Chuck Mertz’s guests on this week’s This is Hell follows the articles.

Rape is like force-fed chocolate cake? “Most sensible Brits have been scandalized by a revelation that a candidate for the London Assembly believes ‘rape is simply sex.’ Yes, that’s an actual quote, straight from the blog of the British National Party’s London leader, Nick Eriksen. So is this: ‘Women enjoy sex, so rape cannot be such a terrible physical ordeal.’ And this: ‘To suggest that rape, when conducted without violence, is a serious crime is like suggesting that force feeding a woman chocolate cake is a heinous offence.‘” Salon (4/2/08)

Rapists in the ranks “The stories are shocking in their simplicity and brutality: A female military recruit is pinned down at knifepoint and raped repeatedly in her own barracks. Her attackers hid their faces but she identified them by their uniforms; they were her fellow soldiers. During a routine gynecological exam, a female soldier is attacked and raped by her military physician. Yet another young soldier, still adapting to life in a war zone, is raped by her commanding officer. Afraid for her standing in her unit, she feels she has nowhere to turn. These are true stories, and, sadly, not isolated incidents. Women serving in the U.S. military are more likely to be raped by a fellow soldier than killed by enemy fire in Iraq.” Los Angeles Times (3/31/08)

As Guantánamo Trials Near, Pentagon Limits What Can Be Reported “A defense lawyer lets slip at the war court convening here that a battlefield commander changed an Afghanistan firefight report in a way that seemed to help a U.S. government murder case. Reporters hear the field commander’s name but are forbidden to report it. In another case, a judge approves the release of a captive’s interrogation video showing the blurred face of an American agent. But a federal prosecutor on loan to the Pentagon withholds it ‘out of an abundance of caution.’ Even as the U.S. government edges toward full-blown, war-crimes trials by military commission here, with more hearings next week, all sides are grappling with what information can be made public and what must be kept secret.” McClatchy Newspapers (4/3/08) More. Evidence Doctored to Implicate Child Detainee: Lawyer The Toronto Star (3/14/08)

Was Colombia’s Attack on Ecuador Carried Out by U.S. Warplanes? “Military and diplomatic sources see a link between the Manta air base, operated by the United States in Ecuadorian territory, and this month’s bombing raid by Colombia on a FARC guerrilla camp in Ecuador. The U.S. air force was granted a 10-year concession in 1999 to use the base, located in the port city of Manta on Ecuador’s northern Pacific coast, in its counter-drug trafficking activities in the region. A high-level Ecuadorian military officer, who preferred to remain anonymous, told IPS that ‘a large proportion of senior officers’ in Ecuador share ‘the conviction that the United States was an accomplice in the attack’ launched Mar. 1 by the Colombian military on a FARC (Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia) camp in Ecuador, near the Colombian border.” Inter Press Service (3/26/08)

Balkans: ‘Serbs’ Organs Sold From Albania? “Serbia’s War Crimes Prosecution Office has formally opened an investigation into the case of hundreds of Serbs who disappeared in Kosovo in 1998-99. The investigations were ordered after excerpts from a book by former chief international war crimes tribunal prosecutor Carla Del Ponte were published in local media. Independent Beta news agency carried excerpts from Del Ponte’s book, ‘Hunt, Me and War Criminals’, in which she says that in the course of her investigations she learned that some 300 Serbs were abducted and killed for organ trafficking in 1999. The abductions were allegedly the work of Kosovo Albanians.” Inter Press Service (4/1/08)

Duke Power Protesters Arrested, Stunned With Tasers “Rutherford County, N.C. – Some environmental activists used the April 1 holiday to try to prove a point, and some of them were arrested and stunned with Taser guns in the process. Activists nationwide refer to April 1 as Fossil Fools Day, and they protested the use of fossil fuels in several locations across the country, including North Carolina. The protesters were in Rutherford County in North Carolina at the Duke Energy facility.” … “The Rutherford Sheriff’s Office said that the protesters were not Tasered. They said being Tasered means being shot with two electric prongs that are propelled from a Taser gun. Being stunned meant that deputies pulled the trigger and touched the person with the current emitted by the Taser.” WYFF4 NBC News (4/2/08)

