the Mount exalting the greedy, bigots or wise guys.

Even worse is Bishop Tobin’s encroachment on the separation of church and state. President Kennedy stressed that he believed “in an America . . . where no public official either requests or accepts instructions on public policy from the Pope, the National Council of Churches or any other ecclesiastical source.” Yet Bishop Tobin wants to claim that right and require Catholic office holders to ignore the interests and views of their non-Catholic constituents and legislate solely based on Church doctrine. Although when pressed by Chris Matthews on this topic, Tobin was unable to articulate what he wants lawmakers to do.

It is ironic that this takes place in Rhode Island which was known in colonial days as “the safest refuge of conscience” and home to the New World’s first Baptist Church and synagogue because of Roger Williams’ vision of separation of church and state. Although it could be Rhode Island Catholic’s sensitivity to this separation that emboldens them to ignore the Church’s political instructions (as a 1986 Church backed referendum to ban abortion lost by a 2-1 margin and recent polling shows no shift in this position); leading Bishop Tobin and others to lash out at their elected officials to mask their powerlessness.

I am not a Catholic scholar like my namesake (the late Rev. Bennet Kelley C.P.), but I know enough to know that the Bible says nothing about abortion but plenty about hypocrisy, pride and arrogance and that the Church has been wrong many times throughout history.

I also know Patrick Kennedy. I know that he has been and will continue to be a great Congressman for Rhode Island because he shares the passion and commitment of his father and uncles to helping those less fortunate that Catholics once overwhelmingly embraced before the Church’s recent moral myopia. That is what led him to state publicly that

I can’t understand for the life of me how the Catholic Church could be against the biggest social justice issue of our time.

Neither can I.

Lapham's Quarterly: The Darkest Days: Black Friday, Saturday, Sunday, And The Rest

2009-11-27T23:21:00Z

Despite the popularity of Black Friday among retailers and the local news media, every day of the week has at some point or another been described as "black." In fact, an entire week can be cobbled together out of the darkness. For more dark days, visit www.laphamsquarterly.org. Our Deja Vu blog can be found here.

Black Sunday (1977)
1977 movie about a blimp pilot / Vietnam veteran driven mad by torture as a POW who uses his intricate knowledge of blimps to attempt to detonate a bomb at the Super Bowl. Much of the film was shot live at Super Bowl X, in which the Dallas Cowboys triumphed over the Pittsburgh Steelers.

Black Monday (1987)
Describes the largest one-day decline in stock market history which occurred on Monday October 19 1987. Also ascribed to part of the Black Long Weekend of 1929 (see "Black Thursday" and "Black Tuesday")

Black Tuesday (1929, 2001)
The day the financial repercussions of 1929's Black Thursday set in, causing wide-spread panic when everyone attempted to pull out of the market at the same time. Also used to describe the events of September 11th, 2001.

Black Wednesday (1992)
Describes the situation in Britain on September 16, 1992 when the government was forced to withdraw the pound from the European Exchange Rate Mechanism due to currency speculators. The fiasco cost the UK Treasury an estimated 3.3 billion pounds.

Black Thursday (1929, 1993)
This was, of course, the day of the 1929 Stock Market Crash, but is it also used to describe a terrible Thursday in 1993 when Phillies player Pete Incavigila shouted obscenities at his fans and stormed out of an autograph session at the Granite Run Mall in Media, PA.

Black Friday (1869, 1929, present)
On September 24, 1869, during one of the great scandals of the Reconstruction era, two speculators sent the market into freefall by buying up government gold in a time the government was run primarily on credit. Black Friday is perhaps better known as, the day after Thanksgiving, on which the Christmas retail season pins most of its hopes. In the United Kingdom, it's the name given to the last Friday before Christmas when widespread alcohol abuse is expected to occur and police are given extra leniency to combat any disturbances of the peace. Also in Europe, this is used to refer to the "Black Thursday" 1929 crash because of the time difference.

Black Saturday (1621)
Saturdays are rarely ruinous. The only Black Saturday on record occurred when a particularly nasty storm raged over the skies of Scotland on August 4th, 1621. This was largely regarded as the judgment of God on recent acts passed by the Scottish Parliament concerning the Episcopal Church.

Megan Berry: Free iPhone Apps To Waste 5 Minutes (PHOTOS)

2009-11-27T23:00:32Z

People always want to focus on using the iPhone to be productive. I'm certainly no exception, but for this article I'd like us all to embrace the fact that the iPhone is excellent at wasting time. In fact, the iPhone App Store provides more than 100,000 ways to spend your time, and I want to highlight just a few of the many apps that have absolutely no productive value. Got 5 minutes to spare and no desire to get anything done (or buy anything)? Well then I've got some apps for you...