[Reader-list] Who's Bin Smokin' What?

[Boud Roukema]

On Thu, 20 Dec 2001, Harsh Kapoor wrote:

> Who's Bin Smokin' What?
> Their blowback . . . and ours
> by Marc Cooper
> As I watched bin Laden yukking it up with those other cherubic imams 
...

> Nor did the Afghan people rally to unite and defeat the American 
> invaders. Instead, they came into the streets flying kites, 
> unearthing their Tali-banned radios and phonographs, and sending 
> their daughters to re-register in the medical schools from which they 

Re-registering in medical schools, so that they can help with more
"humane" hangings and stonings. And flirting freely with their male
"superiors", without the least worry of a mere lapidation with only
little stones... This is from the South China Morning Post/Agence
France Presse (it sounds like a parody, but I think it's real):

http://asia.scmp.com/ZZZLK8SYAVC.html

< Merciful stonings to use smaller stones
< Wednesday, December 19, 2001
< AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE in Kabul
...  
< "There will be some changes from the time of the Taleban," Judge
< Ahamat Ullha Zarif said. "For example, the Taleban used to hang the
< victim's body in public for four days. We will only hang the body for a
< short time, say 15 minutes." He said the purpose of execution,
< according to the Koran, was to serve as a warning to others. "That is
< why it must be done in public and that is why we need to hang the
< body in public afterwards," he said. 
...

< Adulterers, male and female, will still be stoned to death, "but we will
< use only small stones", Judge Zarif said. This allowed the
< condemned person a chance to escape. "If they are able to run
< away, they are free" he said. 

Afghan women had better start jogging (in respectable burqas) if they want 
to be fit enough to run away from their stonings.

> had been barred. So much for predictions of a "U.S. genocide." For 

The U.S. genocide in Afghanistan is about a fair fraction (10%? 1%?)
of 7.5 million starving people dying. We simply don't know the
numbers. 10% would be 7,50,000 (7.5 lakh), 1% would be 75,000. 50%
would be 3.25 million (32.5 lakh). Do the arithmetic.
http://www.zmag.org/chomskyafter911.htm

People in Europe, e.g. Maurice Papon, have been tried for crimes
against humanity as much as fifty or more years after the alleged
crimes occurred (during WWII).  Any politician thinking of supporting
Bush and Rumsfeld ought to ask themselves where they want to spend
their retirement (in or out of prison and national embarrassment as
guilty of genocide).  (We have at least one member of the French
Foreign Ministry who has posted to this list - he might want to
comment?)

The numbers of the genocide will probably be known within a year or
two, if a reliable census is made. 
N(genocide victims) = N(after) - N(before). Plus corrections for
normal deaths and births, and refugee movements.  Demographers will
have a tough time, but the numbers are likely to be big enough to come
up with something to put in the history books.

>  The collateral damage inflicted by this war is nevertheless real,
> and it surpasses mere body counts of civilian deaths (numerous and
> lamentable but nowhere near the bogus figure of 3,700 being
> circulated by some activists). Riding high in the polls, the Bush

This "bogus" figure, dwarfed by the number killed by cutting off food
lines, is a minimum estimate based on collating direct, documented
evidence. Judge for yourself how "bogus" it is:

http://www.zmag.org/herold.htm

I think the author of the article, Marc Cooper, is someone who has
partly escaped the normal manufacture of consent in the US, and has
tried to fit together the facts he's aware of. This in itself is
a very positive sign of hope.

But he should start looking further yet for empirical data, before
denying the genocide that is continuing right at this very moment (I
can't say "before our eyes", because the media choose to close their
eyes in that direction. It doesn't sell well.)