Is Briana Waters a terrorist? “Earlier this month, on March 6, a federal jury in Tacoma, Wash., found (Briana) Waters guilty of two counts of arson for serving as a lookout at the University of Washington fire. According to two women who testified against her in return for dramatically reduced sentences, Waters hid in a shrub near the Center for Urban Horticulture with a walkie-talkie, ready to alert the others if the campus police strolled by. Waters testified she wasn’t even in Seattle that night. Although Waters was on trial for only the University of Washington arson, Assistant U.S. Attorney Andrew Friedman charged that she was part of a conspiracy – a member of a ‘prolific cell’ of the Earth Liberation Front, responsible for 17 fires set in four states over five years. Ten conspirators have pleaded guilty and been sentenced; four have fled the country; three are awaiting sentencing. Waters, the only one of the accused to have pleaded innocent and therefore the only one to have stood trial, now faces 20 years in prison. ... Prosecutors celebrated the guilty verdict against Waters as a signal victory in the campaign against ‘eco-terror,’ a mission that the U.S. Department of Justice has made the centerpiece of its domestic counterterrorism program. ‘This cell of eco-terrorists thought they had a ‘right’ to sit in judgment and destroy the hard work of dedicated researchers at the UW and elsewhere,’ U.S. Attorney Jeffrey Sullivan declared in announcing Waters’ conviction. ‘Today’s verdict shows that no one is above the law.’ Civil libertarians draw a different moral from the verdict. For them it is evidence of how the Justice Department has exaggerated the threat of eco-sabotage; they see Waters’ story as a disturbing example of the misuse of federal authority and the excessive reach of the American counterterrorism program in the wake of 9/11. As Lauren Regan, director of the Civil Liberties Defense Center in Eugene, Ore., remarks: ‘There’s a question of whether burning property is really the equivalent of flying a plane into a building and killing humans.’” Salon (3/27/08)

The FBI Has Some Explaining to Do About King’s Murder Past This is Hell guest Earl Ofari Hutchinson writes ‘Dangerous,’ ‘evil,’ ‘colossal fraud,’ were the choice terms that then FBI director J. Edgar Hoover and other top FBI officials routinely spit out about Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. They didn’t stop at name calling. They talked ominously of ‘neutralizing’ him as an effective leader. And even more ominously they sent him a letter flatly saying ‘King you are done.’ The FBI’s name calling, paranoid harassment and violent threats brutally and disgustingly captured the secret and patently illegal wiretapping of King. This is not smoking gun proof that the FBI had a hand in King’s murder. The tapes do raise the legitimate question: What did the FBI know and when did it know about possible attempts on King’s life? Americans certainly deserve to know the whole truth about the killing of King.” New American Media (4/2/08)

The Welfare King of the 21st Century Past This is Hell guest Dean Baker writes “If the welfare queen is dead, then it’s time to say, ‘Long live the welfare king.’ This person really exists, his name is James E. Cayne, and taxpayers just handed him almost $50 million. Mr. Cayne got this gift when J.P. Morgan renegotiated the terms of its takeover of Bear tearns. The buying price went up fivefold, fetching Bear Stearns’ stockholders $1.2 billion instead of the $236 million in the agreement brokered by the Fed last week. While Bear Stearns’ shareholders may still have been unhappy about their losses even at the higher price (the stock had been worth more than ten times as much a year earlier), in reality this was a very generous gift from US taxpayers. As an inducement to carry through the takeover, the Fed gave J.P. Morgan up to $30 billion in guarantees, in case the bank has to make good on Bear Stearns’ liabilities. In other words, J.P. Morgan is being given the opportunity to do some gambling, with the taxpayers committed to making good any losses. The money that J.P. Morgan paid for this privilege went to Bear Stearns’ shareholders, not the taxpayers. James E. Cayne did especially well as a result of the taxpayer’s generosity because as the former CEO of Bear Stearns, and current chairman, he owned a great deal of the company’s stock. To put the taxpayer’s gift to Mr. Cayne in some context, this is approximately equal to the amount paid in TANF to 10,000 working mothers over the course of a year.” Truthout (3/31/08)

John McCain’s Pastors “In another Fox News agenda-setting moment, the GOP’s propaganda wing has successfully shifted the election focus away from our endless wars and our imploding economy and environment, over to Barack Obama’s pastor. It started with Fox—playing what sometimes seemed like an endless loop of context-free snippets from some of the fieriest sermons ever uttered by the pastor at Obama’s Chicago church. In what is now a well worn pattern, GOP-talking-points-turned-Fox-News-stories quickly migrated to the Fox Lite networks and the nation’s leading newspapers. Lost amid the newfound obsession with Obama’s pastor and the black church in general was any mention of John McCain’s two lunatic preachers.” ArtVoice (3/31/08)

Fox on the Run “Fox hasn’t gone soft, but from watching its coverage lately, I get a sense that the haven for conservative hosts, and viewers alienated by liberal news, needs to figure out its next act. Fox News is not simply a mouthpiece for the Bush White House: it rose with Bush after 2000 and 9/11, was played on TVs in his White House and reflected the same surety and flag-lapel-pin confidence in its tone and star-spangled look. It was not just a hit; it was the network of the moment. Now, with two Democrats locked in what seems like a general-election campaign and lame-duck Bush fading from the headlines, it has to figure out how not to seem like yesterday’s news.” Time (3/27/08)

