this diary is dedicated to all who suffer because of war and other disasters
cross-posted at DailyKos, Booman Tribune, European Tribune, and My Left Wing.
images and poem below the fold
The mother of a kidnapped eight-year-old Iraqi boy holds his photo as she weeps in her home in Baghdad December 7, 2005. Gunmen kidnapped Karam Salam Jerjis, the son of a guard at Saddam Husseins trial, in front of his house in Baghdad Wednesday morning, Iraqi police said. It was not immediately clear if the abduction was related to the trial, where the former Iraqi leader has been accused of committing crimes against humanity.
REUTERS/Thaier Al-Sudani
Kathleen Wei, Ed Loney, center and Matthew Loney, siblings of peace activist James Loney, who is being held hostage in Iraq, hold a news conference in Sault Ste. Marie, Ont., Wednesday, December 7, 2005.
(AP PHOTO/CP/Fred Chartrand)
Death in the Afternoon
by Ángel González
translated by David Ignatow
Of the hundreds of deaths that inhabit me,
this one today bleeds the least.
It’s the death that comes with the afternoons,
when the pale shadows grow longer,
and contours collapse
and the mountains show themselves.
Then someone passes hawking
his merchandise under my window,
where I lean out to see
those streetlamps that are still unlit.
Shadows cross the ashes of the streets
without leaving tracks, men that pass
who do not come to me and do not stay
with their lonely soul on their backs.
The daylight escapes toward the west.
The night air comes in before time,
and a bitter, confused fear, almost
pain, hardly hope, reaches me.
Everything that tied me to life
becomes untied, becomes distance,
goes farther off, disappears at last,
and I’m a dead man,
…and no one raises me.
– – –
read Ilona’s important diary at MLW – Returning Vet PTSD – One Soldier’s Story
view the pbs newshour silent honor roll (with thanks to jimstaro at booman.)
take a private moment to light one candle among many (with thanks to TXSharon)
support Veterans for Peace
support the Iraqi people
support the Campaign for Innocent Victims in Conflict (CIVIC)
support CARE
support the victims of torture
remember the fallen
support Tragedy Assistance Program for Survivors – TAPS
support Gold Star Families for Peace
support the fallen
support the troops
support Iraq Veterans Against the War
support Military families Speak Out
support the troops and the Iraqi people
read This is what John Kerry did today, the diary by lawnorder that prompted this series
read Riverbend’s Bagdhad Burning
read Dahr Jamail’s Iraq Dispatches
read Today in Iraq
witness every day
Note: I inadvertently made an error in not crediting Cheryl Bellus as the photographer in this diary originally posted on October 10.
Click on the candle to copy the image into your own comment (you can leave it on my server), and/or rate this one – not for mojo, but to leave a small mark after taking this moment.
” I know. But I do not approve. And I am not resigned.”
from Dirge Without Music
by Edna St. Vincent Millay
Light A Candle For
Peace, Tolerance, Understanding
and For Innocence Lost!
Witness Against Torture
a march to visit the prisoners of Guantanamo
Marchers to Reach Guantánamo Tomorrow
Friday, 7pm – After camping out last night, today the marchers continued their trek through the Santiago de Cuba Province — the second most populated province in the island of Cuba. Tonight they are staying in a hotel in Niceto Pérez. Tomorrow, International Human Rights Day, the marchers plan to arrive in the city of Guantánamo, about 12 miles from the detention centers.
Ruling On Torture – Leave It Again Too The Brits!
On This ‘Human Rights Day’ 2005 – Our Amnesiac Torture Debate
Human Rights Day (10 December 2005)
SOA – Watch
Center for American Progress – “Torture is not US.”
Peace
.
We Can Have Both
By Andrew Sullivan
The Sunday Times Nov. 13, 2005 — In a telegram on November 21, 1943, Winston Churchill defined a fundamental difference between the Anglo-American way of war and that of our enemies.
Churchill wrote:
“The power of the Executive to cast a man into prison without formulating any charge known to the law, and particularly to deny him the judgement of his peers, is in the highest degree odious and is the foundation of all totalitarian government whether Nazi or Communist.”
Perhaps Tony Blair and George W. Bush regard Winston Churchill as a bleeding heart lefty. But what Churchill’s view represents is an old, very basic principle of Anglo-American warfare and justice: fight war with ferocity, but never lose your democratic soul. Meet the enemy on the battlefield with force, but always treat prisoners humanely in captivity. This is never an easy balance, of course. In the numbing smog of conflict, we make mistakes.
Executives invariably over-reach in prosecuting wars, and have done so in both Britain and America in the past. But our system – of habeas corpus, executive powers subject to legislative and judicial checks, and free speech to air the issues – is specifically designed to correct such errors. That’s its beauty – and its strength in wartime. It gives us a flexibility in war that dictators lack.
Continued …
Winston Churchill – Statesman
LEAVE Iraq to the Iraqis
“Treason doth never prosper: what’s the reason?
For if it prosper, none dare call it treason.”
▼ ▼ ▼ MY DIARY
Concern grows for Iraq hostages
“Woe unto them that call evil good, and good evil; that put darkness for light, and light for darkness; that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!
–Isaiah 5:20.
I think it is time for a New Year’s revolution. That’s right….revolution not resolution. We need to take to the streets, in front of every major media outlet headquarters. Standing in front of the WH didn’t do it, camping in a ditch didn’t do it. How long will we wait to take our country back? Will it be too late then? This scares me deeply folks.