A Case of the Blues “Going into the 2008 elections, Cole faces a daunting list of challenges. To date, 29 of his party’s representatives in Congress have retired, an unusually large number, leaving open politically marginal seats that incumbents might have held but which will be more difficult for challengers to defend — Deborah Pryce’s seat in Columbus, Ohio; Mike Ferguson’s in central New Jersey; Heather Wilson’s around Albuquerque; Thomas M. Reynolds’s in Buffalo. Reynolds, Cole’s predecessor at the N.R.C.C., just narrowly held his seat in 2006. Rick Renzi, a Republican congressman from Arizona, was indicted last month on federal corruption charges, putting what was another safe Republican seat in play. These vacancies mean that in a year when, by historical standards, his party would be expected to win back seats, Cole will have to defend many more seats than he will be able to attack (only six Democratic incumbents have announced they are leaving office). His committee has approximately $5 million on hand, roughly one-eighth the amount of cash on hand as its Democratic counterpart, which at latest count had $38 million. Worse still, the National Republican Congressional Committee recently discovered, during an internal audit, accounting fraud so extensive that it had to call in the F.B.I., which is now investigating embezzlement by the committee’s former treasurer. Many conservative activists have become so dissatisfied with the party’s heresies, particularly on immigration and government spending, that as Cole’s staff took over, the committee’s fund-raising pleas were being ignored and, on at least one occasion, returned in an envelope stuffed with feces.” New York Times Magazine (3/30/08)

Could the Republicans Pick the Democratic Nominee? — The Untold Story of How the GOP Rigged Florida and Michigan “The irony is that the drumbeat for Clinton’s withdrawal — coming on the heels of her recent wins and right before what may be her biggest in Pennsylvania — is rooted in the collapse of the effort to redo Michigan and Florida. The theory is that she should quit because there is no way she can win, and that there is no way she can win because two states she could win, at least one of which she actually did win, will not be counted until she gets out. Barack Obama would thus become the nominee — not because of an honestly earned if precariously narrow lead in the final national vote, but because of two elections he would not let happen. If that sounds like a curious way to end a nominating contest that 30 million to 33 million voters will participate in before it’s done, even stranger is that the DNC is following only some of its rules — and that the real culprits who caused this debacle are Republicans, who are now relishing the catfight they provoked.” The Huffington Post (3/31/08)

At 85, Howard Zinn turns to comics Past This is Hell guest Howard Zinn goes graphic. “Boston University professor emeritus Howard Zinn has turned to a new platform to give his version of US history – the graphic novel, with ‘A People’s History of American Empire.’ Published Tuesday, the book hits several of his strong themes, such as the execution in Boston of 1920s radicals Sacco and Vanzetti.” Several panels from the comic are posted. Boston Globe (4/1/08)

Notes
If you knew… grew out of my efforts to provide content for This is Hell’s Headlines from Hell. It has always been my intent to eventually concentrate on just one site. That day has finally come. ‘If You Knew … ‘ will become the unique content for This is Hell! beginning Monday, April 14.

This Saturday, April 5th, 9 AM CMT, on WNUR 89.3 FM Evanston/Chicago, This is Hell broadcasts live for four hours or listen live online via WNUR’s web site.

This Saturday, our guests include:

• Haifa Zangana, author of “City Of Widows: An Iraqi Woman’s Account of War and Resistance” (Seven Stories). Haifa was a prisoner of Saddam Hussein’s regime. She is a weekly columnist at al-Quds newspaper and a commentator for The Guardian, Red Pepper and al-Ahram Weekly
• Jeff Faux, founder and former president of the Economic Policy Institute where he is currently a distinguished fellow. His most recent article was in The Nation, Is This The Big One? Jeff is also a contributing editor to American Prospect and on the editorial board of Dissent
• Howard Zinn, author of ‘A People’s History of American Empire’, was a late addition to the show

• Jeff Dorchen who will deliver a Moment of Truth from Chicago’s south side
• Danny Muller with his ‘Wasted Energy Report’ ...
• Dr. Krys Bigosinski MD live from Seattle

On Saturday, April 12th, This is Hell‘s guests will include:

• Loretta Napoleoni, author of “Rogue Economics” (Seven Stories) returns to This is Hell! In 2003 she wrote, “Terror, Inc.: Tracing the Money Behind Global Terrorism.” Loretta is one of the world’s leading experts on money laundering and terror financing.
• William Polk, a member of the Policy Planning Council responsible for North Africa, the Middle East and Central Asia from 1961 to 1965 and then professor of history at the University of Chicago where he founded the Middle Eastern Studies Center. His most recent book is “Violent Politics: A History of Insurgency, Terrorism & Guerrilla Warfare from the American Revolution to Iraq” (HarperCollins). He recently wrote, Iran: Danger and Opportunity at Juan Cole’s Informed Comment web site.